Today we’d like to introduce you to Nichole Woolsey.
Hi Nichole, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
In early 2020, I found myself depressed, full of anxiety, and trying to navigate a new life in a new city as we had just moved in the last fall. As a Mormon mom of 5, I had lost my identity and poured everything I had in me into my family and the church. My spiritual self was at battle with what I was being told and I knew in my gut I needed to walk away from a religion I didn’t fit in with. I left in January of 2020 and began the process of deconstruction from the religion. I became very closeted because I wasn’t ready for my extended family to know. My husband also left, so we had the support of each other. I downloaded the Tik Tok app and began watching videos and making friends. I finally got up the courage to make my first video and loved how connected to people all over the world I was. My first “body positive” video went viral in February of 2020 and the number of hateful comments I received almost broke me, but at the same time lit a fire in me. I wasn’t going to let anyone tell me how to cover my body or how I should view my body ever again. I had spent years in a religion telling me to be afraid of everything about my body. So I kept pushing and making videos. Covid quarantine hit, and my page became more and more popular and I began talking to people all over the world to cope with the chaos we were all experiencing. I made friends in many countries and my world began to open up. As it did I began feeling more confident, more kind, more open-minded to life outside the box I had been pushed into my entire life. As I let myself begin to live for me my depression and anxiety became almost nonexistent and life got easier. Since then, I’ve made hundreds of friends, some of whom I’ve met in person and some who have deeply impacted my life. I’ve added many other platforms to my social media life and each one brings a whole new learning curve and experience. Life on social media can be extremely hard on our mental health and I admit the hateful comments and trolls hurt my heart, but ultimately I keep pushing to find the good in the world and maybe being a smile to someone’s face. To hear the stories and the lives of people everywhere has been an amazing privilege I will never regret.
We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
The hardest part for me was realizing that not everyone will like you and some will take advantage of you. As a former people pleaser and someone who is too nice the battle for me is not to let the negativity make me bitter or jaded. I genuinely want people to feel loved and happy and I realized that I can’t save or fix people and sometimes that’s very heavy.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I’m a social media video creator. I have a very healthy sense of humor and people seem to enjoy it. As I have grown in social media, I’ve tried to incorporate body positivity as well as humor. One thing that sets me apart from others is how active I am with my followers. I try to acknowledge comments and messages. I get to know people. They’re very important to me. We are all humans just trying our best to survive this world and sometimes just knowing you’ve been seen and heard can make someone’s day better. It’s refreshing to get messages from people saying how something helped them or got them through something hard. Those are the things that keep me going. To know I can share my stories and experiences and someone can be inspired is amazing.
Before we go, is there anything else you can share with us?
I absolutely believe that kindness above all can lead to the most beautiful life. We live in a time that feels heavy and hateful for so many. We are so quick to judge others we forget to see the human behind the opinion. Be kind. Always. We are more productive as a society when we aren’t wasting time yelling over each other.
