Naveen has rigorously studied the Mahabharata, the longest and one of the most important epics of the world. The characters and stories in Mahabharata are emblematic of the multiple pushes and pulls within each of us.

This knowledge is central to how Naveen operates his life. He has started the Aram Centre for Evolutionary Leadership, in Auroville, India. He is particularly keen on working with young changemakers and those interested in bridging spirituality and social change.

Connect with the Guest, Naveen

• Aram Website

Connect with the Host, Susmeet

• Bio Site

More useful links

• Auroville Website

• More about Mahabharata

• The Suprarational, the Rational and the Infrarational

• Vipassana Meditation

• Jainism

Some Mahabharata References from within this conversation

• Abhimanyu is a young and valiant warrior in the Mahabharata, who knew the technique to enter the Chakravyuha, a powerful military formation. However, he did not have the ability to exit it.

• Arjuna is one of the main protagonists of the Mahabharata. His journey is one of self-discovery and transformation.

• Karna is a symbol of someone who is rejected by those who should love him, yet becomes a man of exceptional abilities. His character is developed in the epic to raise and discuss major emotional and dharma (duty, ethics, moral) dilemmas.

Connect with the Guest, Vasudeva

• Dances of Universal Peace Website

• Dances of Universal Peace Facebook Group

• Vasudeva’s VK

Connect with the Host, Susmeet

• Bio Site

Connect with the Guest, Jessica

• Jessica’s company - Radiance

• Radiance Twitter

• Jessica’s Books

Connect with the Host, Susmeet

• Bio Site

Connect with the Guest, Jubin

• Instagram

• Blog

• Twitter (X)

Connect with the Host, Susmeet

• Bio Site

For over a decade, Vipul has been diving deep into the magical world of Kabir, exploring the musical and spiritual landscapes of mystic poetry. In this conversation, we unpack the wonderful, reflective spaces he creates where people come together to sing and connect through the transformative power of Kabir's songs.

Connect with the Guest, Vipul

• Instagram

• Website

• Book

Connect with the Host, Susmeet

• Bio Site

• Personal Instagram

• Place of Possibilities Instagram

• Website

Connect with the Host, Susmeet

• Bio Site

And now I am experimenting with writing, 
While living in Bali.
Yeah! 

But,
How on Earth do I do this?
What about my resume?

These are some questions my friends ask me. And I am going to answer them in this piece. 

In these answers, there is also an undertone of a story, a story of a new world, where it is possible to transcend the resume, and transcend geographies.

Let me first give some context on why the contract with Dune, that I just mentioned, was so special.

A note about Dune

Dune raised a round of a whooping 69 million dollars while they had 16 employees. Yes! At a valuation of, ___ a__ billion___ dollars.

That is right, they became a unicorn with 16 employees.

Dune has established itself as an impeccable brand in this industry. All the leading chains, protocols and apps are Dune’s customers. 
They have attracted the best in the world to work for them.

In fact, the confidence to dream bigger has turned out to be my biggest win from getting into Dune.

In their fully remote and globally distributed team, I was the first face from India.

How?

Let us dive into the story!

And before we do, here is a teaser of a picture from a team retreat. While working with them, I had the chance to fly to Bali with some teammates. My first time outside the Indian subcontinent.

The Story

The cutting edge of knowledge is online and free

This story starts in Mid 2021.
Like everyone else, I had huge Fomo when Crypto prices went through the roof.

Which made me go, 
This is it!
I am going to learn this thing.

And I went on to have a fascinating journey of diving through rabbit holes and aha moments. This space is layered, and it takes a while to figure it out.

But the silver lining is, for an industry as new and as fast as this, there are no masters degrees. No institutions can catch up at this pace.

So the best in the world learn the same way I did. Online and free.

While I dived in because of Fomo, I fell in love with this knowledge. And the process of attaining it.

However, it doesn’t take long to realise that knowledge alone does nothing.

I started looking for people to connect with. And I started finding ways to leverage my existing background.

Niche Online Communities 

I had a career in data and AI up to this point. I was a Senior Product Engineer working on some cutting edge AI with an incredible team at a Bangalore startup.

