1074 How to Overcome Self-Doubt & Rejection to Build a Billion Dollar Brand w/Jamie Kern Lima

“What I thought was a setback was actually a setup for what I was supposed to do.”Today's guest is Jamie Kern Lima, founder of IT Cosmetics, which she started in her living room and grew into the largest luxury makeup brand in the country. She sold the company to L’Oréal in a billion-dollar deal and became the first female CEO of a brand in its history. Her love for her customers and remarkable authenticity and belief eventually landed her on the Forbes America’s Richest Self-Made Women list. Today, she’s a mother of two and an investor, speaker, and thought leader who is passionate about inspiring the world. In this episode Lewis and Jamie discuss how Jamie hustled to get the results she wanted, how to push through self-doubt and rejection, the moment she knew she needed to exit her dream and sell her company, and so much more! For more go to: www.lewishowes.com/1074Read Jamie’s new book: www.believeit.com Check out her website: www.jamiekernlima.comDaymond John on How to Close any Deal and Achieve Any Outcome: https://link.chtbl.com/928-podSara Blakely on Writing Your Billion Dollar Story: https://link.chtbl.com/893-pod Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

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

• 0:00Jamie Kern Lima?

  I'm the person that literally in my heart and soul managed to go from Denny's waitress to billion dollar entrepreneur because I learned to believe in myself and believe I belong in the room and overcome rejection, overcome fear, but I am still a work in progress, right?

• 0:13Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:36Lewis Howes?

  Colin Davis said, "The road to success and the road to failure are almost exactly the same." And Oprah Winfrey said, "Honor your calling. Everyone has one. Trust your heart and success will come to you." My guest today is my friend, Jamie Kern Lima. She is the founder of It Cosmetics, which she started in her living room and grew the company into the largest luxury makeup brand in the country. She sold the company to L'Oréal in a billion dollar deal and became the first female CEO of a brand in its history. Her love for her customers and remarkable authenticity and belief eventually landed her on the Forbes America's Richest Self-Made Women's List.

• 1:18Lewis Howes?

  Today, she's a mother of two, an investor, speaker, and thought leader who is passionate about inspiring the world. And in this episode, we discuss how Jamie built a billion dollar business, how to push through self doubt when nobody is believing in your dream, what Jamie would do if she could go back, and how she would grow her business differently to be less stressful, how to run your business and have a thriving relationship at the same time, what mindset changes she had to make in order to become more successful. And the moment she knew she needed to exit her dream, she shares that knowing when to let go of a dream is as important as knowing when to go after one. I'm very excited for you to hear this one. Make sure to share it with someone that you think needs to listen to it.

• 2:03Lewis Howes?

  Just copy and paste this link where you're listening to this podcast and text it to a couple of friends, post it on social media. Make sure to tag me and Jamie Kern Lima as well. And if this is your first time here, please click the subscribe button over on Apple Podcasts or Spotify right now, as well as leave us a rating and review to let us know what you enjoyed most from this episode at the end. Okay, in just a moment, the one and only Jamie Kern Lima.

• 2:30Lewis Howes?

  Welcome back everyone to the School of Greatness Podcast. We've got my good friend Jamie Kern Lima in the house. Good to see you.

• 2:36Jamie Kern Lima?

  So good to be here.

• 2:37Lewis Howes?

  Very excited, very excited. You have an amazing story and you've done some incredible things as an entrepreneur. And one of the things that I love about your story is that you had a lot of rejection early on. So I want to dive into the topic about rejection first before I go more into your story. What do you think is the right way for people to look at rejection as a positive thing? As opposed to something that is the end of their opportunity, end of their life, end of their moment for going after their dream? How can you, how did you look at your rejections as a good thing?

• 3:12Jamie Kern Lima?

  I love this question because honestly, I feel like people don't share this enough. And I feel like right now, we see social media, we see everyone's highlight reel, we see all the outcomes. It's really why I wrote this book, to be honest, because like if you Google my name, you see like, oh, Denny's waitress to billion dollar entrepreneur. And I get so many DMs, especially from women, Lewis, so many DMs from people saying like, oh, did you get lucky? Or was that easy? Or did you have connections? And it's like, oh, wow. If we don't share the rejections and like the real story and the real journey, then I feel like people feel like they're alone. And their own rejection and their own pain and all that. So yeah, it was, um, my journey has been filled with hundreds of no's, uh, tons of rejection.

• 3:56Jamie Kern Lima?

  And I feel like figuring out how to not take it personal has been huge on the business side of things. Like it's always hurt, to be honest, it's always hurt. But also I believe, and no matter if someone believes in God or the universe or whatever, when I look back at everything I've gone through, especially this last 10 year window, there's a famous saying, rejections, God's protection. You could say rejections is the universe's protection, right? Whatever applies to each person listening, but like, I believe it. And it's, I mean,

• 4:31Lewis Howes?

  So that person shouldn't have said yes to you. It wouldn't have been the right fit for you.

• 4:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  The right fit, I mean,

• 4:35Lewis Howes?

  Or the right timing or whatever.

• 4:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  And what's hard, and here's the hardest thing is so many people actually like never step out of their comfort zone because they're so afraid of rejection. Cause it freaking hurts. It sucks when it happens, right? And, and sometimes it doesn't make sense and it doesn't feel fair. And I remember, you know, gosh, one, one rejection out of hundreds.

• 4:57Jamie Kern Lima?

  In my journey, because you know, I, I um, I thought I was gonna be a news anchor and I'll talk to host my whole career. I love other people's stories. Like I just want to interview you right now. It's like, since the time I was a little girl, it's all I wanted to do. And I was working in my dream job as a news anchor and I started getting this, this skin condition called rosacea, uh, which is bright red and there's like bumps and all kinds of stuff. Um, and I thought I was going through this big setback in my career and I would be anchoring the live news and I'd hear from the producer in my ear, like, there's something on your face, there's something on your face. And I'd be live and they were like, you need to wipe it off, you need to wipe it off. And I knew-

• 5:34Lewis Howes?

  It'd probably get worse.

• 5:35Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, because of stress.

• 5:36Lewis Howes?

  It's like grinning up more, you're like, ah!

• 5:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  My god, and I, I knew there wasn't anything I could wipe off. Um, and I started going through this season of self doubt where I started thinking, okay, am I gonna lose my job? Are, am I gonna lose viewers? Uh, uh, is my boyfriend still gonna think I'm cute? Like, all those thoughts that we tell ourselves. And I started, uh, thinking I was in this, like, big setback, but what it was really was a setup for what I was supposed to do. Um, and I think so often our setbacks are setups. It's just hard to see it at the time. Um, and I started, you know, trying every makeup out there from the most expensive to the least, to everything. I couldn't find anything that works. And I made this decision

• 6:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  to literally leave my dream job. Like, I think sometimes knowing when to let go of a dream is as important as knowing when to go after one. And I feel like so many people are always like, just don't give up, just don't quit. But I actually think that doesn't always apply. I think that, like, the victory is knowing when to hear yourself and trust yourself and let go of a dream or step into one. But what I didn't know was stepping into that dream would be faced with three years of, of constant rejection. So-

• 6:53Jamie Kern Lima?

  From the moment I quit my job and and my husband and I wrote our business plan and our honeymoon flight to South Africa, got back like dove all in, uh, put everything we had into a product. And once we finally had a product that worked for me, I just thought like, oh, it's gonna sell. It's just gonna do well, right? And it was literally three years of every single beauty retailer, like all the ones I love and the ones I thought, oh, my gosh, like I put them on a pedestal. And I thought, oh, they're gonna love this because it works, you know, and and uh, so I would send it to Sephora and Ulta and QVC, all the places, and they all said, like every one of them said, no.

• 7:31Lewis Howes?

  For three years.

• 7:31Jamie Kern Lima?

  For three years. We got down to under a thousand dollars in our bank account, which was our company and personal combined. Um, literally, it was no after no. And I mean, one no that stands out, just to share this, because anyone listening, part of, you know, your greatness community, like dealing with rejection, dealing with setbacks, dealing with, it's hard. When you check in with your gut, you feel like you're supposed to be going after this dream or or creating something or launching the podcast or creating the product or whatever. It's hard when you feel like it's the right thing, but then there's no proof of success around you.

• 8:07Lewis Howes?

  No one's buying into it.

• 8:07Jamie Kern Lima?

  No one's buying into it. And then your own self doubt starts taking over, right? And and when you have experts telling you they don't believe in what you're doing, that's hard. And I remember, um, one moment in particular when uh, we got interest from a private equity firm. And I was like, I was so excited because we had had so many no's. And I thought, okay, if they invest in us, and this was a big private equity firm. They invest in a lot of like, um, consumer product companies that we see at the grocery store. Like household names, right? And they invest in a lot of them pre-revenue and then they become big companies. And I'm like, oh, you know, if they invest in us, A, I won't go bankrupt.

• 8:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  B, maybe they can get like use their leverage to get us into these stores that are telling us no, they don't want our product. And so we started the meeting process with the investors and went through the diligence phase and presented our product pipeline and showed our budgets. And I'll never forget the final meeting and my husband Paulo, who you know, he was there. And then the head investor was like three feet from me and I thought it was going to be a yes, like I was so excited. And he literally was like, you know, thank you, we're really, we want to congratulate you on your product. We think that it's awesome, we want to wish you the best, but it's a no. We're going to pass on investing in it cosmetics. And I was like, okay, can you tell me why, right?

• 9:31Jamie Kern Lima?

  Because like feedback is usually, I mean, feedback's usually a gift, not always.

• 9:36Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 9:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  And I was like, can you tell me why? And he looked at me and he's literally three feet from me and he says, do you, do you really want me to be honest with you? And I said, yes, please. And he says, I just don't think women will buy makeup from someone who looks like you with your, with your body and your weight, right? And so this was a moment when he said that, I don't think women will buy makeup from someone who looks like you with your body and your weight. It was this moment where I was like looking at him, right? And I was, it was almost like watching his lips move in slow motion. And I remember two big things from this. I remember like my whole body flooded with like a lifetime of body doubt and self doubt.

• 10:16Lewis Howes?

  And God doubt, you say?

• 10:18Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, God, everything, but it felt like I was staring my fear like straight in the eye. It was almost like it wasn't even about him in this moment. But, and I knew like, you know, that, that, two things. I remember that and I remember this moment in my gut that told me, even though I was in pain at the time and it hurt and this was like a big rejection, I also felt this really strong moment of feeling like he's wrong, like a knowing, like a deep knowing. But I also knew that like if I was ever going to prove that, I would also have to truly believe it, you know what I mean? And it was tough. I went to my car and cried and didn't know what we were going to do. But one thing that, and I did a lot of things wrong in my journey and I share those in the book.

• 11:03Jamie Kern Lima?

  But one thing that I did right was like through all the rejections, I actually never took them personal. And with him, and with him, I felt no anger toward him. And I had this big moment. So two big things happened and then I want to, oh, and then I want to tell you the full circle. The whole rejection is God's protection and rejection is the universe's protection. I have to tell you like what happened. This for anyone listening, going through a setback or rejection right now. Because I have hundreds of stories like this.

• 11:30Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 11:30Jamie Kern Lima?

  Uh, and uh, now after building this company and hiring over a thousand employees and all this stuff that we've done on the way.

• 11:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  Okay, so, so two things. One is, um, when I was creating this company, right? Um, and you know, you hear about a lot of, you've had people on your show talking about finding your why and finding your mission and all that kind of thing. And everyone knows about that and, or a lot of people have read about it. And I think knowing your why is important for any goal or any dream. But two things happened. When I created the brand and I was like, why can't I find any product that works? Like, I don't understand this. This is when I was working as a news anchor. I had this moment where I realized, oh my gosh, my whole life, even dating, even when I was a little girl growing up, all I ever saw was uh, TV ads or magazine ads. I loved them. Like I loved them and I always saw the models and I always like aspired to look that way.

• 12:22Jamie Kern Lima?

  But they all always had flawless skin. I never saw anybody that had rosacea or any type of challenges. And I realized two things that I always had aspired to look like them, but they also always made me feel uh, not enough. Because

• 12:39Lewis Howes?

  You could never look like them.

• 12:40Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, what was called beautiful, I didn't see myself in, right? And so I had this whole idea, which is part of why all the retailers were saying no in the, for early years. I had this idea to not just create products that work, but let me show models, all different people, every age, skin tone, skin challenge, gender identity, skin problems, size, like let me just show real people and prove this product works. Like, let me go on QVC and prove it live. Let me show my own rosation. I just thought if people can see people look like them, this just makes sense to me. But all the experts said it didn't. So, so back to me standing there with this investor saying, I don't think people will buy makeup from someone who looks like you with your body and your weight.

• 13:25Jamie Kern Lima?

  After I went in my car and cried, like it's rejection always still hurts. Uh, I also just remember feeling like, wow. He's passing on investing in my business on he's making a business decision. Because of exactly why I'm starting this company like he's just as much. I don't want to call it a victim, but just as much impacted by by the definition of beauty that's out there. And he's literally passing on investing in my company because of it. And so it drove my deep why for like, why was building this company? And I took that rejection as fuel for like, oh, this has got to change, right?

