For most of us, 2020 won’t exactly go down as a time of career highs and goals ticked off the bucket list. But, for Clara Amfo, it really was quite the year. One that she finally had a chance to reflect on over the Christmas break. “It’s been so fullon, you don’t have a second to go ‘Wow, OK’. It’s like it’s happening to someone else,” she says. “When I start to think about what I’ve done, it’s quite overwhelming. I’m like ‘That was me. Cool. Alright.”

Of course, everything the DJ and TV presenter has done during the last extraordinary 12 months has also helped her listeners through the pandemic, in one way or another. For one, there was her Radio 1 show, which gave her a voice when it truly mattered – her candid, heartfelt, speech after the shocking death of George Floyd moved the nation and saw her highly lauded. It also brought her sunny disposition straight into our kitchens to lift the old spirits when we weren’t allowed to go anywhere else. “I’ve never felt more connected to my listeners than I have in the past year, I can say that unequivocally. There’s an intimacy with radio and a consistency. And I only want to hear positivity on my show. Come here with the real but don’t come here with negativity. That’s my mantra.”

And then there was her turn in the sparkly, escapist world of BBC1’s Strictly Come Dancing, where it truly felt like the cast and crew were doing it for their country this time around. “I’ve never had such genuine and sincere love from people for anything I’ve done in my career. It gave people an appointment for somewhere they needed to be on a Saturday night and something to talk about,” she reflects.

“LIFE IS SO UNPREDICTABLE, SO WHEN THINGS ARE GOOD, YOU’VE GOT TO REALLY ENJOY IT”

Clara has, like us all, had some dark days in her life, most notably losing her beloved dad Emmanuel almost six years ago. “I’ve been in low places, and I know what it’s like to feel hopeless, so when life is good, you’ve got to lean in. Really savour the sweetness. When the world is crumbling, we need to celebrate good things,” she smiles. “Life is so unpredictable. I’ve had heartbreak, a friend suffered baby loss last year, we’ve all been through shit, and I’m acutely aware of how everything can slip. So where we can, we’ve just got to really, really enjoy it, because what is the point? We’re not put on this Earth to suffer.”

There are many instances from 2020 that she will take forward with her into post-pandemic life. “A lot has changed about me as a person,” she notes. “I’ve become better at life editing. I only want to be surrounded by genuine people who love me sincerely and only want the best for me. Oh my gosh, 2020 was a year that has taught us who our friends are. I don’t have any time to waste on unfulfilling relationships, whether that is romantically, professionally, platonically. I just can’t be bothered.”

Clara properly grabs life by the balls and lives at a pace of around 150 miles an hour, and that’s a conservative estimate – because every day is jammed. But one thing she hasn’t missed lately is being over-socialised. “I love a party. I’m first on the dance floor, last to leave. But not being able to go out as much has been good for my mental health. There’s a lot of the job when you’re knackered or not in the mood and you’re talking to somebody and they’re looking over your shoulder for the most important person in the room. Not having to do any of that has been fantastic, great, wonderful.”

She’s attempting to work on her need for downtime going into 2021. “I’ve had to do that thing on my phone where it tells me to switch off and go to bed now. I did it for a while before, and I slept like a baby but I fell out of the habit.” Clara says her schedule is “all over the shop. I have my radio show in the morning, and then I’ll have meetings and I sometimes don’t finish my working day until 10pm. I think ‘I’m going to be in bed early, leave my phone outside the room, read my book, go to sleep. But my treat is watching This Is Us, or my guilty pleasure The Wendy Williams Show. That’s my downtime. I think ‘I’ll just watch another one’ and before you know it it’s 2am and I’ve got to be up at 6.30. Then I power through on adrenaline.”

