Identity is a surprisingly complicated issue. And often, we
feel like we're not where and who we're supposed to be. And
sometimes this stops us from making any progress at all. But
it doesn't have to. Welcome to The Bootstrapped Founder. I'm
talking to Sakshi Shukla today. Her journey from a medical
background to content strategist and mentor is what I would call
the squiggly career. And that's a good thing. Sakshi and I dive
into the philosophical and practical challenges of how we
see ourselves as entrepreneurs, how we're shaped and limited by
external pressures, and how we can empower each other to accept
the squigginess of our journeys. This episode is sponsored by
acquire.com. More on that later. Now, here's Sakshi.
Sakshi, thank you so much for being on the show today. I'm
quite excited to talk to you because I know you and I, we are
both big fans of Kevin Kelly. I just recently found that out
about us. What's the thing about Kevin Kelly that currently
impacts your life? Because in our community, the 1000 true
fans paradigm that Kevin Kelly has introduced is one of the
biggest things that everybody tells you, right? As an audience
builder, as a founder, as an entrepreneur, you need these
people. And he has written great books. His blog is amazing. I
just recently read his book about the future of technology
and all the kinds of stuff. He's spectacular. How has he impacted
your life?
Thank you for asking that great question. What a start! One
person that we both really like. And Kevin, if you're listening
to this, yeah, thank you for who you are. But a thing about Kevin
Kelly is number one, he just feels like this, you know, ray
of warmth. Like he's like this genuine warm person that I've
never met in my life, but seems to have impacted my life in so
many different ways just through his words and I thing that I'm
currently obsessed with. And I really want to ask him how he
came up with that was, don't be the best at something, be the
only, right? And as you're growing up, you're always told
be the best, be the best, be the best, right? And what that kind
of does is pushes down or kind of like burries the weirdness
that makes you you or kind of like, you know, fizzles out that
genuine curiosity that you have about life. And so when I read
his code, I think it triggered this, you know, innate sense of,
wow, like, yay, like, I'm worthy as I am, right? And maybe more
capable than I knew, right? And so that one sentence has got me
really hooked. And I read it around like three months ago,
that's when I bought his book, the new book, right? I think,
Rules to Live By. I'm sorry if I'm missing the name up, right?
But I have it on my shelf and I pick it up every day and I read
one line out of it. But this one's in dense around, hey, you
know, don't be the best. Like, how can you be the only at
something, right? And I'm asking myself these questions like, how
can I become great at coming up with ideas? How can I be someone
that people feel comfortable enough and you know, can come up
and say, hey, Sakshi, here's the problem that I'm facing? And I
know that you're the only person possible who can solve this. And
as I'm thinking about this, to be honest, I think early in my
life, I call it my first life. When I wanted to be like a
neurosurgeon, right? And then pivoted into business and
entrepreneurship. Back then, I was also obsessed with being the
only person who can solve real, you know, neurological problems.
I wanted to solve alzheimer's. I was very curious about why
Parkinson's happens and you know, all of those things,
right? So it kinda like, come full circle. And now where I'm
at, I'm like, how can I be this person who is maybe the, you
know, the only person to tell stories in a certain way or the
only person to approach problems in a certain way, right? And
what kind of problems are those going to be? He's played such a
pivotal role in just helping me just like giving the direction
you know, to your life where you're at a sort of like an
inflection point making big decisions. Yeah, so I think even
like, another thought that I have and have been having is,
how do I come up with ideas like this, that don't be the best, be
the only, right? What do you think about that?
Well, it took Kevin Kelly a lifetime or a significant part
of his life to come up with these ideas and you're right,
like, it's also funny because he embodies this to me. Like his
lived experience in his software life and his, you know,
entrepreneurial life and the guide and warmth, the father
like figure that he has to so many, that to me, embodies just,
it takes a while to get there. And it's in the
intersectionality of all your skills and all your insights
that your specific uniqueness lies, right?
Yeah
That's like, there is no second Kevin Kelley, like it's
Exactly!
Just one of them. And what I love about how he approaches
this is that he so willingly shares it along the way, right?
Like, you said, like all these little tips in the form of a
book that he gives people, these rules, he's been doing this
every single year of his life or in many years, like he just
comes up with the 30-50-60 rules or just insights that he's found
into living.
Yeah
And that is, the fact that you have these rules is already a
pretty important thing because that means you've kind of
calcified your thoughts into rules, right? It's a process of
reflection and then kind of specification, I guess, into
something actionable. That is also quite unique because I
think a lot of people have internal rules that they
sometimes most of the times follow, but never really, like
pragmatically put into a shape that they could communicate. And
I guess that's where it starts, like deep reflective thinking
about your own experiences.
Yeah. And, you know, like I love that you bring that up because
another idea that I've sort of, like, you know, found through a
thread of thoughts and things is best practices. Like, I think
we're a bit too much obsessed with best practices that other
people follow.
