Why I Stopped Buying Newspapers

I was the news explainer in my friend’s group.

I took it as a mission to understand current events, politics, issues, science, and other topics published in the dailies. I then took great joy in explaining to others what I learnt. It made me feel like a teacher. I felt like I was doing a service.

People do not have the time to read newspapers in detail or view online debates or discussions nowadays. They are not interested in digging deep because it takes a lot of time. But I was! I used to go through all news portals.

I hoped my explainers would aid busy friends in making better decisions and voicing better thoughts.

None of that happened.

It was a stark realization that no number of facts can change someone’s thinking if they are adamant on sticking to their beliefs.

Then I did the unimaginable. I stopped buying newspapers.

One fine day, after reading another mentally distressing news article, I knew it was time to let go. Why pay for something that mentally drains you? We pay therapists to help us, and then we pay to get our daily dose of pessimism from the papers.

A never-ending cycle.

Negativity sells. So you cannot really blame the papers. You will never see happy news printed in big, bold font types on the front page. That’s reserved for the shockers because that is the type of news that sells.

It is human psychology to drift towards things that are infuriating, depressing, triggering. Have you noticed how our mind suddenly decides it’s time to worry about something when we are in a state of bliss? It will rewind to the past and remind you of all the dreadful things. Or it will flash forward to the future and nudge you to start feeling concerned for yourself.

Our brain is just not wired to be in a state of joy 24/7.

Letting go of newspapers was hard. But I realized, if I paid for it, I would keep pushing myself to read it whether I wanted to or not – only because I did not want my money to go to waste.

I understood I wasn’t really reading the papers to enlighten myself of worldly matters, rather I was subjecting myself to it because I subscribed to it. It felt like a chore. It is like paying and getting a gym membership. Shelling out cash is a big motivator to get things done.

How did I feel when I stopped buying newspapers:

A bit lost at first and a lot of doubt “How am I going to survive without knowing everything in the world in-depth?”
I slowly started getting used to it.
I realized I could live without reading every bit of news out there.
The important news always found its way to me – through social media, people around me, and google alerts set for the news type I wanted to receive.
Finally, a peace of mind.

I felt less cranky about things, less triggered when I let go of newspapers. The publishers send emails, messages with discount codes for annual subscriptions to lure me back in. I am not yet ready to make that commitment. I am not yet ready to sacrifice my uncluttered mind. I feel free, calm and composed.

Rape, deaths, racism, sexism are all important topics to cover. To read about them every day, though, is emotionally disturbing for someone sensitive like me. Speak up when you have to – your voice counts. But also know it is important to take breaks. If you find yourself getting agitated very often and it is affecting your relationships, it is time to cut off from the negatives. Your mental health should hold precedence over everything else including negative newspapers.

Breathe in the good shit.

Breathe out the bullshit.

An Ode to Freelancing and Its Biggest Benefit – The Freedom It Gives You!

My dream is to get back to freelancing one day.

Having done it before, I know how fulfilling it can be. There are many advantages of being your own boss. You decide what projects to take up. You decide whether to say yes or no to a client. You decide how much time you want to spend on your work.

I started doing freelance work around 10 years back. I began my journey by carrying out some research on the best freelancer websites. Finally, I registered on Fiverr and instantly got some clients because of my portfolio. It was easier back then to find customers, unlike today, when the competition is fierce.

I was a freelance content writer. My work on Fiverr involved creating marketing copies for startups. My clients appreciated my work and gave me good reviews. Looking back, I am so proud of myself for getting the freelance writing gigs on my own. When I got my first $100 from freelancing, I felt on top of the moon. Frankly, even if it were just $10, I would have felt elated because this was proof that I could survive independently. It gave me confidence.

Throughout our life, we are on the lookout for confirmation that we are well equipped to face any challenges that come our way. We are skeptical, though, because we were never taught to venture out on our own. There was always someone to help us, guide us at every stage of our life – at school, competitions, college, corporate life. We could depend on someone (a parent or a teacher, or a manager) to help us out.

With freelancing, you are on your own.

You have to figure things out.

You have to decide how to get money.

You have to research and find out what sells.

It’s all you!

To be a successful freelancer, you need to hustle.

Needless to say, every little profit you get out of it feels like a big deal. Plus, the freedom to work from home and the ultimate control you have over your work is unmatched.

