EP 113: Breaking Free with Misa Chien: Empowering Asian Women's Mental Health & Representation
In this episode, Judy Tsuei discusses the importance of mental health and overcoming cultural norms with Misa Chen, the founder of The Authentic Asian.
They explore the biases and stereotypes faced by Asian American women and the need for a supportive community. They also discuss the impact of representation in media and the importance of addressing mental health in the Asian community. Overall, the conversation highlights the importance of embracing individuality and breaking free from societal expectations.
Takeaways
Addressing mental health is crucial in the Asian community, where it is often stigmatized and overlooked.
Asian American women face biases and stereotypes, such as being perceived as submissive or aggressive, which can hinder their professional growth.
Creating a supportive community for Asian American women is essential for overcoming cultural norms and empowering each other.
Representation in media plays a significant role in shaping perceptions and breaking stereotypes.
Meet Misa Chien
Misa Chien is an authentic leader who is known for inspiring others and helping people feel less alone and more connected through positivity and transparency. Her engaging and charismatic communication style stems from her experience through multiple forms of communication through being on TV, speaking at renowned institutions (Harvard Business School and The Harvard Club), and gracing the runway for brands such as Neutrogena and Target.
Misa's exceptional leadership and entrepreneurial style have propelled her into high demand as a speaker, podcast host, and television personality, and has even earned her the distinction of being ranked as the 23rd most viewed woman on LinkedIn worldwide and #1 most viewed Asian American woman nationwide with 16 million+ views per month.
Her past speaking clients include Harvard Business School, UCLA, USC, and the University of Washington. She has been featured in Inc. Magazine's 30 under 30 Entrepreneurs, Forbes Women to Watch, LinkedIn Top Voices, and as a serial entrepreneur on the Food Network’s Great Food Truck Race embarrassing herself in front of over 60 million viewers worldwide.
In terms of her background as an entrepreneur, over the years Misa has founded several companies from food trucks to software that have reached 7 figures in revenue, a milestone that less than 2% of female entrepreneurs can achieve.
As an Asian American female founder for 18+ years, Misa founded and launched The Authentic Asian in October 2023, an AAPI Female Leadership Community, to help AAPI Female Founders and C-Levels feel less alone and more connected.
Episode Highlights
00:00Introduction
00:20Dancing to Manage Stress
01:16Dealing with Rejection and Fear of Happiness
03:06The Double Helix of Trauma Healing
04:00Trauma-Informed Care and Writing a Book
04:29Preventing Re-Traumatization
05:24The Impact of Books and Stories
06:18Creating Trauma-Informed Care in Organizations
07:12Innovations in Tech and Mental Health
08:10Viewing Setbacks as Redirection
08:36Cheering Each Other On
08:58Fear of Happiness and Being Present
09:26The Authentic Asian with Misa Chen
12:22Creating a Safe Space for Asian American Women
13:17Biases Faced by Asian American Women
16:08Challenging Biases and Stereotypes
20:08Breaking Free from Immigrant Scarcity Mindset
22:00Embracing Individuality and Disappointing Parents
23:18Healing Intergenerational Trauma
24:44Representation and Media Tropes
26:05The Need for Authentic Asian Community
27:32Supporting Asian American Women Leaders
28:52Overcoming Biases and Stereotypes
30:13Navigating Cultural Expectations
31:36Embracing Individuality and Disappointing Parents
33:02The Impact of Representation in Media
34:29Addressing Mental Health in the Asian Community
36:19Navigating Identity as a Biracial Individual
38:49Creating a Supportive Community for Asian American Women
41:29Focusing on Mental Health and Breaking Cultural Norms
Links Mentioned:
Judy Tsuei LinkedIn
Judy Tsuei Instagram
Misa Chien LinkedIn
Misa Chien The Authentic Asian
There may be affiliate links included in this blog post.
Transcript:
Judy Tsuei (00:02.606)
Welcome to the F*ck Saving Face podcast where we're empowering mental and emotional health for Asian Americans and voices of color by breaking through taboo topics. Life may not always be pretty, but it is indeed beautiful. Make your story beautiful today.
So if you follow me on Instagram or on LinkedIn, you would have seen me post a video recently in which I was dancing to get out of my head. We were on a Tory Burch foundation call and I'm so excited that in April, all of the 50 women entrepreneurs who were selected for the 2023 -2024 program will be meeting together in New York. We'll be meeting Tory Burch. We'll be meeting her new president, Tiffany Dufu. And she was on a call with us recently and is...
one of the most remarkable women I've heard speak in a while. Her ability, her presence and her inspiration and her belief in women of color is exceptional. So she said to help manage the stresses that she goes through, she will often put on her Beats headphones, go into a room, close the door and just dance, dance, dance to the point that sometimes someone has to knock on the door and ask, you know, are you going to come join us for dinner? So.
