06.28.2023
Episode 234: Amy Chang, Skin, Hair and Health Conscious Content Creator
Summary
We were so thrilled to welcome skin and hair obsessed influencer Amy Chang to the podcast to discuss her career journey. As Amy’s 1.6 million TikTok followers know, Amy is refreshingly candid about everything from her skincare routine, motherhood, to her own adoption journey — she’s even an ambassador for the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption!
WBMB™ listeners at all stages of their careers will appreciate hearing Amy’s path from being in her 20s, from not knowing what she wanted to do with her life to getting on social media, teaching herself photography, editing, lighting and slowly but surely connecting the dots: “I needed to go out there and make a lot of mistakes…piece together what I like and don’t to shape my future.”
To hear more of Amy’s career journey, including her thoughts on what it means to “find yourself” listen wherever you get your podcasts!
You don't find yourself, you create yourself.
Amy Chang
Transcript
| Announcer | Welcome to WHERE BRAINS MEET BEAUTY™ hosted by Jodi Katz, Founder and Creative Director of Base Beauty Creative Agency. |
| Aleni Mackarey | Hi Jodi. How are you doing? |
| Jodi Katz | Hi Aleni, Great to see you. I missed you at our first ever Listened Again Awards. |
| Aleni Mackarey | I missed you too the pictures looked amazing. How were they? |
| Jodi Katz | It was really a magical day. It was so wonderful to honor our podcast guests at a gorgeous restaurant Laduree in Soho and we had so many industries C-Suite guests and influencers and they were all there to celebrate our honorees and are honored these were delighted to be in the room to someone to tell you all about |
| Aleni Mackarey | Oh my gosh. That's so amazing. I'm so excited to hear more about the winners. I saw some great coverage and you also had a really fun guest cohost, right someone very special to you. How was that? |
| Jodi Katz | So we asked Sai De Silva who's on the new cast of the real housewives of New York to be my co-host for the event and she is amazing. She's very impressive and she gave us some inside scoop on the real housewives new season. And that was so cool for me because as everyone knows, I'm a huge Bravo reality TV fan and it was really awesome to be able to present these gorgeous awards to our winners. Can I tell you who they are? |
| Aleni Mackarey | Yes, please. |
| Jodi Katz | So our Q 1 theme that was CEO life that went to Denis Asamoah. He is the co-founder and CEO of Forvr mood and our Q 2 theme that was called influencer journey and that award went to Amy Keller Laird. She's the founder of Mental and I just loved hearing their speeches. They were so beautiful. We're going to actually post the speeches on socials everybody can read them. |
| Aleni Mackarey | Ah, that's great. And tell us again, what constitutes a Listen Again Award? How do you win one of these? |
| Jodi Katz | Great questions, So we just started the awards this year, and this is our first awards ceremony, and we're to do an award for every single quarterly theme. So we'll have our next Listen Again Awards in January to honor our Q three and Q four winners. And the criteria are pretty simple, but really meaningful to us. The guest needs to inspire us to think in a new way. And also really appeal to people at all levels of their career So someone who's been a CEO for twenty years should be as interested in your content an episode as someone who might be still in college thinking about entering the industry and um also fan reaction, right the um episodes that we get, you know DM’s and emails about that really inspired our fans. So when we bundle all that together that it's how we decide as our production team who's going to receive the awards. |
| Aleni Mackarey | That's so amazing. Yeah. It's so incredible to hear from our community and to get to push these stories out there to them. We know they're so interested in these stories and the guests that you've gotten to meet over the years are amazing. So I'm excited for the next Listen Again Awards and we’ll see if maybe some of these upcoming guests are eligible for them. So who do we have on this week's episode? |
| Jodi Katz | Well, this is Amy Chang. She is a skin hair and health conscious content creator very impressive woman. So fun to talk to we had an incredible conversation about finding yourself right and what's meaningful to you. Would you want to do in life? And she also talked a lot about her adoption journey, which is something that she shares intimately with her fans. So this is a really great episode. And also we talk about you know, since this is influencer world, you know, how does her um persona online differ from her persona in her personal life and how does she use her time wisely? You'll hear that she produces a lot of amazing content much of it with luxury bra brands, but yet she's an army of one. So it's really fascinating to hear how she navigates balancing all this important work. |
| Aleni Mackarey | Oh my gosh. That's incredible. I'm loving this quarter. There's so many multifaceted guests on here and it's always so interesting to hear the other elements of their life as well. Well, let's get to it. Here is episode two thirty four Amy Chang. |