Right
And we underestimate what happens when you create best
practices for your own life. Right? And so a little thing and
you know, an idea that I've been, like, you know, just like,
been very fond of is, how am I going to design a life where,
you know, I create best practices that serve me as an
individual and best practices that help me serve the community
better? You know, in terms of whether it is a particular way
that I talk, whether you know, how I show up to a podcast,
whether the kind of people that I help and in what time do I
help them? Right? And how do I approach these things these
little day to day moments in my life and as they come across to
me because it's these like, you know, slow and steady moments
that come together in a classroom make up your life,
right?
Yes
And that's where, like a lot of frame working and decision
making and as I talk, this I feel like just this is what
Shane Parrish in Clear Thinking has been talking about, right?
And people may call me, I'm stealing stuff from him. But I
don't know, you know, it's been what I've discovered by working
with people who are, you know, 20 levels above or even 30-40
levels above is that they have their own unique way of doing
things, right? And own different, just like you said
about Kevin Kelly, right? That he has embodied those rules
completely. And he owns his truth of sorts, you know, if we
must say that, yeah.
And we're lucky, that's an interesting tension there. We're
lucky that he shares it because that gives us the insight into
his life. But we could also completely overreact and just
imitated completely and all of a sudden, we would, like you said,
follow the best practices of somebody who is not us, right?
Exactly!
Somebody else's practices. I've had this problem with advice in
general
Oh, yeah
All the time, right? Like advice to me is a best practice kind of
turned into a teaching, which is problematic. And I say this, as
somebody who gives a lot of advice. I've written two books
about it. Of course, I do this show every week, where I just
talked about something like that is advice. It is an incredible
tension within me because I know it works. But recently, I've
come to understand that it works for me, right? It works because
of all the things in my history, all the path dependent choices
that I made along the way. I don't know if you've ever seen
this visual of the decision tree that starts in the past and then
it goes to the now and then it goes to the future, right? And
then yeah and you see the tree like the path you took and then
there's a whole tree in front of you where all the potential
exists. Right? And that is, it's kind of scary to think about
that you always just look back at the past version and you
think oh yeah, I did this all like intentionally and on
purpose and I went this way because that's totally what I
was meant to do. But if you look in the future, there's so much
potential and you have no clue what you're gonna be doing,
right? And you give advice looking back at the past knowing
that this past was a high potential future for you at some
point in your own past. Sorry, if this is a bit convoluted. The
problem with advice to me is that we over index on the
implementability. Is that a word? You know and the capacity
to implement advice that somebody else has kind of forged
from their own experiences. So
For sure
Very much a problem if you cannot set up your own best
practices. Because you have never thought about stuff, then
taking somebody else's best practices probably is not going
to help you. Right? It's the whole ice bath in the morning
problem. Like all these, like when I get asked what my morning
routine is, it's like, well, what does that even matter to
you? Like, do you have the same dog as I have and that needs
some walk at eight in the morning stack, right? If you
don't, then my morning routine has no meaning for you. So I was
gonna ask you if you have any best practices that you would
like to share, but in thinking about it was like, well, what
does it matter?
For sure. I think, I love that you bring that up because I
think that, you know, it's important to share. I believe it
that that it's important to know what other people are up to. But
you need to build this muscle internally when you kind of
realize how far you've gone, you know, in terms of just exposing
yourself to all these external ideas. External ideas are
important. And exposing yourself to different things is important
because of course, that's how our brain makes connections and
you're aware of the world around you that's like, just basic
psychology and neurology of existing in the world. But I
think that, you know, it's really important to know these
boundaries and have this sort of, like awareness built in
that, okay, if I've consumed a particular piece of advice or
information, what am I doing with it, you know? What
actionable point has really come out of it? Or am I just like I'm
doing on the internet? Or am I just, you know, scrolling away
my time and attention on the internet, right? And I know a
lot of people are talking about this but I truly believe that
best practices for your own self are not things that you imitate
from somebody else. But at the same time, you kind of like, you
know, you take somebody else's approach to life or approach to
problems or approach to a particular thing, even money or
wealth or, you know, buying and all of that, right? And you kind
of take it and you're like, okay, here's how this person
kind of like lives and does things, right? But where does it
fit in my life? Because it might be very possible that your
morning routine does not fit in my morning routine, right? But
something about your morning routine, maybe inspires me to
change how I spend my evenings or something like that, right?
So really thinking about what kind of life you are living
instead of I think we get really caught up in if I'm going to do
something that somebody else is doing, I'm going to get the same
level of success.
Yeah, that's right.
Which is like no, doesn't work that way.
Because it's only the veneer too, right? The ice bath to me
like let's just stick with this because I think it's such a
clear visual of something that you probably won't enjoy, right?
