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- [00:01]
A
The following podcast is a Dear Media Production.
- [00:12]
B
So today's episode is for anybody who says they want more. More money, more ownership, more leverage. But when you're navigating the business of you, that means approaching your life like an investor would and investing in yourself like an investor would invest in. In you. Because you're not just a person with a career. You're an asset with a portfolio. You're a business, whether you're structured it
- [00:34]
A
that way or not.
- [00:35]
B
K.K. hart is my guest today. She's an investor advisor and operator who doesn't just build companies. She evaluates them. She sees risk, she sees upside. She sees where value is being created and where it's quietly leaking. And what I love is that she applies the same lens to the founder behind the business. So today we're talking about valuation, but on a personal level. What increases yours, what lowers it? And are you actually structured for the growth you say you want?
- [01:14]
A
Hey, Kay, welcome to the show.
- [01:16]
C
Let's do it.
- [01:17]
B
I'm so excited to have you. First, I want to get into a couple of backstories of how we met, and then I also want to introduce your backstory to my audience. We could do a whole episode on your backstory because your lore is deep, but there are so many things that I'm excited to talk to you about. So first, I want to get into how we met, which was at a dinner last year that was hosted by Jacqueline Johnson, who is friend of both of ours, mentor of mine. She's an incredible founder, investor. She hosted this dinner last year. We met, and immediately we just locked in. And this is not a good networking tip for everybody, but I don't know who else was at that dinner because once we started talking, we then sat and talked for hours, truly. And I don't know who else was there or what they were talking about. And I was like, I need this woman to be my friend. I need her to come on the podcast, and I want to learn from her because she is so cool and so smart. So I'm so happy that you're here.
- [02:10]
C
The feeling is so mutual, as. Thank you.
- [02:13]
B
Thank you. Now, part of what we talked about at that dinner and where I was just like, I need to know everything about you, not to be too invasive or creepy, was you were sharing a bit more with me about your backstory, about your career trajectory, about how you got to a place of owning businesses, of investing in businesses, but of doing so in a way that feels so uniquely you and authentic to who you are and the life that you want to create. So can you tell our audience a little bit about how you started and what got you to where you are now?
- [02:50]
C
Boy, I feel like it's so aligned that I'm here. I was such a corporate girly for so long. My entire self worth was around how I earned what I brought to the table and I think that looked really good on the outside. I spent most of my career in the field of behavioral science, which is unique because I was able to be a marketer, a business development analyst, a data and statistician, but also ultimately to understand this asset management view of life and also business. I was really good at money and numbers and business, but boy, when I tell you my personal life was a hot mess, express. So much of what I did was in a natural skillset, but I balanced that with my self care and my wellness. I think that's actually how I first found your podcast and really fell in love with the balance and duality between my strengths and my skill sets and and my capital. So starting off, I really didn't know much about being a great person and developing there, but I knew a lot professionally. I had a master's degree and really used that early on in big businesses where I found the glass ceiling really early. I think, especially as a woman of color, if I'm being right out the gate, very honest, is it left me with more needed than I think the world could have offered me in any other way than to do it for myself. I worked for Big Pharma, sold drugs, but legally, and found myself kind of doing other offshoots of that at first. So medical devices, biotechnology, stumbled into the wellness industry, seeing it as like a cash version of what had been happening on the insurance side and really loved using behavioral science for that. You know, it's the science of how we think, what we do and how we change others thinking. So the first thing that happened is I actually changed myself. I changed the way I thought and the way that I acted mostly because I had this hard, horrific start off in my career and my life by getting married and divorced before 30. So that was a fun moment.
- [04:41]
B
What I should have also added in your intro is that you are behind either as an investor, as an advisor, like all of our favorite things and all of our favorite brands, the things that we love and we use every day. I want to add that caveat, but I also want to come back to what it was that you just said. You talked about hitting a glass ceiling, both personally and professionally. When you were in those moments was There a specific event, a specific wake up call where it was like, this career path either isn't working for me. I've maxed out here. As you just mentioned your marriage where you were like, I've gotta go. What were those moments where you hit that ceiling and you knew you needed to make a change?
- [05:19]
C
You know, this is the first time I realized that they were around the same time, both personally and professionally. So I'll give you both professionally in the early aspects of especially pharmaceutical sales was considered like the dream job. Very early on they started taking away merit and performance based bonuses. And that's when I was like, oh, I gotta go. I can't achieve the level of growth that I want and therefore I've gotta find another path. So I had originally started in that industry thinking I would retire out and have this amazing career and I'd have a full arc of life. At that same time I shifted over into more risky industries like biotech and selling devices and started consulting. I was an in house consultant for a long time for a very large healthcare company called McKesson. And at that time my marriage went from horrible to abusive and then it was time to go. So those things happened. Very much so intertwined. The part of the story that I think most people don't realize is that I had been so good with money and I'd made a lot of money with my skill set for quite a bit before my husband. So I actually had a very large amount of money put aside that I had a prenup for, had to fight to enforce the prenup and then found myself on the other side of that. All this money, all this influence and just completely empty inside. So both sides of my life seem to converge and crash in the best possible timing.
- [06:38]
B
Looking back, those wake up calls or I've been thinking about this idea of unlucky to lucky moments where it feels like we're either hitting a rock bottom, everything is falling apart, but it's actually the catalyst to our next lucky thing. Did you feel like you were in that point?
