this is like a therapy session patricia

bryant she's a creator

author entrepreneur with an incredible

story growing up

my mum should take us to offices to

clean the offices and we'll go to school

and she would say like just don't tell

anyone that you're working at five

o'clock in the morning

you just go to school in the morning and

act like everything was normal

there is pressure for influencers to

speak up on every topic

all the time bearing in mind that my

forte is

makeup and clothing and financed you

know to an extent but we

are not credible sources who know

everything

we just don't and i think it's really

important for us to say speaking up on

stuff that you know nothing about is

very very

dangerous i had a stalker for like three

years and it was someone who would like

just message me on all my platforms

constantly

send emails message family members so i

did a meet and greet an event

and then they messaged me like haha i

was at your meet and greet so i remember

feeling so anxious

you didn't see me you look so terrible

in person next time i'm gonna

do something

patricia bryant she's a creator author

entrepreneur

and a mother and she has a remarkable

inspiring story growing up on a

councillors day

having her dad deported when she was

just five years old

a nigerian mother that came to this

country doing cleaning jobs

at night which she took patricia along

to with her

and that mother became a property mogul

and patricia

she became a superstar in her own right

so it's no surprise that when i looked

at the comments section on a previous

podcast episode

a comment requesting patricia bright to

sit here with me and to be on this

podcast

had over a hundred upvotes and now i

know why

her attitude perspective ambition

self-belief resilience is incredible

so without further ado i'm stephen

bartlett and this is the diver of a ceo

i hope nobody's listening but if you are

then please keep this to yourself

yes we share one big similarity with our

childhoods

in the fact that we both had nigerian

mothers we do

we do yeah i didn't know that really no

i didn't actually well i still have

nigerian mother so

yeah yeah we both have nigerian mothers

and

um i believe both of our nigerian

mothers moved from nigeria to the uk

yeah um so they they were both born in

nigeria so they're

you know authentic roots are there but

you know tell me about the rest of your

childhood i only had one nigerian parent

i heard

okay you had two yeah i had both my mum

and dad

um growing up um but my dad was actually

deported

so he got deported when i was probably

like

six years old and i actually remember

the experience of his

deportation as being something very

traumatic

in hindsight as an adult i recognized

that but

growing up you know with an african mom

african dad

our culture was just a part of us on an

everyday basis

but also i was from south london as well

so i kind of grew up in battersea

and i came from a very diverse school

but i always went back to like a very

african home and um

yeah i think it really shaped me to who

i am today

in what ways i think it's that kind of

i'm going to say aggression there's

something about nigerians out of

all other people from say the diaspora

um

that i think means that we're quite

aggressive and very passionate let's not

say aggressive let's say passionate

we're intense we know what we want and

there's also a huge sense of

like pride as well that we can do

anything

and we're good and i feel very

privileged that i had a lot of that

you're great you'll do well you'll be

successful

don't worry about what's going on don't

don't see reality

as a definition of a limitation for

yourself

and i think that that's really made me

do a lot of things that

supposedly i shouldn't be able to do but

that kind of upbringing made me be like

no i can do it

it's fine it was always fine i watched

my mum do a lot of things

that would be considered impossible for

her

and she just did it with ease and chaos

in my

opinion now but somehow she kind of

achieved those things

and i would feel very privileged to kind

of grow up with that

sense of confidence instilled in me

which i think is really

cultural as a nigerian and i bet she

didn't complain either

oh there was no complaining she did she

just got on with it

like even when my dad was deported she

just got on with it and there were times

that

you know growing up my mom used to work

on the trains so she was one of the

train cleaners

and my sister's three and i'm five she'd

go out at night and leave us

because there was no one to like look

after her kids she'd go out she'll clean

she'll clean offices she'll take us to

offices to clean the offices

when we were younger and um she just did

it

and we'll go to school and she would say

like just don't tell anyone that you're

working at five o'clock in the morning

she obviously you're not going to go to

school

and tell people oh i've just been at

foxton's like

cleaning and helping my mom out you just

go to school in the morning and that

like everything was normal

um but no there wasn't any complaining

and she just kind of got on with it

and do you think you know you referred

to that as being that gave you kind of

confidence that you could do anything

but for me it sounds a lot like

because that immigrant story is so

connected with like survival

and that's why i talked about like she

didn't complain because it's like a lot

of complaint comes from

privilege almost doesn't it when you

feel like you have a choice

yeah but what's really also really

interesting is that some people still

feel lucky

the fact that she wasn't deported when

my dad was deported

she probably felt oh my god i'm so lucky

i got to kind of stay here

and um why would you complain when you

feel like you're in a better position

for yourself and your children in the

long term so

yeah she didn't have the privilege of

wanting to complain but i think she was

really like

happy to still be here though she had to

work hard

i think she knew that she had a lot of

opportunity

while being here and she'd be trained

and

she she became a nurse and then she

bought properties and then

she retired in her 40s like i love

england

in that it's kind of like the land of

opportunity for those who really want to

like you know work out what to do and

use it so i think she could see that

that was possible for her and you talked

about that that day when you were six

years old when you're

there's a knock on the door at nighttime

at night time it might have been

at night it might have been in the

middle of the day to be honest

what i do remember is like literally

about four

burley police officers officers kind of

walking in

um shouting like screaming like and

there's

me as a five-year-old my sister is a

three-year-old my mom in tears

and then literally dragging my dad out

of the house and it was like

your dad's gone like at that one moment

and we didn't see him again for seven

years

afterwards so it was like i at the time

i didn't i never processed it

it's only in the last year or two i've

processed

how kind of maybe traumatic that kind of

experience would have been for me as a

child

and i think it's also made me really be

fearful of loss which is why i work so

hard so that

things like that don't happen hopefully

to me and my family in the future

so in the last couple of years you've

had time to reflect on that and you i

guess you're saying

did you choose to reflect on that or go

through the journey of reflecting that