If you introduce it into your life, you do it because you see
somebody else like Jocko like doing this in the morning and
then running a marathon or whatever, right? You have these
people that do this and it's part of their identity. It's
part of their projected self into the world. They project
this and this is part of what they think is unique to them. So
if you then take the ice bath, it's kind of just like the outer
layer of a whole thing that you take because they start at the
ice bath because of a strong discipline and a belief in like
a healthy and shock in the morning or you know in maybe
reluctance to stay like lazy and they force themselves to do
something uncomfortable. All of that is part of their personal
being that you cannot imitate, like you cannot imitate somebody
who just hates to be uncomfortable or hates to be
lazy if you personally don't mind being uncomfortable or if
you don't mind being lazy, right? That's kind of you copy a
result, you don't copy the whole process if you do this. So yeah,
the identity thing is important to me here. Can we talk a little
bit about this? What do you think about making the personal
best practices of other people that may be more impart identity
to them and taking them over. What does it do to you?
Over the past two years, I've been speaking to a lot of
people. And I think this is one of the greatest things about
writing and probably has been said maybe a million times, but
writing and the thing about putting yourself out in the
world and the thing about telling your story to the world
that I have discovered and why so many people, even very
successful people struggle with it, right? Or when people are
building companies and they don't know what is the core of
the company, right? And of course, there are so many
technicalities to it: positioning, branding,
competitor research, all of that, right? But I think it all
comes back to what your sense of identity is. And what I've kind
of realized is that and again, this is kind of like moving into
the best practices part. But self awareness, whether you're
struggling, suffering, venting, achieving being is actually so
crucial, you know, to understand your true identity. And let's
take the eyespot situation as an example, right? These people are
putting themselves in a situation that, of course, you
know the signs of it is completely different. And yeah,
it works, right? I mean, but what if you are somebody who
actually goes and beds in like, glacial river water. I've done
that. And I would recommend that overnight but any day. The sole
reason for that is when I took that dip in that river, I'm in
India and this was in north India. I had gone for a camp and
it was my first time in that absolutely freezing cold water.
And when I took that, you know, dip, okay, maybe it was good for
my body, right? Like I don't know how it affected the
neurology, the signs. Okay, good, it is great, right? But
the respect I had for life just changed in that moment, you know
and it has now become a part of my identity, that one
experience, right? It made me realize it was like I was, you
know, like going back in time for a while when it was just, I
used on Earth, right? I was like, wow! So what I'm just
trying to say here is that and which you kind of like touched
upon is experience and your choices, right? Are so essential
to your whole and accepting that is really important. Because,
like you said, right? I mean that Tim, I think Tim Urban
designed that. It's like you're coming at it and you're here and
then there's like possibilities, possibilities. There is no way
you will know which of those branches takes you to a more
successful place or a more happier place, right? You can't
future prospect or something like that, right? Like you can
only retrospect, right? But I guess it becomes easier when
you're sort of comfortable with who you are as a person. And you
know and you own your story. Right? And so I really feel that
a lot of people who maybe are thinking that, hey, if I do this
one thing, my body's gonna get better or my health is gonna get
better and you know, they're doing it right. I might reach
their level of, you know, athletic body or God knows skin
or whatever, right? And that's another reason I personally hate
people that say do the skincare and everything is going to be
solved.
Yeah, right
You can have the best skin and not be a confident person.
Right? But if you're self aware and if you kind of like are
comfortable in your journey and in your experiences and you're
of course exposing yourself that hey, let me try a sauna or let
me try an ice bath, doesn't work for me. I'm not that person.
Maybe I'm a glacier bath person or maybe I'm gonna jump out for
you know sky or some God knows what, right? But yeah, you know,
this is what I kind of like understand about identity so far
in life.
How do you get more comfortable around this? Because you
For sure. I love that question. I think that, for me after like
a lot of failure and shame, I mean, there was a lot of shame
in my life four years ago. I was very, like, ashamed to look at
myself in the mirror. And I was like and I was the most self
confident person early on in my life because my parents would
constantly validate me, my, you know, teachers and mentors would
constantly validate me. I was really good at theatre and arts
and education in all of these things, right? And then, all of
a sudden, there was this downfall, right? Where I
couldn't get to where I thought I should be. And the way to sort
of like, after that the only thing that sort of worked for me
was forgiving myself for failing or forgiving myself for making a
particular mistake. And I think and this is another idea that
goes on in my head as I've been looking at my do your sort of
like an entrepreneurial or freelancing and now running your
agency sort of a journey is, heck, a lot of times I've
forgiven myself because if I had not, I would not take risks
again. Right? I mean, okay, one rejection, boom. I'm never going
to get another client. I'm never going to have anybody who's
going to say yes, right? But I forgave myself for whatever that
mistake was that I made in that process. And the key to being
mentioned two layers, right? One is awareness of yourself like
comfortable to yourself with yourself and also being like,
kind to yourself, your story is forgive yourself, you know.
