Speaker 1: You're listening to I Choose Me with Jenny Garland. Hi, everyone,
Speaker 1: welcome to I Choose Me. This podcast is all about
Speaker 1: the choices we make and where they lead us. My
Speaker 1: guest today has had a very unique path to success.
Speaker 1: From pageants to reality TV to founding what would become
Speaker 1: a globally recognized beauty brand, she has blazed her own trail.
Speaker 1: She is the founder of IT Cosmetics and a two
Speaker 1: time New York best selling author of the books Believe
Speaker 1: It and Worthy. Maybe you've seen her as a guest
Speaker 1: shark on Shark Tank, or maybe you listen to her
Speaker 1: gorgeous podcast. Please welcome Jamie Kern Lima to the podcast.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me. It's so great
Speaker 2: to be here with you. We're both sitting here barefoot, cozy,
Speaker 2: and I'm just honored and excited for our conversation.
Speaker 3: I'm so glad you're here.
Speaker 1: I'm very happy to hear out with you me too. Today.
Speaker 1: Before we get into the business and the founder talk,
Speaker 1: which I love to get into, we have something in common,
Speaker 1: you and I. We both started out in pageants.
Speaker 3: Oh, I didn't know that you did.
Speaker 1: I didn't know that you did it until I did
Speaker 1: this research. But I was in the Lake Have a
Speaker 1: Suit Cinderella Scholarship pageant, Yeah, in nineteen eighty eight, and
Speaker 1: you were Miss Washington, USA, Yes, in nineteen ninety nine.
Speaker 3: Yes, wow, Yes, it's funny.
Speaker 2: I had never been raised around them or anything at all,
Speaker 2: and I was working all these jobs trying to save
Speaker 2: up for school, and I was like, oh, you can
Speaker 2: make you can you know, if you win, you can
Speaker 2: get a scholarship, right, Yeah. So so I did it
Speaker 2: a little bit, and it was it was an experience.
Speaker 3: How is yours?
Speaker 1: Well, I only did it one time. Okay, I was
Speaker 1: one and done.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: This was my first experience with anything like this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: being on stage, being in the spot light, anything. And
Speaker 1: I learned that when it's go time, when it's your
Speaker 1: turn to walk out on that stage, you drop everything
Speaker 1: and you just give it all you've got, because if
Speaker 1: you're in a pageant, you probably want to win.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, Like there's something that takes over you.
Speaker 2: How did you do in your like how did you feel?
Speaker 2: Were you nervous it all up there your first time?
Speaker 2: Were you like, oh, yeah, what in the world am
Speaker 2: I doing?
Speaker 3: Or where you're like.
Speaker 1: Sure, I could hardly even speak. Is there anything that
Speaker 1: stood out for you, like how long did you do them?
Speaker 1: And yeah, how what did you learn from that experience? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I just did a couple in this really short window.
Speaker 1: I was always nervous.
Speaker 2: I think that I had so much at the time,
Speaker 2: and then for maybe two decades after that, Like a
Speaker 2: lot of people hear my story about building a big
Speaker 2: company or whatever, and they just think, I'm like so confident.
Speaker 2: But most of my life I really felt like I
Speaker 2: wasn't enough. I kind of felt and I didn't realize
Speaker 2: that that would impact every area of my life, you know,
Speaker 2: and I know so many of us. I think it's
Speaker 2: eighty percent of women don't leave there enough. And so
Speaker 2: at that moment in my life, it was my early twenties,
Speaker 2: late late teens, early twenties, that little window. I just remember, Jenny.
Speaker 2: I remember I would always be shaking physically. So I
Speaker 2: one of them. The first one I did that I
Speaker 2: didn't win. I had this white satin gown and after
Speaker 2: the pageant, Everyone's like, why.
Speaker 3: Was there a fan on? Because it was it was.
Speaker 2: Blow it was shaking the whole thing, and I was like,
Speaker 2: I don't think there was a fan on, And I
Speaker 2: watched the video.
Speaker 3: It was me shaking, okay shaking. It was shaking because
Speaker 3: I was just so it's.
Speaker 1: Nerve wracking stand yeah in front of people and putting
Speaker 1: yourself out there like that, yeah, and just being like
Speaker 1: who I am is enough?
Speaker 3: And I wasn't there yet at that point in my life.
Speaker 2: And so I went for it.
Speaker 3: I was trying. I was I was trying.
Speaker 2: I was hoping at some like I was hoping confidence
Speaker 2: would just come to me or something.
Speaker 3: But I did go for it. I did try, I did.
Speaker 2: Want it, And I think also, I don't know, I'm
Speaker 2: actually so curious if you've had a moment like this,
Speaker 2: because you've done and continue to do so many incredible
Speaker 2: things in your career and everything you're doing now with QVC,
Speaker 2: with all with your show. But I remember when I
Speaker 2: was a little girl, I was probably around eight years old,
Speaker 2: and there was this moment. I would always watch Oprah
Speaker 2: every day, and there's this moment where Barbara Walters interviewed
Speaker 2: Oprah and Oprah said to Oprah said to Barbara, this
Speaker 2: was earlier in Oprah's career. She said, I always knew
Speaker 2: I was destined for greatness. And I remember as a
Speaker 2: little girl, like I had this kind of whisper that
Speaker 2: was like.
Speaker 3: Me too, I feel like I'm supposed to.
Speaker 2: Do something that's going to either help a lot of
Speaker 2: people or I didn't know what it was, but had
Speaker 2: that feeling. And I'll also never forget then she just
Speaker 2: got destroyed in the press for it. I think at
Speaker 2: the time, they weren't used to like a woman speaking
Speaker 2: confidently or saying she got out.
Speaker 1: She crashed for saying yeah, I was born for greatness.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like I'm destined to do something like great Yeah,
Speaker 2: there's greatness inside of me. I think it just wasn't
Speaker 2: common at that point for a woman to be to
Speaker 2: just make a declaration like that. And anyhow, I so
Speaker 2: I think when I, you know, fast forward, I don't know,
Speaker 2: fifteen years when I entered a pageant, I think I
Speaker 2: was just trying to figure out what is that thing
Speaker 2: where I'm supposed to blossom or or be dustined for
Speaker 2: a greatness in or somehow help a lot of other people.
Speaker 2: And so it's interesting because most of my life was
Speaker 2: a lot of setbacks and and you know, just for
Speaker 2: anybody maybe who's listening and having this conversation with us
Speaker 2: right now, I think a lot of us have those
Speaker 2: little whispers like, oh, I'm made to do, you know,
Speaker 2: either to put my art out in the world, or
Speaker 2: serve or create, or help someone else or help other
Speaker 2: people make it through the thing I went through, or
Speaker 2: I'm curious with you just given how much you've done life,
Speaker 2: oh my goodness, and continue to did you when you
Speaker 2: were a little growing up, did you ever have kind
Speaker 2: of like a whisper like, Oh, I'm maybe supposed to
Speaker 2: be I'm supposed to do things that maybe are different
Speaker 2: from my friends or the people I was raised around,
Speaker 2: or my environment or the examples I've been shown, or
Speaker 2: that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: Yes, when I was growing up, No, I never questioned anything. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I never had any plans. Yeah, I never had like
Speaker 1: that thing that I wanted and I was going to
Speaker 1: work for. I never knew myself well enough. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: then I got into the business, and then I really
Speaker 1: didn't know myself for many, many years.
Speaker 3: Right, So it's been a ride.
Speaker 1: It's been a journey for me to figure out who
Speaker 1: am I?
Speaker 3: Who am I? Right right?
Speaker 2: Did you before you got in the business, did you
Speaker 2: have did you kind of feel like because obviously what
Speaker 2: I love so much by the way, about your show
Speaker 2: is like everyone with us now and just real having
Speaker 2: a real conversation. I remember for decades always watching you,
Speaker 2: knowing of you all the things right, celebrating another woman
Speaker 2: who's crushing it out there in the world. Did you
Speaker 2: ever have that little whisper before any of that happened,
Speaker 2: like Oh, I'm gonna do something, maybe not a plan
Speaker 2: or anything, but like, oh, I'm you know, I was
Speaker 2: made extra special or I'm going to do something that's extraordinary.
Speaker 1: Yeah, my story is a little different than that. I
Speaker 1: spent a lot of time downplaying my extra specialness or
Speaker 1: not letting my light shine for various reasons. But it
Speaker 1: was certainly has been a lifelong journey for me to
Speaker 1: find out that it's okay to be special, it's okay
Speaker 1: to love myself that much and be confident in who
Speaker 1: I am and not be ashamed of that. You know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it sounds like you had that from an early age,
Speaker 1: and the pageants really sort of brought that out in you.
