As now, I feel more confident going into the depths of the sea with less support of others, I seek noval dive experiences. 

In September 2024, I had to travel to Singapore for a conference, and since there are some amazing dive sites in the Philippines (PHP), which is 90 minutes away from Singapore, I decided to extend my trip to PHP as well.

My last dive was almost nine months back, and my heart and body were itching to meet my friends who live below the sea. 

I looked for some of the best dive options around September-October, and as per PADI Site Malapascua in Cebu province of Philippines is one of the ideal options. 

I also used an online forum for Scuba divers to get more recommendations, and Malapascua was one of them. I checked Tripadvisor to find the best diving center in Malpascua, and to my surprise, I found a Diving resort called Evolution. 

I have heard of diving resorts but have never been to one. I called the number given on the Tripadvisor website (You need to be logged into your Tripadvisor account to see the contact numbers) and enquired about the weather and other details. In a few hours, Nick from Evolution was in touch via Email, and we moved the conversation to WhatsApp. I asked about the weather and other details, and after handling all basic logistics confirmed the booking. 

As I was availing on-arrival VISA (available to Indians who have an active visa from USA, UK and other countries), I had to reach Manilla first. Otherwise, if I had gotten a visa in my resident country, it would have taken about 14 days, and after that, instead of landing in Manilla, I could land directly at the Cebu International Airport. 

Note: If you have ample time to plan the trip, it’s better to get a visa from your home country instead of traveling to Manila and taking another flight to Cebu. This will save some time, if not a lot. 

I arrived in Cebu around 6 PM and decided to stay at a hotel nearby. I found an affordable option on Booking.com, and being a genius member of Booking.com is often more rewarding in terms of price and extras one can get. 

The next morning, my cab was waiting outside my hotel at 8 AM, and we went to the port which took almost 3 hours by road. There we used a boat to get to Malapascua island. 

Refresher dive –

I scheduled a refresher dive which turned out to be highly beneficial for the future dive at Malapascua. It lasted for about 50 minutes and I with the trainer touched upon all the essentials to remember. I realise, if I have this option in future, I will opt for it as I’m still fairly new. 

Diving with Thresher Shark –

The next day, we all gathered at 4.30 AM and after briefing, went to the boat for an hour long sailing to the cleaning station. 

The cleaning station is the place where Thresher sharks come to get themselves cleaned by the small fish. As we reached the diving location, my dive master and I jumped and started ascending while equalising. 

And as we spent about 15 minutes, my dive master signaled to pay attention and I saw a big Thresher Shark nearby. The shark left quickly and we kept searching for a better sighting. 

About 10 minutes after the last sighting, we saw two more sharks and then another shark, and it was so mesmerising. Whenever Shark turned and approached us, I could feel myself grasping for breath and my heart pumping faster. I experienced fear once in a while and also saw it leaving. The sighting was an experience to store in the memory and share with a company of good people. I do miss not taking a GoPro to record this, as in the second dive, I found a great spot to witness the cleaning of sharks at one of the cleaning stations. 

After the second dive, we returned back to the Dive resort by 10 AM. I took a shower, breakfast, and then took a nap. After my nap, I felt refreshed for the next dive, and I decided to do the night dive. I have done a dive in Thailand many years back in a tunnel and one in El-Nido (Palawan, Philippines) where I had to use Torch, but in complete darkness it was going to be a new experience. 

Night dive – 

At 5.30, two of us and one dive master gathered for briefing and straight went to the boat. The dive site was near by (5-7 minutes from boat), and within minutes we were ascending in the water.

As I dive more, I realised that gearing up and descending in water is now becoming effortless. Now the focus is more on improving techniques such as buoyancy and others, which I will touch upon in a moment. 

When we went inside the water, we had enough light and as the night appeared it was dark, but 3 diver with the torch was enough to light the space we were in. We saw many creatures that we wouldn’t have otherwise and after about 50 minutes of dive, we planned to ascend slowly. 

The Air in my tank was about 50 bar, and as I was ascending, I ascended too quickly. It was later I realised that I was not releasing air properly from my BCD (One has to hold the Nozzle for a few seconds and should leave after hearing the air coming out). 

Less air in the tank and BCD not completely empty made me ascend quickly, and I could not make the safety stop. 

Gato Island Dive –

My 3rd day on the island, and this time I picked the Galeto island which is roughly 50 minutes by boat and we planned two dives. One of the dive location was tunnel dive and it was a great adventure. 

After the two dives, we wrapped up and reached Malapascua island by evening 5. 

About Evolution Dive Resort –

The resort was one of the best on this island. I hardly got the opportunity to explore the rest of the island, but from what I heard, I was at the best location. They have a good restaurant with plenty of vegetarian meal options.

This is what the room looks like:

Other good options to stay on this island are:

Ocean Vida and Blanco.

You can check the listing on Booking.com.

Goodbye Malapascua-

On the 4th morning, after breakfast, I and a scuba buddy left at 9 AM and reached Cebu by 1 PM. My flight was in the evening, and I reached Cebu International Airport, and within 30 minutes, I was inside.

I was so glad to discover a multi-religion prayer room, where I spent one hour meditating, which recharged me for the rest of the trip. 

Things that I learned:

Every dive teaches you something, and here are some of the notes and thoughts from this dive trip to Malapascua. 

Discovered some new dive sites and live aboard for future dives –

(Notes from my journal)

Preparation

As I was diving today in Malapascua, Philippines. A beautiful dive location, and witness the sharks. 

I realised the importance of practising regularly. Doing even the minute of things with complete awareness as it all prepares one for time when you need it the most. 

Things as simple as how to breathe properly, and keep the regulator properly or clean the fog of your glasses, all these simple habits (programs) help to run a better self (computer). A superhuman (supercomputer) is one that runs many habits (program) together without throwing many or any error. 

Simple things in life, such as keeping your surroundings clean, taking only enough that you wish to eat, setting clear intent before everything, and having your day or week aligned with your values, all of these sets your life for a joyful ride.

Witnessing:

Sitting at the edge of a standing boat in the middle of the sea, it may seem like we are moving. However, we are just witnessing, and there is no movement of the boat. It’s the wave, with its nature, that is moving and making the boat float while giving the impression that we are moving.

The only time that the boat will move is when the captain decides to go from one location to another. Then the will is applied and now the boat moves with courage and strength, along or against the waves (life). When it is along the wave, it reaches its destination with ease, and when it’s against the waves, the ride seems bumpy and needs little more strength but then also it reaches its destination.

And that’s how life is, always moving, and we could witness it with equanimity or may not be aware and be deluded that we are the doer.

Until next time! 👋

Malapascua Experience with Thresher Shark at Evolution Dive Resort (September 2024)

Vipassana is a meditative practice designed to change the habit patterns of the mind at the subconscious level. (read official explanation here)

You may ask, ‘Why?’

It’s because we are in a constant process of liking or disliking everything on a conscious and subconscious level.

Every time we like something, we crave it, and every time we don’t like something, we create aversion.

This is done at a subconscious level, and what’s interesting is that every time we crave or create an aversion, there is a corresponding sensation that happens at the bodily level.

Sometimes very subtle and sometimes at a gross level.

With the practice of Vipassana meditation, we not only see the true nature of our mind habit pattern, but we also learn to be free from this.

The practice of Vipassana is threefold

Shila – Samadhi – Panya

Shila –

Five precepts we take that help in the further development of samadhi and Panya.

These precepts are:

1. Noble silence
2. No sexual misconduct for 10 days
3. No stealing
4. No intoxication
5. No lying

Samadhi –

Samadhi is a meditative practice called Anapana, where we learn to improve our focus and concentration. In a 10-day meditative practice, we practice Anapana to improve our concentration and focus. Most meditative practices help you reach here as they engage the surface level of the mind.

Panya –

Panya is the wisdom or development of wisdom. The absence of ignorance is knowledge, and this is what Vipassana offers.

When one stays in the state of samadhi for a longer period, they can see the sensation on the body, however stable or gross it is.

Vipassana meditation emphasizes direct experiential understanding, going beyond intellectual knowledge to observe and understand the nature of one’s own mind and experiences.

In this part of the meditative practice, one watches the reality of these sensations with samatha and an understanding of anicca.

With practice, one becomes profound in this and starts to see and understand that in every second, many such sensations come and go. The impermanent nature of these sensations is also a reflection of our thoughts and feelings and attachment to them in the form of cravings and emotions.

The more we see these sensations (think of pain, fear, greed, passion) rationally, corresponding similar sensations (read – emotions or feelings or experiences) will arise from the depth of our mind. If we don’t react to it (create new sankhara in the form of craving or aversion), they will appear on the surface level and go away.

Depending on how many past sankharas one has (this life and past lives if you believe in it and if you don’t, focus on this life only), it could take time to get rid of them.

Why practice Vipassana?

Imagine yourself being woken up and feeling fresh, experiencing the sunlight all over you, and your mind is free from worry about the future or free from the past trauma or memories that trouble you and stop you from living in the moment.

Once the reality unfolds with the help of Vipassana practice, the reality of impermanence, and once we free ourselves from the habit pattern of the mind of creating craving and aversion, one can experience life in its true form.

The joy will always be there, and one will enjoy every moment as if it’s new while understanding it will be gone as we blink our eyes.

One would not stop living or may not renounce the world, which is what many feel when talking about going deep into the world of Vipassana. Rather, one develops the faculty to enjoy life, be joyful, and gain more clarity on how to conduct life.

How to get started with Vipassana?

The practice of Vipassana was designed centuries back, and to understand this technique, you need to dedicate 10 days of your life.

