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We feel lonely without others because we have not built a friendship with our own selves.

Who else can be your best friend, but you?

You know your strengths. You know your weaknesses. You know your secrets. You know your desires. You know your mind.

The truth is – the less we know ourselves, the more we seek to know ourselves through others.

But they do not know us.

They know a small part of us.

But we will form an entire image of ourselves, through the limited view that they have of our life.

Does this mean we do not need friends?

Of course not. We need friends.

If one is friends with their own self, then one will still benefit from friends.

But we seem to need them because we think we are alone and need to share our thoughts, sorrows, and experiences.

That is an excuse to not be able to do so with your own self.

Become your best friend.

In our parents’ generation, it was a privilege to be a specialist.
To be the best and fastest in the world at one thing was the only way to survive.

With unlimited opportunities in the information age, things have reversed.

As someone who wants to climb the corporate ladder, your role is managing people instead of core work.

This needs breadth, experience and understanding of work, in addition to core skills.

Thus, becoming a generalist comes with possibilities of broader spectrum and a stronger profile.

If we are a generalist, we have a speciality of taking different paths.

We’re confused about what to do in life.

And college education certainly hasn’t helped.

Why not explore our way through life, instead of being in a hurry to settle down?

Try out stand up comedy and share videos, and look at the reactions of people.
Create music if we love it, and see if others resonate with it
Get internships in design or coding, if that is what intrigues you.

It is better to be lost and busy in the chase of finding yourself, instead of being lost and busy in the rat race of never knowing yourself.

You have two ideas for your startup, but not sure which one.
Or perhaps two job offers.
Or two career options, and you cannot decide.

You are looking for a solution, but to no avail.

What if we looked for questions instead, whenever we were faced with a dilemma?

Why do I want to make that decision in the first place?
What would change for me because of that decision?
What do we want from that decision?

Looking for questions instead of solutions is asking questions about the problem.

There are some days when Instagram is down.

Sometimes Facebook is, WhatsApp is, Twitter/X as well.

I remember when that happened with Google, we all lost it.
“Dependency” was the word of the day.

We suddenly didn’t know what to do.
How to spend our time.

All we kept doing was check the platform incessantly, showing how much we depend on it.

The next time a platform goes down, try a crazy thing: Go for a walk.
Your world is what your eyes see, not what the screen shows!

We own the screens we own. Not the other way round.

I will spend time with my family later.
That email is important.

I will say “I love you” to my loved ones later.
That love for work is more important.

I will call my parents over the weekend.
Grind on the weekdays is more important.

I don’t have the time!

We don’t find time; we make time.
Because we will never know when we will run out of it.

One of the mistakes we make early in our lives is feeling morally obligated to help others.

If we have something that they don’t, maybe we could help.
And when we do offer our help and that still doesn’t help, we feel we must have done something wrong.
Thus starts a vicious cycle of self-blame and self-criticism.

Except that it helps no one.
And certainly makes no one happy.

When we really want to help others, we could start with listening.
Not trying to help, instead just listening.
And being positive.
While we may still not be able to give them “things”, we will still give them the right vibe.

A rather unusual way to help others is to be happy yourself.

We are constantly fighting for something.
With someone.

Fighting with our parents, our siblings, our boss.
Trying to convince them that we are right.

And that they are wrong.

Defeating them, however, is easy.
Winning over them is easy.

What isn’t easy, though, is to win them.

Real victory is not in winning over people.
It is winning people over!

When we consume antibiotics, we need them.
Right now!

We don’t need vitamins right now.
If we consume them though, we may not need antibiotics in the future.

Good books, thoughtful conversations, observing and learning, are vitamins.

We don’t need them right now. However, if we have them, we may not need to have the urgent need for antibiotics in the future.

A vitamin a day keeps antibiotics away!

How to not get affected by criticism?

Is it even possible to not overthink it?

Whenever we are affected by criticism, an important reminder to ask ourselves is – how do we feel when the opposite happens? How do we feel when we hear praise?

Because if we feel really good when someone appreciates us, we unconsciously hand over the remote control to our emotions. That remote control will determine our state of mind for good and for the bad.

To not get affected by criticism, start with not getting affected by praise.

Calmness is power.