- 6 weeks ago
- #outlookmoney40after40
Entrepreneur, author and speaker Ankur Warikoo shared his insights on the ‘art of relying on yourself’ at the third edition of Outlook Money’s 40After40 Retirement Expo in Mumbai.
“While I create a lot of content around personal finance, I thought that the best thing that I can leave you with is, which is the topic of today, and that is the art of relying on yourself.
Very often in the chase of what we want to do with our life, whether it’s chasing money, whether it’s chasing fame or status or glory, we tend to lose the most important relationship that we ought to have, and that is with our own selves,” Warikoo said.
#OutlookMoney40after40
“While I create a lot of content around personal finance, I thought that the best thing that I can leave you with is, which is the topic of today, and that is the art of relying on yourself.
Very often in the chase of what we want to do with our life, whether it’s chasing money, whether it’s chasing fame or status or glory, we tend to lose the most important relationship that we ought to have, and that is with our own selves,” Warikoo said.
#OutlookMoney40after40
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LearningTranscript
00:00I thought that the best thing that I can do for today is to give you the list of seven
00:08mutual funds that you should invest in.
00:10No, I'm kidding.
00:12This will not be anything about personal finance.
00:14While I create a lot of content around personal finance, I thought that the best thing that
00:18I can leave you with, which is the topic of today as well, and that is the art of relying
00:25on yourself.
00:25Because very often, in the chase of what we want to do with our lives, whether it's
00:31chasing money, whether it's chasing fame or status or glory, we tend to lose the most
00:36important relationship that we ought to have, and that is with our own selves.
00:40And the way that I will do that is I'll share a deeply personal story, which is not very
00:45old.
00:45It's only about five years old.
00:47And it's something that I've never shared on stage before, so all of you get to hear
00:52it for the first time.
00:53It's something that I'm immensely proud of because it shaped us up as a family and me
00:58as an individual in many meaningful ways.
01:01And through that, I will leave you with what, in my opinion, is the art of relying on yourself
01:06because it has three components, because everything in life that is important always has three
01:10things.
01:11So I'm going to very quickly tell you about myself to set that context.
01:16I grew up in Delhi.
01:18We belong to a very middle-class family.
01:19My dad was a sales and marketing professional in the pharma industry.
01:23Mom was a primary school teacher in a local school.
01:26I have a younger sister who is six years younger to me.
01:28We grew up in, as most of us would have been, in a very middle-class 1980s, 1990s India household.
01:35And the struggle was real, as you would all know.
01:39There was some sort of financial debt almost always on our head.
01:42We always wanted to break away from the curse of middle-classness, whatever you may call
01:47that.
01:47And I had very strong ambitions for my life, which didn't pan out the way that I thought.
01:53I wanted to become a space scientist.
01:56And this is before Elon Musk made it really cool.
01:58I fell in love with sciences.
02:02How many engineers in the house?
02:04Yeah, I hated engineers.
02:06I was like, engineers sold their soul.
02:08They went on to make money.
02:09I wanted to devote myself to pure sciences.
02:12And I was like, I'll go to the US and do all of that.
02:14But I dropped out of my PhD program, came back to India.
02:17And at the age of 24, I had to reset my life all over again.
02:21And I navigated through that.
02:25I became an entrepreneur in 2009.
02:27I've been in the startup industry for nearly 16 years, seen how this country has completely
02:32transformed when it comes to entrepreneurship in general.
02:35When I started in 2009, people did not even know how to pronounce the word entrepreneur.
02:39Leave alone, spell it.
02:41Today, it's really cool.
02:42People are on Shark Tank.
02:44They are raising money.
02:45They think that it's supremely fashionable to start your own business.
02:49And frankly, it is.
02:50But it's also intensely hard.
02:52And in 2019, I was running this startup called Nearby.com.
02:57And it had been acquired by Paytm.
02:59We had become profitable.
03:01We were doing about 600 crores of sales a year.
03:03We were making money.
03:05It was generally a dream run.
03:07I devoted some eight or nine years of my life building that sector and that company.
03:13And I decided to step down as the CEO of my own startup, something which is very unnatural
03:20or unheard of in the Indian context, particularly.
03:23I was turning 40 in 2020, very apt for the theme of the event as well.
03:28And I thought that at the age of 40, I want to see what else I could do with my life.
03:33So I stepped down as the CEO.
03:36And this was towards late 2019.
03:39And I decided to take a break for three to six months figuring out what I wanted to do.
03:44And in those three to six months, March 2020 happened.
03:47And I don't know how many of you remember March 2020, but it was a very wild time.
03:53Everything that we thought of ourselves, every plan that we had for our life went out of the window.
04:00We had to reimagine ourselves.
04:02We were locked up.
04:03We were suddenly with our own personality, with our own thoughts, with our own minds.
