Aryamaan Lakhotia

50 Dreams

I value passion, resilience, and impactful ideas. If there is anything I learnt from my background, at Harvard, or at work, it is that consistent efforts, however small, culminate in big rewards.

When I turned 19, I re-watched Masayoshi Son's interview with David Rubenstein. Deeply inspired by his 50-year life plan, which he wrote as a 19-year-old student at UC Berkeley, I decided to note down my 50 goals for the next 50 years.

Here are the things I hope to do before I turn 70.

  1. Attend the Kumbh Mela
  2. Become a Prime Ministerial candidate
  3. Bike across Scandinavia
  4. Buy a professional sports team
  5. Celebrate Diwali in Ayodhya
  6. Complete the Ironman triathlon
  7. Collect 25 old maps of India
  8. Cut 20 kites on Makar Sakranti
  9. Cycle from Manali to Leh and over Khardung La Pass
  10. Eat an extra-large pizza by myself
  11. Employ 4 million people across all my businesses and investments
  12. Expand Toy Joy to 100 cities in the world
  13. Experience zero-gravity in space (and confirm that Earth is round)
  14. Feature in a hit music video
  15. Fly a plane
  16. Financially support 100 Indian low-income undergraduate students at Ivy Leagues
  17. Get a meal with Chamath Palihapitiya (and match his tip)
  18. Have a cumulative turnover of $2 trillion across all my businesses, and use the money as an instrument of change to positively affect at least 25% of India's population
  19. Have a tangible library collection of 1,500 books
  20. Hit a six at Lord's
  21. Hike in the Grand Canyon
  22. Explore the ruins of Hampi
  23. Learn to surf
  24. Learn to play the saxophone
  25. Live-paint the Aurora Borealis
  26. Listen to a talk by every Fortune 500 chief executive, then give a talk at Stanford GSB
  27. Meditate in Kamakura, Japan
  28. Play badminton with a champion athlete
  29. Play scrabble with a spelling-bee winner
  30. Read 100 books in a year
  31. Recreate a woodblock print of The Great Wave off Kanagawa
  32. Research and write about the history and evolution of the Bombay Stock Exchange
  33. Revolutionise finance and capital development in India
  34. Ring the Opening Bell at NYSE
  35. Ride a sled in the South Pole
  36. Route 66 road trip with college roommates
  37. Operate a digital library for K-12 institutions in India
  38. Own a luxury sedan
  39. Own a fort in Rajasthan
  40. Skydive in Fox Glacier, New Zealand
  41. Spend Christmas in New York
  42. Stay overnight with Indian soldiers in Siachen during winter
  43. Teach a class at Harvard
  44. Tend a home garden
  45. Train with an Olympian
  46. Travel to all seven wonders of the world in a single trip
  47. Trek to the Valley of Flowers in Uttarakhand
  48. Visit Mt. Everest
  49. Workout to get six-pack abs
  50. Write a poem for my partner