“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
I'll let you in on a secret: I often pretend I'm a Bollywood star.

You may see me walking down the halls of Aldrich to my next class. Little do you know that I'm actually strutting down a runway in a music video; wind in my hair and camera lights in my face. At meetings, my pen becomes a microphone, and I serenade my team, prepared for an encore. And in the gym, I sneak into an empty dance studio and burst into song and dance, my biggest fan being the wide-eyed, giggling girl on the other side of the mirror.

Life is all about how you choose to perceive it. Lounging at home on a summer afternoon, I turn to my father and ask: "What were you like when you were my age?" I expect him to tell me how responsible he was, moonlighting between his 30-hour residency shifts to send extra money back home to his family in Mumbai. Instead, he pulls out an old photograph of himself in a laser-blue swimsuit, flexing his biceps on a beach in Hawaii. "I was a muscle man," he chuckles.

I want to inspire people to boldly experience the world in their own unique ways. As a mother, I will cultivate little rock stars who will feel invincible in their own alter egos, be they mad scientists or head chefs. As a manager, I will empower my team members to explore and embrace their own creative genius. And, finally, I will reinvent the norms around my own Bollywood persona by doing the forbidden – I will actually kiss the hero, and I will do so passionately and for the world to see!

 

— Minal Mehta