How I faked my way into entrepreneurship for seven years.

June 25th, 2016.

My last day working as a waitress, after being in the service industry for almost 10 years.

I remember that night. It was bittersweet -

definitely scary to quit the only way I'd known how to make money my whole life and instead, leave to go work for my entrepreneurial, video-marketing boyfriend at the time.

That was the start of me leaning into freelancing and learning the "work from home - get paid from your laptop" millennial lifestyle. Granted, I had no hard skills and not much to contribute to the professional world back then. (Unless of course your staff needed a good social event and some bomb cosmos).

It was a grind to first learn video editing, then social media marketing, and it took several years of dedication behind the scenes before becoming the influencer and "LinkedIn Marketing Expert" you all know today.

Within a year of working to help my ex-boyfriend grow his online marketing biz, I became a partner. A position he most certainly didn't have to give to me- but hey, sometimes chronic codependency has its benefits...

for at least one party involved.

Needless to say, we had absolutely no idea what we were doing in business, but we had an awesome model (licensing viral videos on Facebook). And when pitching for outside funding, we ended up discovering we had an 89% profit margin.

I didn't even know what a profit margin was.

By the time I was 24, that company had gotten a half a million dollar capital investment. We gave equity up to a holding company and got to tap into their resources to scale.

It was fast, and I was definitely not prepared, but we went for it.

Throughout that journey I learned the painful ins and outs of running a company. Hiring, firing, mis-hiring, mis-calculating projections and of course, less we not forget-

the ever so fast and changing culture of the internet.

As digital marketers, even young tech-savvy ones, you had to stay on your toes to keep up with the trends, and pivot fast, or you were out.

By age 25 I was managing over 40 in-house employees, dabbing everyday, and still completely clueless as to how traumatized and f*cked up I really was from my childhood.

(To all the employees I managed back then - whoosh... God be with you.)

I definitely felt in over my head, but my partners, which kept growing at the time, always were there to remind me it wasn't really ON ME if this thing failed. I leaned into what I was more confident at the time, which was not "entrepreneurship" -

it was support.

I was the COO of that company and also managed the creative staff, something I was definitely a natural at and loved tapping into. This is where I really merged my gift of the arts with business, and learned how to market uniquely through video.

But, I truly never did feel like I deserved to be there.

I always, always felt like a fraud.

I was very unhappy in my personal relationship, but I had no backbone or strength to leave. Not to mention the hole I'd dug myself in building a company as a couple... that was a tough lesson.

I poured my heart and soul into building that business, and within 3 years got the news from my investors that they didn't feel I was valuable enough to have a seat at a table anymore. And that I, one of the co-founders, would have to accept a demotion.

Ouch.

Talk about manifesting your fears.

This certainly wasn't helping me with my self-esteem as a business owner.

The pain I felt in my chest dealing with this entire situation would end up becoming the catalyst for me eventually remembering my repressed childhood trauma. So in that sense, I look back and smile at this "mini" trauma I experienced, because I now know God was leading me back to a greater one I'd had yet to face.

The source of why I REALLY never felt confident to run a company, or make money on my own...

incest.

I used to share more openly about my sexual abuse, but for now- we'll have to come back to the details of all that. It's hard for me to speak on it like I once did, and I'm definitely in the "regret" stage of coming forward as a survivor. But... I know that'll pass too, and eventually we'll all have to sit down and have a deep chat about how prevalent incest, molestation, and repressed memories, seriously is in our culture.

I think it's the silent demon royally f*cking everyone up.

But yeah, another time.

Back to the business -

So, I sold my shares and left the first company I'd built. I continued working with that boyfriend for almost another year after leaving, still heavily dependent on my safety net, and him. Even though - by that time I had started taking the knowledge I'd been learning in social media marketing and applying it to my own brand,

on LinkedIn.

Running a business certainly did not bring me confidence...

but making videos sure did.

Within less than one year from that exit, we broke up - and despite being unhappy in the relationship, it was more his choice than mine.

And that crushed me.

I was seriously terrified at this point I'd have to go back to waitressing, even though I'd already been working in digital marketing and learning video, social media, and entrepreneurship for over 3 years now.

My blog, and my 100,000 followers I'd grown by that time, saved me.

I remember that first month all on my own. Dealing with the heartbreak of not having a man I'd been so dependent on. Still mourning the loss of my first company, my baby, that had all blown up in flames...

fresh off the memories I had gotten back about what really went on as a child.

HELP!!!

I think I lasted all of a few months, if that, pivoting and starting to run a LinkedIn agency on my own, before calling out for my next "parent" to come save me.

That's when I got connected with a woman who, similar in age to me, was looking to get out of her job and do something that granted her more independence.

I remember thinking she was a bit expensive, but I didn't care.

I hired her right away.

I remember the literal words I said were, "I need you to run my whole company."

She did, and we worked together well for many years.

I was free to go back to what I felt comfortable with, which was making videos, and she handled the backend, the fulfillment, the clients... all the while protecting my energy and keeping my unstable ass sane as much as she could.

