In 2020, 16-year-old Aba Asante stood in front of her phone, filmed a video with trending audio, and posted it to TikTok. Putting herself out there was a risk, but it paid off: the video went viral, amassing over 139 million views and earning her a following of over 6 million people. But at the height of her success in 2022, she walked away, beginning a three-year-long break from what had become a full-time social media career. “I didn’t really realize at the time what I could really do with [social media] long-term,” Asante tells Her Campus in an exclusive interview. “I thought it was just a silly little thing.”
Asante then moved halfway across the country from Indiana to Boston, began college, and set her sights on a path away from social media. However, after pursuing a B.A. in business management and marketing (along with playing collegiate volleyball), Asante realized that creating content online was more than a “silly little thing”: It was her future.
Instead of going the corporate route upon graduation, Asante, now 22, decided to bet on herself once again and return to content creation — this time, with a purpose. “I took everything that I studied from school, my degree, and my internships, and started applying it to my social media,” she says. “I realized, ‘OK, I could actually make a career out of this.’”
There’s one thing about me: I love to break generational curses.
Aba Asante
But posting consistently online after three years away wasn’t as easy as it sounds. In fact, leaving and coming back posed a huge risk: losing an audience of millions that Asante took years to build. Her followers had evolved, and Asante wanted her content to evolve as well — moving away from TikTok dances and trending audios to beauty, fashion, and getting real about her life. “Coming back at first was a little bit embarrassing,” she admits, “because I’m like, ‘Hey everyone, I’m back! I look completely different, and I completely changed my niche up.’”
Returning to the public eye meant becoming vulnerable again. However, she says she was up for the challenge. “There’s one thing about me: I love to break generational curses,” Asante says. “Whether that be just with being a woman, or a Black woman, or being first-generation [Ghanaian American].”
For Asante, being open about her break from social media is just another way to break that generational curse. “I feel like Black women are forced to put up a persona that they’re always strong,” she says. “But it’s OK if a girl feels like crying sometimes, or is a little bit emotional — it should be normal to show that.”
That philosophy is already shaping what this next era means for Asante. Beyond creating content in the fashion and beauty space, she’s using her platform to highlighthighlight causes and communities that are personally meaningful to her. This September, Asante partnered with St. Jude’s to raise awareness for sickle cell disease, which involved visiting a St. Jude’s hospital in Memphis to better understand the experiences of those impacted. “My sister and my niece have it,” she says, “so it’s something that I’m super passionate about.”
Along with her partnership with St. Jude’s, Asante is also involved with the JQ Foundation, which supports educational opportunities for people in Ghana. And, on top of that, Asante has used social media to open up to her audience about having ADHD. “[ADHD] is something that people have, and they’re meant to feel bad or weird about it,” she says. “But it’s something that makes you unique, and I’m really trying to make a space where people feel comfortable being the way they are.”
After spending three years learning who she was away from the public eye, Asante is now figuring out what it means to let people see that person. Because her return isn’t about becoming the girl she was before the break — i — it’s about permitting herself to evolve. “If I try something and it doesn’t work out, that’s fine — I can pivot and do something else,” she says. “That’s the story of my life. I’ve always taken insane risks, and I feel like everything will fall into place.”