The Invisible Mentor

Archive for February, 2012

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Helena Rubinstein had a stunning multimillion dollar collection of jewelry which included pieces that once belonged to Empress Catherine of Russia. In 1964, the year before her death, when she was over 90 years old, burglars entered her Manhattan apartment and demanded her jewelry collection. Though she was tied to a chair, and her servants were bound and gagged, she refused to reveal the location of the key for her safe and the burglars left with $200 cash feeling very unnerved by the incident. Rubinstein was also a contradiction, she wore nightgowns that cost $4.99 yet she wore very expensive jewelry.

Name: Helena Rubinstein

Birth Date: December 1870 – April 1965

Job Functions: Cosmetician, Business Executive, Author

Fields: Beauty Care

Known For: Helena Rubinstein introduced waterproof mascara, foundation make-up and all-day spa treatment.

Books: The art of feminine beauty, This Way to Beauty, Food for Beauty, My Life for Beauty (autobiography published year after her death)

Questions to Ponder While Reading About Helena Rubinstein

1. How are you similar or different from her?
2. What are key lessons you can learn from her?
3. What are five takeaways after reading this profile?
4. Would the strategies she used to build her business work today?

Biography

Helena Rubinstein was the eldest of eight daughters of Polish parents. Each evening, Augusta Rubinstein, Helena’s mother, made sure that all her daughters undergo a beauty regiment which ended with the application of a cream to their faces. Her mother told them that the cream would make them beautiful. While Rubinstein attended high school in Cracow, Poland, she kept the books for her father, an egg merchant. Father and daughter discussed plans for the egg business.

Rubinstein’s father wanted her to be a doctor, but that was not to be the case. She entered medical school, liked the research aspect but didn’t like being around sick people so left a short while later. She left Poland and immigrated to Melbourne, Australia where her Uncle Louis lived. She took 12 pots of her mother’s face cream, which was a special formula created by Hungarian chemist Jacob Lykusky.

In Australia, she noticed that the women suffered from dry, flaky skin because of the extreme climate variation. In 1890 she got her first job at a pharmacy. The owner, Mr. Henderson, was very supportive of Rubinstein. She learned how to compound simple formulas and how to run a business. She started to sell the Polish face cream in Henderson’s store and demand quickly rose. In 1898, Uncle Louis became overwhelmed with Rubinstein’s entrepreneurial venture and asked her to move out.

Rubinstein returned to Melbourne two years later, and while working in a café, she met two people who helped to shape her future. One was the owner of tea business who gave her pointers on how to establish a business, and the second person was a woman who had poor skin, offered to loan Rubinstein her $1,500 life savings. She was able to repay the loan shortly.

With the $1,500, she opened her first beauty salon, imported the face cream from Poland, which she sold to Australian women. Rubinstein didn’t stop there, she advised her clients on proper skin care. Through word-of-mouth marketing, her satisfied clients told other’s about Rubinstein’s products. Eugenia Stone, a popular editor from Sydney, Australia wrote about Rubinstein’s beauty salon. The free publicity resulted in 15,000 cash orders from all over Australia. To keep up with demand, Rubinstein had to work 18-hour days which she kept for most of her life, even when she didn’t have to.

Rubinstein also convinced the chemist, Dr. Lykusky to come to Australia. He taught her how to mix the cream which the called, Crème Valaze, and how to make cleansing cream, lotion and soap. She hired Australian chemists and opened up a small factory.

In the years that followed, Rubinstein built a global empire, spanning several countries: Australia, France, Austria, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada to name a few. She always looked for ways to broaden her knowledge so Rubinstein studied with the best known chemists and dermatologists in Europe. As she expanded her business, she brought in her sisters to assist her.

When she met her future husband, American journalist Edward Titus, he wanted to help her promote her business. Rubinstein employed him, and he created the famous scheme for her ads “featuring the elegant, rich and beautiful Helena dwelling upon her scientific knowledge and always giving a specific reason to women for buying her products.” It is worthy to note that it was Edward Titus who published D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lovers, which was rejected by traditional publishers because of its racy scenes.

With her second husband, Prince Artchil Gourielli-Tchkonia, they developed a line of products for men. Gourielli-Tchkonia also introduced Rubinstein to the world’s rich and famous.

