Dear Friend,
Some weeks ago I came across this remarkable author on Medium, Umair Haque - a former economy & innovation journalist, the most popular writer at Harvard Business Review. A couple of years ago Umair was going through a near death experience, until his girlfriend helped him discover his rare genetic condition, when light causes him organ failure. I encourage you to read his touching story here. Since then he had become a life coach and a writer on Love, Awareness and Psychology. Reading his articles feels absolutely therapeutic, inspirational and raises a lot of questions in me. I hope you will feel the same when you check out his work.
In my previous newsletter I highlighted the issue of self-justification, and now as a logical next step I'd like to help us learn how to accept the truth. Umair simply describes acceptance in this article: "Acceptance is really just awareness of what is, without the distortions of what we want to believe." Once we see and agree with what is real - however hard it may be - that means we have finally accepted it. And only then we can let go of what was hurtful and harmful to us, simply by choosing to no longer welcoming those things into our lives and staying away from disruptive thoughts, words, actions, events and people. It is not always easy to accept unpleasant situations, but we get stronger each time we do it as we have no choice but to move forward. "Every moment of acceptance is a spark that illuminates our paths."
... and here's the illuminated path to my newsletter:
News Digest:
- How Echo Look Could Feed Amazon’s Big Data Fuelled Fashion Ambitions - Tech Crunch
- Why retailers are trying on showrooms - Retail Dive
- Tech Tackles the Fitting Room - Racked
- The labs, designers and startups making smart fabrics a reality in 2017 - Wearable
- PSFK Conference Interview: The Key To Wearable Tech Is Not To Focus On The Tech - PSFK
- In Retail, AR is for Shoppers and VR is for Business - Forbes
- The Robots Are Coming for Your Wardrobe - Fast Company
Events:
Tuesday, May 9th
6:30pm First 100K Subscribers - Startups & Email Marketing
Learn about email marketing for a start up with Ben Hindman (Founder, Splash), Marah LIdey (Founder, Shinetext), Vivek Sharma (Founder, Movable Ink), Kevin Kao (Sr Email Marketing Mgr, NY Times). Price: $8 Location: Knotel Bryant, 22 W 38th St, 4th Fl
7:00pm NY Tech Meetup (& Afterparty) - Creative Tech
This month this largest tech meetup is partnering with Creative Tech Week to showcase a select few of their featured experts showing us the latest technologies being put to creative use. Price: $10 Location: NYU Skirball center, 566 LaGuardia Place at Washington Square
Wednesday, May 10th
9:00am - 5:00pm Founders @ Build
Founders @ Build is a special, invite only event for founders by founders. The day will be full of insightful, engaging and intimate conversations with those that paved the way creating and defining their businesses. Learn how founders and heads of product tackle the tough issues of building a Startup. Price: Free Location: Rise NYC, 43 W 23rd St, 2nd Fl
Saying the right thing the right way can make the difference between sealing the deal or losing the account, getting a promotion, or getting a pink slip. It’s essential to be pitch perfect—to get the right message across to the right person at the right time. You'll hear from Bill McGowan is the Founder and CEO of Clarity Media Group, a public speaking expert and the author of Pitch Perfect. Price: Free Location: General Assembly, 902 Broadway, 4th Floor
6:30pm Startup Talk - RetailTech, FashionTech, eCommerce
Andrea Wasserman, the founder of Box the Party will talk on the future of traditional retail in the face of e-commerce, strategy and future of content marketing + social media strategy, etc. Price: Free Location: Byte Academy 295 Madison Ave, Fl 35
Thursday, May 11th
6:30 - 8:30pm The Edge Of Innovation
Join GA for a series of intimate fireside chats, exploring how innovation has fundamentally changed traditional fields like advertising, journalism, music, and finance — and what they expect to see in the next five years. With Alex Poon COO & Founder, x.ai. Price: Free Location: General Assembly, 902 Broadway, 4th Floor
7:00pm SPECTRUM: Parsons MFADT Class of 2017 Thesis Show