Speaker 3: A little bit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I you know, it's interesting, Jenny, I am.
Speaker 2: I kind of always believed the lie until maybe just
Speaker 2: a few years ago.
Speaker 3: I always believe.
Speaker 2: The lie if I achieve enough, then I'll finally be enough,
Speaker 2: like a if I achieve enough, then.
Speaker 3: I'll be worthy of love.
Speaker 2: And so you know how we're sort of raised thinking like, well,
Speaker 2: you know see commercials everywhere like oh, if you get
Speaker 2: six pack apps, then you'll be happy, or if you
Speaker 2: get this dream car, then you'll be happy, or whatever
Speaker 2: it might be, the white picket fence.
Speaker 3: And so I sort of did.
Speaker 2: I sort of took this route where you know, oh,
Speaker 2: if I finally get that thing, if I finally build
Speaker 2: that business, if I finally whatever it might be, and
Speaker 2: no matter what, I would finally accomplish, win this award,
Speaker 2: whatever it is, I would arrive at it.
Speaker 3: And I think a lot of us have had this experience.
Speaker 2: We think like, oh, once I hit my goal weight
Speaker 2: or whatever it might be, I would arrive at it
Speaker 2: and be like, why is it I still feel like
Speaker 2: it's not enough, and why don't I feel all the
Speaker 2: things I thought I would feel when I finally got
Speaker 2: the thing. And then I'd be like, oh, it must
Speaker 2: just mean I need to actually do more. And that
Speaker 2: was like a cycle. And I remember I was about
Speaker 2: to turn forty, and my whole life I dreamed of
Speaker 2: meeting Oprah and I had then, you know, I spent
Speaker 2: over a decade building at cosmetics and all these things,
Speaker 2: was doing one hundred hour weeks and I was about
Speaker 2: to turn forty, and long story short, my assistant had
Speaker 2: written this letter.
Speaker 3: I didn't know she wrote a letter.
Speaker 2: My assistant at cosmetics had wrote a letter and somehow
Speaker 2: got it to Oprah's chief of staff and they arranged
Speaker 2: this whole thing where I was going to be surprised
Speaker 2: and meet her at one of her events. And I
Speaker 2: didn't know any of this was happening. And I thought
Speaker 2: at the time, I was really confident at that point
Speaker 2: in my life, like I had built the business I had,
Speaker 2: you know, worked so hard and all the things we had,
Speaker 2: millions of customers. Everything on paper looked like I should
Speaker 2: be so confident and feel so worthy. And that day
Speaker 2: at her event in California, they took me backstage and
Speaker 2: I met Oprah.
Speaker 1: And you must have been like dying.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, I was, Yeah, you watched her.
Speaker 4: Since you were a little girl, Yeah, since I was little,
Speaker 4: And I always felt a whisper like I would meet
Speaker 4: her one day, which made no sense because growing up
Speaker 4: I didn't know anybody who knew anybody, you know what
Speaker 4: I mean.
Speaker 2: I was like in a suburb of Washington State. So
Speaker 2: I met her backstage. I then got a call later
Speaker 2: where she invited me to her house for lunch. We
Speaker 2: had a three hour lunch. At the end of it,
Speaker 2: she gives me her cell number and she says, call
Speaker 2: me anytime. You can call me anytime. I did not
Speaker 2: call her for four years. Four years goes by, and
Speaker 2: I would tell myself these stories, like, oh, I just
Speaker 2: need to think of the perfect thing to say, then
Speaker 2: I'll call her, or oh, you know, maybe I need
Speaker 2: to I'm gonna prove everyone probably wants something from her.
Speaker 3: I'm going to approve to her. I don't need anything,
Speaker 3: like I don't need a new car, like I.
Speaker 2: Don't need like be able to prove it. I would
Speaker 2: just tell myself these stories. Four years later, I realized
Speaker 2: the real reason I hadn't called her was because deep
Speaker 2: down inside, I didn't believe I was worthy of being
Speaker 2: her friend.
Speaker 1: I can imagine that. I mean, yeah, that's a big
Speaker 1: that's a big phone number to get in your contact list.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's and it's wild because at the time
Speaker 2: I didn't understand that self confidence is very different than
Speaker 2: self worth. So I had built a lot of self
Speaker 2: confidence through all of these external achievements, but deep down inside,
Speaker 2: I didn't think I was enough. And what I now
Speaker 2: know is that we will sabotage things we don't believe
Speaker 2: we're worthy of, and and that our self worth is
Speaker 2: our ceiling.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: It's why you can meet so many people who are
Speaker 2: amazing and you're like, why is she so amazing but
Speaker 2: she's in this relationship with this person that treats her terribly,
Speaker 2: or she's so amazing, but she won't put her art
Speaker 2: out there or her talent or her ideas or raise
Speaker 2: her hand.
Speaker 3: And it's because if we.
Speaker 2: Don't deep inside believe we're worthy of, it will sabotage it.
Speaker 2: And I realize, like, oh my gosh, you can't out
Speaker 2: succeed your level of self worth. So even though at
Speaker 2: the time I was so career successful, I didn't think
Speaker 2: I was enough. So that was when I became obsessed
Speaker 2: with studying self worth. It's why I launched my podcast,
Speaker 2: The Jamie cern Lima Show, because I'm like, I want
Speaker 2: to have these great conversations which I'm so excited.
Speaker 3: I'm praying you come on into the show. I will
Speaker 3: be there, yeah, because I want to.
Speaker 2: I just feel like it's so new. And thank you,
Speaker 2: by the way for having a conversation like this, because
Speaker 2: it's so new that we come together and share our experiences.
Speaker 2: Because on the outside, on the outside, I would never know, Jenny,
Speaker 2: that you would ever struggle to shine your light. And
Speaker 2: so probably on the outside, someone maybe if they've read
Speaker 2: part of my story that the press sures, which is
Speaker 2: always like Denny's waitress builds billion dollar company, they might think.
Speaker 3: Oh, she probably feels worthy.
Speaker 2: But on the inside, like sharing these real things I helped,
Speaker 2: I think helps so many people feel less alone and
Speaker 2: more enough because otherwise we're sitting at home, we're a
Speaker 2: scroll on Instagram, and I'm like, Jenny Garth would never
Speaker 2: not shine her light, you know, And that's.
Speaker 3: What we think.
Speaker 1: And I look at you and I think, you've built
Speaker 1: this amazing business, you have achieved such success, and you
Speaker 1: have this beautiful show, Like I think the same thing
Speaker 1: of you, Like I wouldn't imagine that you struggled like that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, And I feel like for me, I still do.
Speaker 3: I still so too, do you?
Speaker 1: I mean you think you're there?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: You think you've done in the work. You think you've
Speaker 1: put in the hours you know of soul searching and
Speaker 1: contemplating and do therapy and doing all the things that
Speaker 1: we have to do to do that work. And then
Speaker 1: like that, it'll come back. Yes, like and just like
Speaker 1: a like you know when you turn on the gas
Speaker 1: burner the stove and it goes. Yes, that's the feeling
Speaker 1: when an emotion takes over or something triggers you and
Speaker 1: it sends you right back to that place of unworthiness
Speaker 1: or of I have to hide my light or what
Speaker 1: you were talking about before about sabotaging things.
Speaker 3: Yes, that I'm really good at, are you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've for years told myself relationships are not for me.
Speaker 1: I am not good in relationships, and because they're hard,
Speaker 1: and I'm such an independent woman, I've always have that like, well,
Speaker 1: I can just go off on my own and be
Speaker 1: just fine, you know, but I will do whatever I
Speaker 1: can to sabotage a relationship so that it breaks before
Speaker 1: I break it.
Speaker 2: Yes, do you do that in friendships and like all
Speaker 2: kinds of relationships just romantic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I'm working through that. I'm so close to
Speaker 1: getting it right. But like I said, set backs come,
Speaker 1: triggers happen, and you're right back there. But I think
Speaker 1: it's so important that you recognize, Okay, this is just
Speaker 1: a trigger from something in my past. This is something
Speaker 1: I've done so much work on, and I know what
Speaker 1: this is. I know how to handle this. I know
Speaker 1: how to get through this.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then you go and you sit with yourself for
Speaker 1: a while and you be quiet, and you see what happens,
Speaker 1: because usually it will work itself out because you have
Speaker 1: that place of knowledge about what you've worked through.
Speaker 3: Feel like, I know what this is.
Speaker 1: I know what this is. Yeah, you can identify it,
Speaker 1: you can get through it. I feel like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: didn't know this. But you were a contestant on the
Speaker 1: first season of Big Brother, which everybody watched. Yes, that
Speaker 1: was in two thousand.
