Don't get married, get a puppy first
5 Lessons my puppy taught me, The art of being alone, Last few pages of Classmate notebook ❤️ and many more...
Hi 👋 Prado here
3 Things I thought worth sharing with y’all
1. 5 lessons my puppy taught me ❤️
Exactly a month ago, I got a labrador puppy and we named him Harry.
He also featured in one of my videos. My life has changed since he joined the family.
In this week’s newsletter, I want to share things I learned from harry 🙌
Lesson 1:- Family
When the lockdown hit the last march, I was working remotely from my hometown. I spent way less time with my family than I expected. With lockdowns and pandemic around there was not much to talk about with each other. It was a simple loop of Eat, Sleep, Work, Repeat.
But after I got harry, my family spent more time together in the last month than we did in the last year.
Even though I had to push meetings away, drop few projects, stop making YT videos (getting back at it). I never missed taking harry upstairs and everyone spending time together. Mom liked us around, dad liked playing with him, cousins were always playing and this little circle made me happy. I could never tell them that I got work to do and I have to take him with me.
Y’all know how much I love the Tail End blog by WaitButWhy
Where he shares that by the time we are done with school (18) we’ve spent around 93% of in-person time with our parents.
What’s the point of doing anything, if you can’t spend time with your family
Lesson 2:- Not Alone
Well, I’m not alone anymore. I can’t wake up at any time I want. I can’t be flexible with my schedule like I used to. Harry needs to be fed at least 5 times with regular bathroom intervals. If I miss any, he’ll go full “I-WON’T-LET-YOU-WORK” mode.
I realised I have a dependant now. I got to take the responsibility. I can’t say no to few things anymore. I can’t be procrastinating.
Life’s changed. I got a little glimpse of how life will look after getting married.
Lesson 3:- NO MO CO FO
No More Continous Focus.
It’s extremely hard to focus for a period of time. When you are alone, you are able to know what’s coming in future and you are certain that you won’t be disturbed for a while. You can get into the Deep work mode and get things done. A video used to take me 7 hours to create and 7 more to edit. But now I’m unable to put in those 7 hours continuously as harry got needs. I can sometimes push my lunch or dinner but I can’t push harry’s food timing.
This newsletter was supposed to go out at 6 and I’m three hours late.
This does not mean I don’t have time to focus at all.
He sleeps around 10-14 hours a day. I’m learning to understand his sleep cycle and finding gaps of around 20-30mins which brings me to the Pomodoro technique.
It never seemed to work for me when I had a clock running on my laptop but now that I know that he’ll be up at 7.30 PM again. I need to get the work done between 7 - 7.25 PM
Spreading time equally. When you’ll be married, You won’t be able to spend most of your day with yourself. You need to understand and learn how to spread your time right.
Lesson 4:- Sacrifices.
Sacrifices are real. Not just mine but my family’s too. When a new person joins the family they usually come with sacrifices. When I got work to do, I ask my brother to chill with him for a while. When I can’t give him food, mom leaves everything and gives him food.
But these sacrifices also creates more love between the family.
The feeling of we are “IN THIS TOGETHER” is amazing.
The sacrifices will be 10x when you’ll get married and when you’ll children to take care of.
Money can solve everything except love.
Lesson 5:- Responsibilities.
My mom was my age when she had me and she was also handling a 4-year-old daughter. When I compare myself with her, I can’t even handle a two-month-old puppy.
Waking up with barking and cleaning piss & shits. Feeding him 5 times a day and making sure you give him enough attention the entire day. Especially with kids around. It’s time-consuming. Unable to focus on a thing for more than 30mins.
I used to work on my own schedule and now I have to make it work on two different schedules. Mine & Harry’s 🙌
Responsibilities piled up. You can’t run away from them. You can’t wake up one day late and keep your dependant hungry :)
My mindset completely changed when I know there is someone who’s completely dependant on me.
The same goes for marriage life. You are not a one-man show anymore. You are a team now. More responsibilities are upon your shoulder.
Most of us are not ready to get married yet. The experience of suddenly gaining more responsibility is daunting.
Conclusion:- Get a puppy before you get married. See if you can handle the responsibilities. See if you can share your schedule with one more being. It’s definitely not impossible but it’s not easy too.
Getting a puppy will be one of my life’s best decision. I’m getting trained to understand how I will handle my spouse after marriage and how will I keep myself together when my kids will be born.
My entire family was against this decision but now it made a not just a better human but also a family man. Questioning my position and learning from my mistakes will help me be a better husband, a father, a grandfather and a storyteller.
This journey is just getting started ❤️
I was supposed to write about money & personal finance but I couldn’t as the research was not complete. I will be writing about it next week. Make sure you subscribe to not miss it 🙌
2) Few Interesting Things:
The art of being alone (Blog)
IN THIS TOGETHER
Picture of the week:- RIP Michael Collins (He was the pilot that did the first moon landing 🙌 )
Question of the week: So far, in the gallery, are you the art, the artist or the visitor?
(Retweet this question)
Quick hack of the week:- Before you get on a Zoom call with a person… get to know about them online. Google them. Look at the first few links. Unless lots of people writing about them, the SEO won’t be heavy on them.
It can help you understand the person better and even better you’ll have an idea what interesting questions to ask them ❤️
(If you know of any hacks, send me a mail at pradologue@gmail.com)
Meme of the week:- This is getting out of hands now :))))
3. Quote of the week
Check out some previous newsletter:
END GOAL (Read)
5 Different ways to look at time (Read)
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Good old memories
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In This Together,
Prado
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