Speaker 1: In you know way. Hey, hey, you see me? Why
Speaker 1: we're back. We're black, We're blo blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 2: Buh see this is why brawn ambition, ambition, ambition, ambition, ambition.
Speaker 1: Yes, it's stressful. I don't know what to say.
Speaker 3: There's every time the key is different lyrics and I'm
Speaker 3: not supposed to go on so I don't even know.
Speaker 1: I'm just I'm finding my way, finding for my lane
Speaker 1: since twenty fifteen. Okay, so let's kick off the show.
Speaker 1: So we're gonna do a little bit of chat. I know.
Speaker 3: The theme for this evening is what are we calling
Speaker 3: the Great Pivot? The Great Pivot, Great Pivot. I'm so
Speaker 3: afraid to move that I will be holding the book
Speaker 3: in this awkward physician. We're going to talk about professional pivots,
Speaker 3: career pivots, financial pivots. We're gonna get y'all a chance
Speaker 3: to answer someone, to ask some questions if you would
Speaker 3: like to. And then we're going to get into our
Speaker 3: game show element of the night because I love it,
Speaker 3: and we're gonna find out how well Tiffany and I
Speaker 3: know each other, so.
Speaker 1: We have a good memory. Anybody who knows me knows.
Speaker 1: She's already apologized. I know nothing about it, y'all, Like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, I'm like so nice to meet you, Like,
Speaker 1: I know you got so.
Speaker 3: It's gonna be great. But I do want to say
Speaker 3: I mean to Tiffany, like, I mean, I haven't seen you.
Speaker 3: We were trying to figure out the last time I
Speaker 3: saw it. We saw each other in person, and it
Speaker 3: was before I had my second baby.
Speaker 1: I know.
Speaker 3: It was at my baby shower picnic thing, which is
Speaker 3: bizarre because obviously we talked to her every single week.
Speaker 1: Yes we do.
Speaker 3: But it's really special to be here with you to
Speaker 3: celebrate thanks for bringing it to Newer and the elephant
Speaker 3: in the room I guess is that this is not
Speaker 3: just our ninth year. It's also going to be Tiffany's
Speaker 3: last year.
Speaker 1: With the show. But it's just without me. But Hi,
Speaker 1: Mandy's got a rock. I told her she's just fine.
Speaker 3: Yeah, if I ever can unclench my hand from this mic,
Speaker 3: we'll do a show.
Speaker 1: At this particular angle.
Speaker 3: But yeah, I mean, I think our origin story is
Speaker 3: something that y'all know already. But yeah, over it was
Speaker 3: well over a decade ago we met each other, and
Speaker 3: for you to say yes to doing the podcast and
Speaker 3: for dedicating.
Speaker 1: I mean, we didn't even make money for like five years, right,
Speaker 1: so I go a podcast. But Mandy asked me if
Speaker 1: I wanted to do a podcast. I was like, yeah, wait,
Speaker 1: what's a podcast? Because this thing.
Speaker 3: Really yeah, there really wasn't and we just made it
Speaker 3: what it is today with y'all support. I mean from
Speaker 3: the very very beginning, it is so hard to build
Speaker 3: a podcast audience. It really truly is, and we really
Speaker 3: were starting from scratch. So just to even be here,
Speaker 3: I know, we have some fans from Georgia, my hometown,
Speaker 3: my home state, got some fan in the house, and
Speaker 3: but I think the winner has to be homegirl from Japan.
Speaker 1: Yeah, talk about ocean.
Speaker 3: But Tiffany bts army. Okay, let's get into it. So
Speaker 3: with Brown Ambition, it being nine years, we're also I
Speaker 3: don't know, going toward the end of the year. So, Tiffany,
Speaker 3: one of the things that in the themes of our
Speaker 3: show recently has been big changes obviously with you starting
Speaker 3: a new chapter post Brown Ambition, and I just feel
Speaker 3: like the way that you characterized it the great pivot.
Speaker 3: So I don't know, anytime you call something the great,
Speaker 3: it just feels right. But what does that mean? Inform us,
Speaker 3: educate us, and then let's talk about it. Well, pivoting
Speaker 3: is a critical component of growth.
Speaker 1: We all know, right, you know, think about like when
Speaker 1: you're in your twenties, maybe you decided this is what
Speaker 1: I'm going to get my degree in and then that's
Speaker 1: not what you're doing. Now. How many people is that
Speaker 1: the you know, the life for them or you know,
Speaker 1: maybe there's a pivot to have children, a pivot to partner,
Speaker 1: a pivot to unpartner. Some of you are like, that's next.
Speaker 1: They don't know yet, right, But pivoted is critical. But
Speaker 1: ideally you want to pivot on purpose. You know that
Speaker 1: you want to be as much as you can some
Speaker 1: things life, you know, life throws us things, but you
Speaker 1: want to you know, you want to make the choice
Speaker 1: to pivot. And I called it. I like to call
Speaker 1: that pre pivoting versus waiting until your back's against the
Speaker 1: wall and then you kind of make unforced errors like
Speaker 1: a forced pivot.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's pivots in life that are not our choice,
Speaker 3: which are so like getting let go being the person
Speaker 3: who didn't know that you were going to get divorced.
Speaker 1: Just other part of that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and they are the beginning of incredible stories. But
Speaker 3: there's so much empowerment and at least preparing, like for
Speaker 3: the pivot. So when you think about preparing for a
Speaker 3: career pivot with yourself, Tiffany, like, what are you actually doing?
Speaker 3: Are you telling people? Are you superstitious? Do you like
Speaker 3: keep it close to your chest when you got big
Speaker 3: plans or do you like to tell it? Some people
Speaker 3: feel like they can't share it because it hasn't happened yet,
Speaker 3: and they're afraid if I say it out loud. Is
Speaker 3: anybody you say it out loud, it may not happen.
Speaker 1: No, I mean anybody who knows me knows I'm a
Speaker 1: blah blah man. I'll be our live like and then
Speaker 1: oh wait, I signed an nda y uh rewind no
Speaker 1: because I am an out loud processor and I recognize
Speaker 1: that about myself. So the way I process change is
Speaker 1: to talk about it. So I have like a group
Speaker 1: of people. So I'll call Mandy, I'll call Rihanna, I'll
Speaker 1: call my sister, I'll call Cabre, I'll call so because
Speaker 1: I'm processing like my thoughts and my feelings out loud.
Speaker 1: Before then I kind of like suck them all in
Speaker 1: and then make the decision. So for me, you don't know,
Speaker 1: I just feel like it's not even anything in particular
Speaker 1: when it comes to professionally that I'm wanting to do more.
Speaker 1: So the shift for me is to decenter budget, needs
Speaker 1: to and recenter Tiffany. I think that's the pivot where
Speaker 1: I am now because there are moments when you know
Speaker 1: it is career in business and you know there's nothing
Speaker 1: wrong with that, and then there are moments when you
Speaker 1: can kind of get lost in it. And for the
Speaker 1: longest time, somebody would ask me how I was and
Speaker 1: I'd be like, oh, this is doing good and it's
Speaker 1: like how are you. I'm like who oh, Tiffany, or
Speaker 1: like what do you like to do in your free time?
Speaker 1: I'm like, what's free time? We don't know her, you know.
