what up beautiful people? it is your homegirl shameless all up in her shameless castle! i'm in a shamelesscastle with palm trees. remember when iused to say that guys and i wasn't livingin a shameless castle, but like the power ofwords and actions? huh, hello? speaking of which, words, this video isinspired by a commentthat was left on my video
on my new life insunny california. and i gave you guysa tour of my new loft, and this is legit insane,sometimes i'm just like, "what?" but anyways,back to the comment, it was basically about,i'm going to find it, entered it here, but this young woman was like, "how is this even possible? how do you youtubershave these fabulous lives
were you get to travel andlive in these amazing homes? and i just don't get it.how is this even possible?" that commentreally resonated with me, and it's because ihad those same questionsbefore starting youtube. i could never wrapmy head around, how could these people havethese awesome, amazing lives? like what theheck are they doing? i used to think theywere just born rich, they married rich,or were drug dealers.
that comment took me back, soi just wanted to answer that. and today we live ina social media craze. and it's just things tokeep you entertained and to laugh, you know? all of those heartacheand pain happen off-camera, and they even happybefore social media existed. i encourage eachand every one of you to read or watch biographieson people you admire, people that have theseamazing, epic, great lives
because they all havea common through line, and they've all been throughthe trenches and back again, but they didn'tallow that to discouragethem from moving forward. so, i'm going toanswer this video with my personal backstory on my work because anyone that knows me, knows i am a worker,i am a hustler. but those of youthat don't know me, you don't even knowwhat i've been through.
so my work history of hustle began at the age 8 years old. and i got my firstjob, very young, yes. my mom was a singlemother raising two kids, and she, fyi guys mymom never put me to work, this is justsomething that was in me, that i've always wanted to do. so, we weredelivering newspapers, ok that was my first job,
you get the newspapers, you open them up, you putin the flyers, the brochures, the samples, fold it,roll it, put it in the bag. you do that all night, and thenyou deliver it the next day. simple enough as it sounds, but when you are born andraised in toronto, canada the winters arebrutal, snow up to your knees, and it did not make the news. we would put it on a sled,
and then go door to doordropping newspapers off. that was a hustle, .30cents per newspaper bundle, ok. [laughs] that's hard work.ten, $3 dollars, a lot of work. ok, anyways, my second job was doing background,i did background, which is extrawork as they call it. and basically that is, you know any showand movie that you watch there's people walkingaround in the background,
that's an actual jobthat you can get paid to do. so i got that through my dad, my dad had brought my brotherand i one day to work with him, and my dad is an artist,he's a photographer, an actor. and we were doing background, and that was myfirst kind of exposure to the entertainment world. and i was so fascinated,like wow, and then director calls"action," and then i walk,
and it's like, "reset," andthen you go back to your spot, and you walk again, andyou can get paid to do this. so, me and my brother did that, but we only did that once because it's during theschool week and we had class. so it was a goodexperience to have as a kid. but i think that waspart of like the seedling of what has manifested today. then my next job was atthe age of 12 years old,
illegal [laughs] to work, but i managed to do it. i volunteered at a pet store, because i wanted to be aveterinary when i grew up. so i worked at pj's pet centerin scarborough town center, every saturday for free, and i would workan eight hour shift just so i could playwith puppies for 10 minutes. i know i'm crazy. jackie, jackie!
i have wanted a dogever since i was a baby. well ever since i can remember. i've always wanted a dog. did you know jackiethat i would used to work at a pet store for free and scrape shit off ofcrates with a smile just so i could play with thepuppies for 10 minutes? did you know that? noyou didn't know that. and my manager saw howhappy i was to be there,
and how dedicated i wasto do my job with a smile, even though itwas literally shitty. so they started giving me money, so $12 to $20dollars for the day, and i would use the moneyand go get a lunch, come back. that was my illegaljob at 12 years old. my next job, myfirst official legal job was at a grocerystore at no frills. i was so happybecause i didn't have to lie,
i didn't have to likebeat around the bush, and i got to work like 3days a week and make money, and what did i do with my money?i got acrylics with french tips, and i blew my hair out straight. then after that i wentinto the world of retail, my cousin got me ajob at a hat store, then i got a job at foot locker, i worked there 30plus hours a week, at that time i was in grade 10,
and my schoolworkstarted to suffer so bad that i had toget fired. [laughs] i didn't even quit, they firedme for some reason i forget. where did i worknext? i applied at gap for a seasonal positionduring the holidays as acustomer service rep, then i wanted to moveup because i told myself, "what do you wantto do with your life?" be an accountant or getinto marketing? one of the two, because my momwas an accountant.