Freelancing is special. It gives you that sense of achievement and fulfillment when work starts coming your way. It is the feeling I yearn for now.

I stopped freelancing 2 years after starting it. The reasons being, my sleep cycle got messed up, and the pay did not match my hard work at the time. I would sleep at 5 AM and wake up at noon. There was no discipline in my life. I had a few passive income streams that paid a few bills, but more was needed. That’s when I decided to get back into the corporate world. I thought I would continue with my side hustles. But life had other plans. My work responsibilities at my day job increased. I had no time left for something I enjoyed.

Does freelancing count as work experience? Does it help your career? Let me tell you this. I got my job after the recruiter saw my freelancing work. All the hard work paid off. I know many freelancers (web developers, graphic designers, writers) getting a corporate job after building a solid portfolio of impressive projects. So I would consider it as a work experience. People are afraid of mentioning “freelancer” in their work resume. They are afraid that the recruiters might think it is a fancy way to say you haven’t worked for some time. The best way to prove naysayers wrong is by building a good portfolio of your freelancing work. No recruiter would say no to a freelancer who has done notable work.

Does freelancing pay well? Yes, it does. Freelancing is hard though, and it is not for everyone. Start small and easy. When you start getting overbooked for a month or two, increase your rate by 10-15%. You don’t have to wait till the annual performance review to get a raise!

Freelancing is the future of work. People are quitting big corporate jobs because working for yourself is mentally more peaceful. I would love to get back to it one day to be my own boss again.

There’s a funny quote out there that goes “I can’t wait to earn a lot of money and quit. So I can start doing the work I like.” Truer words have never been spoken.

An Ode to 17 Thought-Provoking Life Quotes from Fredrik Backman’s Beartown

I am a big fan of Fredrik Backman, even though I have read only 2 of his books.

The first one was A Man Called Ove. I completed the second one quite recently. It is a beautiful, emotional, intense story of a sleepy little cold town called Beartown. A place where people are laidback in all things except one – ice hockey. Their love for the sport transcends everything. It reminds me of professional football club fans. The same passion, the same energy, the same love. The same disappointment when their team loses or when a controversy pops up. If you are a sports fan or know someone who is, you would find this book extremely relatable.

Fredrik Backman is a genius when it comes to explaining moments and expressing emotions. I got goosebumps while reading through many of the quotes in Beartown.

I am listing some of my favorites here.

“The only thing the sport gives us are moments. But what the hell is life, Peter, apart from moments?”

“Being a parent makes you feel like a blanket that’s always too small. No matter how hard you try to cover everyone, there’s always someone who’s freezing.”

“Religion is something between you and other people; it’s full of interpretations and theories and opinions. But faith … that’s just between you and God.”

“People sometimes say that sorrow is mental but longing is physical. One is a wound, the other an amputated limb, a withered petal compared to a snapped stem.”

“One of all the terrible effects of grief is that we interpret its absence as egotism. It’s impossible to explain what you have to do in order to carry on after a funeral, how to put the pieces of a family back together again, how to live with the jagged edges. So what do you end up asking for? You ask for a good day. One single good day. A few hours of amnesia.”

“In a few years’ time she’ll read an old newspaper article about research showing that the part of the brain that registers physical pain is the same part that registers jealousy. And then Ana will understand why she hurt so badly.”

“A great deal is expected of anyone who’s been given a lot.”

“Community is the fact that we work towards the same goal, that we accept our respective roles in order to reach it. Values is the fact that we trust each other. That we love each other.”

“If Peter has learned one thing about human nature during all his years in hockey, it’s that almost everyone regards themselves as a good team player, but that very few indeed understand what that really means.”

“When you can accept the worst aspects of your teammates because you love the collective, that’s when you’re a team player.”

“Because the thing you can never be prepared for when you have children is your increased sensitivity. Not just feeling, but hypersensitivity. He didn’t know he was capable of feeling this much, to the point where he can hardly bear to be in his own skin.”

“One of the first things you learn as a leader, whether you choose the position or have it forced upon you, is that leadership is as much about what you don’t say as what you do say.”

“The easiest way to unite a group isn’t through love, because love is hard. It makes demands. Hate is simple.”

“Every child in every town in every country has at some point played games that are dangerous to the point of being lethal. Every gang of friends includes someone who always takes things too far, who is the first to jump from the highest rock, the last to jump across the rails when the train comes. That child isn’t the bravest, just the least frightened. And possibly the one who feels he or she doesn’t have as much to lose as the others.”

