MIKAYLA NOGUEIRA EXCLUSIVE: The Story She’s Finally Ready to Tell

Jay sits down with beauty creator Mikayla Nogueira to go beyond the online persona and share the real story behind her rise. Mikayla opens up about the struggles that shaped her before finding success, the viral moment that changed her life overnight, and the painful reality of a marriage impacted by addiction and divorce. She also shares how she found her way forward, reconnected with her high school first love, and launched her own beauty brand with Sephora. With Love and Gratitude, Jay Shetty Built-in protections for teens. JAY'S DAILY WISDOM DELIVERED STRAIGHT TO YOUR INBOX Join 900,000+ readers discovering how small daily shifts create big life change with my free newsletter. Subscribe here: https://news.jayshetty.me/subscribe Check out our Apple subscription to unlock bonus content of On Purpose! https://lnk.to/JayShettyPodcast What We Discuss: 00:00 Introduction 00:45 Why Share Your Story Now? 01:31 Beyond The Influencer Persona 02:46 Childhood Memories That Shaped Her 03:45 Bullying & Discovering Makeup At Age 10 05:24 The Insecurities Behind the Confidence 06:48 Expressing Her True Self Online 08:55 The Origin Of Her Passion For Makeup 11:18 Work Ethic And Thinking Big 12:37 Creating Her Very First YouTube Video 13:58 Presenting A 50-Page Business Plan 16:30 Returning To Her Hometown & Donating Makeup 18:00 Getting Hired At Ulta Beauty 23:52 Letting Go of the Future She Planned 28:10 Losing Her Job and Finding a New Path 31:34 The First Viral Video 37:08 Manifesting Success & Building A Content Engine 41:53 Experiencing Her First Cancellation 45:25 Reflecting on Past Controversies 48:56 The Mental Health Toll of Rapid Growth 52:54 The Boston Accent 56:48 Meeting Her Ex-Husband Cody 59:41 Navigating Addiction In A Relationship 01:04:08 Dating An Influencer & Dating An Addict 01:05:56 Marriage Through Addiction and Relapse 01:13:00 A Harrowing Late-Night Emergency 01:18:11 Making the Decision to Divorce 01:33:53 The Path To Divorce 01:40:46 Finally A Fresh Start 01:46:45 Reconnecting With High School First Love, Zach 01:52:21 Building Her Beauty Brand (POV) 01:57:30 Looking Back 01:59:34 Mikayla On Final Five Episode Resources: Facebook | https://www.facebook.com/share/1C43BCLCFi/?mibextid=wwXIfr TikTok | https://www.tiktok.com/@mikaylanogueira Instagram | https://www.instagram.com/mikaylajmakeup Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Jay Shetty?

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• 0:45Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by State Farm. We spend so much energy becoming the best version of ourselves, building better habits, showing up more fully, embracing mindfulness. But sometimes the most purposeful thing you can do is just handle the thing you've been putting off. If getting your insurance sorted has been living on that list, State Farm is there to help you choose the coverage that's right for you. Go online at statefarm.com or use the easily accessible app to get help from one of their over 19,000 local agents. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. This episode is brought to you by Whole Foods Market. If you're talking about quality food, you can't forget Whole Foods Market, who've been holding themselves to the highest standards since they opened in 1980.

• 1:31Jay Shetty?

  That means you'll see thousands of organic products across their stores, from the produce department to the aisles. It also means you'll never see certain ingredients. They've banned artificial sweeteners and colors, high fructose corn syrup and more, so you can shop with peace of mind. Shop Whole Foods Market in store or online.

• 1:53Jay Shetty?

  Hey, it's Jay. I don't know what your day's been like, but I was just thinking about you for a minute. And I hope you're being a little patient with yourself because you deserve it. And yeah, I'll talk to you soon.

• 2:16Jay Shetty?

  Today, we're speaking with Michaela Nagera, one of the biggest and most influential beauty creators in the world, with more than 20 million followers across social media. We're going beyond what you see online to talk about the person behind it all, the reality of massive success and the pressure of living so publicly. Please welcome to On Purpose, Michaela Nagera.

• 2:38Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 2:39Jay Shetty?

  Michaela, welcome to On Purpose.

• 2:40Speaker 01

  Hi, Jay. Very happy to be here. Thank you for having me.

• 2:43Jay Shetty?

  Thank you. I'm so grateful to have you here. You've been so private about your journey for so long.

• 2:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:50Jay Shetty?

  Why was now the right time and this the right place to open up?

• 2:55Speaker 01

  I feel like I'm at a turning point in my life. You know, I'm almost 30 and my twenties have been a really interesting journey for me. And I'm beginning to feel like I'm really learning who I am and who I want to be. And I knew I wanted a safe space to talk about this and who better than you, so.

• 3:13Jay Shetty?

  Thank you for trusting me. I don't take that for granted. And I've been following your journey for quite some time and it's pretty remarkable what you've achieved. But I'm fascinated by the Michaela that we don't see or don't fully understand. And I heard you say recently that you only ever saw yourself as Michaela the influencer. And I'm intrigued, if you take away the money and the makeup and the businesses and the success, how do you define who Michaela is today?

• 3:41Speaker 01

  So I think I've always been someone who is very outspoken, very loud about who I am, very proud about who I am. Just because I find that we're in a society where everyone wants you to fit in and be someone maybe you're not. And I grew up always wanting to be exactly who I am, Michaela. And that is someone who is very curious, very, I'm a Gemini. I don't know if you're into astrology. But I'm a very curious person. I'm very, very creative. I grew up in a very artistic household. My mom's a professional artist. My dad is an antique appraiser and collector and I was just always surrounded by that. So I'm very known to be eclectic and artsy with my makeup and just different.

• 4:25Speaker 01

  But I never wanted to fit in. I always wanted to be different. And I kind of like that, you know?

• 4:32Jay Shetty?

  I'm a Virgo.

• 4:33Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 4:33Jay Shetty?

  So I'm giving it away now.

• 4:34Speaker 01

  So you're into the astrology.

• 4:35Jay Shetty?

  Yes, totally, totally. Not as much, I don't know so much, but I enjoy the conversation around it. If you want to make any judgments about me, you can feel free. I love that you just said that you liked to be different.

• 4:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, I love being different.

• 4:48Jay Shetty?

  And I think most people just want to fit in.

• 4:51Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 4:52Jay Shetty?

  Especially when they're young. What's your earliest memory of being comfortable being different?

• 4:57Speaker 01

  From birth. I mean, I really give credit to my mom because my mom knows how to sew. So she would actually sew all of my outfits and she would make these really fun, crazy colorful patterned dresses. So, you know, I'm going to school with a big bow on my head, these crazy dresses that my mom made, and she would actually make the matching dress for herself. So that's how you know that I really get it from her. And she was just always so open about who she was. And I really admired that from a young, young age and I get that from her. So growing up, all going to school, I always looked different than everybody else because of these outfits I would wear. But teachers always appreciated it and said, she's really interesting and I feel like she's going to do something really interesting in her life.

• 5:41Speaker 01

  Because I was just so different from everybody else, which is not a bad thing. I never saw it as a bad thing.

• 5:46Jay Shetty?

  But you experienced bullying for that, right?

• 5:48Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely.

• 5:49Jay Shetty?

  When you were younger, like for the way you looked. And even recently, I've heard you say that, and this was in your own words. You were saying, I feel I'm a beauty influencer who doesn't think I'm beautiful. And like, you know, you're seen in that way. Like, how did you deal with that bullying and that othering when you were younger? Because I imagine you didn't have the success at that time. You didn't have what you've built at that time. How did you deal with it?

• 6:11Speaker 01

  Well, I began wearing makeup really young. I was only 10 when I began doing the winged eyeliner and lipstick and everything like that. I was the only kid at school wearing makeup at the time. And I got really good at it really young. So by the time I'm, you know, 14, 15, 16, I am going to school with a full beat on my face. And I was really the only one doing that. And people definitely look down on that, especially when I grew up in a very almost conservative area where everyone dresses relatively conservative and no one's really doing things that are considered different. So me being that type of person, it was a challenge. But I never gave up on it because I always knew that I was meant to do that.

• 6:54Speaker 01

  And even in high school, I decided really early on that I wanted to do something in social media and online. So, you know, I'm 14 creating a YouTube channel. I'm 14 creating a blog about beauty. People always laughed and said, this is ridiculous. You're not going to go anywhere with this. Delete your YouTube channel. My classmates would go on my YouTube channel and comment the worst things and hoping I would just stop and I never did.

• 7:21Jay Shetty?

  I love that confidence. That's remarkable.

• 7:24Speaker 01

  I've always found that really interesting about myself. I'm a very insecure person and I struggle a lot with my self-esteem. But I have a lot of confidence about who I am. And I've always thought that, isn't that weird?

• 7:36Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, explain that to me. It's not weird, it's just fascinating.

• 7:39Speaker 01

  Fascinating, yeah.

• 7:40Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, it's fascinating, yeah.

• 7:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm really self-aware. I don't know why that is, but I'm very self-aware of my insecurities, self-aware of how low my self-esteem is, self-aware of my mental health and how I self-sabotage myself in certain ways because of mental health. So because I know all of these things, I feel like I have a really good sense of who I am. And that allows me to be confident in the person I am and who I'm becoming. At the end of the day, when I lay my head on the pillow, those insecurities still exist. But I know at the end of the day, it's all in my head. And I know I'm capable of doing great things without letting those insecurities get in the way.

• 8:19Jay Shetty?

  Instagram teen accounts come with automatic protections that limit who can contact teens, the content they can see and the time they spend on the app. Learn more about teen accounts and Instagram's ongoing work to protect teens online at instagram.com forward slash teen accounts. Naturally, I think we all see our flaws. We all know our insecurities. But we don't want those flaws and insecurities and shortcomings to block us from going out there.

• 8:45Speaker 01

  Right.

• 8:46Jay Shetty?

  And doing something incredible. And it feels like you've built up a healthy relationship with both of those things.

• 8:51Speaker 01

  Definitely.

• 8:52Jay Shetty?

  To some degree. Talk to me about how you became aware of your insecurities or your shortcomings or whatever you see those as, but didn't let them block you.

• 9:02Speaker 01

  When I decided to go on social media and really put myself out there. I mean, that's a big decision. I'm going to put my whole life online. I think that was the moment where I really realized I am okay with who I am because I, if you've seen my videos, you know, I'm a little bit loud, I'm a little bit out there. I try to be funny. Sometimes I'm screaming in your face. I'm very clickbaity, like there's a lot going on in my videos. But that is who I am when I'm with my safest group of people. Because I'm a Gemini, there's different versions of me. There's this soft version you're getting right now where I'm very composed and just, I feel safe and I feel comfortable. But then when I'm around like family and friends and people I love, I'm very loud. I'm very talkative. I'm almost annoying.

• 9:46Speaker 01

  And I don't think there's anything wrong with that. But I think when I went online and I took that safe piece of me where I can be loud, I can be myself. Because you have to realize I'm filming these videos in a room by myself. So there's nothing making me say, oh, I can't be who I am. And I film my videos almost as if it's a video diary where I'm just going to post this. And I, at the time when I began on social media, it wasn't as if I thought anyone was going to see it. So I can just be myself, no problem. And then when I actually blew up online and saw that people actually enjoyed this persona, which is really not a persona. It is who I am at the end of the day. But they enjoyed the real me online. And I thought that was really cool that people appreciated that.

• 10:30Speaker 01

  Because I knew I was going to be different than the other beauty influencers, as I said.

• 10:34Jay Shetty?

  I love hearing that and I love seeing your success because to me, it's so affirming and reassuring to anyone out there. Because you hear this advice, right? Be yourself. And it always sounds cheesy and cringey and a bit awkward and whatever. But actually, then you see people do it and you go, oh, people actually want that authenticity.

• 10:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 10:52Jay Shetty?

  That people actually really gravitate towards someone like yourself who's putting their genuine self out there.

• 10:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:58Jay Shetty?

  And there's all these people, millions and millions of people who are like, oh, Michaela, we just want you to be yourself. Like, we love the way you are. Like, that must feel so great. And at the same time, it elicits a reaction. But we'll get into that. I wanted to ask you, talk to me about where your love for makeup came from. Like you said, you grew up in this artistic home.

• 11:14Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 11:14Jay Shetty?

  In this visual home, your mom sewing your clothes for you. What leads to you being fascinated with makeup?

• 11:21Speaker 01

  Because I grew up in this very creative family. I'm looking at my father, who's the most historically smart person I've ever met. He collects antiques, he has an amazing collection. He's very artsy in that way. Then you have my mom painting these beautiful paintings, taking gorgeous photography. You have my brother, who's doing video game drawings and really good at art. And then there was me. And I'm like, I have to be good at something. I have to be good at something. And my mom saw that in me right away. Because I was so open to being like her with the creativity and everything. So she handed me an Avon catalog. And I'm like, literally eight years old. Hands me an Avon catalog. And if you don't know what Avon is, it's this mag-

• 12:00Jay Shetty?

  I do. My mom used to do Avon.

