Baka Breakthroughs EP 3

Quote I’m living by

27th March: Partied a lot during the weekend, so spent Sunday binging The Night Agent. Slept early and woke up early this morning. Although I could not get a lot done, that’s why I was disappointed in my own effort. As much as I like to talk about being ruthless, I do have days when I don’t match the expectations I have of my effort and that pisses me off the most. But no more.

28th March: Good day today, although I woke up really late, around 11.30. Watched John Wick 4 yesterday night, such an incredible movie. I will put this in the tier of the first one. Part 1 was the best due to the story, this one had the best action sequences hands down. I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen for even a sec, even though I was tired asf after the muay thai session and working all day. You’ve got to watch it in a theater, you won’t regret it I promise. I was slacking off on outreach for my agency a lot, but got a lot of outreach done today, plus learnt about email campaigns. The last newsletter edition got delayed again due to a delay in editing the setup tour, it’s all good. Although I hate not being on time with anything, but getting it done was the ultimate goal.

29th March: Woke up at a good time today, 9am, although it’s not early as compared to the early risers, I’m happy about this. Went out, had some pineapple juice, and got back straight to work. Momentum in terms of content is building up faster as compared to my agency. It’s all a part of the process.

30th March: Talked to Saad yesterday, also known as “kaafisexy” on socials. Bro he’s been a guy whose content I’ve consumed regularly for over a year now, since I found him. Brilliant with his words, raw with his feedback and absolutely real when in conversation. One guy I always wanted to connect with, and finally did. But I went to bed yesterday with only one thought, I’m a newbie in this industry, I need to become more valuable when I connect with higher level individuals, maybe I’m undermining myself but since the start of my journey online, I’ve been molded into thinking about providing value first then asking for something in return. Let’s see, I’m a bit nervous and really excited.

31st March: Woke up in good spirits today, I was putting too many things on my plate everyday, so I cut down the amount of tasks and made it simpler to execute. I’ve taken care of a lot of my to-do list already and it’s only noon. Now I’ll get time to read and take it easy in the night and plan things. Often times when we’re too much in the moment or in momentum, we overestimate what we can do in the short term hence we plan too much and when we can’t execute it, it makes us doubt ourselves too much. So go easy on yourself, take care of the highest leverage activities daily.

1st April: Woke up late, finished watching “Bullet train”, decent watch, don’t know why I started it right before sleeping. It is what it is. I had to self reflect a lot, maybe all this creator stuff was getting me away from what I’m actually trying to build. My agency, I have to focus there again. It gets so complicated since I’ve got to take care of twice the things I can actually handle at the moment. Maybe I’m not being efficient enough at this. I’ll tackle it all one by one. April will be the best month for me as an online business owner and creator. Said it here.

2nd April: Training was brutal yesterday. Had a PT at 5, then Jiu Jitsu Gi session for about 1.5hrs. Body has never been this sore in recent times. AND I LOVE IT! Hence started work late, just finishing the newsletter rn (It’s 5pm), and uploading the YouTube video too so it’ll all be uploaded together. I know there isn’t a proper schedule for these, but I’m trying to get it all done on Saturdays each week. That’ll happen by next week I’m fully sure.

Lessons from books:

Expert Secrets: There’s an art to teaching a topic. In school, similar to the literature books, there was a story before the actual teaching. That made us more and more attached and interested in the lesson (Bear in mind the backbenchers eating their lunch before the break). But deep it down for a sec,

Maybe when you revised a topic back then, you remembered it mainly because of some kind of story attached to it and not right away the topic.

So similarly, when creating content or teaching anyone on your value, instead of going straight to the meat of the content, try attaching a story before the value. It’ll get people hooked and they’ll be invested into your delivery.

Let’s see how many people take action on this, there’s an actionable for you in the section later in the newsletter.

Interesting resources:

Dan Koe’s Deepwork Video 

He separates his day into 3 parts,

1. First part of the day for creativity.

2. Second for learning.

3. Reflection and Journaling at the end of the day.

I saw that I have been doing something similar too for a long time, for about 5-6 months, but the way I looked at it was different in terms.

It’s really effective. I have tried going to bed doing high intensity work like scripting, or filming or sending outreach messages, and for some reason I took more time to fall asleep. But during the last couple days when I went to bed, just thinking, or should I say, putting my thoughts on paper, it helped me go to bed with a way more relaxed mind.

When you learn with the thought that you’ve done what was needed to be done with the knowledge you had, you consume more and at a better level. When you reflect knowing you did your best throughout the day (Doesn’t necessarily mean you got everything done, it’s just that you gave your best while having all sorts of distractions), you reflect with clarity. And this word, “Clarity” is what I preach a lot. (Talked about it in the YouTube video too)

New thoughts and approach to my work:

Seeing people happy after I make something they requested makes my day honestly. Now the game is to match that with what I want to produce and get to a proper medium.

Asked for feedback on this newsletter and I think separating my journal from the learnings and professional stuff would be a great next step. Maybe I’ll turn the initial written journal into recordings that I make everyday and upload a compilation of those on YouTube. (If you read this, I’m seriously thinking of turning the first section into a video series, so let me know if it’s a good idea or not).

