Book Review: My Life, My Rules – Story of 18 Unconventional Careers

This book is set on similar lines as those compiled by Rashmi Bansal, such as Stay Hungry Stay Foolish and Connect the Dots. The success of such books is not determined by a great writing skill (frankly all that is needed is that writing does not come in way of a story) but the selection of people and interestingness of their stories. It is the power of these stories alone that can make a book worthy.

Good news is that in the choice of people and their stories, the book has been very effective. Although inclusion of popular, well-known folks like Aditi Govitrikar, Nikhil Chinnapa, Harsha Bhogle, R Madhavan and Srikant initially miffed me, however, after reading Harsha Bhogle and R Madhavan’s stories I realised that I didn’t know it all, and was mollified. It was interesting to know about what Harsha did before cricket commentary happened to him and that R Madhavan conducted widely successful coaching classes before he became an actor.

My favourite stories were about Nalin Khanduri who started Great Indian Outdoors Private Limited, it definitely takes courage to quit a corporate job and start an outdoors company in a country like India, Manohar Parrikar, a middle-class boy, a IIT graduate who went on to become the Chief Minister of Goa, Ashish Rajpal, his story was especially inspiring for me, he worked all over the world but came back to India to enrich K-12 education, Rajeev Suresh Samant, who through his brand Sula wines put India on wine-making map, Praveen Tyagi, another K-12 educator who started PACE education and despite being from impoverished background, Praveen made it to IIT and decided to devote his time to teaching to help other folks make it to IIT.