Back in the day, talking about wealth used to be considered a show-off, even slightly bad manners. People inherently preferred to accumulate wealth silently - something I think is still relevant across a large part of South India.

Businesses, in some ways, weren’t very different. Even the maker or the founder of a company was not necessarily known. Rather, I would say that the product or the services they were working to provide through their brand were more known than the maker or the maker’s wealth.

Then came the digital era, and somewhere along the way, the maker started becoming as visible as the make - sometimes even more so.

Today, founders aren’t just building companies. They are building personal brands alongside them. Their opinions, lifestyles, networks, interviews and social media presence become extensions of the businesses they run.

Shoutout to the companies that still manage to make their make bigger than any one person behind it.

When processes outlast a person, when institutions outlast an individual, I feel that is the true metric to say that a company is successful.

Interestingly, I still see a different pattern among many small and mid-sized businesses across the world. A greater part of their bet continues to be on the product itself - its quality, its usefulness and good old word-of-mouth - rather than on the face card of the people behind it.

Sometimes, the product becomes so successful that it becomes the identity, almost the middle name, of its maker.

With large businesses, though, founders who stay completely away from the public eye seem increasingly rare. The founder has become a storyteller, salesperson, spokesperson and, sometimes, the brand itself.

There is definitely value in that.

A stakeholder’s network can get the company a foot in the door. Their visibility can get people curious enough to enter the room.

But once they are in the room, the product still has to speak.

We have seen businesses with extremely visible founders struggle or shut down because visibility could not compensate for a product that failed to meet even basic expectations.

And perhaps that is where the distinction matters.

Visibility can make me notice the maker.

A network can make me notice the company.

A story can make me curious about the product.

But none of those can indefinitely replace what the company was created to do in the first place.

Its purpose.
Its product or service.
Its quality.
Its usefulness.

Maybe the question, then, isn’t simply whether the maker or the make is more important.

Maybe it depends on what the company is trying to build.

If the company is built around an individual, the maker may always matter.

But if it is meant to become an institution - something capable of surviving its founder, its leadership and perhaps even generations - then eventually, the make has to become bigger than the maker.

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Inat - a word of Turkish origin that became deeply ingrained as a mindset and a cultural concept unique to the Serbs.

It is that stubborn determination to do something simply because you have been told you cannot. It is choosing to stand your ground when circumstances tell you to surrender. Sometimes it is pride. Sometimes dignity. Sometimes resistance. Sometimes it is unreasonable, even self-destructive stubbornness.

And sometimes, it is the very thing that keeps you going.

The moment I captured this moment, my inner self echoed the children’s rhyme:

Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.

No matter how many people you have, no matter what your relationship with them might be, no matter how close-knit or no matter how distant those relationships become, eventually, your hand is on the oar, it is ONLY YOU, who have to choose your own battles and fight them until you last.

These days, even when someone reaches out with good intentions, we find ourselves wondering, “Why are they being so nice?” or “What do they need from me?” Sometimes, it feels as though ill intentions have become so common that genuine kindness itself makes us suspicious.

Perhaps it is because survival of the fittest has found its way into our relationships too. People are increasingly valued by their net worth, their usefulness, or what they can bring to the table. Somewhere along the way, relationships have started feeling more like transactions—almost like business deals.

We protect ourselves.

We stop asking.

We stop expecting.

We tell ourselves, I’ll do it myself.

And after saying it enough times, doing everything ourselves begins to feel like a badge of honour.

Self-made

I hear that word often.

But I don’t think anyone in this world can truly call themselves self-made.

You may have fought your own battles. You may have worked when nobody was watching. You may have picked yourself up when nobody came looking. You may have made difficult choices, survived circumstances nobody completely understood, and rowed through the uncharted waters, against the currents others knew nothing about.

That part of the journey is yours.

But somewhere along the way, someone taught you something, gave you an opportunity, believed in you, opened a door, challenged you, rejected you, loved you, disappointed you, praised you or inspired you.

And sometimes, even the people who stood against us unknowingly taught us how to stand for ourselves.

Isaac Newton once wrote:

“If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”

Perhaps that is the distinction we forget.

Owning your journey is not the same as having made the journey alone.

Being the one holding the oar doesn’t mean you built the boat, created the river, understood every current or learned how to row entirely by yourself.

Maybe none of us is truly self-made.

Self-driven? Absolutely.

