7 AM, Jun 23
I haven’t written for 2 weeks now (I was busier than expected). And while I dont have a lot of time today to write either, I will do it. I have promises to keep (Hi, AA). I will not talk about how busy I was and all that. I will merely get writing.
Here we go.
💭 Highlights, reflections and notes from the past two weeks
PS: These are not in any order. Specifically because I was all over the place the last two weeks. I haven’t had the time to process things that I was experiencing and living.
PPS: Since I didn’t get to write for the last few days, my thoughts and reflections will suffer from recency effect. A lot of my words are an outcome of what ive been thinking lately.
Let’s go…
A/ Taught some 300 people about Gen AI
It was not the best session in terms of my delivery but I got a reality check that the world out there needs a lot more education that the world of twitter has. In fact, we must encourage each person to get active on twitter and follow the silicon valley types and see where the world is headed. Not from the lens of being scared about it but from the lens of learning and being ready.
Here’s my feedback from the students.
B/ Kabir
Saw this reel on Insta.
Insane lessons. And insane talent of to dissipate lessons from Kabir. The amount of wisdom from kabir made accessible by this music is fabulous.
At some point in time, I want to commission someone to do such things. In case I am unable to in my life time, I hope one of you (the ones reading) does it.
C/ Grateful that Vivek exists.
I just wish I was not so far behind him in terms of wealth. I would have got to spend more time with him and M, if I werent.
D/ The Flight
Everyone has been talking about the Air India plane crash. Since then I’ve taken two flights – both Air India. And in one of those, there was a very rough patch. So clearly, thanks to the recency effect, been thinking a lot about it. In bullets…
First things first. In the grand scheme of things, we are meaningless. Heart goes out to folks who lost their lives. Even tougher is the lives of the ones left behind. I wish there wasnt so much pain in the world around us.
Second. I am not afraid to die. Just that it would be a shame that I died without doing anything that I had set out to do. Heck, maine to achi achar bhi nahi daala! I have a lot to lose and the thought that I would go randomly, I get sad.
Third. I would’ve taken 500, if not 1000 flights in my life. And I was never the kinds to be scared. But thanks to second above, I am little scared. I was reminded of what a classmate from MDI once told me – while a plane going down is a Black Swan event, the very nature of the event means that it can happen to you and the destruction would be 100%, unlike a road accident where the destruction is not fatal.
Fourth. In the two flights I took in the last week, I was unable to write. I tried to but I failed. I could merely take bullet point notes. I need to fix this cos flights used to be me sacrosanct writing place where I could be in the zone and get a lot thought / written.
Fifth. Maybe I need to work on my attention span? Maybe get back to meditation? Maybe I am unable to write cos I am unable to focus on things?
So that.
E/ Events is a good business
Over the weekend, I was in BKK. For an event thing.
And I was reminded of all the reasons why I love it – there’s no set office, there is freedom of time and place for the most part, there is ample use of common sense and there’s some of the most interesting real life folks with real skils and not just keyboard warriors.
Oh, and it sucks as well – there is no scalability (the largest event agency would be like 500 crores), there is a lot of muck (relationships, under the table conversations etc) and no large impact on the universe per se.
So, its something that I would like to be a part of in some way. But now that I have Meru and some bits of C4E, I may not be able to.
At this time, I am merely cataloging. Oh, wait, events business is a brilliant training ground for life skills. I want EACH of my kids to be spend a year doing events. But then, I dont know where so I find kids who want to build their lives around mine (and then subsequently, I build mine around their’s). So that.
May be I will bring back SoG?
F/ Life without border and passport control
I pine for a life where I dont have to worry about my passport or about visas and all that. But then lately, with all the news around hyper-nationalism and flying horrors, I dont know.
G/ Health and Fitness
I have realised that I dont look great and I anyway don’t dress great. And thus I get judged and a lot of opportunities that ought to come to me, dont. So, I need to work on those. Maybe fitness with help.
Thing is, my looks or clothes never mattered to me. In fact, I looked at it as a giant fuck you to the world. But now I realise that this fuck-you attitude was not the best thing.
So, I will fix it.