• 14:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  And for me, it was like, let me build a company. Where we show all types of beauty where where where it wasn't even just about selling product. It wasn't about solving my own problems and even though I want to help millions of women and all that. The real why was like, can I shift culture and beauty? Um, for every little girl out there who's about to start doubting herself. And every grown person who still does. And so like that drive fueled it and not being afraid of rejection is so huge. And it's it's really huge for women because it it prevents a lot of people from even trying. And it hurts, it always sucks, it never feels fun.

• 14:49Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, but I got rejected so many times on this journey and to uh, finish this thought about how rejection is God's protection. So, so the day this dude tells me this, right? Uh, fast forward six years. And uh, the day that L'Oréal bought our business for one point two billion dollars cash. It was all over, it was, they had to announce it because they're a public company. So it was on the Wall Street Journal homepage, it was everywhere. And I got an email from him.

• 15:18Lewis Howes?

  Wow, what did he say?

• 15:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  I got an email, he said, congratulations, I'm so, so happy for you. Um, I was wrong. And uh,

• 15:25Lewis Howes?

  Had you stayed in touch in those six years?

• 15:27Jamie Kern Lima?

  Ha, uh, not with him, with everyone else that rejected me though, I did often. Because I was always like, it's going to be a yes, it's going to be a yes. Um, with him, here's, here's, and this was six years, right? Until this moment happened. But what I realized that day is when we talk about like rejection is is protection.

• 15:48Jamie Kern Lima?

  I was so desperate in those moments when I wanted him to invest that we probably would have sold him the majority of the company for like no money because he didn't believe in us. Two things, we found out we would have been his most successful investment in this firm's history, but then also like by the time, because he didn't believe in us and also we got a lot more rejection on the way. By the time that L'Oreal acquired our company, we were still the largest shareholders. So it was like, okay. So I was so glad he didn't believe in me then. But when rejection happens, it's not easy to see it in that moment. It always does hurt, but I always believe.

• 16:28Lewis Howes?

  I was gonna ask you, do you feel like if anyone would have said yes or invested or whatever from Hammer, anyone before that, do you think it would have been as successful if people did believe in you?

• 16:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  I mean, there were definitely people along the way that did believe. There were. I just believe in the timing of things and I believe in trusting our gut and going with our knowing, you know, with everything.

• 16:51Lewis Howes?

  And what if he would have said, yeah, I'm gonna give you a million dollars or whatever it is to invest and I'm gonna take this much equity. Do you think it would have been as successful of an exit or you think you would have been driven to serve more at a higher level with that support and with that backing? Or would it have made you more complacent in some ways during that process?

• 17:10Jamie Kern Lima?

  Right, having that. I don't know. I mean, I think the only thing that would have gotten in my way is if he owned the majority and wasn't a great partner. Because I wasn't driven by the money, like I wasn't. I was driven by, you know, what I'm, no I'm born capable of giving and also just I loved our mission. I knew what we were doing. We were shifting culture inside the beauty industry. And you know, there were a lot of people that believed in us along the way. And I mean, with L'Oreal, we got a champion inside of L'Oreal three years before we actually did the deal. And she kept wanting them to like, you know, she's like, look at what this brand's doing, look at this brand's doing. We would do meetings and get, they'd end in no. So it was, it was three years of, of that as well until they acquired us. But yeah, there were people that got it. And then,

• 17:56Jamie Kern Lima?

  A lot of us learn this lesson. Once we did get into all the retailers and started doing really well, um, then they all believe in you.

• 18:03Lewis Howes?

  Of course, yeah. Once you get results.

• 18:05Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. When you make people money, they like you.

• 18:07Lewis Howes?

  Of course. They want to be a part of your success.

• 18:09Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 18:10Lewis Howes?

  You know what's interesting? There's a meme online of a kid, uh, and it of a little child learning to walk. And it says something like, you know, when a child is learning to walk, they fall over hundreds of times. And they hit their head and they scrape their knee and they, you know, they cry and these things. But that no point do they think maybe this walking thing isn't for me. They, they don't say, I'm just gonna crawl for the next 80 years of my life and just crawl everywhere. They eventually keep getting up and, and they learn to walk. They balance, they hold on to something, right?

• 18:44Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 18:44Lewis Howes?

  You've got kids and so you've seen this firsthand. They never stop trying to walk. Why do you think we as adults stop trying to walk into our dreams or into opportunities? When we hit ourself one time, we fall one time. Why do you think we stop when as kids we never, we never did when we're learning to walk?

• 19:04Jamie Kern Lima?

  Mm-hmm. I think, uh, I've never answered this question before, so I'm just gonna pour it right out to you. My, my, like, how I really feel about that. I think kids have a knowing inside, an instinct. Uh, uh, they wanna walk and they just think that they're going to figure it out. They see people around them walking and they just do it. It's like a knowing. Um, and nothing's telling them not to trust themselves. And I think that as we grow up, I think that everything around us starts to tell us not to trust ourselves. Like, uh, self doubt is so huge. We get other, and, and just to use my own example, um, and some of the stories that I, that I share for the first time ever in the book is like, it's like when you're in the spot of, of every, all the experts telling you they don't believe in you. Or it could be other people's opinions, right, telling you they don't believe in you.

• 19:49Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, it could be literally no proof of your own dream or idea that it's gonna be successful, right? In those first three years of this journey of it cosmetics, there was no proof. It was like, like no signs, right? Other than, than women were starting to post their own befores and afters and spread the word online, which was great.

• 20:07Lewis Howes?

  You were getting some sales.

• 20:09Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, we were doing like two to three orders a day on our website.

• 20:12Lewis Howes?

  Were you doing like, uh, you know? Were you going and sharing, showing it in person at a live events? Were you doing QVC at this point?

• 20:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  No, no. So QVC was our big, big, big first yes. And probably the scariest, probably the biggest life and business decision, business lesson I've ever learned.

• 20:28Lewis Howes?

  When did that come? After three years?

• 20:30Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, after three years.

• 20:31Lewis Howes?

  So the first three years, were you going to grocery stores and?

• 20:33Jamie Kern Lima?

  I tried everything.

• 20:36Lewis Howes?

  Fairground?

• 20:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  Any trade show, anything online. We couldn't afford to advertise.

• 20:40Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 20:40Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, any different beauty event. I mean, we would, my friends and family would walk into any Ulta or Sephora and be like, and they knew they didn't carry them, but they'd be like, can I talk to the manager? Do you, do you carry it cosmetics? They're like, it what? They go, oh, it cosmetics is so good. And they would try to hustle for us.

• 20:57Lewis Howes?

  Very Sara Blakely-esque where her friends would go and like,

• 21:00Jamie Kern Lima?

  Oh, yeah.

• 21:01Lewis Howes?

  place orders and make it all, yeah, sell out.

• 21:04Jamie Kern Lima?

  It was, it was that. It was just trying to hustle. And, and the other thing is all the no's. Like every time Sephora or QVC or Ulta would say no, like that was one thing is that I didn't take it personal, right? That was one, I did a lot of things wrong. There was one thing I did right. And the second they would say no, you know, it hurt, it sucked, obviously. But it's like, okay, I would literally, Louis, I would decide to believe like it's gonna be a yes. And I behaved accordingly. Like I would say, okay, um, thank you, but one day it will be a yes. And I'm so excited for when that happens. And then what I would do is every time we get like a, um, press placement, or we would get, we would be launching a new product or whatever, I would send that buyer who kept saying no. And I'd be like, great news. We just got, you know, in this magazine or whatever.

• 21:48Jamie Kern Lima?

  And like, one day when your customers get to try this in their store, they're gonna love it. I think they probably thought I was crazy, but, um, I just decided to believe.

• 21:57Lewis Howes?

  You've gotta be relentless in following up too.

• 21:59Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 21:59Lewis Howes?

  You can't just hope that they find out about you. You've gotta constantly be following up the way you did, right?

• 22:05Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 22:05Lewis Howes?

  They weren't, they're not gonna look at the magazine and see it. They're not gonna see your sales numbers unless you tell them over and over again.

• 22:12Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. And I know you're big on LinkedIn and everything. I would literally scour LinkedIn for any person who worked at Sephora or Ulta or QVC.

• 22:21Lewis Howes?

  Find them and message them.

• 22:22Jamie Kern Lima?

  And then try to send them a sample. I mean, it was like everybody. It was, and we couldn't afford to hire anybody. So, so it got, we got so lean and so scrappy that like in the early years, uh, my middle name's Marie. And so Marie got her own email address. So Marie at cosmetics dot com was like head of customer service. And I would pitch all the, um, the good morning, America. I'd be like, our founder is available for, you know what I mean? It was just like hustling and trying to figure it out. And every time I would check in with my gut, though, no matter how many times I got knocked down, like I still, even though there's no proof around me, I still kept feeling like this was what I was supposed to do.

• 23:01Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, and I made the decision to trust it in through those years of no proof around me. And that's the hard thing. And I feel like when you talk about why does a little kid keep trying to walk? But why do most of us just give up? I feel like that we don't, I feel like so many people either have never heard their own gut or haven't heard it in a long time. And, and then sometimes we hear it and we don't trust ourselves, right? And instead of putting our own intuition on a pedestal, we put things like other people's opinions or what our partner is telling us to do, or our own self doubt, or what the experts are saying, or the lack of proof of success around us. And

• 23:46Lewis Howes?

  How do you think we learn to trust ourselves more?

• 23:49Jamie Kern Lima?

  I think that we have to want to. I think we have to make the decision that we need to want to. And that's hard because you know what? The truth is it's way easier to stay in our comfort zone. It's way easier to make the circle around us happy and comfy and not fearful. It's way easy and I think that chips away at our soul when we do that. I think every person knows, like I think we know deep down inside if we're, if we're created for more and we're supposed to give more, if we have more inside of us to give or to serve or to love or to live. I think we all know that deep down inside. And I think that if we don't do something about it, I think it chips away at our soul. And I think we end up literally talking ourselves out of our own truth and literally never becoming the person we're born to be.

• 24:32Jamie Kern Lima?

  I know that sounds dramatic, but I think it's true. And I think that What, I think that's the easy, easy route. Um, so I think the first thing is you have to want to.

• 24:43Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, absolutely. It's, you gotta take a lot of courage to overcome your fears and go into that stuff too. I'm curious, the first time going on QVC, what was that experience like for you? Were you, you felt like you had, okay, a few years of building confidence under your belt? Or were you extremely nervous right before that first experience?

• 25:01Jamie Kern Lima?

  Literally, everything was on the line in that, in that moment, and that's what made it hard. So you know how you can like know your values and know your why and know all these things? And you think you're gonna like stick by them and live them and then all of a sudden they're tested? I think like all of us have had that happen to us. And, um, the, you know, after, after three years of hearing no, we got one shot. We got a yes, and we got one shot on QVC. It's a crazy story. So I go into it in the book on how it happened and how we finally got the yes and all this stuff. But, uh, what it meant though was we had one shot in this 10 minutes.

• 25:37Lewis Howes?

  If it didn't sell, you're never coming back on.

• 25:38Jamie Kern Lima?

  You're never coming back. And it's live, so there's no script. And you know, QVC is, as you know, but maybe not everyone knows, it's a, it's a live television show, a television channel to broadcast to a hundred million homes. And, uh, and you have to like, you're measured in dollars per minute. And so their airtime, they don't have, it's not like a store where you walk in and you can see thousands of products. Only one product can be live on the air at that moment. So you're not just competing with, with beauty brands. You're competing, um, with, you know, Apple iPhone and Dyson vacuum and Vitamix, all the stuff to hit a certain sales. So we got one shot and 10 minutes. And it was a consignment deal.

• 26:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  So what that meant was we had to manufacture all the product, pay for it, et cetera, get it all shipped in there.

• 26:25Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, they don't buy any of it.

• 26:25Jamie Kern Lima?

  No, not in beauty, um, at the time. And then whatever, you know, and then if it didn't sell, we would take it all back without being paid, go out of business. And at the time, we were doing, just as you know, two to three orders a day on our website. And what I learned was, we'd have to sell over 6,000 units of our product in a 10-minute window to hit their sales goal or not come back. And so Paulo and I, together, and you know Paulo, which is why I say his name, applied for his 22 SBA loans and got rejected. It was the 23rd one in California, actually, that gave us a SBA loan, just to cover the cost of the inventory for this one shot on QVC. So, you should never accept a purchase order you can't afford to lose.

• 27:10Jamie Kern Lima?

  But at this point, three years in, it was like...

• 27:13Lewis Howes?

  It was like, make it or break it.

• 27:14Jamie Kern Lima?

  Make it or break it.

• 27:15Lewis Howes?

  We're going all in or we're dying on the sword.

• 27:17Jamie Kern Lima?

  Exactly. And so, we said yes, and did everything. We hired third-party consultants, and this is where everything I believed in, like, was put on the line. And they're awesome, and they help a lot of people, right? So, they help people sell in QVC and retail stores.

• 27:36Lewis Howes?

  They gave you a different strategy that wasn't what you wanted to do, probably.

• 27:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  Right, exactly. They all said...

• 27:41Lewis Howes?

  They're like, "This is what you need, and you need this perfect model, and they need to be speaking this way, they need to look a certain way."

• 27:46Jamie Kern Lima?

