Scholar-Journalist of the Week: Master the art of self-love 

Tav Prasad Kaur is currently pursuing her MBA from  Apeejay Institute of Management and Engineering, Technical Campus (AIMETC), Jalandhar. Her hobbies include listening to soothing soulful music and watching South India movies. In addition, the Apeejay student is an avid writer who started her writing journey from childhood. When Tav was 5-year-old she had written her first poem, and the journey continued. In this scholar-journalist of the week interview, the 22-year-old budding writer shares about her writing inspiration and more:

What inspires you to write?

Writing for me is therapy. Whenever I feel a little low, all I need to do is pour it all out on a piece of paper. It really lightens my heart. Not just that, whenever I see things happening around me a lot of thoughts start bubbling up within my mind, and I just can’t stop myself from writing about that.

What was the inspiration behind writing this article on self-love?

The basic idea behind this article is ‘Self Healing’ by means of ‘Self Love’. There are many people including myself, we all want others to make us feel good in our lowest times and stand by us. But these expectations are taking lives now. Teenagers these days are getting stuck into this vicious circle and when they don’t receive the love and care they want, it impacts them, sometimes to an extent that they end their lives. In fact, when my very dear friend committed suicide in 2018, it shook me to the core. That’s when I wrote this article.

Why do you think self-love is important? Do you think it may have a negative impact on oneself?

One thing I firmly believe in is, no one can harm you till you allow them to. Don’t we all stand for those we love and ensure no one causes any harm to them as they are precious for us? So why not stand for yourself? 

This concept is sometimes misunderstood with accepting everything about oneself, and not even working on ourselves when it is genuinely needed. But that isn’t the real idea of self-love; accepting our flaws and working on them at our own pace is what it’s actually about.

Four ways to master the art of self-love

• Never get offended by what others think of you.
• Spend some time alone everyday, sit with yourself.
• When you feel something isn’t going well, just be patient, write about it on a paper, that’s one of the best ways to calm your soul.
• When you are healing, take your time. Hurrying can actually do a lot worse than good, so heal completely and then come back stronger.

Coming back to the writing journey, share some writing tips:

I am in the process of learning at the moment. But something I always say is, if you love reading, read good books and if you love listening, listen to TED talks. These will help you with building your vocabulary and you’ll get numerous ideas to write on.

Do you wish to become a writer in the future?

I’ve always dreamt of it, but there is a long way to go, let’s see where the universe wants me to reach.