Clara plans to work on her confidence this year, too. You wouldn’t think it, what with her career choices being the sort that would frighten the living daylights out of most of us, but she is a big sufferer from the old self-doubt demon. “I have so much self doubt. I’m a typical Gemini, I both over-think everything and don’t think about anything at all. I need to trust myself because I’m someone who lets fear hold me back. I’m like ‘Oh go for it, f**k it, I don’t care’, and ‘Oh no, I can’t do it’, all at the same time.” She is currently, as she puts it, ‘writing down bits and bobs’ with a view to penning a book but has reservations about admitting to it. “I cant be like ‘Hey guys, I’m going to write a book’ all over social media because I don’t want to put that pressure on myself. It’s about me trusting in it, not thinking ‘Is anyone going to care what I have to say?’”

A big lover of running, another thing the DJ wants to get over this year is her fear of the London Marathon. “I’ve done five half marathons and a full one is on my bucket list. For me, running is time to myself, I can do it wherever and whenever I want at my own pace. You’re never going to regret going for a run, you’ll always be happy you did it. I run for that feeling,” she says. “I want to get back into boxing, too. If I’ve had a long day or someone has pissed me off and I just want to get my aggression out, boxing is the one.” That’s not to say she’s averse to a spot of more mindful exercise. “I went to a yoga retreat in Jamaica and I absolutely loved it. It was one of the best things I ever did. I’d wake up and meditate, then the staff would make me delicious, bountiful vegan food, then it was yoga, and more meditation. That was my routine for 10 days and I came back feeling incredible.”

Clara discovered a love of vegan food on the retreat, though she’s since decided she needs the odd, juicy steak thrown into the mix. “I kept up the vegan lifestyle for a good while when I got back but then one day I just really fancied an Honest Burger. I felt loads of guilt until I thought, ‘no it’s about balance, take things you’ve learned from this retreat and put them into the life you want to live. You love red meat but you’ve eaten way too much of it before’. So now I have red meat maybe twice a month. I eat fish and white protein, I could eat salmon every day.”

Her go-to dish is baked salmon, Tenderstem broccoli and sweet potato. “Or if I was cooking vegan, I’d go for a roasted butternut squash. Scrape out the middle, mix it with some greens, and some chilli. I try to buy as locally as I can, I’m not going to act like I never shop in a supermarket because I do, but we’ve all seen the devastating impact of the past year on small businesses. I also want to eat well-sourced meat and fish, farmed and slaughtered humanely. I remember a vegetarian girl I know once said she doesn’t want to eat an animal’s fear. That’s always stuck with me.”

Of course, she loves a good treat, too. “Red velvet cake is my one true love. There’s an amazing bakery in Brixton called Sponge and Cream, and it’s sublime. The woman who runs it puts some magic in those cakes.”

Clara is someone who needs time by herself. “I love my own company. I really do. I live on my own and I couldn’t have thought of anything worse than living with someone during lockdown,” she laughs. “Don’t get me wrong I’ve had moments where I’ve thought it’d be nice to be around others, but that’s where video calling comes in. I’d video call my mum every day and group chat with my mates.”

Currently single and ‘always open to a bit of romance’, Clara says she’s learnt some big lessons in her dating life in the past few years. “I’ll make space for people if my gut tells me it’s worth it. I’d like to be with someone who isn’t intimidated by me. Or doesn’t want to make me feel small. I’m not here to appease anybody’s mid-life crisis. That has happened several times, never again,” she says. “But I don’t need to be with anyone, which is a great place to be at.”

Life is generally pretty lovely for Clara Amfo, and well deserved it is, too, thanks to her combination of hard graft and seizing the day, squeezing every single drop of joy out of life. ‘Luck is when preparation meets opportunity’ is one of the phrases she lives by, coined by none other than her life guru Oprah Winfrey. “Because Oprah knows everything,” she laughs. In fact, when the two met, Oprah told Clara ‘You’ve got a light. I can see it. I can feel it’. And Clara Amfo is shining her light of hope and optimism brightly forwards into 2021. She just needs to remember to get to bed early once in a while…

To read the whole of our lovely Winter/Spring Digi Magazine click here: Hope Issue

Clara was featured in Bumble’s campaign #MyLoveisBlackLove which aims to better represent Black love in a real and uniquely British way. You can see her reflections on love, alongside 30 other leading Black voices at thebeehive.bumble.com/myloveisblacklove and @bumble_uk