• 12:02Speaker 01

  Okay, yeah, it's a magazine. You circle products and you can order them. We don't really do that anymore. But I said, okay. And I took a Sharpie and I'm circling page after page of products, not knowing anything about makeup. I knew nothing about makeup. I didn't know what anything was. But my mom thought I would be into it. So she ordered me a bunch of Avon products. And the minute I picked them up, I never put them down. Because I learned about makeup, I began going on YouTube. I think for a lot of people who were into makeup, YouTube, beauty YouTube specifically, was a major place to learn everything you could about beauty. And I became obsessed. I became absolutely obsessed with all of the biggest beauty creators you can think of. I'm going home after school and the first thing I'm doing is throwing my backpack down

• 12:46Speaker 01

  and making sure I'm checking what these beauty creators have posted. I became so, so addicted to it, in the best way. It became my saving grace. I mean, anyone who goes through high school knows it's a challenging time for a lot of people, myself included. And I find that makeup was like that peace for me. It was that place where I felt really peaceful. But yeah, once I picked it up, I did not put it down. And I, and people told me, you're gonna grow out of this. You're gonna grow out of this. And I always said, I'm gonna go into a career in beauty. And they're like, you're gonna be a makeup artist? Maybe, but it could be something else. I just knew I wanted to be in beauty. But I also knew I wanted to make a bigger impact than just being a makeup artist. I know that being a makeup artist is, is a really special job. But I wanted to do something even bigger.

• 13:31Speaker 01

  Because I, I just think that way. I think really big all the time, so.

• 13:34Jay Shetty?

  How did you get that bug of thinking big?

• 13:37Speaker 01

  Well, both of my parents own businesses. So when you grow up in a household like that, where you have parents who are hustling, my work ethic is just crazy. And I was like that in school, too. I was a grinder in school. I was that kid who would, I would get up at 4:00 AM, do a full beat so I could make my 6:00 AM bus every single day. I wouldn't miss breakfast either. And then I would love going to school. I love learning. I loved education so much. When I went to college, it was the best four years of my life. I loved college so much. I just really loved school. So my parents put that work ethic in me. And then going to school and seeing what you can truly accomplish with your life, just, I've, I've just always been so open to massive success and not afraid of it.

• 14:22Jay Shetty?

  And everyone who's listening and watching, this is a Sunday. Me and Michaela are here on a Sunday just to prove that that work ethic is still there. Like, we were talking about your schedule here. You've been in LA for a week, you're here for a few more days. And you've been going back to back to back. You have a shoot after this. Like, that work ethic is something that's still sustaining even today after all this success. And after all this, you know, all the mega achievements you've had. Talk to me about the feeling that you have around, you said you were 14 when you started your YouTube channel? Like, in the beginning?

• 14:52Speaker 01

  Between 12 and 14, yeah.

• 14:54Jay Shetty?

  Do you remember the first thing you ever posted?

• 14:56Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 14:57Jay Shetty?

  What was it?

• 14:58Speaker 01

  So it was a full makeup routine where, and, and in the video, I'm using all of the Avon products, I said, where I have my little Avon quad. And it, there was no audio. It was just, I put music over because I, I did, I was too scared to talk on camera. It was my first video. And it was just a, a video of me doing makeup. No talking, just kind of showing people how I do my routine. The lighting was horrible. It was, I feel, I did film it on a camera, though, for my first YouTube video. I asked for Christmas for a Canon camera. And my mom got it for me because she knew I wanted to do YouTube. And that was my first video on the camera. And I was so excited to do it. And I, you know, I had to learn how to edit at such a young age. So I'm downloading all these editing softwares and, and just trying to figure it out.

• 15:40Jay Shetty?

  How many views did it get?

• 15:41Speaker 01

  Oh, God, probably a hundred, maybe? You know, I sent it to all my family and friends, but that was it.

• 15:47Jay Shetty?

  And how long did you keep that up for?

• 15:49Speaker 01

  Oh, years. I, I kept it up most of high school, yeah.

• 15:51Jay Shetty?

  Wow. And, and like you said, there were friends at school or other people telling you, you're gonna outgrow this, this isn't your thing, this isn't gonna work out. What would you say to someone who's young, has a dream, is building towards it, wants to start something, but they're hearing a lot of the criticism, hate?

• 16:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:08Jay Shetty?

  Complaints, naysayers?

• 16:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:10Jay Shetty?

  What would you say to that person?

• 16:12Speaker 01

  Well, I think there's different types of dreams, right? And some of these dreams that we have are considered outrageous. So when I was in high school, I was in a program called DECA. It's a business competition. And I actually entered this competition when I was 16. And I wrote a 50-page business plan on how I could be successful as an influencer, knowing, having no idea that this would be my life now. And I remember I, I presented this presentation in front of judges. And they're like, huh? Because this, when I'm 16, this is 10 years ago.

• 16:47Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 16:48Speaker 01

  So influencing was a thing, but it wasn't like a huge thing. And the judges were definitely like, no way. But I won, by the way. I think I was just very convincing about, I can make a business out of this. So after I did that business competition, people at school kind of saw that I was serious about this. I was legit. I wanna be a beauty influencer. I knew that 10 years ago, that I wanted to be a beauty influencer. And I would tell everybody, I would tell all my teachers, all my friends, everyone at school. And absolutely everyone said, that's not gonna happen. That's not gonna happen. And I think it does come down to the fact that, one, I grew up in a very small town, where a lot of people stay there and it's just very quaint.

• 17:29Speaker 01

  And even the idea of going to New York City or LA is, is scary to a lot of people, including myself. The idea of growth, I think, when you come from a small town can be really scary. So even I experienced that, too.

• 17:43Jay Shetty?

  Who did you look up to at the time that was doing this? That made you feel you could do it? Or was it just self?

• 17:49Speaker 01

  I was looking up to every single beauty influencer. Everyone you can think of. James Charles, Jeffree Star, Nikki Tutorials, Tati Westbrook, Jaclyn Hill, Manny Mua, Patrick Star. I was watching every single one. And I learned a lot of what I do in my videos from them.

• 18:04Jay Shetty?

  And you're right, that 10 years ago, people didn't know this could be a real thing. It's evolved so fast. I, I uploaded my first video 10 years ago.

• 18:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. And what platform was that on?

• 18:15Jay Shetty?

  It was originally on YouTube. And then on Facebook, which is where my content took off in the early days. And then YouTube, and then Instagram came later, and then of course TikTok and everything else. It's fascinating looking back because I remember being at the award shows, streamies and shorties and all these things in the early days. It's so different to what it is today.

• 18:35Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 18:35Jay Shetty?

  It's absolutely changed. Like, now it's like a real career path and everyone has a plan. When we all started, I didn't know, I didn't know where it was going.

• 18:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:44Jay Shetty?

  And so it's, it's pretty unbelievable to see it. When you go back to your hometown now that you grew up in, what does that feel like for you?

• 18:50Speaker 01

  Well, I actually just went back to my hometown to go to my high school. I donated a ton of makeup to my high school. And it was so interesting just walking through the halls and seeing where I grew up. My hometown is, is a place I, I hold close because it's where I really discovered that I could be different. So I love going back to my hometown. It's, it's really special.

• 19:10Jay Shetty?

  What was it like walking through those corridors and almost going back in time?

• 19:14Speaker 01

  Spooky. I mean, it's a little bit eerie, like walking through and, because your, your whole life during that time flashes before you. Like, all those years in high school, all those years where maybe you didn't believe in yourself or you were unsure, you know, you don't know where you're gonna end up when you're in high school. You just don't. And when you walk and get your diploma, you don't know what's, what happens after that. And I think a lot of people, including myself, were terrified after that. But obviously really excited, too. But there's also the fear, so.

• 19:41Jay Shetty?

  What did it feel like to donate all that makeup?

• 19:43Speaker 01

  Oh, my God, how cool, right? They had all the, all the girls come into the cafeteria and just, I, I donated so much, like 20 huge bags.

• 19:53Jay Shetty?

  All of POV.

• 19:54Speaker 01

  Yeah. I definitely threw in a lot of POV. And the girls just went crazy and, and filled up little goody bags. So it's, it was cool. Because I just know there's that one girl at the school, and maybe more now, who knows, who's doing makeup like I did and has a similar dream. There's, there's gotta be at least one.

• 20:11Jay Shetty?

  Talk to me about how you got your job at Ulta.

• 20:14Speaker 01

  Oh, gosh, okay. So when I turned 16, I knew I needed a job in beauty. I want my life to be in beauty. I have to work in beauty. So I'm applying to everything you can think of. JCPenney Beauty, Nordstrom Beauty, Sephora, Ulta, everywhere that sold makeup, I'm applying. Now, because I lived in a small town, I lived nowhere near any of these places, by the way. But I happened to live 10 minutes from an Ulta. And I applied, I didn't hear anything for a really long time, years. So backtracking a little bit, when I went to college, I decided for a brief period of time that I was gonna give up makeup.

• 20:54Speaker 01

  Because I didn't see a life where I was gonna be successful in this. It was a moment of giving up. And I think we all have those moments. We all have those moments where we give up, maybe just for a little bit. It doesn't mean forever. So there was a brief moment where I gave up. And I ended up deleting my YouTube channel, deleting my beauty blog, deleted my beauty pages. I deleted everything and I gave up. And then a few years into college, I'm a senior and it's time to start thinking about jobs. So I'm getting my degree in communication, media, marketing, and I have to think about getting a job. And in my head, I thought, oh, my gosh, if I don't work in beauty, I'm gonna be miserable.

• 21:38Speaker 01

  So that's when I decided, okay, I'm gonna apply to Ulta again and just see what happens. I applied, got the phone call a week later. I went to this interview with a full beat on. I had purple eyeshadow on. I did a purple cut crease, I'll never forget. I wanted to show that I could do makeup, so I did my best work that day. And I went into this interview and I basically just was really honest with the manager. I said, I need this job. I was, not in the sense that I need the money. I need this job because beauty is my life. And I'm going to feel so empty if I don't work in beauty. And I really need this chance. Obviously, I did all the other traditional interview questions. But at the end of the interview, she was like, I actually applied for a cashier position.

• 22:22Speaker 01

  And this was, wow, I'm already getting emotional talking about this because this was the first time someone believed in me.

• 22:44Speaker 01

  You you'll never forget the first time someone believes in you.

• 22:54Speaker 01

  My Alter manager looked at me and she said, I actually don't want you to be a cashier. I want you to be a makeup artist on the on the floor. And mind you, I had no makeup experience, except for the makeup I do on myself.

• 23:09Speaker 01

  And I thought, oh, my gosh, this is it.

• 23:12Speaker 01

  This is someone seeing something in me.

• 23:17Speaker 01

  And my first day was the best day ever. You know, they handed me my brush belt, gave me brushes, my Alter name tag, and I was just so happy. I was so happy. And then I loved working there. It was everything. I learned everything you can imagine about beauty working there. And that to me was was a turning point in in me thinking about my future. And I knew that beauty, that I did have a place in beauty.

• 23:47Jay Shetty?

  I love how emotional you just got about the idea of someone believing in you.

• 23:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:50Jay Shetty?

  Especially in your dream.

• 23:52Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 23:52Jay Shetty?

  And I imagine your parents believed in you.

• 23:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I think for parents, a lot of the times they want the best for you, right? And when I go to my parents and say, I want to be a beauty influencer, it's like, okay.

• 24:05Jay Shetty?

  Oh, interesting. Okay.

• 24:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:08Jay Shetty?

  So despite them being entrepreneurs and creative and everything.

• 24:12Speaker 01

  I think they were scared. They were they knew they wanted me to work in beauty. But that concept of being an influencer, being a creator on the internet, what is that? Because my parent, I have older parents, so my parents are in their seventies. Um, so they didn't grow up with any of that. They don't know anything about that. My dad doesn't even know how to use a phone. So they were skeptical, not skeptical that I would make something of myself. They really are always proud of me and believe in me in every way you can think of. But it was more so the, oh, you want to do this on the internet? That was a question for them, which I think it would be for any parent, transparently.

• 24:50Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. So, yeah, you get this moment of, wow, someone who works in this industry.

• 24:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:58Jay Shetty?

  At Alter has this positive emotion towards you and recognizes that you shouldn't just be a cashier. You could actually be on the floor doing makeup.

• 25:06Speaker 01

  I hope she sees this because.

• 25:08Jay Shetty?

  What's her name? Do you remember?

• 25:09Speaker 01

  Her name was Lindsay. Yeah.

• 25:10Jay Shetty?

  Oh, you remember her name?

• 25:11Speaker 01

  I hope she sees this.

• 25:12Jay Shetty?

  Do you remember what she looks like?

• 25:13Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 25:13Jay Shetty?

  Oh, wow.

• 25:14Speaker 01

  Short haircut, glasses, beautiful.

• 25:16Jay Shetty?

  Lindsay, big shout out. That's awesome. Have you ever met her again?

• 25:21Speaker 01

  Um, I saw her a few years later. She was a manager at a different store. Yeah, I saw her.

• 25:25Jay Shetty?

  Okay, but not since all of this.

• 25:26Speaker 01

  No, no, but that would be cool.

• 25:28Jay Shetty?

  That would be cool.

• 25:28Speaker 01

  I would be open to that.

• 25:29Jay Shetty?

  Imagine we had Lindsay in the back right now. It's like, guys, bring Lindsay out. Oh, man, we should have done that. Oh, that's awesome. I really hope she does see this because I can see what impact she's had on you.

• 25:38Speaker 01

  She has had a big impact on me.

• 25:40Jay Shetty?

  It's incredible, isn't it? People like that who didn't realize, they didn't even know what they were doing for you.

• 25:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:46Jay Shetty?

  They were just doing it. I think about those people sometimes, the people that opened doors or gave someone an opportunity. They're not the ones who are well known or, you know, whatever it may be, but everyone has someone like that in their life or a few people like that in their life.

• 26:00Speaker 01

  You never know who's walking through the door.

• 26:02Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, that's pretty remarkable. So wait, you get this job at Alter. And actually, I want to I want to track back a little bit to the point you talked about giving up.

• 26:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:11Jay Shetty?

  Because I find that really fascinating because up until now, I'm hearing your confidence. I'm hearing you believe in yourself. You're like posting a blog at fourteen, you've got YouTube, like, these are, like, just to be really clear, that is early days to do that. Now people are doing it because you can see where it goes.

• 26:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:26Jay Shetty?

