My Philosophy In Life: Dream. Dare. Do.

Dream: The Foundation of Every Great Journey

Every meaningful journey begins long before the ticket is booked.

As a schoolboy in Rajasthan watching cricket on a black‑and‑white television, I was already traveling in my imagination. While most people focused on the match itself, I found myself looking beyond the game. I imagined the stadiums, the cities, the roads, and the countries where those matches were being played. That was my first taste of travel psychology—seeing the world through dreams before reality allowed me to.

Many people call this manifestation. Over the years, I have often been asked whether I believe in it. My answer is yes, but perhaps not in the way social media describes it. I do not believe dreams become reality simply because we think about them. I believe they become reality because they influence the choices we make every day.

Long before I stood at the Panama Canal, drove through the valleys of Cuba, watched the midnight sun in Norway, or explored Australia and New Zealand, those places already existed in my imagination. I read about them, studied maps, watched documentaries, and pictured myself there. The dream stayed alive for years. Eventually, that vision influenced my decisions, my priorities, my savings, and my willingness to take risks.

Perhaps that is the real power of manifestation. It is not about attracting opportunities from the universe. It is about training your mind to recognize opportunities that have been there all along. Dreams create focus. Focus creates action. Action creates results.

Dreaming is often dismissed as fantasy, but in reality, dreaming is vision. It is the ability to see possibilities before evidence exists. This applies not only to travel but also to life philosophy, career success, and personal development.

Every successful entrepreneur, traveler, leader, athlete, or professional begins with a vision that others cannot yet see. Whether you want to travel the world, start a business, change careers, achieve financial independence, or become a better parent, everything starts with the courage to imagine a future different from your present.

Dreams create direction. Without them, there is no destination.

The Lost Mumbaikar says:

“Dreaming is how you travel before the world agrees you can.”

Dare: Where Growth Begins

Dreams are comfortable because they cost nothing.

Daring is where growth begins because it demands action despite uncertainty. Standing at Nordkapp, the northernmost point of mainland Europe, under 24 hours of daylight was not simply another destination. It was the fulfillment of something I had only read about as a student. Driving through Finnish Lapland at minus 29 degrees Celsius with only a few hours of daylight was not comfortable either. It was challenging, unfamiliar, and at times intimidating. When I accidentally damaged my campervan and received a bill of nearly €4,880, the financial pain was real.

Yet today, I barely remember the money. I remember the lesson. Comfort rarely transforms us. Challenges do.

The same lesson appeared during my motorcycle journey toward Machu Picchu in Peru. For hours, I rode through relentless rain, muddy roads, and landslide‑prone mountain passes. Eventually, a truck driver warned me that the road ahead had become too dangerous to continue. I turned back and never reached my intended destination. Many would call that a failure. I see it differently. That journey taught me that courage is not always about reaching the destination. Sometimes courage is simply having the willingness to try.

This principle applies equally to career success, entrepreneurship, and leadership skills. Career‑defining opportunities rarely arrive wrapped in certainty. Promotions, leadership roles, business expansion, and strategic decisions often require stepping into situations where outcomes are unknown.

I experienced this firsthand in 2016 when I was offered an opportunity to join Avigilon, long before it became part of Motorola Solutions. At the time, I was working for Pentair, a company nearly twenty times larger. The move appeared risky. The basic salary was lower, and many people questioned why I would leave a large multinational for a much smaller company.

Yet I believed in the technology. Avigilon was pioneering AI‑driven video analytics, high‑resolution surveillance, and end‑to‑end security solutions long before the industry fully understood their potential. I took a calculated risk, leaving the security of a multi‑billion‑dollar company for a startup because I believed in the technology, the leadership, and the long‑term vision. It was one of the best decisions of my career. Three years later, Motorola Solutions acquired Avigilon, proving that sometimes the biggest rewards come from backing the right opportunity before everyone else sees it.

Looking back, that decision became one of the most important of my professional career. It led to consistent target achievement, President’s Club recognition in Mexico, regional leadership opportunities, financial growth, and exposure to projects across multiple countries. More importantly, it reinforced a lesson I had already learned through travel: confidence is not built before action. Confidence is built because of action.

The leaders who inspire us are not fearless. The entrepreneurs who succeed are not free from doubt. The travelers who explore the world are not immune to anxiety. They simply refuse to let fear make their decisions.

The Lost Mumbaikar says:

“Dare is moving forward even when nothing around you promises comfort.”

Do: Turning Vision Into Reality

Dreaming creates possibilities. Daring creates opportunities. Doing creates results.

Doing is where dreams stop being ideas and start becoming reality. One lesson travel taught me very early is that there will always be reasons not to go. Friends, relatives, colleagues, social media, news reports, and sometimes even your own mind will provide endless reasons to stay where you are. Every destination comes with warnings, fears, uncertainties, and worst‑case scenarios.

At some point, you simply have to book the ticket.

Before every major trip, especially my solo motorcycle journeys and road trips, I spend countless hours preparing. I read articles, study maps, watch documentaries, understand local culture, research weather conditions, learn about potential risks, and speak to travelers who have already been there. Preparation does not eliminate uncertainty, but it reduces fear. This is why preparation creates confidence—a principle that applies equally to travel and professional growth.

When I planned motorcycle trips through Romania, Eastern Europe, South America, or remote regions many people considered risky, I heard plenty of reasons not to go. Yet every journey taught me the same lesson: most fears are far larger in our minds than they are in reality. Once you begin moving, uncertainty slowly transforms into experience, and experience becomes confidence.

Family travel follows a different approach. Safety, comfort, logistics, and contingency planning become much more important when traveling with your spouse and children. The planning is different, but the principle remains the same. At some point, you still have to commit and take the first step.

The same philosophy applies to career success and professional growth. You cannot sit and wait for promotions, leadership roles, or business opportunities to arrive automatically. Just as travelers prepare for a journey, professionals must prepare for opportunities before they appear.

Throughout my career, I never wanted to be limited by my engineering alone. That is one reason I pursued an MBA while continuing to work full‑time. Long before podcasts became mainstream, I spent hours listening to successful entrepreneurs, business leaders, investors, and industry experts during commutes, flights, and travel. I invested heavily in continuous learning and self‑development because I understood that learning compounds over time.

That mindset was shaped much earlier, during my years in Mumbai. Whenever I had the opportunity to work with exceptional leaders, whether within my company or across the industry, I made it a priority to absorb everything I could. I believed that every conversation, every project, and every mentor had something valuable to teach. This philosophy became the foundation of my 3 A’s of Success: Acceptance, Acquire, and Accelerate—where growth begins with accepting that you don’t know everything, acquiring knowledge from every possible source, and accelerating your progress by applying those lessons consistently.

Every project, every failure, every lost opportunity, and every difficult customer interaction became a classroom. The most successful people I have met share one common characteristic: they never stop learning.

Whether in travel or business, growth belongs to those who continuously invest in themselves. The destinations may be different, but the principle remains identical. Preparation creates confidence. Learning creates opportunity. Action creates results.

Action transforms knowledge into experience, and experience transforms uncertainty into confidence.

The Lost Mumbaikar says:

“Confidence is built after movement, never before.”