2024 Recap

2024 was a wild year, especially in business, tech, and AI and also my personal life.

I am turning 30, and I’ve learned a lot—through failures, risks, wins, and all kinds of highs and lows. 

I did every job/business you can think of: venture associate, sales, trading, events, animation studio, e-commerce store, AI tool, etc.

And if there are a few things I wish someone told me earlier:

• Start taking bigger risks sooner. You are probably too risk-averse. Write out the worst thing that could happen, realize they are not that bad, then take that leap. Take as many asymmetric bets as you can. The worst risk is taking no risk. 

• Change your environment, country, location, city. Move to a place where you will flourish, put yourself in places where you are forced to perform. Don’t lurk put yourself out there. 

• Figure out what you truly want. The mimetic theory of desire says that we don’t come up with our desires on our own — we imitate what other people want. Go on the journey to self-discover what you yearn for.

• Be intentional about the content you consume. Limits on consumption hours. Be honest, when something is learning or entertaining, real learning is extremely hard and effortful For example: learning a new language or learning how to code is extremely hard. P.S. If you scroll and read too much can drown your inner voice.

• Do things fast. Take action fast, if there is no urgency exists, impose some. Moving fast things forces you to strip things down to the bare bones. 

• Choose your friends wisely. I realized how insecure I was. Trying to show people I was cool, but instead, I should have hung out with the nerds & builders.

• Travel as much as you can as far as you can. Doing things is energizing, and wasting time is depressing. 

•  Avoid student loans, credit card debt, or any debt they’re rarely worth it.

• Send as many cold emails as possible, and talk to strangers in elevators. Don’t look down on your phone. Talk to people standing in front or behind you in line. 

• Shift your mindset from complaining about a problem to finding actionable solutions. Ask yourself: What can I control in this situation?, What actions can I take to improve it?

• Make time to talk to your family and friends often. Call your parents and host events, dinner, and parties. Remember, three close friends are more valuable than 30 casual ones. Real friends are the ones who will pick you up from the airport and you can call them any time of the day.

• Don’t take “no” as a final answer. Have no ego and don’t take yourself too seriously. Chill out. But remember, Time is your most valuable resource – Protect it and be selective about where and with whom you spend it.

• Dress well—even if it’s just for a coffee run. You never know who will you meet.

• Save a lot of money, Learn the basics of personal finance – Understand budgeting, taxes, and investment fundamentals.

• Work out at least 5 times a week and walk a lot. Read a lot and think a lot. Eat clean but indulge twice a week, Learn to cook a few good meals – A skill that saves money, impresses others, and contributes to your health.

• Ask that woman/man out immediately

• Replace “Why is my life so hard?” with “What can I do to improve this situation?”

  Use the 3 Questions Framework: Is this thought true? Does it help me? How can I reframe it?

This year, My YouTube channel achieved 28 million impressions and 2.4 million views.

Please subscribe if you haven’t already. I will be choosing one random subscriber to give them Apple Airpods.

My mission is to educate people on the latest emerging technologies. We’re interviewing the smartest entrepreneurs from Y-Combinator & Shark Tank building in AI, Robotics, DTC, Healthcare, etc.

What Happened in 2024:

• Donald Trump made history in 2024—a lot of it. First, he became the only president to take a mug shot (a real contender for “Photo of the Year”).

• Elon Musk, once an engineer focused on building cars, rockets, and tunnels, was drawn into politics. Four years ago, a California Congresswoman tweeted “F*ck Elon Musk.” Elon didn’t retreat—he moved his companies to Texas with a sharp “message received.” As Twitter censored voices, even a sitting President, Elon saw free speech under fire. The final insult came when President Biden held an EV summit and snubbed Tesla—the company that transformed America’s electric car industry. It was a slight to the country’s leading innovator, the man building factories and driving tech forward. Instead of backing down, Elon made his boldest move yet—betting big on Trump and positioning himself as a kingmaker.

• Podcasters became kingmakers.

• OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google went head-to-head like kids fighting for lunch money with the latest AI models one-upping each other.

• NVIDIA Prints Gold and becomes the largest company in the world: Jensen Huang was busy cooking up chips, and NVIDIA quietly became a $3 trillion tech giant. AI sure loves its silicon.

• Show of the year: Penguin on HBO Max.

• Taylor Swift became the world's first musician to become a billionaire solely from songs and concerts. Kendrick Lamar and Drake fans had a feud. The real winner is both of them because of the juicy streaming dollars.

• Apple Launched the Vision Pro – $3,499 and it failed kinda (Too expensive, Too bulky) whereas Zuck might be the winner of the year with Meta Orion glasses.

Never bet against Elon, Zuck, Trump and BITCOIN.

See you in 2025 🎉

Thanks for reading,

Manav Golecha
Host of Emerging Founders Show & Cat Daddy

All I want this Christmas is for you to subscribe to my youtube channel.

Bonus: Here’s a photo of my cat napping