With that, I took that as an inspirational cue. And when I got rejected recently from an indie publisher that I was hoping would take my manuscript because they'd actually reviewed it and then pass it on to the next level, they decided to pass. And I'm a delayed processor. I don't know about you. So it took me a little bit to just let it in. It's also, I try to pivot really quickly. So I realized that that kind of sinking feeling in my heart,
is an indication that this project matters to me. And my therapist recently has been telling me that I'm afraid of happiness. You know, for people who've survived trauma, it can be difficult to let in the good things. And in order to even let in the good things, there's a lot of grief work that has to be done so that you understand that you're worthy and you're deserving. I've been doing the 25 attributes that she has encouraged me to do in which I am looking at myself in the mirror.
Judy Tsuei (02:12.75)
and repeating 25 attributes about myself. And it has made a difference. Some of the things that I say are, I'm deserving, I belong here, I'm worthy, I'm adventurous, I'm fun, I'm creative, I'm intuitive, I'm a powerful manifestor, now I can do it really quickly. But when she first asked me to do this assignment, it took me forever to write 25 things. And then I asked other people who I thought have much higher levels of...
you know, self -confidence or self -worth because they didn't necessarily experience the same type of upbringing that I did in my family of origin. And even they said 25 is super hard. It has become a very valuable practice that along with grief journaling and allowing myself to grieve. And now we've gotten to a point where she says it's the double helix of trauma healing. So for someone who's been in therapy, you know, collectively for maybe over a decade and has done.
all types of healing modalities has really talked through and been present and processed through so much. It's interesting and fascinating to me because I know that the brain is one of the most, not unexplored, I guess, maybe unexplored, but not fully understood things that are in existence, much like the depths of the ocean. So she was talking about this double helix in which,
Before, I've always said that I believe in an upward moving spiral. As you're moving through life, you're getting more wisdom. Even if you come across similar experiences or circumstances, that you will come at it with a higher level of understanding, a different level of awareness. So it's similar, this double helix premise, in which you will continue to drill down. I guess it's going in the opposite direction, the double helix that we know in science, and you'll find yourself revisiting.
different themes, ideas, wounds, areas for healing. And each time you're coming at it from a different perspective. And so it's allowing you to go deeper into the root, the core, uncovering what you need to. But she says it's so important that you don't peel back the next layer before you're ready. Because if you do that, then that's where you could re -traumatize yourself, where you are.
Judy Tsuei (04:29.546)
afraid and unwilling and feeling too vulnerable. So thankfully, I am looking to explore more trauma -informed care in my communication, especially as I write this book. I want to be of service and I don't want this book to re -traumatize anyone. For those who know me and know my story of having an eating disorder for more than 15 years, it all kicked off because I was watching an after -school special that was actually
warning any viewer not to become bulimic. But at the time, I didn't even know that bulimia was a thing. I had just inadvertently started starving myself, got myself down to a size zero. I'm 5 '6", so very, very thin. But, you know, even a size zero at the time was like too big for me. So I didn't know that I was becoming anorexic. I didn't have the languaging around that. And then when I saw this after school special,
On the rare times that I got to watch TV growing up and I found out that you could eat and then throw it up and not gain weight, well, that just kicked off decades of bulimia. So I don't want that to happen with my book because I know that the topics that I'm bringing up in my book, which is called How to Disappoint Your Parents in 10 Shameless Steps, a modern Asian American guide, that it could have that effect.
And if you want to get a sample chapter, you can go to wildheartedwords .com forward slash book and you can get a sample chapter to see what this book would be about. Thankfully, I've been reintroduced recently to a woman who I knew 20 years ago and she's connected me with a leading practitioner in EMDR therapy. And from there, we've discussed his initiative of having trauma informed care across the board.
for all organizations in all industries here in the States. As it stands right now, I've learned that in Ireland, they are on their way to becoming a trauma -informed country. So they're really paving the path for people to understand how to communicate more consciously with one another, how to have greater depth of understanding for...
Judy Tsuei (06:42.51)
what someone else is going through, greater compassion, to have greater compassion for oneself and what you've gone through and how you communicate that and how you show up and how it impacts you. And so I'm grateful that I'm going to reach out to this practitioner, this doctor, and learn from him. And it's leading to all of these incredible innovations in tech and mental health, which I'm also very excited in because, you know, I'm going to be investing in this company that I can see doing potentially.
huge impact in a lot of different industries and kind of changing the way that we experience the world through our senses. And I've always wished that, you know, if you're using an app that you could actually feel like the app giving you a hug when you needed it or, you know, deepening that sense of connection with oneself. And from what I've learned about all these technologies, this may have the opportunity to do that. So all of that.
is a very, I'm just choosing to view this setback as a redirection. And I repeat the mantra, everything is working out for me. And what's even more remarkable is because of the Tory Burch fellows and the other women I've met, they texted me when they saw the Instagram video to tell me to keep going on and my story deserves to be shared. And these are women I admire. I've met phenomenal people on LinkedIn who've shared and continued to help me.
figure out a way to pivot and cheer me on and having this podcast and realizing the impact that it's had on different people's lives from the people who've reached out to me via email, who've booked a coaching call, who've signed up for my newsletter and who sent me text messages just to tell me that all of this is making a difference. And that's what I hope that you have people in your corner cheering for you.
