My 2014 Review & 2015 To-Do List

Every year, much like every day, there is a moment where the end is the beginning. Today, perhaps is as good a moment to reflect on the year which is winding down. It was quite a wonderful year — travel, food, family moments and a chance to meet the mighty, the marvelous and the famous.

It has also been a year of self reflection — an attempt to slow down, get off Internet’s rigmarole, be less anxious and perhaps like a piece of chalk, soak in life. I have enjoyed reconnecting with old friends, made new friends and have slowly start to appreciate personal time.

But it hasn’t been the easiest of years. The relentlessness of internet publishing has a dangerously narcotic effect — the instant gratification and feedback on one’s work is enough to make rest of the world seem slow and plodding. My new life as a full time venture capitalist for True Ventures commands more patience and calm — and if anything 2014 has been a transition towards a more tranquil approach to life, crisis and creation. 

2014 was also the year I stopped checking analytics and statistics. It was today, an email from WordPress which reminded me that I had posted 268 times during the year and that 706,000 people have visited Om.co. My most popular essay for the year was WhatsApp is different. Others that got attention: It’s time to stop rewarding failure; With big data comes big responsibility & On visual web,a photo is worth a 1000 words.

Most readers clicked on a link I shared on Twitter, others came from Facebook but it was Jim Darlymple and John Gruber who shined the light on some of my posts and thus became as important as the social and search from a discovery standpoint. Thank you Jim and John, for your support.

2014 by the numbers:

• 2500 is the number of photos I took with my iPhone and Sony RX-100.
• 500 hours of total video is what I watched on my iPad – Netflix, MLB, Amazon Prime & HBO Go. I confess, I like the Newsroom.
• 396 photos and videos shared on Instagram.
• 50 is the number of years my parent have been together and we celebrated the milestone this year.
• 45 is the number of times I ordered from Amazon using Amazon Prime.
• 41 is the number of visual stories I published on Storehouse.
• 15 is the number of books I read in 2014. I would say, Grains of Gold: Tales of a Cosmopolitan Traveler (Buddhism and Modernity) by Gendun Chapel is the most influential of them all.
• 14 the number of cities I visited this year — Cabo, New Delhi, New York (5), Peruiga, Rome, Paris, Los Angeles, Florence, Siena, Modena, Ann Arbor, Detroit, Sofia, Stockholm and Porto.
• 7 is the number of countries I visited this year— Mexico, India, Italy, France, Bulgaria, Sweden & Portugal.
• 5 is the total pounds in weight I gained during 2014.
• 3 is the number of Michelin 3-starred restaurants I visited.
• 2 new opportunities I have participated on behalf of True —Veniam and OpenDoor.
• 1 thing I couldn’t live without this year: my iPhone!

My to-do list for 2015:

1. Write more letters – the analog kind!
2. Read 52 books
3. Visit 3 more Michelin 3-star restaurants.
4. Restrict buying only one new thing every month (food, grocery and household items not included.)
5. Get rid of a third of things I own and unclutter my life.
6. Restrict social media usage to 30 minutes or less every day.
7. Walk 5 miles everyday.
8. Lose 8 pounds during the year.
9. Be 80 percent vegetarian.
10. And, obviously more New York 🙂

7+8+9 = less medications which is always a good thing!

Happy 2015 everyone!