Helena Rubinstein Tidbits

• Important timeline: Opened first beauty salon in Melbourne in 1902, opened Helena Rubinstein Salon de Beaute in London in 1908, opened cosmetic factory near Paris in 1911, opened Maison de Beaute Valaze in New York City in 1915, US Department stores start selling Rubinstein cosmetics in 1918, opened Prestigious salon on New York’s Fifth Avenue in 1937, introduced Day of Beauty in 1937, Over 2 million Mascaramatic sold in first year, in 1950.
• When Helena Rubinstein died in 1965, her estate was estimated at $100 million and her company Helena Rubinstein, Incorporated annual sales exceeded $60 million.
• Her treatments relied on her understanding of diet, skin anatomy and body metabolism, which she learned from French chemist Marcellin Berthlot of the University of Paris.
• By 1939, Helena Rubinstein, Incorporated distributed 160 different products to 3,000 retailers.
• Her sales volume from $13 million after World War II to $23 million in 1956.
• Helena Rubinstein, Incorporated, grew into a cosmetics empire with factories, laboratories, flower plantations, and salons in 14 countries, which in the mid-sixties employed 32,000 people globally.
• Philanthropy
• Donated the pavilion bearing her name to the Tel Aviv Art Museum.
• Donated money to the new State of Israel after War II
• Founded the Helena Rubenstein Pavilion of Contemporary Art in Tel Aviv where she housed her exquisite collection of miniature rooms.
• In 1953 she established the Helena Rubenstein Foundation to coordinate her philanthropic endeavours, which included gifts to museum, colleges, and institutions for the needy, especially women and children and established annual scholarships for young Israeli artists.

Steps to Success

• Rubinstein found and filled a need based on her strengths and what she knew. When she was growing up, each evening, her mother made sure that all her daughters underwent a beauty regiment which ended with the application of a cream to their faces. Her mother told them that the cream would make them beautiful. She noticed that Australian had poor skin because of the extreme climate in the country, and decided to do something about it.
• Kept the books for her father’s business when she was in high school and they discussed plans for her father’s egg business.
• When she launched her beauty salon in the UK, she charged her clients about $50 for 12 treatments because she recognized that they would be willing to pay that price.
• First cosmetician to send saleswomen on the road to demonstrate the right makeup for the average woman.
• Embraced publicity and hired Edward Titus, her first husband for promotions.
• Worked 18-hour days to keep up with the demand when a popular editor wrote about her beauty salon.
• Learned how to make her products and knew the ingredients they contained.
• Worked on acquiring a wealthy clientele.
• Worked constantly to improve the quality of her products and updated her factories.
• In the US, to keep the business going, she offered department stores 40 percent in cash for every item sold, 5 percent of the retail price for every advertisement of a Rubinstein product in a local paper, 10 percent commission for the salesperson, and another incentive for the “Product of the Month.” She put out a magazine for her salesgirls and had them visit the stores regularly.
• Knew how to negotiate: allowed a department store in San Francisco to sell her products on the condition that orders were worth at least $10,000 and Rubinstein could personally train the saleswomen.
• Rubinstein was an innovator: introduced tinted face powder and foundation.
• Developed the idea of the health farm for beauty, and her line of men’s cosmetics was one of the first in the world.
• Trained her salesgirls to teach women the basics of skin care.
• Introduced “Day of Beauty,” in which clients at her salons underwent eight hours of reconditioning.
• First marketed “Mascaramatic”, the mechanical mascara applicator, and sold over two million in the first year.
• Designed self-care evening classes for young working women. Rubinstein also understood that cosmetics were not only sold for skin-care. She offered status by selling women world-wide the illusion of wealth and glamour that she cleverly built into her products, using the force of advertising, and promoting herself as a woman of supreme glamour.
• In early 1937, she opened her most prestigious salon: a seven-story building at 715 Fifth Avenue in New York City. The rooftop library with rare books on beauty, the miniature doll museum, and the unique “Day of Beauty” program for $35 to $150, contributed to its success.
• Her 50-year feud with rival Elizabeth Arden kept her on her toes.