I hope that you are doing something bold, that when you don't get a yes right away, that your heart tells you that it's something that you care about and that's a good thing. And I hope that if you are like me and you're having this fear of happiness because of whatever has happened in your life, that you're learning how to be more present and savor the moment and allow those things in.
Judy Tsuei (08:58.542)
So I want to introduce you to this podcast episode, which is with Misa Chen. She's the founder of The Authentic Asian. I was able to meet with her. She has a remarkable story. And what I've loved seeing is she identified this need that women executives and, you know, whether that's a C -level executive, a VP, a founder, all of these Asian American women who've experienced different and similar prejudices, you know.
masking, code switching, the emotional tax of everything that you have to endure, racism, stereotyping, all of these things in big rooms. She has been on television shows, she was a model, she's had successful different business ventures, and she created this space that feels so safe for women to show up and really speak their truth and support one another as we need now. What I'm also really excited about is I'm
taking that inspiration and seeing how she's identified that need and really shown up to offer this valuable resource so that I'm going to be doing that in San Diego. So my amazing operations manager suggested that I look into creating live events, which has been something that's been on my mind for a while. And when something clicks for me, that's when the powers of manifestation just go into full force. So within less than a week after we talked about this idea, I was already...
thinking about it in the middle of the night, thinking about naming, thinking about what the different topics would be that we would cover, how this would look. So I'm really lucky that I found this space down the street and the woman who owns the space is also a woman of color, a founder, and very much believes in a holistic approach to wellness and to success. So without further ado, I want to introduce you to Misa Chen. She...
has been helping so many people, and you can see this on her LinkedIn posts, feel less alone and more connected through positivity and transparency. Her communication style stems from her experiences being on TV, speaking at different renowned institutions like Harvard Business School and the Harvard Club. And then she also has graced the runway for brands such as Neutrogena and Target. Her leadership and entrepreneurial
Judy Tsuei (11:14.486)
style have propelled her to be a highly sought after speaker, podcast host, television personality. And she earned the distinction as being ranked as the 23rd most viewed woman on LinkedIn worldwide and the number one most viewed Asian American woman nationwide with 16 million views per month. She's been featured in Inc Magazine 30 under 30 entrepreneurs, Forbes women to watch, LinkedIn top voices, and as a serial entrepreneur on the Food Network's Great Food Truck Race.
embarrassing herself in front of over 60 million viewers worldwide. In terms of her background as an entrepreneur, Misa has founded several companies from food trucks to software. And those have reached seven figures in revenue, a milestone that less than 2 % of female entrepreneurs achieve. As an Asian female founder, Misa now runs The Authentic Asian, which started in October, 2023. It's an AAPI female leadership community to help
AAPI female founders and C -level executives feel less alone and more connected. And I will turn it over to Misa.
Today I have Misa Chen with me. And one of the reasons that you specifically stuck out to me was because I actually had another, I think, domain name or something about the authentic Asian. So I was like, oh, so when you created it, I'm like, I'm so glad that someone's doing this. So Misa is a former model, a serial entrepreneur, and she's now the founder of the Authentic Asian. So before we go any deeper, I'll just pass it over to you and to share a little bit about.
what the authentic Asian is and a bit about how your journey started to create that. Yeah, so I feel I've been brought on this earth to help others feel less alone and more connected. And specifically, I'm doing that right now for Asian -American women to help them feel less alone and more connected through the authentic Asian, whether it's with support groups, fireside chats, workshops, coaching groups, one -on -one coffee chats.
Judy Tsuei (13:17.646)
mostly all virtual, but some in person through our community. And that's been just so enjoyable because it's a community that I wish I always had in my two decade entrepreneurship journey. And now that it's come to fruition, it's a dream come true. And what are some of the other businesses that you started? Why did you see that there was a need to create this for Asian American women? Well, I've always been an entrepreneur. I come from an entrepreneurial family and.