SPECTRUM is the 2017 Parsons MFA Design + Technology annual thesis show, and will showcase nearly 100 projects by emerging artists, designers, coders, makers, hackers, educators, thinkers, and tinkerers. MFADT thesis projects will appear in exhibit, interactive demos, symposium, and performances. Price: Free Location: Parsons New School of Design, 6 E 16th St, 12th Fl Studio
Saturday, May 13th
12:00 - 7:00pm Stronger Together: Exhibition of Tech Art, Maker Workshops and Electronic Music Performances
Stronger Together is an exhibition featuring software and electronic art by faculty and alumni of computer art departments of nine area universities, and includes a selection of electronic music performances and free Maker workshops teaching 3D printing and modeling as well as DIY electronics assembly and programming. Price: Free Location: Knockdown Center 52-19 Flushing Ave, Queens
Tuesday, May 16th
5:00 - 9:00pm NYU ITP Spring 2017 Show
2-day exhibition of creative interactive projects by grad students of NYU ITP. Price: Free Location: Tisch School of Arts @ NYU, 721 Broadway, 4th Fl
5:00pm The Future is Cognitive
With Chris Luebkeman (Global Director, Arup Foresight), Kevin Schawinski, (Swiss Astrophysicist), Pascal Kaufmann (Founder, Starmind Int'l AG), Georg Polzer (Founder, Teralytics), Chris Wiggins (Professor of Applied Math, Columbia University), Ce Zhang (Asst Professor, ETH Zurich). Price: Free Location: National Sawdust, 80 N 6th St, Brooklyn
Wednesday, May 17th
5:00 - 10:00pm Mixed Reality Party
A cocktail party with extraordinary interactive experiences – Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, interactive projection, electronic instruments, sensors, and other cool responsive technologies both experimental and profitable. Price: $15 Location: Microsoft Reactor at Grand Central Tech, 335 Madison Avenue, 4th Floor
Thursday, May 18th
8:00am Propelify Innovation Conference
Learn from amazing speakers, connect with startups and investors, hire and be hired. Plus virtual reality, drones, music, and a startup competition with Techstars and Samsung NEXT. Price: $58 Location: Hoboken Waterfront
6:00pm Artificial Intelligence - Redefining How We Live, Work, & Play
With Daniel Beringer (Sr. Director, SAP), Megan Berry (Head of Product, Octane.ai), Alex Capecelatro (CEO, Josh.ai), Michael Witbrock (IBM Research). Price: $20 Location: SAP Innovation Space, 10 Hudson Yards, 48th Fl
6:30 - 8:30pm The Art Of Illusion - Success Strategies From A Professional Magician
As a magician and New York Times crossword constructor, David Kwong mixes puzzles and illusion. In this talk, he will share these principles and describe the psychological research behind them, illustrating them through his own work as a magician and applying them to the realms of business, communication, creativity, and areas of high performance. Price: Free Location: General Assembly, 902 Broadway, 4th Floor
Saturday, May 20th - Sunday, May 21st
Two Roboticists from Google X. The Head of VR and Game Design at IBM Research. The Creative Director of Virtual Reality at Viacom NEXT. Producers and Creative Directors from cutting edge experience designers Pearl Media, Future Colossal, and Local Projects. Computer Vision and Natural Language Processing AI from Microsoft. Building Mixed Reality Experiences for Hololens. Virtual journeys in Google Expeditions with Cardboard. Tips for great Data Visualization and Storytelling. How to win the premier global prize in digital art. Price: $35 – $100 Location: NYIT Auditorium on Broadway,1871 Broadway
Wednesday, May 24th
6:30 - 8:30pm Gaming, Going Viral, And Getting It Done
Through the success of their video game, Andy and Sophie received unprecedented access to some of the biggest start-ups and tech companies. Now they’re sharing what they’ve seen and how women are taking the tech industry by storm. Price: Free Location: General Assembly, 902 Broadway, 4th Floor
Thursday, May 25th
6:30 - 9:00pm Chatbots: More Than Hype
You'll find out how to create your own chatbot, best practices in chatbot creation, and how to leverage chatbots to in order to improve your brands, websites, apps, and overall marketing strategy. Price: $10 Location: General Assembly, 902 Broadway, 4th Floor
Cool Finds:
- Mental Models -The Best Way to Make Intelligent Decisions
- The Boring Company - Elon Musk's new company, creating tunnels for traffic
- SpreadShare - Explore community-curated spreadsheets.
- 5 to 9 Podcast episode with Michelle Poler, Creator of 100DaysWithoutFear.
Stay Inspired,
Nataliya