S17, Ep8 Yomi Adegoke on social media, mental health and reality TV

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1:16Hello and welcome to How to Fail with Elizabeth Day, the podcast that celebrates the things that haven't gone right. This is a podcast about learning from our mistakes and understanding that why we fail ultimately makes us stronger. Because learning how to fail in life actually means learning how to succeed better. I'm your host, author and journalist Elizabeth Day, and every week I'll be asking a new interviewee what they've learned from failure. Yomi Adegoke is a journalist and author whose work concerns race, feminism, popular culture, and their intersection. She was raised in Croydon, studied law at Warwick University, and later worked at Channel 4 News before joining online magazine The Pool as a senior writer.

2:05Since then, she's written for many publications, as well as having regular columns in British Vogue and in The Guardian on reality TV, my pet passion. In 2018, she co-authored the non-fiction book Slay in Your Lane, The Black Girl Bible, after which she scooped both the Groucho Club Maverick of the Year award and was named one of the most influential people in London by the Evening Standard. But it's her debut novel, The List, which is causing a stir right now. A month out from publication and it's already been snapped up by HBO Max for TV adaptation. The List tells the story of high-flying journalist Ola, who discovers her fiancé Michael has been named in a Google Doc that claims to out men who perpetrate sexual assault.

2:56Yomi writes about secrets and lies in an online culture that values sociopolitical hashtags over the more complicated truth. It's already been heralded as provocative and wise by Bernadine Evaristo, who will be in conversation with Yomi at the Southbank Centre in London on publication day, the 20th of July. Although Yomi is still only 31, she was once asked what she would tell her younger self. Be very thick-skinned and take rejection, she replied. Don't take things personally, keep going, because it does pay off and is worth it. Yomi, welcome to How to Fail. Thanks for having me, Elizabeth. I'm so excited.

3:41I'm so excited and I feel like we've been circling this idea for so long. For a while, yes. And I'm so happy that you're sitting here in front of me. I can't believe that you'd have me. I'm honoured. I'm not even just saying that. I'm like, gosh, the most famous and important people in the world are constantly on here. But Yomi, you are a month out of publication. And I know that feeling. That feeling is, for me anyway, when I have a book coming out, I have lots of anxiety spirals. I have stress dreams about walking down the street naked because I worry that I've exposed some terrible truth how are you doing oh my god thank you for asking Elizabeth thank you for asking I feel like I'm supposed to say that I'm super excited and raring to go and I am and that's definitely part of it but as you mentioned the TV rights have been picked up it has been causing quite a stir and it's not yet out so whilst that is like the dream it's also really anxiety inducing because I'm like oh my god I know it sounds terrible to say but I'm just like shit I hope it's as good as everyone is expecting it to be because it feels like quite a bit of pressure and I'm super super excited but I'm always saying I'm not someone who necessarily reads hyped books and I take a while I'm one of those people that's like hmm I'll come back to that next year when it's all sort of died down and I kept saying to my friends god would I pick up my own book amidst all the hype I don't know but yeah I'm so excited but also yeah definitely definitely had a couple stress dreams.

5:08Clothes on for now, but we'll see how we get a week before publication. So that quote that I ended on, that idea of being thick-skinned, are you there yet? And if so, can you tell me your secrets? How do you deal with criticism? How are you armoring yourself against people's perceptions? Because I'm sure it will be rave reviews, but do you have a strategy for coping with other people's perceptions? Oh, certainly. Avoid, avoid, avoid. Honestly. honestly so I have been writing on the internet for over 10 years I started I was a blogger I've written for you know various publications and started quite young some of them I was writing whilst I was at university and the landscape was quite different and I think especially writing about I'm sure you'll know writing about feminism writing about women's issues writing about race writing about these things back in the day wasn't necessarily I'm not saying that it's you know a walk in the park now but it's different let's say I'd say at least there's an appetite even from commissioners to hear about it whereas back then certainly when I was writing about race it was it was very difficult and it came with a lot of commentary let's say and at times yeah abuse I remember constantly reading comments and gosh I thought I was going to say it was when Twitter was the wild west but I feel like we're back to a wild west now so I receive all kinds of messages on there and then one day I just sort of thought why am I engaging with this again I don't I don't even know these people it's not because I'm putting something out that I'm then obliged to hear what's said about it I kind of decided that the criticism I'd engage in would be even when Slay in Your Lane came out book reviews friends people who I respected peers because not just friends because obviously they're going to be like everything you do is amazing decide what noise was and tune it out and so for instance things like goodreads I've got a block on that I use twitter in a very specific way I've never I don't think I've had my dms open for about nine years it's just a lot harder for me to come across that stuff and that's not to say I don't engage in criticism I think it's really important to I just think that I'm cautious of who it comes from so every review that the list gets in an actual paper I'll read anyone who's written a thoughtful blog post absolutely but if it's sort of you know screed in a comment section yes no thanks I'm gonna ignore it yeah I mean there's a difference between feedback constructive feedback from someone who wants the best for you and anonymous trolling absolutely I've got to the stage where I don't read anything I'm like I just want to insulate myself and exist in a little bubble where I understand who the people are that I go to for that constructive feedback absolutely and the rest of it but you've learned that 13 years ahead of where I am so congrats I'm the hard way but I think what you're saying isn't necessarily a bad thing because people can then say oh you know you're insulating yourself what about feedback that you need to receive as you said you've decided whose feedback is worth listening to but also it works both ways so when it comes to criticism I try to tune out the noise it's the same for compliments so when people on Instagram sometimes you you know you open your Instagram or you open your social media and it's just loads and loads of people saying incredible stuff which is amazing but then that can also distort your view of yourself and your work and I've very much lived by you know if you live by somebody's compliments you'll die by their criticism and the idea that I need to take criticism from certain people with a pinch of salt but I also need to take gushing and lovins and what kind of stuff with a pinch of salt also otherwise my head would just explode do I something I think I have to kind of temper both ways so I think that the whole kind of bubble and just kind of living in this suspended state of reality where you don't listen to much is actually kind of a good thing I think I think it insulates you from a lot well one of the things that I really really hadn't expected to find in the list in the best possible way because I knew it was going to be pacey and you structure it like a thriller no honestly like you do a terrific job.

