11. Smooth Sailing with Nimit Bansal
“think of my career more as, like, a mentor and someone who’s helping people on my team, but then also someone who’s just trying to build new skills and continue to learn and develop, as opposed to thinking about just moving up to the next level.”
On today's episode, we talk to co-host’s Tara Conti-Bansal's husband, Nimit Bansal. As you will hear in our discussion, for Nimit, there's no big crises, no huge questions or seismic shifts happening, but our discussion highlights an aspect of middlescence that we haven't really discussed much yet, that midlife does not need to be a crisis. It can be a rewarding time of self-acceptance and gently shifting priorities.
As a result, we have titled this episode “Smooth Sailing.” But do not be misled by the title. There are just as many significant lessons and valuable wisdom to be gleaned from this episode as from some of our others.
In this episode you get to hear about Nimit’s:
Reflections on Happiness, Passion and Upcoming Changes
Middle Age and Professional Growth Reflections and Shifting Priorities
Struggles with Fitness, Parenting, and Feeling Out of Sync With His Friends
The impact of reading the book, Die with Zero: Getting All You Can From Your Money and Your Life by Bill Perkins
Life Quakes and Their Resulting Personal Growth
Desired Legacy and the Importance of Relationships to him
Favorite Activities
We hope you enjoy this episode as much as we did.
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[00:22] Christina Donovan: Are you between the ages of 40 and 60?
Do you feel the need for change in your life, but are not sure why or when or how? Do you feel a pressure of running out of time? Do you spend most of your time doing things that are not important to you anymore? These are all symptoms or characteristics of middlescence. And this is our podcast, messy Middlescence. Welcome back. This is Christina Conti Donovan, and on today's episode, we will be talking to Tara Conti Bansal’s husband, Nimit Bansal. Our discussion with Nimit on his experiences in middlescence, I feel is actually indicative and reflective of Nimit himself. As you'll hear, Nimit is very unassuming, very easygoing and modest. And in a way, I feel like these qualities can initially distract you from what is super smart, super competitive, and just all out brilliant gem of a person. And I think all of his family and friends would agree with me on that statement. And our interview with Nimit is kind of similar. There's no huge crises, no huge questions or seismic shifts happening for Nimit. But our discussion with him highlights an aspect of middlescence that we haven't really discussed much yet. That midlife does not need to be a crisis, but rather can be a rewarding time of self acceptance and gently shifting priorities as a result. We have titled this episode smooth sailing, but do not be misled by the title. There are just as many significant lessons and wisdom to be gleaned from this episode as from some of our others. So here is our discussion with Nimit. Enjoy. Hello. This is Christina Conti Donovan, and I am here with my sister, Tara Conti Bansal, and we are very happy to have as our guest today Nimit Bansal, Tara's husband and partner. Life partner. So welcome, Nimit.
[02:47] Nimit Bansal: Thank you for having me.
[02:49] Christina Donovan: So, I think everyone's a little nervous.
[02:52] Nimit Bansal: I heard we shouldn't be, but we are.
[02:55] Christina Donovan: Yeah, I think it's a little interesting to have Tari interview Nimit, and of course, I'm excited to do that as well. But should we just jump right in? Yeah. Nimit, do you want to start by talking a little bit about your story, give people an idea of who you.
[03:17] Tara Bansal: Are and where you come from?
[03:19] Nimit Bansal: Where. Yeah, so I was born and raised. Well, not born, actually. I almost messed up. I was born in Canada, in Saskatoon, Canada. That's where my parents first got their jobs when they kind of moved to slash Canada from India. And we didn't live there very long, about a year of my life. And my parents were able to get their visas and move to the United States. So we moved to Pittsburgh, and that's where I was raised. My parents are still there. So all of my kind of formative years were in the city of Pittsburgh in a suburb called upper St. Clair. So my kind of heritage is indian. Both my parents were born and raised in India. Both went to school there, went to medical school in India, and then, like I said, came over to the US at some point. I have one sister who's three years younger than me, Anita and her family is in the Atlanta area. And let's see. So after I went through high school in Pittsburgh and then went to undergrad at the University of Pennsylvania in Philly, and then kind of stayed in Philly for a couple years after undergrad, did a couple years at I'm aging myself at Anderson Consulting, which turned into Accenture, and then actually ended up taking a job at a client I was working at at Accenture called Astromerck, which turned into AstroZeneca, a pharma company. Did a little bit over a year there and then went back to business school. Did two years of business school down in North Carolina at the FIcO School of Business. And that's where I kind of got into my current career, which is brand management and marketing, interned at SmithKline Beecham, which was a consumer products company that was in Pittsburgh at the time, and interned there, and then got my first job at Johnson and Johnson doing brand management. So my career has been very focused in brand management. I've spent five years at J and J, a bulk of my career, like 15 years at a company called Church and Dwight, which is a pretty mid sized consumer products company. And then most recently have spent about two and a half years at Santa Fe, which is a healthcare company. But I'm on the consumer side, still doing marketing from a kind of personal standpoint, obviously, Tara and I are married. I was previously married. So second marriages for both Tara and I. My first marriage was to a woman named Kristen. And we were married from, gosh, 1998 to like 2002. So we were married when I was about 28 to 32. And then was lucky enough to get kind of reconnected with Tara after that, after my divorce. As you guys know, we have two kids, Nathan and Alex. We live in Princeton, New Jersey. And yeah, that's a little bit about myself.
