Life Uncut - The 'Currency' of the Ageing Woman - Uncut with Trinny Woodall

Episode Date: October 24, 2023

Today's guest is just so fabulous! It's Trinny Woodall. Trinny Woodal is an extremely successful business woman, entrepreneur, TV presenter, author, podcaster and fashion expert!  Trinny's story is one that would take hours and hours to talk about. At 26 Trinny went to rehab, got clean and started in an entirely new career. At 35 she underwent 16 rounds of IVF. At 53 she started Trinny London. In the last few years she has grown that business into one of the most successful makeup and skincare companies in the world. We wanted to speak about the belief that a woman's value declines as we age. Society has us so focussed on holding onto our youth, but Trinny is a bit of a juxtaposition to this. She has such a refreshing take what women bring to the table as we age.  You can check out Trinny's website and her Instagram GET TICKETS TO OUR LIVE SHOW HERE  If you have a question please send it on it to life uncut podcast on Instagram hereJoin us on tiktok Or join the facebook group here Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friend and share the love because WE LOVE LOVE! xxSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Life Uncut acknowledges the traditional custodians of country whose lands were never ceded. We pay our respects to their elders past and present. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. This episode was recorded on Darug Wollamutta land. Hi guys and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncut. I'm Brittany. And I'm Laura. And we've got a bloody goodie for you today. This is one that we are so excited about because we love her.

We love Trini. It's one of those people that you always wish, like she's on your interview hit list, right? You always wish you could interview her and you'd take it in any capacity. But then to have her in person next to you, it hits different. We were so, so chuffed to be able to interview Trini in person. I mean, I did get to interview her before. I interviewed her on the project. Yes.

I feel like that's different than your own podcast for an hour. I agree. But I've been in her aura twice and I will take anything I can get. No, do you know what? When I did get to speak to her originally, it was like 10 minutes and all I thought the whole time I was speaking to her was far out. I would love the opportunity to pick your brain. Trini Woodle, she is someone who has had so much success

throughout her life and I think that one of the things that I love about her even more so is the fact that she is now in her 50s and her success is still climbing. and it really bucks the trend that as we age we're not going to be as valuable and for her like she works in the beauty industry so she really is going against the grain of everything that we've been taught when it comes to traditional beauty standards her real astronomical success with her business she only started her business at 53 she's 59 now but it's not like she started it 40 years ago and it's finally hit the astronomical success it started at 50 which is something we chat about

but if you don't know Trini, Trini is behind Trini London, the makeup brand, the skincare brand. She was one half of What Not To Wear, that TV series a very long time ago that she did with one of her best friends, Susanna. Well, she also has this wonderful cult following. And I think even though with this TV series, What Not To Wear, this styling series that she did when she was back in her 30s and 40s, I think the reason why it was so successful was because it wasn't just about giving people a makeover with the you know like changing their clothes and giving them a makeover it was really about this connection with people as well and figuring out like what it was about them that made them feel like they weren't good enough or insecure

and then making them be and feel empowered to be the best version of themselves and using clothes as a gateway to that so there's been so much around who she is as a person how vulnerable she is online how authentic she comes across on social media and how she shares herself that has truly created this Trini tribe is what they call themselves but it is this cult-like community of people who follow her who love her and who are the reason why she is this like powerhouse and and has had the success that she's had we cover a lot in this interview from Trini's life before we knew her before she was in the public eye she worked as a trader we talk about her battle with addiction and going to rehab and then we talk about her starting her business later in life

yeah and I guess that's one of the things that I liked the most about this chat is the conversations that we had around what success means to her and what is her driving force because for somebody who wears so many hats and who has had so many different kinds of businesses throughout their lives and so many different types of work I think it's very interesting to see how someone has pivoted their career and pivoted their job later in life and she's gone through periods where she's had a lot of money and is the version of herself that she is now. And she's also been through periods of life where she's had no money and what that has meant for her resilience and what it means for her tenacity when it comes to business.

Trini Woodle is an extremely successful businesswoman, entrepreneur, TV presenter, author, and fashion queen. She's also now a podcaster with her new podcast, Fearless. She wears many caps and I'm quite intimidated to be honest to be here today because I I feel like she's low-key already judging my outfit. But today we are talking about Trini's life, her business, and a topic that we have wanted to touch on for a very long time, and that is the currency of the aging woman. Trini, welcome to Life Uncut.

The currency of the aging woman. Do you know, and there's been many articles about it in Australia recently. I just want to replay that, the currency of the aging woman. It's, fuck me, what a sentence. Isn't it? Yeah. First of all, I love your outfit. And as soon as you came in, I thought, she's got to be wearing heels under that.

Otherwise, her legs are endlessly long. And then I saw you wore that and flat flats. And I was like, oh, my God, great legs. I'm wearing a piece of paper on my feet. Literally, that's the first thing I thought. Well, do you know what? And you're wearing the right yellow for you. Oh, thank you.

Yeah, so you look great. I really, really thought about it this morning. I woke up and because you are a fashion queen, fashion royalty, we would like to say. And I remember watching you many, many moons ago. and I never really think about what I wear and this morning I was like do I put heels on my nice like wide leg trousers and a blazer and I thought hang on she'll know that I've done that for her let's stick to what I know so I went I peeled it back I have this every day I mean I think I came back from New York where the weather was kind of iffy and then I was in London for a day

and then I came here so I had to have very quick turnaround packing so I threw in way too much stuff and then also you know it was like 17 degrees 12 degrees 32 degrees because I'm going to Brisbane and Perth and everywhere and so I then got here opened it up and thought okay so we went through with the team and I went all right so we've got this business owners lunch and then we have this and then we have this and this so I had all this so today I was going to be fully in sequence and I got up and there was horrible weather and I just thought actually I'll be cozy oh my gosh I'm cozy for you today if you were in full sequence we would have been the most underdressed people, we would have had to reschedule. No, I would have loved it. I would

