Why I Sometimes Regret Being Famous - Simi

Simi gets honest about fame.

Fame is very alluring to all of us who don't have it and look at it from the outside looking in. From the glitz and glam of red carpet to fashion spreads, music videos, television shows, media attention, fan love, it looks very alluring. Many people want to be famous. In fact, statistics show that these days, when asked, a lot more younger people said that they want to be famous when they grow up than younger people from past years.

Fame is good. It looks very enticing and for those of us just scrolling, it looks like the ultimate party ever.

But how come celebrities seem to then complain about fame a lot? Time after time, we've heard celebrities talk about how they struggle with being famous and today, Nigerian singer Simi who is very famous especially for her music but also her private life, is now speaking about what she doesn't like about fame.

Are you ready to see what the beloved songstress said? Then let's go!

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In an in-depth interview with Afrobeats Intelligence, Simi talked a lot about being famous and how she's not a big fan of fame and the constraints that have come with being famous.

It all started when she was asked about having to be opinionated while being famous and how she's managed to manage that, Simi said:

If I think something and I feel like it needs to be said, I would say it. But I realise now that sometimes you mean well right? And you say something because you want to be heard. But then because of my status as an artist or someone with a level of fame, sometimes what you're saying becomes about you, not what you are saying. And that can be a bit problematic. Imagine you’re talking about the government for example. And sometimes it might become about how you said what you said, and then people are not paying much attention to what you were saying. They are paying attention to who said it or how it was said. And that can be very unproductive. So I try to be more guarded about expressing myself in the public. 'Cause I realise that the platform is not the same, so I have to be careful with that.

I'm a very opinionated person and I like to say how I feel. But now because whenever I say something, I don’t want it to become about me as opposed to what I'm talking about. Now I have to calculate before I say something. That is really frustrating because that is not my natural state. My natural state is not to over calculate before I say something. That's not how my mind operates. Also, look at how my relationship was private before I got married. Normally, I would have liked to just celebrate my relationship how I could without... But now, if I do it, I'm not just attracting comments from people that I love, or people that know me personally. I'm attracting comments from the whole of Nigeria. So now everything is censored more because when you put it out there, you are giving people access to that part of your life. I definitely miss that. I'm not a big fan of fame

When asked by the interviewer, "You don't seem to embrace fame," Simi said:

I like the perks. Obviously, that's where the success of my music comes from. But on a personal level, I'm not a big fan of it. For example, I don’t like to have makeup on. It stresses me out and I have allergies. I'm not a super glam person. I like to wear my sneakers and shorts and t-shirts. That's me. And that's not going to change. But like, everybody now has an opinion about things like that. You know that could become a little tiring. It is tiring, but something has to give. I love music and I want to do it, so something has to give.

In a perfect world, Simi says that she'd allow her music to be famous without she herself being famous because of the kind of attention it brings to not only you, but also the people around you, even people who never asked to be a part of any of it like her daughter. She said:

when I started to sing, I used to wish that I could sing anonymously and my music would like… And like I said, fame has its perks. You get certain favours, the respect that comes with it. Sometimes the privacy is the price. And the fact that I also feel bad for my mum. My mum is also really opinionated and she likes to use her voice. But sometimes she probably censors herself because of me. Also in advance, I feel for my daughter as well because she didn’t ask for fame. She’s a baby now. And now we have to be very careful because it's not her choice to be in the limelight. But at the end of the day, something has to give. And I'm used to it now. I'm used to how it has to be now. I've mastered the art of balancing my life and know what I want out there. And knowing what I don't want out there.

And I have to say that I realise that I'm also very grateful for all the support, all the love. So it's not like I'm just famous and people just know me. Liket there's no value added to me and anything. There's a lot of love, there's a lot of support. So I'm thankful for it. It's just obviously sometimes you miss your privacy, you miss the anonymity.

Whew! That was very candid. Honestly I understand. Being famous while glamorous looks like a LOT of work and stress and invasion of privacy. I'm happy Simi has finally been able to find a way to balance it all but still, it can't be easy.

Just another thing that makes you think about the things we aspire to in this life and what sacrifices we have to make to attain them.

That's All.

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