Number 37

Health is “THE” most important thing in life. You could be having millions of dollars in bank but it’s hardly worth anything if you can’t get out of the bed in the morning. About 4 years ago, I felt pain in my left leg which over the years turned into debilitating chronic pain that stays with me everyday. I spent thousands of dollars and days of my valuable time in vain. Few more drastic events of medical emergencies in the family shook me to the core. It was a wake up call for me. I learnt the hard way. Don’t wait for that call. Do not wait for something drastic to happen. Get moving. Do anything that you like — walk, swim, run, play sports, do yoga or lift weights. But do something. When I say health, I equally emphasize on physical and mental aspect of it. Exercise both.

Universe works in equilibrium.

You cannot receive anything that you don’t give. Anything that you want from others— time, attention, love, respect, money; you have to give first. If you don’t give, you don’t get. You can try to test it yourself. However, you have to be very alert and open to see the mechanism of this law.

Time = Attention.

You manage your time by managing your attention. We all have the same amount of time and we always seem to be complaining of not having enough. We often hear the term “time management”. There are millions of books and tools available which claim to help you better manage your time. I am sure many of them work but I realised that root of the problem lies in behavioral aspect. Only thing I needed to take care was how I use my attention. Is your attention so fragile that it runs after every stimuli that comes into your perception?? if yes, then you will always feel scarcity of time. Filter out your priorities and pour your attention fully in it rather than being tethered to every distraction. Observe closely if you are using your attention deliberately or if it slips out involuntarily.

Money is important.

If I can summarize in a sentence, this is what my take on Money is.

Neither neglect the importance of money nor get obsessed with it.

Money is never enough until you feel you have enough. Pay attention to the gap, the gap between your earning and spending. If this gap is narrow and stays constant regardless of how much money you earn, you will always feel lack of money.

Money doesn’t buy happiness but neither poverty. Money is good. I love money. I want money. Money will get me into a brand new Wolfsburg Golf R which will take me to 100km/h from standstill in 4.6 seconds when I press the right foot down. Eventhough transitory, it will make me happy. I fantasize about it everyday. But that’s not the point. As long as money is not the only focal point of life, it’s all good. If your pursuit of money contaminates other important aspects of your life such as health, relationship etc, money is not worth the money. But just to get into Wolfsburg Golf R, will I work extra hours, take up weekend work or find another job that pays me well but keeps me away from my family for months?? I don’t think so. A new car is not the right trigger to pursue money if it compromises key priorities. I will never trade family time for the sole pursuit of money. Spend some, invest some and if leftover, donate some.

It is not wealth that stands in the way of liberation but the attachment to wealth.” — E.F. Schumacher

Letting go is freedom.

Eliminate the unnecessary. If you don’t use it, lose it. If you don’t know where to start, go and look into your wardrobe first. Throw out or donate that pair of shoes or old t-shirt that you haven’t worn in years. Same with people and shitty relationships. Do not let others suck your inner peace. Anything or anyone that costs your natural state of being — Remove.

Take care of your friends.

Life sucks without friends. They are crucial for happy life and make it more fun. If you want to read more, I have written at length about friendship here. You should have at least one friend in life whom you can talk any shit that you can’t talk with anyone else on the planet. No, not even family.

Happiness is directly proportional to gratitude.

Sounds cliché yeah? Maybe. But I have experienced significant benefits of gratitude practice. How often we take things for granted? How often we forget about things we have and get dragged by the things we want? I call my wife a “gratitude police”. I whinge and complain a lot at times. Every time I go into that complaining mode, she brings me back to the things we have in our lives that I should be immensely grateful for. And I have seen her virtue of being grateful reflect in other parts of her life. She is definitely happier person than I am. She walks her talk. I have no doubts on link between happiness and gratefulness. As they say, be grateful and you will have more things to be grateful for. Just recently on my way to work in a freezing cold morning of Melbourne with heavy rain, I was sitting in my car and felt miserable! I was complaining about weather in my head and it felt quite depressing! I don’t like cold. But then suddenly I told myself,

“hang on dude..its 11 degrees cold outside and raining but you are inside the car cruising at 100km/h sitting in a perfectly comfortable environment of 20.5 degrees with leather seats heating up your bum while you’re listening to your favorite podcast!!??”