9:11It's so meaty. I hate that word. Do you know what I mean? Like, Bernadine's right. It is provocative. It takes on some very, very interesting topics. And you write about them with real nuance. So there is no binary in many ways. There is no right and no wrong. We are constantly asked as the reader to keep asking ourselves the questions that the characters are which I thought was super engaging and there is so much to talk about as I mentioned in the introduction it sort of takes on the idea of me too and the idea of movements that spread like wildfire on the internet possibly without enough questions being asked and Ola is confronted with the fact that her fiance is named on this list but she loves him right and I wondered how important it was for you to look at the issue of men being outed believing women but also the specific situation for black men often being accused of crimes that they never committed thank you for picking up on that honestly thank you for writing about it such a loving so much to say i mean first of all as i said like i appreciate you picking up on that very specific nuance.

10:28I think nuance is the operative word when it comes to me trying to talk about this book. I really wanted to have a character that could very easily have done the things that he was accused of by virtue of, you know, mistakes that he's made in his past, by virtue of the industry he's in and the way that the industry often sort of not even necessarily coddles, but hides, obscures the crimes of men and allows them to sort of go on and live their lives without issue but I also wanted to really bring to the fore the fact that you know Michael as a character is a working class black man and his relationship with the police is therefore different with certain institutions and systems is therefore different there's definitely a kind of not implicit I'd say there's a sort of expected or suspected like inherent guilt often with black men especially in America but I think that's also something that has happened in the UK and does happen in the UK and is very much obscured because I think we think that we are sort of further along with racial relations than we necessarily are but I think I just wanted the whole conversation around me too and because I always say I could have written this about any social justice movement that's sort of taken place on the internet I wanted it to be very very critical of not the movements themselves, but the way that they unfold online.

11:52And I always say that the list is first and foremostly a book about the internet, because I feel like I could have, rather than it being something as, you know, explosive as an anonymous list of male abusers, it could have been a TripAdvisor review that kind of followed the same storyline. Again, someone putting something out there, let's even say like, for instance, Goodreads, and you can write a review about a book you haven't read. You can review a hotel that you've never stayed at on the internet. So what happens when you have anonymity and human nature, and then something as powerful as the internet, and you also have systems that fail women when they do attempt to report various abuses.

12:29And it's kind of this, you know, very toxic cocktail of lots of injustices playing out at the same time, and the internet essentially being used to try and right those wrongs. But what happens when, I suppose, this is why human nature comes into it, what happens when you've got real people behind those screens that may use something as powerful as that for their own nefarious purposes and that's such a roundabout way no no it's a brilliant answer and also you have to be quite careful what you say because there is so easy to spoil yes there's so many twists yes but there's one in particular which I just thought was so clever and brave in terms of how you end the book but that's all I'm gonna say the other thing that I really enjoyed amongst many things because albeit you're a decade younger than i am but i feel like we've had similar experiences in media yes in many ways and the skewering of like a certain type of media girl boss yeah i could not get enough of did you have fun doing that i had so much fun with that character frankie i think she's actually my favorite character yeah um she was my favorite character to write and as you said everything's supposed to be quite grey and nuanced so I didn't want to write her as a kind of like caricature or cartoonish villain I actually wanted her to be kind of sympathetic and humorous in ways but I had so much fun with that I also really like the deputy political editor at the observer character I thought that was really smart as well thank you very much yeah that's very heavily based on people that I've met and I respect and in terms of that character you know that it's a real kind of they're in a very grey area in terms of trying to do what they think is right but simultaneously maybe not applying the ethics and the codes of journalism that they would normally in their job yeah whilst trying to I suppose speak truth to power and give women a voice it's again yeah quite a nuanced one I think you grew up in Croydon I did Croydon is where you unveiled the the list cover and I think you're brilliant at dialogue which is why I can totally see it on TV.