I started my first entrepreneurship journey at 18 years old. Now I'm 37 years old. It was a very lonely journey. In building all my businesses, it was always like I was the one and the only in the room. At 20 years old, I won an entrepreneurship award with other student entrepreneurs from around the world. I was so excited when I arrived.
that's when I suddenly realized, wow, I am so alone in this realm. I had built a pretty good business, a jewelry business, featured in an entrepreneur magazine, and it was doing really well. And I arrive and it's literally all white young men who are students and just getting rejected by a lot of them. Some of them were amazing supporters and they still are great supporters today. I don't wanna say everyone's like that, but getting so much rejection kind of like,
being signaled that I wasn't worth some of their time, that was a really big slap in the face. And it just happened again and again, where I was put, as I moved up the ladder in success with entrepreneurship, I felt more and more alone. And that is such a hard feeling. I know that women in the corporate world also feel that way. And so as that continued to happen, after two decades of it, raising money in Silicon Valley, facing a lot of racism with that, which wasn't expected,
I built a seven figure business as a food truck owner in my 20s and that was tough as well. Just building so much grit, I was like, I am tired. In my late 30s, this needs to exist. And so that's really how the authentic Asian came to fruition. And last spring, I attended the Women of Color and Leadership course at Harvard Business School and discovering all these biases that I kind of ignored for so many years as an Asian American woman being a.
Judy Tsuei (15:39.278)
Asian and a woman is a really hard situation. And we have a lot of biases against us. And once I really learned that and that was unveiled and I thought, aha, this is what I've been experiencing for two decades. That's when I thought, OK, why does nothing like this exist? I'm just going to build it. Can you tell me about some of those biases? Because part of what I've been able to do as a writer is to give words to things. And I think once we have the words to express what we've experienced, it totally makes such a big difference. It's like, oh, my gosh, there's a relief.
of I'm not crazy, there's actually this trend or this cognitive bias that exists. And then once you have the words to articulate, then you can do something about it because it's like that hurdle has been overcome. So now what do you think about it? So what are some of the things that you learned? So what the most unbelievable thing. So first at Harvard Business School, we mostly just talked about the racial biases because it was learning about women of color and leadership in general. So we learned that African -American women,
biases against them are that they're like the angry black woman, which is horrible. For Asians though, it's so interesting. Men and women, but especially women are perceived as quiet and obedient. And so that's really hard for us when suddenly we're like standing out and not quiet and speaking up, especially if we want to change to if we like go into a position and we're the quiet one. And then suddenly we get to
a leadership position where speaking up and they're like, wait, what? Or I have a lot of women in my community who are very high up, they get in the C level and they start speaking up, they're like, wait, I thought we brought you on to be like quiet on the C level boardroom. So it's super interesting to learn about that bias. Another racial bias is that we can't be both competent and kind. So when I was raising money in Silicon Valley,
I brought on a mentor and I was really excited because he was super well connected. I'm like, man, I'm going to crush it raising money in Silicon Valley with this guy. And I pitched to him, I am my pitch and he says, are you going to pitch as the cute Asian or the tiger Asian? And when he said that, I mean, that was more racism, like a harder blow to me than all the racism and difficulties I experienced with a food truck because I went to Silicon Valley thinking,
Judy Tsuei (17:57.198)
people are very well educated here, they're very well spoken, but actually it's like, it's almost even worse there in a way than in the food truck restaurant industry. There's fewer of us and it was really tough. And so I let them go that day and I kind of just swept it on the rug. A lot of Asian American women and just Asians in general, we just have something called Tiara syndrome. I learned this from a member in the community, her name is Michelle and she specializes in helping women with this.
We just put our head down and work and we sweep things under the rug. So I just swept it on the rug. I was like, let me just work harder. And it wasn't until in class, literally at Harvard Business School, my professor, Linda Hill, unbelievable woman, she just said, outright in class, Asian American women cannot be perceived as both kind and competent. So you can't be perceived as warm and nice and smart at the same time. Like we have this thin balance.
on Speme. And so that was a huge aha moment because I realized when he gave me that feedback of pitching, that that's what I was experiencing being the Tiger Asian or the cute Asian. And often I do get placed in the cute Asian category just because I do have a lot of warm charisma and presence. And so I've been earning my alumni status and shouting from the rooftops on on LinkedIn and Instagram, I'm attending Harvard.
I put in quote unquote, because it's a little imposter syndrome there. It's like executive education, learning my alumni stats. But I like to promote it as much as possible, because since I am so nice and warm and competent and such a giver, that is that bias that works against me. I'm not perceived as cold. So they're like, oh, she must not be smart. And also, I'm dyslexic, so that doesn't help. So it's just so important to know these biases and be aware of them and know how to navigate them. So that's just.
the racial, societal biases, but then the other 50 % is actually cultural. Ah, and can you tell me more about that? It's like, basically, we were raised, Dave Lue is a very famous VC, and he came in to recently talk about this. His terms are, we were raised to be workhorses and not show horses. So because of immigrant scarcity mindset, a lot of our parents...
Judy Tsuei (20:08.174)
not all parents, but it's a very high trend if you're first generation, that your parents are just like, become a lawyer, become a doctor, go the safe route. You know, don't do entrepreneurship, don't take risks. Just put your head down and work and you don't even need to get a leadership position, just earn good money. And as a result, a lot of us are not getting to leadership positions, whether in corporate or building successful businesses. And that's really hard. And so in our community, we have a lot of workshops around
these biases, how to navigate them, intergenerational trauma, immigrant scarcity mindset. Dave recently spoke about that. And it's really important to be aware of these things because it's so subtle. Like, I think the only reason that I feel comfortable posting more vulnerable things on social media is because I have my white side. So my white hippie mom is like, good job. Oh my gosh, you just posted about your anxiety. I'm like, I love you, mom. Thanks.
