I'm married to an Australian. I returned to Australia from the UK in October.

This is my experience of what happened to me when I arrived in the country during COVID.

I think it will help people understand how criminally bad our government's response has been. (a thread).

On arrival, passengers were escorted from the plane by armed police.

We were allocated a government-mandated hotel, and told to wait in a holding area.

Once processed we were led to a coach. Members of the Australian army lined the route to make sure no one tried to escape.

Once at the hotel we were taken off the coach one by one

An Australian police officer escorted me to my room, telling me in no uncertain terms that if I left it in any unauthorised circumstances for the next two weeks, I would be spending up to two years in an Australian prison.

During the next two weeks I was fed three times a day in polystyrene and with plastic cutlery. Below are some examples of the food. It was fine, but there was no control or choice.

After about eight days I was tested for COVID.

This was mandatory, and the first time I’d seen another human since the quarantine started.

Even though I was negative, I was told I could leave only once my 14 days of isolation were over.

I’ve put together my list of top 10 tips for early career researchers and I’m going to share it here as promised. But first a disclaimer...I don’t know everything. This list is based on my experience in academia. I would love for others to add and augment. With that in mind....🧵

1: Decide what you want your LIFE to be. This career could consume you completely if you let it, but it won’t always love you. Focus on the other things in your life that bring you joy and fulfillment and cultivate those just as much as you cultivate your research career.

2: Decide what you want your CAREER to be. What are your values? What are you in this for? There will be hard times. But knowing your values and what success means to you can help guide you through them.

3: Decide whose opinions really matter to you. Mastery requires feedback and you will get a lot of it, some useful some less so. Identify the small circle of people you can really trust to give it to you straight. This includes forming a no committee.

4: People are people are people. Don’t be afraid to email someone about a postdoc or job or grant idea. We’ve all been there. Some people are not generous people. This is good information to have. Move on to other colleagues and mentors if you encounter these people.

My highlighted passages from The Psychology of Money by @morganhousel. Thread below

1. The 401k - the backbone savings vehicle of American retirement - did not exist until 1978. The Roth Ira was not born until 1998. If it were a person it would be barely old enough to drink

2. NYU professor Scott Galloway has a related idea that is so important to remember when judging success - both your own and others': "Nothing is as good or as bad as it seems."

3. Margin of safety - you can call it room for error or redundancy

4. "Every job looks easy when you're not the one doing it because the challenges faced by someone in the arena are often invisible to those in the crowd."

5. "The average equity fund investor underperformed the funds they invested in by half a percent per year, according to Morningstar - the result of buying and selling when they should have just bought and held."

If you wanna level up - the fastest hack is to hangout with people who are ALREADY at that level.

The beauty of twitter is that you can hang with anyone.

The problem is ppl follow the wrong accounts. It's noisy as f*ck.

Here's 27 people you should follow (and why)👇

If you hang with smart, interesting, successful people - you will start to think & talk that way too.

We are monkeys that copy what we see. You can fight it, or use that to your advantage by surrounding yourself with people who you want to become more like.

Group 1: Smart, Rich, & Don't Give a F*ck (no filter)

@chamath - was early FB, has big balls, bet early on Bitcoin & SPACs

@rabois - kind of a dick but he's clearly smart

@balajis - this guy is from the future, and has come back in time to tell us what's going to happen

BTW - I'm recommending people who are:

* smart
* say interesting things
* successful (not just talkers)

Plenty of people are 2 of 3.

You need ALL 3 to make the list

Group 2: Business Buyers - they see the $$$s of 100s of businesses a year.

@awilkinson - built a $200M+ empire of internet businesses

@BrentBeshore - same as^, but non internet (unsexy) biz (eg. swimming pool repair, port-a-potty rentals)

@XavierHelgesen - he does both

How Reading Helped My Career

 In 2013, a joint venture Israeli/South African company was looking to make a foray into Nigeria. They wanted to set up an outlet in Lagos after conducting their feasibility studies and they needed a Nigerian financial institution to partner with.

Somehow, i was given their contacts and we agreed to meet with our teams from both sides at Victoria Island. 

I got my team together- about 8 of them- people in e-business, IT and other units that I know will have one thing or the other to do with this company.