  You're doing it at a time when it's still pretty new and fresh. So those are not small things. Talk to me about what had to happen for you to get to a point to say, I might have to give up on this dream. I don't think it's happening.

• 26:38Speaker 01

  When I went to a business college and as I was going through school and seeing just people getting these opportunities and finance and accounting and all of these big jobs that are going to take them like really far and and I I was getting a communication degree. And I was thinking about working in TV or radio or something like that. And then I interned in radio and I liked it. I liked it a lot, but there was something still missing. It just nothing ever fit and I felt really confused when I was a senior in college. And like I said, I gave up. I I went to a college that was, again, pretty conservative. No one's wearing makeup.

• 27:21Speaker 01

  There was actually a girl, her name is Dana, Dana Rose. She's a beauty influencer now, fun fact, and we're friends. But she was a year above me at the school and she was an athlete at the school. And she would walk around campus with a full beat to go to practice. And she had this gorgeous makeup and I always admired her. And I wondered what she was going to do with her life because she was going to a business college. And then I saw on Instagram that she began a lash business. And I thought, wow, she went to college to get this degree and now she wants to have a lash business. So clearly there's some correlation between business and beauty. Clearly there is something here.

• 28:04Speaker 01

  So I decided to create an Instagram account and I began posting just makeup stuff. Just makeup hauls, makeup pictures of my eyeshadow, because I did really cool eyeshadow. And Ardell lashes is a company, it's a lash company. They reposted one of my pictures and just that simple repost, okay, they liked the makeup enough to repost it. That's kind of cool. And then I began tagging brands, tagging brands in photos and doing more like product stuff and showing people what products I use. And then I noticed brands were paying attention. So if I show a Covergirl foundation, Covergirl may like the photo.

• 28:47Speaker 01

  And I'm thinking, wow, this is really, really interesting. If I really put in the work here, maybe this could be my future. Like, I had this hint of a maybe.

• 28:59Speaker 01

  So that's when I kind of said, all right, I'm going to try this again.

• 29:02Jay Shetty?

  Well, yeah, it's, I'm sure you sometimes look back and go, gosh, if I didn't pull through.

• 29:09Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh.

• 29:09Jay Shetty?

  You must have those sliding doors moments.

• 29:11Speaker 01

  I think about that all the time because I did have a job offer after college and it was going to be to work in an HR department at a bank. Imagine that. Imagine me working in the HR department at a bank.

• 29:23Jay Shetty?

  You'd be amazing at it, I imagine. You'd be really good at it.

• 29:26Speaker 01

  I'd be great at it, but um, I I think I would have been really miserable in the job, honestly. Just from a creativity perspective, when you're someone who's really creative, if you're not constantly activating that, it's it's tough.

• 29:40Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, absolutely. I can relate to that. I spent two years in the corporate world after living as a monk, which I thought was my path. And then spent two years working a corporate job, which, by the way, I enjoyed and it was good, but and I learned a lot from it about business that's been very, very useful. But I felt the exact same way. I was like, oh, I thought my life was about helping people. I thought it was about being creative. I thought it was about teaching people something and guiding them and helping them improve their life. And all of a sudden, I'm not doing any of that.

• 30:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:10Jay Shetty?

  And I got that real awakening by spending two, you you are smarter than me. You you figured it out before. You know, spending those two years in there, which is amazing, but you have this moment, you get their job at Alter, the first day is the best day. But then twenty twenty comes along, COVID happens.

• 30:27Speaker 01

  And I experienced the worst day.

• 30:29Jay Shetty?

  And you experienced your worst day. Talk to me about your best day at Alter to your worst day at Alter.

• 30:35Speaker 01

  That's a day I feel like no one will forget when COVID hit its peak and the country just simultaneously shut down. For me, at the time I was working at Alter, I was also getting my master's degree. And I was preparing and being on boarded for that HR position. So I'm doing these three things at once and I felt really good. I felt confident, like, okay, my future, I feel like I I got this. Then COVID happens. Alter Beauty shuts down across the country. Um, I lose my HR position because they decided to shut down the program because they were unsure about COVID.

• 31:15Speaker 01

  And then also my master's program shut down entirely. It didn't even go remote. It just shut down. So I, in one day, lost everything and I was terrified. I was absolutely terrified. It was a horrible day because I'll never forget it because my mom came in my room and said, hey, Michaela, your student loans just got delivered to you. So I'm looking at these student loans that I owe, which is, if anyone has student loans, you know how much those are.

• 31:47Speaker 01

  At the same time, I just lost my job at Alter temporarily. COVID is happening, school's shut down. I am just panic attack, panic attack. And I'm just crying to my mom, crying that I don't know what I'm going to do now. It was very, very scary. But I'm also at the time twenty one, so I think a lot of us at twenty one are a little bit scared about the future.

• 32:12Jay Shetty?

  Well, I think everyone's scared about the future, but I think COVID added a whole new layer.

• 32:16Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 32:16Jay Shetty?

  For everyone who's graduating at that time or looking for work.

• 32:19Speaker 01

  I didn't even have a graduation.

• 32:20Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 32:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:21Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, or you're graduating on Zoom for some people. Or you don't know if you're going to get a job, but a lot of people didn't get jobs, programs got canceled. Like, I feel like it was such a defining moment for people in a different way if you were.

• 32:32Speaker 01

  It could either make or break you.

• 32:34Jay Shetty?

  You know what I find fascinating, Michaela, is that you're talking about one of the worst days in your life, but you cried in this interview when someone believed in you.

• 32:44Jay Shetty?

  And that tells me a lot about you.

• 32:45Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 32:46Jay Shetty?

  You got teary and emotional at the fact that someone believed in you, which just shows how grateful you are. And like how much, you're crying at a good thing.

• 32:54Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 32:55Jay Shetty?

  Like, like, you know, it's like.

• 32:56Speaker 01

  I love crying good things.

• 32:58Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, but that that tells me a lot about you. Like, as in, that's a, that's rare. Like, most of us, we cry when we go through bad things or we remember bad moments or bad memories and that's normal as well. There's nothing wrong with that.

• 33:08Speaker 01

  Well, how could I cry at the most defining day of my life? I mean, I believe in timing. I believe timing is everything. I do believe things happen for a reason personally. And I felt that that day was meant to happen to me. It was meant to be a massive wake up call, wake up, Michaela, and get it together because you got this.

• 33:28Jay Shetty?

  That's so powerful. I love that because I feel like there's so many people right now who might be going through a difficult moment or a difficult time like that. And knowing that being let go from your job or rejected from the place you want to work at or

• 33:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:41Jay Shetty?

  something not working out could actually be the beginning, you said it could make or break you.

• 33:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:45Jay Shetty?

  How long after that did you join TikTok?

• 33:48Speaker 01

  The next day?

• 33:50Jay Shetty?

  Wow.

• 33:52Speaker 01

  A lot of people don't know the full story about the TikTok.

• 33:54Jay Shetty?

  Tell me.

• 33:55Speaker 01

  So my mom was a school counselor. She's retired now. And she struggled a lot in COVID because all schools went remote. And like I said, my parents are older. So my mom knows nothing about technology. And she came to me, knowing I knew about videos and asked me if I could figure out a way for her to teach her students virtually. And I said, okay, well, there's this app right now. It's, and at that time, it was, that app was blowing up. TikTok was blowing up during COVID because everyone's on their phone, looking for something to distract themselves. I didn't even have TikTok. I just, I downloaded it so I could help my mom to make videos for her students.

• 34:39Speaker 01

  So I downloaded the app and I created, for a few weeks with my mom, I was making lessons on TikTok of my mom. I was filming it for her, filming it and editing it. Cause I love video editing. I love filming and video editing. So I was so down to help her. And I grew up with chickens. So like, we did this whole lesson about counting or whatever with eggs, with the chickens. Like, how many eggs do we have today? Like, things like that. One thing I noticed when I was posting these videos, I'm posting these, I'm posting these videos. I have no followers, by the way, none, zero. Yet these videos were getting thousands of views. And I thought to myself, wow, this app has a really interesting algorithm. I noticed the algorithm right away.

• 35:24Speaker 01

  You could have no followers and you could have a video blow up. And that could be a, a turning point. So I thought to myself, all right, I don't have a job anymore. I'm no longer in school. What could I do with this? And I knew nothing about TikTok. So I said, all right, let me do a transition video, which I saw some people doing on the, on the timeline. They were doing these makeup transitions and I thought, I can do makeup. I can probably figure out how to do a transition video. Now, if you go and watch the transition video, it's horrible. It's really, really bad. But I did it. And at the time, I was struggling really bad with acne. For some reason, I got adult acne.

• 36:06Speaker 01

  So by the time I turned 20, I all of a sudden got this severe cystic acne. So when I posted the transition video, I showed my acne. And then I showed this after where I had this flawless makeup on. And I think immediately that's what caught people's attention. Two things about that. One, that I was a, a person willing to show my skin. I was willing to show the world my acne. And also I wrote, it's so funny, I wrote a blog article about how that was the first time I showed the world my acne. Cause I had never shown anyone my acne. Like, not even people I knew, knew I had acne. I would, I would wear makeup to really disguise it.

• 36:48Speaker 01

  I was pretty good at makeup to the point where no one would know I had acne. Cause I could cover the texture of it and smooth the skin. So when I posted the transition video and people saw that, I literally made this acne disappear. I think people got really curious about it. And then I decided, okay, I've been reading the comments on this video and the video is blowing up. Even though I have no followers and no one knows who I am. I had no, I had a, my Instagram account probably had 800 followers or something like that, which is nothing. I was not trying to be an influencer at the time. So to have a video skyrocket like that, I thought was really interesting. And I said, okay, my, I need to do a video, maybe showing people technique. Cause I love education and technique.

• 37:30Speaker 01

  So I did another video and this one I'm talking, which scary. But I was talking and I showed people how to do that acne trick where I cover acne really well. That video, the minute I posted it, blew up like I've never seen anything blow up in my life. It was crazy. 15 million views within a day.

• 37:58Speaker 01

  Imagine that for me. Imagine that for me, after all those years, trying to be a beauty influencer. You, I'm sure you can only imagine how that would feel. It was crazy.

• 38:12Jay Shetty?

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• 41:03Speaker 01

  See.

• 41:04Jay Shetty?

  What made you want to share your real acne on that day? Like, you'd never shared it with people you knew.

• 41:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:10Jay Shetty?

  You never shared it online. What was different? Why did you feel that was so important?

• 41:14Speaker 01

  Well, I knew I wanted to be a beauty influencer and I knew what my skin looked like. And I knew that if I was gonna have a public platform, I needed to show my face. Especially if you're gonna do something in beauty, you need to be open to having that bare skin. And I'm, I'm a big fan of exposure therapy. I do it all the time. And for me, that was exposure therapy. I also didn't think that a lot of people would see the video. I figured, you know, a couple thousand, but, so that was exposure therapy to the max. So once everybody saw my acne, it wasn't a problem for me. I was able to show it, no problem.

• 41:53Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, I can imagine it helped a lot of people too. Who were struggling with the same thing. And that's why it had such a connection with people.

• 41:58Speaker 01

  In that video, I showed a technique and I talked about products and I, the products I showed sold out for months. So people became obsessed with the technique too.

• 42:07Jay Shetty?

  Wow. Did anyone in your private life struggle with that success or react differently to that success at the time?

• 42:15Speaker 01

  Okay, so this is one of my favorite stories.

• 42:17Jay Shetty?

  Okay.

• 42:19Speaker 01

  So remember how I said my parents were maybe a little skeptical? When I had that video blow up, I, like I said, I come from two really hardworking parents who ingrained in me this like, you're gonna do big things mindset. Cause I watched them do big things.

• 42:40Speaker 01

  So when the video went viral, and I, I knew at least as much as the other beauty YouTubers, how successful you can be. Watching, you know, Jeffree Star buying this $25 million mansion and like, things like that. I would, I would see that. So I knew what beauty influencers were capable of. And I knew that that was a life that I aspired to, to have. Who wouldn't aspire to be successful in what they're passionate about? So when that video went viral, I literally ran downstairs and my parents were watching TV on the couch. And I, I sat down, put the phone in my dad's face. And this video is like, he's watching the views act. I'm like refreshing, showing him the views going up. And I said, dad, I just wanna let you know that your daughter's gonna be a millionaire.

• 43:26Speaker 01

  I literally said that to him. Not knowing if that was gonna be true.

• 43:30Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 43:31Speaker 01

  But I, I'm big on manifesting and I think if you put something out there and you're loud about it, you can make it happen. So I literally said that to him and he was like, you're full of shit.

• 43:43Speaker 01

  He was like, no, no, no, no. How's that even possible? How can you make money doing internet videos? And I said, I'm gonna show you, just wait.

• 43:53Jay Shetty?

  When did he start to believe you?

• 43:54Speaker 01

  So, once that moment happened, I, I became a machine. Because I believe in seizing the moment. So if you, it's easy to have a viral moment. What the viral moment happens, boom, that's it. What do you do next? That's the question. How do you build something out of this? And I took that very seriously. Because thankfully, I do have that business mindset, too. So, and that's what a lot of people lack, right? They have the ability to create the content, but they don't know how to make it a business. I knew how to make it a business. So, when that video went viral, I said, okay, I've put myself out there. Now I need to grind. So, I ended up posting every single day, a minimum of three videos a day. And each video, I would do something different to see what my audience wanted to see.

• 44:38Speaker 01

  So whether it's a makeup tutorial, a lifestyle video, a haul, a vlog. I began doing all kinds of different things to see what caught the attention of, of people. What I discovered was, it wasn't the content they wanted to see. It was me. They didn't care what the topic of the video was. They just liked my personality.

• 45:00Jay Shetty?

  That's amazing.