| Jodi Katz | Welcome to our brains meet beauty. We are career journey podcasts talking about what it's like to define success and reach for it in the beauty and wellness industries. Today. We continue our influencer journey theme with Amy Chang skin and hair obsessed health conscious content creator sharing beauty tips product reviews ooze and life experiences with her audience her handle Bonnie von phones Las Vegas great with one point six million followers on Tiktok and over four hundred can Instagram covers topics from skincare routines to more personal life stories including her adoption story. I'm excited to dive into the conversation about her career journey from the East to the West Coast all on episode two thirty four. Hi Amy. |
| Amy Chang | Hi. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me. |
| Jodi Katz | Welcome to where brains meet beauty. So Amy since we're a career journey show, I wanna start way back. Let's go to your like eleven twelve year old self. What do you want to be when you grow up? |
| Amy Chang | I wanted to be a brain surgeon and of course my parents loved it. My dad is an academics or was rooms growing up and I remember we used to get National Geographic magazines and there was one edition of it and on the cover they had this Surgeon doing brain surgery on, you know, someone's skull. They had like cut off the top of the skull and you can see the brain. And I was so excited and interested in it. And I told my parents I was like, that's what I wanna do. And they loved it. They they were really supportive. And then when I got into adolescence, like teenage years, I wanted to be a fan tion designer. And so I was like, no, I'm not going to be a neurosurgeon anymore. And I always had this creative flair in me. I love fashion. Really love colors and putting things together. And so I went through a moment where I wanted to be a fashion designer. And then after that, I kind of lost my way and I didn't know what I wanted to do. Yeah school was kind of tough for me. I was a bit of a loner and I just had I really struggled with my identity and finding myself and I really thought that you kind of you wait and it's like suddenly all comes to you and you know your path, right? And so I was like waiting for that moment. I was like, okay, when am I going to know like what's the purpose of my life and why I'm here and what I meant to do and I felt so paralyzed because I was worried if I took a wrong step in one direction or another it would cause me to be a failure in my life. And so um during high school and like that first year of college. I had no idea what I wanted to do and I kind of just felt paralyzed and Yeah. |
| Jodi Katz | Let's talk a little bit about this because it's such a contrast to the me I met just a short amount of time ago, right? Um, you describe yourself as loner feeling like a failure. Um, it sounds like you were really worried about the future and not knowing where you fit. It's so hard to imagine that the Amy that I just met in that place, right? And I know it's you know, some of it is age appropriate right to kind of not know where you fit in the world. But um, if we can just talk a little bit about that version of yourself in those earlier, you know, it's like late teen early twenty years because I'm sure a lot of our listeners today felt exactly the same way you did. How were you able to step over that like get through it and move into finding your way? |
| Amy Chang | Yes. So what I did when I was in high school and my you know, early twenties I kind of tried on different things and granted some of them weren't the best. You know, I went down the wrong path a couple of times, but I was always curious and trying new things and I was like, okay, does this fit? Does this fit? Does this fit? This doesn't fit. Okay, actually this is taking me down the wrong path. I have to correct but I was exploring and I was trying and I was making mistakes and I think that was really important for me to go through that journey. You know, I grew up in Minnesota. I'm adopted. My parents are American. They're white and I grew up Jewish. So that is like a recipe for an identity crisis, which I feel like is what I went through when I was in high school and I was waiting for this magical answer to appear either in my head or my life or to come from outside somewhere, right to say, okay, this is who you are and this is where you belong. And then I realised one day, like when after I moved to New York with my parents, I was like, God, you don't find yourself, you create yourself. And so then it propelled me to just go after I'm like, OK, I'm just gonna go. I'm gonna start doing everything I can to like, move forward. I don't know where or I'm going, but I just need to put one foot in front of each other there and kind of create the shape of who I think I want to be. And if that doesn't you know, if it doesn't feel right, then I just adjust and pivot and pivot. And so, you know, I feel really blessed that my life worked out the way it did. I was going through a really tough time when I was Minnesota. I dropped out of college after my first year. I was just going through the motions. I didn't know why I was there. And, um, I was having a really tough time. My sister had just gotten married to her high school sweetheart. I have one older sister and my dad got a job in New York and he asked me if I wanted to go with them to New York. And I really changed my life. So I decided to go with them. I left Minnesota and there's something about being in a new place. Yeah, and it allows