Living life with less

I have had some amazing experiences so far at SXSW. It hasn't really been what I anticipated but that's ok. What it has ended up teaching me about is being happy with what you're doing with life. I heard about two zen digital nomads yesterday Erica O'Grady and Julia Allison who have no permanent address to call home. What courage they had to give away nearly all of their possessions and rely on friends, friends of friends and even strangers sometimes to provide shelter. As it relates to work, they found that they worked longer and harder because they were happier with doing away with trivial distractions. Their stories were both inspiring and interesting. A statement that really hit home with me was, 'you don't choose a life, you live one.'

Three authors I heard today, Eve Blossom - Material Change, Erika Napoletano - The Power of Unpopular and Dinah Sanders - More Life, Less Stuff all had some similar themes. For business, they recommend branding with less, proven products and services and stepping outside the box.

Eve spoke about helping startup textile companies with women in Asia and India. Her primary goal is to keep them from being forced into sex trafficking. Dinah said 'innovation is seeing problems in a new way and finding new ways to solve them.'

Erika talked about her book The Power of Unpopular. She said 'the popular kids are followers, unpopular kids start up something new. It's time to challenge what you think unpopular
means.'. She says the keys to success for a company are Personality, Approachability, Sharability, Scalability and Profitability.

Dinah suggests we let go of everything that doesn't make your life awesome. Her principles include: 1. Decide and do - acknowledge and act. 2. Quality over quantity - buy less and buy better, including time. 3. Perpetual upgrade - frequent action in a direction. Her 80/20 rule was described as '...it's easy to keep true to your important things by spending more time at the bottom of your to-do list. My favorite quote came from her in regard to sharing in social media. She said: 'just because you're friends doesn't mean you have to read every electronic output.'

Perhaps my favorite session was 'The Making of the Modern Office' this morning. The panel consisted of a moderator and three female panelists from smaller startup companies. They had great stories of interesting incentives and fun ideas for the workplace. This was everything from telecommuting, flex time, bringing dogs to work, wii gaming, massages and Friday lunches among other things. They all said when selecting employees they made sure the potentials had a strong work ethic and that they would be a good fit with the culture of their company. Since the employees are working long hours they need time to recharge. They said a new way for executives to lead is to 'be out in front of people any time, any day not just at an all-hands meeting. A profound thought shared was 'you shouldn't have to motivate people, you should create a motivating environment.'

Well, I'm off for one last session for the day. Signing off from a now beautiful and sunny Austin! Have a great day!