“The simplest and truest thing David knows about hockey is that teams win games. It doesn’t matter how good a coach’s tactics are: if they’re to stand any chance of working, first the players need to believe in them.”

“Fighting isn’t hard. It’s the starting and stopping that are hard.”

“There are few words that are harder to explain than ‘loyalty’. It’s always regarded as a positive characteristic, because a lot of people would say that many of the best things people do for each other occur precisely because of loyalty. The only problem is that many of the very worst things we do to each other occur because of the same thing.”

An Ode to Not Checking Work Emails on Weekends and Holidays

We bring work to home and home to work.

We find it challenging to keep our professional and personal lives separate.

People say you should never talk about your personal problems at work; that your coworkers can use that info to bring you down. You never know who is plotting against you to climb that corporate ladder.

When it comes to bringing work home, though, things are a bit more relaxed. Many workers are guilty of committing this sin of not switching off post work-hours. We take it for granted that our loved ones would understand. No one is going to plot against you. There is no ladder to climb, except when the ceiling fan needs cleaning up, we need to fix a bulb or pull out something from a top storage unit.

The number one red flag that you are a workaholic is that you check your work emails during post-work hours and holidays. There is no urgency at work. There are no production issues. But there you are, checking your email like you are checking your fridge for something new.

I was guilty of this too.

I used to check my email after work hours. I wanted to know if my bosses replied. Sometimes the replies to my emails were neutral, sometimes positive, and sometimes negative. As expected, the negative responses were joy killers. Imagine facing anxiety during your day off. It is more than enough to ruin the rest of your day.

This is why I stopped checking work emails outside work hours.

Armed with the new understanding that checking emails would wreck my breaks, I consciously started staying away from work emails after the scheduled hours, on weekends and holidays. I would pull myself back from checking them. It was never easy, especially when you are anticipating a reply to an important email. But I would tell myself that enjoying the moment is of prime importance. If I were to find out I had tons of work for the next working day, I would spend my breaks coming out with an action plan. Breaks are not for making work plans! It is meant for rejuvenation.

Switching off from work made my holidays more enjoyable and relaxing. I was able to pursue my hobbies and also spend quality time with family.

I find many people around me committing this sin of checking emails post-work hours now.

A friend, during his vacation, worked almost every single day. He couldn’t stop checking his emails. Many like him tend to forget to create boundaries at work. It sends a message to your organization. That you, as a worker, are ready to work anytime, even if it is your vacation.

It is not the company’s responsibility to look after your well-being. They will never beg you to look after your own mental or physical health. They will never stop you from working after the scheduled hours or on holidays. That onus is on you!

I know many in their late 20s and early 30s who complain of backache. Each one of them works 10+ hours every day, and they have wrecked their health in the process. We overwork ourselves because we are brimming with energy, and we want to do impressive work. It is only over the years that the side effects start to show. People in their 30s and 40s are increasingly facing heart attacks. Stress is a significant contributor. There is no time to sit back and enjoy the pleasures of life. A fast-paced life only contributes to more stress.

The easiest way to kickstart your journey towards physical and mental well-being is by separating your personal and professional lives. Learn to switch off from work after the scheduled hours. If you cannot complete your work on time, learn proper time management, or better yet, ask for more time. Extra time for a project submission means improved deliverables.

The first step to post-work wellness is to sign out from your work emails.

Please do it for yourself. You highly deserve it!

An Ode to Saying Please and Thank You at Work

Say Thank You at Work — Photo by Polina Zimmerman

How often have we dealt with authoritative emails at work?

The ones that sound unnecessarily aggressive and bossy, instead of courteous yet firm.

After my previous rant on surviving performance reviews, I looked into a couple of emails of supervisors generally well-liked at the office, and those who weren’t.

The ones who were liked (Batch A), were polite and empathetic in their emails:

“Could you please finish this task by Saturday?“
“Thank you for completing this!“

In contrast, the ones who weren’t liked (Batch B), wrote their emails like this:

“Do this by Saturday!“
Dead silence after completing any task

See the difference? Would you like to get emails from Batch B? No one is fond of unnecessary aggression.