PS: Is 42 the wrong age to admit this? Or maybe this is me coming out with my insecurities?
So solution…
I will make fitness my P1. You know, Yoga. I think I can do this. I’ve done it in the past. Then at some point IN THIS MONTH (7 days to go), I will add a better diet (where I prep things myself (I cant seem to find a cook)). And then at some point in the month, I will add a gym or some sport. I dont think I can do gyms yet. I need to pick a sport for sure.
My P2 would be better groomed. You know, more focus on shaving my head, beard etc. Perfumes, accessories etc. Better footwear (no shoes ;))
My P3 would better clothes. This may take forever. But I will try.
H/ Let go of a team member
Not the best feeling to part ways. But had to be done.
Have done in the past as well and no it doesnt get better.
And funny thing is that I will have to part ways with more team members in the next few months.
I/ Work hard, make money and give money
The entire world around me seems to be moved by money. I need to find a way to make a LOT of money. And then use that money to build better lives for everyone around me. And give great money to people that are around me.
I am a capitalist at heart but I love that people chase more things than money.
J/ SG on Mira Murati’s team
C pointed that Mira’s team seems to have a SG. I must gather all these folks ;P
K/ Biography writing for seniors
I am working on a cohort to help active seniors write their biographies. While the idea sounds good on paper, there are inherent challenges with that. I need to solve for those.
L/ Personal Brand
My sense is that world in the future would be run by personal brands. Think Elon. Think Tanmay. Think SG. Three different people. Three different spectrums. Each has a certain influence over things. Each has opportunities in direct proportion to their brand.
I need to work on this.
This has been a theme since I dont know when. I HAVE to accelerate this. I will probably hire someone for this.
On this, I will also put in motion my podcast and content. Just that in the post-AI world, I dont know what is the importance of all the content you put out.
M/ Ask. And the world shall give.
See this from Jim Rohn.
And this from Steve.
N/ Regrets in life
While I was in the flight yesterday, I made a list of things that I regret in life. While more details would go on my notes, here are four folks that I wish I could continue to be with – KG, RG, RN, Parents.
Funny most of my regrets seem to around people. And not around money, achievements and all that.
O/ Make a film
I have decided. I will make a film this year. It would be a short (while I will try, it may not be a full-length), But will do. And this is apart from my book (lol). That I will work on as well. More details in subsequent days.
Oh and all these things need one thing and one thing only – my decision that I will separate people and projects. I know it would require me to be tough and stern with my people but I will do it. Oh, and also marry this with my thing about personal brand (see J above)! And AI!
Wow, so many things seem to be coming together!
P/ Passive income
I HAVE to HAVE mutiple sets of passive incomes. Right now, I only have one source of income – that too needs me to be fairly active. May be a franchisee of something? May be something on rental? What else?
Oh and I need passports of 3 countries and bank accounts in 5.
Q/ Not deep
Lol (first time I heard this, it was from a kid I mentor – she said that no boys are deep – all they do is talk about pizza, games and sex).
So, while I was writing this, I reaslied that am an ordinary person. And while thats ok, makes me question the meaning of these notes. I mean why would you (or someone) read these notes? I dont talk anything deep. I talk about what I want to do, what I fail at and mostly these are reflections.
R/ “ai makes people dumb”, “money makes them lazy”
Everyone has read that research of less than 50 participants where they proclaimed that people that use AI tend to get dumber. No they did not use these words. Dont hold me for words. But try to get the drift.
Warikoo had an interesting take on it. He highlighted two things – AI and UBI.
I will do an episode on this. CC Anshika.
S/ If money werent an object…
Like I said, I was in BKK over the weekend and apart from one presentation for 3 hours, I had all the time in the world to explore. So I went around. And I realised that at different times, I wanted to buy…
Remarkable
AirPods
On Sneakers
Even thought about changing my phone
I realised, I wanted a new toy.
However, I chose to not get.
You know, money.
I wish money werent an object…
T/ Neosapian
Wrote a review of the Neo 1. Here.
U/ Films
I saw a few films – dunno why or how. And I dont even remember the names (except Ritual Killer and Bonnie and Clyde that I remember seeing cos it was in the long / boring flight).