14:32And there's a certain kind of dialogue where I felt this is just totally as it is and so on point. And I really enjoyed being an eavesdropper into that. And I wanted to ask you possibly quite an impossible question, but how much do you think growing up in Croydon has shaped your writing? Oh my God, that's such an excellent question. Potentially impossible, but I'm going going to definitely give that a go. I think growing up in Croydon potentially shaped my writing because actually, no, I would say it did shape my writing in quite a heavy way because I'd say that I haven't seen many characters from that area depicted on screen unless it's like sort of in a caricature way, for instance.

15:17And I think that even though Ola isn't from Croydon, she's spiritually from Croydon. She's from Streatham, which is up the road and she's like, lives in and I really wanted to kind of depict I suppose people that I know from Croydon in South London and I think depicting them outside of I suppose stereotype outside of expectation and just right people I always say that even though you know my friends have read it and they're like they kind of get to the end and they're disappointed like that's not me I thought I was gonna be in this wait a minute Ruth's not based on me and I'm like no but it's been because I've taken elements of lots of people I know and Croydon is such a vibrant area I always take the capital of South London, lots of people say that.

15:56It's very much its own world because we've kind of been told it's not in London, even though it is. So we've kind of like, I think, got our own sort of, yeah, world there. And I think when I think of the people that, you know, I went to school with and that I've grown up with, it's just a very real particular type of person, I think. Very distinct, very South London person that I wanted to kind of write about. So yeah. And And we've got our like Freud legends, like Kate Moss and like Stormzy and stuff. And I think I'm always kind of trying to like put Freud on the map, even if I'm not writing about it.

16:27I'm like trying to write like a South London character that could be from there. And Naomi Campbell's from Streatham. She is from Streatham, yes. To Dunraven, which is like a notorious school. Like crazy anecdote. I want to ask you a little bit about your creative influences before we get onto your failures, because I'm hoping one of them is the real Harris Wives. what are your creative influences and is reality tv one of them you know what i think that is why we actually first bonded because you are such a reality tv expert as i am thank you i love that that was such a genuine like thank you i thought you were gonna say obsessive i was like no no you know your shit like you actually know what you're talking about um i love reality tv and i love that you love it non-ironically like it's not this like guilty pleasure like you genuinely love it and I really really do love reality tv because I really do think you know I write reality tv column at the guardian and I always say when I'm trying to explain it to people and still make sure they take me seriously I'm always like you know it's kind of like an anthropological look at reality tv I always say that you know it's about the microcosm of what you know it says about society but I genuinely do think that I think reality tv is so good I think at telling us about society and about ourselves and I was an only adopter of Love Island I watched it I think the the first series in 2015, Real Housewives for My Sins is actually one of the ones that like I only dip the toe in.

17:51Everyone gets really angry at me because they're like, how could you possibly call yourself a reality TV expert and not watch Real Housewives like religiously? It does inspire my writing in many ways just because it's about what's real. And obviously it's not asterisk because it's about, you know, like it's heavily produced and things are very much curated, but I just love people. And I think reality TV is about people and affairs and scandals. And emotions. And emotions, yeah. The setup might be produced, but the emotions generally are real and truthful. Exactly, right. What about other creative influences?

18:23How much does music play? Because you include a lot of music in the list. I do, yeah. I used to be a music journalist. That was kind of how I got started. So yeah, music is a very, very big inspiration for sure. That's kind of how I got started out. And even though I have absolutely no music ability, I think it's one of those things that I listen to rather and watch other people sort of like creating beautiful music. And it really inspires me. Now you mentioned like, gosh, you have a lot of music in there. That's something that I very much realized, like I think on my like hundredth millionth read of it.

18:54And I was like, wow, this has got a proper like soundtrack to it. There's a lot of music. Because I think it is that thing of, you know, how a fragrance can really take you back to a particular time. When I hear like Rihanna's work featuring Drake, I am just transported to 2016. Like, and just little things like that. So I felt that I was really trying to get a sense of, I think, time in the list. And I really wanted it to be clear that, you know, it was pre-COVID. Because it's kind of that time that's so close to now, but so much has happened since then. So I really wanted it to be that when people are reading it, they're very, like, aware that this was, like, before the many life-changing things that have happened, like, globally in the last three years.

19:30So, yeah, I think music, for me, really gives a sense of place and time, which inspires me. Yeah. Okay. Who's on your Spotify most played? Wizkid. Okay. no like no thought I'm like whiz kid it's just always been whiz kid for the past decade of my life yeah let's get on to your failures now so your first one is uni yes tell us what happened oh how long have you got uh 40 minutes you might honestly be here forever well I was one of those kids at school that didn't necessarily try particularly hard but I think there were different types of intelligence right and I think the way school works it is very much geared to a very specific type of intelligence and I think I lucked out in terms of having that type which is I could like cram and I could like revise a day before something and remember everything and then vomit it out in an essay and do really well but I don't think I was probably certainly not in secondary school as academically gifted across the board as it was assumed in my school as well they also had this assumption that like if you were good at like English and history and things with words that are you're probably quite smart in science as well and and maths and I was horrendous at maths horrendous at science but managed to kind of blag my way to getting decent like GCSEs very good in like certain subjects in which I excelled but blagged it across the board then I got to uni and you just couldn't blag you just couldn't it was like the jump was so extreme the fact that I even didn't mention college just shows that for me it was very much an extension of secondary school same thing even easier because it was like oh god I've only got like three subjects now one of them is drawing like I love art I like was doing fine art and art's something I had a natural aptitude for so it didn't feel like work it felt like it was a hobby for me so then I got to uni and kind of went in with that exact same attitude and then it was like okay here's law which I genuinely thought was going to be I always say I thought it was gonna be Ali McBeal I thought I was gonna be in like a skirt suit arguing looking cute whilst doing it and then I got there and it was like okay okay, so here's taught law and obitadicta and suddenly there was Latin.

