Humans are a confused breed. We want all those things which we miss. When we get all those things, we don’t value them. When we lose those things, we crave them yet again. We are infinitely dissatisfied, greedy and selfish.

Most importantly, all the things that we crave are available right in front of us (many times), but we ignore our gut feeling and always pursue things in vain (because we always chase imaginary non existent perfection).

  1. True Love :
    1. We all want / crave true unconditional love but hate to give it ourselves. Even in so called ‘true love’, we always give by expecting something in return!
    2. We chase perfect life partners who are always charming and happy. In real life that’s never the case. When you meet your girl friend/boy friend for some time, you only see their best persona . But in real life they do get angry, have a ugly face in the morning, they do have hidden bad habits etc.
    3. Accept what you have and stop chasing. Love is about loving all you can hate about the person you love.
  2. Success :
    1. We want success. Only problem is that we want it real quick with minimal hard work. Success is a learned art. Success is a skill. Skill needs hard work and time to muster and master.
    2. It is always harder to reach at your goal than you assume, it always will take more time than you think. Murphy’s law is quite significant in real life and success.
    3. Surprisingly the benefits of perceived success too follow Murphy’s law. You will always get much more than you anticipated and will always reach faster at subsequent goals than you anticipated.
    4. Success needs a minimum threshold of knowledge and hard-work. Once you got that habit of hard work and that thinking pattern, rest of life is a cakewalk. The problem with life is that it gives tests first and lessons afterwards.
    5. If you are willing to put more hours than needed initially, I can assure you that you will get much more than you put for later.
  3. Peace of mind : We all are running from pillar to post but reaching nowhere.
    1. Your goals will never end. There is no perfect day to enjoy life. The perfect moment is  right now. If you are not happy right now, you shall never be. That perfect girl, that dream car, that perfect vacation or whatever will never give you bliss. All those moments are short lived. You have to be blissful independent of circumstances. Time change, people change but your bliss has to be an independent variable. Learn from children. They are eternally happy with their 10/- toys or even without them! Observe any kid on the beach. They need nothing but only sand and water be be elated.
    2. We are chasing happiness, chasing goals, chasing situations, people etc. Nothing can make you eternally happy, except you. Try meditation, just sit at one place for only one minute doing nothing. Can you do that? Can you stop your ever programmed mind to stop thinking/worrying/planning even for a minute? And you say you are in control of your own life! You cannot put you overthinking mind at rest even for a minute using your conscious effort and you want peace! Ponder over it.
  4. Real life conversations and friends :
    1. Do you remember the last time you spoke to your school time best friend? Except for WhatsApp groups and Facebook friend list, how many real friends do you really have? We have forgotten the art of conversation and remember only connection (read online connection). We are only hypothetically connected with better parts of life of our loved ones. Social media is feel ‘good media’. No one will tell you their actual feeling on WhatsApp chat or FB update. Real conversation can only happen in person. Go and meet you best friend to know what’s really going on in his/her life beyond those feel good moments.
    2. Call your friends, write a real letter to them, visit them personally and just feel the difference. Life is not a mobile screen my friends.
  5. True feedback :
    1. We all are egocentric people. We all crave appreciation and hate real feedback. But sometimes we do want true feedback for our improvements. And alas! we have no one to give it!
    2. Social Media likes (Basically reciprocal like for a like) are not true feedback. Further hate porn and hate comments (trolling) are not true feedback either. We all seek constructive feedback.
    3. Do not just tell me what I lack but also constructive ways to change me and improve me. Just saying that someone is fat and ugly will never work. Tell them why they are so and what can be done. If you have no constructive suggestions avoid doing that.

What is the single biggest mistake entrepreneurs make when starting up?

Looking forward to your constructive feedback!