Self-determined? Perhaps.

Self-reliant? Sometimes necessarily so.

But completely self-made? I don’t think so. We are made from little pieces of everyone and everything we encounter

I am an eclectic mix of people who loved me, helped me, left me, underestimated me; the opportunities I received, and the ones I was denied; the mistakes I made; and the circumstances I somehow survived.

And yet, we all row differently.

Some are rowing their boat, tolerating everything that happens to them in their life, to get their things done. Some are holding to their dignity, self-respect, believing it’s better to have true enemies than fake friends, while still involving others when they genuinely need help.

Perhaps, then, life is less about how fast you row and more about where you are headed, how you maneuver the oar, and when you choose to let someone row with you.

To know when to hold the oar.

To know when to let someone hold it for you.

And to know when to row against the current.

Terati inat!

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Right from the minute we wake up to the time we are tucked into bed—from our homes and home appliances to our lifestyles—everything seems to be documented.

And with so much information being created and shared every single day, I sometimes wonder: is the value of information declining while the value of reliability is increasing? Maybe having access to information is no longer the difficult part. Maybe knowing what—and whom—to trust is becoming more valuable.

As I observe, some do it as a full-time job, some as a side hustle, some to increase their visibility and brand value, and some to stay connected with their followers. Some document their traumas, while some share only the highlights of their lives.

But then again, what if documentation isn’t always about being seen? What if sometimes it is simply about remembering?

Maybe that random photograph of an ordinary breakfast, a room, a street, or a person doesn’t seem significant today, but years later, it might mean everything to someone.

Now, with everything becoming digitalised, the internet becoming so accessible, and the influx of new devices—with physical books increasingly sharing space with e-reading platforms and digital libraries—sometimes, looking at all of this, I wonder if our preference for human connection is decreasing.

Are we beginning to prefer talking to screens, or through screens?

When I was an adolescent, all I knew was that people considered only certain aspects of their lives significant enough to be documented—things related to their work, important moments, or anything to do with complying with rules and regulations.

Today, sometimes I feel people are documenting things just for the sake of doing it, and not because they truly want to share something valuable. And with so much information around us, it is also becoming increasingly confusing to decide what is accurate and what isn’t.

I was reluctant to fall into this.

I think I still am.

But then the FOMO kicks in—what if I am missing out on something?

And with 100 different options available, I’m always confused about which one I should choose. Sometimes I become like a kid in a candy store, lol. 😂

I still don’t have the right answer to why documenting everything in life has become so important to everyone.

And then there is another part of all this that fascinates me: we don’t just document life anymore. We measure it.

There is now a scale and metric for almost everything.

Our sleep hours.
Our heartbeat.
Our step count.
Our calorie intake.
Our screen time.
The number of books we read.
The number of followers we have.
The number of people who liked, viewed, shared or reacted to something we posted.

And then come the anxiety levels after looking at all those numbers when they aren’t in our favour. 😂

Sometimes I wonder—when did numbers stop simply describing our lives and start telling us how to feel about them?

You could wake up feeling perfectly rested, only for your watch to tell you that apparently... you weren’t. 😂

Sometimes, every person’s life I see feels more like a dashboard than a LIFE!!

But maybe documenting itself was never the problem.

People have always documented their lives. Diaries, letters, photo albums, postcards, home videos, scrapbooks—none of this is really new.

Maybe what changed is how easily we can document, how frequently we do it, who we document it for, and how many people can see it.

A diary could have an audience of one.

A family photo album could have an audience of twenty.

Today, an ordinary Tuesday morning can have an audience of twenty thousand.

And somewhere along the way, documenting also became rewarding. Attention can become followers, followers can become visibility, visibility can become influence, and influence can even become income.

So maybe the question isn’t whether documenting life is good or bad.

Maybe it is about why we are documenting it in the first place.

To remember?

To share?

To connect?

To be seen?

To create?

To make money?

Or simply because everyone else seems to be doing it?

And the funny thing is, here I am questioning why everyone feels the need to document everything...

while documenting my thoughts about documenting everything. 😂

So, should I just make peace with it, thinking to each their own?

Or should I start documenting too?

Maybe I don’t want to document everything.

Maybe I just want to document the things that make me stop, notice, feel, or think.

I still don’t have the right answer.

And maybe I don’t need one yet.

Happy World Photography Day!! 📸

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