We recently connected with Lovisa Lightning and have shared our conversation below.
Lovisa , thank you so much for making time for us. We’ve always admired your ability to take risks and so maybe we can kick things off with a discussion around how you developed your ability to take and bear risk?
I developed my ability to take risks by practicing and engaging in self work. Very few people like taking risks or at least feel uncomfortable doing it, that is actually what defines what taking a risk is, stepping out of the comfort zone. As I practiced taking risks the stakes felt smaller and the crashes that I feared became soft landings. At last when I forwarded so quickly with my risk taking my fears decreased significantly. This eventually caused my life to skyrocket and one dream after another came true. Today, I have new dreams that I never in my wildest dreams would have thought were possible 6 years ago. However, I need to add that getting there was a rollercoaster. It took a lot of vulnerability and was extremely stressful from time to time to live out of my comfort zone to that degree.
One major key for me to this practice is detaching from results, especially perfectionism, what is that even?! Other key takeaways were daring to face what I am suppressing, letting go of people-pleasing, to accept, surrender and tune in to my intuition. This requires a lot of self work.
I got to deep dive and practice the above through different training programs and spiritual events 4 years ago. It literally was like a slap in the face to clearly see the things I was suppressing both consciously and unconsciously AND to face them and be friends with them was a whole other journey.
I really thought that I believed in myself but when I realized I didn’t it came as a shock and the work of filling my own shoes began. Luckily, no one else can fill those shoes, the only competition I have is my ego, isn’t that just hilarious!?
That’s why I totally believe in “Faking it til you make it”. Because I realized that what it REALLY means is maxing my potential. Just because I don’t believe in MYSELF doesn’t make it fake, that’s actually a pretty sad expression, ha ha.
There are many books about self work, some of them with exercises, these are great! However, it’s easy to read, feel fulfilled and get those aha-moments. Living it is a different story… It’s a lot of hard work which is why life coaches and self work programs in my opinion are crucial not only to learn how to take risks but to also get used to and actually enjoy doing it.
Whenever an action that I’m excited about take makes me feel like throwing up and hiding under a cover, which typically results in me scrolling my phone ha ha, that’s when I know I’m on the right track and THAT means I gotta get off my phone and bring out the tools to defeat that ego of mine. But first we have to get to know your ego really well. This can be super stressful and depressing, that’s why the support of a life coach is a very important part of the process not to let your ego take over and come up with excuses to give up.
Looking back, a risk I took 5 years back seems like a walk in the park compared to the risks I am currently facing. To give a few examples – I wanted kids so badly together with a partner who I trusted and loved deeply. But I was afraid to be rejected, abandoned and very scared to trust anyone to that degree. As I faced those fears and forced myself to open up and risk getting hurt, it turned out the dream life partner was right in front of me. My ego had pictured someone else and not until I could define what was me and what was my ego was I able to truly see that.
Another huge fear I had was what people would think of me if I ended up having kids by myself as a result of not meeting the right life partner. The thought of telling people that I was going to have my baby eggs frozen was so stressful. What would they think? “Aww, poor Lovisa, I wonder why she doesn’t meet someone, what’s wrong with her?” Not to mention the fear of finding out that I’m not fertile or that I don’t have enough eggs, what if it was too late after having spent all that money!
It took a lot of emotional work to surrender to and accept the fact that I may not find a partner for a first child, accepting the fact that people may be prejudiced and that I can’t control what other people think. Not to mention the money risk, to pay for something without knowing if there were any eggs left to freeze..! The only thing I could control was taking action, and if anything I knew I would only have regretted NOT trying despite all the scary risks. So 2 years ago, I made the decision to freeze my eggs. I also decided not to keep a low profile but to share my thoughts and journey on social media. I got a lot of positive feedback and women reaching out to me, inspired to also freeze their baby eggs. Vulnerability is scary but a key in creating real and deep connections.