There are centers where you can go and understand this technique. However, don’t take it too lightly, as these 10 days, you will be :

• Maintaining noble silence – No talking and maintaining complete silence.
• 10 hour of daily meditation: Your day will start at 4.30 and ends at 9.30. There will be sufficient breaks for you to relax.
• No phone, no internet, and no contact with the outside world – For 10 days, you will have no contact with the outside world. So before you come, you need to ensure that the next 10 days of commitment are taken care of. You can have your family or colleagues take care of urgent or critical issues.
• This is completely free, and you don’t need to pay anything. Your stay and food are completely free, and if you like, you can donate any amount. Even if you don’t, nobody will frown on you.
• Breakfast at 6.30 AM, lunch at 11 PM, light snack at 5.30 PM (See the complete schedule before)

How, when, and where to register for Vipassana?

My schedule used to be very busy, so what I used to do was look for available courses anywhere in India as per my available time. It doesn’t matter if it’s in UP or Rajasthan or Hyderabad. In India, you can reach popular cities within 3-6 hours max.

Head to Dhamma.org and click on search

Select your preferred dates (keep it around 30-40 days at least) and select your location and preferred language.

You will see results like this, and based on location and availability, you can click and apply.

Note: You will get notification via email in a few days. Often, you will get a call from the center to explain the program and to ensure you are willing to stay for the entire 10 days. If you ever feel you are not ready, do not force yourself to do this. You can always re-apply at a future date. Leaving the course in between is not a good idea, so make sure you are aware of the program and join only when you can dedicate 10 days.

Note: I have completed 5 * 10-day courses and many 1 and 3-day courses. I keep going back to it because I see many benefits of it. From my experience, I could suggest you let go of all your limited beliefs and, for the 10 days (your first course) simply follow the process. After 10 days, you can decide whatever you want with newfound info.

Here is a video that I made after the 2019 camp (Pushkar). It may give you some more info:

What have I learned by practicing Vipassana?

Every time I completed a 10 day retreat, I came out as a new person. A lot of things inside me has changed or in the process of changing. It is usually after 3-4 months, I start seeing some significant changes in my life.

Here are a few takeaways that I could recall right now which is worth sharing –

World always moves on – We often worry a lot, and think how everything will workout if we are not available for 10 days. But to my surprise the world simply moves on and only a few people might have missed your presence, and thats it. Your work, family and everything else, just moves on. This is what will happen when we die or someone else’s die, this realisation was pretty strong and a lot of things changed because of this.

Intent is everything – The difference between you and a criminal in a jail is, he is caught. Day and night we often commit so many crimes in our mind, but the only thing is we are never caught. However, we are punished by the law of nature when we have ill will for others. It could be as simple as thought of stealing, hurting others and more. For example, if you get angry on someone, before you shout on other, you already hurt yourself to a degree. When you practice meditation, you will be able to see this in a better manner, and perhaps you will change your conduct. First anything appears as intent (thought), then in voice and then in action! Once you understand this, you will do your best to improve on how you think and life choices that you make.

Always attempt to respond over react.

One more step – Before giving up, push yourself for one more step. It will be worth it.

Serve – Once you complete your first 10 day camp, you can now give service. The purpose is to be a server in one of the meditation camp and enable an environment which helps other practice this technique. I was fortunate enough to do this once, and the kind of reflection such experience gives is going to be very unique and dissolve a lot of ego and create space for selfless love.

On day zero you take 5 precepts, and the 5th and most important once is “no intoxicants”. The reason it is most important is because once you take intoxicants (drugs or alcohol), you will not be able to maintain other precepts such as sexual misconduct, stealing and others.

Even though we maintain 10 days of noble silence, every evening there is a discourse of around 1 hour. In this discourse (available in many languages), the teacher Goenka Ji explains the technique and that entire one hour clarifies most of the doubt related to the technique.

Feel free to let me know if you have any questions about Vipassana. Do note that I’m a student as well, so my answer may not be perfect, and I can’t talk much about the technique, but I will do my best to point you in the right direction/resources that I know of.

What is Vipassana Meditation? (From a Practitioner)

I’m a student who is practicing/learning the technique of Vipassana and this article is my experience as a learner. So if you find any error or fault in my explanation, kindly inform me. 🙏🏻

Special thanks and congratulations to Shallu, Shikhar, Bhavya, Tarang who completed their 1st 10 day Vipassana experience. I sincerely hope that they complete their 2nd course soon to see the compounded benefit of this practice.

Are you a theist or an atheist?

Well, I don’t believe in God, and I used to say that because I felt it made me look cool.

I was born religious. Not by choice but by birth.

I always felt that I’m surrounded by an unexplained force that always guided me and still guiding me on how to navigate the world.

However, this story is not about religion or god or anything that will make you or anyone uncomfortable.

This is a true story of my journey to an unknown dimension that I never ever knew existed until I turned 27. After this discovery, I’m surprised to see how my life unfolded, and it’s been more than 7 years now, and I’m sharing this untold part of my journey. This section of my life is not for everyone but for those who ever asked some big questions like:

– What is the meaning of life?

– Why do we suffer pain, and how to let go of pain?

– How to live every day like it’s your first or last?

– How to leave fear, anxiety behind and find your true self?

And this story is also for someone who is

– Tired of repeatedly doing the same thing every day.

– Tired of being stuck and want to move on…

Before we move ahead, let me tell you that a certain part of this story is written in raw form.

You need to be patient and when you get distracted, focus on what you are seeing and read every word from your heart. Every word will reveal a new meaning to you. Have patience and faith.

Adding a disclaimer was important, and now let me take you to the time where this all started.

It was the summer of ’86 when I was born in a Hindu family. The fun part of being a Hindu is, one can learn the concept of god and rituals from the very day he/she is born. It’s not a choice but it’s how life in a Hindu family is.

I always had a curious and inquisitive mind, and I like to know the reason behind everything that is happening. I like to ask questions and I don’t rest unless I don’t find a logical answer behind it. It was my mother who I always found on the other side of the fence and trying to answer my endless questions one after another. I always find her to be a genius because her every answer was either logical or laced with the sweetness of morality.

Later on, when I touched the stairs of adolescence, I kind of got busy with life. School is a fascinating place because not only do we learn in class, it’s more about what we learn outside the class.

The school kept me busy, and I started asking questions like:

– Why are we all divided?

– Why do Hindus only go to the temple?

– Why do Muslims go only to the mosque?

– Why does the Church exist?

It didn’t take me long enough to see the ancient wisdom behind most of the things.

For example, when a Muslim offers prayers (Sarah), they end up doing a lot of exercise.

A Hindu usually has to climb a mountain for prayers, which has direct health benefits of trekking. Fasting on special days (done by almost all religions) has significant health benefits.

Well, lately my belief in god started fading, and I moved from a small town to “New Delhi,” the capital city of India, for high school. It was only once or twice a year when I used to visit my hometown and the temple. I really loved myself when I used to go to the temple as that’s the time when my thinking was pure.

I usually pray for bringing goodness into every human life. Instead of getting stuck in mindless chatter, I simply pray, and the thoughts are usually positive (for me and also for others). Whenever I’m inside the temple, it felt like there is a cool breeze inside me.

In a few years, life got me again, and this time I became a computer engineer. Whenever I used to get time, I used to thank a few Deities (Gods), usually before sleeping for giving me a good life and always prayed for the well-being of all human beings. I do believe the only way I could do well in life is when people around me do well.

It was the summer of 2009 when my life took the most unexpected turn. I met with a severe accident, and for the first time in my life, I felt so helpless. This accident had a significant impact on my life, as it changed the complete course of my journey.

Usually, it’s a major event like an incident, death, birth that changes the course of someone’s life to an extent that is beyond our control.

It’s the pain that opens the heart more and lets us see the true form of life.

This incident made me realize that I don’t have any control over my life and any day the whole life could turn upside down. There will be no reminder on calendar notification or phone call when that happens. Life is so unexpected, and that became one of my life Northstar.

My faith in a power beyond my understanding remained there, but I got more curious to understand more dimensions of this life.

Six years passed by, and my life got completely changed. From being a small-town boy with a big dream, I became one of the most successful and celebrated bloggers of my country.

Fame, money, and everything was coming to me, and I was living the life that most of us usually dreamed of. Everything happened too fast, then I could understand and make sense out of everything.

It was 2015, and I was in the midst of the biggest mental depression of my life due to loneliness and my lifestyle.

My best creation of all time “ShoutMeLoud” was touching the lives of millions, I was reaching new heights every day, and ShoutMeLoud was the #1 website in its niche for multiple years, I was married to a beautiful women, I purchased my own house, and everything seems to be going well, yet there was a feeling of incompleteness.

I always felt that life can’t be only this. “work, family, make money, travel, reproduce, and die.” It sounded so purposeless to me. I was longing for more and the curiosity inside me was growing.

I could see that I was becoming part of a rat-race which has no end. One milestone after another, and there is hardly any joy.

I could see that the way I was living the life, it will never stop. I could literally write my next 10-20 years of life story in a diary.

My life has become predictable, and even though my work had a purpose, personally I was feeling restless. Usually a longing question makes me restless till the time I don’t find an answer or I’m on the right direction to find the answer.

My next few years were sorted in terms of business, family, and I was ready to live a grand life. I was “Selectively confused”, that was my state of mind.

The Unexpected Encounter: September 2015

While I was seeking an answer for “What’s next”?

Something unexpected happened. To break the monotony of my journey, I decided to attend a bloggers meet happening in Mumbai.

Before this event, for the last 2 years, I attended most of the events as a speaker.

This was the first event in the past 2 years that I wanted to attend as a student.

