Alicia Navarrette shares the journey of Cheechable, a community of digital creators and ethnobotanists working towards a symbiotic future. Learn how they're leveraging mixed reality to open minds and inspire new possibilities in the emerging cannabis industry.

Alicia Navarrette, Creator of Cheechable

Cheechable is an immersive independent media collective where digital creators and ethnobotany intersect. The mission of the organization is to inspire, instruct, and invigorate our capacity to live a symbiotic existence.

We are a community who is open to experimentation, cultural research, and design as the pathways to sustainable futures.

The commercial landscape of the 21st Century has shown us needs in social, economic, and environmental perspectives that have been previously underrepresented. Cheechable conversations are representative of humanities’ future concerns, like sustainable community systems, new experiential language, and creating space.

We deliver these explorations with a quarterly publication, talk show, and live events. We further examine these ideas of culture and commercialism in the Futurist blog and carry limited product runs in our shop.

We accept written, visual, short film, short animation, and performance contributions on a rolling basis. Check out cheechable.com or @cheechable_world on instagram for more ways to get involved or hire our design team.

A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself.

At The Glow Up, we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders.

In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success.

If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link.

Alan Smithson, co-founder of MetaVRse and Unlimited Awesome shares his entrepreneurial journey, which includes extensive work in music technology and virtual, augmented, and mixed reality.

Key Takeaways:

• Persistence is Key: Staying committed to your vision is essential, even when faced with setbacks.
• Transforming Education: Alan aims to revolutionize the education system by integrating modern technologies and success principles.
• Global Innovation Access: Unlimited Awesome seeks to democratize access to innovation and entrepreneurship for individuals worldwide.
• The Power of Gratitude: Practicing gratitude and mindfulness is foundational to success and resilience.

Together with wife, Julie, Alan has been working for over two decades to create a new education system that focuses on success principles rather than traditional subjects. They realized that existing educational frameworks were not adapting to emerging technologies like AI and XR.

This realization led them to embark on a mission to build a comprehensive education system from scratch, one that inspires and educates future leaders to act responsibly in social, economic, and environmental contexts.

Throughout the conversation, Alan emphasizes the importance of persistence in entrepreneurship, reinforcing the idea that setbacks are merely bumps in the road on a larger mission.

Unlimited Awesome seeks to democratize entrepreneurship, leveraging AI to connect individuals globally. Alan envisions a future where anyone, regardless of their background, can participate in the innovation landscape.

Alan Smithson

Alan Smithson is a father, founder and futurist. His purpose in life is to inspire and educate people to think and act in a socially, economically and environmentally responsible way. Alan and Julie, his wife and partner make creator tools including; METAVRSE, 3D creation engine for the spatial web, Your Director AI, automatic AI video switching and Emulator, a touchscreen system for the music industry. The couple is building a new education and entrepreneur system to encourage global innovation through technology called Unlimited Awesome.

He is a board advisor to HSTAR Space, a space transportation company and a juror for The One Creativity Awards and Named Top Retail Expert, 2023 and 2024. Named Top 50 Digital Futurists (2022), Alan is a TEDx Speaker, and host of Daily Tech News w/ Alan Smithson.

A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself.

At The Glow Up, we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders.

In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success.

If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link.

Elizabeth Bieniek shares her journey from navigating the complexities of Cisco to embracing entrepreneurship, highlighting the challenges and triumphs of fostering innovation within corporate structures.

Takeaways:

• Persistence is Key: Stay committed to innovative ideas, even when they seem ahead of their time.
• Filter Feedback Wisely: Be cautious about whose advice you take, especially from those without relevant experience.
• Embrace Customer Insights: Customer engagement can lead to unexpected breakthroughs and validate innovative concepts.
• Celebrate Small Wins: Simple gestures can significantly boost team morale during challenging phases.
• Cultivate Company Culture: Actively protect and nurture your organization's culture to ensure innovation thrives.

The "intrapreneurial mindset" is explored as a blend of stubbornness and resilience needed to push through corporate red tape. Elizabeth emphasizes the importance of persistence in innovation, noting that many groundbreaking ideas require time to mature.

Her book, Cake on Tuesday: 25 Lessons to Unlock Corporate Innovation, serves as a guide for navigating innovation. A critical lesson: "be careful who you listen to." This underscores the necessity of filtering feedback, especially when pursuing uncharted territories.

The origin of Elizabeth's book title, inspired by a morale-boosting initiative during a challenging project phase. The "Cake on Tuesday" concept illustrates the significance of small gestures in maintaining team spirit and culture, especially during the "barren middle" of innovation projects.

Elizabeth Bieniek is an author, speaker, and consultant focused on “good peopling” as the secret to exceptional execution. As a founder and Fortune 100 innovation and engineering leadership veteran, her expertise lies in challenging assumptions, embracing diverse perspectives, and leading through ambiguity to build empowered, resilient teams that last.

Named to Toptal’s 10 most influential “Female Pioneers in Technology,” she has spoken on bridging the gap between human connection and innovation at EmTech NEXT, Chatham House, ITEXPO, AWE, and the Global AI Community. Her leadership and innovation philosophy have been featured in Forbes, Bloomberg, Inc., International Business Times, and Women in Business. https://www.elizabethbieniek.com/

A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself.

At The Glow Up, we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders.

In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success.

If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link.

Most innovative ideas are ahead of their time, which makes staying on the playing field long enough for your idea to hit one of the most crucial skills for any founder or new business.


The Glow Up talks with innovators about their big ideas and how they stay resilient in the face of change; and how they find and build the value that will drive their future success.

A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself.

At The Glow Up, we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders.

In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success.

If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link.