Dance is who I am!

Some of you may have seen my films but very few have come to my home in Kerala. So welcome to my world! Welcome to Natyashram.

It's a space where we've created a completely different world that revolves around dance and creating a passion for excellence.

Natyashram began as a barren expanse but my Mom planted 2000 trees over the years. Now it's lush and green. Living in this very quiet, secluded place, we have a quiet and minimalistic lifestyle.

And we share this sacred space with our three dogs, three cats, lots of snakes, insects and butterflies!

Everything here is farm-fresh. We grow our own spices, fruits, vegetables and coconuts.
So since I was a kid, I've lived a very healthy lifestyle and am a bit of a health freak.
If I want to have lunch I cut my own vegetables and prepare it!

I like experimenting with food. I don't have any recipes, I've had big flops...I once mixed bindi and dal!
But I'm very particular about what I eat. I try to use a lot of tofu, fish, very little oil, less cheese and butter but make it tasty and spicy. I love spicy!

One of my favourite past times when I'm in Kerala is is taking the kayak out. We live by such a beautiful lake, so after a long day of dance it's so much fun to go kayaking or swimming.

When I was very small, I almost drowned in this lake! Then my father taught me to swim. Now I swim in the mornings with my dogs!
We look out at this beautiful lake every time we dance. It's such a central part of our lives.

We've had so many great moments here...like when it's very hot after rehearsals we just dive into it! This is so different from the life people think I lead as a film actor!

A typical day at Natyashram starts at the studio with practice, yoga and Kalaripayuttu. This is where we work our entire lives, where we sweat it out and this is the heart of my existence in Kerala.

And the person at the centre of it is my Mother Daksha Seth, who has taught me everything I know and is the person closest to me in the whole wide world.

We have a very unconventional relationship. Mama's not only my Guru who has taught me everything I know about dance but she's my best friend.
We live together, travel together we work together, we create together. We are more like sisters.

Our dance troupe is small and close knit. Lead Dancer Rajesh Raveendran, has been with us for 10 years, and we've been dancing together since we were both very, very young.
Ramesh Ram is the technical guy of our group and has been with us for five years.

Ratheesh Kumar has also been with us for five years and does all the production and backstage stuff. Babu Sukumaran is our chief rope rigger.
The guy's fearless and goes anywhere! He's been with us for four years.

What I enjoy most about our kind of work, is we take traditional Indian artforms like Kathak, Chau, Kalaripayuttu, and other dances from the country, study them, and transform them to a completely different level.

My mother has been doing Kathak for about 40 years, Kalaripayuttu since 1984, Chau for 15 years.
So the interesting bit is to take something that's pure and transform it into something which is uniquely hers!

Surprisingly, I started dance rather late at 13! Considering everybody in my family and all my mother's friends were artistes and musicians.
But once I decided, I gave up school, I taught myself, I cut out, didn't have much of a social life growing up.

But that discipline has transcended into everything I do now. When I first started doing aerial work, I used to be so scared of heights! Even now I'm not all that comfortable with heights.

But I enjoy doing everything, I enjoy challenges, I enjoy anything that pushes me and forces me to take my work and my mother's work to the next level.

Films wasn't something I planned or had foreseen. It happened entirely by accident. In fact, I signed Mr Subhash Ghai's Kisna upstairs, in Kerala, in my old house!

Till then my life was all about dance. I used to start rehearsal at 7.00-7.30 am. We would break for lunch. Get back, then break for chai. Sometimes we would be in the studio till 8.00-8.30 pm.

My life in Bombay, is obviously very different. Life in films is more glamourous. But when I'm back at Natyashram it's like nothing has changed.

What does dance mean to me? I've never known how to answer questions like that. For me it's just become a way of life. It's who I am.

Sometimes I feel that I live two realities: One is my life in films, in Bombay, and one is this life. And I enjoy both immensely! And I get the most out of each.
I think I enjoy every opportunity given to me in life. I make the most of it.

When Kisna happened, it was the first time I came in contact with the media, people, parties, the lifestyle in Bombay, the traffic, the noise, everything good and bad about Bombay.
It was such a culture shock! Honestly, I wasn't prepared for it.

Dance is a very different lifestyle. It is early morning, early to bed, no partying, specially our kind of dance requires a lot of discipline.

In films there is a lot of discipline and hard work but obviously the timings are different. We shoot nights, often the whole night and those are the worst for me as I can't sleep in the day.
Naturally my body clock is such that I get up by 6.30-7.00.

Both require a lot of work, just different kinds of work. One is like you get all dressed up and go out looking beautiful! The other, you are in your old phata phatichar pants and top and you are working and sweating it out. But I enjoy them both.

Shooting for films is very different from dancing on stage. When you dance on stage, there is only one gig. You have to get it right. You practice for months to get a five minute sequence together.

In films, for a five-minute session, we spend five days shooting! And we shoot it in small, small bits so it requires a lot more patience.

Even the styles are very different. Our dance is very martial, you have to really hold your body tight. Films is much more free flowing, enjoying and expressing with your eyes.

I enjoy this parallel world. It's also a very interesting time to be in the Indian Film Industry.
There are a lot of new directors, new ideas, new scripts and even the big banners are doing very interesting stories which before would not have been taken.

I think life is a learning process – be it acting, be it dance, be it as a person, be it life experiences. You learn, you get better, you learn from your mistakes. I think as an actress, dancer as a person hopefully I'm growing.

My first day on set was terrifying! I must have gone to the bathroom a hundred million times! It was the same with my first show.
Two three nights before, my heart would go dhak..dhak..dhak..dhak! And I would get these beautiful butterflies in my stomach!

Even now, every time before I go on stage, or when I'm driving to a shoot, I just want to re-collect and gather all my energy and expel it all on the shoot.

I don't have a technique. The only technique is learning. Every day I learn and with every year hopefully, I get better. I see my films, I see what I've done wrong. I see good films to see what I could do better.
The minute I stop being a student, I think that's the end of it.

My family is my strongest and best critic. My father in particular. And his critique has always pushed me further. My mom and my brother too and I'm quite self-critical!

When you come to work, be it dance or acting, you have to drop yourself.
Either you are a dancer or this 'character' who reacts in certain ways, thinks in certain ways, behaves in ways you'd probably not like but that's the job.

That's what you are meant to do. That's what I enjoy, I like being another person once in a while. Good fun!

I don't know what the future holds but that's what is exciting. I'm finding out and figuring out...let's see what happens! Life's an open book...