[06:33] Tara Bansal: What is brand management? Because I don't think most people know what that is.
[06:38] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, no, sorry. That's a good question. So brand management is marketing. So my career has been working on consumer products, brands that you will see in stores and kind of as a marketing person, you are in charge of kind of the brand strategy, the packaging, the advertising. How do you basically get consumers to try to buy your product? So it's a little bit of entrepreneurialship without having your own business.
[07:05] Christina Donovan: It's always funny to me how modest, I don't know, so many people are. I mean, you kind of glossed over a lot of your achievements. I feel like nimit, I mean, he's a tremendous athlete. You played tennis in high school, correct.
[07:20] Tara Bansal: Went to states.
[07:21] Christina Donovan: I think he was a state tennis champ. And of course, in my family, your greatest achievement is your ping pong.
[07:32] Tara Bansal: I don't know if you want to tell people about that.
[07:36] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, I started playing racket sports when I was really little. My parents got me into it and I enjoyed it. And so I played a lot of junior tennis tournaments growing up and played high school tennis and was lucky enough to be on a pretty good high school tennis team and had a great coach. His name was Richard Sakani. That Tara knows pretty well as well because he was a math teacher. I'm sure, Tina, you know him as well. He was just a really special guy and was a great coach and taught us a lot. So that was a really kind of important part of my life was the four years that I spent on the high school tennis team. And we were lucky enough to win some sectional stuff, and my doubles partner and I won states one year. And then, yeah, ping pong was just kind of like an offshoot of that. We had a ping pong table and I don't know, it was just kind of funny. Like, no one knows that there's ping pong tournaments, like state tournaments and national tournaments, but somehow I got involved in that when I was little and, yeah, have always just kind of liked playing ping pong. That's a little kind of side note about me.
[08:44] Tara Bansal: And you were valedictorian of our high school and you've.
[08:50] Nimit Bansal: We both were. Yeah, we both were. But that's where I play it.
[08:56] Tara Bansal: There were nine of us, I think. But, yeah, I do feel like you're being very modest and you are successful. What advice would you give to your younger self? Do you have anything that stands out to you?
[09:16] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, I wish I would have taken more chances or done some things that were out of my comfort zone. Like, now we have a lot of friends who have kids in college and a lot of them are doing semesters abroad. And that was something I never did and probably just felt like it was out of my comfort zone. When I was at school, but now. Kind of wish I would have done that. Yeah, I think that would be one piece of advice is just to don't live in autopilot or don't live in your comfort zone as much as maybe I did, and then maybe to relate it to that, just to take chances. Right? Like, if you have something you're really passionate about, you know, do as much as you can to, like, make that passion come to life. So those would probably be the couple of things.
[10:04] Tara Bansal: What would you say you're passionate about now?
[10:09] Nimit Bansal: Definitely passionate about our family. Like, I'm passionate about the time we spend together and trying to do everything we can to just bring opportunities to Nathan and Alex and make sure that they're getting to see different parts of life. So I'm definitely passionate about that. I'm passionate about us. I'm passionate about us having quality time together and us being able to enjoy our lives together. I'm still passionate about sports, sports in general. I'm a huge sports fan, so I love watching sports, but I love participating, too. So it's important to me to keep being able to play tennis and to ski and to do some physical things as well.
[10:54] Christina Donovan: I mean, on a scale of one to ten, where would you put your happiness right now?
[11:01] Nimit Bansal: So I like to do this kind of in different parts of my life, I guess so. I would say that I'm probably an eight or a nine. From like, a personal standpoint, I feel like we're in a really good place. Not that there's not challenges, but I feel like. I feel good about kind of personally where we are, how our kids are, just what we're trying to do from a personal standpoint. And it brings me a lot of happiness. I'd say from like a professional standpoint, I'm probably like a six, which is pretty good for me, actually. I do feel like I have never loved. There's obviously people out there that love their job and feel really passionate about the work they're doing. I enjoy my job and I enjoy the people I work with and I think it's interesting. I wouldn't say that I'm passionate about it, but I would say that this term right now, there's just a lot of uneasiness because we're going through a lot at work in terms of this is a whole other story, but we're basically carving out the consumer portion of Santa Fe, like a lot of other pharma companies have done, and try to create our own kind of probably an IPO, but carve out from the rest of Santa Fe. So there's a lot of just, I guess, uncertainty and uneasiness going on at work. So that's causing, I guess, some stress. But in general, I like the people I work with. I like my team a lot. I like the brands I'm working on. So that's all been good. And then I'd say physically, I feel like I'm like a five or six. I do work out, but I just feel like from a little physical ailments and things not feeling like I did when I was 30, that's just stuff that we deal with. I also feel like I just need to do better in terms of just having stamina and feeling like I'm as healthy as I want to be. Overall good.
[13:00] Christina Donovan: I love how you broke that down. We haven't had anybody do that, and it does sort of make sense. It's like anything else.
