Stoa Digest #21: Shining a Light

Where you go, lead with a trail.

Nov 1, 2021

From the Editorial Room

With the dawn of the Festival of Lights at nipping at our feet, we're going to try and make this edition as festive as we can. Feel free to let us know if you think we failed, or if you have better ideas.

They say Diwali represents the triumph of good over evil, light over darkness and wisdom over ignorance.
This in some metaphorical way is also what we aim to do through Stoa School for every fellow that comes through our virtual doors.
Just like Diwali though, it is an evergreen practice that returns every cohort, and not one that ever diminishes in it's brightness & joy.

We've somehow built a room of some of the smartest folks in the country in our own tiny little niche of the virtual world, and as we grow, we'd like by extension you to be our torchbearers of these attributes as much as they are ours.

Good over Evil: A positive sum game. Assume the best in people unless proven otherwise. It's definitely easier said than done, but you realise that as you allow for yourself to think this way, you allow for more interactions with a larger range of people, too. Meeting people outside of your comfort zone and allowing yourself to have authentic conversations can result in some very interesting outcomes, but in Chris Martin's famous words, "If you never try, then you'll never know"

Light over Darkness: Curiosity harbours Learning. It is very easy to be comfortable with darkness, because if you exist in it long enough you stop noticing that you're in the dark. A lot like relativity almost, you only know how/what Light is because we use it every day. Apply this to how we learn at Stoa. It's fairly easy to stagnate and just be comfortable doing the same old thing, but with how dynamic the world around us is daily, it's hard to move forward without adapting. To move forward though, you have to be curious & want to learn something new.

Wisdom over Ignorance : Ignorance is truly bliss. Accepting your lacks and wanting to learn from them, allows you to be wise about whatever it is you engage with, in the future. Not today, not tomorrow, but maybe 10 years from now. Wisdom doesnt come from living in a bubble, it comes from turning your faults into pieces of art a lot like the practice of Kintsugi in Japan.

As this festive season rolls around, choose to believe in the unadulterated good around you, both physically & virtually, and try to learn from it. Don't feign ignorance, because your wisdom in time could change the outcome of something big.

We know we have two graduated cohorts, with one more to add to that roster only very soon, but if you haven't already: please start trying to put these small habits into practice within Stoa. They can be significantly hard to practice in the outside world, but you have to have a few wins at something before you want to commit to it entirely, yes?

We wish you wealth, good fortune, wisdom this Diwali, and hope you get to pass on the Light to those you meet too.

Fellow Spotlight

You’ll find Tanishka here: On LinkedIn / On Twitter

Meetups!

Birthday Parttaaayy! 🥳 🎂

Nov 2nd - Abdul Poonawala , Chandresh Kalyan
Nov 3rd - Aarthi Ganesh
Nov 4th - Dilip Pitchika, Venkata Mellacheruvu, Gautham Kannan
Nov 6th - Ramasamy Ramanathan
Nov 7th - Ashwin Agrawal

Community Buzz

📚This Monday we launch our third active club at Stoa - The Reading Club.
Poignantly named, “Between the Lines” they launch tonight at 8PM with their inaugural event.
For those of you who have registered for the club, don't forget to join their Discord server & accept the calendar invite.
For those who haven't signed up yet, you can read their manifesto & register using this link which will redirect you to a message in our lounge on Discord.
OR you can reach out to Siddharth Ramachandran from Cohort 04. 📚
🤔📣🏦🐕🧳💻
🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁Withoouuout fuuuurther adooo 🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁
we are pleased to announce, that we have resurrected the “Learn & Intro” channels and brought them back to Discord!!
Please, be mindful of where you’re dropping your information, the purpose of clearly demarcating each of them under a topic is so there is less whelm for those likely to be.
🤔📣🏦🐕🧳💻
🎇With Diwali around the corner, we’ve put together an interesting night of fun & games to celebrate.
Should you want to be in the comfort of your own home, but still want a Diwali plan, do come & join us at 8pm tomorrow - the Calendar invite is on the Community Calendar already! 🎇

Best Discord Messages This Week:

If you’re new to Twitter, and joined because of all the Stoans who constantly keep raving about it, drop in your profile link here for some follows from fellows!

Fellows Rocket🚀🚢 Shipping Content

Tweeple 🐦

Organisation Vs Organiser Vs Organising.

LinkedIn 🔗

Epic things by Epyc

For Stoans by Stoans

Books 📚

Sameer Mohan’s book reccos are some of the best to exist out there

Watchtime 🎥

Blogs 🤓

Meme Wars 🥲

This week’s shiny new winner of Best Meme goes to …………
🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁

Jay Joshi!!

To end, we’ll leave you with this:

This playlist is by no means a Diwali playlist, we’ll save that for you tomorrow!!

See you next Monday!
Keep reacting, keep sharing, keep posting, keep leaving a trail!