With a proactive approach to her aspirations, Naimy finds modeling gigs through her studies and draws inspiration from high fashion content. Her advice to listeners is to start pursuing their passions immediately, without hesitation or delay, and to wholeheartedly engage in what they love.

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From cancer fighter to content creator: The inspiring journey of Klara McDonnell will leave you in awe! Watch as she shares her story and learn how to turn your struggles into success!

This month we had the incredible opportunity to get to know Klara McDonnell, one of the brightest stars in the Nomysh fam. Klara McDonnell, a cancer fighter and successful content creator and actress, shares her inspiring story in this video interview. Klara's positive and radiant personality shines through as she talks about opening a successful YouTube channel in the early 2000s and transitioning to a UGC creator.&nbsp;She discusses her motivation, inspiration, and the challenges she faced along the way. Klara's story is one of perseverance, strength, and creative talent.&nbsp; Look at her nomysh portfolio: <a href="https://nomysh.com/portfolio/klaramcdonnell?s1=cd1&amp;s2=kla" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">https://nomysh.com/portfolio/klaramcdonnell</a> Transcription Host:Hello, everyone, this is Nomysh. And my name is Maxy, and we are very, very excited to announce this brand new series called The Creator Diaries. This episode in particular is called My Niche Crush. And this is where we take a deep dive into the life of a content creator, you know, the tips and tricks, you know, their journey of how they got started, all the insights, everything that's going to be incredible. And what better to start off the series with incredible content creator Klara, how're you doing today? Klara:Hi. Very happy to be here. Host:Amazing. So if people didn't know, could you just run us down with you, know who you are, where you're from, and what it is that you actually do. Klara:Okay, so I'm from Ireland, originally from Dublin, but I'm living in Ireland. And I'm 41. I'm old enough to remember MySpace, Bebo, and the very early days of YouTube and YouTube was where I got my first taste of being a content creator. And I had a couple of videos maybe 16 years ago that did really, really well like 100,000 views, 600 views. And I got really freaked out! So I then held back on creating a lot of content for a while, and then I dipped my toes back into it again. And I work as a musician and an actor. So I've always had social media, great to get myself out there and get more work. And in the last few years, I've also had social media clients. So two years ago, I worked for the St. Patrick's festival in Ireland. And I've also worked for other arts festivals. I was the Social Media Manager for a very well known Irish actor, don't have like mentioned them, they're a little bit older. And so I've been kind of involved in all different areas of this social media world.&nbsp; Three years ago, I was going through chemotherapy, I was diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer. And I decided to document my journey back to health. And on social media. Initially, I was a little bit scared about doing this because I thought I'm self employed. And I still want to work. And this was just before COVID really hit the world before the first lockdown. So I was like, No, I want to work. I don't know if I want to put this out there to the world. But I did. And it actually helped a lot of people. I had women contact me that told me that they got their breast cancer diagnosis, through my videos, through self checks and then going to their doctors.&nbsp;I also had other women tell me that my videos, my tips and tricks of me going through chemo helped their recovery. So that meant a lot to me.&nbsp; And then UGC. I just accidentally fell into that last year. I had somebody actually from the UK, a guy from Scotland emailed me and I thought: ‘this has to be a scam’ because I've never heard of UGC. I've heard about user generated content, as in fans and just real people doing reviews, and then companies repurposing that, but I didn't know it's another way to make money. I'm quite a niche influencer, I didn't know it was a way that I could make money. Host:Wow, that's incredible. The journey from how you've gotten started, and all of the people that you've influenced, and how you've been able to turn something like breast cancer, and help other people deal with what they're going through, which is really incredible.&nbsp;So, just a bit more on that. What I want to know is what kind of challenges do you face? Because, when people are trying to get started into content creation, they're riddled with maybe fear or anxiety. Being in front of a camera isn't everyone's comfort zone. So for you, what made you have that leap to the site, or what started the thought ‘I need to show people my story’ or be in front of the camera: What was that for you? Klara:I think initially, I was 24. So initially, it was MySpace. And there wasn't much content creation on MySpace, I think you're probably too young to remember it. Some people tried to mess around with their backgrounds that was kind of as far as it went.&nbsp;But a lot of musicians were discovered on it, and I put some music up on that. Not much happened with it back in those days, but I made a lot of friends and contacts even from back then. MySpace kind of made me feel like the world was so much smaller through social media, and I just really wanted to put my songs out there. And then, my first YouTube videos, which I've actually deleted, were so creative. They were so pretentious, but they were meant to be tongue in cheek. They were called video diaries of an artiste. Horrible. It was just me talking really fast. And as you can hear, I talk very fast. And because I didn't know how to enter back then, I would just talk really fast to the camera and talk about going to auditions, what it was like as a struggling jobbing actor, that sort of thing. And people were commenting: some people really connected with it, but I also got a lot of trolls and that's the thing that stops a lot of people from putting their content out there, you know? Host:Yeah, that is really important to ignore. It's really difficult when you see, like 800,000 views like that is a lot of people to be watching your videos. So tell us more about that: what was that? It must have been really nerve racking! You're saying to see so many people watching your videos, and I'm sure you probably got an array and mix of comments.