[13:08] Nimit Bansal: Certain areas, something that Tara and I have done in the past, like we always say we haven't done that in a while, but where are you? One to ten? Emotionally or physically or whatever? Professionally. So, yeah, I kind of like doing.
[13:19] Tara Bansal: That in the design your life. So with coaching clients, I do four categories. One is work, one is health, one is, I think, love, they call it, or just relationships. And then one is play. So the one, how would you rate your fun or play on a scale of one to ten? I think you kind of lumped it in with personal.
[13:53] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, I'd say pretty good. I mean, if fun and play is like being able to do activities and see your friends, I think there's a lot to balance. Obviously, we have a lot of kids activities going on right now. So would I like to see my friends more than I do? Probably. But we also have basketball games and hockey games and ukulele and horseback riding and all this stuff that we're trying to take people to and from. And so I think we do a pretty good job of balancing it. I would say that's like a seven or an eight. I feel pretty good about that.
[14:27] Tara Bansal: Is there a change that you're contemplating?
[14:32] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, I mean, I think it's out there a little bit, but I do think that we've talked about this a little bit. It's like, when's the right time to stop this job and either do something that's a lot more flexible and or just fully retire? I don't think that's imminent, but I would say in my mind, I would love it to be in the three to five year time frame. Maybe four to five years. So that's something that would be a change, obviously, and then trying to figure out what that means. And is there an organization that I would like to become more involved in and volunteer with? Is there a part time role that I would like to do? So, yeah, I think you have to figure that part out, but I think that would be a big change. And then, not that it's a big change, but I think just another thing on my mind is, like, we only have so many more summers with our boys before at least Nathan goes to school. And so what are some of the things that we want to do during those summers? If we don't start thinking about that now, then I think it's going to go away before we can think about. So, like, if we do want to go to Europe with them or take a specific trip, then we probably should be thinking about those things sooner rather than later. So, not that that's a big life change, but it's just something that's kind of been on my mind.
[15:58] Christina Donovan: Yeah, I mean, you mentioned retirement, granted, a couple of years away, but when you think about yourself, do you consider yourself middle aged?
[16:09] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, definitely. It's funny, I feel like when we're together with our friends, especially like our high school friends, which Tara and I have a pretty tight group of high school friends, I still feel young. I still feel like we're not that far out of college. But then you think about it, you're like, oh, my gosh, we're 30 years out of college. It's like crazy. So sometimes I still feel younger than I am. And I think the fact that Tara and I had kids later in life, too, I think a lot of the people that we hang out with, like parents of kids who are the age of our kids, are definitely younger than us. So maybe in some ways that makes us feel, or makes me feel a little bit younger than I am, but, yeah, I think in a good way, mostly.
[16:59] Christina Donovan: Yeah.
[16:59] Tara Bansal: I think it's interesting for me, a lot of our kids parents, and hence friends through them, are at least ten years younger than us. And yet our high school friends, they're becoming empty nesters left and right. But physically, I feel like I'm middle aged. And I don't know if that's how you feel. Emotionally, I guess I don't really think I'm middle aged, but physically, I feel like it's more obvious or evident, and I don't know if that's how you.
[17:40] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, no, I think that's true. I definitely feel like physically I'm not where I was and where I'd like to be. Even, like when we went skiing, just like the physical ailments or pains or not feeling as good when you're skiing or playing ten, all of that stuff. Yes. Definitely feel different than I did probably 1015 years ago.
[18:02] Christina Donovan: I mean, is middle age what you kind of thought it would be? It's funny.
[18:10] Nimit Bansal: That's a great question.
[18:11] Christina Donovan: I do a lot of like, wow. When my parents were my age, they were.
[18:16] Nimit Bansal: Oh, my gosh.
[18:17] Christina Donovan: Yeah. Doing this or you kind of can set a stage in your mind of a comparison and it's always surprising to me.
[18:28] Nimit Bansal: Yeah.
[18:28] Christina Donovan: So I don't know for you, is it kind of what you thought it would be when you were younger in.
[18:34] Nimit Bansal: Your think that the kids part is definitely different in terms of when we had them. When you had your kids, we were 41 and 43. Tara knows this. I'm not much of like a future looker person. I'm very date. I don't know if it's. It's not Zen. I don't know what it is. But I am very much like day to day. Yeah. So even into my. Don't think I spent too, too much time thinking about what middle age would look like. But I do think that us being in our having kids who are twelve and ten is very different. It's not like, unheard of. It's not like there's not other families that are going through this. But I would say a majority of our friends from our kids, like, their parents are younger. And then when we hang out with the people we grew up with in high school, their kids are all, like Tara said, they're all away. So it puts us in a much different place in terms of what we can do with our friends. We don't have the flexibility to do some of those things. And just what they're going through in their life, like, I think they are going through and they have seen a lot more bigger kid issues with their kids and they're going through now, like, being separated and being their kids are.
[20:16] Christina Donovan: You guys get a glimpse almost.
[20:17] Nimit Bansal: We get a glimpse of that. What's to come. Yeah. Which in some ways I think is good, but we also don't know what we don't know yet. So we're just living.
[20:28] Christina Donovan: Ignorance is sometimes bliss.
[20:30] Nimit Bansal: Exactly. We're living with a 7th grader and a fourth grader right now.