so i got a job atroots canada as a cashier, i did that for about 4 years. then i was like, "you know what?i'm too big for this small pond, i'm going to go to somewhere inthe u.s. because i'm amazing." so i came to sunny los angeles,ta-da, at the age of 18. now i had my license at 16, but i didn't have a car,and i couldn't rent a car, i was too young, icouldn't afford to buy one. so i was like,"what am i going to do?
oh, i know i got it. i'm goingto work at a rental place, or a car dealership. and one of them willgive me a car." [laughs] so i applied everywhere, and i ended up getting ajob at lexus santa monica, shout-outs tolexus santa monica. i got a job there, and iwould commute from crenshaw, which is where i wasstaying for half of my stay, and then theother half was at ucla.
and i wouldcommute taking the bus, but i like walking, that'swhat i do on the east coast, i walk everywhere. so after work i was walking, and it must havebeen, i must have beenwalking for over an hour, and at this point my managerhad already picked his kids up and was heading home, and he saw me walking, ohmy god i was so embarrassed, and he's like, "mayawhat are you doing?!"
and i'm like, "i'm just walking,what's wrong with walking? sunny california." he's like, "get in the car!" so i was in the back ofthe car with his two sons, and he's like,"you can't do that." and i'm like, "whynot? i don't have a car. and i don't want to take the busright now, i just want to walk." so, anyways, he got me a car, he gave me a usedcar from the lot
that i could use every weekend. so i had that on the weekends, and i would justdrive along the coast, can you believe? 18, 19,i turned 19 at that point, driving, i waslike, "this is gorgeous. i need a camera to take photos." so i went to a camerastore and bought a camera. then i went back to canada, and i was just like, "i don'tknow what to do with my life."
like i really, as a kidi really wanted to act, and that was inspiring,and i did some extra work, and i even, you knowwhat, if i really want to act i have to go to theater school. so i applied totheater school, i got in, but that was in september,and it was like june. so, i couldn't get a job, and i was takingphotos all the time. i was like, "ugh,until i get a job,
let me just drop offthis film every week." and the manager over theresaw me coming in every week, and i kept dropping off film, and he started togive me like feedback, some constructive criticism, all of which i absorbedlike a sponge. finally he asked me ifi was looking for a job, uh, yeah i'm looking for ajob, can you get me a job? thank you, yeah.
so then i learned asmuch as i could from blacks, and i was like "maybe icould do this for a living, be a photographer." i would have to find out more, because i lovefashion, and i love beauty, and i love looking atall of these magazines, and maybe i can findout the name of thisphotographer in this magazine. oh, it's that person,how can i find them? so i would go to theirwebsite online and email them.
and i was able tointern for one, and photo assist for another, and i, again learnedso much, had a light, because i never went toschool for photography. this is my whole rationale, work, get a job that pays,or get a job that doesn't pay, because it is better to notbe in debt, or pay for school. and then theater school, oh, theater school i wasdoing headshots for my friends,
so i got to do that, and then i alsophotographed agency models. their agents wouldset them up with me because i was ayoung female photographer, and these girls were very young. so i was doing photographyand acting in tandem. then i moved tovancouver, canada for 3 years. and when i was out there igot a job doing extra work, that was the first thingi did when i got out there,
i'm like, "you know what? ineed money and i need it now." i ended up gettinga job as a stand-infor a tyler perry movie, and i was the stand-in becausemy proportions to janet jackson. when you're astand-in you're not seen, so this is just when thecameras are not rolling, and the actors are intheir trailers gettingtheir makeup done, and i just stand in their spot,and the camera people light, do all the lighting, and thenthey're like, "thank you maya, please step out. janetjackson please step in."
