Today we’d like to introduce you to Brandi Starr.
Hi Brandi, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
For a long time, I was depressed, but I had lived in that place for so long that it became comfortable. I had lost myself somewhere along the way. I didn’t have much motivation to think about my future, and honestly, I didn’t feel like I had a purpose to live.
I battled suicidal thoughts, sometimes randomly, without understanding where they were coming from. At the time, I thought maybe I just needed to make more money. I thought financial freedom would make me feel free. I was also tired of following other people’s dreams while believing I didn’t have one of my own.
The truth is, I had always been creative.
As a child and teenager, I was bright, goofy, expressive, and constantly creating. But somewhere between childhood and entering the “real world,” I started disconnecting from that part of myself. I began doing what I thought I was supposed to do—working, trying to survive, trying to please people, and helping build someone else’s dream while slowly forgetting about my own.
My low self-esteem made people-pleasing almost second nature. I wanted to be accepted. I wanted to feel like I belonged. I wanted to feel like I was enough.
Eventually, I broke down.
But this time was different.
I cried my heart out to God. I asked Him, “Why am I here? Why does nobody understand me? Why do I always feel like an outsider, even around my friends? Why do I feel like I’m not smart enough to be here? Why do people take advantage of my kindness? I’ll never be anything. I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t want to be here anymore.”
I felt defeated. I had given up.
Then, in the middle of that moment, I came across a YouTube video on Facebook called “Girl, Get Up” by Sarah Jakes Roberts.
I watched it, and something shifted.
I cried out to God even more, and I had an encounter with Him that changed my life forever. I can’t perfectly explain what happened, but I knew I wanted to live differently. I wanted to be better. I wanted to do better—not just for myself, but for God.
That was the beginning of the real work.
And I didn’t make that mental shift completely on my own. God also used people in my life to help me see myself differently.
Two of those people was are my good-friends, Jonah Munoz and Alainah Dean
They’ve became a huge part of my transformation mentally. During a time when I had become so accustomed to living in a dark mental space, they consistently poured positivity into me. He encouraged me, challenged the way I saw myself, and helped me recognize possibilities in my life that I wasn’t always able to see on my own.
Looking back, I believe God knew exactly who I needed around me during that season. Jonah didn’t do the healing work for me—I still had to confront myself, surrender to God, and make the decision to change—but his presence and encouragement helped me climb out of a mental rut I had lived in for far too long.
Sometimes God answers prayers through people. Jonah and Alainah were just a few of those people for me.
I went from seeing myself as a victim to looking inward and confronting the things I had spent years avoiding: my insecurities, trauma, unhealthy patterns, people-pleasing, and the uncomfortable truths about myself that nobody else could fix.
I wanted to heal.
And as I began healing mentally and spiritually, I started looking at my physical body differently too. I began seeing my body as a temple and became intentional about what I was putting into it.
Today, that commitment has grown into a lifestyle. I’ve lived a raw, plant-based lifestyle and haven’t eaten meat in more than eight years. For me, it isn’t about following a trend or temporarily going on a diet. It’s become part of how I choose to nourish and care for my body.
I started researching nutrition and became fascinated by whole, nutrient-dense plant foods and the relationship between what we eat and our overall health. The more I learned, the more I wanted to simplify things and return to the basics—eating foods as close to their natural state as reasonably possible and becoming more conscious of what I was putting into my body.
That curiosity eventually became something much bigger than food. It became a desire to understand the body, longevity, prevention, and how our everyday choices can support our well-being.
I started eliminating things that no longer aligned with the person I was becoming. I stopped drinking alcohol. I became more intentional about processed foods and added sugars. I even began incorporating periods of fasting into my spiritual practice, including a seven-day water-only spiritual fast that was deeply transformative for me.
It wasn’t that I never had cravings. I did.
But I was determined.
I began realizing that so much starts in the mind. The physical changes were often a reflection of what was happening internally.
During this season, I also stepped away from social media and relationships that weren’t healthy for me. God placed me in a season of isolation, and although isolation isn’t always comfortable, it gave me space to face myself.
Nine months later, I had lost more than 100 pounds naturally.
But honestly, the number on the scale wasn’t the biggest transformation.
It was the mental clarity.
I felt like I had been born again.
I remember noticing that my clothes were becoming loose, but the physical changes weren’t what excited me most. It was the way I felt inside. I was thinking differently. I was seeing differently. I was becoming more intentional about my life.
And as I continued learning about health, I realized this wasn’t just about me.
I had watched people I love struggle with diabetes, high blood pressure, blood sugar complications, chronic kidney disease, cancer, dementia, and other health challenges. My mother passed away a few months before I graduated high school. Before her passing, she had also experienced serious health complications, including diabetic comas.