• 45:01Speaker 01

  They liked who I was.

• 45:04Speaker 01

  The reason I appreciate that is because, like I said, growing up, watching all these, these beauty YouTubers. The reason I did that was because it was people I felt I could relate to. It was people I had something in common with. I really struggled to find people that I had something in common with. So, watching these beauty influencers made me feel a lot less alone. And I just loved that relatability. So when I went viral and I saw people in my comment section saying, wow, like, I'm following you. I love this, I love your videos. I thought, wow, I wonder if they feel the same way. I wonder if the people at home watching this think, I want to watch your videos every day because I relate. I feel something, I feel a connection to her, even though I don't know her.

• 45:48Speaker 01

  And people say that to me all the time when they come up to me. I don't know you, but I feel like I connect to you, you know? And, and that's, that's something I really appreciated because I know exactly how that feels.

• 45:58Jay Shetty?

  It is such an incredible feeling. I, I've had that too, where people come up to me and be like, I feel like I know you.

• 46:02Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 46:03Jay Shetty?

  Because I listen to you and, and I feel like it must have been a pretty remarkable feeling that people were just gravitating towards you, as in your personality, your energy, your the way you came across. And people got fixated. And of course, when you, when you have that and you have the level of scale of success you've had, it starts to also be like, you know, you've said in your own words, it's like, oh, you become somewhat of a controversial figure. But like, everything you say, people get addicted to and they latch on to it.

• 46:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:30Jay Shetty?

  And then it becomes a talking point. Like, that's pretty fascinating in and of itself, that anything you say becomes something other people talk about. Like, the Kardashians have that effect, where like, anything Kim says, like, everyone is discussing what people feel about it. And like, when you say something, a lot of people on the internet, there's like pages and pages and pages of discussion of everyone talking about you. Like, talk to me about how that feels? And why do you think you specifically, as a personality, had all of this reaction that came from you?

• 47:00Speaker 01

  Well, I'll never forget the first day I was canceled. Canceled. A minor cancellation. It was over filter accusations, which I will say it here straight out. I don't use filters, but I get accused of it a lot. So, uh, someone made a video saying I use filters. And this video blew up. And, you know, I had not experienced this level of hate before. And I remember, I had just gotten a manager. I had signed with her like the week before. And I called her just crying and crying and crying. And I remember, like, I don't know if you experienced this, but sometimes when I become so overwhelmed and so anxious, I want to throw up. So I, I felt like I was going to throw up.

• 47:44Speaker 01

  I'm shaking, I'm crying. And it was really difficult. And then I went through other cancellations over time. And I learned that it's kind of just the role. It, it comes with it, it comes with growth. And if anything, I've kind of learned to appreciate it, which is really strange to say. But you have to appreciate it. And my manager said, Michaela, you can't become numb. This is going to make you numb. Like, I see that you're shutting yourself off from all of this hate. But I see you becoming numb. And I didn't like that either. So, you kind of have to become confident in yourself.

• 48:25Speaker 01

  Like I said, if you're really confident in yourself, when I'm seeing all these hate videos, I know who I am. I know my character. I know that what I see online isn't true. So that's why it doesn't affect me like it used to. Because at, at a certain point, there's nothing you can do about it. There's nothing you can do about it.

• 48:42Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, it's, it, it comes with the territory of being as, I, I've been saying to a lot of people recently, when, when we're talking about this experience of, I feel the closer you get to the top one percent in your industry,

• 48:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:54Jay Shetty?

  the more likely is that 50% of people have an opinion about you.

• 48:57Speaker 01

  Hmm, yeah.

• 48:57Jay Shetty?

  And, and you see that across the board, like, the biggest athletes in the world, there's a 50/50 divide on how people feel about them. Even the biggest musicians in the world, there's a 50/50 divide on, do you love or hate them?

• 49:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:09Jay Shetty?

  It's like Marmite, right? Like, that love or hate relationships people have. So the closer you get to the top 1%, the more likely you have a 50% love or hate relationship, which is fascinating to think about.

• 49:19Speaker 01

  It's also interesting because it is so parasocial, right? And I've had experiences, actually, where the people who have publicly hated on me, I meet them in person. And they changed their mind. They changed their mind. One girl came up to me and said, hey, you, you blocked me because I made a hate video about you. And she said straight up to my face, I, I was wrong and I'm sorry, and I want you to unblock me. I said, oh, I said, okay. I, I appreciate that you're acknowledging that maybe what you saw and read wasn't true and, and I'll, I'll unblock you. So, it's really, it's really interesting how a lot of times, there's not as much weight to what's being said.

• 50:00Jay Shetty?

  It's fascinating to me, though, the level of like scrutiny that people have. Like, I think there was a video in 2023 with L'Oréal. And it was all about whether, with your lashes. And I'm like, there was such a debate about this. And I'm like, when I first saw that and I read about it, I was like, huh, like, I can't believe this elicited such a

• 50:18Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 50:19Jay Shetty?

  Massive reaction.

• 50:20Speaker 01

  It was in every magazine, everyone was talking about it. It, it was an explosive conversation, yeah.

• 50:24Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, talk to me about that moment.

• 50:26Speaker 01

  Truthfully, that moment didn't affect me at all because I was canceled worse a few months prior. For my, uh, phrase I'm known for saying, try being an influencer for a day.

• 50:39Speaker 01

  Which was completely taken out of context. Someone basically commented, try getting a nine to five. And I made a response video saying, I worked until 5:19 today. And then I talked about all the things that come with being an influencer. And I said, try being an influencer for a day. Now, I knew in that moment that what I said was wrong. And I actually deleted that video within seconds of posting it.

• 51:00Jay Shetty?

  Oh, wow.

• 51:01Speaker 01

  But someone, you know, saved it right away. And, and it didn't blow up until years later. I actually made that video where I said, try being an influencer for a day. The first year of me being an influencer. It was not anywhere, uh, any recent. It was something I said early, early on, when I was trying to figure out how to be an influencer. Do I agree with this statement anymore? No. And I, I don't think, um, the L'Oréal situation affected me as much because the try being an influencer situation hit me heavier. So when the L'Oréal one happened, I was already prepared for that moment. It like prepped me for it. And I kind of just kept it moving.

• 51:44Jay Shetty?

  I appreciate what you're saying about remembering who you are at these moments. Because that's hard as well.

• 51:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:50Jay Shetty?

  Because you, you seem like a genuine, sensitive human being.

• 51:55Speaker 01

  Very sensitive.

• 51:56Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, and it's like, when you read things, and I, I, I do this too. Like, when I read things about me that are negative, I can start to believe them about myself as well. Because I can be sensitive and vulnerable and open up to that and start to look for those things within myself and be like, oh, mate, like, am I, you know? And, and you can get really, you can be really broken open in that way.

• 52:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:18Jay Shetty?

  Talk to me about what you've had to do, but your manager's advice was great. What else have you had to do to remember who you are and hold on to who you are and why you do this?

• 52:27Speaker 01

  Well, one thing I used to do was, at night in bed, I would scroll. And I'm reading all of the hate comments, I'm seeing all of the hateful videos. And I would go to bed really upset every night. And then I would wake up feeling upset. And it would kind of rule my days. So one thing I began doing is at night, the minute I walk in my bedroom, the phone is away. That has made a huge difference for me and I'm present at night. I'm not scrolling. I don't doom scroll at night. I also have done a lot of like minor things to protect myself online. Like fun fact, if you block, you can block words on TikTok.

• 53:11Speaker 01

  So I blocked my name and that way videos about me don't come up. I don't even see them because I blocked my own name.

• 53:18Jay Shetty?

  Wow.

• 53:19Speaker 01

  But I did it to protect myself. Obviously, I'm probably missing out on maybe nice videos about me, but I just really had to do that because there was a time where it was getting to me really, really bad. But I'm really happy to say that now I can handle it really, really well. There are, I'm human, so sometimes something will happen and it'll really hurt. But for the most part, I'm really strong with it and I'm really proud of that. I'm proud that I didn't have to numb myself to it because a lot of times that's what we do. I'm actually really more so strong about it versus numb.

• 53:55Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. What was the hardest, worst moment of it for you internally? I mean, not even what happened, but, but for you and your experience of it?

• 54:03Speaker 01

  I mean, because I grew at an exponentially fast pace. I'm talking I had 15 million followers in two, three years. That's abnormal. That is an abnormal growth pace for a creator. So with that, that's the scale of hate was maybe a lot higher than an influencer would be used to in the very beginning. So that very beginning, those first two, three years of me being an influencer were honestly really devastating from a mental health perspective. I struggled really, really bad.

• 54:44Speaker 01

  I had some really dark moments that I wasn't sure. There were many times I wanted to even quit being an influencer. Thinking, can I do this? Do I want to do this? Do I? Because being an influencer is a choice and this is the, probably the biggest thing I've learned. This job is a choice. You're choosing to put yourself out there. Everything you do in your career, you're choosing to do. Do I want to choose to be this, to receive these hateful comments every single day? To put myself through this? Why am I choosing this? And in that moment, I thought, I'm choosing it because of everything else. It's not about this. It's about everything else.

• 55:28Speaker 01

  So those three years where I really struggled, I thought, okay, this is challenging. But everything else that I'm choosing this for, the connections, the love of creating, beauty, makeup, the impact I can have on people's lives, the experiences I get to have, the growth, the success, the, the joy that I get doing it. A lot of people say that there's influencer fatigue. I don't experience that. I have yet to experience it. Maybe I will eventually, but I have not experienced influencer fatigue yet. Where you, you wake up and you don't want to do it. You wake up and you say, oh, I gotta film videos.

• 56:09Speaker 01

  I have not experienced that. I wake up every single day so beyond excited to film. I never run out of ideas. I love what I do. I get so much joy and creative outlet from it. And I'm really grateful for that, but that's definitely what drove me to keep going.

• 56:26Jay Shetty?

  How have you maintained that? How have you held on to that? For all the creators that are watching, that I think you just spoke to in being open about the mental health toll that

• 56:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:36Jay Shetty?

  being a creator can take, the feedback can take. How have you held on to that? And I believe you because even today, before we were in recording, you were telling me how excited you were about the week and what's been going on. So I believe you, but how did you hold on to that when people can become jaded, tired, burnt out?

• 56:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:53Jay Shetty?

  For all the natural reasons.

• 56:55Speaker 01

  I think influencer fatigue comes from when you're creating from a place that lacks authenticity. If you're creating content that you don't feel excited about, that's when the fatigue happens. If you're coming up with videos just to come up with them because you feel you have to post, you have to create. That's when the fatigue happens. So if there is ever a moment where you begin to feel fatigued, take a step back. That doesn't mean you need to press the, the foot on the gas. It means you need to press the brake and you need to, you need to back up. And you need to think, okay, I'm losing myself a little bit here. I'm a little fatigued and what can I do differently?

• 57:38Speaker 01

  And even I've had those moments. I've switched things up. Absolutely. I've switched up my creative space to revive my creative juices. I've switched up video ideas to make sure that I'm still feeling creative and not being repetitive. I've experienced different styles of videos, different blogging techniques, different everything. I just switch everything up, change things. But don't change who you are in the process.

• 58:01Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by State Farm. We spent so much energy becoming the best version of ourselves. Building better habits, showing up more fully, embracing mindfulness. But sometimes the most purposeful thing you can do is just handle the thing you've been putting off. If getting your insurance sorted has been living on that list, State Farm is there to help you choose the coverage that's right for you. Go online at statefarm.com or use the easily accessible app to get help from one of their over 19,000 local agents. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Talking about not changing who you are, one of the biggest talking points of your content has always been your accent. Like how, like, why do you think that is? And what's, what's your take on?

• 58:43Speaker 01

  Well, because people watching this right now are saying, where is it?

• 58:49Speaker 01

  So, um, yeah, the accent. So when I first began my page, the first video I posted talking had no accent.

• 58:58Speaker 01

  And that's the one that changed my life. And then a few videos later, all of a sudden there was an accent and people thought, what the hell?

• 59:06Speaker 01

  So the premise behind that is I do have an accent and it can actually be very strong, as strong as you see in my videos. But I also went to school for communication, radio. I code switched like you wouldn't believe. So I'm talking to you like this right now because I just met you. I just met you and I'm not in that comfortable place with you yet where I'm gonna throw out my heavy, strong Boston accent that maybe

• 59:34Jay Shetty?

  I wanna hear it.

• 59:34Speaker 01

  No, no, no, no. That you maybe, that you maybe wouldn't even understand.

• 59:38Jay Shetty?

  Right.

• 59:39Speaker 01

  A lot of people don't understand it. They're like, what is she saying? But when I'm around the comfort of my friends, my family, like the people I'm really close with, see every day, that's when it comes out. And remember, I film my videos by myself, so I'm just talking to myself. So that's when my accent, like, you'll hear it. And then I've, I've told my audience this many times. For example, I don't know if you know my meme with the Kim Kardashian, but that was me just being a goofball. So sometimes because I have an accent and because people make fun of the accent, I take it upon myself to exaggerate it, make it really annoying, just throw people off with it because that's what I, I'm an entertainer at the end of the day.

• 1:00:21Speaker 01

  So I'm just trying to entertain you. And to me, entertainment is someone watching the video because they love it or because they're so annoyed that they can't look away.

• 1:00:32Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, it's what you said about being an entertainer, that there's a part of it that is performance, that is playing up to the character.

• 1:00:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:40Jay Shetty?

  That has that. I find myself always like trying to do the opposite with mine where I feel like people who watch me for like 30 seconds or two minutes, they just feel like I'm just always serene or like always calm. And so I try and like put out like personality funny, silly videos with my wife or with my team or whatever. Because I'm like, guys, like, I'm not serious all the time. Like

• 1:01:01Speaker 01

  People are multifaceted.

