Karan has mastered the art of living many lives in one: from being the CEO of Discovery Channel’s India division to becoming a certified yoga teacher, writing bestsellers, globe-trotting, and founding a tech startup that sold for $400 million within 18 months of its inception.
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.