Betty Lam shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Good morning Betty, it’s such a great way to kick off the day – I think our readers will love hearing your stories, experiences and about how you think about life and work. Let’s jump right in? What is something outside of work that is bringing you joy lately?
The thing bringing me the most quiet, genuine joy lately? It’s reconnecting with my very first love: writing!
I launched my blog and online portfolio, Bettysoyanlam.com/blog, about three months ago, and it has been this incredibly grounding, almost therapeutic process.
It’s funny, it feels less like launching something new and more like coming home. I was that girl who lived by her journal from fifth grade all through high school (I still have all 20 of them). It was my private, sacred space to process the world. To now have a public platform to channel that same energy… that’s a completely new dimension of fulfillment for me.
It’s become this beautiful ritual. I get to move through my week—whether I’m discovering a hidden gem of a local business, exploring a new corner of the city, or just documenting a night with my GFs (@glamfriends.to)—and I see all of it as a story waiting to be told.
What I truly love is the intention it allows for. It’s not just about posting a beautiful image; it’s about crafting the entire narrative behind it.
Don’t get me wrong, I live for our community on Instagram. And my friends + audience know I’ve always been the girl with the lengthy captions (I’ve been lovingly teased about it for years!). It’s because I genuinely have so many stories to tell, and I’m also that person who loves reading a thoughtful, in-depth piece from someone else.
I’ve often felt so restricted by the character limit, like I was only showing a snapshot when I was dying to tell the full story.
My blog is the answer. It’s this expansive, beautiful space where I don’t have to edit my thoughts down. I can be as detailed and as me as I want, and that feels incredibly freeing.
But what’s been truly fascinating—and honestly, so humbling—is seeing who is showing up.
As a creator, you pour your heart into the work. As a strategist, you live for the analytics.
Of course, I was so happy to see my home base in Canada and our neighbors in the U.S. at the top. But I was floored when I saw my third-biggest audience is in… Sweden. Sweden! How amazing is that?
And it doesn’t stop there. The list is over 20 countries long—Japan, Brazil, Italy, Nigeria, the UK… all these different corners of the world. It was this beautiful reminder that even though my stories are so personal, the themes of style, self-expression, and discovery are completely universal.
But the most mind-blowing statistic for me? My number one traffic source isn’t even Instagram. It’s ‘Direct.’
That’s the metric that means everything. The Clicks* could come from texts or messenger apps, sharing them in DMs, through emails, pdfs, documents, or typing my site directly into their browser.
In a world driven by algorithms, this proves we’re building a true destination that people are coming to on purpose.
It’s a new level of connection. And it’s wild to see the data—something like 83% of people online actively read blogs. It just proves we are all still craving depth and authentic, long-form stories.
For me, it’s my digital journal, my creative strategy, and my community hub, all in one. It has been incredibly life-giving.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
At the heart of everything I do is a simple belief: that life’s most beautiful moments aren’t just found, they’re intentionally created.
As a luxury lifestyle creator, I use my platforms, @itsbettylam and my new blog, Bettysoyanlam.com, as a way to explore what it means to live a life of intention—from curating a beautiful home to celebrating the small, everyday joys that make life feel rich and meaningful.
It’s all about romanticizing your reality and becoming the author of your own story.
But while my personal brand is my core passion, one of the most joyful and unexpected extensions of my work has been the community I’ve helped foster through a little project that has taken on a life of its own.
Years ago, I started a “just for fun” joint Instagram page with a group of my creator friends, a space where we could share our adventures and support each other. It was originally called “Girlfriends of Toronto,” which, in hindsight, might have been a bit too on the nose. Let’s just say we started receiving some… shall we say, misguided DMs from men who had the wrong idea entirely (Haha…Oops!). We quickly realized we needed something more inclusive and, well, a little less ambiguous.
And so, the Glam Friends Toronto Creators Collective (@glamfriends.to) was born!
What started as our little corner of the internet has blossomed into this beautiful, recognized entity. It’s surreal and honestly the most heartwarming, pinch-me moment to be at a media event and hear someone say, “Hey, you’re the Glam Friends!”
My personal DMs and email inbox are constantly filled with invites, and it’s become this wonderful norm for agencies to ask, “Would you like to bring the Glam Girls or Glam Friends along as well?”
It is so unbelievably cute, and it fills my heart to see how this fun side project has grown into a symbol of community and collaboration.
To keep that spirit going, I’m currently in the process of creating a fun form to invite more creators into the fold, building a bigger table where we can all share, create, and celebrate together.
Ultimately, whether it’s through my personal storytelling or our collective adventures, my goal is the same: to inspire a life lived with more beauty, connection, and joy.
Okay, so here’s a deep one: What did you believe about yourself as a child that you no longer believe?
Growing up, I was completely convinced that my value was something that had to be granted to me by others. It was a belief that manifested in one all-consuming goal: I needed to be popular.
For a child, popularity is the ultimate form of being chosen. It’s the ultimate validation. This desire was amplified tenfold because, in elementary school, I was bullied. It was a deeply painful experience that made me feel small and powerless, the absolute opposite of being chosen. So, in a misguided attempt to reclaim some agency, I fought back (mostly with words).
