Summer Newsletter 2022
My life mission is to maximize global human potential. Here's a glimpse into my journey.
The 4 areas you’ll read about in this post:
My general life update
A thought about education
Wins we’ve had at TKS
Top monthly recommendation
1. My general life update ✈️🧘♂️
Over the past couple months I’ve been moving around a lot - Geneva 🇨🇭, Tallin 🇪🇪, Prague 🇨🇿, San Francisco 🇺🇸, Toronto/Ottawa 🇨🇦… currently writing this post at a coffee shop in Houston, then flying to Vancouver tomorrow morning for my close friend’s wedding (congrats Danish and Neelam!). It started taking a toll on me. So for the past week I’ve been prioritizing self-awareness and health. Every morning I’ve woken up at 4am to practice various forms of meditation, followed by deep work or learning, then fitness. I find that I enjoy mornings much more than nights, so sleeping at 9:30pm hasn’t been difficult. I have much more time in the day and my average enjoyment per hour is higher. This wasn’t possible with my crazy schedule in the last few months, and it won’t be possible next week with the wedding. Reminding myself that I only had this week was a strong motivator to be disciplined.
What was I doing in all those places?
Geneva, Switzerland: Meetings with people from The World Economic Forum, United Nations, CERN, AKDN, Rothschild & Co, The Earth Foundation, Impaakt, and more.
Probably some of the best conversations I’ve had this year with incredibly smart and impact-driven people. We spoke about philosophy, politics, history, and the implications to making meaningful impact in today’s world. Many exciting TKS partnership opportunities being developed.
Villars, Switzerland: The Villars Institute invited 11 TKS Alumni to their first annual symposium, held in the beautiful mountains of Switzerland.
During the week we learned about the future of nuclear fusion, new technologies to reduce waste from fission, earth-based diets to sustain the planet, and methods to dramatically impact climate change. I’m extremely grateful to Lee Howell and his team at The Villars Institute for the work they’re doing, and TKS is proud to partner with them and support future initiatives.
Tallinn, Estonia: TKS partnered with Mindvalley to lead programming for youth (ages 6-17) at Mindvalley University.
Mindvalley is an incredible organization and I’m proud that TKS had the opportunity to partner with them to create life-changing experiences for 200+ international students who attended the 3-week experience in Tallinn, Estonia. The program was designed for personal growth, global problems, and critical thinking, while building a community of openness, authenticity, and kindness.
Prague, Czech Republic: It’s not always about work… my very close friend had his bachelor party in Prague. Wild time! From human foosball, to horror escape rooms, boat parties, and midnight guided sauna sessions.
San Francisco, USA: X, the Moonshot Factory (formerly Google[X]), hosted 18 TKS alumni at their headquarters in Mountain View, California. Over the course of two weeks, Xers and TKS alumni worked together to develop “Moonshot” projects - the intersection of a huge problem x breakthrough technology x radical solutions. The results include:
Early cancer detection through non-invasively measuring biomarkers in the blood by combining various spectroscopy methods.
Removing particulate matter using electrostatic precipitators to massively reduce air pollution on the level of 2.5 microns (PM 2.5).
Solar desalination to increase access to portable water in water-scarce regions.
Programmable garments using self-cleaning photocatalysts to create the future of environmentally friendly clothing.
Toronto and Ottawa, Canada: Attending our annual TKS Showcases.
It’s one of my favorite parts of the year - watching how much our students have grown as they present projects they’ve worked on throughout the year. We hosted the Toronto Showcase at the new Microsoft HQ in downtown Toronto, the Ottawa Showcase at Hub 350 in Canada’s largest technology park, and the Vancouver Showcase at UBC Robson Square.
Houston, USA: Visited some close friends in Houston. Refocused myself on physical and mental wellness, including daily 4am meditations, eating clean, and working out + cardio. This was the first week in months I had for myself. Got a lot of work done as we’re preparing for the launch of TKS 2022-23 programs in September and hiring seven roles to the team, after recently bringing on eight new hires… lots of growth!
The concept of balance never resonated with me, instead I focus and prioritize. These priorities shift monthly or quarterly and as long as I can adapt to the shifts I can maintain a thrive state - being joyfully fulfilled, while physically and mentally healthy.
TL;DR → life update = doing great.