21:39I was like, what? The jump was enormous. Also, I don't have hugely strict parents, but I hadn't ever, like, I hadn't even had my own room before. So I was like, wow. You hadn't had your own room? Never. So you've been sharing with your sister? I've been sharing with my, well, firstly I used to share with me and both my sisters who are my best friends. So that was actually really nice. And then it was me and my little sister who's two years younger than me. And then it was uni and it was just me. and I was like hang on a minute like it was just a level of freedom I'd never experienced before I'd only ever lived in Croydon so I was like wow I'm now in Warwick's in Coventry right and I was like oh it's really leafy there were all these people from across the world all these international students I was like this is wow this is amazing so I just kind of went full throttle like party girl just went I'd always liked I'd always liked a bit of a party but and just didn't even remember that I was there to study that's paired with the fact that like there was a huge academic leap so I'd also discovered binge drinking at the same time as like not understanding any like missing all my lectures that I didn't understand anyway so yeah that culminated in me failing my first year at uni after getting into a really good uni that I'd really wanted to get into quite easily but like failed instantly and how did that feel I suppose I want to ask because you mentioned that your parents weren't particularly strict no but was there a sense that they had high hopes for you given that you had got to university yeah my parents I should actually clarify weren't strict only because I was getting good grades so they were so they are so academically focused so I used to like go out and like go raving and like come back at like four and they were like that's fine as long as you did your homework I was like yeah I did my homework and they're like cool like that's fine like you can live your life and it was because I was doing quite well at school that I was then given like freedom to like go out with my friends and like party and all the stuff at college so they had very high expectations of me but yeah I felt fine unfortunately originally because this was first year so I was like oh I will just dip it a second year that's fine and I didn't have to tell my parents so I was like oh great I'll just fix everything second year which of course I didn't okay and in your second year the way that you put it to me you expressed it as an equation party animal plus depression equaled a tutu in your second year bless you

24:11tell us about that experience of depression yeah so I was having a great time initially I mean I met I've always said my Elizabeth because of course you're you're the OG Elizabeth my Elizabeth who I call Polly Elizabeth if you've ever been a name co-author of Slay in Your Lane and we were like thick as thieves having a great time we both failed our first year together so we were fine and then I don't know I think the pressure of sort of academic work also being like the whole fish out of water thing was quite fun at times because it was like everyone was super were posh and white and I was really different, but I was having a great time.

24:49So I was like, oh, this is a whole new world. But then I really started to just miss things that like made home home. And I mean, I can't cook for shit. So I was kind of like, oh, I want jollof rice. I want like African food. I want to like be able to, this one, I had hair, go to hair shops and I want to be around my friends that I grew up with. And I think I just started to feel quite disconnected. And then so suddenly I was like, wow, I don't feel good. I'm like really sad, but it was really difficult because I thought that depression had to be like brought on by something by some sort of traumatic incident or have some sort of at least inciting incident and it just felt like one day I just was depressed and I was like I've been in this bed for a long time it's just been like god I think American Dad I don't know how many seasons it had then but I remember like I'd like watched from like one to like maybe seven and I was like wow how many days is it like you know the days just go by in this haze of just like tv and like fast food and I just like wasn't leaving bed and I was quite prone to like missing lectures anyway but it was before it was on that kind of fun cheeky like oh I don't care about work way and then it was like no I actually don't want to get out of bed but it was very sudden so I just kind of went into myself and was honestly confused because I was like I didn't identify as a depression for a really long time because I was like what have I got to be depressed about everything's fine do you know I mean I'm at a great uni I've got these great friends so I didn't understand it so I didn't really do anything about it until I kind of had no choice.

26:13And then what did you do about it? Well I think oh my god the most insane story well I wasn't really leaving my house much and I had this brilliant friend Adwa who I don't even know if I'd articulated what I was feeling but I remember she like came to my house with all this like food and all this like stuff and she just kind of like sat with me which was really nice and I was still again very like confused and I kind of felt like wow I really appreciate this gesture but why do I almost feel like someone's died like you know it's like you go to someone's house you like bake them like something or bring them flowers and I felt like oh she's doing this lovely thing for me but I don't even know why I need it because I know I've been in bed for a long time but surely I'm fine and I'll never forget I was watching Shutter Island on yeah I was pirating okay pirating Shutter Island years ago such a good film and I was trying to watch it on like one of these like one, two, three illegal movies dot UK like websites.

