appConfigEntityId

bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

isVideo

articlePageQuery

article

articleSchemaContent

content

hooksArticlePageAdvertisementConfigArticle

hooksArticlePageFloatingButtonConfigArticle

appConfig

filter

json

liveArticle

Kavita Daswani

For Dana Nakagawa, the Covid pandemic was especially challenging.
“The day we went into lockdown, my mom passed away,” she says. “And then a couple of months later, I got laid off from my job.”
At the time, Nakagawa was a 56-year-old single mother living in the US state of California with her teenage daughter. She had been working in advertising as an art director after decades as a graphic designer.
“Suddenly I was jobless, and that was a huge shock … How was I going to survive?” she recalls wondering.
“That moment became a major pivot point in my life.”
First, Nakagawa needed to land on a viable means of support. She created a business selling modern and vintage clothing she found at thrift stores. She sold it on sites such as eBay and Poshmark, using the apt name Dana Findwell.
It became a full-time vocation. While she was not earning as much as she was in her previous job, she was managing to pay her bills. And she enjoyed the work.
She launched a YouTube channel, @danafindwell, focused on her reselling business. But one day, instead of describing her items, Nakagawa started describing her life. She spoke about her recent challenges – being laid off, losing her mother, restarting her life in her 50s.
Clearly, it resonated with viewers. The video, titled “Not too late to start over. Finding purpose after 40, 50, 60, or at any age”, went viral.


“If we become irrelevant, then that’s when we disappear, that’s when we become invisible, and it’s almost like we’re in the corner, in the shadows, and too afraid to pursue what we want to pursue,” she says.
“This could happen in a lot of different ways. We either are faced with fear, fear of not being good at something, fear of what others will think of us. Fear can be debilitating. I don’t want my life to be controlled by fear.”
To date, the video has had more than 777,000 views.
She decided that her next act would be as a content creator addressing the subjects that were dear to her: starting over, decluttering, reinvention, and her interpretation of ikigai: a Japanese concept that translates as “a reason for being”.
Nakagawa is a third-generation Japanese-American who was born in Los Angeles, raised in Berkeley and now living in Oakland – all in California. Her mother’s family is from Okinawa and her father’s from Hiroshima. She began delving deeper into the idea behind ikigai when, a few years into her thrifting and YouTube endeavours, she began to feel overwhelmed.
“The ikigai that I understood before was more the Western version,” she says, referring to the popular Venn diagram that links passion, money and career. “It assumes you’re going to get your purpose from your job.”

But she began to examine the Okinawan understanding of ikigai. Okinawa is one of the world’s original “Blue Zones”, a term coined by American longevity researcher Dan Buettner in 2004 to refer to places with a high number of centenarians, where people tend to live longer and have lower rates of chronic disease.
“The real ikigai is very, very simple,” Nakagawa says. “It’s what brings you joy, and it intersects with what you do on a daily basis. It could be something like your morning coffee or tending to your garden.”
Your job does not have to be your ikigai. “It can just be your job. Realising that was such a relief. I thought my ikigai had to be this one big career or life-changing job. And then you realise it’s something you already have.”
Her focus on decluttering – especially for people over 50 – eventually led to another project.
“What I found is that we have a lot of keepsakes. And the keepsakes have stories in them.”
But letting go can feel impossible. “People think, ‘I don’t want to get rid of this pen because it reminds me of the time I met my husband.’”
She wrote a book, called Keepsake Stories: A Guided Journal for Cherished & Remembered Keepsakes, that provides solutions.
“It allows for people to write the story of the keepsake. Then you don’t need the object any more,” she says.

Beyond videos, Nakagawa now offers her viewers free guides, one-on-one mentoring and YouTube memberships.
“Trying something new is hard,” she says. “I was very afraid to do these things.”
But her audience responded. “I’m much more comfortable having a smaller, loyal, engaged group.”
Financial stability gave her room to experiment. “I had a good retirement fund,” she says. “I also own my own house, so I had some assets to fall back on.”
That allowed her to step away from what no longer fit. “The thrifting business is very linear,” she says. “You sell something, you have to go out and get another one. It overruns your life.”
Now, she posts long videos every other week and short videos in between, and hosts a monthly live session – something she once found daunting.
“I was very afraid to do a live video,” she says. “But my word for this phase of my life is ‘fearless’.”
She found the courage to take up hip-hop dance lessons based on her lifelong love of dance and as part of her “redefining” journey. She also began classes in Japanese drumming known as taiko.
“I wasn’t going to be a professional dancer or a drummer,” she says on one of her popular YouTube short reels. “But those classes proved to me that I was still a student capable of learning, even when I felt like I had lost my professional identity.”


The biggest lesson for Nakagawa is one she shares often.
“Your life matters,” she says. “No matter how small you think your purpose is, it’s important. This time period in my life right now is the best it’s ever been, because I have space, and I finally understand what brings me joy.”
Like what you read? Follow SCMP Lifestyle on Facebook, X and Instagram. You can also sign up for our eNewsletter here.