I became a bully to my bullies (little 5 or 6 year old me made an alliance with kids that were bullied). And for a short time, it worked. I had the power, I had the fear, and I was no longer a target.
This version of me lasted from Kindergarten to grade 5. I was good at getting what I wanted – but sadly, in a manipulative way. But I vividly remember looking at myself and feeling this sense of dislike for the person I had become.
The “popularity” I gained through intimidation wasn’t connection; I had friends, but it was just a different kind of isolation. That was a critical turning point for me. I realized that the kind of person I truly wanted to be wasn’t the one on top of a social hierarchy, but one who was genuinely kind.
It was a conscious choice to trade that fleeting, ugly power for something more authentic and lasting.
That entire childhood arc—the yearning for popularity, the pain of rejection, and the unsatisfying nature of forced validation—was really just a younger version of the belief I carried into my adult life: the belief that I needed to be chosen.
For the longest time, I applied this logic to my creative path. I thought success meant waiting for the “cool kids” of the industry—the big brands, the exclusive invitations—to legitimize my presence, to give me that permission slip. But my childhood experience had already taught me where that road leads.
The shift was realizing that the power I was looking externally was already within me. ‘Choosing yourself’ is the adult version of deciding to be kind instead of being a bully.
It’s the active decision to be the author of your own opportunities, to define your own worth. It means you don’t wait for a seat at the popular table; you build your own, more interesting one. You build a growing community like @glamfriends.to not to be exclusive, but to be collaborative.
You start a blog like Bettysoyanlam.com not because you were asked, but because you have something important to say.
So, the old belief was about chasing external validation, a chase that began on the elementary school playground.
My truth now is knowing that real power isn’t in being selected; it’s in the quiet, confident work of building a career and a life that you genuinely like and respect when you look in the mirror.
If you could say one kind thing to your younger self, what would it be?
If I could pull that younger, trying-so-hard version of me aside, I’d tell her:
”All those little things you’re self-conscious about, the ‘weird’ way your brain connects dots that no one else seems to get? That’s not a glitch; that’s your magic.
And I know everyone praises you for being the ‘happy’ one, and you’re proud to wear that label. But please know, it is more than okay to not be okay. It’s okay to have the full-on, ugly-cry breakdown.
Your wit and your humor are brilliant gifts, but they don’t have to be your armor. You don’t have to deflect every time you’re sad or hurt. Your vulnerability isn’t a liability; it’s your depth. It’s what makes you real.
All those parts of you that you’ve been told are ‘too much’—your uncontainable ambition, your independent thinking, your constant questions—those aren’t your flaws. That’s your fuel. That’s the energy that will build everything.
So whatever you do, do not sand down your beautiful, quirky edges to fit into a mold you were never meant for. The world is saturated with copies. It needs your specific, unfiltered edit.
Your goofy, weird, brilliant, heartfelt-ness… that is what will make you unforgettable. It’s your superpower.
I’d want Little Betty to really internalize that, and to carry this energy from Glennon Doyle with her: ‘Be messy and complicated and afraid and show up anyways!’”
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 would your closest friends say really matters to you?
This is a great question!
I think, after they’d inevitably laugh and tease me about something, my friends would tell you my real superpower is curating connection, or being a good ‘human connector.’
I have this almost intuitive joy in building ecosystems. I’m constantly connecting two incredible people from different parts of my life, just because I have a gut feeling their energies will align and they’ll create something beautiful together—a new idea, a collaboration, or just a powerful friendship.
But then, I think they’d get serious for a minute and say that knowing me is a different experience. It’s like watching something slowly unfold.
They’d probably explain that my public-facing energy is warm and open, but the full version of me—the un-curated, unfiltered Betty —is an inner circle that I fiercely protect.
It’s in that protected space, over time, that I reveal all the different facets: the unfiltered goofiness, the deep-seated vulnerabilities, the 3 AM conversations about what truly scares and inspires us. A friend once told me that I have a way of making people feel like they are the most important part of my day when we’re together. That really stuck with me.
It’s because I truly believe in holding space and listening just as much as I talk. They get the raw, unfiltered version of me.
So, in the end, I guess that’s it. My value is rooted in connection—not just in architecting it for others, but in building that sacred, multi-layered, fully present connection with the people I hold closest!
Before we go, we’d love to hear your thoughts on some longer-run, legacy type questions. If you knew you had 10 years left, what would you stop doing immediately?
I would immediately stop saying “yes” out of obligation… We’re all guilty of it—attending somethung we’re not all excited about, taking the meeting or a project that doesn’t align with our goals. These are energy leaks. With a finite amount of time, I would become ruthless about protecting my energy and pouring it only into the people, projects, and experiences that are a “HELL yes.”
Life is too short for misaligned commitments.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://Bettysoyanlam.com
- Instagram: https://Instagram.com/itsbettylam
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/itsbettylam
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@itsbettylam
- Other: [email protected]
Glam Friends Toronto Creators Collective:
Instagram.com/glamfriends.to
[email protected]
Image Credits
Image Credit :
Justin To (images of me in blue dress)
Ashley Hassard (first image of me in burgundy long sleeves dress).
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
