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On November 4, 2008, Indie Lee drove 15 minutes to a doctor's office after an MRI. She came out knowing she had a brain tumor. On that 15-minute drive, she decided two things: that something incredible was going to come from this, and that she was no longer going to be a passenger in her own life.
She had already been making clean baby products in her kitchen — botanical powders and massage oils for her nephew's baby shower, from herbs she grew herself. Her friends told her this was exactly what the world needed. She hadn't listened. The universe, as she puts it, decided to send a bigger sign.
This conversation between Rachel and Indie covers what happened next: brain surgery on Earth Day, a website launched two months after waking up, and the building of one of the most recognized names in clean beauty — by a CPA who had never worked in the industry, had no retail contacts, and started by maxing out credit cards and emptying her 401K.
🎙 WHAT’S COVERED IN THIS EPISODE
How a brain tumor diagnosis in 2008 led Indie from CPA at HBO to clean beauty founder
Choosing purpose, presence, and optimism when given six months to live
What "clean beauty" actually means — and how to spot greenwashing
Why Indie Lee formulates to EU standards, not US regulations
The link between environmental toxins and autoimmune disease — and why it matters more than most people realize
Building a brand with no playbook: the figure-it-out mindset in practice
Low-tox living essentials: sleep, clean eating, gut health, stress reduction
The clean skincare routine Indie actually uses — cleanser, squalane, SPF, and nothing else
Indie doesn't just talk about ingredients — she talks about what it means to stop living by other people's definitions of success, trust your gut when everyone thinks you're crazy, and build something that genuinely aligns with your values. Plus: she's not wearing foundation. At all. Check out the video to see her amazing skin — the squalane speaks for itself.
🎙 ABOUT THE GUEST
Indie Lee - founder of Indie Lee, a pioneering clean skincare brand she built from her kitchen in 2008 after a life-changing brain tumor diagnosis.
Before clean beauty was a category, Indie was formulating products free of harmful ingredients because her own health depended on it. A former CPA at HBO, she taught herself everything from Illustrator to retail strategy, surrounded herself with best-in-class partners, and eventually landed in Sephora, Nordstrom, and Bluemercury. Every product is formulated to EU standards — stricter than US regulations — and certified Leaping Bunny cruelty-free. Today she's stepping back into the public-facing side of the brand, speaking more, writing more, and raising awareness about the environmental links to autoimmune disease.
To follow her: Instagram: @indielee
Shop Indie Lee products Rachel loves: IndieLee.com
Use code YAH20 for 20% off at IndieLee.com
✨ TOP 5 TAKEAWAYS
✦ Purpose reveals itself when you stop being a passenger. Indie's phrase for her life before the diagnosis was precise: she was checking boxes, not driving. The tumor didn't create her purpose — it cleared away everything that was obscuring it. As she put it, she had two bad days between diagnosis and surgery, because she made a choice to stay in gratitude for whatever time she had left, and focus entirely on what she wanted to do with it. That's not toxic positivity. That's an active, daily decision.
✦ Clean beauty has a definition — and "natural-looking packaging" isn't it. Greenwashing has been around since Indie started in 2008. Her definition of clean is specific: do no harm to humans, living beings, and the planet — and formulate to the EU directive, which bans over 1,500 ingredients that are still legal in the US. The same brand can sell two different formulations — one for Europe, one for America — because they don't have to meet the same standard here. Knowing that changes how you read a label.
✦ Two thirds of all autoimmune diseases are environmentally linked — and almost nobody is talking about it. Indie has had rheumatoid arthritis, a brain tumor, and a Crohn's diagnosis she didn't even know about until a colonoscopy. She traces it all to toxic load — what's absorbed through skin, food, cleaning products, the air. There are currently around 80 million Americans with autoimmune or autoimmune-adjacent conditions, more than double the number with cancer. The research and public conversation haven't caught up.
✦ The figure-it-out mindset is a skill, not a personality trait. Indie started with no retail contacts, no industry knowledge, and no money. She learned Illustrator to design her own labels. She asked for help constantly — and reframes asking for help as giving someone an opportunity to contribute to your vision. The brand went from farmers market aesthetics to Sephora by bringing in people who knew what she didn't, one gap at a time.
✦ A clean skincare routine is simpler than the industry wants you to think. Indie's daily routine: a gentle cleanser, chemical exfoliation (not physical — it damages the acid mantle), squalane facial oil, and SPF 50. That's it. No foundation. She's 52. She attributes the texture of her skin directly to a single-ingredient squalane she's used for years, derived from olives, Cosmos certified, and formulated before anyone else was doing it.
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💛 RACHEL'S FAVORITE MOMENTS
I loved the moment Indie described walking out of the doctor's office still reeling from the brain tumor diagnosis and telling her best friend: I know what this is about. I'm going to create a skincare line.
Sometimes clarity, vision, and purpose come to us in such unexpected ways. It shows that despite obstacles, heavy news, and health challenges, there is a path that will show the way and provide a healing journey, unique to you in exactly the way that you need.
⏸ PAUSE HERE
Indie said something early in this conversation that I haven't been able to put down: she spent 37 years checking the boxes of what she thought she needed to accomplish, and she was a passenger, not a driver, in her own life.
Where are you still riding passenger in yours — in your career, your health, your daily choices?
And what would it look like to take one small step toward the driver's seat — not a dramatic overhaul, but one decision that's actually yours?
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