BE THE CHANGE THAT YOU WISH TO SEE IN THE WORLD” – Mahatma Gandhi
They say failure is a stepping stone to success. For me, it’s probably adversity. The more the odds that stack up against me, the stronger I get. That’s how I am built. Or maybe that’s how I have built myself.
Born and raised a Kashmiri Pandit in Srinagar, turmoil was the soil in which I was sown. The turmoil of the exodus of 1990 took its toll on my family and my childhood was ridden with mental, emotional and financial challenges.
At the age of 11, I was sent to a boarding school in Dalhousie and from there to Delhi for further studies. During my school years, I was given a pre-fabricated mould to fit in. There was a strict code of how to talk, what to wear, who to talk to etc. Let’s just say it was suffocating, to put it mildly. It led to my feeling more and more isolated and alone. And in this world where my desires and dreams had no place, I made a new friend, Myself.
A friend that gave me strength, a friend who understood me, a friend I could trust. A friend who always had my back. And slowly, together we started to take on the world, one step at a time.
With this newfound strength in me, I realised I could do things that most others my age were too scared to even think of. Soon and not surprisingly, I was called free-spirited, a vagabond and a rebel.
At a very young age, I started earning and tasted success .. the money I was earning was giving me more confidence to make independent choices and set a direction for life.
When the time came to choose a career I had to face stiff resistance to my choices once again .. acting or fashion both were not given any importance. It clearly was not what my folks had envisioned for my life.
But without any emotional or moral support, I chose to follow my heart. I knew the impact of this strong step. I knew I would be ostracised. But I never gave up on my dreams and I moved to Mumbai for my higher education.
{ Mumbai – fashion & work )
I enjoyed working & keeping myself busy doing different jobs in college… experimenting with events, modelling and styling… it was then that I discovered the explorer within me who said yes to every adventure and opportunity.
Everything I earned was channelled back into nurturing my dreams. Money gave me the freedom to do multiple courses to develop and hone my skills in my chosen field of acting, pranic healing and fashion designing.
My hard work reaped rich dividends and success came to me in a form of topping my college in marketing. This made me realise that hard work can never let u down. You can change and carve your destiny with strong will and actions.
After graduation, I worked as a freelancer for 3 yrs. Modelling and also having my own label called “Summer Snow’. Slowly I started professional styling for TV commercials and Ads’.
Since I wanted to pursue this art I enrolled in a prestigious Fashion institute, in the fashion capital of the world.. ‘Milan’. This journey alone and moving far away from the comfort zone of family, friends and stable career and connecting with students from different countries and cultures helped me evolve.
This chapter in life I call expansion. I could now choose the clothes that expressed my personality, and as I grew as an individual, I started expressing myself more coherently. There were good and bad lessons, challenges and achievements throughout this time too but by the time it was time to come back to India, I was much stronger, nourished and liberated.
{ Transition Acting }
Soon after I returned to India, destiny had more in store for me. With a never-ending thirst to grow, I set my mind to invest in myself as an actor to make my childhood dream come true. The acting was always my first love but I had to first prove myself and my family that I wasn’t seeking just glamour but had an inbuilt chip to perform and which was suppressed for the longest time waiting for their approval. Finally, due to persistence, hard work and a lot of patience, I landed a role as an actor in an independent movie.
But acting doesn’t pay your bills unless you are a big movie star. That’s when my learnings from Milan came in handy. My experience in managing my finances helped. I simultaneously worked as a fashion stylist and teacher to make sure I was independent and my expenses were taken care of.
My hard work paid off. My very first film ‘Stones & Wounds’ got me the Best Actress Award in an International Film Festival. I had proved to my family that I wasn’t making a mistake, just pursing my dream. This award gave me the strength to believe in my own potential. Yet I was still searching for something more. I wanted to be more than an actress. I wanted to contribute to humanity and serve in ways no one had thought of before and for that, I had to first become energy or force to make an impact as I knew I don’t have a father or a godfather to help me here.
{ Spiritual Awakening & Service }
That’s when my real journey began. I discovered the science of spirituality.
Spirituality taught me to fight a lot of childhood conditioning, to break through traumas and programmed patterns. I was then becoming a different person. I slowly saw myself bloom into a better version of who I had envisioned.
I dived into and studied the spiritual philosophies of Yoga, Pranic healing, Buddhism and various other esoteric sciences and soon started manifesting my vision.
Having gone through the hardships in my life my inner voice told me that I had to give back to society. My wish was to nurture and support children in choosing their own destiny and not accept what their ancestors or parents believed in. While growing up I had realised that a lot of fears of failures that were projected towards me were not even mine but they existed in the minds of other people and society.
This awareness leads me to actively create time in my day to help other people. Social work was now a big priority in my life. I started creating opportunities to do workshops for women empowerment, shared healing programs to raise consciousness and shift vibrations.
And before my family, the recognition for all my work came from the wife of the then Vice President of India, Amna, one of the most powerful and iconic social workers of her own time. I received an award for my contribution to social work and achieving constant success.
I was humbled. As I continued to bring trophies home I would say this rebel in me by now had become an alchemist who transformed and transmuted all the negativity into light and power to move in just one direction- forward.
Looking back – I would say it wasn’t easy. There were countless challenges and tests for this growth but persistence and patience always pays back. Today I have no regrets and no complaints about all the struggle I had to endure to become what I am today… that is ‘invincible’.
{ Women – Empowerment space }
If I could share anything with young women today or youth for that matter. Don’t let misfortune make you bitter because we grow through pain and challenges.
And I am writing this for women who are seeking support outside or in a man. You are your best teacher, healer and best friend. Educate yourself, train yourself, discipline yourself and invest in yourself.
These seeds of freedom, hope and courage need to be sown now as there are a lot of women scared of the so-called norms of society which will never let them sprout.
Women and young girls of this country need to be healed first of hereditary and ancestral pain and suppression. I strongly believe in equality of the genders and I often worry more for men as they don’t speak, they don’t cry, they don’t break things to vent, they just keep it all in. We all need to heal.
Nothing brings me more joy than seeing people transform their lives and move towards peace and purposeful lives
Present:
I am currently based in Mumbai expanding my life and career as an actress. My first film is releasing this month officially so I am excited to start this journey & My web series “Mastram” too is getting awesome feedback. I still work as a stylist to keep creative juices flowing at the same time investing a lot of energy in creating healing programs for future workshops. I am content in the “now” and looking forward to what the universe has in store for me.
Social Media Profile of Snower Sania Vasudev:
Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/snowwww_0000/
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/snower.sania
Pinterest:
https://in.pinterest.com/snowers/