Makeup is not a mask that covers up your beauty; it's a weapon that helps you express who you are from the inside.
Michelle Phan
Makeup is no different than clothes and accessories - it's embellishments for your face. And it also gives you creative freedom. You get to have that moment in front the mirror every morning and give yourself self-love. You're making yourself up beautiful, which is essentially self-love.
Whatever happens, I'll just keep moving forward. Like an avalanche.
Success is like a lightning bolt. It'll strike you when you least expect it, and you just have to keep the momentum going. You have to strike when the iron is hot. So for me, I just kept striking and striking to polish out the sword that I was making.
I know I'm a storyteller at heart, and if there's a platform that needs stories, I'm going be there.
The beauty of the Internet is there's a niche market for everything, and if you can focus on it, you can build a sustainable and viable business of it.
Seven years ago, in my first semester at college, the professors handed out MacBook Pros. With mine, I filmed a seven-minute tutorial on 'natural makeup' - just me, my laptop, and a cup of coffee. When, a week later, it clocked 40,000 Web views, I knew people were connecting with it, so I kept going. That moment changed my life.
When you're eating a bowl of pho, you're eating everything you need.
I'm a total nerd, so I'm on my telescope, or I read a lot. I'm very inspired by ancient history.
I use sunscreen every single day, even if I'm not going outside in the sun, because I'm near a window. I can always get those UV rays on my face, so I always apply sunscreen on my face and neck. It's like brushing my teeth: I feel weird if I don't apply sunscreen.
Growing up, before my mom would cook our rice, she would rinse the rice out and pour it out three times. And after the fourth pour, she'd pour it into a little bowl, and she'd rinse her face with that. It's known to help whiten the skin and nourish it because essentially inside the water you have all the essential nutrients from the rice.
What inspired me to work so hard and to maintain my determination was seeing my mother. She was an immigrant and was struggling in America to make it by; that inspired me to work hard.
I believe if religion brings you to a sense of peace, that's beautiful. But I also believe if religion's not your thing, that's fine, too, just so long as you're a good person and you find that one thing that leads you to peace and teaches you to have harmony with yourself and other people around you.
Every day is different. I am constantly creating, whether that be for my own YouTube channel and social networks or my businesses like FAWN (For all Women's Network) - a women's lifestyle network on YouTube that I founded/produce; em michelle phan (my cosmetics line with L'Oreal); or Ipsy (a beauty sampling service I co-founded in 2011).
You know when you're a child and your imagination is limitless and you really believe in magic? I thought I had super powers.
I listen to a lot of Tibetan music before I sleep. I'll just type in 'Tibetan meditation music' on YouTube, and within 15 minutes, it knocks me out. I sleep like a baby.
That's the beauty about beauty; it's not like a tattoo. You can just wash it right off, and your skin is your canvas, so you can do something new the next day.
I was inspired by many teachers when I started my channel, Bob Ross being one of them. His voice was so soothing, almost like hypnosis. He was that great of a teacher, even the casual viewer could learn how to paint from watching his show. Growing up, I just remember him being so mesmerizing on screen.
I didn't start wearing makeup until I was in art school, and many of the techniques I learned on canvas, I applied to makeup.
So many of my followers who just graduated can't get jobs; they're hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, and they don't know what to do. My dream is to see a new generation of entrepreneurs who are creating and having more meaningful jobs than the day-to-day grind.
Platforms - they come and go, but storytelling is forever.
I believe that rejection is a blessing because it's the universe's way of telling you that there's something better out there.
When Google reached out to me in 2011, they wanted me to build out their female lifestyle vertical. When they were starting with that initiative, they were giving each production house a million dollars to produce content.
I am first a creator, but my ongoing objective is to leverage my personal success to help mentor new and existing talent and further help them achieve their goals. Endemol Beyond shares this vision, and together, we will drive the future of original content for generations to come.
All of the development I do is with the help of business advisors who are more like my best friends than just business people. They helped me as I created Ipsy back in 2011, which is a beauty community that ships out sampling bags to subscribers.
I'm a creator at heart.
Influence is the new power - if you have influence, you can create a brand.
Robust activity on one site is so much better than halfhearted activity on multiple sites.
Anyone can wear glitter, even a woman in her 60s. It's all about techniques. Instead of applying glitter all over the face, you can just add a little to the inner corner of your eyes or on your brow bone, or even on your Cupid's bow. It just adds this magical element to your makeup.
Don't trust everyone, especially if they say, 'Trust me.'
I really believe in giving tools and resources to other creators so that they can create beautiful videos.
Every video I've made has an inspirational message behind it. Since day one, I thought, 'Okay, I want my audience to be, like, Disney members.' So if that's the case, I have to keep everything rated G.
As a young girl, I loved having stories read to me. There is something magical about narration and voiceovers. Recording a voiceover is an art form in itself.
Just like hair frames our face, brows frame our eyes. I see so much potential in harmonized beauty whenever I see a woman who's not filling in her brows, and I just want to go in with my brow pencil and just be like, 'Filling in eyebrows, OK, done - look in the mirror and be inspired.' That's one of my pet peeves, but beauty is subjective.
When I first started, there really was no beauty guru community. I didn't have the right production resources. I had to learn how to edit. I didn't even have beauty products. I had to go out and buy them myself because beauty brands didn't even know what a beauty guru was.
I always wanted a family environment, a community where a creator like myself could connect and vibe with other creators without feeling competitive.
Eight years ago, if I wanted to do a YouTube video, I broke out my camera and filmed everything myself and learned how to edit and kind of become a one-woman studio. But we're living in an era now, thanks to ICON, where any creator who is online, they can create in their own space.
I don't believe that if one door closes, that's the end. You're in control of that, but you need to seek opportunities and prepare for them.
It's no longer the older paradigm of, 'I want to own this market, and no one else can own this market because I own this market.' The Internet has made the market limitless.
I'm homemade. I upload my videos in my living room; I edit everything, and I upload on my laptop. And my viewers love that about me, and they get inspired and do it themselves.
I've colored my hair so many times, and nobody tells you the damage it's going to do! I went blonde and lost all my baby hairs. I'm not coloring it anymore. Never again.
I don't believe in that term 'self-made' - not to be offensive, but I believe everything happens for a reason, every single person you meet. Even if it's one single person giving you advice, that person helped you get to where you're at today.
The Manuka honey face mask is another favorite of mine that I actually do. I know there are these people that recommend crazy masks, and I'm like, 'There is no way you're putting that on your face!' But I do put Manuka honey on my face. I take a teaspoon and warm it up.
I always secretly loved the art of makeup as a child. I would come up with stories and characters and try on my mom's Maybelline eyeliner when she wasn't home. It was a very old-school pencil - you had to burn the tip to make it smudgy enough to use.
My production style is all about imagination. I want my audience to use their imagination when they watch my videos. My goal is for my voice to be that little hope of encouragement in your head when you walk out your door.
When you read about the real history of where feminism comes from, it came from a very political point of view. I don't believe in bringing any politics to an idea like feminism. I love the idea that women should be celebrated, but I also believe men should be, too. We need both - yin and yang.
I love Fredorator and what they produce and the storytelling of 'Adventure Time'... There's such a dark, adult underlying theme underneath the whimsical, magical children's aspect of their storytelling element.
I am so inspired by the people watching my videos and responding to them. I have learned so much from my community over the years and always love reading their feedback and their own personal stories that they share with me.
The Internet is where you can find people who are authentic.
There's definitely more to me offline than what you see online. Because what I show online is what I want to show to my followers... If I showed everything I did offline, it might not align with some of my other followers around the world.
