17.05.12

S tuffing my face with a chocolate truffle is perhaps not appropriate while reading Yaana Gupta's debut book “How To Love Your Body And Get The Body You Love”. At any turn of the page, I expect to run into the usual chastisement on consuming rich food. But I'm surprised that the book, despite the hourglass frame of its writer, insists on eating what you desire when you're hungry and spurns restrictive diets.

Model, actor and now author, Yaana struggled with eating disorder for 17 years before balancing out her life and diet. My conversation with the Czech-born beauty touches on her years of binge eating, overcoming it, how the writing process provided her emotional release and the importance of nourishing and loving one's body. Excerpts from the interview.

Why did you decide to write a book? How long did it take?

I wanted to be a writer from the time I was 20. I was writing poems and essays. I realised that every time I shared fitness tips with someone, I would sound excited. This is an exciting topic for me because I have been into nutrition and fitness for a long time. It took me over four years to complete this book. I rewrote it three to four times because while writing I realised there is so much more I understood now that I had to incorporate in the book.

Source: The Hindu