Jessica Alba Is Standing in Her Power [VIDEO]

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Speaker 2 If I'm gonna die, I would like to die in my bed old and then fade away. That's that's preferable.
Now, if I had to choose, they force me.

Speaker 2 They said, Trevor, you're gonna get shot or are you gonna get stabbed? What would you choose? I would choose stabbed.

Speaker 2 Oh, just because I feel like there's a there's like an intimate moment between myself and the person stabbing me. Oh, okay.
You know what I mean? Where I can like look and you say something.

Speaker 2 That's what I like. You get to say something.
If you're shot, it might just be over. It's very loud.
It's done. Yeah, it is loud.

Speaker 2 When you're stabbed, I can just like look at the person and say something. Oh,

Speaker 2 it was you all along. I like that.
I like that moment.

Speaker 2 This is What Now

Speaker 2 with Trevor Noah.

Speaker 2 Hi, Jessica Alba.

Speaker 3 Hi. Haven't done an interview in a really long time.
I'm a little bit nervous.

Speaker 2 You haven't?

Speaker 2 Well, don't think of it as an interview. Think of it as a conversation.
If it's an interview, then I've failed.

Speaker 3 I haven't had a conversation in a really long time.

Speaker 2 I'm feeling really nervous.

Speaker 2 Oh, it's hilarious. So like in most conversations, I wouldn't introduce you, but

Speaker 2 let's say there was a third person here and they just walked up. And then I would say, oh, hey, hey, viewer.
Let's say my friend was viewer or listener. Hey, viewer, listener.
Very strange name.

Speaker 2 Their parents wanted something interesting that would get people talking. Hey, viewer listener.
What's up? Oh, yeah. No, nice to see you.
Oh, this is my friend. This is my friend Jessica.

Speaker 2 Yeah, Jessica. She,

Speaker 2 yeah, yeah, known her for years. She does a bunch of things.
You know,

Speaker 2 she acts when she wants to, really.

Speaker 2 You know, she starts like companies that make, you know, hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars, but also make people feel good about the products they're using.

Speaker 2 I stand to be corrected, but honest was the first time I even heard conversations around like, you know, paraben-free and all these, like, something free. And I remember there was all these words.

Speaker 2 I didn't understand them. I didn't know

Speaker 2 all of it. It was just like all these words.
I was like, I was like, I don't know what these things are. Wait, they're in the other things we use? What, what's happening here? Yeah.

Speaker 2 And yeah, and she's a very smart person. She's very thoughtful.
She's also very funny. She doesn't take herself too seriously.

Speaker 2 You two should get to know each other. You don't know each.
Oh, you have heard. Oh, Jessica Alba.
Yes. Yes, that's it's the same Jessica.
That's how I would introduce you.

Speaker 2 Oh, this is the conversation. So, hi, Jessica Alba.
Hi, hi, viewer person

Speaker 2 as well. I hope I've made it.
Is it completely not awkward now? No, it's totally awkward.

Speaker 3 Thank you, Trevor.

Speaker 2 I tried my best.

Speaker 2 I tried my best. Welcome.
Welcome to

Speaker 2 the conversation.

Speaker 2 I'm very excited because

Speaker 2 you

Speaker 2 were acting and you were blowing up at a time when I was watching things.

Speaker 2 Like on so you know, like I feel like in life.

Speaker 3 You didn't watch anything.

Speaker 2 No, I actually didn't really. I didn't really.
So, yeah, so I grew up in a very strict family. Like, my mom was very religious, very strict.
So she limited what I could watch. Oh, yeah.

Speaker 2 So, like, I couldn't watch The Simpsons when I was young because my mom,

Speaker 2 this is crazy. My mom saw a bumper sticker of Bart Simpson pulling the finger.
And then she was like, she remembered that. She like that little yellow thing pulled the finger.

Speaker 2 And then somewhere, someone wrote an article that the Ninja Turtles and Bart Simpson were

Speaker 2 Satanistic. And so my mom wouldn't allow me to watch any of that.

Speaker 2 And so, yeah, so I had a very limited.

Speaker 3 You were deprived.

Speaker 2 I was. I was very limited.
And then I got to a certain age, and my mom was like, you're now free to watch whatever you want. And then, boom, there you were on your motorbike, Dark Angel.

Speaker 2 And I remember having every feeling as a human being. And I was just like, this is the greatest experience of my life.
And that's why I'm so excited because now you're back into it.

Speaker 2 So maybe let's start with that. How does it feel? How does it feel coming back into a world that you have so many feelings about? Positive, negative, lukewarm, neutral.
You know, how does it feel?

Speaker 2 Jessica Alba's back as an action star.

Speaker 3 I feel so official when you say it for some reason.

Speaker 3 So

Speaker 3 when I'm on a set, it feels like home.

Speaker 3 It feels like

Speaker 3 I'm with my people. I think because I maybe because I grew up in my early years on a military base and I started acting so young,

Speaker 3 being on a set and that like nomadic life. And essentially, you're like circus people, right? It's all the sort of like freaks and weirdos of their family are who end up usually in the business.
And

Speaker 3 they just feel like my people. They feel like home.

Speaker 2 You've always, you know what it is? It's like you're not just. Somebody who wants to act in action films.

Speaker 2 It's almost like you're an action aficionado who likes the integrity of what's happening in the fight and what's going on behind the scenes.

