Tag: Akanksha Pandey

Wk 27-25 – Weekly Notes

Notes and thoughts from Week 27 of 2025.

Morning!
Of afternoon. Or evening. Or whatever time you read this at.

This week and the next week’s edition will be not as detailed as I would like them to be. I am on the road and may not be able to carve time to reflect on how I spent time. But an edition nonetheless. You know, progress > perfection. So, yay!

So, the H2 of 2025 is here.

This has been one of the most “interesting” years.

Interesting from multiple lenses.
Exciting.
Challenging.
Full of changes.
One of the rare years when I didnt do my regular yearly plans.
But then I went with the flow and learnt a lot.
I even saw a large change in my personality and decision making (you know, from people person to ideas person). I am sure there is more.

While I want to write about this year, today is not the time and here is not the place. Right now I want to publish this weekly note.

Oh, I am listening to this as I write. By Twin Strings and Raghav Chaitanya.

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Ok, lets go!

💭 Highlights, reflections and notes from the past week

PS: As always, these are not in any order.

1/ Mann Ko Bhaya to Accha, Na Bhaya to Aur Bhi Achcha
I saw this first as a status message of Hareesh Sir. And then I read more about it and reaslised that this is by Harivansh Rai Bachchan. Salute to both the men.

Over time I have started to try and internalise this. And I think I am successful to some extent. And it has been one of the most liberating ways to live life. I no longer think about the good or the bad. I think of things without attaching any emotion. Guruji from Vipassana would be proud.

Of course I am yet to build that in to daily practise but I try on a day to day basis. And I am lot more about not attaching the emotion and outcome.

PS: Lol, Mr Garg. See point #9.

Oh, if Marcus was the kinds to write Hindi poetry, he would’ve probably written this.

Any how.

The point is, mann ko bhaya to accha, na bhaya to aur bhi achcha.

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2/ From Chaand Taare to Kutumb
If you’d had met me a few years ago and asked me what my trip in life was, I would have said…

Saari daulat saari taaqat
Saari duniya par hukumat

If you live under the rock, this is from this song.
And if you dont know, in one of the shots in this track, SRK is actually passing by what would eventually become Mannat.

But lately, my want of taaqat and hukumat has changed to…

Sai itna dijiye, jaame kutumb samaay,
main bhookha naa rahoon, sadhu na bhookha jaaye

This is by Kabir.
And this has been the cornerstone of my life and decision making in a while.

This implies that rather than having all of it, I want enough to take care of myself and my village. This also indirectly implies that I will reduce my wants (not needs) and I will try and help my people to do more.

Oh, and this epiphany happened when I was meeting AP. More on our interaction in a bit (point #8). But this is what defines me now.

Make of it what you will.

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3/ Its expensive to be poor
I read this somewhere once that its expensive to be poor and I have now seen this in action. If you are rich, you can “buy” time and use that to do whatever.

Here’s an example – say you have to travel between Mumbai and Delhi. The poor (aka middle class) will probably take the train and invest 15-18 hours for this. If you are better off, say me, you would take a 2-hour flight. You may spend another couple of hours to reach the airport and check-in and all that.

Just because you can afford the flight, you saved 13 hours.

Now, thats where the imagination of most people will end.

Indulge me a bit more.

Imagine you were uber-rich. I am talking SRK level rich. You could take a private plane and save another two hours.

And then if you are even more rich, say Ambani rich, you can question the very reason of travel and call whoever you want to, to, to your place and save all the time.

Now, extrapolate that for everything. Food you eat, healthcare you have access to, people you meet, education you get, opportunties that come to you, access to private deals and everything else.

Get the drift?

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4/ Posture
I’ve realised that I need to fix my posture.

I have this lingering pain in my back all the time. I think I can blame it on sitting hunched over my laptop for like 42 years. I really want to fix this.