Speaker 1: And I mean, honestly, there are times, especially when you're
Speaker 1: in building stage, where that's what it looks like. But
Speaker 1: I've learned that you have to align and adjust, you know,
Speaker 1: or you can get stuck in a place. That's why
Speaker 1: the pivot is so important to kind of take stock
Speaker 1: and say, Okay, where am I heading and does this
Speaker 1: path serve me, and if not, what pivot do I
Speaker 1: need to make?
Speaker 3: And also it's like, and I believe if you had
Speaker 3: like a concrete on the day after, you know, January first,
Speaker 3: twenty twenty five, when I am no longer beholden to
Speaker 3: the podcast or Mandy like I'm going to start this,
Speaker 3: But you're also leaving space right for something new to
Speaker 3: come in.
Speaker 1: It's like creating.
Speaker 3: Sometimes you don't know what's going to come next, but
Speaker 3: creating the space for it makes it more possible than
Speaker 3: something can happen to you. Yes, imagine who you could
Speaker 3: run into on the street at one pm on Mondays
Speaker 3: when you're not recording our shit.
Speaker 1: You mean, when I'm taking an ass everybody knows between
Speaker 1: one and three I'm likely to be laying.
Speaker 3: Do you know what we're gonna pre tape? I got
Speaker 3: all kinds of plank of oh, I can't be put
Speaker 3: around too much. But no, I mean for me as
Speaker 3: the it feels a little bit y'all know. I don't
Speaker 3: know if you've listened to that episode where we talk
Speaker 3: about Tiffany leaving, but it was really really hard for
Speaker 3: me to sit there and have that and we held
Speaker 3: it for like two weeks, I was like, I'm not ready,
Speaker 3: and I think it just it feels extremely vulnerable just
Speaker 3: because we're so close and it and I truly don't
Speaker 3: It is so mixed emotions. It is like deep sadness,
Speaker 3: a little bit of fear, a little bit of doubt.
Speaker 3: But on the other hand, it's like as time now,
Speaker 3: I've had two months to process it, and I think
Speaker 3: what I've come into is like.
Speaker 1: This is also.
Speaker 3: Maybe a forced pivot for me, but in an exciting way.
Speaker 3: It's like it just reinforced for me how brown ambition
Speaker 3: is something that I still like, believe in and care
Speaker 3: about so much, and I want to take it, you know,
Speaker 3: as far as it can possibly go. And this almost
Speaker 3: like shakes me up and makes me, you know, come
Speaker 3: up with a strategy, come up with a plan, start
Speaker 3: envisioning what it can look like when it's a little
Speaker 3: bit different, which is exciting. I think when you're in
Speaker 3: a position like that, it's a gift. I get to
Speaker 3: decide what I'm doing with this podcast. I'm gonna own.
Speaker 1: And the thing is, I don't think people realize that
Speaker 1: when you pivot, it's not just about you, because if
Speaker 1: I didn't, because you have the whisper like it's time
Speaker 1: to move on. I remember when I taught preschool for
Speaker 1: a number of years and I loved it, just like
Speaker 1: brown ambition that I kind of got the whisper it's
Speaker 1: time to move on. I was like, what, No, I
Speaker 1: love teaching the kids. I'm not leaving. And then the
Speaker 1: next year got harder. I'm like, wait, these kids never
Speaker 1: acted up like this before. And then the next year
Speaker 1: you get a bier. You're like, what you know? And
Speaker 1: then you know? And then it then literally my school
Speaker 1: shut down, and I realized, like, oh, whether you move
Speaker 1: or not, it's gonna move you. And so you can
Speaker 1: listen or be forced. The thing that I really learned
Speaker 1: is that me making this choice, if I didn't make it,
Speaker 1: it's not just me that's affected. It's Mandy too, because
Speaker 1: I honestly believe I was holding her back things that
Speaker 1: Mandy wants to do. Look at her, Let me take
Speaker 1: my flowers, Let me take my flowers back. Right, So
Speaker 1: there's some things that Mandy wants to do that I
Speaker 1: don't have the time, you know, So me making the
Speaker 1: choice that I know is the right choice to make,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not just my prayers it's likely Mandy,
Speaker 1: you now too. Yeah, so it's just learning that like
Speaker 1: pivoting doesn't hurt. I mean, I get it. Sometimes it
Speaker 1: feels hurtful, you know, but you hope that you have
Speaker 1: a good enough relationship with the people in your life
Speaker 1: that you know you said the best thing I Mandy
Speaker 1: and I talked. I was scared to tell her. Not
Speaker 1: scared because I thought she was gonna be mad, because
Speaker 1: I just thought, like, oh man, it's been nine years,
Speaker 1: this is my friend. I don't want her to to
Speaker 1: be like, I don't know, I just was. I didn't
Speaker 1: want you to feel like I was leaving you. Oh
Speaker 1: I did.
Speaker 3: I know, you know, I can't like sometimes the decisions
Speaker 3: you make like they're gonna make another person feel uncomfortable,
Speaker 3: And I think that's like, that's just what it is.
Speaker 3: Like I've told so many people like that I've mentored
Speaker 3: or mentored without there even asking me. Just like you're
Speaker 3: gonna have to piss people off on your way to
Speaker 3: whatever you're gonna be.
Speaker 1: Not that I'm.
Speaker 3: Pissed, but like you're gonna Yeah, it's gonna create complicated
Speaker 3: feelings for me to figure out. But I'm so glad
Speaker 3: that you trusted me to have them, and like the
Speaker 3: worst thing ever would be to find out that you
Speaker 3: were staying, because oh, I don't want Mandy to be
Speaker 3: like outraged and you know, what is she gonna do
Speaker 3: and like, well she seek revenge or whatever. Like we
Speaker 3: have so much trust and honestly, I think I'll see
Speaker 3: more of you now.
Speaker 1: Like I said, I'm excited for the next chapter. Like
Speaker 1: I told Mandy, I said, I stayed a brad a
Speaker 1: bitch and forth long because I did for her and
Speaker 1: I left for me. I'm trying to receive that. It's
Speaker 1: really hard. Yeah, I did.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 1: I stayed because I was like, this is my friend.
Speaker 1: I'm having so much fun and you know, I'm knowing
Speaker 1: this is what she's wanting. But you know, and especially
Speaker 1: after my husband passed away, I didn't want to do anything.
Speaker 1: This is one of the few things I came back to.
Speaker 1: And if Mandy wasn't doing the brand A mission, I
Speaker 1: wouldn't have done it, y'all. It wouldn't have been no
Speaker 1: goodbye episode, just click click click, you're on your own.
Speaker 1: But I was like, I'm coming back because Mandy's here.
Speaker 1: She was such a good friend during that time and
Speaker 1: I realized I can't continue to stay just for Mandy
Speaker 1: and that if I'm here because Mandy's my friend, she's
Speaker 1: my friend either way, you know what I mean. And
Speaker 1: that's what you said. Like when I told you you
Speaker 1: were like, first of all, I felt so bad because
Speaker 1: you were like with your son blowing up balloons at
Speaker 1: a birthday party. I was like, I am visit. I hear,
Speaker 1: hey you, what's up? I'm like, and then my son said,
Speaker 1: are you okay?
Speaker 4: Mommy?
