Sara Blakely

Trust your gut.

Don't be intimidated by what you don't know. That can be your greatest strength and ensure that you do things differently from everyone else.

Everything in our society is so purposeful.

When I was 7, I came up with the idea of 'charm socks.' My mom would take me to buy bags of plastic charms, we would sew them on frilly white socks, and I sold them at school.

I'm just like so many women - I was frustrated, I had these white pants that I had spent a lot of money on, and you get home and you think, 'What am I really supposed to wear under this?' So it was a frustrated consumer moment.

The word 'Spanx' was funny. It made people laugh. No one ever forgot it.

I took a Fear of Flying class, and I always missed the class, because I was always flying.

We don't have the luxury of time. We spend more because of how we live, but it's important to be with our family and friends.

I started thinking about joy. Everything in our society is so purposeful. Let's bring joy back to the experience.

I grew up in a house where my father encouraged my brother and me to fail. I specifically remember coming home and saying, 'Dad, Dad, I tried out for this or that and I was horrible, ' and he would high-five me and say, 'Way to go.'

When I'm bored or tired of being blonde, I'll throw on a wig. It's a lot less of a permanent way to change your look, and I have about 10 - all different colors, shapes, bobs, long hair, short, feathered.

I've always leaned toward a feminine, funky style, even in business settings. I used to paint my nails blue in 1993, before it was mainstream.

My revenue was $4 million my first year in business, off of one $20 item.

I'd get kicked out of buildings all day long, people would rip up my business card in my face. It's a humbling business to be in. But I knew I could sell and I knew I wanted to sell something I had created. I cut the feet out of those pantyhose and I knew I was on to something. This was it.

Don't solicit feedback on your product, idea or your business just for validation purposes. You want to tell the people who can help move your idea forward, but if you're just looking to your friend, co-worker, husband or wife for validation, be careful. It can stop a lot of multimillion-dollar ideas in their tracks in the beginning.

I failed the LSAT. Basically, if I had not failed, I'd have been a lawyer and there would be no Spanx. I think failure is nothing more than life's way of nudging you that you are off course. My attitude to failure is not attached to outcome, but in not trying. It is liberating.

I think failure is nothing more than life's way of nudging you that you are off course. My attitude to failure is not attached to outcome, but in not trying. It is liberating. Most people attach failure to something not working out or how people perceive you. This way, it is about answering to yourself.

My dad encouraged us to fail. Growing up, he would ask us what we failed at that week. If we didn't have something, he would be disappointed. It changed my mindset at an early age that failure is not the outcome, failure is not trying. Don't be afraid to fail.