• 1:01:03Jay Shetty?

  I can also laugh and have a good time. So sometimes mine's the opposite where like, I don't have to play up to a persona. I'm trying to like poke holes in my own persona because I'm like, guys, I'm not always calm and meditating.

• 1:01:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:14Jay Shetty?

  You know, I know I have a good time as well.

• 1:01:16Speaker 01

  It's weird because it's not like this right now, but I, I'm a really loud person. I'm very talkative. I don't shut up.

• 1:01:21Jay Shetty?

  I know today you're like super zen and calm.

• 1:01:23Speaker 01

  Right. Because look at the space we're in. Like it depends on the environment I'm in. I've always been very adaptable. I adapt to the environment I am in. So right now it's so serene and calm. So I'm just in that moment, you know?

• 1:01:36Jay Shetty?

  What I'm hearing from you, and correct me if I'm wrong, is that that's just you in different spaces.

• 1:01:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:41Jay Shetty?

  It's not like one is more you or less you. It's just

• 1:01:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:01:44Jay Shetty?

  you're adaptable. We're all different in different, around different people and naturally with our families and friends.

• 1:01:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:49Jay Shetty?

  I think when you have such a public life, you want to have certain things that are just private.

• 1:01:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. Like my, my personality is so, I don't know. It's, it's personal. It's a personal thing that I really enjoy saving for my family, my friends and things like that. Obviously I put it online too.

• 1:02:10Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:11Speaker 01

  When I'm in real life, you know what I mean?

• 1:02:13Jay Shetty?

  You know, you were in such a public relationship and marriage and that was a big part of your content and what you were sharing. Take me back to the moment that you met because that was when you were on this meteoric rise.

• 1:02:27Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:02:27Jay Shetty?

  Talk to me about meeting your ex-husband at that time.

• 1:02:31Speaker 01

  Yeah. So Cody and I met, uh, right when I began my career. So, and we met at really massive turning points in our lives. And I think that's why we connected so fast. Cody and I connected from the moment we met. So I was blowing up in my career. I had just moved out of my parents' house into my first apartment. So I'm living alone. I'm navigating life. I'm navigating this influencer world, trying to turn it into a job. And at the same time, because I grew so fast and because of COVID and because of me navigating this whole new world that I'm in, I felt that I was really longing for companionship.

• 1:03:13Speaker 01

  Someone to go through it with, someone to share it with. Um, because it was, it's amazing. I mean, everything, the growth, the, the experiences, the it was something I wanted to share and I didn't want to do it alone, transparently. And Cody at the time had just moved across the country to go to rehab. So Cody is an addict and he went to rehab in Massachusetts. And I met him on Tinder, which a lot of people meet that way nowadays. But when I met him, he was just coming out of rehab. And he moved into a sober house with other sober individuals.

• 1:03:54Speaker 01

  And he was too, seeking companionship, longing for someone to go through this new sobriety journey with. You know, he, he's freshly sober, he's confident about life, he's feeling good. And he wants to share it with someone. So we were both really in this same exact position of going through a massive change and wanting to share it with someone. So when we met and he told me a story about sobriety and moving across the country, I was honestly very inspired. And it reminded me of me in the sense of taking a massive risk and changing your life and doing something with your life.

• 1:04:32Speaker 01

  So we just connected like crazy right away because of our stories. And so because of that, our relationship just exploded from the get go.

• 1:04:41Jay Shetty?

  It's amazing, isn't it? How like that similar phase in life, similar experience, even though totally different.

• 1:04:48Speaker 01

  Totally different, yeah.

• 1:04:49Jay Shetty?

  Totally different experiences, but similar spirit of how you're trying to live and you kind of become close to someone. What did it feel like though? Because I imagine a sobriety journey, living in a sober house feels like more insular, private, more inward focused. And then you're obviously like blowing up.

• 1:05:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:08Jay Shetty?

  You know, you're becoming the most successful person in your field.

• 1:05:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:11Jay Shetty?

  In a matter of months and continuing on that success. Like, was it hard managing that public and private life? Or did it just feel really natural at the first time?

• 1:05:21Speaker 01

  It was not natural at all. So Cody really, really struggled with the public life. When I met him, I had just began my career. So I hadn't really reached that peak of publicity and public lifestyle and, and being recognized out in public. And, and it was also COVID, so no one was really going anywhere. So I don't think he or I understood the scale of what was going to be. But because I grew so fast, both of us were kind of slapped in the face with this new reality. And Cody really struggled with it because Cody's from a really, really small town in Nevada.

• 1:06:04Speaker 01

  And he's not familiar with the world of influencers and he was kind of along for the ride. He was growing with me and helping me with my videos and being in my videos. And he was very, very supportive and open to it. But I think he very quickly realized that it was a lot more challenging than um, he thought. And the biggest reason for that is because he had to watch me, the person he cared about the most and loved, go through immense pain and suffering, essentially because of how I was treated online. So there were times where he didn't know what to do. He felt so helpless, so, so helpless,

• 1:06:48Speaker 01

  that he couldn't get me through this because it got really dark. I was really, really depressed and really sad all the time. And because of that, for the first one, yeah, three years, as I was navigating this new world, I became very detached and I became very passive. And I wasn't being a good partner to him because I was so, one, taken back by the online hate. And two, trying to figure out this new world I'm in as a, at that time, 23 year old. So I just, I couldn't figure out how to handle the career.

• 1:07:29Speaker 01

  And he had to just watch because he couldn't, he couldn't do anything for me. He could be by my side and support me and, and try to help me through it. But he couldn't physically do anything. And I think for a lot of partners, that would be really, really hard. So he struggled a lot with that. And so did I.

• 1:07:47Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. I really appreciate your honesty on just, A, how hard it was for you.

• 1:07:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:52Jay Shetty?

  And B, how much that impacts who you are in a relationship.

• 1:07:55Speaker 01

  Mm hmm. Yeah.

• 1:07:56Jay Shetty?

  And how hard it can be for the other individual as well. And, and what you just laid out is so real. Like, I know there have been times when I'm going through something. And my wife loves me and wants to help me and support me. It's like, sometimes I don't even know what to say.

• 1:08:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:10Jay Shetty?

  Because I'm just trying to deal with it all internally.

• 1:08:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:14Jay Shetty?

  And trying to make sense of it and figure it out. And it's, and I can't, people will be like, well, you should help them help you. And I'm like, but I don't even know what I need right now.

• 1:08:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:22Jay Shetty?

  Like, I'm just trying to figure that out. Just as he was helping you both making videos, being in videos, also trying to support you with the fallout online. Were you also trying to support him in his sobriety journey? Or were you trying to be helpful in that way?

• 1:08:34Speaker 01

  Oh yeah, absolutely. I would go to the AA meetings with Cody because I too needed to learn about that. And honestly, Cody told me he was an addict from the jump, which I appreciated. And a lot of people would maybe hesitate in that situation. Okay, you're an addict. I had never been with an addict. I knew nothing about that. I knew nothing about being with an addict. But two people in my life who are very, very close to me, who have been married for 40 years. One of them was an addict and got sober and they've had a very happy marriage. So I thought, I saw this and I can do the same thing.

• 1:09:20Speaker 01

  If I watched this long, happy marriage where they got through that, I can do it too. That's what I thought. I had never experienced it though, so I didn't really know what I was saying. But I really tried to be there for Cody as much as I could. I, I worked with him to go to AA. And he did a lot of speaking about sobriety as well. And he was really into his sobriety journey. So I definitely was supportive.

• 1:09:48Jay Shetty?

  If you were now asked to write a guide on dating an influencer and dating an addict, what notes would you give people from your experience and your perspective?

• 1:09:58Speaker 01

  Oh gosh. Well, that's a very interesting combination.

• 1:10:01Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. But like, for example, if someone's dating an influencer, what should they know?

• 1:10:05Speaker 01

  If you're dating an influencer, you should know that that person's in the public eye. So you're likely going to be in the public eye too. And as much as you try to avoid it, sometimes that can be a challenge if your videos get taken of me out in public all the time. So, you know, Cody and I go out, someone could take a video of him and boom, he's revealed. So you have to be really open to that. You have to be open to the times where your partner is struggling with the hate online and, and how they may react to that. You have to be open to the lifestyle. I was never home. I'm constantly traveling, go, go, go, go, go. So that would be the influencer guide for sure.

• 1:10:41Jay Shetty?

  And the addict, when you've had that experience?

• 1:10:43Speaker 01

  The addict guide, I would say, you have to be really open to listening. You have to understand that every addict's journey is different. There's every book you can read, but at the end of the day, every addict's journey to sobriety or staying sober is going to be completely different. So you have to just support your partner as much as you can. You have to realize that if, say they relapse, you can't be the one to get them sober. They have to be the ones who want to get sober. So.

• 1:11:14Jay Shetty?

  That's, thank you so much. So, so it's so useful when someone's had that experience. And when you're going through it for the first time, you kind of go in with blinders on and you don't know.

• 1:11:23Speaker 01

  Mm hmm. Yeah.

• 1:11:24Jay Shetty?

  What that feels like. Like you said, you had this very close friend of yours, the couple, one of them was an addict. And you obviously get to a point of getting engaged, getting married. Talk to me about that journey from, from dating to marriage. And what was giving you hope or faith or, or what was working that led you to that?

• 1:11:42Speaker 01

  The first year of Cody and I's relationship was, was really beautiful. It was very fast, but it was very emotional and full of love. And he actually bought the engagement ring three months into dating me. Three months into dating me. This man was so sure that he wanted to marry me. He did it all on his own. And he couldn't keep a secret. He could not keep a secret. He's, he would just, he literally picked up the ring and said, I got this ring so I can propose to you later on.

• 1:12:13Jay Shetty?

  Wow.

• 1:12:14Speaker 01

  I was like, well, that's interesting. Um, and he's like, this, he, he kind of said, this is how sure I am that I want to marry you. He showed me the ring and he said, I'm not giving you this right now, but I just want you to know this will be on your finger. Okay? That's three months into dating.

• 1:12:26Jay Shetty?

  How did that feel when, when that happened?

• 1:12:28Speaker 01

  I think there was maybe a little bit of um, love bombing involved for sure. But like, um, it was on both sides. We were just like infatuated with each other. And I think for both of us, at the time, we were 23. So we're both the same age and we both just fell in love so fast. And he got really excited. And I think he was so proud of being sober. And knowing that he could have a future ahead of him where he's sober. And I think like that next step in his head for him was, okay, now I get married, then I have kids and I'm going to have, live this beautiful, happy life. That's kind of what his mindset was. So he was just really excited. But I thought the same way, you know, I, my parents have been married for forever.

• 1:13:08Speaker 01

  And, you know, I watched a happy marriage all my life. So like, I thought the same thing. Okay, I graduated college, I have the job, what's next? You meet a partner, you get married. That's just what we both thought. So seven months went by. And simultaneously, Cody relapsed and he was planning to propose. So both of these were happening at the same time. And that became really, really difficult. So.

• 1:13:39Speaker 01

  He relapsed because of the pressure of life, right? That can be the case a lot of times. He felt so overwhelmed with my career, with his career, with the idea of proposing can be overwhelming to a lot of people. And I think there was just so much going through his head that he couldn't take it. So he ended up relapsing really early into their relationship. And I stayed because I knew I could be that partner that helped him through it. And I did, I helped him, you know, get help. And he got a sponsor and he started going to AA again. And I said, don't lose yourself, don't lose yourself. You've got this because sobriety is very, it's not a straight line.

• 1:14:24Speaker 01

  Relapses are very common and normal as you're going through a sobriety journey, especially when you're just getting sober. So I knew that was going to be the case and I was very open to that. So we got him sober again and got him back on track. And then, you know, things were fine. Things were good and we got to the point of the wedding and we had a beautiful, beautiful wedding. And then shortly after getting married, he relapsed again. And this one was more challenging because he had relapsed on alcohol. And the first time around was drugs and this time around was alcohol. And this was one I was really not familiar with.

• 1:15:09Speaker 01

  Cause you know, there's different reactions to both of those. And it was a devastating day when he told me that he had relapsed. I was leaving to go to Spain and I was sitting in my office and I was jamming out to music. My friend Sydney was about to show up because she was going with me. And he opens my office door and he's just devastatedly crying. And I, I knew right in that moment, I said, oh no. And then he told me, he said, Michaela, I have been drinking alcohol for the last few months. And I said, months?

• 1:15:54Speaker 01

  Months? And I had no idea. And that made me question everything. I said, oh my gosh, he's, he hasn't been sober for this amount of time. And I didn't even know. Cause he hit it so well. And this is, you know, as I'm going through this, this relationship with him, I'm learning about addicts, I'm learning everything about addicts. So I said, oh my gosh, okay. I'm going to cancel my trip to Spain, like let's get you help. So he had a friend come and, and he said, you're not canceling your trip to Spain. He said, you're not stopping your life for mine. And I said, Cody, I will, I will, if, if that's what we need to do. And he said, no, don't.

• 1:16:39Speaker 01

  So I ended up going to Spain. And it was a really hard trip for me because I'm knowing in the back of my mind that Cody is struggling with alcohol and like when you're with an addict and you, you, you love them so much, you care about them so much. You're so terrified about what's happening when you're not around them. Cause any moment they could overdose, they could do something that hurts themselves. That you just don't know. So as I'm in Spain, I'm spiraling, I'm freaking out. I don't know if he's okay. I don't know what's going on. And then I get home from Spain and you know, now is the time to try to get him help.

• 1:17:24Speaker 01

  So we ended up going to, to get him help again. And this is what it's like being with an addict. They, they, they stay sober and then something maybe happens that causes them to relapse. Then they'll get sober for a little bit. It's just so like unpredictable, very unpredictable. But as the years went on, unfortunately Cody's addiction just continued to progress. And my career also continued to progress. So Cody and I's marriage became very dark. Because we were balancing so much.

