This blog post has been pending for a while now!
Major things have happened in the last one month!
For 1, I walked out of my company. V and I had extreme difference of opinion about roles, execution and ownership. My choice. And I am absolutely complete about it. Some are shocked, some call it dumb, some feel happy for me that finally I’d make better use of my skills and get paid for the same (but then they can’t realize that my struggling startup was worth a few Crores in valuation at least) ;P… I am confused. But its a good kinda confusion. One of my biggest weaknesses (as an entrepreneur) has been my dependence on peoples’ opinion. I am over it. I can see that I have grown up. My whole world has turned around, hundreds of unanswered questions. And truckloads of people who’d come and tell me “I told you so!”, but I don’t care this time. I take responsibility of the situation I am in. I don’t avoid their pointed questions, and I don’t let their opinions bog me down. Its a good feeling to realize that I have gotten more independent than I earlier was. I guess I have reached the right level, where I don’t bother about what people say, yet can objectively understand what they mean and learn from the same.
Of course, there are lessons to be learned. I gotta get more focused and gotta work more on my discipline. I also acknowledge that I am more focused and disciplined than the average lot, but what I have is not good enough to accomplish the things I have set out for.
Maybe, I’ll take up a job now and start paying my loans. I will own up my work. Something I didn’t do when I worked for Subex. Infact, just now I realized that I didn’t own up my work in my own company too. I am a go getter, but I wasn’t a go getter when I worked for my own company. No wonder V didn’t want me to execute this project. While I don’t approve of most of the things he feels, I take responsibility of not being someone he could count on. At the same time, I am far from feeling guilty. I did a good job. Dealing with whatever I was dealing with, I did quite fine.
None the less, its a major thing. I have learned from it.
As the saying goes, “when you loose, don’t loose the lesson”.
A majority of my initiatives didn’t work out. And I started living inside this conversation called – “I am a failure”. But in reality, I guess its just that I am not on track with my targets.
Life is fun. I saw this wonderful video on YouTube! It really cheered me up.
More often than not, people are not able to comprehend why I am doing what I am doing. I don’t want to explain anything to them either. I want my actions to do the talking, but off late, my actions have not spoken much and I have had to give a lot of explanations to people for my supposed “inability to make money”. This video really pepped me up. And even though I am a little spaced out right now, I am all set to kick some solid ass in the days to come.
There are so many highs and lows that I have seen this month!
The Lows,
I break my resolution to read 5 books every month.
I break my habit of waking up at 5am every month.
I stopped planning my work
I became careless about my eating habits again. There are few days when I have my breakfast. Often skip a meal.
I quit exercising
I quit yoga
I quit meditation
My house started getting untidy again
I don’t read my goals daily
I didn’t meet my financial targets
I quit painting
The Highs,
I became absolutely unstoppable towards my entrepreneurship centric projects
I made money! Finally!
I got the offer to revamp a dead organization as an entrepreneur with limited liabilities.
Impressed with my proactive attitude, the company’s founder asked me to become a director in the company instead of my previous role as an adviser. Its a big honor and privilege for me to be regarded to highly.
My coachees at Landmark love me and we are contributing to each others’ lives. Its a very enriching experience
I developed alliances with several people and companies.
I am close to building a team that will create a revolutionary book.
Well there are a lot of gaps in life right now. I would like to do everything that I want to do. And do it all together. I gotta grow massively as a human being to make everything happen together.
Today is the 3rd of June.
Today I take on being an absolutely un-stoppable person. I will not succumb to my circumstances, I’ll be their creator instead.
I will restart megaliving from tomorrow onwards and also restart simple.ology. I have to build a lot of habits before I take on my role as an entrepreneur. I have time till July 21st. And I’ll make it happen.
I also take on writing a blog entry every night. I want to document my growth through these times. I would love to read these pages sometime in the future!
I had a wonderful experience recently. Since I have already written about the same on email, I won’t repeat the whole thing for this blog entry. At the same time, I want to remember this incident later on in my life. Its an interesting piece on how much I have grown as a person!
What follows is a response to the email I had sent to my fellow SELP mates.
———————————————————–
Hey Guys!
My play got canceled. Actually my role in the play got canceled. I had got the opportunity to act because an important character’s mom had to get an operation done on the dates of the play. But now her operation is postponed and he can act. I got to know it all just today, and I hope you all get to read this mail before planning anything.
