How to Be a Bawse: A Guide to Conquering Life(33)

Build Your Empire

List all the pillars that make up your success and that will NOT allow you to be made or broken with ease.





SOCIAL MEDIA has made everyone insecure. Don’t get me wrong—if I could, I would marry YouTube, and I’m completely in love with Twitter because it provides me with endless entertainment and information (and memes—lots and lots of wonderful, glorious memes). But social media also exposes us to what everyone else is doing. And let’s be real: according to Facebook, everyone we know is happy, always dressed to impress, at the gym, politically correct, eating right, and constantly cuddling a cute puppy. When you’re going through a rough patch and doubting your very existence, seeing Kelly from your social studies class on the beach with a martini and a hot boyfriend isn’t very helpful. That’s because we compare other people’s highlight reels to our blooper reel and accept that illusion as reality.

We all do it. There have been so many times when I’ve had a day full of rejection and failure and then I sign on to Facebook only to see that two of my high school friends just got married. I’m sitting there, single, trying to make it in Hollywood, alone in my apartment, eating burnt popcorn for dinner, and just staring at this wedding reception album thinking, “What the hell am I doing with my life? Am I completely delusional? Should I be getting married? I don’t even remember the last time I was in a relationship! I AM LITERALLY NOT DOING LIFE CORRECTLY.”

Then a few weeks later I’ll connect with one of my newly married friends and they will tell me how they got into a fight with their wife and then signed on to Facebook only to see a picture of me with Michelle Obama at the White House. They began to think, “What the hell am I doing in my life? Here I am getting married, spending time on floral arrangements instead of my career! What if I fail at my job? What if I never make it to the White House? I AM LITERALLY NOT DOING LIFE CORRECTLY.”

Here’s the thing, though. There is no correct way of living life. Similarly, there’s no one path that leads to success. A Bawse knows that there are many different pathways to every destination in life, and just because you’ve only been given one set of directions, that doesn’t mean ten other roads don’t all lead to the same place.





Throughout my life I believed that the only way to make it in Hollywood was to audition over and over again for movie roles. That’s all I was ever exposed to in films and through stories people told me. You have to move to L.A., struggle a lot, have a side job, and audition many times until one day you finally land a role. After moving to L.A., I realized that auditioning over and over again was only one way to achieve success in Hollywood. My career on YouTube was actually paving a new pathway to the same end goal. You see, the audition process is very grueling and competitive. There can be ten people who are all great for a role and yet someone is chosen over the others for reasons no one will ever really understand. Looks, height, weight, accent, ethnicity—all of these characteristics can factor into the decision. My success on YouTube gives me something special, and that is a following. When I walk into an audition, the casting agent knows that I bring a very large online audience with me and that my audience is ready to support me in my future projects.

At first I was very skeptical about the entire thing. I didn’t like the idea of getting opportunities because I had a following online. I should have to audition over and over again while juggling three jobs because that’s what people said I had to do. I expressed my discontent to my good friend Humble, saying, “I don’t want to be given opportunities because I have a following, I want to work for opportunities.” His reply changed my entire perspective on the situation. He said: “You weren’t born with your following. You worked for it.”

He was absolutely correct. My following is the result of countless all-nighters, years of hard work, and an unwavering work ethic. Why shouldn’t I create a new path to success in Hollywood via YouTube? Why shouldn’t I change the game? Why shouldn’t I create a new L.A. fairy tale?

Don’t get me wrong. I still have to audition for things over and over again and practice my acting. My online following doesn’t land me movie roles that easily. If that were the case, I’d be Katniss Everdeen, but I am not. (Though I could be. Just a note for any directors reading this who are considering a spin-off franchise: I’m proficient in whistling.) However, my success on YouTube does allow me to take a path less frequently walked. My loyal following has gotten me into meetings with Mindy Kaling and Whitney Cummings. Auditioning didn’t get me into those rooms; my online presence did. Mindy discovered my videos online and she liked my work. That’s what got me in to see her.

When people ask me for advice about the digital space, I always start by saying, “I can tell you about the route I took, but I’m not familiar with the entire map.” I say that because I believe new paths can be created every single day. We live in an exciting time where almost anything is possible. All you need to do is use your unique mind to create a path that works for you. Think about it. Each pathway has only so much room. You don’t want to be that awkward third wheel who’s forced to walk on the grass because of a crowded path, do you? No, you don’t. You’re not Milhouse.

Think about where you want to get in life, what you want to achieve, and where you want to be years from now. Now think about the directions you’ve been given to get there. I want you to pretend like there is an earthquake and the roads between you and your goal are cracking. How are you going to get to your destination? Find two or three more paths that all lead to the same place. That’s how you should view the road map to success. It’s not a straight line, but a loopy, curvy maze that resembles one of those puzzles on the back of a cereal box.