&nbsp;So a lot of young creators growing up are really struggling when it comes to mental health. And there can be a lot when it comes to people's impression of you, especially on my end.&nbsp;So how did you deal with that? How did you deal with that constant kind of presence on you? Klara:I think I was very lucky, because when I started doing those videos, I was 24. I wasn't in school or college. I'm very lucky that when I was in school, the phones were quite primitive, and not everybody was able to really film each other and upload videos.&nbsp;There's so much that even without people's consent: somebody can take a photo of you, or film you, and just upload it and anything could happen. That's quite scary. That was crazy trolling.&nbsp;So back to my 100,000 views video: I think the reason I was getting so many views is because nobody was really doing what I was doing. So it was like: ‘What is she doing?’. So some of the trolling was that I was too thin or that I was too fat. I was 24, and some were saying that I looked 50, some people said 12, and it didn't read. It’s one extreme to another.&nbsp;So really, it was just trolling for the sake of trolling. And a lot of the time it says more about the person that's typing this, especially when it's anonymous. I have talked to much younger people that are in school and college, and they said to me that they’d like to post videos or post more often,&nbsp;but they're scared of what their peers are going to think about them. I tell them to just do it. Do something small. And especially now I do a little bit of consultancy, and I talk to small business owners, and if they don't want to put their face on camera, maybe they're comfortable enough editing a video, a few little clips, you can edit easily a cup could or in shot at doing a voiceover: there's different ways that you can create content, you don't have to be the face on the voice. Host:Right? And you know what, you made an interesting point there. Because you've said that you've done UGC, you've done acting, you've done consultancy, your day must be proud of so many different avenues and different kinds of things that you're doing the day. So when it comes to content creation,how do you make the time to sit down, and if you want to use natural lighting, for example, the sun's gonna go down at a certain time or if you're not feeling motivated, how did you manage to fit that within your busy schedule? Klara:Oh, I'll be honest, I don't. It's an art form, and I'm trying to get better at it. I do try to do content days, and I've done that for clients as well, where I will batch shoot things, and then edit them at a later time.I tried to be as real as possible on social media, on my own social media, but it's hard. A lot of the time I don't post things in real time. As you might know, I do vegan food reviews as well, and I will post that maybe a day later, a week later, when I have time: you have to not put too much pressure on yourself.&nbsp;But there is a little bit of a thing where you do see those deadlines. And a lot of brands will have agencies, they like somebody that's used to dealing with a fast turnover.&nbsp;I actually got my last UGC gig through one of my acting agents, and this was a bit weird. They said somebody pulled out at the last minute, and they needed someone to replace them. They knew I did UGC and asked me to do it for them. It needed to be to five o'clock today. Now, I do a little bit of working at events. I was like: ‘No, I can't do this, I’m working at the event right now. We'll be home too late tonight’, and they asked me to get it done early in the morning, so I had two hours to film up five separate videos, different backdrops and different outfits. And I also didn't love the scripts. So I had to say to the agent, this is not UGC: it's very heavily scripted. And to prompt it to the audience from the beginning that people are going to scroll as those first two seconds are so important. Your hook on UGC is so important.&nbsp;So I had to do some script rewriting, costume changes, and everything within five hours and slight edits and get them off.&nbsp; Host:Wow, that sounds intense. So what I want to ask you just to round off, one last question is: you've been talking about how you started during MySpace and now we're in a TikTok era and loads of different new social platforms that come up. If you had to give yourself a love letter or like one final note that you can remind yourself and tell yourself from the beginning of your career until now, what would you remind old Klara from back in the day, what would you tell her that you've learned from that whole experience now getting some words of advice or some competent words. Klara:Oh, it's hard to be brief with today's quote. A huge thing that I've done, and I'm sure other people do, is talking about plans: I've got to do this, I'm going to do that… without actually doing it! You need to take the first step. And if you fail, so what? You'll learn from it.&nbsp;And then another thing was me being too afraid when I started to have lots of views. I was too afraid, and I pulled back, and it's much harder to get views on YouTube now. Especially YouTube shorts, that's a whole other story.&nbsp;But yeah, Stop telling yourself ‘I'm gonna do this, I'll do this when I'll do this’ and just do it. I'm a massive believer in manifestation, and i believe that you can actually create things with your mind, so you need to take a step of inspired action. You need the spark of something.&nbsp; Host:That is incredible. What you've said today has inspired a lot of people. So, just to round off I want to say a massive thank you to you. This has been the creative diaries with the incredible Klara. Thank you. 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Create with Klara: from cancer fighter to content creator