Speaker 2 So, talk to me a little bit about that. Like, what is it about action in particular that

Speaker 2 you enjoy?

Speaker 3 I think because I grew up on like

Speaker 3 Lethal Weapon and Beverly Hills Cop. And like, okay, you know, I loved

Speaker 3 that genre growing up. And, and it was always men who got to do it and they were saving the chick.
And I was like, what if the chick was the main event here?

Speaker 2 What if the chick was saving herself? No.

Speaker 2 What?

Speaker 3 Yeah. And so I, and then James Cameron picked me when I was 17, you know, out of thousands of

Speaker 3 people to, to really be the star of this wild

Speaker 3 idea, which is this post-apocalyptic dystopian future where there's genetically engineered.

Speaker 3 humans and I was in the writer's room with them because they only had three paragraphs written when they hired me.

Speaker 3 And they wrote the character and the rest of the story kind of around who they were going to cast. And I think because they gave me a seat at the table when I was 17

Speaker 3 and I trained with stunt people, so I'm a trained stunt person, essentially. I don't know.
I feel like that's probably

Speaker 3 where I feel most comfortable. I never felt comfortable in Hollywood settings, like more traditional Hollywood, where we've met, you know, at the Vanity Fair Party or the Golden Clubs or that.

Speaker 3 that's where I always felt wildly uncomfortable, but I've always felt really comfortable on a set.

Speaker 2 You felt like uncomfortable in those settings? Oh, yeah. Wait, why?

Speaker 2 You seem like you fit in. No,

Speaker 3 no, I don't know. I just never was part of, never really had like a crew or like a group of people or a community.

Speaker 3 Yeah. And I think because the nature of being a young actress and how they brainwash us is that we should be competitive with one another.

Speaker 3 You know, and I think that that breeds a bit of like isolation in a way. But I always felt like I was competing against men.
I never felt like I was competing against other women.

Speaker 3 I was always excited if there was another chick around. You know, I was like, yes.

Speaker 2 Did you feel that that was reciprocated at the time? And do you feel like it's changed since?

Speaker 3 I don't think women really got me until after had

Speaker 3 created a company, it was successful, and had a bunch of kids. I think that's when women and I and I worked really hard on

Speaker 3 trying to make sure that women knew that I am a girl's girl, you know? Right. Because if I just allowed PR

Speaker 2 of

Speaker 3 projects that I was in

Speaker 3 tell the story of who I was, it was really like a fanboy fantasy kind of person, right? It wasn't, there was no real truth there.

Speaker 2 I've always wondered what that felt like from your side. You know, as

Speaker 2 a human being, you're having an experience. And oftentimes, what we take for granted is the experience that we're having of other people isn't necessarily what they're having of themselves.

Speaker 2 Yeah, never. So you were in the industry, you're in Hollywood at a time when it's rarely curated.
There was no social media.

Speaker 2 There was no way for you to speak to your fans or to your audience or to anybody on the outside. And

Speaker 2 I like that you say that, that fanboy image.

Speaker 2 You know, did you ever feel like you were being pigeonholed or put into a specific space where it's like, you know, Jessica LB, you have to be the sex bomb that's looking like this in the leather pants, and this is the only way you can exist?

Speaker 3 I think that no matter what role, whether I was doing like a dance movie, you know, to inspire young girls like Honey, or if I was Dark Angel, where I was a genetically engineered like super human or if I was Sue Storm who was a very like maternal kind of superhero they would always

Speaker 3 feel like they needed to sell me to the fanboys in a certain way and it wasn't just me it was all of us right at the time right and so yes there were like two or three of these men's magazines that we would all do to you know

Speaker 3 try and get those fanboys to go and show up and watch whatever it is that we were selling But I would always try to do three to four women's magazines.

Speaker 3 So, for every one guys, I would do three to four women's to try and keep the balance there. You have to be strategic.
And I think it taught me when I thought about longevity in the business.

Speaker 3 I think

Speaker 3 being portrayed that way forced me to be even more strategic, probably in a very early age.

Speaker 2 I went back and looked at some of your early interviews, and

Speaker 3 I'm so embarrassed.

Speaker 2 No, you shouldn't be because it's really interesting to see that that trait

Speaker 2 is even evident back then.

Speaker 2 In some of your earliest interviews, you talk about wanting to be a producer, you talk about wanting to get behind the camera, you talk about wanting to control the environment that you're in.

Speaker 2 And back then, I'm sure if people read it and saw it, it would just seem like a nice thing to say.

Speaker 2 But when we look at Hollywood and the industry in hindsight now, you know, everything, the Harvey Weinsteins, the Me Too movement, looking at the insidious nature of agents and what was happening and, you know what I mean?

Speaker 2 When we look at it now, and I go back and read some of your interviews, it almost seems like you were sometimes either prescient or you were speaking through what was happening and you were trying to say, hey, I would like to have a little control so that I'm not at the mercy of this machine.

Speaker 2 Did you feel at times or

Speaker 2 or did it seem that you couldn't be everything you wanted to be in the industry? And you absolutely just had to be one idea?

Speaker 3 Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 3 I think it's difficult for people, once they have, I think, an idea of who you are in their mind and they've put you in Maxim, and you're in Esquire and GQ, and you know, they have you in those things, it's tough for them to imagine that you could be intelligent, that you could have a soul, that you could have depth of emotions or be dynamic in any way.