So, from today on, I will ensure that my back is ALWAYS stuck to a support structure. Or it is straight. As I write this, my lower back hurts and I have some giving me a backrub!

And as I edit this, my back is hurting but I am resting it against a backrest at a cafe that is blasting AC air on my face at 18 degrees. Wow!

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5/ WSOP
WSOP is on as we speak.

I REALLY want to get the ME Bracelet some day. And I know that I dont have a lot of time left. A, age. And B, AI. I mean its probably a matter of time (unless already) before AI-enabled and coached people come in and with superhuman intelligence start to whoop asses of poker players.

In fact, it would be interesting to see KidPoker take on some AI bots. Has this been tried? Adding to my #todo

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6/ Aadmi Ka Zeher by Srilal Shukla.
It’s after a while that I’ve read a whodunnit.

And I enjoyed it. Buy here.

Looking forward to a Jeffery Archer that I took from Ankit last week.

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7/ How to write your autobiography
As part of learning more about active seniors (for Meru), I’ve been running tiny experiements.

This week I started with a small one – to help active seniors write their autobiographies.

Now, this is tough.

For a simple reason – I have not lived the experiences they have. Plus I know that I am not the most effective communicator. And I know that I have not helped other write an autobiography. Yes I have ghostwritten a few. Yes I’ve written a lot of books. But I have never “taught” anyone to write an autobiography.

So, lets see how that adds up.

But then, this a also new thing that am trying and I am very very excited about it! I’ve had one session so far. Let’s see how the next one goes.

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8/ Akanksha Pandey (AP)
I know of AP for a while now.

I first met her to see if we can work together. At the time we couldnt make it work. But she is one of the smartest young people I know. And I had to stay in touch. And we did.

So, I met her in the last week. And I realised that AP’s great IRL as well! Here are some notes from our meeting…

  1. I asked her to look at “couples” like [Bonnie + Clyde], [Shilpa Shetty +Raj Kundra], [Donna + Harvey] and others. The point? Large things get built when you are with someone for long and have shared madness for things.
  2. The Godfather and his principles of living life – loyalty, frienship, winning people.
  3. 1000 True Fans by Kevin Kelly
  4. Sex and the Cash Theory by Hugh
  5. Kunal Shah’s Forbes interview

I know these links without nuance and context wont be of much use to people reading this but I wanted to share here. And I am sure there’s a lot more but these are what I recall from the top of my head (and from my notes). Maybe some day I will edit this and add more.

But meeting AP has to be one of the highlight of the week so far.

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9/ Respect
This week, two of my fav kids crossed lines.

In two independent places.
At two different times.
Now this is a tough one to write and I will not.
But I want to catalog it here. More on my echochamber.
Also see point #1.

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10/ Deepak Ravindran (DR)
Lemme start with a disclaimer. I dont know DR personally.

However, he’s recently started a new startup (Kirana Pro) and it’s been all over the news. But this post is not about that. This is about how he’s running his personal brand. You just can NOT miss it. The corner of the internet I spend time at, I get to see and hear a lot about him. A lot means, A LOT.

And naturally, like most people I am enamored by and want to get to know, I followed him across socials. And then I reached his WA group where he and his buddies chat with each other.

And, O.M.G.!

The group opened up another dimension in the brain. A lot of chatter there is techbros nerding over the new things. I am unable to understand a lot of things there but the rare things I can fathom, I love it. Each post there is a lesson (to a point that a lot of saves in the photos from this week are from his group). Each chatter there is about building (some are delusional as well, but well…).

Ok, the point is, I need to surround myself with more people like that.

Bas itna hi.

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📷 Some Photos from the week gone by

Here are some photos from week 27.

The one I want to post on this blog is…

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Made me think hard.
To a point that my head hurt.
Or may it did cos I was on a long flight. Lol.

I dont know what my myth is. But I know what my myth is not. And that’s a good place to start. I need to now work towards finding it.

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🈺 The LARGE objective from the week gone by?