V/ Details
I am realising that I am unable to remember names of things but I can remember facts around them. For example, I wanted to write the name of the film I saw but I couldnt remember it. I remembered hunting and Africa. I googled. No response. But then I thought, lemme put the name of the actor. Again, I didnt remember the name of the actor. But I remembered he’s often refered to as the voice of God. And thus I made the connection.
I dont know what to do with this information. Maybe I will put this in some LLM and see what can I do about this.
Phew!
So that!
📷 Some Photos from the week gone by
Here are some photos from week 24.
The one that I would like to plaster on my blog is…
🈺 The LARGE objective from the week gone by?
Book 2
I didnt get time to even think about thinking. The person I was working with seems to have a lot on her plate and thus I am unable to move. No, I am not leaning onto her and blaming her for my inaction but I didnt move on this at all.
PS: Dropped 2025 Plan a few weeks ago.
☑️ What did I get done last two weeks?
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 but here is a report nonetheless.
At this point, the following things are important to me (I know too many but…) and these are IN ORDER.
- Health
- Meru
- C4E
- Brand SG
- People (Family, Friends, Strangers, etc)
- Book2
- Shauk (Music, Films, Poker etc)
Health. No action. 0.
Meru. Again, like last update, moved the needle a bit. No large updates to be hoenst. 0.
C4E. No action. 0.
Brand SG. No action. HAVE TO PUT IN A LOT MORE EFFORT HERE.
People. No action on this. I’d say 0.
Book 2. Lol! -1
Shauk. Nothing. So, a 0.
So the overall score is -1 for this week. Also, like I said, the last two weeks went in a whirwind.
Trends from the previous weeks: 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.
📊 The tracker from the last week
This is the tracker for the last 2 weeks.
Nothing to write home about. I have failed.
I will rise up again.
PS: I have noticed that each time I am on the road, I miss updating this. And once I am back to ground, I take a few days to get back to speed. And that causes the chaos. May be I need to find a way to do this better.
📖 Interesting Reads from the last week
I have a lot to share TBH but I may not have the time to write about all of those. So, I will get to those in the next week’s update.
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.
So, some links that I want to share…
- Ankush Datar on Thin Desires vs Thick Desires. Here. And here.
- Pentagon Pizza Index. Here. And their twitter account. Also read, Big Mac Index.
- Wrote a review of a note-taking device. Here.
- Why you MUST not read. By Kevin. Here.
- This NY Times piece talks about Grief Tech. I first heard a version of this on Sahil Bloom’s Twitter.
- This video of Boston Dynamics machines at America’s Got Talent
- These two resources (a video and the companion presentation) by Vinod Kholsa on Luring the VC.
There are a lot more but I will skip. You know, done is better than best. Progress > perfection.
🧠 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.
Here are things from the past few weeks that I want to remember. And no, this may not be a comprehensive list. In categories.
- Long term
- Professional pool / snooker / poker. I played poker in bangalore and it was fun. I dint win a lot but I was able to read some players. So that’s cool. Other thing (pool) saw no action.
- Health
- Kitchen setup (incomplete)
- Gym membership (incomplete)
- C4E things (I will stop tracking these things and have C do these)
- C4E Base
- Design
- Borderless agency
- Adding films
- Shauk / Personal
- Use of money to buy time – doing this already.
- Better dressed – lol
- Find love – lol!
- Demand more from life
- Speak better!
In case you know me, lemme know if I have missed something.
PS: Adding a section of things that I talked about in THIS post…
- Kabir
- Film
- book 2
- Personal Brand
- Podcast on AI and UBI (for adulting?)
- Meditation
- Yoga
Did I miss something?
🥡 So, one thing that defines the past week?
Experience.
That’s the world I would use for the last two weeks.
Oh and in the previous weeks, the one-word reviews have been… Grind, Busy for Nothing, Regular, Getting back to action, Slack, Busyness, Action, Survive, Looking Up, Survival, Taste, Community, Respect, Money, People.
—
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)
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.
Love this weekly posts Saurabh.
You do good. Keep going! ✨
I have been following this space for the last 3 weeks now.
Ho jayega sab!
thank you 🙂