thoughtSeekers features individuals with outstanding attitudes and incredible achievements in order to inspire and motivate.

Vesela Tanaskovic, thoughtSeeker
She lives in Vienna, Austria.
We first met in 2015, when she was accepted in INiTS’s incubation program, Austria’s largest university incubator. She won a long series of prizes with Afforest4Future already:
– Climate Launchpad 2016 – 1st place Austria
– INiTS- incubation
– Blue Living University (participation of 60 people from all over the world)
– Climate-Kick – I stage
– KATANA – I stage
– GSP2017 Singularity University (participation of 90 people from all over the world)

Vesela on the street
Vesela in Vienna, Austria, raising awareness for her project Afforest4Future

She is greening the deserts with her start-up Afforest4Future and in this interview she shares with us what moved her to find a solution to green world’s deserts:

What is your motivation?
The future motivates me, the future of my future children, of our children. Without us working on it they will not have a future and they won’t be able to live on this planet.

The future of my children motivates me.

I plan by 2025 to have children and I really want them to be able to have a good and healthy life. My kids will be in their 20s by 2045, which will mean that the rest of their life, their adulthood, will be lived in chaos, unless something drastically is done to shift the world to become much better place to live in.

We who live on this planet need to change our mind-set, we have to pull up our sleeves and work hard to save it because it just goes downfall. Only if we manage to do this now, within the time of our generation, we will have a great impact on humanity. Furthermore, our work will benefit many people in one of the most critical regions on the planet: MENA.

What is your secret success recipe?
I think you have to align yourself with your own vision and with your own beliefs, I think they all have to be balanced. It’s about authenticity; you cannot be in recycling yet through away plastic bags for example. You have to align yourself with yourself, to be true to yourself.

I am really aligned with myself and I think this gets me through anything.

I believe in the things for which I stand for, whenever it gets tough I just go on, one does not feel the challenges when one is aligned with one’s core believes.

Just believe in what you do and always go back to your core inspiration, in that something which drives you in the first place to do what you are doing. For me this was always trying to have a future, trying to save the planet, because I think it necessarily, desperately needs saving.

How do you feel when you are working for Afforest4Future?
When I am working on my start up as well as on my PHD, I feel really inspired. I feel really great connectedness, big love and inspiration towards this planet and all the people living on it.

I could work for hours on Afforest4Future, I somehow never get tiered! It just cheers me up. The more I work, the more I want to work.

Which were the highest obstacles and challenges you faced until now?
Our greatest obstacles are actually finding the right investors, the impact investors willing to wait passionately and willing to invest in such a critical region such as MENA. On one hand they have to be willing to passionately wait for the outcome and on the other hand they have to be willing to invest in a critical region, such as the MENA region, which is not the most stable region on the world.

We have challenges in talking to government and making it aware about the necessary impact needed in the region and with investors to convince them to invest in this region.

What is your message for the reader?
The one thing I would like to tell you is to plant a tree today. Plant a tree but not just an ornamental tree, plant a fruit bearing tree, because it will be so crucial for your future children’s future!

Discover more about Vesela and her work here and on Facebook 

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