04:08And we were spending time in a close quarter with our best or perhaps worst relationships.
04:13And we had no idea what is going to hit us.
04:16And in the middle of all of that, as all of us were reimagining their lives, I had to reimagine myself as well.
04:25But there's one thing that for no fault of yours, you would not know.
04:30And it always seems like when you are the startup founder, when you are running this really large company, you will be in the money.
04:37But that wasn't the case for me.
04:39I had a lot of savings because I'd been working for nearly 15, 20 years at that point of time.
04:44But all of my savings, I had deployed back into my startup, which was nearby.com.
04:49So on paper, I was a millionaire.
04:52I owned what was the largest individual stock ownership in the startup, but I had no cash.
04:59And most of you who are financial advisors or who have been in the business of making money know that cash is the only real measurement of financial freedom or not.
05:09It's not what you own, which you may not even have access to and so on.
05:13So when the lockdown happened, I had no income stream.
05:19I had no money in the bank.
05:23And I had to reimagine myself from scratch.
05:26To give you pure context, I had five months of runway.
05:30And runway is like the startup term that we use to tell how long does the startup have before it has to wind up or shut down, because that's the money in the bank.
05:40So I had five months of money in the bank for every expense that we had to bear, which was the school fees of the kids, our home EMI, our daily living expenses, support that I was providing for my parents, all of that.
05:54Five months.
05:55And we had no asset to speak of.
05:58I was a complete doofus when it came to investing, much different from who I am today.
06:05I actually thought that people who made investments in mutual funds and real estate and gold were the biggest losers in the world.
06:13Because what they didn't do is invest in the coolest thing ever, startups.
06:18Because I was living and dreaming startups every single day.
06:21I thought that that is actually the only place where one should invest.
06:24And I was so dumb and so foolish to not realize the fallacy of this cocoon that I had built around myself.
06:33So again, as I had ownership in my startup nearby, I had ownership in other startups as well, but it didn't amount to anything.
06:41I could not draw that money when I really needed it.
06:44So all of my net worth was deployed in illiquid assets that I could not, at my own demand, draw out.
06:54So I had actually no money.
06:57And the only asset we truly had, which could be sold if we could, was our house.
07:02So I remember having a conversation with Ruchi, my wife, saying, Ruchi, we have five months of money left in the bank.
07:11And we have to figure our shit out because this could very well be the end and we could be bankrupt.
07:19We technically are already.
07:21So here's the plan that I've thought of and I want to share it with you just to see whether you think it's a good plan or not.
07:29We'll give it three months.
07:30We'll try our best to figure out what we could do.
07:33We'll hustle, we'll rediscover, re-imagine ourselves and we'll try and see if we can create another income stream that could support us as a family and we'll see where that goes.
07:44But if nothing happens in those three months, we will just have two months of money left in the bank.
07:51And at that point of time, we have no choice but to sell our house and see what happens.
07:58We'd made a down payment of about 50 lakhs for our house.
08:00So the hope was we'll at least get that money out.
08:04I wasn't expecting anything more.
08:07And what I proposed to her was if we get those 50 lakhs, we'll move to the mountains, we'll homeschool our kids, we will teach in some primary government school.
08:18And those 50 lakhs is far more money than we'll ever need to have that kind of life.
08:24And are you okay with that?
08:26And Ruchi being Ruchi, she was like, I'm really excited at that idea.
08:30Not that she was wishing that that would happen, but she was like, you know what, it's not such a bad life, but let's give it our best shot and see where it goes.
08:40At that point of time, I had started to actively be on stage.
08:49And I have loved public speaking for nearly 20 years, but I used to do it for schools and colleges mostly because that's the kind of crowd I love spending time with.
08:57No offense to all of you, but please take offense.
08:59I love spending time with young minds.
09:03They're just so fresh.
09:04They're challenging the status quo in so many ways.
09:07And I'm very hopeful that a lot of you have that same mindset as well.
09:11But I'd never seen that as something that could actually become a really big thing if it amounted to anything at all.
09:19And I remember having a conversation with a friend of mine.
09:22This is April 2020, and I was telling her that, you know what, the potential income stream of corporate talks is now zero because nobody in their right mind is having any corporate talk in the middle of a lockdown.
09:36And she was like, you know what, corporates were paying you money, but what if people could pay you money to actually hear you speak?
09:44And I was like, I don't think that's a good idea.
09:45I don't think that would happen.
09:47And she's like, well, you know what, there's only one way to find out.
09:49Why don't you find out?
09:50So I started to create these webinars.
09:56And I don't know if how many of you remember back in March, April, May, June, July of 2020, there was a webinar for anything that you wanted in life.
10:06People had so much of time on both sides, creation as well as consumption, that people are like joining these webinars, and they were completely free.