So I had to find a way to use my existing skills with this new thing, with blockchains. I had to play to my strengths. I began diving into the intersection of data and blockchains.

And stumbled upon this group called Web3 Data Degens started by Andrew Hong. Who is The thought leader for blockchain analytics. You could not enter this space without coming across at least one article from him.

Which meant his group attracted some of the best talent and rising talent in this space.

And I got in, got into the web3 data degens group. This was the foundation for what would happen next.

This and the Build community where I found peers to build side projects with.

Side Projects

Side Projects is how I got my foot into the door.

I have been working in AI since 2016, since I graduated. Which meant I was also following Sam Altman and Open AI since that time.
Surprisingly, the world still hadn’t taken notice. (May 2022)

This was my opportunity.

I used OpenAI’s Codex API (now deprecated) with Blockchain data and built a side project.

When I shared it with the Data degens group. They couldn’t believe that it was even possible to do what I had done. They wanted me to tweet it out immediately.

And I did. 

I tweeted.
Members of Data degens retweeted.
And within this niche of blockchain data, I became micro famous overnight.

I had heard about it,
and I had read about it.
But nothing beats the feeling of this experience.
The feeling when something of your creation goes viral on the Internet.
My launch tweet went on to garner over 60,000 impressions.

Amongst other wins, this project also succeeded in attracting attention from Dune co-founder Mats Olsen.

A personal brand

I did not stop here, I pulled off a crazier feat.

I went on to launch seven projects in seven days. 

Some in collaboration with my amazing peers from the Build community.

My solo projects were the ones that went on to receive appreciation from some of the best in the industry.

By this point, my work had established a personal brand for me within this space. 
And offers for work were pouring in!

Including an offer for a contract with the leader in this niche. 
An offer I couldn’t refuse.

After a rigorous evaluation process, I cracked this contract with Dune.

Very Specific knowledge

Let us break this down a little more.

I did developer relations for Dune’s API. Highly interdisciplinary work.

This role played at the intersections of

• Blockchains

• Data

• Data from blockchains

• API for data from blockchains

• Applications built using an API for data from blockchains

And this is just the developer part of Developer relations. 

I demonstrated aptitude for the relations part with my already active participation in online communities in this space and the small but very high quality audience I had nurtured on my Twitter. I also had some experience in public speaking etc from my college days.

In a way, every nonlinear turn I took in life, got me closer to this role.

There were perhaps very few people anywhere in the world that could play at such niche intersections.

Being one of them, I went on to work with the brilliant team at Dune. 

End of Story

But what’s next?

While that completes the story of landing work that has given me some freedom, and more importantly, a lot of confidence.
And I since then have taken the liberty to not work but travel across 10 countries.

Don’t I have this gap in my resume?
Yes, it does make me worry.

What comforts me is that my personal brand somehow still keeps working for me.
Most of my side projects were launched a year ago. Even so, just a few weeks back, I got approached on twitter by one of the co-founders of Mercor.

Yeah, even in this market!

I loved chatting with them on Zoom, but I did not take this offer. 

I might regret this later.
But that is how I live.

Why?

I wish I had a simple answer.

But the best I can do is share this other piece with you where I try to make sense of my nonlinear life.
I also go into a side story of cracking my contract with Dune. And explain how writing feels valuable to me in yet another piece.

There is one more instance that can help answer this why. Immediately after I published my first piece of writing, out of all places, an acquaintance connected with me on facebook. A platform I hadn’t used in years. And reached out with this dreamy role that combines tech and writing.

This conversation hasn’t moved forward as of yet.
But there is hope for me! 

At this point, I want my work to be aligned with me. I want to work with a team, on a mission, that I can immerse into. I want it all to be harmonious, like a symphony.

And I dare to believe, that something will happen. 

Or I will make something happen.

That is all for this post.

If you made it this far. Thank you for reading.

Did I leave you wanting to know something more?
Drop in a comment!

Thank you, , ,,and for reading early drafts of this essay, during Write of Passage cohort 11.

Karan's juggling act – CEO, yogi, writer – echoes the many hats I find myself wearing. My journey, too, has been nonlinear, and making sense of it has been challenging. Karan’s insights give me comfort, like a bowl of warm soup on a cold winter's day.