See I like to call a risk a win instead, because no matter what the outcome is you have learnt something very important that will lead to success. There are so many, many people who live in fear and struggle to move forward because of fears so if you manage to crack the code to overcome them and start taking actions, risks or wins, or whatever you want to call it – you will bypass EVERYONE and thereby be able to bring your vision and dreams the world faster than you thought was possible.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
I am a Musician, Songwriter, Voice actress and a Life & Vocal Coach. I’m currently performing music and releasing an album with Der2Lov, a duo that I have together with my husband and biggest inspiration, Derrick Lightning. Der2Lov is a combination of our names, Derrick and Lovisa. It also describes our story and our life philosophy. Together we founded Der2Lov Academy “Der2Dream, Der2Play, Der2Lov” – a music school for all ages that is meant to support people in overcoming fears, finding and pursuing their dreams through self work and music and instruments as the tools. As a freelance, artist and human being I get to practice facing fears everyday and I believe there is too little focus on learning how to navigate in life and to find our happy place especially for kids and teenagers. I find learning an instrument to be a very similar process to finding what our blocks in life and to open up and be vunerable. To take an example, many people like to sing in the shower, because no one hears them and they like how they sound with the nice and echoing room sound and therefore enjoy singing. Now why is it that we don’t feel that way outside of the shower and with people listening. What happens in that process and how can we overcome that illusion of thinking it’s a different situation? Those thoughts were what inspired me my husband to start Der2Lov Academy.
So, going back to the very start, I was born in Sweden, raised in Belgium and also lived in Norway and Japan. Since 5 years I live in Hollywood together with my husband and our 6 cats.
Since 20 years Los Angeles has been a dream destination to live and work as a musician. I even visited LA twice to feel it out, but fears and excuses always got in my way of making the move. The pain of wanting something sooo much but at the same time not daring to pursue it was insanely painful, I simply couldn’t give up the dream but didn’t dare to risk failing and instead I was stuck in the anxiety limbo of fears and dreams.
6 years ago I got the amazing opportunity to transfer from Stockholm to LA though my job within the localization industry, also known as dubbing, where I made a career starting as a Project Coordinator and got the privilege to grow in different departments as a Client Manager, Global Project Manager, Voice Actress, Dubbing and Vocal director, Producer and finally, Global Creative Director. I loved the variety throughout the years and I got to do super fun stuff such as vocal directing for Baby Shark Brooklyn, I was the Dubbing Producer for Pokemon and I got to provide creative guidance for Disney shows to studios all over the world. It’s been such a privilege and learning on so many levels.
Moving to LA changed my life, not only was I blessed with a new, sunny home but I also found myself, my life partner and the path to my dream in the city of my dreams.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
My absolute strongest advice for a happy and successful life, whatever that means to you would be to practice self work and manifestation and create real connection. To me self work and manifestation were and still are very complex and hard to understand and practice. This is why I didn’t even care to get started at first. People will say “YOLO” or “just do it!”and I’m like uhh, sure..how? So that’s why I highly recommend a life coach or self work programs to get that push and guidance.
The way I create my most meaningful and successful connections is by being vulnerable, trusting, to dare to ask for support and receive and give authentic feedback to support my and other people’s growth.
One of the wins that came with the slap-in-the-face self work that I mentioned earlier, was deeper and new connections. When being able to set my ego aside and trust myself I was able to trust people on a new level. I could then let go of control and prejudice and listen to other’s in a new way. Most importantly, I started daring to ask for support to get closer to my dream. We just HAVE to be able to trust that people say no if they want, if not too bad for them, not your responsibility. When you stop seeing it as you are asking for something and thereby owe them, and instead choose to see it as you are involving people in your dream, it becomes so much fun!
Unless you already did – I highly recommend that you write a list of everyone you know and ways they could support you thanks to their talents and unique skills and professions. Then write a list about what you can provide to the world and start reaching out to your community. You don’t necessarily have to pay back, pay forward!
When it comes to manifestation, I used to be very skeptical to it. I felt like I put myself out there with the risk of failing if it didn’t happen and I needed to learn all about the science to support this crazy act of lying to myself ha ha. I really was very resistant when I think back to that time. Today, manifestation is a daily routine of mine and I absolutely LOVE it. One of the ways I manifest is – daring to be vocal about my vision and dream and declaring these every single day to myself AND, most importantly, to others. Be excited about it, talk about it as it’s reality and it will become your reality, it’s super important!
My daily manifestation routine is that I manifest in the morning when I meditate, before looking at my phone or getting any sort of information from the outer world. It can be for 1 minute or 15 – doesn’t matter. I let whatever needs to come up in terms of my ego’s thoughts come up, I process the thoughts and if I can’t snap out of the anxiety clouds that my ego creates right there and then I manifest that I will be able to..someday soon, and it gets easier and the process more positive every day. Meditation was super hard for me for years because of the stressful thoughts that came up.