- [06:55]
C
That was it. But I would not have told you that if I was in it. Yeah, I actually thought I would be, you know, wealthy businesswoman with a dog and. And I was for a while and never thought I would remarry and always said I'd never get married again without a prenup and took about seven years to meet my forever husband. And not only did we remarry without a prenup, but we doubled our net worth together. And so it goes to show you that sometimes the wrong fit for you for that season or reason is okay because you learn so much from it and you've processed in a way where you're a different person on the other side. And so now I ended up walking into a life that I was ready for, that I would have never been ready for before that. Talk about great luck to be abused and then left and then realize that actually I had more that I needed to do on me with regards to my own growth. I had more skill sets to learn. And honestly, I had a better me that was waiting for me on the other side.
- [07:49]
B
I got to say though, the idea of not having a prenup is terrifying to me. And I don't have. I have but a mere sliver of what I know you're working with. What went into that decision?
- [08:03]
C
I wish I could tell you it was tactical. I can tell you all the circumstances around it. And I want to give real numbers because I think someone there in this story is probably seeing themself right now. I had had millions of dollars before my forever husband. I really believed that anyone who came into my life, this is where, like journaling the things we vibe off of personal development. It started making me realize that I needed to leave space for this person if I was ever gonna meet him. And if he was that person, he would be someone who expanded me, not contracted me. So I started putting a space out in my place for a second person. I started eating with an extra place setting. Like things that seem really silly and manifestation minded then. But what I was saying is there's a seat at the table, but he's gotta come, right? He's gotta come with some assets under his belt, so to speak. And when I met my husband, he was on his glow up. He was up for partner. He's an engineer. We had totally different skill set, but he saw me as an equal. He always used to say, if he's a 9, I'm a 10. And he's treated me like that ever since. From the first day to today, almost nine years together. I think there was something too, that I remember not thinking tactically, but thinking if I never feel this way again, I would feel regret and remorse about the person that I showed up as. So why not go all in? Why not only choose a person that I wouldn't feel unsafe having a prenup with, and if that ever, if the stars ever aligned, that would be the person that I align with for life. I actually never thought it would be marriage. But about a year into our relationship. I realized that not only had I already reformulated my whole life to be married to this person, but I realized that there was a depth in me that was different this time around. To be fair, I think sometimes we villainize our former partners or what we've been through, because it's easier than turning the mirror on ourselves and saying, there's some work that I had to do. But. But with about $10 million under my belt when I met him, what I think I felt more than anything was lonely. Much of that was liquid. So I also felt free. And I felt like I could finally make the decision that if I was gonna do it, it would be so aligned that I would. I'd be blind to miss it. And so it really was a flying leap, but the best one of my entire life.
- [10:18]
B
Can we also come back to how casually you said that? That at that time you were basically sitting on $10 million, mostly liquid? That was like so casually said, which I don't think a lot of people would casually say. I want to reverse engineer that a little bit. If that was the point where you kind of entered your second marriage at like, $10 million net worth at that time. Can we talk about how you got to that point from, you know, you finished school, working in medical. What got you to that point? What got that first 10 million? How did you get from A to B?
- [10:57]
C
I thought about this a lot, especially being a mom now through adoption and always thinking about this question of, can success be created? And so for me, I can tell you for sure, it definitely can. And a lot of it is that mix of culture, nurture, and nature, as a behaviorist, I can tell you we call that epigenetics. But essentially, I think what I can tell you is I really had an early love for strengths. And I understood that while many people think you go out and you find the things you're not great at and you put all of your effort there. I was trained with military grade precision on the brain, and I knew that actually it was the opposite. That was true, is you double down on your strengths. And some of my strengths were fiscal conservativity, like being very, very good with money very early on, didn't really have a choice, had no backup plan.
- [11:40]
B
And was that something your parents instilled in you 100%?
- [11:43]
C
Having a immigrant parent and coming here at the age of three, we didn't have anything. My dad threatened to kill my mom.
- [11:49]
B
We.
- [11:49]
C
We packed up basically in the middle of the night, landed in America, went through the naturalization process. And me being such a young age, I was actually around for my mom's glow up. So I watched the way she navigated money. I negotiated her first car, I co negotiated the house she still lives in. I was 16. I learned about doing for yourself at a very young age. But some of those were natural skill sets and some of them were learned skill sets. And so piecing that all together meant I wanted to double down and double click on my strengths and, and using my career and my education. I mean that's every good immigrant parent will tell you that. But the second piece of that was kind of figuring out who do I want to be as I glow up. And I knew that I was going to have a rise in my career. I thought it would be in this one company in this easy way. But every single time I came back to it, it was like, well, I'm going to have to do this myself. I'm overlooked for this opportunity. I'm underrepresented in this room. Guess girl is going to have to roll up her sleeves and do it myself. And so I got to the point where that made more sense and felt less risky because I know me and my thought process has always been, well, fuck it, I'll invest in myself.
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B
When betting on yourself doesn't feel like a risk.
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C
Truly, yeah,
- [13:07]
A
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- [17:51]
B
I do appreciate what you said about those skills being instilled in you at a young age of being more frugal or kind of having it instilled in you to manage money well, having practice negotiating, which I feel like probably a lot of first gen kids probably feel of being put in a position to either, maybe translate, depending on where their family is from, negotiate, do those things. I'm curious for people who may be coming into those skills later, how would you advise they strengthen those things if they weren't raised under that mindset?
