purpose, and once this is accomplished, the universe will conspire to make one’ s dreams a reality. Prior to reading the book and long before he was a household name, Pharrell often felt as though the universe was conspiring against him. He toiled for years behind the scenes, writing and producing songs for some of the biggest stars in the music industry, including Britney Spears, Gwen Stefani, Nelly, Adam Lambert, Jay-Z, Ludacris and Justin Timberlake. While he collected a slew of Grammys and loaned his distinctive falsetto voice to other artists’ videos, he dreamed of breaking away and having a solo career. For reasons he couldn’ t fathom, success and fame continually eluded him.
“ Time after time, people kept raining on me and putting my fire out,” he said.“ I was at the point where I said I was going to give up and accept that I should just be content being a writer and producer.”
For more than a decade, Pharrell said he was frustrated by all of the trappings of success enjoyed by his peers, such as recording artists Sean“ P Diddy” Combs and Jay-Z. They had all the beautiful women, luxurious homes, private jets and flashy cars that money could buy, and he believed that if he kept on working hard enough that all of these things would eventually be within his grasp.
“ I misinterpreted what my friends were doing and thought the same thing was for me,” he said.“ I was doing a watered-down version of what they were meant to do, and didn’ t realize I wasn’ t following my purpose.”
Disenchanted that his goals never materialized, his perspective changed when his manager suggested that he read The Alchemist. Suddenly, it was clear to him that he was meant for a much different path. He was also humbled by the realization that many people had believed in him since he was a child and had contributed to his career, including his teachers, band instructors, his family, and especially his beloved grandmother.
“ My grandmother told me she had a vision that I was going to be way up high,” he said.“ She said I was going to be up in the clouds.”
When Pharrell made a decision to stop chasing other people’ s dreams and started focusing on his own, that’ s when things finally started to click. After several years of dating, he married model Helen Lasichanh in 2013. He also accepted a project to write a song about happiness for Universal Picture’ s animated film Despicable Me 2, but for some reason he encountered a serious case of writer’ s block. Completely out of ideas, he realized he was“ over thinking” the concept of being happy and needed to relax and let his mind flow. For the song“ Happy,” he chose gospel chords and said the lyrics finally came to him while taking a shower. He submitted nine songs to the film’ s producers and“ Happy” was finally selected for the movie’ s soundtrack and video.
Pharrell recalled that when“ Happy” was first released to radio stations, it did not get any attention or airplay. However, soon after the song was released on video in November 2013, millions of people took notice and embraced the catchy lyrics and adorable dancing minions. The song rose to the top of Billboard’ s
The Hot 100 chart and remained there for 10 consecutive weeks, peaking at number one in 103 markets worldwide and spawning videos on YouTube of people all over the world dancing and singing along to“ Happy.” It had not happened overnight, but Pharrell had finally achieved his dream of being a solo artist and a superstar. He acknowledged that it was“ overwhelming” that the song, which sold 6.5 million copies in the U. S. and 1.5 million in the UK alone, resonated with so many people.