Successful People Take Notes

This one looks pretty obvious from the title but it’s not simply advantages-of-taking-notes kind of theory. In this article I want to share how Mohit Pawar (Author, Blogger, Entrepreneur, Public Speaker if an introduction is required), influenced my thought process. In an unexpectedly long time I luckily got to spend with him, I figured out plenty of practical values for life.

I was winding up for my hometown on a thursday night from ColoredCow when Mohit visited the team and was speaking motivating things in a very very attractive way. I’ll be blunt here to say that I don’t find all public speakers very fascinating, but he had a different aura, which came from the experience he shared. And there comes the first and a very crucial lesson I took from him: Always have examples. It’s been repetitively told to me to share experience not just knowledge, Mohit was a live demonstration of this thought. The way he said “for example” after every thought he shared, followed by the experience, made everything so lively. I’ll come back to share more occasions when Mohit made everything so amazing with examples.

In the beginning I was trying to wind up stuff because I was leaving for home. I was expecting emails and was anxiously checking them in the meeting only. He picked up on me and told me how he stays away from all kinds of social media and doesn’t keep track of emails all the time. He shared the experience that it doesn’t make much difference to life. I was being more attentive after that and then like everyone else, I was so lost into his presentation that for that time, the thought of catching the bus to home just wiped away. There are plenty of things he was trying to convey to us related to goals, motivation, business and money. It was all quality stuff presented very crisply to us. I am not covering them all, because I’ve so much besides this. So the important point is that Mohit advised us all to take notes. Again I’m mentioning it’s not as theoretical as it sounds. Sometimes you note stuff down on paper and then just forget about it completely. Taking notes means way deeper than that, and I realized it when I spent more time with Mohit.

Couple of quickies here from his stand up presentation that struck me well. One is that Introverts need not be dumb. In fact they are smarter on most of the occasions. He had examples as usual. It doesn’t mean that you need to be introvert to be smart, but over communication doesn’t help you becoming smart. Another one was that we should try out crazy stupid stuff as it gives us happiness and uniqueness.

For Mohit there were plenty of new faces he was meeting for the first time, but while winding up from there he remembered all of us so well, including our characteristics. That’s what I want to convey by taking notes on a broader sense. Not all of us have a good memory as Mohit, but we all should observe and be considerate about the people we’re meeting with. He had observed us, very well. The kind of life he has, it’s all about many many people, and it was a great feeling to be remembered. While departing from there, I was already late for the bus stand and since Mohit had a car and was going through the same route, Prateek suggested that I could take a lift from him which I did.

We headed for a dinner first at a nearby hotel, which Mohit uses frequently for his stays. In the restaurant it was great to see him remembering all the names of people at service and communicating with them. It seemed he was so involved with them all. They were all very pleasant to us. Alongside a good dinner and coffee, we spent some quality time with each other and opened up a lot on various aspects of our lives. Mohit always keeps the conversation alive with the experience and examples he gives. He advised me to analyze when and under what circumstances, I am at my best and to try and create similar situations. It includes everything from meals to sleep.

He taught me a great lesson to push yourself to achieve. He set targets to write certain number of words each day when he wanted to become an author. His discipline made it more commendable. To stay away from social media, strictly, to do Yog and exercise and to quit drinking tea, to achieve, that meant something.

The most significant take away for me would be a lesson to connect with your audience and to keep taking a note of wherever you go, interact with. Observe them, bond with them. He showed me mails from his readers and how well he writes back to them. He showed his blog articles and I could sense simplicity in his blog posts as well. It didn’t have complex English terms, rather clear ideas put simply and attractively. It astonished me again and again how involved he gets into people not just his blog audience but from the waiters in hotel to noticing my anxiety while checking mails earlier in the conference room.

I remembered him asking my birthday when we were in car. It just passed recently and to see the mail from Mohit wishing me on my birthday was a delightful surprise. The sense of bonding in his lovely wishes, actually made my day.