- [18:27]
C
There's something to be said for upskilling, and I think that can look a lot of different ways. We're in the middle of this amazing technological evolution and I'm happy to double click on my professional background because I actually was an early adopter to AI and what I found was most people think of their strengths in very binary ways. I either have professional strengths or I have personal strengths. And actually what I find is oftentimes what you have in one area is translatable to the other. And so the first thing I always think about, besides being rigorously fiscally conservative, is thinking about efficiency and, and figuring out what parts of your skillsets you can kind of grow alongside. And then what's really so outside of your wheelhouse that you need to either outsource or allow others to do for you. I think we've glamorized this idea of passive income and having other people do everything for us, but I found that most of My success and all of that first 10 million came from what I call DIY or ROI, which is doing it myself and growing my skillsets along the way. What that looks like, this may be helpful actually, is to break down how I spend my time and how it grew my wealth. So 50% of my time still is spent on low cost advising, mentoring, coaching business owners. 30% is really around managing the assets in our portfolio. We run a modern family office. It's about 30 million in assets under management. It's myself, my husband, two adopted kids and our dog Caramel Frappuccino, who you know, I love. And the other 20% is kind of those really big investments, going to the moon type stuff that people get really excited about. We now call them alternative investments. So that's how I spend my time. But here's how I grew my wealth. It's the exact inverse. So 50% of my wealth came from those alternative assets. I've done everything from trade options to precious metals, of course, startup investing. But I also really love doing things that are not as sexy and heart led and allow us to have a greater upside. And then 30% still comes from those assets that we own. 10 businesses that I've owned over the last 20 years. And then 20% of my wealth actually comes from the cash flow from having my agency and advising and mentoring. So what I want someone to hear in that is no matter what that number looks like right now, not only can it grow, it's part of a skillset you can use to create your own ecosystem or platform of success. And that's both. Financial, professional, it's diversification, it's asset management. But it comes from this idea that you can grow with a few thousand dollars, you can grow to a few million dollars. I think the thing that doesn't get told enough is that maybe you should do a few more things yourself.
- [21:01]
B
There's a lot in there that I want to unpack first is that you gave us a few terms that may be new to people. Family office and alternative investment. Can you tell us what a family office is and can you give us some examples of investments that may be considered alternative?
- [21:17]
C
So family offices for a long time have been just the billionaires, usually over a hundred million dollars in assets under management, which basically means you have all kinds of assets that total that amount. So it could be real estate, could be stocks and bonds, it could be all kinds of stuff. We run what I call a modern family office, which is about $30 million in investable assets. And we don't really count the stuff that's still growing. We do so with that investment committee of the husband, the dog, two kids. And so we really are a more nimble version of a family office. But we also are very impact driven. So we do a lot with regards to giving back and we stack all of that in our generational wealth. So it's not just about stocks and bonds and real estate and businesses. It's also about giving back and philanthropy. The other thing that's interesting about what we're talking about is alternative investments, which is actually having a moment right now. You may hear of it as startup investing or kind of understanding how the private market works versus the public markets. There's a lot in there that I would kind of encapsulate into that. Everything from investing in wines and vintages, investing in sports teams. Acquisitions still fall into that space as well. It's kind of anything that's not the traditional stock bond investment account. Most Americans hold their wealth in retirement accounts, which means they don't get access to it. Twenty years ago, being alternative meant that I had to carve out a different way to invest because if I locked all my money up into retirement accounts, I wouldn't be able to really do much with it without a huge fee. Whereas what I've done is created this modern family office where there's a four layer effect. And it touches everything from real estate to your retirement accounts to investing in businesses, acquiring them, and of course, just being operational around the entire structure.
- [22:57]
B
I'm curious about the logistics of it. If someone is running a family office, what kind of entity is that? It is, you literally have like an, an LLC or something on behalf of your family. And that's what you invest into. All of these things under.
- [23:10]
C
We have a holding company. Okay. That holding company really looks like a LLC that holds all of the assets within it. There's a lot of reasons for that. There's tax protection, liability protection, and for us, there's a generational transferability that allows us to set up a trust for our children, set up Roth IRAs and retirement accounts for our children, and keep the wealth going beyond just our generation that's here now. But it looks different for everyone. I think we are exceptional at operating businesses and so we spend a lot more of our time doing that than maybe a traditional family office that's more of a check writer. I'm a skill investment girly, so I love to come in with my marketing agency and provide resources and support. And not just a check, but we're more leveraged There because it is our strength. And I think most family offices are the opposite. They want to deploy assets under management in really one very specific way, which is a check out to someone else. And they get the upside whenever they get it.
- [24:08]
B
I'm curious when it comes to family offices, what it also looks like for the businesses that you invest in. Because this month on the podcast, our theme is the business of you. And we're exploring, exploring women owned businesses, and particularly black women owned businesses from different lenses. And something that we see a lot of businesses come up against, particularly in our community, is just a lack of funding. And when we think about the barriers that we face, especially when it comes to like maybe not having friends and family around who have a bunch of cash to contribute to a friends and family round, if we're investing to the different biases that prevent us from getting like adequate amounts of, of venture capital and things like that. Do you think something like family offices and getting family offices to invest are an underrated or underutilized source of capital for founders?
- [24:55]
C
Maybe.
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B
Tell me more.
- [24:56]
C
I'll tell you why. And it has to do with the F word, freedom. I think a lot of founders believe that there's this perfect entity that's out there to give them money and let them go to the moon with their entity or investment. I think we've got it all wrong. We look at a business as a job, but we should look at a business as an asset.
- [25:14]
D
So.
