Adii Rockstar

So following up on this tweet about my upcoming international travels, I have to say that there’s only two words to describe my current emotion: surreal & blessed.

At the beginning of the year I set myself the goal of speaking at, at least 3 international conferences. Up until now I’ve spoken at:

• DIBI, Newcastle
• NetProphet, Cape Town (local, but international in quality & size)
• EECI2010, San Francisco

I will however soon add the following conferences to this list:

• SchnitzelConf, Vienna (September 2010)
• WordCampNL, Utrecht (November 2010)
• TBA, Las Vegas (December 2010)

Couple that with the fact that I’ll also be visiting Corfu (Greece), London, Barcelona, Madrid & Lisbon on honeymoon with Jeanne in October and you’ve got yourself a jet setting line-up there.

So I’m being paid to see some amazing cities across the globe and I’ve far exceeded my goal of 3 international conferences, which really is a surreal experience (considering that there are awesome people that want to pay me to hear me speaking). Consider this as a thanks to all of you that have in any way made this possible! :)

Recently I’ve been pretty addicted to running (which isn’t this type of “business” addiction that I normally exercise) and I can’t get enough it. I completed my second half marathon over the weekend and since I’ve started running at the beginning of this year, I’ve been a much healthier & happier person.

Anyone else experience how such a change just has a knock-on, positive effect on other aspects of one’s life?

I’ve often wondered whether anyone else considered why I would be involved with a charity such as The Rockstar Foundation, as perhaps the business / entrepreneur persona versus the charitable / giving persona weren’t as obviously aligned. So I figured that I’d share a few reasons for my (personal) involvement in the Foundation…

1. I have an absolute passion for kids and helping out kids that are talented, are willing to work extremely hard & as a result have the ability to become the leaders & game-changers of tomorrow.
2. Every time I get to see Mariana & Okuhle (this doesn’t happen often), my faith & investment in the Foundation gets confirmed. I love these two, amazing girls to bits and since joining the Foundation they’ve done incredible work.
3. South Africa is an amazing place, but the country needs every little bit of help it can get to eradicate the not-so-great things. I believe that education is a great way of enabling a better future for all South Africans, which is why we are targeting such talented girls to be history makers going forward.
4. I’ve been incredibly blessed as an entrepreneur & as an individual. I have so many great things going for me in my life (on all levels) and the Foundation is a way of giving back and saying thanks for all the privileges that I have been allowed thus far.
5. I also share the exact same passion, ambition & drive for the Foundation as I do with my business ventures. For me, the Foundation also represents a challenge & a massive learning curve; both which I love embracing as I continue to evolve & develop as an individual & entrepreneur.

In the past couple of weeks, I’ve really been bogged down by what I consider to be a biggish to-do list. I don’t think that I’m unique in this and most of you too would have similar or even bigger to do lists.

My advice for getting through those to do lists? Just pick on item and handle them one at a time.

Whilst that may sound silly, I realized recently that it doesn’t help to get stressed about the things that just never disappear of the list. Instead, I wake up every morning, get to the office and simply pick the thing that jumps at out me from the list and handle that. When done, I just move onto the next one.

So whilst this may be the most stupid GTD / productivity tip you have ever heard, just consider that sitting around, trying to plan and trying to prioritize your to do list, only means that they keep piling up…