The marriage test

5 Questions to ask yourself before marriage

Before saying yes for marriage, ask yourself these 5 questions

1. Why are you getting married?
   Is it for the sake of society?
   Is it for your parents?
   Or is it for your own sake, your own good?

2. How do you handle fights with your partner?
   Because fights will continue.
   How you handle them decides whether this relationship moves forward or not.

3. Are you aligned on your individual financial responsibilities?
   Will you both contribute to expenses? To investments?
   How will you share this responsibility?
   What happens if one person loses their job or doesn’t want to work?

4. Do you have space for your own personality?
   Your hobbies, your interests, your friends (not just the common ones).
   How much of your life is separate from being married?

5. How will you spend your life after marriage?
   What are the expectations from your family?
   How will your daily routine look like?
   What will be your living arrangements?
   Have you thought about having kids?

Your marriage partner is the ONLY family member you get to choose.
It is, in my opinion, perhaps the single most important decision you will make in your life - because it affects your physical, mental, financial and emotional state.

Do not take it in a hurry.

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Book I am reading

Started reading Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves by Matt Ridley.
Matt is trying to argue, quite funnily I must add, that optimism drives the world and explains a lot about how and why humans came to become the most dominant species on the planet.

It covers human history in a beautiful fashion and makes the case for an economics of hope, arguing that the benefits of commerce, technology, innovation, and change - what the author calls cultural evolution - will inevitably increase human prosperity, as it has in the past.

Here is a list of all books I have shared in this newsletter.

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3-2-1

3 pics from last week

We were in Kasauli last weekend to dine at this restaurant called NAAR. It is run by Chef Prateek Sadhu. Hands down one of the finest meals we have ever had in our life.
All portions locally sourced and magically weaved in together.

Ruchi and me, right before the dinner.

Quaint little place in the hills - with a seating of 20 people. Booked out usually months in advance.

With the entire team of NAAR, after the dinner :))

2 quotes I wish to share

Attention is a finite resource.
The moment you realize this, every decision gets simpler.

Share on X

Experience with bad content makes you intolerant of bad content.
Same for people as well.

Share on X

1 new thing I learnt this week

Just outside Kolkata stands what looks like a dense forest.
Thousands of trunks. Massive. Except it isn’t a forest.
It’s a single banyan tree.

The Great Banyan is over 250 years old.
It covers 4.6 acres - the largest tree canopy on Earth, per the Guinness Book.
What looks like 3,600 separate trees are actually its aerial roots.

Here’s the strangest part.
Its original trunk rotted and was removed in 1925.
The tree has no center anymore. And it is still alive, still growing.
Fascinating, isn’t it?

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Quiz of the week

Last week I asked: India’s first satellite was named after which ancient Indian mathematician?
The correct answer is Aryabhatta.
Around 900 people got this answer right.

The lucky winner last week is Pawan Singh (paw***wp@gmail.com)

Question of the week (don’t Google or ask AI!):

Which Indian city was the country's first to get electricity, back in 1905?

Reply with your answer, and I will pick one random winner with the right answer.
They will get a signed copy of a book of mine :))

PS: This section is inspired by Capitalmind’s awesome weekly newsletter - you should subscribe to it - terrific personal finance content.

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🎙️ My top content from last week

🏦 YouTube Finance: Why global markets are beating Indian market right now

📹 YouTube Career: 6 careers where your degree doesn't matter

📱 Instagram: 5 things I wish I knew about career, in my 20s

🐥 Twitter: GenZ doesn't have an attention span problem

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You can, of course, always write to me by simply replying to this newsletter.

I love reading all your emails, even though I may not be able to reply to them all.
Yes! I READ ALL MY EMAILS. ALL OF THEM.
(Baarish aa jaane aur saath mein paseena le aane ki kasam)

Have a lovely weekend and week ahead all you lovelies! :))

until next week

stay awesome | stay focused | do epic shit

warikoo