i’ve heard this quote before:
“great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, and small minds discuss people.”
back in the wap-site days, yeah the slow 2g internet days. docomo, aircel, airtel, uninor all fighting to give the best offer.
back in the wap-site days, i was trying every airtel free-net trick i knew. pages loaded forever. one wrong click took me to a quote site. i read that line once and moved on. years later, a friend asked what changed in my thinking… and that quote came back.
i don’t remember where i first heard it. but it stuck, because it matched my life like a timeline.
my calls changed as my life changed. and my life changed faster than i noticed.
the quote i can’t place, but i can feel
the first time i saw that quote, my reaction was simple. “yeah, that’s great.”
not “life-changing”. not “deep”. just that quiet feeling when something clicks and you accept it.
and then i started seeing my own calls evolving inside it.
nokia 1100: the one kilometer gossip zone
back then i had a nokia 1100. i used to call friends while walking from the bus stop to home, about a kilometer.
mornings were chaos. i used to rush to catch the 8.30 bus, packed with people.
…and the walk had another version too. that sunset golden hour version, when the light is about to leave. that sun kiss on the face for the full one kilometer. it felt nice, even when the calls were not nice.
rainy days were their own thing. umbrella in one hand, phone pressed to the ear with the other. and i wasn’t walking like a normal person.
like salim kumar says in the movie “chathikkatha chanthu”:
“oru variety ku vendi, dhingana dhingana dhingana nadakkuvo?”
but i did and was doing, a playful walk through the road, like i’m performing for nobody.
the road itself was a small road, not a bus route. only small vehicles used it.
after rainy season, holes would appear. in rain, those holes became a game.
you had to use your working memory. map how the road looked when it was dry. guess where the holes are. jump.
miss once and you land in a water-filled hole. instant disqualification in that game.
…and while doing all that, my calls were mostly about people. classmates, neighbors, random folks from other places. their issues, gossip, bragging. small talk that felt big, because it filled the walk.
one of those classic college gossips sounded like this:
“ne arinja namude senior helson anupama ye propose cheythu, ajith inum oru kannu undayirunu, ini” :D
”master blaster” computer bragging
i used to brag a lot. mostly about computers.
i would talk about installing gta vice city.
cd after cd.
installing windows.
i even memorized the windows cd key like it was a superpower. and then i would reenact the dial-up sound. that “krrr krrr piiii” connection scene. i could imitate it like a ringtone.
the funniest part is, sometimes the other person wouldn’t even let me finish. mid-story, they would jump in.
they start bragging about their own stuff. they visited a nearby cafe. played ps5. whatever.
i used to wonder, did they even hear what i was saying? :D
and still, i kept doing it. because back then, being “the computer guy” felt like being the main character.
bike + symbian days: the hack-and-download era
later i bought a bike. and the calls moved with me.
i was doing phone calls while pedaling. phone on the ear, pedaling, talking.
the same road, same sun kiss, rainy seasons, holes in road, same 1 km to home. only thing changed was “dhingana dhingana nadakkunnathu” to “cycling”!
i even thought about how to do “dhingana dhingana nadakkal” in cycle also :D
i had a nokia c3 for a while. and i also had a sony ericsson. those symbian os days were something else. i still love them.
the sony ericsson had an aircel sim and a docomo sim. those sims that gave free net. that era where you feel like the internet is a cheat code.
…and then there were airtel hacks for unlimited data. and i used to download mp3s from random wap sites. half of them were messy. some worked. some were virus vibes. but the thrill was real.
the calls in this phase were still heavy on people. but the tech ego was louder now. more hacks. more “i figured it out”. more “i know this trick”.
scooter + redmi: events enter the call
then i moved to a scooter. i used to put the phone in a headset, or inside the helmet.
moved phone to “micromax”, that glowing yellow phone
later i switched to redmi 2. it was great then. simple, solid, felt like an upgrade in life.
…and the calls evolved again. it was an evolving phase.
still some people talk. still some gossip. but now it started mixing with events, especially tech events.
college time. techfests were my primary income.
i had that hobby background of hacking things and figuring things out. web designing, tinkering, doing random computer stuff. in my group, i was the master. even though i wasn’t the top one.
the reality is, i got at least second prize in all the techfests i attended. and i earned around 3000 to 5000 rupees from each event.
one clear memory: rajagiri college. my friend from degree days, aleena, invited me.
luckily it wasn’t a great hacking event. but i got second in that competition + some new friends also.
cash prize in hand. sometimes that meant going on stage. standing there, taking it, pretending i’m not nervous.
after that, web designing events were my zone. first prize sometimes. second prize often.
those calls were event-heavy. what happened in techfest. what happened in college. what happened somewhere else. incidents, updates, results.
“average minds discuss events” started feeling too accurate.
now the “ideas” era starts:
car calls: ideas, process, and helixonauts
now i have a car - honda city <3. i call it a “she” in my head. i named her “charlie”, but i never actually call her that name :D
and when i’m driving, the calls are mostly about ideas.
what can we improve in the company. how can we help the team grow. how can we help customers succeed.
how do we make customer support even better. how do we scale support to 100% without breaking anything. and still keep the same quality.
even things like naming. we brainstormed calling our team “helixonauts”.
the biggest change is, these calls create action. they are not just noise. they turn into notes.
i used to take notes, but i’m driving. so sometimes i’d ask a friend to take notes for me. because i don’t want to lose those ideas.
one car-call idea that became a real standard in helixo is:
our core focus: 101% customer satisfaction.
we evolved, and that’s the standard we keep. whether we have 50 support people or 100, we stick to that focus.
somewhere in the middle of all this, i truly embraced the mindset shift. it happened when i started building our very first shopify app.
i still remember my friend, kiran. he cared enough to tell me something that was hard to hear.
business is not something that you can do. “because people will scam you/make most out from you/exploit you since i know you for long time, you won’t identify a cunning face”.
that line changed a lot in the last six years. it forced a new version of me to show up.
…and i also think about my shift through phases like ambi, remo, anniyan. that story deserves its own post [#TODO].
the phone upgrades were real, but the mindset upgrades were even better
yes, phones also changed. from nokia 1100 to c3 to sony ericsson, to micromax then redmi 2.
…and now i’m on vivo. i love the vivo x series.
but the real upgrade wasn’t the phone. it was what i used the phone for.
i look back and i feel grateful. not because the past was perfect.
because the past was mine. and i can see the growth clearly now.
even if i compare myself to one month back, it’s different. the thinking evolved. it keeps evolving.
change is the only constant that doesn’t change.
takeaways
- your environment upgrades you without asking. walking, bike, scooter, car… each one changes what your mind defaults to.
- small talk is not “bad”, but it becomes your identity if it is your default.
- events talk can be a bridge stage. it pulls you from gossip into a wider world.
- idea talk is only real if it turns into notes, decisions, and actions.
- the best growth is when you can embrace every phase without pretending it didn’t happen.
see you tomorrow!