27:11I remember it wasn't loading. So I remember like I kept trying to put the capture in and like it was just not working. And then the next time I refreshed, I shit you not, it literally said this too shall pass, which was so bizarre to me because like captures normally like seven, six, Q one, you know, I was like, what? But also what was so weird is my dad had like spoken about that like you know the whole proverb of you know the good times pass the bad times pass and he specifically told me like when you feel down like that's what you should cling to so when I saw it I remember thinking like I literally was like looking side to side like okay when's Ashton Kutch they're gonna like show my age when's Ashton Kutch gonna jump out and be like punt I was like this is so random and then I kind of thought well why is this speaking to me so intensely if there's nothing to pass clearly there's something that needs to pass yeah I'm clearly feeling pretty she that was a real moment and I remember speaking to my uni and like immediately being like can I get therapy and they gave me like three therapy sessions for free and then during the course of those like conversations with a brilliant therapist who was a white man but like had background talking to and like working with people from diverse backgrounds so sort of understood things like familial pressure and the need for me to like do well at uni and throughout that conversation I decided to take a year out which now I look back on it it seems like I'm very glad I did it but I can't believe I did it because I know how much I wanted to do well at uni but I took a year out and it was very much needed but um very scary at the time I think that is one of the best most accurate descriptions of that kind of depression that I've ever heard.

28:55Oh, thank you. Because some depression can be experienced as numbness, where you're not sure what it is. Yeah. But you're still yourself, aren't you? Yeah. Like it's that kind of thing. Yeah. And that must have been really scary. So scary. Did you go back home? I went back home and I think it was very scary for my parents because I've always been like super chipper. Like I'm one of those friends where when I'm having a bad day, it makes everyone awkward. I don't know if you've got that thing where it's like, because you're like the really like bubbly one when everyone's like you're okay and you're like yeah I'm fine they're like oh because it's like they're not used to it so I think it made everybody kind of like oh like feel away because they weren't used to me being like that because I was such a like happy chipper person and then it felt harder because I couldn't articulate myself so then I felt like I didn't necessarily feel as supported as I wanted to but I don't hold it against anyone because everyone's asking me if I'm fine and I'm like yeah that's why I really appreciated adjuar to this day who i've actually gotten my acknowledgements even though like we don't see each other as much but because i just remember feeling incredibly seen because i'd never really articulated to anybody what was going on because i didn't know and she just kind of instinctively i feel knew something was up and like came to my aid so i went back home i was back in my childhood bedroom and it was back to like rules not rules but being like accountable to my parents and stuff like that and yeah it was it felt like regressive because everyone was graduating and I just got a third in my second year so I was like oh my god it's getting worse I find this so I'm so glad that you're speaking about it thank you because it's very courageous to revisit something that I imagine is still felt on some cellular like muscle memory level but the interesting thing is is that you took this year out you started a magazine yes NVD as you do on your and then you came back to do a third year and you did external modules that you actually like and you graduated with a 2-1 overall so for a lot of people they would think well I got a really good degree from a really good university but for you it still feels like a failure to the extent that you've chosen it as one of your yes so I started a magazine because I needed something to do and I had a friend Tanika also in the acknowledgement for the same reason because we met at uni and I was kind of like restless and I think there's a definitely like child of immigrant mentality where it's like you can be like in the throes of depression but because you've still got your arms and legs and you're like you know you're breathing you're kind of like I've got to be productive everyone else is graduating and she'd said you know I'd started a blog around that like maybe a year before and she was like you know if you want to start writing in fact I was trying to pitch to magazines and this was as I said when writing about race and feminism and stuff wasn't quite as like in vogue as it is now so I was pitching to places and no one was taking my commissions and she was like why don't you start your own magazines and that's how I started Birthday Magazine which was like a very short-lived but like magazine aimed at like young black girls I used to give out in local hair shops in South London so I felt like it was productive and I really look back at it as a really really useful time I wouldn't have learned things about myself had I not gone through that period but I guess I see it as a failure in some ways because I don't know I think that I kind of maybe on some level did want to do the typical like first year second year third year I guess my view on failure is that I can see something as a failure and still see it as a win mutually like I'm glad that it was a failure if that makes sense because all my friends graduated and I was watching them in their like you know with their little hats and their gowns and I was like a year late and lots of good came from that I like met like a boyfriend I was with for a long time and I'm friends with and I made all these new friends but I think on some level I did want to do it in those three years and I guess on another level entirely I'm really glad I studied law because it's helped me think in a different way and I don't regret anything and I have no regrets in my life but a part of me thinks gosh a lot of stuff could have probably been avoided if I'd studied English literature or studied something I liked I bet you're great with contracts though I'm horrendous at contracts, Elizabeth, and that is why it's a failure.

33:02Because I am terrible at contracts. So bad at contracts. That's why I got my third.

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34:53may apply.

