10 observations about Meditation:

1. Meditation is like a compound habit. 
2. Meditation will make you non- violent in every sense. You will not like violence in any form be it non-vegetarian food or porn.
3. Meditation is essentially doing nothing.
4. If you are doing yoga, then it becomes easy for you to meditate.
5. When you are deep in meditation, you lose meaning for entertainment. You will not depend on others to be happy.
6. The best hobby for meditators is to do nothing.
7.  A meditator is not good for society or for friends. He has found the secrets of happiness.
8. The ideal time for meditation will be 20 minutes.
9. Meditation becomes easy if you are surrounded by fresh air.
10. The world should have a meditation day where people do not speak at all.

10 common words/sentences to learn in a new language.

1. "Is there a restaurant around?"
2. "Where is the bathroom?"
3.  "Are there any good places around?"
4.  "Can you keep quiet?"
5. " Can you take a photo"?
6. "How are you?"
7. "Thank You"
8. "Can you do this for me?"
9. " How much does it costs?"
10. " I love you"?

10 topics for this blog:

1.  10 reality shows that define human stupidity.
2. 10 advantages of corporate job over government one.
3. 10 ways marriages should be changed.
4.  10 questions to sales experts.
5. 10 questions to a historian.
6. 10 gadgets with horrible design.
7. 10 tricks to break your multitasking problem.
8.  10 superheroes that are really realistic.
9. 10 advantages of marrying an introvert person
10. 10 common words/sentences to learn in a new language.

10 observations about Introverts/Extroverts:

1. The notion that "We need to become Extroverts to be successful" should go away. The world also needs thinkers and thinkers are generally introverts.
2. Newton, Albert Einstein, Madame Curie, Rosa Parks, Steve Wozniak, etc -some of the famous introverts.
3. One of the notions that we should know as many people as we can is also flawed. We only have limited time on the planet and we can substitute some needs of the people by machine or apps. e.g. You move to a new city and often, you will need a bike to go somewhere. Here, You can rent a bike rather than becoming friends with someone who has a bike.
4. Open workplaces may make you connected with other people but they don't help you foster creativity. A human mind should be free from distractions to create something.
5. People should respect introverts. Some people just like to read a book rather than traveling.
6. Society needs to accept that being in solitude is not a negative situation.
7. Not everyone should do public speaking or learn to do it. 
8. Introverts tend to speak slowly because they think a lot before speaking.
9. Introverts might like to express themselves via writing.
10. Introverts can concentrate easily on tasks.

10 new holidays that can be introduced in the calender:

1. Hangover day: 1st April. Prices of Alcohol drop down on 31st March due to the closure of the financial year.
2. Meditation Day/Stillness day
3. Digital Detox day in every month.
4. No Sugar day
5. One fast day in every month
6. Earth day every 6 months.
7. Services day: During this day, we appreciate the services of people who provide services like cleaning, cooking, safeguarding, etc.
8. No water day: We limit the water consumption to 10 Litres per person.
9. White day: I think white color deserves more respect.
10. A sign day: A day in which we communicate via signs.

10 sports with high ROI

Sports should also be seen as investments which give you maximum health benefit in the least amount of time:

1. Tennis 
2. Running
3. Basketball 
4. Swimming
5. Cycling
6. Volleyball
7. Badminton
8. Football
9. Gym
10. Gymnastics 

10 ideas for this blog

1. 10 ways interviews will be conducted in the future.
2. 10 sports with high ROI.
3. 10 changes in school designs.
4. 10 activities that can seem like meditation.
5. 10 politicians who are most inspiring.
6. 10 titles of my autobiography.
7. 10 ways to interpret NOTA in elections.
8. 10 words starting with Z or X.
9. 10 popular Bollywood movies which should not be glorified.
10. 10 questions to any Richard Feynman

10 design changes in whatsapp:

1. Remove the status option.
2. The chat backup should be allowed to happen on cellular data.
3. If I mute any chat, the chat should not appear on the top if a new message arrives. It is still a distraction. Maybe, an advanced feature of mute can be introduced.
4. When I mute a chat for a year, I have to mute it again when the year ends. There should be a "forever mute" option.
5. The first few seconds of a voice message are empty. The user is not sure if the option has started recording.
6. All the WhatsApp settings should be synced also just like Name and display picture.
7. An option to change the name of the contacts being shared.
8. If I mute a status of a friend and I don't have any other statuses, then what is the point of muting? I will get the muted status on top.
9. No need of telling if the person has deleted the message.
10. The calling facility should be available on the WhatsApp web.

10 topics for this blog:

1. 10 questions to god (if I ever meet one)
2. 10 interruptions which disturb the flow of our activities
3. 10 things to take care of while reading books.
4. 10 effects of climate change in my surroundings in the last 10 years.
5. 10 stupidity of humans.
6. 10 ways businesses deceive you.
7. 10 things in life you should always keep straight. 
8. 10 questions to any food expert/chef.
9. 10 changes I will do in the country if I become a prime Minister.
10. 10 ways to organize my kindle. 

10 design changes for youtube:

1. Telling people when they cross a limit of normal usage limit.
2. A section "the videos which provide value to me" and "the videos which I like".
3. A strong mechanism to counter fake news.
4. Banning vlogs.
5. Addiction warnings like the warnings on cigarette packs.
6. A better way to measure the quality of videos than views.
7. Maybe a debate on "anyone can post" with world governments.
8. Banning hate comments/cyberbullies for life.
9. Simple guidelines on citing the sources of any facts (like done in research papers)
10. An option whether users wants to view recommended content.

10 topics for this blog:

1. 10 negative effects of email communication.
2. 10 changes in learning things from the last century.
3. 10 reasons why you should not watch cricket at all.
4. 10 observations about pleasure.
5. 10 great lines about yoga.
6. 10 jokes about Bollywood.
7. 10 good hobbies.
8. 10 thoughts about "regret"
9. 10 questions to an android designer.
10. 10 questions to any marketing professor.

10 things transportation system should change:

1. No music on buses.
2. Organizing Truth Speaking Workshops for Conductors.
3. Fast online status tracking system for trains.
4. Having bus stops and railways stations close to each other in new cities.
5. Banning Royal Enfields.
6. Having LEDs and maps on buses.
7. Metros in cities with more than 15 lac population.
8. Better service of google maps.
9. An essential overview of transport systems of a city for travellers.
10. Making it mandatory for states to update their transport schedules on websites/GPS apps.

10 topics for this blog:

1. 10 changes in the primary school curriculum.
2. 10 design changes for youtube.
3. 10 changes in the Indian judicial system.
4. 10 observations about email.
5. 10 negative effects/positive effects of the bar culture in India.
6. 10 values that I stick to in my life.
7. 10 rules about driving that should change.
8. 10 examples of Machine Learning put to positive use.
9. 10 benefits of learning world history.
10. 10 books I will reread again anytime.

10 thoughts about attention (time):

1. See all the activities in terms of investments. Stick to the ones which pay well in the long terms.
2. If you go for walks/ runs, go on the road less traveled. You can focus your attention on some thoughts for longer periods of time.
3. It's okay to not reply to every email you get.
4. Switching between tasks will reduce your attention capacity. Phone Notifications are a threat.
5. Filling your time/home with more tasks/things might enhance your ego but it's only going to add anxiety to your life.
6. One hour of solitude time is a necessity. With the amount of information you input in a day, you should at least spend one hour doing nothing so that useful information is consolidated in your brain.
7. Being informed about your body/ life is more important than your state/country/world. 
8. If you are trying nofap, you will save a lot of time and you will gain your body strength.
9. 99% of the company emails are not useful so it's better to make folders and store them there and never look at all.
10. The best revenge is to not think about people you hate. You save your time which is the most precious resource available to you.

