NBC Nightly News with Tom Llamas - American Dreaming with José Díaz-Balart: Lele Pons

Episode Date: September 12, 2020

Lele Pons is one of the most influential digital creators in the world today. Through creativity, hard work and determination, Pons is learning to take charge of her mental illness.

Tell me, Lele, what does the American dream mean to you? I think it means opportunity and freedom. I am so pleased and so happy to be with Lele Pons today. Lele, it's great to see you. Thank you. Great to see you too. When you were 16, you really kind of found Vine when you were in high school. Yeah. And then you ended up this phenomenon.

I mean, the first to reach a billion loops on Vine. And then from there, you just kind of shot up into our consciousness. And now, you know, 42 million followers on Instagram, 17 million followers on YouTube. It came like supernatural. Like, you know, it's just like it came because it was something that I was doing fun. And then it became like, um, like work. I went to, uh, Berkeley, um, Berkeley and Boston music school. I went there, uh, as a summer program. And, uh, that was before I did Vine. So I had my whole life planned out. So to have Vine come, come in the way, my mom was just like, what is this app?

And my dad was like, what is this app? And I was like, I don't know, but it's working. And I like what I'm doing. And, you know, and then it became a business. And I turned it into like, let's say a mini empire. Like, you know, I went from Vine to then YouTube and Instagram. And you, early on when you were in Vine really, you were kind of laughing at yourself. I was laughing at myself the whole time.

What now? You are eminently successful through these apps. I mean, this is, you know, you make a very good living out of these apps, right? A stable living, yes. But in the beginning, I didn't know that this was possible. You have a podcast coming up. Yes, I'm really excited for that. I get two anonymous callers

and people come to me and tell me their secrets. Relax the toes, there we go, there we go. Just hang in there. In this documentary that you just, you executive produced and you put out on YouTube, The Secret Life of Billy Phones, you know, you executive produced and you put out on YouTube, The Secret Life of Billy Pons. You know, you talk with such honesty and such strength about living with OCD,

Tourette's, depression. Those are things that have really been with you pretty much all your life. And it's a constant issue in your life. No, it is. And it's something that people are not going to see it's something that I thought it was time for me to show that little thing that no one was seeing because I owe it to a lot of fans of mine because they also share their life and their stories and I

never got to share it like my side it's always like oh perfect filters and and videos and in cute pictures but like I wanted to kind of show them an unfiltered thing. Also, how important it is to take care of your mental health. And you say in there, I mean, if your parents tell you to deal with issues, even though you think, I'm okay, I've got it, I'm fine, you need to do something about it. Yeah, yeah. I have many times I was like, no, I can control it. I'm good. You need to do something about it. Yeah. Yeah. I have many times I was like, no, I don't, I can control it.

I'm good. You're not good. How do you do it when you've got, you know, in your documentary, I was seeing how sometimes you just, it's difficult to continue on without, for example, a tick or, or, or repeating issues over and over again. Then how do you walk on to the, you know, Telemundo Awards? How do you accomplish that?

So I, what I do is I do a wiggle break. Before anything I do, before I walk into a red carpet, I start touching, like, I let it all out. I let it all out. I scream and I do everything. And then I put my, I mean, I've learned how to do that, though. You know, I've learned for nine years how to do that. And then because like red carpets shows are just an hour. And then the rest of the day, I do everything else, you know, but in an hour,

I'm just like, hold it in together, you know, think I drink my medicine. So it just, you know, it helps me kind of manage it better. But when I'm alone, that's when it's mostly like I start doing a lot of like my rituals. What would you tell a kid that is dealing with mental health issues? I would tell them that they are not alone, that your mental health does not define you. You're better than that. And then go to therapy try to understand your what you have you know to understand what you have and to read about what you're dealing with is going to help you understand that it's not you there's something

in your brain that's telling you to do stuff and and um you are not your your mental health you left venezuela at five um you've always kept Venezuela in your heart, right? Yeah. And you're very proud of being a Latina. Yeah, because, you know, people are like, oh, she's, you know, she grew up here, basically, so she's not. I mean, you know, I came here because my family was kidnapped, you know. I didn't want to come to America. You know, I was five.

I was very happy where I was with my family was kidnapped. You know, I didn't want to come to America. You know, I was five. I was very happy with where I was with my, my, my family. But you know, once you have, once you go through that and, and, and I went through a hard time as well, like my family and we came here, you have to adapt, you know, and thank God. And I'm so grateful that my mom and my dad has never have never like stopped teaching me everything about Venezuela. And they always say like, be proud of where you come from. This is, this is like, they show me pictures and everything because they knew what was going to happen, you know? And, um, I was very young and, but I still do remember because I would go back and forth though, that that will always be in my heart. What are you proudest about being a Latina?

What I'm proudest about? I feel like we're the best adapters. Music, you know, music, movies, food, fashion, everything. It's just like we really do conquer the world somehow. We're there. And we're sometimes we're even the best. I don't know. I just think that being Latina is just like a cool club that thank god I was born in it's just you know what's the attitude to the

attitude like how fresh you are one of the things that I so enjoyed is seeing you for the Venezuela aid concert that was held there on the Colombia-Venezuela border. And you went, and you went with your dad and your team. Hola, Venezuela! And I was so proud of you when, in the moment that you had to be up there, and the pressure must have been, like, you know, amazing, that you talked about freedom, you know?

It was hard for me, you know, because I felt so out of place when I went there because I had that opportunity of freedom when I was five, you know? But everybody else didn't. And I felt kind of like, wow, like I'm so privileged. Like, you know, like, I felt kind of guilty, you know? Like, who am I to talk to these people about anything?

So I was just like, well, this is all I can say is that we're going to fight for everybody to have this freedom. Tell me, Lele, what does the American dream mean to you? I think it means opportunity and freedom. It's just open doors. I think that's the American dream. Open doors, do what you want to do. And there's ways to do it. There's, as I said, opportunities to do it. I think that's the American dream. Open doors, do what you want to do. And there's ways to do it. There's, as I said, opportunities to do it. I think that's the American dream. Thank you. It's been wonderful to speak with you and I wish you all the best.

Thank you.