Speaker 1: I was like, oh my god, I said, I feel
Speaker 1: like this is not a good time. I mean, I've
Speaker 1: never been broken up with that's so bad. And you like,
Speaker 1: I'll talk to you later, but then you feel My
Speaker 1: body language was like, I know, but you text me
Speaker 1: the text she said. You know, Tippy, you know I
Speaker 1: love you. I want what's best for you. And if
Speaker 1: this is I'm what did you say? You said? I
Speaker 1: almost I'm sad, but that's okay, you know, like you're
Speaker 1: allowed to be sad, you know. And I told her, honestly,
Speaker 1: I'm sad too. Yeah. Can we change as something? Yes?
Speaker 1: Because we're here now, right, let's talk about all the pivots.
Speaker 1: Still got her? Got her okay?
Speaker 3: So I want well, I have. I don't know about pivoting,
Speaker 3: but I want to. I want to ask you something
Speaker 3: as a business owner, because I have known you since
Speaker 3: before you is there even probably was a business There
Speaker 3: was a blog, you know, and you interviewed I interviewed
Speaker 3: you and yes, business insider.
Speaker 1: Yeah, put her on the mat she did. She was
Speaker 1: literally my first professional dress, first professional interview. Oh that's wild.
Speaker 3: But anyway, and you've been through so much any chapters
Speaker 3: as a business owner, and now you're pulling back. So
Speaker 3: I kind of want you to paint a picture of
Speaker 3: how your business has changed. And you had several right,
Speaker 3: you had Live Richer Academy, you have obviously the budget
Speaker 3: Nista was there. A third one was a market the
Speaker 3: marketing thing I am, But what does that look like
Speaker 3: for you now? And what do you want? What I
Speaker 3: love about our show is how transparent we are about
Speaker 3: the real reel of what's happening. What do you want
Speaker 3: to say to like younger entrepreneurs or just entrepreneurs who
Speaker 3: are starting businesses or have had them for a while,
Speaker 3: about like the realness of making those kinds of shifts
Speaker 3: and how maybe it's not so it's not all like
Speaker 3: magical and taking naps between.
Speaker 1: Before because I'm up till three, so I need to
Speaker 1: take a nap bath three. Yeah, well I'll say. And
Speaker 1: there was a woman here, Oh, what's your name? Is
Speaker 1: the Burgundy? Diane? No? No, So Diana and I were chatting
Speaker 1: because I was sharing that like, well, one, I don't
Speaker 1: care who you are. In business, it's never easy. Like
Speaker 1: anyone who's pretending like it's easy is lying because the
Speaker 1: way it goes, and it took me a while to realize,
Speaker 1: is then you reach a certain level and then you
Speaker 1: feel a little bit stuck and you're not growing. And
Speaker 1: what you realize is that you have to almost become
Speaker 1: Like what happens when a caterpillar turns into a butterfly.
Speaker 1: One of my friends Bozma, she was like, do you
Speaker 1: know what actually happens when a caterpillar goes inside the crysalist?
Speaker 1: And I'm like, I don't know. It grows wings. I
Speaker 1: know a lot about butterflies actually, and it actually liquifies, yes, itself.
Speaker 1: It liquifies itself and basically almost eats itself down to
Speaker 1: about thirty percent and from that the butterfly is born.
Speaker 1: And so what I realize is that. Let's just say,
Speaker 1: if we're just talking straight money, that to go from
Speaker 1: five figures to six figures in business annually, I had
Speaker 1: to liquefy myself and almost it feels like dying because
Speaker 1: you're like, I'm feeling at everything, but you're not. You've
Speaker 1: just reached as far as those wings can take you.
Speaker 1: And then you have to be born into the sixth
Speaker 1: figure person. And so that shift is just mindset right.
Speaker 1: So to me, five figures of six figures, it's mindset
Speaker 1: of like I can do it, and sometimes it's just
Speaker 1: knowing someone else as making six figures. There was a
Speaker 1: man who the first man who ran the eight minute mile,
Speaker 1: Like nobody had ran a mile under eight minutes, and
Speaker 1: it was like this farmer who were like rubber boots
Speaker 1: who ran the first eight minute mile, and once he did,
Speaker 1: after that, people started breaking that record like crazy, because
Speaker 1: people just have to know it's possible. And then to
Speaker 1: go from six figures to seven figures six figures, to
Speaker 1: me was the hardest because that mindset shift was like
Speaker 1: I didn't know anybody who was like I was living
Speaker 1: in a room that costs five hundred bucks a month,
Speaker 1: and they're like, I just came home, some of y'all
Speaker 1: went over that. Well, we adure, so you know what
Speaker 1: I'm talking about, right, So, but six figures is seven figures.
Speaker 1: The shift Diana and I were talking about that, the
Speaker 1: rebirth there was. I remember I was at six figures
Speaker 1: for a while. I'm like, I did the math. I said,
Speaker 1: seven figures is about like eighty something thousand dollars a month.
Speaker 1: That seems impossible, and I realized you can muscle your
Speaker 1: way to six figures, meaning that you can work really hard,
Speaker 1: wake up late, you know, or wake up early, go
Speaker 1: to bed late. But seven figures requires help. So typically
Speaker 1: to get the seven figures, you're gonna have some sort
Speaker 1: of team. And it took me a while to learn that.
Speaker 1: So I had to be reborn again as to somebody
Speaker 1: who had a team. And I'd never really done that before.
Speaker 1: I mean, I taught preschool and certainly I had like
Speaker 1: co teachers and stuff, but I never led anyone in
Speaker 1: a team, so that was really hard. I started with
Speaker 1: interns and then I started with like part time people,
Speaker 1: and I had to learn to lead. And once I
Speaker 1: got better at it, then we got to seven and
Speaker 1: then from seven to eight, you know, it was like,
Speaker 1: it's it. That was hard too, not as hard because
Speaker 1: you collect all these lessons along the way, and seven
Speaker 1: to eight the rebirth there was. I had to learn
Speaker 1: to scale in a way where like I had to
Speaker 1: trust people because I was still was very hands on.
Speaker 1: I had to try people to do like to do
Speaker 1: what they did best, you know, like, hey, you know
Speaker 1: she's the CFO, she knows best. This person is going
Speaker 1: to like run my online school. They know best, and
Speaker 1: kind of like hands off because I can't possibly do
Speaker 1: everything to get to eight figures a year, and so
Speaker 1: really like hiring not just a team but the best
Speaker 1: that you can find and allowing them to do out
Speaker 1: of the work and getting out of the way. So
Speaker 1: that was that eight figure and even now I have
Speaker 1: opportunities where if all of them come through, it would
Speaker 1: take me gross meaning I'm sixteen years in business. It
Speaker 1: would take me to a nine figure business gross not
Speaker 1: not annually, or I will not be here. I'm now
Speaker 1: struggling with that because I am holding on to my
Speaker 1: eight figure wings, thinking like if I've flapped them hard enough,
Speaker 1: I could And it's like no, girl, you have to
Speaker 1: die and be reborn because that takes outside I don't
Speaker 1: want to say outside investing and investment, but it doesn't
Speaker 1: always have to be outside investment, like in the monetary sense,
Speaker 1: but it's gonna take outside people. And I'm used to
Speaker 1: doing everything myself, like everything, you know, my team is here.