10 ideas for this blog

1. 10 changes in the Diwali celebration over the next 50 years.
2. 10 things everyone should know about nutrition.
3. 10 changes in buses that should happen.
4. 10 new holidays that can be introduced in the calendar.
5. 10 things that will happen when humans achieve immortality.
6. 10 food regulations that should happen in India.
7. 10 questions to anthropologists.
8. 10 habits of minimalists.
9. 10 design changes that should happen in the MacBook.
10. 10 unethical applications of Machine Learning.

10 things which are popular may not work for you at all:

1. News: News is broadcasted on the basis of what is popular. They will show cricket not tennis because cricket is the most popular sport here. So don't watch the news.
2. Movie Stars/Sports Persons: You may not get anything from them.
3. Drinking/Smoking: Just because people find it cool, you may not like it.
4. Video Games: Kids love it but it's okay if they don't excite you.
5. Travelling
6. Gym: 
7. Stand up Comedies
8. Tea
9. Non -Vegetarian
10. Extroverts

10 questions to any philosopher:

1. Do I have the obligation to help everyone or is it something extra I do on this planet?
2. Is it really possible for a man to stay happy his whole life?
3. Should we leave this planet and go to other parts of the universe?
4. What should be a universal motivation to live?
5. Is being a nonvegetarian a moral or ethical issue?
6. If there had been no religion, how would the world have panned out?
7. If entertainment is momentary, should we seek it?
8. Is it right to say that every human being has a purpose?
9. If we find the cause of immortality, how will the world change?
10. Do you believe in any high power?

10 rules that can have exceptions:

Most of the principles in life can have exceptions. You should not trust any principle blindly. These 10 rules might or might not have exceptions.

1. Pareto Principle
2. 10,000-hour work.
3. Law of Diminishing Returns.
4. Power Law
5. Giving up.
6. Incremental Improvements( Business can avoid moving incrementally).
7. Give your 100 % percent.
8. Being curious always.
9. Lifelong Relationships.
10. You only love once.

10 ways you can use the tracking principle to your advantage:

1. If you want to read a big book, use MS Excel to track it. Every time you read a chapter, color a box.
2. Want to see the benefits of yoga? Write your emotions and feelings after a yoga session.
3. If you want to read books, take the Goodreads goal of reading books. (The results here will be much better than not tracking your goals. )
4. You can note down your sugar intake and compare it with average.
5. You want to reduce your judgments or your ego? Every time you make a judgment, write in a short pad. The process will be painful but awareness of it will make you judge less.
6. Don't rely on health trackers to gain insights about your body. Do it the difficult way. The pain will make you think more. 
7. You can also start meditation by tracking how many minutes you spend on it.
8. Analyze your trips to know if you are the kind of person who loves to travel.
9. Also, Track your video and movie consumption. Always see activities as investments.
10. Track your email check timings also. We waste more time than it is required in checking or anticipating mails.

10 ways to encourage cleaniness in our society:

1. Making people realize that one person can change a lot of things. 
2. Encouraging governments to spend more research on plastic materials.
3. Relying on video sensors to catch the culprits. 
4. More video documentaries being shown in schools and workplaces on environmental research.
5. Bills being designed in a way to encourage electricity savings. 
6. The village sarpanch and MLAs of the city should clean their surroundings once a month.
7. Making people aware of the psychological benefits of cleanliness.
8. Banning plastic bottles in hilly areas.
9. Celebrities promoting healthy alternatives (recyclable bags) to products like polythenes.
10. A cleanliness day to be celebrated.