the space for reinvention and I really got to ask myself like, who am I? Who do I want to be? Who, you know, what do I want from my life? And so it allowed me that space and I got back into school and really turned my life around when community college by some I ask, ah, you know, straight A's days transferring to NYU and then graduated with honors and, you know, got a job working in PR because at that time sex in the city was really big and I was like, oh my God, PR. It looks so glamorous. What a amazing life. Like I watched Samantha on the show and I was like, oh, I think that might be right for me. Right? So I've worked in P R briefly after school and it still didn't feel right, but I was making those moves like each time to figure out what it is I wanna do. Where do I want to go with my life? And I kind of got past that that moment of being paralyzed. I was like, okay, just go just push yourself. And so yeah, and then what ended up happening is I started dating my husband and we were just boyfriend girlfriend at the time in New York and his office opened up an office in LA. And so we moved to LA and we're there. I I knew I didn't want to go back working in PR and in the agency. I want to do something a little more creative something different. So I started a blog just as a side hobby. And I was I just decided to document all of the things that I was experiencing in LA so, you know different places that I would work out or smoothie recipes I was trying or the farmers market or thrift shops I was going to and I really enjoyed it and I was like, wow, I wonder if I could make this into something big eager make this into something more meaningful. And so I just kept at it. I found something that I really enjoyed and I got a lot out of it and I kept at it and here I up and it just it kind of has grown and evolved until many different ways like it started as a blog and then I got an Instagram and I had to learn photography iffy and how to use lightroom and Photoshop and all these photo editing, you know, tools. And then I decided to try getting on Youtube and I had to learn, you know, filming and video production And then I decided to get on a Tiktok. And so it's like you can see how all these little steps like eventually lead you to where you're supposed to be and like you can't really connect the dots as you're going through it. But when you look back, you're like, whoa. Okay, all of that these were little stepping stones that helped give me the knowledge that I needed that helped me move forward towards where I'm supposed to be. And so yeah. And so here I am today, like talking with you and it's so wonderful. |
| Jodi Katz | I love this. You said just something moments ago that we have to pause on. You don't find yourself. You create yourself. Yes. This is so meaningful. And for my team listening like this has to be the pull quote for, um, marketing her episode. This is so genius. Because when I was younger in my career, I just thought that like everything all the success I was seen when people around me. I thought it just happened, right? I thought that you know, it's because they went to college with so and so or you know, they're friends with, you know, some other person and and it just wasn't going to happen for me. Like I really believed it and so sad. Yeah, um, but I needed to create it for myself and I didn't know that I even could. So, um, say again, who said the quote? |
| Amy Chang | So one of my best friends actually for Christmas, she got me this little I think I still have to actually have it in my bathroom and look at it every day. She bought this for me from target and it has all these different quotes on it and you can Like change the quotes and there's a little window here and you can see it and she bought me this GIF of Christmas and on it is one of the courses. You don't find yourself. You create yourself. And so I just I was like, wow, that means it's like everything connected in my life. Like when I saw that quote, I was like that makes so much each sentence, right? Like I was just waiting for this aha moment to kind of happen to me instead of realising I needed to go out there and just make a lot of mistakes try a lot of different things and then threw that piece together what I like what they don't and then shape my future. |
| Jodi Katz | So I love this. Well, um, I want to talk about beauty, but let's just pause for a moment. And talk about the Dave Thomas foundation for adoption when you're an ambassador for that organization. Tell me about your adoption journey and how you're involved with this amazing organization. |
| Amy Chang | Yeah. So like I mentioned before, I'm adopted actually was adopted twice. I was adopted the first time when I was three months old. My birth mother in Korea was you know, had like a middle school education and worked in a factory making leather handbags, you know, could not take care of me and wanted the best for me. And so she pulled me up for adoption. And the way it works it worked back then in Korea is that the mothers who were pregnant would go to these he's like kind of like a group home that would take care of them and help them with You know, she would be with other mothers who are waiting to give birth to babies. They were gonna put up for adoption. And then once the baby was born, a foster mom would come in and take the baby right after birth and take care of it for three months. And then at that