Lessons from Helena Rubinstein

• Focus on your strengths so do what you know.
• Update your knowledge and continue to innovate.
• Understand all aspects of your business.
• Improve the way you do things.
• Marketing and publicity are very important.
• Train your employees.
• Give back to the community in which you operate.

Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

Further Reading

Women`s History: About Helena Rubinstein

Rubinstein, Helena (1870–1965) by J. R. Poynter 

Sources Cited/Referenced

Business Leader Profiles for Students

The Cambridge Biographical Encyclopedia

Encyclopedia Judaica

Encyclopedia of World Biography

Book links are affiliate links.

Friedrich Nietzsche Part 1

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Friedrich Nietzsche Part 2

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Written in 1888, and published a decade later, Friedrich Nietzsche’s Why I Am So Wise is his autobiography, which was his final book.  He wrote his autobiography so that he would not be taken the wrong way. Gerta Valentine who translated Why I Am So Wise writes, “Nietzsche saw himself as a missionary and a prophet; he did not write for personal gain or fame. He wanted to confront the world with the truth – his truth: ‘I am no man, I am dynamite,’ he exclaimed. In Why I Am So Wisehe looks back on his literary output and tells why he wrote these books, where they came from, and whether his position had changed at all over the course of the years: overall his answer is ‘No’.”

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Why I Am So Wise is a small book in size and only 128 pages in length. Friedrich Nietzsche spends nearly 60 pages, close to half of the book dedicated to the books he had written. At the time of writing his autobiography, he hadn’t had critical acclaim for his work and set about to change that.

It takes a bold person to title his book Why I Am So Wise, and it takes an even bolder person to name his chapters in the same vein. The book has four chapters in addition to an introduction, Translator’s notes and a preface. The four chapter headings:

Chapter 1. Why I am so wise

Chapter 2. Why I am so clever

Chapter 3. Why I am such excellent books

Chapter 4. Why I am destiny

Friedrich Nietzsche suffered from a crippling illness all his adult life, which forced him to retire at the young age of 35.  He did not allow his illness to shut him down, and in fact, he believed that it set him free and allowed him to return to his “self.” This forced retirement gave him the time he needed to think and write.  Shortly are completing Why I Am So Wise, Nietzsche had a complete mental collapse which he never recovered from – he died in 1900.

I do not know what to make of Why I Am So Wise by Friedrich Nietzsche. Sometimes I found myself laughing while reading the book, and at other times I experienced consternation.  I was shocked by his brutal honesty because these days we are socialized to act a certain way, and we often try to cushion what we have to say so that we do not offend others.

A German philosopher of the late 19^th century, Friedrich Nietzsche was born on October 15, 1844 in a small German village in Prussian Saxony. He was born to a family from a Protestant background.  Nietzsche’s father, Carl Ludwig Nietzsche died when his first son was only five years old so he was brought up being surrounded by females, “his mother Franziska, his younger sister Elisabeth, his maternal grandmother and two maiden aunts.”

In my opinion, Nietzsche often had some very unflattering views of women. “Woman is inexpressibly more wicked than man, but also cleverer….The struggle for equal rights is actually a symptom of disease, every doctor knows it.” It also appears that there was disharmony between Nietzsche and his mother and sister. For instance, Nietzsche writes, “If I search for the most shocking contrast to myself, the unfathomable pettiness of the instincts, I always find my mother and sister – to believe myself kindred to such bitches would be blaspheming my divinity. The treatment that I have received from my mother and sister fills me with unutterable horror to this very day; there is a totally hellish machine at work here, operating with infallible certainty at the precise moment when I am most vulnerable – at my loftiest moment.”

Friedrich Nietzsche is also a very misunderstood persons, thanks to his sister Elisabeth. After his death, his sister, an anti-semitic, edited his work without permission and twisted the meaning of what he originally wrote.  Hitler used this edited work to support his cause, so many believe that Nietzsche was an anti-semite, though he despised anti-semitism.

It is worthy to note that when Nietzsche grew up, he challenged Christianity and traditional morality which is apparent throughout his autobiography, and he saw himself as a prophet. He became an atheist and believed that religion thrived on people’s weaknesses. In addition to being a philosopher, Nietzsche was also a poet, composer and classical philologist.

