One of my good friends shared this video with me via Facebook last week and I certainly appreciate it! Robert Greene who is the author of a number of bestselling books including: The 48 Laws of Power and The Art of Seduction opens up to Brian Rose and Nic Gabriel for London Real regarding his thoughts on a variety of topics.
Here are some key takeaway points:
“Organization is a high level skill. Organizing your thoughts and surroundings is strategy at it’s highest level and it also requires creativity.” – Robert Greene (32:34)
“Young people are often too in a hurry to make it.” – Robert Greene (42:00)
“There’s no upside in escalating aggression with aggression.” – Brian Rose (48:37)
Hope you enjoy the video!
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies and organizations such as Cornerstone Agency, City Year Miami, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.
I initially came across this video not too long after it was posted on YouTube’s Zeitgeist Minds channel back in October of 2015. I’ve been meaning to post this video since then but I just couldn’t make the time to do so due to the intensity of my schedule. Thankfully, I was recently able to make some time to revisit this clip and extract all of the meaningful bits of insight and wisdom shared by the very inspiring, Bryan Stevenson.
In this video, Bryan discusses 4 things we can do to change the world and create better relationships, more justice, more compassion, and less poverty. Hope you enjoy!
1. Proximity (2:53)
We can’t be responsible influencers until we understand the importance of getting proximate to the problems in our world. Proximity teaches us things that we cannot learn from a distance. When we get proximate to problems we see things and hear nuances and details that we cannot see from a distance. In order to solve problems and create breakthroughs, we must get very close and inside of the problems that we intend to solve. Proximity is essential if we want to change the world.
2.Change The Narrative (10:05)
Anger and fear as a narrative is the cause of many human rights issues such as inequality, genocide, and oppression just to name a few. The narrative of anger and fear must change. We need truth and reconciliation. Changing the narrative is important if we want to change the world.
3.Protect Our Hopefulness (15:45)
Injustice prevails where hopelessness persists. Hopelessness is the enemy of justice. As long as we continue to think that we cannot do anything, we will not make any progress. It’s important that we protect our hopefulness. Increasing our hope is essential to changing our world.
4. Do Uncomfortable Things (22:09)
Justice cannot be created through only doing what is comfortable and convenient. We have to do uncomfortable things. We will not succeed until we do what’s uncomfortable. It is the uncomfortable things that we do in service of justice that ultimately honor us as a human race and community of people who are committed to changing the world.
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies and organizations such as Cornerstone Agency, City Year Miami, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.
7 Days of Wisdom is an original weekly video series presented by A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group and hosted by Aquaus Kelley. Our mission is to foster growth and create a community of success and significance. Through sharing meaningful advice, knowledge, and insight gathered throughout our daily experiences, we aim to empower, encourage, and inspire our community to achieve their most passionate aspirations.
Man’s Search For Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl (Book)
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies such as Cornerstone Agency, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.
Here’s an insightful conversation on leadership as Director General of the United States Foreign Service, Arnold Chacón talks with U.S. Ambassador, Kristie Kenney about leadership getting things done, learning how to make a difference, and creating a mindful balance when it comes to developing ourselves as leaders.
When asked what qualities Kristie looks for when building and developing her teams she replies:
“I look for a range of qualities. I look for people who are innovative. I look for people who are ready to step up and make a difference. I look for people who can work well with others and also possess good interpersonal skills. However, above all…the quality that I prize the most are people who are passionate about their work.”
This was definitely a great listen. We really enjoyed this one!
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies such as Cornerstone Agency, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.
7 Days of Wisdom is an original weekly video series presented by A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group and hosted by Aquaus Kelley. Our mission is to foster growth and create a community of success and significance. Through sharing meaningful advice, knowledge, and insight gathered throughout our daily experiences, we aim to empower, encourage, and inspire our community to achieve their most passionate aspirations.
(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies such as Cornerstone Agency, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.
7 Days of Wisdom is an original weekly video series presented by A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group and hosted by Aquaus Kelley. Our mission is to foster growth and create a community of success and significance. Through sharing meaningful advice, knowledge, and insight gathered throughout our daily experiences, we aim to empower, encourage, and inspire our community to achieve their most passionate aspirations.
In This Weeks Episode We Discuss:
Building Relationships Through Vulnerability (9:30)
How to Master the Grind: Jeff Bezos’ $38B Net Worth (Video)
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies such as Cornerstone Agency, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.
In 2011, Doug Morris made the decision to depart as the Chairman and CEO of Universal Music Group for various reasons. Under the mentorship and guidance of Doug was his successor, Lucian Grainge. Lucian was appointed as the Chairman and CEO of Universal Music Group in March of 2011. When Doug spoke at Oxford University’s Saïd Business School in 2013, he mentioned that he was met with two job opportunities when making the decision to leave UMG. One offer was from Sir Howard Stringer, who at the time was the Chairman and CEO at Sony Corporation. Another offer was from a guy over at Apple by the name of Steve Jobs.