[20:34] Tara Bansal: What about professionally? And I know you're not a huge future planner like I am. I take on that role, I think in our relationship but professionally, would you say you had goals or where you thought you would be and you achieved them?
[20:56] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, I think that actually I had more ambitions to get up to higher levels earlier in my career. Definitely a church and white. Like, I had been a director for a while and had wanted to make VP and had thought I was going to make VP and then change in leadership and things happen and that didn't happen. And so then you have to kind of just readjust. So my roles since then have been all pretty much at the same level, director, senior director type roles. But I think I have changed my view of continuing to move up and have embraced kind of the roles I'm in and thinking more about broadening roles as opposed to necessarily continuing to move up, which I think has been healthy for me and probably has put less stress on me professionally and then has in some ways just allowed me to kind of think of my career more as, like, a mentor and someone who's helping people on my team, but then also someone who's just trying to build new skills and continue to learn and develop, as opposed to thinking about just moving up to the next level.
[22:14] Christina Donovan: I mean, is there anything right now that you're struggling with?
[22:21] Nimit Bansal: That's a good question. I think a little bit of the physical stuff, not that there's any ailments or anything, just like, I would just like to have more endurance and more stamina than maybe I do in some things, like running, being out, doing physical activity for a long period of time, I think is tiring for me. So physically, I think I feel like I could do better. I guess I wouldn't call it a struggle, maybe just, like, constant worry about the kids, just like trying to make sure that we're good parents. Right. There's only so many things you can control. But making sure that we teach them the lessons we want to teach them and making sure that they're starting to build independence. And I think Tara and I talk about sometimes, do we do too much for them? Do we coddle? Know, we go into good periods where we're asking them to help out around the house, and then we kind of, at least me, I fall back into my traps where I do more stuff than I should be. So it's just like, little things around parenting that I want to make sure that we're doing everything we can to make them happy, successful adults, independent. Independent, exactly. But, yeah, no, I wouldn't say any big struggles right now. I feel like things are pretty good. I mean, I'd say, like, I would love to spend a little bit more time building or strengthening the relationships I have with my family, meaning, like my parents and my sister. I feel like I have good relationships with them, but I feel like they're sometimes a little bit more superficial than I would like. So it's talking to them and understanding what's going on in their day and catching up. But in terms of having more meaningful conversations, I feel like there's an opportunity to try to build that as well.
[24:25] Tara Bansal: And with that, do you have ideas of actions you could take or things you would like to do to work on it?
[24:33] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, I mean, I think some of it's just like taking time to call them and to talk to them. I think it's hard. We don't see them very often, but I think I always call my mom's cell phone, and so then I end up talking to my mom. I don't end up talking to my dad that much. So calling my dad's cell phone, like, being. Taking the action to do that, right? To call, intentional. Yeah. That's what I was looking for. To actually call my dad, I think would be nice just for our relationship, because he tends to, if I'm talking to them or he gets on the phone, he'll just give it to my mom right away. He doesn't talk very much. So to intentionally call him and maybe even intentionally call him when I know my mom's not around, if she's out golfing or whatever, that would be a nice thing. And then with Anita, I feel like sometimes we talk when the kids are so, you know, either the kids are in the car. I tend to call her sometimes when I'm either picking up or dropping off, or she's doing the same thing. And so then we can't really get into that meaningful of a conversation because the kids are in the car. So maybe even just talking to her about, hey, when's a good time that we can talk where we actually have a little bit of, um. Yeah, maybe just being more know about those conversations.
[25:49] Christina Donovan: Did your family do, like, Zoom calls over Covid?
[25:53] Nimit Bansal: We tried, yeah. But not as good as you guys did. But there was definitely times, especially for the kids, like, Anita's kids and ours love talking to each other and being together and stuff like that, so. Yes. I don't know, Tara, how many times we didn't do it, that you guys were very intentional. I think as a Conti family doing it, we probably did it once every couple of months or something.
[26:15] Tara Bansal: Yeah, I would say maybe once a quarter.
[26:18] Nimit Bansal: Yeah. Which was great. I think we really liked it. I know my parents loved it. I think the kids loved. So I know my mom puts pressure on our kids to call them. It's so funny. My mom says to Nathan and Alex, make sure you call Daddy ma once a week or whatever, facetime me or so they don't do it once a week. But I do know I've heard them say, oh, we should call daddy Ma. But I think they feel like they're forced to call.
[26:44] Tara Bansal: Well, I wouldn't say forced.
[26:46] Nimit Bansal: They like it. They really like it when they do it. Yeah.
[26:48] Tara Bansal: But just yesterday morning they were like, let's call daddy Ma. They didn't. But I know they had the intention. Yesterday morning they said that, which is really nice.
[27:00] Christina Donovan: I think that happens, though, where you tend to talk to one parent more than the other. And I don't think it has anything to do beyond convenience.
[27:11] Nimit Bansal: And I think my mom's just a talker. My dad's not a talker.
[27:14] Christina Donovan: I think that's some of it.
[27:17] Nimit Bansal: Yeah.
[27:17] Christina Donovan: Yeah. We see the same thing. At least both Matt and to. And even with my kids now that are like, I tend to talk to both Maggie and Jimmy more because I'm around more. Like they know if they call, I'm more likely to pick up because I'm around at OD times of the day or I'm just generally more available.
