--:-- Mel Robbins: Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to an unbelievable episode of the Mel Robbins Podcast. Okay, you are in for an incredible masterclass on purpose, success, vision, intuition. My name is Mel Robbins. I'm a New York Times bestselling author, and I am so excited that you're here because today I'm going to introduce you to a woman that I profoundly admire who went from being a waitress at Denny's to solving a problem that she had in her own life and creating a cosmetics company in her living room and growing it to a game changer in the cosmetic industry.
--:-- She ultimately sold It Cosmetics. Yep, It Cosmetics, that incredible mega brand. She sold that sucker for $1.2 billion to L'Oreal in cash. And she went on to become the first female CEO inside of L'Oreal, the first one in 100 years. She has appeared on QVC over 1,000 times. She has built the largest cosmetic brand that they have ever launched. Not only that, but she has donated more than 40 million in products and in cash to survivors of cancer. And she is one of my favorite human beings of all time.
--:-- She wrote the book, *Believe It*, and it is an instant New York Times bestseller. And today, Jamie Kern Lima is here as my friend and as the professor in the topics of drive, purpose, success, meaning, giving back. There is so much I can't wait to dig in with you, Jamie. Thank you for being here.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Mel, thank you. Thank you for having me. This is going to be fun and real and raw. By the way, I love "Purpose Professor." I'm like, yeah, let's do it. Let's do it because it's one of our biggest life questions: How do I find my purpose?
--:-- But I just want to say something really important to me that I didn't want to leave here without saying, but everybody listening needs to know this. You are one of the rare human beings that is the same off air, behind the scenes in your everyday life as you are in all the public things. You and I have both met so many celebrities and so many people with millions and millions of followers, and it's very rare they're the same. And one of the things I love so much about you is you are even more funny, even more intelligent and brilliant and kind and raw and real in real life. And I'm just grateful to be here for you.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Wow. Okay. Just that. I think the episode's over now.
--:-- Now we got to go back in time because one of the reasons why I wanted to have you on is because the entire mission of this show is to empower and inspire you listening to us right now to create a better life, whatever that means for you. To take the simple steps that sometimes feel impossible to pursue your dreams, to improve your health, to create greater connections, to believe in yourself. And Jamie truly is not only the professor of purpose, but her life story is a demonstration in cultivating belief. Belief in your ideas, belief in your intuition, belief that things will turn out.
--:-- So I want to go back in time and talk about how you started as a waitress in Denny's. And then from waitressing at Denny's, pursued a dream that you had of being on television. And as a fellow former waitress, I would love to start there.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yeah, waitress at Denny's, full uniform, name tag to prove it.
--:-- Mel Robbins: I forgot they had uniforms.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Full uniform.
--:-- Mel Robbins: What was your favorite thing on the menu?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Oh gosh, I love the pancakes. You know what? Just simple. It's so funny how our steps are ordered, I think, in life. And so often I remember being a waitress at Denny's. I remember feeling — and maybe someone listening to us can relate to this right now — you have this feeling inside of you like there's something more I'm supposed to do, but you don't know what it is yet. And you doubt it might be possible.
--:-- I remember being a waitress at Denny's and just feeling like I have these big dreams, but not quite knowing how to believe I'm worthy of them yet. At the same time, the kitchen at the Denny's I worked at was a disaster. They would take an hour to get pancakes out. So I learned to talk to people so that they wouldn't leave. They often did leave, or they'd throw like a dime and a penny on the table and leave as your tip, as if it's your fault.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Exactly.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: But it's so funny how, years later when I ended up launching my own business, I'm like, oh, I've got to get the operations right or nothing else matters. Those little things we learn along the way.
--:-- But yeah, after that, I thought my whole life I would have a talk show. I watched Oprah in my living room growing up. So I thought for sure I would share other people's stories with the world. So I went into it, did all the jobs, saved up all my money to pay through school, pushed grocery carts in the grocery parking lot, sliced meat in the deli, all those jobs. And then I found myself in what I thought was my dream job working in TV news. And I thought, this is it, right?
--:-- And what I didn't realize was I was about to enter this huge season of setback in my life of self-doubt. I have a skin condition called rosacea. For me, it started getting really red, really bumpy. And I would be anchoring the news live thinking, okay, this is it. This is it. And I started hearing in my earpiece from my producer, "There's something on your face. There's something on your face. You need to wipe it off." And I was live on television, right? I would glance down during the commercial break and I saw, oh, the makeup is breaking up on my face and these big red bumps are coming through.
--:-- But so often in life, the seasons that feel like setbacks are actually setups for what we're called to do.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Okay, stop right there. Did you hear that? The seasons of your life that are setbacks are often setups for what you're called to do. I want to make sure everybody heard that.
--:-- And I want to take a highlighter and also highlight something that you said about being a waitress at Denny's. You said our steps are ordered. So can you explain what that means, particularly to somebody who's listening who may feel like, I know I'm meant for something greater. Why the hell am I at this step? And this does not feel like it is on the path of where I'm supposed to go. So what do you mean by the fact that our steps are ordered?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yeah. I believe everything in life is happening for us, even when it doesn't make sense.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Can we just — what do you mean "happening for us"? So to somebody that's really in it, Jamie. What does that mean?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Let me frame it around our topic of purpose. So often people feel empty because they feel like, oh, my purpose needs to be some job. It needs to be my job or it needs to be this grand thing I haven't figured out yet. But for those of us that have accomplished a goal we always dreamed of, we get to it and we're like, oh, this isn't it. It's never, in my opinion, purpose is never this big goal necessarily. Purpose is so often when we're able to serve the person we once were or serve in a way for something we've gone through.
--:-- Here's what I mean. I think our purpose can be like, oh, wow, I went through a really hard season in my life. And I now am actually realizing I'm born to be a generational cycle breaker in my family. That is an incredible purpose. When I actually just take a minute and say hi to someone else who's lonely, maybe it's in the coffee line at Starbucks, maybe it's the neighbor down the street, whatever it is, you feel in your gut a sense of fulfillment, a sense of alignment when you're doing something in your purpose. And I think that the big mistake people make is they think it's this end goal.
