Joy Denalane
The singer about self-love, change and being different
© PR
Soul and R&B singer Joy Denalane was part of Triumph’s “Love Your Changes” day. At various panel talks, the successful musician spoke about her personal experiences with change. In an interview with BRIGITTE.de, she tells how she became the self-confident woman she is today.
Singer Joy Denalane, 47, is one of the most successful singers in Germany with her unique soul voice. In an interview with BRIGITTE.de, the Berliner speaks about self-confidence, self-love and the feeling “different“ to be …
BRIGITTE.de: Your current album is called “Let yourself be Loved.” How about your self-love? How do you express them in your everyday life?
Joy Delanane: To be honest, things are looking pretty good for me with the subject of self-love. In the sense that I can be good with everyone and enjoy spending time with myself. I know myself and my weaknesses. I also think that’s advisable. That you deal with yourself. But beyond that, I can also look down at myself with a loving look and say “I’m ok with that”. Of course, also in connection with the idea of improving yourself, becoming smarter and, above all, looking at the world and not being satisfied with the things that you have at some point defined as a belief.
Has self-reflection always been an issue for you or did you have to learn it the hard way?
Self-reflection has always been an issue for me. I grew up in Berlin, Germany, as a black girl in a white majority society. That inevitably made me think about me. And above all to ask myself whether I think it’s good to look “different” or to be marked as “different” from the outside. It’s not something you start with yourself.
Did it take time for self-reflection to turn into self-love?
I always really liked myself. Perhaps out of an instinct to support life in early childhood, which has to do with the rejections that I had to experience again and again in my childhood. I can not say exactly.
And I don’t think I’m overly great now either, I just get on with myself.
And finally, I also had role models in my life – my father, for example. Every time I got home I knew why I looked the way I look. It was like my daily dose of affirmation.
Were you raised to do this from the start? Was “being different” a theme?
Yes! At least they discussed how to respond to situations of discrimination – that you should definitely say something, that you should stand up, and that you shouldn’t just endure it.
The Triumph campaign is all about change. As we learned after last year, change is everywhere and coming whether we want it or not. How do you deal with change?
I would be dishonest if I said that all the changes had passed me by without a trace. Or if I said, “Oh, everything will be fine if I just hold out long enough”. There are very different phases that I go through. Productive phases, but also moments when you worry because you don’t know when it will all end.
You are a role model for many women. Do you have any tips or rituals for days when self-love is not going well?
I think there must be days like that too. They are perfectly fine. I then try to simply accept it and not want to obsessively optimize anything. It’s part of life.
There are always phases in which you struggle with yourself and doubt yourself.
That also leads to a development to question oneself and to ask the questions of meaning: “Am I happy with what I am doing?” If not, I have to try to change the situation, to improve it. Of course, this takes effort, but for the result it is worthwhile to walk those extra miles every now and then.