your own story. Owning your story is just allowing yourself
We're very easy to forgive others. That's what I feel, you
know, somebody hurts us. And we're like, it's okay. She's my
to be part of your your story, right? That which is for some
best friend, you know, it's fine. It's okay. He's my dad,
people I'm not even talking about trauma. I'm just talking
you know, it's fine, right? It's okay. He's my partner, right?
about the path that you take in your life, right? For some
We're very forgiving of other relationships that we have. But
I think we have to become very forgiving of the mistakes that
people, they made mistakes. And now they don't want to be that
we have made or even the way we have kind of like treated our
own selves. And I think that to anybody who is maybe not finding
person anymore. But
power in their own journey, I would just say, just sit back
Yeah
You know, that is allowing yourself to own it and then
and tell yourself, hey, I forgive you, you know and it's
getting comfortable with it is kind of the next step. Do you
okay. We're going to give this kind of like an another chance,
a better chance, something like that. So I think that is one
have any ideas that would make this easier or allow you to, I
piece that is really important, at least for me has been really
guess build a best practice internally to get to terms with
important in being comfortable with my journey, whether it was
the downfall or trying to get back up and learn how to walk
that?
again because that's how it really works. You know? Yeah
It sounds like you have developed this retroactive
experimental mindset, where now you look back at things and say,
well, it could have worked. It might have not and it didn't,
but that's fine. It was all an experiment. That's how this
feels.
Oh, my God. Exactly. And the idea, okay, so I studied science
for the longest time in my life and I still do, right? And one
of the best things that scientists probably taught me
and people are going to be, you know, so mad at me because I
keep repeating this. But I think it's worth repeating is, can you
live your life like it's an experiment? You know, I think
science teaches you the best way to live your life, you know. You
put things in the bottle, boom, you know. Okay, didn't work.
Okay, messed up. Clean the lab again. Right? Let's try putting
other things. Oh, my God, this is a blood red color, doesn't
work. Okay, throw that up. Let's try again. Right? Maybe that
blood red color was a, you know, a chemical compound that, you
know, I don't know, this is how scientists discover things
right? But there's always something that comes out of
whatever your experience has been. And so yes, like, I
honestly respect the fact that you kind of like captured this
part. But I do, especially after realizing that there is no map
to anything, no matter how much anybody tries to sell you a map.
They're just trying to sell you an experience. There are no maps
in the world.
That's a wonderful way of saying this, yeah. And it might be
benign, right? People might want to help you find your way. They
might sell you a compass. But it's not a map, right?
It's not a map. It's never going to be a map. I think, okay,
maybe that sounds like rude because I do consume what other
people create, right? I do buy courses, I do buy folks. The way
to think about it is nobody's handing you a map and nobody
possibly can hand you a map. But I think they can hand you ways
of what does it take to build a map?
You know, you need a paper, you need to know what different
Yes
kinds of roads are there in the world, right? It's like
geography almost. So these are basically tools to understand
geography and maybe where it goes, right? Or where it could
possibly take you. Or this is what mountains look like, no,
don't go that way. Right? This is what a valley could look
like. No, don't go that way. Right? Or maybe go explore that
well, right?
Yeah, it depends, but yeah, that's great. It's a wonderful
way of phrasing it. I think that kind of encapsulates why people
are looking for the map, right? Because everybody wants the map
because it allows them to skip the experiment. They don't want
to fail, they don't want the potential of failing, they don't
want to run into the forest. And then all of a sudden, there's a
mountain out there. Ah, I don't know how to climb a mountain,
right? They don't want that. They want to go around it before
they even come there. And to me, it's kind of an analysis
paralysis problem that we have when we get started, right? Get
started building businesses or even just get started becoming
aware of our own stories and our own trajectory in life. Once we
noticed that there is something that we can do about it, we want
to do it 100% right. That's how it feels to me, right? Which was
why a self help as a book genre exists. And everybody wants the
perfect way to form a habit or the perfect way to thinking
clearly. You just talked about like clear thinking, right? And
nothing wrong with atomic habits or clear thinking, like all of
these books and thoughts and frameworks are great ways of
finding your own path. But they are not the path. I think that's
a wonderful way you just described this. It's never a
map. I'm going to use this from now on. I just really liked the
way of because you're confronted with a terrain that you don't
know. And of course you want to map because ideally, you don't
want to fail. It's so hard to overcome this.
