Write a journal to document your progress

Write a journal to document your progress: You do have a passbook to keep track at transactions of your money at the bank. What would happen if the bank stops keeping a track of your money and expenses? Wont that be a terrible idea? So why not keep track of where you are in life right now, what are you doing to improve and how much have you improved over a period of time ? To actually improve yourself, you do need a tracking system in place to track your progress on a daily basis. This system does not need to be complex, you just need to maintain a journal which records things you have done today to improve yourself. For example, you may write things down like “1. Reduced social media usage by 2 hours”, “2. Started learning XYZ skill, completed 1 topic” “3. Walked for 1Km ”. At the end of every week or every month, you can now do a self-review to see how much you have accomplished for the entire month. You can calculate the total hours you have put into learning a new skill, total kilo meters you walked, or total time saved for the entire month which you would otherwise have spent on social media. You can use the same journal for comparing your month-to-month progress as well. For example, in the past month if you had walked 30km then in the next month walking even 35km would be considered as a good progress.

-Saurav Sharma

Be very stingy with your time and energy

Be very stingy with your time and energy

A simple question?

Would you pay INR 500(USD 8) per month to use the social media site which you browse regularly which provides no value but instead wastes your time?

Heck no, you would rather stop using it instead of wasting your money.

So why would you want to waste your time and energy on the same site which are worth a lot more than INR500 per month ?

If the site starts charging that subscription amount you would rather quit using it.

It’s funny how we panic when we loose some money, we are very wise with our money even though we know that it can be earned.

However, our time and energy is something which can never be earned back.

Hence be very cautious before spending energy on some dumb stuff, like watching that YouTube video which provides no value.

Stop spending time on social media which brings in no value, would you have paid a monthly fee for using the same social media site?

-Saurav Sharma

Optimize your energy

Read, read, read and read

Read, read, read and read

I cant emphasize how important it is to read. Read whatever you can get your hands on, if you have the money then buy every book you can on the areas which you want to improve, be it business, marketing, programming etc.

If you cant afford books, then read all that you can get your hands on. Just make sure that the quality of content you read is good.

-Saurav Sharma

Be stingy with....

Does not cracking the IITJEE make me smaller than those who actually did it?

Does not cracking the IITJEE make me smaller than those who actually did it?

There are a lot of occasions in life where you can feel absolutely worthless.

1. You cracked JEE and joined the best IIT but got 5–6 CGPA.
2. You managed 9+ CGPA but didn’t get a high paying job.
3. You got a high paying job but the work is absolutely boring.
4. You got challenging work but the manager is a tyrant.
5. You got a great manager but the company is laying off.
6. You escaped the layoff but you are unable to find a partner.
7. You found a partner but they can’t stop comparing you with their ex.
8. You found a partner without ex but they don’t love you for what you are.
9. You found a loving partner but have a hard time conceiving.
10. You have a child but they are not healthy.
11. You have a healthy child but they won’t listen to you.
12. You have a lovely, obedient child but you get laid off.
13. You escaped layoff again but your child couldn’t crack JEE.

Life is a giant cycle of ups and downs. The lows teach you humility. The highs teach you thankfulness.

Can my future be brighter than those IITians?

My mother isn’t very educated. She has been a house wife throughout. She managed the limited household budget very well. She nurtured and took care of her children to the best of her abilities. She monitored them during their teenage. As a result, she produced 3 (three) IITians. I think she is more successful today than all 3 of us IITians put together.

Be THAT parent if you want to beat IITians. You will literally become the “mother/father of IITians” :-)

For now, love, respect and obey your parents who have been there for you all along. Their prayers and blessings can take you far far higher than what you and I can imagine.

-Imtiaz Mohammad

Changing the World

Lock in Brain

Optimise your energy

Optimise your energy

Is there something which is draining your energy.

Are you engaging in some activities which are a huge drain on your physical and mental energy.

Activities like these include, engaging in hate conversations on social-media, consuming irrelevant content for hours, mindlessly browsing social media etc.

You can always analyse your day and list out the activities you did today that drained your energy but were not a good investment.

You can stop doing these and find a drastic increment in your energy levels.

On the other hand, you can also work on enhancing your energy as well.

Activities like running, working out , meeting up with friends in real life are the activities which energise you.

You may also make some tweaks to your diet for being more energetic such as including vitamin-c and a consuming a lot of water.

-Saurav Sharma

Cab Driver Makes More Money Than IT Graduates then why to study ?

I had the same question about......

I had the same question about more than a decade ago when I wondered what separates the class toppers from an average student like me.

Luckily I had the chance to be around a topper and observe him and his actions.

What I learned from a class topper.

While I was in school I was an average student. I studied enough to score well but never topped the class.

However when I was in std 8th, I had a chance to sit besides a class topper.

Here is what I observed and learned from him.

1. He had a tremendous zeal to score well, the intensity with which he studied showed up on his face.
2. The amount of enthusiasm this guy had to tackle the exam was mind blowing. If you ever see him revising before an exam, you would think that he was a maniac. Compared to him I was like Meh… its just an exam, let’s write the paper and get over with it.
3. He honestly prepared till the last moment, he made sure that no answer is left unrevised. He genuinely immersed himself into books. Not like others who study before exam just to show off.
4. His enthusiasm was contagious, you wont believe that after sitting besides him for an exam even I started studying with more zeal and more passion. I became genuinely interested in studies. This is the very reason you should surround yourself with great people, we end up becoming a bit like them.
5. As soon as the exam ended, the very next moment he would start preparing for the next one. He knew the value of every minute and utilised well.
6. Most importantly he didn’t consider this as work or something he has to do but he genuinely enjoyed studying and being a class topper.
7. Was he talented and had more IQ than others? I have no idea, but I can assure you one thing that he put a lot more effort to study the same topic than others did. If he was really talented and had a god gifted photographic memory then he wouldn’t have had to put so much effort into learning/memorising things.
8. Was he lucky? He had the same set of Questions to answer as others did. Although he might have had other advantages like a favourable and conducive study environment at home, better coaching however there were plenty others who had much more advantages than him.