point a military service member would take the baby on an airplane too America or Europe or wherever the baby was going to be adopted and their final destination their home. And so that's what happened to me and I was adopted by a family in Buffalo, Minnesota. And unfortunately that family could not take care of me for whatever reason. I don't really know the details of what happened. But then I was placed into foster care and my parents now adopted me and I just believe that the universe really works and kind of these mysterious ways and Eventually we all end up where we're supposed to be. And so I feel so fortunate that life worked out the way it has and that there were these services, you know, like children's home society and Eastern welfare and children's orphanage like these places that helped me get to where I am today. And so I knew that once my like when my platform grew, I knew that I wanted to do something more meaningful to give back and to support a cause that really is important to me. And so the Dave Thomas foundation, they have their Wendy's wonderful kids program, and it's where they try train these experts to go in and basically be the AIDS to help children who are in foster care who have special needs, who are teenagers and about to age out of foster care, basically kids who Or not are more challenging cases to find permanent homes for and so what they do is they're trained experts go in and aren't they're assigned to one of these cases and they basically stay with the child wherever because there's a lot of relocations that happen unfortunately to consider in foster care and they stay with them the entire time really watching over their case and helping them to make sure that they find a forever home. And so I partnered with them and you know every year to a large annual donation and then help what what in whatever way that I can to support them through my platform and just bring awareness to this cause and like how pork how important these types of organizations are to help kids that you know deserve forever homes and really should also try to break down the stigma around foster care around adoption There's a lot of positive stories that come out of these instances myself included. And so I think it's really important to change what the you know, this the kind of the storyline is or how people see foster care and adoption in media. |
| Jodi Katz | Thank you for sharing that. I wasn't familiar with this organization. I'm excited to check it out and learn more things. Well, we're going to switch gears. Um quite a bit. It's a beauty. What was your first job in beauty? |
| Amy Chang | Oh my okay, so I worked at a Shiseido beauty counter. I had just dropped out of college and my parents were like, we're not going to support you. You have to get a job. And so I applied for for a job at a counter at Macy's in Minnesota and I think they thought that I was older than I was. Anyways, I ended up getting the manager position of the counter. But at first I was like, I don't know Yes, but it was one of those moments you just rise to the occasion. I was like, I could do it. So I did and I loved it. I learned so much about makeup application and skin care. And this is like fifteen years ago. And back then they were using essences and they were they had moisturizers that had hyaluronic acid in them. And I mean, Shiseido is one of the oldest skin care companies in the world and they have some of the best products. And so I feel really fortunate that my real introduction into skincare and beauty was through Shiseido. I mean, I learned a little bit from my mom. My mom is was more about makeup than she was about skin care. Like at night, you know, she would just use Cetaphil gentle cleanser and then Vaseline like very simple in terms of skin care because it was kind of a different time then. But with makeup, oh my God, my mom always had the best makeup shoes, like for Daisy foundation. She was always doing like the lip liners and the lipstick. I just remember I was in the But through all the time and she would be looking in the rearview mirror like reapplying her lipstick. Like to this day my mom still reapplying lipstick when she's at home and she's a lot like all throughout Povich. She was still wearing lipstick like that woman goes through like ten lipsticks a month. I'm constantly giving her lipstick and I'm like, how do you go through these so fast? But just like well, I have walked around the house and I'm cleaning up but I noticed a reflective surface like I need to reapply my lipstick. And so I do it. I'm like, mom, you're crazy. But she's like, I do it for myself, right? Like she loves just it just looks six bring her so much joy. And so I feel like I gotta love for makeup up from her. Like my mom was doing the major blush trend before it was a trend. And I feel like that's why I've always loved a lot of blush too. |
| Jodi Katz | It sounds like you um through your mom and the shadow counter you had a front row seat. So like what's happening in beauty because the Shiseido products and ingredients you mentioned those are hot and trendy right now, right? And that was thirteen years ago. Yeah, right. And um, your mom's devotion to lip and lips are having a big moment now. So it's so fun that you were able to embrace that and I think our fans will want to know what her favorite shades are. So maybe after the show you can give us a list and we'll publish it and when we um, share episode. |