- [25:14]
C
So something I created was cashflow 2.0. It's an asset management approach to running businesses and then creating this modern family office. And what's often overlooked is that the idea of someone giving you a check to find product, market fit and to be successful usually puts you, the founder, at the bottom of the capital stack. That means everyone gets their money first and you're hoping for a few pennies at the end. Whereas when you think about running your business like an asset, that means you're stepping into a new version of skillsets and a new way of thinking about your growth personally and professionally, that allows you to be more thoughtful. So family offices come up because we're considered very friendly and kind of patient capital. I'm a strategic investor. The contrarian thought here is that I like a return because there's more impact for all the things that I am able to support. So I think about this as alignment, I think about it as purpose, and I absolutely think about it as profit. So. So when someone is thinking about partnering with a family office, I would ask more questions than just what's your check size and what are you interested in is your investment thesis? I would ask them about what their legacy looks like. I would consider if I can do it on my own if I was a founder, and I would consider if there are other paths to success that I should be considering. One of the things a lot of women talk to me about in wanting a family office is the idea of having a business to scale and exit. And I've actually never done that. I'm never proudly going to be an exited founder because I found that there's so much more cash flow in buying, buying, holding, and operationalizing the businesses in a way that's gotten a bad rap lately. I feel like private equity is evil has been like the moniker for a little while now. But ultimately with my background, you know, what I've done really uniquely with behavioral science is also layered in this approach called Six Sigma. Essentially, it's the idea of 1% better in change and decreasing any deficiencies or issues in the business. In fitness, we talk about it as 1% better every day, right? A little bit better every day in business. It allows us to not just operationalize, but create less dependencies and less stuck, which means there are more opportunities if you think about the business that way. So there are essentially three other ways, except for an exit, in order to grow the business, Two of which are internal and one is of course, the exit. And then the fourth is to acquire. I'm a big believer in acquiring. I've acquired eight out of the ten businesses I own. But I'll tell you why I'm talking about this. It's because there are other ways to be successful besides taking on capital. Much of what I've done over recent is spoke to many women of color who've taken on capital. Sadly, the last couple of years, there's almost been a resurgence of the businesses struggling once again. And as a strategist, I still work at a very low cost or for free in order to be able to do that and support this community. And it's broken my heart, Les, the things that you see after the fact, the concerns that I have as an acquaintance acquirer for who would ever acquire that business now that the investment has been wired, the funds have been used entirely, and they're out again. And so I would really strongly consider anyone who's thinking about taking on investment, period, even if it's from a friendly family office, to really consider if they can go at it with a different view of success. Internal can mean many things, including monetizing the Business with a new audience space or a new, different type of ideal client. One of the things that's really popular that I do with a lot of my wellness and my business clients is we think about other skill sets and other client bases that we can tap into with regards to share of wallet. So what that may look like is you already have a client base that trusts you and knows you, but can we get them to spend on something else that we can also do very excellently? That's another way of growing and actually provides a lot more profit, a lot more upside. I call that cash flowing and growing. And then of course, I want more women, especially more women who are of color, who have unique and varied backgrounds to be able to be acquirers. It's less than 1% of us, and I don't like being part of the 1% alone. I'm lonely and I want to grow with others. And so that's a really unique way to use even a little bit of capital to be able to grow not just your skill sets, but also ultimately your wealth.
- [29:21]
B
How do we get more of us acquiring?
- [29:23]
C
We need to learn the skill. And I think some of this is innate. If you're good with money, if you are, I would say this if you're a bit of a detector or if you know, stalked all of your college boyfriends, if you are someone who's really good at like putting out fires in your current career, you can actually be great at being an acquirer. It's an acquired taste. I acquire everything, including my children. So like, some of us love it more than others. But I will say it doesn't also have to be a large amount. So when I start talking about acquisition, people are thinking about the billion dollar this and 100 million DOL or that. But my first acquisition was $300,000. It was my own money, which is a very privileged place to be. But I had an acquisition about three after that that was only $30,000. I've bought blogs that were $8,000. So there is a place at every monetization level if you're willing to learn the skills around it. And then that's where the fiscal conservativity comes in. Can I beat that drum one more time? And then being operational and hands on in the business allows you to get all the upside. So I think that's where we start. I offer apprenticeship because I think it can be learned. But I think many women have the skills already. We need to see her to believe her. And maybe that's why I'm Being so loud and proud about this now. I used to be really ashamed to have made all the money because it felt not just lonely. Cause I always say it's lonely at the top if you let it be. But it felt very polarizing and I had to really sit and think, what's the world that I want to live in? Who do I want to grow with? And it's other underrepresented founders and other people who want to bring their skills and their capital to a new place. So I believe that she can be anyone with any background as long as she's willing to take a risk on herself and believe in her as the asset.
- [31:03]
B
I actually love what you said about the detective work piece because I posted a video about this recently on Instagram and TikTok and the girls weren't hearing me. I said, in this video, you're using all of these skills for nothing. Why are you on that man's ex girlfriend's aunt's childhood home listed on Zillow when you could be using those detective skills to go research either. A way to build a business, a way to learn a skill that you want. There was this girl who posted this tick tock video of like 30 things she did in a month to absolutely terrorize her ex boyfriend. And she was like building websites and impersonating people and creating like, I don't know, fake. She was doing all of this stuff where I'm like, sis, you're actually very talented.
- [31:49]
C
Yes.
- [31:50]
B
And could you imagine where 30 days of applying all of these skills and creativity could get you outside of like. I mean, it's funny to like terrorize whatever, but if you could apply that to something else, imagine where you could be like, what is doing these things to these people getting you? And so I just, I wanted to call that out because I appreciate that
- [32:11]
C
you still the wrong asset.
- [32:13]
B
Yes.