In Why I Am So Wise by Friedrich Nietzsche, to me, he often sounded like an unbalanced person. However, there were a few things that I found interesting. He wrote about war tactics, but he used it as a metaphor. See what I mean below.

Friedrich Nietzsche’s Four War Tactics

1. Engage in causes that are winnable. To me this means to pick your battles.
2. Engage in causes where he stands alone, where he can only compromise himself – that is his criterion for doing right.  I interpret that as being not to get into situations where others cause you to compromise your values.
3. Never attack people. A person may do something wrong, so focus on the action and not the person.
4. Attack things from which all personal differences are excluded, where any background of bad experience is lacking. This appears to more of an extension of the tactic above, and also means to remove the emotions before you respond in a “charged” situation.

Nietzsche devotes several pages where he discusses the following four choices in life. Some of what he says about nutrition makes no sense to me. “No snacking in between [meals], no coffee, coffee is depressing…Tea is only good in the morning, in small quantities but strong.”

Important Choices in Life

1. To attain maximum power, what you eat matters.  Nietzsche had a poor diet until he figured this out. He warns against lengthy meals and snacking in between meals.
2. Location and climate matter. Nietzsche believed that Genius depended on dry air, on clear skies.
3. Recreation is important:  For him, reading was a big part of his recreation because, “it allows me to escape from myself, that lets me stroll through alien sciences and souls.”
4. Instinct for self-preservation.  You are not here by chance but out of necessity so you develop an instinct for self-defence.

Great Ideas & Quotables

1. Life became easiest for me whenever it demanded the most from me.
2. I do not wish to be taken for someone else – and I too must not take myself for someone else.
3. Every accomplishment, every step forward in knowledge is a consequence of courage.
4. It was during those years when my life-force was at its lowest ebb that I ceased being a pessimist: the instinct of self-recovery forbade me to adopt a philosophy of poverty and discouragement.
5. It is not doubt, but certainty that drives you mad.

Throughout Why I Am So Wise, Nietzsche writes about Zarathustra, which is his alter ego. Thus Spake Zarathustra was his most popular book, which he considered to be his masterpiece. In Why I Am So Wise, he was saying some of the same things. One of the most explosive things that Nietzsche says which ignited a lot of discussion is God Is Dead! Brian Johnson in his commentary on Thus Spake Zarathustra wrote, “Nietzsche’s philosophy paints the portrait of his ideal man, the ‘Uberman’ or ‘Overman’: an individual who, through self-discipline and his ‘will to power’ has overcome his social conditioning and is, in Nietzsche’s words, ‘beyond good and evil’ and no longer needs God (or anyone else for that matter) to tell him what is moral. Hence, the Overman lives. God is dead.”

I am a book lover, and I am often changed by the books I read because I learn so much. There were a few interesting things in Why I Am So Wise by Friedrich Nietzsche, however, with the time I invested in reading it, it doesn’t quite balance out for me. While reading Nietzsche’s autobiography, I often found the experience quite grating. Despite that, I think it’s important for us to read a variety of books to get a more rounded view on life, and we can discard the pieces that do not work for us. I am learning to appreciate even the books that I do not enjoy.

Friedrich Nietzsche Part 3

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Friedrich Nietzsche Part 4

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Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

Book links are affiliate links.

There is a new field called biomimicry, just over two decades old, where nature is used to solve problems in the world. This may sound odd to you, but George de Mestral invented Velcro after burrs stuck to his jacket, and when examined them he recognized the potential for a fastener. 

Today, let’s take a look at the palm tree. I will include some of the characteristics of a palm tree and use them (add some of your own) to associate with a pressing problem that you are having, to see if you can open a new avenue of thought to aid with creative problem solving.

When you think of a palm tree what immediately comes to mind?

• Tall and majestic
• Towering beauty
• Slender
• Graceful
• Evergreen
• Provides shade
• Withstands drought
• Stands strong even in the most inclement weather

Facts About, and Characteristics of, Palm Trees

• Evergreen, mostly tropical plant in the family Palmae (also known as Arecaceae).
• 202 currently known genera with over 2,600 species of palms.
• First appeared in the fossil record around 80 million years ago.
• Growing from three to 100 feet.
• Strong Foundation: Before it begins to sprout upwards, it attains its maximum girth beneath the ground first. That is, it grows deep first.
• Grow best in moist soil to dry, desert conditions – rainforests to deserts.
• Crowned by a mass of branches from 40 to 80 in number, and on these the fruit grows.
• Fan shaped (palmate) or feather shaped (pinnate) compound leaves arranged at the top of an un-branched stem. The leaves of palms are found in an equal distance apart on the spine of the branch.
• Flexible: The tree bends and sways back and forth but does not break.
• The coconut tree is a type of palm tree.

