Yes, I’m an entrepreneur.
Yes, it’s something I’m passionate about.
Yes, it’s all I think about some times.
Yes, I’m proud to be a business woman.
But no, entrepreneurship doesn’t define me.
I’m so much more than that.
I’m a wife who loves her husband. I love watching him work, and that he’s so passionate about cooking. I love how I can help him and provide him with a place that we can both work toward something we are so passionate about. I love how he takes care of me and my little family. I love how he makes me laugh so hard I can’t breathe. I love him for who he was when I met him, the man he is today, and who he will become.
I’m a Christian woman who serves an awesome God. I’ve been through a lot during my time so far on this Earth. Lord knows what He has planned for me in the future. But through all the things that I’ve done, experienced, endured, failed, and succeeded in – it has been with God’s grace. No, I was not walking with Him the whole time. I didn’t always do what was right. But He didn’t give up on me. And no, life isn’t easier. In fact, it might even be harder sometimes but because of His grace I’ve been able to get as far as I’ve come. He’s opened doors that I would never dream of, and He’s closed doors that needed to be closed. All I want to do is to live my life in such a way that aligns with His plan for me.
I’m a daughter and friend. I’m a binge watching, cries-over-everything, overly sensitive, positive thinking, sweats-the-small-stuff, food loving, always smiling girl that will always be there if you need someone to talk to. That’s just me.
Yeah, I’m an entrepreneur too. Admittedly, it’s a big part of my life. I’m pretty sure that’s obvious. But it doesn’t define me. There’s so much more to me than that.
Ok, maybe I’m being a bit over dramatic. Technically you can’t lose something that wasn’t yours in the first place.
I didn’t lose an existing client, I lost a potential client. But oh man, this one hurt. It hurt my ego and it hurt financially. But alas, there’s a silver lining to this story if you just keep reading lol 😝
So what happened was one of my mom’s clients from 20 years ago contacted me because they are planning to sell their home. The same home my mom sold them 20 years ago. This couple had never met me (I was 13 when my mom sold them their house) until our meeting a couple weeks ago. My mom was really good at keeping in touch with her clients, she was a real people person. After years of my mom visiting them every year with cookies and calendars during the holidays, it stopped. The last time they saw her she brought them some cookies and told them about her breast cancer diagnosis. A few years after that my calendars started arriving at their door. Naturally, they called me.
I was so excited! So far real estate has been slow for me this year so I was really looking forward to get the ball rolling again. TBH, it was actually good timing because I had to focus on building out the new restaurant.
When they called me I immediately prepared my listing presentation and doing my research. I met with them, they asked questions about my mom, her story, we reminisced, told me how they met her, they asked about my story, and I asked about their beautiful home. Everything was going great. I told them about my background, my journey as an entrepreneur, and how I’m following in my mom’s footsteps.
Then the other day I got a call, and they seemed to be concerned about the fact that I didn’t do real estate full time. I explained to them that I had a great team of people that help me with not just my other businesses but my real estate business specifically. I have a great broker and mentor as well as a great team at our office. They informed me that they were thinking of interviewing other agents and immediately my heart dropped.
I told them that while I do hope that they choose to work with me I understand their concern. I could lie to them and tell them that I do real estate full time but I wanted to be open and honest with them. I wanted my experience, knowledge, and dedication to be the reason they would entrust me with selling their home. I wanted to be truthful not only to them, but to myself. No, I don’t do real estate full time but I give everything I do 100%. I make time for important things. I put in the hours. I put in the work.
Well, a few days after that I got a message from them saying that while they really liked me and thought I was knowledgeable they decided to go with a full time real estate agent. At first I was really, really discouraged. I felt like a failure. I got really stressed about money. Instantly, all these negative feelings started to take over. But after I allowed myself to feel my disappointment for a moment I started to look at the bright side of this. I was actually really proud of how I handled it.
The truth is I’m a serial entrepreneur which means I own a number of businesses. I used to be ashamed of this, like it was a bad thing. But then I realized what that meant. It meant I was ashamed of my life, my reality, and who I am. The last year has taught me to be proud of myself, my journey, and what I’ve been able to accomplish so far in my life. The people that I want to attract are the ones that have faith in me and believe that I have something of value to offer.
I’m starting to remember that I should stay true to the mission that God has placed in my heart. It isn’t to please people or change who I am to meet their expectations. It’s to serve Him by bringing value to others through grace. and to share my stories to lift people up and give them hope. I’m not upset at my situation or getting turned down by potential clients. Don’t get me wrong, I was. In a way I’m grateful. I’m proud of who I am. It has helped me to realize that I’ve come a long way.
I feel like every time I write one of these “Lately” posts that’s the first sentence that I always lead with. SMH.
But they have been busy lol
Charlie and I have been busy with a home project and working on yard maintenance. It rarely ever rains in LA so our “grass” never really grows. And yeah, I put “grass” cuz it’s not really grass. Since we’ve had to conserve water we just decided to stop watering our “grass” all together. But since it’s been raining a lot this winter our “grass” decided to grow. If you saw my instagram story a couple weeks back the height of the grass was so tall you couldn’t even see my dogs when they’d run through it. Since then we’ve been trying to do our best to do yard work every week so it’s easier to maintain. #adulting am I right?
Aside from a little house maintenance I’ve been chipping away at my business projects.
I guess that’s the way things are when you’re an entrepreneur. You try to make decisions hoping for the best with the best intentions
CO Creative Cartel has the Jackalope Fair coming up and we’re using this as an opportunity to work on our product line. We’ve got a few new products we’re currently sourcing and hopefully we’ll be able to debut those soon! We’ve also applied to a few other Spring 2017 craft shows to gain local brand awareness and to get direct customer feedback on our products. All of this is to prepare ourselves for our biggest event of the year, Las Vegas Market coming up in August. I’m scheming up some fun things and am really excited to make my wholesale trade show debut. It’s been a long time coming, over 5 years – I can’t believe it! But the time has finally arrived, we’re making it happen this year and I’m glad I didn’t rush into it. My patience was tested over and over but I’m more prepared than I ever would have been in the past.
A sneak peek into some fun things coming soon 🙂
Ninong’s is undergoing a big transition this year, in a million different ways. I always tell people that this business has been my testimony of faith as well as entrepreneurship. I firmly believe that Ninong’s has been the reason I have learned and grown so much as an entrepreneur and as a Christian. We’ve recently changed our FOH (front of house) operations to sit down service and it’s been quite the challenge to change the way we’ve been doing things for 8 years. But this was just another decision we made to help us grow, do what is best for our customers, and try to create a better experience. We’re finally beginning to adjust and our operation is becoming a bit smoother. We’re still a long way and we will never be perfect but I can see how this decision was a good choice for our business.
I guess that’s the way things are when you’re an entrepreneur. You try to collect data, observe your customer base, take in constrictive critique, and make decisions hoping for the best. What sucks is you’ll never know for sure if that was the right decision until you try it, implement it, and give it time. But you have to jump in fully and trust that you made the decision for a reason, the right reason.
Because of this, my blog got put on the back burner.
But I decided that it was okay.
Normally, I’d be stricken with guilt over not posting. I’d rack my brain about how I can make it up to the few readers I have. I’d tell myself my blog will never grow if I don’t take it seriously. But honestly, I do! lol. I take my blog very seriously and so this time I said NO. No to feeling guilty and no to making myself think that I don’t work hard enough. Because I do work hard, it’s just…priorities. 😉