Speaker 3: Yes, what was that?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 3: That was wild? How did you get into that house?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2: So I was in my senior year of college in
Speaker 2: Washington State, middle of nowhere, like a small town Pulman, Washington,
Speaker 2: and uh there. I had seen Real World a long
Speaker 2: time ago before that, but reality TV wasn't sort of
Speaker 2: like a genre yet, and so I didn't even know
Speaker 2: what it was. And I'm on IM at school and
Speaker 2: there's these flyers everywhere for this uh casting call for
Speaker 2: Big Brother.
Speaker 1: Those flyers get in there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know, they must have.
Speaker 2: I think I think the production company just did a
Speaker 2: nationwide wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And you know, social media wasn't there really yet. There
Speaker 2: was blogs online and AOL was live streaming. Other than that, yeah,
Speaker 2: there were flyers, and we're like, oh, what's this. And
Speaker 2: so me and a bunch of friends we all just
Speaker 2: sent a tape in, which was a VHS tape, by
Speaker 2: the way, and we sent to tape in and I
Speaker 2: got a call and and did an interview, and then
Speaker 2: it just sort of like the whole thing kept going
Speaker 2: from I don't know how many thousands of people down
Speaker 2: to the final seventy five. We all got flown to
Speaker 2: LA and we went through this like week long interview
Speaker 2: process and I eventually got picked as one of ten
Speaker 2: people to go on Big Brother. Now I didn't know
Speaker 2: what it was like. I didn't fully understand. Survivor wasn't
Speaker 2: here yet, none, none of the Yeah, and so we
Speaker 2: were locked in a house for three months and it
Speaker 2: was on a studio in Burbank.
Speaker 1: Three months, I think three months. Have they shortened terms now,
Speaker 1: I don't know if.
Speaker 3: They've shortened it.
Speaker 2: Well, And you know, my season was season one, so
Speaker 2: it was really different and meaning that I think they
Speaker 2: were learning what works in reality shows. And so my
Speaker 2: season nobody hat, nobody fought, nobody had sex, nobody, there
Speaker 2: was no big drama. But how they did it was.
Speaker 2: But you know, you were locked in this house with
Speaker 2: with ten strangers, were locked in the house, and then
Speaker 2: every week the whole American public would call in and
Speaker 2: vote you off. And so some people were there just
Speaker 2: so weak.
Speaker 3: Yeah it was.
Speaker 2: And then and I was there the whole three months.
Speaker 2: I got kicked off the day before the end.
Speaker 3: Uh oh, but go, I think.
Speaker 2: But here's what was crazy was that there were seventy
Speaker 2: cameras throughout the house, a kid in cameras. There was
Speaker 2: a camera in the shower and the old I know, yes,
Speaker 2: And the only place there was no camera was in
Speaker 2: there was like a small toilet room, like a toilet
Speaker 2: and a tiny room, but there was a hanging microphone
Speaker 2: in it.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, it's weird.
Speaker 2: And now I'm you know, I go, I've never had
Speaker 2: siblings that I've lived with, and I was so shy
Speaker 2: and private in terms of, you know, changing these personal things.
Speaker 2: It was honestly the biggest And what I didn't realize,
Speaker 2: so you guys, imagine you're locked in. You're locked in
Speaker 2: this house, and you're at that time it was airing
Speaker 2: Big Brother was airing six nights a week on CBS
Speaker 2: Prime Time, and you know it was and you're in
Speaker 2: this house. You have no technology, so you don't know
Speaker 2: what's airing every night, and it was live streaming over AOL.
Speaker 2: And so I walked in there this really really broke
Speaker 2: college student. I walked out a really broke college student.
Speaker 2: Except it was sort of so new that it was
Speaker 2: the first time I had ever experienced what they call
Speaker 2: fifteen minutes of fame, where you can't even walk down
Speaker 2: the street. We had all this had stalkers. I'd have
Speaker 2: all these stalkers that would show up at my parents'
Speaker 2: house that one guy had built. I guess, one guy
Speaker 2: who was not well had built this robot and he
Speaker 2: believed it was me living with him. And it was
Speaker 2: so scary that FBI got invought. And what I've realized is,
Speaker 2: at the time, unli like talented actors like yourself who
Speaker 2: have built this.
Speaker 3: Career and then have money and can protect yourself. You're
Speaker 3: just like thrown out. You're just thrown out, and you
Speaker 3: have all these stalkers.
Speaker 2: You're like, I can't even afford you know, an apartment
Speaker 2: that has two locks on the door, Like you're just like, wow.
Speaker 2: It was wild, but the thing I am also, it
Speaker 2: was the first time. You know, now we're all so
Speaker 2: used to the Internet with trolls and comments and this
Speaker 2: and that, and it's like, you can't breathe in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty five without getting fifty million haters and fifty million
Speaker 2: people love you, and it's just what it is. It's
Speaker 2: everything so divisive. But this was brand new back then,
Speaker 2: and so I remember we walked out of the house
Speaker 2: and it was a huge It was a challenge in
Speaker 2: the sense of everyone had a million websites from fans,
Speaker 2: but a million hate sites from fans. It was just
Speaker 2: a whole thing. So it was kind of wild. I'm
Speaker 2: grateful I did it. I became a lot more uninhibited
Speaker 2: and I got tat I had to oh my gosh,
Speaker 2: oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: Yes, that's such an incredible experience you have had. Not
Speaker 1: a lot of people have that. I mean in this
Speaker 1: day and age, probably more and more and more, but
Speaker 1: right back then.
Speaker 2: Back then, Yeah, my family, my family's like, what is
Speaker 2: a reality show? I'm like, I don't know, I don't know,
Speaker 2: And yeah, it was. The whole thing was was kind
Speaker 2: of wild. So yeah, I'm just in love with this
Speaker 2: sort of non traditional path that you've taken, the pageants,
Speaker 2: the reality TV let's talk beauty brand founder. Yeah, because
Speaker 2: you did something huge that not a lot of people
Speaker 2: can do. You are widely known for creating the hugely
Speaker 2: successful brand IT Cosmetics.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I love something that you said early. I think it
Speaker 1: was about starting your brand. You said, sometimes a no
Speaker 1: is just not yet. Yeah, So tell me about the
Speaker 1: nos that you had to endure to get to that
Speaker 1: moment when someone said, yes, I want to help you
Speaker 1: with this.
Speaker 2: I'm so grateful you're asking this question because I think
Speaker 2: a lot of people just think maybe it was luck
Speaker 2: or that it was easy, or or they're getting knows
Speaker 2: in their life and they think it's some indication that
Speaker 2: it's not their idea is not going to work, or
Speaker 2: their product or their book or whatever it might be. Jenny,
Speaker 2: from the moment, so really quick in terms of traditional,
Speaker 2: non traditional path you know, I always thought, especially watching
Speaker 2: Oprah growing up, I was like, one day, I'm going
Speaker 2: to share other people's stories with the world. I just
Speaker 2: thought that's what I would do. And so I did
Speaker 2: all these jobs to eventually did Big Brother all the things.
Speaker 2: But eventually I was working in television news and I
Speaker 2: thought that was my dream job. And I thought I
Speaker 2: had that was it, and I was going to maybe
Speaker 2: do a talk show, which.
Speaker 3: Makes it ironic. I'm now doing a podcas I love
Speaker 3: so much.
Speaker 1: But what was the television news situation? Oh?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so like did you sit at a desk? And yeah,
Speaker 3: I was a news anchor reporter.
Speaker 2: I took my first job in Tri City's Washington, which
Speaker 2: is a pretty small town.
Speaker 3: I loved it.
Speaker 2: I anchored the morning news and then I would move
Speaker 2: up from there and I was anchoring in Portland, Oregon,
Speaker 2: and I thought I was in my dream job. And
Speaker 2: what I didn't realize was my dreams were gonna be
Speaker 2: about to take a tumble and like a big detour.
Speaker 2: So I have roseatia, which i'd been to dermatologists for
Speaker 2: there's no cure and for me on my cheeks and
Speaker 2: my forehead, what will happen is I'll get these flare
Speaker 2: ups where I get a lot of bumps and there's
Speaker 2: my skin will be bright red. It'll feel like sandpaper.
Speaker 2: I'd always been able to cover it with makeup.
Speaker 3: It was no big deal.
Speaker 2: And I was anchoring the news one day and I
Speaker 2: hear my earpiece from the producer, there's something on your face.
Speaker 2: There's something on your face. You need to wipe it off.
Speaker 2: You need to wipe it off. And I knew what
Speaker 2: it was.
Speaker 3: But I thought, Okay, not a big deal.
Speaker 2: In the commercial break, I glanced down and I tried
Speaker 2: to cover it and it wouldn't cover, and I would
Speaker 2: and then we're back on live and I hear in
Speaker 2: my earpiece it's still there.