because you could see

things in your behavior that you thought

maybe that's connected

i didn't even recognize it i knew that

there was

like i work really hard like i'm really

intense and i'm always like let's just

keep going i'm always like that

and until i literally you know started

to have therapy as like

where does that come from and it was

that then got uncovered

in my therapy sessions that actually the

maybe one of the triggers for me

like working hard was because because of

that maybe fear of loss

um and obviously there's other aspects

as well i just

like hustling that's fun but there was

also maybe this thing here

that was one of my drivers that i've

actually used in a positive way but

it's also important to kind of reflect

on like dealing with things like that

and i think that i came from a place of

no it happened

that just happened it's fine on to the

next whereas like when you sit down and

talk about it you're like

oh that's that's not great yeah that's

50 years old

that's not a great situation yeah yeah

it must have taught you something about

something even if that lesson was wrong

that's where i think about it i'm like

that must have taught you something

about the nature of life because at five

years old you're learning what the world

means and what this means and that power

and your dad and your mum i must have

taught you some lesson about something

even if that lesson was wrong

right yeah exactly i mean i didn't even

realize that it could have been teaching

me something

like no idea but maybe that

stuff happened that's life you're not

really in control of anything

um but things like that can't stop you

yeah i mean yeah i think if my parents

were snatched out of my house i

definitely wouldn't feel safe

yeah i wouldn't feel safe you know

because that's

parents represent the foundation of like

safety in yeah

this is my house and these are my

parents and they just are yeah and then

one of those things is snatched out

it makes you i guess insecure about ever

feeling too safe to somebody

yeah but i think for me

maybe mine was that i can't rely

on the system or other people to

secure my safety maybe and so i kind of

i'm always trying to make sure i secure

myself

with the actions that i take because

those are the only things i'm in control

of

so i'm very much like i'll do it myself

i swear out myself

oh don't worry because you never know

what's going to happen there

and i i'm like that as a person does

that make you

paranoid about i guess

everything professionally no

it makes me really objective i'm like

i'm a pure realist

like something that's probably going to

go wrong at some point in time and

that's fine

like how are you going to handle that

like it's almost like i prepare for

something to

go wrong in a way this is like a therapy

session oh yeah i mean this is

this is pretty much what this podcast is

okay great yeah well no

i just find i i think when i started

this podcast i i am

i was anticipating to find these like

wild differences between everybody

but in fact i found the opposite which

is that fundamentally

um we're all very very similar right

when it relates to things like

insecurity and safety and childhood and

then

um obviously because in many respects

you've gone on to create a career for

yourself that is so

different from so many it would

sometimes you think well

what was the initial catalyst that

caused that person to be different what

was the like

the environment it's almost like a

cauldron what was the furnace they were

like

scolded in to make them then more

hardworking or obsessive or whatever and

um yeah i guess i mean having a nigerian

mother i

already know what that part is like you

could call it a cauldron

yeah yeah yeah yeah that work ethic

piece as well which um

is quite absent in this culture um and

that

you know what we talked about

complaining you referred to this as the

land of opportunity

yeah how does that make you feel when

you see people who

have lots of a much

more let's say financially privileged

start to life

um and they

don't fully understand the opportunity

the land of opportunity

so my first thought is like i roll

like oh there you go moaning or

complaining

but i also realized that there's so many

different types of privileges that

people have

that can actually provide them like a

long-term foundation

i think that if you do some people have

financial privilege but they have no

love they have no hope they have no

no one to tell them that they're good

whereas i mean

i've had the financial privileges but i

had a mom who was so loving and so

caring and

so encouraging that i was in a better

position just because i had that

so i don't want to ever tell someone

that you're privileged

because of xyz maybe in other areas they

didn't have the support that they needed

to actually um spur them on to be the

best version of themselves

um so i try not to be that judgmental

anymore because there's so many

different categorizations of privilege

and at some point you know you said your

mum she retrained herself

she became a nurse which is amazing yeah

um

and off you went to university i did

yeah i went off to university

mmu we have a similarity oh my gosh i

love that yeah

yeah i lost one lecture but i was there

for all three years but i just

dropped out yeah okay great and we have

that in common because i i was barely

there but i was i had a great social

life so it was enjoying

manchester is great it was great yeah

yeah no i went to

university after like leaving home and i

was so ready to like get out of my house

and get out of london and try something

new and then find myself

in like a new city i actually went in to

do

fashion marketing and to my parents

despair

because again as an african you don't do

fashion that's not

that's not a real course you do

accounting you do law

you do business you don't do fashion

marketing

um but i think i've always had this kind

of more creative

or creative streak as well as rebellious

streak as well

like i'm going to do what i want to do

um

but funny i kind of went there to do

fashion but changed my course to

accounting and finance

because i realized that there was no

financial hope

in fashion i was like oh i'm not going

to be broke when i leave university hell

no

so i changed purely on that on that

basis that you

purely on that basis i didn't love my

course and then when they were doing

internship opportunities they were

paying interns

8k a year 10k a year and like graduate

starting salaries

were like 8k and i was like i i'm not

rich enough to do this

no way and then i found out about

accounting and finance

and they they were like the banks that

had really good opportunities

and i was really good at the accounting

because we had a module

um in the fashion marketing and i would

i smashed it and i was like i'll do

accounting and finance

wow you said at this point that you were

your parents you know typical nigerian

parents my mom was the same when i

actually when i dropped out is when i

got help

but uh yeah because you know that's even

worse

rather you're doing something at

university just i feel like part of it's

just just so she can tell her friends or

something i was like

do you know what i mean it's just like

it's like i'm going to university so

that you

get a degree as being a good mother

my child is at university is what they

tell all the aunties

like it's very important yeah and at

that point your dad was

he was back in your life yes so by the

time

i was about 12 he came back