  Because that's what had always been done, and that's what had always worked. And so, they wanted the best for me. Like, they were smart and wanted me to win. And they're like, "Okay, here's what you need to do, you know, use models of perfect skin, all this." And I would say, "Okay, but, like, that's not why I created this. And what if, what if I..." And this was pre-Youtube exploding. So, I'm like, "What if I go on air and just take my makeup off, like, on live TV and show my rosacea? And what if I put, I'm gonna put models that all different ages and sizes, skin challenges, skin tones, everything." And they were mortified. Like, they're like...

• 28:20Lewis Howes?

  No, this isn't gonna work. You're gonna lose it all.

• 28:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  And I'd say, "Okay, but if I'm sitting at home, and I'm watching, and I don't see someone that looks like me, how do I know the product is gonna work for me?" But it's really hard when your gut is telling you one thing, experts are telling you another. It's like, I couldn't try it both ways. So, I flew out to QVC a week before our airing, our one-shot. And this might sound crazy to you, but I got a rental car. I sat all alone in the QVC parking lot for a week, every day, just like, watching the front door of the building, knowing the next time I go in, like, I'm either gonna walk out with... Out of business or with, you know, and I sat there and I prayed and I cried and it felt

• 29:07Jamie Kern Lima?

  really heavy, um, to be honest, because I didn't.

• 29:10Lewis Howes?

  It's a big moment.

• 29:11Jamie Kern Lima?

  A big moment because it was like, okay, I'm not nervous for TV, but it was like every, it felt like everything was on the line and I tried to imagine who my customer was, who was watching it, like, why am I doing what I'm doing, all these things. I remember at one point channeling Oprah, I was like, okay, I remember this time when Oprah was obsessed with the color purple, she told this story on her show, and she wanted it so bad that it consumed her and she ran around a track and just sang I Surrender All and asked God to take it from her because she just couldn't carry it herself. And I was like, okay, I'm gonna try that. So I sat in the car, like, literally singing I Surrender All and crying.

• 29:52Jamie Kern Lima?

  I tried, I also was imagining, uh, you might do this, uh, I was imagining like, okay, Olympians, I think that they imagine, like what happens.

• 30:02Lewis Howes?

  Visualize, yeah, yeah.

• 30:03Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and so I was visualizing the sold out sign coming up across the screen. I was, you know, all those things, I was sitting in the car, just doing everything that I could and, um, and I also just had this moment where I, I imagined this woman sitting at home, uh, and if I was gonna be blessed enough for her to turn her TV on for five seconds, like, what did I want to stand for, right? And I was like, okay, if she's gonna give me her precious time, even if she buys nothing, I'd rather her look at the TV and see me showing real women and calling them beautiful and meaning it, because you can't fake authenticity, meaning it. And I'd rather have her for a moment feel like she's seen and like she matters and sell nothing than, than stand for nothing and sell a shitload of product

• 30:48Jamie Kern Lima?

  and hit a sales goal. And so it was this moment where I just kinda knew. Um, but sometimes we know what the right thing is, but it's also the hard thing and it's scary.

• 30:58Lewis Howes?

  It's like being in the wrong relationship and your guts telling you get out. But everyone's like, oh, but they look great on paper or you know.

• 31:05Jamie Kern Lima?

  And my parents are happier.

• 31:06Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah, you're like, ah, but I'm torn.

• 31:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes, yes, I feel like everything comes down to our knowing and trusting in life. You know, and so many people like, oh, you, how do you sell your business for whatever billion dollars? Like, oh, no, that's not the victory. The victory is if we're trusting ourself and our knowing and where we're supposed to be on our journey. Do you know what I mean? Like, that's the victory. And it's like every time I don't do that, that's when I make big mistakes. And when I look back and that's when I stayed in wrong relationships. That's when I kept employees on too long. That's when all those things. Um, so I'm walking in the QC building and I go into the studio and there's uh, uh, cameras like we see right now. Um, I know that the second the on air light goes on.

• 31:53Lewis Howes?

  It's go time.

• 31:53Jamie Kern Lima?

  Live, yeah, go time.

• 31:55Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 31:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  Live to a hundred million homes and there's this 10 minute clock. Um, and here's, here's what I learned right before, okay? I learned, oh, you're not guaranteed 10 minutes.

• 32:06Lewis Howes?

  Oh, if it's not selling in five.

• 32:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yep.

• 32:08Lewis Howes?

  See ya.

• 32:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  See ya, so, so exactly. So you might be a minute or two in and if you're not in real time doing well, hitting the goals, it jumps. Like your clock might go from eight minutes, boom, you're down at two minutes and you're like, and you, and you, if you try to sell, nothing sells. You know what I mean? And it's just like.

• 32:25Lewis Howes?

  If you're forcing it, then people can feel it.

• 32:27Jamie Kern Lima?

  You can feel it and you can't, you cannot fake authenticity. That's the thing. So it was like, okay.

• 32:31Lewis Howes?

  How do you get sales in two minutes if they're not seeing sales when you haven't even told the story of the product?

• 32:36Jamie Kern Lima?

  I know, exactly. You have to be so just, I know, I know. And so, um, and I had prepared so hard for this, like I.

• 32:45Lewis Howes?

  Consultants taught you how to pitch and how to position and tell the story within a certain timeframe and everything.

• 32:50Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and I, and I literally thought, I walked in there thinking, okay, here's what I'm gonna say off the top. Here's how I'm gonna do this. And I didn't listen to consultants in terms of models. I'm like, I'm gonna show real women all those things. But I'm like, here's how I'm gonna, you know, do this demonstration on my wrist, all this stuff I had planned out. And then I did my host meeting a few minutes before the show. And she thanked me for my ideas and said, okay, but here's what we're gonna do. So literally scrapped everything.

• 33:13Lewis Howes?

  So we're not doing that?

• 33:14Jamie Kern Lima?

  Nope. And, and I had, in that moment, I had to trust her. But I also had to just, like, I, I know, but they're so good.

• 33:21Lewis Howes?

  They're pros.

• 33:22Jamie Kern Lima?

  They're such pros, yeah.

• 33:24Lewis Howes?

  So you had a co-host with you?

• 33:26Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, the QVC host, and then I'm the, um, I'm there with the product. Yeah, yeah, like the entrepreneur, the founder. And, um, and, and, and she was amazing and all that. And I just, but at that moment, like, the, the, I remember the 10 minute clock. And I remember it was like 9:59, 9:58. And I remember like feeling my heart racing.

• 33:47Lewis Howes?

  This is it.

• 33:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. And it's so gross, but I remember like sweat. I remember feeling sweat. And you would talk about how much we love Sara Blakely. I was wearing two pairs of Spanx and I remember feeling the sweat like dripping. I was like, okay, these Spanx are gonna save me, cuz it's not gonna come through my dress. Um, but then I also remember thinking like, I have to not make this about me or I'm done. So like, okay, this is about, how do I wanna shift culture and beauty? How, who is that woman watching? Like, how, if she's gonna bless me with her time, how am I gonna show up for her? And I remember, uh, this moment where my bare face came up on national TV. And then I remember walking to the models and I was shaking like a leaf. So I had planned this demonstration.

• 34:27Lewis Howes?

  Like a hundred times in the mirror.

• 34:28Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes, in the bathroom mirror.

• 34:29Lewis Howes?

  I'm gonna wipe this thing off, I'm gonna put this on, I'm gonna smile.

• 34:32Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes, and I, I was, it was so good in my bathroom mirror. And then, I'm trying to do this on national television, and this is my hand. Literally, and the host grabs it, and she's like, thank you, sugar. And she took over and we walked to all the models. And then I remember toward the very end of, I think it was like a minute left, and she's like, the deep shade is sold out, or the tan shade's almost gone, something like that.

• 34:53Lewis Howes?

  What?

• 34:54Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and I was like, and then I remember at the 10 minute mark, the sold out sign came up across the screen, just like I had envisioned it in the car, in the parking lot. The sold out sign came up, I started crying.

• 35:04Lewis Howes?

  Like I imagine.

• 35:05Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and they cut, and I see Paulo coming, running, my husband, coming, running through the double doors at the studio. And I'm like sobbing, I'm like, real women have spoken. And he's like, he's like, we're not going back, right? And it was just like, and I was just like, ah, and that. About one airing turned into five that year and then one next year and then we did

• 35:26Lewis Howes?

  A hundred?

• 35:27Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and we did over 250 live shows a year for eight years. Yes, I did over a thousand live QVC shows myself, but we also built the largest beauty brand in QVC's history and it is right now at this moment that you and I are talking. It's right now still our largest beauty brand in QVC's history and I only share that because it was three years of them saying, "No, you're not the right fit," all those things, right? So it's like, at the end of the day, like, nobody can tell you you're not the right fit.

• 35:53Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, and you also gotta know the timing of, maybe if you'd done it three years earlier, you wouldn't have been ready.

• 35:58Jamie Kern Lima?

  Oh, totally.

• 35:59Lewis Howes?

  Maybe if you're pitching it, you would've bombed and you would've never had another chance. You never would've had another chance and you would've been done. So sometimes, the delayed of people saying no is good for you to figure out, okay, how can I become better?

• 36:12Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes.

• 36:13Lewis Howes?

  How can I be prepared? How can I sell more? How can I do these other things? So that's what I think we gotta think about as well is, you know, how are we going to set ourselves up for something when someone says no?

• 36:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and to not be afraid of it.

• 36:24Lewis Howes?

  Exactly.

• 36:25Jamie Kern Lima?

  I mean, to not be afraid of rejection, to not be afraid of doing it, you know, imperfectly, any of that stuff. It's so important. Oh, my gosh, if I ever got afraid of, it never was easy, but if I ever got afraid of rejection, I would've, I would've been done. Like, done. Would've never, hopefully had, you know, I hope I had an impact on the beauty industry. That would've never happened. I would've never built a billion dollar business. You know what I mean? I think it's huge. And I think it comes down to this, is like, just really trusting your knowing. You know what I mean? Every time somebody hurt me or said no or whatever, I would go back and be like, okay, another expert said no. Like, is this, am I wrong? Is my gut wrong? Right?

• 37:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  We start to, but every time I would get still and just know. And, you know, for me, it's how, I've never heard God talk to me, but like, I feel, for me, it's faith is part of that. I hear it through my intuition. For other people, it's the universe. Like, it's, it's everything and I just think, you know, you mentioned relationships. I think that we all know if we're in the right relationship, like

• 37:32Lewis Howes?

  In our gut, we know.

• 37:33Jamie Kern Lima?

  In our gut, we know. And I mean, there, I don't think I have a single girlfriend in my life, including myself, who hasn't gone through a relationship where you know, he's like sketchy, you know, and you know, and you're like, oh, maybe his phone did break for three days, maybe, like, you know, it didn't break, you know.

• 37:54Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 37:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  We all know. And I just think that we start to turn up the volume on all this noise in our life, how busy we are, other people's opinions, what our inner circles say, all the things, and we like, we have the mute button on our own gut, and it goes on for so long that we start to not learn how to hear it. And so, you know, for me, and it, and it's not, and I believe everyone has a knowing, and I believe it's always right, and I think that like, learning how to listen to it, how to trust it is a journey. It's a process.

• 38:28Lewis Howes?

  I'm curious about, uh,

• 38:30Jamie Kern Lima?

  Do you do that in life, though, like with people, with friendships? Do you feel a knowing?

• 38:33Lewis Howes?

  No, I feel, yeah.

• 38:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  You feel it, right?

• 38:35Lewis Howes?

  It's usually pretty quick for me, uh, you know, it's an intuition. But I'm also, I also research people pretty extensively, and I look at everything. I look at things that they don't even think I might be looking at, and

• 38:49Lewis Howes?

  I'd learn a lot about people by doing research. So, before I even speak to them, I'll kind of get a gut instinct. And then, they really need to show me, whether convince me that I'm right or convincing that I'm wrong, within connecting with them. And sometimes, I've been wrong, very few, maybe two or three times out of thousands of people, where I was like, oh, the things I saw about them, you know, I prejudged them in a way that wasn't accurate. And I took responsibility for that. But, uh, most of the time, you can get a sense from people, whether you watch a couple of videos, or just see what they're sharing, or how they communicate. So...

• 39:26Jamie Kern Lima?

  It's funny, I just get a feeling.

• 39:28Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, me too.

• 39:29Jamie Kern Lima?

  Cause you know, I've met so many people that are amazing on video, and then I just get a feeling, and I'm like, okay, you know, and...

• 39:34Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. Do I want them in my life that much? Yeah.

• 39:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  Well, and I just think that, you know, listen, I think every single one of us... You know, has miscalculations and misjudgments and makes mistakes and all that. And I just, I don't believe we're our mistakes. I believe we're our intentions.

• 39:51Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 39:51Jamie Kern Lima?

  You know?

• 39:52Lewis Howes?

  Absolutely. We can shift our intentions in any moment.

• 39:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, yeah, for sure.

• 39:56Lewis Howes?

  I'm curious about, a personal question. Have you felt more self-doubt before QVC or right now?

• 40:12Jamie Kern Lima?

  Before QVC, but I still feel it now.