In this piece, I'll share some of my favourite ideas from Karan.

Be your own unapologetically weird self

Explaining what I do for a living has always been complex. Karan, too, struggled with this. He writes in his blog post,

I’d apologetically explain the gaps in my resume for time spent backpacking, writing, and learning yoga and meditation.

“Umm…my family wanted me in India.”

“Actually…my publisher wanted me on a book tour.”

Things began to change when he embraced his complete self, unapologetically.

I began to realize I’d be a fraction of a professional without the creative energy of writing or the curiosity from years of drifting. 

I stopped hiding large parts of me and talked openly about my experiences in interviews and work. 

The right kind of people and jobs began to come my way.

Starting to write is one step I have taken in this direction. I am sharing all of me with the world. I want to be my unhinged self in the Symphony of my life .

Karan goes on to quote Floyd.

All of you is you. Like that old Floyd song, 

“There’s no dark side of the moon. As a matter-of-fact, it’s all dark.”

Only lighter.

Cycles of creating and seeking

Karan has an interesting way of making sense of the nonlinearity of his pursuits.
I am paraphrasing what I believe is the spirit of the message from this youtube video in Hindi.

Any creative project, any act of creation, be it a product, a youtube channel or a substack. If you give it your all, it will take, all of you.

I know what he is saying, I once poured all of myself into launching seven projects in seven days.

Then you would be empty.

Yes! Had nothing left after those seven launches.

And you would naturally seek more new experiences before moving on to the next project of life. Reading new books, traveling to unfamiliar places, learning a new skill. 

This again fills you up, so you could express yourself again, with a new project, in a new act of creation.

This explains what I have been doing the past year. And I think I am just getting ready for my next act of creation.

Just getting this perspective, a way to understand my own choices, sometimes helps stay sane.

Embrace momentary phases of loneliness

I am again paraphrasing Karan’s words from his video in Hindi.

The entirety of my twenties and thirties, I moved a lot. In a way, I had been seeking loneliness.

I have moved a lot too. Am I also seeking loneliness? What?

Everything that I value deeply now, wouldn't have come into my life if I hadn't chosen to be in a new place every time, away from any familiar voices and distractions.

This makes sense. I have to get away from people to do something new, because when I have familiar gazes on me, I feel stifled in my ability to step into the unfamiliar.

And when he goes on to say the following words, I feel personally spoken to.

If you are at a place in your life, where you are lonely. Recognise how powerful and profound this moment is.

Recognise that this phase of your life is very special. And wouldn't last for long.

Do not try to sidestep it. Embrace it.

It is true, some of my best work and best times have followed such phases. These momentary (and in hindsight, intentional) phases of loneliness need to be embraced!

Karan has also captured this idea in a blogpost.

Measure Life in Decades

I try to romanticise my nonlinear path, but the truth is, it sucks.

Karan feels me when he writes in this blog post…

“I was sleeping on an ashram floor at age 30 when my friends from B-School were moving up in their careers and sending pictures of their newborns and first houses. The wandering life is painful in the days.

You start learning from scratch in new fields, humbled again and again, while people around you make steady progress in their chosen fields. But the wanderer’s dots connect in decades.”

This one insight, looking at life in terms of decades, not days, really grounds me. 

Karan, now years past those times, sees the dots connecting.

“You’re at your best when you’re creating new systems or working in troubled waters. Others falter in the uncertainty. But you’ve mastered displacement and ambiguity, skills that come in most use in later years of your career.

Be kind to yourself in the days of struggle. Or don’t think of it as a struggle at all. It’s just learning with outcomes deferred by a decade.”

Don’t seek validation from conventional sources

In January, I will be attending the wedding of a cousin, a premier B-School grad working at an MNC.

And he also happens to be…. two years younger than me.

I really love to see my family on these occasions. But I am dreading that this time the scales have tipped. I would be judged in every interaction for being behind in life.

In this blog post, Karan talks about something similar.

“A close relative told me once that he wouldn’t want his children to grow up to be a drifter like me. He wasn’t trying to offend. Like most people, he couldn’t fathom why I would leave my job to learn yoga for a year at age 35.