um so fundamentally they defined his

deportation as an illegal deportation

but we i remember going to the court

cases and my mom pleading with you know

social services and

lawyers and just people help us help us

get my our dad back like how do we do

this and then

we went to the court case and she was

like i don't know why this man was

deported

like gavel down bring him back i was

like that took seven years for you guys

to do that

but he got back and like he just started

again

worked as a security guard did all of

that kind of stuff and then ended up

working in the home office

for immigration which is so random

because

he was you know deported are you pissed

off about that

the fact that you lost your dad for

seven years for what

what sounds like it was a bit of a

mistake or just negligence

or at least a lack of empathy to take a

dad from their kids for what

yeah oh am i i'm not pissed off

maybe i haven't processed it enough to

be pissed off it just felt like

it is what it is and this is how it went

um

i felt more upset for my mum in that i

know

how difficult it was for her to like

have us and have responsibilities and

deal with like managing this court case

she managed it her entire self

she represented herself because she

didn't have money for like lawyers and

stuff

so she was under a lot of stress but she

did it and she did

other stuff as well so that was really

the main thing that kind of

upset me i'd say when did your dad come

back did you have a relationship with

him

it was weird it was so weird it's like

this is my dad

hi dad like how how do we have a

relationship with a man we haven't seen

for seven years

but um you know he was the kind of

what stoic african dad so i remember he

always gave me an envelope with money at

the beginning of term

like well done look after yourself okay

how's the weather

are you reading your books yes dad yes

dad okay good

like it was that kind of relationship

but i knew it was it was still

caring it was the way he kind of

communicated his

care for me which is that envelope of

cash and that's probably like a nigerian

generational cycle of like

male figures yeah just being a bit you

know a bit standoffish

about caring and when they ask you

certain questions

whether it's about the weather or your

studies how are

how is your studies going like that's

just they don't really know what else to

ask you

but them asking you that is is powerful

and my dad calls me every day is

hi how are you fine dad how'd the kids

find dad

okay bye like it just it's that checking

in which is really

i like it i think that's probably also

just a male

a male issue i think men typically

aren't as

um emotionally open so they don't build

that you know because vulnerability it's

well

connection seems to be built on

vulnerability and they seem to have a

bit of a guard up i

my dad is definitely exactly the same

like yeah the questions are so like

you know just say hi yes are you okay

yes okay goodbye

yeah yeah let me know if you're not okay

exactly

yeah um so mmu you go there you feel a

bit out of place

yeah quite out of place what do you mean

by that

because i'd never left like london and

i'd

like i had to make new friends and i

didn't know anyone and i wasn't

really good at it and i i couldn't

really find

my tribe very early on and i was on

a campus really far away i was on the

didsbury campus oh yeah like that was

the town

yeah out of town right and then there

was like the main campus for manchester

university

that everyone was at that's where i was

yeah

where i was like come on um and i

actually ended up like

moving out of my halls of residence

really and crashing

with a number of girls um in that main

campus

and i would move from room to room so

once one friend got annoyed of me after

two weeks

another friend would say i'd stay with

them for two weeks and then

i'd just go back and forth like a nomad

for a bit

and you you change course to accounting

yeah

in hindsight how important was it how

like pivotal was it

for you to have an understanding of

finance for everything that would then

come in your

in your career because i feel like i

feel like finance is such a neglected

topic for

for kids i wish someone had told me

about [ __ ] credit scores before i

smashed mine

okay so the moving role was pivotal for

my life like

it set me up on a completely different

trajectory that i

i wouldn't have even been aware of

because off the back of that role i

worked at

you know all the top four four companies

in the world in finance i worked at

merrill lynch and deloitte consulting

banks all of that stuff i would have

never done that

if i'd stayed in fashion when it came to

her from a

personal finance perspective didn't

prepare me at all

really not a clue i owed the tax man

money

i i i got my taxes wrong i had to pay

fines i had no clue what i was actually

doing

i had the degree i had the t1 great

you've passed

how do you actually apply financial

knowledge to

running your own business to your

everyday personal taxes like

i didn't have a clue spent the money

bought bags

made extra money on the side spent it

all oh the tax man

and i wasn't prepared [ __ ] hell well

i mean that's

a great advert for manchester united

university maybe it was just me

maybe i was just like young and dumb but

like it helped me from a career

perspective but

a lot of the financial courses out there

don't

help people be better themselves of

money and that's psychology point

because

money isn't such an emotional thing

especially as like an immigrant yeah oh

yeah

exactly yeah when you come and you grew

up on a councillor state right growing

up in a council state getting money

yeah dangerous concoction for getting a

lamborghini or [ __ ] up with some

chanel bag or some [ __ ] exactly

but like i grew up on the council estate

and then my mom bought her council house

rights for 17 grand sold that house for

250 grand

used that money to buy it to build a

property empire

and that's how she ended up retiring so

when i was in manchester

i was actually my mom bought like four

houses in manchester so i was doing

property management while being a

student

so i was still like running businessy

stuff like as a student

so even though i had that came from the

council background

i'd seen kind of like how hustle and

money could kind of be made and that

i didn't have to be broke forever if i

was kind of smart about it

your mom sounds like all right beast

she's wild she bought four houses while

you're in manchester

yeah no how many no three oh well yeah

so different yeah yeah but they were

and i can't swear they're like right can

i swear of course you can swim

she was just in it for the flip oh yeah

exactly yeah so you start at some point

blogging while at university and

why did you turn to blogging why why was

that a

compelling path blogging or vlogging

i kind of went into it because i kind of

had like a

friendship fallout and i became a bit of

a loner like i didn't have a big social

group

like people would go out without me and

i would live with a group of girls

and they'd all go out together and i'd

be like left at home by myself

so i i found like online communities

so i was part of different forums before

reddit was read it

before youtube existed there were like

forums where girls would talk to each

other about beauty and makeup

and i'd spend hours like writing to

these girls across the world

and sending them pictures and they're

used to before instagram there was [ __ ]

