As a child, I had no idea that I would end up in the film industry. My ambitions changed from wanting to join the army like my grandfather to taking up merchant navy as a career to running for India, and finally, investment banking while I was a student of economics honour. But during my college days, I began to get offers for modelling.
These days I travel so much it's hard to get into a routine. When I'm on the road, I tend to use hotel gyms. When I'm home in L.A., I like to hike and hit the surf. All in all, I try to keep a balanced diet and exercise routine, which has stood me in good stead to date.
When I joined the industry there were mafia like Haji Mastan and Vardharajan. They had a healthy relationship with film stars. Their men never came calling for 'petis' and 'khokas.' In fact they used to felicitate film personalities.
You can be the most beautiful person on Earth, and if you don't have a fitness or diet routine, you won't be beautiful.
People wrote me off when I joined the industry, my looks were criticised, my acting was slammed, my films didn't do well. These things changed only slowly, and after a struggle.
Nothing's changed from when I'm seven years old to now. Nothing's changed at all. I like the same stuff that I did - Kiss, Van Halen, 'Happy Days,' 'Laverne & Shirley,' 'The Brady Bunch,' monsters and all that stuff.
My Instagram took on a life of its own and became very different from my Twitter. I never used Instagram to post. I'm into fitness, I used it to follow a few people in the fitness world to see exercise ideas and or nutrition ideas. All of a sudden I felt like I was a part of that community.
I follow a strict routine and healthy diet to stay fit.
I wasn't sure if I would survive in the film industry in the beginning. So, I gave myself six months to see if things fall in place, and luckily, soon after I moved to Mumbai, I began getting modelling and acting offers.
I came from modelling industry so I am part of fashion industry. It is not that I hated being part of glamorous film.
I thought that losing weight by following a strict diet will make me more flexible and feel more confident about my body. I have become so used to the routine now and have fallen in love with my body that I would want to follow it forever.
There used to be a huge snobbism between the film industry and the television industry. I produced and acted in my first - well way back - but the first thing that I produced and acted in was Sarah, Plan and Tall. And the only place to go at the time for really quality television was Hallmark Hall of Fame. And think how much television has changed since then.
In 2012, I got my first Gujarati film. After that, a lot of things changed for me and for the Gujarati film industry. I did my early films by taking leave from my engineering job.
The meteoric rise of the 'wellness' industry online has launched an entire industry of fitness celebrities on social media. Millions of followers embrace their regimens for diet and exercise, but increasingly, the drive for 'wellness' and 'clean eating' has become stealthy cover for more dieting and deprivation.
I work out five days a week with my personal trainer, who comes home and gets me cracking on my fitness routine.
In the early days of my modelling career, I think the industry was uncomfortable with how strikingly different I was.