Baka Breakthroughs EP 5

Quote I’m living by

10th April: Woke up early today. Created a new structured approach to my day yesterday and followed it. Helped me get more focused work done. Although there is one non negotiable that I would like to do, that I didn’t complete today. But it’s a start. The IG thing still hasn’t sorted out, I actually saw negative growth for the first time in 3 months, it’s easier on my mind now, I’m not taking it too seriously, instead being grateful that I was able to do so much in such a short amount of time, and grateful for you all who support me regularly, I’ll forever be in your debt. It’s now up to me to level up my game, give you more with what I produce and I’ve already started taking action in that direction.

11th April: Woke up nervous today because of the Bayern Munich game against City. I always feel nervous but during the match it goes, so let’s see. Got a lot to do today. Did a decent amount of work. Created videos, more outreach for agency, build a new email campaign that I’ll test. After gym, did a small IG live session as I couldn’t focus on work before the game.

12th April: Really disappointed after yesterday’s game. Woke up late because of it, on top Bayern lost due to just silly defensive errors, the whole morning was ruined basically. I always have these conversations with myself that why am I letting these football games influence so much of my behavior. Those players don’t even know I exist, in the grand scheme of thing, it shouldn’t matter. But after playing the sport for more than 10 years, I have this attachment that I don’t want to remove. Whatever these online gurus say about people who watch sports are losers, don’t listen to it. If you’re emotionally attached to a game, stay there, at least that’ll be a habit that keeps you active in some region of your daily life. These days of losses help me reflect back on stoic values, to not let my emotions get the better of me. Although things are not perfect, I was not actually able to focus on work because I was dwelling on it, eventually I gained focus. Removed the primary distractions, so twitter mainly for football, logged off from my laptop and removed it on my phone for some time. Whatever happens, I’ll still support Bayern Munich, hoping for some magic in the next leg🤞. (People who don’t watch sports, probably won’t be able to relate to any of this haha, but if you do, I’ve got something for you in the actionables section)

13th April: Good day today, did a good amount of prospecting for my agency, posted the agency intro video, although still the engagement is not good, feels good to make progress. I’ll be honest, I would be wondering and frustrated because of this, but I’ve kinda made peace with it at the moment, I know it’ll be back to normal and better so why dwell on just one thing. Good gym session today as well, although in the coming days I’ll be travelling so I won’t be able to do enough martial arts. Bro why is it so addicting, literally it has made me not wanting to travel because I want to go to those daily training sessions haha. Couldn’t make time for reading today, but it’s fine, the main priority at this moment is the agency. And I’m putting this here, I’ll do everything to take this to $5-fig monthly revenue in just the next 90 days, you guys will know my thought processes, feelings along this journey. It’ll be a fun ride.

14th April: Couldn’t do a lot of work, had my relatives over at my place so spent time with them. Did have a good talk with my team member Aman, with what we’re about to do, you guys will be shocked that how am I giving away so much sauce for free. Just wait. Also, almost done ideating a collab that will be out of nowhere. I’m sure you guys will like it.

15th April: Worked until 2am, to reflect on some things, and prepare for today. Woke up a bit late, was in bed for an hour just scrolling memes. Did some decent work, filmed a collab which hopefully turns out great. Did outreach for my agency, had an espresso tonic before and after training. Bro it’s 3am right now and i can’t sleep lol. Anyway, thinking of more ways I can make it all work.

16 April: Cousin came over, and went bowling. It was a Sunday so I just took a break from work and spent time having fun. Good food and long conversations only.

17-23 April: Was not able to work at all during these days. Maybe spent 2 hours in total, just organizing things. Had to travel back home to attend a family function so completely out of touch with work. Managed to upload a collab with Akshat Tongia and a nice little live stream too, it was a good experience. Need to get back to work. (It’s 12.50 AM right now, 24th April), I was reflecting on my current work scenario, and to be honest, everything has been below average, whether it’s my content, my agency work, or managing my team. Thinking about it, I know I didn’t get carried away by all the growth because I’ve put in years of work before even seeing any results. It’s a familiar space, where I’ve been several times now. When we’re trying to build something of ourselves, there comes a point every once in a while, where you hit a ceiling, where you see absolutely no progress, even if you’re putting in a good amount of work. At that exact moment, either people give up, or they make everything clear around themselves, look at the current scenario, momentum, and possibilities and pick out small deficiencies in every aspect, and fix or improve on those results in breaking through that ceiling and achieving new heights. I know I’m at that exact point when I was gaining momentum with work, I had to travel and there was a halt in progress. I have found a few loopholes in my overall process of work, and now it’s my job and responsibility to fix it all. I set big goals for myself when I quit the IG agency back in Jan end, and even though I’ve progressed quite a bit, I’m nowhere near satisfied with my own effort.

Drastic changes are needed within me and the ecosystem I’ve created, now it’s time for work.

24 April: Reflected a lot and now it’s time for work. Addressed the issues and loopholes I’m facing with my team members, and as always we’re back in good health and energy. Some difficult things needed to be talked about. Because we’re at a point where we are not absolute beginners and we need serious work if we don’t want to end up mediocre. Taking it all easy and nice can result in going from step 0 to 1, but no further. What got me here won’t take me to the next step.

25th April: Traveled the whole day got back to my apartment at 9pm ish. Took some rest and planned what I have to do for the next 90 days. There’s a certain goal I’ve set for myself, that I will unveil once I’ve achieved it. Maybe it’ll happen before the 90 days mark. Let’s see.

26th April: Good day, made videos, screen time is really low today. Already seeing good progress. I’m making sure I cut out all distractions, and seriously limit the dopamine inflow.

Lessons from books:

Expert Secrets: To be honest, I haven’t really read enough to write a good section on this. I’ll send an extended version over the weekend talking about this and the next section. So thoda time dedo plz

Interesting resources:

I can easily find shiny-looking resources, but I won’t this time because I haven’t tried or tested anything over the last 2 weeks. My bad if you were waiting for something nice, I’ll make sure you receive something great in the next edition.

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 initially written journal into recordings that I make every day 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, but 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 the 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.

It’s 24th April and I’ve decided I’ll hire 1 person to work with me, I haven’t decided on which part of my work yet, I do know that I’m probably doing too much, myself, all the activities that are not of highest leverage and that’s causing a delay in a lot of my recent work. I’ll take a few days and build a hiring process for myself and see which people I would like to work with me. If you’re reading this, don’t tell it to anyone else, and send me your details of expertise and I’ll see if that’s what I need to take it all to another level, and make 1 or who knows, 2 people part of it all.

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 do 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. Put up a story or a video talking about how sports is a big part of your life, you could be a fan of any sport, just talk about it. How it helps you be optimistic, which team or player you support. Pour out your emotions and the impact of it on your life.

2. Do an honest life audit, and pick out 3 things you seriously need to improve right now. Be absolutely brutal, show no mercy on your current self. Seek clarity, and you will know exactly where you need to work in order to become a better human. If you’re comfortable enough, send me the list via IG DMs, and I’ll make sure I talk to every one of you about those and see if I can support in any way.

Latest YouTube video:

Since I’ve been self reflecting so much these days, again. I found that I’m letting all sorts of dopamine fry my brain. I need to be more selective of what I consume. Hence I made this video where I explained how you can select creators to consume content from, that will benefit you the most.

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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