Speaker 1: We're self funded. You know, we've never taken money. You know,
Speaker 1: we farm ourselves. All the fruit we eat, we build,
Speaker 1: you know. But to get to one hundred million dollars,
Speaker 1: you can't do that, you know. And I'm really struggling,
Speaker 1: you know, with that. And it's I'm right at the
Speaker 1: cusp of like it's time to build a crystalist and
Speaker 1: I'm fighting it, like maybe I could do it this
Speaker 1: way and it's just like narrow. But so I share
Speaker 1: that to say that no matter where you are on business,
Speaker 1: there's always going to be kind of like this being reborn,
Speaker 1: dying being reborn, so meaning like you're gonna hit the
Speaker 1: hard walls over and over, not because you're doing something wrong,
Speaker 1: but because you're growing. In order to grow, you have
Speaker 1: to have growing pains. That's what it looks like if
Speaker 1: everything is really easy, and for the last three years
Speaker 1: it's been smooth sailing, and you know, year after year
Speaker 1: it's the same. Well, then you're in the same place, like,
Speaker 1: of course you're getting a A. You're in high school and
Speaker 1: you're still taking like, you know, second grade math, Well
Speaker 1: you had better get a A, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So it's like you're not really challenging yourself to the
Speaker 1: next level. And so I just want to say that
Speaker 1: business is meant to be hard, and it doesn't get easier,
Speaker 1: you just get better. That sounds painful, but it's still fun.
Speaker 1: Though I would become liquefied.
Speaker 3: I do feel like this year has been a year
Speaker 3: of liquefication for me in a lot of ways. I mean,
Speaker 3: I started my business. I mean I was nine to
Speaker 3: five for a long time. How many of y'all are guys?
Speaker 3: How many of y'all are nine to five? Maybe you
Speaker 3: have a nine to five only, no shame, ninety.
Speaker 1: Five girls these years? Nine to five plus a side hustle, Right,
Speaker 1: that's the new right? What about who's just straight entrepreneur? Straight? Okay? Okay?
Speaker 1: What's that straight entrepreneur? All right? I mean entrepreneur? Yeah?
Speaker 3: And I think for me, because I was, I wasn't.
Speaker 3: I did not gracefully exit from nine to five life.
Speaker 3: I would say it decided it was done with me.
Speaker 3: I'll just putting it there because legal reasons. And for me,
Speaker 3: it was like, Okay, I can't see my I can't
Speaker 3: see myself right now trusting anyone. So I'm just gonna
Speaker 3: trust myself and you know, start this business and then
Speaker 3: it has become you know, my my Mandy money Maker's business.
Speaker 3: The career coaching practice and getting to pour in and
Speaker 3: be poured into by women.
Speaker 1: Of color every day, every week has just been incredible.
Speaker 3: But I'm trying to make space for like, I don't
Speaker 3: know if it's a monetary goal, I'm not. I'm not
Speaker 3: so I know someone mentioned I think it was Charmain
Speaker 3: Rachel Rogers, who's such a baddie and like, you know,
Speaker 3: it's like a what did you call her, like a
Speaker 3: it's not a snake that would be bad, like a
Speaker 3: bull or like she was just like really intense, you know,
Speaker 3: and she like sets these goals. And I listened to
Speaker 3: her podcasts and I you know, it's it's about what
Speaker 3: you were talking about, like getting like making those rich
Speaker 3: you know, decisions and making decisions that are bold and
Speaker 3: they're going to get to the next level. But I'm
Speaker 3: kind of like in this space where I'm okay right
Speaker 3: now with like the level, and like I just want
Speaker 3: to sit in this level for a bit and I'm struggling.
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm not struggling, but I'm recognizing that like
Speaker 3: sometimes the more for more for more as a business owner,
Speaker 3: and it's what you feel like you should be reaching for.
Speaker 1: But I'm just trying to.
Speaker 3: Be okay with where I'm at now and like just
Speaker 3: sitting in it and learning from this space, not liquefying
Speaker 3: just I mean, eventually I hope I can liquefy and.
Speaker 1: Enjoy your wings. I think sometimes you don't, Like that's
Speaker 1: great joy enjoy your wings in a moment, you know,
Speaker 1: just enjoy being out here.
Speaker 3: Yes, And now with the podcast, like I feel like
Speaker 3: with Brown Ambition, for me, it's always been bigger than
Speaker 3: a podcast. It's really always been a conversation about, you know,
Speaker 3: the special kind of ambition that you need as a
Speaker 3: person of color in this world when there's so many
Speaker 3: obstacles and yet we strive, and yet we go, we
Speaker 3: show up, you know, we fly from Japan just for him.
Speaker 3: But it's also a question to me, like ambition, you know,
Speaker 3: it's it's a question of what is enough and how
Speaker 3: much of how much of the success, and how much
Speaker 3: of the the accolades, the money, the whatever, the cars,
Speaker 3: whatever you want to get, whatever you see for yourself.
Speaker 1: How much of that is actually something that we genuinely
Speaker 1: want to need, and.
Speaker 3: How much of it is something we feel like we
Speaker 3: must strive for because it just is such a part
Speaker 3: of our story to be striving and reaching. And at
Speaker 3: what point does that become almost like across to bear
Speaker 3: and almost something that can hold you back. It's always striving.
Speaker 3: It's very existential. I get that, but I'm I'm working
Speaker 3: through it because I also have like two little boys,
Speaker 3: And to be honest, right now, I'm like mostly mom.
Speaker 3: Most of the time. I'm Mandy money for like three
Speaker 3: hours a day.
Speaker 1: School days are short. It felt long when we were kids,
Speaker 1: but they're actually very short. I'm not able to get
Speaker 1: much done.
Speaker 3: And yeah, it's sometimes it's just the you know, I'm
Speaker 3: not running around and traveling and building building building, I'm
Speaker 3: just being being being while these little you know, nuggets
Speaker 3: are small and cannot.
Speaker 1: Be Okay, of course, yeah, not all time is created equal,
Speaker 1: not all yours. When your babies are babies, like you
Speaker 1: don't ever get that back, you know. So if you've
Speaker 1: got children, now you get a chance to lean in
Speaker 1: and be present with them because you don't ever get
Speaker 1: to redo that, you know, And like, to me, enough
Speaker 1: is ambitious, especially in the world we live in now,
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's ambitious to say I'm actually okay,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna use these wings for
Speaker 1: a while.
Speaker 3: Did I ever tell you that I tried to come
Speaker 3: up with the book idea that was like the power
Speaker 3: of mediocrity And I'm just saying it out loud. I'm like,
Speaker 3: want no one wants to buy that book. But isn't
Speaker 3: that kind of like it's sometimes it's okay to like
Speaker 3: it's just good enough.
Speaker 1: I'm good, yeah good, this is mind good. And you
Speaker 1: know what, there's I think that we tie everything to
Speaker 1: like financial that there has to be a reaction financially.
Speaker 1: There are people who like play the piano, like, is
Speaker 1: Cabrel in here? You go home?
Speaker 4: Right?
Speaker 1: So my friend Cabrell like took his plate with the foil.
Speaker 1: I saw that. I was like, now you're taking your
Speaker 1: four plate and going home. So Cabrel is an amazing singer.
Speaker 1: Ask Cabro where he sits. He should have opened up
Speaker 1: for us. Where does he sing nowhere? And I remember
Speaker 1: I didn't get it. I was like, I don't get it.
Speaker 1: He he has a coach, he's been he's had a
Speaker 1: coach for over ten years. He's has beautiful voice. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's just if you're in the car with him, you're
Speaker 1: gonna hear him sing Luther, You're gonna and that's about it.