Why dementia is preventable – and the new tools that can reduce your risk

A guide to Hong Kong’s bitter herbal teas and how Gen Z is reviving the health tradition

Focused ultrasound could be the next big cancer breakthrough for hard-to-treat tumours

How much sex should a couple have? Focus on quality over quantity, experts say

Wellness

Japanese-American influencer, 60, who went viral saying it’s never too late to start over

One of the things that Dana Nakagawa talks about in her YouTube videos is her interpretation of the Japanese concept of ikigai. “It’s what brings you joy, and it intersects with what you do on a daily basis. It could be something like your morning coffee,” she says. Photo: Dana Nakagawa

When Nakagawa lost her job during Covid, she started selling modern and vintage clothing she found at thrift stores. Photo: Instagram/danafindwell

Nakagawa shows how she declutters her home using specially marked bins. Photo: Dana Nakagawa

Hong Kong fitness charity founder lost 13kg in 4 months. Now she helps others get in shape

Karen Chau, who is from Taiwan but has called Hong Kong home for the last decade, is pictured at a gym in the city’s Tin Hau neighbourhood. After losing 13kg in four months, she set up her charity Fit2Give to help church ministers and NGO workers on their fitness journey. Photo: Jonathan Wong

Chau (left) and Fung train together in 2023. Photo: Karen Chau

Chau leads a group exercise class for Alpha HK through her Fit2Give organisation. Photo: Karen Chau

Chau began strength training twice weekly as part of her weight-loss journey. Photo: Jonathan Wong 

Chau used the MyFitnessPal app to track her calories and macros on her way to losing 13kg. She “eats the rainbow”, having many different types and colours of vegetables and fruits every day. Photo: Facebook/fittogiveministries

“I never imagined I would be fitter in my late forties than in my twenties,” Chau says. Photo: Jonathan Wong

Chau enjoys a meal out in Tokyo in March 2018, before her weight-loss journey began. Photo: Karen Chau

What is ‘soft January’? New trend helps you start the year being kinder to yourself

January often brings “exhausting” pressure to set rigid self-improvement goals, but “soft January” offers a kinder alternative. Wellness experts talk about what the trend means to them. Photo: Shutterstock

Hong Kong-based holistic health coach Tammy Hackman treats January as “a tapering off period”. Photo: BizBee Social

Recipe developer Aline Davies says January is about “approaching the year with a more gentle mindset and less pressure”. Photo: Madie Downs

Life coach Sanam Thakur reframes January not as a sprint, but as a moment to pause and realign. Photo: Sanam Thakur

Malabar Baby founder Anjali Harjani is saying goodbye to pressure in January, and instead treating the month “like a warm hug”. Photo: Denise Pontak

For London-based musician and spiritual coach Ada Chan, soft January means “a quiet reset – a kinder, gentler way of beginning the year that trades rigid resolutions for small, sustainable shifts”. Photo: Ada Chan

How the concept of happiness has evolved through the ages and ways to achieve it

Happiness has been defined in many ways throughout history, and there are as many different theories about how to achieve it. Photo: Shutterstock


Paying less attention to material goods, tamping down our physical desires, being content with what we have and being kind to others all play a big part in happiness. Photo: Shutterstock

Humanistic psychologists of the mid-20th century thought happiness is the state we achieve when we fulfil our psychological and physical needs. Photo: Shutterstock

The Ancient Greek philosopher Socrates believed self-reflection was intrinsic to happiness. Photo: Shutterstock

Psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud did not pay much attention to happiness, believing we should be content to manage our negative feelings. Photo: AP

Buddhist monk and author Gelong Thubten says: “If you free yourself from the need to find happiness, you will find that it was already there.” Photo: Mindvalley.com

How ‘the first Asian woman in hip hop’ went from misfit to managing Wu-Tang Clan members

Sophia Chang with RZA (left) and GZA of the Wu-Tang Clan, in 2019. After growing up “a yellow girl in a white world”, the Korean-Canadian moved from suburban Vancouver to New York, where she would come to manage hip-hop artists from A Tribe Called Quest to D’Angelo. Photo: Sophia Chang

Chang celebrates her 60th birthday in Los Angeles, California, in May 2025. Photo: Instagram/sophchangnyc

Chang hugs Method Man of the Wu-Tang Clan in October 2025. Photo: Instagram/sophchangnyc

Chang became close with some of the most prominent hip-hop artists of the time after moving to New York in 1986. Photo: Sophia Chang

“I felt like I was coated in Kevlar because they were so formidable,” Chang says of her time spent in the company of the Wu-Tang Clan. Photo: Sophia Chang

Lifestyle

Health & Wellness

Health

Dana Nakagawa reinvented herself as a content creator and now posts videos on starting over, decluttering and her interpretation of ikigai


Dana Nakagawa reinvented herself as a content creator and now posts videos on starting over, decluttering and her interpretation of ikigai.


Japanese-American influencer, 60, who went viral saying it’s never too late to start over

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Dana Nakagawa reinvented herself as a content creator and now posts videos on starting over, decluttering and her interpretation of ikigai

Dana Nakagawa reinvented herself as a content creator and now posts videos on starting over, decluttering and her interpretation of ikigai