It is, it is and you know, I think when we start out in life,
right? I mean, it feels like you're handed a map, right? You
got to go to school
Yes
Then you gotta go to, do college, you're hired. There's a
mentor who's gonna guide you, right? And I think this is why I
like entrepreneurs so much or indie hackers or people who just
went out of their own way because it's absolutely
something must be wrong in our heads, I truly believe. And I
think it's Jensen Huang of NVIDIA who said this. Yeah, I
watched these things and they stick with me. And he said that
something has, there's something wrong with entrepreneurs that
they and he said this so wonderfully. I just have to tell
you. He said this, like, we ask ourselves, how hard can it get?
How hard could it possibly get? Right? But at the same time, a
lot of people don't. The thing is, I don't blame people.
Actually, I think that's just how we're shaped. We're always
told what to do, where to go, here's how it's going to be
like, right? And what happens is, after a point or just like,
oh, my God, now it's my turn to figure things out, right? And so
I think problem solving is never really ingrained in us or
ideation and thinking through things is never like a subject
that's like taught.
Yes
I don't think it can be taught, right? Maybe somebody should try
if that can happen, right? But and then all of a sudden, you're
like, go out there. It's your turn to figure things out. It's
impossible to not want a map, right? So I don't blame people.
But I also think that after a point, everybody wakes up to the
fact that maybe I should have done my life different. Right?
And that's when but they couldn't have because they were
not ready to face uncertainity. Right?
Yeah. And they were also not, like you said, the systems, the
institutions of the world in which they grew in, they were
not conducive to allowing them even to build the skills that
they would then need. That's a wonderful example. And I know
you're from India. I'm from Germany. And I think both of our
cultures are pretty traditionalist in many ways,
right? You have a very clear path and you go to university,
you get a degree and you get a good job and then you keep this
job forever. You're there for 50 years, you get a watch, and then
you're done. Right? That's kind of the story, which is horrible
because that sounds super boring. But that's coming from
an entrepreneur's perspective. Some people might like this.
It's stability. It's a clear vision of what your next 20-30
years are going to look like. You can make long term choices.
I understand why people would like this. But the reality
today, it looks very different, right? You jumped from job to
job, you switched careers completely, like you did going
from medicine into business and entrepreneurship, which is quite
different, right? The impact that you have is different, the
people you work with are different, the methods used are
different. And I wish, I absolutely wish that school
would have prepared me to lead a life of kind of self determined
choices instead of trying to suppress creative thinking. And
you know, be in kind of a, I was kind of a problem kid in school.
I was always very outspoken about my opinions, you probably
too. Yeah, obviously. Right? Otherwise, we wouldn't be
talking right now. But that's been an issue for the people
around me. And they tried to kind of squash it. And it took
me ages, a long time in my life to unlearn these lessons of
compliance and of following rules to the point where you
learn for the test not to have the knowledge, right? That kind
of stuff. And culturally, I think we come from similar
places when it comes to these kinds of things. Other
countries, Canada, the United States, Canada being the place
where I live right now, it's a little bit different. There's
still a lot of compliance. But there's also free thinking,
competitive thinking. There's a lot of competition in many ways
and expression of the self and that stuff. And it's interesting
how that affects your journey because I would love for
creativity to be a subject, let's just say that, right?
Where people teach you maybe not how to be creative, but how to
find things that you're interested in because creativity
comes automatically from there, right? So do you have any big
ideas that would help people maybe small ideas, doesn't
matter, to foster that sense that maybe the institutions have
suppressed now that they've understood that there is
something that they need to learn?
For sure. And touching base upon like India as a country and you
know, these ideas that we've been fed have like the journey
to follow. And funny story that I think people would find very
interesting was like two years ago, I found myself very
overwhelmed with where I was headed because I had changed
careers. And I didn't know what the heck was going on. And as
I'm looking back now, I realized I actually never applauded
myself for the shift I made and never really said, wow, you
pivoted from something to something. And I never gave
myself any credit, which was a disservice to myself and I'm
learning to forgive myself for that. Right? But here's the
thing, nobody else also did. For a very long time, nobody and not
even my parents, I don't hate them for this, right? They set
in their ways, right? Like traditional people don't think
about this in the ways but they never really realized how much
it must have taken to make that change, just accepting that
change, right? And I think that's why I was deeply
struggling with the questions of who am I? What does this working
out for me mean? Right? Like, I was not good at something. But
this is working. What does it really mean? And where do I sort
of like to get ahead? Right? And a question that I was asking to
myself was, should I go for like a proper business education,
right? And I started mulling over that question. And I
started writing to Howard students and I was like, hey, I
know you're doing MBA. Would you talk to me for like, just 10
minutes? And three women replied, three women I spoke to
and asked them questions. And after each call and it takes a
lot of strength to say this, I will just sit and cry because
their stories and journeys were 100 times different than mine,
right? They had different resources, different ideas,
different exposure, different perspectives in their lives. And
here I was in a small town in a country that's still like
developing. Of course, everybody is now looking at India. But I
was scared. And I was like, I'm talking to these people starting
at the top institute of the world and I'm grateful that
they're talking to me, right? Because I've made that ask. But
my context is extremely different, right? I'm glad that
I took that move and talk to those people, at least because
the clarity it gave me was a truth that people rarely accept,
especially in traditional societies like India. Here
people do an MBA after their undergrad. So like, it's like
these complete school, they do undergrad, which is like maybe
three, four years, whatever. And then they do an MBA and then
they get a job, right? Which is like, the traditional path. In
the US, it's opposite. You do undergrad and then you go to a
job. And then you take an MBA and I remember one of my
clients/mentor said to me, do you need a two year vacation at
this point in your life? Because that's what an MBA is. And I
laughed out so hard because that was real. My life is just
beginning and talking to those students at Harvard and my
mentor and slash client, it taught me that, you know, I have
to do my own learning of sorts. And I have to first accept the
huge change that has happened in my life, right? And I needed to
like, change my environment and change my unlearn is the word
that you just said, right? But accepting that you need to
unlearn something, is the big step in its own way. Because
your mind is trying to convince you and your upbringing and your
values are trying to convince you no, you've been taught
something because it's right, because it works, right? And I
think that is where creativity lies. When you say to yourself
that, hey, what I've been taught may not be working. Or maybe I
need to choose a different way of thinking is where creativity
happens, at least in my opinion.