If you assigned the characteristics of a palm tree to your problem, how would you solve it? For instance, consolidation is taking place in many industries, so perhaps you are no longer earning enough income. Like a palm tree, you have strong roots since you have built a strong Foundation of knowledge. Now could be the perfect time to sprout upwards, and like the palm leaves, which spread outwards, you could move into adjacent industries, or provide complementary products and services.

Further Action

Spend some time exploring http://www.AskNature.org.  Nature may be the solution to your most pressing problems. I have included photos of palm trees that I took while on vacation in Barbados a few years ago. Take a look at the pictures, you may notice other characteristics that stimulate problem solving.

Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

This is what we talked about on The Invisible Mentor Blog this week: Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier, Black History Month – Bob Marley, Singer, Songwriter and the Father of Reggae, and Gary Vurnum, Author.

Adventures in Learning

I have never given museum curation much thought, and I first learned about online curation in the fall of 2010 from Social Media Examinerin their post How to Grow a Following With Other People’s Popular Content. However, during Social Media Week Toronto, I attended an excellent session titled Curation vs. Curation, where the panel compared curation in the context of museums with curation online. The big question is, are online “curators” true Curators?

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Idea of Curation: Museum Curator vs. Online Curator 

Booked for Mentoring

Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier was published in 1938. Though it’s an excellent book, it bugged me a lot because the heroine, who is the narrator does not have a name – all we know is that she has a lovely and unusual name – in the story until she gets married, and you do not know her age, you are told that she is young and essentially naïve. However, the book is excellent because it’s a story about a woman coming of age. You see a nameless woman, who is quite timid getting married and ultimately evolving into an assertive person when she faces a major challenge in her life.

Booked for Mentoring: Book Review – Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier

Wisdom of Life Profile

Bob Marley- I Shot the Sheriff

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Bob Marley sold more than 20 million record albums valued at approximately $190 million before he succumbed to cancer at age 36. “Bob Marley rose from poverty and obscurity to international stardom, becoming the first Third World artist to be acclaimed to that degree.” He is best known for reggae and Rastafarianism.

Black History Month: Bob Marley, Singer, Songwriter and the Father of Reggae 

Interviews for Mentoring

This week we featured author Gary Vurnum. A big message from Vurnum is to focus on being happy instead of becoming a millionaire. The life and death of his son who was born with multiple disabilities forever changed his life and added more depth and meaning to it. Here are Part I and Part II of Gary Varnum’s interview.

Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

Interviewee Name: Gary Vurnum, Author

Website:  http://www.vurnum.com 

Avil Beckford: Tell me a little bit about yourself.

Gary Vurnum asks a question (Photo credit: Ralph Zuranski)

Gary Vurnum:  I’ve been earning a living from the Internet full-time since December 2001, and in that time, I have created 15 products in the self-improvement niche, from general success to leadership to goal-setting to law of attraction to stress relief and so on. I’ve also written 20 books over the last few years, and set-up my own publishing house last July, and I publish other people’s books as well as my own.

Avil Beckford: How do you integrate your personal and professional life?

Gary Vurnum: My work really is my hobby because I love to read and write about self-improvement, marketing and the internet. I choose how often I work so I don’t need to integrate anything at all. I take time off whenever I choose, whether I’m with my daughters, fiancée and so on. It’s one big melting pot for me because I choose when and how often I work then there isn’t too much conflict between the personal life and the business life. 

Avil Beckford: When you have some down time, how do you spend it? 

Gary Vurnum: Because I have my daughters for a couple of days each week, and half of any holidays I focus on them because I don’t have the quantity of time, I focus on quality. I read books on the topics that I write about and I watch very little TV. Apart from that, I spend time fiancée and we go out for meals and date nights and things like that. That’s essentially how I use my free time.