I wanted to conclude in just one meeting. As the South African MD and his Israeli partner walked into my office where we were all seated and I stood up to exchange pleasantries with both of them, his eye went to the book on my table. 'Oh, you're reading Tipping Point?', he asked.

I was reading Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell that week and I had the book on my desk in the office. I usually have the books I'm reading either in my car or on my desk. I replied in the affirmative.

He asked for other books of Malcolm Gladwell that I've read and I mentioned Outliers-The Story of Success and What The Dog Saw. He asked for my best among the books and I mentioned Outliers. His best was Tipping Point.

#PLEIADIAN COLLECTIVE

1. Friends Of The Great Planet!

We Gather With You In These Moments To Unveil All Darkness Hidden And Shine Light Brighter Than Ever! As You Observe The Lies Declared To Be Truth, You Will Begin To Notice That Truth Cannot Be Hidden!

1/

Get a cup of coffee.

Let's talk about the Birthday Paradox.

This is a simple exercise in probability.

But from it, we can learn so much about life.

About strategic problem solving.

About non-linear thinking -- convexity, concavity, S curves, etc.

So let's dive in!

2/

Suppose we came across a "30 under 30" Forbes list.

The list features 30 highly accomplished people.

What are the chances that at least 2 of these 30 share the same birthday?

Same birthday means they were born on the same day (eg, Jan 5). But not necessarily the same year.

3/

What if it was a "40 under 40" list?

Or a "50 under 50" list?

Or in general: if we put M people on a list, what are the chances that *some* 2 of them will share the same birthday?

4/

Clearly, this is an exercise in probability.

To solve it, we'll assume 3 things:

1. No Feb 29 birthdays,

2. Each person on our list is *equally likely* to be born on any one of the other 365 days (Jan 1 to Dec 31), and

3. The birthdays are all independent of each other.

5/

Another way to state the problem:

We have M people, and a 365-sided fair die.

Each person is allowed to roll the die once -- and is thereby assigned a number between 1 and 365 (both inclusive).

What are the chances that *some* 2 people will get assigned the same number?

The Law of The Stretch

I had become dissatisfied with my career at that point. Having started my career in Ibadan and having lived there all my life, I felt there was more. I remember how I felt there was a void within. Outwardly, things looked okay but inwardly, I was a mess.

I knew that if I wasn’t careful, I would just settle into a comfortable zone and that may just be the end of my career. Everyone loved Ibadan- the cost of living was low and I had almost everything, at least compared to those within my immediate space.

One of the greatest mistakes you can make is to benchmark your life by those within your immediate space or circle of influence. You will think you’re making progress until you get out and see others who will challenge you. And that was what I decided to do.

I saw a vacancy for a role in Lagos and I applied. Up till then, I had never worked in Lagos- save for a few trainings, attachments and banking school.

When I got the role, it was a major stretch for me. I didn’t have a place to stay so I had to ‘squat’ with a friend for 6 months until I could pull resources together to get a studio apartment.

Plz take a moment to read this & watch the video.
#threadstorytime
Story of 3D
So when i shifted to Mumbai, a batchmate of mine helped me in finding a rented house. He was fooled by one of his acquaintances, & me with my sister ended up in an under construction building
1)

Near slum.
It is horrific. But I had no choice since we reached by car 2 am, with my 3 dogs. Area was not safe. Even police avoided to enter it

One day when I got down to get in my car to go for work, I heard a growling.
I bent down to see a dog just in bones, feeding puppies 2

Tried to get her out but her one leg was badly broken & bleeding.
One puppy half eaten by rats, coz rats there were bigger than her puppies.
I used auto but contacted many NGO
Got no help.
I started mixing antibiotics & pain killer in rice to feed her.
Initially I had to push
3

The food below the car. But on 3rd day, she actually came out from under the car to eat from my hands.
She started trusting me. I put bandage on her leg.
Called her 3D 😁 which my sister @doorva207 Found really odd & stupid
3D started recovering. She started gaining health
4

I introduced her to children of out building.
Parents found them dirty, but kids are ❤
We gave all of them bath, vaccination.
They were happy.
But every other day her one pup started getting crushed under a tempo or car
People wouldn't bother to slow down
3D would cry to me
5

#AKATU

1. Beloved Friends!

We Speak Words Of Peace And Unity Continually, But Do You Realize We Could Soon Be Cut Off From Communication On This Forum For Speaking Truth?  Indeed, We Honor The Planet And The Free Will As An Incarnated Soul Arriving To Explore Life In Many Ways!