have been like, here it is. No, this is, I'll take you any way you come. Okay. We start every episode the same way. We ask our guests, what is your most embarrassing story? It's really humanizing. I can't tell you my most embarrassing story because then it would be in the Daily Mail. True. It will be. But I can tell you an embarrassing-ish story, which is during COVID. And it's in a way what many people discovered me for because I'm at home and I'm thinking, I want to do some beautification and so I think I can dye my own eyelashes very simple you know I've done brows I'll do lashes so I order the stuff from Amazon mix it together in the bowl and I'm doing a live which I did every day I just did live on whatever and I always just keep the

thing running I go off and get shit and come back and things and so I thought I'm gonna dye my lashes got stuff from Amazon and I was mixing it in a bowl trying to remember what somebody did when they did for me at the salon and then I realized god I need cotton wool and I couldn't find cotton wool anywhere in the house and I was just trying to think on the fly and then I remembered my poor incontinent 14 year old parson terrier I got some puppy nappies for so I thought cotton wool is going to be inside the puppy nappies so I open out the puppy nappies find the cotton wool I'm really excited so I've got the slash stuff on I'm putting the puppy cotton wool on and then the puppy cotton wool literally disintegrates and so I'm blind doing this live

to say fucking puppy cotton wool is not working and it was just it was a smugness broadness so that was quite i mean that's what most people when they say i discovered you doing lockdown they go the puppy nappy incident who would have thought that that would have been the thing that would have really just i know gone viral yeah but it's also one of those things that you kick yourself because you're like why did i do it live why didn't i just do a video that i could have edited and put up because i never do that yeah i mean i do that like when we do closet confessions but I believe it's profoundly important to be totally you on social media because I think otherwise it makes other people feel potentially less than. When did you discover that?

From the moment I started social. It's so interesting because I feel like most people, you know, a lot of people come to that realization at some point, but there's very few people who come to social media and instantly feel as though they have the confidence, the self-awareness to be able to be themselves from the get-go. I think most people try and be a version and it's only after that doesn't really work out that they go, okay, well, I guess I'll just be me, like unfiltered in myself. It depends how they came to social media. So I came to social media from doing TV shows for 10 years where it was unscripted and I was me. All right. So even though in the edit of those shows, they would make Susanna more one version of herself and me wore the other version.

I was me. So when I went to Facebook, like in 2016 or something, and they just said, look, just put the phone up and just start chatting. And so I just put it up on my wall and I just said, hi, it's Trini. Is anyone out there? And then I, then I had these sort of things coming, comments coming out. I was saying, God, this is amazing. And then somebody went, are you Trini that used to be Trini and Susanna? And I went, that's me. Yup. Hi. and it went from there and so I've always felt whenever I look down a lens whether I was doing what not to wear or today on a live that I imagine those people at the end of the lens and so like last night we did an event in Sydney and there were a lot of women there who discovered

me doing lockdown or they're all there and this one woman she just comes up she goes I know that when you're chatting you're looking and you're seeing me down the lens and I feel heard and that's the most like you know I was really tired last night and I'd gone on this half-hour journey and I got very very car sick and I thought I can't stand up to I was chatting to people thinking I want to throw up and then you know you get women come up telling you very intimate things because they feel they can and when you can create a relationship with a woman where she feels she can do that it's the most rewarding thing that you can have in your life because it's the trust and so you get that and sometimes there's a weight to it because you feel there you know and you kind

of give them a hug and you feel through that hug they have such a weight in their life but it's also it motivates me more than anything it motivates me that's so special we've experienced this recently because we've been doing our live tour for the podcast and i think it's so special when you meet people who have connected to something that you've done or something that you've said and it has had a huge impact on their life and maybe at the time when you're doing it there's not even an understanding of how that might affect someone else and then you have these special moments where they come and share their story and all those pieces of the puzzle really fall into place for you and it makes you feel on days when you might find your work

challenging it makes you feel this purpose is the best thing in the world well that's exactly what Laura and I said to each other I just after I show a couple of nights ago this is the nice reminder of why we do this every day. Yeah, because you've had a grueling running around and then at some of those stages, you're kind of thinking, my God, have I got enough in the tank? And then things like that give you tons in the tank. I mean, our grueling running around does not even pale in comparison to the mighty workload that you seem to manage. I want to go right back though, for some people, they would only know you as Trini. And then unless you kind of did a little bit of digging, you might not know that that actually wasn't your first name or your real

name Sarah Jane is your name yeah where did Trini come from Trini came from my dad was friends with this man called Frank Lauder and he co-wrote these St Trinian's films which then were reimagined in color but they originally were in black and white and they were these naughty school girls and they lived in this boarding school and they kind of go and they just did really naughty things and they wore very short skirts and suspenders and they gambled and everything it was kind of a 60s show but anyway I was naughty at school and I cut a girl's plait off at the top of her head I was about six and a half um because she kind of was flirting with this boy I didn't even like boys then but there was just this I don't know whatever I think competition what I also

remember too is I always thought it was a plait at the back of her head and I remembered recently I cut off just one plait but she had to have the other plait cut off as a result and uh evened out and I went home and my dad was with Frank Norder and he said you are so like these girls I'm writing about and so i was called trini and then very soon afterwards i was sent off to boarding school at like six and a half well you're sort of like oprah now like that one name madonna all these other people rihanna you know these people that you could just say the one name and everyone in the world knows who it is like if anybody says unless you're in the caribbean is everyone trini so many people in not just trini dad but in the caribbean because whenever i'm with somebody from

the Caribbean, they go, oh, you're another Trini. And I go, yeah. I love it. It's great. But I think it's T-R-I-N-I. Yeah. But apart from that, yes. Well, you do wear many hats and a lot of people do, you know, for a multitude of different things. We know you from Trini and Susanna, from What Not to Wear, from Trini London. But who were you before you jumped onto this scene, before the rest of the world knew you as this fashion makeup mogul? God only knows because I didn't know who I was. You know, I think I spent quite a few years where I just was figuring out who I was. And I think we all go through that in different stages.