And then my Chinese side is like, why do you post about that? Why would you do that? It's like, I have like both on my shoulders, but I can't imagine if you had both saying you should not be posting that you're making the family lose face. Like, you know, it's not about individualism in most Asian cultures. It's a very collectivist society and not individualistic society. Yeah. So I definitely have both. And so being like, you have both. Yeah. And so pursuing the path that I did where.
I became not a doctor, a lawyer, engineer, any of those. I went and majored in English and marketing. Nice. You go girl. Yeah. And then I built my businesses. I became a travel writer. I became a yoga teacher. Like all the things. So were your parents supportive of that? No, for sure no. But I was always like, I think I was built as not a rebel. I think I was just built as me. And then I was just. I'm so proud of you for doing it because you're happy now, right? Yes. Oh, for Imagine if you went the lawyer or the doctor. Yes.
Oh yeah, and I saw so many friends in high school do that in college. You know, like that's the only thing I knew someone in San Diego who was living with her boyfriend and he just desperately wanted to propose to her and couldn't because he was a white guy and she, you know, is Asian and just the family obligation and she would be disowned. And I was just like, oh my gosh, like the things that we sacrifice for that, you know, so.
Judy Tsuei (22:25.902)
I think that, yeah, and being able to pursue all these things, like I just sent out a newsletter where maybe you just weren't born into the right family. So there was nothing wrong with you. You weren't the black sheep. You just like, this was not the right fit. And I wish that more people knew that because I think that we are made to feel like something's wrong with us if we by nature just weren't designed to fit into a corporate world or we weren't designed to fit.
to think about math and science. And so it's been a big journey and it's one of the things that I am working on in my book. And what has been shocking to me is I have an accountability partner. He's completely, he's like a white man, not in my, what I thought was my demographic. So I sent him chapters every week of this memoir about, it's about how to disappoint your parents. And it's all like, just to create that liberation and freedom to understand like your mental health is so important. You're built differently so you can create like the things that you have gifts to do.
And he's emailing me back every week and he's like, you know what, last week you were in Puerto Rico and you didn't send me the chapters and I didn't know what to do with myself. I was like, where are the chapters? And he's like, I relate to everything you write. I'm like, how could you relate to this? And he's like, cause you're talking about human emotion and like the journey that we all go through to figure out who we are. And so just because I haven't been raised in the same environment, the way that you write about it, like I know exactly what you're talking about. I know exactly that moment in my own journey.
when I disappointed my parents or I didn't know. So I think that it exists across cultures, but it's so much more pronounced in college. It is. It really is. It's so crazy too, because there's this pretty famous fitness influencer, Cassie Ho. We went to an entrepreneurship program together and I read an article she was in and she said that her parents were disappointed in her. Like she's so successful now.
she said her parents were disappointed in her until she was on the cover of a magazine. I think she was on the cover of self magazine or something. It's like, does that what it takes? Like you have to be in the cover of a national magazine and be doing like seven figures. It's just like the bar is set so high for us and we feel like we're failing when we go against and it's so hard because China, Japan, all those Asian countries are some of the most collectivist societies in the world. And then,
Judy Tsuei (24:44.846)
the US is the most individualistic society in the world. So these culture clashes are really real. And I saw it with my grandpa, because he helped raise me so much. And I just see him, it's like, they really, you know, they are anti -risk, and they just want you to play it safe. And there's nothing, you know, that's the thing. It's like he grew up in World War II escaping China to survive. And so it's like a very different mindset.
And so, yeah, it's just, it's really hard. It's hard to go against the grain, especially if it's people that you really trust and care about who might not be your biggest cheerleaders. And why Asian American women? Because I obviously am an Asian American woman, but what I've noticed and has been surprising to me is Asian American men have reached out to me to say, like, thank you so much for writing about this and sharing about this. Like, that's exactly what, you know, like I went through.
And so I'm curious, you know, like, what is it about Asian American women that you feel needs to at this point in time, like, be shown and like, we really have to uplift each other. There's no other organization like Authentic Asians. Very, very, very targeted. You know, I'm a part of Ace Next Gen that I absolutely love and a couple other Asian American organizations and as well as female organizations. But there's this intersection.
very unique experience of being an Asian American woman and things kept happening to me in business, men wanting to own me, finding out that certain men in business that I was gonna do business with had an Asian fetish. I wrote about that recently. I did turn down a job about that. And that's something that men don't experience as much. So there's very specific things that Asian American women have to deal with. Not only being Asian,
but also having the sexism piece. And also for a lot of the CEOs that I interviewed, they're like, you know, I don't know if this bad thing in business happened to me. These are super successful CEOs. They built like $400 million restaurant empire, right? She was like, I don't know if this happened to me because I was a woman or Asian. It's hard to know, you know? So you don't know, like you have to not only deal with racism and these cultural biases and.