• 1:18:08Speaker 01

  We're balancing his sobriety and his addiction. We're balancing my career where I'm only growing at this point. And it became very, very challenging, our marriage to, to balance the two. Because I wanted to be there for Cody and I wanted to help him as much as I could. But I knew that he was the one that had to want to be sober and to get sober. And he tried so many times throughout our relationship to get sober, to stay sober. He was giving it his all the whole time. And I was giving my all to try to be the best partner for him. But my job is so demanding and so exhausting and, and busy.

• 1:18:50Speaker 01

  And I think he needed a partner who was there more. And I wasn't, I, I, I really battled with this idea of, I couldn't save him. I couldn't help him get sober. But also, how much of myself do I reel in? Do I, do I dull down to help him? I really, really struggled with that. Because as I said in the beginning, I love what I do so much. And the problem with that though, is I was putting my career above Cody.

• 1:19:34Speaker 01

  And that wasn't fair to Cody. That was not fair to Cody. And that's definitely one of the reasons I decided to, to, to walk away. But also just the balance, it was so much. So anyways, he got sober and time went by. And then he relapsed again. And this was one of the scariest nights of my life.

• 1:20:12Speaker 01

  When you're with an addict, one of the things you worry about is, will you wake up and they'll be there in the bed? And one night I woke up and he wasn't in the bed. And I looked at the clock and I saw it was 1:00 AM and I thought, oh no. I was so scared about what I was going to see when I walked over to the next room.

• 1:20:40Speaker 01

  So I got out of bed and I very slowly just kind of listened at the door to see, maybe he's playing video games late at night or something like that. And I, I opened the door and Cody was just completely hunched over, unconscious. And when you see something like that, the first thought is, are they dead? So I, I'm, I immediately start crying and I, I run up to him and I'm,

• 1:21:20Speaker 01

  he's, he's six two and as you've seen, I'm very small and he's heavy. So I, I go and I try to lift him up. And I was struggling, I was struggling to lift his body up. But finally I was able to lift him up and, and I'm screaming, I'm like, Cody, Cody, please. And he wouldn't wake up. And I didn't know what to do. This was my first time in this situation. And, and anyone who's been in this situation, the first time you're in it, it's a panic and I wanted to do right by Cody. So, and it's again, it's 1:00 AM, so no one's awake. And I, so I, I called his mom and I said, Cody's not awake, what do I do?

• 1:22:04Speaker 01

  And she said, call 911 and she hung up on me and I'm like, oh my God, okay. So I call 911. And I said, hi, my husband, he's, um, he's not waking up. He's not waking up and I think he's overdosing and, and you know, they're trying to keep me calm because I'm, I'm, I was very emotional. And he said on the phone, he said, you think he's overdosing? And I said, yes. And then he said, what does he do? And I said, drugs and alcohol. And he said, I need you to slap him as hard as you can in the face right now. And I said, what? You want me to slap my husband in the face?

• 1:22:45Speaker 01

  And he said, yes, I need you to slap him as hard as you can. And, and in my mind, I'm like, oh my God, I can't do this. But in, in my mind, I'm like, I have to do this. So I go up to him and, and I'm not a very strong person either. So I like smack him as hard as I can and nothing happens. He just keeps falling over, you know, drool and foam coming out of his mouth and he's not waking up. And I'm like, he's not waking up. And obviously they already had the ambulance on the way. But I was so, so scared. Anyways, the, the ambulance came, the police came and he was fine. He ended up being okay.

• 1:23:28Speaker 01

  But that moment was so scary and it just traumatizes you. And going forward, all you think is every night you, you wake up in the middle of the night and you're checking if, if they're there. It's so scary.

• 1:23:51Speaker 01

  So time goes by and Cody wasn't getting better.

• 1:24:00Speaker 01

  And actually, he was able to stay sober, but then he would relapse, stay sober, relapse. But what I saw was a mental health decline, a significant mental health decline. And with addicts, when you're doing drugs and alcohol,

• 1:24:17Speaker 01

  that can shift your brain chemistry. It can change you as a person. So the last year of Cody and I's marriage, I didn't know who Cody was anymore. He was a completely different person, not who I married.

• 1:24:35Speaker 01

  And that was really, really scary.

• 1:24:38Speaker 01

  Cody means well, and he's an amazing person, and he's a really, really incredible guy. But addiction can change people in a bad way. So I was just seeing a different person. And I can't just say that that's because of solely his addiction. Everything plays into that. My job, the career, the pressure, me never being home. I was not the partner that Cody needed.

• 1:25:09Speaker 01

  And I've never said that before.

• 1:25:27Speaker 01

  And it's embarrassing to say that.

• 1:25:33Speaker 01

  But talking to people and

• 1:25:37Speaker 01

  you know, working through this, I've realized that Cody and I got married when I was 23, or sorry, we got married when I was 25. We met when I was 23.

• 1:25:51Speaker 01

  We were so young. We were so young.

• 1:25:56Speaker 01

  Neither Cody nor I knew who we were.

• 1:26:01Speaker 01

  I was too early in my career and too young to understand what marriage is.

• 1:26:10Speaker 01

  And Cody was too early in his sobriety journey and also too young at the time to be looking for a partner.

• 1:26:27Speaker 01

  And that is essentially what led to me deciding we needed to get a divorce.

• 1:26:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:38Jay Shetty?

  Okay, thank you so much for taking us through so many difficult moments in such a vulnerable way. And I think it takes, it takes a lot of courage to

• 1:26:50Jay Shetty?

  admit how you feel about how you showed up in the relationship.

• 1:26:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:54Jay Shetty?

  I don't think it's embarrassing or I think it's very honest and very genuine for you to say that that's how you felt. And as you said, you were both so young, it's hard to know

• 1:27:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:12Jay Shetty?

  what could have been if you were more established, if he was more further along in his sobriety journey, but

• 1:27:20Jay Shetty?

  I think taking us through that, you've really given us like an in-depth viewpoint on something that you can't understand through a short reel on social media or TikTok or how we view people's relationships. We really don't know what's going on past midnight.

• 1:27:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:41Jay Shetty?

  You know, on a dark, tough day and you can't know. And it's, it's hard to share these things. So just want to thank you for being so open and honest, not only about the experience, but how you felt about yourself. And I think it takes a great deal of courage to just put your hand up and say you wish you wanted to do better. And at the same time, it's hard to put that much pressure on yourself because how could you know what to do? And you're going through all these experiences for the first time. It's not like you're an expert or been trained in knowing how to do this.

• 1:28:13Speaker 01

  I think it would be so

• 1:28:16Speaker 01

  unfair of me to come on here and blame Cody for everything when both Cody and I know that it was both of us. It was just different things that led to it from both sides. And that typically is the case with, with divorce.

• 1:28:35Jay Shetty?

  Have you both had that conversation with each other?

• 1:28:39Speaker 01

  In brief spurts, yeah. Not as in-depth as this.

• 1:28:44Jay Shetty?

  How do you think he'd feel about knowing that you feel like you didn't do your part? That you feel that way?

• 1:29:13Speaker 01

  One thing that Cody always said to me during the marriage was,

• 1:29:19Speaker 01

  I wish you would just acknowledge

• 1:29:24Speaker 01

  that you put your career above me and that

• 1:29:31Speaker 01

  I'm second to this massive empire you've built and how that makes me feel as a partner when your partner should be your priority.

• 1:29:47Speaker 01

  And, and when you're an influencer, it's really easy to get wrapped up in all of this.

• 1:29:54Speaker 01

  And unfortunately, my reality is I got really wrapped up in it and

• 1:30:00Speaker 01

  I failed as a partner to Cody.

• 1:30:08Speaker 01

  But he failed me too. We failed each other. We failed each other.

• 1:30:16Speaker 01

  And honestly, and Cody can agree,

• 1:30:22Speaker 01

  we're really grateful for our marriage because neither of us could have gone through that alone.

• 1:30:30Speaker 01

  And we at least had each other.

• 1:30:37Speaker 01

  And I think maybe it wasn't meant to be forever. And like I said, I believe in timing and I believe in everything happens for a reason. And I do believe that Cody was meant to be in my life for that period of time. And I think he would agree

• 1:30:52Speaker 01

  that we were meant to be in each other's lives for that period of time, even if it wasn't meant to be forever, because we learned the amount we went through together. It taught us everything we need to take us into this next chapter of our lives.

• 1:31:11Jay Shetty?

  I mean, Michaela, I feel like as I'm sitting here listening to you, I'm just like, I think it's very human, your experience. Like it's very, no, as in it's very like,

• 1:31:22Jay Shetty?

  it's, it would be so unfair to put pressure on either of you to say that you should have known how to navigate your dream career and navigate dealing with a partner who's an addict and for him as well to deal with having a partner whose career is doing and then what he's going through. It's like, it feels like very human, natural,

• 1:31:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:31:42Jay Shetty?

  real challenges that we all face put on steroids through the various experiences that you both have had.

• 1:31:49Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, it, it got to a point where my career for me became my distraction from the addiction. And the traveling became kind of a safe haven for me to separate myself from the addiction. Because addiction really consumes your life and

• 1:32:14Speaker 01

  I'm grateful for my career in the sense that it was a really good distraction for that. But it's interesting how my career is the thing that played a massive role in the destruction of my marriage, but also what saved me from the destruction.

• 1:32:33Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. And I assume it's, it's also harder as a woman in business as well.

• 1:32:38Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:32:38Jay Shetty?

  To go through that, to have that experience.

• 1:32:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:41Jay Shetty?

  Because there's different pressures of gender roles and requirements and all this societal noise that comes with that, whether it's from your own background or the pressures of feelings and how other people are. And so you know, being a woman in business and like yourself and being a female entrepreneur that's you know, achieved so much success. I'm sure there's pressure from

• 1:33:04Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:33:05Jay Shetty?

  what your role needs to be as well. Thank you for taking us through it so, you know, so gracefully and thoughtfully and reflectively. It sounds like you've done so much

• 1:33:16Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:33:16Jay Shetty?

  in your work. I can hear it. I'm like, sitting with you going like, oh, wow. Michaela's sat with this for a long time.

• 1:33:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:33:24Jay Shetty?

  Like, that's how it's coming across to me, sitting opposite you right now. I'm like, wow, this is.

• 1:33:29Speaker 01

  Well, remember when I said I'm really self-aware?

• 1:33:31Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:32Speaker 01

  That's something I appreciate about myself because I'm able to understand where I went wrong

• 1:33:39Speaker 01

  and where I can improve. And I know that Cody's doing the same thing.

• 1:33:44Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. And that's the hardest when there's two good people who love each other and care about each other, but life circumstances just ended up in a way that it didn't fit. And that's, that's the hardest.

• 1:33:56Speaker 01

  Yeah. Cody and I were very, very different people. You know, he grew up in, in the, in the Wild West and loves horses and and going four-wheeling and, and things like that. And I'm, I'm a makeup girl. So like, we were just so different.

• 1:34:13Jay Shetty?

  And you were young and that's totally fair.

• 1:34:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:34:16Jay Shetty?

  I think people forget that as well.

• 1:34:17Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. But we were, we were our biggest support system for five years. Five years. And there are five years I don't regret. I would not change. They've made me a very strong person. So I appreciate the, the five years I was with Cody.

• 1:34:34Jay Shetty?

  I can't imagine how difficult it was that this is what you're actually going through. And then at the same time, people online obviously attach themselves to a relationship that you know about through what you see, but of course it's naturally very limited of what you experience.

• 1:34:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:34:50Jay Shetty?

  How did it feel to have to manage the actual stakes and the extent to which how much pressure this was as a relationship and then manage everything externally?

• 1:35:02Speaker 01

  I mean, it was hell, honestly.

• 1:35:06Speaker 01

  The last two years of my marriage, when Cody was really struggling with his addiction, things got really, really bad in, in the home and

• 1:35:19Speaker 01

  There were times where I could barely get out of bed. But I would do it because I knew it was the only way I would get out of my head about this. Because when you're with an addict, there's only so much you can do. There's only so much you can do, and I would ruminate, just ruminate. And you're constantly, you know, we had cameras, so I would constantly check the cameras to make sure Cody was okay. Or I'm constantly checking his location to make sure he's where he is supposed to be. And, and you know, not somewhere in a ditch somewhere. Like, I'm just making sure that he's okay constantly. It became my entire existence, making sure Cody was okay.

• 1:36:02Speaker 01

  And it's so draining, it's so exhausting to be with an addict, especially when they're in an active addiction. And at the same time, I'm balancing waking up every day and putting on this persona on camera. And I can't even tell you how many videos I have done where I'm dealing with this, but I have to show up for my community. It's just, I wish I could explain how strange that is, but you have to push through because people go through really hard things and still have to show up to work. So I'm gonna go through hard shit and I'm still gonna show up to work, just like everybody else.

• 1:36:46Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, I think that's the part that people forget that like people are going to work at a job every single day while

• 1:36:51Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:36:52Jay Shetty?

  there's things going on at home.

• 1:36:53Speaker 01

  You gotta go to work.

• 1:36:54Jay Shetty?

  And what you're doing is your work. And what I'm doing is my work. This, this is still work and it's, you, you recognize that even though if you love your work and you enjoy it and it's the best thing that ever happened to you, it's still part of work. And there are responsibilities and there are people that are on your teams and you're paying people's bills. And everyone's depending on you. And so you have a level of responsibility

• 1:37:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:17Jay Shetty?

  to your work. That takes care of a lot more people that can't be dealt with. It's, it's so hard being the CEO, the brand and the face and the person all tied into one.

• 1:37:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:30Jay Shetty?