--:-- A lot of times when people hear my story — Denny's waitress builds billion dollar company — they think my purpose was to be some big entrepreneur. It wasn't.
--:-- Mel Robbins: What was it?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: In the journey of how I did it. I took this massive risk, taking my makeup off on national television when I was told not to, and being brave enough to be seen and helping other women realize that they're worthy and enough exactly as they are, seeing them as who they are. To me, that is my purpose. And in doing that, a byproduct of that with It Cosmetics is we built a company with millions and millions and millions of customers. And what's wild is 5% of our customers actually have skin issues like I do. 95% don't. It's just that they felt seen and connected with something that spoke to their soul.
--:-- For me, being willing to say, "Here I am exactly as I am, no makeup and all my skin issues," I think people connected with that feeling of, oh, I'm enough exactly as I am.
--:-- Mel Robbins: You know what else I think is a really important part of your story? It is waitressing. It's pushing carts in a supermarket. It's working in the back house of a restaurant. That's my story too. Helping my best friend on her paper route. Bussing tables. And I think when you work in retail or you work in a service job and you feel at times invisible, you start to realize how important it is to treat everybody with respect and kindness, that there is no work that is beneath you.
--:-- And when you can bring that level of service to the job that you have right now, even if you hate it, even if people treat you like garbage, even if the back of the house is not getting those pancakes out on time and people are angry — if you can bring a sense of grace and service and just humility, I think it changes how you show up because you don't ever forget what it's like to be treated like shit.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yes. Because somebody was mad that their pancakes weren't out on time.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: And also, you and I have had this experience where we've truly gotten to see and be almost every type of person in every type of environment. So now it's like, whether it's me building a business or you building one of the top shows in the world, I feel part of that was like, oh, we understand who's listening and watching you right now. I understand who real people are, who bought my products.
--:-- So when you mentioned steps are ordered, it's like, no matter where you are in your life right now, what you're going through, I believe every piece of it. Whether it's someone just cut me off in a parking lot and screamed at me, or whatever it might be you're going through, all of those things are happening for you, I believe, so that you're amassing this toolbox of understanding and getting strong enough and equipped enough for the purpose you step into.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Amazing. So, Professor of Purpose, Jamie Kern Lima, right there. That's your takeaway number one. The steps are ordered. Believe in that. And this moment is helping you. It's giving you something.
--:-- So that is one major tool that you used along the way. Let's go back to that moment because I think you were 28 years old, right? When you're sitting on television in Seattle, you are a local news anchor, you're living the dream, you're on your way, and you are now starting to have this nightmare happen where your rosacea is breaking through on camera, in front of everybody, the makeup that they put on you. And you've got people in your ear telling you there's something wrong with your face.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yes.
--:-- Mel Robbins: And you're realizing, holy cow, the makeup that they've put on my face cannot cover the rosacea and the skin issues that I have. So what do you do in that moment?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Well, the first thing I did was start freaking out, right? Thinking thoughts in my head like, oh, am I going to get fired? Are viewers changing the channel right now? Am I costing the company ratings? So it was this big...
--:-- Mel Robbins: Could you feel those moments when you could feel the makeup kind of disappearing?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: There were moments when I used to be a commentator for CNN, I was pre-menopausal where I could feel the hot flash coming.
--:-- Mel Robbins: I didn't feel it until they said it in my ear in my earpiece. And then what would start to happen was I would get so nervous and stressed out because I kept trying to cover it during commercial breaks. I could feel my heartbeat in my ears. So what I remember is anchoring the news live and sometimes you have to be happy, tell this happy story, or you're serious telling. And I just remember my heart beating in my ears, hoping people weren't changing the channel.
--:-- And it started this thing where I would spend — it's funny, I was anchoring the news and people think when you're doing that, you must have all this money, but you really don't get paid much at all. And I took my little paycheck that I had and started spending it on department store makeup, professional artistry makeup, drugstore makeup. I couldn't find anything that worked.
--:-- And I had this idea one day like, oh, if I can't find anything that works for me, there's probably a whole lot of other people out there that feel like makeup doesn't work for them. And it was sort of this idea where I was like, if I could figure out how to make something that worked for me, it'd help a whole lot of people. And that was my knowing or this gut feeling. But then my head, Mel, was like, oh, but you got no money. You got no connections. You know no one in the beauty industry. You're unqualified.
--:-- So I sat in this place, right? And I just want to — we're talking about purpose — I had this gut feeling like I was supposed to go for this thing, but then my head was like, oh, but here's all the reasons why you're not qualified to do it. Plus you're in your dream job. And I sat between those two, and it wasn't until I had this big, big aha moment of why I needed to do it that pushed me over the edge.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Okay. So what is the aha moment?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: So I realized one day, I'm like, this makes no sense. There are thousands of makeup companies out there. How does nothing work for me? Then I had this moment where I realized I've never seen a model with bright red, bumpy skin selling makeup. You always see these photoshopped, airbrushed models. And I realized, Mel, like, wow, my whole life, I've actually loved those beauty commercials. And I love seeing the magazines. And I always aspired to look like them. But deep down inside, they always made me feel like I wasn't enough.
--:-- And I had this moment. I was literally on the news set when this happened where I was like, wait a minute. What if it's not just about launching a makeup product? What if I could actually figure out how to do it, which I had no idea how and I had no money. But it's like, what if I could actually launch a product that works for me? And what if I actually put real people as models, like every age, shape, size, skin tone, skin challenge? What if I use them as models, call them beautiful and mean it for every little kid out there who's about to start doubting themselves, and every grown woman who still does?
--:-- And that deep source of pain from how I was feeling not enough and what could I do about it — that, in my opinion, is one of the strongest ways to find your purpose. It's what has just destroyed you or hurt you that you've maybe made it through. And how can you now use that making it through to help someone who's going through it?