Book 2
No action.
I am thinking, should I drop this?

What do you think?
PLEASE let me know.

PS: Dropped 2025 Plan a few weeks ago.

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☑️ What did I get done last week?

This is a one-line report on things I got done on various things that are important to me. I will only talk about things that I got done. Shipped. Not WIP.

I may not have a lot to add this week (and the next) but here is a report nonetheless.

At this point, the following things are important to me and these are IN ORDER.

  1. Health
  2. Meru
  3. C4E
  4. Brand SG
  5. People (Family, Friends, Strangers, etc)
  6. Book2
  7. Shauk (Music, Films, Poker etc)

Health. No action. 0.

Meru. Same as last week. Tried to move the needle. But not as much as I would have wanted to. So, a 0.

C4E. No action. 0.
Next week on, I will remove this from this tracker.

Brand SG. No action. 0.

People. No action on this either. I’d say 0.

Book 2. Lol! -1

Shauk. Nothing. So, a 0.

So the overall score is -1 for this week, like it has been for the last 2 weeks.

Trends from the previous weeks: -1, -1, 3, 0, -4, 0, -4, -5, -5, -3, -2, -1
The max I can get is 7 in a week. Let’s see when I get to it.

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📊 The tracker from the last week

This is the tracker for the last week.

All the amber is becuase I am on the road.

The week was better in terms of steps, sleep, food and recovery. But was terrible in terms of mood. Hope the coming week is better.

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📖 Interesting Reads from the last week

No large inputs here. I did read a few things but I dont have the time to update those. I will get back to this section once am back on ground.

In the meantime, the best place to get these updates is via my TIL WA group. It is inspired by Sunanda’s fabulous book, TIL, and on this WhatsApp group, I aim to post VERY VERY VERY frequently. Like MULTIPLE times a day. About things personal (rants, overshares, thoughts etc), what I read, what I want to think about, what I need help on etc. Join here.

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🧠 Reminders from last week

This section captures things that I want to not forget. I will copy paste these week on week and track updates. I will also add these to SG’s Office.

I will skip this section this and the next week. I will get back to this in the week of 14th July.

From previous weeks, here are things that I want to remember. And no, this may not be a comprehensive list. In categories…

  1. Long term
    • Professional pool / snooker / poker. No action.
  2. Health
    • Kitchen setup (incomplete)
    • Gym membership (incomplete)
  3. C4E things (Will stop tracking these)
    • C4E Base
    • Design
    • Borderless agency
    • Adding films
  4. Shauk / Personal
    • Use of money to buy time – doing this already.
    • Better dressed – lol
    • Find love – lol!
    • Demand more from life
    • Speak better!
  5. Money (adding this on Jun 29)
    • Passive income

In case you know me, lemme know if I have missed something.

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🥡 So, one thing that defines the past week?

Uncool.

That’s the world I would use for the last week.
Wont talk too much here but it was not the coolest week. The good thing is that this happened after a long long time!

Oh and in the previous weeks, the one-word reviews have been… Disappeared, Experience, Grind, Busy for Nothing, Regular, Getting back to action, Slack, Busyness, Action, Survive, Looking Up, Survival, Taste, Community, Respect, Money, People.

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Phew!
Lemme know what you think.
See you around.

Oh, and this too shall pass!

PS: This series of posts is inspired by Thej and his weekly notes. The previous editions are here: 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09 (missed), 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 (missed), 16, 17 (missed), 18, 19, 20, 21, 22 (missed), 23, 24 (missed), 25, 26

PPS: Please do point typos.
Grammarly is not working well and I don’t have energy to cut paste edit this in some other spell check thing.

PPPS: In case you see me being inconsistent in anything – work, writing, reviews etc, PLEASE do point out.

Wk 14-25 – Weekly Notes

Notes, thoughts and reflections from the week gone by.