• 40:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 40:16Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, it's still a journey. You know, I think that there's so many areas in my life I've figured out how to like, you know, overcome it, how to turn down the volume on it, how to believe in myself. And I try to apply those all the time. There's, there's, it's a lifelong journey. You know, for me of, of believing where I come from doesn't determine where I'm going. Of turning down like the, the volume on past mistakes or on miscalculations or that kind of thing. And, um, you know, believing that, you know. I, I think at the end of the day, I think all of us, no matter where we're at in life, on a journey of it. Do you know what I mean?

• 40:59Lewis Howes?

  Of course.

• 40:59Jamie Kern Lima?

  You know, um, one thing that happened to me that I share in the book for the first time, with Oprah's blessing. She read it, she read it cover to cover. She blessed what I shared in the book. But having said that, I, I talk about, you know, the first time I ever met her. And then I talk about having lunch with her for the first time at her house. Just one-on-one, me and her, and...

• 41:20Lewis Howes?

  So I was there the day you met her, right?

• 41:21Jamie Kern Lima?

  You were there.

• 41:22Lewis Howes?

  First time. We were at an event. And you met her, I didn't meet her. But what was that like for you?

• 41:27Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, I mean, from the time I was a little girl, sitting in my living room, right? I would sit in my living room watching Oprah every day, Monday through Friday. And her sharing her vulnerability, her sharing her...

• 41:42Jamie Kern Lima?

  You know, all the parts of her, not just, not just the perfect part, right? All the parts, like, she was my mentor who I'd never met. You know what I mean? Like, she helped me believe, like, oh, maybe my dreams are possible. Like, my whole life. So, I don't get starstruck. And with, with, um, it cosmetics, you know, and growing, and then especially the L'Oréal acquisition, you know, you have a lot of celebrities that want deals. They want makeup deals. So, so, be, just because of that, you, you meet, you meet so many. So, it's, I never, I think everyone's human. I think we all have the same doubts, same fears, same insecurities.

• 42:18Lewis Howes?

  Are they gonna like me? Do they see me? Do they think I'm interesting?

• 42:22Jamie Kern Lima?

  We're all the same. So, I knew all that, right? Um, and so, the day that I met Oprah was at that event in L.A. And, uh, and, uh, it was a surprise. I didn't know it was happening. Um, it's a long story. So, I go into how it happened in the book, too. Uh, but I ended up going to, into her green room. Uh, it was just me and her. And I had never met her. And she's like, Miss Kern! And I'm like, freaking out. I was so out of my body in that thing. I literally just prayed for the right words. And all I could say was like, can you let me know if I can ever be of service to you? Like, I didn't know what, like, I didn't, it was, it was, it's a whole thing. And after I met her, I went and spent, like, three days writing an email to her.

• 43:06Jamie Kern Lima?

  Like, how do I even? And so, I talk about this whole process and talk about the whole thing. And I ended up getting invited to lunch at her house. And so, we-

• 43:14Lewis Howes?

  One-on-one, or a small group?

• 43:15Jamie Kern Lima?

  One-on-one. Yeah, I didn't know until I showed up. But I spent days, like, looking at all the things I was gonna, like, how do you bring her a hot, like, a-

• 43:25Lewis Howes?

  A gift.

• 43:25Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 43:26Lewis Howes?

  A woman who has it all.

• 43:26Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, yeah. And so, I won't give it up, but what I brought her is so crazy. It's so crazy. Um, and it'll make everyone who reads it feel-

• 43:36Lewis Howes?

  And you get a car.

• 43:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  No, I know. I was like, how do you bring? And anyhow, after the day we had lunch, we spent a few hours together. And again, only sharing this because she is blessed it. She read the book cover to cover and gave me her blessing to share this story. But I left her house and as I was leaving, she gave me her cell phone number. And she said, you know, here's my number. Call me anytime.

• 43:57Lewis Howes?

  You put the number in the book?

• 44:00Jamie Kern Lima?

  Oh, my gosh. No. No, but she's.

• 44:03Lewis Howes?

  It's on page 100.

• 44:05Jamie Kern Lima?

  And this is recent, right? So she says, she says, well, within the past couple of years, she said, you can call me anytime. Like, call me anytime. And I was like, thank you. And we did a video and all these things. To this day, Louis.

• 44:16Lewis Howes?

  You never called her?

• 44:18Jamie Kern Lima?

  I text her. I email her.

• 44:21Lewis Howes?

  I would never call either.

• 44:22Jamie Kern Lima?

  Really? Okay. Help me figure this out.

• 44:24Lewis Howes?

  I would have already texted and just been like, hey, what can I do for you? How can I serve, you know?

• 44:29Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, it's, well, and I realized, so, so, you know, if I have like a, a, a show. So I did, I did a show with her friend Gail and all the, and I'll ask her for feedback or this or that. And, and she's like, do you want the truth? And I'm like, yeah, please. And, and I'll text her, I'll call. But every time I, or I text her and I email her, but every time I want to share something with her, even just anything, I don't call. I have a call to this day.

• 44:58Lewis Howes?

  I know.

• 44:58Jamie Kern Lima?

  And I was trying to figure out, why haven't I?

• 45:01Lewis Howes?

  Why haven't you?

• 45:02Jamie Kern Lima?

  Like, I'm the person that literally in my heart and soul managed to go from Denny's waitress to billionaire entrepreneur, because I learned to believe in myself and believe I belong in the room and, and overcome rejection, overcome fear, but I am still a work in progress, right? And I'm like, I'm not calling Oprah because at a deep, deep, deep, deep, deep level, I still don't think my vibration is high enough to like be with hers. And I know that's a lie. I know it's a lie.

• 45:28Lewis Howes?

  You've never called her?

• 45:29Jamie Kern Lima?

  Never called her. I know.

• 45:31Lewis Howes?

  You should call her right now.

• 45:31Jamie Kern Lima?

  Oh, my gosh. I know, but.

• 45:33Lewis Howes?

  You should call her right now. You should. I think it'd be possible to see if she picks up. Just say, hey, I appreciate you. That's it. Don't ask for anything. Just call her and see if you want to.

• 45:45Jamie Kern Lima?

  See, if I do it, it needs to feel like it's the exact-

• 45:49Lewis Howes?

  Do it when you feel ready. Yeah, yeah. But I'm throwing it out there, throwing it out there, just to tell her what you appreciate.

• 45:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  Do you have these moments? Because I think maybe people, and by the way, I know, literally, I know, anytime we feel like we're not worthy of being in the room with someone else, of being at their level, it's a lie we're telling ourselves. I know that, right? And even for me, it's still a work in progress for everything. And I was like ashamed and embarrassed when I realized why I hadn't called her. Do you know what I mean? And like, I'm the best freaking friend and I'm, right? Like, I wouldn't have written a word unless she had blessed it in the book. Like, I'm so loyal to people. So it's like, you know what I mean?

• 46:31Lewis Howes?

  She told you to call.

• 46:32Jamie Kern Lima?

  I know.

• 46:33Lewis Howes?

  Couple of years ago, right?

• 46:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes.

• 46:35Lewis Howes?

  On your drive home, if you're tired, and just say, "Hey, I was just thinking about you and appreciate you." You know, don't ask for anything, just say, "Hey, just wanted to see how you're doing. I appreciate you."

• 46:44Jamie Kern Lima?

  Is there anything you're afraid of, where you haven't done like that, you haven't done it yet?

• 46:47Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 46:48Jamie Kern Lima?

  Would you call her?

• 46:51Lewis Howes?

  You know, I'm the type of guy that, I'm similar to you, but not because I wouldn't call her, just be, I have friends who I know are so busy, or extremely successful, and I just see how busy they are, that I don't want to bother calling them, that I'll just text them or send them a voice message, or a video message. Say, "Hey, I'm here for you. If you need anything, let me know."

• 47:10Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 47:10Lewis Howes?

  And it's just, I know they're easier to respond over text, and maybe they would pick up or not, but it's just a-

• 47:17Jamie Kern Lima?

  What are areas you have doubt, based on what you've had and stuff? Have you like mastered it all?

• 47:23Lewis Howes?

  No, I haven't mastered anything, I don't think. That's why I'm always learning, but things I doubt. Before I answer that, I want to make sure I close the loop on Oprah, and then I'll answer that question. What is the greatest advice she has taught you, from the first time you met her till now?

• 47:42Jamie Kern Lima?

  So her advice was Maya Angelou's advice, uh, which she shared over and over. She said she's learned this lesson a few times, which is, you know, when people show you who they are, believe them the first time. Which is Maya's words and it's, it's actually something so hard to do. You know, I go into the book, in my book about a lot of stuff from being like the rug being pulled out from underneath me, learning I was adopted in my late twenties by surprise. There's so many things I go into this book on about how to handle when they happen in our personal lives and in relationships and all that.

• 48:15Lewis Howes?

  You didn't know you were adopted until you were in your twenties?

• 48:17Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, until my late twenties. I found out by accident. Yeah. And then I went on a five year search of trying to find my birth mom. And so it was like five years of thousands of women, calling thousands of women by this name. Yeah. And I go in and I feel like, you know.

• 48:30Lewis Howes?

  Did you ever meet your mom?

• 48:31Jamie Kern Lima?

  Uh, I have, and then that's a whole thing. I know you're, I think you're halfway through the book, right? Yeah. Yeah. There's some stuff in there and I share it. I've never, there's ninety-five percent of this book is stuff I've never shared before. Personal lessons, professional lessons.

• 48:48Lewis Howes?

  What was the first thing you said to your mom? Your birth mom?

• 48:51Jamie Kern Lima?

  It's a story, Louis. You have to like, the first thing that happens after five years of searching for her. Yeah. After five years of searching for her and watching the adoption shows where people go running to each other, like in the wheat fields.

• 49:02Lewis Howes?

  That's not happening. That didn't happen.

• 49:04Jamie Kern Lima?

  I dreamed, it didn't happen. I, I, I, um, when I finally found her and reached out to her via email, um, I was getting her info finally. It's a long story. So I share how it happened in the book.

• 49:16Lewis Howes?

  You emailed her?

• 49:17Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, I emailed her and the day I did, everything disappeared. Her social media, everything was gone.

• 49:23Lewis Howes?

  Shut up. So you were, you followed her. You could see her stuff online, Facebook or wherever it was.

• 49:29Jamie Kern Lima?

  Within twenty-four hours of finding her, I found out everything, gone.

• 49:32Lewis Howes?

  Like LinkedIn, Facebook, whatever, Twitter.

• 49:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 49:34Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 49:35Jamie Kern Lima?

  And I didn't know why. When was this?

• 49:38Lewis Howes?

  How old were you?

• 49:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  In my thirties.

• 49:40Lewis Howes?

  Thirties, wow.

• 49:41Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 49:42Lewis Howes?

  Couple of years ago, right?

• 49:42Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. And so I, um, and so at the time, it felt like she gave me up again.

• 49:48Lewis Howes?

  Oh, man.

• 49:49Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. And I talk about that process of, um,

• 49:54Jamie Kern Lima?

  And it's it's a it's a it's a beautiful story, though, that's still unfolding right now. And I talk about how we mend relationships in our lives and how we handle things when people when we feel, because you know, I my parents who raised me didn't ever want me to know and so.

• 50:10Lewis Howes?

  Did you feel abandoned by them by never telling you?

• 50:12Jamie Kern Lima?

  A little bit. I also I also felt like it was like the rug just got pulled out from underneath me and I went on this journey of like, who am I?

• 50:18Lewis Howes?

  Like living a lie.

• 50:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 50:20Lewis Howes?

  They weren't being.

• 50:20Jamie Kern Lima?

  Exactly.

• 50:21Lewis Howes?

  I understand they're trying to protect you or whatever, but it's like eventually you'd find out, right?

• 50:25Jamie Kern Lima?

  I mean, I don't know. I mean, now with twenty three and me, it's like, but yeah. I mean, yeah, they never it was a total accident. So I talk about that process, too, of like, how do you handle that when somebody? Like, I love my mom who raised me more than anyone on the planet. And that's who I thought was the closest person to me in my life. I mean, she still is, but how do you? What do you do when you feel like someone betrays you? And so it was it was been a it's been a journey. There's so much in this book. That's why I was laughing in the beginning. I'm like, oh, you're you're halfway through. Okay, get ready.

• 50:54Lewis Howes?

  Have you felt like you've? I guess healed that part of your past from your?

• 51:01Lewis Howes?

  The your mother that raised you?

• 51:03Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 51:04Lewis Howes?

  And, yeah, I mean.

• 51:06Jamie Kern Lima?

  I think that anytime we face abandonment of any type, I think that it's a life journey of figuring out how it's showing up, right? And so it's interesting, like on my journey, if I were to say my biggest weakness, and I built a cosmetics over a thousand employees. My biggest weakness was not firing people soon enough.

• 51:25Lewis Howes?

  So hard.

• 51:26Jamie Kern Lima?

  Because I didn't want to abandon them. Even when they mistreated me in some cases. Um, it's hard, right? Um, and I kept toxic people around in relationships or in friendships or in my company. Because I didn't want to abandon them. So it's like, I'm aware of it. Our stuff always shows up, right? And then we work through it. Um, it's hard. It's hard. Um, yeah. Yeah, this is a book.

• 51:54Lewis Howes?

  Do you feel like you're still recovering from all that? Or do you feel like it's?