The way I reduce these thoughts is by instead of closing my eyes and being quiet, I focus my eyes on something, a candle, a scroll or painting while repeating a mantra or chant. That way I feel like I have control over the situation and I am able to stay in the gray stress cloud until I suddenly accept it or put it behind me. I highly recommend manifesting in combination with meditation in the morning and every single day, especially the days when you feel like you don’t need it. There’s a reason it’s called a practice and it won’t necessarily be fun or give results right away.
I also have a manifestation spot by the Hollywood reservoir where I declare my future to the Hollywood sign once a week and have been for the past 3 years. I’m telling you, IT IS WORKING!!! When I started practicing manifestation 4 years ago after a guided meditative manifestation session, I hard-core manifested and declared that in the next 5 years I would be performing my music on stages around LA and that I would find and marry the love of my life and start a family. I manifested in detail how he would propose to me on stage after performing my own music with my family all the way from Sweden, in the audience. I manifested that we would live in a big white house with two children. I even asked my aunt Carina, who is a designer, to create my wedding dress inspired by two pictures of dresses that I sent her. She was surprised because she had no idea that I dated someone, which I didn’t at the time.. She was even more surprised when I asked her to have it ready in two years.
1 year later Derrick, my husband proposed to me while performing our music at Black Rabbit Rose in Hollywood while my family was visiting from Sweden. 2,5 years later I got married to him wearing the dress that my aunt created pregnant and with our first baby in my belly with the Hollywood sign as our back drop.
Today, I manifest that in 5 years from now Der2Lov will be playing the Hollywood Bowl accompanied by the Der2Lov academy orchestra and have our child currently joining us on stage.
Derrick and manifest taking Der2Lov Academy to the next level and create Der2Lov Land – an art and self work school, community, and meeting point for all ages, all instruments, cultures and religions – anyone who is looking to grow as individuals and artist. There will be multiple stages, recording studios, a huge music room where you can try out instruments from all over the world AND, last but not least a cat cafe. The concept Der2Lov Land will keep growing thanks to visitors and curious souls from all over the world providing their experiences and talents.
Alright so to wrap up, who deserves credit for helping you overcome challenges or build some of the essential skills you’ve needed?
My idol and husband, Derrick Lightning. 4 years ago I saw him on stage for the first time pouring out his heart as he came up to the people in the audience playing saxophone to their souls. His playing combined with a very humble and loving personality was rare in the hierarchic scene of Hollywood. He would skate down the Hollywood Boulevard in a robe playing 2 saxophones at the same time with a three colored beard. Derrick doesn’t think outside the box or inside the box – for him there simply is no box and I strive to be more like that every day. This is also Der2Lov Academy’s motto, to remove the concept of there being. a box.
We strive to become better as musicians, partners and individuals everyday. We love to inspire and to be inspired by others, that’s how we get our fuel to keep growing and that’s how we are looking to expand the De2Lov community.
For any reader who is interested in the concept of Der2Lov Academy and potential partnership or investment please don’t hesitate to reach out! We are currently looking into getting a space that will serve as a meeting point and where we can perform all our services, choirs, orchestra, ensemble practice, manifestation meditations etc as well as performances by our community members.
We also want to work with kids and teenagers who are less privileged or/and who are struggling with their health to help improve their life quality.
If you are interested in joining the Der2Lov orchestra, ensemble or choir or to get individual music lessons in either piano, vocals, guitar, bass, drums, saxophone, flute, clarinet or oboe please shoot an email to der2lov@gmail.com
For all the above requests please send us an email at der2lov@gmail.com and let’s see where it takes us!
Please also check out and follow DerLov on Instagram, facebook, Youtube and Spotify. Your support would means a lot!
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/der2lov.music?igshid=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA%3D%3D&utm_source=qr
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lovisa.lightning
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lovisa-blixt-lightning-0955477a?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@der2lov
- Other: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/1qhMyMtwtXg5CP8ClL43Pm?si=VEs5bXT_ReO8Bb7lxdAnyw
Image Credits
Pictures with wedding dress – Summer Shade Head shot with lightning and picure with gold glitter – Michael Hack