Speaker 3 And I think I also had to wrestle with

Speaker 3 those stereotypes, even on myself.

Speaker 3 It took me probably three years after I found it honest

Speaker 3 until I really started to embrace the notion that I could be smart.

Speaker 2 Wow. The notion that you could be smart.
Yeah.

Speaker 3 I allowed

Speaker 3 my co-founders who I brought on and who I pitched them the idea, but I I let them take credit for

Speaker 3 finding me, even though it was the other way around.

Speaker 2 Wow.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 I didn't actively change that narrative for a long time.

Speaker 2 Where do you think that came from or what do you think that was? Because many people, I think, can identify or relate to

Speaker 2 being in an environment, whether it's in the office, you know, whether it's in starting a company, whether it's even on a small level in a friend group sometimes, you know, where people feel like they aren't credited with who they are, what they've brought to the table.

Speaker 2 Where do you think that came from?

Speaker 3 I've tried to unpack this

Speaker 3 a bit, that years of therapy and everything. I think it really has to do with my family growing up in a very racist and segregated environment.

Speaker 3 You know, my grandfather and my grandmother having to assimilate them having to

Speaker 3 essentially brainwash and train their children into believing

Speaker 3 that they

Speaker 3 don't have brown skin in a way, you know, so that they can get through the day or life

Speaker 3 without feeling the

Speaker 3 restrictions of what that meant. You know, my dad was six, I think, when they were

Speaker 3 when segregation kind of stopped between Mexicans and whites in Southern California. And he has a lot of shame around what that means and

Speaker 3 how he has always been treated. You know, he's undeniably Mexican.
I asked him not too long ago, I was like,

Speaker 3 dad, when there's like

Speaker 3 cops looking for a brown guy running through Claremont, do you get stopped? And he's like, probably

Speaker 3 every time.

Speaker 3 And because we were talking about voting.

Speaker 2 And I was like, you know, dad, I think you might be voting for the wrong side.

Speaker 3 You know, just trying to like ease him into voting differently. I'm like, do you get stopped extra every time you go to the airport? And he's like, yes, 100%.

Speaker 3 And I was like, so maybe we should start thinking about maybe voting differently for someone who kind of under, you know, maybe a party that is more sympathetic towards what it's like to walk through the world being you.

Speaker 3 It is funny.

Speaker 3 Knowing that that is my history now when I think of like, oh yeah, this is why it took me three years for me to even embrace this idea that I could be intelligent, that I deserve what I've worked for and stand in my power in a way.

Speaker 3 Yeah. It took me a while.

Speaker 2 When you're working from the age of 12, I can only imagine.

Speaker 2 that you miss out on a lot of childhood. You know, my mom always used to say to me, she would

Speaker 2 to me, she'd like force me to play. Not that you had to, but my mom would say to me, she'd be like, I honey, go and go and do things.
Go and play, go and play. That's good.
Good, good, good.

Speaker 2 And then when I was a little older, and I'd be like buying things, I'd buy like a flashy car or I'd get like a trashy car and I'd put rims on it that really didn't match what was happening.

Speaker 2 And my mom would see it. And then she'd be like, no, good, good.
And I, it was almost like she was roasting me a little bit without realizing it. She'd be like, she'd be like, oh, I can see you.

Speaker 2 You needed to put earrings on an ugly person to make it look better. I see what you did there, baby.
And I'd be like, what? And she's like, no, no, do it, do it. She said, it's good.

Speaker 2 You should play now as a boy so that when you're a man, you don't try to live the life that you didn't get when you were younger. Go ahead.
Go ahead. Be a boy.
Be a boy.

Speaker 2 And I'm like driving away with my rims. Like, I don't think that was a compliment.
But

Speaker 2 it did always stick with me. You know, what the thing that my mom was saying was, she was saying,

Speaker 2 there are stages in life where

Speaker 2 you need to be living according to that stage. And I've always wondered about, especially, you know,

Speaker 2 actors who act from a young age, it looks like it's fun, but it's still work.

Speaker 2 Did that rob you or did that

Speaker 2 shift your ability to be a child? Have you been able to experience childhood in any way?

Speaker 3 Yes, I think I do it through my kids.

Speaker 2 Oh, I love that. Yeah.

Speaker 3 So

Speaker 3 I feel like I have given them the life I didn't have. And so I get to be present with them and live through their eyes and sit with them and allow them to really be kids and be have temper tantrums.

Speaker 3 And I'm still there, you know, hold space for them and then let them be joyful and silly and goofy and all that. Yeah.

Speaker 2 What's the your favorite thing you've experienced through your kids' eyes? Something that you never got to experience?

Speaker 3 I don't think my parents did this on purpose. And so I don't want them to take it the wrong way.

Speaker 3 I always felt a layer of cynicism whenever I was being

Speaker 3 completely me, when I was uninhibited. There was always a

Speaker 3 comment.

Speaker 3 I don't know if I ever really felt

Speaker 3 the freedom of just being me.

Speaker 3 So every moment that my kids exist is great because they're just being them. And it's like

Speaker 3 beautiful because they're all very different, but they get to just be them. And I'm not in any way kind of confining that or putting them in a box.