Speaker 3: It's still there, just what you need to hear.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And you can't talk back because you're live and
Speaker 2: you're doing the news. And that day started a whole
Speaker 2: new season in my life. I thought it was a
Speaker 2: huge setback because I would try every makeup product out there,
Speaker 2: nothing would cover. It would start to crack like desert clay,
Speaker 2: and then the red would come through live on television.
Speaker 1: Was it like the lights and the hot HD lights?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Sure, yeah?
Speaker 2: And I thought I was going to get fired, and
Speaker 2: I would have you know, I'd be live on the
Speaker 2: air and I would be talking and sharing stories in
Speaker 2: the news, but in my head I'd be thinking, like,
Speaker 2: am I costing the station ratings? Like our people turning
Speaker 2: the channel right now? And I'll never forget this moment.
Speaker 2: And I think all of us have moments like this
Speaker 2: in our lives. Maybe you had one when you launched
Speaker 2: the show, or when you had the idea for it,
Speaker 2: or or your amazing you know, fashion or I don't know,
Speaker 2: but I had remember this moment on set where I
Speaker 2: was like, Okay, this makes no sense. There's thousands of
Speaker 2: beauty companies out there. Why can't I find anything that
Speaker 2: works for me? And then I got this this kind
Speaker 2: of whisper this knowing that was like, if you can't
Speaker 2: find anything that works for you, there's probably a lot
Speaker 2: of other people out there that also can't find anything.
Speaker 2: Like what if you could figure out how to find
Speaker 2: great chemists and like launch your own thing. What if
Speaker 2: you could figure out how to create a product that
Speaker 2: works for you, It's probably going to help a whole
Speaker 2: lot of other people.
Speaker 1: So I had that found that gap, you did the
Speaker 1: thing that gap.
Speaker 2: But it took a minute because my gut told me that,
Speaker 2: but my head was like, might where all myself dot?
Speaker 2: It was like, oh, but you got no money, you
Speaker 2: don't know anything about the beauty industry, You're not qualified.
Speaker 2: And I sat in that place for a while, and
Speaker 2: I think where my life completely changed was the moment
Speaker 2: I decided to trust myself and like, trust that whisper,
Speaker 2: that knowing and go for it what I didn't know.
Speaker 2: And and thank you for your question because I think this.
Speaker 2: I think your question is going to be life changing
Speaker 2: for so many people listening who think like the nose
Speaker 2: they're getting are just them, or there's some indication that
Speaker 2: their thing has no potential, isn't going to make it.
Speaker 2: From the moment that I launched a cosmetics in my
Speaker 2: living room, it was over three years and hundreds and
Speaker 2: hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of no's and rejections, and
Speaker 2: over three years before I could even pay myself a penny,
Speaker 2: Like we were teetering on bankruptcy for so long, and
Speaker 2: I were doing this in your living room, in my
Speaker 2: living room, yeah yeah, and just try like you know
Speaker 2: all of it, I mean, no money, trying to figure
Speaker 2: out how to do every job, right, Like, my middle
Speaker 2: name is Marie, so Marie got her own email address.
Speaker 2: Marie was the head of pr okay and the head
Speaker 2: of customer service, and Marie would like email you know
Speaker 2: the Today Show and be like great news. Our founder
Speaker 2: Jamie Curly was available, friend, kids, amazing.
Speaker 1: If you guys, if you're listening to this, this is
Speaker 1: such an inside hack. This is a good idea. Get
Speaker 1: another name, use your middle name, use your middle name
Speaker 1: for that's your first employee right.
Speaker 3: There, exactly.
Speaker 2: And you've got to do what you've got to do
Speaker 2: sometimes and you're just like and I just remember, I mean,
Speaker 2: it was so many years and the one thing I
Speaker 2: was I just I had this this I guess vision
Speaker 2: of because it when I when it didn't make sense
Speaker 2: to me that no products would work for me. I
Speaker 2: also realized I'd never seen at the time a beauty
Speaker 2: company having a model with bright red, bumpy skin saying
Speaker 2: buy this product.
Speaker 3: It was always photoshopped images.
Speaker 2: And so when I created it cosmetics, you know, I
Speaker 2: wanted to use models that were every age and shape
Speaker 2: and size and skin tone. And every retailer so that
Speaker 2: will not work like all of the stores, the department stores,
Speaker 2: in particular, would always say you have to use images
Speaker 2: of unattainable aspiration or women won't buy your product, meaning
Speaker 2: you can't even look like that because it's not real.
Speaker 2: But I was like, I, you know, growing up the
Speaker 2: ads I would see, I loved them, but they would
Speaker 2: often make me feel not enough. So I was like, Okay,
Speaker 2: how can I change this? How can I do something
Speaker 2: to help you to find beauty? Which was sort of
Speaker 2: like this big, god sized dream for someone who had
Speaker 2: no sales or success yet.
Speaker 3: But it all came down.
Speaker 2: So after three years of nos, we got one yes,
Speaker 2: one big yes from QVC and and it ended up
Speaker 2: being life changing. Now QVC had also said no for years,
Speaker 2: but we got one yes.
Speaker 1: What happened? Why they why did they say yes if
Speaker 1: they had already said no, no.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they had said no forever.
Speaker 2: They said, uh, their head the head of QVC Beauty
Speaker 2: at the time, who's a legend, who is now such
Speaker 2: a dear friend and a mentor and I love him,
Speaker 2: Alan Burke. At the time, he said, you're not the
Speaker 2: right fit for QVC or our customers.
Speaker 3: But what was it?
Speaker 1: Do you think? Was it your persistence? And you're continuing
Speaker 1: to ask.
Speaker 3: To finally get it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, so this is one thing I would
Speaker 2: do every time I would sense a or old to
Speaker 2: a sample, and it was always it was like another no.
Speaker 2: I would even though sometimes I'd cry myself to sleep
Speaker 2: to them, I would always I'd always respond as if
Speaker 2: it will absolutely be a yes. So they'd tell me
Speaker 2: like no, and I'd be like, okay, well, one day
Speaker 2: when we are in your store, it's like, this product's
Speaker 2: going to change so many people's lives. And then if
Speaker 2: we would get maybe a press mentioned or something like that,
Speaker 2: I would send it to every retailer that had.
Speaker 3: Said no and be like, look at this.
Speaker 2: You know, buzz is spreading about cosmetics great news, and
Speaker 2: one day when we're in your store, it's going to
Speaker 2: impact so many women. And everything was as if it's
Speaker 2: one hundred percent happening amazing, and I just feel like
Speaker 2: either they thought I was absolutely nuts, but eventually they're
Speaker 2: probably like, if she's gonna, you know, be this persistent,
Speaker 2: she's probably going to figure out how to make sure
Speaker 2: she hit sales goals in our store. But with KIVC,
Speaker 2: I was at this big sort of beauty expo in
Speaker 2: New York. There are six thousand women there, all walking
Speaker 2: this event, and as a brand, you could get a
Speaker 2: three foot table to demonstrate your product and the hope
Speaker 2: is somebody discovers it, or you win an award, or
Speaker 2: the press covers it. And we were out of money, Jenny,
Speaker 2: it was like three years in. I had entered us
Speaker 2: a year ahead of time, and that at that event
Speaker 2: that day, I see that KVC had this giant booth
Speaker 2: there and even though I was told no over and over,
Speaker 2: I had never met anyone in person. And I remember
Speaker 2: standing at that booth. I was like praying for the
Speaker 2: right words. And you're not supposed to leave your booth
Speaker 2: that you that you're it's really a three foot table
Speaker 2: that you're demonstrating. I went straight over to the buyer
Speaker 2: at QVC and I just like poured my heart out
Speaker 2: to her, and she said she's willing to take a meeting,
Speaker 2: and then we flew to KVC, had a meeting, got
Speaker 2: a first yes, but we got one shot and it
Speaker 2: was a ten minute airing live on QVC to either
Speaker 2: hit their sales goals or not come back. We were
Speaker 2: only doing like one to two order's a day on
Speaker 2: our website. I had no money. We had to take
Speaker 2: out alone to fund the inventory to get one shot
Speaker 2: on QVC, because we had to sell over six thousand
Speaker 2: units of Concealer in this ten minute window. And here's
Speaker 2: the one thing that I want to share, just for
Speaker 2: anyone who's feeling like their ideas haven't gotten traction, or
Speaker 2: someone hasn't seen their value or hasn't you know, acknowledged
Speaker 2: their value or their potential. We hired third party consultants
Speaker 2: going on to this one big airing, and they all
Speaker 2: told me the same thing. They said, if you're going
Speaker 2: to have a shot at making it, because it is
Speaker 2: so hard, as you know, it is so hard to
Speaker 2: do well on QVC, and because you're competing against so
Speaker 2: many great brands all over the world for that one
Speaker 2: minute at airtime, they said, if you're going to have
Speaker 2: a shot at doing hitting these sales goals, here's what.
