A few days ago I was overwhelmed by the number of things I try in a year and the progress I make.

Just this year I’ve tried to:

  • Get better at visual design
  • Continue strength training
  • Run more
  • Get back to coding
  • Play mid/high stakes poker
  • Learn about the AI landscape
  • Read more books
  • Diversify my investments
  • Write more
  • Public company analysis
  • Do side projects
  • Stay in touch with my friends This doesn’t even include
  • Continue to get shit done at work
  • Family
  • Travel (both work and personal)

I always joke to myself that if Papa Zuck can learn Mandarin in a year, I can get better at Figma. But it is still a lot.

What has helped me (a little) is telling myself that I don’t have to learn iOS in a month. I don’t even have to make a lot of money at poker. I am pretty good at product and interaction design, the visual sense will improve over time. I picked up a lot of this stuff by choice. Nobody is forcing me. I can just keep doing my day job and never have to worry about getting better at anything else or even monetising it. Nothing will replace the salary I earn as VP Product. And I am probably capable enough to get another job. Besides, when you lose more than a month’s salary (my first job) because of the colour of a card on the river, you get a little desensitised to money.

I remember having goals around running for years before I actually went running. Years of wanting to train before I built my home gym.

Life is long. You need new things to keep it interesting. Every new thing I try, I learn something new. I get better. Relatively, of course. Compared to where I was a year ago, not much progress in absolute terms.

I have been blogging for more than 10 years. Has it led directly to anything? Probably not. But I have met so many interesting people who read what I write. Every time I post something on Twitter, people DM me and tell me what they are working on. People use career posts I have written to negotiate job offers. House hunting. I have started to appreciate serendipity.

There is still no production-grade side project that has a lot of users. I got a PR in the deadlift and then couldn’t get back to regular strength training. I ran a half marathon but limped the last 5km. But hey, maybe next year I will run the whole thing. Until then, I will not be hard on myself.

I have probably got better or done something related to all the things on my list. And that probably matters. We will all be 80 year old uncles or aunts in our societies (if we are lucky enough to get old and not die of lung cancer from the air we breathe here). Use a walker for our evening walks. Wondering where our years have gone. When we have tried enough, done enough. I just don’t want to go back to this winter of 2024, down memory lane, and ask why I didn’t do more with my time. Why didn’t I learn that frames are better than groups in Figma?

And yes, before anyone asks, I don’t have any children. No new flat I bought that I have to renovate. No EMIs to pay. What am I going to do with my time if not this.