key there's all these platforms

where we were communicating and then um

some of the girls would send videos to

each other of like

their new hair and their new makeup like

so random

and then youtube had just launched it's

like this is a great way to send videos

to each other

and so i kind of got sucked up in

communi

communicating with all the people that i

met online

because my real life wasn't that great

and i guess when you started in youtube

you never

never thought it was anything more than

a no it wasn't a thing

at the time of me like watching youtube

and

kind of creating on the platform there

wasn't actually that many people on

there

um and so like little artists could go

viral and there'd be

like there's a song chocolate rain i

don't know if you guys remember what i

remember with the the black guy with the

hat yeah

like yeah yeah that was like

mind-blowingly amazing and then what

there was michelle phan

she was like the main beauty girl that

was really like

killing it so it was such a small little

ecosystem that

wasn't a business but it was genuinely

about like

connecting and talking to other people

online why did you do so well in

hindsight

on youtube honestly length of time

like i was just doing it for a really

long time and i was very

transparent like i was so transparent i

was putting a lot of information out

there

um i wasn't that strategic with it but i

loved

talking to people online like they were

literally my friends

and i used it a bit like a online diary

in a way

very earlier on um but it wasn't like a

full-time

thing i was like interning and working

um but i think eventually i got really

strategic about it

and that's when i saw like more growth

or

huge growth um you were saying that you

know you first started

um like the online forums and stuff at a

time when you'd like falling out with

your flatmates

and um i guess from what it sounds like

youtube was giving you that sense of

like community i guess and

that you weren't getting in the real

world fact yes

definitely i didn't have like a huge

social life

after a while um after the fallout and

i had so much solace with just this

online community

i never felt lonely because i could log

in and there'd be someone on there and i

could read

all the forum updates and talk to the

girls who are into the things that i was

into

they were all over the world it was just

really nice to like have friends

you referred to the fallout as if it was

a really pivotal moment in your life

it was it wasn't uh it wasn't that

pivotal but it's quite hard when you're

at uni and like

your friends are off doing stuff and

like meeting people and then you're you

don't have anything to do

or they they're not talking to you it

feels like a big thing

in in real life it's really not a big

thing like but at the time it was like

i'm so lonely

i'll go online okay yeah wow good thing

you did

what a journey and you say consistency

you point at consistency as being the

real

factor to your success but consistency

must come from

you know enjoying it because there'll be

a lot of people listening to this

thinking i want to be a youtuber i mean

everybody seems to want to be a youtuber

yeah but the insanity to do it as long

as you did without

the um guarantee

of money must have come from somewhere

there was no guarantee of money it was a

hobby like if you're a painter

you like painting at the weekend you're

gonna paint anyway

whether someone pays you for your art or

not you just enjoy doing it

so i just enjoyed making videos

that other girls watch and i could talk

to the other girls so

i didn't get paid for like four years

but i was always uploading every weekend

it was my hobby like it wasn't this is

going to be my new job

which is why i even struggle with it now

and that i really

want to enjoy it in the same way that i

always enjoyed it

and do i need to look for a new hobby

and is now youtube my job like

oh i find it really hard to kind of

balance the fact that

this thing that was my my escape is kind

of like my job now

there's we i was talking to one of the

guests on the podcast a couple of weeks

ago about um

this study where when someone gets paid

to do a task they used to love doing

they lose motivation for it and it's

just mental they they do the study where

they give people this game

people enjoy doing the game they then

say we're going to ask you to do the

game again but this time you're going to

get paid

the other group don't get paid and the

group that got paid to do the thing they

just enjoyed doing

lose motivation doesn't it make a lot of

sense you two stopped paying me

i like those checks um that is insane

it's you lose internal motivation when

it becomes

when when some of the um reason for

doing it becomes

extrinsic monetary so and this is a

you know it's a wise oh my gosh it's

tough isn't it

it's really tough because people are

like oh my god like what privileged

conversation

it's not because like say imagine

someone's like a

a dart player or something right but

eventually once they get into the

competitive sports of

darts maybe it becomes a bit more

stressful maybe they don't enjoy it as

much maybe

the the the challenge of doing it is now

i've got to perform for my management

and the the

crew or whatever there's a dark crew

i just made that up but that becomes

like i don't know

more pressure than the person who just

wanted to play darts on the saturday

night would feel can you feel that

no no but the reason being is that

i'm i try to frame what i do as

i've accepted that i have a huge desire

to create

stuff right that's it so as long as i

focus on

this process is creation this process is

creation

i'll be fine and that might mean saying

no to work

and no to sponsorships for a season so i

can at least

feel that creation because it i'm very

much like

how do i feel about this which is kind

of bad but

also it's allowed me to do what i'm

doing feels like a good long-term

strategy

yeah right because if you're not asking

that question in the short term how do i

feel about this

so many people in fact i think the guest

that just sat in that chair last

um you end up gradually becoming someone

you never intended to be and ending up

someone you never intended to go

so that constant asking of that question

how do i feel about this today

which as you alluded to means turning

down money sometimes

but you know thinking longer term about

what you're doing and why you're doing

it i think is so critical

so critically important you know the

thing that had the biggest positive

impact on me

sticking to the gym has been this change

in mindset and i've talked about this

extensively on this podcast about how i

used to view

my goals in the gym as being super

superficial and attached to a season

to summer looking good for summer and

that the shift came in me

when i started asking myself this

question and i started viewing life as

one season

so i'd say to myself if if life is to be

one season then what can i do

sustainably

over the next 50 years what are the

healthy habits that i could maintain

and that moves you from a place of

intensity to consistency

and one of the things that has really

helped me get in great shape

is the ready to drink cures in the

bottles as you'll know i've had them for

three to four years i've had two today

alone but also huel's brand new protein

product

i've completely finished the salted

caramel one and i'm now

starting my journey with the banana

milkshake and it just tastes amazing

