An Inspired Chat with Ama Appiah of Downton St. Petersburg

We recently had the chance to connect with Ama Appiah and have shared our conversation below.

Good morning Ama, we’re so happy to have you here with us and we’d love to explore your story and how you think about life and legacy and so much more. So let’s start with a question we often ask: Who are you learning from right now?
I learn from the people I interview for my magazine. They give me insight into how they started their careers without any particular idea of whether they would be successful or not. They just followed their passions and let life lead them to success.

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
My name is Ama Appiah. I am an arts & entertainment attorney and a graphic designer, who has now launched a digital magazine for arts and entertainment communities. What makes my business ventures so interesting is how connected they are. I’m grateful that I can use my artistic talents as well as my analytical skills.

Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. What relationship most shaped how you see yourself?
I think I’ve probably mentioned this before, but without a doubt the relationship that most shaped how I see myself was the relationship I had with my mother. We were more than just mother-daughter. We were soulmates. We were each other’s “safe place to land” and “ride-or-die,” so to speak. As such, I took her advice and guidance as my playbook for life, and still do.

My mother knew me better than I knew myself at times. She helped me to see my potential. By her example and resilience, I learned the importance of having an education and working hard. She encouraged me to have dreams and was my biggest cheerleader. I learned from her that no obstacle was insurmountable. That continues to be my mindset to this day even 9 years after she has passed away. She related the struggles that she had to endure to eventually experience equal opportunities and treatment growing up as a black female in the south. Yet despite those challenges, she persevered. She was always an independent and fearless woman with a thirst for knowledge. It was through her example that I also had a thirst for knowledge and never entertained thoughts of not being able to do something that I wanted to do to better myself.

I think it actually made me feel like I had no excuse to not succeed with all the opportunities and privileges I had available to me that she did not have.

What fear has held you back the most in your life?
The fear that has held me back the most in my life has been my fear of failure. That fear has been in my mindset since childhood. I always feared not being right. I associated not being right with being a failure, which then meant, in my mind as a child, that I was a bad person or incapable. I think as a child we have limited experiences to explain why we feel what we feel, and we create explanations in our minds as to why something is happening or not happening. Unfortunately, I never really let go of those misguided beliefs as I became an adult, and have tended to be very harsh with myself when I made mistakes or did not understand concepts.

It’s just now that I am older in fact, that I am finally accepting that “failures” are actually the best tools for learning and becoming great at what you eventually want to do. I know there are many opportunities I did not take and risks that I would not consider because of that fear. But now I at least take educated risks and analyze risks before saying yes or no. I attribute that to part of the process of learning from past failures.

I have also learned as I have become older, that you can have fear and just push through it to see what happens. Basically feel the fear and do it anyway. When I was younger if something felt scary or the result had any possibility of being failing, I would avoid it completely. Now I actually find myself jumping into projects head first and seeing where the process takes me. I now feel authentic in this space.

I think our readers would appreciate hearing more about your values and what you think matters in life and career, etc. So our next question is along those lines. What’s a belief or project you’re committed to, no matter how long it takes?
I am committed to my current project as editor and publisher of Entertainment & Creative Arts Magazine. It is a digital magazine that I update monthly. It is a passion project for me as a graphic designer and an arts and entertainment lawyer because I get to combine the knowledge and talents that I have acquired over the years into creating a unique resource for other creatives.

It is designed to be a one-stop resource for people in the entertainment and arts industries to get information about some national and international music and film festivals, art and photography exhibits and conferences, book releases and writers’ conferences, submission deadlines and work opportunities. The magazine also provides inspirational interviews with people who have successfully navigated their niche in these industries, a legal section on relevant court cases and topics for creatives, and a section dedicated to providing guidance on focusing techniques and meditations to help achieve inspired creativity.

There are challenges from time to time with getting celebrity interviews, but the goal of the magazine is to encourage and inspire people in the arts and entertainment fields. The purpose is to encourage them to not give up on their dreams and to expect to have a breakthrough no matter how many obstacles or rejections they face. I think most of the interviews highlight how many people start out not knowing where their journeys will take them, but no matter how crazy or “pie in the sky” their dreams may have seemed, taking a risk or a step in the direction of the dream resulted in incredible breakthroughs that led to a life even better than they imagined.

Okay, we’ve made it essentially to the end. One last question before you go. When do you feel most at peace?
I feel most at peace when I am near water at the beach or at a park. I love the stillness required to appreciate sunrises and sunsets while I’m standing by the water. Stillness allows me to also appreciate the sound of water lapping, notice the wildlife or marine life, and admire the flowers and trees that I would probably otherwise walk by and never notice.

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