I remember feeling bad then. A part of me was still seeking conventional validation. “

Yes. When my loved ones question me, even I begin questioning myself. What am I doing with my life?

Over time, Karan grew to understand that conventional opinions are not for him.

“As my choices have become less and less mainstream, I’ve learned to rely on books about people who’ve charted new paths, and importantly, my own instinct as my North Star for validation of my choices. 

Read widely. Think critically.”

Absorbing this message, I have become mindful of seeking validation from the right sources, if at all. 

Which in turn has helped me see my boundaries. And allowed me to stay in touch with friends and family who might not understand me, but still are very dear to me.

Another reason I look up to him so much is knowing how he started his wanderings in his late twenties.

In his forties now, he is settled with a wife and kids. He is still unconventional in his ways as he has transitioned into parenthood.

It gives me strength to know that I am not too late in life, at 29. And this meandering way is a way of its own.

It is as if someone, about 15 years ahead of me, is living the kind of life I want to live. And he is very generously sharing all his lessons, so that the path feels easier for me.

Thank you Karan!

My voice is hardly my own.
It's orchestrated by everything around me.
My very sense of self emerges from my environment and from the people around me.

As soon as I reached Nepal, I was taken over by the new sounds and smells, the architecture, the food.
As I immersed myself in Nepal’s sensory tapestry, I felt as though I was a note in an emergent dynamic symphony.

Within Nepal’s chaos and calm,
I found my voice.

When this voice clicked,
friendships were formed.

Out of all places in the world, those who chose to be in this place, right after Covid receded, were the exact misfits who were my tribe.

Between the backdrop of the Himalayas (the world’s tallest mountains) and the serendipity of meeting my people, a version of me came to life, a beautiful symphony.

When the Symphony Is Harmonious

The newfound rhythm flowed into every aspect of my being.
I began to produce some of my best work in the niche of blockchain analytics, work that flowed like a melody and got attention from some of the best in the world.

As the monsoon’s curtain fell upon the summer's stage in Nepal, bringing a close to my chapter there, I began my journey back home.

On the way from Nepal to India, the bus made a stop for lunch.
I eagerly took out the aloo parathas (potato-stuffed bread), a farewell gesture from my Nepalese host family.
I relished each bite, as I had relished each moment in my time spent in this land.

Just then, I heard a sound!
Ping!
A notification had come through.

Mats Olsen had DMed me on Twitter!
The co-founder of Dune. The premier blockchain analytics company!

“Cool side project!” said Mats.

My mouth was wide open.
I looked at the paratha and then at my phone.
The paratha had to be dropped.
And my life was going to change.

As a testament to the harmonies composed in unexpected places, I eventually went on to secure a contract with Dune and engaged in a fulfilling five-month tenure with their ensemble.

When the Symphony Falls Out of Rhythm

At Dune, I found my place among a cadre of distinguished peers, some boasting education from institutions like Oxford and MIT.
And my role was everything I could have dreamed of.
Developer Relations. The best possible culmination of the left and the right brain.
Working alongside the finest voices in the industry empowered me to do more.
To be more!

Despite all of this, I had begun to lose the unique tempo I’d found in Nepal.

I felt this discord when attending a friend’s wedding, a friend I had made during my time in Nepal.
She was getting married in this enchanting little town of Hampi in India.
This destination was magical.

And the wedding was magical.
But my experience of it wasn’t attuned with this magic.
Even as I attended the wedding ceremonies, I crammed in work during brief escapes to the surrounding cafes.

I was not the same person.
The me that had become friends with this bride, while we were in Nepal, was not to be found.
I had lost my voice.
But, I could not notice this loss.

I could not notice back then.
But something has changed now.
In this dissonance, I have found a different kind of resonance.
A Write of Passage.
And I think, I think I have just found a way to stay in tune with the symphony, the symphony of my life.

Enter Writing

An unexpected outcome of starting to write is being able to see myself in my writing.
It is easy to go about my day and not really see myself.
But when I have put myself down on paper, it becomes a mirror to my actual self that penetrates deeper than the surface.

There's nowhere left to hide.

When I write something that is not real, I hate it—I hate myself. I have to throw it away. I have to start afresh.