--:-- Mel Robbins: Okay. Okay. That's like a mic drop moment from our professor of purpose, Jamie Kern Lima. So I want to make sure nobody gets left behind.
--:-- And there was billions of dollars worth of wisdom that you just dropped, but I got to hear a word from our sponsors. So just hit the pause button and we're going to continue this conversation when we come back.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Welcome back. I'm Mel Robbins. I'm here with the founder of It Cosmetics, the billion dollar brand that Jamie built from scratch on her own and then sold to L'Oreal. She is giving us a masterclass today on purpose.
--:-- So I want to try to unpack it for anybody that is listening to this and you have this sense that you're made for more. One of the things that I heard is look in your life and see what problems or frustrations or things that you're struggling with that feel like a setback. And Jamie gave you the example of the rosacea on her skin and her inability to find something that actually could help her solve this issue of being able to cover it up so that she could do her dream job. And that setback is a setup for something new.
--:-- And then get out of your own sort of selfish or self-loathing or the self-excuses and the self-pity and remind yourself that there are 8 billion people on this planet now. There are other people that are dealing with this. And that if you can figure out how to put your energy into making this better for yourself, and you bring other people into the fold with you, you now have something that's worth working on because it helps you and it's going to help other people.
--:-- And I also want to point something out that Jamie will not tell you, but I sure as hell will. And that is that this was about 14 or 15 years ago. So we're talking 2007, 2008, correct?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: In my opinion.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Jamie Kern Lima is the reason why we have this real beauty movement. There always has to be the first person and she was it. So when you look around the internet and social media and you see people doing naked faces, that was not something people did in 2007. It was all airbrush. It was all perfection. That was the beauty standard.
--:-- And so you've got a woman who is sitting in Seattle, who has no experience and no money, deciding that she is going to not only figure out how to create a makeup line for people who have issues with their skin, but that she's going to do something nobody has ever done, which is put real normal people like you and me into her campaigns when she finally gets this figured out. And she's going to show people what her skin actually looks like in order to sell it. I mean, that was a revolutionary idea. She was the first.
--:-- And I'm telling you this because you could be the first. You have something that you can solve, and you could be the first to change the way that people think about an issue.
--:-- So, Jamie, let's pick up the story because how do you go from this aha moment like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, to doing something?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yes.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Because I think some of us have aha moments, and then we doubt them. But we don't do anything.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yes, because we doubt them. We think like, oh, someone's already done it. Or oh, whatever.
--:-- First of all, if you're out there right now and you think, oh, you have an idea or a way you want to show up in the world or you want to help, but you think, oh, someone's already done it — literally, there's only one of you in the entire universe, which by definition means no one has ever done it the way you're going to do it.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Say that again, Jamie, for the people that are like, whoa, whoa, whoa, kids, calm down. I will wait. Jamie just said something — I was doing my dishes. Say that again. Talk about the fact that this matters. This is huge because I think the biggest reason we talk ourselves out of things is we think, oh, someone's already done it. Someone's already done it before, who must be smarter than me or more talented or more whatever it is than me.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: And what I have learned and then proven — and I want to tell you, too, about all — I'm going to get so excited now — because no, when you do this thing, don't be shocked when there's millions and millions of rejections and people don't get it. Because it's never been done before.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Oh, yeah.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Because there's only one of you. There's only one of you doing it the way you're going to do it. But just to recap that, there is literally only one of you in the entire universe. And so if you are going to show up to this world authentic, that means whatever you do, if it's authentic to you, it's actually by definition never been done before.
--:-- And so when you show up that way, don't be surprised if not everyone gets it right away. Or, in my case, all the experts I put on pedestals all said no. That this idea of how I wanted to connect with women, they thought it wouldn't work and they thought I wouldn't make them any money.
--:-- Mel Robbins: But can I ask you a question real quick? How did you go from the aha to starting? What did that look like? Because I think if you're in this space where you have this thing about catering that you just can't get it out of your head. You want to do these events. You've never actually done this. You had never done anything with makeup. You had no idea what you were doing. You have an idea and you have an aha moment. What was the first thing that you did to start to make this real?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: So leaning on that why I had to do it and why I felt like it was going to be part of my purpose was a big thing that helped me actually take the risk, quit my job.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Wait, you quit your job because you had an aha moment?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yeah, it was deep. I was like, if I had — what did it feel like? It felt like if I didn't do it, I would wake up the rest of my life with this pain in my gut, this longing, knowing I was created for more. It felt like if I didn't do it, I would have the pain of regret. And if I did do it, I might have the pain of failure and maybe the pain of embarrassment and then maybe the pain of, oh, wow, that doesn't feel like it went how I thought it was. I knew it was this big risk. I knew I was leaving what I thought was my dream job.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Why did you have to quit your job? Just curious.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: It was literally from day one, I was all in. I dove all in. I knew if I was going to do this, I needed to just go all in on it. I do not recommend this, but I started working like 100 hour weeks from the beginning. I was so passionate about it. I couldn't stop thinking about what if I can actually figure this out? What if I can literally — because it became a big dream.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So did you have any savings? Like, do you have a little bit of savings?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Very little savings. Because you didn't pay yourself for the first three years that you did this. First three years. So basically my husband and I wrote this business plan, quit our jobs, dove all in in our living room. We poured all of our savings into it. I thought if I can figure the product out, it's going to be huge. And then I realized like, oh, being an entrepreneur or launching a dream is not always that easy. We put every penny we had into it. And once we actually created a product, and we were scrappy.