Avil Beckford: What are five life lessons that you have learned so far?

Gary Vurnum:

1. You have more chances of making people miserable if you always try to make them happy because they need to make themselves happy rather than you doing it for them by bending over backwards. If you try to bend over backwards trying to make others happy, quite often, it’s at the expense of you being happy. And it ends up blowing up in your face.
2. The best way to deal with a setback is to say, “So what,” and get on with it. Deal with what happens and move on. It’s not always easy but essentially that’s what I try to do.
3. Being successful at anything may be complicated but not difficult, whether it’s internet marketing, being an author, trading stock, real estate, whatever. The steps involved are not difficult, you don’t need degrees, or need to be a rocket scientist, but there are usually a number of steps involved. If it’s important to you, you’re going to find a way to make it happen.
4. Always get paid more than once for everything you do, which is a rule I try to stand by whenever I can, and refuse to be paid per hour. That’s why I have books and products that earn me money years after I created them.
5. You always get what you expect. A lot of us in our lives expect the worst, and guess what happens, the worst. Again it’s not easy, I’m human and you have to catch yourself if you’re focusing on the things you don’t want to happen. It’s so easy to focus on what you don’t want rather than what you do want.

Avil Beckford: What process do you use to generate great ideas?

Gary Vurnum: If you’re doing the same thing day-after-day then new thoughts and avenues won’t appear and I never ever have a problem with ideas. In fact, I have too many of them. I have many product ideas and things I can do and that’s because when I approach a task, I keep on with it and look for new ways to improve it. There isn’t a set process, I just basically get on with it and solutions often appear.

Avil Beckford: What’s your favourite quotation and why?

Gary Vurnum: It may sound a bit vain but it’s one of mine, “Never ignore the obvious, that’s what it’s there for.” Too many people talk themselves out of starting because they over-complicate things. Start with the most simple and obvious thing first and then you find quite often that things start to fall into place once you get moving. Don’t hold back from doing the most obvious thing because it’s obvious.

Avil Beckford: How do you define success? And in your opinion what’s the formula for success?

Gary Vurnum: The formula and definition for such is really the same thing in my book. Success is doing what you love as often as you want to, whether that’s in business or life. In my mind, how happy you are should be the currency for success not a monetary figure. There are enough miserable millionaires and billionaires around to prove this. Unfortunately, the gurus will tell you that you should be a millionaire and aspire to this, but essentially everyone wants to aspire to be happier in their lives. My definition and formula for success is to do more of what you love in both business and life.

Avil Beckford: What are the steps you took to succeed in your field?

Gary Vurnum: I push beyond my comfort zone because if you’re not moving forward you’re moving backward while other people are moving forward and leapfrogging. We’re always in motion so you may think that you’re standing still by not doing anything, but you are going backward because you are nor learning and applying. The reason why I’ve become a speaker, author, publisher, marketer and so on is because if I didn’t believe I could do something, I looked and saw that other people could do it and thought I should give it a go, and sometimes it’s scary, but unless you can push your comfort zone you won’t find out what you’re capable of doing. Once you start doing a few things that you didn’t think you were capable of then you find that there are very few things that you can’t do.

Avil Beckford: What advice do you have for someone just starting out in your field?

Gary Vurnum: Work out what you’re already world-class at, and everyone that I’ve ever met whether they were failure, rich or poor is world-class at something – painting, motivating people, fantastic parent, whatever. Everyone has something that they find either easy to do or comes naturally to them, and enjoy it as well. Take that and see how you can build something around it and do it as often as you can. You do what you love and the money will follow except you have to look at it in a business sense.

But basically someone, somewhere will want what you can do, or wish they could do what you find easy to do. So if it’s organizing, you have very successful personal assistants out there, if it’s painting, people will pay you for your paintings. If it’s being a great parent, there are many avenues to monetize your world-class talent. Everyone has been given a world-class talent at something. That’s the best place to start from rather than follow a process to go and do this then that. Start from inside out.

Avil Beckford: If trusted friends could introduce you to five people that you’ve always wanted to meet, who would you choose? And what would you say to them?

