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A small step ahead is all it takes...

How I started my travel and life inspiration venture - The Purple Backpack.

Roota Choksi 1 Stories

Tuesday August 09, 2016 , 5 min Read

Lost in the view en route to Santorini , Greece.

For long , I had wanted to write. I kept doubting myself whether I had something important to say? What will people think of me? Who would read what I wrote anyways? What if they read it , and make fun of me? What if people read and like it but then , I can’t write anymore? All these questions were hounding me , till I stumbled upon the most important question - What if I don’t write? What if my words do not get a chance to inspire people and probably help out in their darker times? What if 10 years down the line , I regret not having started sooner?

What if I always keep what I want to say deep in my heart and burst from within? Okay , that’s it. But you got the point. I could have not acted upon that calling , but I did , in a small way though. I started a sucky blogspot page and wrote an article on it about ‘rains’ - my favorite ever topic. I don’t think anyone read it. Then , I wrote a silly poem about love or something. Maybe few people read it. Then , I lost steam and came about doing other non-important things. Time went by and I remembered that I loved writing , even if hardly anyone read it. I loved expressing myself and I always had this innate desire to inspire people and help them get off their bum and do something meaningful with their lives. I decided to start ’The Purple Backpack’ blog and decided to go big this time. Bought a domain (Although it was www.roota.in since I was feeling egoistic and I had not decided upon The Purple Backpack yet) , Purchased hosting , learned Wordpress via other blogs , sifted through loads of Wordpress themes and plugins and finally had my website going. It was pretty , so pretty and purple. Ok , not being mushy , but I was proud of myself , and excited to launch and write and share with the world finally what I thought.

I started writing about my travels then , I was writing while backpacking around Europe and it was the best of times. The day was meant for adventures and the night was meant for pouring those adventures out on paper. Thanks to you , my readers , I got a humongous response and people whom I had not talked to in years , messaged me saying that they were really inspired by what I was doing and to keep doing it and spreading joy. What was I doing? I was just doing what my heart asked me to do. I wanted to spread joy and inspiration - inspiration to go out of that comfort zone and do what your heart says , to go travel to far off lands and gather some stories to tell your friends , to pursue that hobby that you merely think about , to watch a little less TV and watch more documentaries to learn what history wants to teach you , to help people and make them smile , to invest in memories rather than materialistic stuff , and to be a better version of you everyday , not a better version of someone else , because that’s not how that comparison needs to work , just you! So yes, this is what I intend to do now. Spread joy and inspiration.

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Read : The Purple Backpack : Thailand Unplugged!

’The Purple Backpack’ blog is not a huge or a popular blog , it has 300-400 users visiting per month as of July 2016 with the highest being 2058 users in the month of April , because of this popular article. So , yes from a crappy blogspot page that none read to reaching even this amount of users , is a huge achievement. Yes, I believe in taking happiness in small wins. Keeps me motivated! I plan on working this to make it bigger and reach among wider audience. Yes , I have wonderful plans for ’The Purple Backpack’ with lots more wanderlust , amazing faraway lands , life inspiration and motivation to keep you going , interviews from highly successful people , e-books , cool travel stuff on the site and tie-ups with awesome brands to aid in your travels. I just cannot wait for the magic to unfold. Meanwhile , you can do something too , to help share wanderlust and inspiration , you can share the Facebook and Instagram page with your friends and tell them all sorts of lovely things about me , errr , the TPB blog. That would make me the happiest and more inspired to keep writing.