In this episode of 5to9, I had a chat with Hailin Liu, aka DJ Hailife. She’s a musician, brand strategist, lover of fashion, cat mom, and a tarot enthusiast.

Growing up with traditional expectations of her career, Hailin started in investment banking due to her family and peer’s influence. She quickly realized that she hated the environment and pivoted to brand strategy. While working at Landor and McCann, she realized that she was yearning for more creative expression in her life, which led her to experiment with music and fashion. She is now a brand and design strategist at Pepsi while moonlighting as a DJ playing at dope venues in New York like TBA and elsewhere. She also just released her newest single, Call Me Baby, and is slotted to perform at Groove Cruise, a festival also featuring DJs you might know like Diplo and Tiesto.

We talked about her unconventional journey into music, how knowing what she didn’t want led her to find what she wanted, following her joy, the power of taking small actions, what she calls “creative courage”, the role of her 9-5 job as a strategist while pursuing music and more!