BY ATIKA CHERRY
Get ready with the inspiration, empowerment, and motivation from the incredible story of Ritu Mehra—an open-minded, dependable, and positive person—who never gives up on being her true self!
She immigrated to Canada with her family at age five. Her family moved around quite a bit to adjust to the new culture.
Ritu is adventurous and a risk taker, never afraid of new challenges and changes in life, and loves to take on the possibility of new jobs and volunteer opportunities. Without any hesitation, she applied to a new university. She believes that trying something new always brings positivity into our lives.
“One of the greatest risks I have taken is to put my ideas and opinions out in a room of people with more experience than me and different opinions and values,” she reveals. “Building the confidence to do this has come over the years, and understanding how important it is for my voice to be heard even in a room full of people who disagree with me. Again, I can’t stress this enough, but take the chance, leap, and do things out of your comfort zone.”
Ritu remembers Ms. Bishop, her first-grade teacher and biggest inspiration, telling her she wanted to be a teacher like her one day! Meanwhile, her mother is her rock and the forever inspiration of her life!
Ritu thinks mentoring is essential to have any part of one’s life. Being the oldest of her siblings, she is alone in British Columbia, where she found mentorship from people around her to be independent. She believes positive role models are crucial for young individuals for guidance and inspiration.
“I am a dire-hard optimistic, believing that failure builds resilience. I also failed in some aspects of my life. But from those failures, I learned many valuable lessons that guided me to where I am now. I developed traits like perseverance, determination, and resilience—which gave me a new perspective on life.”
Like an empath, she always puts herself in the shoes of her mentee to understand their strengths and weaknesses. Mentoring is never a job; instead, she thinks it is all about creating a respectful connection with compassion and respect.
While growing up, she was mocked for being herself and doing things her way. As a kid, she felt pressure to follow the crowd only because everyone else was doing so. As she grew older, she started to understand her true passion and her voice to grow and finally become the person she is today!
According to Ritu’s viewpoint, courage, risk-taking, resilience, and managing ambiguity are the four crucial competency traits that help youth achieve a more prominent role in their lives. These strategies are keys to becoming a great leader in an organization. She also emphasized the importance of discovering the passion to help one become a great leader. To achieve the desired objective of being a leader, this is of utmost importance to lead with integrity, to have a positive attitude and open mind in whatever we do, and to be passionate about.
Ritu has a clear opinion about Social Networking, its advantages, disadvantages, and pitfalls. She believes that social media has pros and cons. There are lots of social media postings that can create false narratives for young individuals. But despite this, Social media is the platform that allows young people to develop and follow their dreams. At the same time, it helps to get a network of people who can help, support, and mentor them.
She advises young people: “Opportunities will always seem intimidating if you are outside your comfort zone. Things will always seem scary on the outside and intimidating. There will be many times in your life you will feel this way. No matter what you decide, you must do it with determination and courage. Yes, it’s scary. But it’s scarier to be copping out if you aren’t taking a chance to follow what you want to pursue. Take a deep breath, meditate, write in a journal, talk to a trusted person, and follow your passions and goals. You can’t go wrong by believing in yourself.”
In three words, Ritu describes herself as Open-minded, Dependable, and Positive.
