Brock O’Hurn is famous. How did he get famous? “I made an Instagram,” he says. “Same as everybody else. The old way, you’d have to done a movie and become famous for that to happen. Now it’s like people know you just because.” In O’Hurn’s case, it’s just because he stands a chiseled 6’7” with a lion’s mane of hair and perfectly groomed beard. He became one of the most swooned-over men on the Internet when he uploaded a 24-second Facebook video of him putting his hair in a bun—and taking it out of the bun. Now, his Instagram is littered with selfies, many shirtless, all captioned with optimistic, positive messages and all going out to his army of 1.7 million followers. And he’s got some advice on how to get famous for your looks (it’s also going to require knowing how to take a perfect selfie, which he explains, on video, at the end). So if you aren’t yet a famous movie star or a famous anything, pay attention.
1. Get yourself some haters.“I was awkward and lanky. I had acne. I wasn’t used to my body. All I would ever hear was, You’re never gonna be in shape. You can’t do it. You’re too skinny. But what I did was I never quit, I never stopped, I never gave up. And man, it was probably one of the best decisions I ever made.”
2. Turn exercise into a daily ritual.“Before I went to bed, I would do three sets of 50 push-ups. Before showering, I would turn the water on, do 100 push-ups, and then get in. For me, it created a trigger that now every time the shower came on, I knew I had to work out.”
3. Have Instagram-savvy buds.“I didn’t really understand social media. I had these friends trying to show me and they would say, like, Oh, you have to double-tap this and gets a heart. And then that’s a like, and it’s good to get a bunch of likes. And I was like, Well then why don’t you just keep double-tapping it and get a bunch of hearts? And they’re like, That’s not how it works! One of my friends took my phone, downloaded the app, created an account for me, and—I’m not kidding—said, This will change your life.”
4. Grow out your hair. Put it in a bun. On video.“I ran out of ideas to post online, so I did my hair. Once I posted that video, within one month, I had 300,000 new followers. It was around November, December last year. And from then it’s been a consistent 100,000 a month.”
5. Take care of whatcha got.“Shampoo three to four times a week. Condition once. Let it air-dry. If anyone comes near my hair, we’re gonna have a problem.”
Clay Skipper is a Staff Writer at GQ.XInstagramRelated Stories for GQInstagramMan Bun