and the crazy thing is it's 105 calories

some people historically you know when

we

think about protein shakes we look at

the calorie number when we see 300

calories

it's 105 calories you get all of your

vitamins and minerals

and it's 20 grams of protein for me this

might be the best product that you would

have ever created

and in terms of the results well they

speak for themselves

you know we've got two guests that have

come to watch this podcast today and

sophia i said sophia you know she's

she's followed you for some time i said

sophia if you could ask patricia any

question what would it be she said to me

um how did she find the confidence to

make the leap from that sort of

corporate career

to going full time with this thing

called youtube

so for me my confidence came from an

excel spreadsheet

so i am not a risk taker i'm

more of a steady and stable person but i

did a bit of maths

i did a bit of a projection i looked at

what my

long-term potential earnings

and lifestyle would look like if i

stayed in the banking industry

and then i looked at what my numbers

were looking like

you know if i stayed as a creator where

could i take it

and even at that time i had no clue i

could get to where i am

today but the numbers looked healthy

enough so i was like

okay i'll take the leap even if i do it

for two years

it could be okay um and i didn't just

jump out i kind of um took a

toe dip in and i quit my job but then i

took another job that was part time

so i could make content and have a job

as well

and you call your mum you say quit my

job i didn't tell her i didn't tell my

mom i didn't tell

anybody what you've quit your big

banking job oh

hell no i could never do that so

i knew my parents would be worried and

scared should we tell them now

no no no no so mom i left my job

they barely know what i do right now

they're like i do this thing on the

internet they're like oh wow

it's fine yeah yeah so my mom but yeah

so you made that you took that leap

into youtube um was there a moment where

you think [ __ ] how this is

this is moving this is

or was it just one step at a time slow

and steady yeah

slow and steady i was making i'd been

making content for seven years

and then i got to a million subscribers

so i didn't have any of those

really viral moments and i saw lots of

people

kind of steamroll ahead of me like go

viral

they were part of these groups and these

crews and you know there was a time that

there was a thing called the brick pack

they were all there

and i was just like in the corner by

myself like plodding along

and then inevitably like my my time

came and it took again that seven years

to one million

and then one more year to another

million and a half

and i then had my own viral moment off

the back of myself

and um but i never kind of took the step

back to be like oh you've made it

because i never feel like i've made it

not even now not yet

a lot of people might be surprised by

that um

maybe but it depends on someone's

personal definition of making it right

and what's yours

domination

what is mine um it's not just being

popular on social media that's not my

complete definition of success right i

think for me it's like

creating things that i want to create

when i want to create them

and monetizing them and bringing value

so

if i say my overall thing that's it what

that looks like i don't know just yet

and you don't think you're there yet you

don't think you're creating things that

you really

oh i'm doing it i'm doing it but i don't

think i've had like one

big thing yeah does anyone have one big

thing though

i don't know i think that i you know i

think if you'd gone back and asked

patricia when she was at mmu

what her making it look like you would

have said you know hundred thousand

followers

on my

yeah so maybe the goal post is just

moving off into the future

maybe that's maybe that speaks to what

life is it's just that journey as

opposed to that destination right so

yeah yeah and influencers being an

influencer

talk to me about that when i say it you

know what do you think about

the lifestyle the stigmas etc etc

so when people say influence i think

there's a little cringe when they say it

but i think this concept of being

influential

is has always been around but it's

always been around with the hands of

the upper echelon of people only certain

people are

are picked by certain industries to be

influential

but what i love is like now there's this

democratization

people can choose who they want to be

influenced by

and how i got in my position is because

people liked me

they decided that actually i want to

hear what patricia has to say i want to

see what she's buying i want to see what

she likes

so i think it's a really powerful tool

we've all been influenced the question

is like

we want to choose who those influences

are

it's a it's a it's a big i guess

responsibility to some

because i know for a fact that every

time something happens in the world

you get a dm patricia i thought you were

with us

why aren't you doing 55 instagram posts

about

palestine or kenya or india or oxygen in

the fires in australia i thought you

were one of it's a lot it's a lot

that's a lot bearing in mind that my

forte

is makeup and clothing and and maybe

financed you know to an extent

i feel

there is pressure for influencers to

speak up on every topic

all the time but we are not credible

sources

who know everything we just don't and i

think it's really important for us to

say

we're ignorant on a matter and we're

learning but kind of speaking up on

stuff that you know nothing about is

very very

stupid dangerous yeah yeah and stupid

yeah um

and also what is really scary is that if

you don't think the same way that

everybody else thinks

you're in trouble what if you have an

alternative

perspective you're not allowed to have

an alternative perspective

if you ask of peace whether or not it's

you know in the middle east specifically

or for on a certain matter oh no way

because the world wants to keep

everything burning but

like personally i'm like can can this

just chill

like not just that situation

specifically but a lot of situations i'm

like

i just wish it wasn't happening is that

your approach to it you think generally

if i don't have a

a proper well-rounded view

because it's all well people like

because i get the same this is how i

know you'd get the same

people message me and say steve speak on

this issue or black lives matter or

whatever

um while i'm still processing it and

what you're right what they're actually

saying is

share my opinion to your followers on

this issue

and they're trying to try and like guilt

trip me into it like

yeah you know especially when it's when

it's a group of people that i can relate

to

just viscerally so like my skin color

yeah yeah i'm expected to be

a you know the spokesman of all black

people yeah

oh me too as well yeah yeah it's a lot

of yeah a lot of um

nastiness what what else do you think is

um unappreciated about being an

influencer you've obviously got a big

platform

the other thing i was going to say right

this is what i was just thinking as

we're talking

um the other day i thought and i've been

working out for a year and a half now i

always like talking about this

love it um and grace who sat behind that

curtain over there

i sent her a photo i'm going to post

like a transformation picture

okay like the before and after and me

and grace had a conversation because

if i was a female and i'd posted that