It was a shocking realization!! What is really the point of complaining about things that are not in our control?? In fact, in this instance, I did have full control and yet I was utterly miserable. One may argue that you cannot be grateful in all situations. How can you be grateful if you have lost a loved one? How can you feel grateful if someone close to you is in enormous pain? Well, when you face such situation, ask yourself if there is at-least one thing in your life that you can be grateful for at that point in time?  And the answer to that question is YES. Always. There is always something in your life that you can be grateful for regardless. Here is the video I often go back to when I am down and it never fails to lift me up.

People will tell you all the time that “your life will suck….”

Each and every stage of my life, I was told that when I reach to the next stage, my life will suck. For e.g. once you start working, your life will suck. Once you get married, you are screwed. Once you have mortgage, you are fu%$ed. Once you have a kid, your life is finished. At every stage, people will discourage and tell you that your life will suck when the next thing happens. I am not saying it’s entirely false. At times, you will feel like your life sucks. But there is always something great comes out of each new phase of life. Yes I have a mortgage but I still enjoy my cars, watching movies in cinemas and eating out. I have a kid but I still travel and do things I want to do. The very nature of life is to suck. So work with this fact not fight with it. Your life will suck only if you want it to suck.

Not everyone will like you.

If everyone likes you, you are doing something wrong. The best way to deal with people who have issues with you — Do not give them any power to rattle your soul. Just watch them pass by. Do not react or confront. Do not entertain their dramas. Your reaction is the feast to their ego. Stop feeding them.

Regrets, Decisions, Mistakes.

I often hear people claim proudly “ I don’t have any regrets”. But I think the other way. You must have few regrets. Regret to me is a mistake in the past. Regret is poor decision-making or indecision in the past. Regrets are growth factors. Often, the worst mistakes/decisions in the past lead to the most profound understanding and experiences in life. At the time of taking a wrong decision or making a mistake, you obviously don’t know that you’re making a wrong decision. If you knew, you wouldn’t make it! Make mistakes but once you know that you have stuffed up, correct it if you are in a position to do so. Living with your mistake will be far more detrimental in the long run than little discomfort of correcting it immediately.

If you can do it today, don’t wait for tomorrow.

Anything that makes you alive or brings you joy, you must pursue immediately without wasting any time. If you are in a position to do something that you love, you must not delay it just for the sake of delaying it.

For example, if you like travelling but delay it by thinking of accumulating more money now and do the travel in retirement! If you have money and would love to own a sports car now but instead you pour money in investments for future security just because other people suggest its wise to do so.

Problem is that we think we have time and we live as if we know how much time we have. As philosophical as it may sound, it is a simple fact! You never know when your time is up. Here is the short excerpt from Sam Harris’ talk about death and time. He isn’t telling anything philosophical or extraordinary here but just plain simple fact.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0R3yJA7TnSk

If you die unexpectedly, you missed out on everything; a sports car, travel and your investments. Its a lose-lose situation. And there is 50% chance that this can happen. Take risks for things that are important to you in life.

Start with yourself.

This is a golden nugget. I cannot stress enough how important it is. It has helped me in some remarkable ways. Work on yourself. Invest in yourself. If you want to change the world, change yourself first. If you want to make others happy, make yourself happy first. If you want to help others, help yourself first. Majority of life problems start with you but we are programmed to think that cause of these problems reside outside of us; external situations, other people etc. Sometimes, all you need is a little tweak in how you think and perceive the problem.

If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. — Wayne Dyer

Only constant is change. Everything changes and so am I. There is no doubt that I am a different person than I was 10 years ago. But despite all changes, I feel there is a side of me that is unchanged. I don’t know how to describe it but I feel really good about this unchanged dimension of me.

See you again on 12th May 2018 with some more musings.