Steve wanted to bring Doug on board to open up a “Digital Record Company.” By the look of things today, it may have been Apple Music. Instead, Doug made the decision to become CEO over at Sony Music Entertainment. Steve was not very pleased. At the time, many people may have thought, why would Doug choose Sony over Apple? However, here is the part that I particular find to be very interesting. One of Doug’s very close friends is Jimmy Iovine. For those of you who may not know, Jimmy Iovine is a long-term record man and former chairman of Universal Music Group’s Interscope, Geffen, and A&M records division. He’s also the co-founder of Beats by Dre which was acquired by Apple last year. Jimmy is now an important part of the Apple team. Although his exact title is yet to be disclosed, we do know that he occupies an important space in a very influential capacity.
I would be curious to know:
What role did Doug play in any of the “behind closed door” conversations between Apple, Beats, and Jimmy Iovine?
Was Doug aware of Apple’s interest in purchasing Beats?
How likely is it that Doug may decide to make a move over to Apple Music?
These are all questions that I find to be quite intriguing. I guess we’ll see what the future has in store!
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Creative Consultant, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies such as Cornerstone Agency, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and raise awareness to help uplift the condition of humanity.
In 2008, I was an intern for a wonderful woman by the name of Elise Wright. She was the SVP of Urban Music at Universal Republic. At the time, Doug Morris was the CEO at Universal Music Group. It just so happened that his office was in the same building that I interned in on 1755 Broadway in midtown Manhattan. One afternoon, Monte Lipman’s assistant asked me if I could bring lunch downstairs to Doug Morris’ office. As soon as I was gifted with the task of doing so, I knew that I had to handle this particular package with care. As ambitious as I am, I was delighted to make the delivery. Unfortunately, I never had the opportunity to meet Doug in person. Had we met, it may have led to a very interesting chain of events.
Flash forward 7 years. Doug Morris is now the CEO of Sony Music Entertainment. Doug was recently invited to speak at Midem in Cannes, France. In his keynote speech entitled “Visionary Talk,” Doug shares a plethora of insight that he has gained throughout his 50+ years of experience in the music industry. Throughout the interview, he praises his fellow industry icons and pioneers. These names include, Ahmet Ertegun, Jerry Wexler, Berry Gordy, Jimmy Iovine, Suge Knight, L.A. Reid, and Steve Jobs.
Doug on The Impact of Urban Music
A few interesting stories that Doug shares includes his first encounter with rap music. The first group that he signed was 2 Live Crew. Shortly after, Jimmy Iovine was responsible for introducing Doug to Suge Knight. This meeting would eventually lead to Interscope signing Death Row Records which Doug mentions as an “Incredible moment.” Doug also goes on to mention that his strategy at Universal was to fill it with urban music. “I don’t think a record company can really be successful without urban music” says Doug. “We had Death Row, Def Jam, and Cash Money. Just with those three companies, we probably had 40-45% of all the urban music in America.”
Doug on The Importance of A&R + Content
When asked about the importance of content and distribution, Doug mentions, “If you don’t have a hit you have nothing. We’re all slaves to the brilliant people who are in touch with the culture and can spot an artist. The people who can spot a record that’s going to be important, that’s where we invest our money, in these people.” Although the people and titles may vary, the process of identifying and developing talent at an early stage is what we call A&R. To this day, I consider A&R to be at the pinnacle of necessity in regards to the future expansion and growth of our entertainment and music industries.
Words of Wisdom From Doug Morris
On Leadership – Doug has a philosophy that it’s important to be nice and treat people with respect. It’s important to make the people that work for you feel great. It’s important to make them know that you appreciate what they do. When Doug was coming up, people would degrade others and make them feel bad. Doug runs his companies based on mutual respect and loyalty. This is the culture that he believes in.
On Identifying Your Talent – Find what you’re good at. Some people are good as recording engineers. Some people are good at publishing. Some people are able to identify great artists. You have to look at what you think your strength is. Don’t listen to the naysayers. It’s your life, live it. Don’t be afraid of anything. When you’re doing something that you love, it’s fun. When something is fun, you actually get good at it. Do what’s fun. Do what you love going to work for.
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Creative Consultant, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies such as Cornerstone Agency, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe.