[27:39] Tara Bansal: Going to what you were talking about before, like in three to five years, making a change professionally, how do you think you're going to figure that out or what will help you with that? I just wondered if you.
[27:58] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, no, I think that's a great question. I think one will be like, feeling like I'm retiring to something. I've learned that from you. I think in the next couple of years, trying to figure out what that next chapter is going to look like. So I don't think I'll do anything until I feel prepared that I have something I feel good about moving towards. Like I said, whether that's charity work, whether that's another part time job, whether that's helping you with something. Who knows what it could look like. But, yeah, figuring that out, I think will help me kind of make that final thing final kind of step or retire, I guess. Just thinking about our money, too. Right? I think we have a pretty good sense of where we are. But three years from now, who knows what that's going to look like. So I think, obviously feeling comfortable about that piece will help us. And then I love the stuff we're doing right now with our financial planner just trying to also figure out, related to that, what our kind of spending patterns should look like. And I'm really in the top of my mind right now is this book that Sarah had me read called Die was Zero. But being able to also figure out how we want to enjoy ourselves and spend our money and time and know sooner rather than later, I think is an important thing for me, too.
[29:31] Tara Bansal: I view it as intentionally, but, yeah, not to put things off.
[29:36] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, exactly.
[29:38] Christina Donovan: The book die with zero, I mean, I know Tara's mentioned it to me, too. Do you want to just spend a minute saying what the premise takeaways.
[29:47] Nimit Bansal: Yeah. So the premise, and obviously, and I don't remember who's the author again? Do you remember?
[29:52] Tara Bansal: I don't.
[29:53] Nimit Bansal: Okay. Anyways, it's called die with zero. Yeah.
[29:56] Tara Bansal: We'll put it in the notes.
[29:59] Nimit Bansal: And his premise, he's trying to be provocative, obviously. So the title of the book is die with zero, which means that it's a waste, basically, to die with a lot of money left over. You should be trying to maximize your life's happiness and your life's experiences. And his premise is that, like life, happiness experiences is all about, like, memories. And so what you kind of die with is all of those memories of things. And so he would advocate for spending money sooner rather than later because you have your health and you can enjoy things probably better when you're younger than you can when you're older. And he feels like just through a lot of the research he's done, that people tend to, one, save up too much money for retirement and then realize once they're in retirement and they're in their, they don't have the health they had when they were younger. And they can't do the things either as well as they could have before, or they can't enjoy them as much as they would have before. So he's very much about you trying to switch that balance a little bit so that even if it feels uncomfortable, spend money on experiences that you'll be able to enjoy because you have your health and don't just keep working, working to generate all of this money and wealth that you're going to basically not be able to use later. He can take it to an extreme. I think in the book he does take certain things to extremes, but I think just that shift is an important lesson, at least for me, because I had been thinking about it that similar way, and there were some interesting things in there. I think the other thing is it's written a little bit for people who are pretty wealthy, because it's a lot about inheritance and stuff like that. So it's a little bit about if you're going to give money to charities or to your children, even, that you're better off in some ways giving it to them earlier, as opposed to waiting until you die. Because the average age of people dying, especially when you get to 53 or whatever, you're probably going to be in your whatever it is, 80, 85 before you may pass away. Your kids, by the time they would get that money, are pretty old. So there's certain lessons in there I just thought were interesting that Tara and I have been talking about.
[32:41] Christina Donovan: I mean, one of the things you talked about earlier, when Terry asked you about giving advice to your younger self, you talked about taking more risks. Do you feel like you are more of a risk taker now, or is that something that. Is that a goal, maybe even now, today, that you wish you took more risks and moving forward into older, middle aged, is that something you think about?
[33:12] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, a little bit. And I don't think I do a good job of that still. I think I am very safe. So, yeah, I think even trying new things, we've had this guitar sitting. I don't know if you can see it. Yeah, you can see the. I guess it was pre Covid. I took some guitar lessons, like, at the community, like just community high school or community college was giving lessons, but then I never kept doing it, and I never practiced enough and never took more lessons. So it's stuff like that. I don't know if I would call those risks, but it's just like, yeah, I would love to try new things.
[34:00] Christina Donovan: Outside your comfort zone.
[34:02] Nimit Bansal: Exactly.
[34:04] Christina Donovan: So if time or money was not an issue, what would you love to do?
[34:12] Nimit Bansal: I like traveling a lot, so I would love to travel. Like, I have a bucket list of things that I would love to seen. I'm a big tennis fan. I've seen two of the four grand slam tournaments. I've seen the US Open and the French Open. I'd love to go to Wimbledon. I'd love to go to the Australian Open. I'd love to do a safari. We've never done that. So, yeah, I think travel would be a cool thing to do. And then I'm trying to think if there's other stuff, to be honest, a lot of the other stuff I do. I do feel like we spend a decent amount of time with our kids and our family, and we go on some nice vacations, and so I don't feel like there's any big, I don't know, dreams or anything like that that I would love besides just, I do really enjoy traveling, so I think that.
[35:10] Tara Bansal: Would be fun if you were to volunteer or to find something to spend your time on besides travel. I guess I understand that. But is there anything else that comes to mind?
