Get to know the ||Superwoman|| of YouTube, Lilly Singh

Once upon a time, the world looked up to superwomen like Margaret Thatcher and Princess Diana. But the millennium seems to have created a digital version of its own, all with its own virtues and quirks.

Meet 'Superwoman' Lilly Singh, whose YouTube channel is one of the world's top five subscribed and viewed. She currently has 5.6 million subscribers on YouTube alone, close to a million followers on Twitter, 1.7 million followers on her Instagram and 2.1 million likes on her official Facebook Page! What brought this on?

Rapper, vlogger, motivational speaker, comedian… the Canada-born Punjabi has many descriptive to her name, but what she is without doubt, is an entertainer. Her first spontaneous Youtube video in 2010,"was a spoken word piece that wasn't funny at all" by her own admission. Five years and two million subscribers later, Lilly didn't think she was "becoming something", until Shah Rukh Khan called her when she was in Mumbai for the YouTube FanFest, last year. The superstar is in India through Culture Machine, a digital video entertainment brand.

If you're wondering why Lilly chose Superwoman as her digital identity, the story goes back to a hip-hop song that she really liked when she was growing up. "I called myself Superwoman a few times and it felt good and motivating. I decided that if I had any problems throughout my childhood, I'd just pretend I'm a supergirl and I'll get through them. Then I found my Superwoman ring, which I've been wearing since I was 10, so the name just stayed," she explains, flaunting her ring.

In the last one year, not only has her fan base expanded, she also finds that she has evolved at various levels—personal, emotional and spiritual. "I'm more comfortable with the lifestyle. If a big name (like SRK) were to call me, I don't hyperventilate any more," says the psychology graduate and one-time bhangra dancer. "I feel like I have no time to relax, like ever! When you become popular and go to a party or do anything else, there's a roomful of people who want to take selfies with you. It's hard to turn that off. But it's something that you get used to. Understanding that your life slowly becomes everyone's life."

And what has Lilly done to earn this fame? Lilly thinks of an idea, writes the script, shoots, edits and releases her video, all in the same day. "If I have the idea I can write a script in 45 minutes, but thinking of the idea is the hard part," admits Lilly, dressed in a grey T-shirt, sleeveless black leather jacket, floral P-cap and furry unicorn slippers.

While she does always have a script, she performs impromptu too. "I post daily logs on my second channel, which are natural videos of what I'm eating, feeling and thinking. Otherwise I do a lot of random things; so I'm always doing meetings, conference calls, writing and reading scripts, going to events—my whole life is consumed by Superwoman," says Lilly, who shoots her videos in her room at home.

Lilly, who is in her mid-twenties, says you don't need something concrete to be inspired. For her, inspiration comes "from a lot of places".

"Throughout the day, if something happens to me, I think 'Okay, new video'. If I'm hanging out with my friends and they do something, I'm like, 'You know what, you're annoying and I'm making a video about this, because I'm sure other people experience it! And if I really can't think of an idea, I just ask my viewers—what do you want to see today? Oh great! That sounds like a great idea, I'm gonna do that," she adds.

Lilly, who has collaborated with the likes of Madhuri Dixit, Seth Rogen, James Franco, Jay Sean and Kunal Nayyar (from The Big Bang Theory) as well as Karan Brar from the Disney Channel believes, "consistency is important to ensure my viewers stay with me". She posts two videos a week, because out of sight is out of mind. "I also talk about things that people can relate to".

As one of her fans, Beulah Pereira, puts it, "What really struck me is her charisma and realist attitude, she never says no to fans who want to greet her no matter how tired she is. She deals with issues on pop culture, which we all relate to; she always adds an element of newness into every video. But most of all, she remains humble".

So what's next on Lilly's radar? She has approximately 350 videos and is 'super' excited about performing live during her World Tour in May, starting with Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bangalore.

She wants to maintain her YouTube channel for as long as she can. "I'd love to try film, TV and music more seriously, but I feel that YouTube is the platform that got me there, so I want to try to pay tribute to it for as long as I can. And moving somewhere where there's no snow, that's my goal for the next year," she laughs.