A few days ago I happened to stumble upon a documentary featuring Pharrell entitled, The Plastic Age. It was released on i-D magazine’s youtube channel back in April and produced by AllDAYEVERYDAY. It was a very interesting watch as it shared a lot of insight into the impact that plastic has on our planet. “In the 1950’s and 60’s, plastic was heavily marketed to consumers as a time saving device and matter of convenience” says Anna Cummins of 5 Gyres Institute. Today, it is estimated that we make 288 million tons of plastic annually. This is more than 1 BILLION TONS every 4 years! So what happens when this plastic escapes or does not make it into our waste management system? Where does all of this plastic end up?
In the Pacific Ocean exists a “Great Pacific Patch” which is approximately 1500 nautical miles from shore. It was discovered by Captain Charles Moore in 1997. This is where anything that we throw into the ocean that floats eventually ends up. Captain Paul Watson, Founder of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society mentions, “We live in the most highly educated society that has ever evolved on this planet, everybody knows…the real problem is getting everyone to care.” His estimate of the number of plastic in our oceans is around 700 million tons. It’s important for us to think about what we use and how we discard it. Think about this, when we utilize plastic that is not properly discarded, it makes it’s way into our oceans. Shortly after, it is consumed by fish. Eventually it makes it’s way back up our food chain to be consumed by us humans. “The chemicals that are in plastic make their way up the food chain and now they are in us because we’re eating those fish” says Kahi Pacarro of Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii.
So, what is the solution? Well, no one person can solve it. However, Parley for the Oceans unites partners in all categories of industries to develop new ways of doing business to protect our oceans. In an effort to address the issue of plastic in the ocean, Bionic Yarn helps to turn low-grade plastic into high-profile material. Tim Coombs, Co-Founder of Bionic Yarn shares the process of how it works. “Bionic Yarn is a yarn spinning process that takes recycled plastic bottles and turns them into a high-quality yarn and fabric. A plastic bottle is shredded into flakes, melted, extruded into fibers, spinned into yarn, and helixed into another fiber like cotton to create another surface over the recycled plastic.” “Everything has a purpose, even trash” says Tyson Toussant, Co-Founder of Bionic Yarn, “We should be accountable for everything. The basic idea is to synchronize the economy and the environment by pulling out the plastic from the ocean, keeping it on land, and making it into products for us to use.”
RAW for the Oceans by G-Star is a collection of products to make the world’s first denim from recycled ocean plastic. RAW for the Oceans by G-Star is where science, activism, and fashion intersect. “Innovation comes from a lot of different people working together” says Shubhankar Ray Global Brand Director at G-Star RAW. The idea of RAW for the Oceans by G-Star is to establish a new mindset within the fashion industry and inspire other segments of business and economy to follow these models. Captain Paul Watson sums it up best, “The strength of an eco-system is in diversity. The strength of any movement must also lie in diversity. All social revolutions in history have been carried out by passionate individuals who discover, build, and ideate. There are ways of solving these problems if we can harness our imagination to find solutions through everybody’s particular love.”
What do you love? #ALOVERSAmbition
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies and organizations such as Cornerstone Agency, City Year Miami, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers centered around love. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.
(Björk, one of Time magazine’s “100 Most Influential People of 2015.”)
Björk was recently honored by Time magazine as one of The 100 Most Influential People of 2015. In her interview she mentions, “If you are really true to yourself and really follow your intuition in the most rigorous way, there is a moment that becomes universal, that reaches everybody.” I find this to be such a profound statement. It also happens to be a re-occurring theme in my life at the moment. Just a few weeks ago, both myself and a good friend of mine discussed the importance of staying true to ourselves. I shared with him one of my favorite quotes, “Those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.” Does this sound familiar? It is argued as to whether it originally stems from Bernard Baruch, Mark Young, or Theodor “Dr. Seuss” Geisel. Let’s leave that for the experts to debate.
I told my friend that when we are true to ourselves and do the things that matter, we attract the people that we matter the most to. On the contrary, when we do things to merely gain the attention of others, we tend to gain the attention of those who see us for someone who we truly are not. When we begin to gain attention from things and people who may not be in alignment with our best interests, we fall victim to the attention that we receive as opposed to what we receive it for. When we do things that matter, not only are we at our best, we are also able to give our best to the world around us. Laurieann Gibson who is best known for her work with Diddy, Nicki Minaj, and Lady Gaga may have said it best, “Be humble and let your gift slice through everything else in the atmosphere.”
I believe that it’s time for us to start giving our best. Within following our intuition and doing what matters exists a certain level of courage and fortitude. It takes a lot to step up and speak out. Whether it’s mentally, physically, or both. It’s time that we become as breathtakingly true to ourselves as we can possibly be. We owe this much to both ourselves and the greater world at large. Be great, be proud, do what’s different, do what matters!
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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Creative Consultant, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies such as Cornerstone Agency, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe.
A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group 