10:15And there was a webinar on financial planning, a webinar on retirement planning, a webinar on content creation, a webinar on this, a webinar on that.
10:23It was just insanely exploding.
10:26And I was like, you know what, let me just throw myself out into the universe as well and see what happens.
10:31So for the next three months, I conducted 17 webinars.
10:36And those 17 webinars were on themes that I knew best, how to hire a team, how to raise money, how to speak effectively, how to manage your time, things that I had done for my life, I was in complete control of.
10:49And I knew that people would benefit from that.
10:52But what I didn't know was whether people were willing to pay for it or not.
10:56So I had this novel idea.
10:59Why don't I let them decide if they want to pay or not?
11:03Why do I have to decide what should be the price of this?
11:06So I ran these 17 webinars on what I call pay-what-you-want pricing model, which was you join that webinar, and the only thing you have to do is pay at least one rupee.
11:18But beyond that, it's your choice what you want to pay.
11:22Completely free.
11:23Or freedom in that sense.
11:26And as you would imagine in India, 50% just paid one rupee.
11:32It's like, that's the best deal ever.
11:33But there were 50% who were surprisingly willing to pay more than one rupee.
11:38And the average came out to about 197 rupees per person.
11:42Which frankly was more money than I thought somebody was willing to pay for a virtual delivery that they had no idea the content of beforehand.
11:50Because they had to pay this to reserve their fee.
11:53This wasn't after the webinar was over.
11:56And that gave me a lot of confidence because I realized that one, people were actually willing to pay for good quality.
12:03Content.
12:04Two, I was not doing half bad a job of delivering that content virtually.
12:09And three, there was enough market, if it was priced in the right way, for people to consume good quality curated content.
12:16And that then became the genesis of what became WebVeda.com, which is a startup that I run right now.
12:23This is not a promotion.
12:24It's more of a discovery that I did for nearly five, six months before I figured that there was a business case and a model for content creation in an affordable manner that could be dealt in a way that India could consume and hopefully the world at some point of time.
12:40But here's the bigger thing that I wanted to talk about.
12:44And that is, in those five months, I, at all points of time, knew that I was just one month away from selling the house that we had.
12:56The only asset that we had.
12:58And what gave me confidence was, of course, the alignment that I had with my partner that if that were to happen, it's okay.
13:07But more importantly, upon reflection, I realized that the biggest thing that helped me was just this insane confidence that I had in me that everything is going to be okay.
13:21Everything is going to be okay.
13:24And that doesn't mean that everything is going to be okay in the sense that I will be one day at the Outlook money 40 after 40 stage in front of all of you.
13:32No, that's far, far away from the okay that I had in mind.
13:36My okay was that we're going to have a life where we will have our closest relationships together, where we will have enough financial money to take care of our daily needs.
13:46And if I know that I am not the one fighting anymore for the fanciest car and the biggest house and the biggest net worth and to be on any social status game, we're going to be absolutely okay.
14:00We're going to absolutely have a wonderful life if we wish to or not.
14:06And that brings me to a really interesting story that you may have heard of.
14:10There is this famous classic novel called Catch-22, and you may or may not have heard of it, but if you haven't, that doesn't take away anything from the story.
14:21The author of Catch-22 and his friend are one day invited to a really fancy party, which is hosted by a gentleman who is the friend of the Catch-22 author.
14:35And they are at this massive gathering, imagine a set-up like this, but on a private beach island, and it's fine liquor, it's the fanciest of food, it's the beautiful music and whatnot.
14:49And Catch-22 author's friend remarks, you know what, this guy who's invited us for this party, he earns in a day what your entire book has made through selling in its entire lifetime.
15:07He earns in a lifetime what you have earned in a lifetime selling this best-selling book that you have.
15:17And the author replies, but I have something that he doesn't have.
15:24And the friend's like, what could possibly be that you have that this really cool, successful dude doesn't have?
15:32And the author replies, I have enough.
15:37And I love that.
15:39I love the fact that you at some point of time, irrespective of where you are in life, realize that you have enough.
15:49Enough to lead a certain life that you want to, enough for the way that you want to live that life.
15:55And the art of relying on yourself is this discovery of realizing that you have enough.
16:02And it has these three components that I wanted to live you with, because those are frankly the things that helped me in my journey, and I'm sure will help you in yours as well.
16:12Number one, and perhaps the biggest thing when you acquire a certain age and a certain mindset and certainly a certain experience.
16:19And that is, go back to the day when you joined your current organization.
16:25Or for those who are, how many of you here are students?
16:28Anyone here who's a student?
16:29Some of you.
16:30Okay.
16:30How many of you are working professionals?
16:33All right.
16:34How many of you are running your own business or startup?
16:37Awesome.
16:38Perfect.
16:39Cool.
16:40Well, actually, yeah, one more interesting.
