Feeling.

Feelings are tricky. We can’t be sure what we will be feeling next. In a moment, our feelings can change. The difference between an amateur and a professional is how they handle their feelings. An amateur lets the feelings get in the way of doing the work. They say

Between restlessness and lethargy.

In the Bhagawad Gita, Krishna outlines three different natures of humans: rajas, sattva, tamas. Excessive rajas becomes restless and anxiety. Excessive tamas becomes lethargy and depression. Sattvic mindset and body is the one that is balanced. A good analogy to understand this is that of a microsope. If you turn

Can you be more specific?

It is always a good strategy to be more specific. What is it exactly that you want? What exactly do you need to get done in order to get it? When exactly are you going to do that? The more specific we become with our intentions, the more like we

Thinking vs. typing.

Typing is helpful. It takes us somewhere. It makes our thoughts tangible. Typing in public is even better. It keeps us on the hook. On the other hand, thinking keeps us in the loop. Very rarely do people break out of status quo because they were thinking. They break out

freedom.to

Freedom, this is one app I don’t think I can live without. It blocks all the distracting websites on my MacBook. So, even if my tired or distracted mind is looking for salvation in YouTube or any of the other dopamine dealers, I am unable to access them, no

Keep going.

There are times when things do not look like they are working, especially when they are. At these times, there is a very strong urge to change, to pivot, to analyse. What I have realised over time is that this is just a phase. That all we need to do

8 hours a day.

Without that, that amount of sleep, you are running your body in an emergency state. Coffee is the quick fix you do to get the engine started although you know how much engine needs an oil change. It is easy to spend another 2 hours in the night on your

Forward.

Forward motion is uphill. It is full of roadblocks, full of uncertainty, full of ambiguity. But is there another way? I don’t think there is. That’s all we can do, no matter how difficult or impossible it may seem. — If you liked reading this, consider subscribing. If you

Its all about perspective

Love this post by @garvit. Very well articulated points.

The Rat Race

A very well articulated blog by my student Shreya!

Killing your darlings.

No matter how much we want, we can never save all our darlings. Time is limited, there are only 24 hours in a day. While our imagination and the number of things we assign our ‘tomorrow self’ can just keep on growing. When you are faced with such a predicament,

Magic.

There is no degree, certificate in magic, thankfully. There is no entrance exam to be selected to learn magic. Not the tricks, for them there might be. But real magic. The magic that makes your heart skip a beat. The magic that comes from a heartfelt story written by a

Wonderful rebound...

A student wrote and sent me this… There is more to our life, our career than the scores of any test. We tend to make an identity out of that score and think that it will make us a better person(hierarchically) to have achieved it. Then we try to

When things go right...

When things go right, at times it doesn’t feel right. There are butterflies in the stomach, and there is a tinge of anxiety all around. When things are static, we feel comfortable. Nothing much changes. The more we shift from this latter feeling of comfort to the feeling of

Reasons?

We always have a reason not to level up, not to take action. In almost all cases (read: all cases), these reasons are merely excuses. They come from the fear of levelling up, the fear of letting go of the status quo. When your identity is someone who wants to

Better.

To make something better means that we have to make something worse before that. The 2nd draft can only be better if the 1st draft isn’t perfect. When we strive to make the first draft perfect, we give into Resistance. The magic happens by making things better, not by

Say 'no' to notification.

How would you feel if you are working on something and every 10 minutes or so, some random person taps you on your shoulder? How would you feel if many of those taps are not by a person but by a robot sent by a company that wants to sell

assistance

We talk a lot about resistance and rightly so. Most of us keep experiencing that force. But there is another force at play, the one which is on our side. The one which never falters. It works if you do the work. Neil Gaiman famously said in his commencement speech

Shifting the focus from circumstances to action.

When we focus on our circumstances, we invite the ‘victim mindset’. We become helpless. We feel that we can do something only if ‘this happens’. The best way to change your circumstances is to focus on the action that would lead to the change. In most cases, the actions would

Rushed.

When we are rushed, we keep moving but we get nowhere. The feeling of ‘rush’ comes when we try to get something done in lesser time than it requires. But when we act rushed, we increase this time and in most cases actually do not get the outcome. It’s

Non-negotiables

Our non-negotiables define us. It’s imperative that we find them and be explicit about them. When we start making exceptions to our non-negotiables, that’s when we start losing our sense of ourselves. By definition, there can be no exceptions to the non-negotiables. — If you liked reading this, consider

Experiment.

Life gets better when we experiment. When we try something out and see if it works. A 5-year old experiments all the time, with the snacks they eat or the toys they love. As we grow old, more often than not, we lose this knack of experimenting. We become comfortable

Time is finite.

If we spend 3 hours extra awake in the night, it gets deducted from our day the next day, or worse, from our sleep. The natural cycle of day and night is an ally and not an enemy. It is something to be embraced. Sunset and sunrise are very strong

Accepting yourself.

I don’t do well in open offices. Even when no one is around. I don’t do well on social media. Even though it offers a supposed shortcut to success. I don’t do well making plans in excel. I prefer a blank document instead. I tried for a

Resolving ambiguity.

Ambiguity is the reason behind procrastination, more often than not. And we try to resolve this ambiguity in our head or by talking to someone. Sometimes, very rarely, we see through it, but most times, it leads to even more clutter. The reason is that thinking and talking are not