So, what happened in the 20s?
Shobhika B.
Senior Consultant @ Deutsche Bank | Business Architect, AWS & Google Cloud Partner
When I was growing up, I contested a few professions in my head such as Doctor, Teacher, Engineer, Lawyer, Interior Decorator, Fashion Designer, Counsellor, Rockstar, Blogger, Traveller, Entrepreneur, Journalist and so on. So, when the time came to choose my career path, I selected Computer Science Engineering just like other teenagers around that time but I could not drop other subjects as they became a part of my personality somewhere. To be frank, what happened is, I hated opportunity cost in my 20s to an extent that I practiced every subject in isolation to understand the effect of the law of marginal utility in each area and to see if my head gives up in a few areas revealing my true subjects. But, it turned out to be a fight between my head and I, as I have to tame my wild head, using meditation and journaling, because my head ran in every direction as I was an all-rounder. No matter what I did, I felt like a Tinkerbell, a Disney fairy who did not want to become a Tinker fairy but wanted to experiment in every field possible just to know that Tinkering is her niche. Coming back to this story, once I knew that I am on a right track, and someday, I would become a manager, I chose a masters' degree to further my interest in Information Systems and Operations Management learning all about Digital Transformation and Fourth Industrial revolution.
Once I earned my masters' degree, I took an assignment again to check if I can accomplish work-life balance, by giving 100% throughput in my professional zone pursuing my interests back in my personal zone. It turned out to be a consolation as I was balancing personal and professional zones very well. Further, my personal habit of market research provoked me to contest ideas from the digital landscape to streamline business processes and run lean operations in the industry. Besides working on my engineering niche, in my personal life too, I constantly searched for supporting data and collected pieces of evidence for daily talks only to share validated knowledge with my circle. I also researched the millennial mindset of getting addicted to games, spending sleepless nights on social media, not reading newspapers, healthy lifestyle, and dodging in-person conversations with loved ones as well. So, below are my learnings of my 20s through practicing the power of having a disciplined lifestyle which never came from only setting a timetable but also understanding disruption in the market. Because our lives never exist in isolation but in circles and you prepare for the future every day.
1.????Continuous Learning
There is a learning curve involved in building concrete theories in every sphere of our existence that can be impacting our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual areas. So, I tried to sit with the subject, researched supporting theories online and developed a concrete concept with supporting data and pieces of evidence. I connected multiple subjects through logical reasoning, root cause analysis, pattern recognition, problem-solving, and data sufficiency. Also, I inferred analogies from multiple areas and understood the data in question. Further, I noticed that it might take 6 weeks to 2 years to learn the subject depending on my previous knowledge as I might also have to fill gaps in understanding the subject. I realised that the first step was the hardest as the brain, by default, gives up on the new topic. Currently, I allocate an hour daily to upscale my knowledge in different areas with the supporting data to do the preliminary analysis of the problem. Then, once I prepare those topics, I take tests online just to see where do I stand in the market. Also, I practice writing daily, because for me, going through texts is just skimming the topics but when I arrange my learnings and opinions on the topic, it helps me an in-depth understanding of the subject.
2.????Compartmentalizing the brain
When I was 25 years old, I came across the term "Compartmentalize" which means to segregate subjects separately to understand them one by one. Because sometimes when we work in offices, we forget that we only try to understand management and do not work on core areas to attack the business problem at hand. Through mind-mapping and writing concepts in a file over a period of time makes you aware on how you grew in your subject in the long run. Further, I experimented with a PowerPoint presentation and recorded my voiceover to see how well I was able to deliver the message. Most of the time, I thought I could engage the audience but, in reality, as per feedback, I realized the audience needed the background story or chronological order on the topic.
3.????Food & Nutrition
When it came to Food & Nutrition, I started with 10-15 minutes quick meals and gradually try cooking for 40-60 minutes long dishes.?I allocated time to prepare meals in advance by buying veggies and groceries on the weekends. Coming from India, it is hard to find a recipe that requires less than 30 minutes as our simple masala chai consumes good 15 minutes in the making. But I tried many recipes in the past decade to adjust to the shock of full-time cooking with the work routine. Also, I tried to balance my daily nutrition because of my dry eyes and ate as many micronutrients as possible where The Eating Well Guide by NHS helped me understand ingredients on the plate. From time to time, I try to understand the macro and micro-nutrition to have a wholesome meal. Over the period of time, I realized that over-processed food such as Pizza, Pasta, Coffee, and Cakes makes me sad if I consume them too much but fresh products such as Salads, Fresh cut Chicken, Lentils & Rice, Fresh Cream, and Potato makes me satisfied. Also, on the contrary belief, I indulged in consuming a lot of fat and protein, and I ate processed food by combining them with the fresh veggies/fruits for a quick indulgence from time to time, after all, who can leave a piece of cake behind when you have a bad day. A quick tip, if you are feeling very sad, eat a clementine/orange or drink a glass full of fresh orange juice with a calm head to overcome a bad day. Coming from my experience, I can guarantee nobody gets fat on a good diet, good mental health, and an active lifestyle. So, eat well, work on your niche daily, and move a little to have a healthy lifestyle. Even doing household chores counts in staying fit. If you are hungry between your meals, snack on kids meal, fruits, and trail mixes.