But I really want to share with you the breakthrough I had in this incident. You know, the director told me that he would prefer the old character to perform instead of me because he had much more experience and I have not had an opportunity to rehearse properly (as in with the whole troupe) yet.
I said thats fine. And I was slightly upset. The breakthrough is that I was slightly upset for just 10 seconds flat. In those 10 seconds, I created a context that gave me power. As in, if I were playing a match, and a better player could replace me to help the team win the match, I would have willingly given him my position. And this is what I did. The whats-so is also that I had turned almost everything in my life upside down to make this play happen. (Memorizing the dialogs, taking audio clips and listening to them while riding, rehearsing in my free time, getting other people to fulfill my responsibilities, travel 60+km a day, give up a few things that I wanted to do over the week, etc… it was like a dream come true for me) And 1 day before the event I am told that I can’t do it……………………….
… And I don’t abuse them, I don’t get upset, and I actually enjoy the experience.
While riding back home, I was actually enjoying being in the present! No earphones, no dialogs. Smiling all along .
This is called ‘Living Life Powerfully’. And as I had mentioned, I am living a life I love anyways. So in essence, today I could feel the outcome that was promised in our SELP. I remember, I gave a 2 to ‘living life powerfully and living a life you love’ when we were asked to give a rating during our last few classrooms, but it did get delivered. I am standing pretty close to 5 now!
I don’t know if I am communicating it properly, but this is breakthrough for me and I want to thank YOU ………….. (read with your name in the space provided)………. individually for giving me this kind of a life. Thanks so much
How are you all? Lets meet sometime soon. I would love to know whats happening in you lives. Mine is rocking. Solid breakdowns and I am absolutely powerful on top of them. And breakthroughs are solid as well.
As a part of my future, I created a life I love. I am pretty much on the path there. Though I did not invent the possibility of acting, I guessed the possibility of my buddy Subash rubbed on to me. Guys, I am doing my first theater performance and am damn excited. All of you mean a lot to me and I want to celebrate this opportunity in your presence. I would really love if all of you come and enjoy the experience of my troupe (Aavega’s) touching play in Ranga Shankara.
Here are the details:
The Death Of A Salesman
Ranga Shankara
JP Nagar – Near Police Station.
Date – 20th May Tuesday (OR) 21st May Wednesday (Its being played on both days, you can plan and come on either day)
Time 7:30 PM to 9:30 PM
Ticket costs Rs 70/-
Thanks and Regards,
–
Amit Singh
98863 14456
PS. Its my first play and I have no idea how much or how little free time I would get to spend with you guys, but I would do my best to spend as much time with you all as possible.
The tickets will be available in the venue and you can also buy them from me. Bindas call madi.
By the way, I am a coach right now and its our community’s 2nd workday tomorrow. (Sunday) I would love if you guys come and witness the transformation that we are causing.
Truckloads of Love,
You guys are very special to me in my life,
Thanks for all that you have given me.
Amit
Life is good and bad. Good because, I recognize that there is nothing wrong in breakdowns. Because I realize that life looks tough only because I am ambitious.
Its bad because, I am not learning from my mistakes.
I did not do what I said I will do. Forget about being punctual about them.
I really wanna build this habit of doing what I said I’ll do by the time I said I’ll do it. Really.
In the past few days, I have been my powerful self. I have refused to accept that things are impossible and I am just beginning to realize what being true to your purpose is.
But if I take the holistic picture, life is still a breakdown. I am not meeting my friends or speaking to my family, regularly. I am not exercising, neither am I waking up at 5. I am not keeping my house spic and span. Not washing my clothes regularly and almost nothing is planned. I am not reading either.
Ok, so I put all these things together in my life from tomorrow onwards.
Truly converting all my ORs to ANDs.
There are a lot things that I had said I’ll do by the weekend.
Doing 100 volumes in sales and recruiting 1 person in my team by tomorrow 3PM. I did only 66 volumes and haven’t recruited anyone yet! But I have time till 3PM
Putting up the Startup Pains research website. (This will be done tomorrow)
Interviewing 2 people. This again will be done by tomorrow.
Memorizing my dialogs. Tough, but I have to memorize them by tomorrow.
Inviting 15 people for my workday.
