Mindset

The global gratitude goddess

By Jonathan Jackson

The power of positive thought has always come naturally to Kim Serafini, but it wasn't until recently that the author of bestselling book I Am Gr8ful for Life discovered her spiritual side and turned positive thought into an inspired existence. Jonathan Jackson reports.

How often do we remind ourselves about the things we are actually appreciative of, the people who inspire our lives or the simple everyday occurrences that shape our futures? How often do we sit back and examine what we are grateful for? What does being grateful actually mean? Do we take being grateful for granted and get too caught up in our moments of joy to see who or what has inspired these events?

Most self help experts and positive thought proponents, from Bob Proctor to Joe Vitale, tell us that to live an inspired, fulfilled life we must first look at what we are grateful for. Kim Serafini has based her entire business model on the concept of gratefulness; her logo, the infinity symbol, represents the infinite number of things, places and events that require our gratitude.

Yet for Kim, an understanding of what it is to be grateful and how this impacts on spirituality has been a work in progress; the culmination of life as a corporate high flyer and subsequent events that left her near broke and looking for answers to some of the universe's larger questions.

Kim's expedition can, for all intents and purposes, be seen as one of great success, but by her own admission she failed to see the spiritual side of the journey until recently. Despite this, she has always considered herself lucky.

"I'm one of those ordinary Australian girls who was in the right place, at the right time, hanging out with the right people," she says. In spite of dropping out of Bond University because education got in the way of the party life, the former Commerce student landed on her feet in Sydney where she found a job working for an events organisation.

"A couple of things happened that were way beyond my imagination or capabilities at the time," Kim says. One of those things was to be sent on assignment with the CEO of a US based company.

"He had the entire Anthony Robbins collection on tape, so I borrowed it and listened to it whenever I got into my car. That was probably one of the things that shaped me."

Though she failed to realise it at the time, Robbins message of mimicry and rapport was seeping in. Kim briefly gave up the high flying lifestyle to go back to school to finish what she started and degreed in management and marketing. Then, shortly after graduation, flew to the US to pursue her fame and fortune.

Visa's in the US are hard to come by, so Kim flew to London and found her next big break as a temp in the mergers and acquisitions department of The Credit Suisse Group.

Working the graveyard shift didn't seem to faze Kim. She was being paid well and the company even sent a private car to collect her each day. This position led her into a job with one of London's leading consulting firms and a 100 hour working week dealing with many of the world's top 50 FTSE businesses.

"I was lucky to land it, but it meant I put my hand up for the jobs my English co-workers didn't want. We took on one of the biggest global mergers ever attempted between two pharmaceutical companies. I lived in a hotel. The life wasn't fun. But I developed an understanding in change practice management and theory."

When the deal was done, Kim went on sabbatical. It was supposed to be a rest, but it served two other purposes: it brought her into the world of sports therapy and it eventually forced her out of London's corporate mayhem and out on her own.

"I was lying down on the therapy table and wondering where the margins were, what the business dynamics were, what separates them (experience wise) from other therapy businesses, how they retained customers and why the staff was bitching about management."

Kim has a problem switching off and relaxing. She has learnt the ebb and flow of life now and the spirituality associated with being, but at the time, "I didn't really understand anything about spirituality," Kim says. "I didn't know that when you connect at the divine level or with the universe you achieve everything you want with ease and flow" She went back to work after her spa enlightenment and was involved in one of the biggest mergers and acquisitions in history involving companies including Burger King and Old El Paso as well as the world's major distillers.

The merger was successful, but Kim felt out in the cold. "They thought I should have been doing an MBA and couldn't see the value to the company in me studying sports therapy."

So Kim went home to Australia, meditated on a career as a sports therapist, then went back to London and fulfilled her goal of opening a clinic in Harley St, known for its reputation of private medical excellence.

By this time in her life, Kim's world was developing beyond being in the right place at the right time to something more along the lines of making her own luck.

"It takes a lot of courage to change, but you don't realise what that is unless you have a lot of passion. And I had a passion and I knew there was an emergence towards a more serious health spa and more professional skills."

Kim immersed herself in study. She took classes for 40 hours a week, while still running her business. She topped the UK in physiology and anatomy, when she hadn't even studied biology at school.

Although having moved into the health related field, she was still yet to discover her spiritual side and was driven by science and business. The science of sports therapy and the magic of ultra sound inspired Kim to create Lithos therapy.

"Seven years ago when I started with Lithos Therapy I received a lot of abuse from the spa and medical fraternity, but I had spent some time with geologist and physicist Dr Andrew White, so knew the science behind the stones and I knew they worked. So I launched Lithos therapy and it took one spa a year later to take off. I had to convince the industry that I wasn't a crystal healer, which I knew nothing about. Today the image of stones on a woman's back is the most used image in the alternative health and beauty industry."

