To the soon-to-be 18 me (part I).

10th Oct, 2024

This blogpost is going to be a little off-track. I am not writing on computers or doing some weird calculation to find at what rate you should fart to fly–although that’s a really good math exercise–but a note to myself and the upcoming youngsters. Disclaimer: it’s going to be really boring to read. And to be very frank, it’s just yet another teenager ranting about his life and giving his own unsolicited opinion on subjects he is not an expert on. But isn’t that literally the point of running your own online blog? So without any delay, let me mention some things I learned in the seventeen years of observing this world and some things I wish to understand better. A PDF version is available.

Finish reading books.

The heading could have been “Start reading books,” but I chose this instead. The reason is reading books is like reciting the value of pi. The number, pi, itself is not big but it is endless. And even if you somehow start reading books, it seems like you are never going to finish it even though reading is actually such an easy task. And to be very frank, there is a good chance it is not your problem.

In Indian schools, the books we are generally suggested to read are written by dead people and narrate century-old stories. Now it is not that old stories cannot be good. In fact, my favorite author is Franz Kafka who was a twentieth century author. The thing is that when you start reading, you must choose the right books. Pick books by contemporary authors. It can be a romance by Chetan Bhagat or a thriller by Gillian Flynn… it’s completely up to you! These authors have written stories in the present times–which is not only easier to visualize but also easier to relate with. This is what will gradually increase your affinity to books. Once you are done with such books, go ahead and explore other genres. Best way to explore other genres is to just read everything that comes in the way. You may think this must be so time consuming, but that’s barely the case. You will gradually increase your reading speed and learn how to finish a novel in three days. Good novels are made to be addictive. All you have to do is get past the inertia, i.e. read the first fifteen pages.

You can even start your book reading journey with whatever genre you want, whatever subject you want and even in whichever language you want. For example, the first novel I read with absolute zeal was The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. I am aware that this book is now basically joked about for some reasons I cannot comprehend, it is a good book and it hooked me up for two days. However, I soon shifted from literature to physics. I read Leonard Sussking and even different university textbooks from The Feynman Lectures to the classic Halliday-Resnick just to taste each one of them and see how different books decorate the same topic before serving it to the viewer. Made me a better writer, for sure, and even helped me write better documentation for all the software I wrote later on. I have tried reading A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking but I fall asleep everytime I read more than 5 pages of it. There must be a reason it has such a controversial Hawking index.

Reading books is not only about improving vocabulary or learning a language. Reading books teaches how to write. And once you know how to write, half your problems will be solved. Trust me, whenever you feel you are confused, start writing the problem. This simple act can give deep insights and immense clarity. The more you write, the more clear and honest you become with your thoughts.

Books will also help you make better decisions in later life. For example, thanks to all the physics books I read, it was easier for me to develop an idea of the differences between being an engineer and being a scientist. This helped me finally decide that I actually am not interested in engineering and wish to pursue research in applied mathematics.

Keep your eyes open.

This one is going to be more personal than other topics. In my school, all boys wished to be in some kind of relationship with girls. Yes, fifteen-year-old idiots who do not even know how to make a perfect roti suddenly want girls’ attention. They would do naughty things hidden from their parents, inviting huge risks if someday all of this was revealed to the elders.

Now I do not know if this is one of the negative side-effects of social media but I witnessed all of it happening. All I did in my school was to observe such boys and learn from their mistakes. I knew that after 10th, many children will move to different cities like Kota, Delhi and Vizag. So it is better to spend time with your family as much as you can. Therefore, for all friendships I made, none of them were “hidden” so to speak. I did it all in the eyes of the elders and nobody objected. See fellas, you guys may think that your father is “too old to get things” but always remember that he has seen more of the world than you. Just trust them and keep moving. They are not gonna stop you, in fact they will guide you. Moreover, this might be the single biggest advantage I had when it comes to making friends. I never lied or hid things from my elders. My mother, for instance, told me that this is the age where you will desire such connections and be attracted to the opposite gender but the key is always to talk to the elders. She is right. Elders are not your enemies; and the earlier you understand this, the better.

Be talkative.

Be talkative. YES! Acting like an “introvert” sounds cool but is not so helpful. Today itself I was reading a Nature article¹ that states, “We often do not even know what we are thinking until we express it, either in writing or in speech. An intelligent interlocutor can offer crucial additional benefits over a passive medium by spotting flaws in our reasoning, suggesting new directions of thought, or putting out supporting or contradictory evidence that we may have overlooked. Mental breakthroughs are often achieved by stepping from an established habit of thought, a step that is much more easily taken if we engage our thinking with that of another. Conversations also serve as an important psychological boost to our morale, with the encouragement that we get from the feedback of someone who understands our work and our motivations.”

