Sleepless night

I get these constant reminders about the life and how fast it's passing and how much less time I've in my hand. How people achieved great things by the half my age and here I'm still wondering whether I'd ever be able to achieve something written on my virtual and mental todo lists. 

I am tired of not doing anything. Doing a lot but ultimately achieving nothing in the end. It seems I've never focused on one thing completely. I've spent countless hours on the things that we still not out for the world to see. They're all there in my harddrives or countless other places that I put my notes on - the notes app, todo manager, email draft, at least 6 different places in my telegram account, then WhatsApp self notes, Google docs, one drive backup files. Even hand written notes and mind maps.

I see people wrote books, read hundreds of pages a day, did preaching, tought and prayed, played and indulged in poetry. All with some sign of productivity.

For me, this productivity is zero. Or so does it seem. My sleepless mind is just wandering around at this moment of the night I know, but still I am awake at least as much to know how irresponsible, unproductive and knowingly lazy I am. 

I took deliberate steps to write everyday, made new year resolutions and prayed. Not sure why it's not working. No wait - I know why. It's all a buzz of distraction for me. People get on a track and keep repeating things manually. And me , first thing I do is to try and automate stuff that I've to do. 

I often recall Zack's comment on somebody who irritating-ly commented to a project where people had started to shout for Nastaleeq clothing for the UI, he said "koi achhal Kam shuru hota ni aur log Nastaleeq ki rat laga dete hain."

And that "Blog doesn't have a single post but font should be Nastaleeq".

Gyaan_vaapi mosque verdict and other ongoing problems triggered today's sleepless night. I had been thinking of doing some actual dawa work since the beginning of the ruling party but hah to me and double hah to these precious 10 years that I did nothing. Nada. 

I still have those notes from the Dawah camp of 2010. I vividly remember M. Kaleem Siddiqui arrival in Ismailpura mosque and the tashkeel where people passionately pledged for Dawah to their friends, colleagues and neighbours. I didn't have friends then, but I had a clear idea of what I'd do the day I'll have some. 

Now I do have friends and colleagues but they're just the observers. I've been the passive daaii, that I'll give to myself. But what I thought I should have been isn't a finished business. It is not. The interview I thought I would conduct, they're still in pending list. The phone calls I thought I'd make someday to remember my old days , they're not longer available as their numbers are lost to the time. Maybe tracing back on Facebook groups or LinkedIn will lead me to them someday and I'll get my chance.

I'm thinking I should just add all my todos and make them a public record. Maybe I won't be there long enough to cover this list. Not that I haven't already added them, the resolutions are the prime examples. But still if I have an extensive list at one place then it's probably help me focus on a few things every now and then, instead of wandering about in the pool of my own thoughts procrastinating endlessly. 

I need to arrange the notes on mobile, clean it up and then add them all to one todo list. The master one. Clearing clutter from everywhere and then try to close on the things that are about ready for release. 

Hah! I just remember that I've done this planning countless times and now the only difference is I'm documenting it right now. 

There's one more fear - losing everything of I keep it at one place. I had writer-monkey for this exact reason.

...

Shakeeb Ahmad

4:54am-5:18am, Feb 6, 2024

People I listen to...

Over the years, many have asked me to suggest what to read, watch and listen to which will benefit them. For the books, I've started writing reviews about the ones which I like. 

Here, I've listed all the channels I've been listening to. The list is not complete and subject to updates. Also, names are not in any particular order.

— Shakeeb

Note: Obviously, I don't agree with everything a speaker promotes.

Philosophy, Psychology & Logic

Prof. Jordan Peterson

Steven Crowder

Vsauce

Adam Ruins Everything

Ben Shapiro

Ahmad Javaid

Entertainment

Jim Browning

Nigahiga

UFC

Mojahed Fudailat (UFC Animations)

Bad Lip Reading

Patriot Act (Hassan Minhaj)

Obayd Fox (Ar+En Vlogs)

Karan Singh Magic

Shaheer Khan

Dawood Savage

        DIY Perks

IT & Programming

Fireship.io

Two Minute Papers

Code Bullet

DevEd

WebdevSimplified

Ben Awad

The Net Ninja

Srinivas Tamada

Graphic Designing

Mohamed Achraf

Logos by Nick

Politics

Dhruv Rathi

Maulana Sajjad Noumani

ScoopWhoop Unscripted

Shahbaz Ansar (ThePrint)

The Deshbhakt

Dawah & Comparative Religion

Sheikh Ahmad Deedat

Dr. Zakir Naik

Mohammad Hijab (and group)

Mufti Yasir Nadeem Al Wajidi

Maulana Kaleem Siddiqi

The Muslim Skeptic

Islam, Quran & Jurisprudence

Peer Zulfiqar Naqshbandi

Nouman Ali Khan

Mufti Tariq Masood

Maulana Manzoor Mengal (Tafseer Classes)

Maulana Makki Al-Hijazi

Dr. Israr Ahmad

Youth Club

Hanafi Fiqh

Salahuddin Saifi Naqshbandi

Mufti Saeed Khan

Scholarly Subtitles (Arabic content translated)

My New Year Resolution for 2021

 Off you go 2020! Quite a year it was, wasn't it? 