16:41How many of you in your 20s?
16:43In your 20s?
16:45All right.
16:4630s?
16:47Okay.
16:49And 40 plus?
16:52All right.
16:52Yeah.
16:53Good job with the target audience.
16:55Yeah.
16:56Bang on.
16:58I don't know what you're doing.
16:59People in your 20s?
17:00No.
17:00You're also invited.
17:01Of course you are.
17:04Go back to the first day of college for those in your 20s.
17:08Go back to the first day of your current work for those who are working.
17:11Go back to the first day when you were in your college, if you remember that day as well.
17:15And I'm sure it was an auditorium like this.
17:18You were surrounded by different sort of people, all from very different backgrounds.
17:22They look differently from you.
17:24They dress differently from you.
17:25They speak differently from you.
17:27They have very different mental makeup from you.
17:29They have had very different experience from you, a very different upbringing from you.
17:33And I don't know anyone of you personally, but I guarantee that within the first few hours of you spending time with these very different people,
17:42you began to look for people who were like you.
17:46You began to look for people who are from the same city as you.
17:50You began to look for people who are looking like you, speaking like you, dress like you, feel like you're the same one,
17:57came from the same city or college, from the same department.
18:01We love hanging out with people who are like us.
18:04We love building this lovely cocoon, this lovely oasis of yours where we're surrounded by people who are like us.
18:15And I remember doing that or feeling that when I was at business school.
18:20First week of my business school and there were 3.30 of us on that batch and everyone had formed these groups.
18:28Everyone was just hanging out with each other.
18:30Engineers with engineers, chemical with chemical, mechanical with mechanical,
18:35IITNs with IITNs, NIT with NIT, the others with the others,
18:40Delhi with Delhi, Sarojni Nagar with Sarojni Nagar, Bombay with Bombay, South Bombay with South Bombay.
18:45This beautiful groups, communities that we love to hang out with.
18:52And in my head I was like, isn't this the exact opposite of what you should be doing?
18:58Like somebody has painstakingly got 330 very different individuals from across the world on a single campus for the next one year
19:08and you're going to spend time with the five people who are like you?
19:13How does that make sense?
19:14And the older slash wiser you grow, you love these communities even more.
19:22Because in your head, there isn't anything outside of this that you want to learn from.
19:29Go back to the first day of college or your work.
19:33And I assure you that there were, when you were scanning the room,
19:36some two or three people that you looked at and you were like,
19:39I won't be able to be friends with them.
19:49You were so judgmental that you refused to believe that there is anything new that you can learn from them.
19:55And surprisingly, the best way to discover yourself or to actually rely on yourself is to spend time with people who are nothing like you.
20:04Nothing like you.
20:06Because that's when you truly find out what exists in the world that you had no idea about.
20:12Which brings me to one of my favorite questions.
20:15How many of you here are middle class?
20:17Yeah, I knew it.
20:20I love the fact that everyone in India is middle class.
20:23I love that fact.
20:25Irrespective of how big or small the forum is, this is one of my favorite questions in all times.
20:30But because this is also a financial inclined exposition, let's ask something which is more specific.
20:41What is the definition of middle class in India?
20:43What is the definition of middle class in India?
20:46Anyone?
20:47Throw out an up.
20:47Or let me be very specific.
20:49What's the monthly salary of middle class Indians?
20:52What's the monthly salary of middle class Indians?
20:54Sir?
20:56Sorry?
20:57Less than?
21:0020 lakhs a month?
21:02A year.
21:03Yeah.
21:04I was like, sir, it's middle class at a completely different level.
21:09Yeah, I was like, the ground floor on Nepentese Road is middle class.
21:13Yes, sir.
21:153 lakhs to 12 lakhs is middle class, which is per year.
21:19Because it's easier to say per year.
21:20So 3 to 12 lakhs, wide range.
21:23Almost all of our income tax budget is in that range.
21:2810 lakhs per annum is middle class, sir?
21:30Hello?
21:3330,000 per month is middle class.
21:35Anyone else?
21:36Let me ask from that crowd.
21:38Go ahead.
21:39Give me a number.
21:40Shout out.
21:4110,000 a month.
21:4310,000 a month?
21:44Okay.
21:45Is that a wild guess or what?
21:46How do you know?
21:49Sorry?
21:51Oh.
21:51He's saying I've attended my session before, so...
21:57Hello?
21:58Yeah, Ankur.
21:59Yes?
21:59Roti kapra makan.
22:00Yes.
22:01Yes.
22:02Roti kapra makan.
22:03Actually for middle class, it's 25,000 I guess, sir.
22:0625,000?
22:0725,000.
22:07And for definition of middle class, I guess, sir, balancing the personal and professional life.
22:12Okay, so 35,000 a month, sir.
22:1425,000.