Do y'all mind if I share a personal story about my faith and witnessing a miracle?

It's a pretty amazing story. So I hope you stick around to the end.

1/13

Years ago, while on a family snowboarding trip, my mom came down with a cold. By the time the trip was over, it had gotten worse. Hours after we flew home from the trip, my mom was admitted into the hospital. In less than 24 hours, she would be in ICU on life support.

2/13

A sickness had taken over her body and started shutting down her organs. Weeks went by with my mom's life hanging by a thread. It was such a delicate balance between medications to keep her alive and fight the illness. The doctors and nurses did an amazing job. True heroes.

3/13

Eventually, the doctors came to the conclusion that they'd tried everything they knew, but my family wasn't ready to give up the fight. We stood strong and pushed forward, holding out hope for a miracle.

4/13

So the doctors kept fighting to save her. Many days had passed with my mom under sedation and other heavy medications. At this point, the cure was almost as deadly as the illness. They took her off the sedation, but my mom never woke up. She was in a coma.

5/13

21 advice for 2021

👇

Invest in the things you use for a significant fraction of your life, like a chair and bed.

Learn how to sell. Everything and everybody is a product.

Reflect every week.

Сollect all the junk you haven't used in over a year and throw it in the trash (no, you won't need it)

I increasingly believe that the only successful approach to productivity is treating yourself like an addict

If you want to stop drinking alcohol, don't keep it in the house 🙅

Here's how I keep myself productive:

1. Clean Out The Cupboards 📱

I use iOS Screen Time to block all social media, news, and yes, EMAIL, from my phone.

I also remove the ability to install new apps.

My wife set the code, so I don't have any easy way to get around it.

2. Add Guiderails 🚆

On my Mac, I have an automation that quits all apps each morning before I get to work and pulls up OmniFocus on the screen, so it's always the first thing I see when I open my computer and can't go down a rabbit trail.

3. Reduce Dopamine Hits 🥱

I use to spend my entire day in my inbox.

As I'd send emails, new ones would stream in constantly, and before I'd know it I'd spent 4-5 hours just responding to emails instead of moving important projects or individual work forward.

I setup @Mailman_HQ, a Gmail plug-in @mohitmamoria and I built, to only deliver email once in the morning and once in the early afternoon, and to automatically batch any emails from anyone I hadn't emailed with before at 7AM...

@billious @dptech23 @Eutrapeliamuse @Soteriology101 @lordgrindleford @jbabym @ErweeKoos @monergism @DrJordanBCooper @ThaRealJgibbs @leightonflowers "Choose" in verse 4 means to "pick out" or to "select" or to choose out for oneself"

Can we agree with this Bill before we continue

I did read all of your "response to a friend" and know you see verse 4 as being a group of believers selected for sanctification I believe.

@dptech23 @Eutrapeliamuse @Soteriology101 @lordgrindleford @jbabym @ErweeKoos @monergism @DrJordanBCooper @ThaRealJgibbs @leightonflowers It seems thru your foreseen faith that God is only saving those He knows will believe.

Then from eternity, God looks into the future in time.

Then God is informed by the LFW actions of all those who will believe and these God chooses to be Holy and blameless in Christ,

@dptech23 @Eutrapeliamuse @Soteriology101 @lordgrindleford @jbabym @ErweeKoos @monergism @DrJordanBCooper @ThaRealJgibbs @leightonflowers Bill, is God TRYING to save EVERYBODY without exception?

Or only those who INFORM Him with their LFW action of Belief that they will set their faith in the direction of believing in Jesus?

This God knows thru "foreseen informed faith"

@dptech23 @Eutrapeliamuse @Soteriology101 @lordgrindleford @jbabym @ErweeKoos @monergism @DrJordanBCooper @ThaRealJgibbs @leightonflowers Bill, does God have to keep looking into the future to keep being "informed" by the LFW actions of believers?

