• The Secret to a Happy Life 1

    It’s not money. Or fame. Or marriage. But you know that already.

    Those aren’t secrets. They come with their own rewards and challenges.

    The real secret to a happy life?

    It’s helping others.

    That’s it. Really. But hardly anyone talks about it.

    The world makes you feel like happiness is something you can earn. But it’s not a product. It’s a consequence. It’s what happens when you stop thinking about what you need, and start asking what you can offer.

    Not in a “donate to charity” kind of way. That has its place—but writing a cheque or setting up a direct debit doesn’t really do it. Not in your bones. Not in your soul. You don’t feel the friction—and that friction is the point. You need to labour for others. You need to face their problems with them, use what you know, what you’ve learned, and actually solve something.

    We often call this “sending the elevator back down.” Helping people who are earlier in their journey than you. Sharing the map after you’ve already found the way out of the woods.

    Some of the most fulfilled people I know aren’t defined by the size of their bank account. In fact, a lot of them who retired started working again—because there’s a kind of work that has nothing to do with salary. It’s a calling. A compulsion. They mentor. They volunteer. They build. They give—not passively, but with effort.

    Compare that to the people who retire and slowly dissolve into daytime television. The body might hang around for a while, but their spirit leaves. And statistically, that matters.

    Turns out, retirees who volunteer even a few hours a month literally age slower at the cellular level. Their DNA says so. Meanwhile, the more TV you watch post-retirement, the shorter your lifespan tends to be. One study even found that just three hours a day in front of the screen doubles your risk of death over eight years.

    So maybe the secret to a longer, happier life isn’t about freedom from work. It’s about finding the kind of work that sets other people free.

  • “You Wouldn’t Understand, You Don’t Have Children” — And Now I Do.

    There’s a phrase that used to make my skin crawl.

    “You wouldn’t understand — you don’t have children.”

    It always felt like the highest form of condescension. Dismissive. Wounding. As though empathy was something you either earned through parenthood or didn’t possess at all. As if my experiences, my capacity to care, or my exhaustion didn’t count.

    Worse still, it ignored something deeper: that not everyone without children chose that. That for many, it’s a source of grief, not a lifestyle. And so that phrase, delivered casually in conversation, could be so unconstructive. Even hurtful.

    And yet — five weeks into being a father, I now understand where that sentiment comes from. Not the delivery of it. But the deeper truth it’s trying — and often failing — to communicate.

    Because something happens — something huge. You go from being an autonomous adult with your own rhythm, overlapping with your partner’s, to suddenly… everything changing. You walk into a hospital as two people. You walk out as three. And your entire world flips.

    Every minute of every day is now tied to this tiny human. Your brain doesn’t just shift — it rewires. Priorities you thought were non-negotiable suddenly feel less urgent. Work, emails, even basic things like meals and sleep — they get squeezed to the edges while you deal with this immediate, constant, beautiful chaos.

    And it’s not a choice — it’s instinct. A complete internal shift you can’t pre-empt or fully imagine until it’s happening to you.

    So no, I’d never say “you wouldn’t understand” to someone. I know how alienating that can be. I’d try something more honest. Like:

    “There are things about parenthood that don’t land until you’re in the trenches — not because you lack empathy, but because your whole frame of reference changes overnight. I didn’t get it before either.”

    It’s humbling, this shift. And I think if I ever talk about it with someone on the other side of it — the ‘before’ side — I’ll do so with a lot more softness than I was once shown.

    Because now I see both sides. And that perspective’s taken me by surprise.

  • On the Importance of Words 1

    I think about words a lot. Not just what we say, but how we say it, when we say it, and most importantly, why.

    It’s something I come back to often when I’m writing anything meaningful – whether that’s an email, a WhatsApp message, a pitch… The act of writing gives us space. We can think, self-censor, edit. I can optimise every word until I’ve shaped what I believe is the best possible version of what I want to say. It’s incredibly intentional.

    But speaking? That’s a different beast entirely.

    When I speak, in real-time conversations or voice dictation, there’s barely enough space to think beyond the next few seconds. Maybe a little longer if I’m lucky – helped along by filler words or pauses – but it’s fast-thinking by nature. Reacting more than crafting, drawing on what I’ve said and heard before.

    Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow lays this out perfectly: System 1 thinking is quick, instinctive, emotional. System 2 is slow, deliberate, logical. Most of my writing happens in System 2. But the most important conversations usually happen in System 1.

    That contrast hit me recently during a negotiation that, if I’m honest, has been seven years in the making. It’s a partnership I could only have dreamed of when I first started the company. I’ve been incredibly patient – careful to build trust, maintain the relationship, and not push too hard. This company in question is synonymous with our industry. What they’ve done represents tens of millions of dollars in development and years of a head start that we simply couldn’t afford to replicate. But because of the strength of the relationship, we’re now on the brink of working together in a way that could fundamentally shift what’s possible for us.

    Just over a year ago, an enormous Fortune 500 company pipped us to the post. I remember the call when our ally at this company phoned up and cautioned me that a press release was imminent. “That’s fine,” I choked. As is often the way with larger companies, a budget cycle later and their work in this space has been sidelined. Their partnership is on ice.

    Once the dust had settled, I went again. After years I could feel the timing was indeed different. I was finally asked to lay out what we wanted. So I did – and I didn’t hold back. I wrote a full view of how we could win together, including one particular request: exclusivity. I knew it was a big ask, but from my side, it wasn’t about dominating – it was about reducing risk. Earning something defensible.

    The CEO pushed back, as I half-expected. So I suggested we jump on a call.

    Here’s where the difference between fast and slow thinking came into play. I didn’t go in with a line to hold. I didn’t say, “We need exclusivity or we walk.” I just talked honestly about the real concern. If we go all-in on integrating their technology and someone else comes in later with more leverage or volume, we’re toast. Our entire effort could be marginalised. And if that happens, we’re fucked.

    You could feel the shift in the conversation. It clicked.

    Suddenly, we weren’t debating the word “exclusivity” anymore. We were problem-solving together. Within minutes, they were offering ways to give us the protections we needed – effectively solving the same issue, but in a way that worked for both sides.

    What struck me afterwards was how close we came to missing that breakthrough – all because of a word. If I’d stuck to slow-thinking, writing carefully worded emails, trying to make the case from a distance, we might have missed the moment entirely. But speaking honestly, and trusting the relationship, gave space for something better.

    There’s a risk with slow thinking – you can over-optimise, over-edit, and lose the human part. Sometimes it’s better to stop hiding behind carefully crafted words and just get on a call, look someone in the eye (or at least the camera), and say what you mean.

    Because at the end of the day, the words matter.
    But the why behind them matters even more.

  • Parental Evolution

    Becoming somebody’s beginning is something that nothing in life can prepare you for.

    I’m so aware of how unoriginal this experience is—billions of people have done it, are doing it—but it’s also the most personal thing I’ve ever lived through. That contradiction is wild. It’s ordinary, but it’s cosmic.

    My wife and I were saying the other day how fast the first six weeks of our son’s life have gone. But at the same time, it feels like we’ve never really lived without him. Like he’s always been here, folded into the shape of who we were, slowly emerging.

    People gave me all kinds of advice. Everyone has their version of what it’s going to be like. The most vivid one I remember is someone saying, “It’s like a grenade goes off in your bedroom.” Which… fair. But also: a bleak metaphor.

    I prefer to think of it as an evolution.
    Kind of like a Pokémon.

    You and your partner evolve almost overnight—from some final form of adulthood you thought you’d reached—into something new. Something nobody else can quite train you for. You become a person who a human being needs to survive. Not just survive, but to become whole.

    If you don’t do right by them, they won’t thrive.
    They’ll be hungry, or cold, or feel alone in a world that’s supposed to feel warm and held.

    So you do it all. Feed them. Clean them. Dress them. Entertain them. Read the instructions of the world and try to translate it into something soft and safe. You think about everything in their life—and somehow, you try not to get too caught up in the future.

    You live in the moment, even when it’s two in the morning and you’ve forgotten what day it is.

    It’s just such a beautifully complex situation for one of the most tried, tested, and ancient experiences in the history of humankind.

    And still, it feels like something brand new.
    Because it’s ours.