And I went through it probably, I think I really knew who I was until I was about 13, 14. And I, you know, I was like, say to my dad, I want to be the prime minister of England. I have this relentless sense of a purpose. And then at school, I was really bad academically. And so that falters you. That makes you think, maybe, you know,

you need a bit of academia to get to all these places you want to get to. To run a country. But not even that. I think when you are failing, quote unquote, and the people who are your superiors, i.e. teachers, who have such an impact in your ability to feel smart and feel like you can achieve something, it's like when you don't follow that perfect structure and you do fail at it, it then takes you so long to overcome it, to then realize, oh, actually I am capable of many things, just not maybe schoolwork. Maybe not schoolwork. And maybe when the careers advisor

person said you'd make a really good secretary um which was like what I did actually for a while and there's nothing you've got any other things and I think like the best PAs are the back rock of any person who is successful it's like when they used to say there's always a woman behind a successful man it's exactly the same so you know I have a rock in my life and without her I wouldn't have a life really so it did take down a notch of of that sense of what I could do and then I think I didn't feel appealing I had very bad skin and you know to be in a room like this would be hideous because I'd feel the craters on my face would be on the down light so all those little things the superficial exterior and the interior of being the youngest of six kids where

you're fighting for your place in the family you know you're trying to sort of say I'm me an independent character but you haven't quite figured out who that character is yet so that then led me to a few years of addiction and that kind of was a way of I don't know who I am so let me try different personas and I think when you're in that position you do that and you just you know I remember I'd go out and be a bit stoned and I'd pretend all evening I was a vet you know seriously I would I would try it on and I would be so convincing in myself or under the influence convincing myself that I was a vet and talked to some poor boy about giving birth to a sheep and you know doing stuff I mean I literally invented these different roles that I had because I just

I think felt I don't know who I am that must have been such an incredibly confusing time how do you find your way out of that because when you're in it how on earth do you have a moment where you go well this is who I am and I'm going to lean into these strengths you don't you have to hit a rock bottom first because I don't really know many people who just woke up one day and thought actually I now know who I'm going to be so let me change my whole life I think you need something that happens to you in your life where you feel you might lose it all whatever it is that you've got there that you don't even know what you want you still have something that you might lose and that is intangible but I did get to that stage and I felt that sense of a rock bottom

and I had some friends who felt the same. So we kind of made a pact to go to rehab and I went to rehab and some of them did and didn't and of that pact, none of them made it. So when I got clean when I was 26 and I stopped using drugs, I had this very strong sense in the back of my mind that many people don't make it. What they do in rehab then compared to now

is it was kind of shaming. There was a shaming element. I think rehab now is very very different so I left feeling shame in what I'd done and feeling not knowing who I was but knowing I could never use drugs again I just kind of knew that and so then when I slowly built up I wasn't building up on quicksand I think that's a fundamental way I would say that difference because you can be you know we can be bravado and we've all in our lives had that moment of bravado and we can like fake it to make it but you will you will trip up at some stage with that you will trip up so you've got to build it up then on bricks so it was slower

it was longer i remember i went down my high street where i lived and i had a panic attack and i thought what is this you know if you've never had a panic attack you're like am i having a heart attack and slowly slowly i began to fit in my skin and as i began to fit in my skin then I knew what I wanted to do. How do you overcome that feeling of guilt, that feeling, especially when the structures around you that are the support structures are also the structures that are telling you you should feel guilty about yourself? What do you think is the difference between guilt and shame? I think they're very similar. I think they're born from the same feelings. I think to me, I think shame is how you feel about something you've done. Guilt is how you

feel other people feel about something you've done. So I think they're slightly different. guilt's more of probably an empathetic response well it's like I felt guilty towards my parents about them selling a table to pay for rehab yeah I felt guilty about how I'd behaved I felt shame for myself about that I hadn't got anywhere with my life yet and I'd let myself down so to me there is that difference so I think it's shame that I would talk about when you use that phrase in guilt in that context and I think it's how do you then go from there to self-belief and it's about nurturing yourself it's about surrounding yourself with people who will lift you up and not drag you down which is surrounding yourself with love and not competition or you know like that and just

I think from that age one thing I really learned then is I can't bear gossip I really really hate gossip and I think that gossip is a commodity that allows you to feel empowered to know something to feel better to be able to say to somebody oh did you know and we use it because it makes us feel we have some information and therefore we are a value and I did use that as a commodity you know when I was that age and I just thought it's only painful it only ends up in being painful So, you know, we all have friends who live in drama or not. And I don't like to be around so many friends who have to live in a drama to feel connected to the world.

And was this a period of life where you made those decisions? You were like, these are the friends who I will keep. And these are the friends who support and really identifying the ones who maybe live within that world and would pull you into that world. I knew you have to kind of like, if you make a decision to get clean, you have to commit to some form of recovery. And so for me, I knew I couldn't see any friends who use drugs. So I literally had to start over. And I had friends from many years before who then I picked up with who had become boring to me in my world of where I was going. But they were actually fantastic people. And I just didn't see it for a while. so I made new friends who were all on the same path we were at the same stage it was like going to kindergarten together learning to brush our teeth together and then slowly I brought people back into my life who I'd known a long time who'd always been there for me but I hadn't chosen to

see it what was the biggest thing you noticed in your life how it changed when you left rehab and became clean and became sober that I felt in control of my decisions you know that I kind of I felt in control of my decisions and I had to then take responsibility for my decisions so there's a flip side to it but I think that was the biggest change and also I wanted to figure out what I want to do with my life and and it was challenging because I remember I very first came out and I worked for this guy who was tiny physically tiny and had a bit of a Napoleonic complex and he ran a sort of kindergarten centers around England I can't remember the name of it actually I don't think I'll ever listen to this podcast I've never seen again in my life but I

