The home is where the heart is, and Ashwath Sezhian’s heart has always been in the pursuit of writing. Sezhian is a doctor about to start his training in the UK, but whenever he finds a moment to breathe – he seeks the comfort of writing and lets his creative juices flow.
He has authored two books – “An Affliction of Orchids” and “When Varun Met Meera”. The latter became a bestseller on Amazon within forty eight hours.
We are very delighted that Sezhian gave us some of his time, and sat down with us to have a little chat.
Ashwath, going to med school and training to be a doctor, both are things that require a lot of time and effort. How and when do you find the time to write?
Both are time consuming, yes, but they are very fulfilling as well. Studying to become a doctor and then training for the profession itself requires you to give all of yourself to it.
But I still find the time to write. I am able to do so because writing is a part of me. Some people unwind by watching TV, by playing a game of chess, whereas I relax by sitting down to write. I’m not putting down writing sessions on my planner, it just comes from within and flows on to paper.
Spoken like a true artist! Speaking of artists, many artists have had to face struggles and hurdles that come between the artist and their art. Have you faced such problems too?
Hmm, if you are speaking in terms of Van Gogh being bullied and harassed for making art, then definitely no. But yes I have had my fair share of oddballs. I wouldn’t call them problems, per se, I see them as things that demotivate me.
Like, I write short stories on Instagram, and when I started, I would feel so annoyed if a post didn’t do well with likes and comments. I’d think of giving up on that platform. But with time I realized that the value of my writing doesn’t lie in likes and comments. I stopped caring about those trivial things, and today I still happily write my short stories on Instagram.
Today you’re writing short stories on Instagram. Could you tell us about tomorrow, as well? I mean do you have some plans for the future?
I’ll keep my cards up my sleeve for the moment. All I’ll say is, nothing really concrete right now, but I do have some ideas for a third book. But before jumping into anything I’ll need to get into further training and choose a specialty.
Let us know when you want to pull out those cards from your sleeve! So, do you have some word of advice for the younger generation?
I don’t think I’m qualified enough to be giving advice to anyone, I’m humbled that you think so. However, I do have an example, an example of what not to do. The example is me when I was in the earlier stages of my writing.
I didn’t read enough at the time, and that was very foolish of me. I mean if everybody is busy writing, and nobody’s reading, then there won’t be anything to talk about, everybody will be in their world. So, don’t ever give up on reading, you can’t write a story without reading lots of stories first.
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