34:58Your second failure is, as you describe it, a nine to five in journalism. And this is a specific time in your life where you've referenced the fact that growing up with financial instability sort of informed some of your life choices. And this is sort of what happened here, isn't it? So explain to us why you chose this failure. Again, I see like failures in a way of like I can consider it a failure but I still think it was for the best certainly right yeah exactly I'm on the right I'm on the right I'm a monk preaching to the choir I've never had a nine-to-five in journalism that's lasted more than like two and a half years and every time it's either like ended in like redundancy or the like company collapsing I've never just like had a normal nine to five in journalism so when I left uni the goal the absolute pot of gold at the end of every wannabe journalist rainbow is was maybe yes still is like a stable staff job my god so when I got my first staff job at ITN I could not believe it especially because I'd never done an NCJ I like didn't study journalism and my experience was very much like work experience and a blog so and a magazine that like I edited myself so I couldn't believe I got a staff job and it was just so coveted and I felt so important and I just felt like it was amazing and it was very short-lived because basically ITN had set up what was I think at the time you were like it's gonna rival BuzzFeed and it was supposed to be like a kind of like news site that was quite like young and aimed at millennials gosh to say like young and aimed at millennials now when there's like a whole gen z and it was so exciting and honestly one of the best teams i've ever worked with everyone was phenomenal i had an editor that like was quite young but really took like risks because i remember writing this list called called like things you only know if you grew up in ends and it was very much about like inner city working class like black culture and it was like all these things that like me and my friends had grown up around but your average person didn't know and he was like i don't have a clue what this means but i'll commission this and i felt really trusted and then it was like okay this doesn't exist anymore this was kind of I think god we're all so used to it now but this was like the first round of kind of like when companies used to just explode media companies so I was really lucky and worked at Grayson Road so Channel 4 was just above and my ex-boss now friend John Lawrence at Channel 4 had like seen my work downstairs at the ITN venture and asked me to work at Channel 4 News things have gone from good to best like obviously I was miserable because I'd been made redundant but now I'm working at Channel 4 News which was amazing but I just wasn't honestly I can say at hand on heart no humility I was not cut out for that job I can say that now like god bless John for taking a pun on me but it was like really serious hard news of course I was like a multimedia producer and I was working online and I don't have any technical ability whatsoever I literally am that person like trying to set up a zoom call and it's like your mic's off your camera's off like that's me so i was like then having to try and like cut up and subtitle and edit videos it was a nightmare i was so bad horrendous and i wasn't across the news cycle because i was watching love island i could tell you everything that was happening in a way in a way is being across the news cycle but not the kind that that's why we're that's why we're kind of experience yeah you get it i see we see each other in the words of Nini Meeks but um like I was across like pop culture and I was talking all this rubbish about like tv and I could tell you anything that's happening in any like reality show or any show but I didn't know what was happening in the news cycle which led to me once I used to work on the newsletter sometimes and I remember I was like so on autopilot that like I had put news I think honestly from like a month before bear in mind this is like I was working at Channel 4 News during Brexit, Trump, serious world events had taken place.

38:54I put in news from a month ago. You'd send out a dummy newsletter before you'd the real one, and you sent it out across to the whole office, and everyone was like, this is from... Trump's been elected now, and you're talking about his campaign. I was like, oh, oops. And it was so humiliating. And basically, John was like, you know, he really did... At this time, me and Elizabeth had got the book deal for selenio lane but again financial stuff i really wanted to keep the job i really had that kind of pressure for myself of like you need a stable media job so john was trying to keep me on i will never forget he said i've got this incredible black woman i know that's in the media i'm gonna introduce you to her and she'll show you the ropes and you know kind of show you the virtues of being here the woman was a fua hush yeah it was a fua that's how i met her we went for coffee and her job was supposed to be that she kind of was meant to say like yeah this is why you should stay and literally we sat down and immediately she was like you should leave she was like go for it you're young you've got a book deal she was just like leave and I was like oh but I was like you know but I had such imposter syndrome and I was so concerned like what if the book doesn't sell and all these things and I was so nervous I just didn't want to leave because I just need the money and she was just like look you've got the advance you've got like she was just so supportive and she was like I really think you should leave like it's up to you but she was like John's gonna kill me but you should leave and then I left and then I got imposter syndrome again so I got another job like immediately afterwards and then had to leave that you got another job on an online magazine yes and my understanding is that you were not allowed unpaid leave to work on and promote your book right so I got a dream job as a staff writer again I was like you know what channel 4 didn't work because I wasn't supposed to do multimedia that was fair enough whereas with this I was like oh my god this is writing this I can write about pop culture I can write about opinions I was like this is perfect but then slaying your lane the book that obviously I wrote with my best friend and we were doing all these events and we're doing all this stuff and it took off in a way that we didn't expect I must say you were very much an early adopter oh I will never forget that we saw you in the waterstones do you remember that and you You looked so, you were slaying.

41:07Like you were in this like lovely dress and you had these sunglasses and your hair was longer. And we were like, who is that? She's fab. And you were like, hi girls. I'll never forget that. You were so nice. You watched so much of the road. I remember it so well. And I remember that dress. I remember the sunnies, man. You just looked, mate, it was such a sub. But I remember we were like, oh my God, she was amazing. And Naomi was like, that's Elizabeth. And then we were like, Googled. Oh my God, she's fucking huge. What? She's amazing. Anyway. That book was amazing. And you two did an amazing job.

