“I Find Writing Extremely Therapeutic”: Says Rachana Gupta, Featured Author Of The Month, May 2017

From writing notes to be read by family members, Rachana Gupta is today a confident writer ready with her first book on relationships and happiness. A Featured Women’s Web author in 2017, she tells us her story.

With over 1600 women (and men) sharing candid stories, views and experiences here, our editors are picking some of the best contributors each month, as Featured Author of the month. Here we talk to Rachana Gupta, one of our 3 featured authors for May 2017.

Rachana describes herself as the ‘sunshine’ in the life of her family, and indeed, this sunny, optimistic, and humorous temperament is often what comes through in her work. It’s not easy to write slice-of-life essays without becoming banal, and Rachana manages to do that very well by infusing humour and bringing in a light-hearted feel to her writing. Not that she cannot take on serious themes, mind you! Yet, she often chooses to focus on the beauty of everyday life and on the silver lining in the darkest of moments. You can read more of Rachana’s writing here.

I write primarily to express my thoughts, feelings and simply to get more clarity of what’s going on in my mind. Personally, I find writing extremely therapeutic and I am always in a ‘happy-flow’ whenever I am writing about people, places, issues and ideas that matter to me.

When and how did you first begin writing?

I officially started blogging around June’16. Until then, I would write and publish notes that would be mainly circulated amongst family and friends. People enjoyed what I wrote and complimented my style of writing. While this was very encouraging, my husband, Vishal Gupta, was instrumental in enabling me to pursue my love and passion for writing. He would read every article of mine with utmost sincerity and was also my toughest critic. While this would irk me initially, today I can’t thank him enough for pushing me hard to not settle for anything mediocre and to grow out of my comfort zone. Women’s Web is one of the first platforms that empowered me to write freely and gave wings to my passion for writing and thank you for this opportunity.

Do you have a muse?

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Yes, I do. My muse is an extremely confident, happy and a free-spirited woman who loves laughter and humor. She loves being herself and does not want to mask her identity for anything in the world. She blends her fierce independence with a great deal of sensitivity and takes pride in being authentic.

Where do you get your ideas from? 

I love to write about the parenting journey, my personal account of a Mum’s life, daily huddles and some very interesting conversations with my 11 year old son, observations of people and relationships, our travel diaries and places that have moved me beyond words, and any incident that makes me restless and triggers my curious mind to think and write about it. A lot of my ideas have also come from my daily morning ritual of tea-time tales with my beloved husband.

When it comes to writing on/for/about women, what questions and issues drive you the most?

I am very passionate and highly inclined towards women-centric issues – be it gender diversity at workplace, women communities being the enabler to help women grow and thrive, women finding their passion and pursuing their dream, women safety issues, the increasing demand on mothers (especially mothers of boys) to raise responsible boys, child bullying, women maintaining key friendships and finding their support groups and celebrating the importance of our women domestic help that empower us to have a well-managed life and family.

Anything you’d like to tell others who would want to write?

Yes, I would like to urge anyone who has a flair for writing to simply start writing and get into the flow of expressing yourself. It’s a great energy booster and please write without any pre-conceived expectations about the outcome of your writing. Within three months of blogging and writing articles for various platforms, I tumbled upon the opportunity to write my first book. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine doing it, but as they say ‘never say never’.

With the support of my mentor and my husband, I took on this challenge and have successfully completed writing my first book. I don’t know how well it will be received or what kind of commercial success it will achieve, but it’s a great feeling of accomplishment to have completed writing my first book and getting the task under control And today, I am glad to share that my first book that is centered on relationships and happiness is ready to be published soon.

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