- [32:13]
C
Yeah, 100%. I should say this. It's very clear to me what my strengths were that worked against me personally since business and money came easily. But I was such a hot mess express before I met my forever husband. And it was that skill as well as very codependent. I did a lot of work, invested a lot of money on therapy and support groups and books and more books around this concept and even mentoring and coaching. And actually what I realized is that most skills are transferable. There's a gap between how we utilize them and what asset we put them towards. I think that's a big part of having this modern family office is many of my children's skillsets. Are now even being used in our businesses. Like I'm looking at gen Alpha driven businesses to invest in. Who better than my gen Alpha daughter? So I think we really have to start thinking very tactically about the life we want. Something you said that really kind of relates to this roll with me here, because it'll take me a second to explain it, is that there's a 2% number that we talk about a lot with regards to women. Less than 2% of women make even a million dollars a year. Less than 2% of women get venture capital. But what we never talk about is the same skill gap for women to ever get there from where they start. There's an interesting study, it's actually by JP Morgan Chase and they looked at when you start a business, what percentage of possibility would it be to be able to get to a million dollars. And actually a lot of it correlates with your skills, of course, but also what you chose to do first. Meaning if you're running a business where you're making a good living, if you're in career girly mode and you're making a good l most times, Just because it's not a million dollars doesn't mean you'll never get there. It means there's one or two little skills or goals that are needed in order for you to upskill to the next level and then the next level and the next level. So when I hear that, I think about that first a hundred thousand dollars, which I got very early, I was 20. But then I think about the next milestone after that, which is about a quarter of a million and making that consistent every year. Notice, it's not about the million, it's not about the billion. It's about what we do with what we have. And that's where the assessment skill gap, you have the skill sis. Let's just use it for something that's a bit more productive.
- [34:20]
B
What would you say are maybe the top three skills for making those incremental increases to get to that million?
- [34:27]
C
I'm not going to be liked for this.
- [34:29]
B
Ooh, even better.
- [34:30]
C
The first one is to live drastically underneath your means. It has been the unlock for me in every way. I still live underneath my means. And I believe that it is something that I wish more people would lean into even in the era of abundance, even in the world we're living in today. And I think that's one that's just really drastically understated. Debt has never helped us get ahead. And I think especially when you have a little more melanin in your skin. Debt can really put you in a very difficult place with the wrong perspective of success. So that's one. I say two is really personal development and figuring out who you are and who you want to be. And that can change. To be fair, I always say shift happens every five to seven years. There's been some skill, some client base, some unique thing that I did that shifted. And I think being willing to shift is a skill in and of itself. But the other mindset around this is to be really thoughtful about who we're becoming. And I'll tell you the reason for it. It's really hard to share, but many women, even when they get to these big milestones, we're talking about the thing that actually keeps them from going further, right? Because I've advised in over $300 million in exits. So I know what it looks like to have the big shiny thing that everybody thinks they want. Here's what keeps women stuck from getting there and then actually having miserable lives afterwards. Oh, it's so hard to share. It's personal development. It's caretaking, it's having the wrong interpersonal relationships. And so those seem like really soft skills. But it only gets harder as you glow up. And so putting in that work, even when it feels futile or when it feels like there's no understanding of the end goal. I remember when it was just myself and caramel Frappuccino and thinking, who will all of this go to? It's just me and a dog. And on the one side I thought, okay, well, that could be kind of cool. But on the other side, it was very lonely, it was very sad, it was very dark. So that personal development allowed me to be a great me. So that when I became a we, it actually got better and not worse.
- [36:33]
B
And what did investing in your personal development look like for you?
- [36:36]
C
So many things, especially being very severely codependent. And while that was also a strength, professionally decoupling that from my personal life, seeing the diamonds in the rough of every partner prior to my forever husband, I see it so clearly now. Having very specific one on one counseling, specific to the idea of being codependent, being the fixer and the doer professionally kind of nurtured that even more. I could see how it hurt me personally. And I found a way to have boundaries professionally afterwards. So that's one certainly health and wellness. It's still such a big part of my life. Investing in exercise. I mean, I bought four exercise gyms. So for me it was like a little bit of an interesting habit where I would like something and then buy the company. Investing from everything from skincare, which I now own, that company, and then exercise regenerative foods. Like I'm beating a drum here. That I know is a bigger picture than what most people want to focus on. But truly when I started putting different fuel in my body, my body responded differently. And I don't think I would have even been proud to say, like I'm 40 years old now and I feel great about what I've accomplished, but I feel even better that I've invested in my health and really made a lot of time for that in years that were a lot easier than now. Being a mom of two, I would say maybe the last one is because we often get stuck with our interpersonal and our caretaking needs is coming up with optionality. I think one of the things I'm most proud of with the exits that I've advised in and been a part of is really having different layers of success. When you take outside capital. I'm gonna make this very full circle for a second. You really only have one view of success. You have to exit, you have to have what we call a liquidity event. But what if you had liquidity, which is essentially just your assets are able to be used without the exit. So when that happens, you have three, four other things you can do to be able to do well and to grow up with your business to evolve and change your lifestyle. And I think that's what most people haven't thought about because they're waiting for that big dub. I think if we did it sooner, we would actually have even more impact at the end.
- [38:40]
B
There's a few things that I'm thinking about right now as you're describing that is I think there is an element of humility with that of not necessarily chasing the biggest, flashiest thing that we think success is. So not having the billion dollar, multimillion dollar exit and having a different version of success that may not be that. Having a business that is really sustainable and potentially lucrative, that isn't like the VC backed super fast, you know, break things type of model.