Judy Tsuei (27:02.638)
and societal biases, but you also have to deal with sexism at the same time. And so that's really, really hard. And there are so few of us at the top, so few of us. It makes me upset. So it gets me going every morning. I love it. And it's like finding a needle in the haystack to find these female leaders, whether they do a fire search chat or even join the community and uplift each other. And probably almost every single Asian American female leader on LinkedIn knows who
our communities at this point because there's so few of them. Like we literally combed through all the Asian American last names throughout the entire United States and C level positions on LinkedIn. Like that's how hard, that's how few of us there are. And that's why I really, really believe that it needs to exist. I love that. I actually, when I was doing my book proposal, I just pulled it up because I didn't understand that.
Obviously, like in my lived experience, the Asian fetishism, like all of that kind of stuff, you know, being a woman, I understood that. But I didn't really know specific to Asian American women that there are these certain tropes. And so, you know, because of history and they, Gina Davis's Institute has done a lot of research on this and is specifically about how Asian Americans appear in the media. But when it comes to Asian American women, like what you were talking about, the two tropes are the lotus flower and the dragon lady.
And yes, yes. And so for black women, it's similar to the mammy and the sapphire. But the lotus flower, the China doll is being submissive, you know, subservient. Yeah, exactly. And in a bunch of different movies, even to this day, like to modern day, it's still played out like the 40 year old virgin and family guy. They're, you laughing at the expense of Asian women. And then the dragon lady or deceitful villainous, you know, using their sexuality, aggressive power. Yeah.
So like that was in like Kill Bill or like Lucy Liu's character in Pocket of Deal. And so once I read that, I was like, oh my God. And then, you know, just like the modern media. It's like, and I love this because Greta Lee recently, she got an award at the Unforgettable Asian American Awards. And she heard in her speech, she was like, this is the first role I've had where I haven't had to explain my existence in the United States as an Asian American woman. And that just makes me so.
Judy Tsuei (29:20.718)
emotional because I was a model for 10 years and literally so much of it was explaining my existence. Like whether I was like it was ridiculous for DC shoes. They had me dress up in like a short Chiang Sam dress and like pretend to do karate moves on a guy named Rob Dydre. Yeah. Yeah. Like a weird and I thought was so cool at the time, but I didn't realize how racist it was because I'm so used to the racism.
Like now it would be, I don't think they could ever get away with that. That was just so 10 years ago. So it's like things are changing finally. Like people are beginning to notice just how upsetting these things are. But I feel like because as Asian Americans, we didn't speak up as much before we're like, oh, we'll just go along with it. And it's like, no, this is not okay. And just the last like couple years as a model, finally, I'm more like,
and the protagonist role in commercials. I'm just like an Asian American woman, Asian American mom, you know? I'm not just like in the background. And so we're beginning to see those changes in the media, thank goodness, but it only took what, 50 years. Yeah, well, and I think that what you just said about adopting the racism and internalizing it is - Yeah, we're playing to it, because we're like, well, at least we're on the screen. Yeah. You know, I'm playing this really offensive role in a buffet, an Asian -
a Chinese buffet like doing karate moves, but hey, I'm getting paid. You know, like this is the only role for me. And that's the same thing that happened to Greta Lee. It was like, what was she in? She was in this movie, Sisters with Tina Fey. And like, she was like at a nail salon and you know, she had a heavy Vietnamese accent. I don't think she's even Vietnamese, but like she, you know, it's like.
all of her roles, she had to be like this immigrant stereotype explaining her existence. And then this role, gosh, past lives. It may even get an Oscar. Like it was apparently really good. I'm kind of scared to watch it because I think I might get very emotional, but apparently she's amazing in it. And that could be, that's huge, you know? She's just an Asian American woman in it. Yeah. Oh yeah. I actually ended up because Alaska kept canceling all my fights. I had like...
Judy Tsuei (31:36.334)
like delays and stuff. So I had to go. So I had a long time and Past Lives was on the, it was one of the films that they were playing. So I was able to watch it because my former mentor is Latinx and he was like, I think you'd really like this. I kept thinking about you the whole time. And I was like, oh, yeah. But I think just like you, there's this like hesitation of like, is that going to be triggering? How much of it is going to like, really get to me? But thankfully I was on the plane. So like I'm watching. You're like kind of forced to watch something.
So I was like, oh, and I watched it and she's amazing in it. And it was so much about like, yeah, like the subtle nuances of what we give up or need to honor if because of our heritage. And so I think that that was what was so fascinating. Yeah. And like being able to see these two paths that could have been carved out for her. And then like, you know, she, this is no like spoiler, but she has like a white husband.