Speaker 1: And it confused me so because it was like, what's
Speaker 1: the point. The point is just mastery for mastery's sake.
Speaker 1: He's like, I love to sing, and so I want
Speaker 1: to be the best at it that I can be,
Speaker 1: not because I'm necessarily going to be on stage somewhere.
Speaker 1: And I just thought, you know, it's okay to just
Speaker 1: be like, I'm I enjoy a thing so much, I
Speaker 1: want to be good at it, not because I'm displaying
Speaker 1: myself to the world or because I'm exchanging it for money. Yeah,
Speaker 1: can we talk.
Speaker 3: Well, that just the image that when you talked about
Speaker 3: Cabrel singing just for himself. Sometimes that inner work, like
Speaker 3: the work of just cultivating your own talent or cultivating
Speaker 3: a scale that you care about can be lonely. But
Speaker 3: I want to talk to you about that. On your
Speaker 3: journey through entrepreneurship, how have you dealt with those times
Speaker 3: where you can feel isolated because even though you have
Speaker 3: a team, now I know it's gone smaller. Do you
Speaker 3: struggle with it's all on my shoulders? You know, at
Speaker 3: the end of the day, it's my name on the
Speaker 3: virtual building kind of vibe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think so. I think anybody in leadership feels
Speaker 1: like that because at the end of the day, if
Speaker 1: something goes wrong, no one says, oh, it was your
Speaker 1: project manager. They're like, it was you. Let me tell
Speaker 1: you there are people not lucky. I'm so nice because
Speaker 1: sometimes I remember a woman wrote me, so she bought
Speaker 1: my book You Go with Money. She brought it from Amazon.
Speaker 1: It was printed upside down, which okay, Like, girl, do
Speaker 1: you think I'm book pressing at home? Wint The cover
Speaker 1: was up side No, No, like the inside, you know,
Speaker 1: like these things happen, So I'm assuming whatever at the
Speaker 1: printing press. So she wrote me, She's like, really upset
Speaker 1: I borrow your book. I got it from Amazon. It's
Speaker 1: printed upside down. She's slid in my dms on ig
Speaker 1: and there's two Tiffany's. There's the Tiffany that was like, okay, girl,
Speaker 1: like you bought it from Amazon. First of all, let
Speaker 1: me tell you something about Amazon. They're gonna give your
Speaker 1: coins back quick fast, in a hurry, So what you
Speaker 1: asking me for? But then the other Tiffany was like,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, that's so crazy girl. You want me
Speaker 1: to send you another book? And I did, cause what's
Speaker 1: you know, twenty dollars? And then I think she realized
Speaker 1: how silly it sounded. She's like, I'm surprised you even
Speaker 1: mentioned me. Girl. Back she was like, Tiffany, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go ahead on and send it to Amazon. Like the
Speaker 1: comment sense that God gave me. But that is sometimes
Speaker 1: like people think that I'm like the magic wand Waiver,
Speaker 1: even on the team, Like there's some of my team
Speaker 1: members in here now. Sometimes they come to me and
Speaker 1: I'm like, how would I know? I don't know, and
Speaker 1: I don't I don't. Like it's almost like you know,
Speaker 1: who's a parent in here? You know now that you
Speaker 1: have children, don't you realize how much your parents knew nothing?
Speaker 1: Because you'll be making it up your kids.
Speaker 4: Come to you. You're like.
Speaker 1: On Wednesday. You know, like, yeah, you can have cereal,
Speaker 1: I guess is it okay? But the plan cera you know,
Speaker 1: and it's the same. And the thing is that with years,
Speaker 1: you collect knowledge and wisdom about your business and then
Speaker 1: you make your best guess. That's what you do with
Speaker 1: parenting too. Like if your kid is ten, they've never
Speaker 1: been ten before, you make your best guess. Even if
Speaker 1: you have multiple kids, this kid has never been ten before,
Speaker 1: you know, because you know that first child is not
Speaker 1: like that second child. I'm the second have you now,
Speaker 1: I'm not shout out to you, izy, that's our bill,
Speaker 1: that second child energy. We're gonna put give you a
Speaker 1: roll for your money. You might stat after that second job.
Speaker 1: I'm like, tell me about my second child. He's so small.
Speaker 1: What's he gonna do to me? He's gonna put your
Speaker 1: through all right? Well, I want to open the floor
Speaker 1: for Brown, Bruce Brown break or b a q and a.
Speaker 1: So my thoughts. Since y'all are here, anyone want to
Speaker 1: ask a question live? It's time for the b a.
Speaker 4: Q a A b a q A What you said
Speaker 4: b a q air mandad b a q a with
Speaker 4: tipping a to b a q a a.
Speaker 1: That was a good idea. Okay, I'm shock by anyway,
Speaker 1: Hey guys, I love you guys. My name is Betty.
Speaker 1: I'm an inspectitioner. I practice aesthetics. Those questions for you, Mandy.
Speaker 1: As a mom of multiple children, I have to on
Speaker 1: my own my three children myself boys girls. My oldest
Speaker 1: is a girl, and my two youngest boys. Yeah. Seven,
Speaker 1: they kind of want a third, should I? Or like,
Speaker 1: huh would you? Should I have another? How are you
Speaker 1: feeling you're here? Do you want your very true? Mm hmm. Okay,
Speaker 1: so from one to young child is not listening? No,
Speaker 1: that's fine.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 1: One to two was an easy transition for me. Three
Speaker 1: was hard to sell. Yeah, three was hard. I was like, damn,
Speaker 1: we're not doing this so much. And I mean I
Speaker 1: think part of the reason was because I had help
Speaker 1: with the first two and then with the third one
Speaker 1: not so much. It was right after COVID. So yeah,
Speaker 1: but that's but that doesn't mean anything. You know, maybe
Speaker 1: three will work, you're fucking hero. But yeah. So my
Speaker 1: question was, you know, I'm an entrepreneur myself. Well i'm
Speaker 1: you know, kind of transitioning into that role. How do
Speaker 1: you balance being a mom of multiple children and still
Speaker 1: being present, you know, with your children and your family
Speaker 1: without getting the mom guilt, Like how do you kind
Speaker 1: of balance that?
Speaker 3: Also, my problem is I don't have mom guilt. I
Speaker 3: have business guilt because I spend so much time with
Speaker 3: my sharing. It's almost like because I I know that
Speaker 3: it's you know, I think it's kind of like cool
Speaker 3: and trendy to be like this is the worst.
Speaker 1: Being a parent is so hard, and.
Speaker 3: It really is, but it's real also really fun to
Speaker 3: just like get on the floor and color. I really
Speaker 3: like crafts, I like going to the library. So I
Speaker 3: find it really simple to ignore my work and spend
Speaker 3: time with the kids, which is a problem because childcare
Speaker 3: is expensive. Mama needs to actually work. So for me,
Speaker 3: it's like every day is different and I don't I mean,
Speaker 3: I'll just tell you the real world, like every day
Speaker 3: is different. I don't have a perfect routine. I try
Speaker 3: to focus on one thing that I can do business
Speaker 3: wise every day because my to do list is never
Speaker 3: going to get to done in one day. I and
Speaker 3: if I and I and my makers know because I've
Speaker 3: been trying to set my intentions and are in our
Speaker 3: slack every week and kind of say what I intend
Speaker 3: this week, and if I overload it, it's not going
Speaker 3: to get done. I'm going to get a call from
Speaker 3: daycare about someone being sick. I'm going to get a
Speaker 3: call you know that you forgot his lunch, you know,
Speaker 3: bring it to the school. Whatever, it's going to disrupt
Speaker 3: my day. Where I am trying to get a lot
Speaker 3: better is in trusting my partner to show up for
Speaker 3: me when I can't be there as like super mom
Speaker 3: and trust that he can do as good.
