We were lucky to catch up with Lulu Essey recently and have shared our conversation below.

Lulu, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

Tell us the story of a risk you’ve taken – it could be a big, life changing risk or a small risk. Either way, paint the picture for us, tell us the backstory and all the relevant details so we can fully understand the context and circumstances around when and why you took the risk and tell us how it turned out.

As a successful Executive Creative Director working with global brands, I had mastered the art of creating emotional connections through storytelling. But there had been something stirring within me for decades – a desire to use my voice not just for corporate campaigns, but for something deeper: helping people build genuine self-love and mental fitness. The risk? Launching a podcast on November 14, 2024, into a seemingly saturated landscape of 4.1 million existing shows globally, with about 460,526 still actively producing content. Those numbers told a stark story about how many people start but don’t sustain.

I made a deliberate choice that surprised even me: I told not a soul about this venture until my first episode was released. This wasn’t about secrecy. It was about protecting my decision from outside influences, whether encouraging or discouraging. Sometimes even well-meaning support can add pressure, creating expectations I might not live up to. I needed this to be a completely inward journey, feeling my way through every decision in the Dark.
From equipment choices to format decisions, I was entirely on my own. I drew on the one principle from my corporate work that transcended brand building: stories must create an emotional connection, they must make people feel something, because that feeling is what makes them remember. But applying this to my own vulnerable voice? That was uncharted territory.

Then came perhaps my biggest creative risk: I decided my episodes would be unedited. Once I hit record, whatever came out – including mispronunciations, fumbles, and mistakes – would stay. This was intentional. If I was asking people to be vulnerable and show up as their true selves, shouldn’t I model that behavior? In a world where the majority of content we consume is polished to “perfection”, I chose raw authenticity.
The moment I hit publish on that first episode was a mix of terror, excitement, wonder and “damn, I did it!”. Then I sent the link to everyone close to me.

How did it turn out? The most surprising revelation wasn’t about download numbers or metrics – it was personal. I discovered that I live what I teach. This daily practice of showing up consistently, regardless of external validation, became the ultimate test of my own frameworks around self-love and mental fitness. Some days the numbers climb and it’s easy to feel worthy and love myself. Other days they plummet, and that’s when the real work begins: practicing self-love when the external evidence doesn’t support it.

The podcast remains a solo format because I believe in taking imperfect action rather than waiting for perfect conditions. I’d rather create something manageable and sustainable than do nothing at all. And in this seemingly saturated landscape, I’ve learned that consistency trumps everything – you can have all the talent and resources in the world, but without that daily practice of showing up, success can remain elusive.

Most importantly, this risk gave me exactly what I’d hoped for decades: a platform to uplift others and be of service, using my voice to share tools for mental fitness that people can access wherever they are, with whatever they have. These tools and conversations meet you where you are. Sometimes the biggest risk is finally doing what’s been stirring in the depths of your soul all along.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’m Lulu Essey, and my journey spans two seemingly different worlds that have beautifully converged into my life’s work. For over two decades, I’ve been an award-winning Executive Creative Director, working with some of the world’s leading brands across South Africa, Hong Kong, Greater China, South East Asia, Japan and New York City. But beneath that corporate success, I was navigating a 30-year journey with severe bipolar disorder, learning firsthand the transformative power of genuine self-love.

Today, I still work as an Executive Creative Director but I am also a Speaker, host of the Lulu Essey Podcast and Certified Life Coach, where I share unedited conversations about Mental Fitness, self-love and personal growth. I’ve developed what I call “The Tiny Way to Profound Resilience” philosophy, my L.O.V.E Framework, and several others guiding individuals to build sustainable success from the inside out. This is an inside job!