As someone who I was, a learner for life. What happened at the event turned out to be the best decision of my life.

It was the last day of the event, when ‘Archana’ found me at the event and said hi to me. She told me how her husband (Desh Kapoor) is a reader of my blog and how much he loves ShoutMeLoud.

There was something remarkable about her. The warmth and love that I felt while talking to her in those few minutes felt like something I never experienced in my life before or probably something I have been longing to feel. Now I think it’s her positive vibrations, but more on it later.

Anyways, in our few minutes of conversation, she told me she and her husband both have a blog. And her husband, Desh, reads ShoutMeLoud.com regularly.

She also invited me to visit them in Atlanta if I ever visit the USA. Going to the USA was not something I ever imagined or thought of.

Note: I ended up visiting USA in January 2016, and also stayed with these two beautiful people in Atlanta for 1-2 days. Here is a picture from this memorable trip.

We parted after exchanging numbers, and the energy that Archana passed on to me unknowingly in those few minutes of conversation was about to change my life.

Just a day before, I was club hopping with Jeff Bullas, and it was 7.30 PM, and I was getting ready to hit the club again. Just before leaving, out of curiosity, I opened Desh’s blog – DrishtiKone.

The next time I checked my watch, it was 11.30 PM. For the past 4 hours, I was busy reading his blog.

Almost 20+ tabs were opened, and I was watching a video of a spiritual guy called “Sadhguru” who looked no different than any other gurus that we see or hear about. I was hooked to Desh’s blog, and I can’t thank him enough for introducing me to the scientific explanation of spirituality.

In India we used to have a TV broadcast channel called “Sadhna TV” and I believe it still exists, and I remember seeing my grandmother hooked to all the talks and I straight away dismissed all this thinking that it’s for old age and just a money making scheme. With the commercialization of spirituality and god, this is true to a larger extent.

Anyways, more on this aspect some other day, and let me get back to the journey in sequential form.

So from Desh’s website, I discovered about Godman called “Sadhguru” and it was the first time ever that a few of the aspects of god, prayers, and temple made sense to me.

Things seemed logical.

About Sadhguru:

I did follow many of his content in the initial days and attended one of the discourses. However, it felt like a cult, and eventually, I started looking elsewhere. I also bumped into this video recently made by a critique, and I do suggest to watch this.

However, I was hooked because most of his videos sounded logical to me. His views on topics like

• Why people go to temple
• Architect and science behind prayers
• How not to be worried,
• Quitting any addiction
• Living a peaceful life

made me speechless.

In those few hours, I learned the most important difference between Spirituality and Religion.

Before this, both (Religion and Spirituality) used to be the same thing, but that night in the hotel room of a 5-star hotel, I got the clarity about something that was about to change my life forever.

That night I hardly slept, and the next day I flew back to Delhi. That trip has changed something about me, and for the next 1-2 weeks, I was spending a minimum of 1 hour of time watching and reading about Spirituality. It was mostly “Sadhguru” videos that were giving me guidance, and I was slowly drifting into the world of spirituality.

I ordered my first-ever spiritual book, and I’m not wrong – it was “The Surrender Experiment” by Michael Alan Singer. I could not have picked a better starter book than this.

After that, it was a marathon of spiritual books.

– The Power of Now

– The Untethered Soul

– The Autobiography of Yogi

– Tao Te Ching

And many more…

Intellectually I was stimulated, and I was ready for more.

After reading all these books, I realized – I need to practice meditation and yoga to further proceed on this path of spiritual awakening.

Note: I’m in no manner recommending Sadhguru or any other godman. I feel that anyone who truly is spiritual, may not discrimnate people based on caste, religion, sex or anything.

My first Unfinished Vipassana experience – Kanpur (20th March 2016)

Read more about Vipassana meditation here.

My first real encounter happened in 2016 when I discovered about Vipassana in one of the spiritual books and researched more about it on Quora. I was beyond fascinated when I realized something like Vipassana does exist in the world that we live in. I straight away enrolled for the next available course which was in Kanpur, and attended my first-ever Vipassana course.

My first experience was brutal, as by the second day, my physical body and mind were super tired. I could not sleep and could see my entire life running ahead of me. I could not figure out what was happening to me, and sitting 10 hours cross-legged, meditating while maintaining noble silence, and the entire environment was way too much for me. I thought Vipassana meditation was nothing like what we do as guided YouTube meditation. It was nothing as I imagined and by the 6th day, I gave up. I got out on the 7th

It was a complete disaster for me and I moved ahead with my journey. However, my life started changing and it was changing for good. I believe those 5-6 days of meditation (which was more like an introspection) made me realise many things which I would not have realised otherwise.

I was yearning to go back and deep down I was slowly getting ready . I was preparing myself for next sitting, and I got this opportunity in the September of 2017.

2nd Vipassana retreat – Jodhpur chapter (30th August 2017)

It was after a year and half that I got this opportunity to attempt for next Vipassana camp. This time it was Jodhpur, and I arrived there was strong determination to complete the entire 10th day this time.

This young dude is Daniel from Spain who was travelling India and I believe his couch-surfing host told him about Vipassana, and he joined and completed one. This picture was taken just after we got out of completing our 10 day retreat.

It’s been more than 6 years that I have completed my first 10 day retreat, and honestly I can’t put my fingers on what has changed. But deep down I knew that something has changed for me. FOREVER!

Post the completion of Jodhpur chapter, I started attending one day camp every year.

• 3rd 10 day Retreat – Pushkar ( Feb 2019)
• 4th 10 day Retreat – Pushkar ( August 2020)
• 5th 10 day retreat – Pushkar (June 2021)
• 6th 10 day Retreat – Pushkar (March 2022)

Photo (above) from Vipassana February 2019 (Pushkar) and video (below) after the retreat:

What I could notice is, every 10 day camp started changing something inside me for good. I was becoming free from a lot of my vices, and useless deceptions created by others for their profit and ill will.

Pushkar 2021. Photo with assistant teacher “Subhash Sethi ji.”

When we slow down, the truth and reality reveals itself ( don’t want to sound dramatic and don’t want to over simplify this as well), but after every Vipassana camp, my life changed drastically in 3-6 months. Mostly for good, aside from one time when I felt I was stuck in somewhere, and it took my months to got out of that mindset.

Anyways, I was definitely living a better life. I was doing things that I could have never imagined in my wildest of dreams.

I believe these 10 days of silent meditation, is the best thing that has ever happened to me.

Tip: Once you complete one 10 day Vipassana retreat (Dhamma.org), you can always go for one day and three day refresher course. I highly recommend to try going for at least 1 three day refresher course every quarter, as this improves your practice by a greater extent.

Tip 2: Attempt for regular practice but don’t beat yourself up if you can’t be regular. Make effort and continue to do so.

Top 3: Albert Einstein said “Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world”. And, this is true for Vipassana meditation as well. Every year when I go, I could feel that past experiences are not in vain, and helped me to go deeper in my practice. (Deeper in the sense that I could stay in Samatha for longer period).

I still have a few vices, and as a practicing student I don’t have that kind of wisdom to share much. But, I do think I’m a pretty intelligent being, and I go back to Vipassana every year because deep down I’m getting immense benefit from it. As I learn more and I have maturity to share my insights objectively, I would do the same here.

I would definitely love to chat more about it if we ever meet at a conference or a cafe or even online.

I’m not advocating anything here, and my purpose here is to share my experience, and share everything I do that has helped me to become a better person. This is how I could contribute my bit to make this world a better place.

I look forward to hearing your experiences and journey in the comment section below. 🙏🏻

My Journey to Vipassana Meditation – Spirituality Is Not What You Think It Is!

This blog post is more for me than you.

It is a reflection and timeless documentation of thoughts and ideas for me. After years, when I re-read such posts, it reminds me of how far I have come.

I also believe in the power of manifestation, and by writing what I want, I’m also manifesting what I will like to receive in the future. I wish I could tell you, how writing and meditation have helped me manifest a big part of my life, and here I’m, doing what works for me.

What do I want from 2023 and the years ahead –

To Travel –

Here are the places I will like to travel to in 2023

• Colombia
• Spain
• Japan
• Thailand (unexplored islands, doing Scuba)
• Philippines
• Madagaskar
• Tanzania
• South India – Coorg and surrounding area
• Goa
• Brazil
• Mexico
• Egypt

That’s a long list, and it will be interesting to see how many of them I will be able to achieve.

Activities/Hobbies I will like to learn/Master

• S.M.A.R.T. Goals – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound.
• Become a better trader and value investor – This into the realm across all asset classes. I also want to master the art of automated trading, something I have been dabbling with since 2018.
• Golf – This is a new hobby I picked in the last quarter of 2022. And will love to hone my skills as I grow myself in 2023. I often thought its a rich man’s game, but as I’m practicing golf, it is nothing less than meditation if done properly.
• Badminton – Take training and get better at it.
• Chess ♞
• Salsa Dance – Dance is an expression of the heart , mind and soul
• Become a remarkable public speaker – Will join ToastMaster again for the same.
• Be more fun – Life is already serious, and I want to hone my quality to turn any dull moment into a joyous moment. After all, its all about how you approach a moment, do you react or you respond?
• Dive at new locations – I would love to dive at new locations and see the marine life up close. I especially wish to achieve peak Buoyancy and take better underwater pictures.
• Train harder – One of my best decision for 2022 was to have a personal gym and fitness trainer. I saw the benefit all around me with this new habit, and in 2023 I wish to let go of any leftover complacency and train harder.
• Rock climbing
• Free Diving

What will be my center for 2023 –

• ShoutMeLoud and CoinSutra – These two web properties are my passion project. I wish to touch the lives and hearts of more than 10 million in 2023 with these passion projects. This may require me to write and create regularly, which I will gladly do. I want to take ShoutMeLoud pro and CoinSutra VIP to next level, by helping our members on more personal level.
• Love and live consciously – The only thing that is truly limited is the amount of breath we going to inhale and exhale in our lifetime. I wish to take every breath consciously and with a purpose. (Zanshin)
• Health – I have been serious about health for a while, but there are many battles I still need to win to reach my peak performance. I wish to train harder and have a body and fitness of a world-class athlete.
• Live in the meditative state – While physical exercise is fuel for my goal to the athletic body, meditation and mindfulness are the fuel for living consciously. I wish to stay in the meditative stay as much and as long as I could.
• Love more and worry less
• Travel more – I have often found that travel ignites my soul, and I wish to stay in that state as much as I could.
• Only remarkable work – I always took pride in doing remarkable and meaningful work. Everything else was the outcome of what I did with true intent. I wish to continue and improve on my quality of remarkable work, which creates a difference in my and numerous people’s lives.