Speaker 1: Of a job. It's quite hard. I'm like a Microman momager.
Speaker 3: I just think I do it the best, you know,
Speaker 3: like and I entertain I'm like a cruise director.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I really am. You gotta keep this. It's a lot.
Speaker 3: It's a lot of like if you don't want to
Speaker 3: give him the phone. If you give him the phone,
Speaker 3: it's like a little bit easier. But I don't do
Speaker 3: that because I don't like joy or time alone. Okay,
Speaker 3: so that may be like the worst way to answer
Speaker 3: your question. What I'll I'll I say is like I
Speaker 3: have I mean, I have Tiffany and I love her
Speaker 3: to my sister. I haven't I have like relatives they
Speaker 3: live in different states. I have friends that are across
Speaker 3: the country, but my neighbors across the street are essential
Speaker 3: to me and they are the unsung heroes of my
Speaker 3: this journey of my life as an entrepreneur, because I
Speaker 3: can leave out my front door and I'll run into
Speaker 3: someone who can hold a baby or run to the
Speaker 3: store for me or babysit last minute. And building those
Speaker 3: relationships has been such a life saver, especially during a
Speaker 3: time with the pandemic where it was really easy to
Speaker 3: be isolated.
Speaker 1: I reached out.
Speaker 3: I pushed through to reach out and like foremost connections
Speaker 3: and my local little community is just a freaking life saver.
Speaker 1: So having ye creating your own.
Speaker 3: Damn village and like and actually like agreeing that will
Speaker 3: be like I've had a conversation with a mom, like
Speaker 3: if I if you live near me, I'd be like,
Speaker 3: I'm your village. We have to help each other and
Speaker 3: like have that like looking each other's eyes and be
Speaker 3: like no, no, I mean it, Like I don't mean
Speaker 3: go get a drink and be cute. I mean like
Speaker 3: come over watch while I fold laundry, and like, you know,
Speaker 3: can you watch baby? Why I full laundry? Or like
Speaker 3: do a dish or write for my book or something
Speaker 3: like that. Having that community is really essential.
Speaker 1: Our community is here. Shout out to Sunday Supper folks.
Speaker 1: I have a community. We call ourselves a Sunday Supper Crew,
Speaker 1: and we started some years ago, or at least once
Speaker 1: a month, we just tried to have Sunday Supper together
Speaker 1: all of the neighborhood, my sisters, my neighbors, and so yeah,
Speaker 1: that's exactly no.
Speaker 3: I can't even get Anna to come. Anna doesn't want
Speaker 3: to come to Sunday Supper. She wants to do it
Speaker 3: once a month with my cousin that I can do
Speaker 3: once a month, and it can't be the same Sunday.
Speaker 3: I was like, complease, No, that's really great though, thank
Speaker 3: you for thank.
Speaker 4: You, thank you.
Speaker 1: Who's neck? Who's that?
Speaker 4: Should?
Speaker 1: Come on up ahead? Sorry, orange sweater? Yes, a cute
Speaker 1: A yay b A cute A transition. Sorry, I'm a
Speaker 1: little nervous.
Speaker 5: I have a question that's like a two part question,
Speaker 5: and I do kind of Okay, let me get it out.
Speaker 5: So i've paid off my student loans, I currently haven't. Yes,
Speaker 5: I do currently have an eighteen month old though, so
Speaker 5: she'll be eighteen months next week. So Mama and Papa
Speaker 5: are like taking care of a baby. So we're now
Speaker 5: like in a good place, in a decent place financially
Speaker 5: because we do pay for childcare, which is very expensive.
Speaker 5: So my first question is do you think it is
Speaker 5: worth having a five O three B for a child?
Speaker 5: Like I'm sort of torn because there is someone that
Speaker 5: is like, oh, you have to start now, you have
Speaker 5: to start at eighteen months. But when I'm looking at
Speaker 5: the actual risk to benefit ratio, I'm like, well, what
Speaker 5: if she doesn't want to go to college and what
Speaker 5: if we don't have it?
Speaker 1: Yes?
Speaker 5: Yes, yes, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: I was like, what is this. I don't know what
Speaker 1: this is. I'm gonna have to google it. No, yes,
Speaker 1: And I'm like.
Speaker 3: Sure we're lying, yes, yes, three if there was a podcast,
Speaker 3: you don't see us googling.
Speaker 1: I mixed them up? Oh my god, sorry fire not Okay, Yes,
Speaker 1: I'm smart, got it.
Speaker 5: But so there is one woman that is like, you know,
Speaker 5: you got to start now. She's eighteen months, like by
Speaker 5: the time she paid off her son went to grad
Speaker 5: school for free, Like she's paid both of her son's
Speaker 5: college tuition, Like okay, great, but now I'm like, well,
Speaker 5: you know, I don't know if I'm one hundred percent
Speaker 5: sure if that's the right direction to go in, and
Speaker 5: then we I've also been wondering, like, now that we're
Speaker 5: in a decent place financially, what's the next step to be, Like, uh,
Speaker 5: you know, okay, do I start investing here? Or like, okay,
Speaker 5: do I just buy a house now? And like start
Speaker 5: because you know, it's just a lot of decisions to
Speaker 5: make it this direction.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, I don't know what to do.
Speaker 3: I think this is like where Tiffany says, just enjoy
Speaker 3: your wings a little bit, just be debt free for that,
Speaker 3: just like enjoy the extra money. When I was a reporter,
Speaker 3: I was a personal finance reporter for many years, and
Speaker 3: whenever we would talk about this question, the financial advisors
Speaker 3: that I would speak to would typically say something like,
Speaker 3: your kids can take out student debt, but you can't
Speaker 3: take out retirement loans, you know, other than from yourself.
Speaker 3: And it was almost like the financial version of put
Speaker 3: your own oxygen mask on first. So if there are
Speaker 3: long term goals that you have, I wouldn't I wouldn't
Speaker 3: necessarily feel like any kind of guilt or shame for
Speaker 3: not setting aside like college shavings for them now. But
Speaker 3: it really depends on what your priorities are as as
Speaker 3: far as like the actual account the five two nine plan,
Speaker 3: I mean there are benefits because you're they're tax benefits, right,
Speaker 3: so you get to use that money.
Speaker 1: It can grow tax free. But they have to use
Speaker 1: it for college. Oh okay, fact check, because it used
Speaker 1: to be it was just for college, but now it's
Speaker 1: like school, so you can actually do five twenty nine
Speaker 1: and in my paper daycare five twenty nine and at
Speaker 1: my paper highschool because if they go to private high school,
Speaker 1: it's like K through twelve now, right, yes, So because
Speaker 1: there are fine so when you put money in a
Speaker 1: five twenty nine, it does help to lower taxes. So
Speaker 1: there are tax benefits. But to your point, for example,
Speaker 1: for my bonus child, she's in school now, and I
Speaker 1: didn't want to do a five twenty nine because it
Speaker 1: didn't have those benefits then, because I just I don't know,
Speaker 1: you don't know what these kids are going to do.
