Lillee Jean was recently interviewed by Fotis Georgiadis, for Medium's Authority Magazine! The topic was 'Ways To Develop More ‘Grit’! Lillee says in the article, "My resilience and grit have helped me become who I am, creating both informative and entertaining shows, which make me happy, and I hope share a positive message with the world. I’m currently airing two series, “Mind Over Beatue” which explores what will make you happy, etc., in your life.."
https://medium.com/authority-magazine/lillee-jena-on-the-five-ways-to-develop-more-grit-e804a7f7d5c5
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about the events that have drawn you to this specific career path?
As a child, I enjoyed stop-motion photography for my dolls and creating short videos online. As a result, I decided to experiment with videos and blogs, producing makeup tutorials and product reviews for my blog and YouTube channel. When I was a teenager I began to receive online attacks from a group of people marshaled together by one person, who calls them a cult. My privacy has been violated, and I have been attacked with antisemitic hate, slander, defamation and lies, all aimed at hurting me, and with one goal, to prevent me from flourishing online. All of these people come from the beauty community, and after years of being assaulted online non-stop by these people, I decided to leave this toxic, angry community permanently. It had become difficult for me to conduct business because of the defamation, which adversely affected my business relationships. Since my mindset has changed, I will never represent or interact with such a hateful group of people again. My emotional and physical well-being improved after changing gears. With my new focus on advocacy and filmmaking, I’m sharing my passions with the world in a more creative and productive way. Currently, I’m filming a documentary called Project: Bullyish about my experiences (and what continues to happen to me), and we have several commitments starting in the Fall of 2023 to show our film at several film festivals. My resilience and grit have helped me become who I am, creating both informative and entertaining shows, which make me happy, and I hope share a positive message to the world. I’m currently airing two series, “Mind Over Beatue” which explores what will make you happy, etc., in your life, and “Voyager”, a series about wonderful places to visit in New York. It really takes inner strength to get to new beginnings in your life.
Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?
At the moment, I am working on three different projects at the same time. Currently, I am filming my new web-series, each of which explores a different theme. It is very important to me to finish the documentary I am working on. It is my goal to ensure that no one goes through what I have without support and information again. I seek to make a difference in the world in my lifetime. The world needs purpose, passion, and teachable moments.
Where did you get the drive to continue even though things were so hard?
I am someone that does not believe that anyone has the right to tell me that I cannot do something. This is not in my genetic makeup, and I will never allow somebody else to dictate my life. Things have at times been unbearable for me, but I will make my way in the world, and nobody will tell me that I need to move because they deemed it so. I was born with this drive within me, and nobody will ever take that from me.