i would have got [ __ ] ripped to

pieces

right i would have been told i was toxic

irresponsible body image

yeah i posted it fine yeah 100 of people

like

send us your plan like whatever yeah

yeah and it really made me reflect on

how

tough it is to be a woman on social

media with a big audience it's like

the standard of perfection in terms of

your like morals

what you're posting how you're posting

what you're saying is a high bar to

reach

yeah whereas i'm not held to that

standard as a guy okay

yeah yeah i'm not surprised

but there's gonna be different standards

you're held by so

with the women like

us there's a lot of pressure around our

appearance

or if we're mothers how we mother or

what we're wearing i mean it's so random

but i'm sure there's

definitely things that men are going to

expect from you

that that i can't believe you did this

or something even relates to success

it's like i can come on and i could come

on this podcast yeah

and say that i the reason i'm successful

is because of me

and i can talk about my big old

ambitions and i'm gonna

when a woman does it it's like you know

what i mean it just seems like there's

just a double

a total double standard the fact that i

can post me being kind of slightly

overweight in that shape

and then like nine 19 pack like

do you know what i mean i saw many

videos you said seven abs or whatever

like seven abs whatever

and the comments are like whoo but i

know if

if um if a woman did the same thing it

would be like this is irresponsible what

are you saying fat shame

why is that i mean because

like men and women are fundamentally

different so

presuming that your audience is like

probably say

sixty percent to seventy percent male 1

eighty percent women

eighty percent with uh

i think women judge men by different

standards so what you'll see

oh let's talk about this what you'll

actually see

in the world of beauty and women's

fashion

and um industries that are

predominantly consumed by women men are

always

at the forefront so the biggest

influences

in the beauty industry are five men men

who wear makeup

right and that's yeah so men who wear

makeup

are more popular than or let's say three

men who wear makeup

can be bigger and get to bigger

stratospheres

than any women could um the fashion

industry

and fashion brands all of them the

majority of them

are owned by men and ran by men or

creative directors are men

not women not women there aren't a lot

of brands that are run and owned by

women

and i just think this is something to do

with biology

sociology the way in which kind of women

interact with

men is different to how we interact with

each other i wish it was different

but i've i've just noticed this like a

lot

and and the other point which i kind of

alluded to there as well as on on this

topic of gender disparities i guess is

it like just

discrediting success yeah do people

discredit your success

do you know what not so much and i think

also because i'm a black woman

people are so happy to see me do well

because they feel like it's rare and so

i think i'm afforded

a bit more luxury to be a bit more like

aggressive about

you know i'm pushing i'm moving hard

whether you like it or not that's the

nigerian in me coming out

and culturally i think um i'm allowed to

celebrate that a lot more because

brits i don't think like to celebrate

people doing too well or

being too much um so i can get away with

it a little bit more

um but i know like

there is a little it can be tension when

i talk about my numbers too much

and i'll definitely get the messages of

this is

not what you should be talking about you

shouldn't talk about how much you earn

it's a bit rude

imagine a guy doing it though oh

go one what show us the lamborghini

again do you know what i mean it's like

that's all guys do

yeah that's how they build their status

is like i mean

just that's what that's how it works

have you put your lamborghini on no no i

don't have a lamborghini

but no but i can openly talk about how

much money i've i've

generated in my companies and no one's

ever going to say oh that's so just

tasteful they clap

and but when women do it they people do

go oh god she's not that's not good

taste is it yeah

and that again is a huge like ben

francis he talks about he's built a one

point

something billion dollar company

everyone's like amazing yeah you know

they can show men can show the nice

things the cars the houses whatever and

it's all but

the minute grace beverly does a house

tour you can't do it yeah

i have a video called like how i made a

million

on youtube right and um

it's firstly it's got like over almost a

million views on it

and um but the comments were so kind of

crazy people are like i can't believe

you're sharing this

we're really excited but um also

like um you should be putting this out

there and what i actually did is there's

no

way i could actually share my actual

numbers

because i think people would judge me

negatively

and like fall over be like what the hell

how is it possible and like almost want

to stop the bag

if that makes any sense like they don't

people don't like to see women doing

two big numbers you gotta still be

humble as a woman

how do you respond to that though how do

you how does that impact the choices you

make and does it impact

the choices you make isn't that sad

though that yeah it really does

so i've moved away from like putting out

my numbers

i'm not gonna use using my numbers as a

strategy or

showing my things too much as a strategy

i also

bought a couple of properties and you

know i really want

to share with people about financial

empowerment and

properties and making money but like i

can see that almost like a

a sour taste sometimes in people's

mouths so i show a bit less of it i i'm

not going to show you the new house that

i bought

or or something else i'm not going to

show it as much and

i've tried to make more relatable

content

and a lot of us have to be relatable and

remain

humble to still be considered um

a good influencer just don't show what

you have

are you happy with that though are you

happy to go along with that and to to do

what

um because when we spoke earlier about

what your goal is it's to make stuff

that like really matters to you and that

sounds like it's driven by like

my terms you know what i care about in

my way

and not allowing the audience to dictate

what you create that sounded like your

north star

and this being a good influence but it

doesn't sound like it's gonna make you

very happy

yeah i think it's all about being

strategic though right

so like if um

eventually showing lots of glamorous

stuff

is gonna impact growth it would be silly

for me to keep doing it right

and again that's not my personal

strategy anyway i'll be honest with you

i don't want to be like

look at my new lamborghini look at my

new house that's not who i am as a

person

is a bit cringe for me and it's not part

of my strategy but

um i do want to remain authentic but i

understand that

showing too much of my success um

doesn't always sit well for people

and i'm happy to like remove that aspect

if that makes people more comfortable

and i think that's because i'm a woman

like i want people to feel comfortable

um and you know you're you start this

platform called the break

yeah that was it when i say when i say

that there's a big smile on your face

yeah that's like my like my passion

project

turned like great potential business

opportunity

and i think for me that's like where i

decided to

