In 1993, I started on an interesting journey in the business world: at the age of 23, I became President & CEO of my first high technology company, called Brainstorm Technologies. I grew this company rapidly and for a time we were known as one of the "hottest" start-ups on the East Coast. As the company grew, so did my understanding about the business world and how it worked. I learned a series of lessons over the next few years that I'd like to share with you.

However, around the same time, I began another journey of personal growth, which became inextricably entwined with the growth of my business. In fact, it led me to some startling lessons about entrepreneurship as a path of personal growth; I learned a set of spiritual practices, techniques, and principles, which had to do with what my mentors called "the hidden worlds".

Eventually, I realized that these lessons were part and parcel of what I learned in the business world, and the only way for me to explain one is to also explain the other. Though my chosen career, high tech entrepreneurship, is more risky (and potentially more rewarding) than most careers, I believe the lessons that I learned were universal and can be applied to any "life path".

Part I of this book, Baby Steps, is about the events leading up to the starting of my company. It includes my introduction to concepts about how the "hidden worlds" affect us. Not only were these concepts new to me, but I wasn't sure that I believed them.

Part II of this book, Initiation, is about the events and lessons that I can only describe as "intermediate steps" into the business world, as I grew the company rapidly and stepped into the role of the "CEO". My initiation into the business world consisted of choices that I was forced to make on an almost daily basis. My initiation into the hidden worlds had to do with a more thorough exposure to the spiritual principles that I was beginning to see at work all around me.

Part III, Surprises, is about the how what was happening in "the hidden worlds" helped to shape the course of my business in ways that I didn't consciously acknowledge or want. The events described here happened after I had raised many millions of dollars in venture capital and was facing some of the toughest personal and career challenges I have ever faced.

It took some time for these lessons to sink in, and it was not easy for me to come to the realization that success or failure in the business world is not simply about "dollars and cents", that it could in fact be an integrated part of a path of spiritual growth and personal discovery.

I discovered that starting a business is a much an act of self expression as it is a professional one. I found that our beliefs, energetic patterns, and our thoughts manifest themselves in our careers in ways that I hadn't, and couldn't have imagined.

This, then, is the story of what happened in the everyday world, and how it led to a gradual awakening of what was happening behind the scenes, in the "hidden worlds" during my formative entrepreneurial episode. It is also a collection of the lessons that I gradually learned. I have re-arranged some events to draw out the spiritual lessons ... in particular, I have combined several of my meditation and business mentors into one personality; Otherwise, this is my story. 

-Riz Virk, January 1999