My favourite TED talk is the talk by Larry Smith on “Why You Will Fail To Have A Great Career”. It is also my worst nightmare. It is what keeps me looking hard for problems that I believe in, that I want to be assosciated with. I take part in multiple forums just trying to see what would interest me. After all, if you want to commit all your time to working on something, you might pick up something that you really believe in....
I am a Jobs’ fan. I mean, by now you must already know this. I have heard his “Stanford commencement address” almost once a month ever since I came across it. I take inspiration from many of his quotes. I don’t want to be another Jobs. I just like his example. But unlike most Jobs fans, my favourite quote wasn’t “Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish”. Simply because I never understood what it meant....
So I got about 60% of one app working on my iPhone to a satisfactory extent. I still need to add a couple of features before it can used as an app. I thought this is perhaps a good time to think about and generally fix the horrible UI that I have created so far. Thinking about it, I suck so bad at UI that I have never written a GUI application all my life....
I sometimes wonder if I should just enroll and do a certificate course in UX. UX, not UI – my visual sensibilities are a tad retarded, but I am good at spotting failures. And I love research. I may not be the best guy to talk to people yet, but I haven’t tried that first hand as well. So maybe I can learn. I think UX is a very interesting topic....
Currently, am an NRI. Wow!! And an expat in Singapore. Super wow!! I never thought I’d be any of that. You know only NRIs are able to afford housing in Abhiramapuram and Mylapore, right? For Teynampet, you may need to be NRI banker or something. And you know the kind of life expats live in Chennai? Splurge is the word. They are the only people who buy stuff at KNK road and that European coffee boutique off-Gopalapuram....
I won some cookies in the office CNY lucky draw this year. Honestly, its an amazing thing to happen. I have tried to participate in lucky draws in many different stages of my life. And each time, my number would never be called out. Then I concluded that these are sour vine. Not for you. I had the same thoughts as I wrote my name in the lucky draw tag at office....
I love this post from Seth Godin. http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2015/03/more-trouble-than-its-worth.html You must read it too. And here is my favorite line in that post: Seeking out the things that are more trouble than most people think they’re worth is a powerful place to be. I have been here. Early on in my career, when I was here, it really gained me the quick recognition and earned me the type of tasks I was best suited for....
Read this post from Seth Godin. I found it profound and enlightening, even outside of the marketing paradigm that Seth talks about in. http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2015/01/your-mood-vs-your-reality.html In fact, this is completely in line with “The Secret”, another book that I’d recommend a read. I’ve never managed to read it through so far, though. http://finishonethingtoday.com As simple as that. Go finish one thing today.
I tried to think about it a lot. Honestly, nothing. Yes, I do worry about terrorism, about women’s safety in India, about general social inequality at times. But I find myself more worried about my career, the stupid choices I have been making etc. Other than this, the only problems that I think about are : those that I believe can help me startup and those that I feel are really bad designs....
2015 indeed started on a great note for me. I managed to get a 1-1 meeting with the Harnhua – Co-Founder at Plunify, a startup specialising in FPGAs and cloud computing based solutions for this space. Well, technically, they aren’t a startup anymore, just a small company. But from my talk with him, I understand that they are pretty much the startup that they set out to be. And probably have all those startup problems 🙂...