Live Life Love | Volume Twenty-Six

Hello Everyone,

I hope your 2014 is off to a great start. Mine has been a bit of a wild ride (the governor even had to get involved), but wild rides are for the most part fun. Digital health and wellness is about to explode and after years of hard work preparing and getting ready for this trend to takeoff I’m well-positioned to make my mark. This is also true for so many Live Life Love alums in their respective areas. After modest beginnings of getting the start-up WaNeLo off the ground Deena Varshavskaya was just added to the Board of Directors at Wet Seal. After years of waiting for the mass market to accept augmented reality, Matt Szymczyk is now seeing the fruits of his labor through interest from major brands. And although I’ve mentioned Dr. Gervais’ professional progress before, he’s reached new highs now being credited as a significant factor regarding the Seattle Seahawk’s Super Bowl win. I am humbled to have had early access to these thought leaders, to have learned from them as well as all that have participated in this project. Each quarter’s opportunities manifest in unique and magnificent ways. This quarter was no exception.

Health and Wellness: This quarter I had the unique opportunity to meet with seven employees of the Apple App Store to specifically discuss the Health & Fitness and Medical sections of Apple’s app marketplace. Notes from my interview with Apple about mobile health and fitness apps can be found here.

Entrepreneurship: Neville Medhora (AKA Nev) is the trusted sidekick of Noah Kagan. The two joined forces to create the entrepreneurial marketplace AppSumo. Nev is known for being a bit of a character and shares some interesting ideas about creating a start-up (he believes most people who start businesses tend to be wantrepreneurs) as well as his thoughts on creating good marketing copy. My interview with Neville Medhora about wantrepreneurs and copywriting can be found here.

Life Experience: Playing off the “wild ride” theme, this quarter’s life experience was attending the Land Rover driving school at Quail Lodge in Carmel Valley. I took an off-road course in a brand new Land Rover LR4. Hard to put into words how awesome this vehicle is so the best I can do is show you a little clip from the experience.

Next quarter I am determined to knock off another World Wonder, but for the 2014 fall quarter my life experience mission is to try the top four beers in the United States. Number three and number four, Pliny The Younger and Pliny The Elder (respectively), should be easy to come by because their brewery is in my backyard, but Heady Topper (number one) from Vermont is extremely hard to get outside of the state. A six month challenge to complete this mission has been set, and any help achieving this experience is welcomed. I look forward to seeing how I can pull my network together to make this happen (and hopefully enjoy some good beer with a few of you in the process).

Contribution: This quarter I contributed to several charities I’ve previously provided donations to, and also made a donation to March for Babies in the memory of Ryan Ahdan.

Wow! You read the whole thing. Thank you so much for taking the time. I’m a firm believer in reciprocity so if there’s anything I can do for you in return please let me know.

Warm regards,
Michael