22:15Ankur, Ankur, one of the similar people like you, he's got a word called F money.
22:21Yes, exactly.
22:22Anybody who doesn't have an F money, is middle class.
22:26Is middle class.
22:27The actual description, sir, is FU money.
22:29Yeah, F money.
22:30Because F money could be very different.
22:33It could be like dismissing money.
22:35So anyone who doesn't have that is middle class.
22:37Perfect.
22:37I get that.
22:38Awesome.
22:38What else?
22:4112,000 a month?
22:42Okay.
22:43How do you know that?
22:46We follow you.
22:47Oh, we follow you.
22:49Okay.
22:49Now, it is official 12 lakhs in a month.
22:53So, because tax benefit is zero.
22:54Ha, because we don't have income tax.
22:55Exactly.
22:56Like, it's officially now, ma'am has ensured that 12 lakhs per year is now middle class.
23:02Okay.
23:02Great.
23:03All answers.
23:03Wonderful.
23:04Sir.
23:05Yes, sir.
23:05According to me, 2 lakhs per month.
23:09He's a middle class person, but he doesn't have a flat.
23:11He's staying on rent.
23:13All right.
23:13Perfect.
23:14I love the nuance of it as well.
23:16Yes, final one.
23:17And we don't need more answers.
23:19Yes.
23:25No, see, middle.
23:27So, middle means beach.
23:30Okay.
23:30We don't do two roads.
23:32So, it won't be like that we're upper middle class.
23:34This is our whole shrinkage that we've made for ourselves.
23:38This is to show that we're actually middle class.
23:41But middle means middle.
23:42Average.
23:43What is the average of India?
23:45Simple.
23:45So, the average of India, if this was an economic discussion where you had to actually give an accurate number,
23:53is between the ones who have actually attended, it's between 8,000 to 12,000 rupees a month.
23:58It's between 8,000 to 12,000 rupees a month.
24:01Which means about 600 to 700 million people in this country are earning more than 8,000 to 12,000 rupees a month.
24:07And 600 to 700 million people, this is per person, by the way.
24:10So, if you add, of course, a household income would be very different.
24:13But that would be about 8,000 to 12,000.
24:15Now, the reason I state that is because if you were to say, hey, I am middle class, but I'm earning 2 lakhs a month and I'm on rent,
24:25you would have a very different impression of what middle class is from somebody who's perhaps sitting here and saying,
24:30I'm actually earning 12,000 rupees a month and I'm middle class.
24:33The middle class in India is the Uber and the Ola driver.
24:37Not you.
24:37You're all rich.
24:39You just don't know it.
24:41Just because you see Ambani's wedding at Jamnagar doesn't make you poor.
24:44You have to recognize this is no comparison.
24:49It's an absolute.
24:50All of you are rich.
24:51The fact that you came to this place makes you rich.
24:54The fact that you can even think of retirement as a concept makes you rich.
24:58Because that's a point of privilege that most people don't even have.
25:01What is retirement?
25:02I have to pay for my money and my food.
25:05So, there is no concept of retirement.
25:07But here is like fire, FU money or F money or whatever money.
25:10The truth is, this is not middle class India.
25:13The point that I'm making is, please step out of your cocoon.
25:18Step out of the world that you're living in.
25:20Step out of the corners that you engulf yourself with.
25:23Step out of the social media content that you're consuming.
25:26Because that is never going to tell you anything that challenges your point of view.
25:30When you open up Instagram or LinkedIn or Twitter, it doesn't tell you, oh, you're wrong.
25:34No.
25:35It tells you, you're right, bro.
25:37You're absolutely right.
25:38Here is the video.
25:39Whatever you believe in, here it is.
25:41Everything that they believe in isn't wrong.
25:44Here is another video.
25:46It just convinces you that your point of view is the only point of view and the right point of view.
25:51So, only when you step out, do you actually begin to see what the world has to offer.
25:57And that's the first step of relying on yourself.
25:59Because until you don't do that, you're just in love with the identity that you have.
26:05And you have to break that identity.
26:09If I ask you, what do you do?
26:11And you give me a designation at a company.
26:13That's the most pitiful existence you could have.
26:17Because that's the only construct in your mind that is worth talking about.
26:22If you ask me, what do I do?
26:24I'd be like, how much time do you have?
26:26Because I could go on and on about all the things that I do and that's nothing to do with just my career.
26:31It's to do with my hobbies.
26:32It's to do with what I do as a person, as a husband, as a father, as a son, as a brother, as a friend.
26:38And that all is where you need to be.
26:43Which brings me to the second point.
26:46A lot of us, as we get experience, start to become intellectually comfortable.
26:53We love getting comfortable.
26:55We love being in that spot where we can send the email, the work's done.
26:58Pick up the phone, the work's done.
27:00Walk up to someone, the work's done.
