CK Kumaravel

A movie that inspires you…
Gabriele Muccino’s The Pursuit of Happyness, in which one scene in particular stands out. This is when Will Smith casually tells his son that he will never be great at basketball because his father is below average. But when he realises that he has disappointed his son, he tells him: “Hey. Don’t ever let somebody tell you that you can’t do something. Not even me. Alright? You got a dream… You gotta protect it… If you want something, go get it. Period.”

...and a song?
The song Ovoru Pookalume from the Tamil film Autograph about resilience.

When anxiety sets in?
Play chess or snooker. Hanging out with friends makes me feel better too.

Lowest point in your life? How did you deal with it?
I was very dejected when my first venture in the late ’90s did not take off. There were numerous problems — legal hassles, banks freezing my accounts and a demotivated team. Even my well-wishers had started saying that I had failed. But I told myself that I did not fail, my efforts had. I had started listening to audiotapes with positive messages and one of my favourites was a story about two frogs. Both were trying to get out of a milk bottle. One frog gives up and drowns in the milk. The other keeps trying, the milk turns into butter in the churn and the frog jumps out of the bottle, finally!

An anecdote or lesson you’d like to share?
You should never take success or failure too seriously. You must learn to detach yourself from the problem, rather getting bogged down by it. Then you will be able to find a solution.