Quotes from Shweta Bachchan Nanda

I was a stay-at-home mom, with an important job to raise the kids. I filled it into the occupation slot on innumerable immigration cards, looking at the officer with defiant pride. What was I then, now that actively raising my children was no longer my vocation?

The modern brain is clogged with information, a huge percentage of which is non-essential to effective daily functioning.

Distilled down, it is pretty simple, the only way to overcome shyness is to allow yourself to be vulnerable and nothing made me as vulnerable as unconditional love.

I remember reaching college and having to introduce myself at every class, it was terrifying. I waited fists clenched as one by one my classmates said their names out loud and when it was my turn I simpered and squeezed out a barely audible introduction, my face burned as if it was on fire.

Men in their 40's grow a beard and presto! They've achieved Silver Fox status. Meanwhile, I am sitting in front of a mirror using a mascara wand and eye shadow palette to painstakingly colour in my greying roots, because this 40 year old got a little too comfortable in her skin and didn't go for a touch up in time.

If there are two things you must be by the time you hit your 40s - be kind and be educated. If you don't have time for both - be kind!

I don't get the romance of airports. Families crying while waving off a member destined for far -off shores to make a livelihood. The euphoric reuniting of couples as they run into each others arms at arrivals, while I am forced to watch on a reluctant interloper.

Parents of adolescents often complain that they cancel all plans to spend time with their kids, who end up giving them a few distracted minutes before they rush off to meet their friends. My advice to you? Don't cancel your plans. Your time should be respected as well as theirs.

Not just for tissue-holding folks, the empty nest syndrome is so pervasive, it can take over the most headstrong of parents.

Welcome to your reality check - social media is not your friend, your friends are your 'friends'; invest in them, trust me.

Try scrolling through a regular teenager's Facebook or Instagram posts, everything is captioned with borrowed words or lyrics from songs, without any filters whatsoever and many times without quotation marks, because we all know what the millenials have done with punctuation.

The more you expect out of a person, place or party, the higher your chances of disappointment.

Having teens of my own, who let me just add, I am not trying to impress. I come into contact with a lot of them from time to time, if I am lucky! Just listening to them is like mainlining adrenaline.

Young people are intimidating. But I really want them to like me. There is something about a group of teens that turns me into a performing monkey.

The physiological signs, of getting on in age, are enervatingly apparent. What creeps up on you insidiously are the changes of temperament.

Of all the art forms that my family dabbles in, writing suits my temperament the most.

I like getting under the skin of the protagonists of every book I read, it makes the whole story so much more personal.

I'm your regular Gen-Xer - married at 22, had my first child at 23 and my second at 26.

I used to think I saw life in blacks or whites, turns out I was more grey. It is extremely liberating to care for people even if they are flawed, you needn't eschew the whole person for a few not so shiny, sparkly parts.

Airports! The neon floodlit, recycled air filled, melodramatic hell of them. The purposeful mass migration of anxiety-ridden humans as they frantically navigate through beeping buggies and mechanised walkways to make it to their gate in time is the stuff of dystopian nightmares.

Of all the relationships in my life, the one with my brother is most cherished. He was my first friend, partner in crime, shoulder to cry on and always the wind beneath my wings.

We are drama junkies, living half lives on social media, where we grandstand in a way only cowards do, anonymity gives us wings and if we are not trolling someone or being trolled by someone, the day just isn't a productive one.

Gone are the days when imitation equalled flattery. What happens today, is essentially an entire generation looking outward - not for inspiration, but appropriation - because quite frankly, they're lost and their role models are increasingly questionable.

We get our facts from Wiki-something or the other, which at the best of times, is generalised information gathered and submitted by anyone who wishes to!