Soul Letter #9
The Reunion, Somewhere Along the Line We Change, And NFTs
Hi 👋, Shubham here.
I am back with another dose of Soul Letter 🗞
We have submissions from two of our readers in today’s newsletter, which make it extra special 😊
Let’s begin.
The Much Awaited Reunion
As you might recall, I was due to meet my school friends last Saturday. I had a feeling it might get postponed at the last moment, but we pulled it off somehow. Kudos to us!
It was nostalgic re-living those school memories. My recollections were so distant from my friends that it felt as if I studied in a completely different school.
There was lots of catching up to do. Now, I recognize the thrill one gets from the casual updates of other people, aka gossip.
From now on, I would never judge my neighborhood aunts for doing the same. In fact, if allowed, I will join them in their conversations.
It was a typical reunion, where we concluded everyone is doing well in life except us.
My friend summed up perfectly, How does an average 25-year-old feel?
He said if you keep two sweets in front of me right now, I'll be confused about which one to eat first, and our peers are getting married, going abroad for masters, having exotic vacations, becoming entrepreneurs, and whatnot.
I feel you bro :( even I still get confused while deciding which ice cream to have.
Somewhere Along the Line, We Change
I am a regular user of LinkedIn and Medium, and my feeds are flooded with articles telling me to monetize my writing talent.
I never thought of writing ✍ as a source to make money. It was a way to document my feelings. A couple of friends complimented me when I figured people find value in my work, so why not do more of it.
But nowadays, there is an imperceptible pressure to monetize my skillset. It’s been bugging me for a while now.
I have been thinking about making podcasts, writing on multiple platforms, working on Instagram profiles, and stuff.
And when you think about getting a lot of things done, you rarely get anything done.
I asked myself 💰 why did money become part of the equation?
The answer is, I don't know why.
We often associate success and happiness with money.
Today every other person is making money from their hobbies, and we have set it as a mandatory benchmark. If you are not doing the same, it isn't worth it.
What happened to the days when people practiced hobbies for the love of the craft?
My mind was muddled with similar thoughts when I got the following feedback from a subscriber.
I just want to say that your newsletter is the best thing for me these days. I am always looking forward to your newsletters and I really love your writings. Keep up the good work, brother!! Much love.
Frankly, making money from writing would be cool, but receiving a genuine review like this is just awesome 🤘
The Part and Parcel of Life
Celebrate your blessings and accept your sufferings.
I know a line of philosophy preaches for detachment from pleasures and sufferings to remain calm and blissful 😇 always.
I say, smile on your good days with everyone and cry on the bad days with everyone.
Life is meant to be experienced and emotions demand to be felt.
With my limited experiences, I still vouch for experience and not detachment!
Contributed by Priyank Avijeet. He is Software Designer 2 at Aruba.
NFT or Non-Fungible Token
NFT or Non-Fungible Token is the new buzzword in tech. Non-fungible means something which can’t be interchanged or replicated with something else. Essentially a non-fungible token is unique in its existence. The power of being unique comes from its underlying technology, which is blockchain (rings a bell right, it’s the same tech used in cryptocurrencies 🤑).
Blockchain is a decentralized system, where each transaction is recorded in ledgers that are distributed among interconnected nodes. Hence making each transaction to be genuine and as secure as it can get. Blockchain is itself a topic for a different article and oftentimes it’s a complete semester course in engineering. For now, take my word on it that it’s the safest way to transact online (if interested watch the video linked below)
NFT can really be any ‘token’ that is unique in this world and can be transacted securely and will be acknowledged by anyone who is the ‘blockchain’. It can be a tweet by some celebrity, it can be an original audio recording file of some pop star’s famous song. Essentially any digital thingy that can be shared. NFT as we know is generally digital arts 🎨 e.g., a GIF or an image, etc.
Now you may ask if it is just an image 📷 or video it can be downloaded by anyone, then how is it unique? Consider this analogy, just like every currency note is unique no matter how many fakes you print with that note, Similarly, the piece of art in original NFT will belong to the unique owner will be of value, while the rest will be fake.
As we know art is subjective and that’s the reason the seller can demand any price from the art collector. This applies to NFTs as well, therefore news like Twitter’s CEO selling an NFT for just under $ 3 million doesn’t sound crazy at all. So, whether you are an art admirer or someone looking for an alternative (but super risky) investment instrument, get your hands on NFT. You never know when any art connoisseur will make you a millionaire 💲 for it.
Recently, Messi launched 'Messiverse', an NFT crypto art collection.
Contributed by Naman Gupta. He is an ASIC engineer at NVIDIA.
Video Recommendation
The NFT section mentions the term blockchain. I am sure you must have heard the word before and might wanna know more about it.
Here is watch a 10-minute video by IBM cloud, which tries to explain the concept of blockchain in simple words.
Dad’s 😂
Final Words
I hope everyone enjoyed their Raksha Bandhan celebrations and managed to click some decent photos. Raksha Bandhan is one of the rare days when all sibling rivalries declare a truce.
My Sunday was ruined 😓 as Arsenal lost to Chelsea once again. I have been following Arsenal for a decade now, and my dad knows this very well. Still, during the match, he kept asking whether I support the one in red or the one in blue.
When I hesitantly revealed the one in the red, he taunts, but they are losing 2-0. I know dad, and thanks for adding insult to the injury 😢
Anyways, have a great week everyone😎
Follow us on IG—lettercallsoul. Until next time, Houdoe! 🙋♂️
In case you missed the previous newsletters, we have got you covered.
Soul Letter #8 - To🥂 Small Wins, Soul Letter turns 100, A Big Announcement, And Remembering A Friend
Soul Letter #7 - Choose Your Damn Sacrifice🖐
Soul Letter #6 - Friday the 13th 😱
PS: If anything from today’s letter resonated with you, and you would like to share your views, mail us at lettercallsoul@gmail.com. We might include it in the upcoming letter.
If you have come this far, do check out TheDailyFlow by Masoom Suchdeo.
Cheers to Arsenal!