MADE TO LEAD
me when I took an oath of the self-love journey — that means actively going for self-love . I research self-love the way I do contacts . I do the exact same level of work . I listen to my intuition and I listen to my gut . If I was having a [ moment ] of having low self-esteem at that time or I don ’ t have confidence or I ’ m just not feeling good about whatever I ’ m about to do , I literally will type those things into Google . How to gain more confidence . How to feel better about a meeting . How to pitch better . Those things were all in one for me , so the moment I actually started to do that , it allowed me to truly be the artist entrepreneur that I consider myself .
MADE : Was there a defining moment that made you realize that you really needed to focus on self-care ?
AL : It was a mix of things . I can think of one particular story . I remember looking through some photos with my mom of myself for some promo shots and not liking any of them . And , not because they weren ’ t good , but because I couldn ’ t see any good in it . I could not see anything that I liked and it felt concerning . It was that moment where you ’ re like , “ I ’ m really having a hard time looking at an image of myself ,” and seeing anything that I genuinely want others to see . It made me realize that maybe something was wrong .
The thing that was stopping me the most was my lack of confidence my abilities and who I was and who I was growing in to be . I just took a good half of a year to just focus on building myself up . And doing it in an approach that I ’ ve never done in the past . In terms of growth , I think we can easily start to do the same thing over and over again expecting a different result . I had done affirmations before but what changed for me was treating self-love like it was a project . It was like pitching anything else . I was up at night researching confidence and what that looks like and what it meant and how people gain confidence from everything . And not just motivational speakers but from professional athletes , pastors , anyone I thought was a confident person I thought , “ Wow , how did they get there ? What did they do ?” And that was a part of my work .
MADE : As a creative entrepreneur , what challenges have you overcome while operating in self-love ?
AL : I ’ ve overcome the challenge of overanalyzing or over-critiquing my own work to the point where I ’ ll hold myself back and not release it . I recognize that not everything is supposed to be perfect . And when you like something , sometimes you just have to release it . I meet people all the time who are sitting on the script or sitting on starting a YouTube channel or just waiting until they launch this website and it ’ s like , “ What ’ s the hold up ?” I hear , “ Well , it ’ s just right yet . It ’ s not ready .”
I realize that it was fear and this weird mix of wanting acceptance and also not accepting anything about yourself at the exact same time . That ’ s where I think the fear comes in at and I got over that hurdle . I give myself deadlines I have to show somebody and I also just have to do something . I just have to release it . And I just learn as I go . There are some projects that have to go out into the world for you to learn what goes next with it or how it needs to improve . You can ’ t just hold on to everything super tight . Self-care and self-love helped me get over that .
MADE : You seem to be very comfortable with who you are and where you are . How did you become gentle with yourself ?
AL : I ’ m still working on it . I do have times where I ’ m very hard on myself or I don ’ t have nice things to say to myself , but the gift of selfcare is becoming self-aware . So even in those times when you ’ re down , you have to also be able to have this weird , out-of-body experience where you recognize , right now I ’ m being very down . Right now I ’ m being very negative and this is not normal . This is not the true state of what things are — my mind is being a real Debbie Downer right now .
And we all need those things because it ’ s just part of the human experience , but the self-awareness allows you to just come up out of it and to say , I get one day or I get the next 10 minutes to be down or upset , but tomorrow or by 3:00 PM , I don ’ t get to be that way . I have to move forward . I have to fix whatever it is I ’ m being really negative about . My awareness has been the best gift for me . I ’ m glad to hear you think I ’ m gentle with myself . I think its myself awareness that allows me to recognize that I should be more gentle than not .
MADE : You ’ re known for your “ Self-Love Saturday ” videos on YouTube , which we love because they really do challenge us to be our best selves . What are some of your self-care habits ?
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