• 51:59Jamie Kern Lima?

  I do.

• 52:00Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 52:00Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. I think it's a lifelong journey. Yeah. Yeah, I'm working hard on boundaries on, on, you know, it's, um, yeah.

• 52:09Lewis Howes?

  So you've been in touch with your biological mom many times?

• 52:13Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 52:14Lewis Howes?

  You still have a relationship?

• 52:15Jamie Kern Lima?

  We do now. We do now.

• 52:17Lewis Howes?

  It's like a once a month you talk. It's every once in a while.

• 52:20Jamie Kern Lima?

  She was on FaceTime this morning with my daughter.

• 52:22Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 52:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  Mm-hmm.

• 52:23Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 52:24Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. Yeah, and we're building it. And here's the thing is like, we never know what someone else is walking through, right? We just never, right? And it's like even with our own friends and family sometimes, even when we think we really know them. And so this has been a journey of like getting to know each other from scratch and me understanding all of her decisions and, um...

• 52:45Lewis Howes?

  Do you understand them? Or is it?

• 52:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  More. More now. I do. Um, I do. Yeah. And, and you know, it's, it's also...

• 52:54Lewis Howes?

  Maybe you wouldn't make those choices, but...

• 52:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  You said something, was it, um, Louis, you said something that's so powerful about forgiveness, right? It's like when we, when we don't forgive, it's like we're just hurting ourselves, right? What are the words you use are so good. It was recent I heard you say it.

• 53:07Lewis Howes?

  I mean, I don't know if it's my quote, but I've heard so many different things about forgiveness. I mean, it's like, um, holding on to resentment and not forgiving is like drinking poison in someone else expecting to, to feel the pain or to, or to be hurt or to die. You know, it's like when you're resenting someone or angry at someone you haven't forgiven, it's like you're drinking the poison.

• 53:29Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes.

• 53:30Lewis Howes?

  Hoping they feel that pain. But you're the one who's suffering.

• 53:33Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 53:33Lewis Howes?

  They're often doing whatever they want to do in their life.

• 53:36Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 53:36Lewis Howes?

  Your biological mom, you know, was off doing whatever and was hoping that you had the best life, I'm assuming, but...

• 53:41Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. And believed she made the right decision.

• 53:44Lewis Howes?

  Of course. In her, in her mind, she was right.

• 53:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 53:48Lewis Howes?

  You know, with her story and her life situation, she was probably right.

• 53:52Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 53:53Lewis Howes?

  In her mind, so...

• 53:54Jamie Kern Lima?

  For sure.

• 53:55Lewis Howes?

  You have to get into that frame. It may not seem right.

• 53:57Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 53:58Lewis Howes?

  But you have to get in that person's perspective and you may not agree with it, but that's what it is.

• 54:03Jamie Kern Lima?

  And forgiving is the only way to be free. You know, it's the only way. It's hard.

• 54:07Lewis Howes?

  Do you feel like you've fully forgiven everyone in your past?

• 54:11Lewis Howes?

  Biological parents for not telling you the truth.

• 54:13Jamie Kern Lima?

  I think so. I mean.

• 54:14Lewis Howes?

  I mean, I mean, parents who raised you not telling the truth, biological mom abandoning you or whatever it may be.

• 54:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, there's, you know, my, my mom who gave me up for adoption. She was with my dad one time ever. Um, uh, one night and they were in college, actually. And it's interesting because I, I grew up with a family where no one had gone to college. So I always thought my whole life I was the first person in my family and all that. And my birth mom did go to college and it was her. Um, and my birth father and they were together one time ever. Um, and he doesn't know. Uh, and, and she can't remember his name.

• 54:48Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 54:49Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. And so.

• 54:49Lewis Howes?

  So you don't know your birth dad either?

• 54:50Jamie Kern Lima?

  I don't know him yet.

• 54:51Lewis Howes?

  Shut up.

• 54:52Jamie Kern Lima?

  And so I talk about, yeah, one of the things I talk about in this book is, um, what happens when you don't know where you come from.

• 54:59Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my God. There's no certainty.

• 55:00Jamie Kern Lima?

  There's no certainty. Um, and I had a really big spiritual moment and, you know, I talk a lot also in the book about my whole journey of being raised with faith and then going through a season, a lot, multi-year season of God doubt. Um, and, and how.

• 55:16Lewis Howes?

  What are you, you're talking about self doubt, body doubt, God doubt?

• 55:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. Yeah. And I kind of go there and, you know, it's, um, it's been a journey. So, but, you know, I, I, I, I believe. I trust, I trust in, in our journey that, you know what I mean? I think we're all.

• 55:36Lewis Howes?

  So your birth mom doesn't remember who he is.

• 55:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  Right. She doesn't remember his name.

• 55:40Lewis Howes?

  And have you been able to trace back DNA?

• 55:43Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, it's, it's, I'm in the process. So I've done 23andMe ancestry. I'm sure it's a matter of time before it happens.

• 55:50Lewis Howes?

  This is crazy.

• 55:50Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, but so far, no, I haven't found him. And, uh, but I have this big epiphany. I mean, this like true knowing. Uh, one night when, because Louis, like I go through, you're probably this way too, just looking at the business you've built and everything that you're doing with school greatness and everything is like when I'm into something, I'm like all in.

• 56:07Lewis Howes?

  Obsessive.

• 56:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  Obsessive, right?

• 56:09Lewis Howes?

  I gotta find you.

• 56:11Jamie Kern Lima?

  So like my husband would get worried about me because I'd be up all night searching for my birth dad. Yeah. And this has gone on for years.

• 56:18Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 56:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  Every time I see someone on television that I think they look like me, I'll Google him and see, did he go to this school or did he? All those things and, um. And it's gone on for years. And I had this big moment, like no, this deep knowing that is not going to make sense to a lot of people, but it, but it will to some. Where I realized, like, oh, I actually know who my dad is, like, like, like, how do I say this the right way? I know God is my father, so I know my father.

• 56:47Lewis Howes?

  Sure.

• 56:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  Do you know what I mean? And so at this point, it's just like, okay, who's my dad on earth? And I bet you I'll find him too. Um, and, uh, yeah, so, so.

• 56:58Lewis Howes?

  This is crazy.

• 56:59Jamie Kern Lima?

  The book is crazy. It's, it's a, it's a lot. It's stuff I've never shared. And I think sometimes, you know, what I realize is for, for 10 years, I've done all this stuff with it cosmetics and been the first woman to hold a CEO title in L'Oreal's 100 plus year history, all these things. But, but sometimes when we're doing this role, um, I don't want to say we hide behind it. What I, what I realize is like, if I don't share all of these things, then someone else going through them, who doesn't know how to get through them.

• 57:28Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 57:29Jamie Kern Lima?

  May feel alone.

• 57:31Lewis Howes?

  Struggle more, yeah.

• 57:31Jamie Kern Lima?

  Struggle more or any of that. So it's, yeah.

• 57:34Lewis Howes?

  I have so many questions. I'm curious. Did you, did you connect with your mom, your biological mother when you were before it cosmetics or in the process of it or?

• 57:43Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, we had launched it, but we're having no success.

• 57:46Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 57:46Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. Yeah. So I met her before that big moment on QVC.

• 57:50Lewis Howes?

  Did you ever think maybe one time, like, this is going to be so successful that my dad's going to find out about me and approach me? And reach out to me?

• 57:59Jamie Kern Lima?

  I have those thoughts. I had those thoughts, like, you know, going on QVC, I did over a thousand live shows and, you know, even now, if I'll, if I do like a big keynote at an event where there's like a hundred thousand people and that, you know what I mean? I think that, I think what if he actually knows of me, but has no idea I'm his daughter?

• 58:16Lewis Howes?

  That's crazy, isn't it? Oh my gosh, that'd be nuts.

• 58:20Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. Yeah, and so I'm just trying to trust. I mean, I still obsessively search. I still all those things and have done the 23andMe.

• 58:29Lewis Howes?

  There's no link yet to someone else in 23andMe?

• 58:31Jamie Kern Lima?

  No, it's the craziest thing. There's like fourth cousin, like, I don't know if you've done it before, the 23andMe?

• 58:36Lewis Howes?

  I have, yeah.

• 58:36Jamie Kern Lima?

  Okay, so you know how you get the DNA relatives? And there's like 70,000 people that are your third or fourth cousin, where it's so difficult, but on the highest one, where you're really like, really connected, I have all these people on my mom's side, but on my birth dad's side, it's all the third or fourth cousins, thousands of them still.

• 58:54Lewis Howes?

  Oh my gosh.

• 58:54Jamie Kern Lima?

  So I'm waiting.

• 58:55Lewis Howes?

  Waiting for him to do the test.

• 58:56Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, or somebody related to him and like, uh, cause it could be a sibling or, you know, yeah.

• 59:03Lewis Howes?

  Another child or whatever. This is crazy.

• 59:06Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 59:07Lewis Howes?

  Gosh, that'd be so nuts.

• 59:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 59:09Lewis Howes?

  I want to hear how this story ends.

• 59:11Jamie Kern Lima?

  Okay, keep me updated.

• 59:12Lewis Howes?

  But that's good. Your mom, your biological mom was in your life. Now, is your, the mother that raised you and your biological mom, did they connect?

• 59:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 59:19Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 59:20Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, so, um...

• 59:21Lewis Howes?

  Did they know each other when?

• 59:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  No, so they've never, they had never spoken.

• 59:25Lewis Howes?

  They've never met?

• 59:26Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and it's a journey. Like, I, I learned, um...

• 59:29Lewis Howes?

  So she had you and it's like, two days later, someone comes?

• 59:33Jamie Kern Lima?

  Mm-hmm.

• 59:33Lewis Howes?

  That is crazy.

• 59:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, my parents got me.

• 59:35Lewis Howes?

  And they never met each other?

• 59:36Jamie Kern Lima?

  They never met each other. And it was private and, and my birth mom had used a different name on all the paperwork, which is why it took me so many years to eventually find her. Um, but eventually they met and the three of us met and my birth mom brought, um, three bracelets, kind of like Wonder Woman style gold bracelets.

• 59:52Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 59:52Jamie Kern Lima?

  One for me, one for her, one for my mom, and they had belonged to her mom, um, who had passed away. And it was beautiful. My, my mom who raised me, um, you know, I had, I was worried, would she be okay that I found my birth mom? All those things. And my mom who raised me thanked, thanked, uh, my birth mom, Rosemary, when she met her and just said like, "Thank you for giving me the best gift that's ever happened to me."

• 1:00:14Lewis Howes?

  Oh man.

• 1:00:15Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and we were just sobbing. And so, it is, is beautiful, you know? And, I mean, I'm glad I didn't give up, cause it was, you know, five years, it was, and listen, like, when you get a phone call and someone's like... Hi, do you, right, it's like you think it's a telemarketer and you hang up. And so it was like five years of me calling, you know, tens of thousands of women with like either a similar first name to the paperwork or similar last name and just getting hung up on for, for five years.

• 1:00:37Lewis Howes?

  Why would you ask them?

• 1:00:38Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, hi, um, is your name Rosemary? Like, is this Rosemary? Oh, I, I have a relative, it could be all different things, but like, I'm looking for a relative of mine actually named Rosemary and da, da, da. Like, it was like click, click, click, like, you know, I tried all different stuff. And the, the part that I never knew was, was one of those women who hung up on me, her.

• 1:00:56Lewis Howes?

  It was her?

• 1:00:57Jamie Kern Lima?

  It wasn't, but like, I didn't know, but like every moment for five years, it was like, is this person who's about to answer gonna be my mom?

• 1:01:04Lewis Howes?

  How did you finally, did she pick up or did you found her on social media or something?

• 1:01:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  I, I, there's a search agent, so there's a television show, right? Yeah, television show.

• 1:01:13Lewis Howes?

  An FBI agent who could find someone?

• 1:01:15Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes, and so, so Paulo i- is like, can I submit your, I didn't even know he, cause we have, my husband and I total opposite television.

• 1:01:22Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 1:01:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  Like, nothing in common, right? You would like, like you and him are, like, he's like, UFC this, da, da, da, da. Um, and I'm like, oh, it's on The Bachelor and like, you know what I mean? Anyways, um, anyways, so, so I didn't even realize he knew I was watching these adoption shows. Like, I DVR all of them and whatever. And so, uh, there was one where, uh, it was called The Locator, I believe. And anyways, he wrote into the show, he said, can I write your story into the show? And I go, yeah, of course, you know, and he wrote in and they didn't pick me for the show. But they, but then a, a search agency called and said, you know, for a fee, we can write, search for it. And I thought, oh, what a scam, like, they, right? But it wasn't, it ended up not being, yeah.

• 1:02:02Lewis Howes?

  How long did it take him, like, a week?

• 1:02:04Jamie Kern Lima?

  Couple of weeks. And I'd been searching five years.

• 1:02:06Lewis Howes?

  Oh, man, she'd just be like, oh, I would've paid this right away.

• 1:02:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  And, and, and like as a journalist, I know how to find everything. But because the, her name wasn't the right name, they were able to trace all kinds of stuff back and, and actually, mm-hmm, yeah.

• 1:02:21Lewis Howes?

  This is fascinating.

