Meet Josh Almeida

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Josh Almeida. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Josh below.

Josh, so many exciting things to discuss, we can’t wait. Thanks for joining us and we appreciate you sharing your wisdom with our readers. So, maybe we can start by discussing optimism and where your optimism comes from?

What a great question!! Living a life powered by optimism is a thoughtful practice. It’s something that you decide within yourself and have to choose to keep returning to, even when the darkness starts covering up the light. That’s when optimism is the most important.

I was raised in a family that had all the drive in the world and inspired me to create my own company as well. I was lucky enough to see all their hard work turn into amazing success, even if it took a few failures to get there. They taught me that failure is often just a teachable moment, not a projection of the rest of your life. You try, you fail, you mourn, dust yourself off, and get back into the arena. Don’t get stuck in a moment, it’s all part of the adventure of life.

The way I practice optimism in my every day is to remind myself that life is about expansion, expansion of yourself and the people around you. Life is always inviting you to step up, to push yourself to the next level. Life is a gift but requires you to step into the game of it. Seeing the meaning of it all and understanding that failure is just part of the whole life thing, it becomes easy to see the light and love within it all. It’s all just growth that’s making me better. So staying optimistic and grateful for everything becomes easy. When all of that fails, I get a milk shake and I’m happy again!

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

LARGE SCALE ART!! Sorry, I didn’t mean to yell at you, I’m just excited! My passion and drive in this life is to create massive urban artworks that are free to the public. Playing with scale and people’s senses. I love designing spaces that are interesting enough that you remove people from their everyday worries and into a new world.

With my team of epic people who also happen to be creatives and engineers, we’ve been honored to work with many types of brands to create all types of things. We’ve designed artwork for cities, massive audio video systems for resorts, made an award-winning app, and designed an art park. We’re all over the map in our mad skills, haha. Ascend’s drive is to create thoughtful experiences utilizing with technology to add more beauity into this world.

So if you are a developer looking for a beautiful work of art as the centerpiece of your latest project, a high-end hotel that wants the perfect vibe for your guests, a place of worship looking to attract new followers, or someone that’s creating something fun and exciting, Ascend is your team. We bring not only the creative goodness but techie knowledge to pull it off.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

Don’t Learn All Things!! Partner / hire people who are better at things than you are. The reason you started your venture is because of your passion, don’t get lost in the parts that take months to master and take you away from your drive. If that doesn’t feel like an option for you at this moment, then watch YouTube to learn enough to just keep moving,

Keep Moving!!
-Starting a venture is like nothing else in life. Starting my company 13 years ago changed everything. It changed who I am, and how I see the world and people. It’s a struggle that I’ve become addicted to. You will fail, it will feel all lost, and you’ll be looking at an overdraft account feeling like it’s done. They were right, you were crazy to do this… Then you get yourself a milkshake and say “This world is mine, this is supposed to work, it will work and it’s all part of the process” and you keep moving. You will hit many stopping points, I like to think of them as levels in a game. The more you beat, the cooler the game becomes. You got this!!

Self Work is the Key!!
-How can you lead people and earn clients’ trust with their money if you don’t know who you are? Being in the arena for so long, I’ve learned that self-care and self-work are key. As a founder, you hold the pressures of not only your life but everyone else who’s counting on you within your venture. It’s a lot!! It’s easy to get lost in it all and forget to care for yourself. Make self-care a big priority because like the airlines say, “Put the mask on yourself, then help the person next to you”. If we lose you, we lose it all. Did someone say spa day?

Any advice for folks feeling overwhelmed?

If you’re doing it right, you should always feel a bit overwhelmed. It means you’re pushing. So get comfy with the “holy hell, how can I do all these things?!” feeling. Make a list, and right out each task, sometimes just the act of writing them down makes them feel like smaller tasks in your mind. The mind loves running wild with stories about how things are impossible.

Once you have your list, start organizing things in a way that makes sense for your project. Some people find doing some of the easier items first gets you moving and then creates the moment you’ll need to carry through the harder tasks. Others like to get the biggest, most intimidating tasks out of the way first. Who are you?

Then work your list. Every time you cross an item off take a moment to celebrate the win. It’s easy to move too fast and forget all the amazing things you pulled off along the way and only see the next big task in front of you. Take a beat, turn up the music, and have a dance!

Being overwhelmed is part of it, honor that and don’t run from it. Make a plan and complete a task, dance, and start next task. *Repeat as much as necessary & keep the milk shakes coming!!

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