Most people think branding is the projection of a positive image. Ask any experienced brand strategist and they will tell you nothing(!) could be further from the truth. While it may draw quick attention, projecting an image is not sustainable nor does it lead to the right results. No legendary, lasting brand has ever been built on projection. Instead we start out with values. A deep, total and utter understanding and living expression of a brand’s values. Its not preaching beliefs. Its not selling, convincing or putting yourself or your brand on a pedestal. Its about doing good in the world and building a great reputation through consistent brand behavior based on these living values.

So how does this work for a people brand? Let’s experiment, shall we? Let me share some personal facts with you…and let’s see if you can detect the values that rule my personal brand. Here we go…

1. I danced on the Berlin Wall right in front of the Brandenburger Tor the day it came down. I lived in West Berlin at the time, and in the evening had to make the long walk home by foot because the traffic and public transportation had shut down in a dancing city drunk on euphoria.

2. I spent a night in a snowstorm at 15,000 feet elevation in the Andes Mountains in South America, before being initiated by Q’ero elders into the Inca Prophecy Keeper Lineage through sacred ceremonies.

3.In 1987 when I was only 21 years old, I had an opportunity to spend a week with the Pygmy tribe in the rainforest of Cameroon, West Africa. I declined this once-in lifetime invitation because I felt that unless I had a greater purpose in visiting them, I had no business disturbing their peace and affecting their serene existence negatively by simply entering their lives.

4. When I was 26 I had a light shaft experience in Manhattan sitting on a bench in Washington Square Park when my highest life purpose was revealed to me in this life-altering incident.

5. In 1993, before there was a World Wide Web, I wrote a master thesis entitled “Fishing For The Heavenly Body,” in which I correlated the 7 software layers that constitute the Internet with the 7 layers of Heaven. In addition to this visionary proposition, I created an art installation complete with interactive human interface. It was exhibited up until 1996 in various galleries in Berlin. 20 years later I’m still linking people with their Heavens using the Web.

6. Following the insight of my light shaft experience, I landed 3 years later in San Francisco, after having earned a best-of-class B.A. and a best-of-class M.A. from the Berlin University of the Arts. The founders of WIRED magazine discovered me, offering me a job on the spot as their first web designer pioneering the World Wide Web.

7. In order to qualify for a U.S. work visa I had to prove that my skills are totally one-of-a-kind, and that I’m not taking any job away from any U.S. citizen.

8. Since my early twenties, I frequently hear that I look like Meryl Streep. I think that’s a wonderful compliment, since the academy award winner is my favorite actress!

9. A famous Swiss astrologer told me in my early twenties that I was either going to have 8 or 9 children or live a tremendously creative and artistic life. Thankfully, I chose the later!

10. I was quite a sensitive little baby girl and stuttered from the moment I learned language until my beloved mum and her homeopathic doctor cured me in the nick of time, before I entered first grade. I was never ridiculed or made to feel bad.

11. I am an utterly down-to-earth human being, yet I’ve encountered angels, ascended masters, aliens, ghosts, entities, UFOs, animal spirits, stone people, fairies, and everything in-between.

12. I got married twice to Jewish Capricorn men (and I’m planning on staying married to the second one!).

13. I once had a boss who was convinced that every single person can be “bought,” meaning that it was just a question of how much money it would take to corrupt that individual. I always argued against that contentious belief. Years later, I was put to the ultimate test when I had to take a stand in a company scandal. I had two choices: shut up and walk away with multiple 6-figures or perhaps even 7-figures as an internal settlement—or speak the truth and watch that boss unceremoniously have to pack his own bags and leave. I stayed, both with the company and true to my integrity.

14. I trained in Shotokan Karate at Rocky Marciano’s boxing studio in West Berlin and Muai Thai Kick Boxing at Ken Shamrock’s Lion Den in Scottsdale, Arizona.

15. I passionately drive an Audi/VW Turbo, which not only fits my kick-butt personality but has also saved my life when I almost got T-boned by a drunk truck driver crossing a red light intersection doing 70 miles per hour.

16. I had an early childhood dream to become an actress. I’m happy to say it came true in my early thirties, when I played a lead role in an independent movie filmed in Napa Valley, California. Around that time I also had an opportunity to audition in Hollywood. Flattered, I declined, without regret.

17. Since age 13 it has been my dream to go to Tibet. It’s still on my bucket list.

18. Growing up in the laboratory of my inventor dad, I learned how to make a perfect, splatter-free welding line at age 7.

19. In the early 70’s, my father patented the principle for a water-fueled car engine. The same year, he encountered mysterious reasons to be concerned for his safety. He quit pursuing his alternative energy inventions though he never stopped being convinced that the puzzle of Perpetual Motion had been solved.

20. I live with a MTOB and a MTOH. MTOB, or Master Teacher Of Bliss, is an enchanted cat being who is my furry child, and my husband Leslie, who is also wonderful and furry, and a MTOH or Master Teacher Of Hugs.