• 1:02:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  I feel like Louis, I feel like every, every person though has situations in life where we feel like somebody we trust pulls the rug out from underneath us and it could even just be a relationship, someone we're dating, or a friend, someone we're friends with 20 years and they betray us and we all have these situations and so I felt like sharing what happened and like how I got through it and just all the things. You know, I think that, I think that we all share this journey together, you know what I mean? And we're all connected.

• 1:02:54Lewis Howes?

  Absolutely.

• 1:02:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:56Lewis Howes?

  What do you want people to know about exiting your dream, making it successful, having a big exit, over a billion dollars, being on the Forbes list, and having this kind of, you know, mark of success? What do you want people to know about what life is like when you create that for yourself? Is it everything's easy and perfect? What are the other challenges that come with this success and the financial abundance and the credibility? Is there different challenges you face now? What, what is that like? For people that are wanting to create that for themselves, they see your story, they know your journey, and they want to create that for their dream, what do they need to know that's on the other side?

• 1:03:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  I think that, I believe it's possible for people to accomplish their dreams. I think if they make that decision that it is, I think that, Ed Mylett, I believe, said this famous saying that when you eventually arrive at a destination, you still bring you with you, right? And it's easy to always hear people say things like that, like, "Oh, money can't buy happiness, this, that." You're like, "Yeah, it would for me." You think those things, right? You're like, "Whatever." Right? You hear all those things, but it's all true. It's like wherever, whatever big goal you accomplish, you still bring you with you.

• 1:04:22Lewis Howes?

  Your crap.

• 1:04:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  Right? Your crap, your insecurities, your, your same family, your, I mean, people can change their family, but you're still you, right? It's like you bring you with you. And so... Yeah, some of it's so fun and you know, and you have this same journey too where you are in situations or experiences that are different than where you were raised.

• 1:04:44Lewis Howes?

  Absolutely.

• 1:04:45Jamie Kern Lima?

  Right, like some of the things I've had the blessing of being part of and are nothing like how I was raised and those are fun and amazing and yet I still bring me with me, right? And so like to me, that's the journey for all of us. It's not, oh, can I sell my company for a billion dollars or oh, can I get 50 billion zillion downloads, all the things, right? It's like on this journey, like who am I? And am I stepping into all of who I am? And am I learning to trust myself? And am I learning, right, to become the person I'm born to be? Like that's a victory. It's never, because the accomplishments don't change any, like you know what I mean? You still, to use those words, you still bring you with you.

• 1:05:30Jamie Kern Lima?

  So.

• 1:05:32Lewis Howes?

  What's it been like for you then? What's been the biggest challenge to, I guess, overcome since exiting and being where you're at?

• 1:05:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:40Lewis Howes?

  That you didn't overcome during that 10-year journey?

• 1:05:44Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, I mean, most of my friends are still the same.

• 1:05:48Lewis Howes?

  That's good.

• 1:05:48Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, still the same. I didn't know that the exit would be public. We knew like two days before that they would announce the purchase price. And when that happened, everything changed. So, meaning, you know, you hear from a lot of people you haven't heard from in years thinking, you know, you pay my mortgage, stuff like, oh yeah, medical bills, all that. And so you go through this journey where you wanna say, you know, you try, you go through figuring out, you know, like I've learned the lesson that if you do give, never give a loan, just give a gift. Just give a gift, right? Cause you, cause you don't.

• 1:06:22Lewis Howes?

  You'll never get it back.

• 1:06:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  Never, yeah, yeah.

• 1:06:23Lewis Howes?

  And then you'll resent that person.

• 1:06:24Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, and you don't want any of that. It's like, and even if you do give it back, it's still like, yeah, no, no, no. It's like all those things. But, you know, one of the biggest things I learned is just, you know, I remember when Forbes called for the first time. And called the office and said, you're gonna be on this list, right? And I told the head of PR, like, I'm not, no way, right? I do not want to be in that list, just tell them, no, no, thank you, I appreciate it. And then they called back, emailed back and said, we publish a list of,

• 1:06:59Jamie Kern Lima?

  the list is called America's Richest Self-Made Women. And they're like, you're gonna, we have enough data from bankers and lawyers. I'm like, how do you have?

• 1:07:05Lewis Howes?

  They're gonna post it whether you want it or not.

• 1:07:07Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, yeah, whether I want it or not. And I was so mortified and so like, right? And so for three years in a row, the last three years I've been on this list. And here's the story that happened to me is every year I would either hide it or if I was gonna go to an event and they were gonna, and it was on the bio they're reading, I made them delete the word richest and put in most successful, right? So, so, so it was the Forbes Most Successful Self-Made Women's List in all the bios. In the bio, like, everything online, everything. And I had this huge epiphany. Yeah. I-

• 1:07:45Lewis Howes?

  Why, discounting what you've created?

• 1:07:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yep. Well, and here's the thing, and see, okay, how do I say this? So many women, we are taught, right? We are taught to dim our light. We are, I had this huge moment, Louis, where I'm like, okay, I've gotta figure this shit out because I have a responsibility now for other women, for other girls, for other people out there. And I was realizing I was dimming my own light to, and, and calling it being humble and calling it being gracious and calling it be all those things, right? And, and-

• 1:08:19Lewis Howes?

  What did an Olympian who wins a gold medal say? I didn't win the gold.

• 1:08:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  I know.

• 1:08:24Lewis Howes?

  I'm just an Olympian, I'm not a gold medalist.

• 1:08:26Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, well, and here's the thing is I had this big epiphany, like, wait a minute. Like, okay. All growing up because Oprah showed her vulnerability, all the things that she showed, like because she shared that her background wasn't perfect because all those things. Like it helped me believe where I come from doesn't have to determine where I'm going, right? Because I saw an example of what's possible. And I sat there and I thought, wait a minute. Every time I scroll social media, even when I see successful business women, right? Think about, think about so many of our friends, your friends, people in LA, people that are in entertainment, for example, you might see the woman way more successful than the guy she's dating or married to, whatever.

• 1:09:09Jamie Kern Lima?

  And he's like in a business suit in front of a plane and she's like lower than him physically and like, you know, it's, but she's also a businesswoman doing her, like doing her thing, but you almost never see it out there. And I kind of real, had this moment where I'm like me hiding the stuff about Forbes and me wanting to avoid it, me calling it humble. All I'm doing is dimming my own light and I am, you know, potentially robbing other girls or women of seeing another example of what's possible for them. You know what I mean? And, and so it's been a journey even of things like that, of coming to terms with things like that.

• 1:09:51Jamie Kern Lima?

  And I now believe the Forbes richest self-made women's list, it is still even weird to say that, but like I believe in the power of that because it's, it's showing, you know, not just other women, every person, oh, here's these women that are self-made that are totally kicking ass right now. And they're, you know, every person on that list is an example of what's possible because they're all self-made too.

• 1:10:15Lewis Howes?

  What do you think is the, the mindset is, that is different between those that have accumulated wealth from nothing versus those that stay poor or who haven't accumulated that much wealth? From what you've learned, from where you were to where you are now and all the wealthy people you've surrounded with, what do you think is the mindset that is different?

• 1:10:38Jamie Kern Lima?

  I think that, I think wealth isn't about money. And I know that's gonna sound cliche. I think, I think people...

• 1:10:52Jamie Kern Lima?

  Who are successful, the amount of money they have is irrelevant. But the mindset is what they have in common, right? And I think it's that they show up in service. I think it's that they believe what they're doing is

• 1:11:05Jamie Kern Lima?

  making the world a better place, is serving someone else is bigger than themselves, is answering their own calling. I mean, you know, you probably know so many people that have accomplished

• 1:11:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:16Jamie Kern Lima?

  business success and they're miserable. You know what I mean?

• 1:11:20Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:20Jamie Kern Lima?

  And there's people that haven't who are miserable.

• 1:11:24Jamie Kern Lima?

  So.

• 1:11:25Lewis Howes?

  What have you learned from other wealthy people in terms of expanding wealth? Or what do they do differently that you think, based on just seeing them or having conversations with them? Or is that not something you're in conversation with, with friends in this space? What do you see them do differently?

• 1:11:46Lewis Howes?

  And what do you do differently now that helped you earn this as opposed to, you know, working at Denny's?

• 1:11:54Jamie Kern Lima?

  Working at Denny's is hard.

• 1:11:55Lewis Howes?

  Hard.

• 1:11:56Jamie Kern Lima?

  It's hard. But working at Denny's set me up for this, right? Like, I mean, this is what I'm saying. I think everything sets us up for where, for where we're going. I really believe that. I believe every experience. Like, when I worked at Denny's, it was hard. The kitchen was a mess. They had operational issues and they couldn't get pancakes out fast enough. And people would get mad. They wouldn't tip, they would leave. And I was like, okay. As working as a Denny's waitress, I became aware of operational issues and how important they are. Right? Because of the fact that they couldn't get pancakes out, like sometimes in, under an hour. So, no one wants to wait an hour for pancakes. So, watching, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, watching that.

• 1:12:35Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 1:12:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  So, I mean, I don't know, Louis.

• 1:12:39Lewis Howes?

  Did you ever believe you would become as wealthy as you are financially? When you were making whatever, seven dollars an hour in tips or whatever you were making back then as a waitress? Did you believe like, one day I'm gonna exit a billion dollar company?

• 1:12:54Jamie Kern Lima?

  One day I'll sell a billion dollar company.

• 1:12:59Lewis Howes?

  Like what switched in your mind to be able to say, okay, even though this isn't what I have right now, it's going to happen?

• 1:13:06Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, I believe that, um, I believe that when we have dreams on our heart, and if we work hard enough, I believe they're possible, right? And, and I think if we fill our minds with the right things, like I don't know if it was Steve Jobs or someone that talked about how every single thing out there that's ever been built or been created has been created by someone just like you and me. And when we think about things that way, like we start to carve grooves in our brain that things are possible. You know what I mean? And I think that again, when we tune into our knowing and, you know, for me, I wanted to shift culture and beauty. Um, I probably could have made a lot more money going public with the company. But I also, you know, was working a hundred hours a week and totally exhausted, totally addicted to work.

• 1:13:49Jamie Kern Lima?

  And I made the decision to trust myself also, um, that I didn't trust myself to actually not keep working a hundred hour weeks unless I did sell it. Yeah. And, um, but yeah, I mean, there's, there's big journeys and listen, uh, I again, think we all know, we all know deep down inside what we're born capable of and we know if we are, if we know, like, like there's so many stories I share in this book about how I handled things from competition to competitors knocking us off to mean girls not liking when we were six. There's so many stories and my biggest thing that I learned when it comes to that is like, I believe we're not born to compete with anyone else.

• 1:14:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  I believe we're born to compete with like who God made us capable of becoming, right? And, right, but we all know, like I know right now, sitting here, I am not yet the person I was born capable of becoming. Like I'm not even close to that person. Like I know that and I feel like we all have that knowing if, if we really get still inside, do you know what I mean?

• 1:14:57Lewis Howes?

  Of course.

• 1:14:57Jamie Kern Lima?

  And so for me, I think, yeah.

• 1:15:00Lewis Howes?

  Is there a mantra you have now when you feel doubt?

• 1:15:06Lewis Howes?

  Or if you feel overwhelmed, I know you're, you know, a new mom. You've got new challenges that are in your life. Do you, like, what do you say to yourself?

• 1:15:15Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, I mean, almost every day, God use me, love use me.

• 1:15:19Lewis Howes?

  God use me, love use me.

• 1:15:21Jamie Kern Lima?

  Mm hmm. Because I know it's not about me and I know I don't have to carry it all myself.

• 1:15:27Lewis Howes?

  That's good. That takes a lot of pressure off you probably. Because I think a lot of us hold the pressure. It's like all about us taking on everything.

• 1:15:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  Mm hmm. I prayed that before this interview.

• 1:15:36Lewis Howes?

  Oh, that's good.

• 1:15:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, it's like, you know, help me say something that someone else out there needs to hear. Like, have it not be about me. Because if I start to think it's about me for a second, I'm gonna be like, oh, it does Lewis think that I'm cool enough to be on his show? Oh, you know, all the stuff that our inner critic starts to tell ourselves about ourselves. And when we make things about ourselves, it's like, yeah.

• 1:15:59Lewis Howes?

  Uh, my friend Rory Vaden, who you know, uh, said a great line, "It's hard to be nervous when your heart's on service."

• 1:16:05Jamie Kern Lima?

  Oh, that's so good.

• 1:16:06Lewis Howes?

  And you're, you're just focused out. You're just focused out. You know what? I'm gonna mess up. I'm gonna forget something I'm supposed to say. I'm gonna stutter over my words. But, uh, as long as I make sure that I'm thinking about the people that I'm, you know, in this experience to help them in some way, it doesn't matter if I mess up, you know?

• 1:16:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  And the other thing is like, if you mess up right now, or I mess up right now, it's like someone out there who loves your show and loves you is gonna feel like they're not alone in their own mess up that that just happened to them that day, right? It's still a service. It's like that servant's heart.

• 1:16:36Lewis Howes?

  You can't expect to be, yeah, no one's perfect. You can't, you can't put out that image of perfection. It's not real. So, I'm curious. You mentioned there are many things you would have done differently. One, not working a hundred hours a week.

• 1:16:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:47Lewis Howes?

