Nov 23-24, 2025
Various times, various places.
I had a busy week. Not busy but hectic. I was about town and had some work. Here’s notes and thoughts from the week gone by.
PS: I was half in the mind to not do this (because I am already on Monday night) but then I thought, jaisa bhi hai, karte hai.
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💭 Highlights, reflections, updates and notes from the past two weeks
And no, these are not in any order.
1/ Year Compass
It’s that time of the year where I will take print-outs of Year Compass and fill it in.
I’ve been using it for a while to figure how the year went by and what I plan to do in the next. If you are also the productivity kinds and like to reflect, this could be an interesting tool. At least I have benefitted from this. You may want to check this out.
I find the tool very very useful. It makes me go thru my calendar, photos, conversations, notes, thoughts etc and allows me to spot my mistakes. This also keeps me on track in terms of what I want to do and how far I am.
Most years, I make elaborate plans and from whatever I plan, I only get to do a fraction of things and that’s ok. I am hard on myself and unless I have goals that are larger than myself and my aukaat, no point putting those goals in place.
Even if this this is not for you, I urge you to see it once.
Pro Tip: Download the Digital-A4 version, take two sets of printouts and work with a pen and paper (not iPad / Comp). And on the first, write everything. And on the second refine. And use the second one as your report card for 2025 and then the roadmap for 2026. And if you do take this advice and work on it, please share your plan with me. May be we can help each other get to those goals?
2/ No Coffee
See this tweet.
I am glad to report that I didnt have coffee this week. And, as I write this, today’s monday evening and I am yet to have coffee!
And I went to Starbucks only twice. I did goto other coffee shops (but did not order coffee).
To be honest, I dont miss coffee as much as I miss the feeling of sitting at a table and working on things. I am trying to make my home the place where I sit and work but I like to see some chaos around me. I think co-working spaces are the best bet for me. I need to find a good one around me. And around wherever I go.
So, do I want to continue not having coffee? I am not sure.
I want to not be a leech and I want Starbucks to survive their India journey. The other day I read that even though they’ve been here 12 years, they are still in the investment mode! Wow! If they were backed by a VC, I am not sure they’d survive this long. They would already be on the death bed!
3/ Death bed
See this tweet.
I said, When I am on my death bed, who would I want to be next to me? And who are the people who would drop everything and come see me on my death bed?
This means that while I will have friends and acquaintances and all that, going forward I would allow a very small number of people to get thru the defences.
Also, the point is moot. I dont think I would want to have anyone next to me when my time comes. I would rather be with strangers and all that and not have any of my loved ones see me.
So that.
4/ Warikoo’s Team’s Salary
Warikoo made his team’s salaries public. Many things came from there on. Here’s a list.
- I pay more than Warikoo! And yet I am unable to find great talent.
- I love the radical transparency with which he runs the business. I run mine with a lot of transparency as well but he takes the cake.
- Great people (I know at least one person who works for Warikoo and I made an offer to pay her 2X of what she makes) choose to work with people who have great personal brands. I dont have it. I need to work on it.
- As much as people are important, performance is important as well. This has been a problem for me. I need to index higher on performance. I will do that going forward. It will be tough – primarily because I dont know how to go about it – I’ve never known how to do this. Plus its not something that I can read from book. Its about people and thats messy and all.
There was more but I forgot. I may come back to this.
5/ Magic of IRL meetings and Power of Handshakes
I bumped into a former client the other day. And it was a fantastic meeting. From getting to see his scars to seeing the human side of him to getting a new opportunity, I saw all of those happen in one one-hour interaction!
This is one of those things that COVID-19 has taken away from us – the magic of in-person conversations. While its more efficient I wish we can bring back these IRL meetings, handshakes and texture of people!
In fact, I had started to say no to IRL meetups (cos why travel) but I will get back to these IRL meetings. I will still figure the time and travel and all that.
6/ Nath Saab
For context on him, read this.
Another lesson I learnt from him is the idea of panna faadna. I wrote about it here (section B). I think it needs a page on this blog but for the time being, I will replicate here.
Imagine our life is a notebook. Each person in our life is a page. And you can add as many pages in that notebook (once you meet new people). And then the page can extend to any length (depending on your relationship with them). And like any well-used journal or notepad, it can extend in all directions.
However, once you sort of break your relationship with someone (say, someone moves away from your life, someone does something uncool etc etc) you tear their page from your notebook. And then that’s that. You stop bothering about them. They become a stranger. You operate from a place of indifference. You are kind to the world, you are kind to them. You wish them success but you shall not partake in that. If they need help, you are not proactive. You let them come to you. So on and so forth.
