Shame takes on many forms.
We can feel shameful about our race, our gender, about aging, and so much more. Shame makes us stay small.
What if instead of feeling ashamed of our insecurities, we celebrated every aspect of ourselves?
What if we learned to think independently instead of listening to what the media says about us?
To become the powerful, confident people we’re meant to be, we have to identify our shame and work hard to eliminate it. It won’t just disappear on its own.
On today’s episode of The School of Greatness, I talk about shame with an actor who has made body positivity her mission: Jameela Jamil.
Who is Jameela Jamil?
Jameela Jamil is an actress, model, presenter, and body positivity activist from the United Kingdom. She first started in media as a presenter and was recruited by BBC Radio 1 to host her own show where she made history as the first woman to host a network show.
As a fashion model, she has been featured on the covers of Vogue and The Cut among others. She is a social activist and philanthropist, and she founded Why Not People?: a company focused on making live venue entertainment accessible and comfortable for disabled people.
Jameela is best known for her role as Tahani Al-Jamil starring opposite Kristen Bell and Ted Danson on the television show The Good Place, which ran for six seasons on NBC.
Most recently Jameela started a movement that has been taking over the online world— the Instagram account @i_weigh helps women celebrate themselves, feel valuable, and fight toxic beauty standards.
Jameela is a big proponent of therapy as a way to move past struggles with shame. She says mental health should be a top priority for all of us despite the stigma around it. In this interview, we talked about how she overcame feeling ashamed of her race and her body, how being injured for a very long time when she was younger helped shape her future, and how to stay content no matter what you have going on in your life. Let’s get started!
A Childhood Injury
Jameela had a rough upbringing and grew up with very little money and a lot of emotional problems due to a traumatic childhood.
She was deaf on and off until she was 12 years old and had seven operations to restore just half of her hearing back. She currently is looking into getting another hearing device because her condition gets worse as she gets older and she only has partial hearing.
She attended an all-girls school and was often bullied for her color and her size. She says she felt like she didn’t have many real friends.
Then, when Jameela was 17, she got hit by a car and hurt her back so badly that she couldn’t walk for over a year and a half without crutches or a walking frame. She was pulled out of school and bedridden for a year. She didn’t have many visitors during that year, so she watched TV from the moment she woke up until when she went to sleep. She watched all the daytime shows like Seinfeld, Frasier, Friends, and daytime talk shows. It was by watching all those hours of television that she taught herself acting.
“I’ve had a truly bizarre trajectory after a very tricky beginning, and so I think I’m having to constantly adapt myself to my ever-changing surroundings, but I think I’m an adaptable human being. I think we all are. But I don’t really shame and fear things that I resonate with any longer, and I think that’s been the key to my success.” – Jameela Jamil
Everything Jameela has learned from that experience has made her stronger, and given her a fire that fuels her philanthropic endeavors. She says she would step in front of that car all over again knowing everything she knows now, because that was the path to get her to her destiny.
Dealing with Female Shaming
Jameela discusses that men shaming women and men pitting women against one another is still a very present issue in our society.
“There are still, of course, oppressive patriarchal institutions that run Hollywood and run the media. And so that means that we [women] are being hazed from every angle by different outlets, in different forms. I think that unfortunately, this does come from male shame that has been ingested by women. So what I’m trying to do is empower women to start, rather than wait for men to stop shaming us. I think it’s more empowering to say, ‘Why don’t we now try to take agency over our own sense of self and our own sense of shame and kill it ourselves.’”
– Jameela Jamil
As a Pakistani-British woman, Jameela describes her background as being the “holy trifecta of shame.”
“I’m not trying to stereotype or bring any further negative connotation towards Muslim people. I’m not a Muslim myself. But it is definitely a culture that still controls women quite a lot […] So there’s a lot of shame in that culture, and a lot of shame in Britain. Shame is almost a badge of honor in Britain. The more you shame and flagellate yourself in Britain, the more respectable you are. They only respect the hustle, they do not respect the win.” – Jameela Jamil
Jameela has had to overcome a lot of these external forces by creating an inner fortitude that cannot be broken. She is more comfortable in her own skin now than ever before.
“I had huge shame around my culture, and just felt so much shame about being brown. I mean bleaching creams are still being sold in massive countries where you have a lot of brown people both within the brown and black community. Bleaching is huge.” – Jameela Jamil
Now Jameela is trying to shout from the rooftops that women do not need to feel shame for their outward appearance, and to be more aware of consumerism trying to use them as pawns to make a profit.
“I think no longer being afraid of people thinking I’m unlikeable or difficult has been something very exciting to embrace. I am not here to be anyone’s friend. I’m here to educate people and wake people up and stop them from making all of the mistakes I’ve made that lost me 30 years of my life.” – Jameela Jamil
But all is not lost. Jameela did have a breakthrough when she came to America. That’s when the trajectory of her life began to change.
Becoming Tahani Al-Jamil
NBC’s The Good Place cast is a very diverse one, and Jameela says that is what audiences want to see. They want to watch shows where they can identify with the main characters.
