How Nikhil Kamath followed his passion of blogging by dropping out and learned from his life lessons.

“The best work that anybody ever writes is the work that is on the verge of embarrassing him, always.”― Arthur Miller

I; Nikhil Kamath, have always been the kind of a person who needs that extra push from someone to go ahead and do something. Basically, I have always underestimated myself and I still do. My journey as a writer started in a similar manner in 2011, while my cousin Abhijeet Kini and I were discussing food and he suggested that I should start a food blog. That’s how ‘The Salt and Pepper Food Guide’ came into being. Food is something I have always been passionate about and writing about food was really exciting because food blogging was still something that people didn’t understand properly at that time. But being in school, I wasn’t very regular with blogging and my blogging got a boost in 2014 when I joined one of India’s premier Hotel Management Institute. I was learning about various cuisines and the basics of modern cookery. But towards the end of first year, things didn’t seem to go in the right direction.

My blog was not working out well, I didn’t have a proper friend circle and everything was monotonous as hell. This was the time when I took the decision to drop out of Hotel Management to pursue B.Com with Chartered Accountancy. Back in school everyone used to look up to me thinking that I had everything figured out, but this decision that I took was something that proved that I obviously didn’t have everything figured out.

This was when I decided to give a shot to writing fiction instead of just sticking to food blogging, and I started writing what became my debut novel ‘It Was You…Always’. But before we get to my novel, let me tell you how I fell in love with writing fiction and little bit of poetry.

In 2016, I met a bunch of really talented individuals who were as passionate about writing as I was. This was also the first time when my blog was appreciated by outsiders. Getting honest reviews of my blog from a bunch of outsiders gave me the confidence to do much better with ‘The Salt and Pepper Food Guide’. Together we were 12 people and we would share whatever we wrote with each other. This was when I fell in love with writing poetry and fiction and I also started writing as a freelance writer on various online platforms to expand my scope of writing.

From 2016 to 2017 I wrote on regularly on my blog as well as various other websites and I also finished the first draft of my novel. In March 2017 I started another journey as a stand-up comedian, when my friend and I decided to do stand-up comedy under the name Cut Coffee Paste. Over the past 1 year, we have done 9 shows across Delhi NCR which includes “Comedy for a Cause” which is an initiative to make people aware of certain problems through comedy.

In 2017, I also started working with a couple of start-ups from Delhi-NCR and Mumbai along with food blogging. From handling branding, content and PR to handling customer relations and business development, I got an insight into how start-ups work. I launched my debut novel ‘It Was You…Always’ in January 2018. It is a unique love story of a Chef/Restaurateur and a Chartered Accountant. The story was inspired from what I saw around me during my time doing Hotel Management. Throughout the process of writing this book, my sister Neha Kamath and my cousin Abhijeet were constantly giving their valuable reviews which made the story what it is now.

Author, Public Speaker, Nikhil Kamath

The journey of not having things properly figured out to having a certain direction in life has been a tough one. One thing Nikhil Kamath learnt is that dropping out will always be an option, but you choose that option only if you can answer the “Why?” to it. Making decisions in a hurry won’t be of any help and just sitting and procrastinating won’t lead you anywhere. Stop waiting and wasting time for the moment your “defining moment”, because for most of us that moment has already happened or we are just too lazy to work towards it.

You need to overcome your fears and laziness, get out there and make things happen for you because you are you toughest competitor…always.

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