Speaker 3: You need to do.
Speaker 2: You need to use this type of model, which was all,
Speaker 2: you know, flawless skin, same skin tones, age, same size.
Speaker 2: And I just would say to them, Okay, I get
Speaker 2: that's what often works, that's what's always kind of worked.
Speaker 2: But what if what if I put models of every
Speaker 2: age and shape and size, and what if I take
Speaker 2: my own makeup off and like show my rosation and
Speaker 2: prove live on television the product works. And they were mortified.
Speaker 2: They were mortified, and they wanted me to win. They
Speaker 2: were just give me the best advice they knew how.
Speaker 2: And so when the moment came when we got our
Speaker 2: one shot on QVC, it's so wild. I walked in
Speaker 2: the building and I learned for the first time ever
Speaker 2: because we at that point, just to give everyone perspective,
Speaker 2: we had gotten an SBA loan. We had no money,
Speaker 2: and the loan funded this inventory that we were going
Speaker 2: to go on air have one shot in ten minutes
Speaker 2: to either sell out or it was a consignment offer
Speaker 2: from QVC and Beauty. So what that means was it
Speaker 2: if it didn't sell, we'd have to take all the
Speaker 2: product back and I would I wouldn't be paid, we
Speaker 2: would go bankrupt, we would be done. So it was
Speaker 2: everything was on the line, and I had made the
Speaker 2: decision to trust my gut, which I haven't always listened
Speaker 2: to in my life.
Speaker 3: Right especially with some of the dudes I've dated. But
Speaker 3: that's another story.
Speaker 2: But anyways, I made the decision to trust my gut
Speaker 2: and I cast real women like I had, you know,
Speaker 2: someone in her seventies, a hyper pigmentation, someone in her
Speaker 2: early twenties with acne, and every skin tone, every size,
Speaker 2: every age. I walk in the building for this one shot,
Speaker 2: and I learn, you're not even guaranteed you're ten minutes.
Speaker 2: If if you're a minute or two into your presentation
Speaker 2: and you're not hitting sales goals, your clock can jump
Speaker 2: down to one minute and you're done. You think you
Speaker 2: have eight minutes left, but it can jump. And I
Speaker 2: learned that, And I remember I was sweating so much, Jenny,
Speaker 2: that I put on I had on two pairs of spanks,
Speaker 2: double spanks. Not because I did not care what I
Speaker 2: looked like. I wanted to absorb all the sweat, like
Speaker 2: I didn't want to sweat through my dress. Other reason, right, Yeah,
Speaker 2: And I remember, and you'll relate to this so much
Speaker 2: because of how amazing you and your company does on QVC.
Speaker 2: But I remember walking in the studio and I saw
Speaker 2: the giant clock, the countdown clock, and it was starting
Speaker 2: at ten minutes. Yeah, the red clock, and the on
Speaker 2: air light goes on and it was like nine nine,
Speaker 2: nine fifty eight. And I remember I had practiced this
Speaker 2: demonstration in my bathroom ere so many times where on
Speaker 2: my wrist I would put our product and the top
Speaker 2: two selling ones in department stores, and I would bend
Speaker 2: my wrist back and forth, and the other ones would crease,
Speaker 2: and our concealer wouldn't It was so good, But all
Speaker 2: of a sudden, I'm live on TV. All the pressures
Speaker 2: on me. I don't know if we're either going to
Speaker 2: go bankrupt or my whole life's going to change. And
Speaker 2: I start trying to do this demonstration, but my hand's
Speaker 2: now shaking like a leaf, and the host grabs my hand,
Speaker 2: puts it under the podium.
Speaker 3: She's like, thank you, sugar.
Speaker 2: It was Lisa Mason is her name, and then she
Speaker 2: takes over. And then I remember the moment my bare
Speaker 2: face comes up on national television, right because QVC's broadcast
Speaker 2: to one hundred million homes. And I remember walking over
Speaker 2: to all the models, like every age and shape and
Speaker 2: size and skin tone like, and I viscerally in my body,
Speaker 2: I was calling them beautiful and meaning it, like beautiful models,
Speaker 2: like in every ounce of my being. And I remember
Speaker 2: we were a few minutes in and I didn't know
Speaker 2: how we were doing.
Speaker 3: But I knew I wasn't cut yet. I was like, okay,
Speaker 3: this is good.
Speaker 2: And then I remember we got down to the one
Speaker 2: minute mark and the host says, the deep shades almost gone,
Speaker 2: the tan shades almost sold out. And at the ten
Speaker 2: minute mark, the Giants sold out sign came up across
Speaker 2: the screen, and I remember I started crying on national television. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and they cut from me went to I think Dice
Speaker 2: in vacuum or something. And I'll never forget my best
Speaker 2: friend of twenty years. We met when I was waitressing
Speaker 2: at Denny's. She was also waitress at another restaurant and
Speaker 2: she was there modeling. She has a whole sleeve of
Speaker 2: a tattoo on her arm. We'd covered it with makeup.
Speaker 2: It was like, everything was great. She starts crying and
Speaker 2: then my husband comes rushing through the double doors and
Speaker 2: I just look at him, and I remember I was like.
Speaker 3: Real, woman is broken, broken And I'm.
Speaker 2: Just like what And I thought he's gonna come hug me,
Speaker 2: and he comes over to me. He just looks at
Speaker 2: me and he puts his fists in the air and
Speaker 2: he's like, we're.
Speaker 3: Not going back runs.
Speaker 1: And I was like, oh my god, what a messy
Speaker 1: beautiful moment.
Speaker 3: It was wild.
Speaker 2: Well that one moment QC giving us a shot and
Speaker 2: also me just saying, you know what, my gut hasn't
Speaker 2: proved me right yet, but I can't shake this feeling that,
Speaker 2: like I'm supposed to use real people's models, I'm supposed
Speaker 2: to stand for something to try and you know, shift
Speaker 2: this definition of beauty in the beauty industry. I'm supposed
Speaker 2: to help women at home feel seen, feel feel enough,
Speaker 2: feel beautiful. And I trusted it, and that one airing
Speaker 2: turned into five that year, and then one hundred and
Speaker 2: won the next year, and then we built what became
Speaker 2: the biggest beauty brand in QVC's history, which is wild
Speaker 2: because and I just want to say this for everyone listening,
Speaker 2: it was years of everyone saying no, including QVC, No,
Speaker 2: you're not the right fit.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: And so what I know, be on a shadow of
Speaker 2: a doubt is someone else's no is no indication that
Speaker 2: your idea is not going to work, or that your
Speaker 2: business isn't going to make it, or that you know
Speaker 2: you're not going to become one of the most celebrated
Speaker 2: talents in our country. As I point to you, like
Speaker 2: someone else's no, is no indication.
Speaker 1: And that's great.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so and there it's been such a journey after that.
Speaker 2: So forre, I said, you know, Alta said yes, first
Speaker 2: that Sephora, and then.
Speaker 1: Chips just started falling in and it was.
Speaker 3: A lot of work.
Speaker 2: You know, it was a lot of work and still
Speaker 2: a lot more knows along the way and we eventually
Speaker 2: built to over thousand employees.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: And then in twenty sixteen Loril bought it cosmetics.
Speaker 1: Yes, is that something you wanted? Like when you create
Speaker 1: something and it's your baby from your living room to
Speaker 1: success like that, you have worked so hard and then
Speaker 1: you make that choice to sell it. I know you
Speaker 1: stayed on with Loriol for a time, but then you
Speaker 1: loved you walked away completely.
Speaker 2: It was a wild journey. I so here's the real,
Speaker 2: raw truth. I think I had become addicted to work.
Speaker 2: Like we were working. I was working one hundred hour
Speaker 2: weeks for almost ten years. I feel like I was
Speaker 2: really good at like obsessing about the company, loving our customers,
Speaker 2: obsessing about products, not launching unless they were incredible.
Speaker 3: But that is all I did. Well.
Speaker 2: I was not a great wife. I was not a
Speaker 2: great owner of a body or steward of health. I
Speaker 2: pretty much was just addicted to work.
Speaker 3: I was so obsessed with it.
Speaker 2: So two reasons why I felt it made sense to
Speaker 2: sell the company. One was that we were trying to
Speaker 2: launch in more countries. So we had launched into soup
Speaker 2: fora Southeast Asia and Australia, and I realized, like, oh
Speaker 2: my gosh, every country has different regulatory compliance, different HR laws.