--:-- Mel Robbins: How did you create a product? Like, are you in your kitchen buying stuff at the grocery store? Or how does this even work?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Right. So researching how are makeup formulations made? Who makes them? What are the FDA regulatory compliance? All the unsexy stuff I know nothing about. Just diving into the research phase of how does this happen? And then what I learned is that manufacturers are makeup companies' closest held secrets. They won't disclose who they work with, but a lot of these big manufacturers work with all the top brands that you see, or a handful of them.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So are you saying that all of the brands and top brands that you see are basically manufactured by a handful of companies?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yes, a handful of companies. And then some do it in-house as well.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Gotcha.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: So what I did was scrappy. I walked into a Sephora. I wrote down the name of every single brand in there, went home. I had no money, right? Cold call every single brand saying, "Oh, I'm looking for a really great manufacturer. Could you let me know who you manufacture with?" And then they hang up on me. One after another, after another, after another.
--:-- And I got this really small brand in a totally different kind of positioning where the girl who answered said, "Oh, here's who we use there in New York City." So that was my first manufacturer. Reached out to them, had a meeting in person, had no money, poured this idea out to them. They took a risk making me samples. And that's how it started was just really being scrappy and trying to figure it out.
--:-- All of our money had gone into the product development formula and the advisory board of the product. And I thought, okay, now we have a product that works for me, right? This was after hundreds of formula iterations. I thought that was going to be it.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So is this like year one or year two? Like how long did this take?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yeah, it took a good first year to get that product. And then what I started doing was sending it to everyone I thought was just going to believe in me instantly. So I sent it to Sephora and Ulta Beauty and all the department stores and all of the online retailers, QVC, which is live television shopping channel. And I thought, oh my gosh, this is going to be huge. Every single one of them said no after no, after no, after no. And to your point, it became three years of not being able to pay myself, three years of hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of no's, of crying myself to sleep at night.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Were you and your husband fighting like crazy? Like, "You should go back to work. You should..." But why do we do that? Were you doing that?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: You want to know what it was? We still believed in it, but we weren't sure how we were going to make it. It was friends and family that were like, "Wait, you quit your job. Are you sure you should have quit your job? Or wait, you still haven't made any money? It's been three years." So you hear all of this, the voices get so loud. The loudest though were my own self-doubt.
--:-- Sometimes we take a chance and go for something because our gut is telling us to do it. And then all of a sudden you face all this opposition and you start to question, is my gut wrong? Is my knowing wrong? And there were so many times where I would get another brutal no from Sephora or QVC or whoever it was. And I would just literally cry myself to sleep. I would pray about it and be like, God, I feel like I'm supposed to be doing this, but nothing is going right.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So let's just pause in that moment. Hold that thought. We got to take a short break for our sponsors. And when we come back, we're going to pick this amazing conversation up with my friend, Jamie Kern Lima.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Welcome back. I'm Mel Robbins. I'm here with the founder of It Cosmetics, the billion-dollar brand that Jamie built from scratch on her own and then sold to L'Oreal. She is giving us a masterclass today on purpose, believing in yourself.
--:-- So, Jamie, your story is incredible. You have left your dream job. You have gotten no after no after no after no after no. How do you stay connected to your intuition in a situation like that? What tool do you have or what advice can you give to somebody who's having trouble hearing what the right decision is in that kind of situation?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I think that intuition is like a muscle that we build over time. And I think it's a lifelong journey to really learning how to hear it and to trust it. And one of the greatest tools I think is to go back, think back to times in your life where maybe you had this gut feeling to do something and everyone around you said, "Don't do it." So you listened to them. You didn't trust yourself. And then think about what happened.
--:-- And then similarly, go back to a time where everyone was like, "Oh, no way, no way." And you're like, "But I love him. I don't think he's lying. I think his phone really did break five times every weekend. He didn't disappear his phone." Think about that situation when everyone was telling you something and you didn't listen, or even your gut was telling you and you didn't listen. And you think back to those times and you start to develop pattern recognition of how it felt in moments in your life when you trusted yourself or didn't and what happened. And you get better attuned to what that feels like.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So what does it feel like for you in those situations? Can you describe what it feels like for you when you're like, yep, no, that's a no. And what does it feel like for you when you're like, I'm sticking with this?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Often it's the tiniest of feelings in my gut. Some people describe it as like a still small voice. I pray about it. I ask God to give me the answers and I try to live the answers.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Do you feel the answers that God gives you? Like, is that what happens for you when you do this?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Like right now, when I look at you, I know you're a beautiful soul. I just know it. You know it. You feel it. I feel like you have good, like you're good. It's a feeling. And we get these feelings, but so much around us is so loud.
--:-- And we just learn over time. And by the way, not to go — this could be a whole other episode — but especially as women from the time we're young, we learn not to trust ourselves. We walk into our parents fighting and we go, "Is everything okay?" They're like, "Everything's great. Everything's great." To protect us, we start to learn to doubt ourselves.
--:-- Or, especially as young girls, you learn to make decisions by consensus often with your friends and making other people happy. Making other people happy, people pleasing. We're rewarded for pleasing everyone else and almost ignoring what we feel. So if you're someone who's an adult right now going, "I don't even know how to hear my own gut or trust myself," that's why. We've been trained out of learning how to do it. So it takes intentionality and really deciding, oh, you know what?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I'm going to put in some time, even if it's five minutes a day, just to thinking about moments in my life where I trusted myself, where I didn't. And if you don't remember any of them, start now.