These were my key takeaways form him which I follow to this day:

1. It’s all about how bad you want it. If you are competing with someone else for a thing then the one who gets it is the one who wants it the most.
2. There is no substitute to hard work, even if you are super talented.
3. Enthusiasm matters a lot, if you are not enthusiastic or excited about something it will be much harder to succeed at it,
4. Being genuine always pays, always be genuine to you work and it will reward you back.
5. Enthusiasm and positive energy is contagious and it shows up in your work. So is negative energy. Hence one must do all the possible things to surround yourself with positive and energetic people and cut out all the people from your life who are inherently negative.
6. Value time, it is your most precious resource and hence put it to good use.
7. Luck is definitely a factor, however not as much as you think it is. It does have an impact but the effect of ones luck only amplifies when you put in the hard work.

-Saurav Sharma

Don’t be a slave to your smartphone, instead make it your slave

Don’t be a slave to your smartphone, instead make it your slave

Most people in todays world have become a slave to their smartphones.

Notification bell rings, they pick up their phone saying that “Ill watch this one video and then I’ll get to work”. Even before they know it, they have spent an entire hour watching other recommended videos.

Remember, it’s now machines vs humans. Social media algorithms have gotten so good that they know what exactly you like. In fact they know more about you than yourself and hence they know how to keep you hooked.

Instead of being a slave your your phone, make it your slave.

Don’t let it suck value out of you, instead you suck the value out of it.

Use apps like reminders to remind you of the important stuff you need to do, use the phone to talk and network with people.

Download apps like Kindle, Audible read and listen to a ton of books.

Use apps to remind you to drink water and take a walk every hour so that you stay healthy.

There are hundreds of ways you can use your smartphone to optimize your life and to your own advantage, but only when you actually stop being a slave to it.

You have paid a hefty price for your device, extract every drop of value out of it.

-Saurav Sharma

I was in a colony function the other day, when an uncle came to me and asked .....

I was in a colony function the other day, when an uncle came to me and asked me a similar question, though with a different profession in mind. “You have an amazing profile, why don’t you prepare for UPSC and become an IAS officer?”

A few days back, another person had asked me, “You have an amazing academic background, why don’t you opt for a research career and try for a top-notch Ph.D from Harvard?”

Quite a few people have also asked me why I don’t try to become an entrepreneur.

The thing is - everybody has different goals in life, and what might work for one person might not work for another.

For the time being, I am very happy in management consulting because it keeps me on my toes. There is something new to learn every single day, an extremely smart peer group, and fast-changing industry dynamics.

The day I get bored of management consulting, I might try something else. But for now, I am happy with my career. We don’t have to always go by the norms of society. I would rather focus my energy towards exploring different facets of life these days.

-Rohan Jain

Optimal.......

You can only improve things which you measure

You can only improve things which you measure

Let’s say you want to improve your ability to focus.

After a couple months, you wont be able to tell if you have made substantial improvement unless you have some metrics to measure.

You can only say you improved your focused work hours by x% when you have the data to back it up.

To have that data, you must track measure and track something which proves your performance.

For example, on day 1 you can say I worked for 1.5 Hours in a focused manner. You can keep tracking it every day, and can measure your progress.

-Saurav Sharma

Things Not Worth Anyone's Time

Consistency

Consistency: Understand than improvement is not a one day game. Improvement is a gradual and a very slow process. You can only start working on improving certain aspects of your life today, does not mean that you will see the result in the next day or even next month. Why most people are skeptical about self improvement is because they lack patience and expect fast results. To improve upon anything, its’ important that you do it on a daily basis. You don’t need to do a lot but you need to do it daily. To remember this, keep this phrase in your mind “Doing a little everyday > doing a lot a single day”.

-Saurav Sharma

To have bigger goals, you must be around good people

To have bigger goals, you must be around good people: Most of your achievements do not depend on your hard work but depend upon the people around you. If you are around mediocre people all day long, chances are that you will end up being like them. This is why families which belong to a certain class in a society always remain in the same financial circumstances for generations to come. The way in which this works is that when you be around people, you are influenced by their thoughts and actions. For example, if you are around drunkards you will thinking that drinking a lot is common and you will end up being a drunkard. When you be around chain-smokers you will find smoking to be acceptable and you will end up being a smoker as well. If you be around people who think making X amount of money, buying a car which costs Y is acceptable then you would impose that standard on yourself as well. Imagine if you be around your friends who are terribly fat, they eat potato chips, drink soda and lay down all the time. Chances are that if you hang around with them, you will end up being like them as well. On the contrary, if all of your friends are fitness addicts with a six pack, even if you are a fat guy the next time you go out with them you will feel ashamed of your body and would at least think about joining a gym. Hence always be around people who are better than you, it’s better to be along rather than being in the wrong group of people. If you have no people around you who can be ideals then read autobiographies of great people, reading them has the same influence as being around them.

-Saurav Sharma

Once rain is over, the same umbrella becomes.......