Speaker 3 I felt like I never really had that freedom. And I think that's why actually I started acting so young because it gave me the freedom to be someone else.

Speaker 2 Do you, do you still have that joy and that passion? Like

Speaker 2 you've come back, which

Speaker 2 I might be wrong, but I would assume means

Speaker 2 there is a joy and there's a passion that you find in acting that's special.

Speaker 3 There's something cathartic, I think,

Speaker 3 about

Speaker 3 yes, it's written and there's a script and there's a character and there's other actors, but there's something about

Speaker 3 this moment that you create with people.

Speaker 3 And the fact that I get to be in someone else's skin gives me this freedom.

Speaker 3 It's very liberating it forces me to be wildly present and i think um i'm not sure outside of my children anything else that that does that it's it's awesome i hope to do it more um

Speaker 2 but only work with people i love instead of assholes i think i mean that's that's a great way to be i think that's where i'm that's where i'm going that's a great way to be in trigger warning you you you're playing person who's really really an expert in...

Speaker 2 What military division were they in? What do you mean?

Speaker 3 She's special forces. Special Forces.

Speaker 2 All right. And, you know, she comes back home.
She's lost her father. But it's interesting.
Like, when I first saw the synopsis, I was like, okay, I think I know what this movie will look like.

Speaker 2 And that's the key thing. What it'll look like, what it'll feel like.

Speaker 2 But in many of the scenes. It feels a little grittier.
It feels a little more real.

Speaker 2 It feels like you've always wanted to make this kind of action movie where

Speaker 2 the action is almost happening in the world of a real character as opposed to a character who's just there in service of the action.

Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah, that's exactly it. We're going to have amazing action sequences and it's going to be fun, right?

Speaker 3 But to me, it's always more fun if you could really feel a connection or invested in the story. Yeah.
It makes the payoff in the action that much more gratifying if you're invested in some way.

Speaker 2 Do you like getting kicked and punched?

Speaker 1 I like doing the kick.

Speaker 2 If someone clicks that, it's going to come off very wrong. Context, context, context.

Speaker 2 In films, I will state that all again. In film.
In film only. Do you enjoy being film only? No, because you would get bruised.

Speaker 2 Like back in the day,

Speaker 3 I could sell a punch. I don't like it when they accidentally hit.
That sucks.

Speaker 2 Did you get fewer or more injuries filming trigger warning than you did in previous films? Because you've done everything. Graham Magar,

Speaker 2 and there's like knife fighting in the, but like a specific type of knife knife fighting.

Speaker 3 Indonesian, because uh, well, the director is Indonesian. So I love that.
Okay. So she was like familiar with this specific type of knife fighting.

Speaker 3 And what's good about it is you can be small and you can take down big people.

Speaker 3 And so it's a certain technique that would make it believable that I could take down, you know, big men.

Speaker 3 Oh, and so that's, I wanted, and I wanted to not, I mean, it's kind of a vulgar way of saying it, but if you know you're doing an action movie, movie, you know people are going to probably get injured,

Speaker 3 I prefer to do it with a knife

Speaker 3 versus a gun.

Speaker 2 Oh, say more. Now I'm intrigued.
Jessica Albo would like to stab you, not shoot you. Why?

Speaker 3 Because I just feel like it's too easy.

Speaker 2 Guns almost feel like a cop-out in a way. Oh, wow.

Speaker 3 Like, you don't need skill, really. I mean, you.

Speaker 2 No, no, I know what you mean.

Speaker 2 You don't.

Speaker 3 I think it's more fun to stab someone.

Speaker 2 We're going to continue this conversation right after this short break.

Speaker 2 You know,

Speaker 2 I was chatting to friends about this

Speaker 2 before our conversation, and I was like, it really is wild to think that there was a time when

Speaker 2 a celebrity slash well-known person, actor, singer, whatever you want to call it, there was a time when they would not be involved in anything business. It was just not possible.

Speaker 2 I mean, now it seems so obvious. People are like, I've got my tequila, I've got my clothing brand, I've got my makeup brand, I've got, everyone's like, yeah, you can do it.

Speaker 2 In fact, sometimes people just do it to do it now.

Speaker 2 There was a time when it was impossible. And you stepped into this world

Speaker 2 where

Speaker 2 nobody, and I mean, nobody thought it was possible because it really hadn't been done before. And you set out to create what went on to be a listed company.

Speaker 2 Talk me through that journey. Like when you, when you look back on it, what do you think it was that prompted you to step into a world that really wasn't sexy at the time?

Speaker 2 No, you know, and and the opposite. Yeah, and was the complete, the complete unknown.
When you, when you're starting a company, what, why did you want to do that?

Speaker 3 I have always been

Speaker 3 genuinely like

Speaker 3 keeps me up up at night, social justice

Speaker 2 warrior.

Speaker 3 I've always

Speaker 3 been since I was little. I mean, there's like a tape of me when I was five or six at Disneyland talking about being a feminist and a modern-day woman.
And I had this thick Texas accent.

Speaker 2 And I was like, I'm a feminist. I'm a modern woman.

Speaker 3 I don't need a man, you know, and I'm like this little kid spewing this stuff. Wow.

