Tired of settling for less?  Settle for more.

Project Overview

Going deep inside the Self-Help Movement, multimedia artist Jason Safir presents a serious exposé on this multibillion-dollar industry through a notorious web campaign which causes real damage to its paying customers in GetItOnWithVaughn.com. In his multimedia send-up of self-motivational gurus, Safir stars as Vaughn Murphy, a self-proclaimed international leader in peak performance consulting and personal empowerment. Unfortunately, Vaughn has minimal credentials but promises to transform his audience’s lives for the better with his unproven motivational tools. Vaughn suffers from an extreme case of egocentrism, narcissism, and craves validation through others’ acceptance. Vaughn’s website uses mind-blowing multimedia effects to deliver satirical self-help humor in six categories including: mind and spirit, money and finance, relationships and family, health and fitness, career and business, and creativity and fun. Vaughn highlights these areas by selling relaxation exercise DVDs, fitness exercise programs, assorted wellness products, and even bath salt. In short, Vaughn Murphy embodies everything you could want in self-help evangelism under one colossal digital tent.

In his bio, Vaughn Murphy proclaims he’s an internationally recognized expert in the fields of life coaching and personal empowerment. But the real question is what qualifies someone as a life coach versus a fraud? Throughout Vaughn’s versatile catalogue of self-help products, Vaughn never makes an effort to stay within the limits of his lacking expertise. For instance, Vaughn uses a fake white doctor’s jacket to increase his credibility with viewers and help sell his products. Furthermore, in his Healing Rhythms DVD bundle, Vaughn identifies himself as a well-trained spiritual leader offering hours of relaxation videos deeply rooted in transcendental meditation for the low-cost of $79.95. In an industry that’s rife with fraud and scandal, GetItOnWithVaughn.com parodies the hot self-help entrepreneur that is racking in millions of dollars annually by manipulating consumers hopelessly hooked on self-help.

Leaps and Bounds of Faith

The self-help movement is an industry that survives on repeat business. All told, Vaughn Murphy stands at the heart of a multimillion-dollar brand. When he is not holding his motivational seminars, he spends the rest of his days writing a succession of books, producing DVDs and prototyping wellness products for sale. The experience of Vaughn’s website is a non-stop advertisement for personal success. Every week, the self-help onslaught continues where Vaughn manages to successfully whip up a new life product with an accompanying infomercial. In addition, Vaughn uses every product on his website as an extended opportunity to sell his other books, products, and future seminars by utilizing various web advertising technologies like video pre-roll advertisements, automated popup lightwindows, banner ads and even JavaScript controlled flying blimps. Like all pop gurus that franchise themselves, Vaughn plasters his face on all his books, videos, yoga blocks, and even nutrition bars. In GetItOnWithVaughn.com, the desire and need for Vaughn’s self-help actualization life juice is infinite and Vaughn is never done.

“A failure is a man who has blundered, but is unable able to cash in on the experience.”

- Elbert Hubbard, Philosopher

Hopelessly Hooked on Help

Vaughn Murphy embodies the perfect life guru in a culture drowning in the moral ambiguity and projected blame of victimization. Preying on the vulnerability of people who struggle with real life problems, GetItOnWithVaughn.com’s overly optimistic brand of self-help attempts to lead its visitors to believe that there is something wrong with them and only Vaughn can help. Although there is no denying that self-help can benefit people in certain situations, there is no justification for the $8.56 billion the field grosses annually on ludicrous products. This is ultimately what I am attempting to highlight in my body of work and through my character. A meaningful parody of the mainstreaming of self-help dogma, in GetItOnWithVaughn.com, self-help is everywhere, yet it’s nowhere.

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