It started with the best thing happened to me till date, the journey to the Holy cities of Mecca and Medina, Saudi Arabia, for 'Umrah. It was overwhelmingly wholesome. Alhamdulillaah! [1] I'm yet to document the experience, but I do have the poetry ready, which you will see on the blogs soon.

Then just about a month later, the covid pandemic started and finally the lock-down. Ramazan [2] came and went by, we couldn't offer prayers in the mosques. Eid-ul-fitr was same. So was Eid-ul-Azha. [3] Sad sad times those were. 

It did bring some positive changes too. We had a lot of free time. People actually started working on things they were passionate about. 

Resolutions

First of all, note that making resolution DOES help. 10/10 recommended. It keeps you focused. It gives you a list to work on. It tells you where to concentrate your efforts. 

When you make one, it might not seem realistic at first, even to yourself. Rather, specially to yourself. But the motivation and consistency it provides easily make you more productive than you were before. 

The key is being motivated. They say, around 90% of people who make resolutions drop them by the end of January. You don't want to be one of them. 

2020

Even when a lot of things which were in the resolution of 2020 are still in pending, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I did finish off. 

The only thing I miserably lagged in was "writing" stuff. I put more effort in development and left the actual writing behind. I miss it. 

2021

• Releasing new apps consistently, many of which are in the queue right now, about ready for production
• Hifz (Memorizing Quran)
• Publishing book-reviews on blogs
• Finishing incomplete Novel, Translations, Books/Booklets etc.
• Magazines - Sarbakaf and Personal Bi-Weekly
• Publishing Videos
• Interviews
• Portals Management
• + Resolutions from last year

Last Words

As I'm writing this, the third decade of the 21st century is on the verge of knocking the doors of times - bringing joys and cries, hope and despair, turning the pages of  everyone's destiny. 

I don't know what this new year will bring, but I am nothing but my dreams. I will continue chasing after them.

________

Footnotes

[1] Alhamdulillah - An expression loosely equivalent to "Thank God", used for gratification/achievement. See Alhamdulillah.

[2] Ramazan is considered a holy month, 9th month as per Islamic Hijri calendar, which is observed worldwide as a month of fasting. See Ramadan.

[3] Eid-ul-Fitr and Eid-ul-Azha are the 2 major Muslim festivals celebrated worldwide.

Beginning second half of 2020 — Resolutions?

Yep! That's it. It doesn't stop. 

And sadly enough, the past 4 months we all have been locked up in the lock-down. People like me are in luck, because we don't go out much anyway. Now that we have loads of free time, a lot of my friends planned interesting activities they've been dying to involve in for ages. And guess what? They are actually doing them. I know right?

Anyway! The things I'd planned have really been a mess in my head as always, but writing the resolution actually made me do some work this time. So folks, writing down ideas help. 

Resolutions

Time to see what I did from things I planned in the beginning of this year. 

Maintaining my personal log/diary/rant etc. 

Nope. Never doing that. Because it needs time and I'm busy stuffing my head with new "knowledge" all the time. 😏 It's not a priority anyway. I don't know why I chose this in the first place. 😤

LearnedToday

I started writing this with a hashtag on facebook, and till date I've written 29 of them. In six months, minus 15 days of Umra, It should've been at least a hundred, but anyway. After a long time I did something consistently. And I'm proud of it. 

Weekly – Start posting the stuff I learn every week

Actually a good idea. Did I do something? Nope. Will do? iA. 😁

Sharing – Personal experience + Psychology + Self-help + Philosophy etc.

OK no joking from here. This is actually not on the priority, when I'll be done with the REAL work, I'd start spreading my gyaan. I hope I start it this very year though. 

Works – previous & current (writing+projects)

Red alert. This ranks highest on my priority list. And I'm pretty positive about this with myself. Alhamdulillah! You'll see in the upcoming days.

Tutorials for absolute beginners

Yep, but not unless I find something which has not been done before in the way I'm planning. Have worked on some tutorials actually.

