Fifteen Minutes With Robert Ringer
One of the most common questions I get is how I discovered Ayn Rand. Long story short: When I was fifteen, a friend handed me a book called Million Dollar Habits by an author I had never heard of, Robert Ringer. I was skeptical–at fifteen I had no particular interest in money–but my friend assured me that the point of the book was not how to make money but how to live a successful life.
By the next morning I had finished the book. It had completely changed the way I thought about life. Soon I devoured the rest of his books, and, hungry for more, I decided to check out the books of an author he regularly quoted: Ayn Rand. The rest, as they say, is history. (For the record, although Robert Ringer was clearly influenced by Rand, there are plenty of points of disagreement.)
I tell this story because yesterday Yaron and I had the pleasure of being interviewed by Robert for his Liberty Education Interview Series. You can listen to the interview here.
7 Comments to “Fifteen Minutes With Robert Ringer”
Thanks for the post Don. I think it is fascinating to hear how people came to be influenced by Ayn Rand’s idea.
In the spirit of this post, I will share my story.
Four years ago this month, I began reading The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand. I was touring seminaries, preparing to be engaged, and pursuing what would be a tragic career in Christian ministry.
I never finished the book. The portrayal of Howard Roark, the resolute architect whose integrity was as unyielding as granite inspired and at the same time condemned me. I admired him for his courage and committment to the only standard of truth: this world. I hated him because I had replaced that standard with the mystery of a deity who I happened to call Jesus Christ.
Before I became religious, I had aspired to be an architect, to master the nature of materials and throw them with effort effortlessly into the air. All it took was one summer to extinguish the fire of my ambitions. I accepted, like most people today, an unearned guilt. I confessed an original sin - the sin of independence. For lack of dissenting voice, religion won that summer and derailed my pursuit for the next 7 years.
College was consumed with tears and contradictions. In a pursuit of god, I learned to despise myself. In a pursuit of heaven, I learned to hate this earth. To save my soul, I forsook my body. A promising baseball career, lost. The pursuit of truth, abandoned. The joy of being a great architect, forgotten - more precisely evaded.
Today, after 7 years of torching every known edifice of self-confidence, I revisit The Fountainhead. Today, I pick myself up from the ashes of a scorched ambition and set my sights on the skyline of a promising career. Today, I begin to live.
Is it going to be hard? Yes. It’s going to be hard - damn hard. I have to save $180,000 just to afford three years of graduate school. But when my first building rises from the rubble like a phoenix it will be worth it - more than worth it.
I am very moved by your story because mine is somewhat similar. And, even if I did not emerge as a Phoenix, I’m glad to have made it to be a decent Robin.
I wish you the best of success in the fulfilment of your ambition.
Can you learn whatever it is they teach in grad school without going through the system ? Maybe hook up with an architecural mentor, get materials / lectures from the Internet , take exams, work at an architect’s office ? I remember Dr. Leonard Peikoff’s comment about his grad school experience at NYU. He said he did not learn anything. Took the required courses, then had to forget them because they were so intellectually corrupt. Anyway, best of fortunes in your quest.
The author of the book, WINNING THROUGH INTIMIDATION, was written by somebody with the last name of Ringer. Was that this Robert Ringer who conducted this interview?
Yes.
Very cool to hear both of you guys on at the same time.
My story involves an incredible coincidence- we,Jews,call it BASHERD- meant to be. I was born in the United Soviet Socialist (!) Republic of Krighizja at the end of the war. I went to school in Moscow and left for Poland with my relatives who were Polish Jews from famous actors family.
My grandmother Ida Kaminska a director of the Yiddish State Theatre in Warsaw, was nominated for the Academy Award for her role in a Check movie Shop on Main street in 1967. She took me(I was 21and spoke English well) as an interpreter to Hollywood.
The film won an Oscar for the best foreign film and my Grandmother was nominated as the best actress 1967. But that was the year that Elizabeth Taylor won for “Who is afraid of Virginia Wolf”.So. . .a wealthy and charming Canadians Hans Hirshberg (if my memory is right) and his wife invited us to Canada. WE were their house guests. I was sleeping in the library. The first night, looking for something to read before going to sleep, I found a book by Nathaniel Brandon- Psychology of Self Esteem- what wasn’t I taught that one has to be modest and retiring and meek to be like everybody else? needless to say I was disturbed and mentioned that at breakfast. The gracious lady of the house looked at her husband amazed- “out of all the books there you chose this one???”. Nathaniel Brandon is my brother, she said. Have you heard of Ayn Rand?” Her views and philosophy shocked me and opened my eyes. The world turned upside for me- and I saw the sky! And that is how, after teaching Russian at StonyBrook U of NY, I opened my own business, I learn a completely new field of Esthetic Medicine- I own a clinic in Poland which I franchise and employ MDs for 20 years now. Ayn Rand and the Objectivism changed my life. Sorry for this long outburst, but is so great to talk and read from people like you, while this confused country votes for Unions and Big Government and Socialism which corrupts people, while this wonderful Land of the Free slides towards Land of Not free. . .Erika