10 questions to any persuasion expert:

1. What can we do to make people actually read “Terms and Conditions”?
2. Do we really need to tell people what to eat? Shouldn’t a human know that on its own rather than relying on a device?
3. On ethical terms, aren’t we enhancing the ego of the society by promoting products of scarcity?
4. Will the personalization/customization of internet services violate the principle that ‘Internet is neutral’?
5. Shouldn’t we also talk about depression openly when discussing persuasive strategies?
6. Will we ever be able to establish online peer groups equivalent to the rehab group or AA groups?
7. When journalling helps to address negative inventory, why isn’t it promoted in schools?
8. When discussing competition as a PS, how do we make sure it has a healthy impact?
9. Should companies inform consumers when they create internal triggers?
10. Parents are getting obsessed with tracking every move of their kids. Where do we draw the line here?

10 places/ things where we give mental energies but we should not:

1. On thinking about what other people think of my clothes.
2. Cognitive energy spent on thinking replies to emails, messages.
3. People who have like our photos or watched our statuses.
4. Thinking about digital celebrities whom we will never meet.
5. A student waiting for exam results.
6. A sportsperson thinking about his fans while playing.
7. A yogi/Meditator thinking about the benefits of meditation.
8. A singer/celebrity worrying about the views/like count.
9. A person wearing Fitbit always worrying about the steps.
10. An employee always worrying about his salary.

Review: Stillness Is the Key

Stillness Is the Key by Ryan Holiday
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ryan Holiday is one of the prolific writers of this generation. This book is a short and interesting read.
This book was similar to Sadhguru's Three truths of Well Being on many fronts. This might be the most highlighted book of my life.

This book also contains a lot of paradoxes. Paradoxes like conserve your energy and act bravely, Say no to requests but be a human being, to act but also restraint sometimes. Paradoxes are not bad. They are the reality of life.

I am looking forward to reading the first 2 books of this trilogy.



View all my reviews

10 observations about time:

1. When you waste one moment in wasteful activity, you have wasted one moment to improve yourself.
2. Time spent in solitude in never wasted.
3. We are highly productive when we have deadlines for the task.
4. For using your time, remember ‘technique trumps effort’.
5. To avoid the regret of time wastage, live consciously (not acting for instant gratification)
6. We should also consider the mental energies in addition to the time wasted on social media.
7. We can have ‘time_journal’ to record everything we do on a daily basis.
8. One effective way for time management is to schedule your free time first or fill the time blocks with rewards.
9. You only have limited time on the planet, so you can be friends with limited people.
10. When you bargain with someone, you may save money but you are losing time. You should not waste 5 minutes for saving 10 rupees. 

10 inconveniences to negative habits:

In continuation of yesterday's post, we can add layers of inconvenience to other negative habits:

1. You pay cash instead of using a credit card to buy alcohol or a pack of cigarettes.
2. You go to fast-food restaurants only with one certain friend.
3. You use Instagram only on the web, not on the mobile phone.
4. You listen to songs only if you are walking or dancing.
5. The cookie jar is placed at the most distant point in the kitchen.
6. Only healthy things placed at eye level in the refrigerator.
7. Location wise phone usage in office/home. Designate certain areas to be phone areas in your home which are far away from your bed or study location.
8. Going to a pub/ bar only by public transport.
9. Listening to 5 songs only after doing 5 minutes of meditation.
10. Watching an episode of a sitcom only after reading a chapter of a non fiction book.

10 strong passwords for social media accounts:

Often we are addicted to things because they are convenient. You use internet a lot because it's cheap and available everywhere. But we can resist this addiction by adding some layers of inconvenience like tough login passwords. Some passwords like

1. "Isitreallyimportant?"
2. "Isitreallyimportant?Isitreallyimportant?"
3. "IshouldDevoteOneHourEverydaytoExercise"
4. "WatchingCommentsOfOthersIsAStupidThing"
5. "ThereIsNoUseOfGossiping"
6. "JunkMediaAndJunkFoodAreBadForMe"
7. "IsItImportantForMeToKnowWhereMyFriendsAreTravelling"
8. "ComparisonIsAThiefOfJoy"
9. "BooksAreAlwaysBetterThanReadingNews"
10. "IWillUseThisOnlyOnceInADay"
11. "OneThingIAmGratefulForToday"