2. A thought about education 💡
What we call an “education system” is primarily a filter system. Education is secondary, maybe even tertiary. Ask yourself - when a student gets 70% on a test, why can’t they retake it until they get 95%+, demonstrating they understand the content? Why aren’t students encouraged to ask for feedback on essays before submitting them? Why do schools mainly focus on teaching testable information, while excluding areas like mindsets?
Thought Experiment: If we were to create an education system from scratch, how might we think about it using first principles?
I could write a book on this, so I’ll hold myself from getting into my thoughts. But this insight is worth thinking about. I’d argue the education system is the most important system we have, and it hasn’t improved much over the past 50 years. In the meantime, the world has advanced exponentially - Google, YouTube, Khan Academy, MasterClass, smartphones, podcasts, artificial intelligence - each one has created an inflection point in our ability to educate. The world has significantly changed over the last 20 years.
3. Wins we’ve had at TKS
🎉 We partnered with Amazon to provide 100 full-ride scholarships to incoming TKS students, valued at over $500,000 CAD.
🤩 We welcomed 8 incredible people to the team!
Joining forces with amazing people who are mission aligned is one of my favourite parts about TKS. This team is incredible and I’m very excited for the 2022-23 program year. Welcome to the team Steven Ritchie (Calgary), Andrés Velarde (Boston), Mikaela Ergas Lenett (Toronto), Pranav Menon (Vancouver), Skylor Lane (Toronto), Amber Branny (Toronto), Alec Ngai (Toronto), and Neil Ateem (London/Nomad)! At the end of August we’re gathering together for a 4-day team retreat where everyone can meet each other and form meaningful friendships.
🚀 This year we received over 10,000 started applications from students in 300+ cities worldwide.
Our TKS 2022-23 program will kick off in September with 700 selected students from around the world. We have virtual programs and in-person programs hosted in Toronto, Ottawa, and Vancouver. I’m also proud to share that we provided $1,500,000 in financial aid to students who needed tuition support.
🐣 Dan Jacob, our director of partnerships, had a second baby!
Congrats Dan! Enjoy pat leave. We all miss you at TKS.
There are dozens of wins from the alumni side as well. Alumni are raising millions in venture capital for their companies (eg. Utopia Labs $23M raise), working at disruptive companies and research labs (eg. SpaceX), releasing interesting projects (eg. detecting skin cancer using AI), and working on solving tough problems (eg. supply chain consolidation for farmers in India).
I’ll share a separate update just for those. It’s a very long list.
4. Top monthly recommendation
I probably consume hundreds of hours worth of content every month - including philosophy, history, science, economics, and more. Friends and TKS students/alum often ask me about the most interesting things I’ve read/listened/watched, so I created this section.
Here’s my top recommendation this month:
The Knowledge Project: #141 Kunal Shah, Core Human Motivations
This podcast contains multiple top-tier insights on startups and social psychology. Kunal is one of the most successful entrepreneurs in India, and hearing from someone share ideas on that part of the world was refreshing and highly intellectually stimulating. I especially enjoyed learning about his “Delta 4” framework.
It’s been a great summer so far and I’m lucky to be healthy, happy, and constantly learning new things from people from around the world. Our team at TKS is gearing up to launch the 2022-23 program.
Special thanks to:Adrian Monck for spending time with us at the World Economic Forum and introducing us to so many great people there.
Lee Howell for leading The Villars Institute and inviting TKS to be part of it.
Sean Khan for supporting the United Nations initiatives with TKS (UNEP Challenge).
Shaan Madhavji for the generous introductions to people in Switzerland.
David Gaan for the great conversation during our hike and insights into the future of healthcare and nuclear fusion.
Michael Raspuzzi for hosting a memorable TKS Alumni dinner.
Neil Ateem for the good times, your insights on enhancing our branding at TKS, and now joining our team for the next few months.
Gigi Marquez for leading the Mindvalley youth initiative and all your hard work.
Nadim Nasser and Nazra Noushad for leading the youth programming at Mindvalley.
Kevin Peesker for hosting our TKS Toronto Showcase at the new Microsoft HQ.
Nabeela Virji and Jillia Fongheiser for making the Camp Moonshot experience happen, words can’t express my gratitude.
The mentors at X (formerly Google[x]) who shared so much knowledge with the students during the two weeks.