--:-- Mel Robbins: You know what you just inspired me to think about? I don't even know if it's possible to do this, but imagine if you could go through the rest of today and only make decisions that align with what you truly want. If you don't want to go to that party tonight, don't go. If a friend asks you something and you feel obligated out of guilt to lend them that thing, don't actually lend them the thing. Eat what you want to eat tonight for dinner. Don't just go to wherever your friends want to go. I think that would be a real eye-opening experiment if you were to do that. And you start building that muscle, right? Some people don't even pay attention to what they actually want to eat for dinner. They're just like, what sounds good to everyone?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: But to your point, when you start paying attention, then you also start building that knowing of hearing your own knowing.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Do you think it's possible to discover your unique purpose in life if you are not connected and listening to your intention? Intuition, I mean.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: It's way more likely and you're going to actually discover more than one purpose often if you're really tuned in to your intuition and you're intentional about it. But what I'll say for someone who feels like they can't hear their gut, but they still want to find their purpose. A friend of mine says that you're best positioned to serve the person you once were, right? Trent Shelton, our friend says one day the things you're going through right now will be the things you made it through. And what I would say to someone listening right now is look at something in the past that has broken your heart, that has caused you grief, that has been something that you care deeply about, whether it's positive or negative, that you've gone through, something you care deeply about, or maybe pain you've gone through, something you have made it through. I believe often when we go through the hardest times in our life, it's for one of two reasons. It is to either equip us with the strength we need to carry the weight of our success that's to come, to carry the weight of our purpose that's to come, or we've gone through these horrible unspeakable times, things we would never want to happen to us again in our life, because we're actually going to get our greatest source of fulfillment and purpose by one day helping someone else who's going through them.
--:-- Mel Robbins: I love that saying that you're best equipped to help the person you used to be. Yes. Yes. Yes. Let's go to that moment, Jamie. You're three years in. You've burned through the money. You have been told no by everybody. And even though you have leveraged all of the steps that were ordered along the way and like an amazing Denny's waitress, you can talk to anybody. You can hustle. You can figure it out. You have nothing but closed doors in front of you. And a ton of product and no money. What is the turning point? Why did you not give up?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: So two big things happened. The first was in the form of a crazy painful rejection. So I thought, Mel, we got a call from a big potential investor, very famous for launching all these sort of unknown brands and making them big products we all buy in grocery stores. They got ahold of our product and I thought, if they invest in us, I'm not going to go bankrupt. We can leverage their clout to get in these stores that keep telling me no. I had this whole scenario planned out that was like this Pretty Woman moment, right? Where I was like, he's going to save the day. So we started taking meeting after meeting and it got down to the final meeting with this huge investment firm. It was in person. My husband and I actually flew to the meeting and the head guy was about three feet from me. His whole team was there. It was awesome. I just presented our whole future product pipeline. And he says, "You know, you should be so proud of this product you've created. It's really, really good. 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?" Because I'm so used to hearing no. And I was devastated, because this was supposed to be the meeting where they're like, "Let's do this." I was so hopeful and I was so desperate. He got very quiet and he says to me, "Do you want to know?" I said, "Can you tell me why?" And he says to me, "Do you want me to be really honest with you?" And I said, "Yes, please." He got really quiet and he's like three feet from me in person. And he says, "I just don't think women will buy makeup from someone who looks like you with your body and your weight." When he said that to me, a lifetime of body doubt and self-doubt flooded my body all at once. When I looked at him, I actually felt no anger toward him. I felt like I was almost staring my own fear straight in the eye. But when he said those words to me, Mel, and this is when we talk about purpose and intuition, the second he said it, I felt this feeling in my gut. I can remember it like it was yesterday, this strong feeling that said, "He's wrong." I felt it. I didn't know how I was going to prove it, but I felt that feeling. What I realized later, when I look back at that moment, this guy gave me a no, but God gave me a knowing in that moment. I believe every one of us has had someone tell us we're not the right fit or no, or you don't have what it takes. Sometimes we're the ones telling ourselves that.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: But if you get still and you learn to hear your knowing, I believe which one you listen to—if you listen to the no, all the no's, all the rejections, all the self-doubt, or you get still and listen to your knowing, whether that's from your own intuition, from your creator, from the universe, whatever speaks to you, but we all have it. I believe our life and our purpose and our entire destiny comes down to which one we listen to. Do you listen to the no, or do you listen to the knowing?
--:-- Mel Robbins: Okay. I promised a masterclass. That right there is worth a billion dollars. In life, are you going to listen to the no or are you going to listen to the knowing inside of you? That's it. As somebody who loves you and as your friend, when you shared that story with me and hearing you tell it again right now, I literally go, "I'm gonna kill that motherf***er." I go, my knowing goes, "Oh yeah? Oh yeah? You think? Okay. Let me show you." It's that mojo thing going when somebody says no like that at a moment like that. It's like, "I'll show you." I guess I just got this wake up call that my knowing often feels like "I'll show you. You missed out. You'll be sorry." What does yours sound like? And it's almost always true.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: In that case, I was devastated and at the same time had the strong feeling—it was just a peace. Honestly, in that moment, it was a peace. "He's wrong." And that didn't make sense in my head. Why? Because I had had three years of hundreds of rejections. Jay-Z says, "The genius thing we did was we didn't give up." That's one of my favorite quotes. In that moment, everything told me to give up, Mel. Hundreds of rejections. And now it felt like my last hope of desperation told me something totally different. Not only do I not believe in anything you're doing, but I actually just think you're personally not the right fit. Women just won't buy makeup from you. It was just like, all of these no's everywhere. I want to share that because it's easy for someone to go, "Wow, she built a billion dollar company. She must've just got lucky. Or maybe she just had so many connections." But really what it comes down to sometimes in this case, that big moment for me: do you listen to the no's or you listen to the knowing? I made that decision that day to trust the knowing, to trust myself. I kept feeling like I was supposed to keep going. I didn't know how.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So you got this jerk who's like, "Yeah, they're not going to buy it because your body type and this, that, and the other thing." You're like, "Yeah, you're wrong, motherf***er." What do you do next? The next right step when you can't even see how it's going to work out. How do you determine what the next right step is?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: For me, I just get still. I pray. But whether for you it's prayer or the universe or your intuition, when you get still, all you can do is try to listen and try to live that answer, whatever it is, and take that next right step. I just had this knowing I was supposed to keep going, even when it didn't make sense. I remember crying myself to sleep. I remember writing in my journal, "Know your why, then fly, girl, fly." I read those words every day till I didn't need the reminder. I would Google stories of people that had gone through thousands of rejections who no one would know that they went through them because they're so successful today. I just kept trying to build this toolbox of things I could lean on.
