For the unfamiliar, this influencer isn’t just into make-up but she is also a mental health advocate and mother to a huge family of fur-babies. She is known for her whimsical hair colour choices, hilarious persona and someone who stands for what she believes in. So let’s get into it, shall we?
How did it all start?
The 26-year old, born and raised Klang native began her love for Instagram when she was still studying in college. She studied Mass Communications and majored in PR and Marketing knowing at the back of her head that she was a people’s person.
Mina has always had a passion for photography so, during her trip to the USA, she had the time to train and that moulded her into the photographer she is today. When it comes to her love for make-up, she mentioned that she would spend countless hours watching tutorials by other beauty YouTubers.
“I owe it to the few American and Australian YouTubers I’ve followed for years. One of them being Sophia Chang, Kathleenlights, Chloe Morello, Karima McKimmie, Sharon Farrell,” she shared.
With that, she has developed a love for it and made her want to pursue the art even further. Although she took up PR as her major in college, as a beauty influencer who more often is in front of the camera than the back — she is glad that her diploma didn’t go to waste.
The challenges and expectations of being an influencer
To the public eye, being an influencer may seem like an easy way to make money. But the real deal is you are your own person, videographer, editor, creator and so on. In other words, you would need to have your own equipment to create that outstanding content.
Mina shared with 2CENTS that some of the struggles she go through besides equipment are not knowing what kind of content to churn out every other day, clients that didn’t have her best interest, getting paid after six months once the campaign has ended and many more.
However, despite the downside, she is one who strives to do the best in everything she can. “I’d like to share my art with the rest of the world, of course. I would like to make honest money from it and maybe even start a community for the people out there who are like me or have similar struggles,” Mina adds.
How does she do it?
For inspiration, Mina keeps a Pinterest account where she pins the visuals she enjoys. Most of the time her content is candid and she practices not to force herself when it comes to churning new ideas, “I just wait for the moment to arise and take advantage of it when it arrives.”
To be in this line of work, the biggest misconception people have about being an influencer is that it’s a glamorous job and that anyone can make it big. Despite that being true, it’s somewhat more than that.
“I don’t think they realize that being in this field can cause severe mental health issues alongside self-esteem issues. The constant pressure to stay relevant, comparing yourself to other people, not having the guaranteed certainty of keeping your job. These are just some of the misconceptions that I personally endured.”
Hobbies and previous ventures
Prior to her influencing life, she dabbled with film photography for quite some time. When she’s got leeway, she used to bake pastries as well. However, what generated an income for her was by creating and selling her own concoction of hair oils. The idea came about as she is someone who colours her hair a little too often.
Mina has done almost every colour you could ever think of for the past years and she’s the reason why we are psyched for our next hair appointment.
Eye-opening projects and the future of Mina Rosli
Over the years of being part of the influencer world, Mina was involved in many projects and some of them were concerning mental health, charity and environmental causes + family/relationship-based issues. To her personally, she enjoyed the ones surrounding mental health the most as she has a lot to share from that angle.
Whereas for future plans, she doesn’t have much in mind. However, she does intend to pursue more artlike works such as writing think pieces, focusing on photography whilst working on her artistic side. She also mentioned that 2020 is the year for her to focus on self-development and finding her passion for art again.
When asked about her definition of success, it is generating income from multiple channels by doing work that is meaningful to her. Her dream is to make it big somewhere somehow and then being able to make her family’s dreams come true.
Thoughts on mental health
Mina’s earliest recollection of experiencing anxiety was when she was around 8-9 years old. Previously as she was still living with her family, she didn’t do much to cope with her anxiety as she didn’t have the money then. Now that she’s on her own and is able to pay for things, she’s been going for therapy in order to understand her illness better.
A little piece of advice to those who are going through a similar situation but is afraid to get diagnosed, “Don’t wait for it to take over your life and leave you debilitated. The moment you feel that something isn’t right then that’s the time you ought to get diagnosed before it eats you up whole and leaves you in the darkness.”
Rewarding thing about work and how does she deal with rejection
The beauty of being an influencer is that you would get the opportunity to meet a lot of people.
“It’s always a nice warm feeling to hear from some that I’ve influenced a big change in them or I’ve instilled some sort of courage for them to live their best lives.”
“I’m still looking for ways to deal with this healthily. I know that there will always be competition and you can’t live a life without rejection I’ve come to terms that these things can and will happen to me at any given time so as long as I am proud of my work that’s all that matters to me.”
Advice for upcoming content creators
“This is cliche but be yourself because authenticity never gets old. Don’t be worried what others might think of you since at the end of the day it’s gonna be you against the world anyways!”
Don’t forget to follow Mina’s journey alongside her beautiful fur-babies on Instagram.