Episode Transcript
Hello, my name is Aziz and I'm the son of a divorced mother. She is really my superhero. That's why it's important for me to support women, to share their uniqueness, their personalities, perspectives and emotions about life. Too many women in this world feel alone. They worry about the judgment of others and they struggle with their mental health but when they listen to the Rare Girls podcast where empowered women share their voices and tell their stories, many women will feel inspired to live a life of freedom and to overcome all insecurities. They will feel it is a safe space to find their confidence, to remember their unique beauty and to feel their self worth and they will connect with the sisterhood of Rare Girls who encourage their success and support their dreams. That's what this podcast is all about. My guest today is Jenny Morales. Jenny is the first girl from Guatemala in this podcast. She is 20 years old currently in her last year of fashion studies in IFA Paris and living in Paris, France. She loves sports, art, design, reading, music, fashion and photography. Jenny, how are you today? Hello, as it is, I'm doing very good. Thank you for asking. How are you doing? I feel blessed and very, very positive and absolutely curious to know much more about you. So I'll begin with this nice first question which is, if your friends and the people who know you best could describe your personality, what would they say about you? Oh, okay. I would say, I don't know, I'm a very reliable person. I have a lot of people come and talk to me about their issues and I love helping them and people that I love, it doesn't bother me helping them. Thank you. And I want to know what you mean with reliable only because you as a fashion designer, you're full of emotions and therefore you might be too spontaneous and too instinctive for you to be called like that. What I mean is your mood might change, your opinions might change, your desires might change. How does it work? Do you have both sides of your personality? Do you control the crazy spontaneous side when it's not being creative or how does it work? I am very spontaneous, but I will still be there. Like if one of my friends call me and they're like, I need you right now, I will be there for them no matter what I'm doing at the moment. And I think that it's not something that you have to control to be able to be there for your friends. You know, your spontaneity doesn't really intrude with having your own taking care of someone. I understand. And why is that important for you? Is it because you believe in loyalty, you believe in those connections and you want to protect them? Is it mommy energy and you are like the mommy to your friends and those you love? Is it more that you want to believe and feel that the world is a good place? And if you're helping people, you think someday if something happens, you will feel that you can be helped. And so you feel safer or how does it work? I think it really just comes from how I was raised. I was always raised to put like to I'm going to treat people how I want to be treated. And that's for me is like one of the basic things that my parents taught me. And I am very grateful for that because I see it. You know, I am never going to be treating someone if I don't want them to treat me in a bad way. I'm not going to treat someone in a bad way. And I'm not going to expect someone to treat me nicely. You know, like if we just met. It's just I don't expect anything from anyone. But for me personally, I'm going to have the best part of me showing to people that I meet mostly if we're just meeting firsthand. I don't know you. And I like creating my own opinions about people. So even if I've heard things about you, I will create my own opinion about it. Thank you. That's very, very interesting. And you seem to have your own mind and a way to be independent about it at the same time. Well, it happens in this world. There are a lot of people who might be takers who when you give them and although you don't expect anything, they might not give back anything in return or not be people who are rewarding you for your kindness. How do you separate your emotions from that? Is it because that's the person you see yourself as? And so you're focusing on yourself more than anything. How do you deal with people who would usually might even break your heart no matter how kind and supportive and good you are to them? Right. I'm not going to lie to you. Like that has happened to me a lot. I've gone through a lot of disappointing friendships, things that have happened to me, you know, but I don't let that affect how I think because I will, like I said, I will give you my very best. And if you decide to treat me in your very worst, that is not my issue. I will be very silent about it. But life is life. I will. You will show me at the end of the day, everybody shows their real face. So if it was unfortunately for me, a bad one, then at least I hope that I was able to give you a bit of joy in the time that we met each other. And yeah. Thank you. And I'm curious, how does this relate to the side of you that is into design? How do you approach design? Are you given like a piece of you, your best to the world and each design piece that you're creating? Is it something that you're given a gift to the world without expecting anything? And so you don't care about critics or something like that. How does it work? Well, fashion design is a very critical field, right? So you're always being judged by your teachers, by your colleagues. It's something that is really coming from your own opinion. You know, everyone has their own opinion and everybody has what they like, what they don't like. And so for me, I just put because it's a very