remember when I started this job yeah I think I'm safe when I started this job I felt I couldn't even type a letter you know it was at the still the time of no we were on computers then but we were on the very early apple and I felt so inadequate and then after about three months my best friend died and I had to arrange a funeral and I couldn't bear this man and he would go out very long lunches so in the lunch breaks I was on it and this funeral involved a lot of things it was abroad I had to get people from all different countries I had to coordinate everything and I was like I can do this with my eyes shut you know I suddenly realized when you do something you have a passion about and this sounds weird but i wanted my friend to have the

best funeral ever that i was capable and it was the most ironic thing that it was through katie's funeral that i discovered i can do shit i can get things done and so after three months of being in this job i thought i can do more than this and that little bit gave me that little bit of that first brick and then just other little bricks followed you know slowly for your I mean your career and what you've achieved over the past 30 years it's incredible to see but I almost wonder like is it the type of career progression where you can sit back early on and go I want to be here in the future or is it all these small steps and it almost looks like from the outset these moments of reinventing yourself into something new finding an opportunity that maybe hadn't

been something that was in the master plan, but leaning into something when it comes along and saying yes. How did that? I think leaning in, I think I haven't been what I call a classic manifesto. Yeah. You know, because I just, I can't, I don't know if I feel fraudulent. I look at those things, we scroll through them all on Instagram, both of you might do it, you know, but I find it, I can't be that person. So if I feel the sense of something, I lean into it. And that's what I'll do. When I started Trinity London, you do a, you know, you do a P&L and a projection for five years of revenue, and you need to do that to take to investors. So when I was doing it, you know, I kind of thought to myself, all right, I have X number of followers, and I'm

going to say 3% of those people will buy, which I felt was conservative, but it was the kind of conversion that you get anyway online when you look at e-commerce sites. I thought, okay, let's do it on the most base level. And let's say that I will grow by this number of followers per year, which was a more challenging one but I thought okay let's let's say that I do that we had two investors at the beginning one of the investors four years later left her company and she sent me this I have it on my desk and it was a picture because you don't always celebrate your wins because you're always thinking what you need to do next what you need to do next but there's a thing called this hockey stick growth and so it showed you know this growth like this because

we've done 120 percent amortized over each year and at the bottom was our projections and to the year they were exactly right which is kind of weird because most people you over project because you have no idea not many people under project most people if they're investors they look at somebody's five-year projection and after year two they're like this is pie in the sky you know and it was I don't know if we were just lucky or whatever but she sent this to me and I always have brain but things is up to five years and we're at five years now so i think okay i've got to go do it again well well you've got to do it again we have a lot of people and myself included i'm one of them i have done it in my career but a lot of people writing saying how do you completely

flip your life on its head how do you go from one industry because i know we haven't spoken about it yet but you were a trader you were in the finance world like a very men's men's world how do you go about one day saying this isn't for me i'm going to take a risk and start another business. And obviously you need some level of privilege. Maybe it's some kind of financial backing or some sort of knowledge in the industry. What was it for you that said, you know what, this finance world isn't for me. I feel like I'm so much bigger than this. I'm going to do a complete 180 and go another direction. I think at that time, and there wasn't financial help or anything, I had a rock bottom in hating that job. That's what happened.

and I just thought there I am it's me it's 60 odd men on the trading floor I'm just swear every that's where my terrible swearing comes from because I used to come home and tell filthy jokes and swear my dad was like what happened to you and I just I'm Trini I'm the naughty kid men happens to me yeah men have to be and I I just through that time from like six and a half I'd loved making girlfriends over and always whatever I was doing wherever I was trying to be or pretending this should be my future I would have girls on a Sunday in my closet or in my bathroom I'd be giving them skincare routines and I just loved it and I didn't think I didn't think oh I love that and I hate that but I just that's how it ran like for years and years and then I'm

having a walk one day and I'm chatting to a friend and I'm just like I hate this job and she says why don't you change it and I'm like because I need to earn the money and then I just thought actually I cannot spend 12 hours a day doing something I hate so you've got to I think hit a rock bottom and once you get to that level of I do not want to do this and you have that inkling of I know what I want to do most people don't leave what they hate because they don't know what to do next but if you really know what you want to do then it is within your power to make it happen and sometimes we have to do a lot of things and sometimes we have to let go of a lot of things And when I started Trinity London, I followed this guy, Gary Vee on Instagram, Gary Vinacek.

And he literally at that time had like 100,000 followers. But, you know, Gary was looking down the phone at me saying, what the fuck can you sell? You know, just like don't sort of go, it should come to me, it should come to me. No, make it happen. You want to make it happen? Then what have you got? And he kept saying, because he mainly, I think 70% of his audience is men. But it's like, have you got trainers?

Have you got this? Sell them on eBay. And I was living in this house that was too expensive for me and everything. And I thought, okay, what can I sell? Because I wanted to make it happen. When I started Trinity London, I wanted to make it happen. But going back to that kind of men's world, I met somebody who felt the same, which was Susanna.

She was working, writing about women's cricket and having a fight with a cricketer, who then became the president of Pakistan. And, you know, it was kind of all a big deal. But she knew she wanted to change too. So we met together and we met in this coffee shop off Bond Street and a really good friend of ours introduced us and so I had this idea that I wanted to have a page in a newspaper where you could get immediately because I wanted to do what I did

in my bathroom and because they would always say where can you buy that where can you get that and I was always just writing down this is where it's from etc and I thought it's that instant gratification that we search for it's not reading vogue where you know the thing that was from the mass market store is actually never going to be manufactured but they made sample to be in vogue that's how fashion was then and there was hardly any fast fashion or or excess I'm going to call it accessible fashion it was either like the shop your mum took you to try and look cool and you thought or it was vintage or it was you couldn't afford it that's kind of the three criteria so she loved the idea and she called me up the next morning and she went can I take your idea