  I, I also know in the book, you talk about there's no such thing as balance. And I don't think there is a such thing as balance when you're launching something and when you're needing to build momentum, you've got to go all in. And that means sacrificing certain things for a period of time until you can create more balance. Uh, so I know one of them might be not working a hundred hours a, a week, every week. Another one you mentioned, which is letting go of people that were maybe toxic and holding on to people for too long who were employees. What would be three things that you would have done differently that would have given you more peace and been, and been just as successful in your business? Whether it's those two things and one other, or three other things?

• 1:17:27Jamie Kern Lima?

  More peace. You said three things that would give you more peace.

• 1:17:31Lewis Howes?

  Three things that you would have done differently in your business or in your personal life to create a better flow for you without as much stress. Where you'd still be able to get as much success without this stress and overwhelm that maybe it came to.

• 1:17:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. I would have believed my success was possible sooner. After hearing three years of no's and rejection, by the time we finally started getting traction, I was like, oh, my gosh. I felt like, is it all gonna come crashing down at any moment?

• 1:18:03Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:18:03Jamie Kern Lima?

  Mm-hmm. I felt like, you know, I have to strike while the iron's hot. I have to dry, you know? So in the first, like, especially the early years, but then I really kept that. I drove it so hard because I felt like, you know what I mean? It's like part of why I did 100-hour weeks. I almost, in the beginning, couldn't believe this was happening. Right? So it's another version of imposter syndrome. It's like, wow. And learning to believe it, learning to believe in the mission, believe something bigger than myself is probably how I didn't mess the whole thing up. Because sometimes we start to get success and then we can't believe it for ourselves. Right? And then we mess it all up, so.

• 1:18:37Lewis Howes?

  Okay, so that's one.

• 1:18:38Jamie Kern Lima?

  Mm-hmm. Another one I would have done differently in anybody out there who is starting a dream or a goal or a business with a partner. Or.

• 1:18:49Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. If you're married and you guys started together.

• 1:18:52Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah. Or a loved one or a family member.

• 1:18:54Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, let's talk about that.

• 1:18:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  I had had so many people say, whatever you do, don't ever start a company with your partner. Or, you know, people say, don't do it with a family member or a good friend.

• 1:19:05Lewis Howes?

  Because it'll ruin your friendship or the relationship. How long were you guys married for before this?

• 1:19:09Jamie Kern Lima?

  We wrote the business plan on our honeymoon flight to South Africa.

• 1:19:11Lewis Howes?

  That's crazy. So you got married,

• 1:19:15Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:16Lewis Howes?

  started life together and then started a business together at the same time.

• 1:19:20Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and we did it five years before, but yeah.

• 1:19:22Lewis Howes?

  Man, you really get to know each other in a whole different way, probably.

• 1:19:25Jamie Kern Lima?

  You do, and you know, here's the thing. It's like, I get why everyone does it, right? And I just, we always think, oh, it'll be different for me. Like, there's gonna be someone out there listening right now, watching this, who feels what I'm saying, right?

• 1:19:35Lewis Howes?

  Our partner, we're amazing. We can do anything together. We love each other. It won't get in the way.

• 1:19:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  And like, whoever you launch a dream with, you want to trust that person. You want to spend time with all the things. It makes so much sense why people go into business with family or friends or their partner, so. We did it.

• 1:19:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  It is a miracle that right now I can tell you I love my husband. That is a miracle we're still married. It's a miracle because it got really hard.

• 1:20:03Lewis Howes?

  I'm sure.

• 1:20:04Jamie Kern Lima?

  And what I would do differently, because Louis, there is a point. And I taught, you know, I've never shared these stories before. And in the book, I talk about this because a lot of people need to hear this. It's like, there's things, there's so much I did right, but there's a lot of things I did wrong. And, and it got to the point where, like, my phone would ring. It could be any hour of the day or night.

• 1:20:26Lewis Howes?

  10 a.m., yeah.

• 1:20:27Jamie Kern Lima?

  And if I saw it was my husband, I literally equated it to a work call. Everything was work.

• 1:20:33Lewis Howes?

  Oh.

• 1:20:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  Do you see what I mean?

• 1:20:35Lewis Howes?

  Man, that sucks.

• 1:20:35Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and, and we-

• 1:20:36Lewis Howes?

  He couldn't date you.

• 1:20:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:38Lewis Howes?

  He couldn't date you, or you guys couldn't date each other. Because it was just like, what do we need to get done?

• 1:20:42Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:42Lewis Howes?

  What needs to happen? We need to make money here.

• 1:20:44Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:45Lewis Howes?

  What's the product look like?

• 1:20:46Jamie Kern Lima?

  Well, and, and, and, and, you know, we were really all in together. We both cared so much together.

• 1:20:52Lewis Howes?

  Of course.

• 1:20:52Jamie Kern Lima?

  The blessing is that we both worked so hard. If one of us was all in and the other wasn't, it wouldn't have worked, probably. You know, every, I mean, I did over a thousand live shows at QVC. So I was staying the night in this hotel room for many years, like 150, 200 nights a year.

• 1:21:10Lewis Howes?

  Crazy.

• 1:21:11Jamie Kern Lima?

  And trying to run the business out of the green room, going on air all hours of the day and night. And honestly, it was the biggest gift for our business. But personally, and you're so tired, but he did every one of those shows as well.

• 1:21:24Lewis Howes?

  He was there also?

• 1:21:25Jamie Kern Lima?

  And he'd be in the green room, watching the numbers live, giving feedback. I would actually get off air. And by the way, like, I'm so good with, I love feedback and criticism. I know it sucks, I don't ever want to hear, but it's like, I love, I know it's a gift.

• 1:21:39Lewis Howes?

  Especially from your husband?

• 1:21:39Jamie Kern Lima?

  So that's the one thing. It got to the point where-

• 1:21:42Lewis Howes?

  You're like, I don't want to hear it.

• 1:21:43Jamie Kern Lima?

  I don't want to hear. And so I was like, oh, okay, I need to hear it for the business. I need to hear it. But I would walk off air from a show at 3:00 in the morning. Like, maybe we had this huge, I don't know, million dollar sales goal or something. I'd walk off air, knowing we may have just missed that show goal. And I'd see his face at the end of the hallway. And I would struggle internally, like, okay, how do I show up in love? Because right now, I don't want to see him. I don't want to hear what I did wrong. I don't want to hear the things that didn't work in the show. It's tough, right? And then- We, I think, really failed at ever setting boundaries. So when we would say like, okay, starting at eight o'clock tonight, no more work talk. Or nine o'clock tonight, no more work.

• 1:22:23Lewis Howes?

  You never did that or you tried?

• 1:22:24Jamie Kern Lima?

  We tried, we tried.

• 1:22:26Lewis Howes?

  Oh, but this is important, let's get this done.

• 1:22:28Jamie Kern Lima?

  It was always important and it was always like, oh. Like the person that would say, okay, nothing after nine PM. Or the other person, it could be either one, would be like, oh, okay, but really fast. Did you hear what happened today? Yeah, yeah, like this just got, you know, caught up in customs and this. Whatever was going on with the business and, and we built over a thousand employees. So there's always stuff going on.

• 1:22:46Lewis Howes?

  You're just solving problems all day.

• 1:22:48Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes, yes.

• 1:22:49Lewis Howes?

  When you have a business, you're always solving problems. You can't really shut down.

• 1:22:53Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:53Lewis Howes?

  If it's your business.

• 1:22:54Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes, exactly.

• 1:22:55Lewis Howes?

  So, so how did you resolve it?

• 1:22:58Jamie Kern Lima?

  I mean, faith, li- literally faith.

• 1:23:02Lewis Howes?

  Trusting the process, yeah.

• 1:23:04Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, I mean, to my knowledge, neither of us has ever lied or stolen or cheated or anything like that. So we had those found, that foundation of trust.

• 1:23:12Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, that's great.

• 1:23:13Jamie Kern Lima?

  But we were both burnt out for a lot of years. And when you're tired and exhausted, it's very hard to show up.

• 1:23:19Lewis Howes?

  Of course.

• 1:23:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  Right? And, and so if I look back, I think that I did not need to work hundred hour weeks to build a billion dollar company.

• 1:23:30Lewis Howes?

  You could have stopped at eight or seven and had three hours to yourself. Gotten up early and done it all over again for eighty hours or sixty hour weeks.

• 1:23:40Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, I would have believed it sooner that it was all really happening.

• 1:23:45Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:23:46Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:46Lewis Howes?

  Okay, so, and the final thing you would have done differently?

• 1:23:51Jamie Kern Lima?

  So many things I would have done differently.

• 1:23:53Lewis Howes?

  Tell me about marriage and business then and boundaries around that. If someone's in a relationship right now and they're in total love. And they're dating for years, oh, they're, oh, go ahead.

• 1:24:03Jamie Kern Lima?

  Oh, yeah, I just thought, yeah, yeah.

• 1:24:04Lewis Howes?

  Go ahead.

• 1:24:04Jamie Kern Lima?

  I mean, listen, I think that along the lines of Oprah's advice, just when people show you who they are, believe them the first time, I think that I would have, I would have followed that advice more closely.

• 1:24:15Lewis Howes?

  With vendors, employees, with team, yeah.

• 1:24:18Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, yeah, that's hard. It's hard when you don't want to hurt other people. But, but, and again, I've had other entrepreneurs, you know, after doing a thousand live shows, I've met tens of thousands of brand founders in the green room of QVC and entrepreneurs, and they've all said the same thing, that if you keep a toxic employee in your business, even if you love them or they're doing a great job in some areas, that what happens is they, it's almost like a cancer in the sense of it'll spread and it'll infect everyone else.

• 1:24:48Lewis Howes?

  You cannot allow negativity, or gossip, or drama in your culture, otherwise, you need to cut that out.

• 1:24:56Jamie Kern Lima?

  It's contagious.

• 1:24:56Lewis Howes?

  It is the worst thing.

• 1:24:58Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:58Lewis Howes?

  And I think everyone needs to create a boundary, as a business owner, to ensure and communicate responsibly what's acceptable and what's not acceptable. And if you don't communicate it effectively, that's on you.

• 1:25:12Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:12Lewis Howes?

  And if people are dramatic and this and that, that's on you. So you got to make sure you're constantly in that communication.

• 1:25:17Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and, and I think that the challenge a lot of people face too, is when people grow with you, right, they can, you, you, almost in a way, when you're growing so fast, because we were growing way faster than our infrastructure could keep up with. So then you have people wearing a lot of hats, and then, as a business owner, a lot of people will relate to this, right, and maybe you've gone through this too, that sometimes you'll have an employee, and you actually really feel like you are depending on them. You know what I mean, and like, you can't lose them.

• 1:25:44Lewis Howes?

  So you deal with the toxicity here and there, because they're good.

• 1:25:47Jamie Kern Lima?

  And you never should, but it's hard in the moment. It's hard in the moment to lose someone that you feel like you really need.

• 1:25:53Lewis Howes?

  Of course, or someone you've built a relationship with over years is challenging.

• 1:25:56Jamie Kern Lima?

  Or you don't even know how are you going to absorb their role at that moment, but every time.

• 1:26:01Lewis Howes?

  You always figure it out.

• 1:26:02Jamie Kern Lima?

  You always figure it out. And someone better always comes along, and always.

• 1:26:06Lewis Howes?

  And you're like, wait a minute, who was this person a month ago? It's like, you always figure it out and someone will step up.

• 1:26:11Jamie Kern Lima?

  Why didn't they do that sooner?

• 1:26:12Lewis Howes?

  Exactly, always. What was the longest you went, keeping someone on, that you knew, your gut was telling you, ah, I got to... Let them go.

• 1:26:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, four years.

• 1:26:21Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 1:26:22Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:22Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 1:26:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:25Lewis Howes?

  We've all done it in relationship, intimate relationships where we, we knew, but it's like we waited six months.

• 1:26:30Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes.

• 1:26:31Lewis Howes?

  Two years, six years.

• 1:26:32Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yes.

• 1:26:32Lewis Howes?

  Until we finally broke free.

• 1:26:34Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and you think it's gonna get better, they're gonna change, or it goes back to that Maya Angelou quote that Oprah talks about also being her, her greatest lesson. And, and, and a lot of us learn it over, we need to learn it over and over and over and over.

• 1:26:48Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:48Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, and people show you who they are, believe them the first time.

• 1:26:52Lewis Howes?

  When someone's in a relationship and they have this amazing business idea together, or one person's got this idea and they say, I would love for you to join me in this company, or this project, or this, you know, art, whatever it is.

• 1:27:03Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:04Lewis Howes?

  And you're like, this is exciting, let's do this together, we're gonna launch this and see if it works. What is your advice for people who are married, or going to be married, or in a relationship about working together?

• 1:27:14Jamie Kern Lima?

  Hmm.

• 1:27:15Lewis Howes?

  Do you think they should? If, if they do, what should they create contracts early on, even though there's this like, you know, trust and respect?

• 1:27:24Jamie Kern Lima?

  Hmm.

• 1:27:24Lewis Howes?

  What would you do differently? Or what advice would you give someone to ensure that they could still maintain a healthy relationship? And make a successful business?

• 1:27:33Jamie Kern Lima?

  Hmm, I think you have to have such rock solid emotional intelligence and communication.