Things I would let go of –

• Alcohol – It is possible to attain peak performance while occasionally enjoying a sip of beer or that glass of fine smokey scotch. But, I wish to spend 6 months without drinking and learn how it impacts my overall quality of life.
• Become a non-smoker – Smoking is my real slow poison and something I often struggle to quit. In 2022, I have had a decent streak of non-smoking days, and in 2023 I wish to turn this into a streak of months.
• Avoid Junk food – I’m mindful of what I eat. I avoid unhealthy food as much as I could, and I’m often very harsh to myself with this construct. However, this year I will have proper cheat days so that I could enjoy that one bite of Samosa or Burger that I often crave for. So that I would not get into guilt mode when enjoying that big glass of Pepsi while watching a movie. However, I would focus on picking healthy alternatives over fried and unhealthy options.
• Avoid Meaningless relationships – I give 3 meetings before I make up my mind if the person is worth investing my time in or not. In 2023, I want to focus more on building deep and meaningful relationships with my friends and family who are the center of my life. I’m always open to meeting remarkable people and often not-so-remarkable people too. But, this year (2023) I will keep it minimalist, and focus on cultivating deep relationships with my inner circle.

I have had a few years in my life when my time spent on smartphones and online was too low, and I wish to do the same for 2023. I don’t want the internet to be an escapade from life and will love to spend my time experiencing the beautiful unseen and unknown experiences our beautiful planet has to offer. I wish to spend a significant amount of time reading books.

Here are some of the books that are on my reading list –

• 365 days with Self-Discipline
• Start with Why – Simon Sinek
• Coffee Can Investing
• The joys of compounding

Do you have a suggestion for books that I should add into my reading list? Feel free to suggest in the comment section below.

2023 Plan – What I’m Looking Forward To

Travel opens your heart, broadens your mind, and fills your life with stories to tell.

The pandemic has changed the world, and for a Globe-trotter like me, it was heartache. Since the pandemic hit our globe, my travel has been as low as it could be.

The Philippines trip was very unplanned, and when I look back now sitting in my home office, it was totally worth it. This was my 3rd Solo trip (After Portugal and USA), and something I will cherish throughout my life.

I was speaking to a friend “Apoorv” who was then in the Philippines and was going gaga about the Picturesque and outstanding hospitality of Filipinos, and the next thing I know that I booked my flight to Manilla.

I hold an Indian passport and have a valid USA visa, I was eligible for an on-arrival visa.

Day 1 – Reaching Boracay island (November 26th)

I took a direct flight from DXB to Manilla, and my next flight to Caticlan (MPH) was booked via Cebu airlines. I was lucky to book via Cebu airlines, as their flight take off from Terminal 3 of Manilla international airport, which is where all international airport arrives.

By 12 PM, I was in Caticlan (MPH), and from there I took a speed boat to Boracay island.

I checked in to my hotel which was called “Astoria current” and is situated at station 3.

There was a dive center next to the hotel, and I spoke to them to understand the various programs they offer. I was keen on doing “Padi advanced scuba certification” but I heard some amazing stuff about dive sites at Palawan, so decide to pick the fun dive here.

The base price for fun dive was 1800 PHP and for the advanced PADI scuba certification, it was 25K PHP.

The day was a relaxing day and enjoyed the breathtaking views of the pristine and clean beaches of Boracay island.

Island has some interesting rules, such as; you can’t smoke in public spots, and there are designated areas for smoking. Smoking is one of my vices that I’m trying to let go of, and I open-heartedly accepted this rule.

Day 2 – Paddleboat, Relax and Breathe (November 27th)

Day two was another relaxing day, and being on an island at times doesn’t feel like I’m in rush to do anything.

The vibe of an island reminds you to enjoy, and grow at your own pace. After enjoying a relaxing spa, I hit the beach which was right in front of my Hotel and enjoyed swimming and paddle boating.

After enjoying the island, the next few days were all about adventures.

Day 3-5 – Boracay island

The next few days were all about the different adventures this island offers…

I did two fun Scuba dives, and one afternoon went for the island hop.

If you are in Boracay, you have to do an island hop to see all the hidden beauty these islands have to offer. The island hop could take 3-5 hours, and you have a chance to go on a public boat or book a private boat. No matter what, try to leave by 12-1 PM, as most of the island closes by 4.30 PM, and you may miss out on exploring some of the islands.

It was disheartening to see the dying coral life, but the best we could do is to acknowledge it and limit our carbon footprint and be mindful of our actions. Meanwhile, Apoorv left for Bangkok to attend Affiliate World – Bangkok, and my real solo trip started from here.

There is a very strange kinda excitement when you are on your own. I have always discovered myself more on a solo trip than traveling with someone.

When you are solo tripping, it is your 100% of time and decision on how you would like to spend time. You discover your fears, and your aspirations and the overall solo-tripping experience is just wow.

I decided to spend the last two days exploring another dive, and one day only for relaxation.

Earlier the plan was to shift to the “Shangri-La Boracay”, but it would have made the trip very different than what I wanted it to be. Moreover, I was itching to sit down with my diary and write some notes that would be my north star for life. More on it later…

I was lucky to learn a new meditation technique called “Mantra meditation” from a fellow traveler who has been practicing this for a while. This meditation technique is not new to a lot of Indians, but theory and practice are two different things.

Here are a few other places that you might want to add to your itinerary if you are visiting Boracay island –

• Mandala Spa and report – For a Luxury Spa experience
• Aria Cucina Italiana at D’mall – For Italian cusine
• Exit bar – High energy bar opens till 3 AM

It was the end of my Boracay island trip, and now it was time to move to the Palawan district.

Travelling from The Boracay Island to El-Nido Palawan –

I had two choices to pick from in Palawan – Coron island or El-Nido.

My style of traveling is slow pace, and I love to breathe, live and enjoy one place over visiting multiple places in a record time. I picked El-Nido island and planned my journey ahead.

For this, I had to take a flight from Caticlan to Manilla, and then from Manilla domestic airport (Terminal 4) to Lio airport ( ENI). A lot of tourists prefer to travel to Puerto Princesa International Airport (PPS) and from there road trip to El Nido or Coron, which is about 4-5 hours.

Anyhoo, for the first day, I booked my stay at Karuna El Nido Villas , and it was an ok decision. The Villa was amazing, but it was away from the main town, and it was on the hill.

By now, I was sure of two things –

1. Complete my advanced PADI certification
2. Get a tattoo if I find anything meaningful

I had about 4 nights in El-Nido, and I wanted to dedicate this trip to scuba certification.

The first day went on to strolling through the streets of El-Nido town and figuring out the Scuba certification plan, and the next place to stay.

For the rest of the trip, I selected to stay at “S Resort El Nido“, which is actually a hotel. This one is right at the center of El-Nido town.

Before checking out from Karuna El Nido Villas, I spent time at their restaurant with this breathtaking view and started planning my 2023 and future years.

I was very happy with how the first 3-4 hours of my morning Diary panned out for me.

I checked out from Karuna Villas and checked in at S-resort. Since the room was not ready, I took a tricycle ride to Vanilla beach.

Tip – Make sure you always have music downloaded on your Spotify or YouTube app. The internet in small islands is not always the best.

Later that night I also found a nice Indian restaurant in El-Nido town and fulfilled my craving for Indian food .

PADI Advanced Scuba certification – Palawan divers

I enrolled myself for PADI advanced scuba certification at Palawan divers. The cost for the same was 21000 PHP, and you can get a 5% discount if you pay in cash. If you pay via card, there is a markup of 2.5-3% which will be charged by the payment processor. You can also PayPal the money if needed.

Tip – Paying in cash is much cheaper in the Islands of the Philippines, as the processing fees for cards are too high. You can carry up to 50,000 PHP when visiting from your country, or you can always use an ATM to withdraw the funds.

Before reaching El-Nido, I researched some of the best dive institutes in El-Nido, and Palawan divers were highly recommended. I booked my Advanced PADI diver certification via them, and when I look back I was not disappointed.

There as three compulsory dives and 2 adventure dives to pick from multiple options –

• Deep dive – Compulsory
• Navigation dive – Compulsory
• Peak Performance Buoyancy
• Digital Imaging
• Night dive

Since they don’t have a night dive option, we opted for Tunnel diving at Helicopter island, and it turned out to be one of the best dives of my 6 years of career as a diver.

Note – If you opt for any of the PADI certifications, be ready to spend 3-7 hours reading theory before the dives. So plan your trip accordingly.