In order to write something that is real, I have to start with being real.

I have to listen to my elusive voice emerge in tune with the orchestra of my life.

The first piece I published as I began to write tried to make sense of my nonlinear life.
And concluded with accepting that it did not need to make sense.

As I am now writing this third piece, I still think it does not need to make sense.
But it needs to be coherent.
It needs to be one symphony.

Writing to Stay Attuned

I had attracted my contract with Dune through putting my work out.

But I wasn’t putting my life out.
Now I am.
With my writing.

My writing shall become a means to merge everything.
To keep it one, to keep it attuned.

I want to work, I want to work hard and be consumed by my work, and by my relationships, and by life.
I want all of these to play alongside each other in harmony.

If I want this symphony to keep playing, I need to be authentic in everything I do.
I cannot let it stop, once the summer ends and I leave the mountains.
It can ebb and flow, but it cannot lose its way from Nepal to Hampi.

Getting a dream role in an industry-leading unicorn is not enough.
I want to be immersed in work that harmonises with my deepest values.

I do not want to just attend my friend’s wedding.
I want to bring my life into it.
I want to dance at that wedding.
I want to dance to the symphony between my voice, the mystic energy of Hampi, and the auspiciousness of the wedding.

I want my words to rhyme with this symphony.
And I want my work to rhyme with it.
I want it all to be one symphony.

If I want to write every week, I will need to live every week.
If I want to share myself in a moment, I need to have access to my voice at that moment.

I need to let this symphony of my life emerge. And write my way to stay attuned to it.

From here on, my being and my writing merge.

This piece has been made possible with feedback and love from Write of Passage cohort 11 members —

And if you're thinking I went there myself—no way, I didn't! A new-age Desi vlogger named Garima did. She recently visited the Taliban controlled territory of Afghanistan, as a solo female traveler.

She was even allowed to shoot her vlog from inside this border checkpost where you get your passport stamped. I found this incredibly surprising.

If you are anything like me, your perceptions of Afghanistan have largely been formed by News headlines. You know, bombings, terrorism and the troubles.

But in Garima’s vlogs, you see her exchange smiles in a market and buy some fruit. You see her being treated nicely.
You get to see the streets of Afghanistan and its people.

This is something you rarely see in traditional media.

Headlines miss humanity, vlogging embraces it

The world is largely composed of ordinary people. 
News only captures the unordinary.
Vlogging changes this.

This to me is one of the most powerful shifts currently happening in the world.

Until recently, it was simply impossible to see a place like Afghanistan through a medium as raw as these vlogs.

Once you have seen children playing in the streets, merchants trading in a market, you can only wish good for the people residing in this land. Despite all the ongoing problems. You begin to feel empathy, something that plain old news headlines often fail to evoke.

Vlogs hold immense potential for deepening our understanding—and perhaps even sparking affection—for distant lands.

And they are not the first medium to do so. Movies have already carved a path, demonstrating the cultural impact a form of media can have.

Movies have already been bridging distances, and hearts

For a moment, let me take you with me to Central Asia. Where I traveled to earlier this year.

After strolling for several kilometers in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, I found myself seated amidst a lively public space. 

A cheeky 3 year old kid came running to me and tried to say something in a language I did not understand.

His grandfather, who was nicely dressed in traditional wear and had a belly and a build that added to his calm demeanor, followed him, smiled warmly, and asked where I was from.

“India”, I said. 

His eyes lit up as he exclaimed, 

"INDIAA!! HINDOSTAAN!" (Hindustan is another name for India, albeit lesser-known.)

He called the rest of his family over and introduced them.

“India, India, see, he is from India!”

I felt so touched by this warmth. Warmth, that wasn't just a fluke; it was cultivated over years of watching Indian movies. Yeah, you read it right—Bollywood movies have got a fanbase here.

This was a moment where I deeply felt the power a medium can have to build bridges across distant lands.

And it's not just movies anymore.

Enter vlogging : the democratisation of storytelling

Cinema doesn't universally resonate across all geographies.

Some places are still only accessible when directly traveled to.
And when you do travel, it is even more real. It is not fiction.
You see the place and its people for what it is.

As I did in Central Asia.

