Hello!

This past week had been a rollercoaster again for the entire nation. Sushant Singh Rajput’s death came as a real shocker. An actor who was doing so well, or so we thought from the outside. He might have been doing well on the monetary level but at an emotional level apparently he wasn’t.

It was a shock to me personally as well, as I liked him as an actor, his movies like Kai Po Che!, his portrayal of MS Dhoni (the ex-Indian Cricket Captain) in M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story and many more. He would get into the character so much that you couldn’t tell him apart from the character he was doing. Plus he was a really intelligent human being, his keen interest in astrophysics was really rare to see in any of the Indian Artists. In fact, he was one of the person in my interview dream guest list for my podcast. Gone too soon. I surely am going to miss him as a human being.

On the other side, tensions on Indo-China border are increasing day-by-day. I just hope things settle down. But if chinese forces keep on intruding, I don’t think India will stay with hands folded. War is the least we all want at this moment, where we are are in the middle of a historic pandemic. So I really hope that things calm down on border and China gets their shit together now. It’s high time.

Coming to the book reading/listening progress, I moved forward on below books –

1. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – 40% done (Audible) – I was on a binge listening spree on this one.
2. Atomic Habits by James Clear – 25% done (Audible) – finally started out on this book, I really wanted to read it since it launched last year. So many insights. I’ve been following James from 4-5 years now and love his actionable writing.

No progress on below ones this week –

1. Becoming a Category of One by Joe Calloway – 20% done only (Audible)
2. Breaking Smart: Season One: How Software is Eating the World – 70% done (an amazing book recommended by David Perell) (Kindle)
3. The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand – 50% done only (Kindle)
4. Truck de India – 20% – (Kindle)

Current Yearly Tally – [Yearly goal – 24]

Read – 6 | In progress – 6 | Pending in Reading list – 4 | Yet to discover for reading for yearly goal – 8

That’s it for the personal updates.

Without further adieu, please enjoy this week’s Saturday-Pentacle.

Issue 189 // Week 25 // 2020

An event I’m looking forward to —

WWDC 2020 (Virtual Event) – For the first time in the history of Apple, WWDC is going virtual this year due to the Pandemic. I’m so pumped about this virtual event. Updates for iOS, iPadOS, macOS are awaited. I hope they live up to the expectations of customers’ feedback.

Not sure if they’ll be launching any new hardware in this event. But big software updates are for sure awaited. Fingers Crossed.

If you are as excited as I am, click the link in the title to go to the WWDC page, for following up on updates and on the WWDC days the event can be tracked here.

A podcast conversation I loved —

Ali talks to his roommate Molly – Ali Abdaal is one of the rising YouTubers who talk about productivity and lifestyle design. In this video he has a conversation with his long time friend and roommate Molly, where they talk about Molly’s cancer survival, being a doctor and going through the situations to be where they both are.

I resonated a lot with this video’s realness and totally recommend for watching –

A video which made me understand things at a deeper level (after Sushant Singh Rajput’s Death) —

Parents Who Have Lost a Child – Call it serendipity or something, the below video surfaced on my YouTube feed after I had been hit hard like others (after Sushant’s death).

I was amazed at the ease with which some of the parents spoke about losing their child. It shattered my heart to listen to the mother when she was telling the story that how his son was sitting on the dining table and crying in front of her maid (caretaker) that “Mom, I’m Sorry”, “Mom, I’m Sorry”. Then he jumps out of a high rise building and dies.

But listening about their pain and how they have gone through it all, made me realise not to take things for granted. I felt grateful in a weird way.

Check it out.

P.S.: If you are someone who’s in depression and can be triggered to see people talk about suicide in detail. Please don’t watch this video.

Music I’m loving —

The Important Song (Live) by Joe Anderson – I stumbled upon this song via an Instagram Story. This is from a 2009 album from Joe Anderson. He put out an important topic in the son literally named “The Important Song”. The idea is brilliant.

Quote which I found meaningful –

Goals are good for setting a direction, but systems are best for making progress.

― James Clear (Atomic Habits)

Before saying “see you next week”

Here is the latest story from my Lifestyle Design in Action Story Series where Tanistha Arora shares her story. Check it out if you haven’t –

and if you haven’t checked out my podcast episode yet with Shashank Murali (Co-Founder and CEO of Tapchief), then what are you waiting for! Check it out now. Here is the YouTube link –

Until Next Saturday!

Thanks for reading.

Himanshu

About Author

I’m Himanshu Sachdeva, a technology professional working in Mumbai, India. I spend most of my spare time making Podcasts, YouTube videos and write on Lifestyle Design and sometimes stories.

Every Saturday, I send out an email newsletter called “Saturday Pentacle”, a list of the cool stuff I explored in the past week, including quotes, photos, books, articles, movies, documentaries and so on!

No spam, ever. Only great stuff.

Saturday-Pentacle // Issue 189 // Week 25 // 2020

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