  And this is really the first time in history that that's actually happening. If you really think about it.

• 1:37:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:36Jay Shetty?

  In the past, you didn't really know who the CEOs of the biggest companies were. And you weren't buying that product because of the CEO.

• 1:37:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:43Jay Shetty?

  And so it's also the first time we're all going through this together, trying to figure out how much authenticity to share and what, and when can I share and when do I feel comfortable? I feel like we're all in this together trying to figure it out.

• 1:37:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I was, I was trying to figure it out while going through all of that. And I got to a point where my sparkle was so dulled. When you get married, it's, the intention is forever. So I got married with the intention of forever. And I really thought I could handle being with an addict. I really thought I could do it. And I just have to give so much respect to the people who are with an addict, who are married to an addict, who have stuck by an addict through sobriety, through not sobriety, through anything.

• 1:38:39Speaker 01

  That takes an immense amount of strength, an immense amount of strength. I cannot even explain because we always think about what the addict is, the addict is going through. But we forget about the partner is going through it too. And it is really difficult. So I just have an immense amount of respect for the people who can do it. And I really thought I could, but I realized I, I just couldn't. I just couldn't. And that is something I had to accept, which was tough for me because it makes you feel like a failure.

• 1:39:19Speaker 01

  And I just could not accept that I was not meant to be that kind of person. So, but I'm proud of myself that I made the choice. I had to be selfish in that moment.

• 1:39:33Jay Shetty?

  How did you know that divorce was the right path? And then what was that process like as well? Because I think people underestimate

• 1:39:39Speaker 01

  Oh, gosh.

• 1:39:40Jay Shetty?

  how long and

• 1:39:41Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh, yes.

• 1:39:42Jay Shetty?

  how durus that process is.

• 1:39:44Speaker 01

  So I decided I want to get, wanted to get a divorce in 2025, uh, January 2025. And Cody also was on board with this. Uh, we actually decided we wanted to get a divorce while Cody was in rehab. I was sitting in a rehab with him.

• 1:40:05Speaker 01

  This was actually December 2024. I am sitting with Cody in rehab on Christmas Day and we're deciding that we're gonna get a divorce.

• 1:40:19Speaker 01

  And we were pretty serious about it. We got the lawyers, started doing the paperwork.

• 1:40:28Speaker 01

  Cody got his own apartment. He, he moved out of the house. And all at the same time, while I'm about to launch a brand, by the way. So this, and no one knew what I was going through. And I'm about to become a brand founder. So this, it was just a tornado for me. So Cody moves out, we're deciding we're gonna get a divorce. And then a few months go by and Cody's able to stay sober.

• 1:40:59Speaker 01

  And we start going on, uh, we start going to marriage counseling. And it's, it's working, but then one day he showed up to marriage counseling drunk. And I thought, okay, this is just gonna be a cycle that I'm gonna have to continue to either accept or choose to move forward from. So he continued living on his own, would go back and forth on his sobriety. And then we started going on dates. You know, we're married, but we're going on dates because we don't live together. But, um, he would take me on dates because we wanted to try one more time.

• 1:41:43Speaker 01

  And I think a lot of people who go through divorce and marriage and decide to get a divorce, maybe do this. I can't speak for everybody, but you do that one more try kind of thing in some cases. So we decided to give it one more try to the point where Cody moved back in.

• 1:42:01Speaker 01

  And we were working on it, but it just didn't work. And we, we realized that really, really quickly. And then another day I'll never forget is the day I asked for a divorce.

• 1:42:15Speaker 01

  I was at home with Cody and we got into this explosive fight, screaming at each other. And this, this was the point we were at with our marriage where it became so toxic and it became really unhealthy, where we're screaming at each other, where we're not having good communication. Our communication became really bad.

• 1:42:41Speaker 01

  And we're screaming in each other's faces about something. And I'm thinking, this is the la, in my head, I'm thinking, this is the last time I ever want to do this. And for women especially, I think it's really hard to walk away. And I had a really hard time with that. But in that moment, the fight was so explosive and I knew I never wanted to do it again. At the end of the fight, I said, Cody, I want a divorce. And it was so hard to say that out loud that I fell on the floor, started shaking and devastatedly crying.

• 1:43:25Speaker 01

  I was devastated that I had to say that out loud.

• 1:43:30Speaker 01

  And Cody was so confused because I was in a panic attack. I was in a full blown panic attack because I was so scared. Okay, I just asked for a divorce. Now what? What do I have to do now? So within a week, um, Cody moved out completely.

• 1:43:54Speaker 01

  We both got lawyers and we began the process. And I remember that first meeting, I said, how long is this going to take?

• 1:44:04Speaker 01

  And they said, oh, you'll, you'll probably be divorced next year.

• 1:44:08Speaker 01

  And I said, next year? But mind you, this was in January. So I said, next year? And they were like, yeah, like this, well, we're gonna, you know, ask for a court date, but that's probably gonna be next year. And I could not believe that. I was like so shocked. But that's the reality for most divorces and a year is not even that long. Some divorces go up to six years, especially if you have kids or you've been married for a really long time and there's a lot of assets involved. I'm grateful that Cody and I were only married for two years, which made it a little easier. And we also don't have any kids. So we were able to get divorced within eight months, which I'm really, really grateful for.

• 1:44:53Speaker 01

  Um, the eight months were really, really hard. I, I really, I have two really amazing friends, Sam and Sydney. My audience knows them well. And I was on the phone with them every day for months, crying to them about it, shaking. They were scared for me at times because I, I would lose all, I lost all the color in my face. I just looked lifeless because I was so scared. It's really, you just don't know what the future holds next. And then finally that, that month came with my court date. And oh, man, I was so fricking excited. I mean, I finally get to be divorced.

• 1:45:37Speaker 01

  I was excited for me and I was excited for Cody. Because Cody has his whole life ahead of him and so do I. And that moment when you, when you have that court date and you've both agreed on everything and you know, you just get to show up and sign the papers and call it a day and, and you're, you're free, you're ready to begin your next chapter. It is like the best feeling in the world, truly.

• 1:46:02Jay Shetty?

  I mean, yeah, it's almost like you know it's over in your heart and mind.

• 1:46:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:46:08Jay Shetty?

  And then there's all of this.

• 1:46:11Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:46:11Jay Shetty?

  That has to follow it.

• 1:46:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:46:12Jay Shetty?

  And it only just got officialized in July twenty twenty six, right? Which is so fresh, like, you know, it's been a couple of months.

• 1:46:20Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:46:21Jay Shetty?

  What does it feel like now, looking at it from this side?

• 1:46:25Speaker 01

  It's interesting, looking back at how scared I was for the months leading up to it and thinking I wasn't gonna get through it to now being through it. Cause when you're going through divorce, you really have a hard time seeing the other side. You just can't. Um, and that I I did my divorce remotely, so we did it on Zoom. And I actually, the judge announced in the court, I declare you divorced. Our divorce hearing was actually kind of sweet because um, the judge was listing the date, time, place, we got married. And Cody and I kind of looked at each other on the Zoom and and we just smiled.

• 1:47:10Speaker 01

  Because like, that's a really happy day for people. Um, like that was our wedding day, that was a huge deal. We looked, we just looked at each other and smiled. Cause we knew that we had those happy moments. But we also knew that we were about to to start a new part, a new chapter of our lives. And then the the judge declared us divorced and I um, I had my best friend Sydney with me. And I I slammed the laptop shut and I just started bawling my eyes out to her. And she started bawling her eyes out, cause she had to, she watched me go through everything. You know, all the people in my life um, were also very emotional for me. And I just gave her the biggest hug and I hugged her for like five minutes straight.

• 1:47:56Speaker 01

  Um, and it was just, it was, it's like a bittersweet moment uh, for both Cody and I when that day happened. And then, you know, we went out to lunch and we celebrated, cause and a lot of people ask me, why did you celebrate? Getting a divorce, that's weird. I don't think it's weird at all. Cody and I had a beautiful five years together. But we also had five really difficult years together. And being able to celebrate the good times, but also the fact that we get to start over now and we're we're being given a fresh start. We learned so much through this marriage. And I think Cody and I were just both excited that

• 1:48:40Speaker 01

  we get to try again and and we get to to take time for ourselves to learn who we are and and figure things out. So we we celebrated for sure.

• 1:48:49Jay Shetty?

  I love hearing that.

• 1:48:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. Divorce doesn't have to be some big scary thing. I mean, I was scared leading up to it, but the day of, um, it it it felt like such a weight off my shoulders, yeah.

• 1:48:59Jay Shetty?

  Thank you for taking me back so intimately to like, so many major days in your life and your ability to like, be so present for them is remarkable.

• 1:49:09Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:49:10Jay Shetty?

  Like, when I hear you describe them, I'm like, I'm living these with you right now, like. And as I'm listening to you, I'm just thinking, wow, you're so present and introspective and available to all the emotions that are going on throughout the day, no matter how difficult they may be.

• 1:49:25Speaker 01

  Yeah. And People always say that about me, they're like, you're the most active influencer I've ever seen, constantly filming, constantly posting, yet you're the most present person I've ever seen. And and that's, that's very accurate about me.

• 1:49:38Jay Shetty?

  It's evident, yeah, it's evident, the way you describe a day, I'm like, God, you didn't miss a detail, like it's, you're right there and

• 1:49:44Speaker 01

  I'm always right there.

• 1:49:46Jay Shetty?

  And you're, you're, and also not just physically, I mean, like you're feeling all the emotions that are coming up with it and I'm so, it makes me so happy knowing that you and Cody could look at each other in that moment, appreciate how beautiful that wedding day was. Look at the reality of those five years in both the joy and the pains.

• 1:50:05Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:50:06Jay Shetty?

  And then celebrate and say, well, you know, that,

• 1:50:09Jay Shetty?

  I feel like that's what everyone would want to want when they're moving on from someone like.

• 1:50:13Speaker 01

  It's not the case for everybody, so I feel really lucky that it was the case for me. I mean, I'm not saying my divorce was squeaky clean, easy.

• 1:50:21Jay Shetty?

  Of course.

• 1:50:21Speaker 01

  I don't think it is for anybody. Cody and I have lots of disagreements and like, like I said, we would have explosive fights. But it's like, at the end of the day, when you decide you're getting a divorce, all of that's over. So put it to the side. Um, and I did.

• 1:50:38Jay Shetty?

  How do you grieve an old life and also be happy for the new one that you're building? Because, as you said, bittersweet, there's always that.

• 1:50:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm someone who's really open to anything. I'm open to failure, I'm open to change, I'm not afraid of change, I'm open to spontaneity. And so I'm grateful for the last five years. I'm really appreciative that they happened. And that is what allows me to move forward. I'm looking forward to the next five years. Um, I think you, you, you, what's that saying, you grow through what you go through? One hundred percent. Um, and they say your twenties are the hardest years of your life. Is that true? I mean, I don't know, I'm still, I'm still living in it.

• 1:51:27Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:28Speaker 01

  But, you know, as I'm, next year I'll be twenty nine and and then thirty and I'm like really excited for for my thirties and and the future. I'm so young, I think people just forget how young I am. I'm just figuring it out, I'm figuring everything out as I'm, as I'm growing, so.

• 1:51:48Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, yeah, and I feel like every decade brings its own,

• 1:51:53Jay Shetty?

  you know, uh, awakening moment.

• 1:51:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:51:55Jay Shetty?

  And but but definitely, I think like in your twenties, you're figuring out a lot more than than you're figuring out in your thirties or your forties or whatever may come. I I'm at the end, I'm I'm thirty nine now.

• 1:52:07Speaker 01

  You're thirty nine.

• 1:52:08Jay Shetty?

  I'm thirty nine, yeah, yeah, so I'm a decade older.

• 1:52:10Speaker 01

  Well, you know what they say about forty?

• 1:52:12Jay Shetty?

  What's that?

• 1:52:12Speaker 01

  That's when you really stop caring what people think.

• 1:52:14Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:15Speaker 01

  So your forties is gonna be great.

• 1:52:16Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. But you recently announced as well to your community that you're dating again and a new relationship.

• 1:52:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:52:24Jay Shetty?

  Uh, you actually knew each other at high school?

• 1:52:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, so this is a very confusing story to my audience, cause I haven't really told it.

• 1:52:32Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, yeah, please.

• 1:52:32Speaker 01

  So I dated a guy in high school named Zach. And Zach was my first love. Zach was my first, I'm in love with this person, oh my God, type of feeling.

• 1:52:47Speaker 01

  And um, we dated in high school. And we ended up just not working out, you're in high school.

• 1:52:53Jay Shetty?

  Totally.

• 1:52:54Speaker 01

  Big whoop. Everyone's like, well, they didn't work out in high school, so it can't be like, they can't work out. No, it was high school. I was a year above him, I graduated before him. So when I went off to college, he was still in high school. And my feelings for him were just so strong, but our lives were too different. Um, I was in college and he ended up going into the Air Force. And while he was in the Air Force for years, he said, Michaela, please, like, give me a chance. Give me a chance, like, I, and he lived in Nebraska and Texas and all over the place. And I said, no, like, I'm not doing long distance like that. And I just constantly told him, no, like, go away.

• 1:53:36Speaker 01

  But him and I were really good friends, really good friends. I could talk to him about anything, like even though we broke up in high school, we remained good friends. I sat next to him in class, like, he was one of my closest friends for a long time. But he had feelings for me and I didn't want to be with him because of that distance. I didn't want to be with someone in the Air Force, like it was just, there were too many factors where it didn't make sense. I was in college, I was busy. But for years, he literally tried to get me back. And then when I got married, when I started dating Cody, he went radio silent. Which I, that's really respectful, like he said goodbye, even though he was my friend. He was like, you're married, like, goodbye. Um, so I really respected that about him, even though I knew he had feelings for me.

