 What kind of noodle are you? Are you a ramen noodle? Are you a soba noodle? Are you a udon, right? Secondly, I think it would be really fun to actually dress him up as a noodle. Welcome to School of Hustle, the show where we find insight and inspiration from people who are making their own way. I'm Shannon Truax, VP of Social Hierarch Go Daddy, and I live and breathe the hustle of business. Today, I have Yeying Liu with us. You probably know her as one of Fast Company's most creative people in business. She is the first Shorty Awards winner for design, the creator of the Twitter fail whale, and the official dumpling emoji. Yeying, it is such a pleasure to have you on the show. Thank you so much for having me. It's so glad to be back to New York City. I love it. The last time I saw you, we were at South by at the Media Temple Party hanging out, and now we're back together in New York, and I hear that you're in the city because of our favorite whale. What is going on with our Twitter fail whale right now? Thank you so much for the introduction. Well, I'm here because the Twitter fail whale, or the original name is Lifting the Dreamer, was being honored as the finalist of Fast Company's Timeless Design for the Design Innovation by Design Award. Congratulations. That's amazing. Now, I know that we're in New York now. Last time I saw you was in Austin, but you were born in Shanghai. You studied in London and Sydney. You live in San Francisco. You're so well traveled and you're such an accomplished artist. How has all of your background in travel influenced the work that you do? Wow, that's a really good question. Firstly, I think I was traveling because I was curious, and I really wanted to go outside of my comfort zone and go and travel and meet people who are coming from different backgrounds and culture and history and learn about them who are different from me. But what's really interesting is, as I was traveling, the more that I traveled, the more that I discovered the differences between cultures and people, the more common ground I found. I can actually see this commonality and unity between people. This got me really interested because when you create art or design or anything, anything to do with communication, you have to send a message to someone and you need to speak to this language that they can understand. And so I feel like it really taught me how to feel and live in somebody else's shoe. In somebody else's eye. And that really basically makes me a better designer or just a better person overall. I realized this is my mission. This is not my job. It's not my career. It's kind of my calling because when I create the whale that was used by Twitter as the Twitter farewell, it was a self-expression to create a piece of art to celebrate my friend's birthday or ceremony overseas. And then the next thing you know is that Twitter was licensing it and it became this whole phenomenon. I think people are craving for this connection. People are always craving for conversation. Visual art, it transcends the linguistic barrier. It really, that's why Instagram is so popular. People can look at a picture and just like enjoy what you've been experiencing. My favorite piece right now is the San Francisco seal of approval. I did it in San Francisco because number one, I really wanted to bring more art to the tech community. San Francisco used to be the mecca of art, music and creativity. I love this piece of work as well. But I have a favorite. Oh, you do. I think you might know what it is. I have to show everybody that Ying Ying did a seal of approval for New York and for my team and for this visit being here as part of the celebration around Twitter farewell and coming to New York and speaking with us. And we have a seal of approval for the Big Apple. Yes! For the New York one, it was actually inspired by the New Yorker, the artwork of the New Yorker magazine with the top hat and it also looks very regal. But I wanted to also have this, I feel like New York is such a hustle bustle place and sometimes you just need some time to kind of be present but also be with yourself and sort of going inward. You need to close your eyes and just enjoy the moment for a second. Smell the flowers and just be you. And that was the reason why I made the eyes closed and wearing a bow tie, which is very important. The fashion here. It's very important. I love this piece. Thank you for this. Of course, my pleasure. My pleasure. What kind of assignments do you generally take and have you ever turned an assignment down? That's a really good question. That's such a good question. It's important to make sure that you know that you're doing something, you're spending your life energy. If you take on any project, you're literally spending the most important commodity of yourself which is your time and your life span onto something. So make sure you're doing something that matters, that people actually cares. I love that. Do something that matters, right? I want to redefine the name of hustle or redefine the idea of hustle. Hustle is not, like I think a lot of people are like, you got to hustle. You got to hustle 24 hours. You have to like put all your energy there but you got to make sure where you put your energy to. Like if I just only doing the thing that makes money in order to pay my bail better, sure, that's also hustling but I can also hustle into something that makes you into a better run. Well, you're tremendously successful in what you do. I have to ask though, along your journey, which has been so amazing, what is the best piece of advice and the worst piece of advice that you have gotten along the way? This is the toughest question I've probably ever been asked. The best advice and also the worst advice is the same one, which is follow your gut. It could be the best advice. It also could be the worst advice because you got to make sure you understand what it means by gut. Your gut is not what you think you're going to get. That is not your gut. That is here. That is not here. Interesting. So when people say follow your gut, it's follow your intuition. People misunderstood what it means by instinct. I have been learning a lot from you during this conversation and you offer so much. I mean, you just offer so much joy and so much insight and wisdom. But I have to ask, what is one thing that you still need to learn? Oh my God, I'm learning. I'm still learning. And I still feel like I need to do it better is learn to flow. Can you