One of the oldest sayings in personal development circles is You’re the average of the five people you spend the most time with. It’s one of those things that’s been around for so long that you can find a version of it in almost every culture.
Zama da madaukin kanwa shi ke kawo farin kai essentially means the same thing in Hausa.
One of my strong identities right now is Runner. Another – which is less known, but I’d argue just as strong – is Hummus-maker.
But I never would’ve started making hummus if I hadn’t seen Dani make it. And even though I was running before I met Elvira, it was only after meeting her that I actually became a runner.
And you don’t even need to have a personal relationship with someone in order for you to get that farin kai.
This newsletter, for example, is modelled after
Ali Abdaal’s – a
Youtuber I don’t personally know, but feel like I do because of the relationship I have with his videos. Not incidentally, he was also the person who inspired me to start
my Youtube channel.
My first newsletter – the one I didn’t know why I started – has now essentially just turned into an End-of-Year Review Newsletter (something I learned from
Liy and modelled after
Syar’s). I send it out once a year, and because it’s super long – this year’s being the longest at 10,000 words – only about half the people who receive it read it. But they reply or message me personally to tell me how much they love it. They add new goals to their lives. They discover podcasts and books and films. They get inspired to start working on things they care about.
And really, that’s why I do it. To be of service.
So for this new newsletter, the plan is have it be more frequent, but keep it short. Only about 850 words per dispatch so hopefully more people will read it. Twelve times a year, instead of one. And in each of the categories – Books, TV, Films, Podcast, and Music – I’ll only recommend one thing.
I’ll also be promoting one Youtube video I made, and one post from my blog.