We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Emilia Barbu a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Emilia, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Do you have a hero? What have you learned from them?

Growing up, my hero was an old neighbour of mine who was more like a grandmother – survivor of both World Wars, Pisces (just like myself), a gentle soul with a sharp tongue and a house filled with books, art and memories that belong to a forgotten world. Her resilience and grace have taught me a lot about strength and even today, when I falter, I think about her and our summer days spent eating salty crackers and ice cream on the bench.
My friends are also my heroes: I somehow managed to surround myself with some truly amazing human beings, a bunch of hilarious, brilliant women, all over-achievers with various quirks and personalities. They’re lawyers, writers, doctors, actresses, illustrators, humanitarians — and they never cease to amaze me and make me feel proud to be their friend.

Emilia, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m a freelance copywriter & journalist turning complex subjects into engaging stories for scale-ups & global brands looking to leave their mark on the world. I work mainly with global creative studios to create scripts for brand videos, explainers, campaigns & all sorts of fun stuff with words. I build the story and the design teams flesh it out with their visual magic.

My career path has actually been quite convoluted, but my curiosity and various interests informed every twist and turn, so I somehow always ended up working in a creative environment, either writing about artists and designers, supporting emerging talent or collaborating with amazing multidisciplinary teams. After an initial focus on journalism, working with various magazines (from Glamour to niche publications like Polpettas) I officially added copywriting to my expanding toolbox when I started working for the Italian studio illo.tv.

After a couple of years as an in-house copy and a pandemic, I started freelancing and now here I am: spinning plates and copywriting gigs, working with some of the biggest studios and brands out there, even though my mum still doesn’t really understand what I do for a living. Hell, there’s times when I don’t even understand, so I guess that’s cool.

In the meantime I also started my own newsletter, Tickle News, designed to brighten your day & tickle your fancy. This is where I interview some of my favourite artists and write about the cool design stuff I find online (so that I don’t buy it and drive myself into bankruptcy).

I also recently started a brand with merch and gifts for freelancers, small biz owners & other tired people, called Life Tickles. I thought it would be a fun thing to do – write the copy, the descriptions, put a whole website together, and that maybe it could even turn into a potential new path. So far it has turned into posting very silly things on social media & bookmarking sales classes I’ll probably never take, but stay tuned!

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

I have basically pivoted from journalism to copywriting when I finally understood that I couldn’t make a living out of journalism alone — at least not the type that I was suited for, which was mainly cultural. It’s a very complex (and painful) argument and whereas there’s seemingly no shortage of amazing niche publications, online platforms or media outlets, there’s no secret that the industry size, model and market have been drastically reduced & reshaped over the past 20 years. And that very few of them are economically viable.
So instead of transforming journalism into a full-time gig, I ended up pivoting into copywriting – it felt like the closest thing I could to that would involve writing, creative thinking and paying my bills. What I lacked in experience I made up for in curiosity, eagerness to experiment and a long-held belief that good stories are form-agnostic.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

This one’s a lesson I’m still unlearning every day: that it’s ok and actually necessary to make mistakes. I have a tendency to be super critical of everything I do and to over-inflate any missteps or failures (courtesy of an Eastern European upbringing and a Virgo rising). Basically, whenever I try something out, I have the completely irrational expectation of being instantly good at it – otherwise might as well quit.
This doesn’t really work well with being a freelancer working in a creative industry and constantly experimenting, so I always have to remind myself (through therapy and coaching as well) that mistakes are a natural occurrence, they don’t define me as a human being and there’s no reason to be this tough on one’s self. If anything, they’re necessary steps towards growth, even if they’re scary or you think that you should have it all figured out just because you’re not in your 20s anymore. That’s just silly.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.emiliabarbu.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emilialaland/; https://www.instagram.com/life.tickles/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emiliabarbu/
• Other: https://www.life-tickles.com/

Image Credits

Arianna Cristiano