| Amy Chang | Oh for sure. |
| Jodi Katz | Yeah. So, um, let's talk about being an influencer because that's our theme for the quarter. This is not an easy job. And um, I have so much empathy for people who make this their full-time because I understand the amount of work that goes into this. This is a science and an art. It's not just a hobby. And I'm really curious about the behind the scenes of this role because it's easy to see, you know, what an influencer wants to put out to us, but we know behind the scenes because we make you know content every day here that it's it it it requires a team but you told me you're an army of one. I know so let's talk about like just the basics like how do you make this work happen when you're one person doing all of this? |
| Amy Chang | Yeah. So I'm a film almost everything on my phone. I edit in final cut pro, which is an apple app that I purchased through my Mac. Let me just show are you here? Okay, so we're in my backer and this is my lighting setup. I heard live here and then two softboxes on the sun and then my window on the other side so that I'm getting a three-point lighting system and I mean how much I mean, I just think about all the things I've had to learn over the years, right? And you just slowly start to accumulate this knowledge about how to be your own essentially like entertainment production the house because that's kind of like what it is to be an influencer, right? Like I have to understand lighting techniques. Um, you know how to film and edit things on my phone granite now it's a lot easier because you can do things in app like the Tiktok app is phenomenal for editing same with Instagram reels to like they're getting a lot better. I mean some days it's alive and I remember when my my first was about nine months old. I was just a stay at home mom doing like the blog and social media on the side, but I would put her down for bed at eight o'clock and then we'd go into my bathroom and I would feel tick talks until like one in the morning and that's just what I did every night. I felt that there was something there, right? I was like, feeling some momentum and I just leaned into it. I would say one thing about being an influencer. It requires a bit of like intuition because you received before like it's a combination sound science. It's an art but it's kind of in between and some I trust my instincts a lot. Like if something feels good, I lean more into it. If it doesn't then I pivot away from it. And I think the biggest thing is like I became an influencer really for connection human connection. I think that's what anyone wants right when they open up the social media app is to be seen for who they really are to be accepted to find their place find their community and what moves Yeah lately like I didn't know that many people. Yes, we had some friends here, but they live kind of farther away. So I didn't get to see them on a regular basis and I wanted connection with other women who were interested in beauty and I found it on social media. And so that connection with other women who are into since I mean, I'm fierce early passionate about just kind of pushed me to continue doing it and to continue I'm still to this day really love it. |
| Jodi Katz | So, um, okay, so you're an army of one doing this yourself. We know it's ninety which is actually not that uncommon. I know it sounds like kind of crazy because first it's like, oh, okay, I do everything myself. I film, you know added I help manage negotiations with brand deals do all my answer DMS and comments only you're your own manager and your own agent. |
| Amy Chang | Yeah. Yeah. I know it is a lot but I've talked to other influencers who really are You gotta wear every hat almost. I mean, yeah, some of them have managers or but a lot of them I know even the big ones still don't outsource editing because they want it to feel they want to be in control of that creative direction and to feel like it's them and their voice, you know, because once that is gone then you can it just not the same. |
| Jodi Katz | Um, you know, I think it's really a challenge to continue to up level and advance and like, you know, multiply the amount of work you're doing. Um, and then trust other people to do it in your way. It's not easy. So I understand why um, a lot of people want to you know, keep the rains that leads me to the comments section. Are you responding to your comments and DM’s yourself? |
| Amy Chang | And yeah, I don't know. I think it's I know other influencers that outsource that but I always feel like I like doing it. I mean, I like the connection with my audience and it's from that those interactions in the comments in the DMS that I get a sense of what kind of content they want what they're interested in, but they're not what their questions are that I can help them with because I feel like my platforms really centered around offering helpful information about beauty to help them navigate this world of like oversaturation and the beauty marketplace and tell them like, hey, what's worth it? What's not? And I need to have my pulse on the feel of what it is that they want and they're looking for. But I do understand that it is important to build out a team to scale and I'm actually at that inflection point right now because I have been doing everything myself for so long and I'm getting to the point where I'm now I'm ready to like open myself up. Like I had a friend who works at dinner with the other night shoes like Amy you've been contracted for so long like holding onto control doing everything myself. And now I feel like I'm at this moment where I'm ready to release an expand and like allow other people to come in and help me. But I think part it is that I needed to learn all the aspects of the business first so that I could go in and allow people to come in and help me and and still understand like what's going on in each space. |