That's such a great way. You're thinking the unthinkable, right?
The thing that people kind of forbade you from thinking
because it doesn't fit with the narratives that they tell each
other. Oh, that's cool. And
Yeah
You've brought a lot of things together just now. I just want
to like, reflect this back at you because you talked about
shame earlier about this not reaching the thing that you want
to reach. You just talked about external pressure like your
parents and a traditionalist perspective from the outside.
And we talked about identity earlier, which is kind of who we
are and what we think we need to do. And there's this political
philosopher, Amartya Sen, who wrote about identity a lot. And
I read his books and university when I studied political science
for some reason. And he described it so well because we
are such a layered individuals. We have identities that stack on
top of each other, right? We are people of Earth, we are people
of India or of Germany, we are a son or a daughter, we are a
friend, we are a professional, we are a doctor, or we are an
academic, or we are a thinker, or we are an entrepreneur, we
are so many things and they all exist in one. And often they
conflict, right? Because if you want to be a free thinker, but
you also want to be a good daughter to traditional parents,
there's a lot of tension there. It's unsurprising that you feel
shame if one part of your identity gets stronger and the
other one gets smaller, right? Gets weaker.
Exactly.
How did you deal with that? Are you still dealing with this on
some level?
Okay, so I first of all, love the idea of the stack of
identities that you talked about. And I have a few thoughts
on that. Right? So there's this concept of like, most people are
fake or most people are wearing a mask, right? I think that
isn't what the problem is. Yes. I think some people try to be
who they are not. I agree, right? But I also truly believe
that identity is so difficult because it's so layered. And you
cannot come to me and say, hey, Sakshi, you are just this one
thing. Right? And that's another thing that has helped me be more
creative of sorts when I kind of shunned those labels around and
I was like, you know, and not even shunned. I would say
actually accepted, you know, more like, okay, I am all these
things. I'm also a very strong woman. And I also have my weak
moments. I'm also a really great daughter but I'm also a bad
daughter at times, right? I'm also a great you know, mentor or
a great leader. And sometimes I also make mistakes and I'm a bad
one, right? So, and all these other you know, senses of
identity and dimensions that we have, right? And I think that we
need to be more empathetic towards these different parts of
ourselves. So I think that's something that I've started to
work on and accept and embrace. In terms of the shame and the
part like that one part of my identity was rebelling against
the other. I'm not really dealing with that anymore
because I think that it was just the time that that was needed.
And my parents had no clue that I was making that pivot and what
it looked like for me, right? Because I had no clue what it
would look like for me, right? So how could I go and tell them,
hey, this is what I'm up to work. This is how I'm thinking
about my life in the long term now, right? So I think that when
we shift thoughts, the first and most important person who needs
to embrace and think about it is you. And then of course, the
other people catch up along the way. That's been my learning
because it was also the case with my friends, you know. For
the longest time, I wouldn't tell them what I was up to
simply because I didn't want to explain it to anybody, right? I
didn't have that mental bandwidth, if I may say that.
But then I took my time. I first embraced my journey. And then
you know, I'm more comfortable now talking to people. Here's
what I did. Here's how I did it. Here's where I struggled. You
know, all of that.
I love this, like the fact that you embrace it, which probably
also made it so much clearer to justify and defend if you need
to, right? This is such a negative phrasing because
justification and defense means like, there's something wrong
with it. There's nothing wrong with it. It's just an
explanation. Like, you're helping people understand where
this comes from. This is wonderful. I think this is the
idea that you first have to accept, embrace, and then
project instead of, you know, deflecting all the time.
