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My wife was way out of my league!

I was the super geeky and serious kid who had notions about what is right and wrong.
She was the Shahrukh Khan in everybody’s life – happy and going with the flow :))

We met in our University-special bus of the Delhi University.
Started off as friends.
Gradually began dating a year later.

But then, I was set to move to the US for my studies.

Long distance relationships are known to be tough.

Even today, when technology allows 2 people to be together virtually 24×7.
Imagine what they must have been like, 20 years back?

That’s what Ruchi and I did.

For 2 years, we only spoke for 30 minutes every week.
Because that’s all I could afford!

We made it through.

We got married 7 years after we started dating.

I’ve learned so much from her.
She taught me that happiness is a choice.
One that we make every single day.
Even during the toughest times in my life.

Now, when we look back at our photographs from college,
I look at her and say, “Thank you.”
Because I have no idea why she chose me, but I’m glad she did.

And she happily says, “You are welcome!” ??

The year is 2003.

I am a student in the US, in the 3rd semester of my MS program.
We’ve just finished a class where our professor has given us an assignment, convinced that no one would be able to solve it.

He didn’t say that, but everyone could see it on his face.
You know, those professors who derive pleasure from the pain of students :)

It is an individual assignment.
I sat down and OMG, the professor was right.

I don’t even know where to start.

Unlike India, where, by now I would have called 7 of my friends and we would be “exchanging notes” on how to complete, that is not the done thing in the US.

If it is an individual assignment, it is an individual assignment.

I am staring at my textbook.
Clueless.

And my eyes go to the name of the author.

He is a professor of Physics at Princeton University. Expected to win the Nobel Prize anytime now.

Basically GOD in the field.

I google him.
Land up on his webpage.
Which has his email.
And I tell myself, “Let’s ask him how to solve this assignment. He would surely know!”

I draft an email that I regret I do have access to anymore, except in my memory.
In 5 minutes I get a response, “Where are you stuck?”

I don’t make a big deal of it.

I send an email. He replies.
That is how it works.
That is how emails work!

I reply back (you won’t believe this!), “Can you come online on Yahoo messenger?”

(If you do not know about Yahoo messenger, think Tinder in the 2000s, but not for dating, and not with pictures. OK – that wasn’t helpful, I assume!)

He replies yes.

We come online on Yahoo messenger.
I ask him questions.
He patiently replies.
I actually get my assignment done.

I thank him, wish him good night and we both log off.

That’s it!

I submit the assignment and I was the ONLY student who cracked it.

My professor is now both impressed.
And shattered.

He calls me and asks me how the hell did I get this done.
And I, matter of fact, tell him that the author of your textbook helped me.

“Sorry, what? Dr. X helped you?”
“Yes.”
“How did he help you?”
“I sent him an email, asking for help. He replied yes. And then he helped me.”
“You sent Dr. X an email, asking for homework help?”
“Yes. Am I in trouble?”
“YOU SENT Dr. X AN EMAIL, ASKING FOR HOMEWORK HELP?”
“Ummm. Yes. You are scaring me now?”

“YOUUUU SENTTTT Dr. X AN EMAILLLL, ASKINGGG FORRR HOMEWORKKKKK HELPPPPP?????”
“Haan bhai haan!!!”

You get the drift!

Cold emails have been awesome, ever since emails came into being.

Here is the truth.

Most people when they start working, check their emails more than they check other messages (except perhaps WhatsApp).
But most students do not communicate via email.
So they think no one does.

Wrong!

The people who will give you a job, an internship, a freelancing gig – all of them check their emails.
Send them emails – please!

Open doors to opportunities that are NOT going to be listed on some job portal, or a LinkedIn post.

I scored 57/100 in English in Class 12!

I honestly did not expect this disaster!
I had been a top performer across all subjects, all through school.
I felt like a failure.

But here I am today!

So for anyone feeling like how I felt back then, remember…

Your marks do not have the power to define you.
YOU have that power.

Take it from someone who has failed several times.

The fact that you are still here is the biggest gift you have.
You have time.
You have you.
Make the most of it.

“How did I do?””
“What can I do to get better?”

Managers who answer this are true leaders.
Team members who seek this are future leaders.

If you died, your manager would put out a job posting in 48 hours looking for a replacement.

Your friends and family will never get that chance.

As much as your job is necessary, do not ignore the relationships where you remain irreplaceable.

If you want to be successful, you should know these 5 things about success:

1. “I want people to know I am successful” is a trap.

You want that phone, that car, that salary, that brand – to look good.
You want people to talk highly of you.