| Jodi Katz | I love that is so wise in my own business Base Beauty, which is my day Job. I probably done through the years every job a little bit Right? So it helps me know how to hire people for those roles when I've actually lived the good the bad the ugly right myself. So I think it's very smart. And when you do bring on other people, maybe it's a part-timer to start it will be really evident to Amy if this person embodies your voice and your value who's right. You're gonna trust your gut on that. Sometimes, you know, not everybody um can get into your mindset and that won't be the right person long-term, but you'll find that person or multiple people and they'll be able to help you reach more reach more fans and you know share your message wider. |
| Amy Chang | Yeah. I think part of it too is I wanted to wait wait to build out a team until I really knew what my long-term goals We're going to be because then it's like, okay, I know where I'm trying to go what my North star is and now I understand who I need to bring in to help me get there and the scale right? |
| Jodi Katz | I need to understand the meaning of bondenavant. Yeah. I hope I'm pronouncing it right? |
| Amy Chang | Okay. Yeah. So it's actually French term and it means leap for forward. And when I created my beauty blog, I wanted to create a place that would help women and men leap forward in some way in their life and like lean into what makes them feel good. And so that's the meaning behind it. |
| Jodi Katz | I love that. Okay, you aren't army of one right now your mom sure you have a lot of other Dyne namic things that you do in addition to being an influencer when those comments and questions in DM’s come rolling in Are you stopping what you're doing in that moment to respond or do you set times for yourself, you know, like a work schedule where you're sitting down to do that work. |
| Amy Chang | Yes. So I recently started doing block scheduling which has been so helpful for me. I'm not naturally an organized person. I'm much more of that kind of right BR trade creative all over the place person. Ah, but setting up specific times where okay, you know, these are the days I work on X. These are the times during that day that I do DMS and comments and then I'll do, you know filming and then I'll do a block of time editing. It's really helped me to focus my mind on what it is I need to do and be more effaced patient at getting tests done, but it's hard. I have to force myself to really do it, right? |
| Jodi Katz | So I'm curious because this is you know, I'm hard for me. Yeah. If like, you know, tons of comments and DMS are rolling in and you are with the kids or you're in the food store, are you able to like resist the compulsion to respond and wait till later? |
| Amy Chang | Yes, I have. So I for my own mental sanity. I do a similar thing with like almost block scheduling with my family, right? So my kids go to school during the week and from the time that they leave the house in the morning like a thirty until the time that they come home. Those are my work hours. And then the minute they come home and he my oldest knows this and sometimes she'll run into my office when she gets home and she's like, Mommy, I'm home now. You need to stop working. And I'm like she nose. Yep. This is the time I stopped and I turned my attention to them and am fully present. And then the same thing on the weekends. I used to work on the weekends and I would answer a few emails or do a few comments, but I realised like it wasn't moving the business forward. All it was doing was What kind of draining me mentally. I didn't have time to relax or be present with my family because I would answer a few emails and then my mind would be turned on to work and creating content. And so I created a new rule where I don't post on the weekends. I don't answer comments. I just weekends are for me to recharge and for my family. And so creating those boundaries has helped me so much and I think will give me long Jeopardy with what I do because like I was feeling so burnt out for the longest time. I was like, I don't know if I can continue doing this, like working constantly because you feel like you'd get momentum, like a video goes viral and you're like, OK, I gotta do another video. Okay. I didn't know if I got to, like, answer all the comments and like it's a very tough timely space to be in. And so there's that feeling of like, I got to do this this Asus. But then I realized like, you know what, I can always create momentum again. I can always, you know, take that space and like I've I've taken the time to be really authentic with my audience and build a true relationship with them that when I told them, hey, you guys, like for my mental sanity, I'm not gonna post on the weekends anymore answer DMS or comments. Just wanted to let you know, there was like this flood of support and so many of them were like, God, that's great. |