- [39:16]
C
Yeah.
- [39:17]
B
Really being able to rewire what we consider success to look a little bit different. And maybe on the surface it's not as sexy, but it also has the potential to still be lucrative, to still be fulfilling, to still give us a potential lifestyle and desired outcome that we want, but being okay with it looking
- [39:37]
C
a little bit different 100%. I think business advice has really done this wrong because what ends up happening is we glamorize as women who aren't business owners. Becoming a business owner and then becoming a business owner, you really have this dichotomy as to what success looks like. And it's either you go to the moon and you take outside funding or. Or you're a lifestyle business and you're supposed to stay in your lane. And actually, I think there are shades of gray in between that have not only made me very successful, but I've watched my clients do the same. Different industries, different dollar amounts. But it's always this same idea of staying against the grain and not believing everything everyone tells you about what should be successful for you. Yeah, there's just a whole industry out there that wants us to see this one size fits all approach to success. Success. And I always think that's really just for a few. What if there are options for many? That's the goal when we were always thinking about what we want out of life. When I go back to the F word, it's freedom. It's the ability to buy and do whatever you want and then have the freedom to say, I want to or I don't. That's why I say, go fund yourself.
- [40:44]
B
Go fund yourself. I like that.
- [40:50]
C
Foreign.
- [40:54]
A
Let's talk about sleep for a second. Because I truly believe that good sleep changes everything. My mood, my focus, my patience, which are all things I need to create my own luck. When I'm well rested, I'm a much better version of myself. And for me, that starts with a really good mattress, which is why I love my Lisa. I've been sleeping on a Lisa mattress for a few months now, and it really is that perfect balance of supportive and soft. You lay down and your whole body just settles in. No tossing around trying to find the right spot. It just works. Lisa designs mattresses for all types of sleepers. Side back stomach Freestyle. Their mattresses are made with high quality cooling foam and responsive layers that keep you comfortable and supported all night long. I'm not waking up sore, I'm not overheating, and I'm definitely not lying there wondering why my bed suddenly feels like a bed of rock box. Another thing I really appreciate is that LISA is a certified B corp, which means they're committed to doing good beyond just making great mattresses. So if you're ready for better sleep, go to Lisa.com for 20 off mattresses through March 31st. Plus get an extra 50 off with promo code lucky exclusive for my listeners. That's L E-E-S A.com promo code lucky for 20 off of mattresses through March 31st, plus an extra $50 off support our show and let them know that I sent you after checkout. Lately I've been thinking a lot about editing. Not just content, but also editing your life. Because when something isn't aligned anymore, you don't keep forcing it, you refine it. And I think that that's especially true when it comes to businesses that we're building or big ideas that we're launching. Sometimes the initial version of what we create isn't what we're meant to create forever, and we can evolve right along with it. Growth usually feels uncomfortable at first, but having the right support behind you is what makes the difference between scaling and staying stuck. And that is why I love platforms like Shopify Shopify is a commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world and 10% of all e commerce in the US from major household names to brands that are just getting their first idea off the ground, they make it easy to bring your vision to life with ready to use templates and AI tools that help write product descriptions, headlines, and even enhance your videos so you're not stuck staring at a blank screen. Shopify also helps you get the word out with email and social campaigns, supports everything from inventory to shipping to returns, and offers 24. 7 customer support when you need it. Plus with that purple Shop pay button, which is the best converting checkout on the planet, you can look forward to fewer abandoned carts and more sales. It's time to turn those what ifs into Because Lucky girls use Shopify. Sign up for your $1 per month trial today at shopify.com balance black girl go to shopify.com balance blackgirl that's shopify.com balanceblack girl there is a difference between having a lot of clothes and actually having a wardrobe. Because when you're building a capsule wardrobe you realize pretty quickly that having more isn't the goal. Having better quality pieces is. You want pieces that feel good, that last, and that you can reach for without overthinking it. And that is why I love Quince because they make beautiful clothes using premium fabrics like 100% European linen, silk and organic cotton poplin, plus lightweight cotton cashmere sweaters that are perfect for this in between weather where you still have to layer, but you also want to look put together. The cuts feel elevated, the colors for spring are gorgeous, and everything is designed to make getting dressed simple. I also love that quince works directly with safe, ethical factories and cuts out the middlemen so you're not paying for brand markups or fancy retail stores, just quality pieces that are built to last. For the last several years I've had several quince sweaters that have been a key part of my wardrobe and I keep reaching for them time and again because they're so, so comfortable and have held up so well. Like their cotton cashmere sweater has become one of my go to pieces. It's light enough for layering but still feels luxe with a price point that's jaw droppingly low. For the quality right now, you can go to quince.com balance less for free shipping and 365 day returns. That's a full year to wear it and love it. Don't keep settling. For clothes that don't last, go to Q-U-I-N c e.com/less for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com/less.
- [45:40]
B
With this month's theme on the podcast Being the business of you, a lot of what we've been talking about is really what it looks like to be like the CEO of your life. We do have a lot of listeners who are very entrepreneurial, who are interested in business and interested in growing in business. Then we also have a lot who maybe that's not their thing. Maybe they're a corporate girl, maybe they're a creative or whatever, but they're bought into. This idea that I've been pushing heavily, that business acumen is for everyone and something that I would love to talk more to you about. We've touched on a little bit, but I really want to like double click and zoom in is this idea of an asset. And I think from a business perspective, most people understand kind of what an asset is, something that generates money, generates capital. But this idea of treating ourselves like an asset, how do we know how to identify what our assets are? How do we really invest in them so that it can grow and give us a return? I would love to hear your thoughts on that concept.