Lithos Therapy uses heated and chilled rocks as therapeutic instruments to enhance and prolong the benefits of massage and beauty treatments for the body, face, hands and feet. It is based on simultaneous use of thermotherapy (heated) and cryotherapy (chilled) techniques. Heat released from the black rocks works in a similar way as ultrasound; the chilled white rocks soothe and heal using the same principles as ice therapy.

Lithos Therapy is now used in 500 Australian day spas and Kim is overseeing international roll-out to elite venues such as Ananda Spa Himalayas, Four Seasons Bali and Le Meridian Abu Dabi.

Kim describes herself as someone who digs in her heels when told she can't do something, but that she says, was before she understood what flow was about.

A trip to the Himalayas helped her to understand the concept of 'one is all and all is one', but it wasn't until her world fell apart that she could come to a real understanding of flow and the meaning of gratitude.

With Lithos Therapy doing well, Kim invested in businesses in teeth whitening and Ayurvedic treatments. While she still maintains the businesses were sound, she says she fell in with the wrong partners and lost almost everything. At the same time she was diagnosed with cancerous cells in her uterus and to top it off, fell into a relationship with a man who was leading a double life with a family and kids elsewhere.

It was a time when the high flying stopped and getting through each day became priority. So Kim went back to her parent's place, mowed 20 acres of land, spent five days in silence and found gratitude.

"I thought, 'my god I am so lucky I can come back to my parents' house and they still love me, even though I've failed at the things most important to me. I still have my eyesight, my hearing and my mind still works. I can do this'."

And she did, slowly. She came to the realisation that she had put herself in situations without doing any real due diligence.

"You have to understand the role you play in your life and understand the concept that you are in control of going into situations and coming out of them. The other insight I came to terms with was that what we take for granted and what we show little gratitude for is always taken away from us. I took for granted who I had become and the opportunities afforded me and the universe gave me a proper kick in the butt."

In the five days she fell silent, Kim wrote I Am Gr8ful for Life. When she was ready she partnered with a graphic designer and they had the book ready for production in 10 days.

"I knew this was my destiny; you don't get the feeling of flow unless you are on purpose and fulfilling your destiny." On a vision board Kim wrote: "I am the gratitude goddess globally and I own this state. I am going to help hundreds of millions of people to get in touch with gratitude."

The book spawned the business I Am Gr8ful and Kim is now one of the most respected coaches in her field.

Yet it isn't yet her crowning achievement. Being grateful has brought Marci Schimoff and Bob Proctor into her world and she couldn't be more gracious about it.

"I received an email that asked 'do you want to go global? We are launching a book and would like to endorse a couple of products we believe are aligned with the philosophies in our book'. It had no attachment and I didn't think any more of it." Kim did want to go global and responded to the email. She didn't know at the time, but it was sent by Bob Proctor and Michelle Blood who had come across Kim's book and wanted to promote it.

"The next morning Michelle and Bob rang me to tell me my book will receive a full page endorsement in their book. I went through the full tears of gratitude down my face."

Since that call Bob Proctor and Michelle Blood have told Kim that they are talking about helping her print and distribute the book. "Their opinion matters because they get it. It will sell hundreds of millions of copies," Kim enthuses.

In the same week, the Sunshine Coast Regional Council contacted Kim to be the International Women's Day speaker. Gratitude was having a profound effect and Kim came to the realisation that the concept wasn't just a nice theory, it was a necessary theory.

As things fell into place, Kim read Marci Schimoff's book. "What I new was that if you could live at a state of happiness for no reason you are vibrating at the highest level. I wanted to feel happier, so I read her book and thought this is the best book on happiness I have ever read. I sent her a copy of my book and wrote to her that I am truly grateful to her for writing this book and making it beautiful.

"A week later I get a phone call from her assistant saying she loved my book and thinks its exquisite. I asked if I could interview her for the website. What I wanted to know is 'does gratitude beget success, or does success beget gratitude?' What I learnt is gratitude comes first." Kim is now bringing Marci Schimoff to Australia for a series of seminars. Her honesty with Marci meant more than her lack of experience and Marci agreed to the tour. But it isn't all that is falling into place.

"I had a meeting about creating a TV show and movie in which we interview people about what they are grateful for. I am also coming out with nine more books, in a series of 10, by the end of next year."

It seems Kim will never lose the edge she had that took her to the top of the corporate world, but these days she tempers that edge with an understanding of gratitude. Her newfound success is based on letting people and the objects around her know that she is grateful for them. And she has come to understand that sometimes the greatest lessons come from the greatest challenges.