41:34Oh, thank you. Five years soon. I can't believe it. I can't believe that, man. I can't believe it. But the energy and insight that you bring are so precious. Oh, thank you. Thank you. No, honestly, we're really proud of it. And we didn't expect that's the thing. That's why, like, I remember all the people that kind of talked to it early because it was a different time, Elizabeth. Like, we had the idea in 2016. 2018, we're talking pre-Black Squares on Instagram. It wasn't the thing to necessarily. So I remember when people, like, really supported it because it wasn't necessarily fashionable. It was kind of putting your head above the parapet a bit back then.

42:04so we were shocked that it had really spoken to people so we were like god what do we do elizabeth was working in a bank in central london as a marketing manager and i was now at an online magazine and i was like what are we gonna do like how do we how do we navigate this and we were oh my gosh like i used to think really arrogantly like burnout was like almost made up i'm like oh yeah sure sure you're burnt out but are you really burnt out come on you just need to like yeah like I was like, oh my God, so toxic. Like reproducing the exact same things. I was like, are you really burnt out? But I remember we were dying because we literally were like, obviously we share a super publicist, Naomi Manton, phenomenal woman.

42:44So she was getting us gigs, press, everything. So we were so shocked because we thought it's not going to have that appeal across the board, but it did. So we were like dying. And I was like, you know what? I have to leave, even though I enjoyed the job. So I asked for an unpaid sabbatical. I'd only been there nine months but like by their own admission I'd brought quite a lot to the site and they said I couldn't and I was like god even taking an unpaid sabbatical wasn't ideal but I was like I want to keep the job as you can see there's like that theme of just like security stability man like I really couldn't fall back on the bank of mum and dad at all so I was like oh my god what am I gonna do and again this was more like this was I didn't have a fubahush this time to like come and say quit again this was me really like oh my god I don't know what to do do I just not do the events but also you're you know I've got a co-author who's my best friend who I lived with at that point she used to live with me and my mum and we all and my sister we all lived in the same house we really believed in this thing we're really accountable because we're like with each other all the time and I was like I have to kind of show up in the same way she is so I can't remember whether Elizabeth left first but either way I ended up leaving this time I was not I wasn't invigorated by a best-selling author that my boss had airdropped to tell me to leave.

43:59This was just like miserable because I was like, oh my God, I'm never going to find another staff job. And then it ended up, of course, as every media organization does, sadly these days, it went bust. But I'd been freelance for a while at that point. And I kind of never looked back. Like I was very nervous at the start. Freelancing is hard. But once I got into the swing of things, yeah, I can't actually imagine now, like going back to full time. it's more than full time I'm sure you know but I can't imagine actually coming back to a staff it's so interesting when a choice like that is made for you yes and I had a similar experience with the observer yeah and I was there for eight years and then suddenly I was like I asked to go on contract from being on staff right because I wanted to go and live in LA right and they said no even though it would have saved them money yeah and it's that moment of like oh this place is not looking out for me in the way that I naively and foolishly have been thinking that they would.

44:56Yeah. It's quite a bitter disappointment. It is. But I wonder if it's even more so for you, if you feel that you are working in a media landscape that isn't, back then, was absolutely not representative of your lived experience. Like, did you feel unseen? Oh my God, totally. I felt so like because I felt as well like obviously what me and Elizabeth were trying to do was write this book that was about we wanted a book that was gonna you know sort of empower black women and we always would say it's not you know self-help book because you can't slay your way out of systemic racism but we wanted this guide to life and all these black women were kind of like really excited about it and we wanted to meet those people we wanted to talk to them and we wanted to meet the white people that were like yeah I didn't know any of this but like blah blah blah But we wanted to meet all the people that had read it.

45:43And I felt that that was obviously hugely important. But also the work I was doing at this magazine was like very much an extension of the same thing. I was writing about stuff that I wasn't really seeing anywhere else. And I felt like it was really important. And I obviously for selfish reasons, I needed to get paid. I loved writing. But also there was a part of me that felt like, wow, me stepping away from this. Like back then you could literally count like how many black female columnists or like regular like journalists they were, especially as staff. oh my god like in terms of freelancing there were a few but like in terms of like an actual consistent position being able to shape the culture and the conversation at a place it was really rare so I felt really really torn but as you said I did feel really unseen because I also felt like my gosh like I've been commended for what I'm doing in this place and they're saying that like I'm really useful but then I wanted three months or something and they were just like well there was just no flexibility.