27:02My favorite question during an interview is, how many years of experience do you have?
27:06And people are like, I have five years of experience.
27:08I'm like, great.
27:09Is that five years of experience or is that one year of experience done five times?
27:14And that's a huge difference.
27:16And a lot of us just love, oh, I've been doing the same thing, but I'm just so good with it that I can do it in my sleep.
27:22I've been doing it for 12 plus years now.
27:24I have 12 years of experience.
27:26No, bro.
27:26One year of experience multiplied by 12.
27:28Very different.
27:30What happens then is you believe that the goal of life is to make life comfortable.
27:38What we begin to believe and the world endorses outside is that comfort is the only goal we're looking for.
27:45Because think about it.
27:46Everything around the world today is designed for our comfort.
27:49You need a book?
27:50Click.
27:51Clothes?
27:51Click.
27:51Click.
27:52You need cabs?
27:53Click.
27:53Food?
27:54Click.
27:54Grocery?
27:55Click.
27:56Two minutes.
27:57Ding, ding.
27:58Blinket.
27:58Zeptoe.
27:59Just there at your dear step.
28:00So you're convinced that the purpose of life is to make life comfortable, which is great from a physical comfort perspective.
28:09Please make your life comfortable.
28:10Please get a good mattress.
28:12Please get a safe car.
28:13Please get lovely shoes.
28:15But we don't recognize when it begins to extend to our intellectual comfort, where we're just not challenging ourselves, where we're not thinking outside of what we could be doing because it scares us.
28:29It scares us because we're scared of losing.
28:32We're scared of falling and failing in front of a crowd and be embarrassed by what they would think of us.
28:38We're scared of losing the only identity that we know of because that's just so comfortable.
28:46It's wonderful to be in that identity.
28:49Don't get comfortable.
28:52Don't get comfortable.
28:53Because the day you get intellectually comfortable, you are numbing yourself to any level of growth that you could have witnessed in your life but will never experience.
29:04And then the third and the final point that makes that happen.
29:06How many of you here have kids between 10 and 20?
29:1110 and 20 years.
29:12Yeah.
29:13So some of you do.
29:15And we had a show of hands of people who are in their 20s as well.
29:19It's a very, very different era that we are raising our kids in.
29:23And every single day, I don't think there is any hour that passes by where somebody of our generation is complaining about Gen Zs.
29:32Impatient, privileged, they have everything but yet they are so confused.
29:42In our times we were going to paddle school.
29:44We were going to paddle school.
29:45We were going to pass paths.
29:46We were going to pass paths.
29:47We were going to pass paths.
29:49We were going to pass paths.
29:50Today they are going to AC bus and what they have to do.
29:53They don't know.
29:54What will happen?
29:56What will happen?
29:56How will they live?
29:58We will always do everything on the phone.
30:00it is insane how we think that this generation is completely doomed what we've forgotten
30:17is how our parents used to think about us because our parents were convinced that we
30:22are also doomed and here is a very important lesson recognize why this difference is happening
30:30so that you get to the point that I'm trying to make most of us who are in our 30s 40s and beyond
30:38we grew up in an India where for everything we had to wait for everything we had to wait
30:45if you wanted to buy a watch you had to wait if you wanted to buy a phone connection you had to
30:50wait if you wanted to buy a scooter or a car you had to wait you had to stand in line to get milk
30:55you had to stand in line to get a bus pass you were basically standing in line for everything
31:00you wanted to hear your favorite Hindi songs Wednesday 7pm Chitrahaar that's the only time
31:06you get it and most of you in Bombay are just pampered but in Delhi there was no electricity
31:10mostly on Wednesday 7pm so if there was no electricity sorry bro the next time you get to hear your
31:17favorite Hindi movie song is next week there's nothing on demand and suddenly this generation
31:24is born in a different India where everything is available at the speed of thought as I said
31:31you need a book click you need clothes click they have no concept that there was a time in our lives
31:38where to change the channel we had to get up walk to the TV and turn the knob like they don't
31:48understand what really you were that poor they don't understand that when there was white noise on the
31:57television someone would then climb up to the roof and do some juggling which was almost acrobatic and
32:06then shout out the words aagia because that was our way of getting television they're like ma papa
32:15aap kis zwaan mein rah rahthei they have everything at their disposal right now so for no fault of this
32:25generation they believe that if they want something they can get it right now and it's not shocking then
32:34that I'm speaking to a 22 or 23 year old and this by the way is a true story happens almost every day
32:41again and I'll be like how's it going and they'll be like I've just started this job or mazai nahi aara
32:49I'm like why what happened I'm like I'm not able to create impact
32:56and I was like kisne tujhe bola ki chay mahine me impact create hota hai
33:10kyunki yaan loog saath saal se lage hoa hai woh shayad impact nahi create kar pahe hai