--:-- Mel Robbins: How did QVC come about? Because you built It Cosmetics and it became, because of you, the most successful beauty brand on all of QVC. You did over a thousand appearances. So how did you even get onto QVC? That in and of itself is no small feat.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Their head guy of beauty, who's like a legend, had said no to me many times. "No, you're not the right fit."
--:-- Mel Robbins: Was this before or after this guy was like, "No, we're not investing"?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: After.
--:-- Mel Robbins: After. So she has now gotten three years of no's. They're almost out of money. Her intuition is knowing that she's going to fly, girl, fly. So she is still showing up to a beauty expo where I want you to understand in the business world, it's like going to a convention where everybody that you have ever fooled around with, who has then broken up with you, is attending. So everybody that has said no to her, she walks in and it's like, "Oh, here's this chick again, the It chick." The cosmetics person that has been sending me the stuff and calling me and we have told her no, do not make eye contact.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: This describes it exactly. Everyone you fooled around with who broke up with you and they're like, "Oh, don't make eye contact. Oh God, this chick again with the skin."
--:-- Mel Robbins: So you're at this thing. You've been told no by the big, big, big person. It's been three years. We're talking like 2011, 2012-ish. What do you do?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: You get this three foot table. It's a huge convention. There's 6,000 women at this convention. They're walking up and down and it's every beauty brand in the world.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Are they buying it for their stores or?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: No. It was this big cosmetic executive women award show. You get a three foot table. You're demonstrating your product. You're hoping that someone who walks by either wants to carry your product in their stores or all the press is there. They cover your product. When I got there, I saw QVC had this huge booth in the background and you're not allowed to leave your table. I couldn't afford to get kicked out. But I just kept having this feeling like, "Okay, I've called them a million times. They've told me no forever, but I've never met anyone in person." So I kept trying to sneak away from my table. Every time I got over there, the buyers would be mobbed with people. I eventually got over there, made my way to one of the buyers, introduced myself, poured my heart out. I remember sweat just dripping through my clothes because I was freaking out down to no money. I'll cut a long story short, but she gave me her card. It's like when someone says, "Oh, DM me on Instagram," you don't know if they really mean it. Then you're on your Instagram checking your DMs and you're like, "Oh, they still haven't replied." I thought, "Is that what it's going to be like?" But she actually meant it. I flew out, had a meeting with her, we got a yes. My first big yes for one shot on QVC. What it meant, Mel, was I was going to get this 10 minute segment live on the air, live in front of 100 million homes. I either had to sell enough product to hit their sales goal or not come back.
--:-- Mel Robbins: We were only doing one to two orders a day on our website. One to two orders a day, everybody. After almost four years of this. And barely keeping the lights on. So now you get your shot. There are those moments in life. You're at bat. And you got to be ready for those. So put us right there with you. What happened?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I was about to learn one of the greatest life lessons I've ever learned to this day. I found out I get one shot and I had to sell over 6,000 units of our concealer in this 10 minute window to hit their sales goal or not come back. That was about $130,000 or $140,000 of product in a 10-minute window.
--:-- Mel Robbins: I also want to point out to everybody, that's 10 years of sales on her website at the current amount. So in 10 minutes, everybody, she on live television has to move 10 years worth of volume she was selling on her website at that time. In one shot. And she's never done this before. I realize you were a television anchor, but this is a totally different thing.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: QVC, it's unlike stores where you can walk in and there's thousands of products in one space. Their one minute of airtime can get one product. So you're competing with the volume of like Apple iPhone or Dyson vacuum. You have to hit these highest sales goals. What I quickly learned was the offer was consignment, which meant I wasn't guaranteed to be paid for it. I had to figure out how to get a loan to cover the cost of manufacturing 6,000 units of product, shipping it in, going through legal, going through QC, going through all of it. And then I learned if I go on air and it doesn't sell, I have to take it all back and therefore go out of business. So you should never, ever, ever accept a purchase order you can't afford to lose. But at this point, it was like, "I don't know what else to do. This is it. This is the shot." So we went to 22 banks that all said no, and they probably should have. The 23rd bank, which was California Bank and Trust, gave us a loan that covered our very first purchase order and a little bit more. So I took the little bit more. We hired third-party consultants. I'm like, "I'm going all in. I want to do the best 10 minutes I could possibly do. I want to have no regrets." And they all told me the same thing.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Which is?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: "If you want a chance at making it, here's what you need to do. You need to use this type of model to demonstrate your product, which is flawless skin, early 20s, all the same skin tone." And I'm like, "Okay, but that's inauthentic. That's not why I'm building this brand." I'm like, "What if I put models in their 70s and someone with hyperpigmentation and someone with acne? And what if I take my own makeup off on national TV and I could prove live how the product works?" And they were mortified. Here's the thing, Mel, they wanted me to win. They were giving me the best advice that they know how.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Did people say, "Wait, you can't take them on the air?" Or was there any like, were people like, "Oh, she's got, this is just going to be terrible." What was that like when you walked in? Did they even know you were going to take your makeup off?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I let them know I wanted to. QVC was great. They want everyone to be their authentic selves. It's just, this has never been done this way before. I wish I could say it was easy for me to just go, "I'm just going to go with my knowing." But the truth is I flew out there a week early, Mel. I sat in a rental car in the parking lot, cried every day. I actually second-guessed myself. I'm like, "If I do it, maybe I'll do it their way first. Then I'll make money. Then I'll do it my way." But I know that you can't fake authenticity. And authenticity alone doesn't automatically guarantee success. But what I do know is inauthenticity guarantees failure every time.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Okay, everybody stop. Professor of Purpose in seconds. Did you hear that? That inauthenticity, being fake, trying to do something everybody else's way because you're too insecure to do it your way, that never guarantees success. Authenticity, your knowing, your special spin on things. That is the pathway to purpose and success. So after a week of crying in your rental car in the parking lot at QVC, you were like, "I'm going with the knowing." So tell us about that first appearance. You're standing there on a television set. There's a bazillion cameras. The lights are bright. You got your models there. You're taking the risk of your lifetime on live television in front of a hundred million homes. You were doing something that has never been done on television before.