start talking about these things and

we're just we're talking about this now

that people don't talk about money women

don't talk about money

on that platform i am unapologetic

and that's what i shared about the

making a million in a year or making a

million over a lifetime and

showing how i budget my salary and

showing you how i bought a house in 10

minutes

i put that all on there because i feel

like

you know over there is where i'm going

to talk about this stuff so if you like

it

is there if you don't like it let's go

put on makeup on my other channel

and um it's been just insane to see how

it's grown

and how much there's a huge demand for

this type of

content within this demographic

it was what was missing when you started

out from what you said earlier

exactly and that's why i created it

because you were buying all those bags

and

being a bit reckless and no one told you

so you exactly and the tax man came

knocking at my door and i got

fined and i was like nobody needs to do

this this is how you incorporate this is

how you

get your pension sorted out this is how

you can buy a property for your business

and i was just literally doing all the

stuff that i kind of learned from my

accountant

and from the financial mistakes that

i've made i really wanted to just say

here you go here's this information use

this make it

be valuable to you to help you on your

journey do you know in black culture

we um growing up you know i was watching

50 cent and

all this stuff and he is a bad financial

advisor

because am i can you get some advice

from 50 cent though

[ __ ] every black young black man and

what he told me about bottles and

lamborghinis and stuff

it really hurt me when i was 21 and i

finally got money and i went to the club

and i was getting five bottles of don

perry on please

and i blew a lot of cash and i just wish

those those role models like the rappers

that i followed when i was younger

i wish they told me about credit scores

you know what i mean i wish

but that's not it's not sexy right it's

not glamorous it's not fun

like i have a video on pensions like

40401ks and

whether or not you should be making a

contribution to your sip right

that is not oh this is glamorous no one

wants to hear that

but there are going to be a few who do

take it and use it

i wish we could dress up like credit

scores like

give it lipstick give it a lamborghini

um but we haven't mastered that yet

maybe i'll do that later

but they don't want people to know the

truth

i don't think anybody wants people to

really know the truth about finances

right it's not beneficial it's not

beneficial to government it's not

beneficial to corporations

it's not beneficial to banks and lenders

who actually

want people to be inept

in this area so they can make financial

mistakes and then give them more money

so like that's the reality of it like

rich people aren't actually struggling

financially

it's actually everyone else on the maybe

lower end of the spectrum

who don't have this information but this

information

will transform their lives i guess

that's why they call it financial

freedom

there we go yeah and you said this

started as a passion project and now

it's turned into a potential business

opportunity

exactly talk to me about that and where

is it going ah this is this is a lot

so where's it going so we really want to

build out like a web platform which has

content but also

tools that people can use so one of the

things that i created was a simple

budgeting

like template and like literally in like

two weeks we had like 20 000 people

download

an excel spreadsheet on how to manage

their day-to-day income

so clearly there's more that we can do

here

we then launch a planner as well that

just sold out in like

a day or two and then we're launching

more of these so

for in the long run i'd like to provide

more financial tools and resources

that people could use to help them with

managing their everyday

finances the dream is like an app but

that takes time

to like happen but like we've got the

designs and

we're doing some testing now to really

see how we can like build that out

further

of all the work you're doing across all

of these different projects and i'm sure

there's many many more that we won't

even talk about today

is this the thing you're most excited

about

and it's like choosing your choosing

your favorite child but

i would say it's something i'm really

excited about because

it's so valuable so i'm very excited

about it and i think it's a new

challenge

so as an influencer like i work for

brands

i make amazing content for them i get

nice things but now

this is my chance to kind of be a brand

and create

value more so so it's really like a new

challenge for me that i'm excited to

kind of

get into and you when you're saying we

you know

we've made an excel document who is we

so actually excel

document i made but i do have like my

husband who's been really supportive and

like helping me build that out

and then i've like recruited a ceo to

like help me

think about scaling this out but um i've

had

other team members here and there

freelancers here and there but i know

inevitably that scaling is something i'm

gonna have to

be willing to do and that's hard

for myself to do yeah

your husband my husband michael michael

can i call him mike you can call him

mike i can

i can see him over there in the corner

of the room follow me around

what's it like working with mike so

oh that's a really good question so

working with mike

you know what michael's been like with

me for every step of my journey as a

creator

and he's always worked a full-time job

and then

he inevitably went even to more of a

freelance role

so that i could use him when i needed

him so he will work as a contractor and

i'm like mike i need your help

quit your job come and help me and so

throughout my entire journey he's been

there to do that

however working with your significant

other

can be real difficult um and there are

times when we're like

let's not do this go back to your job

make something happen go back

contracting

and then when we're like oh we're cool

come back again

so it's what's important for us is

actually to establish

how we communicate with each other and

boundaries like when we're working

together we actually don't work in the

same environment

so he'll work in an office and i'll work

somewhere else because if you work in

the same room at the same time

it's not pretty we're gonna send a

microphone over to mike in the audience

it's not pretty yeah because i think

when you're in like

boss mode like you can be quite direct

like i'm very like this doesn't look

good i don't like this

can we change this how how do we do this

better this is wrong right

and i think there are when it's with

your partner

they're going to take that personally

over say someone else who is

you know just working with you and i

haven't developed my managerial skills

to be

great when it comes to you know my

interpersonal skills just yet

so and i think when you're working with

a loved one as well

you you feel like you want to be more

direct like they should know

just you should know this come on like

but

he doesn't always know and he can't read

my mind and he's a man so

there's there's differences there um so

that's when it gets a bit difficult when

we're together

and how do you how do you balance like

leaving work at work

and not bringing that home with you

because one thing i came to learn was

that

the steve bartlett that succeeds in a