[35:26] Nimit Bansal: Think. You know, one of the places that seems interesting to me in terms of volunteering time is, and we've talked about this, too, is like the. I think the New Jersey Special Olympics is an interesting organization that I would love to learn more about and potentially dedicate some time and effort to. I just think that from what we've seen, we've gone to some of their events and we've gone to the Olympics, and I just feel like they do a really nice job, people we've talked to. I think that the organization is really well run, and they obviously are doing great work. And I love seeing kind of the smiling faces on the kids and the adults that are going through the program and going through all the athletics.
[36:15] Tara Bansal: And you love sports.
[36:17] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, it has a couple of things. Yeah, it has a couple of things together that I think would make it interesting and just rewarding for me in terms of dealing with sports and obviously helping people that are in need and how well run the organization is, the fact that it's local, there's just a lot of good things about it that I would be kind of interested in. So, yeah, I'd love to learn more about them.
[36:49] Tara Bansal: What are some of the life quakes? That's a term, but, like, major changes in your life that you've had, good or bad, that come to mind for you?
[37:07] Nimit Bansal: Yeah. I mean, obviously, going through my first marriage and divorce was a big quake. I'd say there was good times there, obviously. But I'd say in general, the learnings that I took from that first marriage and what I want out of my relationship and my partner and what was working and what wasn't working was just really good learnings for me, kind of going into another relationship. I would say that obviously, all of the important things that we've gone through, like our wedding day, the birth of our kids, a downer, obviously, was the stuff we had to go through when we had miscarriages. And obviously not having success with some of that was huge emotional downs. But learnings for us, I think, and helped us as a couple, which I thought, know, obviously a good learning. I have been lucky. I haven't gone through a ton of people very close to me who've passed away, like Tara and I talk about this all the time. We're really lucky that both sets of our parents are still alive. I would say, like, when Mrs. Spiker passed away, that was probably one of the closer people to me that passed away. That was hard.
[38:35] Tara Bansal: And tell everyone who Mrs. Spiker is.
[38:38] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, so Mrs. Spiker was our babysitter, so both my parents worked. They were both physicians, so Mrs. Spiker was our babysitter when Anita and I were growing up, but she was much more than that. She was know, almost like our grandmother in some ways, because all of our grandparents were in India and we didn't really get to see our grandparents. And so she was a very parental, loving figure who took care of us, and we spent more time with her in some respects when we were growing up. Not more time, but a decent amount of time with her growing up as we did with my parents. And so she was very instrumental for Anita and I in terms of just teaching us and being a great role model, and she was awesome and loving you. Yeah, exactly. And so, yeah, when she passed away, that was know, like losing a grandmother kind. Yeah, I would say that was obviously a little bit of a quake work wise. Work wise, yeah. Probably the biggest one is when I got let go at church and Dwight, and so I had spent 15 years there, and they went through a reorg, and I didn't make it through that. And so that was definitely a shocker because I had not been thinking about leaving or looking or any of that stuff. And so they were very good in terms of how they kind of helped me with that transition, in terms of, like, I think it ended up being like nine months. They put me in a new role, basically, and gave me nine months to look for a new job, so that helped out a lot. But, yeah, I think that was, like, definitely a shock and definitely, okay, I got to figure out, do I want to do the same thing? Do I want to do something different? And I did try, actually, after that, I tried some consulting work for a couple of years, but kind of found out that's not what I wanted to do. And so then kind of quickly came back into brand management. But, yeah, I think that without being prepared for it, you had to kind of relook at your career. So that was a biggie, too.
[41:00] Tara Bansal: And how do you feel like that affected you? Did it take you a while to recover?
[41:07] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, I think it did. I think for me, it just questioned my confidence. I was always a pretty confident person at work and felt like I was doing a good job, and so when that happened, I felt like it shook my confidence a little bit about how good of a marketer am I? How good of am I at this job? I think that's taken a while to come back. I think that I also, then, maybe rightly or not, kind of rethought about what do I want to do with the last, whatever it is, eight years of my career.
[41:43] Christina Donovan: What would you say your superpower is?
[41:47] Nimit Bansal: Hmm. That's a good question. I can usually put a smile on people's faces. I don't know if that's a superpower, but I. I think that's a superpower.
[42:04] Christina Donovan: I think that's definitely a superpower.
[42:06] Tara Bansal: That's one of the best ones I've heard.
[42:10] Nimit Bansal: Yeah. I'm a pretty look on the positive side, I think, person. And so if people are down or if people are struggling, I can usually make them feel better or try to make them think about the good as well as the bad.
[42:34] Tara Bansal: I agree with that. But I also think your superpower is people related.
[42:40] Christina Donovan: Like, you are very good with people.
[42:42] Tara Bansal: I think you care about people and try to help them as a mentor or developing. That's what I think is your superpower is just almost like, developing those around you and having that intention, but always coming at it with kindness.
[43:06] Nimit Bansal: That's very nice of you. You're biased. I am biased.
[43:11] Tara Bansal: I guess I'm a little biased.
[43:13] Christina Donovan: Not as much as Tara, and I can totally see why she's saying that, too.
[43:17] Nimit Bansal: Thank you. Yeah.
