Last week I turned 28. It's a bit of a weird feeling because when I was younger, I imagined a 28 year old to be very old and sorted in life and I sometimes feel like I'm far from it. By the time my parents were 28, they'd had both me and my brother, meanwhile here I am still feeling like a kid.

Sometimes in life, everything that can go wrong, goes wrong. Just the classic Murphy's Law in action. I'm sure we've all had those days/weeks/months where everything just seems to keep going out of control in a downward spiral.

For many of us, 2020 was a year of survival. From quarantining, and changing the kind of content I create (since travel wasn’t an option), to virtually vacating my apartment and figuring out different ways of making money, 2020 was quite a challenging year for me. But despite that, it’s been a year full of growth, blessings, and lots of lessons.

On the face of it, you’d think I’d be ecstatic about hitting these milestones. I thought so too, and although I’m glad to be where I am, a part of me felt pretty ‘blah’ about this (for the lack of a better word). I’ve been doing a lot of introspection on why I felt this way and came to an interesting realization.

Today I want to talk about something I, and I'm sure a lot of others, experience a lot - ‘imposter syndrome’. Have you ever felt like whatever you've accomplished in life is just because of luck, and that you don't actually deserve anything? Do you sometimes feel inadequate, like you don't belong, and that people will think you're a scam and you have no real skills? If you answered yes, then don't worry, you're in great company (even people like Tom Hanks, Lady Gaga and Maya Angelou feel this way)!

As someone who literally lives on the Internet (and makes a living off of it), I started off feeling so anxious and incomplete without it; kind of like being phone-less was equivalent to being jobless; but soon came to the realisation (or rather self consolation) that it was just a phone at the end of the day. So I decided to take the day off (not that I had a choice) and it was the best thing ever!

I think there's a huge lesson in productivity to learn from Einstein and Elizabeth Gilbert. You may think that this is just a productive way to procrastinate, but with the right intention, it's motion, and motion always beats inertia, and inspiration will always be drawn to motion.

I don’t know about you but I always thought you have to compete for everything. In school, for a job, for more clients and so on. I think our society engraves the idea of competition in our minds from a very young age.

Today I'm sharing with you a story I came across recently that really resonated with me (and is quite apt for the current times). So here it goes…

Are you a victim of the “I’ll be happy when” syndrome? I’ve definitely been a victim of this in the past. I used to think I’ll be happy when I hit 100,000 subscribers on YouTube, or when I make a certain amount of money, or if I got to travel to a certain number of places on my bucket list.

We often think of wealth in terms of how much money we have in our bank accounts but have you ever wondered what happens if you lose all your money and assets? What happens next? Would you be able to start from scratch all over again?

So if not hustle, then what’s the right way to work? Well, the answer according to me is a state of flow. It’s letting things happen at their natural pace, and taking the time and the balance you need to feel like your higher self.

I’ve spent the past ten days taking a break from posting on social media; you probably saw my stories on Instagram talking about this yesterday. I didn’t really intend to go on this digital detox, it kind of just happened, but I’m so glad it did because I’ve come out of it feeling calmer, more rejuvenated and less exhausted.

It’s surprising how many things we put off for hours if not days that we could actually get done in two minutes or less. For example replying to emails right away, washing your dishes immediately after the meal, cleaning up your desk after a work day, paying your bills, the list goes on.

Each time I move, I get rid of a lot of things I feel I don’t need anymore and this time while I was in the process of decluttering, I was quite pleased at how few things I had to get rid of; I think I’m finally getting close to a point where I actually use pretty much everything I own, something I’ve been striving to get to because how often do we own things we NEVER end up using?

I’ve been doing some thinking and despite everything that’s going on, I feel like this ‘COVID era’ has taught me a lot of things, and if you’re feeling the way I was, I hope these short reminders/lessons will help you out.

I recently came across a story which answers this question perfectly (the lessons from this story apply to multiple scenarios, not just content creation). It’s called the Parable of the Pottery Class and here’s how it goes.

Often times, there are certain tasks on my to-do list which don’t necessarily take too much time but they’re difficult or uncomfortable and I avoid doing them all day long and it keeps running on the back of my mind.