| Jodi Katz | Amy do that. You know, I'm so glad you're doing that. And you know, that's inspired me to do the same with my kids on the weekends and not be on my phone or you know, whatever. So I think yeah, it's just important. It's important for mental health. I'm really big on mental health I love that. I call this the seduction of success what you spoke about like I got that viral video. Wanna follow it up and keep that momentum. It is seductive, right? Once you kind of taste that success, you want more and more and more. But I love the plan you have in place. I'm sure a lot of the people listening needed a little guidance on that today day because it's easy to get sucked in to anything you're passionate about, right? And the fun thing is that we have a job we love, right? We're an industry we love, which is awesome. But that comes with even more seduction, right? |
| Amy Chang | Because it's yeah, I get the seduction piece of it, but I feel like it really is it's like brain chemistry because we're on social the media. It's like these apps were designed to plan our brain chemistry and release dopamine into our systems every time we get the likes and the comments and all of this. And so I whenever I can feel that happening because it's like an addiction almost. Right? I Pause and I tell myself like I remind myself these apps were meant to play on our brain chemistry, right? So when I'm feeling frustrated because something's not doing well or you know, somebody's going viral and I want to like get to it. But oh, it's Friday night and now it's the weekend and I have to, you know, take that time off for myself. I just remember like, okay, this is what's happening. This is the dynamic. This is why you're feeling that way because of these apps and how they're structured. And it kind of helps me to take a step back and see like the true landscape of what's happening and not get sucked into it |
| Jodi Katz | Well Amy, thank you so much. That wraps up our interview segment and I'm re be grateful for your honesty in sharing so much about your career and your dreams. |
| Amy Chang | Thanks for having me. |
| Jodi Katz | This is really fun. Okay, now we have time for fan questions. Are so many rolling in. Let's aim to get three of them answered. Okay, here's a really good one from Shannon. Do you still recommend PDO threads and you still get them again? |
| Amy Chang | So I haven't gotten them again. I got them twice. I had them caught. How many years ago was that now? I think it was after I had Chloe, my eldest so probably four years ago. I had at the first time and then I had done again a year after that. And part of it was because I had Botox in my master here and they did way too much and it just completely atrophied the muscles down here and it made my skin SAG on the lower part of my face. It was really scary. If you guys I have a Youtube video all about that which shows the photos. But for years I really was trying to like build back up the structure here and I had a lot of say, sagging skin. So the PDO threads are like these little little needles here are like, excuse me these little sugar threads that they insert here with a needle and they would put them back here to like tighten and lift because it was trying to help combat some of that sagging skin. But yeah, I liked them. I just haven't done it again. I haven't needed to In a couple of years. So so do you think that it's a combination of the Botox wearing off and the PDF threads kind of replace like moving everything back into place, know, I know it's more than that. So it's like the threads helped with the sagging skin. I had some filler putting back here to like give back some of the structure. I grind my teeth at night. And so it's helped over the years is to build back the muscle here. So it's all of that together. |
| Jodi Katz | Okay. Here's another question. This one's from nour did you take filming and editing classes? I don't know where to start and I'm eager to learn more on starting to post. |
| Amy Chang | Yeah. No, I didn't. I just went on Youtube and watched a lot of videos and kind of learn the basic six there. It's final cut Pro's actually fairly intuitive. So I would suggest just getting that application and then go watch a few videos upload a couple, you know clips of yourself just dancing or something and play around with it. |
| Jodi Katz | Next question is from Xstyle. What is your current hair routine Amy? |
| Amy Chang | my current hair routine. Oh my gosh. It's so long. Okay. So what I will do in wash days is I will do hair oiling first and I'll really work on the ends. I have like medium coarse hair that is not very porous. And so I I really like struggle to get moisture inside of the stram. So I'll do oil on my strands and let it sit for a while then I'll go in and I'll show champ who and I'll do like a clarifying shampoo and then I'll do a second shampoo with my regular shampoo and then I'll do a deep conditioning mask because clarifying shampoos can be they have stronger detergents in them. They're a little More drying but it helps to get rid of any product buildup that I may have like from styling products and such. So then you want to do a deep conditioning mask. I really liked the one by Bureau show the avocado mask because it's protein free and it's just for deep hydration and you can use it as frequently as you want. So I used that one and then what