Fixing the date for an HILF and a CILF. I am not enrolled to making this happen.
Freaks, its too much.
And I’ll make all of this and the ones above it happen tomorrow, and onwards.
I already have a headache imagining how seemingly tough it looks. This is when I shall grow.
—-
A few journal entries,
Did my rehearsals today. Not sure how good or bad they were. I forgot my dialogs left, right and center
Met my college buddy Siddharth Banerjee today after a long long time. He is like a family to me. It felt awesome. Got calls from Krishna and Prateek, both came as a surprise. Felt real fortunate in life!
5th May 00.20 AM – I am lying upside down on my bed, my head sunk in my pillow immersed in thoughts of my goals and why am I so far from them. (Essentially full of bull).
5th May 00.21 AM – Call from uncle! (I can never imagine my uncle to be awake at that hour!) He says something that summarizes to – ‘Amit I have met with a small accident. There is Aunty and a friend with me. Nobody is hurt. I need help. Aap aa Jaao.’ (Now it was great of uncle to have considered to remember me at a time of need. I am sure I would have been the last person to come on his mind had I not had a heart to heart chat the day before. That chat deserves another post. But I guess I wont write it cause – the bottom line of the conversation was my uncle making me realize how much an ‘Irresponsible bloody fool‘ I am! Both of us loved the conversation and I learned a lot about my uncle’s perception of me, it got us closer.)
… coming back to the melodrama
So I thank God for rescuing me from the dungeons of dark meaningless imagination and head off for Madiwalla, where my uncle had met with his fate.
I reach there and find uncle busy on the phone talking to a sleepy fellow after another. Even I called a few helplines and only the “Just Dial” fellow sounded awake. Our job was simple. Ensure Aunty and all reach home safely. Get the vehicle towed to a safe location. Preferably get an authorized Maruti dealer to take it to their workshop. Come back home and sleep.
What had happened was: My uncle hit a big stone that was lying innocently at a place where it should not be lying. Uncle didn’t see it and !#???^%!! Collision. The right tire meets the angels and so does the tie rod. A bent tie rod simply means that the vehicle can’t move.
Uncle’s friend drops aunty and others in his car, while uncle and I try to find out a tow. I ask Aashish and he searches his CityFind and gives me a couple of useful numbers. He even reminds me of his competitor – Just Dial’s number. After talking to about half a dozen service center numbers, uncle gave up. No one provided 24 hour service it seems. We wanted to tow the vehicle a few meters ahead, so that the vehicle can be off the road. The towing service people ask for 1500/- bucks. We say – ‘balls to you’ (not literally though). Some helpful Autowallah suggests that a service center at Bannerghetta Road might be open. So we decide to check it out. Instead of 1 we find 2. But both had no one but the security guard in the premises. We look at the watch. 2:40 AM it says. We come back to the car, reason that ‘we have put stones at a distance from the car to prevent people from banging it from behind + its right under a street light + it won’t be disturbing anyone so early in the morning ++ and chose to go back home at Banaswadi. We resolved to come back by 7.
Next morning… we come and are relieved to see that the car is just the same as we had left it the previous night. Some kind soul had put a lot more stones with small tree branches behind the car to prevent someone from hitting it. Just as we were appreciating the deed, we reached the back of the car and find it completely smashed. Some LMV had hit the car from behind. No wonder he put so many stones in place!
Uncle looks worried for 5 second and then gets completely normal and decides to go a Maruti Authorized Dealer. We reach some place at Bannerghetta Road and the manager there advices us to get an FIR launched. We spend an hour+ finding the police station. We reach the police station and the folks there refuse to take the complaint. Now we come back to the site of vehicle.
Wow! the the car had blocked the whole traffic! People had removed the stones and some irritated fellow picked up one of the stones and hit the windshield. So now we had 3 accidents. A broken tie-rod, a crashed backside and a broken windshield.
There was an amazing adventure with cops and how we finally managed to get the whole thing towed away. But its an old story now and I am short of time to write about it. In a gist, 4 different cops blasted us at 4 different times for obstructing the traffic. My uncle is a general manager of a big govt company. He was extraordinary in taking the bullshit! Hats off! Then the cops heroically stopped a traffic, pulled people out of the buses and lorries and asked them to lift the car and move it to a better place! … After a long tiring day dealing with the insurance and other stuff, we finally got free by around 3 o clock. Uncle treated me to some yum noodles at Taipan!