Morning!
Started writing this on Saturday (April 5) and

This was probably the fastest week of 2025.
And I am glad that it’s over.
Here’s my review for the week gone by.
Oh, I am listening to this as I write this.

🈺 The LARGE objective from the week gone by? And the next week!

I was to work on the 2025 plan and Book 2.

This has been consistent objective for the last few weeks. However, I have not been able to make any progress on these.

I can blame it on a lot of action at work. Actually, more than action, right now, its discussions and deliberations. I am hoping that once we have a team, I would have lot more time on hands. But as someone who takes pride in my ability to juggle things and do multiple things, this should have been easy for me. I need to find a way to solve this conundrum.

Anyhow, to summarise, I didnt make any progress on either of the goals. I need to buck up. I need to push myself more.

And like last time, I acknowledge that I didn’t work on these two.
I will try this week.

Moving on…

☑️ What did I get done this week?

I will give a one-line report on things I got done on various things that are important to me. I will only talk about things that I got done. Shipped. Not WIP.

At this point, the following things are important to me (I know too many but…) and these are IN ORDER.

  1. Health
  2. Meru
  3. C4E
  4. Brand SG
  5. People (Family, Friends, Strangers, etc)
  6. Book2
  7. Shauk (Music, Films, Poker etc)

Health. It was a terrible week. Sunday was the worst. I dont know what came over me. But I am back. Other days saw me with lack of sleep, eating kachra, no walks (except one day) and even happiness was questionable.
So, -1 there.

Meru. A lot of action here. Nothing specific in terms of what I can talk here.
So, a 0.

C4E. No action TBH. C is running the kitchen now. I am merely supporting. I have nothing to report here.
So, a 0.

Brand SG. No large actions. I did use AI to build some posts (will link further in the post) but nothing apart from that. This needs to more VERY VERY fast. So, I will be harsh on myself and give myself a -1.
So, a -1.

People. This was a clear -1. I did a few things that I shouldnt have. I mean I wont do them differently but I didnt know that it would have such large impact on people I care for. Apart from that I met some really interesting people that I look up to. So, if not for the snafu, I would have been a +1 on this.
So, a -1

Book 2. No action.
-1

Shauk. No large action. I am gonna travel to meet M. Maybe that counts? Maybe it doesnt. When I am evaluating myself, I want to give myself a harsh -1.
-1

So the overall score is -5 for this week. Same as last week.
Trends from the previous weeks: -5, -3, -2, -1
The max I can get is 7 in a week. Let’s see when I get to it.

📊 The tracker from the last week

Here’s the tracker.

What do you notice?

For me, the highlights are…

  1. I’ve stopped tracking my twitter updates. I think I can skip tracking this. I am habituated to write these. Lets see.
  2. A couple of days were not as good as I would want them to be.

What do you see?

📷 Some Photos from the week gone by

Here are some photos from the week gone by.

Not too many. Blame it on a busy week.

📖 Interesting Reads from the last week

I didnt have a lot of time to read or reflect in the last week but here are some that I did read…

  1. Naval’s podcast with Chris Williamson. I am at an hour and 30 mark. Took many many lessons. Saved some here.
  2. Akanksha Pandey’s March Reflections.
  3. This twitter thread explaining Kun Faya Kun
  4. How I’ve run major projects by Ben Kuhn. Here. At some point, I must write something similar. From Ben’s website, I spotted this post about how to write cold emails by Sriram K.
  5. This tweet by Erik
  6. This post by Morgan. A couple of quotes worth keeping are “The person who is desperate for attention and acceptance from a group of strangers is hardly different from the person begging for money on the street” and “The wild thing about all this effort is how easy it is to overestimate how much other people are thinking about you. No one is thinking about you as much as you are. They are too busy thinking about themselves.”

Next week on, I will also share a list of things that I share in my groups. I may not read all of those but I am sure it would be useful.

💭 Highlights, reflections and notes from the week.

Here are some from this week.