I'll do I'll get out of the shower and I'll towel dry my hair and then I'll usually spray on like a hair growth serum on my scalp. I've currently been using the array gray one which works to help not only give volume once your hair is air dried, but it also helps to thicken bring back hair growth and prevent NT and reverse grade because I got a gray hair recently. So I'm like, okay, I wanna just like Maintain the health of my hair. So I'll do that. I'll do a little Rosewater to help with any itchiness because Rosewater is anti-inflammatory and also helps with flakes and then I'll do a hair serum for like mid lengths and down. I really like the rubber read milk serum and it has some extra protein and it did just help bind moisture to the strand. So it has apricots oil oil in it and um sweet almond oil. These are oils that can coat the outside but also get underneath the cuticle to nourish inside. And then what else do I do? I mean that's for wash days like I do a lot. Was that Allied? |
| Jodi Katz | Ah, and what about like colors that your natural color you're getting your colored? |
| Amy Chang | Okay. So in the last ten years, I've only colored my hair twice. The first time was a year and a half ago and it was because people kept asking me Amy, you know, I need recommendations for products that are for colored hair and I could only ever give recommendations and speak to them based on the ingredients, right? And I want it to be able to speak from firsthand experience trying them out. So I got my hair color. I got some baby lights and then recently, like I mentioned before, I had a color analysis and a color analysis is where someone who is trained to do this looks at your eye color your skin color your hair color and then based on these different things tells you what colors, you know, you should wear in terms of makeup even hair color clothes everything is it's kinda fun, right? You don't have to be so strict with it, right? But anyways, she gave me a recommendation for a haircolor and I was like, okay, you know what? I'm just going to have fun. I'm gonna try it. So Jennifer Aniston's colorist Michael Canale his team had reached out and was like, hey, we'd love to like, you know, offer to do a hair color or gloss. And at that time I was like, oh, I don't color my hair, but thank you so much. And then after this came up, I was like, oh my God, I'm gonna do it. So I called I called them and I was like, I'm ready. I want to do it. And I got there and I showed him the color that the color analysis, gave Was this kind of like a cool neutral tone, like an ash brown. And he was like, absolutely not. We are not doing that to your hair. And I was like, why what? But at the same time, I was also like, okay, you're Jennifer Aniston's color. So like whatever you wanna do goes. He was like, no, if you put cool neutral tones in your hair, it will make make your hair look like straw. It will make it look really flat. You need to add warm to the hair because it makes you look like you've been out in the sun and then it makes you it like draws light to your hair, which draws light to your eyes and makes people notice your eyes. So I was like, okay, whatever you want to do, let's do it. And so he gave me these like chocolatey Paper thin highlights like you can't even tell that my hair is highlighted. It just kind of grabs light because there's little tiny thin strands here and there that have some color. So anyways, that happened a couple of weeks ago and that was really fun. |
| Jodi Katz | I love that. That's an awesome story. Okay, we have let's squeeze in one more. Yeah, before you go. Oh my gosh, there's so many good ones. Okay, I'm going to pick this one last question for the day. If you could create a beauty product, what would you create? |
| Amy Chang | So I have thought about this and I I won't tell you exactly what it is because at some point I do plan on doing this but my dream is to have my own hair care line. I have tried so many PR products and I have in my mind like what I wish was out there and I just hope someday, I know some day I'm like an a manifesto and put it out there that I will be able to create this dream product that I have. But I also you know, I have recognized that there's so many products out there and there's so many good products. And so I really I think it's important that before people go and create more brands that can create a lot of waste and a big impact on our environment to make sure it's something that's needed. It's something that helps people. So anyways, it would be a hair care grab. |
| Jodi Katz | I love it. And you'll you'll call me when you're ready to tell the firewalls. Oh, hi Amy. Thank you so much. This was our two hundred and thirty fourth episode. I'm so grateful for your wisdom. |
| Amy Chang | Thanks for having me. This was so much fun. And yeah, I appreciate your time. |
| Jodi Katz | Thank you to everyone who listened in enjoined us. If you'd like this episode, please rate and review as always. Make sure you're following us on your favorite podcast platform and Instagram to stay up to date on upcoming episodes and all the fun we have along the way. Thanks for joining us. Thank you bye Amy. |
| Amy Chang | Thank you. |
| Announcer | Thanks for listening to WHERE BRAINS MEET BEAUTY™ with Jodi Katz. Tune in again for more authentic conversations with beauty leaders. |
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