Exactly! I think some people do it the opposite way. They think
that they need to, they feel the need to explain to other people
so that they can accept something, right?
Yup
You know and it could be about whether you're building a
company, they try to convince other people so that they can
convince themselves in the journey, right? And I've seen
that happen, like I was at this event where an aspiring farmer
comes to a VC and he's like, what do you think is going to be
the hottest trend in the coming 10 years? I want to build
something in that space. And I'm like, good for you chap, you
know and I was just overhearing that this conversation because I
was just standing right next to them. But my question was, how
are you going to justify to yourself when you were five
years down in and you're trying to explain to other people
because it didn't stem from within you? You were trying to
find the best hot thing, right? And yeah, you know, I think
people try to explain a bit too much externally rather than
accepting and embracing things within themselves. Because I
think this is where your heart is where most of the work really
happens. Right. And another idea that I have, like kind of like,
I don't just enjoy listening to any more is work is just a part
of your life, you know. And bear with me on this because, yes, it
is a part of your life and there are many parts to your life,
right? But purpose is very, very deeply correlated with identity.
I'm not saying that purpose manifests only in the form of
your career or work. But most of the time, it does. Yes. And your
career could also be like training at a place, right? Or
being a traveler, vlogger, whatever, right? But, so I think
that we're teaching people that your purpose doesn't matter
enough and that there are these other parts of your life that
are really crucial. So don't kill yourself working too much
or thinking too much, right? But, and it doesn't come from a
place of wrong, to be honest. They're like, hey, take care of
yourself as well. Right? I know that that's what they mean. But
internally, a lot of young people have started to believe
that I don't need to push myself anymore or I don't need to seek
my purpose anymore because I'm okay the way I am, right? I
personally have a huge problem with that.
I can tell. And me too, and on some levels I think that's just
something in the way we communicate nowadays. What like,
it sounds like I'm an old person, but the internet in a
way has changed the way that people, the culture perpetuates
itself significantly, right? And what you just said people, it's
the whole Gen Z thing of people not wanting to work. I don't
want to dive too deep into this, but there is kind of a cultural,
you know, the fog that everybody walks through and they can
barely see and that they think, okay, this is reality around us.
I think we are just exposed to everybody's opinion all the
time. And then we pick the things that kind of feel most
compatible. And then we come to conclusions like this. The thing
that makes it so much easier I feel to find your own path or to
go your own path is to surround yourself with people who have
the same kind of goals, right? It's kind of the echo chamber,
but in a good way is like you surround yourself with people
who are aligned with what you want to do. And that's the big
difference, who don't need you to defend your things to them
because they understand them. And I think you've done this so
well with her stage, right? The the concept of this of finding
people around you to support you and then lift them up. I love
this. Could you please talk more about this? Because I think
that's a super important thing.
For sure. Thank you so much. You've done your homework.
That's what I'm feeling here. But yeah, and you know, the idea
of surrounding yourself with people that you don't need to
defend yourself to, I love that. I absolutely love that. And I
think that it's really important to do that in your life. And
this is an advice that I would give to people, like put
yourself in whether those are friends, whether those are
mentors, that aren't asking for explanations of why you're doing
something, right? Because it's very okay to chase the wrong
thing as well. Right? Of course, I mean, I'm not saying don't
validate your ideas, don't see the value of things. But if you
truly believe in something, it's okay to go out there and try,
right. And it's great to have people that are like, okay, go
for it, go give it a try, right? And you're not trying to explain
to them that, hey, I'm going to burn my savings or I'm going to
go crazy in the process or I'm not going to eat for five days,
right? They're like, come over to my house. I'll cook for you,
right? You need those kinds of people in your life. And on the
point of like, an echo chamber but in a good way, I'm also
truly a fan of opposing views or different ideas because I like
surrounding myself a lot with people that I don't know
anything about. So I'll go, you'll find me someday on a walk
listening to a physics podcast because I'm just like, okay,
what's happening in that world, right? Expose myself to it, I
will not understand anything for the first 15 minutes of it, then
I'll take out my phone and I'll make some notes into it. Okay,
this is how it made me feel. Here's what's going on. I should
read a little bit more about this, right? And then I'll just
keep it in my, you know, in my pocket and I'll just just go my
way, right? And five, six days later, something will hate in my
business or an interaction with a client that, okay, heard that
on that podcast, right? And ooh, something's clicking, right? So
I do believe in exposing yourself to different ideas as
well. A little bit about her stage is it's a total experiment
again. The aim is I want more women to be sharing their
stories, right? Especially in my country, especially in India, I
feel that there's a lot of stigma around women telling
their stories or their journeys, right? And I've also heard this
from so many people that there aren't enough women in tech.
