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The Glowreel 2021 Gift Guide is here! Feat. gift ideas from BIPOC women founded businesses, yaaaaas! Spoiler alert, the gift guide is also this week's reco - because you really do need to check it out 🙂

On the news front we've got lists and numbers! 30 Under 30 and 21 Women Of 2021 to be exact. Meanwhile, the Bites section is full of BIPOC women who have just made history - including Cardi B, Bernardine Evaristo and Blackpink.

Ash Paraskevas is this week's Community Feature. I had a great time chatting with Ash, who shared her self-love and mental health journey, and some excellent advice for loving the skin you're in. Catch some snippets in the Community Spotlight section, and the full interview is up on the Glowreel website.

Let's get glowing!

Shilpa

P.S. In this week's cute moment, Jordynn had a fun adventure in the snow, and ended her adventure looking for a ... skunk?! Also, if you haven't seen her "Hey Doodle" video you should probably drop what you're doing and check that one out too!

News To Know

30 Under 30 And 21 of 2021!

It's a numbers game this week!

First up, Forbes' 30 Under 30 list is live! It's always inspiring to read about the impressive achievements of the people on the 30 Under 30 list - seriously, they're all so amazing! ... But also, what are the rest of us doing with our lives?! A reminder that you can achieve whatever you want to achieve and there's always time to achieve it - no matter what age you are.

Usually we do a breakdown of the BIPOC women in these sorts of round ups ... but Forbes' 30 Under 30 has 20 categories, and 600 people featured total. Now, we love you, but we don't want you to be here allllll day! So, we've picked 3 categories where BIPOC women are notoriously underrepresented to highlight:

• Venture Capital - of the 30 winners in this category, 10 are women and 5 of these are BIPOC women.

• Science - half (so, 15 people) of the winners in this category are women, and 12 of these are BIPOC women!

• Media - 18 winners are women, and 10 of these winners are BIPOC women.

Meanwhile, Vogue Australia released its list of 21 Women of 2021 and you're in for a massive dose of inspiration! Featuring 11 BIPOC women, the list rounds up 21 Australian women who have both inspired and defined the conversation in 2021.

Special shoutout to Glowreel faves Melanie Perkins, Adut Akech Bior and Yasmin Poole. But also, you should definitely check out the full list here.

Glowreel Reco Of The Week

You need to check out: The Glowreel 2021 Gift Guide!

Whether you celebrate Christmas, or just want to get some gifts for your loved ones (or yourself!) to see out the year, we're helping you take the guesswork out of giving this year! Each gift is by a BIPOC woman owned business (obvs) - let's support each other this holiday season. 🎁

Bites

• From First Lady to first female President 👩🏾‍💼 Xiomara Castro is officially the first female President of Honduras. She tweeted "People, I am not going to fail you!" following her victory.

• Bernardine Evaristo is the new President of Royal Society of Literature 📚 She's the first writer of colour to hold the position and the second female president in the society’s 200-year history.

• A history making diamond record for Cardi B, okurrr 💎 She's the first female rapper to have more than one diamond record - for Bodak Yellow and Girls Like You.

• Who run the YouTube? Blackpink! 🎤 The K-pop queens are the first artists to gain over 70 million subscribers on their official YouTube channel.

• Breakdancing the glass ceiling 📻 Logan 'Logistx' Edra is the youngest ever winner of Red Bull's BC One World Final (a breakdancing competition) and the first-ever female winner from the United States.

• Azzi Fudd just signed a historic partnership deal 🏀 She's joined Stephen Curry's SC30 Inc. brand in a broad partnership that will support her successes both on and off the court - the first of its kind!

Journey To Self-Love: In Conversation With Ash Paraskevas

Image via Ash Paraskevas

Ash Paraskevas uplifts everyone around her and is all about unapologetically bringing your whole self to the table (we love to see it!)

We recently caught up with Ash to hear more about her incredible journey to true self-love and how she made the shift from trying to be someone she wasn’t, to truly loving the skin she’s in. We've shared some interview snippets below. You can catch the full interview on our website.

Tell me a bit about yourself

I’m Ash! My full name is Ashira - I changed my name to Ashlyn but now I’m back to my birth name which is Ashira, and I’m very proud of that journey.

I grew up in Melbourne, Australia and I’m a social media influencer (though I prefer to say that I’m an online person) that promotes my messages of self love and authenticity.

I have a very diverse background. From my mum’s side I’m Cyprian and Indigenous Australian and on my dad’s side I’ve got Liberian-African-American heritage and Bermudian.

Go-to coffee order: I don't drink coffee because coffee makes my anxiety go crazy. I end up buzzing around the whole time and I can't sleep! So I drink either a turmeric latte, matcha or chai.

Did you feel represented growing up as a woman of colour in Australia? If not, how did this affect your self-esteem?

This is a meaty question!

I’m quite light skinned for a person of colour and I wasn’t represented at all, let alone people who are darker than me! It just shows how bad it was in Australia.

Not seeing myself represented definitely impacted my self-esteem up until the age of 22 where I was just like I've had enough of this!

What’s your advice for loving the skin you're in?

Definitely start with acceptance. I think love is such a strong word and often it takes a long time to get there.

For me it definitely started from challenging the thoughts I had about myself and questioning what I don’t love about myself and why. That shifted to acceptance - this is my reality, this is who I am, I can change it or I can't change it but I need to understand and accept myself for who I am. Then slowly it evolved into love.

It’s a process and you definitely need to start slowly. You’re not just going to wake up one day after thinking you hate yourself or your body and suddenly be like oh I LOVE myself!

The full interview with Ash is available here. In addition to the snippets above, Ash shares more on her journey to self-acceptance, why she started sharing her mental health journey and her tips for getting through the bad days.

Women Who Shook Up The World

Cathy Freeman: A Running Icon Who Advocates For Indigenous Australian Children

By Daisy Truong

Cathy Freeman was the first Indigenous Australian to win an individual Olympic gold medal at the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000.

She was also the first Australian Indigenous person to become a Commonwealth Games gold medalist in 1990. She was only 16! Her personal best 400m sprint time of 48.63 seconds currently ranks her as the ninth-fastest woman of all time. Cathy announced her retirement from athletics in 2003.

In 2007 she established the Cathy Freeman Foundation. The Foundation focuses on Indigenous children in Australia, and advocates for a stronger presence of First Nations people in Australian society. The Foundation's main focus is education and ensuring that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children have the best education outcomes and optimal opportunities in life. Beautiful.

One Lioness To Another

"Justice is about making sure that being polite is not the same thing as being quiet. In fact, often times, the most righteous thing you can do is shake the table."

-Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

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This week's email was brought to you by Shilpa Bhim, founder of Glowreel. You can see more of her work at www.shilpabhim.com or follow her on Instagram @skb.ontherun

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