- [46:33]
C
Yeah, it goes outside of that dichotomy. Right. It's figuring out the first step, which is knowing your natural strengths and skills. And there are great books and human design and just ways for you to understand even how your personality is wired. So I would say that's one. The second is to think about different options for success. Right. I keep thinking about this, this dichotomy between it's either the exit or someone else pays your bills or you're stuck and you're constantly chasing your tail with regards to financials. And I think it's really just starting where you are. It's starting with one thing that, you know you can do. For me, it was putting money aside every month and then investing that into the stock market, investing that into treasury bonds. Those are really kind of easy to do at first. Right. A lot of times if you're employed or even if you have your own business, there's like a way for you to squirrel a little percentage away and adding to that percentage every year, kind of really thinking tactically about the financial aspects of your business. Then there's the whole personal aspect. Right. And that's where layering in different aspects of who you want to be, what skills you want to bring to the table, and what your end goal looks like really does bring it all to fruition. One thing I haven't said that would be probably prudent with an audience who may not be interested in becoming an entrepreneur is that that some of the best people I know have lived great lives running companies and being good with their money, doing that. The first $5 million that I made, I want to make sure that's correct. Yeah. Was just working and putting it aside.
- [48:08]
B
Yeah.
- [48:09]
C
That's when I started realizing, okay, I better do something more with this, because it's just sitting in a bank account bothering me. And the tax man comes every year, and hence why I started acquiring and doing alternative investments. But there's something to be said, no matter where you start out at, for being able to do that wherever you are, one thing, 1%, one skill, one interest. Because you really never know how shift happens, but shift always happens, and it allows you to be malleable. And I think when we think about an asset management approach to life, it means that diversification is actually the thing that we're reaching for. Think about this in personal stuff, Right. Would you have one friend that you just do everything with and have this one relationship with?
- [48:53]
B
You shouldn't. You shouldn't, you shouldn't.
- [48:55]
C
But we do that. Yeah, we do that financially. We do it with our business. And we really have this very kind of singular focus on when we have this goal. It's the only way to get there.
- [49:04]
A
Yeah.
- [49:05]
C
What I often see is that with me, I have 15 to 20 different sources of income that diversification allows me for a lot of ability to weather storms. If I buy a B2B business, a business to business business. So, you know, my marketing agency is one of them. There's a different sell cycle and upside than a business to consumer, a B2C business. And so when my skincare company is having a high, maybe the B2B business is having a little bit longer lag with regards to how we work with clients. When you think about how you can structure different things that work together, this is where diversification is something we really should consider. Not just one business, not just one real estate play, but to think about this entire ecosystem, this portfolio of who you are, who you want to become. This sounds so waxing and waning and every shade in between, that that in and of itself is an asset.
- [49:54]
B
Yeah, yeah. And I think that that's so different from what so many of us do. As you had mentioned earlier, where a lot of people, if they do have any assets, it's either sitting in a retirement account or maybe, maybe if people are homeowners, then it's in like single family homes, that's their primary residence. But it really is all of your eggs kind of in one basket. But as you were talking about acquiring businesses and, and how many businesses you own, I'm really curious what your time looks like. How do you. How much time to give to each business? I would also imagine that for a lot of those businesses, you're not in them day to day running them. How do you decide what that looks like?
- [50:32]
C
You'd be very surprised. I love what I do. I'm actually very hands on. And even my coaching practice and advising practice, I'm one on one with every client. There's this interesting concept right now about abundance. And I think time can be abundant if you're smart about not trading time for money. And what I do instead is I value what I'm bringing to the table as a price point. And I did that really early on. What I often find, I think is good time management is learned. I certainly was not this boundaried in the first decade of my career. In the second decade I've really been thoughtful about how do I want to spend my time, what aspects of that 50, 20, 30 that I talked about are worth. For me, getting out of bed being work optional means I don't need the money, which allows me to be a little bit more risk sensitive and also diving into more risk. I can talk about what that looks like, but I think I want to make sure I'm very thoughtful about how I answer this. I get paid for what I know and not what I do. But what I do is actually where all of my wealth and my upside came from. And I think we've been told a bit of a lie, which is to outsource as much as possible and allow People to run things for us under the guise of, you know, your time is worth more, you can do more with it. But every time I've done that, I've actually seen that because I can run a business very efficiently, it's not the version of success that I want for me. So I actually will not acquire a business that has more than 10 employees. Private equity looks evil, but with thoughtfulness around it, with an ethical family office, we do something very similar to private equity where we operationalize the business, which means we take all of the efficiencies and we pull them into one place. So one marketing agency handles all of my businesses that I own, plus our client businesses that we work with. One tax strategist does all of the tax for the holding company, every llc. So there's a lot of savings in that, but there's also a lot of the ability to offset losses and gains. And this is where there's almost this portfolio management approach, whether it's career and finance or business and strategy. So I think that's often overlooked as a skill in and of itself and as something that can be done that's really interesting.
- [52:46]
B
I'm now I'm thinking about what it looks like to kind of manage the different areas of your life like a portfolio. Like how do we take that efficiency and portfolio approach to our day to day lives?