Speaker 2 And Mickey Mouse is standing there like in the background. I just want to know if if you want a picture or nothing.
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2 You crazy lady. Okay, calm down.
It was a little girl with like wild ideas. Where did you get them from? I

Speaker 3 don't. This is the nature versus nurture thing.
I have no idea. I came in with this

Speaker 3 with this idea that, you know, women needed to be treated with fairness and people who

Speaker 3 were poor shouldn't be treated inhumanely. Right.

Speaker 3 And I knew because my parents struggled in the paycheck to paycheck how lucky I was as a kid to get the type of care I got with my health because my dad was in the military.

Speaker 3 So that gave us medical and they paid for housing. And so that really helped with the fact that he made like 14,000 a year.
Right. You know?

Speaker 3 And so,

Speaker 3 yeah, from very early age, I would say, if I get to be successful, I'm going to do something good with my life and use me to make a difference.

Speaker 3 And then when I learned about people getting poisoned from their everyday products without knowing about it, I lobbied on Capitol Hill. I like did everything I could to try and bring awareness to it.

Speaker 3 But the only way to really change habits is to create a solution. And if I can get people to choose to buy the better thing,

Speaker 3 then it can hopefully make an influence on the industry to do it it better because they can see that this is what the consumer wants. Yeah.

Speaker 2 I can't see you walking into many rooms back then without the resume you have now and without the industry changing the way it does now.

Speaker 2 You know, one of the more interesting stories I remember being told was

Speaker 2 there was somebody who was trying to pitch a makeup brand for darker skin tones. And they were told, oh, no, but.
black women don't really buy makeup.

Speaker 2 And the person was like, yeah, because there's no makeup for black women. And they were like, no, I think black women don't buy makeup.
And then Rihanna comes along with Fenty. And now everyone goes,

Speaker 2 we've got to get into the space. It's huge.
It's growing. And it's like, oh, so you had to see it before you believed that the people existed.

Speaker 3 So I had to first educate the consumer. Then I had to get them to want to buy after I educated them.
And

Speaker 3 it kind of took off like a rocket ship.

Speaker 2 Let me start by asking you the end question.

Speaker 2 One of the more fascinating things I ever heard was: it was Jensen Huang, the CEO of Nvidia, who is now easily like one of the most powerful people in the world because he's essentially controlling how AI is going to move.

Speaker 2 But someone asked him, they said, hey, if you could do it again, and if you were talking to somebody else who was going to do it, what advice would you give them? And he says, don't.

Speaker 2 Same. And I remember hearing this and being like, wait, what? And he's like, don't do it.

Speaker 2 He said, if I knew everything I knew today about what it took to get this company going, going, to keep it going and to get where I got to today, I would say don't do it.

Speaker 2 Too much pain, too much blood, too much sweat, too many tears, too many disappointments. Don't do it.

Speaker 2 And there's a strange like tiredness that you'll feel in people, founders particularly, founders, who have been there from the beginning, who've had to grow something into this, you know, this, this idea more than just a company.

Speaker 3 Yeah, it is an idea.

Speaker 2 Like, what advice would you give to yourself knowing if you, you know, you're in that interstellar moment and you're seeing young Jessica Elbo, who's about to go into honest, what advice would you give to her?

Speaker 3 Stop looking to men for validation.

Speaker 2 Damn.

Speaker 2 Wow.

Speaker 2 Huh.

Speaker 2 How do you think that played out

Speaker 2 in a company structure?

Speaker 3 I think

Speaker 3 in a company structure,

Speaker 3 I kept feeling like I needed to, it was like the

Speaker 3 cat chasing its tail in a way.

Speaker 3 I knew intuitively

Speaker 3 what this company was created for,

Speaker 3 why it existed, why it mattered.

Speaker 3 Most people who came in

Speaker 3 didn't understand any of it and needed to collect data to justify

Speaker 3 them wanting to

Speaker 3 participate in the success of what it was

Speaker 3 because they didn't understand,

Speaker 3 frankly, the consumer and why the consumer would want this. And to me, it was so obvious, but to them, it was mind-blowing.
So from day one of pitching it all the way through to,

Speaker 3 I mean,

Speaker 3 still,

Speaker 3 it's a lot easier now. It's a lot easier.
I'm not going to affront, it's a lot easier now. But I think they learn in business school that unless a McKinsey study or a there's a study to

Speaker 3 verify that this is a smart choice, like they're afraid of their own shadow in some ways. Yeah.
And it also makes it's, I think it's how they got promoted. It was by

Speaker 3 saying, well, what does the data say about blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But usually by the time data is collected, it's too late.
It's not fresh anymore.

Speaker 2 Right.

Speaker 3 And so if you're doing anything that's paving the way or changing or truly disruptive, you can't collect any data and you have to just trust the leader.

Speaker 3 And if the leader looks like somebody that they've never worked for before,

Speaker 3 they can't help but just put you in the box that they understand.

Speaker 3 They can't help it. I used to get so upset that I felt undermined or undervalued or why are they fighting with me? Or why don't they just get it? Why am I even talking to them?

Speaker 3 You know, oftentimes they would say, let me go ask my wife. I mean, literally, this was like most of the time

Speaker 3 because they were so disconnected. And

Speaker 3 I think now I wouldn't be so angry and I would be more compassionate that they only know what they know.

Speaker 3 And society has warped their brain because frankly, I was like the chick that was in Maxim and Esquire and GQ and Rolling Stone, you know, like they only saw what they saw of me.