Speaker 1: So it's said I did a custodial account, you know,
Speaker 1: so I didn't get the tax benefits, but I set
Speaker 1: aside money my husband I had set aside money for
Speaker 1: her in an account, and now she's off at school.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, now, knowing that she's in school
Speaker 1: and she says she wants to get her masters, I'm like,
Speaker 1: I should have done, but how can you know? You know?
Speaker 1: But but to your to I think why my drink cats?
Speaker 4: Right?
Speaker 1: So that to the point now you know, like it's
Speaker 1: not you're not as limited, you know, so I would
Speaker 1: mean I'm not anti five twenty nine for that reason anymore.
Speaker 3: I have one for my first because they get everything
Speaker 3: the best. And Remy does not have a vibe, hasn't
Speaker 3: been baptized yet.
Speaker 1: No, that baby is out here in the world. Tbody
Speaker 1: is so cute, this little.
Speaker 4: Us.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but and I have but I also have a
Speaker 3: custodial account, and I think either option is is perfectly fine.
Speaker 3: But you mentioned the house and your other priorities, and
Speaker 3: I just think that, I mean, I wouldn't be rushing
Speaker 3: to become a homeowner having done it. M it's so
Speaker 3: much money, so much.
Speaker 1: Do you have a business. You're a nurse, right or no,
Speaker 1: that was you're a nurse? Sorry what did you say? No,
Speaker 1: I'm only asking because, for example, for Alyssa, my stepdaughter.
Speaker 1: I actually I have to do it now before the
Speaker 1: end of the year. I'm going to she does social media,
Speaker 1: why she feels like it, but I pay her enough
Speaker 1: so she can nax out her raw fire it. So yes,
Speaker 1: So that's another way if you had a business. So
Speaker 1: I pay her for the year at the end of
Speaker 1: the year. So this year, the max is seven thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: And so even though every year it happens, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: call her and be like, Melissa, you're gonna magically have
Speaker 1: seven thousand dollars year account, money you did not work for.
Speaker 1: When it lands, don't touch it because I have a
Speaker 1: financial advisor that will pull it and put it into
Speaker 1: her wrath. Last year she touched it, I said, girl,
Speaker 1: where's five hundred dollars? Is that what that was? Why
Speaker 1: don't you have sixty five hundred dollars? What do you
Speaker 1: do for a living? And then the year before that
Speaker 1: it was six thousand, same she took three hundred dollars
Speaker 1: out and I was like, what she's like, I was wondering.
Speaker 1: I'm like, so even though I was like, her birthday
Speaker 1: just passed, I said, look at me in the eyes
Speaker 1: we're not gonna do this again. This is year three.
Speaker 1: There's going to be seven thousand dollars deposited. It takes
Speaker 1: about twenty four hours before it pulls out. But that's
Speaker 1: another way if you for those of you who have
Speaker 1: children and so we're in your three or four doing
Speaker 1: for her, which is great because if I continue to
Speaker 1: do this or she maxes it out by the time
Speaker 1: she's thirty, you know, she will be really really well off.
Speaker 1: You know. So I do believe in like because you
Speaker 1: don't have to do as much if you start sooner.
Speaker 1: Fifty dollars here, fifty dollars there, when your baby is
Speaker 1: a baby can make a big difference. Absolutely. That custodial
Speaker 1: iray I started for real five years.
Speaker 3: Ago is looking very cute. Yes, I'm like, let me
Speaker 3: put that out of my sight. But thank you so
Speaker 3: much for your ques.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: If you do one more. Yes, we have one in
Speaker 1: the bag. I think I saw the one on the aisle. Yes,
Speaker 1: with denim and the braids. Gorgeous. Oh yes, we love
Speaker 1: We love a sister a lot. We're just saying it's
Speaker 1: incredible what our hair can do. I know, dude. Sorry,
Speaker 1: it's time. Forday Okay, I didn't come from Japan, but
Speaker 1: it was a two and a half drive from Brooklyn. Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: It's rush hours. That's like two bridges. That's a lot. Okay.
Speaker 1: So my name is Sonya. I'm an entrepreneur. So my
Speaker 1: question is for Tiffany and for a Mandy. I am
Speaker 1: in a space now where my business has grown. I
Speaker 1: left my nine to five It almost felt like seven
Speaker 1: to nine. But I left that job in twenty twenty
Speaker 1: one and went full time with my side hustle. I'm
Speaker 1: a therapist, and so I have decided, oh, we're going
Speaker 1: into your five. Let's let's hire people so we don't
Speaker 1: have to do all of the work. And I'm like,
Speaker 1: this scaling is it's not easy, So how how do you?
Speaker 1: I'm like, how do I get to a place where
Speaker 1: I'm not allowing the growing pains to overwhelm me? Because
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm starting to get overwhelmed with figuring
Speaker 1: out how to grow the business simultaneously while I'm still
Speaker 1: doing my own work and then not freak out because
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh my god, I got to pay people,
Speaker 1: so I need to make sure that they have work.
Speaker 1: And so I find myself staying up till three am
Speaker 1: being like, how can I find more clients for them
Speaker 1: to be able to work with? How can I find
Speaker 1: more things for them to be able to do? So
Speaker 1: it makes sense and not feel like maybe he wasn't
Speaker 1: ready to scale. But I'm like, I'm going into year five.
Speaker 1: I felt like I was in that space where I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 1: we're doing second grade again, and that's why you're getting
Speaker 1: an A. It is time to grow. But I'm like,
Speaker 1: it's only been a month.
Speaker 3: So they've like come to your practice to work underneath
Speaker 3: your brand as therapist.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, I mean they should bring their own clients, right.
Speaker 1: I was about to say, I'm gonna tell you elegant eyes,
Speaker 1: they've been my friend Cabrel, his grandparents started sixty years
Speaker 1: old and so they've been here through the New York Riots.
Speaker 1: Then it passed on to his mother, then him and
Speaker 1: his sister. And when I to me, when I look
Speaker 1: for mentorship, I don't care as much as how much
Speaker 1: money you make, but how long have you been in business?
Speaker 1: Because you don't seen it all. Because i'll ask a
Speaker 1: bro something, he'll be like, well, in nine to five
Speaker 1: we had that issue. I'm like, do tell, And so
Speaker 1: I asked a bro, that's Higin and what you said, Mandy?
Speaker 1: He was like, if you bring someone on, make it
Speaker 1: very clear that you Not every position does this, but
Speaker 1: it sounds like your therapist. You have to bring me
Speaker 1: ideally four times what I pay you, at least, because
Speaker 1: not just like, oh, let's just say you pay them
Speaker 1: twenty thousand dollars a year, not you make me twenty
Speaker 1: because I have to pay taxes, I have to do savings.
Speaker 1: It's like, no, no, ideally four times more. I didn't
Speaker 1: know I can make that ask of my like the
Speaker 1: people who work for me and so, but because too,
Speaker 1: like you can, I incentivize them by also setting aside
Speaker 1: like a bonus pool.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 1: So what I do for my company now is that like, so,
Speaker 1: I get a salary. Everybody gets a salary, and everybody
Speaker 1: was asking for races. I said, where, show me where
Speaker 1: the money is? Show me show me it's not here.