4.????Travel
Coming from the software development industry, I seldom had a chance to visit places from my bucket list but whenever I had time, I tried to create a memorable trip. In my opinion, take a domestic or international trip, pick a few places that you are interested in, and even if you have to travel solo, travel please. If I were you, I would do some preliminary analysis of the place and plan in advance to stay comfortable in that area. If you want to indulge in the living, try to take a vacation of a few weeks disconnecting from social media, or if you get a chance to take a trip for your assignments, try to indulge in the local food, travel, culture, and living. Further, if you are interested in pairing wine, beer, whiskey with your food, try to book classes online in that country for a day as they might have breweries, distilleries, and wineries tours respectively. Also, you can try to book farm visits for strawberry picking and pumpkin picking from a patch as well. Prepare a bucket list, just pick the place, pack your bags, and leave for a journey of a lifetime. You might be knowing a few things from school and college days, but try to build a connection with people, learn common vocabulary, and learn local etiquettes because culture shock is also real.
5.????Work-life Balance
Once I pushed myself to the limit and discovered my true potential, I pursued work-life balance no matter what as all work and no play makes jack a dull boy. Also, I enjoyed cooking, laundry, cleaning, sports, and painting as these activities helped me raise my consciousness to a different level. Further, I constantly felt that I was in a comfort zone and lost track of time in pursuing trivial conquests, so I came up with an aggressive approach to beat the problem at hand through working in isolation for some time to understand the parameters in the business problem, then coming back to my original all-rounder self. To stay motivated, I took a break and rewarded myself with experiences such as travelling to a place, taking a vacation on the beach or buying that thing on my Wishlist. As I never refrained from indulging in entertainment and lifestyle, I wanted to figure out my work-life balance to perform well in the zone.
6.????Personal Finance
I didn't take any risk until I had a full-time income and down payment to take that pressure of a liability. For me, Risk Planning took a lot of investment in the form of time, resources, and money, so I started learning the market by calculating areas I was interested in. For example, if I was interested in the consumer market and cohort analysis, I purchased dresses online and in-store just to see how people and businesses behaved in that category or demographics from an outsider perspective. Also, I tried to invest in travelling experiences to educate myself on cultural sensitivity and to evaluate my wanderlust for the places. Further, I tried free/paid courses online that could have helped me gain knowledge as these areas is also an expense these days which I wanted to reduce through my personal feedback rather than heeding someone's advice because people can speak from their personal biases or negative experiences. For the stock market and IT tax calculation, I used free resources provided by banks and Government organisations. In the end, actually, I constantly questioned minimalism vs conscious purchasing as I wanted to be prudent instead of working in two extremes, spending too much on extravaganzas or depriving myself of indulgences.
Moreover, speaking from my personal experience, I did not want to bring everything I saw in the catalogue as everything enticed me at one point in time. Hence, I had to come up with strategies to keep statement pieces only that I could connect to and not hoard anything because I have purchasing power. First, I create a wishlist and bucket list for items and travel experiences on Pinterest or Amazon instead of purchasing on an impulse. Then, I watched those lists to see what do I like and dislike after a month or two or even a year to shortlist my favourite items/ places before spending money on the item and regretting it later. Second, I visited stores to see what apparel looked good on me before purchasing them online because what looks good on the mannequin might not look good on me. Third, I am a warm tone person and if I am shopping in a store without a trial room, I used to check the colour against my skin tone just to see if liked that colour on me because I don't a mirror. I hope that these three tricks help you in the conscious shopping experience as well.?
7.????Public Speaking & Creative Writing
I practiced Public Speaking/ impromptu speeches as I had stage fright at one point in my life. I started writing drafts to deliver my presentation. Later, to improvise my speeches, I recorded my write-ups and corrected my stances, intonations, and anecdotes. Moreover, in offices, we have to be answerable for every task and sometimes, we forget that we are sharing random thoughts without framing the right questions. The practice of impromptu speaking and working on my niche helped me in staying confident in the work zone as well. Also, I prepared for my elevator pitch during my masters' course for the moment when I have to grab that job offer.