Speaker 2: If we want to expand this vision of beauty and inclusivity,
Speaker 2: like we can do it on our own, it's going
Speaker 2: to be slow. Loreal, a company like Lareel has teams
Speaker 2: on the ground and over one hundred countries that just
Speaker 2: like understand at a granular level, they have that infrastructure. Yes,
Speaker 2: the infrastructure, so we could scale this really cool mission
Speaker 2: that I was so passionate about so much faster. So
Speaker 2: that was a big part of it. And the other
Speaker 2: part was that, you know, I'd spent ten years also
Speaker 2: trying to have a baby. It had so many miscarriages
Speaker 2: and was doing fertility treatments and was just under so
Speaker 2: much stress that I thought, if I keep this company
Speaker 2: or take it public. I thought about taking it public,
Speaker 2: but if you take it public, you're still doing one
Speaker 2: hundred hour weeks forever. I mean, it's just I mean,
Speaker 2: you don't have to, but I knew that I would.
Speaker 2: So it was kind of two parts. And I am
Speaker 2: so grateful that we had gotten to the point where
Speaker 2: there was.
Speaker 3: Interest in our company.
Speaker 2: And the other thing that's wild is that, you know,
Speaker 2: because when you put this thing in perspective, and again
Speaker 2: I'm just thinking of everyone listening to us and watching
Speaker 2: right now, is for years nobody thought this would work.
Speaker 2: Everybody said, no, we had no money. I was trying
Speaker 2: to figure out how to do a million jobs the
Speaker 2: best I could, not knowing what the heck I was doing.
Speaker 1: That's what it is when you start your own brands.
Speaker 3: When you start your own.
Speaker 1: Brands training you didn't go to school for it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and it's making it up as you go.
Speaker 2: And it's so hard when it's your own thing to
Speaker 2: turn it off, Like you can't just clock out.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I wanted to ask you about that, like, because
Speaker 1: I know when it's your brand. Yeah, you are the
Speaker 1: face of the brand. Yeah, everything is on your shoulders.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: What do you do when you reach those moments where
Speaker 1: maybe there was a mistake made, maybe things didn't go
Speaker 1: the way you wanted them to go.
Speaker 3: Maybe you are just tired.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because it's like you said, one hundred hour work.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah.
Speaker 1: What do you do to persevere? What do you do
Speaker 1: to pump yourself up day in a day out?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: For me, I had a whole journal of my you know,
Speaker 2: reasons why I was doing it. I would have a
Speaker 2: stack that I'd bring into the KVC green room for
Speaker 2: every show, because this is what you know, Everything often
Speaker 2: looks so different on the outside than it is when
Speaker 2: you're the person, you know, kind of behind the scenes,
Speaker 2: and or you're the entrepreneur. You're the one that feels
Speaker 2: like it's all on your shoulders, or you're the one
Speaker 2: trying to run your household and hold it all together.
Speaker 2: You know, we all have these same experiences that might
Speaker 2: just look a little different. But I would keep a
Speaker 2: stack of letters customers write posts that they would do.
Speaker 2: I would have them all printed in this giant stack.
Speaker 2: And when I just felt like I can't even go,
Speaker 2: I can't even you know, because we doing two hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty shows a year on KVC, I always still
Speaker 2: felt like I had to strike while the iron's hot,
Speaker 2: Like we could lose this at any moment like it
Speaker 2: took me a long time to believe I was worthy
Speaker 2: of the success we were having, right, And I would
Speaker 2: read these letters and read these emails and be like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I couldn't make it about me, is my answer? And
Speaker 2: I think this is a great tool for anybody, is
Speaker 2: I would.
Speaker 1: I love this idea of the cards? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, with with people that had been impacted by the
Speaker 2: product or love the message, or maybe they'd never bought
Speaker 2: a product, but they're like, you know what, I used
Speaker 2: to be embarrassed with my roseation, but now I see
Speaker 2: you showing it with pride on television, taking your makeup off,
Speaker 2: Like you know, I now feel more confident leaving the house.
Speaker 3: I just got back on the dating app, and you know,
Speaker 3: I've never tried your pot.
Speaker 2: Maybe I will one day, but I feel more confident
Speaker 2: now and I want to say thank you or you know,
Speaker 2: I would just read those and I would realize, Okay,
Speaker 2: this is bigger than me. And I think, you know,
Speaker 2: whether for someone it's saving the note their daughter wrote,
Speaker 2: or saving the moment that something happened with the stranger,
Speaker 2: or I just feel like if if I only made
Speaker 2: it about me, I don't think I could have persevered
Speaker 2: through all the nose and also even trying to carry
Speaker 2: the weight of all the success. And I think also
Speaker 2: it really was a journey. Am I worthy of this?
Speaker 2: I'll also and trying to I guess back to how
Speaker 2: we started this. When you're saying, you know, not dimming
Speaker 2: your own light. It took me a long time in
Speaker 2: that regard. And what a lot of people don't know, Jenny,
Speaker 2: is when you know we were told no for years
Speaker 2: by everybody. And I'll never forget the first time Loreal
Speaker 2: made an offer to buy the company. It was so
Speaker 2: much money, way more than I could ever imagine when
Speaker 2: I was waitressing at Denny, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: But for the first time, I.
Speaker 2: Also knew that we were worth more, our company was
Speaker 2: worth more, and I actually said no. We said no
Speaker 2: to Loreal's offer by the business, and a lot of
Speaker 2: people don't know that. And I believe in divine timing.
Speaker 2: I believe our steps are ordered. And what was wild
Speaker 2: is when we had said no to their offer, we
Speaker 2: started getting other offers as well that were bigger, and
Speaker 2: then Lorel came back to us, and it's so weird.
Speaker 2: I don't know if I've actually processed this in my
Speaker 2: life yet. But you know, they paid one point two
Speaker 2: billion dollars cash for this company that I started in
Speaker 2: my living room that for years everyone said wouldn't work
Speaker 2: and everyone said no, and isn't that wild? Yeah, And
Speaker 2: they made me the first woman to hold a CEO
Speaker 2: title of a brand in their one hundred and eight
Speaker 2: year history at the time, and all of that felt
Speaker 2: so big, And it was also still that same journey
Speaker 2: that we all have, whether it's you know, you know,
Speaker 2: I want to go meet that person and say, do
Speaker 2: you want to be friends because I want to make
Speaker 2: friends as an adult, or I want to audition for
Speaker 2: the part, or I want to start my own fashion line,
Speaker 2: or I want to start a podcast too, or I
Speaker 2: want to write a book, or it's that journey of
Speaker 2: am I worthy of this? And deep down inside our
Speaker 2: soul knows that we are, but like our mind will
Speaker 2: talk us out of it so quick And so I think,
Speaker 2: I think one of the moments because a lot of
Speaker 2: my life, I've doubted myself out of my own destiny,
Speaker 2: or I've let myself doubt take over.
Speaker 3: Easy to do, so easy to do.
Speaker 2: But with Loriel, that was one of the moments where
Speaker 2: it was like, Okay, I know, I know our company
Speaker 2: is worth this much, and then and I'm grateful.
Speaker 1: That's story man.
Speaker 2: Wow, I mean and it was honestly for me, a
Speaker 2: lot of prayer, Like there were moments where I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I do believe it my core. God can dream a
Speaker 2: bigger dream for us than we can for ourselves. And
Speaker 2: I also believe rejections God's protection. So the whole journey,
Speaker 2: when I would get these painful nose, I would my
Speaker 2: first default is, oh, it means I'm not enough. It
Speaker 2: means this is never gonna work. And I would just go, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: let me lean on my faith. Let me I'm going
Speaker 2: to decide to assign this meaning to the rejection of
Speaker 2: like God's got something better coming or or God's blocking
Speaker 2: my value from them because they're not assigned to my destiny.
Speaker 2: I would convince myself of what rejection meant so that
Speaker 2: I wouldn't let it take me down.
Speaker 3: It was another thing. Yeah, that's so.
Speaker 1: Important because you have to persevere. Perseverance is the key
Speaker 1: to success. You also have a very successful podcast, Jamie.
Speaker 1: You currently show you just told me it's a year. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: you celebrated a year anniversary. That's amazing.
Speaker 2: Well, and you know what's kind of wild, just given
Speaker 2: what we've been talking about.
Speaker 3: I felt from.
Speaker 2: The time I was a little girl that I was
Speaker 2: going to do that. And so when the show launched,
Speaker 2: I asked Oprah to be the first guest and she said.
Speaker 1: Yes, and that contact came in handy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's just a and it was getting to
Speaker 2: the point where I believed I was worthy of asking her.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I love that you know which all of us are?