10 things about not using screens for entertainment:

1. Watching comedy shows/ memes/ passive learning.
2. Interacting with someone for a definite purpose, not for fun.
3. You can joke with someone on call but don't chat to crack some jokes.
4. Always reply late to messages so that your mind does not act compulsively.
5. Video games may improve cognitive skills but there are a hundred other activities that I can do to achieve similar benefits and they will also provide me physical fitness.
6. Watching videos on the phone affect our eyesight badly.
7. WhatsApp groups are never useful they are rather promoters of one propaganda.
8. If we are bored anytime, it's better to face our thoughts rather than inputting some more information to the brain.
9. Screens are a threat to Deep work philosophy.
10. Watching sports matches is a time-consuming affair. Sports should inspire us to play more not to get entertainment more.

10 ways to increase or start your reading habit.

1.  Read the biographies of the people you admire or start with comics or magazines.
2. Start reading with physical books and later switch to kindle. Reading habit will be easy to form on physical books.
3. Start with 10 mins of daily reading and increase the time every month. It's easy to go from 50 to 60 minutes than starting with the aim of an hour.
4. Start with the book which is less than 100 pages long.
5. Have some books which you can re-read in the future. Call this section "rereading " and return to it whenever you feel low.
6. Replace smartphones with the book. You should have a book with you every time.
7. If possible, write your own chapter reviews or book reviews to consolidate your learning.
8. Drop books if you don't find them interesting.
9. Find a problem and then read a book about it. You will be highly motivated to read it. E.g. I am having a problem with sleep so I am reading "Why we sleep" by Mathew Walker. 
10. I read books that have a Goodreads rating of more than 4. This is a fairly good rule. It works 90% of the time.

10 things we should be grateful for.

1. Education- the ability to read.
2. A perfectly working brain.
3. Fit legs.
4. To access information about anything on the internet.
5. To practice any religious beliefs.
6. Ability to eat any kind of food.
7. Having your own website.
8. Email
9. Ability to empathize with others(mirror neurons)
10. Ability to see the world.

10 examples of flashbulb memories:

Flashbulb memories are those memories that a person remembers when a famous incident happens. Most people remember what were they doing during 9/11 or with whom they were when India won the cricket world cup.

1. Watching superhit movies with your friends. When you hear about that movie in the future, you will remember your friends.
2. Going to concerts with favorite people.
3. Going to your first celebration of any festival with special people.
4. Going to a famous tourist destination with your friends.
5. Visiting 7 wonders with a special friend.
6. Starting an important habit like yoga with a friend.
7. Inviting close people to your sibling's wedding.
8. First road trip with friends.
9. Eating special kinds of foods/ drinks with that friend.
10. Cycling with close friends.

10 things I learnt from Mahatami GANDHI:

1. Concept of Brahamcharya: Gandhi’s definition of Brahmcharya is the best I found.
2. “Beauty is of character not of face’.
3. Everyone should have their own experiments in their life.
4. Read works of every religion and experiment with the beliefs of that religion.
5. “Man should look upon every woman as his mother, sister or daughter.”
6. When Gandhi was young, the thoughts he had about sex were like a teenager.
7. Also, experiment with the kind of foods you eat. Don’t become like an animal when you eat.
8. Gandhi had more interest in his spiritual philosophy than practical philosophy.
9. It is better to not leave your children entirely to school education. Gandhi homeschooled his kids.
10. “ Truth is the ultimate God.”

10 ideas for this blog:

1. 10 mistakes humans should not make while invading mars.
2. 10 habits of daily life where compound interest is happening.
3. 10 innovations in camscanner app.
4. 10 ways charging of devices will happen in this century.
5. 10 changes in religion laws that should happen.
6. 10 ethical dilemmas of daily life.
7. 10 negative qualities of Punjabi culture.
8. 10 thoughts about freedom of speech.
9. 10 jokes about wrestling.
10. 10 types of cool flags that nations can have.