[laughs] so that's what i did. then i was like,"man, this blow." [laughs] because i'm just, you knowi've gone to theater school, and now i'm doing backgroundwork, which is awesome. i moved to new york, and i was able to get a jobas a cocktail waitress. now i hustled that system,oh i hustled it so good, working as a cocktail waitressyou meet so many people. any time you work in customerservice just ask questionsand be friendly, ok.
that's what i did,that's my mo in life. so i did that at my job, and new york cityeveryone can be someone. and that happened tobe the case with me, i was working, very bored. there was aphotographer working, oh, what kind ofcamera are you using? and what kind of lens is that? and how did you get this jobhere photographing this event?
oh, ok cool. and i kept askingso many questions, and finally he's like, "here's my card. if you have anymore questions email or call." hi pete! that's his name pete. so i emailed him and i'mlike, "hi pete, it's maya the crazycocktail waitress girl. i would love to pick yourbrain or assist, or intern, or anything, i just wantto learn, i am a sponge."
so, pete brought me onphoto shoots as an assistant. so i assisted on photo shoots, and i was like, "you know what? maybe i wantsomething more intimate." so i applied as anintern at this photo studio, and it was a photographeri really admired his work, it was sobreathtaking and beautiful. so i applied as anintern, got the job, no pay, but within aweek i proved myself,
and they were like, "you knowwhat? let's give her something, she clearly is awesome." [laughs] yeah. so, i was paid intern rate, which was like$10 bucks an hour, possibly less, but tofile, i was filing receipts, and do not ever sleep on a job. when i was filingi was just like, "oh what is? whatare these receipts?
and what are youspending your money on?" so i would really studythis man that i looked up to because he had his own business, and i'm like, "man, if hecan do it, what can i do?" so, i just saw where hewas spending his money, and he was reinvestingit into his business, he was taking workshops, he wascontinually learning his craft. new york really opened my eyes, and working with peoplelike this photographer,
and pete, and doing cocktailing, like i just saw so much, and i'm like,"anything is possible. if they can do it, why can't i?" so new york i didcocktailing, bartending, photography, not that much, i did mainly assisting, i didn't really takephotos for other clients that much at this point,
because i was just like,"man, y'all in new york, the hustle is so real." and i'm like, "i don't wantto start all over again atthe bottom of the barrel." but i did have a voiceoveragent, so that was my job, was an actual jobthat i would go to. i booked a job witha production company, and i did theiraudio descriptive voice for the visually impaired. so people thatare visually impaired
do listen to cartoons or shows, and i did audio descriptionfor children's shows. so nickelodeon shows, iwould do the voice for that. and i also did thevoice for audio books, a lot of new yorktimes bestsellers, "jazz agedjosephine," what else did i do? i'll put in the descriptionbox if i can remember. but i had somewhere in theballpark of 30 and 50 jobs. set goals, work towardsthem, have faith, and repeat.
day-in and day-out,day-in and day-out. i would love to know, because it'sthat moment of truth, you know when i get nosey and i want to find outwhat the heck your story is, because that's not fair, i would love to knowwhere do you guys work? what kind of job do you have? do you have aninteresting story?
and why are you there? is it to pay bills? is it because youwant to learn something about the industry there? this video could be a tag, so i tagged everyyoutuber that you guys love. so just tweet them, or commenton their thing, and say, "oh maya, shamelessmaya tagged you, and i want to knowabout your back story boo,
what did you do before youtube?" i know you guys mighthave a lot of questions. i encourage you to writethe questions that youhave in the comments, you can do it there, but you could copyand paste your question and put it into google, growingup i did not have google. y'all are lucky, you haveso many advantages, use them, be an opportunist, seizethe moment, hustle hard, or die trying.
da! make sure youguys like, subscribe, remember to do you,do the work boo. be you, just beyourself, and stay true, because nothing beats honesty. the truth comesout, so stay true. ok, be shameless! [♪]