Every day we took 3 dives, and I could feel more confident and controlled after every dive. My instructor’s name was “Jok Casumpang” he is a local and he was really fun to dive with. Our group consisted of 3 students + one instructor, and it was such a delightful moment when we completed the certification on the 2nd day.

It was my last night in El-Nido, and I was tired. But the joy of Advanced scuba dive certification was pushing me to do more, and I took a leap of faith and went to get myself Inked.

Tattoo – Steampunk diver / Astronaut in the ocean

This is a long pending for me, and I had a meaningful tattoo in my mind after my first few dives.`

I picked “Steampunk diver” which looked like “Astronaut in the ocean”, and seemed apt for my next tattoo. I commissioned a talented local artist named @Joshua for this tattoo, and after spending 5 hours, we were able to complete the inking process.

Watch the below reel to see the entire process…

And it’s a wrap…

Well with this my trip came to an end, and my heart and soul were enriched again with life because of this unplanned and natural beauty of the Philippines islands.

Some places to add when you visit El-Nido –

• SAVA beach bar – Nice beach bar. You should aim to go here not before 10 PM
• Pangolin – A local bar
• Vanilla beach – To relax. Be mindful of the rocky shore.
• Ashoka restaurant – An authentic Indian cuisine
• Cafe Athena – Try the Chicken roll here, and enjoy the breathtaking view.

The hospitality of Filipino people was second to none, and they will continue to amaze you with smiles and the little things they do for you.

Some travel tips for the Philippines –

• In the small islands of the Philippines, cash is the king. Make sure you have enough to pay for your entire trip. I reached home with only 100 PHP left and had to be very mindful of my expenditure in the last 2 days.
• You should find hotels via Booking.com or Agoda, but make bookings directly. You will save a ton of money in this process.
• Better to stay in the middle of town, where the beach and all the restaurants/shops/bars are. However, you might be disturbed by the loud music from the neighboring bar. So plan accordingly.
• “Same vibes attract the same tribe” – When you are on the islands of the Philippines, start every day with a fresh mind.
• There are a lot of ladyboys and transgender around, and they are all good people. But often your friendly smile may lead to a stalker following you
• You are better off planning some part of your trip in advance. Especially how would you travel from one island to another? Also, a rough list of things you wish to see/experience. Anyways, local people are friendly and they will guide you.
• Feel free to negotiate hard, as you could save 10-35% of your money doing this.
• Be respectful of local and fellow travelers.
• You should not solely rely on the wi-fi offered by the resort/hotel, or hostel where you plan to stay. You are better off taking a Simcard with data at the Manilla airport.

Gratitude to the amazing people (Jess, Jok, Cha, Joseph, Noeme) whom I met on this trip, who spread love, and happiness, and shared a piece of wisdom that I will remember throughout my life.

Until next time!

Boracay & El-Nido Trip Dec 2022 – Brighter, Freer, and Picturesque

When I was a child, my mother always used to tell me: “Don’t overdo it”! While in retrospect this was excellent advice, I was a child back then and did not understand the meaning of my mother’s wise words.  Years later, at the age of 29, I understood her advice all too well.

Note: I wrote this article when I was 29, and I have updated it with new info in June 2022, when I’m 36.

In my 14 years as a professional blogger, I have been constantly connected to the Internet. Whether I was on my laptop or my iPhone or Apple Watch, I was constantly connected to the outside world.

I didn’t realize that I had traded the joy of meeting people in real life for quick and meaningless Facebook or Whatsapp chit-chat. I completely missed the boat when it came to drawing a line between my professional and personal life.  

My time-tracking app once cloaked 105 hours screen time in a week.

That’s almost 15 hours a day of screen time.

Is int it too much?

Here are a few of the mistakes I made in doing this:

• I stopped meeting people in real-life and started interacting via Facebook or video calls on Skype/Zoom.
• I stopped myself from saying what I truly felt, and started writing status updates to be acknowledged or liked.
• I stopped listening to valuable comments and opinions from others, and started focusing only on “likes” and ignoring “dislikes”.
• I read a lot about life hacks feeling good that I was learning something new, but I failed to implement in real-life.
• I started ignoring advice from experienced people around me (in real-life), and used Google to find answers to my questions. I also failed to realize that the answers I found via Google searches were written by people just like you and me who may or may not be giving the best advice.

This was just the beginning, and it took me 5 1/2 years to realize that I was becoming an Internet addict.  Before you judge me too harshly, this didn’t happen overnight, but in a gradual manner making it even more difficult to notice.

How I used the Internet in the wrong way:

As a blogger by profession, being online is a part of my daily job and routine. Eight hours is the minimum amount of time I used to work online, and the rest of the time I was online for non-work reasons.

I started replacing my normal healthy habits with my online habits. And it all happened gradually over that period of 5 1/2 years.

What I failed to realize is that the Internet was consuming me. Something which should be used only for work and education became a significant part of my daily non-work routine. The Internet became my entertainment, my mode of communication and a way to stay in my comfort zone anywhere and everywhere.

Besides all of that, one of the biggest challenges I faced was distraction. With the urge to consume too much information in too little time, I was reading too much and learning nothing.

I began my days checking emails and Facebook notifications, and ended them checking emails and reading articles online. Occasionally I would become so stressed with information overload, I would use sleep apps on my phone to try to put my mind into a restful state!

Most telling, perhaps, was the fact that I did not see any of this as a problem.  Such is the life of an Internet addict.

How I realized my Internet addiction, and how I am working to conquer it:

I would be lying if I were to say that I am no longer addicted to the Internet after practicing new discoveries in my two-week attempt to “disconnect to connect!” But I am making sure that I don’t get all caught up in the Internet zone again in my life.

For the past two weeks, I have been away from the Internet, and I have been living the real life of a real 27-year-old person (with no real job!) in the real world.

I have occasionally checked my email or used WhatsApp, but I have limited that to five minutes a day.  For the rest of the time I have been completely disengaged from the Internet. I have not even published anything on my blog, nor have I written anything.

Originally, this all happened unintentionally.  But the resulting self-realization that has occurred has been highly illuminating. What I noticed about my Internet-addicted self was scary.  But only when I disconnected was I able to truly realize what I had been missing in my life while hyper-connected to the Internet.

In addition to seeing the world as a bunch of “likes” and “dislikes”, constantly consuming useless, half-baked information, and developing a weird issue of “constant distraction”, I ultimately found it hard to concentrate on any one thing.  In other words,  my attention span was very short in real life, and it was uncool!

Somehow I had no issue making conversation with people online, but I lost touch with the ability to have real-life, face-to-face conversations with people who mattered more.

Imagine yourself not looking at your computer or mobile screen for the entire day, and having a conversation with someone who knows nothing about the online world. What would you talk about? How would you make conversation?  What would your comfort level be? Could you look them in the eye and meet them face-to-face and heart-to-heart?

If you’re not sure how to answer those questions, you can probably relate to every word of this article.

This is my first post in 2-3 weeks, and I’m taking notes for myself for future reference. Here are a few things that I’m doing and will continue to do in an effort to ensure that I make the most of my online and offline life, never returning to my online addiction:

Minimize Social Networking:

Social networking comes with it’s own taste of good and bad. For me, staying in touch with my social network is not only important but essential to my business endeavours. Being a public person, it is very important for me to stay online.

With that said, one issue that I am working on is using social networking for practical rather than hypothetical purposes.  I have made friends online as we all have, but they are more like connections based on common interests, rather than connections based on personal knowledge about each other.

I have started to use my personal profile on social networking sites solely for my personal documentation, and beyond that I don’t use it anymore. Instagram and Twitter in particular is the area in which I am being most careful.

BEWARE:  Using Instagram too much not only affects your self-esteem, but it also brings about a narcissistic personality disorder.  This can be avoided to some degree if you focus on having meaningful interactions with others via comments, etc., and completely ignoring “likes”.

Simply stated, limiting your personal Instagram profile to your close network of offline connections (friends and family), is a wise thing to do.

Stop Multi-tasking: It is slow poison

I have read a lot about the benefits and downsides of multi-tasking, and one thing that I have learned from my own experience is that online multi-tasking is good only for tasks which don’t require much brain-work.

Here’s the kicker: things which don’t require much brain-work do not deserve your time! These matters should be outsourced.

So I’m sticking to one task at a time.  I will refrain completely from doing multiple things at one time. Why?  Because my complete attention should be given to the single task at hand.

Read and watch to learn something new:

Another bad habit I formed was reading a lot without actually learning anything new. In this era of information overload, it is difficult to discern the good information from a very large sea of loose “information”.

I was being bombarded with news, articles and updates everywhere (Fb, Twitter, Instagram).  In an effort to combat this, I began by taking the time to filter useful information from all the loosely compiled “information” out there and then reading through the useful information as quickly as possible.

Half of this time I spent adding the decent information to my Pocket app to read later.  Before long I would find that I had 40+ great articles waiting for me on Pocket to consume when I could.

Prior to doing all of this, I was missing out on the most important aspect of digital media, and that is the fact that I can control what I see on my social media feeds.

We don’t need quantity – only quality content is worth our dedicated time.

So I started going back to the old-school days, and I started taking notes in the old-school style (pen and paper!) so that I would also retain it. Additionally, I started reading information out loud.

Later in the day, I would take some time to think about the things I had read.

The goal of all of this was to process the information I had learned online, and then to put that information to use in my daily life.  (I’m not referring to things like internet marketing skills here but to life hacks or self-improvement tips, which we spend so much time researching and learning online.)

