Hello and welcome,
First and foremost I consider myself a student of life. An autodidact dedicated to making a meaningful contribution and empowering others to do the same.
When it comes to giving advice and sharing my experiences, I think Derek Sivers sums it up beautifully..
“My approach is just one way, and I could argue against it as well. I’m pretty unconventional so what works for me might not work for others. Enough people thought that the stories and philosophies that I developed from my experiences were worth sharing, so here we are."
I was born in London and moved from Paris to the Bay Area at 4 yrs old.
I exhibited entrepreneurial tendencies from a young age. Music was always a passion and a priority. I was either listening to it or making it by any means necessary.
At 11 years old I sold $10,000 worth of rugs in my mom's shop. As per our agreement I got a 10% commission. I liked that. At around 12 years old I got a guitar and obsessively memorized Metallica and Slayer riffs. A little later at 15 years old I got some turntables, and stood over them for countless hours mixing and cutting records. Little did I know I was in the process of putting in my 10,000 hours and teaching myself how to edit, program, and produce music.
The only thing I liked about High School was English and Art class. I got my equivelancy and took some college courses "a la carte." I studied subjects I was interested in. I followed my passion. After a long line of remedial jobs (many of which I enjoyed tremendously) I landed a tech support job with a local internet provider helping people get online. Within a few months I taught myself how to program and design websites for that same company. Then I went freelance.
I did a brief stint in Athens Greece and lived in Paris and Spain for awhile. Then my brother in law propositioned me to start a web design and development company back in the US. I went for it. We were successful. Then I started my own web development company.
All the while, I had been continuing to produce music for various bands and artists. By this time my own band had played at Red Rocks Amphitheater twice and we’d opened up for many of my heroes.
Then a Creative Director at an ad agency asked me to write some music for an Audi commercial. In that moment, I had supreme clarity. This is what I was going to do. Opportunity met preparation and I made a choice to put everything I had into launching my company Dynamite Laser Beam, which provides Strategic Music and Sound Design services for leading brands.
I’m also involved in a couple of other startups which I’ll be talking more about very soon.
After spending years building up Dynamite Laser Beam and acheiving a certain level of success that I had been striving for, I still felt something was missing. There was another adventure to be had.
I surrendered it all and started with a blank canvas. I’ve began exploring and testing methods to design a paradigm that supported my ideal lifestyle, rather than relying on default societal constructs.
I streamlined my life and business and asked myself what was important. How did I want to spend my precious remaining life force? What would be my meaningful contribution?
I came up with some fundamentals: travel, variety, exploring, connecting with different people, having more freedom, living the adventure….
That’s when I decided to design MY ideal lifestyle, ditch the single residence paradigm and spend a year on Airbnb, traveling, exploring, collaborating and sampling different cultures.
I believe we cannot evolve by sticking to the well-trampled avenues of humanity. We need to reach a little further and explore the untrodden paths, and perhaps that will lead us to some sacred ground where we can lead others to find empowerment and inspiration.
The aim of this project is to help others to find freedom by leveraging modern tools and platforms, and empower ourselves and others to consciously design a lifestyle which supports our deepest contribution.
Welcome to the adventure, my friend. I hope to see you out there…
CE