Her story stayed with me.
My mother was a fashionista and a boss lady wrapped into one. She was entrepreneurial, full of ideas, and knew how to create experiences for people. Outside of her main job, she had a business organizing group bus trips across the country for shopping, live plays, concerts, and other experiences.
She thrived because she genuinely enjoyed what she did. And she could throw down in the kitchen too.
Years after losing her, as I learned more about nutrition and became more intentional about my own health, I made a promise to myself: I wasn’t going to simply accept that the health patterns I had witnessed had to continue through my family.
Someone had to break the cycle.
I decided that someone would be me.
I’ve been able to take what I’ve learned and encourage my father to become more intentional about his health as well. Watching him make meaningful changes to his eating habits, weight, and overall lifestyle has only strengthened my desire to help other people understand that their everyday choices matter.
I’ve always cared deeply about people, and I’ve always been a listener. Someone once told me that I should be a therapist.
That eventually made me ask myself a question:
“Is there such a thing as a therapist who helps people with their nutrition?”
That question led me to pursue an education in nutritional therapy.
But while I was healing my body and learning about nutrition, something else was happening.
I was finding my creativity again.
I started singing. Dancing. Editing. Filming. Photographing. Acting. Voice acting. Modeling. Creating.
The creative little girl I thought I had lost wasn’t actually gone.
She was still there.
And when I look at my family, it makes perfect sense.
I come from a line of creatives.
My grandfather was an artist. My grandmother was incredibly creative, especially with fashion and design. She could take an idea and turn it into something beautiful.
My aunt found her own creative expression through dance and later crafting, creating work that was truly in a league of its own. I still remember receiving letters and cards from her that were completely decked out. You could feel the love she put not only into the words she wrote but into every creative detail surrounding them.
My one and only sister, Brittney Guice, grew up developing an eye for creating spaces that feel timeless. Her interior design skills are incredible. She can draw, take something old and breathe new life into it with her own flavor, and even write some mean lyrics.
And then there’s my father, Theo Starr.
I grew up attached to his hip, surrounded by creativity. He has sold paintings and portrait drawings, created handmade clocks, designed positive-message shirts and keychains, worked as a videographer for events, participated in art shows and news interviews, performed music, written poetry, played keyboard and djembe, and even came to my elementary school to teach children how to draw.
I grew up around creation itself.
Creativity wasn’t something I had to learn.
It was something I had to remember.
For a while, I would make TikTok videos about clean eating and never post them. I had thousands of ideas sitting in my drafts because I was waiting for the perfect time, the perfect video, or the perfect version of myself.
I was getting in my own way.
Then I met Rob Boggan of The Curated Culture. What started as a coworker relationship eventually became a mentorship. Rob is a strong-minded creator who genuinely wants to see other creatives win.
I had complained to him more than once about not having enough storage on my phone to create. Eventually, he gifted me a drive that allowed me to transfer more than 40,000 photos and videos.
That seemingly simple act changed things creatively.
Suddenly, I had access to years of memories, ideas, footage, and pieces of myself that I had been sitting on. More importantly, I had room to create again.
Things started moving.
Then another door opened.
My friend Sheneka Flowers invited me to a free workshop through the Flint Film Foundation’s Flint Creative Academy. I’m incredibly grateful she did, because that workshop introduced me to an entirely different side of storytelling and filmmaking.
I went from sitting in a workshop learning about the industry to actually stepping onto a real film set.
And I worked.
The days were long—sometimes twelve hours or more—but I loved being there. I had the opportunity to support production as a PA and work around crafty while getting firsthand exposure to so many different departments. I found myself learning about script supervision, editing, lighting, audio, makeup, props, and everything that happens behind the camera to bring a story to life.
Script supervision and editing especially caught my attention.
Being on set also connected two worlds I care deeply about: wellness and creativity. I saw firsthand what long production days can demand from actors and crew members, and it sparked another idea in me—finding ways to eventually provide nourishing, energizing food and hydration options for people working those long hours.
Even in a completely creative environment, somehow health found its way back into the picture.
That’s when I started realizing that maybe my interests weren’t as disconnected as I once thought.
The Flint film community also introduced me to more creatives and allowed me to build genuine relationships with people who were creating, acting, directing, writing, and telling stories of their own.
One of those connections was Bam Woods.
Bam is an artist and creator with a story of his own, and getting to know him through that creative community became another reminder of what can happen when artists make room for other artists. That connection eventually became part of the reason I’m able to share my own story in a space like this today.