8.????Build your Self- Awareness
For me, to preserve personal psychology in the industry was the hardest as I was getting assessed from people's encounters in the past. Though it could be baggage from their personal lives, but I taught myself to look at every new encounter from the fresh eye instead of dumping my previous baggage on the younger generation. When I felt down, I wrote my interests and accomplishments on a repeat and rewind just to see my abrupt patterns. Further, there was a point in time, when I was not ready to listen to anybody because I was too deep in my subject as I didn't want anybody to counter my arguments on the subject and break the learning curve. I was frustrated but soon, I stumbled on Dale Carnegie's book "How to win friends and influence people" on the paradigm shift. I have to say, I started to implode as others were not practicing listening likewise while conversating on topics. Soon, I was in a constant dilemma as I avoided arguments to not appear as an inconsiderate person or a people pleaser. I tried to make a note of every negative episode in my life to see the encounters from their and my side to become self-aware and avoid interpersonal conflict. After all, everybody has different interests, personality traits, and ambitions and we are all trying to live together. In my opinion, self-awareness is a continuous journey to unravel my true talents from time to time as every day adds a new perspective to the present.
9.????Start reading Newspapers, Magazines, and Journals
I started studying Governance, Business, Lifestyle, Science, Politics, Sports, Food, and Market constantly to keep up with the current trends. Also, nothing works in isolation as every subject is connected. To prepare myself for the business war, I prepared thoroughly for competitive exams in my 20s. I had only one strategy, even if I don't make it to the B-School, I must remember the lessons and utilise them later, as the core concepts taught in those classes might be getting used somewhere in life. If it was required, I took extra classes to get rid of my education backlogs and revisited basics to fill gaps in my knowledge. On purpose, I avoided a few topics as I felt inundated with the information all over the Internet.
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10.?Journaling in Daily Planner
Recently, I started journaling every day to write my daily activities and to revisit them later in the evening. I kept a mental note of everything till my 20s, but eventually, I dropped this habit and started journaling everywhere as I was starting to forget the previous knowledge when I was struggling to deliver software work-products under pressure as I was not practicing my past knowledge at all at that time. I started journaling my learnings and kept revising them to build a knowledge hub on those business problems. I constantly reminded myself to have a purpose and follow through goals. I would recommend Bullet Journaling Method to manage your day. You can also add the below-mentioned notes to your daily journal
11.?Stay Grateful
Sometimes, I felt agitated because of my daily struggle in my 20s to pursue my dreams on one side and live in present on the other side. But somewhere in between, I got a chance to disconnect from the problem and think differently on the matter when I realized that I have every day to create a difference. I constantly questioned, why to neglect the present and chase something/someone sooner as everything in your life happens for a reason. I try to learn the lessons from the past and keep a note of the solution for the future. I try to live my life to the fullest and to stay grateful for the basic things in life i.e., home, food, education, and job. I learned to start my day with a Smile as it makes my day shiny and bright.
In the end, we can take as many courses as we want to learn from the author's experiences but real experience comes from participating not withdrawals. On a dull day, I try to get up, dress up and show up with grace and humour. In the worst days, I used to send letters to myself using www.futureme.org to remind myself how much I struggled upstream in the past and invested in the correct education. For me, true strategies to live life come from a personal experience, not just books. Books can help you assert your true tactics, but you have to attack the business/life problems to gain cumulative insight on a solution.?But I do try to walk in those leaders' shoes and learn their reasoning on their philosophies to know how did they tackle that problem. Only then, I understood, they struggled too as personal struggles of trials and tribulations in life helps you to unleash your true potential as life is a journey that we ought to travel. I experienced that building your habits is a difficult journey and I must not give up. For me, it started at 24 years old, with allocating 10 minutes out of my morning routine to wash my face to grooming in the next 4 years and slowly, I inculcated many habits from physical, mental, and spiritual areas throughout my 20s to become a lady of my dreams from a student. I knew that life has no curriculum, so, I prepared myself for everything, but in the end, I pursued my interests only which turned out to be a lot of subjects. At last, somewhere in my 20s, I dropped the bad habit of wistfulness to checking that task off my list, from instant gratification to creating a wishlist online then simplifying the decision making to inculcate conscious purchasing, and keeping my agitation in control by eating nutritious food while working. Please find a list of reference materials below.
Few Resources for inspiration:
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Co-founder and CEO From Customer Care Executive to Providing Services through our Jewelry Brand Jazzandsizzle. Delivering happiness and love. Ex Lenskart, Priyaasi & Prita, Lullu & Sky
3 年You are the best one ... Keep going.. Love n lots of love
Senior Product Manager | WTM Ambassador
3 年Great reflection exercise, thanks for sharing, Sho … keep journaling ??