“We have categorical proof of how much success you have when you include the people that we have disregarded for so long. Look at Black Panther, Crazy Rich Asians, Bridesmaids, and The Good Place…all these hits are happening. When you deny most of the world representation, you are denying yourself a huge spending power because people can’t relate to the stories anymore and they stop going and paying to see story lines they can’t relate to.” – Jameela Jamil
Jameela is especially proud of the character she gets to play, and the depth of her character’s story.
“I think it’s just great to see a South-Asian woman whose main storyline isn’t about being a South-Asain woman. It’s not really important to my character and I think that’s brilliant.” – Jameela Jamil
The road to becoming Tahani was an interesting one. One of Jameela’s first gigs was being a host live on television, where she had to read a teleprompter. It was so natural to her because of all the television she watched as a teen. That gig led to a radio career which she did for a couple of years. She liked radio and wanted to step away from the camera because she was tired of being reduced to “nothing more than her aesthetic.”
She was very successful as a radio broadcaster and was the first woman to ever be given the official chart (UK’s Billboard 100). The radio station had been on air for 60 years and the award had never been given to a woman before her.
Whenever she would visit America, she would turn on the television and see a multitude of races, ethnicities and age ranges represented. She loved it.
“You had curvaceous African Americans in their 50’s hosting ‘good morning’ shows, and all races and colors and sexualities on these big mainstream shows, so my heart was calling for America.” – Jameela Jamil.
Jameela also liked that America allows people to be more than one thing. She wanted to be an actor and a screenwriter, and in Britain, you are very much told to “stay in your lane” and do one thing.
After a breast cancer scare in 2016 that ended up not being cancer, Jameela decided it was now or never to take a chance on her dreams. She bought a one-way ticket to America with absolutely no plan.
She took an audition because her agent basically forced her to, and she ended up landing the role of Tahani Al-Jamil. The rest, as they say, is history.
Helping Others Live Mentally Healthy Lives
Now that Jameela has made it up the ranks in Hollywood, she is determined to use the “key of her privilege” to open the door for other people.
“Privileged people are afraid of sharing their privilege with other people, because they think about what will be taken away from them rather than what other people have been denied all this time. And we’re not taught to share, we are taught to fear. And we’re taught greed is a good thing, and we demonize people who don’t have the privilege we do, and say it was their fault.” – Jameela Jamil
Jameela is a huge advocate for therapy and believes everyone should go to a therapist. It shouldn’t be taboo and it’s extremely helpful.
“If we’re not mentally well and as strong and sound as possible, then how can we ever succeed and how can we ever be successful? If we are weakened and suffering then we are more likely to be discontent, and if we are not content then we are more likely to consume. The only elimination diet worth doing is a psychological one. We have to get all the toxicity out of our bodies.” – Jameela Jamil
When Jameela thinks about success in her own life, she believes her success will not be defined by all of her achievements and the empire that she is trying to build — success to her, is about taking time to enjoy her life, to stop and look around, and to be a person who is remembered by the way she loves people. That is what she wants her future children to remember.
Four Truths: Jameela’s Wisdom for Life
Here’s what Jameela says are her four personal truths for her own life:
- “Do everything in your power to ensure your mental health is your number one priority in this world, because with good mental health, you will be able to not only empower yourself, but you will be more valuable to other people.
- Do not allow shame and guilt to be weaponized against you. These are ‘non-things’ that are practically man-made, and have been created to keep you in submission. You must banish those things immediately in order to live happily.
- Be affectionate. Physical affection, to me, is my number one favorite part of my life. All of the money and the success and all of the fame that I get to enjoy means nothing if I can’t wake up in the morning and have a coffee and cuddle with my boyfriend.
- Gratitude. If you are grateful and content, you have beat the system. They haven’t managed to control you, and you are no longer a pawn in the game of consumerism.” – Jameela Jamil
Why You Should Listen to This Jameela Jamil Podcast Episode Right Now…
If you found value in what Jameela and I talked about today, please tag Jameela Jamil and me, Lewis Howes, on Instagram with your key takeaways. Please also go to Apple Podcasts, give it a five-star rating, and don’t forget to subscribe!
I always ask my guests about their definition of greatness at the end of each interview and this is what Jameela had to say:
“My definition of greatness is happiness. That to me is the hardest thing to achieve in this world more and more. Happiness is the sign of success and it’s very rare to find successful, happy people. If I manage to achieve both then I would truly be a great success.” – Jameela Jamil
If you’re ready to learn how to be courageous by being authentic, you can check out the entire podcast here. You can also browse the entire library of podcasts on The School of Greatness! Until next time!
To Greatness,
Some Questions I Ask:
- How much did you shame yourself growing up? (6:30)
- Do men or women shame women more? (9:00)
- What was the biggest insecurity you’ve had? (16:00)
- Do you think you’d be able to make the impact you’re making if you weren’t on tv? (29:00)
In this episode, you will learn:
- The difference between Brittish and American cultures (7:00)
- The types of shames that Jameela has “killed off” in herself (11:50)
- What led Jameela to come to America (24:00)
- How to combat inequality in the workplace (37:00)
- The wrong messages that men are taught by the media (42:00)
- Plus much more…
Connect with:
Jameela Jamil