define the definition of flow? I would say that flow is going with energy and adapting at an even frequency without getting too high and too low. But being okay, functioning, smiling and being at that neutral frequency as life happens. I think you define it absolutely, wonderfully well. So I think, like, I love your definition and I love that phrase which I kind of, like, had that idea the other day. If you read, you're a reader. If you listen, you're a listener. If you fight, you're a fighter. But if you flow, you're a flower. And the flow is in the state. I want to be a flower. There you go. You're a flower now. I'm popping up my Australian accent. There you go. The flow state is in the state of you're really truly enjoying something that you're gifted or something that you had or something that you can having it as a creative outlet, a self expression. You're in the flow state. You forget about yourself. You forget about your time. You forget where you are. You're just so concentrated. I think we're in the flow right now. But my flow, apart from all these, is learning to swim. You need to learn how to swim. For real. I need to learn how to flow. I was not expecting that. In the water as well. Cross-stroke, backstroke. Whatever it is. All of them. I have to learn it. Because I live in Australia. You can't have you drowning. Yeah. That's a big deal. For sure. Water safety. So with everything going on, what is next on the horizon? Right. Great question. So this year or beginning of next year is the 10th anniversary of the Twitter farewell or lifting a dreamer. Wow. So it's been 10 years. Can you believe it? I can't. It's been 10 years. Cache time flies. Yeah. And it's been 10 years that I've been serving startups and corporations and helping innovate in a corporate world and bring art into the technology world. But for now, what my next project and the project that I'm really excited about is this. I was initially debuted this little character for San Francisco Center for the Book for their steamrolling festival in San Francisco. And so I made this seal writing a steamroller. And people were inspired by the seal and they started to create their own, which is amazing. And to me, what my next step is co-create with others, co-create this reality with other people. And I feel like once you started to co-create others, you're creating something together. And this is finding and honoring the diversity, but at the end of the day, converge it into a unity. Well, we let everybody know in our tribe that you were coming on the show and they were very excited. And so some questions came in and, you know, we have a question from Johan who said, you know, what advice do you have for somebody who's getting started in their 20s, who wants to start a business in art? What sort of education do you go after? How do you get started? Oh, great question, Johan. The best education that you will be able to ever receive is the real life education, which is do it as a real project. And you have to allow yourself to give your gift to others and share your gift to others. You're not losing it. You never ever lose creativity. Creativity is interest. The more you use, the more you get. And I feel that for me personally, my experience has taught me that people ask me, how'd you get this gig? How'd you get this project? Because I give, because I served. During my 20s, I did a lot of projects, not necessarily for money. I did so much project that was just for the sheer joy of being able to utilize my skill to help others. And so that is how my career started. I want to play a game with you right now. Yay! Get in a little deeper, but silly. And we want to play a game called Hustle Time. Jonathan, will you bring the cards? I love it, deep and silly. So, Hustle Time is the spirit of setting a timer for 60 seconds and seeing how many questions we can get through before the buzzer. Do you want to shuffle the cards? Sure! Make sure they're fair. Give them a little mix. I love shuffling. Right? Give it a mix and feel good about the deck. All right. I'm ready. Feel good? Yeah. Okay. All right. Ready? Three, two, one, go. Ski trip or beach vacation? Beach vacation. Would you rather have more time or more money? More time. Yeah. First place you'll visit when you retire. Hawaiian. Okay. Worst trend you've ever participated in? What what? Worst trend. Trend. Yes. Man. I don't know. Okay. Favorite breakfast food? One thing you want on a desert island with you? Beach ball. Perfect. Biggest splurge. What's a splurge? Like you spend a lot of money on something. Oh. Dog food. Perfect. Camping or glamping? Camping. Okay. Boozy brunch or morning workout? Brunch. Yes. Go to karaoke song. You wish you could take away from the English language? Serendipity. No cheese ever again or no sugar ever again? No sugar. No sugar. Favorite Disney movie? Snow White. Three things in your closet right now. Done. One last question for you. Okay. And it's giving a piece of advice to Noodle, our resident pug. Oh my God. Is a brand. Now you might not know this but Noodle has an Instagram following of about 50,000 followers. What advice do you have for somebody who has a brand but wants to repackage themselves, want to refresh a little bit, but still be a brand who people love? Great. Well, firstly, I love Noodle. I love Ramen Noodle too. I ate so much Ramen Noodle was growing up. Firstly, I think you have to be true to yourself. You have to be sort of go within. His name is Noodle. So you have to have a bit of personality. What kind of Noodle are you? Are you a Ramen Noodle? Are you a Soba Noodle? Are you a Udon? Right? Secondly, I think it would be really fun to actually dress him up as a Noodle. Right? Oh, you don't have to stop as a Noodle. You can be a Ramen Burger. Get creative, expand the definition of who you think you are. Exactly. But in a way that's true to yourself. That's right. You don't have to stick with the form of Noodle. You can also be a Ramen Burger. I like it. Well, you know what? That's fabulous advice. I think Noodle likes you. And so do we. Hey, everybody. You know what? This was a great show and we loved having you, Ying Ying. And there is more school of hustle to come. Please don't forget to subscribe. IGTV, Facebook, YouTube. It's there. We bring these out every week and we love hearing from you. So keep watching and sending in your questions and let us know what you think. And you, my lovely, thank you. Thanks for having me. I'm so glad to be here.