Once Metro Media House reaches the first milestone, I’ll start hiring people for my brand as well real soon. Mainly editors and writers. Getting in touch with a lot of prospects, still the qualifying process I’ve made is brutal so I just say no to the majority of people.

Doing it all alone has been tiring, but it’s got to be done so I’m doing it.

Also maybe in 2-3 months, (Sooner if things go quicker), I’ll hire VAs and one guy for sales that I’ll train personally. Basically I’ll recreate my journey over the last 3 years but with you guys.

Whenever I think about this, I get really excited because there’s so many possibilities here, and we’re just getting started. Once you reach to a point where I’m at, which is step 1 from 0 basically (I’m not being cocky, this is the reality, I’m only at step 1 right now), you’ve got no clue of the opportunities you get as an individual AND for the people with you on this journey. It’s genuinely mad, how internet has made things so accessible.

Don’t take it for granted, a laptop, internet connection and time is all you need right now to make something massive if you start from scratch.

On the other side, with my YouTube videos, starting this week, I’ll be uploading 2x every week, and getting the whole task done by Saturday so I can send this over at the same time each week.

Food for thought: Creator economy

Disagreement to polarity to tribe. Me saying move away from your family caused some disagreements in comments, and I think that’s good. I’m making a more personalized story video with a polarizing hook too, let’s see the response I get, either people will resonate with it or they’ll say the obvious counter to it. It’ll definitely help me judge the persona of my audience more. (If the video is uploaded before the newsletter goes out, I’ll put the observation here)

The response was genuinely really good, a lot of people resonated with it. I generated some conversations in the comments too. Maybe this is something I’ll do more of, let’s see.

But on the flip side, I saw a comment saying unfollowed too, don’t know why, but I couldn’t honestly care about it.

That leads me to thinking, was I overwhelmed at any point in this journey? Or did I let all this “clout” get into my head. Genuinely not, I still feel the same as I did in December when I had less than 1000 followers. The things that changed now are the number of opportunities I’m getting and the people I’m able to connect with.

This is probably the best part of building an audience, you’re able to connect with people who have already done it and you can see the magnitude of possibilities in front of you. It just gets you excited.

Another advantage I have too, is the fact that I have no YES Men around me, people still treat me the same, at least the ones I care about. Nothing’s changed, I’m still the same Saksham for all of them and that makes me happy.

Because I’ve built this brand on authenticity, I don’t want to not have that in my personal life too. Or maybe I haven’t seen that side yet, because I need to go out more. Let’s see, I’ll keep you guys updated here about everything.

Or if you all see me getting cocky anywhere I want you to keep me in check. I promise I’ll start the discord server this month and talk to you all regularly.

Hence, audit the creators you follow regularly on this one thing, do they constantly say things that are polarizing or they only talk about stuff to please everyone. Would be an interesting observation.

Habit Changes:

Still continuing on intentional consumption, and rewarding myself with some entertainment at the end of the week.

Had quit caffeine for the last couple months and started again last weekend. I thought I’ll feel bad about it, and I did not. Had no remorse. It actually helped because before I felt nothing after drinking red bulls, I used to fall asleep frequently too haha. Now it genuinely helps me to keep working when I need it. I’d suggest you to have caffeine in cycles too. I’m not Hubermann, and I don’t have any perfect study to back it, it worked for me so it’s true lol.

Whenever I go into a deepwork session, in the beginning, I write the 1-3 things I’ll do in that session and say it while writing, don’t know why it has helped me be more focused and I actually got a lot done in a shorter amount of time. (Try it for yourself)

Actionable items for you:

1. Keep me accountable on things I say in my stories, I do tend to get things done. Often I extend the time taken, so I need accountability from you all on getting everything done quicker, whether it’s this newsletter, YouTube videos, responding to DMs, making reels on topics you requested or any project I talk about. Call me out in the DMs and be ruthless. I don’t want you all to just praise me in everything I do, keep me in check and hold me accountable in things I do. Please. Real soon I want to give away stuff if I don’t get any project done, as incentive for the people who keep me in check.

2. Try the Dan Koe structure to his day, and upload a story this weekend updating me about how it went, and I’ll put you on the list to contribute and write a small section in this newsletter from next week. (I already have the first person selected, so you’ll be next in line)

3. Create a video or story teaching something (only if you’re an aspiring creator) and frame your video in a way where there’s a story before value, you come up with the script and everything. Just keep in mind this framework, and tag me in it. Let’s see the change in response that you get as compared to other videos.

Latest YouTube video:

Since I’ve been self reflecting so much these days, I found a pattern that I’ve followed until now in different avenues and it remained similar everywhere. In this video I talked about how you gain enough clarity to find that 1 or 2 things that will get you to the success you’re aiming for. (With how I did it exactly, at the end)

If you’re a knucklehead, and don’t like watching purely info videos on YT, this might not be for you (Click the thumbnail to head straight to the video)….

I probably won’t know you personally, but if what I produce on any platform, makes your life better in any way……… my purpose is fulfilled.

Do send me feedback either on Substack or via email reply, or send me a DM on IG saying “you’re a baka, Saksham”. I’ll read every single one and become better in the next one.

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