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I remember literally I wore two pairs of Spanx, Mel. Not because I cared how I look, but I was so freaked out. My hands were shaking and I was sweating through my clothes. So I'm on double Spanx under my dress. I remember the moment the camera went live. There was a big countdown clock on the floor that started at 10 minutes. By the way, a minute or two before I went onto the set, I learned you're not guaranteed your 10 minutes. If you are a minute or two into your sell and you're not hitting numbers, they know by the second. Your clock, you might think you have eight minutes still to go and your clock will jump to one or jump to two minutes left. Because your product's a flop. You're a flop. So you literally are racing against the clock to be successful out of the gate.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So what did you do to hook everybody? Did you take your makeup off right away? What did you do?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I go live. I remember it's like 9:59, 9:58. I had practiced in my bathroom mirror so many times. If I had known the High Five Habit then, I would have been way more confident. But I was practicing in the bathroom mirror this demonstration a million times on my wrist, how our concealer doesn't crease and the best two selling concealers crease. I'd done this demonstration like this where I show it and they all start to crease. So I'm holding my wrist up trying to do this as we go live, but my hands are shaking. It was never shaking when I was doing it a million times. It wouldn't bend, everybody. She was so anxiety-ridden that she's sweating through her Spanx and her wrist will not bend. So she cannot demonstrate that her product won't crease. The host grabbed my wrist and was like, "Thank you, sugar." And she took over. Then I remember my bright red bare face before shot coming up on national television. I remember walking over to our models, real women, all shapes, sizes, skin tones, skin challenges, calling them beautiful, meaning it.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So when did you take your makeup off? When she grabbed your hand and said, "Thank you, sugar"?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: They did a whole bare face before shot of me for that show. I've taken it off live a million times since that first show. It was like, bare face before shot, and then the after. I remember we were six or seven minutes in. I didn't know how we were doing, but I knew we weren't cut yet. Then it got down to like a minute left and the host said, "The deep shades almost gone. The tan shades almost sold out." I was freaking out. I remember literally right at the 10 minute mark, this giant "Sold Out" sign came up across the screen and I start crying on national television. They cut from me and went to like Dyson vacuum or something. My husband came rushing through the double doors of the studio and he's got his arms up and I'm just sobbing. I thought he was going to give me a hug or be all excited. He just looked at me and he's like, "We're not going bankrupt." That one airing, which was September of 2010, became five more that year, then 101 the next year. Then I did 250 live shows a year myself, direct live on QVC year after year. So we built the biggest beauty brand in QVC's history. The only reason I share that is because it was years of no, and "you're not the right fit." What I love for anyone listening who needs to hear this is no one can tell you you're not the right fit. No one. You can get all the no's in the world, but you have your knowing. By the way, Mel, I believe even when you trust your knowing and then it seems like it was wrong and things don't go your way over and over and over. I look back at those moments. I really wanted that investor to invest in us. Thank God he didn't. When I say everything's happening for us, what I mean is, if he—I was so desperate that if he would have invested in us, I probably would have given him the majority of the company for probably almost no money. By the time six years later, when L'Oreal bought this little company that started in my living room for $1.2 billion cash, Paula and I were the largest shareholders. I look back and it's like, "Oh gosh, thank God all the no's happened when they did, even when they sucked, even when it felt like it wasn't fair." I can look at that in many scenarios. Sometimes we don't have some big positive outcome, but we learn a purpose through a no. We learn a calling through a no. We learn a lesson. We build strength. We build resiliency. We appreciate the beautiful moments so much more when we've gone through the tough ones.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Have you ever seen that investor since?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I have not seen him.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Of course, I asked the petty question. I'm like, "Have you ever seen him to twist the little knife in there?"
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I heard from him one time ever again, and it was six years later, the day that L'Oreal announced the deal. Because they're a public company, they announced that they had acquired IT Cosmetics, made me the first woman to hold a CEO title of a brand in their 107-year history. They did the big press release.
--:-- Mel Robbins: That's kind of surprising. 107 years, L'Oreal, a makeup company. It took them that long to have the first female CEO of a brand?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: I hope they have many more now. That is my prayer. So they announced it. All of a sudden it was homepage of Wall Street Journal, the press everywhere. That was the first time and only time since that I heard from that potential investor.
--:-- Mel Robbins: And what did he say?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: He said, "Congratulations on the L'Oreal deal. I was wrong." That's what he said and wished me the best of luck.
--:-- Mel Robbins: That's a big deal to admit you're wrong.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: It is. So when you speak about petty, what I did say to him was thank you. But what I wanted to say—
--:-- Mel Robbins: What did you want to say?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: In that moment, I thought about the movie Pretty Woman where she goes in the store and they wouldn't help her, and then she goes back. I wanted to say to him, "Big mistake. Huge." I could give you 1.2 billion reasons why it was a huge mistake. But I didn't. I wouldn't have wanted to be him in that situation. We probably would have been one of the most successful investments in his firm's history. So I always say rejection is God's protection so often.
--:-- Mel Robbins: There's another one, everybody. Rejection is God's protection. It's a good way to frame it. I think when you look in the rearview mirror, you know that all the rejections you've faced, especially in relationships, were there to protect you. I think the true thing that you've taught me through your story and through the example that you continue to set, Jamie, is that true power and grace and grit and belief is about seeing that in front of you, not behind you. That the rejections that you're facing right now, that you can look ahead and realize it's protecting you in this moment. After doing something so extraordinary, you also have made a huge difference in women's lives around the world because you are extraordinarily philanthropic. $40 million worth of product and monetary donations to people that are struggling with cancer. What is next for you? Because you are right now in the middle of figuring out on this next leg of the journey called life what your purpose is and what your next thing is going to be. What tools are you using or how are you thinking about it? So many people, particularly after the last three years, have had a profound life change thrust on them. And they're looking ahead at an open road wondering what their purpose is going to be, what they're going to do. Can you just speak to that person for a minute about how you're going about figuring it out?