And so seeing him on it too, like watching his perspective was so, and him sharing what he thinks about like their relationship and like, you know, and it was just for so many different reasons. I was like, oh wow, they did a really good job of like, so subtle, so good. Yeah. And there's actually, I take my daughter to the library here. It overlooks the ocean. So it's a nice place to be, but I always walk down to the like memoir section.
and kind of narrative non -fiction. And there's this book called The Many Daughters of Ae -Fong Moi, which this, I think he's not full Asian, he's half, but he discovered the story of the first Chinese woman ever to arrive in the United States. And he basically created an extrapolated four generations of women from that. And when I was Googling the history of it, because the woman who he's talking about is real, nobody knows what happened to her. She did exactly what.
you were talking about, she lived up all the tropes, she had bound feet. And so they would take her, like the white caretakers or whatever, would take her to all the different places so people could see her as an exhibit. You know, and so she kind of like raised to the height of this ridiculous status, but then fell to nothing. Oh my God, that's so sad. Yeah, it's so sad. And just like hearing that, I think what you're doing for Asian American women everywhere as well is not just for the modern women, but like just...
Judy Tsuei (33:59.726)
I love the idea that we have the power to heal intergenerational trauma and that when we do our work, that it kills prior generations and that that somehow like the whole lineage changes. And in the work that I've done with my parents, I've watched our relationship completely transform. And then I think for them, it also helps them heal whatever it is that they had experienced. Oh yeah, because they're and they don't even want to talk about mental health probably. So are they supportive of you now? Like,
they supportive of what you're up to or at least like okay with it? They're okay with it. They still make the comments of like, well, why don't you want to buy a house and like, oh my god, don't even go there. So there's all that but I know that this last time I took them out to brunch, they're coming back down for my daughter who we also realized in her school, there is not one full Asian kid who goes to school. Oh my god, there's only half Asian. Are your kids half Asian or full?
Yeah, she's half. So she's half white, half Asian and then our really close friends also. You me PTSD of my childhood. We can go into that because I grew up in San Diego where you're at. Oh, that's why I moved there. Yes. And so my parents are coming down for Chinese New Year to do a whole presentation for the class. They did it last year for her private school and then she was the only Asian for sure. But like,
They get so much joy from doing that and they see the value in making sure she still has that connection. You get so much value from it. Like my ex -husband just told me that my daughter gets a little bit sad at night and a little bit like, you know, like reflective of different things. And she was saying like, I wish that I could speak Mandarin better to communicate with popo and gong gong because they don't really speak English that well and I don't speak Mandarin that well. And I want to be able to connect with them. And so it was so...
lovely to hear that she has that desire. Because growing up, I was like, nope, we're not going to talk about the Asian. I'm just going to try to assimilate as much as possible. So that's been really lovely. That's so cute. But yes, but you being biracial, I think that also that's got to be a completely different sense of exotic growing up or having to you personally navigate the different cultural expectations.
Judy Tsuei (36:19.374)
I mean, it's hard because so like I heavily grew up with my Chinese grandparents, they would raise me and they they stay with us for quite a long time, like one or two months at a time. So I grew up very close to them. But it was super confusing because there was no word for like woman of color growing up.
I knew I looked different than everyone. I was literally in La Jolla where it was just all like so white, so non -diverse. So I was just really confused growing up. And then it's like, I had a white mom, but then people would be like, oh, are you upset that your daughter doesn't look like you? You know, it's just like really confusing to me. And so there was this thing called American dolls, American girl dolls. And there were no Asian dolls, which.
pissed me off only in 2023 did they finally create an Asian American doll so freaking annoying. So I was so frustrated at least they still had a woman of color doll. They had an African American doll. So I was like, oh, she looks more like me mommy. I want her. So my mom, like I grew up like feeling so close to like the African American identity more weirdly. Even though I wasn't African American.
Hopefully this doesn't offend anyone, but this is literally just what I had to do because it was like, that was a woman of color. She looked like me. I was like darker skinned. And you know, I just didn't understand my race or identity. And then even in high school, we created like an East meets West club for like the five Asians in my whole high school. And then all the African -Americans, people of color joined this East meets West club. And it turned out it just like turned into like the, all the non -whites who felt very uncomfortable.
our all white school club, but like it was no one talked about it. Like we all just arrived and we went to dim sum together and stuff on the weekends. But like we were, I was looking at back on it with one of my really, my, my really close friends, African -American, and we're like, dude, that was basically like the diversity inclusion club, but we just didn't label it as that, cause that would be offensive. But there was like all the Hispanic, all the Latinos, all the African -Americans, all the Asians, which is like a total of 10 people across four grades were in it.
Judy Tsuei (38:31.566)
in high school and that's how San Diego is most of it. And unfortunately that's why I moved because our community up here in LA is 50 % Asian Latino. So it's just so much more comfortable. Yeah. Yeah. I understand that. Yeah. I'm so curious.