[43:19] Tara Bansal: I mean, and to me, it's funny, because I think you are super intelligent and analytical, and yet I think it's your people connecting and your people focus that an emotional intelligence that really stands out to me.
[43:40] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, we're very lucky. I mean, we have a good group of obviously great family support network. We have really good friends together and apart. Like, I think Tara has a really good group of friends that I'm not that close with. I have a really good group of friends that she's not that close with. But then we have a nice group of people that couples that we're both connected to, which is really nice. Yeah, we're very lucky, I think, with our kind of support network.
[44:08] Tara Bansal: What would you say legacy means to you? What impact do you want to have? Or how would you like to be remembered?
[44:22] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, it's a good question, I guess, in a couple of think. I can't remember if it was Tom Moran who said this in one of the previous ones, but I do think a big part of it is our kids. And I want my legacy to be that we set them up to be, like you said, independent and happy adults so that we did a nice job or as good of a job as we could in terms of teaching them and hopefully allowing them to prosper. So that will be part of my legacy and hopefully continuing to have strong relationships with both of them as they get older and be able to share with them and be able to enjoy all of our time together and see them grow and see them go through their life experiences. I think that will be really fun and something that I'm really excited to do. But then also just hopefully that will be like, part of our legacy is just being able to see them and see them being successful and happy and independent. And then I guess just the other thing is my friendship group is really important to me, too. So I think part of that is just continuing to be a good friend and continuing to have fun with our groups of friends and having their support, but then also supporting them as much as we can. I'm sure as we get older, that will look different, but I think that'll be an important thing as well. So, yeah, it's much more kind of relationship driven, I think, like family and friends and making sure that I'm just continuing to be a good supporter of the people that are important to me.
[46:16] Tara Bansal: I love that.
[46:18] Christina Donovan: Yeah, I love that, too.
[46:22] Tara Bansal: Any question we didn't ask that you wish we did or that you expected we would?
[46:31] Nimit Bansal: I don't think so, no. This is fun.
[46:39] Tara Bansal: What would you say is your favorite thing to do?
[46:45] Nimit Bansal: Oh, wow. That's a good one. I love going out to dinner with you. Not that I wouldn't say this if you weren't here, but I think one of them is like. I think we do a pretty good job of whatever it is, once every two weeks, probably the two of us going out to dinner and getting a babysitter and sitting at a bar somewhere. I love that. I love the time the four of us get to spend together. And I think, to me, it doesn't have to be on vacation. It could be like the four of us after dinner playing yuker or playing some game. I love that. But I do love when we're on vacation, and a lot of my memories of the four of us are at a beach somewhere or walking around a city, know something that we've done. The four of mean. I know you don't get to take a part in this because you're not a skier, but I really do love when Nathan and Alex and I are on the slopes and skiing, because it's like one of the few times I have the two of them to myself and we're doing something that they really love, I like, they love. So it's kind of fun to see that and fun to be able to do something like that, all of us together.
[48:02] Tara Bansal: But did you used to? I thought you loved.
[48:05] Nimit Bansal: Did. Yeah, I did. We just didn't do it that, like, even when we lived in Pittsburgh, I never had, like, a season pass to seven springs or anything, like, know, which is a place near Pittsburgh, so I don't feel like I skied a ton. I did enjoy, but was that something.
[48:24] Christina Donovan: You ever did with your.
[48:27] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, yeah. So we would go out west some. My dad didn't, but my mom would take Anita and I, and she'd be going with some work people. So she had some people she was with as well. So, yeah, we did that some. And then I took trips with our high school friends probably for like, four or five years. We went to different places and went skiing. But besides those trips out west, I didn't ski that much. Other than that, I really enjoyed it and I still enjoy it, but I don't think I have, like, you can see the love that Nathan and Alex have for it. They really, really enjoy it. Which is.
[49:10] Christina Donovan: Mean you actively do regularly golf, tennis and skiing. I mean, how would you rank them?
[49:17] Nimit Bansal: Oh, gosh. Probably from, like, an addictive personality. Not personality from an addictive standpoint. Probably the golf.
[49:24] Christina Donovan: Yeah. And then tennis and then skiing.
[49:27] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, probably golf.
[49:29] Tara Bansal: Just enjoyment wise, that's how you would.
[49:32] Nimit Bansal: Okay, yeah, probably golf, then tennis, then skiing.
[49:35] Christina Donovan: Although I know. I don't know. I don't play golf, but my husband does. And I do know there's the social component of golf that I think he enjoys as much as the actual skill.
[49:50] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, totally. I have a good group of small but good group of guys that I play with at our place. So that's really fun. I love playing with Nathan. Nathan's starting to play golf, so that's fun. And a lot of times Alex will come along and be fun and not necessarily play, but hang out with, um, yeah, I'd say golf probably first, and then tennis and then skiing, but I enjoy them.
[50:13] Christina Donovan: Yeah, you're, you're very active. Your family is very active.
[50:20] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, it's funny. Tara and I talk. Yeah, well, also, Tara and I talk about this. Some of the things that Tara loves to do, I don't love to do, and vice versa. So I think that there's a balancing act where Tara's favorite things in the world, I think, are to go hiking and take walks and things like that, and I'm happy to do that, but it's not like a passion. And same thing, like, if I'm out playing tennis or golfing or skiing, either she will not be with us, or she'll suck it up and just walk with us or whatever, but just to be together. So we talk a little bit about that.
