7 Jul 2024 – Morning Pages

Wrote this on the 6th Jul. Publishing it now.

Its 6 AM. I have about 30 minutes before I leave for a meeting. And here are the things that I want to write / talk about.

1/ Last few days have not been the best for my head. Money, health, relationships. Let’s just say a lot is on my mind. No, I dont need help, yet. If I do, I shall take proactive measures. I think if I fix my food, a large part of my issues would be fixed. 

1.1/ On the food, I think I will try to eat mindfully from today on. This is my perpetual struggle. I dont know why I want to eat it all. I was talking to someone about it and I realised that my insecurity from the times I have been jobless are so deep-seated in my subconscious that I want to eat it all.

2/ I missed the walk yesterday despite publicly committing to it. I could’ve but I dont know what came over me and I did not. I had the time. I had the inclination. I even made a public commitment. 

3/ 5 days without coffee. If I can manage today, it would be the 6th day. Lets see how it goes. 

4/ I am carrying only the iPad and a book as I step out today. So that’s cool. Let’s see how it goes. I am increasingly trying to go without a laptop. An iPad is a poor compromise for not having a laptop – it’s like a phone and very ineffective. But I am willing to experiment. 

5/ I can feel my age now. I can’t stay alert post 9 PM. I find it tough to wake up. I am not alert at times. Yesterday I noticed in at least 3 calls that I was unable to talk well. 

6/ Track of the day is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pHFJELNKZk. I really want to discover new music. 

7/ I’ve been trying to write a letter to a friend for more than a week now and I can’t seem to find inspiration. I plan to work on it today before my 915 meeting. 

8/ I want to get back to a standing desk routine. I have discovered that I can use a makeshift setup at home and use it. I am writing the second part of this letter from this jugaad standing desk. And I can see myself doing more of this.

9/ 730. I am now at a Starbucks. The chairs here are sucky. I think I will walk a kilometer to go to a Starbucks that has better chairs. I can’t sit here for 3 hours as I wait for a friend to arrive. The only good part is that am not carrying my laptop. So that. 

10/ 7:48. I am at the other, smaller Starbucks where the chairs are nice. 

11/ I had a chat with my folks while I was on the way here. It sucks that they continue to ask me tough questions about money even at this age. I don’t know when would I reach a point where money would stop being a bother. I know I am not prudent with money and I must be. And I will find a way to do so. But at this time, today, my folks are not happy about my money situation and it sucks. 

12/ I think that I am unable to make people around me understand how I operate and how I think. I mean I don’t know how to explain to my friends why do I want to organise even lunches with friends on a Saturday. And then at the same time, I take off for 4 days without explanation to people that I hardly know. I am unable to talk about how I am probably not suited for fancy places and I find myself at home at mid places. This concept of mid-places is also a tad unclear to explain. In my head, I know what a mid-place is. If you are reading this, you know me and you don’t know what a middle place for me is, well 😀 

13/ At #CSS04, one of the attendees told me that I need to stop with the self-deprecating humour. Yesterday I was talking to a young coder and she told me the same. Two very different people who’ve met me in very different contexts have told me the same thing. And I don’t think the two of them even talk to each other. 

Of course, I know that I revel in playing down myself but I didn’t know that it was not serving me. Now I know. I will thus make a conscious effort toward it. I am not sure if there’s a specific way to do this. But I will. May be next time you see me play down, please point it out to me and I will correct myself. 

These playing down things could be one or more of these – “I may not know it all”, “I could be wrong”, “i don’t have a lot” etc etc. 

14/ Do you think getting the subscription to YT Premium worth it? I think it’s 200 bucks a month and I lot more than that right now (I can think of three – 650 for Google One, 650 odd for Netflix, 650 for Apple Storage – and I am sure there are more). 

15/ This working on iPad is not cool. I am unable to get in the flow. Even though there are no distractions (multi-tasking sucks on iPad), I can’t think straight. May be this needs getting used to? I don’t know. I will give this a few more days before I quit. Let’s see. 

All things above this, I wrote on 6 Jul. Now, we are at 7 Jul. Here’s the notes in continuation. 

16/ I slept for 8 hours yesterday. But my recovery is still 50%. I need to journal more religiously to understand why it’s that bad. One large component would be food. That I am fixing from today on. 

I slept 8 hours on the 6th night as well but the recovery is still less than 50%. I think its the diet that I need to now work on. Let’s see.

17/ Deleting all the food ordering apps from my phone. Let’s see how we survive.

