[Pt.2] 10 Principles 10 Years of Marriage Helped Me Put into Practice for Entrepreneurial Success

I didn't think I would finish this piece tonight after I posted my first article earlier this morning. But the comments and messages really encouraged me to complete my thought sooner than later.

So, here we go with the remaining 5 principles of the 10 that 10 years of marriage has helped me put into practice to achieve entrepreneurial successes.

6. The way you do one thing, is the way you do everything. Our spiritual father and mentor Dr. E. Bernard Jordan taught us this very early on in our marriage. The root of this principle deals with integrity - the state of being whole and?undivided. Integrity means?being honest and having strong moral principles. A person with integrity behaves ethically and does what will make the situation at hand "whole" -- in our opinion, even behind closed doors. For us, we believe that the way we treat each other will reflect in the quality of products we produce at The Mushroom Angel Company for our customers to the way we engage with our children to the way we upkeep our household, our cars, etc. The way I sweep the kitchen in my home is the same effort I put in the way I clean the commercial kitchen we are leasing. That's because the way we do one thing, is the way we do everything. If you practice this principle, you will experience the blessings that come with consistency and excellence.

7. Quarterback and wide-receiver mentality. This is probably one of our most recent realizations. Perhaps, we've learned this principle in the past, but it didn't become real for us until our second pitch competition for The Mushroom Angel Company. Our second pitch competition was different from our first. In our first competition, we had 5 minutes to pitch with powerpoint capabilities. It was much easier to jive and flow and keep on track with a linear pitch. The second pitch was set up much differently. We had only 2 minutes and no slides. Dom and I essentially used the same strategy from the first pitch with the second. And that was the problem. You see, throughout most of our practices it was a challenge for Dom to remember his lines. I mastered the entire pitch within minutes of finalizing the script. We both had a feeling to change it up and have me do the pitch alone, but for whatever reason, we kept the style the same as the first and went on stage together. Even as we were in the backroom practicing our pitch moments before going on stage, the conversation arose for me to do it alone. But, Dom was determined to get it right and I was committed to being a supportive partner.

Unfortunately, we should have gone with our first mind. I opened up our pitch and when it got to Dom's line, we fumbled the ball in the last inning. That night, I cried all night because I knew in the depth of my soul that I could have brought home the prize for the company which would have lifted a very heavy weight for us financially scaling the business. And that's what made me so sad. However, We DID NOT beat up on each other. We DID NOT point fingers. We allowed ourselves to feel what we felt and began to ask God for wisdom. The next day, Dom came up to me with a hug and asked me this question: "Do you know the most powerful position on the football field?"

I said: "The quarter-back". He explained that only the quarterback touches the ball on every offensive snap, and only the quarterback is the triggerman for the passing game. No other player can do more to win—or lose—a professional football game.

Referring to pitch competitions, he said: "I am your quarterback every time, wide-receiver!" His warm embrace and words blessed my soul. All I could say was, "Pass me the ball every time. I'll make the touchdown."

And that's exactly what I do.

For our third business pitch competition, we stuck with our playbook. The quarterback passed me the winning ball ( I went on stage alone ) and we came home with the first prize of $3,000.

This mentality is how we run our household. The pass always goes the person who can bring it home with a touchdown. After all, same team. ?? (Refer to Pt. 1 of this piece if you don't understand the connection)

8. Trust our first-mind. We do the daily work to keep our hearts and minds as clear as possible so that we can always hear the Holy Spirit speaking with and to us. This is totally faith-work here. We are intentional about this because we believe that what comes to mind first concerning anything that we have to do or choice that we have to make, comes to us in our first mind. We bet on it every time and the seed that is sown doing it bares fruit without failing -- always.

Naomi and I, who are both of the same faith, operate in this way. Any time, we've had to let go of a contract or things didn't go as planned, it always points back to us NOT going with our first-mind. And even more, if Naomi and I are not aligned with our first-mind, we don't move on it. We have to have a sense of peace around every choice.

9. Live at the level of your consciousness and never at the level of your circumstances. We never, ever, ever make choices based on our current circumstance but rather it's always anchored in the future we're committed to creating. People always ask, "W.E., what do you mean?" For the purposes of sharing an example within the theme of this article, this perspective is a huge part of our current marital successes today. I mean, think about. Dominique and I got married at the ages of 23 and 27 with no job. Heck, I was in my second year of graduate school living at my mothers earning a small monthly stipend. And I must add that I was very grateful for it because in addition to my stipend, I was on a full-tuition ride and the University paid for both my masters! But, let's not digress.

I love this principle. It's theeeeeeee principle that I live by 100%. It's sometimes hard for people to conceptualize that I go through hardships (really hard ones) all the time because

I never show up as my pain, but always as my purpose.

It takes years to build this kind of faith-toughness I call it, but it's a real capability.

I don't think I fully knew it than or better yet, how to express it in language, but I knew it in my spirit. When Dom and I said yes to one another 10 years ago, we were not saying yes to the individual that was standing in front of us, we were saying yes to a future (a consciousness) we were willing to create together. For me to go into this really deeply will require more time, but I hope you get the gist. I'm sure I'll be writing or recording a podcast on this soon.

10. You create your world with your word. Simply put, nothing can come to life without giving language to it. This is why people loosely say, "Be careful what you say or wish for." I can't possibly go into the depth about the power of your word. But, my gosh. We work on this daily. We believe that thoughts are prayers. So we are super mindful about what we meditate on internally too. This attitude is used across everything we do in business and how we engage with our team members.

You know I remember a mother in the church pulled me aside once and said, "Stop saying that or he will always show up like that." What did I use to say? In year 2 and 3 of marriage, I used to jokingly say, " I have 2 children, Autumn Eve and Dom." She told me to stop saying it with a deep conviction that shook me to my core. God bless you Mother Shin who is peacefully resting in heaven. From that day on, I starting declaring Dom as my earthly king and sure enough he started to show up like it. The way he spoke, the way he handled himself, me and the children, with a shift in my word, my world started to transform.

This happens to us in business. We have a persistent complaint about someone and instead of speaking positively, we speak negatively and the person forever shows up like that until we create a new world with our word. I dare you to do this concerning whatever situation you are dealing with.

The truth is, if you have a persistent complaint about something, it means you are not in action around transforming your reality.

Look, I can go on and on about so many powerful principles that we practice daily but the root of it all is simply: But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well - Matt 6:33 NIV.

I absolutely appreciate you for reading and engaging with me. I hope this article has blessed you as much as it has blessed me reflecting and writing it for you. I have so much to catch up on since our trip. I hope to post another article in a week or two.

Until my next piece, I would be remiss not to share that we're working on increasing our sales at?The Mushroom Angel Company . We have to rebuild the momentum after having to take a step back and do an overhaul on branding and packaging. We've made it to that milestone, but we have yet another >>>?share the good gospel of mushrooms with the world.

Please share our link with family and friends. Use this code FRIEND15 to get 15% OFF any order over $75. We thank you so much and are taking note of everyone supporting us on this journey. We appreciate you.

If you love all the design and development work on The Mushroom Angel Company, inquire with us at The VGC Group about our work in tech.

For more on me and my work, visit my personal website.