Speaker 2: Every one of us is. It's like it's like really
Speaker 2: and learning all the lies. Yes, so to.
Speaker 3: Believe it you are.
Speaker 1: You recently had the Duchess of Sussex, Megan.
Speaker 3: Yes, on the pod.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that was her very first podcast and podcast. Yes,
Speaker 1: you guys are close friends. Yeah, that's so cool that
Speaker 1: she was. She decided to come onto your podcast. Yeah
Speaker 1: for her big.
Speaker 2: I was so honored and grateful, and I was grateful.
Speaker 3: You know. It's funny.
Speaker 2: It reminds me of this because you and I are
Speaker 2: sitting here at your home, we have our shoes off,
Speaker 2: We're just like hanging out like two friends, right, And
Speaker 2: and I was really honored to to hopefully show people
Speaker 2: how incredible of a friendship is.
Speaker 1: No, that's the thing because as happens, you know, there
Speaker 1: was backlash on the internet. People always have their opinions,
Speaker 1: they say things, and I can imagine how challenging that
Speaker 1: is to be in her position and as a friend
Speaker 1: of hers, how important is it for you to sort
Speaker 1: of show the sides of Megan that you know, to
Speaker 1: sort of dilute all the other negative blah blah blah
Speaker 1: out there for her, because it's a lot.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can't even imagine all of it. I think
Speaker 2: when you know your whole career, you have been famous
Speaker 2: for so long, and do you ever feel that do
Speaker 2: you feel like people's perceptions is always like super accurate
Speaker 2: of who you are inside? Because for example, I never
Speaker 2: thought you would worry about dimming your light or anything
Speaker 2: like that.
Speaker 3: And so I don't know. I think for me, nobody knows.
Speaker 3: Nobody knows.
Speaker 1: Somebody knows what's going on inside someone else, Yes, until
Speaker 1: we ask them and get in there, you know, be curious.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so I think that was my hope is
Speaker 2: to is to really just share a great friendship conversation
Speaker 2: and share how beautiful of a soul she is and
Speaker 2: how great of a friend she is, and how she
Speaker 2: shows up for her friends, and how she's an incredible mom,
Speaker 2: and how you know, she spends you know, all of
Speaker 2: her energy wishing other people well. And so my prayer
Speaker 2: was just that people see that, you know, that was
Speaker 2: my prayer with all of it. And I really think,
Speaker 2: you know, in twenty twenty five, whether I think that
Speaker 2: we're in this day and time where for anybody, you know,
Speaker 2: they might be a teacher or a doctor or a lawyer,
Speaker 2: and all of a sudden there's stuff online about you know,
Speaker 2: everyone is kind of experiencing this.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like.
Speaker 1: The Help, the help review, yeah of you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I feel like in twenty twenty five, I
Speaker 2: actually think, especially because you and I kind of started
Speaker 2: talking in the beginning about trying to not dim o light,
Speaker 2: especially as women, but a lot of people go through that.
Speaker 2: I actually think that, you know, so many people can
Speaker 2: see anybody right now, if you go google anybody you
Speaker 2: admire out there, you can find great things are not
Speaker 2: great things out there. And I think that what's so
Speaker 2: hard about cyber bullying, what's so hard about trolling on
Speaker 2: the internet, is it prevents so many people from even
Speaker 2: trying from even putting themselves out there, from thinking that
Speaker 2: they're worthy of, you know, taking a leadership position in
Speaker 2: a company or wanting you know, so many teachers and
Speaker 2: professors are you know, everybody deals with this nowadays because
Speaker 2: the everything that's online can just.
Speaker 1: It can accumulate. Yeah, if not in the world, then
Speaker 1: in your mind, you can start to chip away at
Speaker 1: that worthiness that you've tried so hard to figure out
Speaker 1: for yourself.
Speaker 2: I think that it holds a lot of people back
Speaker 2: from sharing their calling and their art and their talent
Speaker 2: and their business ideas with the world. And that's the
Speaker 2: thing that you know. I think that when you look
Speaker 2: at politics, or you look at really anything now, you
Speaker 2: really can't do anything without so many people being for
Speaker 2: you and so many people being against you. I can't
Speaker 2: wait until all of us are able to just like
Speaker 2: let it roll off of us like water off a
Speaker 2: ducts back and know, okay, that comes with it, but
Speaker 2: that's no reflection of who I am, and that's no
Speaker 2: reflection of my potential. And I think that I believe
Speaker 2: the truth always wins, and I think that all we
Speaker 2: can do is know who we are show up with
Speaker 2: our full heart, you know, and.
Speaker 3: Trust that.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's what Megan has done, and she's
Speaker 1: been put in that position of the scrutiny of the world,
Speaker 1: and what a what a position to step into. I'm
Speaker 1: sure it was really difficult, but I do see her
Speaker 1: as putting herself out there and really being open to
Speaker 1: receiving the good and the bad. But also there's you
Speaker 1: can tell, there's a goodness that wants to come through.
Speaker 1: You know that she wants to show people like people.
Speaker 1: She wants to let the world know that she is
Speaker 1: the real deal. She's true to who she is, and
Speaker 1: I like that about her. So I feel like that's
Speaker 1: a good friend you have. Rolling back for just a second,
Speaker 1: you were twenty nine when you found out you were adopted. Yes,
Speaker 1: twenty nine. That is late in a life to find
Speaker 1: out such earth breaking news.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, found out by surprise completely really, I had
Speaker 2: no idea. Yeah, I had no idea I was adopted.
Speaker 2: And when I found out, it sort of shook my
Speaker 2: whole world, and I think it almost felt like the
Speaker 2: whole rug was pulled out from Unerney. I'm like, wait
Speaker 2: a minute.
Speaker 3: Who am I?
Speaker 2: Who am I? Because I am closer my mom, who
Speaker 2: adopted me the day I was born. I am you know,
Speaker 2: she has been the closest person to me my entire life.
Speaker 2: I love my mom like I can't imagine loving someone
Speaker 2: more than her until my kids are born and my
Speaker 2: mom has now passed away. But I am like, I
Speaker 2: just love her. So never in my life did I
Speaker 2: imagine I was adopted. Yeah, I found out by accident.
Speaker 1: Did you go looking for your birth pay?
Speaker 3: I did.
Speaker 2: After I found out, my mom went into the closet
Speaker 2: and this fireproof box, pulled out this paperwork and said like,
Speaker 2: maybe you've suspected this, And like, suspected what? And I
Speaker 2: had no idea and my dad, who they were divorced
Speaker 2: at that point, but he just never wanted me to know,
Speaker 2: and they just raised me as if they had me.
Speaker 2: And so I got this paperwork and then she handed
Speaker 2: me a little note with a gold necklace that had
Speaker 2: a medallion of the Virgin Mary on it, and the
Speaker 2: note said, you know, while the baby and I will
Speaker 2: never meet, please one day give her this necklace. My
Speaker 2: parents gave it to me when I was a little
Speaker 2: girl and let her know I love her. And it
Speaker 2: wasn't signed, and I had this paperwork and there was
Speaker 2: a name on it, but I didn't know if it
Speaker 2: was the right name. And I spent the next five years.
Speaker 2: I was working in television news at this point, so
Speaker 2: I thought, I can find anybody. I'm a journalist, I
Speaker 2: can find you know, all the things. And I spent
Speaker 2: five years searching for her, and eventually I found her.
Speaker 2: Eventually I found my birth mom, and she's now in
Speaker 2: my life. We were just together this past week. I
Speaker 2: just gave the yeah, I gave this commencement speech at
Speaker 2: Columbia University for their graduate business school, and she flew out,
Speaker 2: was there, you know, cheering me on. We're in each
Speaker 2: other's lives now. I found out I have two brothers,
Speaker 2: and it was yeah, I feel very blessed. And when
Speaker 2: she and my mom, who raised me, met, my mom
Speaker 2: just embraced her, went up to her and just said like,
Speaker 2: thank you for giving me the best gift I could
Speaker 2: have ever hoped for. And so you know, it's been
Speaker 2: a journey. Nothing's ever perfect, and she didn't think we
Speaker 2: would ever meet. So it took her a minute to
Speaker 2: go okay, because she hadn't told anyone in her life
Speaker 2: that she had ever given a baby up for a
Speaker 2: dog or you know, had placed me into adoption, so
Speaker 2: it took her a minute, and she I have two brothers,
Speaker 2: so she had to tell them and her husband, and
Speaker 2: I just I feel very I feel very blessed that
Speaker 2: they all just embraced me with open arms and that
Speaker 2: they're part of my life. But yeah, that was the
Speaker 2: whole That was the whole thing.