Speaker 3 And it's like, I think it's, it was hard for

Speaker 3 them to wrap their heads around it, you know? So they needed

Speaker 3 to also look at each other to validate. um or verify hey this is a legit thing that we need to to get behind but what's wonderful is the consumers

Speaker 3 were incredible and the growth was out of this world. It was hockey stick.
Then the company had to really

Speaker 3 beef itself up to keep up with the growth. And that was the next stage.
So the beginning was convincing people in the business world.

Speaker 3 The second stage was beefing up your internal team to really match the consumer, the consumption.

Speaker 3 And going from being like a, you know, $12 million business to $100 million business a year, you are a very different business, but that growth was fast.

Speaker 2 It was fast. It was unprecedented.
I'm sure at times it was scary. You know, it's funny when you talk about the dates.

Speaker 3 And we did, and I, my, they're going to say, did that happen? I can't verify anything happen. These are all hypothetical numbers.

Speaker 2 I'm like, I know lawyers are going to come after me. It's all hypothetical.
It's all hypothetical. We're saying, we're using like, it's like when you say 99% of people.
That's what we're saying.

Speaker 2 Hypothetical.

Speaker 2 Yes, yes, yes.

Speaker 2 I found myself wondering, I was like, wow, what is it like to experience that level of change? You know,

Speaker 2 the writer, Simon Sinak,

Speaker 2 had a fantastic idea where he talks about you understanding that there are two yous.

Speaker 2 There is the you as a human being, and then there is the you that is, for lack of a better term, the name badge, you know, the title.

Speaker 2 You know, here you are, it's Jessica Alba, and this is the position that you inhibit, whether it's, okay, you're the actress from this, or you are the, you know, the creative director of this listed company.

Speaker 2 There's a lot that comes with that title. Like with the daily show, it was like that for me.
It's like, okay,

Speaker 3 when your identity is so attached.

Speaker 2 Yeah, you know, and it doesn't always have to be your identity, how you see yourself. It's how people see you.

Speaker 2 And you go like, oh, if I'm going to say goodbye to this, am I also saying goodbye to people seeing me as a person?

Speaker 2 And I found myself wondering when I saw your announcement, I was like, wow, how do you know it's time to step away? What makes you step away?

Speaker 2 And how do you deal with the conflict of losing this thing that's such a big part of yourself?

Speaker 3 I wanted to leave it in a good place.

Speaker 3 When I realized that the business really needed the more kind of streamlined flow

Speaker 3 and not the visionary flow, I had to start thinking about what that meant for my role. And it took me a hot minute to get there.

Speaker 3 I needed to leave it in hands that I knew it would be safe and

Speaker 3 with the right team. And so I felt like I could finally,

Speaker 3 I can kind of like let my kid go off to college in a way, you know.

Speaker 3 But it's sad. It's sad because,

Speaker 3 yeah, it's a part of me. It's a child.

Speaker 3 So I even like thinking about my kids, all of my kids' first day of kindergarten, I weeped, you know, it's like, it's a milestone. I don't think it's ever easy.

Speaker 2 That's interesting.

Speaker 2 It's almost like, if I hear you correctly, you're saying it's

Speaker 2 the difficult balance of holding on to something that you love, but then also being able to let it go so that it can go on to the next stage of what it is.

Speaker 3 Where it's meant to go. Yeah.

Speaker 2 Huh.

Speaker 2 That is an interesting one.

Speaker 2 Does it leave you feeling like you instantly need to do something else?

Speaker 3 Kind of, but also at the same time,

Speaker 3 I think I really need to

Speaker 3 not do that. I think I need to just sit in this space of like nothingness.
You were talking about like learning a language and doing

Speaker 3 pottery and you know, just random creative creative that's all i need to do

Speaker 2 yeah um and and i feel like i'm in that state as well you jumped right into a podcast yeah well actually the podcast i didn't jump into what i jumped into was touring incessantly right right i went into a full year i was so afraid of what like the the gap that i had created that I wanted to just prop myself.

Speaker 2 I was like, well, I have to do something. And then I did everything.
I worked more the year after I left the daily show than I did at the daily show, which is wild. That is wild.
I was everywhere.

Speaker 2 I was nowhere.

Speaker 2 And it's only when I was deep in it that I realized I was like, oh man,

Speaker 2 what you were doing here was you were trying to run away from the silence. Stillness.

Speaker 3 Exactly.

Speaker 2 Yeah. You go back to the kids leaving the house.
It's the you're trying to run away from the house, not having something breaking, someone screaming, something being called, something.

Speaker 2 It's a scary feeling because you're not used to it. Yeah.

Speaker 3 Especially when you've been like so goal-oriented and hustling for so long. Yes.
Yeah, it's really really weird.

Speaker 2 How do you deal with your fear of

Speaker 2 validating yourself only by your achievements or the external things that people see?

Speaker 3 I mean, this is

Speaker 3 self-worth, right?

Speaker 3 It's weird. It's a weird journey thinking about,

Speaker 3 I guess, just this idea that I can be worthy of

Speaker 3 love or kindness or existence without achieving.

Speaker 3 You know, I remember when I was younger, I was like,

Speaker 3 I just always felt like I needed to have a point. Like, what's my point? Like, why do I exist? Like, why did God put me here?

Speaker 3 I questioned that since I was probably three or four.