[50:57] Christina Donovan: I don't think that's a bad thing, though.
[51:00] Nimit Bansal: No, I think it's okay.
[51:01] Christina Donovan: As long as you have other people that you can do those things with, I think it's good to have time guess.
[51:10] Nimit Bansal: Yeah. No, I don't disagree. I do think, um. I don't know. It'd also be fun. I think it's totally fine. But I think it would be fun if Tara liked skiing or liked playing tennis more than we would have something that all of us could do. And same thing with hiking, which we do, but I don't think we have the passion for it that even the kids, I don't think, have the passion for it that you do.
[51:36] Christina Donovan: Yeah.
[51:37] Tara Bansal: I think hiking is the thing we do the least and, like, the least as a family. When you think of messy middle essence, what comes to mind?
[51:52] Nimit Bansal: Yeah. I mean, I think every person's messy middle essence is unique. I think that, for me, it's a lot about the age of our kids, and our age, to me, is messy. And so having to. And I guess it comes down to a little bit about just, like, how healthy are we going to be as our kids grow up so that we can enjoy the things we want to enjoy with them for as long as we can. And just being in a different place than our friends, I think that's the part that, for us, is a little messy, or, for me, is a little messy. Right. Like, not having some of the freedoms that some of the people our age do in terms of time and being able to just have some of that freedom. I think that's probably the hardest part for me.
[53:03] Christina Donovan: Well, you're a little out of step.
[53:06] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, exactly. And we are so lucky. Like, I wouldn't change anything in terms of how it all played out, but it puts us as 53 year olds in a different place than a lot of 53 year olds.
[53:20] Christina Donovan: Yeah.
[53:24] Tara Bansal: Anything else, Tina, that you can think of?
[53:26] Christina Donovan: No. This has been a lot of fun. I don't know. It's so interesting to interview people that you know, because I learned a lot. I don't know. Yeah, me too.
[53:37] Tara Bansal: And I'm married to them. Well, and I have to say, divot. Like, thank you for being so open and sharing as much as you did.
[53:47] Nimit Bansal: Yeah, no, I really had a lot of fun. You guys ask good questions. Even the questions I know that are coming, they're still good questions.
[53:55] Christina Donovan: Well, you're very insightful and very thoughtful with your answers. It was a joy.
[54:02] Nimit Bansal: You guys are doing such a good job with this. So I applaud you guys for kind of stepping out of your guys comfort zone and doing something that you have a lot of passion for. I learned a lot from Tara and from eutine, just being able to do things that you guys are excited about that you're not comfortable doing. And so Tara always pushes me. And so I think this is a good example of what you guys are doing here. So I love it.
[54:27] Christina Donovan: Thank you. Thank you.
[54:28] Nimit Bansal: All right.
[54:30] Tara Bansal: Yes, I am biased, yet I don't think that changes the fact of what a wonderful person my husband is. I wanted to share a funny story related to Nimitz table tennis ability. Back in the day, we used to have ping pong tournaments at my parents house when we got together for the holidays. My brother told this story at Nimmett's 50th birthday about how pleased he was with himself when one time he almost beat Nimit at ping pong. And Nimit didn't say anything, but he just quietly moved his paddle to his dominant hand and then went on to beat him easily. And my brother was just crushed when he realized that he was playing his best and Nimit was playing with not even his good hand. Nimit made it to nationals and may even knowing him, been a national table tennis champion when he was felt. I had to share that story because, one, it's an indicative of who Nimit is and it just always makes most of us laugh in my family. For me, the key takeaway from this conversation was about how much people and relationships mean to Nimit. I know this and have known this, yet even I was surprised to hear him vocalize so clearly the importance of his friends and these relationships to him and his legacy. I expected him to mention his family, but hearing him point out his friends stood out to me. Nimit does make an effort for maintaining his friendships for him. I don't feel like it's a nice to have, it's a need to have, and he really prioritizes it and takes the action to make that happen. All the research shows that this is a big factor in happiness and longevity. I think Nimit's laid back and quiet, unassuming manner can give the impression almost that he doesn't care or isn't passionate.
[56:55] Tara Bansal: Yet he really is.
[56:57] Tara Bansal: He's passionate about supporting the people he loves and those he cares about. He is very competitive and has shifted what success means in his life away from moving up the corporate ladder in his career to his relationships. He makes things look easy, yet he takes action to prioritize people and his friends. I'm so grateful to have him as my best friend, partner and the father to our children. Nimit was concerned that his interview was not interesting enough. I think there was a lot to learn from our discussion, and I love the focus on knowing what matters to you and enjoying and appreciating the people in your life.
[57:44] Tara Bansal: For show notes and other information about our podcast, please go to our website, messymiddlescence.com. If you enjoyed listening, please share with others and come back for more.
[58:00] Christina Donovan: And here's a quote from Greta Gerwig. “You keep learning how to let go and how to live the life that you actually have, as opposed to the life you thought you were going to have. “
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Die With Zero: Getting All You Can from Your Money and Your Life by Bill Perkins