critical space. Sometimes it's very hard, you know, because you're sometimes you just listen to negative things. Other times it's very positive feedback. What I do is I put my very best into my designs. So I do put a part of me to them. I part of myself. I make sure that I like what I'm designing. So even if I do get bad feedback, I like my designs. And at the end of the day, like I said, it's every person has their own likings. So if one person doesn't like what I'm doing, I'm pretty sure I'm going to find someone else that is going to like it. And if I'm producing things that I do not like, then it's just not something that is going to make me happy. Thank you for that. I love it. And you seem to have your own mind and independence. Too many women and especially girls who are growing up to be people pleasers for some reason they're living up to people's expectations and they forget themselves. They try to change their opinion in order to avoid conflict with other people. What about you makes you able to see things for yourself, make opinions about people for yourself, believe in yourself and things that make you happy. And what's your advice to other girls who might have lost a bit of that only because they like try so hard to please other people that they forget themselves? Right. Um, I think for me, all of this being able to have my own mind, like I think what I think comes from, I've traveled a lot in my life. I've gone through multiple cultures. I've lived in two different countries now living here in my third one in Paris alone. I think that seeing the world has opened my mind quite a lot and I am more receptive to things. You know, also my parents have always been ones to tell me like your opinion, you can have your own opinion, not with them, but I think that's where they draw the line. But they do always encourage me to create my own opinion. And that is something I'm very thankful for, for girls, like you said, that have lost themselves into people pleasing and always wanting to be, you know, comfortable around people. I think my best advice for them would be you can never please and everybody there's always going to be someone that is not going to be pleased. And the most important person that matters to be pleased is yourself. If you are not pleased with yourself, if you are trying to please someone so hard that you are losing yourself, that's where you really have to draw your own line and say, I need to be me. I need to not care what people think around me. And I need to just be happy for me because at the end of the day, we were born alone and we will die alone. Thank you for sharing that. That was very, very wise. And it makes me also think about you and the way that you get inspired for your designs, for creative and artistic things. Pablo Bicpicasso had this method that he would go, let's say, one day, want to immerse himself into the green color and he will walk in a forest, look at everything green, fill himself with the color green. And he feels this energy that wants to come out into a new painting. And so he'll create a painting that is based around the color green. So he will take things, fill himself with it. To you, how does it work? Do you go around and then you look at some things and they inspire you and spark into you an idea for a design? Is it other people that you look up to and you're like, they inspire me and I take some elements from them, but add my own twist to it? Or how does your spark for your creativity happen? I would say it's more of a spontaneous thing. It's very random. I think like my most, the nicest pieces that I've made come from very random inspirations. But if I do need to focus on finding an inspiration, I prefer to go to museums and look at art. For me, there is something about art and paintings that really speak to me and call me crazy, but sometimes I go there and I stare at the painting and I just visualize myself in those like, here there's a music called Musee d'Orsay. And they have a lot of Monet paintings and I just visualize myself there in the lily pond of Monet's garden. And I think there it just gives me this inner piece where it just flows and it lets my creativity flow. And when I'm very stuck, that's where I do. I go to a museum, I look at the paintings, I live through the paintings and just ideas come flowing. From when I get an idea, it has to go through research. So it's the inspiration, then I do the research. When I do the research, that goes into more details, like volume of what the shape of the garments, the volume that they're going to have, what type of fabric, colors, and all of that. And then finally, the creation of the garments. So yeah, it's quite a big progress and sometimes I do get stuck because of how many projects I have throughout uni, but just a quick visit to the museum and it's going to fix that for me. Thank you. It makes me think that growing up, you might have been a daydreamer, a girl with big imagination, but you can't only imagine yourself like a princess or another planet or all kinds of stories in your future. And that's what interests you and gives you a lot of enthusiasm and energy. Can you talk a bit more about that? Right. Yeah, I was a daydreamer, to be honest. I would zone out quite a lot and I would always be told that even at home. I think my daydreams would really be based on travel. I love to travel. My dad is a pilot, an airplane pilot. And so yeah, we did travel a lot and that's where my daydreams would take me most of the time. I love that. And I want to ask about it, but first there was some people who are saying that we live now in a time where people don't have the opportunity to daydream too much because before when people used to read books, they're forced to imagine them. But now that