I wanted to experiment with the format today. Instead of talking about my day and sharing highlights from it, I want to talk randomly about thoughts that crossed my mind in the last two days.

Ready?

About 30-day series, this is how I rate it so far:

• Freelancing: 6/10

• Content Creation: 8/10

• Content Consumption: 4/10

• Mental Health: 6/10

• Physical Health: 2/10

• Friends and Family 8/10

• Hobbies: 3/10

Honestly, it’s a little concerning. At the end of 30 days, I’ll be happy to have 7/10 in all of them over these wild fluctuations. After all, the 30-day series is about fixing ‘life,’ which translates to overall development.

The real challenge begins now—the next 20 days will be boring, and I need discipline to pull it off.

Will I be disciplined enough to stick to boring routines? We’ll find out.

The privilege and curse of remote work

Remote work is a double-edged sword.

I live in a peaceful place. The air is good, hardly any noises around, and we got some trees too. If you’re working on an exciting project, it’s easier to get lost in the productive atmosphere at my place. You’ll have zero distractions. It’s just me at home (both my parents work from the office.)

But the other side is not pretty.

As much as the isolation lifts you into an insane focus zone, it can also push you into loneliness. You have your team remotely, and your friends are just a call away, yet there is something special about physical presence that I sometimes miss while working remotely.

I reap the benefits. But it has its downsides.

Instruments

I use background work music (aka focus music) to distract myself a little to avoid bigger distractions. After a few days, it got monotonous or boring, so I started listening to instrumentals.

Boyyy, have I made the right decision?!!

Instrumentals are perfect for me. They are subtle enough to keep the atmosphere lively and not too grand (especially with no lyrics) to engage me in singing.

If you haven’t already, I’d recommend it. Especially ARR instrumentals.

Teacher

Out of many things I’d like to be called, Teacher is a tag I wouldn’t mind (or even love.)

I like the teaching process: simplification of concepts, helping a person solve a problem, using analogies, and sharing what I learned so someone can adapt it and make it even better.

The next time some random relative asks me what I do, I’ll say Teacher. It would be sooooooo fun to watch their reaction.

While I have a few more things to talk about, I think it’s a good place to wrap it up, considering I am damn tired and I don’t want to make typos like ‘fixing my day in 30 days’ in yesterday’s subject line.

Before we wrap up, a few highlights:

• If the cold climate is trying to stop me from working and wants to make me sleep all day, it’s clearly working. I find it hard to get into my best active state. But the cyclone in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh is unfortunate. I hope everyone will be fine

• Spent a couple of hours in the afternoon with my friend and another two hours in the evening with Sreekar. I started writing this email after I came home from his place

• Talked to Priya for an hour about the designs in the ebooks we’re coming up with. She’s really cool with designs, and she is responsible for making me look good on Cognition (my biz newsletter) thumbnails

• Wrote a really good Cognition issue

• Feel free to slap me if I don’t workout first thing in the morning tomorrow

Been a long day. I hope you’re doing well.

Will chat tomorrow. Take care and good night!!