A/ Ankesh Kothari
Met Ankesh and as always, it was incredible to meet him. Among other things, he asked C and I this – “If you had to have dinner with any 3 people from history, who would they be? The answer shows who your heroes are. Then deconstruct what about them resonates, and you will have more clarity on your self.”

My dinner guests would include Steve, Charlie and Charles. Each is different from another – one was an individual poet, other was an investor and the third was an org builder. I should think more on this.

Who would be your three dinner guests?

B/ Rana Sir
Met Rana Sir for something. Went to his home. I almost didnt go but C reminded me that I need to. And thus, I went. As always, it was a brilliant three hours that I spent with him.

One of the things that came out of that meeting was my articulation that if I get physical proximity to young people, I can literally change their lives. Assuming they are willing to submit to me and they are willing to work hard. And then the follow up thought (that I didnt articulate to sir when I met him but was important) – that may be I am destined to be a coach and not a player. I am gonna be at best a Drona (not Eklavya, not Arjuna), a Ramakant (not a Sachin), a Coach Carter et al.

Something to think on. #currentThings

C/ Starbucks induced serendipity
I was at a random Starbucks far from home and I bumped into a classmate from MDI. And I used the opportunity to tell him about Meru. And about C4E. I dont know what would come out of that but it was incredible to have that farce-less chat with someone who knows me since 2004!

D/ Akanksha Pandey’s March Reflections.
One of the best pieces I’ve read in a long time. You must read it. I took a lot of notes. I learnt a lot about myself. I learnt a lot about AP. And thanks to this post, I have started to make public posts about what am thinking about. You may search for those here.

From her note, here’s a quote…

Fear, self doubt, self sabotage, procrastination, addiction, distraction, perfectionism… all can be overcome with stupidity, stubbornness, delusion, blind faith, obsession, arrogance & optimism.

PS: For the context, I had interviewed her for a role with me and she rejected me. Which is ok. But I’ve stayed connected and boy, am I glad! I knew that she would have pushed me to do more if I could get her around. But then as long as I am learning from her even from a distance, I am ok.

E/ Experiments with AI
I’ve been playing with some tools. Wrote two posts. Both via AI. I dont know what traffic would they get me. But it’s amazing that I can churn more content, faster. And I dont see a dip in quality!

I am also pushing C4E and Meru teams to become faster and better with the use of AI. We’ve made some strides. Commendable is AK and team’s foray on Labs with CQ. And then some more.

The ambition is that we would all be AI-enabled Centaurs (in words of Mihir) in the times to come and faster and sooner we get to that, better it is!

F/ Naval’s podcast with Chris
I have a 100 notes on this. I will make a separate post on it. At this time, I am saving my notes here. While I’ve captured this above, this needed a section in itself!

G/ Things I stand for.
Made a thread. I will update it as and when things change at my end.

To be read alongside Work With Me. And also see this photo album where I upload things that are important to me.

H/ People Snafu
I said something about someone that I know I shouldnt have. I cant get into details but I must write.

So, when I said what I said, I assumed what I said was innocuous, harmless, action-induing (I love to err on the side of action). That’s how I talk to people.

However, things were taken out of context, things were assumed without asking for clarification and then I was spoken in a not so cool tone.

I understand why I was spoken to the way I was spoken to. My actions hurt the other person. But then it was unintended. It was supposed to be a nudge in action and all that.

Anyhow. I am rambling. At this time, I know I didnt make a mistake. But I know my actions caused hurt. So, I am unequivocally sorry. I will try to do better.

I/ A-List Assholes
First. What is an A-List Asshole?
Someone who thinks they are A-list talent and are Assholes on top. They may or may not know that they are assholes!

Think of the most obnoxious, rude, unkind, tantrumy sports superstar or filmstar. And then port that person to the world of startups. Think of the rockstar coder that you know who’s also a bully. Steve Jobs would probably qualify to be an A-List asshole.