Vipassana: Disconnect from the world for 10 days

I discovered Vipassana in 2016, and since then I try to go for 10 days camp every year. Vipassana is a meditation practice which is quite intense. It requires you to maintain noble silence, and meditate for 10 hours every day for 10 days straight. At the top of it, you will have not access to phone, TV, internet, and you would be living like a monk.

The first time I went for it, I could not complete the entire 10 days. Infact, on the 7th day I left the centre as it was becoming too intense for me. For someone who never lived without internet for so many days, it was tough. I came out opened my phone and all my anxiety was gone. But at the same time I realized, I could have completed my remaining 3 days camp if I was more determined. 

Anyways, I attempted my 2nd camp after one year, and was able to complete it. I started seeing how my life changed for good after such deep-meditation. The awareness I received due to meditation also helped me to cut down my time on useless activities, and focus on things that matters.

Here is a video after one such camp:

If you wanna know anything about Vipassana, you can email me at harsh@shoutmeloud.com

I’m still working on a few goals, such as:

• Use my smartphone as minimally as possible. This includes having only essential apps on my phone – no Facebook or Candy Crush on my phone.
• “Unlike” all pages and brand pages on Instagram, and use it solely for seeing updates from real friends and people in my network. I can always consume news and updates via other mediums such as Feedly, Google Alerts. In short, I want to use social media only for talking to actual people, and not to become an advocate of brand pages. I’m still subscribed to a few websites and pages with information and updates crucial for me in my professional role. All the above also goes for all other social networks.
• Switching off the Wi-fi router And turning off phone data, after my work hours in order to live an Internet-free life.

There are a few other things I’m working on which I will continue to share in the coming days and weeks. Meanwhile, remember that the only rehab for an Internet addict in the world away from online gadgets.

If you have also faced the problem of Internet addiction, I would be interested in hearing your story.

If you are someone who has found your way out of this addiction, I would love to hear your suggestions.

Disconnect To Connect: How I’m Conquering My Internet Addiction

So, today we’ll talk about a story. The story of the life of a man who has impacted the entire economy and internet industry of China almost single-handedly. His life is nothing less than the story of Robert, The Bruce, and the Spider, that we were taught as kindergartens. That’s the story of Jack Ma.

Who is Jack Ma?

Jack Ma is the founder of the E-commerce giant Alibaba and is a stakeholder at Alipay, its sister company which is an e-payment portal. He is now officially the richest man in China with an estimated net worth of $25 Billion, on the back of the recent world record $150 Billion IPO filing of his company. Given all of this, Jack Ma only holds a 7.8% stake in Alibaba and a 50% stake in Alipay. Alibaba and Jack Ma, although are not household names out of China, you must know that Alibaba is worth more than Facebook, and processes goods more than eBay and Amazon combined!

This might be beginning to seem like the story of an arrogant and rich billionaire who hasn’t seen the dark. But don’t be mistaken by the numbers that you see above, they can fool anyone. Although as simple as it may sound, Jack Ma has had it hard in his life to get to where he is today. A true rags-to-riches story and definitely one which will inspire you even in your darkest days.

Jack Ma – The Backstory

Ma Yun a.k.a. Jack Ma is one of those self-made billionaires with humble beginnings. Jack Ma was born in Hangzhou, in the south-eastern part of China. He was born and raised along with an elder brother and a younger sister during the rise of communist China and its isolation from the Western regions. His parents were traditional Musicians-Storytellers and they didn’t make enough to be even considered as a middle class during those days.

Former US president Richard Nixon’s visit to Hangzhou in 1972 improved the situation of tourism in his hometown and Jack wanted to make the most of this opportunity. Jack always wanted to learn English as a kid, and he spent his early mornings riding on his bike to a nearby park, giving English tours to foreigners for free. Then he met a foreign girl who gave him the nickname ‘Jack’ for his name was hard to spell for her.

Jack, after graduating with a bachelor’s degree in English, worked as an English teacher at Hangzhou Dianzi University with a pay of $12 a month! Now here comes the part where it gets more interesting, even before he has received that degree and became an English teacher.

Rejected, But Not a Failure.

Jack Ma as an extremely lucky bloke who just became a billionaire in a snap. But it is safe to know that Rejections are synonymous with Jack Ma. You wouldn’t believe the number of times this man has been rejected and failed.

In his early childhood, Jack Ma Failed his Primary School examinations, not once but twice!  He Failed Thrice during his Middle School exams. When applying to universities after High school, Jack failed the entrance exams thrice before finally joining Hangzhou Normal University. He even applied and wrote to Harvard University ten times about being admitted – and got rejected each time. This was only during his education!

During and after his Bachelor’s degree Jack tried and failed to get a job at many places. After spending three years to get into a University, Jack failed to land a job after applying to them 30 times! He recollects in his interview, “When KFC came to China, 24 people went for the job.  Twenty-three people were accepted.  I was the only guy who wasn’t.” He was also one of the 5 applicants for a job in the Police force and was the only one getting rejected after being told, “No, you’re no good.”

Also, in his entrepreneurial undertakings, Jack Ma went on to fail in two of his initial ventures. But that didn’t stop him in any way from dreaming bigger.

Down, but Not Out!

The Resurrection of Jack Ma

In one of his interviews, when asked about his rejections, this is what he had to say, “Well, I think we have to get used to it.  We’re not that good.” Overcoming the pain of rejections and treating rejections as opportunities to learn and grow was what Jack Ma made of it.

After finally coming to terms with all of his rejections and failures, Jack Ma visited US in 1995, for a Government undertaking project related to the building of highways. Then, Jack Ma was first introduced to the Internet and Computers. Computers were pretty rare in China then, given the high costs associated with them and Internet or E-mails were non-existent. The first word he searched on the Mosaic browser was ‘Beer’, and it popped out results from different countries, but signs of China anywhere. He then searched ‘China,’ and not a single result popped out! He decided it was time for China and its people to get on the Internet.

Finally, after persuading 17 of his other friends to invest and join him in his new e-commerce startup – Alibaba, the company began from his apartment. Initially, Alibaba didn’t had a single penny in investment from outside investors, but they later raised $20 Million from SoftBank and another $5 Million from Goldman Sachs in 1999. Building trust among the people of China that an online system of payment and package transfers is safe was the biggest challenge Jack Ma and Alibaba faced, a challenge that Jack will cherish for his lifetime.

Having started his first successful company at the age of 31 and even after never having written a single line of code or selling something to anyone, Jack Ma runs one of the biggest E-commerce networks in the world. The company went on to grow rapidly, expanding all across the world, quickly growing out of its China shell. Only second to Walmart now in terms of sales per year, Alibaba has become the E-commerce giant that Jack Ma has envisioned for it.

The Key Takeaway here

Jack Ma Full Interview

What does all of this lead to? With a positive and childlike demeanor to him, the one who himself draws inspiration from is the real-life ‘Forrest Gump,’ who never considers himself disadvantaged due to events that occurred to him.

Believing in yourself, Being Persistent in the face of adversities, and treating rejections and failures as opportunities to propel yourself ahead is what Jack Ma’s extraordinary life speaks out to the world. Here are some of my favorite quotes by Jack Ma:

This is the story of the exceptionally optimistic and determined Entrepreneur who has changed the face of business and the Internet in China and across the world.

So what do you think about Jack Ma and his Entrepreneurial journey with Alibaba? Shout out your thoughts and comments about this business tycoon below.

Also read:

• How Can You Become an Alpha Male in 10 Steps?

Jack Ma – The Inspirational Story of Alibaba Founder

Here is the recorded session:

As I said, documenting it on the blog as it was first time I was being live on a national TV.

See ya in the other article…

On NewsX – First time on National TV

Do you believe that life is about learning and sharing?

Well, that’s one of the things that I strongly believe in, and that’s why I’m always ready to explore new things.

I’ve always considered myself an introvert, but with time, I realized that no one is a perfect introvert or a perfect extrovert. It depends upon the situation, the place, and the people we are with.

With certain people, we are very comfortable sharing everything, and with other people, we don’t have much to add to the interaction. The latter brings out the introvert, and the former highlights the extrovert.

That’s one reason why I always suggest you find and hang out with like-minded people.

This post is not related to discussing introverted or extroverted characteristics; instead, I will tell you about how I toned-down my naturally introverted nature to become a public speaker.

In the past three years, I have given many workshops/seminars on various topics (some with over 200 attendees). Some include:

• “Starting A Blog To Make Money” in Mohali, India
• “How Small Businesses Can Start A Blog For Growth” @ Reseller’s Club Hosting Summit 2013
• “WordPress SEO In 50 Minutes” @ WordCamp, Baroda
• Video Message For Pakistan Entrepreneur Summit
• IBM Business Connect, Panel Discussion, Goa, India
• “Influencer Marketing” @ Socialathon 2015
• Lovely Professional University in 2014
• “Leveraging Affiliate Marketing To Grow Businesses” @ Digital Business Conclave, New Delhi, India
• India Affiliate Summit 2015, New Delhi, India
• India Affiliate Summit 2016, New Delhi, India
• “Growth Hacking Affiliate Earnings” @ Affiliate Summit West, Las Vegas, USA (January 2017)

Even though I love adventure sports, public speaking is something I would have never imagined I would enjoy, even in my wildest dreams.

So let me share how I learned to ditch fear and enjoy public speaking. There are many takeaways & valuable tips here for you. Go grab a cup of coffee & learn something solid today!

How I Started Public Speaking with Zero Experience

If you are a regular reader of ShoutMeLoud, you may have read about my complete blogging journey and also the recent article on the 8 year anniversary of ShoutMeLoud.

So you probably already know that I simply enjoy sharing what I’m learning via my blogs, while at the same time making money.