Honestly, she was a godsend. And I can't say anything negative about this woman. I fired her a few years later when I started to doubt her ability and really, I think I just had enough years of feeling like an imposter with my LinkedIn business.

I wanted to "prove" I could do it myself.

I'm still integrating from it all and trying to understand if it was a necessary move in me finally getting closer to dismantling this business-shame I'd been carrying, or if it was just a natural trauma-response from a girl who struggles to accept genuine love, support, and things going suspiciously well for a little too long.

My brilliant idea to let this woman go and do it on my own, did not go as planned.

Self-sabotage anyone?

Yeah...

guilty.

The good news is, I did start to take on more responsibilities in my business I'd been avoiding for years. I had to after she left, that was kind of the point. The problem was -

I still wasn't all the way in.

Around this same time that she left, I ended up dating a colleague of mine which AGAIN - you'd think I'd have learned by now.. but I'm telling ya'll, that pattern of incest runs deep. Blurring the lines between personal, professional, friend, mother/father, and lover...

it all felt the same to me.

I fell into another pattern of letting my partner run the show and just do it all for me.

Comforting, yes. But also,

clearly just me once again, running away from responsibility, and fearing the real work of being fully in charge of my own company.

The codependency bug got me once again, and I totally knew it. My imposter syndrome and shame around being a "fake" business owner only grew worse.

Fast forward another year or so from that all going down -

another breakup, another reset,

another come to Jesus moment and I'm back at square one.

From the time I went off on my own after breaking up with my first business partner/boyfriend, until today, has been 3 and a half years.

Before then I was with him, and without a job, for another 3 and a half years.

Totaling this whole sob story for a grand timeline of SEVEN YEARS of entrepreneurship.

7. Frickin. Years.

That's:

7 years of spreadsheets.

7 years of you better get a good laptop.

7 years of runs to Best Buy, Office Depot.

7 years of upWork, Fiverr, Indeed, and HR.

7 years of hiring.

7 years of sleepless nights, when firing someone just never gets easier.

7 years of Uber Eats, and takeout, when the business just won't let me move.

7 years of building SOPs.

7 years of softwares & vendors.

7 years of invoices, payroll.

7 years of cashflow.

7 years of taxes.

7 years of investments.

7 years of video calls, of skype, of WhatsApp, Zoom.

7 years of mostly wearing pajama pants.

7 years of coffee runs.

7 years of late nights, early mornings,

and 7 years since I've had to set my alarm, put on a uniform, and hope I make it through traffic in time to start my shift.

7 years... since being a waitress.

7 years...

since having a boss.

All businesses combined, co-owned and now solo, I've generated well over 5 million dollars in revenue by now. Breaking 1 million each of the last three years alone, without equity partners.

I've worked with Petco, Yahoo, Buzzfeed.

I've been on podcasts with Dan Lok, Brad Lea, Elena Cardone.

I've trained Lewis Howes, Kevin Harrington, and Grant Cardone on LinkedIn.

I've been flown around the country to speak and mentor about marketing, video, and entrepreneurship.

I've made millions of dollars, spent millions of dollars, bought real estate, flown private, and came across some pretty amazing business people in the world, and not just the well-known celebrities listed above.

I've grown over 700,000 followers, and collectively gotten millions more followers on social media for my clients.

And I've done it all while completely, shamefully, unDENIABLY...

insecure.

7 years.

I say all of this because I want you to know...

if you feel like a fraud?

Do it anyway.

If you feel like you're not ready?

Do it anyway.

If you feel like you're gonna fail and your deepest insecurities will be brought to the surface?

OH YES-

Do it anyway.

I'm proof that you can not only come from a background that is completely f*cked up beyond belief, but also go into business -

STILL BE COMPLETELY F*CKED UP...

and make it happen.

Trust me, I know I still have some demons left of shame and imposter syndrome to work through. The voices in my head that haunt me and try to convince me, "it's only you who's like this!" - that I'm the only one who struggles with these things and therefor I should just give up now...

but I been around the block enough by now to also know,

that ain't true.

I'm not the exception,

I'm the norm.

Business doesn't care if you've "finished your healing".

It's never finished. And believe me - I've met people making a lot more money than me, who are a LOT MORE insecure & immature.

(actually - I still gotta figure out how they pull it off!)

I didn't have to know all the answers, be good at all the things, I didn't even have to be the focal point of running my own companies. I just had to get resourceful, cling onto the right people, outsource my weaknesses, and hang onto the hope that one day I would figure it all out.

7 years later, and it finally feels like I'm finally doing just that.

It feels like I'm finally becoming an entrepreneur.

I only, just now, feel like I'm not "faking" it.

Like I can finally sit in a room...

full of business owners...

and truly believe...

that I belong.

7 years.

If you relate to having all of these insecurities, and they're crippling you from continuing your business, taking it to that next level, or from starting a business at all...

hate to break it to you snowflake, but-

you're normal.

Entrepreneurship is not for the special, the smarter, and is especially not for the healed.

It's for those of us crazy enough to say,

"fuck it"

and do it anyway.

#Shayshine ??

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