Speaker 3 I would say, what's my point to my parents? Like, what's the point of this?

Speaker 3 And I think I've

Speaker 3 sometimes maybe my point or our point is to just,

Speaker 3 I don't know, sit in stillness and like breathe. And I don't know.
I'm learning how to do that. It's not easy.

Speaker 2 It isn't easy. I often think about how, you know, from a, from a human perspective, we are the people who are generally making or creating a point for other things that are just existing.

Speaker 2 So sometimes we'll look at a flower and we go, oh, the point of it is to look beautiful and to do. And the flower's like, oh, I'm just growing.

Speaker 2 That's all I. And we go, you, you, there's a point to this flower, and the flower's like, I didn't think of that.
I'm just growing. I just exist.

Speaker 2 And because of my very nature of my existence, I give and take. Right.
And so I'm worth being, you know? Yeah.

Speaker 2 Don't go anywhere because we got more. What now after this?

Speaker 2 I know that you spent a lot of time, and not a lot might sound wrong, but like you spent time with your kids in therapy, which again, when you started, this was a very new concept and new idea.

Speaker 3 Yeah, I didn't realize it was so controversial.

Speaker 2 Yeah, now people are like, let's talk about health, baby. Yeah, mental health.

Speaker 2 What are you doing? In your brain, it's like, now it's cool. Yeah, now it's cool.

Speaker 2 Yeah, there was a time. I was doing it early before they went talking about it.
Jessica Elba says, I'm going to therapy with my kids. And people are like, oh, what did she do to them?

Speaker 3 Yeah, it was really weird. It was kind of the first time I got that kind of backlash as a parent is.

Speaker 2 Have you been mom shamed? I've been, yeah, of course. Wow.

Speaker 3 Yeah, it's weird how people have like very strange, judgy perceptions, but I had a really tough

Speaker 3 adolescence and

Speaker 3 it was hard for me to find my way back to my mom. And we have a complicated,

Speaker 3 very loving, but complicated relationship. And I just wanted it to be easier between my girls and me and myself.

Speaker 3 I didn't want there to be years of fighting and misunderstanding and not and missing each other. You know, I wanted, I just wanted it to be different.

Speaker 3 So when I started seeing and feeling the, you just don't understand me thing. And I was like, I feel like I'm always scolding them and, you know,

Speaker 3 and they just feel like I don't get it.

Speaker 3 maybe this is a time where they can have a safe place where they can say whatever they want yeah they will not get in trouble and I have to be a listener and just try and figure out how to meet them where they need me so I can be a better parent that's beautiful I love that I love that because if I hear what you're saying, it's like in many ways, you're doing the thing or you wanted the thing that many of us take for granted.

Speaker 2 And that is the opportunity to interrupt the cycles that we experience in our families. You know, our inability to communicate, our conflict.
So

Speaker 2 it seems like you were trying to actively step in and change something that most people just go, like, well, that's the way our family is. Right.

Speaker 2 What was the one thing

Speaker 2 that you had to change or you had to learn from therapy that you were like shocked by? Because therapy always does that.

Speaker 2 It'll like show you a side of yourself that you didn't know or want to acknowledge. And then you have to go out into the world and

Speaker 2 face that.

Speaker 3 So I think because

Speaker 3 even though I was right.

Speaker 2 What a great beginning to essentially.

Speaker 3 Even though I'm right in many of these circumstances, it's not about being right.

Speaker 3 It's just about them feeling like they can express themselves authentically.

Speaker 3 And it's not even about finding the right or the wrong answer. And I was always so, like,

Speaker 3 so black and white. Like, what's the lane? Like, where's the path of least resistance? Like, what's more efficient? Like,

Speaker 3 and my kids and humans are gray, man. They're like, they're mushy.
And it was. when the therapist was was just kind of like, it's not really about getting to the right answer.

Speaker 3 It's just about letting them feel how they want to feel, regardless of whether it's right or wrong, and you holding space for that.

Speaker 3 And the more they kind of resist you and push against you, is the actually a relief. It's the more comfortable that they are, that they have a safe place to be, to express themselves authentically.

Speaker 3 And so

Speaker 2 that helped a lot.

Speaker 2 How did it affect your relationship or how you related to your parents?

Speaker 3 I mean, I would say the more work I do, the more compassion I have for my parents

Speaker 3 for sure.

Speaker 3 They only know what they were taught.

Speaker 2 And we all do. Yeah.

Speaker 3 And if they didn't heal their trauma for whatever reason, every decision from then on is just piling on from that one traumatic event.

Speaker 3 And then life is mirroring that with various people, you know, whatever it is. I can't blame them for that.

Speaker 3 Now, also,

Speaker 3 my lived experience needs to also,

Speaker 3 that's my truth, but

Speaker 3 I think it really allowed me to heal by going through this with my kids and give my parents grace.

Speaker 2 I like that for you. What's the biggest thing you're struggling with right now that you wish you could change instantly, but you can't?

Speaker 3 The stillness is hard.

Speaker 2 It is. It's really hard, yeah.
Do you meditate?

Speaker 2 But it's still hard.

Speaker 3 You know why? Because if I could go and live,

Speaker 3 isolate myself and be completely alone and just meditate all day and do that,

Speaker 3 I think it would be a lot easier. But interacting with the life, the everyday life, and trying to be fucking still is really hard.