everything they can watch, the TV series, the images are there, they can watch Instagram. The images are there that too many people lost the skill of daydreaming. Do you believe in this? Are you someone who notices that because you're using Instagram and watching movies and YouTube videos that it affects the time or the possibility to daydream or you're still zoning out constantly and it doesn't matter. Your daydreams win either way. I think that even if you're watching, so let's say you took, for example, Instagram, right? Instagram movies, all of that is still very, like mostly movies are sometimes very fictional and Instagram, you don't really put in Instagram a lot of the things that you're living through. You only put in Instagram the nice things, you know? So for example, when you're traveling, you're putting like every nice thing that happened. But if you missed a buzz, if you got your wallet, big pockets here in Paris, it happens a lot. It's not that you're going to be posting that, you know? So there's still this line of fiction that goes into social media in my eyes. And so, for example, the influencers that people follow and they're like, wow, their life is so nice. They must be so happy, you know? And there has been a lot of cases confirmed of influencers that are very depressed, that go through a lot because of hate comments and a lot of pressure that goes into them, creating content. I think, like I said, that fictional site that they create of having their place in the world, like had a really luxury style of living and all of that, still leaves room for that daydream, you know? Like, oh, I want to be an influencer, you know? I will be invited to the fashion shows here and I will have like be invited to Galas and all of that. So that still leaves place to the daydream. Thank you for that. I love it. You said that you love traveling and I assume it's an opportunity because of your father, but also that you're living now alone in Paris. There are many girls who worry about that. They think, oh, what if I'm alone somewhere away from my family and something bad happens? I don't know how to deal with that. And you're 20. They'll be like, I'm still a teenager. I'm not supposed to do all this stuff and all that. What allows you to feel secure in yourself and able to take those risks while many women and girls are not living up to their potential because they worry and overthink too much when it comes to things outside their comfort zone? I think that living alone is hard. It is hard because your normal day doesn't really stop after uni. So let's say you move out of your country, go to study. For me in this case here in Paris, I was studying fashion design and fashion design is a very, very fast paced study and very like they ask a lot from you and I constantly have a lot of deadlines. So my days don't finish when I stop uni. So my day could be at uni from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. and then I come back home. I need to cook something or else I'm going to starve. I need to clean my apartment because if not, nobody's going to clean it for me. And I need to do my homework, get ready for tomorrow. Just like, you know, I'm constantly having things to do. And personally, that is something I never had to do before. I was very lucky to have someone who would always be there and do it for me. My parents have always taught us to like, yeah, like, you know, if you eat, clean your plates, you know, so that they don't have to do it for us. And that is something we used to do. But if, for example, one day I was feeling so tired and I wouldn't clean that plate, it would have been cleaned for me. Whereas if I did not clean that plate, it's just going to pile up. So it is very hard. And I think no matter how hard it is, if that's what you want to do, you know, if you want to follow your dream and really think that this is for you, then you can do it. It is possible. And fear at the end of the day is just fear. And there's something that for me is basically my life lesson right now, you know, living alone. It's my first time living alone. So I have been learning things for myself. But I think one of the main things that I've learned is like, you can make mistakes, you know, you are allowed to make mistakes. You are young, you know, you're allowed to make mistakes. And those mistakes are going to teach you lessons, you know, and they're going to make you stronger. At the end of the day, you're going to move past it. Whereas if you do not make mistakes, you're never going to learn from them. I'm not saying that you should make mistakes, you know, if you think that something is wrong, don't do it. If it's wrong for you, trust yourself, don't do it. But I'm saying that it is normal to like separate from your parents, go study and make mistakes. It is very normal. I've seen that all around. It has happened to me. And all you can do is learn from it and make yourself stronger from that. Thank you for that. That was again, very wise. And I agree with you. Mistakes are beautiful. They're the source for your learning and for your growth. And I'm curious as well about your interest in photography. I interviewed a photographer who is also a painter and she said for her the difference when she's creating a painting, she's emptying all the emotions that are inside her onto the page. Well, when she is being a photographer, she's capturing sincere emotions and moments that she wants to keep in that frame forever. So she said it's very, very different because as a painter, she's expressing and putting her emotions out while the opposite as a photographer, she's capturing other people's emotions and sincere moments. I don't know whether you resonate with that or maybe for your photography is about