I am going to make millions of people laugh around the world on a consistent basis. I am going to have a successful career.
Then I took it further. I wasn’t “going” to have these things. I wanted them to exist in the present:
I am so happy and grateful that I am making millions of people laugh with my videos.
I tried to shift my perception of myself as well:
I am smart. I am perfect as I am. I am enough. I am worthy.
It sounds cheesy, I know, but I had to do it. I had been depressed and thinking negatively of myself for as long as I could remember. Before this, I was writing in my journal, “I’m nothing. I should die. I don’t deserve to live.” These were the things that I thought about myself enough to actually write them down repeatedly in the yellow spiral notebook. Why the hell was I putting energy into that? Before I didn’t know how to stop, but now I had figured it out. I spoke to myself every day to retrain my brain:
I am no better and no worse than anyone else. I am worthy. I am happy.
With a new sense of self underway, I honed in on my goal. I wanted to make millions of people laugh all around the world. That was my new affirmation:
I’m making millions of people laugh all around the world.
I would picture people from all over the world watching my videos and laughing and feeling good because of something I did. It started to change the way I looked at my purpose, because I could give something to people. They might be anxious or depressed, and I could give them some goofy videos and make them laugh for a minute. For that one minute, they could forget their problems. I think that is amazing!
My affirmation was the first thing I would say in the morning, every single day. On the tenth day of saying that . . . I had my first viral video. The view count went up and up and up . . . until it was getting millions of views . . . being shared all over the world! I was literally making millions of people laugh all around the world. The video was of my Ivy character speaking to the camera in a breathy voice:
“Hey guys, it’s me. Just wanted to remind you to never give up on your dreams. Like even if you want to. Just don’t.”
I thought it was so funny to have this out-of-touch character be the one trying to motivate people. The only problem was that in my affirmation, I didn’t specify that the world would know who I was. The video was disconnected from me, reposted, and shared by millions of people who thought this character was a real person. I was honored! My performance was believable!
One morning I sprang out of bed with an idea. I nudged Stephen awake.
“Stephen. I have an idea. Will you film me cooking breakfast?”
Stephen was barely awake. “Who? What?”
I stared down at him intensely, amped up on ideas. “If I throw toast at you, just keep filming, okay?”
Stephen rubbed his eyes and rolled out of bed. “All right.”
We walked into the kitchen and I did this repressed Southern housewife character who has a cooking show but can’t stand her husband who’s filming it. She’s trying to teach the audience how to cook avocado toast, and meanwhile is bordering on killing her husband. This was the birth of my Pamela Pumpkin character. I showed it to a big YouTube-based production company and they picked it up as a series. I got to write, produce, and act in my second show. It was an incredible time of creative growth. I was trusting my intuition and shooting whatever I could think of. Four years earlier, this idea would have just died a lonely death in one of my journals next to the words: “I’m a piece of shit.”
Now I was no longer afraid to fail. I realized that people liked what I had to offer and I wasn’t delusional. I had something to give and I wanted to keep giving.
It was incredible to look out and see what I had accomplished. When I was doing stand-up open mics, I was reaching six people every time I performed. With digital content, I could reach hundreds of thousands of people, and I didn’t even have to put on pants! If I framed the shot right, I didn’t have to wear clothes at all! I didn’t have to stay up until two a.m. every night at bars across Los Angeles; I didn’t have to be around tons of drunk people and alcohol and drugs.
If stand-up had been the only way to be a creator, if there were no social media or online video sharing, I would have stuck with it. But I found this softer way to do what I love, which I happen to be good at. It just makes sense. This is right for me.
I kept growing, and I got a DM from the head of Kevin Hart’s production company.
“Kevin Hart’s a big fan. He wants you to create content for him.”
Um, what? Kevin Hart knows who I am?
“Come in for a meeting!”
Um, WHAT? Okay! A few days later I went to his production company and Kevin Hart was standing there. “You’re hilarious. I love your work. I’m creating a comedy app and I want you to create sketches for me.”
*Screams into the abyss*
UM WHAAAAATTTTTT—
I wrote, directed, produced, and starred in thirty sketches for him. It wasn’t much money, but it didn’t matter. It was Kevin-fucking-Hart. He was a fan of mine? It gave me so much confidence.
After that, opportunities started knocking at my door. Brands were asking me to promote their products, and I finally started making steady money from my art. I would get new opportunities here and there. I finally knew who I was and I was solid. I had fully transitioned from actor to content creator.
It really sounds cheesy but those affirmations are what lifted me over the edge. I swear by them. I had such a rigid self-image before, and the only things that could break the cycle of self-hate were intentional, affirming statements. I’ve been depressed, anxious, and suicidal for much of my life, and this is what has turned it around for me. My brain has said so many mean things to me. I never want my brain to talk to me in THAT TONE AGAIN. You hear me, Brain?
What I imagined for myself could manifest in my world. So I started visualizing more:
A house in the hills with a pool. A house in the hills with a pool.
Then Stephen and I found the perfect one right when we had saved up enough money to move in. Growing up with no money had given me negative associations about money and people with money. I used to think people with money were greedy or selfish, but that’s not necessarily true at all. I had to redefine the way I looked at wealth. The more you have, the more you can give. If you have a little bit of money you can give to homeless people on the street, but if you have a lot of money? There’s a world of help you could give to others. I had to tell myself that it’s okay to have money. It’s okay not to struggle and suffer. It sounds so strange, but getting out of that survival mindset was so difficult. Now that I’m financially stable and saving up . . . my affirmations are getting even bigger.
My most recent philanthropic goal is to open an animal sanctuary. Animal rights are very important to me, so I started visualizing a sanctuary where we can rescue tons of animals from being put down. I was obsessing over it, and then I got a call from Colleen. “Laura, we went vegan and we have an eight-acre farm that we don’t know what to do with.”
“HELLO, SISTER. I HAVE AN IDEA.”
I told her about my idea and she was very into it. Things are happening, people! The dots are connecting themselves.
I started to get even more specific with my affirmations. I’m making millions of people laugh around the world AND I have millions of followers. I was getting a ton of views and shares, but my follower count wasn’t in the millions yet.