The catch though is, that I can not travel everywhere by myself.
And this is where Vloggers come in!

During my travels in Central Asia, crossing into Afghanistan was a line I didn't cross—until I saw it through Garima's vlogs. These vlogs, so accessible and unfiltered, offered me a look at what was otherwise inaccessible. They underscore just how game-changing this new wave of vlogging is for the way we understand the world.

Gone are the days when you needed a charismatic host, an entire film crew, and a huge budget to document travel experiences. Now, any solo traveler with a decent phone can produce vlogs, capturing unfiltered experiences as they happen.

With this level of accessibility, vlogs might go on to eclipse films in their cultural impact.

No matter where you are from, and what language you speak, there probably is a vlogger who is just like you, and who is capturing a land far away from you, a land that you did not understand, yet!

As a digital nomad, I could have been anywhere I wished to be. Out of all places, I found myself on a drive towards the Uzbekistan border from Tajikistan. A hit Bollywood song from the ‘80s played in the background.

“Jimmy ♪ Jimmy ♪ Jimmy ♪”

“Aaja ♪ Aaja ♪ Aaja ♪”

The driver, a big Bollywood fan and an avid tobacco chewer, was thrilled to have a passenger from the land of Shah Rukh Khan. He made sure to entertain this passenger with Bollywood music all through the one hour ride!

There was just one problem: I was seated on the wrong side for the best views. 

One guy in the shared cab understood English. I requested him to capture a picture on his side of the window.

This was one scene from a typical day in my two months spent in Central Asia. A time where I learned to shout Khorosh (translates to Goood!) when my teammate scored a goal while playing football with the locals. Got a peek into their lives through conversations over long walks on (surprisingly well maintained) sidewalks in Dushanbe. Generously got offered extra free fruits by a lady in a Margilan market. Got pestered by a group of girls at a mall in Andijan. Warmly got invited for meals despite no common language. (And learnt that these invitations are to be refused at least three times and then accepted if still insisted) My ideas of the world were constantly challenged in the time I spent there.

After this time in Central Asia, I wanted to be somewhere more comfortable and focus on work. So I came into the comfortable digital nomad haven of Bali. 

As I am writing this piece from my apartment in Bali, my cup of chai rests on the edge of this couch, something my mom would freak out on seeing. Mom, it won't fall; that only happened once when I was five!

The peaceful serenity of this place, contrasted with the bustling memories from Central Asia, leads me to reflect on the unconventional path my life has taken. I'm eager to understand it better. Then, by pure coincidence, I stumble upon the mimetic theory in David Perell's writing, which helps me make sense of my nonlinear life.

At its core, Girard’s mimetic theory argues that humans are imitative creatures. We subconsciously pick up desires, goals, and even lifestyles from those around us. The theory questions the originality of our ambitions, hinting that what we often 'want' might not stem from our inner selves but from societal mimicry.

Perell goes on to say, 'Competition distracts us from things that are more important, meaningful, or valuable. We buy things we don’t need with money we don’t have to impress people we don’t like.' 

This idea resonates with me deeply. If we strip away the influence of mimicry, what are we left with? What do we genuinely value and why?

Unintentionally, I've been sidestepping this tendency to mimic, with my way of life.

If I had simply come to Bali, I would have still felt compelled to follow some subculture. Like being an indie hacker, building micro SaaS products from the beach. 

But within the last year, I have sung the works of medieval Indian poets at a workshop in the Himalayas, commuted lying in our host’s rickshaw kart after partying all night in Kampot, and chatted about life over a delicious Lebanese breakfast prepared by another host in Abu Dhabi. The sheer diversity in my lived experiences strips away strong influence from any one place. It takes away any idea of “me” I had gathered and what “I” should be doing.

Mark Manson’s words resonate with the rhythm of my own experiences. I am void of very specific desires because of this constant flux of my nonlinear choices. And this is perhaps the entirety of my quest. To get away from being too specific. To let things emerge more organically.

If a Bollywood song can echo in remote parts of Central Asia...I can keep my cup of chai on the edge of the couch and simply focus on writing. 

And as I sit here thinking back, trying to make sense of a nonlinear life, I realise—it does not need to make sense.