Neha's Notebook

Zest. Gusto. How rarely one hears these words used. How rarely do we see people living, or for that matter, creating by them. Yet if I were asked about the most important items in a writer’s make-up, the things that shape his material and rush him along the road to where he wants to go, I could only warn him to look at his zest, see to his gusto. If you are writing without zest, without gusto, without love, without fun, you are only half a writer. For the first thing a writer should be is - excited. He should be a thing of fevers and enthusiasms. • Life is short, misery sure, mortality certain. But on the way in your work, why not carry those two inflated pig bladders labeled zest and gusto.

when you drink the well water in the summer it seems cool and when you drink the same water in the winter it seems warm. Even though it’s the same water, at the same 18 degrees according to the thermometer, the way it seems depends on whether it’s summer or winter. At present, the world seems complicated and mysterious to you, but if you change, the world will appear more simple. The issue is not about how the world is, but about how you are.