This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Lauren Antonoff, CEO of Life360. It has been edited for length and clarity.
My mother was an awesome parent, but she was a person first. It was just the two of us for a lot of my childhood, between the time my dad died when I was 8, and my mom remarried when I was 14.
During those years, my mom was parenting while also in school, working, and dating. She was always there for me, but she wasn’t trying to manage my childhood. She didn’t do homework with me, for example. She made sure I was happy, loved, and well cared for, all while living her own life.
A lot of single moms might not have been open about things like dating, but mine was always transparent. I liked that I got to do my thing while watching my mom do hers.
My mom’s benign neglect helped me develop agency
I didn’t grow up knowing I wanted to be a parent. When I met my now-husband, he was already a father. Our daughter, who is now 27, was 5 at the time. I say I got her the easy way.
Courtesy of Lauren Antonoff
From the beginning, my husband was the primary parent. That really opened the door for me to feel comfortable having kids. About three years later, we had our son.
Once I became a parent, my mom and I would sometimes talk about this idea of benign neglect — the benefits of letting kids do their own thing, and figure it out. In my childhood, my mom’s benign neglect allowed me to develop independence and problem-solving skills.
Because my mom was less involved than some parents, I created a sense of agency that’s served me well throughout life.
I wanted to change the world, but didn’t expect to be in tech
My interest in tech was an accident. I thought I would become a civil rights lawyer and change the world.
While I was in college in the early 90s, I purchased a Mac to write papers with. I was living in Berkley, and got sucked into this community of Mac enthusiasts. I understood the technology — though not as well as some people — and I could articulate things well.
My techie friends diagnosed me as a product manager. I had a desire to advance technology that was both intelligible to humans and useful to them. I started working at a startup that was bought by Microsoft.
I thought it would only be for a few years, until I went to law school. I ended up spending 19 years at Microsoft before joining other tech companies like GoDaddy and now Life360. I realized along the way that I have an impact on people’s quality of life, at scale, by advancing technology that makes day-to-day life easier.
Location monitoring keeps my in-person connections close
At Life360, we talk a lot about agency, which was so important in my childhood, and which I tried to encourage for my own kids. For me, and a lot of our users, the platform creates agency while helping people boost their real-life connections.
Here’s my favorite use case: my husband is still the primary domestic partner, and he brings me lunch most days. If I’m at work feeling hungry, I can check his location and see if I need to get myself a snack, or if he’s around the corner with my meal.
Recently, I got a flight notification from Life360. It showed that my brother — who doesn’t live locally — had touched down in LA. I hadn’t known he was in town, but since I got the digital signal, we were able to get dinner. Ultimately, the platform keeps us closer in real life by creating those opportunities for connection.
I’m cautiously optimistic about the future
I’ve never seen tech as a bad thing. I had a TV in my room growing up, and a simple coding game that was so basic I had to retype the code each time I turned it on.
Courtesy of Lauren Antonoff
I was pretty liberal in how I let my own kids use technology. Looking back, I got my son — who’s now 19 — a phone when he was probably too young. At the time, we wanted to play Pokémon Go as a family. I didn’t think about how harmful some aspects of tech can be. I’m lucky that he turned out good despite that.
I’m cautiously optimistic about the future of technology. I’m also an activist. We get to shape what the future looks like, for our children and us — and there’s a lot of power in that.