I didn't know Susanna that well at this time and I went no you cannot but we could do it together so she said okay so she had the contacts in the newspaper world and I had this kind of idea of what this column would look like and so we pitched it and we pitched it to three newspapers and one of them took it and that was a lucky break for sure because it was a main paper like Sydney Morning Herald it was like page three on a weekend and that column took us everywhere that column took us to TV it took us to writing books it took us to starting our first online business in 99 so that was in a way the turning point of where my new career began but i love this idea and i think it's something that can't be overlooked at all this idea of making your own opportunities

i think so often in life people wait for something to be given to them or they think because the opportunity hasn't arrived that maybe they're not worthy of it or maybe it's never going to happen for them but every single person we've ever spoken to who lives big and vibrant and fulfilling lives, the things that have made that pinch point difference, the thing that set them on a new trajectory have 99% of the time been opportunities that they have created for themselves by going and asking for it, by being that driving force. Well, you also just said it was, you know, luck played a small role in it with the newspaper picking it up, but luck is also preparation, meeting opportunity. And if you weren't prepared for that opportunity,

the luck wouldn't have prevailed, would it? Because you still have to do the work. But I love that you said, okay, how am I going to do this? I'm going to sell everything that I own, like every superficial thing that I own. I think that's really important, especially in today's economic crisis. I do think we all have something that we probably don't need to hold on to that we can sell to improve our life. And it's the thing of that letting go again. And there's a lot about what do you let go of so that something better comes in your life? So that could be relationships that could be physical tangible things and you know when i let go of this house i'd bought and i'd really like the closest i come to to the concept of manifestation i always have

to put this accent on it because i just find it slightly cringy i don't mind manifestation i knew you were going to say that i knew she manifests doesn't she brit does and i'm in your camp where i find it i find it a cringy concept but also i don't want to deny that sometimes i you know but I think also there's a sort of there's a proactive I'm manifesting and there's an intuitive feeling it and that's what I do so intuitively it's like I believe this could happen during COVID maybe this is the modern day interpretation but I wrote on my wall all my figures from when we'd begun and I'm sorry I'm here in manifestation there Trini but the thing is I didn't know that That's its name.

She's going to get me now, isn't she? But the thing is, did I write – yes, because I did write what I was – and it all happened. And so let's talk that through. What is that, Trini? Let's talk that through. I dug my own hole. I dug my own hole.

Fuck. No, but manifestation isn't about – and this is what I love. Oh, I'm talking about manifestation. For one moment. Manifestation, I think, isn't about – because I don't want to say that I'm a person that sits back and says – you know, I write that I want to meet my man and then I sit in my room and don't do anything.

I think it's about You've got to do the work Yes It's a driving force Right Because then you've put Into the world what you want Now you subconsciously

And consciously Start to think about it Yes You start to It's like when we see Angel numbers We're like oh 111 But that's because

It's in the front of our mind So this is something On another level for me What are you talking about Angel numbers 111 Sorry Don't worry That was a personal thing

To Laura She sees this all the time Do you see angels No Who am I in the room with Wow We have just made ourselves Sound batshit crazy

Angels and manifestation This is going What I am trying to say is I do think there's a lot to be said for it just being a driving force for you to work harder towards something. Yes, I agree. So I agree. And I think you're right. And I have to take back my sarcasm around manifestation.

What I wanted to ask you is like so much of your career is built around styling women and helping people feel empowered by the way in which they look. Why is it that the clothes we wear and the way I guess it is kind of comes down to the way we present ourselves. But why is it that that has such a profound impact on people? Because we judge people before they open their mouth, I have to say. So I could look around the room and think, who in this room do I feel drawn to or is most present or has an energy? And so I think how we dress and how we put ourselves together is the physical embodiment of the sort energy we carry around with us so i find that people who wear black in a certain way where

they're shrouded wearing black because there's very different ways of wearing black they want you to feel they don't have to contribute or make this presence because there's an element to them that has an uncomfortableness in some people other people they wear black and they're the chicest carrying rottfeld the chicest woman in french folk you know just like but i can usually So if I'm like yesterday, there's 160 women in the room and they all make an effort. And when they come to meet me, this is a funny thing. I'm going to say this. But when they come to meet me, I used to feel my role was to say, this is great, but you could change that and whatever.

And then I realized they've made such an effort to come see me. The most important thing I can do is to point out what's amazing about what they're wearing. and so it was very interesting seeing these women and looking at these women where I know this is not how they used to dress and seeing even though I didn't know them before the change that they told me the impact was on them as a person you know whether it was I left my partner or my kids respect me more or I went to get the job or I love my body more or I feel my voice counts you know it's that that is why it's so important however like so when i did this book you know being fearless an element of that is how we feel inside emotionally for sure probably 70 but how we present

how we feel how much does the inside connect to the outside how much are we prepared to show of the internal part of us to the outside world do you think it's a chicken before the egg thing in terms of the way that we dress is a direct reflection of how we're feeling verse can you kind of reverse manufacture it so it's sure so can you you can fake it to make it you can you know decide okay inside i'm not i'm feeling rocky still but let me just because i've had lots of women say this to me you know i'm going to wear bright colors or i'm going to make the effort or i'm do you know i'm going to walk a certain way and they feel their inside being nurtured as a result so i feel the difference when you put something absolutely incredible on the difference

in how you carry yourself and how you feel and like you want people to see you and you feel more confident when you enter a room as if you were wearing a paper bag you're like well I don't really want anyone to look at me like it definitely changes your confidence on who you are on the inside as much as the outside 20s the mention at the beginning the currency of the aging woman the reason why we were speaking about this there's been a lot of articles that have come out in Australia over the past year and I think that it's come more into conversation this recognition that as women get older, they seem to be less valuable. And I say that in terms of media, in terms of career opportunities, there's an invisibility that can happen. How have you

experienced this in terms of, or what do you see? Because your career has only gotten more powerful, more amazing, and you have shined brighter as the years have progressed. But I would say that that doesn't seem to be the general take for most women or how they feel about themselves as they've aged. This is challenging because I've for the last 30 years worked for myself. All right. And I think when you work in a career for somebody else it can be more challenging but there is also that sense of a glass ceiling or you just imagine there is no ceiling so through my life I have never seen a fucking ceiling okay and I think it's not so much that sense of defeatism it's not but there's a lot of people who are in a situation where ceilings are put on top of them and they

