My Notes - Vishal Khandelwal

Stop Being So Busy

May 15, 2018 | Leave a Comment

As we coast through our lives day after day, being extremely busy at our obligations, we are absent from our selves. The idea for most of us is to do than to be. And thus, life seems short because we all have so much to do.

But then, “Life is long,” wrote the Roman philosopher Seneca, “…if you know how to use it.”

In his brilliant treatise written 2,000 years ago, Seneca wrote…

It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements if it were all well invested. But when it is wasted in heedless luxury and spent on no good activity, we are forced at last by death’s final constraint to realize that it has passed away before we knew it was passing. So it is: we are not given a short life but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it… Life is long if you know how to use it.

So, while there’s a huge mass of time ahead of us, it passes much faster than we think. Our kids grow up fast. We get gray hairs before we’re done getting our bearings on life.

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Before You Quit Your Job

May 13, 2018 | 28 Comments

Getting out of your comfort zone is the most difficult thing in the world to do. But then, the thing that I learnt early in my life (thanks to an advice from someone I respect a lot) was that the time to quit your job is before it starts to feel painful.

The worst time to quit is when the pain is the greatest, simply because decisions made during great pain are rarely good decisions.

So, sometime in 2010, I decided to quit my job just as I was starting to get comfortable in it. That comfort was leading me to stagnation, and thus pain. I quit in 2011.

That my spouse was strongly by my side – not just emotionally, but also rationally – was an important factor that helped me in my decision making. Our second child was on the way when I had decided to quit, but that acted more of an incentive than a deterrent to quitting my job. The thought of taking care of my kids, and seeing them grow every day, encouraged me to move fast in this decision.

Shortcuts

May 11, 2018 | 11 Comments

It is human nature to want to get a job done as quickly as possible. Like you cross the street between intersections instead of using the zebra crossing. Or you jump a fence instead of using the gate.

It is not your problem!

Most of us have grown up being told that it’s important to accomplish as much as we can. But what we often aren’t told is that rushing can result in accidents, errors, and more time spent in the long run.

It is often not worth it.

Warren Buffett, the investing legend, says, “No matter how great the talent or efforts, some things just take time. You can’t produce a baby in one month by getting nine women pregnant.”

This rule applies to almost every sphere of life. Some things just take time.

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Burn Your Boat

May 10, 2018 | 13 Comments

It seems like yesterday, but it was nearly seven years ago. I was at the crossroad of my career and was facing an important decision. The outcome would greatly impact my future.

I had spent the past 8 years working in the job of a stock market analyst. My job was comfortable, and the money that came with it was good enough. But something seemed missing. I took a few years to realize this, but what was missing was the need to have complete control over my life and decisions. I did not like someone else calling the shots for me and maybe, in a phone call, deciding what my future would look like.

And thus, after much deliberation and after ensuring that I had financial cushion to support me for a couple of years, I quit my job.

The first year was tough. Compounding the fact that I was trying to build credibility, brand myself and make meaningful connections in a new field, I was also dealing with the arrival of my second child.

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The One Thing You Need to Grow and Prosper

May 1, 2018 | 5 Comments

There is one thing that is common to you and me. We have this as the root of our relationship.

It is also common to any organisation, nation, economy, and civilization.

This one thing, if absent, will destroy the most the most successful business, bring down the most powerful government, put brakes on the most thriving economy, destruct the most influential leadership, the greatest friendship, and the deepest love.

But if developed and leveraged, this one thing has the ability to create unparalleled success and affluence in every dimension of life.

Writing is Magic

April 25, 2018 | Leave a Comment

“You can approach the act of writing with nervousness, excitement, hopefulness, or even despair–the sense that you can never completely put on the page what’s in your mind and heart. You can come to the act with your fists clenched and your eyes narrowed, ready to kick ass and take down names. You can come to it because you want a girl to marry you or because you want to change the world. Come to it any way but lightly. Let me say it again: you must not come lightly to the blank page.” – Stephen King, On Writing

I came across this wonderful thought while reading King’s autobiography (for the third time!) last weekend.
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