HOW I FOUND SUCCESS TWICE
Happy Poor. Burgers or gas you choose?
One day on the way home my mom asked me “do you want to burgers or to get gas?” It was probably the first time I remember having a choice between food and something we needed. We got those burgers and we sure did run out of gas on the way home, but we were still smiling. Becoming a parent, myself propelled me to choose a career that would make sure burgers or gas was never something my daughter had to choose from. I carried the tradition of love and smiles on, but I broke the chain and graduated college and I took a job in marketing sales to provide a grander life.
Dreams don’t just come true overnight. Take the jump but be smart.
Even though I knew I wanted to leave a very successful job and search out a soul fulfilling position I didn’t just magically wake up and start a new path. It took time, work, determination, and planning! I stayed at my current position and paid my house off and saved everything I could in order to plan for the switch. I stayed at my position as long as I possibly could while seeking out research in design. I spoke to everyone I could in the business, I sought out advice from everyone! Don’t be afraid to reach out to others in the field you want to be in. They have been through it and can give you the best advice to jump start your career. There was an entire year of preparing to leave, then I took a position in a corporate company doing what I wanted to do for 4 years, then a year of going out on my own, and finally attacking the dream.
Prepare to fail, it’ll happen to you but that’s not the end. Don’t take it personal.
At this point I have prepared to go out on my own for FIVE years. Five years of preparing and every single small business owner and anyone self-employed told me prepare to not make money that first year. I thought “no not me”, “I know what I am doing”, “I have succeeded in everything up to this point this won’t be ME”. Guess who had to dip into that savings I created for going out on my own? Ding Ding Ding you guessed right; I sure did. It will happen, but that’s why everyone told me to prepare for it. I listened and I was ready, but it was more of an ego blow. Speaking of blows to yourself go ahead and prepare right now that not everyone is going to love your dream. They may love you and want to support you but chasing your dream is scary to them and they’ll have something to say. This dream, it’s like your baby, I get it. BUT you have to learn to let their opinions roll off your shoulders and chase it!
Before we fully dive into how I was able to find success TWICE let’s talk about my motivation. I was born into a happy family, for as long as I can remember we always had a great time filled with lots of smiles. But, you see, it was smiles over monetary things. I was the kid at on the first day of school who didn’t come with a backpack full of fresh new supplies, sometimes the electric would be shut off, and we would run out of essential items like toothpaste or laundry soap.
Monetary success created the dream but didn’t fuel my soul.
The marketing sales job I was in had nothing to do with my degree in design, but I was amazing at it. I made great money at that job and to anyone looking in that “job” was successful. But it didn’t fuel my soul, I wasn’t truly happy. I was successfully providing a life but decided to leave that kind of success to pursue the soul fueling, passion filled kind of success.
Become a sponge, soak it all in.
Before I jumped into my own interior design company, I took a major pay cut and worked for a corporate company in the design field. I stayed there for four years, soaking up everything I possibly could. I built up my knowledge in the career field and took every moment to learn. I talked to LOTS of contractors, customers, small businesses, you name it every single person and interaction was a learning opportunity. Be a sponge, soak every learning opportunity in, and store it in your knowledge bank. Grow from it and take that experience with you before you chase the ultimate dream.
