THE BEAUTY CONVERSATION
Ashley Kuich, Team Los Angeles, T1Q3
Interviewed by Pamela Heath (Team LA – T2Q3) on May 12th, 2013
What is the Name of your Game?
The Beauty Conversation.
What is the Possibility of your Game?
Being Authentic, Inspiring and Empowering
Tell Me More About
THE BEAUTY CONVERSATION
The Beauty Conversation is a series of online interviews with women speaking about beauty and about themselves and their own self-worth. These women share their concept and relationship to beauty and allow us (the audience) to listen in as they distinguish their thoughts about what beauty is and whether they accept themselves as beautiful. As long as I can remember, I just had a series of questions that I had in my own head about myself and always wondered if other women had the same questions. Working in the beauty industry I noticed that women are not very happy about their appearance and that even the men are not very happy about their appearance. Women spend a lot of time trying to convince folks that they are beautiful, yet not really truly convinced that they are beautiful. I realized that we can be accepting of ourselves AND of other women by inquiring into what it means to be beautiful. I guess I look at it as something that starts very young. People tell me they were worried about their looks in the fourth grade! I want to give women a chance to hear other women say how they feel about ‘beauty.’ How they have dealt with and actually overcome the conversations regarding beauty over the years. What I intend is that young women can grow up without questioning themselves so much. That they can grow up in a world understanding that beauty looks a lot of different ways. I’m committed to impacting the conversation that women have about beauty.
What was your initiative to start?
There were many things I wanted to accomplish when I started Team but I work in the beauty industry and when I joined Team I saw what my commitment to women really was. Team gave me the access to get clear about what my project or game was and how to go about getting down to it. I have ALWAYS known I wanted to make this difference in life. My resources were exactly the same and everything was in place but my structures became solid on Team. Creating a team and getting started became easy. I have shot a number of interviews already and we are on target to shoot and edit and have these videos available to view. This conversation of beauty will rock our conception of what it beauty really is. It is an intriguing conversation and engaging to watch and participate in. Many of my subjects report that the questions I ask put them in an inquiry where they are able to distinguish what decisions they made in life about whether they are beautiful or not. I am moved to hear the feedback and reaction to The Beauty Conversation and the effect it has not just on the women who are interviewed, but the participants who watch the videos.
When did you start?
It came to me over a year ago. I started the project after I joined the Team Management & Leadership Program. It was just an idea before that. So that would be August 2012.
How did you use what you learned in the Team, Management and Leadership Program to contribute to your life?
I would say team is almost everywhere in my life now. It seems like it is becoming second nature to create teams now. Whether with my friends, family or at work ¬– being the source of teamwork makes life is so much easier. And it’s a lot more fun to play with a team than taking the lone wolf route!
What are your intentions for the future?
The game started as something that I intended would live on the internet. The interviews provide questions that have the participants actually grapple with the conversation of what it is to be beautiful. The project has grown with every person I have shared it with, in ways that I did not foresee. I now have a producer on board who sees the possibility of me traveling the country giving lectures. It is becoming a much bigger project than I ever anticipated. With every step that I take to fulfill on what I started to do, I start to see what is available for women globally. It has turned what was initially a project just for me into a MOVEMENT.
Have You Got Anything Else To Share Regarding The Beauty Conversation?
The flood gates have opened and people have been unbelievably generous and it has been so much fun to be a part of. The sky is the limit and I can’t wait to do more interviews!