While Happstr is no longer in active development, I still strive to put the lessons learned into everything I do. The main take away from the Happstr experience is that staying positive can have a positive affect on your surroundings. Five people and I built Happstr in 3 days on the Startupbus. While many other teams broke down at times under the stress of the situation, our team always was upbeat and was able to move forward at a steady rate.
Technology and money are means to an end. Whether you are planning to start a blog or start a business, the tools can only answer the how they do not answer the why. What drives most of us is the desire for fulfillment in life. Whether through family, through work or through side hustle happiness can come most easily when we focus on the positive. Still in this complex world, staying positive can be a challenge.
When Nate created Happstr he had the big hairy audacious goal of creating a phone app that spread happiness virally. Within a few days he saw as the app went viral and spread through major media like Bloomberg Business and Mashable. Based in part, on Nate’s pitch for Happstr, the team made it to the StartupBus finals where Nate pitched the benefits of Happstr in front of tens of thousands streaming online. With a prototype hack built in three days, Nate and the Happstr team truly proved the premise that happiness can spread virally.
In my classes I always tell students not to worry about parts of the material. It’s easy to get overwhelmed when confronted with strange, new information. Often it takes time to process and reflect before one realizes that one has learned something. I call this learning your ‘one thing.’ If in a 90 minute class you can walk away with one bit of knowledge that sticks with you that’s great. We are so often confronted with mountains of data it’s hard to make anything stick especially if it’s challenging. Stay focused on what you did learn and look to connect it with other things you learn down the line.