The problem I solve is profound yet often overlooked: I help people understand that self-love isn’t selfish indulgence – it’s essential infrastructure for both personal transformation and creating the world we claim to want. My clients learn to position self-love not as a luxury, but as the very foundation that makes real, sustainable, joyful success possible.
What sets me apart is that I truly live what I teach. My frameworks aren’t theoretical. They are born from the real-world experience of building a successful corporate career while managing severe bipolar and self-harm. I understand both the resistance people have to self-love work and why that resistance is so costly, because I lived in that resistance for years. This resistance reminds me of how vulnerability was perceived before thought leaders like Brené Brown helped us understand its power. Self-love faces that same cultural barrier – people dismiss it as weakness or self-indulgence when it’s actually essential infrastructure. My mission is to help transform that understanding.
I’m most proud of successfully navigating my mental health challenges, crippling self-doubt and self-hatred which has allowed me to create tools that meet people exactly where they are – whether you’re a CEO or someone just trying to get through the day, these approaches work with whatever you have, wherever you are.

What I want potential clients to know is this: everything you need for confidence, success and joy already exists within you. My role isn’t to fix you because you are not broken. My role is to guide you home to yourself, to your inner knowing. It is vital to me that my clients feel empowered to trust themselves. My tools are only guidelines and I encourage them to make them their own because there is no formula that fits everyone. My work bridges the gap between corporate and personal achievement and authentic wellbeing and Mental Fitness, showing that you don’t have to choose between success and self-love. Through my podcast, mentoring and speaking, I’ve seen clients move from burnout and self-criticism, self-doubt, fear and uncertainty to leading with authenticity and sustainable success – proving that when you build from self-love first, both personal fulfillment and professional achievement follow naturally.

I understand that the world does not pause while we heal, the demands don’t stop often they just seem to intensify and there is a way to show up amidst all of that messiness and it starts with an awareness and a willingness to take imperfect action. To take one small step.

The world needs our humanity, not our perfection, and the ripple effect of loving yourself first extends far beyond what we might imagine. Transformation, success, joy, all of it lives in the tiny moments, the small steps, the consistent action which compounds over time. It can feel hard and there are days where it feels impossible but it is doable and we can find our way back to ourselves and experience the love, the joy, the success we want and deserve.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

In early 2025, life decided to test everything I teach about Mental Fitness and self-love in what felt like the most brutal way possible. I experienced a full-blown bipolar relapse, the first proper relapse I’d had in more than a decade. This was not just a bump in the road of which I had many, but a complete mental health crisis – at the exact same time I lost my full-time employment as an Executive Creative Director.

The timing felt cosmically cruel. Even though I do believe there is Divine timing to all of Life, I was just not in a place where I could see it or feel it. Here I was, someone who coaches others on building resilience and practicing self-love, facing a distressingly dark mental health period while simultaneously losing the financial security and professional identity I’d built over decades. The shame was overwhelming and all-consuming. I felt like a fraud: how could I help others when I couldn’t even help myself?

But here’s what I learned about moving through trauma and resilience: it’s not about having your life “together” when challenges hit. It’s about showing up anyway, even when everything feels impossible. Life doesn’t pause while we heal. The bills don’t stop coming, responsibilities don’t disappear, and the world keeps spinning regardless of our internal storms. And showing up means doing what you can from where you are and with what you have and it can be so infinitesimally small, so I’m not talking about showing up in big, profound ways.
I had to practice what I’d been teaching: that healing happens while life continues to unfold in all its messy, imperfect reality. Some days, “showing up” meant simply getting out of bed and if you can’t do that just opening the curtains to let the light in. Other days, it meant honoring a tiny promise to myself – taking three conscious breaths, stepping outside for five minutes, or writing one sentence in my journal.

My frameworks became my lifeline. The L.O.V.E Framework wasn’t just a teaching tool anymore – it was survival equipment. Listening to my inner voice without judgment, owning my worth even when I felt worthless, valuing my journey despite feeling like I was moving backward, and embracing imperfect action when perfect felt impossible.
What surprised me most was discovering that being willing to embrace and share my vulnerability became my strength. Clients who knew about my struggles didn’t lose faith in me, in fact they trusted me more. They saw someone who wasn’t just teaching from theory but living the work in real time, making mistakes, crumbling, and struggling, but still getting back up, even though I didn’t feel like I was standing firm, I was wobbling. And the Podcast? I still showed up for that, in the best way I could.