For anyone who loves to write and help people, blogging is definitely a great career. But it also comes with responsibilities- like being asked to speak in public.

My first public speaking experience happened in 2013 when a blogger contacted me to be a keynote speaker at a blogging event happening in Mohali, and I realize this could be a good reason for me to try something new.

Since I had almost one month until the presentation, I prepared and learned how to fight against stage fright.

The presentation turned out to be better than I imagined, and after a couple of months, another friend asked me to give a workshop at the Reseller’s Club Hosting Summit (Asia’s biggest hosting summit), and I gladly accepted his offer.

This time, I made the silly mistake of being over-confident, and I didn’t prepare in front of the camera like I did the last time. Surprisingly, the workshop turned out to be great for many attendees (based on feedback), but I was not happy with my own performance and negligence for not practicing.

In 2014, Baroda WordCamp organizers asked me to become a speaker, and that was something I didn’t want to miss for various reasons.

For starters, I love WordCamp. The first time I ever attended (Janurary 2009), I got the insights necessary to shape my career as a professional blogger.

Secondly, I knew that there were going to be many newbies there with great enthusiasm that just needed to be pushed along the right path, and I felt like I could be the one to push them.

The hard part was deciding on the topic for the seminar, but I decided to pick “WordPress SEO”.

Well, it’s almost impossible to teach WordPress SEO to anyone in 50 minutes, but I tried my best to make it targeted for both beginners & intermediate bloggers.

Oh boy! What a day that was! I had such a great experience speaking at WordCamp Baroda. I believe this was one of those speaking gigs that changed my career as a speaker.

After that, I spoke at many national & international forums. You can find a list of most of my appearances here.

To be honest, after the first few appearances, I became pretty confident. But it was my last session when I started getting nervous & worried.

I was about to speak at Affiliate Summit West in Las Vegas, USA. It was my first ever international solo speaking engagement & the audience was completely new.

However, it turned out pretty smooth & I recently just got the feedback from my session.

Well, this kind of feedback is priceless as I now know which particular areas I need to work on. With this last one, I’m so happy to join the league of people

With this last one, I’m so happy to join the league of people who have spoken internationally. It’s indeed a good feeling.

So enough about me. What can you do to start your career as a public speaker?

Before we dive in, remember this one rule:

• A good speaker never differentiates between an audience count of 1 or 1 million.

Also remember:

• Time is money, so make it count.

1. Make Your Own Slides

It doesn’t matter if you are a CEO or just an account manager of a company, if you are going to be speaking at a seminar, or a workshop, or even in your office meeting, ensure you make your own slides.

If you don’t have enough time to make your own slides, ensure that you at least work out a complete rough draft of your slides.

This will ensure that you maintain a flow of information while giving your presentation, and get rid of the “ummm”, and “humm”, and all of the awkward pauses.

2. Add Humor When It’s Needed

One great tip to keeping your audience engaged is to add in humor when it’s necessary.

Adding in humor will make you and your presentation much more entertaining.

If you are speaking on a technical topic, try to make it understandable with a humanly-relatable approach (and humor will help with this).

Add in some jokes, and keep the mood light.

3. Dress Appropriately

Non-verbal communication, like body language, vocal tone, and style of dress matters a lot when you are on stage.

You don’t have to wear a thousand dollar suit to leave an impression, but you need to wear something which makes you look more authentic and professional. This will make you feel more confident and make your audience more receptive to what you have to say.

4. Take Questions Seriously

I love questions after my presentations!

They’re what make me believe that people genuinely listened to everything I said. And as a speaker, you should pay serious attention to the questions coming your way.

Remember that the people asking the questions are not the only ones you’re addressing. Some people may have the same question, but they’re just too shy to step up to the mic.

Whenever a question comes in (on-stage), ensure that you repeat the questions, ensure that everyone is paying attention, and then answer the question insightfully and with wisdom.

If any of the questions are off-topic or require more time to explain, you should tell the asker to come up to you after the event and talk with you.

Overcoming The Fear Of Public Speaking

If you feel shy about speaking in public (stage presentations or giving workshops) but you still want to do it, today is the right day to start.

But how?

Start with your laptop or smartphone camera and record yourself while talking about something you are knowledgeable about. Once you are done speaking, watch your recorded video and notice your facial expressions, your tone, your body language, your movements, and listen to the words you did or didn’t use properly.

If you’re feeling particularly adventurous, you can even show it to a friend to see what they have to say about your performance.

Now, repeat the process 2-3 more times and seek to improve upon each of your problem areas each time.

Continue this practice until you are a master public speaker!

• Also read: How To Prepare Yourself For Your First Stage Presentation

What kinds of things do you recommend for public speaking? What are your techniques for giving a good presentation? Have you ever had to give a speech? Let me know your thoughts and experiences in the comments section.

Like this post? Don’t forget to share it!

Just in case you are in the mood to learn some things, here are some videos of my public appearances:

From An Introvert To A Public Speaker: Important Public Speaking Tips

Out of these 3640 weeks, I have already completed 1700+ weeks. So, to be precise, I have close to 2000 weeks left to contribute my life for achieving my goals, my family and the work that I contribute for my extended family, that is you.

This post is a reflection of my entire 52 weeks that I spent in 2019.

Every year is special, we win some, we lose some, but we can’t live our lives afraid of making mistakes. Most importantly we learn things that help us live a better and more meaningful life in the days to come.

Well, this yearly review post is all about this.

• How was 2019 for me and what all did I learn?
• My mistakes and my goals for 2020

Grab a cup of coffee and read every sentence like you reading someone’s autobiography.

If you want to revisit my last year, here is: Revisiting 2018- Do what your heart feels is right!

The 2019 Year in review:

January: Hello Goa!

On 31st December, I was at the Kochi beach with locals. It was just a simple night with the grand view of endless sea and sounds of Arabian sea vastness. There was something special in that simplicity and something I took with me this whole year.

I started the year with a goal of keeping my life simple and peaceful.

One of the major highlights of January was my trip to Goa. I spent some time with an old friend of mine “Gaurav Mishra” who founded few agencies and is now on a lead role in one of the biggest tech companies in the world.

In those few days, we had a long discussion on stuff like artificial intelligence, machine learning and on persona building.

We created a few personas for the ShoutMeLoud audience and also interviewed some of our regular readers. We interviewed users who have made a purchase from ShoutMeLoud or through ShoutMeLoud and every interview lasted for 90 minutes.

Anyways, after a few interviews, it gave me the direction for the next few months.

February 2019: Meditation and USA trip

February was started with my yearly retreat for Vipassana. This is a 10 days silent meditation retreat. I started this tradition almost 3 years back, and since then, every year, I go for one 10 days retreat, and one 3 days retreat.

Being disconnected from the outer world and connecting with my inner self helps me in decluttering my life and focus on what really matters.

I have seen a profound effect of this practice in my life. I also made a video to help others become aware of this free practice which is available for everyone.

In fact, I believe this is the best free thing that is available on this planet. If you have an oppurtunity, do take out 10 days and plan a Vipassana retreat this year.

Once, I was back from the silent meditation retreat, I went to the USA to meet my buddy Syed in Miami and to attend the Traffic and Conversion Summit in San Diego.

I hung out with Syed Balkhi in his Miami house for one day and we chatted about a lot of things. I was so intrigued by his life story and his journey as an entrepreneur.

I will probably invite him to share his journey with the world. For now, here are a few pictures:

From there, we flew to attend the Traffic & Conversion Summit (San Diego), where I met my buddy David Henzel and it was 3 days of knowledge bomb at the T&C conference.

I did share some of my learnings and takeaways in this podcast:

In LA, I met Tejas who is in the leadership role at SocialPilot and it was the first time I drove a car in the USA. I always wanted to drive outside Asia but was worried about the left side driving, and mate, I did it this time and that too at the Hollywood. It was such an exhilarating experience for a first-timer.

One of my goals for the coming year is to rent a car and drive across cities in the USA or Europe. Let’s see how that turns out to be.

March: Slovenia for InOrbit

In March I traveled to Slovenia to speak at InOrbit. Here I shared my journey to building a million-dollar business from the comfort of home.

Slovenia was a place that I have never seen before. With mountainous terrain and mainly continental climate, It was a perfect place for a digital marketing conference.

I met with many of my digital marketing colleagues, friends and made so many new acquaintances. It was great to meet Andrea again, who I have met many times in the past 1 year.

Here are a few pictures from InOrbit:

April – May: My Video Blog

In May, I visited my ancestral house in Rajasthan with my grandfather. In case if you are not aware, my grandfather is the biggest inspiration of my life.

His story of how he moved from a small village to create a thriving family in a big city. How he lived life with his principles that have made him a respected individual and a leader in the community. Something, that takes a lot of insights and persistence to build.

Now, when we stay in two different cities, I try to spend as much time as I get an opportunity. As he is aging, living with him gives me so much perspective about life that I possibly could not put it in words. His attitude towards relationship building and generosity has always inspired me to do the right things.

Every year, we do a road trip from Delhi to Rajasthan and visit many places including our ancestral home and usually, he blesses me with his childhood stories and wisdom.

Soon,, I went to Hyderabad for a photoshoot with my College buddy, Aditya, who is now a passionate photographer. I meant to do a professional photo shoot for a while, and finally, we spent two days in Hyderabad doing the photoshoot.

This is the first time I also made a video blog that you can watch below:

This video blog was created with the help of just two tools:

• DJI Osmo Pocket
• Wondershare Filmora

And this whole process of creating the video blog did not take much time. However, I don’t fancy putting my day to day life on YouTube unless it adds any form of value for my subscribers.

