What I'm up to (updated on March 15th, 2020)
Hi again! I haven't really updated this page as much as I wanted last year, so from now on I'll update it every fortnight.
Current location & travels
Right now, I am confined at home due to the nation-wide emergency state.
Last year was pretty heavy, travel-wise, for me. I had to travel for work quite often, visiting for the first time Scotland, Armenia, Sweden and Denmark. Other trips took me to San Francisco, NYC (x2), Oslo, Lisbon, Porto, Berlin, Menorca, Bilbao, Vienna, Amsterdam and I completed one of my dream trips: a roadtrip around the beautiful island of Crete (read more about it here).
In May, I started going one week per month to Madrid for work. We're opening business there, so I need to be on the ground and get to know people on a regular basis. I'm enjoying this part of my job very much.
You can cross paths with me quite easily. I share all my trips using Nomadlist. While in Barcelona, you can book me for a quick call or for office hours on Wednesdays at Spaces 22@ (C/Pallars 193, 08005, Barcelona).
I live in Barcelona - everybody's favourite city in the world - and I spend less than 50% of my time there. I mostly travel for leisure because I can work while on the go (perks of having an all-remote company like MarsBased) but I also travel for business more often now. We don't need our clients to come to Barcelona, and they don't require us to go to their offices, wherever they are. We do everything remotely, as we're 100% oficeless.
This year looks pretty exciting too (when and if they will lift the travel ban), when it comes to travelling. I will be visiting a few new places, like Mexico (got a wedding there in the summer) and hopefully I'll get to see 2-3 new countries I haven't visited before. Other countries I'd like to visit soon are Montenegro and Kosovo and maybe the Baltics.
Regarding festivals, I'm always down for travelling to a festival, especially if it's in a place I've never been before, so hit me up if you want to go to any rock/punk/metal festival together!
Goals
2019 was a transition year, for me. I have become a person of habits. I am using everyday.app to track me, and I've written this post explaining my habits and how well/bad have I performed in each of them.
In 2020, I want to add a couple of new items to my habits list:
- Write a piece of content every day.
- Read 30 minutes every day.
- Work out every day.
- Write a post on LinkedIn every working day.
- Push some code to Github every day.
- Get rid of an object every day.
- Study languages every day. 🆕
- Play guitar every day. 🆕
Additionally, I'd like to add the following two goals to my list of things to accomplish: move to a new flat and lose 15kgs.
Side projects & interests
2019 wasn't a great year for side projects. I have literally spent 0 minutes in side projects, as I've been more focused on getting habits right and writing my first book.
In general terms, I am getting more and more into investing and M&A. This is because I am doing business development for my company, so I get to know a lot of people and therefore a lot of deals. One of my goals this year is to grow my network of investors, brokers and companies that normally acquire startups, and cultivate a good relationship with them.
This way, I will not only find out about interesting deals for me to invest, as far as startups are concerned, but I will be able to help my clients at MarsBased, our partners and also the Startup Grind Barcelona community, including our sponsors and providers as well.
So far, I have invested in Kantox, Consentio, Mailtrack, Hireflix, Globatalent, Vocdoni, Upstock and four other companies. I plan to become a full-time investor someday!
If you've got an interesting project, let's talk. I'd love to help out, even though my maximum ticket is 5k euro. I like helping the startups I invest in by giving them clients through my personal network.
As for non-work side projects, I'd love to start a band this year. I've had a bunch during all these years, but I feel like I've never committed 100% to any of them. I also want to be as fluent as possible in Greek by the end of the year and improve my German.
What am I working on?
At MarsBased, since we're always booked up for the next four to six months, I am working to get us more press and to get to speak in bigger events and podcasts this year, whilst growing the company on the content side.
Since the company is really stable on sales, I can concentrate on enabling the rest of our company to do their best. I am also getting some consulting projects, which allow me to bring extra money into the company.
As for Startup Grind Barcelona, we have been forced to cancel our annual conference and to move our monthly events to online. Sucks, but people before business.
Last, but not least, I will be promoting a bit more my first book. Here you can find it on Amazon here.
Food, drinks and such
In 2019 I've overeaten in excess. Indulging in too many social events and celebrations, I've really missed any regularity in healthy eating habits and I've gone up to 90kgs, my maximum weight ever, for the second time in my life. This time, however, I'm much more in shape, as I've built up a considerable increase of muscular mass.
Since I didn't take any action to correct course in 2019, I will have to do it this year. I've already done some change in mentality and taken the first actions.
Last year, I didn't do as much cardio as I used to do (mostly running) and have done more weight-lifting, and I think this has played a role in the change of my body shape. That, and beer.
Like in the previous years, I am getting more and more into sub-genres of Black Metal. I was always a Black Metal person, but now I'm pretty hooked on Depressive Black Metal and Raw Black Metal. It's a kind of music I don't get tired of.
Random trivia
I'm on a 33-book reading challenge on Goodreads. I do this every year to force myself to read outside of the computer screen. I do read on my Kindle, though, as I only like paper books for decoration purposes. I find them uncomfortable to read in bed.
Last year, I read 33 out of 32 books. I am trying to read my age in books every year. It'll be a challenge, but for when it becomes ridiculously difficult, I plan to work less and have more time to read.
In 2019, I only got one tattoo. I want to resume this year, and get, first and foremost, a David Bowie tattoo. It'll be the German chorus of Heroes.
If you know me, you know that I am a huge music fan, and I can't conceive my life without music. I'd say I listen to music to most of the time I'm awake. I also go to one or two concerts per week. I like to contribute to the concert-goers scene by submitting the setlists of the concerts I attend to Setlist.fm.