Truth is – people’s opinions about you don’t make you successful.
You are successful when you feel successful within!

2. If you are waiting for success to share your failure story, you haven’t understood failure. Or success.

3. The leading indicator of professional success is not the school you went to.

Not your grades.
Not your intelligence.
Not your ambition.

It’s your curiosity.

4. There is no success without micromanagement.

Micromanage the process.
Never the people.

5. Nothing will define success better than going to bed everyday, knowing you lived your day the way you wanted to, without caring what the world thinks of you.

This is a story across 20 years, that I still can’t believe.

27th August 2002 – I took my first ever flight in my life.
It was for the USA.

Papa had to take a Rs. 55,000 loan to pay for the one-way ticket.

I still remember the scene at the Delhi airport.
My entire family had come to see me off.
Ruchi had come too.
Everyone was crying.
I was crying too.

But I was also excited.

This is what I had always dreamt of.
To go to the US for a fine education, become a space scientist, join NASA, land on Mars.
And that dream was finally coming true.

27th August 2022 – exactly 20 years to the day I left for Michigan State, the university confirmed me as a speaker for their alumni speaker series.

I spoke at the university this April.
Shared my journey with the current students.

19 years back, when I dropped out and came back to India, if someone had come up to me and said:

“Hey – I am from the future. And I have some exciting news for you.
In about 19 years, you will have more than 8M+ people following you on something really cool called social media.
You would have written two best selling books.
You will be invited by top companies to address their employees and motivate them.
Forget all of that – this very university that you are dropping out from, will call you back to address their students.”

I would have told the person to get a CT Scan :))

But here I am.
Living this life.
Not because I am the smartest person I know or the most hard working person I know.
I am living this life because I did not give up on myself.

A lot of you would be going through something similar in your lives.
A new company, a new city, a new career, a new relationship, or a new experience.
And it may not always turn out to be what you wanted it to be.

But that’s not the end.
There is never any end, until the day we all die.

Up until that day, you have yourself.
And I wish for you to find that yourself, one day :) 

When I tell people that Ruchi (my wife) and I had a long-distance relationship for 2 years when I was studying in the US, an obvious question is “How did you two manage?”

And the answer – as crazy as it may sound, is in part – “because we spoke only once a week”.

You see, I think a big reason why relationships are hard and have become harder, is because the two individuals are perpetually in each other’s face!

Today’s technology allows for that.
WhatsApp, video calling, social media, location tracking – it seems wonderful, isn’t it?
Until it isn’t.

Before becoming a partner to someone else, we need to become a friend to ourselves.

And that means, distance.
Distance helps.
It helps us process what we go through and what we went through.

When I was in the US in 2002, none of this technology existed.
Calling was expensive.
I could only afford a 30 minute call once a week.
So that was what it was.

Every Thursday, I would call Ruchi on her landline.
And we would talk for 30 minutes, through a calling card.
Which meant there was no “speak to me for 5 minutes more”.
In 30 minutes, the call would disconnect.

So we were focused.
We cherished those 30 minutes.
It was all we had.

So we didn’t engage in random chatter.
That was the time we caught up on each other’s lives.
And it was the time when we had to be careful of what we chose to share.
Because time was precious.
It was our currency.

Our next opportunity would come after a week!

Imagine if that was the case today.
Imagine if all you got was 30 minutes with your partner every week.

How differently would you act?

Would you still engage in that useless fight? Pick up that unnecessary argument? Lose your patience over that random person you felt threatened by?
Or would you do everything to make the other person feel loved? And cared for? And heard?

Just because you can speak to your partner every second, do not.
Just because you can connect with them on demand, do not.

Give yourself the space to long for them.
For them to long for you.

Do not misuse the privilege you have.
Do not waste a relationship because technology made it easier to start one.

Relationships still need to be built.
Build one!

Recall the time when we asked a question in class and our teacher dismissed it as a stupid question?

Suddenly we felt alone.

The entire class laughed at us.
We felt the teacher doesn’t like us anymore.
We wondered why we asked in the first place.
The best thing would have been to shut up instead.

So, that’s what we did.

We stopped asking.
We stopped questioning.
Instead, we focused on memorising answers.
Answers that helped us score in exams.

Today, as adults, we have trained ourselves to not ask.
Just to answer.

What we do not realise is that the only way to grow in life is by asking questions.
To never ever stop your curiosity.
Especially because of what we think people might think.

That’s the way I have grown.
And I love this way of growing :)))

1. Do something together that you used to do as a child.
2. Help them. They are getting older.
3. Tell them you are thankful for them.