Better known by her alias, “Superwoman,” Lilly Singh has a good reason to claim such a name. The 28-year-old star and recent author of the book, “How to Be a Bawse” has made a wildly successful career for herself, garnering over 11 million subscribers and 2 billion views on her YouTube channel and raking in $2.5 million dollars annually. She even outdoes the iconic superhero herself, coming up as the first search on Google.
But Singh wasn’t always a “bawse.” Getting to that sweet spot took time, and she had to work— hard.
Thankfully, she’s not shy about doling out advice (and who wouldn’t take tips from someone who’s found a way to collaborate with Dwayne Johnson and slip in time for tea with Michelle Obama?).
We spoke with Singh about how to become our own super humans and take our careers to the next level:
In your new book, you suggest that people map out their visions if they want to truly conquer life. How does that work?
A lot of people know that to be successful you have to work hard, but a lot of people that work really hard don’t really know what the end goal is. Making a vision board is a great way to know what you’re working towards. On my vision board I have people I’d like to work with, so Dwayne Johnson is on there, Selena Gomez is on there. I also have places I want to visit or passion projects I want to start, charities I want to donate to — so just anything you aspire to do.
I’m sure making these visions a reality involves putting ourselves into uncomfortable situations.
Absolutely. I’m a big believer that success lies outside of your comfort zone and one of the hardest things to do is to be willing to fail. Sometimes you just have to count to three and throw yourself into something you’re nervous about doing, because the next time you do it, you’ll be a little less nervous, and the next time, you’ll be slightly less nervous. It’s all just part of the process.
What about FOMO? What happens when that little voice in our head is telling us to procrastinate or go out and party with our friends instead of getting to work?
How I’ve kind of learned to deal with FOMO is by doing something I really love, so that FOMO is weak to begin with. Making lists also work, so every time FOMO wins and you do something to procrastinate, you write it on your list. And you have another list, one for every time you overcome FOMO and decide not go to that party or not binge watch Netflix and you accomplish something. So by the end of two weeks or a month you have two lists: one where you beat FOMO and one where you didn’t and you see all of results that came from that decision. When you analyze those lists you’ll be able to see which one means more to you, and hopefully that will be your reminder the next time you want to slack off.
You’re also a strong believer in breaking the rules to get where you want in life.
There are certain rules that people should definitely follow or the world would be in chaos, but when it comes to business, you don’t always have to play by the rules. With my career, I’ve broken the mold of how people traditionally get through the entertainment industry. A great way to f*** protocol is to be creative and make your own path and sometimes break the rules so that you can make the magic you want to make.