To see if they will continue to "keep walking in the Spirit?"

Or if they will keep focusing their innate faith in the direction of Jesus?

Nxt

@dptech23 @Eutrapeliamuse @Soteriology101 @lordgrindleford @jbabym @ErweeKoos @monergism @DrJordanBCooper @ThaRealJgibbs @leightonflowers Does God do this individually with each person?

That is look into the future to be informed by their LFW actions?

Or is God capable of doing this with a large group?

Everyone all at one time?

What is the extent of God's ability of his knowledge being informed by the creature?

Thread about intrusive thoughts, by someone who has intrusive thoughts:

I’ve seen people on here say they’d end friendships over someone’s intrusive thoughts. As someone who’s had some disturbing ones, I want to address that. Intrusive thoughts don’t make me a bad person.🧵

I think one of the biggest problems is that we don’t talk enough about intrusive thoughts. People don’t understand them. They’re not purposefully being insensitive, they just genuinely don’t understand the nature of intrusive thoughts. Intrusive thoughts are INTRUSIVE.

That means you can’t control them. They’re NOT PLEASANT. No one wants to have these thoughts running through their heads at inconvenient times. No one is having disturbing intrusive thoughts because they’re in the mood to be disturbed.

Tw/ suicidal ideation

Everyone has random, intrusive thoughts pop into their heads, For example, have you ever been driving on a highway and thought to yourself, “I could just yank the wheel right now?” Thats an intrusive thought. But for most people, it’s easy to brush off

People who experience intrusive thoughts as a mental illness symptom can’t just do that. They can’t just brush off the disturbing thoughts that pop into their heads. They get STUCK in them. And it’s incredibly distressing.

#IKAI

1. Greetings Planet Earth!

I Share My Family Of Light With You!  I Now Communicate In The Sacred Essence Of ONE!

You Live Now In This Dream That Has Been Anticipated Since Your First Creative Experience!

#AYA

1. Precious Ones Of My Heart!

In These Moments Of Now, All Beings Have The Fundamental Ability To Perceive Past And Project Future.  Would You Believe Me If I Told You That The Future Exist NOW?

This is how I got three job offers as a 16-year-old high school student.

( and why I rejected them )
🧵👇

June 2020.

I receive a DM from a college student in California. The message read something like this "Hey Pratham, I am one of the co-founders of XYZ Inc, a robotics company, we are looking to add enthusiastic people to our team, would you be interested?"

(2 / 11)

It was the first time I had ever been offered a job, so I said Yes! (I did reject it later)

There were a couple of interview rounds I had to go through. None of them included technical questions, which was interesting.

(3 / 11)

After the first interview, I saw the list of the roles I could apply for. I realized how little I knew, terms like "Ui/UX, ROS(Robot operating system)", at that time, I was overwhelmed.

(4 / 11)

I knew that this wasn't a job for me. I decided that I would reject this job role even if I cleared the second round, which I ended up doing.

(5 / 11)

Become Unrecognizable in 2021.

(9 Steps to Transforming your Life in One Year)

>>THREAD<<

Before we get started, understand these 3 things:

1.) You will not achieve your goals overnight

2.) Some of these steps will make you uncomfortable

3.) There will be times where you struggle

Not okay with this?
Stop reading.

Ready to make shit happen?
Then let’s begin 👇

#1: Remove all sources of negativity.

- Toxic friends
- Bad relationships
- Disrespectful family

Most people have no interest in growth..

No interest in getting better..

But that’s not you.

NEVER let these people into your life.

And if they are…

GET THEM OUT

Find positive people.

Find people who want to get better.

Find those who are genuinely happy seeing you succeed and SURROUND yourself with them..

They exist, but you have to find them.

“3 great friends is better than 20 ‘eh’ friends.”

#2: Lift weights and eat right.

Imagine going from:

~ Fat
~ Acne
~ Skinny
~ Little arms
~ & Swimming in your clothes..

To:

~ Toned
~ Muscular
~ Clear skin
~ Having a jawline
~ & Filling your clothes

Your confidence skyrockets, you feel amazing, the rest of your life improves