In 2020, I plan to do a few more video blogs especially when I’m attending a conference. The next one would be Wordcamp Asia.

June – Diving with Sharks

In June, I went to Thailand to swimming with Sharks. In case if you are not aware, I love Scuba diving, and one of my ambition is to become PADI certified so that I could dive at many exotic locations around the world.

Diving with Shark is available at Sealife Ocean World in Bangkok and it was completely different and tougher than diving in the sea. I always wanted to see the sharks up close and the whole experience gave me the goosebumps.

At one point of diving, a Shark was coming straight to me in a narrow path, and I zapped for a few milliseconds, and I noticed my instructor signaling me to move, and within seconds I was away from the path of the Shark. It literally rubbed me from sideways, and it gave a nice thrill to every inch of my body.

Facing fear up close and moving ahead is what made this dive very special.

Here are a few pictures from diving with Shark:

When I was back in India, the rest of the weeks went into diagnosing the traffic drop on ShoutMeLoud. We were hit by one of the recent algorithm updates and traffic was down close to 30%. Nothing significant was changed from the website architect.

However, while diagnosing, I realized the main culprit is the Keyword cannibalization and next few months, I spent time fixing the KW Cannibalization and improving old blog posts. It was a devastating time as some changes were making a big difference in keyword ranking and some of them were hardly moving the needle.

None the less, the overall ranking and traffic drop were not improving but as I have experienced many such cycles in the past, I knew the way forward is to continue working, and reward would follow.

July: SEMRush Summer Jam and Solo trip

In July, I went to Portugal to attend Summerjam. This is a yearly private event hosted by the SEMRush team with industry thought leaders, SEO ninjas, and people that matter.

This was 3rd year in a row that I was attending the event and the team always leveling up the experience. I got to meet many old friends and got acquainted with many thought leaders. One of the agenda of this event is to work with product owners at SEMRush to build the tool for the future.

I think this is one approach of making users the part of the product creation, that differentiates between an ordinary product from a world-class product. Something, a lot of SAAS companies could learn from the SEMRush approach.

We also had a workshop with David Allen, who is popularly known as The GTD (Getting Things Done) guy. He shared his wisdom of how to approach towards getting things done and it was very insightful.

In the later part of 2019, I implemented his technique and could see a remarkable impact on my career. If you have trouble being organized or having projects stuck in between, you should read his bestseller Getting things done book.

Here are a few pictures from SummerJam:

After 3 insightful days with the SEMRush team, I traveled to Lagos and Albufeira for my first solo trip in the past few years. This was first such a trip, where I was not meeting any friend or business colleague, and it was pure solo exploration.

I will be making one such solo trip every year to experience the life of my own. However, next year I will be traveling without my laptop and perhaps carrying just a diary and a pen. If you have never made a solo trip before, do plan and get one done. It would be one of the best things you would be doing for yourself.

Here are a few pictures from my first solo trip:

August: My appearance on Radio and Family trip to Goa

August started with my first ever Radio interview. As an avid listener of Radio (when driving), it was such a nice experience to be on a radio show. We talked about how cell phone addiction is becoming an epidemic and something we (netizens) need to be aware of and action we could take.

I will also be doing a video on this topic soon, as I still feel a lot needs to be done before this addiction could hamper the growth of many of us including our children.

If you are a curious one, do read about “NomoPhobia” to learn more about it.

At the same time, I also traveled to Pune to meet my friend Rishabh Parakh and met Sujay Pawar, who runs Brainstormforce.

As we were expecting a new member to join our family, I planned a trip before that and picked Goa for a family retreat.

It was a 3 days trip with family and books.

Moreover, I kept my last few months free from any speaking or public apperances, as my focus was to spend more time with my wife in her journey of delivering a baby.

I turned down many speaking gigs and conferences that I wanted to attend, and being with family turned out to be the wisest decision of 2019.

September- October: Content and SEO

As all these months I was optimizing ShoutMeLoud and rewriting literally hundreds of content to make it future proof. I started seeing many improvements and our traffic was coming back.

Moreover, in the process itself, I learned a lot of new things about content marketing and SEO. This whole process also made me more organized and I started using a checklist and to-do’s to stay on the track.

I had a big pile of unused gadgets that I wanted to get rid of. I followed the GTD philosophy and created a project and plan to get rid of those gadgets. Within the next 45 days, I sold most of those unused gadgets on sites like Olx, FB groups and a few other places.

Selling more than 6 gadgets, It not only brought significant money from the sales but also decluttered my home office. None the less, now those gadgets are being put on good use by others who bought it at a throwaway price. It was a win-win for all.

A lot of credit for this goes to Getting things done book, as it helped me add more structure to my To-do’s.

Note: After using Wunderlist, Nirvana, now I have finally started using ToDoist as my to-do app. It is not particularly designed with the GTD method in mind, however, you can configure it to follow the GTD method.

November- December: Hello Kiddo!

November was a life-changing moment for my family, as we were blessed with a baby boy. When I think of that moment, when I picked him for the first time, a feeling of joy enriches me, even when I’m writing these lines.

If I have to describe the feeling, it is like falling in love at first sight. The feeling of pure love and responsibility is what I had and have since our child has joined us.

Our life since then has changed a lot (all for good), and we are loving every bit of second since he has arrived. I have been told that becoming a parent changes you, and I vouch for it. You would realize some of the changes when you experience such a life event.

In the last week of December, I spent on reflecting on how the whole year was and designing my 2020.

I reflected on some of my philosophies of life such as “Less is the new more“, “Ecstatic yet Simple life” and put an action plan to put certain segments of my life that are sidetracked from my philosophies.

You will see a lot more about this from me in 2020.

A few things that I’m taking away from 2019:

One app rather than many

I enjoy discovering and trying new apps and putting them on use. However, in this process, I end up trying too many apps for the same thing, and at times missed out experiencing the true potential of the app.

So this year, I plan to pick only the best of the apps (Which I usually do) and stick with one, while I learn all the features and implement them.

You can expect more tutorials and guides on specific apps in this year.

Personal finance: Learn & DIY

My journey to personal finance started when I read the book called “Rich dad, poor dad“.

For years, I have had a financial advisor to help me to manage my investments. However, this mid-year for the first time my investment was in the negative, which is ok as its part of the market cycle.

Before this negative return, I never paid attention to investments and was happy that I’m accumulating wealth and reaching towards my goal of financial freedom.

However, when my years of investment was down rather than going up, I thought of spending some time to learn about market and investment.

You know what surprised me the most, I was paying almost 1% of every investment to my advisor as a commission even if the return is negative.

It just did not make sense to me as it was a passive investment. More like a strategy that you crafted and implemented, and now you don’t need to do anything apart from continuing investing. Moreover, of all the investment done, I was paying 1% every year for all old investments.

So in the last few months of 2019, I spent a significant time of my life learning about personal finance and ways I could lower down the cost of fund management.

I did some write up about my learning at ShoutMeTech, and in the future, I may spin-off this as a new blog completely focus on personal finance or just continue doing the same on SMT or harsh.in.

However, here is one important takeaway:

Just like if you have a medical problem such as a headache, you go to a doctor and pay him fees for his consultancy and take his prescribed medicine. Now, even if you are taking his prescribed medicine in the future, would you pay the doctor every time?

Similarly, in personal finance, you are better off paying a financial planner one-time fees to make a financial plan and strategy for you, rather than paying them throughout your journey. The sad part is, finance is a very private topic, and, due to this, people end up paying a hefty sum to distributors without being aware of it.

However, as I am expecting financial technology to penetrate rapidly in emerging markets such as India, Brazil, Philippines, we all will have more awareness and middle-man will be cut down from the process, bringing benefits to end users like you and me.

A lot of such models have emerged lately and you can learn a lot from apps like ZerodhaVersity or do it yourself with the help of apps like Goalwise.

Either way, I urge all of you to pay attention to your personal finance and learn to invest early, to have a worry less financial future.

What’s in store for 2020:

This year, I want to be more aware of my intent and do things with a purpose. I have been following this philosophy for a long time, and I planned to the slowdown so that my work will have a better impact on the lives of others.

Some of the things I would be doing and planning to do in 2020:

• Add new content on ShoutUniversity
• Move ShoutUniversity from Thinkific to ShoutMeLoud using any LMS plugin
• Put the new design of ShoutMeLoud – I have shortlisted a combo of Astra + Elementor theme for the same.
• Put more SEO + WordPress oriented content.
• Find a new niche and create a microblog for experimenting
• Publish a new version of our books on ShoutMeLoud store
• Complete Scuba certification
• Foster better relationships with existing and new friends, family, and business colleagues.
• Take a 90-day challenge to form new habits and leave some bad once
• Travel to USA, Europe, Tanzania
• Put the new design for harsh.in. If you wanna see the new design and help me improve it, just send me a DM on Twitter @denharsh
• Create 4 video series in the year and 2 podcast shows every month.
• Continue the regular practice of Yoga + Meditation.
• Being mindful of my diet and learn cooking.

As you may notice, I don’t publish new content regularly on ShoutMeLoud. The reason is, I’m spending a significant amount of time, rewriting existing content.

Moreover, as I mentioned in my few earlier posts, I believe in quality over quantity. Let’s see how this plays out in 2020.

Well, it’s just good to reflect upon your last 52 weeks and then have a direction for the next 52 weeks. A lot of us don’t design our life, but it is one of the essential things every one of us should do to move ahead in the direction that aligns with our life callings.

So, now it’s your turn to let me know how was 2019 for you? What are the things you accomplished and how you are planning to make the most out of 2020?

Revisiting 2019 – Simplicity is The Ultimate Sophistication!