Speaker 3 That's, you can relate.

Speaker 2 Oh, yeah. I had an argument with a monk about this.
Yes, I'm that kind of person.

Speaker 2 I am, I was, I was in Bhutan, and there was a monk I was chatting to, and this monk was like, well, the stillness, and I was like, it was beautiful. Don't get me wrong.

Speaker 2 There was a lot of things that I learned. And then the monk, I said, well, I said, that's why you have to go to other places, right?

Speaker 2 So you can try and, you know, find your calm or find your still or find your peace. And then the monk was like, Yes, but you can always find it inside yourself.
And I was like, well, not always.

Speaker 2 You can try, but you can remember what it feels like, but not always. And he was like, no, always.
I was like, it's not always. I was like, yo, man, you live in a monastery and you always

Speaker 2 on top of a mountain. I was like, why do you go there? Because you know that if there were kids screaming, running around, or if there were cars driving by, it's a lot harder to connect to that.

Speaker 3 If they need help with their homework, or if someone was wronging them at school and spreading a rumor,

Speaker 3 you You know, one wants to play with monster trucks on your freaking bed, and you're like, I can't have any more monster trucks on my bed.

Speaker 2 Yeah, so I know I agree with that.

Speaker 2 I'll struggle with the stillness, but then I will find it in random moments.

Speaker 2 It's probably why I stay up late because that's where I find my stillness comes. There's just like a little

Speaker 2 piece where I go, like, oh, okay, this is silence. This is me.
My time.

Speaker 2 I think I'm the most still and the most me at like

Speaker 2 midnight, 1 a.m.

Speaker 2 That's when I,

Speaker 2 if I'm struggling, I do what I like to call worst-case scenarioing and I burrow. I burrow as deep as I can.
I've actually recommended this to people.

Speaker 3 I think sometimes what we do-you put your head in the sand?

Speaker 2 No, no, no, it's quite the opposite. So sometimes what I think we do is we will be told, and this became a trend a few years ago where people would go like, no, think of how good it is.

Speaker 2 Think of how you think you came through that.

Speaker 2 And you, and I understand that positive framing, but I think people take for granted that when you have anxiety, what you're doing is you're really applying too long-term thinking to what might be a temporary feeling.

Speaker 2 Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, what I do is I do the opposite.
Instead of trying to hold myself back, I go with it. And I'm like, all right, what's the worst that could happen? So, let's say it's a show.

Speaker 2 I'm like, oh, I'm having a little anxiety about that show. Then I'm like, okay, what's the worst that can happen? Well, what if the people don't laugh?

Speaker 2 I'm like, and then, and, and then it's a terrible show. I'm like, and then,

Speaker 2 and, and then they're gonna, and then the show's done. I'm like, and then, and then I'll do another show.
And then, and I'm like, well, I guess that's, that's it.

Speaker 2 And I promise you, it makes a big difference. I go, like, what is it? Cause sometimes I think

Speaker 2 because you're trying to hold yourself back from understanding that the worst case scenario isn't actually that bad.

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's just like, all right, what's the worst that could happen? And then when you see it, you're like,

Speaker 2 I guess.

Speaker 3 Shme.

Speaker 2 Shme.

Speaker 2 I like that. Shme.

Speaker 3 Where did you learn that?

Speaker 2 Oh, just from me. Oh, really? Yeah, genuinely.
I was just like, I can't keep on doing this whole like, be positive. And no, ask yourself, what is the worst that could happen?

Speaker 2 Genuinely go into it, and you'll be shocked at how many times the worst may still be terrible, but you acknowledging what it is

Speaker 2 can sort of help you either avoid it or understand

Speaker 2 where it lays.

Speaker 3 You know, it's a or what's so scary.

Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It sort of

Speaker 3 dissipates its power.

Speaker 2 It does, it does indeed. Interesting.
You know, so it was actually Charlie Munger, who is

Speaker 2 Warren Buffett's business partner for many years. He passed away, but he said this beautiful quote.
He said, I don't want to know when I will die or how I will die.

Speaker 2 He said, I just want to know where I will die. Just tell me where I will die so that I can never go there.

Speaker 2 And I think it's sort of

Speaker 2 the same approach. Totally, totally.

Speaker 2 I would love to know, like, what now? What now for you as a human being? And not what's next, by the way.

Speaker 3 What now? What now? Yeah, that's interesting.

Speaker 3 It might be your shortest answer.

Speaker 2 Oh, go. I love that.

Speaker 3 I don't know.

Speaker 2 Huh.

Speaker 3 I really don't know.

Speaker 2 That is beautiful.

Speaker 3 I mean, this, right?

Speaker 2 No, but I, and I mean it. That is beautiful.
Thank you for that.

Speaker 2 Jessica Alba, thank you so much for joining me on the podcast.

Speaker 3 Thank you for having me.

Speaker 2 What Now with Trevor Noah is produced by Spotify Studios in partnership with Day Zero Productions and Fullwell73.

Speaker 2 The show is executive produced by Trevor Noah, Ben Winston, Sanaz Yamin, and Jodi Avigan. Our senior producer is Jess Hackle.
Marina Henke is our producer. Music, Mixing and Mastering by Hannes Brown.

Speaker 2 Thank you so much for listening. Join me next Thursday for another episode of What Now?