By Aida Toro
Don't let this newly crowned AmerAsia queen fool you. She is full of raw wisdom and emotion. Like light shining through a crystal, Krystal Leonardo von Seyfried bursts through the other side of the prism in colorful effervescence. We are totally here for her zen rainbow vibes.
Krystal Leonardo von Seyfried is not just a gorgeous face, but a storyteller as well. She grew up in the Koreatown sector of Los Angeles and has quite an interesting ethnicity as her mother is Filipino and her father is German. Her maternal grandmother was a beauty queen, winning Miss Bulacan and Miss Manila in her youth and her paternal grandfather was a soldier who perished as a casualty of World War II, fighting at a later age than most in order to protect his wife and children.
“His sacrifice is why I am here today,” said von Seyfried in regards to her grandfather.
von Seyfried was actually named one of the Top 10 Most Beautiful Filipina-American Women of 2015 by the Beautiful Life Awards Foundation. The opportunity arrived at her door through the Filipino-American community in Los Angeles, which she’s been active in for most of her life.
“Being named in a prestigious list like that was truly amazing and another childhood dream come true because every little girl wants to be called beautiful, and how much more being named that for your people?”, said von Seyfried.
In all honesty, von Seyfried felt guilty for this honorable mention as she is only half Filipina. She was mostly raised by her Filipino side as most of her German side was lost in World War II. Therefore, she considers herself well-versed in the culture of the Philippines rather than German culture, which she’s actually working on changing because she wants to embrace both sides of her lineage equally.
“But, me being raised in a very Filipino household and knowing more about the culture than some of my full-blooded Filipino-American friends doesn't and will never change the fact that I don't look like most Filipinos,” she said. “I am mixed race, Eurasian and pale-skinned and this is the ideal for beauty in the Philippines, post-colonization. And knowing what happened to my people's culture through colonization makes my soul weep daily.”
She explained that the Spaniards made the people of the Philippines abandon their indigenous religion, desecrate their idols and live in shame and misery. The Spaniards made them forget their history. Prior to colonization, they had a rich trading culture as well as Hindu principalities and kingdoms - many people also don't know that Baybayin, the Philippines indigenous script, predates the birth of Christ. The Roman Catholic Church's stronghold in the Philippines is built on the tears of the Filipino people, as well as the ideal for their whitewashed beauty.
“I am a lover of Christ, but what happened to my people when the Spaniards came was nothing short of demonic in nature and something Christ himself would have put an end to, had he known what his name was being used for,” said von Seyfried. “So knowing the extremely ugly reason why a mestizo face like mine is seen as beautiful in my mother's country of tan, Moreno faces, makes me feel kinda awful accepting these awards. If I were to really choose, these awards would go to people who look like most Filipinos, with tan skin and indigenous features.”
von Seyfried said she is really not in a place where she can make choices such as this one yet. She needs to take what she could in order to build her platform because she can't launch her cannon with a minuscule slingshot. One of her ultimate dreams is to help facilitate interest in the Filipino pre-Hispanic history, so holding the face of a colonizer while doing so is kind of tough. She is in hopes that she and her people can unify their post-colonization culture as well as pre-colonization culture into something that is more copacetic and beneficial for the people of the Philippines - something respecting both their indigenous beliefs and the mixed beliefs that now dominate.
On another note, von Seyfried’s grandparents play a big role in her life. She feels her grandparents' stories come together in her own genetic story. Her connection with her grandmother’s story is clear and obvious as she has competed in pageants and holds some award titles in that sphere. The connection with her grandfather is a bit more convoluted as she is not a soldier physically, however, she sees herself as a soldier fighting for the Law of One and humanity’s happiness.
“People need to learn how to love one another again, cause over millennia we've forgotten,” she said. “Knowledge is power and I intend to spread it, even if the knowledge could be potentially dangerous for me and my modeling career. The modeling career is simply a means to an end, the end result being seeds of knowledge planted in the hearts and minds of people.”
As the lifestyle influencer she is, von Seyfried tries to spotlight things that are off the beaten path in terms of the general public’s knowledge while attempting to be an effective storyteller in her posts. She believes storytelling is really the best way to communicate with one another and that history would somewhat agree.
“Most stories have been passed down in oral histories and though the game of telephone happens with things changing and shifting over time, I see this as a natural waxing and waning in the patterns of humanity’s consciousness,” said von Seyfried. “Through stories, humans take what resonates the most and leave what doesn’t, and as long as society encourages a multidimensional view of the self which includes meditation and mindfulness, people will make the right choices in hearing and re-telling stories.”
Unfortunately, today's modern society preaches for the opposite, which is where von Seyfried thinks most of the world’s problems arrive from. Either way, she feels telling stories and connecting to people’s hearts is really important, which is why she chose this specific way to make an impact.
Although she is making a major impact as an influencer, von Seyfried does face some bumps along the way. She believes the evil eyes and jealousy a conventionally attractive woman is apt to receive from another individual is a major deal.
“I mean, I did the same thing to Instagram models and influencers when I was broken inside,” she said. “I would look at their pages, feel awful about myself and mentally curse them out of bitter jealousy.”
Knowing how metaphysics works, von Seyfried believes and is knowledgeable that these things can truly affect someone on an energetic level which then starts affecting the physical. She said she’s felt angry, jealous eyes scoping out her page, which makes her feel horrible as a woman.
“I never want to be the source of another woman's insecurity, as I myself have spent late nights crying about my appearance, comparing myself to some other women,” said von Seyfried.
One of the hardest things von Seyfried recently heard was from one of her childhood best friends at a birthday party. Her best friend introduced her to one of her guy friends who she said used to follow von Seyfried on Instagram.
“I made a face and said - ‘Used to? Why not anymore?’, and she laughed and said, ‘pfff, he got a girlfriend’. With that, most women would feel kinda hot and sexy, like a siren or something,” said von Seyfriend. “But for me? I felt absolutely horrible. Knowing that there may have been a discussion, a fight, or some kind of insecurity attached to viewing my page, which I only intend to send my heart's love from.”
Dealing with that kind of energy in the way some other women view von Seyfriend is probably the hardest thing to deal with as an influencer for her because of the deep guilt that comes from it. She knows she can't control other people and their choices, but she really just doesn’t want anyone to feel any kind of pain or insecurity stemming from her existence in any way.
“It sounds kinda overconfident and insane to say, but this is an issue that really bothers me and my heart,” she said. “It has come to the point that I now open my Instagram profile in my prayer room, place it on my altar and literally pray over my page that nobody gets hurt from it, especially another woman. Since doing this, I've felt much better.”
Post shadow work, von Seyfried can look at the face of an attractive woman and not feel jealous or insecure. She actually feels happiness for these women. Nowadays, when she encounters a beautiful woman, she wants to be her friend, rather than the enemy.
von Seyfried looks forward to every single day ahead of her, even the bad days. She is just really excited to be alive every day, in her body on planet Earth.
“I've started treating my life as a video game and I'm just the avatar playing in it and it's so much more fun this way,” she said. “I let the bad stuff roll off my back, and let my sleeping at night be me pushing reset and waking up in a new vessel. Every day is a joy, even when it's not.”
Krystal Leonaardo von Seyfriend
Instagram @krystalvon