sf you were so good to me

welcome to introspection ft. harsehaj! ⭐️ i’m harsehaj, an 18 y/o always up to something in social good x tech.

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btw, feel free to reply with topic ideas you want me to write about for future posts.

onto today’s topic: sf you were so good to me 🌉

this is a long one.

for the last 3 months i’ve been living in silicon valley building out projects. i won’t dive into what exactly i was doing and working on — you can read that here in my professional bi-monthly update. in 1 line: i was developing an ai fashion app as a part of the residency’s founding cohort.

what i do want to touch on in this post are my key learnings and highlights from the past 3 months. yes, i learned so much about development and shipping products, but i learned even more about myself and what building actually looks like first-hand. ⚒️ 

1) the only time to live is the present.

a common response i’ve gotten to me delaying my education for a year has been, “what if you fall behind?” fall behind in what? life? a career? chances are your big goal in life is to “find happiness.” why delay that? why is that something to achieve in the future? we don’t know if we’ll still be here tomorrow, the day after that or even later today. there’s no other time we can possibly live besides the present. ⌛️ 

i don’t think i’m falling behind at all. even if i do want to bring it back to my career, i can confidently say that i’ve learned more about the software and entrepreneurship in these past three months than i ever will through a formalized education.

my life is more than my career though. it’s joy, and how i can optimize that for as many other people as i can. why wait to live this life? it’s my present, not just my future. :)

2 more specific cases come to mind to contextualize this key takeaway of living in the present:

• a lot of us have bucket lists that never get checked off and are instead met the perpetual “another day” response. i made it my mission to cross off 75%+ of my 3-month bucket list and i hit 90%. skydiving along the sf sunset 2 hours after deciding to go with my housemates was definitely a highlight. 🪣 that spontaneous plummet was the start of me internalizing this mindset back in september.

• almost to really nail this learning into my head, one of my favourite conversations were with my lyft driver to the sfo airport for my flight back home. he was telling me about how he always planned to motorcycle across africa with his brother. unfortunately, his brother passed away before they were able to fulfill that dream. this struck me and i could feel the lingering regret in his voice. we don’t know which day is our last, so we might as well live every day like it is.

plenty other experiences are also a testament to this lesson, but these 2 stuck out.

2) you don’t have to be insanely technical to ship.

something i’ve always struggled with being “good enough” to create software tools or products. i was only ever around 2 types of people in high school: peers that wanted nothing to do with technology, and those that have been grinding code since age 8. i was none of the above. 😍 

i like technology and innovation, but i’m not that fond of coding so i thought i would just have to power through learning code (which i have to a decent level) or set technology and being a founder aside to pursue something else. working out of founders, inc. and being surrounded by so many founders, builders and creators in sf, i realized that most people aren’t building their own products end-to-end. the smartest people get together teams that are smarter in their own specialized fields to build the vision. 🚀 

i’m a super product-minded person, and this realization was so important in me actually believing i can put my ideas into reality. i love generating new ideas, putting them to the test and iterating. my love for this process and grit in scrapping things together assures me that i’m in the right space. i just need to be always searching for the right people to join me.

3) i know what it’s like to build a community.

at nearly every stage of your life you’re always put into a curated social life until you hit “adulting” or are moving on from your first job. in college, highschool, the workforce … those repeated social interactions are set up for you so when they’re gone and you’re unemployed figuring life out, you’re also alone and isolated — without a community. 🫂 

these 3 months have forced me to exercise this muscle of creating community and forming friendships from all sorts of places despite not being in one concrete social scene. the lack of inevitably in these friendships make them that much more meaningful. rather than the connection being nurtured by built-in social structures, it felt more natural and meaningful: the care in striking up conversations, the bonding over deeper topics and the clarity in reciprocation.

i’ve made friends from helping a group of people carry their japanese drums from one side of the uc berkeley campus to the other, from nerding out over neurotech and it sticking with one particular person, from falling horribly while rollerblading, and much more. i’ve learned to really put myself out there and open myself up more for connection. each interaction doesn’t have to blossom into a friendship (it shouldn’t, that’s pretty exhausting), but it could if you want it to. ⚡️ 

it truly feels like there’s now someone in my life for any possible ask i have (literally. ty aren for telling me what camera to buy LOL).

on my last morning in sf, i shot a quick message to my house slack to let them know i would be getting breakfast at a nearby café in case any of them were around and wanted to say bye. after 10 minutes of waiting alone, i thought “damn, was i delusional? 💀” 

5 minutes later, there was a group of 4 of us eating our chocolate croissants and talking about our plans for the next few months. 10 minutes later, another close friend calls me near tears telling me that she slept in and that she was so scared she didn’t get a chance to say bye. she sprinted to the café and caught us just as we were about to leave so i could get my bags loaded into the lyft.

the air was chilly, but i felt so warm. my friends woke up earlier than they have in months just to say bye and drag my luggage over to the car for me. 💼 

i’ve known these people for less than 3 months.

💌.

done with the key lessons, now i’ll rapid fire some of my favourite memories:

• buildspace irl in sf — it was magic.

• roasting everyone in the office and robbing the endless pocky.

• every time i met up with irene (café hopping, cheese nights, mixed aerials class etc. etc). ❤️ 

• going skydiving, obviously.

• feeding my concert junkie side: saw daniel caesar, enhypen & travis scott.

• becoming a regular at a tiny punjabi restaurant across my house and them remembering my order as soon as i walk in (chole bhature btw).

• solo walks, solo exploration, solo grocery shopping. being solo!

• taking every coffee chat buddy to sana’a café (ty for putting me on alia)

• splurging on the berkeley thrift scene.

• long chats and impromptu outings with my fellow arcadians. 

• becoming a veteran at public transportation.

• hitting up dallas & la + catching up with friends.

• day trip to stinson beach.

• instacarting myself cake every week. 😭

• diwali @ uc berkeley. 🪔 

• eating the best tiramisu known to mankind.

• friendsgiving.

• chocolate croissants at café strada.

• + a lot more that i’m blanking on right now. most of my posts from the past 3 months cover them.

i’m writing this from my bedroom in lovely canada (the weather is not so lovely) and i’m glad to be kicking back for the month and spending time with my family. my plans for january are a secret for now, but i promise it’s going to be equally (if not more) cool. ;)

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