Speaker 1: Twenty twenty three is a hard year. So what I
Speaker 1: did instead, I said, I'll let you get paid. How
Speaker 1: I get paid. I get a base salary, a regular salary,
Speaker 1: just like everybody else. It's not even the highest. But
Speaker 1: what I do get is that when there's extra money
Speaker 1: every month, I can take an owner's draw. So after
Speaker 1: I set us side money for taxes, for savings, for
Speaker 1: all these other things, sometimes there's money left over. Sometimes
Speaker 1: there's zero, sometimes there's negative. But I can pull a draw,
Speaker 1: and I'll let you get a draw. To that draw
Speaker 1: that I pull, I'll put twenty percent in a bonus
Speaker 1: pool for you, and then every quarter anybody who's a
Speaker 1: full time employee can split that pool. Because what it
Speaker 1: does is that it won It means that I never
Speaker 1: pay out more than what we've made because bonus is
Speaker 1: always extra. But it also incentivized them to make money.
Speaker 1: You know, there are some positions that don't like. Maybe
Speaker 1: your admin doesn't necessarily generate income, but especially when you're
Speaker 1: hiring hiring generating income generating people, I don't hay around it. Hey,
Speaker 1: maybe that's my niece of my nephew late. Yah, Mama
Speaker 1: brought ya late, share brought y'all late. Don't be like mind,
Speaker 1: I'm just talking.
Speaker 5: All right.
Speaker 1: There was act like they don't know me. That was
Speaker 1: hard when I speak up from pigh school. I used
Speaker 1: to be like, why are you like we don't know me?
Speaker 1: The teacher I think I steal every week. Well I
Speaker 1: don't know, but yeah, so that's the ways is, especially
Speaker 1: if it's a therapist. I mean, ask anyone who owns
Speaker 1: like a salon, like the stylist has to bring clients.
Speaker 1: You know, that's not a big that's not an you
Speaker 1: can't do all the work. You know, it's not fair.
Speaker 3: State farm agents, you know, like insurance, like you're under
Speaker 3: the umbrella. But you're like an entrepreneur. You're and they
Speaker 3: call them small business owners. You own your own business.
Speaker 3: I mean my therapist, she has a practice and there
Speaker 3: are other therapists that work under her and it and
Speaker 3: they could look at it like, well, I'm why why
Speaker 3: join your practice when I have my own clients. But
Speaker 3: they also can keep growing, they can bring in more
Speaker 3: clientele and say, well, if you want to join us, like,
Speaker 3: there are other people in my practice, so then you're
Speaker 3: not overwhelmed with like too many clients. But I think
Speaker 3: that's the key. And I was just going to say,
Speaker 3: you need a community of other mental health practitioners who
Speaker 3: are doing something similar, who have grown a business, who
Speaker 3: are like a few steps ahead of you, who know
Speaker 3: what you're going through and can like be there alongside you.
Speaker 1: I just don't want you to be doing it by yourself.
Speaker 1: That's hard, too hard. M hm. That's what we do,
Speaker 1: what we know, because you can't be marketing for like
Speaker 1: no no, no, no, no, no no no. And sometimes I mean,
Speaker 1: I hate to say it, but sometimes it's overwhelming because
Speaker 1: it's overwhelming. I mean, for any of y'all who have
Speaker 1: pushed out a human being, it's like, ain't that a lot?
Speaker 1: It's like sometimes I mean for some people they're like,
Speaker 1: you know, you've sneeze and the baby came out. But
Speaker 1: for most people it's like, oh, it's hard because it's hard.
Speaker 1: I don't know. We live in this weird space where
Speaker 1: we think hard means wrong, and sometimes it's hard. It
Speaker 1: shouldn't be feeling this stressed. I mean it's not ideal,
Speaker 1: you know, and so to feel stressed. But it's like
Speaker 1: learning to like that this thing is hard because it's hard,
Speaker 1: so it shouldn't stress you out. This is the natural
Speaker 1: order of things, is what I'm saying that, like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm growing, you know, like I don't know how to
Speaker 1: color right away, I don't know how to ride my
Speaker 1: bike right away. That's just what it looks like. It's
Speaker 1: hard because it's hard. It's meant to be hard because
Speaker 1: the truth is you have to make yourself worthy of
Speaker 1: the dream that you seek. You know it's not for
Speaker 1: everybody because if it was easy. Let's just say you
Speaker 1: were gifted. You're at door one, and you're gifted a
Speaker 1: pass to get to door ten. Right, you didn't have
Speaker 1: to go to two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight nine.
Speaker 1: I promise you when you get to ten, you'll realize
Speaker 1: that the key to ten was at seven. So now
Speaker 1: you gotta go back to seven. But you didn't realize
Speaker 1: that the key at seven is inside a box that
Speaker 1: was at door three. Now you gotta go back to three.
Speaker 1: And then the box took the puzzled code to the
Speaker 1: box was at door too. Now you shot just go
Speaker 1: through all the doors because by the time you realize
Speaker 1: so there is no skipping the line, you're going to
Speaker 1: have to pay your dues. It's just the It's doctor Green,
Speaker 1: my therapist talks about that we're not here for stress
Speaker 1: stress stress management because stress is it's like cancer management,
Speaker 1: like we're not who wants that. It's really learning internally
Speaker 1: how to manage how you feel about the things. This
Speaker 1: is a natural reaction to what's happening, Like, oh, this
Speaker 1: feels like a lot because it's a lot, but it
Speaker 1: doesn't mean it has to make you feel so bad.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense?
Speaker 3: No, my therapist this week, we're really candid about our therapy.
Speaker 3: I'm starting with a new therapist. And he literally was like,
Speaker 3: I told him what I am. I told him I
Speaker 3: had to break up with my other one.
Speaker 1: No tomorrow, tomorrow, that's hard.
Speaker 4: Oh, we need to ask you, but I.
Speaker 3: But she's so great, she'll understand, you know, I I've outgrown,
Speaker 3: I'm on a different path.
Speaker 1: She does young mothers.
Speaker 3: So anyway, but I was telling you in this really difficult,
Speaker 3: complex family issue, and he looked at me and he
Speaker 3: was like, that sounds like you're having an appropriate reaction.
Speaker 3: I thought that's extremely complex, and I was like even
Speaker 3: just accepting, Oh, this is the only way to feel
Speaker 3: about it because it's really effed up and there's no
Speaker 3: great solution and like there's no right or wrong. It's
Speaker 3: just like withithstanding that feeling is something that like I
Speaker 3: understand why we turn to like our our you know,
Speaker 3: these unhealthy ways of coping with stress, because it's just
Speaker 3: so can be so uncomfortable, but almost sitting in that
Speaker 3: discomfort is it's like a muscle that you have to practice.
Speaker 3: And my therapist, this new one especially, is reminding me
Speaker 3: that you can withstand this. You can it will, it
Speaker 3: will pass, it will get through. And you know, I
Speaker 3: like to use this analogy all the time, like there's
Speaker 3: a version of myself a year from now who's done
Speaker 3: this hard thing and has gotten through it. And I'm like,
Speaker 3: that girl's got she figured it out, so I'll figure
Speaker 3: it out. It's a great little mind.
Speaker 1: It is. Well you would you would know therapists. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're congratulations on your business. Thank you by e you
Speaker 1: a what you said that by thank y'all so much.
Speaker 1: Just says a dream come true.