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After I finished my MBA, I joined a management consulting firm.

I was working with smart people, getting paid a lot of money, and I was good at it.
It made me happy.

But…

There was something missing.
While I was immensely satisfied, I felt useless.
It was then that I was introduced to the concept of ikigai and I realised why. 

Ikigai is a Japanese term that roughly translates to “a reason for being.”

It states that YOUR reason of being is the intersection of:

1. What you are good at
2. What you love
3. What the world needs
4. What you can be paid for

However, it wasn’t so much the intersection of 4 circles that was interesting.

It was the intersection of 3 or lesser circles that explained a lot more.
It explained to me why I felt useless in consulting.

I was doing something that I was good at, that made me happy, that made my money, BUT it was not something that I THOUGHT the world needed.
No one got up any morning saying, ‘I wish I had more consultants in my life’.
So while I was very close to my ikigai, I was still far away! 

It is this critical nuance that most people miss out on.

The meaning of your life is the intersection of ALL 4 things, not 3 or 2.
And understanding what the intersection of 3/2 circles means, brings us closer to the meaning of Ikigai.

I spend only 10% of my time in content.

20% is spent in learning and reading.
20% is spent in conversations with people.

And a good 50% in thinking and doing nothing.

It is a time distribution that has served me well, and also lead to the biggest opportunities I got lucky to be sitting on.

What does your time distribution look like?

I used to commute to my college by bus.
By availing of my unlimited bus pass.

However, how to get that bus pass was a monthly grind I used to go through, which had a fun of its own.

I used to stand in a queue every month.
For 4-5 hours.
To be able to travel in buses endlessly, by paying Rs. 13 per month.

Those were the days!

And the best part of those days? Meeting my wife on a bus :)

Every job sucks.
Every startup sucks.
Every relationship sucks.

The goal is not to find something that won’t suck at all – because at some point everything does.

The goal is to find something you are happy to struggle along – because you care about it. And who you are becoming in the process.

One of my favourite thinkers, Seth Godin, recently wrote about competition.
And how it is all pervasive.

I totally agree to his PoV.

However, what, then should be the driving force of what you create – your business, a side project or a piece of art you want to create?

That you bring YOU into it.

Not what you must be.
Not what you should be.
Certainly not what the voice of resistance says it should be.

Do your own thing. Your own way.
And you would find a way to beat the competition by not competing against them.
Which is a win-win.

A lot of people reach out to me on social media and emails, and appreciate me for creating content consistently on almost every social media platform, considering it is a difficult thing to be active there all of the time.

However, I am not creating content daily. Nor am I active there all of the time :)

I shoot content for 8 hours every Monday. And that gets into a two-week production cycle. Every week. And then my team takes on their respective roles.

We do the same boring things every week.
However, we don’t do it entire week.
We have our days planned. And we show up. Consistently.

Showing up as per process > Showing up urgently

We track our social media content meticulously.
Every week – on what worked, and what didn’t.

Amidst all of this, one fascinating sight that has emerged is what kind of posts have higher and lower reach.
Yesterday I shared my content journey on Twitter, and how I create content. It received a decent amount of interaction and traction.

However, whenever I post something related to having more validation or having fun, it automatically gets more traction. Because that is what social media is all about.

The key, then, is to create content in a manner that allows you to validate the audience and state your point conclusively.
When you strike that balance consistently, that is when you have won the game of content.

Don’t create.

Document your life.
Your failures.
Your wins.
Your rituals.
What makes you soar.
What makes you plummet.

Be transparent. Share progress.

Quicker than you know, you are creating wonderful content because of authenticity.

Creating content is difficult. However, when you share your life, it is the easiest thing in the world.

How do you celebrate your first half-a-million?

YouTube was the platform where Ankur Warikoo clocked his first 500,000 followers once wariCrew was formed.

To celebrate this milestone, all of us decided to have a virtual offsite, where Supriya from our team led us for a fluid art workshop, followed by lunch and random banter. 

It turns out, celebrating success is equally if not more important than all the hard work to get there.

Some BTS:

1. Ankur’s colours and canvas were used by his kids two days prior only. He had to order a new set :)

2. Some of us were fortunate enough to have it delivered to our doorstep just an hour before the scheduled time.

3. The lunch that day was on the company that day, and Ankur had cham cham in dessert, which of course, he didn’t offer to all of us :))

The onus to market and sell your book is on you.
The onus to keep yourself happy is on you.
The onus to “create” your luck through your habits is on you.

Not anyone else.
They may help you.
Assist you. Root for you.

However, no one can walk the path for you.

The path is yours. So is the onus. Just like the success would be yours.