have to really break through and there are many champions out there on equal pay on on women's rights in the workplace. But there's also something about making your world less possible or making your world limitless. And for me, I've definitely had times when I felt it's not going to happen and sort of do they therapy, but I felt a disappointment in myself. I've never felt it's an outside force. I felt I haven't lived up to my potential. So I put the onus on me more than on the outside world and i don't know everyone is different and everyone have a different circumstance situation but i think that this is my best decade yet i feel that emphatically i mean i feel i know myself i have self-belief i have self-worth i know who i am i know what

my faults are most of the time i learn new ones every day um i think i have a growth mindset not a fixed mindset on 50% of my life. I think that what I found offensive is the word the aging woman. I found that really offensive because I feel ageless. You know, people in every interview that I've had in Sydney sitting down, there is that question, how does it feel that you're going to turn 60 next year? Every single interview, like in the last, when I was in New York too. and I'm like I literally feel what do I want to do for a birthday that's literally all I feel I feel no sense of I've never put an attachment to my ability with age ever but that's the thing right all those questions it all comes from the social structures around us that tells us that

we're supposed to care I mean even at 37 there's things that tell you that you're supposed to care you have kids you're supposed to care. I remember when I first had my children and I had this innate fear that my career was over, that I would not be able to continue in the same way that I had. And it's because there, I mean, there are so many pioneering women who have shown that there are different paths, but at the same time, I think you still hit these milestones and you're up against what society tells you is capable. And I appreciate your perspective on whether you put the limitations on yourself or whether you can see that as limitless. But I think that that is a really amazing mindset that not everyone has hence why the questions come yeah I think it's a minority

mindset for sure I remember being I think I was only 26 or 27 and I wanted to go to acting school I always wanted to be an actor and I remember saying well I'm too old so that moment's gone at only that age but that's because we're in the world of entertainment and media that is that is old like people are getting their breaks at 18 and 19 and I love the fact that you are calling bullshit on this because a lot of people aren't. And the fact that you started Trinity London at 50, you started this huge, incredible business at the age of 50. And a lot of women are taking inspiration from that, myself included. Already in this interview, I'm like, well, I better leave and start a business. It's like, it's not too late. You already have one. It's called Life

Uncut. I need another one. What if you leave me one day, Laura? I've got nothing. But I think it's really interesting. And just yesterday there was an article on myself that was written. The whole article was a photo of me from six years ago when I was 30 and a photo of me now and the whole article was my how she's changed to look at her taut face basically saying I got Botox and I'm like what's your point I got Botox but why are we writing a whole article that's saying that as I'm aging I'm trying to change I'm trying to maintain my youth and this is the reason that women in particular hold on to the idea of aging and being a currency and that we have to stay young because it's all anyone speaks about what do you want to say to people because i've

read some articles about you saying you've been doing botox in the anti-aging since you're 35 but now you you've got a young daughter and she's completely the opposite to you she's she doesn't want to go down that route so what is your outlook on this because i find it a really interesting daily mail article like your yeah daily fail yeah it was kind of a crap article because i think whatever it doesn't matter because you read these things every day and you just got to say i would have said it's tomorrow's fish and chips which is what my agent always used to say to me because i used to have many more articles written about me and he'd say it's tomorrow's fish and chips and now it's perennially online but you know today i had coming arriving in sydney and adding up the

cost of my luggage you know and the next day it's like look she's done really well as a business woman and then the next day it's something else so you just got to say don't give a shit actually you just got to laugh at it and knock so i'm just going to say that to you we shouldn't give a shit All right. And everyone is going to have an opinion and people need to have an opinion. That's why we have opinion writers. But I do think that another thing I love and it's also ironic when it's written by female journalists is that there's a look at her. How can she have a beauty brand? She does Botox. All right. Which is what I'll get. And I'll go, yeah, I fucking do do Botox. I've done since I was 35. I didn't realize then it was, you know, stopping lines. it was because I did tell you and I have a very moving forehead and it stopped my forehead moving and I was so relieved but it then meant I didn't get lines on my forehead but I think that there are also other women who say you know in a way they're sort of saying why do you fight age why didn't you age gracefully and I fucking challenge that and the reason I challenge it is I want to

wake up I want to look in the mirror and either I'll feel that already or I'll do something to make myself feel that where I have the energy to do anything I want to do today. All right. So I got up this morning, we had a long day, we started at 530. We ended at 10 o'clock at night, I got to bed at 11. It was a long day for a 20 year old and for a six year old. All right. And then I got up this morning and I thought, do I go and work out at 536? Do I really do that? But I thought, I want to look after my body. So it looks after me, I want to feel full of energy, I want to come today and do the podcast and give you my best and I want to breathe every day so that whole sense of that it's a vanity matrix it isn't a vanity matrix it's that we want to feel empowered and fantastic

about who we are as people and whatever it takes whatever it takes we have to stop judging and we have to stop women judging each other of you know it can only be this path like why don't you let your hair go green actually because I don't like my gray hair because it will look like the end of a fox tail and it's a bad gray but this is this is the thing right I mean it's so often is women who hold the torch up to other women and say well you're doing this it's never I mean and I think it comes back to that very thing you said at the start around gossip we do it but we do it in mainstream media as well but it comes from the same thing it comes from the same put down and this feeling of empowering and we like to read gossip articles because it makes us feel a little

bit better about ourselves and it's all part of that same space you know but I love this idea of getting to a place where and I mean I appreciate that you're there and I think that for anyone who's still on their journey to it of not giving a fuck what other people think it's a really hard place to get to and maybe that's people to get there earlier like when you said this thing about 20 I tried for RADA at 26 like I what's RADA RADA is an acting school in London oh exactly when you said that. And I remember at 26, the reason I failed is I cannot sing. And I thought I could sing. I remember I go for this thing and I think I'll do something which isn't singing. So it was like Shirley Bassey, the minute he walked in the joint. Everyone knows in the office, I'm a really