That’s something I don’t take lightly.
There was a time when I was afraid to even post a video sitting in my drafts.
Now I’m telling my story.
And now I’m beginning to understand that all of these seemingly different parts of me actually belong together.
Health.
Creativity.
Storytelling.
People.
Faith.
Purpose.
I want to educate people about health in a way that doesn’t feel intimidating or complicated. I want to create engaging, educational content that makes someone stop scrolling because they’re entertained—but leave having learned something that could encourage them to care for themselves differently.
I want to use storytelling and creativity to reach people who may never pick up a nutrition textbook.
And I have a vision for bringing healthier, nourishing food and hydration options into creative spaces like film production. I’ve experienced those long days myself, and I understand how important it is for people to feel cared for while they’re giving so much of themselves to a project.
But I don’t want to put myself in one box anymore.
I’m a creative.
I sing. I dance. I act. I voice act. I model. I photograph. I edit. I create content. I tell stories. I study nutrition. I love nature.
And somehow, all of those things that once seemed unrelated are beginning to make sense together.
I’m no longer trying to force myself into one box.
I’m allowing God to show me what He intended to do with all of it.
I’m still becoming.
If you had asked me years ago where I would be today, I probably couldn’t have imagined any of this.
The biggest thing that changed wasn’t my body.
It was my mindset.
I believe God saved me when I couldn’t see a way forward and began rewiring the way I saw myself, my life, and my purpose.
I thought I had lost myself.
But maybe I wasn’t lost.
Maybe I was being led back to who I was always meant to be.
And if there is one thing I want someone reading my story to know, it’s this:
Your story isn’t over.
Someone could live another day because you decided not to give up. Someone may need the story you haven’t told yet. Someone may need the gift you’ve convinced yourself doesn’t matter.
We are stronger than every thought that tells us otherwise. Sometimes we have to surrender what we think we know, give it to God, and allow Him to lead.
I know what it feels like to believe there is no purpose in your life.
I’m here to tell you—there is.
We need you here.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Not at all. It definitely hasn’t been a smooth road. Old negative thoughts still try to creep in every now and then, and I’ve had moments where I questioned myself, my abilities, and whether I’m really capable of bringing my dreams to life.
But staying positive has become my forever go-to. I’ve learned that I can’t just pray about something and expect it to happen without putting in the work. I have to do the physical work alongside the spiritual work and trust that, in time, things will begin to align.
Patience and faith have been two of my biggest lessons. I believe the dream God placed in me was already chosen for me; I just had to keep working toward it.
There have been sleepless nights, uncertainty, setbacks, and plenty of moments where I’ve had to push past my own thoughts. But those moments have also shown me that I’m capable of more than I once believed.
I’ve learned that I don’t have to have everything figured out before I take the next step. Sometimes, you just have to move. Keep moving. Keep believing. Keep working.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I consider myself a multidisciplinary creative because I’ve never been someone who could fit into just one creative box. I express myself through content creation, acting, voice acting, modeling, singing, dancing, photography, video editing, creative direction, storytelling, and now creative strategy. But I’ve also learned that creativity isn’t always about making something you can see. Sometimes it’s about creating an experience, finding a solution, developing an idea, or creating a connection for someone else.
I’ve carried that mindset into my professional life as well.
Even while working a traditional 9-to-5, I found ways to bring my creative side into the workplace. I had the opportunity to serve as a Culture Champion at my branch, where I helped create an environment where people felt seen, heard, appreciated, and connected.
I created boards and activities around awareness months and important topics, helped recognize my coworkers, and looked for creative ways to bring positive energy into the workplace. For me, it wasn’t just about decorating a board or planning an activity. It was about paying attention to people and finding little ways to remind them that they mattered.
That same creativity has naturally carried into my work in health and wellness.
I create digital resources designed to help people make healthier living feel more approachable and realistic. This includes meal plans, wellness guides, ebooks, simple food swaps, and educational resources focused on topics such as digestion and the importance of gut health. I want to take information that can sometimes feel overwhelming and break it down into practical steps that people can actually incorporate into their everyday lives.
My goal isn’t to tell people that they have to completely change their lives overnight. I want to show them that healthier living can sometimes start with something as simple as making a better food swap, becoming more aware of what your body is communicating, or learning why something like digestion matters in the first place.
My creative work also allows me to combine education with storytelling. Through social media and digital content, I can take something I’m passionate about and present it in a way that is visual, engaging, relatable, and memorable.
I also create content for brands and small businesses and help manage social media accounts, which allows me to work on both the creative and strategic sides of their online presence. I love getting to know the heart behind a brand—what they stand for, who they’re trying to reach, and most importantly, how they want people to feel when they come across their page.