There aren't enough women, you know, in product. There aren't
enough women speaking up or saying things, right? That's
because they're not actively present. You're not inviting
them to speak, you want more women in tech, whatever many are
there, 10, 20, 50, put them on stages and let other people see,
hey, I could be here. These people are similar to me. Their
journeys are similar to me, right? And my vision with her
stage is also evolving as we speak. I've been brainstorming a
lot about it. So the initial idea, which I'm executing on is
that it's going to be a database of women speakers or panelists
that you can reach out to and be like, hey, come speak on my
podcast, come speak in our conference, give a keynote
speech, take a masterclass, stuff like that. But I also
eventually going public saying this now is that I eventually
want it to be its own event of sorts, where this is a stage for
women, right? And I'm not saying men are not invited. I have
great men in my life and have been great, great allies, right?
But I just believe that a lot of people have been talking about
women empowerment and women this, women that, but it's
really important to get into the nitty gritties of it, right?
It's really important to ask yourself, what happens when a
girl says, I want to go work at the top research facility in
India? Right? Can I create something that she can hear
someday? And be like, no, I'm gonna go at it. Right? Or can I
build something that can support her in that journey, you know?
So yeah, those are, that's just how I've been thinking about it.
Oh, that's awesome. I'm so glad you're doing this. And that's
the thing. I love that you're here today, sharing your story.
And at the same time, you're empowering others to share
there's . I'm really grateful you're doing this. I believe the
same thing. We definitely need more women's voices, presence
and journeys to be inspired by. I'm just sick of the same white
dudes doing everything. It's just really saying this as one
of them myself, I have all these privileges in my life that I
think are not necessarily of my doing, obviously. So their
diversity of thought and diversity of life and story and
narrative is such an important thing. Otherwise, honestly,
otherwise, life would be boring. That's also one thing. It's not
just about the fact that, you know, there's a political and
social problem. It's also just a variety of experiences that we
can all share with each other. So thank you for sharing your
story here with me today. If people and I know that people
would love to follow you, if they want to find you and follow
your journey, where should they go?
They should go on Twitter and LinkedIn and search for Sakshi
Shukla. I'm going to pop up first. I can give you that
You've done great work with your personal brand, could tell you
that.
Thank you! Thank you. But you can also, my DMs are always
open. People can reach out to chat, to jam. And if you're in
Bangalore, I would love to hang out with you. And if you're
listening to this, I hope this wasn't a total waste of time.
There's the self doubt coming back. No, it was definitely not.
It was a wonderful conversation. And I'm really, really fortunate
to have talked to you today. I'm really inspired by several of
the things that we talked about. And just the awareness of you,
you're very self aware person and you're talking about it in a
wonderfully open and embracing way. So thank you so much for
being on the show today. Sakshi, that was really, really nice.
Thank you.
Thank you so much for having me. It's been an honor. It's been a
true honor.
Thank you!
And that's it for today. I will now briefly thank my sponsor:
acquire.com. Imagine this, you're a founder who's built a
solid SaaS product, you acquired customers, and everything is
generating really consistent monthly recurring revenue, the
software as a service dream, right? The problem is you're not
growing for whatever reason, maybe it's lack of skill or lack
of focus, or just plain lack of interest to kind of done with
the thing and you feel stuck in your business. What should you
do? Well, the story that I would like to hear at this point is
that you buckled down, you reignite the fire, you work on
the business not just in the business, and you do all these
things that you always wanted to do. You built an audience, and
you do marketing, sales, outreach, and all that stuff.
And six months down the road, you made a lot of money, you've
tripled your revenue, and you have a hyper successful business
and everybody is happy. Well, reality is unfortunately not
that simple and the situation that you might be in that looks
different for every founder who's facing this crossroad. Too
many times though, the story here ends up being one of
inaction or stagnation until the business itself becomes less and
less valuable over time or worse, completely worthless. So
if you find yourself here already, you feel like this is
where you are. Or you think that your story is likely headed down
a similar road, I would consider a third option at this point and
that's selling your business on acquire.com. Capitalizing on the
value of your time today as a founder, as a maker. This is a
smart move. It's always good to think about and acquire.com,
free to list, they've helped hundreds of founders already.
Just give it a shot. Go to try.acquire.com/arvid and see
for yourself if this is the right option for you and your
business at this point in time.
Thank you for listening to The Bootstrapped Founder today. You
can find me on Twitter @arvidkahl. And you'll find my
books and my Twitter course there too. If you want to
support me and the show, which I would really appreciate, please
subscribe to my YouTube channel and get the podcast in your
podcast player of choice. And then please leave a rating and a
review by going to (http://ratethispodcast.com/founder).
That makes a massive difference for me and the show because if
you show up there, then the podcast will show up in other
people's feeds and then we all get to learn and I really like
that. Any of this will help the show. Thank you so much for
listening. Have a wonderful day and bye bye.