world
Sara Blakely Urges Florida State Graduates to Bet on Themselves; Binance Says Emerging Markets Now Represent 77% of Its Users
Spanx founder Sara Blakely recounted her rejections and self-taught path in a commencement address at her 1993 alma mater. Personal finance expert Beth Kobliner outlined basic rules for young adults facing elevated debt and job market challenges.
May 9, 11:41 AM·3m read3 sources
FOYA
forbes.comAudio version
Tap play to generate a narrated version.
Sara Blakely, who graduated from Florida State University in 1993, told the class of 2026 to bet on themselves in a commencement address. Blakely recounted being rejected by 20 companies at a campus job fair, after which she worked at a Disney World park for a few months and then spent seven years selling fax machines door to door.
When she was 16, her father gave her cassette tapes of Wayne Dyer’s book “How to Be a No-Limit Person.” “I heard a man’s voice talking about the power of your own thoughts and visualizing the future you want,” Blakely said. She listened to the tapes so often that she memorized all 10 cassettes front and back.
” This led her to journal, schedule time to think, and deliberately try things she feared. Blakely appeared on the cover of Forbes as the youngest self-made woman to join the 2012 billionaires list. She launched Spanx in 2000 with no investors and minimal resources, writing her own patent because she could not afford a patent attorney and trademarking the name herself.
“I had no experience, but I had belief,” she said. Blakely recalled making a major on-air mistake during a BBC interview about Spanx and using the embarrassment as a lesson. “You will be embarrassed,” she told the graduates. She also spoke at the Forbes 2025 Power Women’s Summit in New York City in September 2025, where she warned about protecting focus amid constant news and social media.
“You have to protect your time,” she said. Blakely concluded that graduates face one decision: “You can distract yourself or you can discover yourself.”
Beth Kobliner, author of the newly revised book “Get a Financial Life: Personal Finance in Your Twenties and Thirties,” advised new graduates and young adults to stick to financial basics. Kobliner, who taught Elmo about money on Sesame Street, said debt payments not including mortgage should be less than 15 percent of monthly pretax pay, rent or mortgage payments should be no more than 30 percent of monthly take-home pay, and savings should be at least 10 percent of take-home pay each month.
