The term ‘accidental writer’ is almost too literal in Jyotsna Gandhi’s case. A patient of rheumatoid arthritis, the author wrote You Step One, He Steps Thousands , her debut book, when she was bedridden.
“Five years back, just after my marriage, I fell seriously ill. It was a period of great internal struggle. I had so many fantasies and so many dreams but I could not move a limb. I went to all the top doctors but to no avail. Finally a doctor in Ram Manohar Lohia hospital counselled me and helped me out of my situation. He was my angel in disguise,” she says.
Having grown up in a spiritually inclined family, spiritual thought was ingrained into her as a child. But this experience reaffirmed her faith in what she calls the Supreme Being, as she committed herself to conveying this newfound bliss. “I never set out to be a writer, but when I started writing it just flowed.” The title reveals a lot about her journey. “It’s an inspirational title that points towards the supreme power that guides our life. It is not a concept. It is a reality that if you step towards Him, He’ll respond abundantly,” she asserts.
Brought out by Mahaveer Publishers, the motivational book talks about the need to reshuffle one’s life. “It highlights in a simple manner the point that the truth is simple; it is the human being who is becoming complicated every day. That is why we experience peace, but never in an everlasting way,” she says.
An interesting feature of the book is the thoughts that preface each chapter. These thoughts range from Kabir’s dohas to Jyotsna’s own musings, rendered in Hindi. “They were a last minute addition to the book. Since Hindi is our mother tongue, I deliberately put them in.”
Although Jyotsna delights in spiritualism, she is not exactly religious. “Spiritualism is the art of living. It teaches you your realities; you get to know the various layers of your life. Religion is a set of rules and regulations,” she says. Spiritualism and religion exist in a sequence, and she is in the middle somewhere, Jyotsna suggests.
The genre of spiritual writing is a bold choice for a first time writer. Jyotsna says she doesn’t have steep expectations of the book. “I just wanted to express the bliss I felt. I wrote it because I felt that no one should be deprived of the love of the almighty and to get rid of the misconception that he doesn’t exist.”
But her next book is going to be a novel. “I am very imaginative and can elaborate very well,” she justifies. “It will be a work of fiction with a spiritual base.”
From the book
“Spirituality gives us the right understanding of the disciplinary nature of religion which states that the right way to discipline life is to nourish it with inputs of love and virtues, so that it does not become a compulsion for one to follow it.”
“I thought that I understood the purpose of life and had taken birth only to acquire higher academic degrees and become a scholar. With this perception, I led my life and performed every action accordingly to fulfil this purpose. But when the Supreme Being mercifully changed my perception, I realised that attaining high qualification was just a part of my life…I still had to travel a long way.”