Speaker 1: I'm sure that being sort of you must have felt
Speaker 1: like you've been kept in the dark for all these
Speaker 1: years and then this came out and that was probably
Speaker 1: a lot to come to terms with. And it kind
Speaker 1: of leads me to talking to you about your book, Worthy.
Speaker 1: How did writing that book help you process through all
Speaker 1: of this?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Worthy is you know I shared with you the Oprah
Speaker 2: moment when I realized, oh wow, I'm really confident, but
Speaker 2: I actually don't write. I have confidence, but I don't
Speaker 2: have self worth. And from that moment, on that day,
Speaker 2: four years after having Oprah's number, when I realized that,
Speaker 2: that was when I became obsessed with studying self worth
Speaker 2: and with trying to understand how do you build it?
Speaker 3: How do you actually believe you're enough?
Speaker 2: Like we're in a moment I shared I shared earlier
Speaker 2: that eighty percent of women don't believe theyre enough. In
Speaker 2: seventy three percent of men feel inadequate and not enough.
Speaker 2: And then you start, you know, I started becoming obsessed
Speaker 2: with understanding what does that mean? And how can I
Speaker 2: Why do I never feel enough? And how can I
Speaker 2: solve that? And why doesn't accomplishment solve it? Or hitting
Speaker 2: a goal weight that doesn't solve it? You know, falling
Speaker 2: in love that doesn't solve it. Either getting a great
Speaker 2: job that doesn't solve it?
Speaker 3: Why?
Speaker 2: And I became obsessed with studying self worth and realizing
Speaker 2: that your self worth is your seeling and how we
Speaker 2: sabotage stuff if we don't believe we're worthy of it,
Speaker 2: and so I am. And so that turned into years
Speaker 2: and years of studying it and then writing the book
Speaker 2: Worthy and I go into there's twenty different tools in
Speaker 2: there on how to and it's really again, and I
Speaker 2: think this is important. Building self worth, I believe, is
Speaker 2: not about learning all these things. I think it's really
Speaker 2: like unlearning, like unlearning all these lies that lead to
Speaker 2: self doubt and igniting those truths that wake up worthiness
Speaker 2: in us because every one of us, I don't know,
Speaker 2: who needs to hear this, Jenny, Everybody, everybody, every one
Speaker 2: of us, every single one of us is.
Speaker 3: Fully innately worthy.
Speaker 2: I do not care what past mistakes you've made, or
Speaker 2: things you wish you never did, or the shame you
Speaker 2: might attach to things. None of that actually impacts. None
Speaker 2: of that makes.
Speaker 3: You not worthy. You're fully worthy.
Speaker 2: And it's almost like reclaiming that worth is so important,
Speaker 2: you know, and again, and I love how just open
Speaker 2: you are about sharing. For you and for me, it's
Speaker 2: not a thing that's done. It's like, for me, it's
Speaker 2: a daily practice. I feel like the rest of my life,
Speaker 2: I'm going to have to intentionally not go back to
Speaker 2: the default thinking or the default patterns of stuff. And so, yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm obsessed with building self worth, and so through the
Speaker 2: book Worthy and also through my podcast, the Jamie Kerly Micheau,
Speaker 2: which I'm so excited to invite you on too. I
Speaker 2: just it's it's my greatest passion. And there's this quote
Speaker 2: by a friend of mine, Rory Vaden. He says, in life,
Speaker 2: we're best positioned to serve the person we once were.
Speaker 2: And I find that interesting, almost like an interesting key
Speaker 2: to discovering our purpose Because a lot of people think
Speaker 2: their job might be their purpose or there, but often
Speaker 2: it's like, what is that thing that we struggled through
Speaker 2: or that thing we went through we would never wish
Speaker 2: upon anybody, but we made it through, and it's like, oh,
Speaker 2: how can we actually help someone else make it through that?
Speaker 2: And So for me, I don't a million percent believe
Speaker 2: I'm worthy all the time, but I know I'm worthy
Speaker 2: in my soul, and It's changed my life believing I'm
Speaker 2: worthy of good friends and I'm worthy of people who
Speaker 2: treat me well the way I treat them. I used
Speaker 2: to hang on to employees that you know, had really
Speaker 2: needed to be fired, like there was just it wasn't
Speaker 2: even up for him to be And I'm like, oh,
Speaker 2: I didn't want.
Speaker 3: To abandon them and I didn't want to make them
Speaker 3: feel unworried.
Speaker 2: I mean, you know, I used to not think I
Speaker 2: was worthy of even having higher standards. And I've come
Speaker 2: a long way. I've come a long way, and I'm
Speaker 2: okay not being a people pleaser all the time now.
Speaker 2: I used to have to be one all the time.
Speaker 2: I'm okay, not I'm okay if someone's disappointed. Now I
Speaker 2: used to not be able to handle that. You know,
Speaker 2: and I think that's self worth. Building self worth will
Speaker 2: change all aspects of your life because you know, we
Speaker 2: attract the level of love in our life that we
Speaker 2: love ourselves exactly, and so like that's the thing.
Speaker 1: I think. It's so interesting how your book and a
Speaker 1: lot of books the messages are similar to my message,
Speaker 1: which is it comes down to choosing yourself, listening to
Speaker 1: your instinct, listening to yourself, and choosing to trust yourself
Speaker 1: and choosing to love yourself enough and then everything just
Speaker 1: falls into place. Yeah, magical ways. Yes, yes, it is beautiful.
Speaker 1: I think. Yeah, these the books I know, I grew
Speaker 1: up with. My mom has had tons of self help books.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, and I just grew up looking through them
Speaker 1: all the time reading them.
Speaker 3: I loved it.
Speaker 1: I don't even know why, because I didn't even I
Speaker 1: didn't know about my problems yet. Yeah, but it has
Speaker 1: come in uh full circle in my life. And so yeah,
Speaker 1: it's that moment, that moment you find your worthiness.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I love that you were exposed to those early on.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I had no choice, you had no choice.
Speaker 2: I was always I would see the Tony Robbins personal
Speaker 2: power tapes on the infoversial. I would see them on
Speaker 2: television and I loved it, Like I was so into it.
Speaker 2: I remember I was waitressing at Denny's actually, and I
Speaker 2: remember saving my tip money to go to one of
Speaker 2: his events. But I wasn't around anybody that thought like that.
Speaker 2: Wasn't into that at all, nobody at all.
Speaker 3: Was I love that? Yeah, yeah, you were called.
Speaker 1: Well, I just have one more question ask you before
Speaker 1: I let you go. Jamie current Lima, what was your
Speaker 1: last I choose me moment? Mmmm?
Speaker 2: Last I choose me moment was pushing. It was delaying
Speaker 2: a trip by a day so I could take my
Speaker 2: daughter to school on Thursday. Normally I would never do that.
Speaker 2: I would, you know, I would put my to do
Speaker 2: list or my scheduled things over everything. And I was like,
Speaker 2: I can sense that she really needs me, and I actually,
Speaker 2: for me, I need that I want.
Speaker 3: To just take her to school.
Speaker 2: And it sounds like a small thing, but for anyone
Speaker 2: has ever been addicted to busyness or to human doing this,
Speaker 2: or who would rather work over do anything else, or
Speaker 2: for me, yes, it's kind of it's a it's a
Speaker 2: big moment where it's not only I'm choosing me, I'm
Speaker 2: choosing the me I want to be choosing the me
Speaker 2: I want to be over sort of the default pattern
Speaker 2: of oh yeah, I already have this scheduled. I've got
Speaker 2: to do that, you know, kind of a thing. I'm like,
Speaker 2: oh no, I think my soul right now needs to
Speaker 2: take her to school, and then I do that thing.
Speaker 2: So I pushed it out by a day. So, yeah,
Speaker 2: that's what just happened. It was a decision actually I
Speaker 2: made driving to your house today, to your studio today.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, you got clarity, got clarity, and I
Speaker 2: feel good about it.
Speaker 3: You should feel good about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, lifelong, we're all works in progress, right, yeah, forever.
Speaker 1: Even seemingly little things like that. It's hard to make
Speaker 1: choices for yourself. Yeah yeah, and subsequently for your daughter.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I love that.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for coming you to my studio
Speaker 1: and just chatting with me and being so open and
Speaker 1: I know what your journey has been will absolutely inspire
Speaker 1: other people who are just starting out, because it's all
Speaker 1: the no's that you took and turned into maybees never
Speaker 1: let those nose stop you. And I think that's such
Speaker 1: a beautiful message.
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you, thank you for inviting me in
Speaker 2: for hanging out barefoot with your sweet dog, who, thank goodness, survived.
Speaker 2: You say, get a coyote, right, Yeah, yeah, it's okay,
Speaker 2: Yeah great. Thank you, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: You're welcome.
Speaker 3: Thank you,