capturing models wearing different outfits that represent your style of design or something like that. But what's your perspective on this? I think she is very right when you're creating something with your own hands. It's very normal to be putting your feelings into that. Whether even just writing, you can be writing something and your feelings are going to be translated through your hand to the paper. It goes the same when you're painting and when you're taking a photography, it's more of like what really impulses you to take a photo. It's going to be because you like what you're seeing. You like what you're seeing. And when you take the photo, you want to capture the beauty that you're seeing. For me personally, I love taking pictures of nature things, things that will future like if I'm ever blocked and I don't have the time to go to a museum, I'm going to look back to my pictures and see, okay, I really I remember how I was feeling in this moment. And what I was feeling looking at this landscape. And that's where I'm going to draw inspiration from, because it's a feeling that I captured through the phone. Thank you for sharing that. And you mentioned before that you love traveling very much. What does traveling give you? Is it that the people that you go there and see how they're living differently to you makes you be more open minded and feel you can be anything because culture and roles are not real. They're different to different people. Is it that each place has a different energy and emotion and you want to connect with that beautiful nature with those different architectural styles and it inspires you? Is it the food and your foodie and you're like, I want to eat everything. That's why I am going for it. Or simply it just feels like a mini vacation that takes you out of the stress of life. So you return refreshed or what about travel or is it the manifestation of your daydreams? You're like, finally, all my daydreams are real now. I can see them. I can believe in them. Right. I think maybe a mix of everything. I think that when I travel, truly it is taking a rest from everything that I like of work, life, study, life, you know. So traveling is a restful time. But also, like I mentioned before, I love learning. I love constantly learning. I love reading. I love learning. I love learning. I like being very, like I said, it goes into me having an open mind and having the knowledge to, you know, as well. I would say that every country is very different. Every country, no matter how close they are, you know, France is very different from Spain. It's very different from Belgium, which they still speak French, but the cultures are very different. And you can always learn something from the people there. I think it's very people. It's the very people, the very natives that are going to teach you things and they're going to teach you lessons. They're going to teach you like history. It's going to be amazing. Also, I'm a big foodie, so I love eating, like love eating. So yeah. That's very cool. Thank you so much. And Jenny, to finish this, for women to be happier, for women to live life in their potential outside of their comfort zone, creating their dreams and their dreams into reality, what is your advice that you can share with them or a lesson you learned that can help them on that journey, that can help them stay motivated, smile more, be happier in general in a time where it seems a lot of people are too distracted to remember to live life on their terms. Right. I think something that is very important is just living in the moment. What I mean by this is like, don't go. I mean, I have done it. I've gone crazy. I've gone like partying and everything because, yeah, live the moment. But I don't you can do that. But what I mean is living in the moment is just yes. A lot of times what we do is we overthink of the future, you know, like you are going to feel overwhelmed because you don't really know what you're going to be doing with your future. So you're like at the present, things are not going that great. How are things going to be in the future? If things are not great right now, you know, and I think that's where you really need to take a step back, breathe, do something that you like doing for yourself, because basically it's just about yourself. You know, you are you. You have to take a step back. You have to really breathe and just visualize and remember to yourself, remind yourself why you are there in the first place. So why am I here in Paris? And I've gone through a lot of things. And why am I here? You know, I'm here because as a kid, I wanted to study fashion design. I applied, you know, just it was very wild application. I just applied to one universe here and I got in. Everything happened so fast and it was quite overwhelming. So when I first arrived here, it was quite a shock for me, you know. But then I was like, OK, I'm here, you know. I've already done it. I've already gone through all of that process. Now I just have to really focus on what I'm doing here, which is designing, which is something I like, which is something that is me. So that is why it's very important to choose something that you like doing. One hundred percent. Thank you so much, Jenny. I wish you all the success in the world. I wish you all the good vibes and happiness, all the beautiful art and the good emotions. Keep going. And we all will celebrate your success every step of the way. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and your feelings and your wise words. And keep going. Thank you so much. You too, Aziz. I hope you have a very wonderful day. And this podcast was so lovely. I've I've heard some podcasts and I think what you're doing, your vision is very nice. Thank you so much. Thank you.