bad singer, but I love to sing. And I said, I think I'm tone deaf or whatever. And then at the end of the audition, the man went, yes, you are totally tone deaf. You know, that was it. And I And I got that. But there was that moment of that. That was my dream. And that's gone. You know, that's a challenging thing in your 20s. It's something you really, really felt was you, you know, the lead in the school plays. I was always the man. I was always Macbeth or Othello or whatever, you know, so I didn't like I wasn't starting off to a good point here. But then I think one of the things that's important is that once something is not possible, reset. And that key is how quickly can you reset? Because the more we live in the past and the future, we don't

get the most out of the present. And that sort of rooing or it's never going to happen to me saps every element of the energy you need to make what is right in front of you happen. Trini, what do you think it is that drives you? Because I think for so many people who would look at your story, they would think like, fuck, she does so much and you have achieved so much but like what is it that keeps you wanting more and I don't want to say more success because it's definitely not that but just more within your career more within your life what makes you want to go from starting a new label to writing a book to doing all these different things all over the place because I think I don't see life having a beginning middle and end it's linear you know

or it's Stephen Hawkins it turns and folds on itself I don't know which one I'm just reading it's kind of more like this isn't it but I feel that this journey is not I'm at this stage now so what do I you know it's just it's a continuing journey I think that's what it is it's a continuing journey so how can I bring into now that the best of what there is how can I give out the best of what there is how do you find balance then when you have your beautiful daughter as well how do you find that balance between your career your family yourself and having enough in the tank for all those three things that's probably a challenge my work-life balance a lot of what I do I don't see as work work because I see it as nurturing the soul work so like last night was

definitely work but also at the end of it I went home and I felt my tank was empty but I felt good I felt that I'd made some people's evening at the very end of the evening I had I met somebody who I hadn't seen Vages who was my husband's best friend and it was a very poignant emotional you know and I was of all the things that happened I was so happy I could be there for her because she's having a tough time and lives here it's those moments that it was during my work but we need to be there for other people and sometimes when you work really hard you aren't so when you have that moment to be there for somebody it's all worth it you know it's all worth it. And with my daughter, she will, as a mainly single child, I have a stepson who's 10

years older, who's like my son, but she has this self-worth that I never had at her age. So she will go, excuse me, mommy, I'm here, you know, and sometimes I'll be distracted and she has no compunction than others to say, I'm here, come on. You know, she'll call me 10 times a day. You didn't call me back. You didn't call me back. You didn't call me back. You know, I'll tell her, if I don't call you back straight away, I must have said to 3000 times, it's because I'm busy. she'll call a hundred times she doesn't give a shit she'll break through everything and we have a very strong bond so i've done something right i still will have that sense of i'm away and you know she'll sort of say other people knew my favorite food at nine and what was my favorite

food 11 you don't remember and i'm thinking it's okay i can let go of that guilt so so so that's sleep at night i'll sleep at night through that one because i know in the important shit i'm there so the balance is more the spiritual balance and filling the sort of spiritual hole of you know if you're wanting to give out you've got to fill your hole so we were on Sunday we went to I met with the team and they come from New York to come and they'd had a day a bit of a day in Sydney before I came and then I met them down at Bondi and we were sort of going to go shopping and stuff and I'd shop that morning because what I do is I get off a plane and I I don't buy shop but I just shop because it keeps I just need to keep walking and it's something I can do on autopilot so I went

down to Paddington and William Street and I was just like in and out in and out and then we had lunch and then somebody said let's go and lie on the sand and it was literally we did it for 15 minutes but just lying on the sand and feeling the ground and looking up at the sky and that's when I can get into that thing of, you know, the ground gives us so much energy. And it's rare that we feel grounded by the ground giving us something. It sounds I'm now going to get woo woo, but I felt it. I really felt it. So it's like, we can do that for 10 minutes. And it will do something very strong for us. And you'll feel the wind and you'll feel that earth elements. And when I am empty, I need the earth elements. I need to lie on the grass. I need to look at the sky.

Trini, speaking of your daughter, Lila, I did read that up until about 35, you didn't ever really have a strong desire to be a mom. And I think that's something a lot of people, myself included, would resonate with. What do you think changed for you? I don't know. I think like, I didn't know if I'd be a good mother. I had a complicated relationship with my mother. So those things impacted my thoughts around it. And I had friends who had all started to have kids, more than friends who hadn't had kids. and it was probably Susanna who when I saw how she was as a mother and I'd known her before she was a mother and I saw how she was and sometimes her being a mother frustrated me tremendously because we started an online business in 99 and you know I was a chronic workaholic and she was you know at 8 30 I'll call and say where are you said I'm breastfeeding and I said well when are you going to be in I mean there was a total disregard for the fact that she was a mother it angered me that there was this thing that got in the way of us building a business I'm

being very candid but that was my thought at the time and also it made something underneath really deep uncomfortable you know and I hadn't I sort of knew that maybe I couldn't have a child I haven't really said this before but I didn't have any I didn't take the pill from 30 since I was with my partner and I just you know I had never got pregnant so by 35 there was probably a part of me that actually thought I probably won't have a child and then I saw Susanna being an incredible mother and she's an unbelievably giving woman Susanna and she's a very chilled mother incredibly chilled and she's got three amazing children and I just then you know when you're around somebody where it just lets you think what is that concept like would I like that concept in my life

and so I then thought actually I would and then a few years later I had Lila. And there you go. I think so many people can relate to that because I do think that for so many women, you just expect that this pull of motherhood is going to hit you, that you're going to, that it's going to come and all of a sudden you're going to know when you want to have children. But if you're also someone who's incredibly career ambitious, it does feel like you have to give one up for the other. You grapple with that debate in your head almost. But also let's just talk about the fact that you don't have to be a mother. Yeah.