This period taught me that resilience isn’t about avoiding the fall – it’s about learning to dance with whatever life throws at you while refusing to abandon yourself in the process. “I will not abandon you” became my lifeline and I repeated it over and over to myself, even standing in the shower with tears streaming down my face. The most profound transformation often happens not in spite of our struggles, but because of how we choose to move through them.

I also strongly believe that the Dark periods in our lives are not wrong, they are not a sign of failure and to truly heal we should not make them wrong or hope for a life where we never have Dark times. Learning to hold both the Light and the Dark is so key to building self-love and emotional resilience. We don’t want to shrink from life and “protect” ourselves from the Dark times, we want to expand ourselves so we can experience both without judgement. I see it as an ongoing, beautiful, sometimes painful, process of becoming.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

In March 2020, I was living my carefully planned life transition. After 19 years in Hong Kong as a successful Executive Creative Director, I had orchestrated my move to New York City – new job secured, visa in process, apartment arrangements were being made. I flew to New York that month to meet my new team and finalize details. That very same week, COVID hit and the city shut down.
I returned to Hong Kong thinking this would be a brief delay. Then Trump banned all work visas for foreigners, and my painstakingly detailed planned April move hung in the balance. Everything I had worked toward seemed to be crumbling and fast! I faced a choice: give up on the dream I’d been building, or find another way to move through this challenge.
The first thing I had to pivot was my mindset. I’ve always believed that when life forces a pivot, the Universe is asking us to trust something bigger than our original plan. Instead of fighting against what was happening, I chose to allow the process to unfold while maintaining my determination to get to New York. Letting go and surrendering to the process that is unfolding rather than forcing yourself to hold onto how you wanted it to play out is much easier said than lived. I found the way through was to take it not even a step at a time, but sometimes a moment at a time, a breath at a time. Gripping on tightly seems to feel a lot more logical than letting go and allowing but that allowing is where our power truly lives, that is the place where we can be resourceful, creative and agile. It’s actually a beautiful state because fear is no longer leading the way when we are in that place of allowing.
This was clearly not a time to force or push – it was about holding space for both persistence and surrender. I remained laser-focused on my goal while staying open to paths I hadn’t originally considered. I researched every legal avenue, consulted immigration lawyers, and explored creative solutions within the constraints of a global pandemic and visa restrictions. For months I lived in the uncertainty of not knowing if I would be able to legally make it to New York.
The key was understanding the difference between clarity and force. Clarity kept me moving forward; allowing meant I didn’t waste energy fighting circumstances beyond my control. I trusted that if this move was meant to happen, a way would reveal itself – and it did.

On October 21, 2020, I finally arrived in New York City. But the city I found was nothing like the vibrant metropolis I had left in March. It was quieter, masks everywhere, restaurants closed, people afraid to make eye contact. This wasn’t the New York I had planned for – it was something entirely different. As an outsider, it even felt hostile to my arrival. The city and everyone in it seemed to be so tightly gripped in fear, desperation and debilitating uncertainty and this was not the time to welcome newcomers.

And that became the most beautiful part of the pivot: learning to embrace what is, rather than mourning what I had expected. The city was different, my timeline was different, my entire experience was different – and all of it was exactly what I needed, even though a lot of it I couldn’t see or feel at the time but I trusted. Life has shown me that the Universe’s plan is always better than my own, there are times when they are remarkably similar but, in this case, they were vastly different. There is so much for us to gain if we are brave enough to trust the process.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.luluessey.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lulu.essey/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lucille-marie-essey/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@luluessey
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@lulu.essey

Image Credits

Hakan Yuksel (first image)
Mandy Liddell (second and third images)