It was a heroic moment. Or so I thought. There I stood like some desi Hercules, staring at my treadmill. “Today,” I declared to myself, “you move!” The treadmill, however, stayed where it was, unimpressed by my proclamation and utterly unaware that it was about to be relocated from my study to the spare room next door.

I called my driver to assist in this noble feat of strength and logistics. He arrived, looked at the treadmill, looked at me, and then—rather annoyingly—looked at the door.

“Have you taken the measurements, sir?” he asked, as if we were planning a moon landing and not merely shuffling fitness equipment from Point A to B.

“What measurements?” I replied, slightly bristling at his calm competence.

“The measurements of the door of the other room,” he said politely, but with the subtle tone that drivers often reserve for bosses who think with their biceps and not their brains.

Lo and behold, I whipped out a measuring tape and… the treadmill wouldn’t fit. Not horizontally. Not vertically. Not even diagonally with the grace of a ballet dancer. It needed men who could tilt, pivot, and manoeuvre it like a reluctant groom through a narrow wedding mandap.

I called off the mission.

And as I stood there with the measuring tape dangling in one hand and my ego bruised in the other, a thought struck me: How many of us barrel through life without measuring first? Not doors. But dreams. Not walls. But wallets.

We leap into start-ups with more enthusiasm than research. We launch businesses based on what our neighbour’s cousin’s friend said worked in Canada. We buy expensive coffee machines to start a café, only to discover the lane already has seven. We take out loans for products nobody wants, hire staff before we find customers, and build apps we ourselves don’t know how to use.

And after all our treasure is sunk, we stand there—just like I did—wondering why the treadmill won’t fit.

Measurement, my dear friends, is underrated. It’s not just for architects or carpenters or tailors with chalk behind their ears. It’s for all of us who dream. Measuring is the silent pause before the grand statement. The quiet moment before the dhols start beating at a baraat. The soft whisper of reason before the drumroll of ambition.

That little tape measure taught me more than any motivational poster could.

Measure your resources. Your time. Your energy. Your capacity to fail and bounce back. Measure not just what you want, but whether you’re ready for it. Measure the size of your dream against the size of such research.

Because if you don’t measure, you’ll be calling reinforcements tomorrow—or worse, a bank for another loan.

Measure to save your treasure.

And maybe—just maybe—you won’t end up like me: holding a measuring tape after the decision’s been made, and a treadmill that’s still where it was..!

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