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: One thing I just want to remind everyone too, Mel, because I think people put so much pressure on themselves that their purpose has to be their job or their next job. A lot of times we can be doing a job that's fine. And maybe for family reasons, we need that health coverage and we need that paycheck. Your purpose can be found in the things you do outside of that. There's a lot of ways to listen to that knowing and your gut. And when it feels right, that's aligned with who you're born to be and how you're born to show up in the world. So for me right now, there's that famous thing: just because you can, should you? There's a big part of me now with all these—could I go launch a bunch of businesses? Yes. And what I feel drawn to is literally—here's the deal. I've built a billion dollar business. I have other companies I invest in.
--:-- Mel Robbins: You also are married and you have two beautiful children, a two-year-old and a four-year-old. And you're incredibly devoted to your family.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: That's all part of my story. But when I look at my real story, meaning the part that ties deeply to my purpose, my real story is a girl who went from not believing in herself to learning how to. So when I wake up in the morning and I think about the things I've done so far, the things I hope for my kids, and how I built a billion dollar business, it was really through seeing women, helping them see themselves and believe in themselves and believe they are worthy and enough. That's what fires me up every morning. So when I think about what I'm stepping into next, I wrote *Believe It*, my book about how to go from underestimated to unstoppable, donated all the proceeds. I'm donating all the proceeds throughout 100%.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Hold on, hold on. Let's just underscore that. So she writes a New York Times bestseller, donates all the proceeds from the book. So you're kind of in this soup of knowing that this is the area where you want to focus the impact, but it's still a fuzzy target, so to speak, as our friend Dean would say, it's a fuzzy target. If somebody has a sense that there's something more, but they haven't had that aha moment yet that you had almost 14 years ago sitting on that television set—"I'm going to make makeup and I'm going to bring real women and I'm going to show my skin and I'm going to solve this problem. I'm going to make people think that they're beautiful because they are beautiful, no matter what." And you did it. But if you're in the soup and you don't have the vision yet, is there an exercise or something that you would recommend that we all do while we're waiting for that clarity and that epiphany to strike?
--:-- Mel Robbins: Yeah, two things. One, waiting for it to be perfect can be the lowest vibration, biggest excuse, number one reason why people just never try and never get started. I think it's rare to ever have complete clarity, like this is exactly perfect for it.
--:-- Mel Robbins: I think two things: I think just taking a step and seeing how it feels is good. Tuning into your knowing. I also think you mentioned our friend Dean, he was saying it's a fuzzy target. He was saying something to me recently about, almost like when you're about to aim a bow and arrow and you're about to let go of the arrow. He's like, you can aim and turn it and twist it a few times before you let go of the arrow. It's okay to wait a little bit and just make sure you're going to aim at the right thing.
--:-- Mel Robbins: So this year, for example, I've kind of been doing that. I've been saying, how do things feel? I have the gift and blessing of being here with you right now. How does this feel? Feels amazing.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Well, like you, and maybe this is one of the reasons why we have become such dear friends in such a short period of time. I often say on the show that I truly believe that the best years of your life and the best friendships that you'll have are on the road ahead. But a lot of the reason why we connected so profoundly, even though we are different in many ways, is that it goes back to the Denny's waitress. At my core, I am still the waitress making money, waiting tables at the Red Rooster Tavern on Scenic Drive in North Muskegon, Michigan. Same as you, stalling because the fryer has now broken and the fried perch is not coming out. I'm talking to the tourists from Chicago and I'm treating everybody kindly. I know that all I want to do is impact people's lives that have their head down and don't feel very seen or heard. I want to make them know that they have it within them to tap into this incredible power inside them to create whatever they want in life. It starts with believing that you can, and having somebody like you who has demonstrated that is really important for people to hear.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: On that topic of friendship, I love so much that you are the friend that people need to your audience. I'm honored to be the friend for this episode with you to everyone. I'm honored to be part of that. Thank you.
--:-- Mel Robbins: I think one of the things that I've learned, and it took me a long time to learn this, is that there is so much success and happiness to go around. When you lift other people up and you reach out for help, your success comes faster and it's richer.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Yes.
--:-- Mel Robbins: It goes back to purpose. It goes back to that knowing and staying connected to your intention and this unique thing that you have to give to the world. It is not only your responsibility in life to stay connected to your knowing. It is your responsibility to advocate for it because only you have seen it in your heart and mind. Of course your family says no. They don't even know what you're talking about because they only know the person that you've been in the past. Of course the investor is going to say no. Why? Because they only know what they know. Your knowing is yours and you have to stay connected to it. You have to keep describing it or advocating for it or explaining it to people so that they can see it too. It's not until you demonstrate what you see in your own heart and mind by continuing to walk toward it, continuing to talk about it, continuing to believe in it, that it will become a reality. That's why people say no, because it's your knowing, not theirs. In a weird way, a ton of no's or a lot of friction or bumping up against things as you're trying, you can't understand why don't people get this? Why isn't this working? It's because it's your knowing, not theirs.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: Amazing. You're just the freaking best. In case nobody else has told you, I want to just make sure that we end by saying that I love you. I know Jamie does too.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Yeah. I love you also. You're worthy of your greatest hopes and your wildest dreams and all the unconditional love in the world and your purpose and worthy of grace, the grace that you want to give yourself on this journey. We're all in it together. That's the beauty and power of your show also. Like we're all in it together.
--:-- Jamie Kern Lima: We are.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Yeah, we are. Well, we believe in you. So get out there and do it.
--:-- Mel Robbins: Oh, one more thing. It's the legal language. This podcast is presented solely for educational and entertainment purposes. It is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional.
