‘FOR ME, TAKING THERAPY WAS A BIG STEP TOWARDS ACKNOWLEDGING MY ISSUES’

Shruti Haasan says you need to be true to yourself in order to stay positive

Actor Shruti Haasan is still finding ways to love herself, and she says taking therapy helped her get a grip on the realities, and dealing with them. Over the years, Haasan has used social media to stress on the importance of loving oneself, especially amid the ongoing pandemic crisis. And she admits that she is still a work in progress.

“Getting comfortable and embracing my real self has been a process for me. Actually, it is funny because when I think back to my childhood, or if everybody thinks back to their childhood, we all had our insecurities,” shares the 35-year-old, adding, “We all had our little bag of worries. But there was also clarity about who we were, what we liked and what we didn’t. I think that slowly erodes over time,” says the daughter of actor-politician Kamal Haasan.

According to her, it also fades a little from other people’s opinion and one’s inability to differentiate between what we need and what we don’t. “A lot of us go through that. I really salute the spirit of those who have been unwavering through that,” she asserts.

Going into a confession mode, the actor reveals, “For me, it has been a process about conversing with myself. There have been times when I’ve not had important conversations with myself. I avoided things or went down a road I’ve not liked, mentally. For me, the big step was taking therapy, acknowledging and working through (my issues) with compassion.”

Even in this journey of selfdiscovery, there are many obstacles. “We tend to put this huge pressure on ourselves, like ‘I should be okay. I have addressed it now, and it should be fine in the next 15 seconds’. These timelines don’t work with us,” she says, adding, “That’s why I talk about loving yourself. Forget other people being kind to you or understanding you. And that’s something I am enjoying doing with myself.”