33:14but in their head if they want to create impact it should happen it's on demand if they want to get
33:21promoted it should happen it's on demand if they want to become successful it's on demand
33:27and that is why the impatience it's not their fault it's not ours either but it's very important to
33:35recognize why it happens and the only way that you will recognize why something happens if you ask
33:41why is this happening instead of dismissing it that it happens and it's not aligned with your point of
33:47view and the shortest way of ensuring that you ask questions of why things happen is to become a
33:53student and unfortunately particularly in our culture we stop being a student after college
33:59and we are now just a student because we are told to do something we don't do things out of our will
34:06we're not students by will we're students by compulsion so if our bosses tell us go and discover this
34:14new thing that you have to do because that's the only way you'll get promoted we will do that but
34:19we will never pick up something new out of our own will and if we do the first thing that we do is
34:27announce it to the world so go back to any new thing that you were learning in the last six months or
34:35something if you have at all and again i'm very sure that after the first two or three classes of you
34:42learning it you announce it to the world that i'm learning this new thing it's so bizarre for me
34:47you know you gotta learn it you know like you have been learning it to earth you know you are
34:51right so what wereショ называется this new thing you are Stuase i'm doing things that you're reading
34:53telling you about your students and seeing brea as a late now two straight
35:00Monsieur他 and his professors do what do you want to learn and we have learned learning in the second law
35:07now even we never bravery about that but we're proud of our exemple these things because we want to show to the world to learn a lot red
35:14We want to show to the world
35:16that we are learning something.
35:18We are not learning something.
35:20We are learning something.
35:21And that is not, in my opinion,
35:23true learning. True learning is when you're learning
35:26something and nobody in your world knows
35:28that you're learning something.
35:29That is when you're truly devoted to that art of learning.
35:33So when you combine these
35:34three things, spending time with people
35:36who are nothing like you, so that it
35:38broadens your horizon,
35:40doing it in a manner that you are never
35:42intellectually comfortable, that you're constantly
35:44challenging yourself
35:45and always remaining a student,
35:48you basically have
35:50the mechanism for
35:52relying on yourself forever and ever.
35:55Nothing is going
35:56to destroy your life because you will always
35:58know that I'm enough,
36:00that I have enough,
36:01that I don't need more to prove
36:04to somebody else I can
36:06make do with what I have.
36:09And
36:09this is the way that you
36:12should be convinced about it.
36:14How many of you have been to a casino?
36:17Regularly?
36:18Okay.
36:20Just checking.
36:21Okay.
36:23So I've started this new casino
36:24and I'm happy that Outlook Money
36:26has given me the platform to talk about this.
36:29This is without paying any money.
36:31Um, this casino
36:32doesn't matter where it is.
36:34It's called Variko Casino
36:35because I couldn't come up with another name.
36:37It has only one game in it.
36:39But it's a fascinating game.
36:40Here's how you play it.
36:43Irrespective of the amount you bet,
36:45you will always lose 90% of the times.
36:49You'll always lose 90% of the times.
36:52But the beauty is,
36:53you will know
36:54the maximum that you will lose
36:56and never be all that.
36:58There is a cap
36:59on the loss that you will have.
37:01So it's never going to be the case
37:03that you will lose
37:04an infinite amount.
37:05You will always know
37:07the amount
37:07that you will maximum lose.
37:10It will be known
37:11before you play.
37:13But you will lose 90% of the times.
37:17However,
37:18the 10% time that you win,
37:20you can win
37:21any amount.
37:23Any amount.
37:24It could be a life-changing amount.
37:27It could be an amount
37:28that you will never have to ever
37:29work in your life again.
37:31And that's the game.
37:33You play.
37:3590% of the times you lose,
37:37but your losses are capped.
37:3810% you win,
37:40and your wins are not capped.
37:42They could be infinite.
37:44And my question to you
37:45is how many times
37:47will you play that game?
37:49And I'll give you my answer.
37:50If such a game existed,
37:54I would play it
37:55every single day
37:57of my life.
37:59I would play that
38:00every single day
38:01of my life.
38:03And the beauty is
38:04this is exactly
38:05the game of life.
38:07This is exactly
38:08the game that
38:09all of us
38:09are in the middle of.
38:11All of you
38:12middle class people,
38:14the truth is
38:15your losses are capped.
38:17Because of your parents'
38:18hard work
38:19and your own hard work,
38:20you are never going
38:21to be ever on the streets.
38:23You're never going
38:24to die of hunger
38:25or poverty.
38:26You're never going
38:27to have a day
38:27when you don't even know
38:29where your next meal
38:29is going to come from.
38:30You're never going
38:31to have a day
38:32where you don't know
38:33whether you'll have
38:33clothes to wear or not.
38:35Your losses are capped.