I am sure I’d come back years later and read it and smile again.
Today was a harsh day! Every single thing I tried to earn out of my hobbies – failed. Or rather I did not give my heart and soul to achieving success. I firmly believe in the fact that, we create our destinies and everything that looks ambitious initially, becomes downright practical if you focus your attention and energy into making it happen.
However, I am not that great at FOCUSing yet! In fact I have realized that “Lack of focus” is my biggest impediment to success.
May is about to come and I don’t have the resources to last it. In the midst of a heartache, I chose to pick up a job again. I’ll give my final burst to earning from my hobbies till 15th of May, and if I am still broke, I’ll pick up a job.
This journey has not ended yet, so I will not jot down everything that I have learned from it. But I do wanna acknowledge the tremendous amount of good that it has done to my psyche. Man, I am so glad that I got this chance to experience life and do all the wacky things that I have done in the past 4 months.
I have discovered several mental blocks, attitudes and fixed ways of being that stop me in life! I have also realized that getting a job and sticking to it is the easiest thing one can do in life. But thats a sure shot way to mediocrity as well. I quit my job to live a life I love, and being in the rat race is actually 1/(Living a Life I Love). But none the less! There is something called Stomach as well
Freak yar! I am not turning so negative!
I’ll fucking make my way out of this negativity business.
I declare – By May 15th I would be having 10,000 bucks in my Bank Account. Earned by me without writing any code.
Today has been full of breakdowns. There is nothing wrong there but, I am still irritated.
First, I wake up on time and go back to sleep again. Then Soniya wakes me up and I go back to sleep again. Then I wake up at 11.30 in a good mood (As I said, I don’t abuse myself anymore). I quickly finish reading “Surely you are joking Mr Feynman” (there were just about 20+ pages left). I have an orange for my breakfast for I wanted to have a proper lunch at least. Then I check my mail and get a bomb from HSBC. They say that my credit card has been canceled and they’ll be taking legal action. And that I’ll have to pay for the legal expenses as well. Now I am already struggling with my finances and I don’t want to borrow money… but goddamn it. Paying the card money is also important. There has been a lot of confusion with a Rs. 10000 balance transfer from SBI to HSBC. And all the while I have been blaming HSBC for improper conduct. I have spoken to their officials several times and gone to their bank once. But earlier this month, I was informed in my statement that no money has been transferred from SBI and HSBC are not completely at fault.
Anyways, I do have to pay my remaining Rs 13,000 or so immediately. Because the interest rate on the outstanding amount is very high. I had decided not to borrow any money. But now I’ll need to do that. I have had enough experience with generating money to know that this kind of an amount can’t be made in a week’s time doing what I know to do. There are ways, but I wont be able to go home if I follow them. Its such a small situation and it is already giving me the creeps. Come to think about what will happen when I have my own company and the pressure will by 100 times literally!
Ok, coming back to my senses, I chose not to allow these circumstances to get better of me. I’ll speak to my dad, ask him to pay for my credit card. I’ll still take on the game of generating some amount of money to take care of my expenses. I’ll make an action plan around that tonight. I’ll go and talk to the placement cell of my college and propose to be their partner in securing 100% placements. I’ll follow up on the mail that I had sent them regarding a placement training program.
Well there were other breakdowns as well. But its time for action right now. I’ll straightaway go and update my organizer and start executing my plan.
I gotta be powerful and make winning my habit. Its a long long way to go! But I have taken my first steps.
I have been failing so often that I don’t feel bad at failing anymore. And the best thing is, the lesser worse I feel the more I am able to learn from my failure.
So I was not able to make any money still. Did quite some stuff but nothing worked.
So I asked Deepu to pay for my bills. She is my ex, and with her its not like I am borrowing money. With her its like family. My money her money and same way around. So I still don’t feel like I have borrowed.
So what have I learned from this failure. — [ It looks like I am not putting my heart and soul ]– . We always win the games we play. And if I am not earning money then I am playing the game of not earning money.
So how do I transform this area? Possibility of creating 150$. I’ll go all out on creating this thing.
Meanwhile I put up an existence system today. http://www.rememberthemilk.com
Its a good one. And I wanna build a good relationship with this fella! As in what I write in the organizer, I end up doing as well!
.
Really.