Gary Vurnum:

1. Napoleon Hill: He is the man who wrote Think and Grow Rich and also Law of Success, which is my favourite book of his. I would ask him, “Can I have your original notes to your interviews of over 600 millionaires of the day?” He converted those interviews into Think and Grow Rich but it was a two-day seminar that was the Law of Success. I would want to see those original interview notes to get insights.
2. Warren Buffett: I would like to get information from him on investing.
3. Dalai Lama: Aside from meditation, I’d like to find out what he would recommend to focus on happiness as often as I can.
4. Richard Branson: I would ask him how best to manage your to-do list because I’ve seen his to-do list at the back of one of his books, and he has a big to-do list.
5. Leonardo da Vinci: I’d like to watch him but not necessarily ask him any questions. He was a polymath and involved in many different things.

Avil Beckford: Which one book had a profound impact on your life? What was it about this book that impacted you so deeply?

Gary Vurnum: There have been many that had a profound impact on me. One at the time when I was going through all my problems to quit my job and so on, which tuned me in to the more spiritual side of success, was a book written back in 1912 I think, The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace D. Wattles. You can get it for free online. It’s a short book and might be a bit too spiritual for a lot of people. It made me focus and took me away from the reality that I was facing and made me appreciate possibilities rather than restrictions.

Avil Beckford: You are one of the 10 finalists on the reality show, So, How Would You Spend Your Time? Each finalist is placed on separate deserted islands for two years. You have a basic hut on the island and all the tools for survival; you just have to be imaginative and inventive when using them. You are allowed to take five books, one movie and one music CD, and whatever else you take has to fit in one suitcase and a travel on case. What would you take with you and how would you spend the two years? T he prize is worth your while and at this stage in the game there really aren’t any losers among the 10 finalists, since each are guaranteed at least $2 million?

Gary Vurnum: This is the hardest question because there are too many books and I have eclectic music taste and I go to the cinema quite a bit.

Two Years

I would do a lot of writing, thinking, teach myself meditation and try to find a way to invent a happiness machine so I could work out whether I’m being happy or not. The hardest thing when you’re on your own is being happy irrespective of technology and the tools you have in your life. So I would work on a happiness machine so that I would come off solitary confinement happier than when I went on.

Five Books

1. Law of Success, Napoleon Hill
2. The Science of Getting Rich, Wallace D. Wattles
3. The Richest Man in Babylon, George S. Clason
4. Ask and It Is Given: Learning to Manifest Your Desires, Esther and Jerry Hicks
5. Reality Transurfing 1: The Space of Variations, Vadim Zeeland – It’s just becoming known in the west but has sold millions of copies in Russia. It adds a completely different spin on law of attraction and spirituality in a completely different language and approach. Very few people have heard of it but it’s fascinating

Movie and Music CD

One music CD would have to be a compilation of 80s music because I was a child of the 80s. I was born in 1969 and it was my teenage years in the late 80s (Journey – Greatest Hits DVD 1978-1997 – Music Videos & Live Performances). In terms of films that is very difficult because I don’t tend to watch movies more than once, and I have a number of favourites. One of them for pure comedy value is Step Brothers (Unrated) with Will Ferrell. That’s the only film that made me laugh before the credits started and it’s a film that you either love or hate.

The 80s – Greatest hits

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Step Brother, Trailer (iHD), Will Ferrell and John Reilly

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Avil Beckford: What excites you about life?

Gary Vurnum: Knowing that I am the only one who can choose what I do with my life. If there are any limitations in my life, they are due to me, which is a scary thing because you start to question yourself. Essentially I’m the one in control, that’s what excites me, if I choose to do something, there is no reason why I shouldn’t be able to do it.

Avil Beckford: How do you nurture your soul?

Gary Vurnum: My business life is about that side of things, the best way for me to nurture anything is to teach other people, share it with other people because you learn so much more by trying to teach someone or put it down in words. The way I develop and cope with things – problems or challenge,s is to get it down on paper, and take a step backwards and see how I would suggest other people do it. So I nurture my soul by getting things out of my head and see what other people think.

Avil Beckford: If you had a personal genie and she gave you one wish, what would you wish for?

Gary Vurnum: I would wish that everybody in the world would aspire to be as happy as possible instead of aspiring to be a millionaire.

Avil Beckford: Complete the following, I am happy when…..

Gary Vurnum: The people I love are happy.

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