• 1:54:21Speaker 01

  I'm in a relationship, I'm married, and he took a full step back and said, I'm not trying to get in the way of that. So I didn't talk to him for many, many years. Except when I saw that he finished his term in the military and he, cause we grew up right down the street from each other.

• 1:54:37Jay Shetty?

  Hmm.

• 1:54:38Speaker 01

  So I saw that he moved back home. And I just sent him a message, like a nice, like friendly message. And I said, I saw you just got back home and out of the the Air Force. I just wanted to say like, thank you for your service, like, congrats on everything, I hope you're doing well. Just drove by your house, thought of you, and that was it. Um, when Zach saw that I was getting a divorce, because I'm very public about it, that was the first time I heard back from him, where he said, hey, I saw you're getting a divorce. I just want to say I'm here for you, like if you need someone to talk to. So I started talking to him, just as friends. Because we were friends, we were friends for years. And at that point, I didn't have feelings for him.

• 1:55:23Speaker 01

  And I didn't think he had feelings for me anymore, at that time, so much time had gone by. And then he was really there for me through my divorce. Really, really supportive and just kind, and if I needed to talk to someone, he was there and he's just a really, really good guy. And then um, a lot of people ask like, but you started dating him while you were getting a divorce. And that's just how my life played out. Um, Cody and I were fully separated, we were not together. And I know there's mixed opinions on whether you should date someone while you're getting a divorce. Um, but I didn't really have a choice with that because Zach and I's connection grew really strongly and

• 1:56:08Speaker 01

  I'm not the type of person to pass on a connection like that. Um, so months into my divorce, I decided, you know what, Zach, let's like, go get dinner. Casual, just friends. So we went to the Cheesecake Factory. And we got dinner. And in that moment, I knew that I think I was meant to be with him. And our connection was just really special. And I sat in that Cheesecake Factory with him for three hours, talking. And then after we left, he sent me a text and he said, um, he said, I just want you to know, like, I want to be with you and like, I'm going to fight for you. And I was like, okay.

• 1:56:53Speaker 01

  And then we've just been inseparable since. So, yeah.

• 1:56:57Jay Shetty?

  Well, how do you decide now how much you let your community in and update them and tell them like, what have you learned about that?

• 1:57:04Speaker 01

  My community hasn't fully come around to Zach because Cody and I were married and a lot of people just don't know the story about Zach and I or about Cody. There's just so many details, which obviously I'm not going to tell the entire internet, but um,

• 1:57:19Jay Shetty?

  They've learned about it today, yeah.

• 1:57:20Speaker 01

  They're learning a lot about it today, a lot about it today. But I've, I sprinkled in bits and pieces of Zach. And I was going to keep the relationship pretty private. But then, like I said, when you date an influencer, you have to be open to being in the public eye. So Zach and I were getting spotted in public. People were taking photos and videos of us in public. And then the conversation just spirals. And then you don't really have a choice. You don't really have, and that's actually what happened with Cody and I as well. They spotted Cody and I out in public. And then I decided, you know what? Screw it. I'm just going to start talking about Zach.

• 1:58:01Jay Shetty?

  How does it feel that you were able to go through some of the most difficult years of your life? Some of the most personally painful moments?

• 1:58:12Jay Shetty?

  Hold on to your career that was always so important to you and now also launch such a successful brand and POV? I mean, it feels like that's been such a priority for you since being a little girl, since being a teenager. You're on this side of it now where you have something that's, you know, doing incredibly well. Like, talk to me about what that means to you at this point? And what it feels like to have your own brand that's solving a challenge and a problem and a gap in the market?

• 1:58:43Speaker 01

  What's crazy to me is if you think of everything I've done in my career and everything I've gone through in my life, and I'm 28, to launch a brand is huge. That is a huge deal and I'm extremely grateful that I've been given the opportunity. When I was working at Alta, it was such a special position for me because as someone who really struggled with acne, people would come into the store and they would open up to me about insecurities, similar to what I had. They would talk to me about their acne, they're, say they're a burn victim, say they have skin cancer. Say they struggle with rosacea, PCOS, eczema, any sort of skin condition that can cause you to feel insecure.

• 1:59:29Speaker 01

  They're coming into Alta looking for a solution. Oftentimes they thought the solution was just to, you know, slap makeup on their face and it would cover it. But then they would find that, but it doesn't really look very good. Like my makeup doesn't look very good and I don't know what I'm doing wrong. Like that's what I would always hear. I don't know what I'm doing wrong. Please help me. And I realized there wasn't really like an easy solution to helping these people. I would have to walk all over the store and ask them a million questions about their skin type and their skin texture and their skin conditions. And, and I would have to really get into it and, and I just wanted to create something that was so simple and straightforward and easy and approachable.

• 2:00:14Speaker 01

  And I had this idea when I was working at Alta years and years ago. So when I started to be approached by investors, they would want to bring me an idea. And I said, no, no, no, I have the idea. So then I would pitch to them my idea. Because that's what happened. They saw the selling potential I had, so they would come to me with this already pre-conceptualized brand that they would want me to be the face of. And I said, no, no, no, that's not what I want to do. I've had this idea for so many years and this is what I'm going to do. And I really had to go, the same way I'm telling you about this now is what I, is exactly how I would tell it to them.

• 2:00:59Speaker 01

  And they would kind of shake their head and be like, you know what? Yeah, that is interesting. Skin prep, this whole concept of skin prep. Investors trusted that and they trusted that I could bring that vision to life. And I thought that was really cool that they took my idea and ran with it, so.

• 2:01:15Jay Shetty?

  That's amazing.

• 2:01:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:01:17Jay Shetty?

  From working at Alta, the 14-year-old, writing a makeup blog, uploading a video to a 28, having a brand. It's pretty awesome.

• 2:01:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:01:27Jay Shetty?

  It's pretty incredible.

• 2:01:27Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 2:01:28Jay Shetty?

  Talk to me about the decision between Alta and Sephora because that must have been like,

• 2:01:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:01:33Jay Shetty?

  Everyone wants you at this point. It's,

• 2:01:35Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Yeah. We had conversations with Alta, we had conversations with Sephora. But the reason I chose Sephora is if you look at Sephora's top brands, you're going to notice that they're founder brands. They're brands that a founder came in, had a really strong vision and brought it to life. Make it by Mario, Patrick Ta, Charlotte Tilbury, Patrick Star. All of these founders who have these visions and brought them to life. Sephora does an exceptional job at helping these founders bring those visions to life. I always say, if you were to walk into a Sephora and go in front of all these founder brands

• 2:02:17Speaker 01

  and remove the founder's face and name from the brand and not know whose brand is whose, you would still be able to say, that's Mario, that's Patrick Ta. You would know because they do such an exceptional job at curating brands that are authentic to the founder. And that's what I wanted. And that's why I went with Sephora. And, and so far, they've truly been an exceptional thought partner to work with. They have this thing called in the kitchen where when you're developing products, they're developing the products with you. Because they're looking at trends, they're looking at the analytics, they're looking at what sells and it's just really collaborative. So a lot of people have been asking me, did I make the right choice now that we've been in Sephora for about a month?

• 2:03:01Speaker 01

  And absolutely, absolutely without a doubt. Yeah.

• 2:03:05Jay Shetty?

  Congratulations again. That's incredible.

• 2:03:07Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 2:03:07Jay Shetty?

  You know, you sold millions of products, promoted so many beauty brands, millions and millions of followers, so many views, building POV, launching at Sephora, available everywhere. What would you say to that little girl who had all these dreams?

• 2:03:22Speaker 01

  Oof. I think, I wish that I could go to my 14-year-old self and like, play her a movie of my life, like up to now. I, I just think that would be so crazy for her to watch. She wouldn't believe you. She would think it's a movie. It's scripted, it's, it's, it's a plot. But then like, if you were to tell her at the end, this is going to be your life. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. But I kind of, I appreciate that like, we can't see the future. Because it's so sweet and cool and fun and special to go through all these moments for the first time. Like the firsts.

• 2:04:06Speaker 01

  I always am very appreciative of every first and grateful for every first. Like, you've, you've seen the way I tell stories. Like I never forget anything. I'm very, I remember everything. So, yeah, she would be really, really happy and proud. Yeah.

• 2:04:23Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. Yeah, I, I'm so excited to see what you're going to do and I can't wait for you to tell them more of those stories because you're a great storyteller.

• 2:04:30Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 2:04:32Jay Shetty?

  It's beautiful living your incredible moments with you and it was very, very, very heart touching to hear your personal experience of the challenges, the difficulties, the pains today. We end with a final five, but before we do that, is there anything I haven't asked you that you wish I asked you? Or something that you really wanted to share that I didn't touch on?

• 2:04:52Speaker 01

  I don't think so. There's nothing I can really think of. I think you did a really good job.

• 2:04:56Jay Shetty?

  No, you didn't. No, you, you've been so generous and so thoughtful and so, I only ask that because I like to make sure that

• 2:05:03Speaker 01

  That's a good question.

• 2:05:03Jay Shetty?

  You've really been able to have, you know, share your heart because you have been. I, I really felt that today and I, you know, don't want to take that for granted to give you space to, to share. But Michaela, we end every episode of On Purpose with a final five. These questions have to be answered in one sentence maximum.

• 2:05:20Speaker 01

  Okay, got it.

• 2:05:21Jay Shetty?

  So, Michaela,

• 2:05:22Speaker 01

  Hard for me.

• 2:05:24Jay Shetty?

  Michaela Nogueira, no, you're, you're very eloquent and well spoken, but, uh, Michaela Nogueira, these are your final five. The first question is, what is the best advice you've ever heard or received?

• 2:05:34Speaker 01

  Don't give up.

• 2:05:35Jay Shetty?

  Who told you that?

• 2:05:37Speaker 01

  Manager at Alta.

• 2:05:39Jay Shetty?

  Nice, that's awesome. Uh, second, Lindsay.

• 2:05:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:05:42Jay Shetty?

  Lindsay. Uh, second question, what is the worst advice you've ever heard or received?

• 2:05:47Speaker 01

  Not all of your dreams can come true.

• 2:05:50Jay Shetty?

  What would you say to someone who says that?

• 2:05:53Speaker 01

  That's bullshit.

• 2:05:54Jay Shetty?

  I love that. That's good.

• 2:05:57Speaker 01

  A college professor said that to me, by the way.

• 2:05:59Jay Shetty?

  Oh, really? In response to what did you, what did you say to get that reaction?

• 2:06:03Speaker 01

  I said, follow your dreams. And they replied, not all of your dreams can come true. And I thought that was ridiculous. And I, I'll never forget them saying that.

• 2:06:14Jay Shetty?

  Do you remember their name?

• 2:06:17Jay Shetty?

  I like send this to them. Uh, question number three, how do you define a good friend?

• 2:06:23Speaker 01

  They're there for you at your very best moments, but also your absolute worst.

• 2:06:29Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, it's both those moments, not just one.

• 2:06:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:06:32Jay Shetty?

  Because you have some people who are only there for your worst and some people only there for your best.

• 2:06:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:06:35Jay Shetty?

  And your real ones are there for both.

• 2:06:38Speaker 01

  And you don't want to be friends with jealous people. That's my best advice.

• 2:06:42Jay Shetty?

  Why?

• 2:06:43Speaker 01

  Jealousy is, in my opinion, the root of all evil. I don't like jealousy. You want to lift people up. You want to encourage people. You want to support the people around you. I see, you know, all three of me and my Sydney and Sam, my best friends, we all do the same thing. We're all beauty influencers. And people constantly try to like tear us apart. And I'm like, we're not like that. We support each other. We lift each other up. We know we can all succeed in this space.

• 2:07:07Jay Shetty?

  Well said. Uh, fourth question, what did you used to value that you don't value anymore?

• 2:07:14Speaker 01

  Wow. What did I used to value that I don't value anymore? Okay, I'm gonna cheat a little because I literally can't answer this in one sentence.

• 2:07:22Jay Shetty?

  Sure, please.

• 2:07:23Speaker 01

  I think I used to think very differently about marriage. I think I used to think that marriage was like all happy and butterflies and you get married and it's like this whole thing. But really, I've learned to value marriage differently. That I will be taking forward into my future, a full marriage.

• 2:07:44Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. Uh, fifth and final question. We ask this to every guest who's ever been on the show. If you could create one law that everyone in the world had to follow, what would it be?

• 2:07:53Speaker 01

  Ban cyberbullying?

• 2:07:57Speaker 01

  Like, I don't know how they would do that, but.

• 2:07:58Jay Shetty?

  But figure it, there's some smart AI in the world.

• 2:08:02Speaker 01

  That would be amazing. I wish the internet was a more positive place, um, especially social media. Because I think a lot of people go to social media for it to be a safe space. But a lot of times it's not. Um, so that's what I would do. I would ban cyberbullying.

• 2:08:20Jay Shetty?

  Michaela Nigara, thank you for your openness, your vulnerability, your, you know, just your thoughtfulness today. I've learned so much from you and I can't believe you're only twenty-eight. I mean, that's incredible and I genuinely hope you'll come back year after year and tell us what you've done, what you've achieved, what you've learned because uh, it's pretty fascinating watching your journey. So thank you so much and I'm so grateful that you chose to come and share your story with me, truly.

• 2:08:46Speaker 01

  Well, thank you for always giving a safe space to talk about things, especially regarding mental health and just major life moments. I've been asked to talk about a lot of these things for so long and I never felt the right person came along to talk to about it until you.

• 2:09:04Jay Shetty?

  Well, I don't take that for granted. That means the world to me, truly.

• 2:09:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:09:08Jay Shetty?

  Thank you so much. Thanks, Michaela.

• 2:09:13Speaker 05

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• 2:10:34Speaker 07

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