professional environment that is direct

that is it's very clear and

uncompromising it's not the same steve

bartlett that is required to

compromise and oh you want to go for a

walk in the park for no reason

how do you be two different people in

order to achieve two completely

different objectives

and how do you do that also when you're

you live and work in the house

right the same house because that's

something that we deal with i think it's

again about setting these boundaries

like physically

so michael won't really work in a house

even if he's working on

my projects and i'll try and work from

an office as well as much as possible

um and then it's the case of like

switching off it's hard man it's really

hard

i think as a creator as a social media

creator like you're always on

i haven't mastered that yet but we have

kids so

the good thing about kids is that they

force us to

like give them love and give them

attention so we have to switch off and

sort the kids out and give them a bath

and give them dinner

so we'll always kind of i don't know

switch brains

because of that oh there's a really good

point i never actually thought about

the fact that kids would actually force

some kind of balance into your life they

do which is

you know yes amazing and you guys have

been together a long time

a long time yeah we've been together for

14

14 years yeah and married for like

nine years i think yeah nine years yeah

i always i always think because because

um because of my own experiences of

being pretty useless at relationships

um entrepreneurs and especially i mean

creators that's a different bag because

you say you're always on they're quite

difficult to date

yes yeah yeah and i think as well

and i'm probably gonna get in [ __ ]

there's a troll famous but i don't

really care i'm gonna die anyway

um i think from entrepreneurs from other

cultures

who have come up from another background

and another another mother can be even

more

tricky to date yes you spoke to your

mother you used the word

yeah we'll say passionate yeah yeah yeah

yeah

does that really really yeah so

obviously michael's like

a englishman from from manchester right

and like we are very culturally

very different and i think but it's so

interesting i think if i wasn't with

michael i'd be very single and very

lonely

like i've accepted that i don't know if

anybody else would like actually handle

me

if that makes any sense i think it takes

a certain kind of person

to be with an entrepreneurial person let

alone an entrepreneurial nigerian woman

like that's like so many different

layers there

and yeah yeah he's like a magician to be

able to handle that

and we're like polar opposite people i'm

very

like emotional and like let's do this

now and he's very

logical steady stable and i think that

actually is the balance that i've needed

like

and i think we're meant to be together

to like

i don't know ying and yang it's great

you said he followed you here today but

i heard you actually had a cyber stalker

oh yeah it's not yeah it's not mike it

wasn't like i found it it was actually

his account

disturbing me yeah no i did i had a

stalker for like three years

um and it was someone who would like

just

message me on all my platforms

constantly send emails

message family members really weird

and nowadays i can't even remember like

what their

what their issue was i don't think they

even had one they were just

obsessive me and obsessive like my

relationship

to an extent because i used to put vlogs

out and i used to have like

content with me and my husband and i

stopped like actually it sounds so bad

but i think

it was enough to tell me i'm not going

to put myself out there

in that way why

i i think it takes an emotional

toll having a stalker because you're

worried like when you log in

am i going to see their messages what

are they going to do today what are they

going to say today

are they going to dox me so they found

out my parents name and address

and say your mom's this name and she

lives here

so like those things and obviously it

was like psychological warfare

um but it was yeah it was more

psychological

but like when i was thinking about it i

kept thinking it's because i put myself

out there too much this is why they're

targeting me and i think inevitably it

made me want to

retreat in certain aspects do you still

think that was the case

no i think that was one of my triggers

but i think inevitably i was like

putting yourself out there

too much from a personal perspective um

wasn't something i wanted to do like i

used to show

like i showed our wedding i showed me

giving birth

i've shown i put a lot out there okay

link in the bio

looking via my best story

um and like the platforms love it when

you put yourself out there a lot

but inevitably it does take a toll on

you as a person

and i i just said we're going to stop

this i don't want to be that person

i actually care more about my real life

than putting

a version of my real life online i tend

to think when you're reaching that many

people

just probabilistically just by numbers

you're gonna reach

at least 10 artists yeah okay just like

do you know what i mean regardless it

just happens yeah

yeah and you're blocking this person i'm

guessing every time they pop up and then

they're making a new account

they're making hundreds of accounts

they're messaging other people so what

would happen is that when i would

message someone online

they would like be in in the thread or

they'll be watching everything i was

doing so

i'd have to tell people i'm really sorry

i've got a stalker

like if you got that message it's from

it's from a stalker

that like message brand sometimes it was

just really weird behavior

and at some point it stopped it vanished

or yeah it

reduced it reduced i'd say and then it

inevitably like

disappeared i kind of forgot about it to

be honest after a while

but i learned how to like listen to

their speech pattern

so even if they would create new

profiles i always knew it was them

based on the things that they would say

and how they would say it

so they'll try to hide that it was them

but it's like it's clearly you

like and there's even like online forums

where people

like moan about online creators and she

would like

she or he would go into the forums

and be like talking about me so i would

stalk my stalker

right so i knew it was them and then

other people in the forum would be like

your patricia stalker that they would

know it was the stalker

so yeah anyway wow what a ride

that made you feel unsafe at any point

there was nothing where it was like we

know your home address we're gonna i'm

gonna come there

there was some of that oh really so

there was some of so i did a meet and

greet an event

and then they messaged me he's like haha

i was at your meet and greet

you didn't even know who i was you

didn't see me you look so terrible in

person

next time i'm gonna do something right

so i remember feeling

so anxious and i would i vlogged it and

i remember like looking through the

footage and i was like

who could it be who could it be it's

like racking my brain it's like which

one is it which one is it

and i think it made me a bit paranoid

like sure a season

but i was never scared because i'm from

south london

i'm not scared come to my house

we'll see

quick one i talk about fiverr.com a lot

on this podcast but i think the perfect

sort of illustration of the power of

fiverr

was actually illustrated a few weeks ago

when jack who is the director