46:35My perception of you is that you're someone who thrives on truth oh gosh you need clarity I love oh my gosh you could just see I'm like oh my god music to my ears like honestly I can hear the angels sing yes clarity in every area of my life I need to know what I'm doing I need to understand and even if they just said I couldn't have the sabbatical if they'd have been clear as to why fine but it's because it was kind of like well you just can't that was like painful because I like to understand you know like it's yeah I do love clarity before we get onto your third failure does that mean boundaries are very important to you yes oh my god hugely how good are you at a boundary phenomenal listen i lots of things i'm not good at but boundaries i'm very good at maintaining my boundaries for sure i feel like i've had no choice because i love people as i say and i really am one of those people i am that drunk on the toilets that's like being everyone's friends i love people i think i learned that quite early because i'm like that i know how easy it is for that yeah maybe potentially taking a part of a job and that whole my kindness is mistaken for weakness all that kind of stuff like yeah I think you know there's truth in it as corny as it sounds and I think it's just meant that like I've got such a phenomenal group of friends like if I do cry on this podcast are we talking about my friends we're talking about my like best friends my sisters I have a phenomenal family and it means that I'm very secure in their love and they've made me secure in who I am and it means that I am so confident in that group of people that I have in my life that it means that anyone that's not within that I am quite happy to like put boundaries up I don't like to try and put walls up but boundaries yes I think it's really important to respect like your personal space and it's why even when it comes to things online like the people I love and the things I love are so sacred to me that like if they don't want to like be part of that world that's totally fine for me and I'm like you know I put a picture up of my gorgeous gorgeous godson the other day and like I asked his mom he's been my best friend for 20 years are you okay with that and she was really like oh of course like he's gorgeous put him up there and I was like I just want to make sure because you guys really matter to me like and you didn't ask to necessarily have a level of visibility and I feel like I'm very very very boundary orientated I think especially because like things like for instance on like the online world I'm not totally enamored with it I don't really love it I use it a lot for work but as people always say when they follow me on Instagram especially people I've met like in the toilets of a club or people I've met on holiday they kind of like whoa oh wow like your Instagram's really like something it's really curated and I'm like it's so curated because it's so intentional I feel like I don't owe people a certain level of intimacy because loads of things in my life are quite private and important to me so the boundaries on my social media are like gowns beautiful gowns here she is in another outfit here she's another outfit because for me it's about that boundary of like my personal life and my private life and yeah just the minute like someone oversteps a line for me it's just yeah boundaries up because that's so I really appreciate that and I appreciate the insta content as well but when you said earlier you did because you did a level art and I know you're you're an incredible artist I've seen some of your work and actually your instagram tiles are sort of mini works of art in many ways aren't they try a little bit that's right but that makes total sense that there are sort of two ways of handling social media and one is well there are many ways of handling it yeah but one of the current trends is to be extremely quote-unquote authentic and right oh I'm fake as hell on this yeah and actually you're fake as hell because you're protecting your authenticity which I think is so fascinating and I always say that like it's one facet of myself which is like I'm always like oh my god I'm so fake on Instagram but you know what it's not like I wasn't at this event and it's not like I'm editing my pictures it's just this is one side of a very complicated life and I mean the things that you know that like lots of people don't and for me it's really important again all of it comes down to my love of my friends and my family I like honestly could cry speaking about them they're just so phenomenal I'm so supported that a it makes it really easy to draw those lines because I'm like okay I've drawn this line I still have the amazing people in my life and that doesn't change but also it's partly wanting to protect them and protect their interests and make sure that like I'm never doing anything that kind of puts anyone I love in like harm's way in any way but yeah as I said it's an extension of my reality but there's all this other stuff I'm like constantly like in the throes of like mental breakdowns and like oh my god like having some sort of crisis and I'm like it's just not necessarily someone's business just because they happen to press follow I'm like why the hell does that mean I owe you anything you're protecting your truth by not sharing all of it online okay your final failure is your first foray into tv this experience sounds horrible and it starts with you in 2020 being commissioned to do a documentary with the big tv channel yes so this is around the time of the second wave of black lives matter yes george floyd has been murdered the black squares are appearing on instagram right okay so so so so it was basically like lockdown i think the first lockdown had happened or was happening everything was really really manic and terrible as it was for everybody and then I got this incredible opportunity I'd always wanted to do a documentary before so I was like wow things are looking up I was really excited an inaugural conversation had happened like maybe like a year before and I just thought you know how TV is TV is a different world so I was like oh okay I'd love for this to come off but it probably won't then it was yes that was the timeline it was initial conversation didn't really hear much then the tragic passing of George Floyd.

52:16And it was very much like, this was a documentary that was, it was a black documentary for lack of better phrases. And it had black themes. It was about black people. And it was like, well, I'm assuming the thinking of the channel was, oh, well, this is like a black show and an idea by a black person. And this was the time when I assumed like lots, not assume, lots of brands were trying to sort of like show, you know, that they cared about diversity and black lives so I got a commission and it all happened really quickly I was younger than I am now and I was agentless at the time I didn't even have a literary agent at the time because I was in between agents so I was not really thinking I was just so excited to have that opportunity and didn't really think of the this will prove how bad I am with contracts because didn't even didn't even ask for a contract Elizabeth didn't even have one yeah honestly wasn't thinking about any of this because I was just so excited and also like the person who'd asked me to do it I knew them so I was like oh this is great and had no prior experience so didn't know when the contract I thought oh it's been a couple months I don't have a contract that's probably normal but I'd been introduced to a production company I didn't know what chemistry meet was so I didn't have one it was like here's your production company again I thought that's probably normal didn't realize that you're meant to often like meet with multiple production companies and I was given a director same thing and just didn't ask any questions because I and now again this was a big failure because I was like I didn't ask a single question so I just thought this is normal and was so and the tv industry so opaque that I didn't really have many people to ask about it so yeah was excited and didn't realize what was to come at all and what did happen so I was maybe a month in two months in I started to have this like you know that niggling feeling of maybe something's not right.