Moving forward, what do you hope and with the women who you've cultivated in your community, because I've seen and I followed on LinkedIn and you know, yes, they're C level executives, everyone so accomplished. And I'm curious as to what the feedback has been from them. And then what is it that you hope is like the takeaway and that, you know, we can in 2024 and beyond, what do we hope to see? Yeah, so it's like kind of what did they get from the community or?
Yeah. Oh gosh. You know, the coolest thing that happens is when people write testimonials on LinkedIn, whether it's a post or an Instagram story. Recently, we had a really successful entrepreneur. She's one of the most successful D to C founders in the fitness category. Like she just posted a story of the screenshot of a recent event we had. And she just said, this is so amazing. I feel so connected to all these women.
And just like seeing that without me prompting anyone, they're just putting it out there. That is so invigorating and that keeps me going. And so just seeing these connections being made and things happening without me even prompting people, that's what's inspiring. And I think our participation rate alone in the community just shows the impact. So I have an advisor in the community space. He's like, oh, you know, if you're lucky, you get one to 5 % of your community to show up.
to your workshops and fireside chats. I'm like, whoa, this is, and that's when I knew we hit it big. I knew we hit gold because within our first month we had a 40 % attendance rate on events. So right now most workshops and fireside chats, that's the biggest value we bring across the community. So that has around 40 % attendance rate. We have a hundred women in the community. We have about 40 show up. And then like we have support groups, which are more tailored like.
Judy Tsuei (40:43.074)
navigating the emotions of divorce. We have a very famous divorce lawyer in the community doing that support group. So obviously only five people out of the 10. Fortunately, it's five people out of 100 going through a divorce, you know, but those are super helpful. And just knowing how many women I help, that's like my Ikea guy. That's like my passion knowing.
that I'm helping so many on a daily basis. And there's days when I kind of pinch myself. I'm like, I can't believe this is my job. I put in my notice to my modeling agency and I'm just all in on this. Hopefully I'm gonna be taking a decent salary in the fall when annual memberships renew. Really looking forward to 2024. That's awesome. So I asked every guest at the end of the interview, if you could say fuck saving face about something, what would you say fuck saving face about?
I would say about mental health. I think that that's a big issue in our community and a lot of people don't address it. And a lot of the first generation women in my community are kind of like picking up the pieces of addressing their mental health because it wasn't taught to be talked about. Like you don't talk about it. You don't address it. You just sweep it under the rug in Asian culture. And I think it's so great that so many women.
are talking about it more openly on social media. And so many Asian American women are going into professions that are really helping people. Yeah. It was interesting because, you know, when I think about when I was doing the book proposal, it was saying that most Asian Americans shove their problems so far deep and it has to become such a monumental problem. It was them to go seek help. And by then, there are so many things that have fallen apart or so much like.
You know, and so even though the utilization rates of mental health therapy are low, it's not for lack of need. It's for overcoming all of these barriers to be there to do that. So I fully a thousand percent agree with you. If people want to join the Authentic Asian, how can they do so? They can go to theauthenticasian .com slash apply. And then that has information about the community and then they can just apply right there. Amazing. And if they want to follow you on social. I've linked in is probably my preferred channel. Just Misa Chen.
Judy Tsuei (42:55.086)
The membership does come out to just $99 a month at this time. We will be raising prices probably in about six months. So it comes out to $99 per month upfront for the year. That's amazing. If to join. Thank you so much. Thank you. If you're interested in getting that sample chapter of my book, remember you can go to wildheartedwords .com forward slash book. You can also sign up for my newsletter to stay in touch and get these weekly newsletters that I send that are called the heartbeat.
which are filled with personal narratives. And I get a lot of people telling me that it's the one thing that they read from top to bottom when it comes in their inbox, which is such an honor to me. If you'd also like to be an advanced reader for my book as I'm working on it, please feel free to connect with me. You can go to wildheartedwords.com and click the contact form and send me a note and just say, ARC, advanced reader copy.
and I will be sure to add you to my team. Thank you so much and I'll see you in the next episode.
Judy Tsuei (43:56.302)
Thank you so much for listening to today's episode. If you'd like to support me and this show, please go to iTunes and leave your review. It means so much to me and it'll help others find this podcast. I'll catch you in the next episode. And if you'd like to stay in touch between now and then, please visit wildheartedwords.com and sign up for my weekly newsletter. I've had people share with me that it's the best thing to arrive in their inbox all week. Aloha.
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Keywords: F*ck Saving Face podcast, mental health, resilience, stress management, trauma healing, trauma-informed care, storytelling, Asian American experiences, stereotypes, biases, cultural norms, representation in media, intergenerational trauma, empowerment, community support, well-being, Misa Chien, interview, mental health advocacy, ARC team, iTunes review, Spotify review, podcast support, community engagement, newsletter signup