He of course has a far deeper reason and philosophy. What I wrote is mine.
And yesterday, I tore one more page off my book. I wish the individual all the luck. I continue to love but I am no longer invested.
So, that.
This week, I tore two more pages from my life’s book. Both pages are relatively fresh and yet I cared deeply for them. One I’ve known for 2-3 years. The about 18 months. Both seemed to have outgrown me and took my patronage for granted. I dont expect that people I support put me on a pedestal but I expect them to be polite and respectful towards me.
Not worth ruminating. Made a note in my Roam. There are now 4 people there. I should re-read Meditations.
7/ Inevitable future
The world is changing fast and I dont know how to navigate. I am thinking, do I create a group of people I trust and talk about things there?
Some themes I see emerging…
- Network
- Atoms vs Bits
- Personal Brand
- Personalized Health
- Hard Skills and Soft Skills
- Interdisciplinary intelligence
I am sure there are many that I am missing.
So, I am thinking I will add people who I trust and who I was to be on my death bed. The idea will be to spot where we are (as individuals, as a group and as society) and what we could do as a collective to be a part of this inevitable future. I am not sure what shape would it take and who would I include in it. But this has been simmering in my head.
Give me thoughts?
Ask me questions?
8/ Urban Poverty of Time
I was talking to C about something and I happened to mention Urban Poor. In one line, its the people who don’t have the resources and yet take on debt to appear of a certain strata to appease people around them.
Lately I’ve started to spot people who are poor with their time. You know, young people who are perpetually short of time and yet are travelling for concerts, going to meetups, joining board game groups, attending festivals that they have no clue about.
I see so many young people waste so much of their time on doing things that would seemingly get them acceptance and approval from the world around them. And then after they come back from these social dos, they are left scrambling to get things done and all that.
PS: I want to develop this idea a little more. Lets see where I get.
9/ On saying yes!
See this tweet.
I have lived a life of “always yes” till I was 40. And my excuse was lack of focus. And undiagnosed ADHD. This served me ok – I learnt a lot. But in societal measures, this didnt serve me well.
And despite that, I continue to believe that one must say yes to everything. And I know a lot of people who are sharply focussed even at the age of 20.
So, you do what serves you (yes or no) and what has served your people. But this is worth reading and thinking.
10/ Harada Method
See this tweet. I have been a fan of Ohtani and how he’s built a deliberate life. I did not know that he was following Harada all this while.
Since then multiple tools and apps have popped up that help you visualise this Harada method. I have used goalpillars.com to visualise quiet a few. Here’s one.
The point?
You must try the method to build a map for your success.
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Ok enough!
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📷 Some Photos from the week gone by
Some photos that I took and save over the last week are here.
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🈺 LARGE objective from the week gone by?
I had two large things when I started this year. Book 2 and a yearly plan (that I’ve been writing for a long time. This year I couldn’t). And I just added health a few weeks ago.
No update from the last week. Plus now that we are close to the end of this year and I am working on Year Compass, I will probably make updates to this as we go along.
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☑️ So, what did I get done last week?
This is a one-line report on progress I made on various things that are important to me. I will only talk about things that I got done. Shipped. Not WIP.
On this as well, I dont have an update for the last weeks.
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📊 The tracker from the last week
Here’s the tracker. Publishing this after a while. Took a lot of effort 😀
What do you see?
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🏃🏻♂️➡️ Health
I am not publishing this at this time.
The food log, my daily health log channel continue to be active.
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📖 Interesting Reads / Views
Not too many. And whatever I had, I have covered those in the note above. You are welcome to join this WA group where I post updates often.
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🧠 Reminders from last week
This section captures things that I want to not forget. I add those to SG’s Office. I will copy paste these week on week and track updates.
I’ve been skipping this for a while now.
Lets see when I get back to this.
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🥡 So, one thing that defines the past week?
Blur.
I dont even know where this week went. And there is no better word than this to capture that emotion.
Oh and in the previous weeks, the one-word reviews have been… Sad, Getting Back, Unsettling, Regular, Grind, Sad, Tough, Routine, Routine, Busy, Grind, Blur, Stress, Numb, Blur, Fast, Uncool, Disappeared, Experience, Grind, Busy for Nothing, Regular, Getting back to action, Slack, Busyness, Action, Survive, Looking Up, Survival, Taste, Community, Respect, Money, People.
This week was not
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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, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 42, 44, 46
I’ve missed the following weeks: 9, 15, 17, 22, 24, 41, 43, 45
PPS: Please do point typos.
Grammarly is not working with WordPress 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.