Who Am I?
Hello readers,
This question “Who Am I?” is the most problematic questions that troubled spiritual gurus like Sri Ramana Maharshi and fictional superheros like Mahendra Bahubali alike. So, I better don’t venture into answering that.
But since we like a label for the sake of simplicity and judgement, I’m Sai Krishna Dammalapati. I find it difficult to ascribe any other single identity to myself. The question implicitly means that you can be one fixed thing. That is suffocating for me. Even my name might imply a few stereotypical identities. If I can get anything out of my writing, it is breaking those stereotypical boundaries.
A far better question to ask is what are the things that interest me? This need not be a single fixed thing. I’m comfortable answering this question!
For long I believed that my primary interest was patriotism, social development etc., but some introspection helped me articulate my deeper interests better: creativity and curiosity. I think some of the most creative and wicked problems to solve are in the domains like governance and social development. But these are being deserted by the fine minds of the planet for obvious reasons. I luckily found good work with NGOs, Universities, Governments, Consulting firms, News Channels, Think tanks and Civic-Tech Startups at various capacities.
See how the first thing I told about myself is about my work? So let me tell about ME rather than about my work alone.
My heart is going back to Filmmaking and Theater off-late. I’m learning to write stories, screenplays and to act. If I do anything worthwhile in this endeavor, you’ll read about them in this newsletter.
If there is any more time left in a day, I spend it with my friends, family, pet Heera, reading books and listening to podcasts. All in all, I’m very grateful that I am able to spend time for things and people that really interest me.
While that’s my life off-line, I like to have an internet community. We are social animals and it feels nice to meet distant animals on the internet with similar interests and with whom I can have a word occasionally. Tried using social media for that, but I think there is enough evidence to suggest that social media causes more harm than benefit. I’ll thus spend only 3 hours/week on social media at max.
This brought me to using newsletters to find my internet community. I’ll use substack mainly to weekly letters to you. I like the idea of a letter. It’s of perfect length to stay in touch meaningfully. I’ll be happy if you respond to my letters with your letters :). I’ll also continue writing archetypes but very sparingly. My main website will continue to act as a one-stop link-tree.
I look forward to your replies to my letters.
With love,
Sai Krishna Dammalapati