Because I really just want to bring that up. And like one of my closest friends is not a mother. and well two of my closest friends are not mothers and won't be and there is a judgment around it someday a woman will be a parent and there's also many ways you can be a parent and a friend of mine a newer friend of mine who had been on a huge fertility journey and I had a conversation with her which she shared but just to maybe make a decision to let go of the traditional way you thought you'd be a parent it's a release that you're not going to be it's like when somebody is left by someone and you go congratulations because ultimately it's going to be the best thing for you and so i think we have to be very aware that it's not this automatic thing and in

and the way we have this conversation can make some women feel very uncomfortable when they feel it has to be that that has to be a part of the picture just last week spoke to elizabeth day about this. Oh, that's who I'm talking about. You know, when you were speaking about it and the way you were talking, I thought, I wonder if you're speaking about Elizabeth Day. She spoke about it so beautifully, but you also just took the words literally out of my mouth. It was only a few weeks ago that I had said, because I'm having my own fertility problems at the moment. I've just tried to take eggs. I got none. Like I'm having my own struggles, but I said exactly what you just said is I wonder if me saying, I don't know if I want to be a mother is because deep down you think it

might not happen so it's almost like a protection thing you think if my body's not going to give it to me i might say i don't really know if i've had that maternal pull anyway it's it's a protection i think it's at the beginning of that fertility it's definitely the way that you will protect the journey that you're going to go through and elizabeth went on a long journey and i went on a long journey and i won't speak for her but you had the conversation with her so it is one that it will protect you to be able to go through the journey for some people you know and sometimes we need that. When I was doing fertility and I did 16 IVFs, but nine to have Lila, I had that sense of it will never happen, but it will never not happen. I lived in this limbo land. So

I never imagined myself as a mother, but I didn't imagine that I wouldn't be a mother. It was that kind of, you know, and it went back and forth and I lost a few babies and then I got Lila, but it might not have been that that was my path. I could talk to you forever, but I know we've got to let you go because you're a busy woman. I think we should just finish with, for all those women out there that are wanting to start a business or that already have a small business but want to further it, what is your overarching piece of advice? I first of all want to say it is appalling how unsupported women entrepreneurs are in Australia because I gave a dinner for CEOs in Melbourne last year and they were talking about, there was one investor there and people who have

some really great businesses, a woman who founded Triangle who no longer is involved in it, some other women as well and we just went around the table and I had said you know let's not just chat about who our friends are what are the problems we're going to bring to the table and there were some very young founders there and then some more experienced ones with a higher turnover in their business but I think it's having a network of people around you who are on the journey as well is important because when you are wanting to start your own business it's very lonely there is only you you might be starting business with somebody else like I did with Susanna but when I started Trini London it was me and I built up a team but there was always going to bed that night it was

where am I going with this and what you know is my intuition right so the few things I'd say from starting a business where I did the wrong things to starting it where it's grown well are that when I had my original idea for the other business I was so unconfident in my ability to do other things like I didn't know enough about tech or how to market a brand or monetization that I hired quite quickly I'd got investment and I had hired quite quickly people who were very much experts in that field but then the direction of where the business should go in a way was diluted from my initial idea because I didn't have enough time by myself really understanding what am I doing who am I doing it for who is my customer how am I getting to her and and knowing that so well so

when I started Trini London, we were a very small team. And the next year, we were a little bit bigger. I knew what everyone was doing on their laptop around the table. And then slowly, we brought in people who had, you know, they knew how to do performance marketing, or they knew how to do building the algorithm, you know, things that I did not know how to do, but I knew we needed. And so it's having people who can inspire you, it's having a network of people who, you know, there are many female networks it's also having access to understanding how you can fundraise if you need to fundraise and you can't self-fund and what you can do and what schemes there are so there's a lot of work to be done but above everything it's that you never know what's behind the closed door and

what I mean by this is there will be days when you just think you kind of build the future out to think it's just not going to happen because we'll put these kind of negatives in front of ourselves if we're having a really bad day and when i was building trendy london i had days like that and then something unexpected would happen and it would come out of nowhere but it didn't really come out of nowhere because i did put the work in and when we go back to this thing of the manifestation you know a part of the success of thinking i want this to be my future is imagine the journey and it's going to be tough but it's going to be amazing but it will be tough and you have to feel that journey so if you're going to be the marathon runner you have to imagine getting

up at 4 a.m in the snow with your ankle that hurts and still doing it so it's not a quick fix there's a lot of people that maybe become instagram stars or they're an influencer but and they might then turn that into a really proper grown-up business which they have till they're you know 80 all right but there are some people who would do it for a bit and then go on something else but you have to get up every day and it has to be at the front of your mind and you have to sacrifice stuff it's a commitment it's a real commitment and it has incredible rewards but you're always going to be on that journey you'll never you're never going to feel I'm a hundred percent fulfilled just from experience you're always going to feel of what there is yet to do

I mean this is me and that's what drives me a bit so you've got to decide is that for you is that for your character is that who you are because there are there are other amazing roles out there own careers out there. It's not for everyone. And it's never a nine to five. It's a 20. What's that saying? It's like, I quit my nine to five to work 24 hours a day. That's exactly it. Trenny, thank you so much for your time, for your generosity, for your story. We absolutely adore you. And we're so grateful to have you on the pod. We feel very lucky that you came in to chat with us today. Well, I loved chatting to you both. It was fantastic. Thank you. Guys, if you are listening to this on the day of release, we have the Gold Coast show tonight, but then next week

We have our very last two shows. I can't believe the tour is coming to an end already. That's the whole month. We have Canberra and then straight to Brisbane both next week. So if you are in either of those places, we have amazing guests. The show is amazing and that is us done for the year. So please come. And also tomorrow we have our Ask Uncut episode coming out.

So if you have a question for Ask Uncut, slide on into the DMs. You can send it to us. Just put Ask Uncut at the top. If you have your accidentally unfiltered stories or anything else that you want to share with you can slide on into the dms at life uncut podcast and also follow us at the life uncut discussion group on facebook and don't forget tell your mom tell your dad tell your dog tell your friends and share the love because we love love