Reading

Finished more than five books of different lenghts. I'm also planning to start writing reviews of them both in English and Urdu. Not quite sure how writing English reviews for Urdu stuff would go. 

Reviewing English stuff in Urdu would be fun. So that ain't going anywhere.

___

That was a little overview. 

Lastly, an exciting news! Urdu Mehfil has completed its 15 years. May Allah keep it alive and make it more beneficial for the Urdu community. 

The birthday celebrations of Urdu Mehfil always push us to contribute. Good for me. 

Rab raakha!👋

My New Year Resolution for 2020

End of 2019 now. The last post as you can see on this blog was of March 2017. I was in my final year of Engineering then. At the end of the previous year, I bought this domain “shakeeb.in” and thought at least this will motivate me to finally drop a post. But nah! 

A little history of this blog

Let me tell you why I created this blog in the first place. My friends on Facebook, WhatsApp and a few forums, especially Urdu Mehfil, were asking for a place where they could read all my work. (Sounds fancy, doesn't it?) Being a polite person that I am ( :cough: ), I complied. But unfortunately, I couldn’t post anything for the reasons I still don’t. (More on these “reasons” in a while.)

The first thing which finally pushed me to move my lazy bottom (not literally, of course) was a report which I was asked to write. To be honest, I wasn’t going to write anything if that workshop would not have turned that astounding.

I dropped a few more posts and then just stopped posting anything on this blog; wasted a lot of time procrastinating (which I love BTW). On the request of few very close friends, I created the Urdu blog and posted a chunk of my tutorial/essay “How to be a good Urdu poet” as 4 blog posts, then parked the Urdu blog at the sub-domain “ur.shakeeb.in”,  (ur is ISO 639-1 standard for Urdu). I did publish few other posts there too, but still, most of them were not even part of my plan.

In every month or so, I kept checking on this  blog's stats  for some reason, and kept wondering who are these people and why are they reading these 5 posts?

Look at that. Russia? Seriously? I hope they are all bots.

I've had a long list of things to finish in 2019, most of which are still pending, or have made its place at the far bottom of my priority list.

Priorities change. Mine did too. But it’s not reasonable to abandon the tasks altogether, leaving them incomplete for the sake of your new interest. That’s why my new year plan is to do A LOT in the least time possible.

Problems and their possible solutions

Coming to the difficult part. Let me list down the reasons why I couldn’t complete the tasks:

1. Perfection: I have the constant urge to present the things in the best way possible, which is not a wrong inclination in itself, but have somehow kept me from publishing my work. Throwing the work in pending-bucket just because you will sooomeday make it presentable and publish – is pure laziness. 

Solution: 

Present it, then refine it whenever you get the time. And for the urge part, you know you’ll not present it cringe-level-bad anyway.

2. What: The most difficult thing for me is to decide what to post. No, I'm not out of ideas. It’s the opposite. I have too many of them. In fact, as mentioned above, I’ve a lot of them incomplete. So, the issue expands to deciding what to post / complete / begin with. 

Solution: 

Pick whatever appeals you at the moment. Don’t wait. Do it.

3. Where: Each platform (social media, forums, blogging services, Q&A sites) has at least one plus point, so like a normal CS student, I am signed up for almost all of them. Every time you get something to post, the chaos starts in the mind and the post sits back in a corner, frightened. 

Solution: 

Use “length” as the deciding factor. Also, use website as the central hub.

Plans

I'm listing down my plans here publicly, because one –This post will be a reference for me in the coming days, I’ll look for this post whenever I’ll lose my focus; and two – somebody from the readers will keep poking me about something s/he is excited to see completed.

I've not added the specifics right now, and will add them as and when required.

Here goes the list:

• Maintaining my personal log/diary/rant etc. 
• LearnedToday – I learn a lot of things every day, about diverse topics. Will write these things daily, even if it’s obvious-to-the-level-of-dumb for the world.
• Weekly – Start posting the stuff I learn every week
• Sharing – Personal experience + Psychology + Self-help + Philosophy etc.
• Works – Posting previous works/ completing work in progress + Properly arranging and maintaining ongoing projects (Website, GitHub)
• Tutorials for absolute beginners (because why not?)
• Reading – Minimize the time spent on useless crap of Facebook / WhatsApp and read the books I’ve left unfinished for years now

Accordingly, categories would be:

• Personal (blog, interests)
• Nostalgia
• Reviews
• Tutorials
• Self-help
• Religion
• Politics
• Works (My poetry, prose, books, software, apps etc)

We all make plans. The question is, do we stick to it? This time, I hope I will. 

What are your plans for the year 2020? And what are the things you should’ve completed in 2019 but are still left in the to-dos? Share in the comment below.