38:37In fact,
38:37the only loss
38:38is notional in your head
38:39because it is no threat
38:48to your life.
38:50The loss is completely
38:57notional in your head.
38:59It doesn't factually exist
39:01because it is no threat
39:02to your life.
39:03It's just a threat
39:04to your identity.
39:06But,
39:07if you were to win,
39:10any one of you here
39:11could be anything
39:12you want.
39:13If you were to win,
39:15you could create
39:16a destiny for yourself.
39:18That could change
39:19not just your orbit
39:21but the orbit
39:21of the next seven generations
39:22to follow.
39:24It's just that win
39:26that you have to wake up
39:27for every day.
39:29And that will be
39:30that game of life
39:32that you should be
39:32willing to play.
39:33Because if not,
39:35then you will just be
39:37caught up in
39:37the next corpus amount,
39:40the next investment asset,
39:42the next mutual fund,
39:44the next crypto,
39:45the next real estate,
39:46boom.
39:47And it's just so mindless
39:49that chase
39:50that you don't even realize
39:51it's taking away
39:52one day of your time
39:54meaninglessly
39:56without giving you
39:57anything in return.
39:58So what I would love
40:00is to bank
40:02on the only asset
40:04you truly have
40:06yourself.
40:10Irrespective of the day,
40:12the time,
40:13irrespective of the difficulty,
40:14irrespective of how
40:16you feel that you're stuck
40:18and you have nowhere
40:19to move,
40:20there's always one asset
40:22that can get you
40:23out of that.
40:23And that is
40:24your belief in your own self.
40:26And unless you don't
40:28believe that,
40:29nobody else is going
40:30to believe in you.
40:31Unless you don't believe
40:32that you are enough
40:33to make shit happen
40:34and get you out of shit,
40:36nobody will believe in you.
40:42Anupam Kher
40:43had this talk show
40:45where you used to
40:47invite celebrities
40:48and the first one
40:49was Shah Rukh Khan.
40:51I think so,
40:51if not the first one,
40:52the one of the first few.
40:54And Anupam Kher
40:56asked Shah Rukh Khan,
40:58Shah Rukh Khan
40:59is so successful
41:00and Shah Rukh Khan
41:03says,
41:03sir,
41:03I do a lot of work.
41:06And you can see
41:07the look on
41:07Anupam Kher's face
41:08because he's like,
41:09bro,
41:10I think I've been
41:10a man and I haven't
41:11done a lot of work.
41:13Like,
41:13all of the work
41:14do a lot of work.
41:15After a certain point
41:16of time,
41:16that's not something
41:17that you say.
41:17It's not like
41:18really cool.
41:20But of course,
41:20Anupam Kher
41:21is a
41:22Diggaj-Insan,
41:23so he was
41:23very respectful
41:24about it.
41:25He's like,
41:25Shah Rukh,
41:26we all do
41:27work.
41:28So what's your
41:29work?
41:31And he says
41:32something which
41:33I believe
41:33is the best
41:35lesson one can
41:36have in life.
41:37He says,
41:38sir,
41:38every person
41:39works for the
41:40time.
41:41Everybody works
41:46hard to get
41:47an opportunity.
41:48But after
41:49the time
41:49of the time,
41:50nobody can
41:54work harder
41:55once I've
41:56got the
41:56opportunity.
41:58And I
41:58love him
41:59for that.
42:01He may be
42:01the world's
42:02and I'm
42:04sure he's
42:04listening at
42:05Mannat.
42:07He may be
42:08whatever it
42:09is.
42:09You may like
42:10him as an
42:10actor.
42:10You may
42:11not.
42:12But what
42:13I love about
42:13Shah Rukh Khan,
42:14and this isn't
42:15about him,
42:15but about his
42:16ideology,
42:17is that he
42:18is convinced
42:19that he is
42:20good.
42:21And because
42:21he's convinced
42:22he is good,
42:23he automatically
42:24draws a lot
42:25of people
42:25who believe
42:26that he is
42:27good.
42:28And I think
42:29that Shah Rukh Khan
42:29exists in all
42:30of us and
42:31should.
42:32Because if we
42:33stand in front
42:33of the mirror
42:34every day and
42:35we are convinced
42:36that we have it
42:37within us to
42:38make things
42:38happen,
42:39then you don't
42:40need this
42:41session,
42:41you don't
42:41need me,
42:42you don't
42:42need Outlook
42:43money,
42:43you don't
42:44need any
42:44investment
42:44advice,
42:46you'll figure
42:46your way
42:46out,
42:47because you're
42:48enough,
42:49and you know
42:49that you have
42:50everything within
42:51your capacity
42:52and agency
42:52to make things
42:53happen.
42:54And on that
42:55note,
42:56I wish
42:562025 for that
42:58year to be
42:58for you.
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