Yes, I gloat.

Yes, I gloat.

“Appa,” my daughter said the other evening, “you make every conversation about yourself.”
I looked up from my book, surprised. “What do you mean?”
“You boast too much,” she said, half teasing, half serious. “Every time someone visits, you somehow turn the talk toward your books or your writing. You can’t help it.”
The day before, a distant relative had dropped by to invite us to his daughter’s wedding.
Somewhere between the tea and the sweets, I’d asked him, “Have you read my books?”
My daughter caught my eye and gave me the look — that mix of affection and exasperation only grown-up children have perfected.
I laughed it off then, but her words stayed with me.
I confess — I boast.
Not quietly, but with the occasional chest-thump of a senior man reminding the world (and himself) that he still exists.
When someone asks, “What do you do?” I say, “I’m a writer.”
It sounds intentional.
It wasn’t.
I never planned to write books. I was a businessman — firmly rooted in the material world.
I never dreamt of being a writer — it looks like the universe dreamt of making me one.
I never boasted about being a businessman when I was one.
Ever since I was a teenager, I read voraciously.
I devoured more paperbacks than textbooks — stories, travelogues, biographies, philosophy — anything I could get my hands on.
Books were my sanctuaries. I admired writers, but I never imagined I would become one.
Then came Kailash — the trek that rearranged me.
Despite the exhaustion, altitude, and awe, something slipped its fingers into my brain and began to type.
I didn’t decide to write; writing decided to use me.
Inner Trek: A Reluctant Pilgrim in the Himalayas was born.
It even went on to win a couple of indie awards in the U.S. — recognition I mention far too often, still half in disbelief.
Perhaps it was the universe nodding back.
Next came Myopia — a memoir of love and loss, my second book.
It is yet to make any semblance of a dent.
Yet I boast, even as I live quietly.
I read, I write, and I practice mind-watching — observing the mind perform its acrobatics without joining in.
Small talk feels heavy; silence feels like home.
And yet, despite all that meditating and contemplating, sometimes my ego sneaks in — especially when I meet people.
I clear my throat and say, “I’m a writer.”
Then, upon reflection, I smile — like a mischievous child caught boasting at a family dinner.
Because the truth is simple: I didn’t create this path.
I was carried onto it.
So now, when I say it with a grin — yes, I boast.
But it comes more from internalised gratitude than from any need for validation. So maybe what my daughter calls boasting is really my way of saying — I’m still astonished to be here, doing what I never thought I’d do.  

And I’m sure you’ve heard of my book Inner Trek😉.

 #WritingLife #SelfReflection #Gratitude #Purpose #AuthenticLeadership