So, I was to interview someone for a client. And the guy turned out to be an A-List Asshole. I couldnt interview him (we couldnt agree on a calendar) but from the conversation, it seemed that the guy was heavily inspired by Silicon Valley types and was misplaced. Or may be I am misplaced. Irrespective. It was not going to work out. And thus I quickly retreated.

That’s a thing that I need to work on by the way. Stay away from A-list assholes. While it was ok for Steve to be one, in this day and age, I dont want those.

J/ Online selling Gurus
Met someone who told me about the work of these online gurus. You know people like Sadhguru, Robin Sharma, Brian Tracy, Tony Robbins, Dandapani, Dave Ramsey, Russell Brunson, Harv Eker, Chris Chroft and others.

For all the interest I have in cults, it was incredible to learn that cults and these sales conversations tend to be the same!

More on these some other day. But it was important to write and track.

K/ Venture Studios
I need to push C4E into becoming a venture studio. I’ve been reading about the likes of Tiny, Recurse, Late Checkout, Bending Spoon etc. Some of these may not be venture studios in the traditional sense but I like the idea of a small team building many things together.

Again, with Meru on the horizon, I may not get to do this with my time but I can nudge my kids!

Oh, here’s a thing. Most of my ideas are old ideas that I’ve been on since I was a child! I need to find a way to ship more and do more. I mean this venture studio idea, I’ve been on it since the beginning of time!

L/ 12K Steps #in2025
Made a bet of 50K with Annkur that at the end of this year, I will have averaged 12K steps. I made a similar bet with Subhendu. Let’s see.

This also reminds me that I will not have climbed the Mt Everest by Jan 1, 2026. Sigh.

M/ Other things that I want to capture but I may not spill too many words on…

  1. Found money on the road, two times, on one single walk. And I was listening to Naval’s podcast while I found that. Maybe that’s a sign!
  2. While listening to Naval, I was left thinking, should I get into podcasting fulltime?
  3. Implemented Paras Chopra’s TDL at C4E. See this tweet. Been 5 days and so far my score is 0. Lol!
  4. Met some clients for C4E for quick meetings. Not to pitch anything. Not to sell anything. Only to say hi. It’s incredible how many people have supported me on my journey! Eternally grateful.
  5. My back has started to give me trouble. I need to find a chiropractor or a masseuse. I dont want to go to a doctor. The skin thing is also spreading. So that needs fixing.
  6. Met Paras and asked him a few questions about this business. Must push him more.
  7. The number of times I wore pants and traveled this week to Nariman Point – I am reminded why I didn’t do the “regular life” all this while. Once we get an office, this will hopefully get fixed!
  8. Been thinking about US tariffs. Saw some videos. Read some but I am not able to wrap my head about how it would impact and what would the second order effects be. If you are aware, please share and help!

🧠 Reminders from last week

I am adding this section. To capture things that I want to not forget. I will copy paste these week on week and track updates. I will also add these to SG’s Office.

Here are things from the past weeks that I want to remember. And no, this may not be a comprehensive list. In categories.

  1. Health
    • Kitchen setup (incomplete)
    • Gym membership (incomplete)
  2. C4E things
    • C4E Base
    • Design
    • Borderless agency
  3. Shauk / Personal
    • Poker
    • Better dressed SG
    • Use of money / time
    • Love
    • Demand more from life

In case you know me, lemme know if I have missed something.

🥡 So, one thing that defines the past week?

Busyness. For nothing. Going forward, I will change this.

In the previous weeks, it’s been Action, Survive, Looking Up, Survival, Taste, Community, Respect, Money, People.

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Ok!
This is it for the week gone by.
Late by a day but here nonetheless.
Lemme know what you think.
See you around.

Oh, and this too shall pass 🙂

PS: This series of posts is inspired by Thej and his weekly notes. The previous editions are here: 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09 (missed), 10, 11, 12, 13