So what did we learn? Just how I said writing helps you understand your own ideas better, so does talking about it. However, you must have a good group to do so. Although the article states that a duo is best to have the best conversations, I think a trio holds more potential. In fact, I would go as far to say that you should only have a friend circle of three people–not more than that. The more people you know, the harder it will be for you to maintain those connections and more time consuming to stay connected with each of them. Three is the perfect number. Your first priority should always be self-improvement, not impressing a group of a hundred people. My own trio has two boys excluding me, both with absolutely varied interests and thought process. One of my friends is an aspiring entrepreneur while the other is currently preparing for entrance exams for law colleges. Meanwhile I am a science and computing nerd. Now imagine what kind of discussions we must be having? Let me give you an example.

Few weeks ago, my entrepreneur friend and I were discussing the financial feasibility of a start-up. In the discussion, we encountered the idea of an online platform for lawyers and advocates. We know that literacy regarding law and the Constitution is very limited in our country. Therefore, we thought of a platform where users can look for the most appropriate legal professional within their budget for their specific problem. This could be done by analyzing the past cases of all lawyers and matching them with the user’s legal issue. Our way to generate revenue would be to charge lawyers for advertisement on the platform. Looks amazing, right? Well, only until we were later informed by our law friend that it is unethical and a punishable offense for lawyers to advertise themselves. This is why you have never seen ad banners of any lawyer. The same rule can be extended to online sites too. Thus this plan was successfully canceled thanks to the group of diverse men I know.

Being talkative is also going to help you gather information and help take advice from experts when you need to make some important decisions. For example, coming back to the engineering vs. science issue, I contacted a dozen scientists, engineers and teachers to take their advice. Even professors at IITs and a highly qualified alumnus of BITS Pilani. Unlike most, I never hesitated to write to them or even directly call them. What is the worst that could happen? They will block me? Create another fake account and start writing again! They will respond. They have to. These traits can only be developed when you open up to groups.

Stick to your priorities.

You must know your priorities. What I have realized till now–and I might be wrong–is that only a few people actually matter in life. For me, that is:

1. Parents
2. My younger brother
3. Life partner (existence unclear)
4. My friends
5. Extended family

Frankly speaking, even extended family will not help you in the long run unfortunately. Today society is becoming more and more “individualistic”. The concept of joint families is long gone and with the formation of nuclear families, the distances that kept us apart physically now keep us apart emotionally too. Obviously there will be many instances in which your extended family can be very helpful but in my case it has majorly been a source of fights.

Respect and honor each of the people in this list. I never argue with anyone in public because I know it does not matter. It is of no use to convince my batchmate that the research sector in India is growing and being a scientist is a good career option, but convincing my father for the same is almost a requirement because his opinion matters and influences my life directly. You have the right to choose who affects you.

So learn to make your own priority list and follow it like religion. I have a strong feeling this priority list will change once more when you get a job and two times thereafter–one when you get married and the other when you have kids. This one is such a big topic that it deserves a blogpost of its own.

Be more you.

Learn to be you. You do not need to drape yourself in the cloth of a community or cult. You don’t need to be part of some kind of “BTS Army” or a “Taylor Swift Fan Club” or even the classic “XYZ hacking group”. You must realize your individual potential. You must understand that people around you who identify themselves as part of a cult do so because they never realized their own potential and hence never even tried to create their own identity.

Creating your own identity helps you gather self-confidence. You cannot fight for yourself, which you will apparently have to do a lot when you come to real life, if you do not even consider yourself worthy enough to defend. This often happens when people do not find material in themselves. For instance, I identify myself as a self-taught computer programmer and an Olympiad medalist. Now these are my recognitions. This is what identifies me. My identity is defined by my skills, which you cannot take away from me. But if your identity relies on some other cult, your existence is limited to the existence of the cult. This was not the case earlier because the internet did not exist. Now that the web exists, forming huge communities is easier than ever. The sheer size of the communities can give you a sense of belongingness and protection but remember that online communication is of no use in reality. Even though the number of connections has increased, the number of quality connections has not only stagnated but is constantly declining.

The easiest way to create your own persona is to upskill. Start learning new things because skill and knowledge are the only things one cannot snatch away from you. It stays with you.

#blog