You are the words you tweet

Oct 7, 2020 |

Recently, I downloaded my Twitter archive and have been going through twelve years’ worth of every tweet I have posted, drawing inspiration from the thoughts, ideas, experiences, etc expressed for my upcoming book, to be published in 2021 by Pan Macmillan South Africa. “Study the past if you would define the future.”Confucius It has been a fascinating trip down memory lane. The things that I considered ‘tweet-worthy’, the ideas that I have had, the moments I have lived through. It occurred to me that, in being active on social media, we are essentially documenting our lives. This can be...

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How important are photographs today?

Sep 7, 2020 |

Remember the days when we used to take photographs with cameras that used film roll? You would take your pictures without knowing how they would turn out, take the film to a photography shop and then wait about two weeks to pick up your photos. The closest we got to immediate images was with an instant camera, of which Polaroid was the brand name … as Andre 3000 sings in Hey Ya!, “shake it like a Polaroid picture.” Quick sidebar. It seems the song actually helped revitalise Polaroid Corporation’s business and they sponsored some Outkast parties where they distributed cameras, though they did...

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Strengths versus weakness. Where’s your attention?

Aug 21, 2020 |

Perhaps the flaw is in how I interpreted it. Throughout school, the focus always seemed to be on my weaknesses. Subjects that we were good at were given minimal attention, while the ones we weren’t as strong on was where the focus was. To become balanced and progress, we were encouraged to improve our strengths. Perhaps that makes sense for school, when you study a broad range of subjects, and need to pass all of them to make it out of those classrooms and, if that is in your destiny, into the lecture rooms of tertiary. Years ago, I heard Marcus Buckingham speak at an event for one of my...

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A day riding the Triumph Tiger 900s

Jul 30, 2020 |

In this social distancing times, the back of a motorcycle is probably the best place to be. Recently, I was fortunate enough to get the opportunity to go on a media ride with Triumph South Africa to experience the two new Tigers – the Tiger 900 GT Pro and the Tiger 900 Rally Pro. I must confess that, while I do enjoy the dirt a bit, I always thought that my first time on a Triumph would be a Bonneville or Thruxton. But, starting on the Tiger 900 GT Pro was not bad at all, especially on the windy back roads towards Maropeng and then Hartbeespoort. It comes with five driving modes, namely...

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The entrepreneurship life can be a hustle

Jul 29, 2020 | ,

In a recent Q&A with health entrepreneur, doctor and founder of Proactive Heath Solutions, Dr Fundile Nyati, I asked the following question, “would you say entrepreneurship attracts people prone to struggling with mental illness or does it cause it?” Dr Nyati had just given a talk on “The Importance of Holistic Health as A Key Success Factor for COVID19 Pandemic Disruption Survival” at a virtual event for The Innovation Hub and one of the things he spoke on was how entrepreneurs can be prone to depression, anxiety and the like. Having grown up in an entrepreneur’s household and having...

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The curse of so-called original ideas

Jul 20, 2020 |

As Nas said, in his track No Idea’s Original, “No idea’s original, there’s nothin’ new under the sun, It’s never what you do, but how it’s done.” He was not the first to say it and he won’t be the last. Yet….it is often hard for us to accept that ideas are a dime a dozen. Personally, I am sitting with multiple notebooks from over 15 years with idea after idea. I have folders in the cloud with proposals for countless concepts. There was a time when I used to beat myself up when I saw an idea that I had thought of previously being implemented. A lot of what-ifs. The two things I have since...

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