Meet Malayka Gray

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Malayka Gray. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Malayka, thanks so much for taking the time to share your insights and lessons with us today. We’re particularly interested in hearing about how you became such a resilient person. Where do you get your resilience from?

The women who raised me, for sure! I’ll briefly talk about both.

My grandmother taught me to always find ways to nurture a thirst for adventure and to find ways to make yourself happy while balancing your priorities and duties. My grandfather was very dependent on her in the last few years of his life, and she was very committed to taking care of him. But once a year, every year, she would take a trip for two or three weeks to a new country with her friends. She would set him up with a nurse and made sure he was well taken care of, and gave herself that time. And then she would come back and take care of him. I’m sure it wasn’t easy for her seeing the love of her life go through illness the way she did, but she still found ways to take care of herself while also taking care of him. I respected that about her very much. I think the ability to find pockets of happiness in hard times is a great display fo resilience.

The second woman is my mom. She moved to North America with her two teen kids, alone, in her 40s, to start all over, with English not being her first language. She started as a cashier at a department store, because that was the only job that would hire her even though she was overqualified for it. She just knew she had to support her kids. Now she’s a commercial account manager at a major bank, exceeding her quotas every quarter and serving multi-million dollar clients, consistently getting recognised for her impressive and brilliant work. I can’t think of anything more resilient than that.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

I’m a multilingual RnB artist. Some of the coolest stages I’ve performed on have been Coachella, The Voice Middle East, and Comic Con. My intention with my music is to give listeners the permission to feel playful, excited, enthusiastic and vulnerable minus the self consciousnes. My music, and I, are very dancey and also kind of emotional. I’ve heard people describe my shows as theatrical, even though I don’t do that on purpose. I’m just a little eccentric 🙂

I have two of my latest singles out on Spotify under Malayka. I’ll be performing at a Music Festival in Saudi Arabia this December which I’m very excited about!

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

Resilience, respect, curiosity.

There was a lot of setbacks, rejections, moments of reinventing and starting over. It’s easy to get discouraged. I still do sometimes. But you almost need to be a goldfish with these things and keep looking forward. If a logical person took stock of all the times I felt any of these feelings they would tell me to quit 🙂

Respect is imperative in my opinion, because along the way you’re naturally going to come across a lot of people who are either going to work with you or help you. The impression you leave behind with every single person is going to either propel you forward long term or hold you back. Everyone from the band members to the concert bookers to the producers and beyond work very hard. It’s important that they feel their efforts are acknowledged and appreciated, and that they feel respected when they work with you.

Curiosity is important because being open to the world showing me something I didn’t know was how I stumbled upon so many things that were positively monumental in my career. A friend of mine needed my help for a Comic Con panel he was putting together, and my curiosity is what encouraged me to say yes. I ended up singing for the creators of one of my favourite TV shows of all time, Futurama (twice!). My roommate once asked me if I sang in French, and I said yes (the answer is actually no but I told myself I could fake it), and that’s what ended up getting me hired to play Coachella. It’s important to check your ego and be open to things you might not usually be open to, because you never know where you might end up.

What was the most impactful thing your parents did for you?

The most impactful thing my mom did for me was give me space to be myself. She never pushed any careers, habits, oppressive rules or anything like that on me. Don’t get me wrong, she was a very strict woman who asked me why the ‘A’ I got on my test wasn’t an A+, but she never forced me to do anything with my hair I didn’t like, or make me pursue a career that didn’t feel authentic to me.

The most impactful thing my grandmother did for me was love me unconditionally. She and I were very different, and looking back, I gave her a very hard time as a kid. I was stubborn, mischievous and I talked back But she always kissed me, always told me she loved me, always teased me and and held me. I hope I can provide that to my future children and grandchildren.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/malaykaofficial/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@malaykamusic
• Other: https://www.twitch.tv/malaykamusic

Image Credits

Jana Akkari
Nahal From Outer Space
Karla Haddad
Faiza Rahman