It is such a refresher nowadays to hear supervisors being polite. A “Thank you” or a “Please,” even if formal makes you look humane and not cold and distant. It motivates employees to do better. Politeness does not mean being weak. You can be firm and polite!

Something Batch A does often (to show the emergency of the situation):

“Please send this across by Saturday! This is very important.“

No unwanted aggression here. A simple message that conveys the seriousness of the task. Most people are smart enough to get the gist of such a message.

Employees perform their best when their supervisors are empathetic and kind. The attrition rate (the rate at which people leave) is always high in companies with bad managers. A 2016 survey in India showed that employees are willing to stay longer and work harder if they were well appreciated in their companies. About 59% felt they were unappreciated by their bosses. That’s more than half of the survey sample! No small number there. Sometimes, all it takes is a “thank you” or a “please,” to make things better.

So why are we so stingy with appreciating others or using cordial language at work?

Each supervisor is shaped by their own experiences in the corporate world. Some might have faced similar situations, a boss being too self-centered or supercilious or manipulative, and they end up thinking this is the only way to climb up the career ladder.

Sadly, this is partially true.

A recent study disturbingly stated that narcissistic, manipulative people tend to beco me CEOs faster (29% more) than their less self-entitled peers. We look at people at the top for inspiration, and we see a lot of them acting entitled and impolite, and we think “That’s how we become successful.”

But is it really? Is this the downside of being successful? Should we dump our emotions, empathy, kindness in the garbage in the quest for power?

I have been in the corporate world for so long, and I have seen and experienced so much, that the first thought when I see a CEO or a leader on LinkedIn is not “Wow! I want to be this person,” but “How many people did you demotivate and destroy to reach where you are? How many fake stories have you cooked up to save yourself, by shifting the blame onto your juniors? How good are you at playing politics in office?” This seems very dark and harsh I know. But it is mostly the truth. There are exceptions but the many leaders I have seen have sold their souls to the corporate devil. They will do anything to get on the super boss’ good books and won’t hesitate to drag anyone else down in the process.

Sometimes, from what I have seen, I feel it’s best to stay away from the rat race.

So you don’t end up becoming a rat.

An Ode to Not Telling Everyone Everything

I am into a new experiment nowadays.

Over the past one year, I have been trying not to announce all my latest material possessions, achievements and personal milestones online.

Why? To find out if I can enjoy them without the world getting to know.

I used to be obsessed with posting everything on the gram. Every little thing. “If it’s not online, it never happened,” applied to me. But then I started getting agitated – when I didn’t get enough likes, when my friends or relatives whom I thought are close didn’t respond as often. It sucked out the joy in me and I felt I was getting more and more negative with every passing post.

It was then that I decided to cut back on announcing everything online.

I realized, weirdly, once online, a personal achievement didn’t feel personal anymore. It is now out in the open for the world to judge. It kind of loses its value (for me, at least).

Exposing something that’s near and dear to you has its cons. Once it’s out there, after a day or two, when the comments and likes dwindle down, you lose the high. And then you are looking for the next high. Another super hit post that can derive the maximum likes and comments. You forget to just “sit” with your latest achievement. Your high is not linked with your achievement anymore, it is linked to those likes and comments.

I realized by not posting online, I was able to extend this high. Savor it like slow-cooked food instead of junk. The type of soul-food that’s healthy for you. A high that lasts for days, weeks and sometimes even months. You look back at the milestone and it still seems raw and precious, not yet exposed to anyone’s judgments. It is something that I am enjoying and appreciating a lot honestly.

This is not just applicable for achievements by the way, it can be a selfie that you love, a video you took to capture the beauty around you, a beautiful moment.

Sometimes, the intensity with which you feel about something is not reflected by the people around you, and we all know how big a mood dampener that can be. Our highs might (just might) end up not feeling like a high anymore. Something gets lost in the whole process of displaying things online. For me, it feels like whatever I have posted about has been disconnected from me, and now it’s up to the others to give it value.

I keep telling my friends that if ever there comes up an old-school social media network, that doesn’t rely on validation like likes, I would gladly join it, and ditch the others.

Most of my posts are limited to Insta stories nowadays and are aimed at providing information that others might find helpful in some way – on what I have used, the benefits, cons if any, experiments, thoughts. Rarely about what I have achieved. I share that with my loved ones, but not online.

The rest are for me to savor. For my mind alone, for my heart to hold dear.