• 1:27:39Lewis Howes?

  That's hard.

• 1:27:40Jamie Kern Lima?

  Hmm, I think it's the only way.

• 1:27:41Lewis Howes?

  You can't get offended, you can't be, yeah.

• 1:27:44Jamie Kern Lima?

  You have to be able to communicate your emotions when they happen in a healthy way. I know, and you know, I know a lot of people now who are even two friends that are running businesses together, and they go to therapy, they go to, just like the way couples would go to therapy. Yeah, a lot of like friends that are co-founders go to therapy, I think it's really important.

• 1:28:00Lewis Howes?

  It's healthy.

• 1:28:01Jamie Kern Lima?

  Hmm, yeah, I agree, yeah, yeah, it's hard, but I get why people wanna do it. You know, you trust that person.

• 1:28:08Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, and you wanna do it with someone that you, you know, love or appreciate with, so you can build it together. But when things get hard. That's when it's challenging.

• 1:28:17Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and the odds are not in anyone's favor when they're gonna start this. You know what I mean? It's um, and there are people that end it and they are able to stay friends or whatever, but it's weird.

• 1:28:28Lewis Howes?

  Very hard, very challenging.

• 1:28:30Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, and you just have to really ask yourself, is your relationship worth putting at risk? Is your friendship worth putting at risk? But here's the thing, Louis, is like our humanness, our human nature wants to believe it's, it won't happen to us. It's just, it's what everyone else goes through, but, but for me, like my friendships rock solid, or my marriage, or my, you know what I mean? And, and so it's, it's hard. Sometimes it's just a thing that we go through and then have to decide, is it something that, you know what I mean? That we wanna do again.

• 1:29:02Lewis Howes?

  You've accomplished so much, Jamie. You've, you know, done so much. This book's amazing. I want people to get it, believe it. How to Go From Underestimated to Unstoppable. I'm curious, what do you think will be the greatest thing you have to overcome? After you've accomplished so much, this stage of your life? Like, what's the thing you're still gonna need to overcome to make you feel like you've made it? Or a sense of peace inside, or a sense of, I don't know, next level understanding about life? What do you think is still your challenge you get to overcome?

• 1:29:38Jamie Kern Lima?

  It's a journey. I think, I think um, stepping into all of who I know I'm capable of becoming, while somehow still feeling enough, while doing it.

• 1:29:50Lewis Howes?

  What is that? Who is that? Who is that, like, knowing of who you can become? You've already become so much.

• 1:29:56Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, I mean, I think, I think we all have, right? I think we all know what that means for us. I just have a deep knowing uh, that I have a lot more to give, and a lot more to serve. And I'm in this space right now. I mean, you know, Louis, like, a lot of people would never have left the situation I was in. And what I mean by that is, I, you know, as you know, struggled for so many years, finally got success at this company when we sold it to L'Oréal, uh, a few days before I... Met you at Summit of Greatness. A few days before that.

• 1:30:31Lewis Howes?

  You sold it a few days before, yeah.

• 1:30:32Jamie Kern Lima?

  Um, well, I was sitting in this corner office, in this sixty, I think it was sixty thousand square foot office. And a corner office overlooking the skyline in Manhattan. And the office, my office, the bathroom, all these things was bigger than like any place I'd ever lived most of my life. Like, you know what I mean? And, and beautiful and all these things, like stuff you'd see in a movie. And I remember sitting in this office, knowing, feeling my gut, knowing it was time to let go of one dream and start another. And I remember knowing in that moment, most people wouldn't do this. Because I was sitting there looking around in this office space of, uh, uh, at what the world tells me significance looks like.

• 1:31:13Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, the CEO of this big company, thousand employees.

• 1:31:16Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, I have goosebumps saying this, like saying this out loud, but I remember like looking at the Manhattan skyline, sobbing my eyes out, all alone, sitting in this office. Like seeing this beautiful artwork on the wall, looking around going, oh my gosh, like I finally got this. Like I, like I finally, like this reminds me of a movie. Like I'm sitting here and yet I know in my gut, like I'm supposed to, uh, leave this dream. And, and, and, and yet it would be way easier to stay there and, and, and have this really cool title and this really amazing office and, and literally the things the world says are significant.

• 1:31:52Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:31:52Jamie Kern Lima?

  You know what I mean? And I think our life is defined by those moments when we listen to our knowing and we, and we, and we follow it anyways. You know what I mean? And when I look back at this journey, all those times, even when it didn't make sense, even when the experts said, don't do this on, you know, all the things. It's like when I listen to my knowing, even when it didn't make sense and I, and I trusted it, that's like the moments that change our life. You know, so, yeah, then a few days later I met you.

• 1:32:18Lewis Howes?

  And now we're here. I love it. Well, I want people to get this book. I've got a couple of final questions for you. But make sure you guys get the book. Believe it. Very powerful stories endorsed by so many people. Incredible wisdom, lessons, humor, sadness, all those things. Make sure you guys check this out. Powerful, powerful story. It will be a movie one day. I can say that for sure. This is a question I ask everyone at the end called the three truths. So imagine you've accomplished everything you want to accomplish for the rest of your life. You do it all, whatever that is with the family, more business ventures, mentoring, helping women, whatever it is you want to create, you create it. And it's your last day. For whatever reason, you've got to take all of your content with you.

• 1:33:00Lewis Howes?

  So this book is no longer with you. You take all the copies. Whatever happens, you take all of your content with you. No one has access to this interview anymore. But you've got a piece of paper and a pen and you get to write down three lessons from your entire life that you would share with the world. This is all we have to remember you by, these three lessons. I call it the three truths. What would you say would be your three truths?

• 1:33:27Jamie Kern Lima?

  God can dream a bigger dream for you than you can for yourself.

• 1:33:37Jamie Kern Lima?

  You have a knowing inside of you and it's always right and God and every single one of us is love.

• 1:33:46Jamie Kern Lima?

  And we're all connected.

• 1:33:47Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:50Lewis Howes?

  I love that. What's something you wish people asked you that they don't ask you?

• 1:34:00Jamie Kern Lima?

  How are you so funny? Because I'm really funny and people don't know that. I would say that.

• 1:34:07Lewis Howes?

  How are you so funny?

• 1:34:08Jamie Kern Lima?

  I'm really funny and my husband's so funny and so like he always just talks about how he's funny, but I'm really funny.

• 1:34:15Lewis Howes?

  You're funnier than him?

• 1:34:16Jamie Kern Lima?

  Ah, he's pretty funny.

• 1:34:17Lewis Howes?

  He's pretty funny?

• 1:34:18Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, he's pretty funny.

• 1:34:19Lewis Howes?

  You have a good day?

• 1:34:19Jamie Kern Lima?

  But I'm really funny.

• 1:34:20Lewis Howes?

  Is there such a thing as a mom joke? Those dad jokes.

• 1:34:23Jamie Kern Lima?

  I don't know, yeah.

• 1:34:24Lewis Howes?

  You should come up with some mom jokes.

• 1:34:26Jamie Kern Lima?

  Some mom jokes.

• 1:34:27Lewis Howes?

  That'd be a great book.

• 1:34:27Jamie Kern Lima?

  I'll work on that.

• 1:34:28Lewis Howes?

  A little coffee table book, mom jokes.

• 1:34:30Jamie Kern Lima?

  You're right. Has anyone, I don't think anyone's done that.

• 1:34:32Lewis Howes?

  I've never heard mom jokes, but I have a couple of friends. Daymond John, whenever I talk to him, he always starts with a dad joke.

• 1:34:38Jamie Kern Lima?

  With a dad joke.

• 1:34:39Lewis Howes?

  And they're just, I don't know why they crack me up when, when someone tells me a dad joke because it's so dumb that I just laugh so hard.

• 1:34:46Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, they're so funny.

• 1:34:47Lewis Howes?

  Well, I want people to get the book and I want to acknowledge you, Jamie, for, you know what I'm noticing during this, you have this childlike wonder about you. You have this like reflection of your younger child, just keep seeing like the seven, eight year old Jamie inside of you who is coming out. And that's what I'm noticing when I'm, when I'm with you. So I appreciate your childlike hunger and desire for truth, for answers, for creating what you want, for dreaming big. I think kids have big dreams and they go after it. And you continue to do that and you accomplished your dreams, a lot of your dreams. You still have more to do as a mom and as a, an entrepreneur and everything else.

• 1:35:27Lewis Howes?

  So I acknowledge you for your, your childlike joy that you bring now and day to day. I really appreciate that. And I know you have a lot on your plate and you carry certain burdens and I want to remind you that your, your child joy is always there for you. And I don't know, I felt like you just needed to hear that. So it's always there for you to support you.

• 1:35:51Jamie Kern Lima?

  Thank you.

• 1:35:52Lewis Howes?

  Of course. This is, people can get the book anywhere online. They can go, obviously on stores, if you can get in the stores right now, Amazon. Where can we connect with you online personally?

• 1:36:04Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, so, so Jamie Kern Lima dot com or Instagram at Jamie Kern Lima. And then, yeah, the book, Believe It dot com if you.

• 1:36:13Lewis Howes?

  Believe It dot com.

• 1:36:14Jamie Kern Lima?

  Yeah, Believe It dot com. And anywhere you grab the book at, wherever it's sold, we're doing a big launch promotion. So if you go to Believe It dot com, it's the book, Maybe Believe It, lots of free stuff. So downloadable action plan, of course, I'm doing all that you get for free in celebration of the launch. And um

• 1:36:33Lewis Howes?

  So if you buy a copy or two, then you just go there and you submit the information and you get the

• 1:36:36Jamie Kern Lima?

  And you get all the free stuff, yeah. And it's really like at the heart and soul of this book, it's anyone who wants to go from not believing themselves to believing themselves and learning how to trust themselves and know they're enough. And uh, thank you by the way for talking about childlike wonder. You know, my daughter's name is Wonder. I don't know if you remember, she kept calling Jay Shetty dada. Do you remember this?

• 1:36:55Lewis Howes?

  Vaguely.

• 1:36:55Jamie Kern Lima?

  I was like, I think it scared him.

• 1:36:58Lewis Howes?

  No, he's not here yet.

• 1:37:01Jamie Kern Lima?

  But uh, literally like 10 minutes leading up to this interview, I don't even know why you and I were just laughing, like giggling. So you have childlike wonder and it's really cool. It's really cool to experience that. Thank you for bringing that out of me too. I don't think I've laughed or giggled like this ever. Like I, I, in an interview, I can't remember. Like just laughing.

• 1:37:21Lewis Howes?

  It just makes it easier, you know? It makes you relax more, you laugh and yeah.

• 1:37:26Jamie Kern Lima?

  Cause you ask tough questions. You know, you know.

• 1:37:30Lewis Howes?

  You gotta lie in the moment too though. You gotta have fun. And sometimes I laugh when I'm like, I don't know if it's nervous or more like I laugh when like something is really like, you'll share something that's bad or like that's a shock and whatever reason I laugh in those moments. Cause I'm like, that's crazy to think about and I just laugh. So um, believeit.com. Uh, make sure you guys get a few books. I recommend getting a few copies always. This is gonna be powerful for you. Uh, final question for you. What's your definition of greatness?

• 1:37:59Jamie Kern Lima?

  Stepping into all of who you are and knowing it and knowing it. You have a peace when you do it. You just feel it.

• 1:38:08Lewis Howes?

  Jamie, thank you. Appreciate it. Appreciate it.

• 1:38:10Jamie Kern Lima?

  Thank you, Lewis.

• 1:38:12Lewis Howes?

  My friend, thank you so much for being here, listening to this episode. Isn't Jamie such an inspiration? Man, if you enjoyed this, make sure to share this with a few friends, post it on social media. Just copy and paste the link where you're listening to this right now and share it out with a few people you think will be inspired by Jamie's story and her message. Or you can just copy and paste the link, lewishouse.com/1074. Text it to a couple of friends right now, post it on social media and make sure to tag both of us so we know. That you are listening and can connect to you over on social media. And if this is your first time here, then welcome to the School of Greatness community. You are an amazing, loving, incredible human being, and we're so grateful that you're here. You're wanting to learn, you're wanting to grow, you're wanting to improve in the different areas of your life.

• 1:38:57Lewis Howes?

  So make sure to subscribe, stick around. We've got the greatest minds in the world here, and I want you to have access to them for free. So click the subscribe button right now on Apple Podcasts or over on Spotify or wherever you're listening to your podcasts. Make sure to leave a rating and review. Let us know what you enjoyed most about this episode. And I can't wait for you to be a part of this community. There's some amazing people I'm going to want to connect you to in the coming weeks. And make sure to check out some of the previous episodes. When you scroll down, you'll see some of big names and big topics that we dive into that I want you to have access to. And if you want inspirational messages from me sent to your phone every single week, then text me right now.

• 1:39:35Lewis Howes?

  The word podcast to 614-350-3960. So you can get on my texting list and get inspirational stuff, behind the scenes and some secrets every once in a while as well. So make sure to text podcast to 614-350-3960. I hope you enjoyed this episode with Jamie. I'm so grateful for your time today. Again, please spread the message forward till we can help more people achieve greatness in their life. And I want to remind you, if no one's told you lately, that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And you know what time it is? It's time to go out there and do something great.