18/ I am writing this from a Blue Tokai (and not a Starbucks). BT opens at 7, SBux at 8. This one hour is important.

The only problem is that at BT, the charging ports are less (and my laptop needs to be charged (old you see)), the wifi is poor (and the mobile network is also not the best). So it is not the most optimal place to work out from. Let’s see.

I wish there was a 24/7 cafe around my house. I would have loved to work from there. I can go to the airport but it’s too far from where I live. May be on some days I will go there and work the entire day.

Let’s see what I end up doing.


So, that’s about it for the day (and yesterday).

Over and out.

Untitled – 1 Feb 2024

Random musings from a bored mind at 8 in the morning.

So, I woke up early and I had a bit before I had to leave (Starbucks opens at 8). So I thought I would write (cos I want to get back to writing and anyway journaling things is a good idea). And here we are. Talking about things at the top of my head.

These are in no order.

1/ Everest
I realised today that my Everest shot is less than 18 months to go. And I am not really in the pink of my health. And the way things are, I will miss it. It has been my biggest goal, dream, public claim, etc etc since I can remember (I cant remember too much to be honest) but this has been a big one on my list (other two are a billion dollars in cash and an impact on a billion lives).

2/ AK
AK’s shareholder letter for Jan 2024. Read here. I have so many thoughts – public and private. One public thought is that I am so much very proud of this woman! I wish I was her when I was 22. At 22, I was getting fired from a job (I can see now that I was wrong), on my way to get in to MDI (thank God, I did) and I was in general a clueless person (am still as clueless but I know more things than I did back then). Life has a way to sober you up.

Also, a note to self to write a letter. Maybe on weekend.

3/ Blue Tokai vs Starbucks
I hang out a lot at Jamjar Diner at Versova. Right next to it is Blue Tokai. And I have come to build a theory about the kind of people that hang out of a Blue Tokai. Lemme don my planner hat and sit on my privileged ass at a Starbucks (am writing this part from a Starbucks) and write about it.

Lemme give context. All three places – Jamjar, Blue Tokai and Starbucks tend to not ask you to leave if you are respectful to their staff and other guests, you don’t occupy too much space and you understand that it’s a restaurant / coffee shop and not a park. In terms of perception, Jamjar feels the most expensive, followed by Starbucks and lastly, Blue Tokai.

I’ve seen similar kinds of people hang out at Starbucks and Blue Tokai – the ones wanting to make films – writers, directors, producers, crew members and more. At Blue Tokai, I spot more actors than I do at Starbucks. But you get the drift.

So, for some reason, the people who hang out at Blue Tokai tend to be more dreamy than the ones at Starbucks. And I don’t blame them. I think everyone wants to find their ilk and I’ve seen conversations at Blue Tokai to be more earthy, more grounded and more dreamy at the same time. At Starbucks, these chats are a lot more in the air. Plus, I’ve realised that people at Blue Tokai tend to thrive in their “struggle”. You know, they assume that a movie is being made on their lives and when they are big, the audience would applaud the effort they made to reach where they are.

While this may not be an emotion that they are aware of, each time you speak to them or overhear conversations, you realise that they are looking for an end goal to be famous. And they are unable to see that this day-to-day life of freedom, control, chase, grind is what success is supposed to be! You may not have fancy cars or gorgeous bags or a million followers but you have your freedom and your dreams and no one can ever touch those, leave alone taking away from you. And that is something that most people tend to miss and that is what causes misery. And that misery is what they want to be captured when the film on their life is made.

So that!

This cartoon explains this the best…

4/ SG’s Clicks
I clicked some REALLY kickass photos at the beach yesterday. Here. No, I cant figure out a way to embed Insta on WordPress. It sucks to be old.

And staying on old age, see this vid and see the raspiness in his voice. The good part, he’s still got the rizz but you can spot that he’s not really, well, young. Sigh!

5/ Modern Day Gurukula
While walking on the beach yesterday, I told AK and C that at DD, they need to cut the umbilical cord to C4E for their own good. And then I gave them a few reasons why. And then I explained them that they need to discover their life themselves and not live a reflection of mine. And then I told them about how I’ve learnt from Raj, Suvi, Rajesh Sir and others and I have picked the best things they did and made them into mine. And while I did this esoteric chat, an epiphany happened.

And that is that I would REALLY love to replicate some sort of a Gurukula where we have sharp young folks interacting with people who have been around. And these exchanges help both the sets of people. May be Base would be that? May be not.

Let’s see.

Bas itna hi for the day. Work beckons. Hopefully, more tom!