More recently, that side of my creativity has expanded into creative strategy through my work with the Wynn Collective, a collaborative creative project bringing together people with different talents, perspectives, and ideas.
Being part of the Collective has helped me recognize that one of my strengths isn’t simply creating content—it’s seeing the bigger picture behind it.
I naturally find myself thinking about how an idea should be presented, how an audience will experience it, what messaging will connect, how things could be organized more effectively, and how we can take someone’s vision and turn it into something people genuinely want to engage with.
I enjoy looking at an idea that’s still in its early stages and asking, “Okay… what could this become?”
Whether that’s helping shape social media direction, developing concepts, thinking through audience engagement, organizing how live experiences such as auditions are presented, or finding ways to make communication more intentional and efficient, I’ve discovered that I genuinely enjoy being involved in what happens before the audience ever sees the finished product.
That’s what creative strategy has become for me:
The space between the idea and the execution.
From creating and editing content to developing ideas, managing social media, maintaining a consistent online presence, and finding ways to engage an audience, I enjoy helping people bring their vision to life. To me, social media isn’t only about posting. It’s about building community, creating an experience, and developing a genuine connection between the people behind a vision and the people on the other side of the screen.
My experience with the Flint Film Foundation opened another door for me creatively. Through their workshop, I had the opportunity to step onto a real film set and learn firsthand about different aspects of production, from script supervision to lighting. Working those long days and seeing how many people come together to create one story gave me an even greater appreciation for the industry.
What I’m most proud of, though, isn’t necessarily one specific project or accomplishment.
It’s the fact that I’m creating again.
For years, I allowed fear, low self-esteem, and perfectionism to keep me from sharing my creativity. I had thousands of photos and videos sitting on my phone and countless ideas that never made it out of my drafts. Now, I’m giving myself permission to create even when it isn’t perfect.
What sets me apart is that I don’t see creativity, wellness, strategy, and connection as separate parts of my life.
They all work together.
Whether I’m creating a wellness guide, managing a social media page, developing a creative strategy, creating content for a brand, contributing ideas to a collaborative project, filming a video, stepping onto a film set, designing something, performing, or simply finding a way to make someone at work feel appreciated, I want people to walk away feeling something.
I want people to feel seen.
I want them to learn something.
I want them to feel inspired to take better care of themselves.
I want brands and businesses to feel like their vision was truly understood and brought to life.
And sometimes, I simply want to make someone smile.
I’m still discovering where all of this will take me, and honestly, that’s what excites me most. I don’t want to be known for doing just one thing. I want to be known for being authentic, versatile, intentional, and willing to use every gift I’ve been given to create something meaningful.
Overall, I love creating connections, making wellness approachable, telling stories, developing ideas, and turning a vision into something people can see, feel, experience, and use.
And I think that’s the beauty of being a multidisciplinary creative:
I don’t have to choose just one way to create.
Do you have recommendations for books, apps, blogs, etc?
One resource I genuinely recommend is The Curated Culture Podcast by Rob Boggan.
What I appreciate most about Rob is that he’s logical, practical, and incredibly genuine. His perspective has helped me get “unstuck” during a time when I felt stuck in my 9-to-5. I wasn’t necessarily lacking ideas—I was lacking the mental energy and space to actually create.
One episode that really resonated with me was his conversation about treating your 5-to-9 like your 9-to-5. He breaks down actionable steps for shifting your mindset and intentionally using the hours outside of your traditional job to build toward the life and career you actually want.
That message hit home for me because I’m someone who has struggled with wanting to build a creative career while still navigating the responsibilities of a traditional job. It’s easy to come home exhausted and tell yourself you’ll create tomorrow. Then tomorrow becomes next week, and next week becomes months.
Rob understands that because he’s living it himself. He’s also building toward eventually leaving his 9-to-5 while developing his own creative work, so his advice doesn’t come from a place of simply telling people what they should do. He’s actively doing the work and sharing what he’s learning along the way.
What makes him stand out to me is that he genuinely loves seeing other people win. He’s always willing to share knowledge, encourage other creatives, and help people see possibilities for themselves.
His podcast has reminded me that sometimes getting unstuck doesn’t require having the entire plan figured out. Sometimes you just need to start taking intentional steps. That’s something I’m learning to live by myself.
If you’re feeling stuck in your 9-to-5, sitting on creative ideas, or trying to figure out how to build something of your own, I definitely recommend checking out The Curated Culture Podcast.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healing.with.bstarr
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@healing.with.bstarr
- TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@healingwithbstarr