- [52:57]
C
You make the time for the things that are actually making you money first. So while it looks really good now, I work about 20 hours a week, maybe 30 on a week that I'm doing a lot of research because I still love my behavioral science and I still like to learn. I would say that 20 hours is spent face to face, meeting founders, advising of course, looking at decks for investment. You know, I love that. And then actually spending time on my own professional development. This is what I mean. Les. No one talks about this, but one of the biggest success points for me has been constantly growing my skill sets. Even now, especially now, I don't want someone to hear that I did it 20 years ago and I'm not doing it now. I still have a skill set that needs to evolve with AI and being a prompt engineer to evolve with the algorithms that we all love to hate because I run low cost digital ads for clients. And to understand the economy of today means I have to think about the future of work from different angles. All of that takes time and skillset but for me I enjoy it. So I never do anything that I'm not interested or excited about. Now cut to 10 years ago. That's when I had just started that journey, the 10 years prior to that, I was working 60, 70 hour weeks. I was literally getting up in the morning. You may appreciate this as a fitness girly. I would wake up at 5, I teach the first class at one of my studios. I owned four. At 5:30 in the morning, I'd finish that class. I go teach another class some days in another studio. Cause I wanted to be hands on. That's something I'm very proud about. And then I'd go advise clients all day, get back in the car and go visit one of the businesses that I owned that may have been local. That was a regular day for me for a decade. So time management is an evolution. Just like they say, you can't have it all. You can, but it looks different in different seasons and for different reasons. Now I'm very strict in my calendar. I'm really thoughtful about how I spend my time. And so not being codependent anymore means I can say a thoughtful no or I can say what my boundary is with regards to being mutual and thinking about it with benefit for the entire ecosystem that I support. And I still like to take my kids to school every day. We still walk to and from every single day to their school and have dinner together as a family. So I carve out the time for the things that matter to me and everything else fits inside of it. But I want to be clear that it took a while to get there.
- [55:10]
B
Yeah, yeah.
- [55:11]
C
So the big thing I would say there, my other favorite word is boundaries
- [55:15]
B
and bitches, but boundaries, Bitches and boundaries.
- [55:19]
C
Bitches and boundaries. That's what my mom always says.
- [55:21]
B
No, I do, I appreciate that approach though, because I do think that there's something in that that regardless of our lifestyles, we're really able to take from, which is really understanding what the main thing is and figuring out how to make other things fit around it.
- [55:35]
C
Yes.
- [55:36]
B
Also with that, there's a few things that I want to get into. Going back to this idea of assets and acquiring assets. I feel like it might be helpful for the audience to hear the very first thing that you acquired. Because I think for a lot of our girls, like they're starting at a point where they're just now learning about this. Yeah, they're maybe just now learning about different ways to approach money and assets and business. Can you tell us a little bit about the very first thing you invested in and acquired?
- [56:03]
C
Yeah, I want to give you the first. I also want to give you the lowest cost because it actually wasn't the first one. So when I got divorced, I was just broken and the first thing I acquired was actually the dance studios that I was a part of to build back up my confidence. So I was taking dance fitness classes. I had a background as a gymnast and a competitive cheerleader. So that really felt aligned to get my groove back, so to speak. And it just so happened. No shade to me. I Google searched how do you buy a business? Because I had had exposure to this with my first client and found that this business seems so similar to the one that I was attending. And you'll see that's a throughput. Almost every business I've acquired actually was a client of and so I kind of knocked on the door and said, would you be willing to do a deal that was $300,000? The lowest cost one that I've ever done is an $8,000 blog and $30,000 for this is interesting. It's a digital asset. It's a business that creates pictures for real estate agents and construction companies. So notice there's a lot of different dollar amounts that I've done this at. It's not all multimillion dollar deals all the time. In fact, most of the deals prior to my husband were under 250k and many of them were under a hundred and under 50K.
- [57:11]
B
Can we talk a little bit more about the blog? Because it was $8,000 to acquire a blog. I think that's something that's probably a lot more like accessible for people where someone's like, okay, if I saved up that amount of money to invest in something, whatever, what did it look like to acquire a blog?
- [57:27]
C
Very scary because that's the one I think I was leaving skilled for. It's interesting. It was a blog again around the ecosystem that I support. So I knew the client very well. The ideal client was me and pretty much everyone that I wanted to support. That's a linchpin, Laz, that I probably should say. A lot of times when you're an investor, people talk about your investment thesis. Well, for me, what I learned early on with the family office is we wanted to have a different thesis. It wasn't just industry, but it was around this idea of who is the ideal client so we could meet her needs in different areas. So that has always been fitness, beauty, health, health, wellness, the future of work and the future of money. What most people don't think about is it's the same ideal client in all of those. So given that, it made it a lot easier to say, well, I Already know who she is. But guess what I also had. I had an asset from another business that I owned. The list that I could actually piece together with the blog, which was not yet monetizing at the time. So it allowed me to say, here's an asset. Here's a piece of intellectual property. Something that I physically owns. A list of about 70,000 women at that time. The list, the list, the list, the list. Oh, I remember the list. A literal mailing list.
- [58:34]
B
Yeah.
- [58:35]
C
Okay, so I own the list.
- [58:36]
B
Yeah.
- [58:37]
C
I bought the intellectual property to send that to.
- [58:40]
A
Yeah.
- [58:41]
C
And then we ended up adding in different services and offerings. See what I mean? The exit doesn't have to be the thing that makes you a lot of money. Yeah, it could be, but it can
- [58:48]
B
help fuel the next thing.
- [58:49]
C
It can fuel the thing.
- [58:49]
B
That's what creates the ecosystem.
- [58:51]
C
That's right.
- [58:51]
B
Yes.
- [58:52]
C
You got it, girl.
- [58:53]
B
Yeah. That's what I'm like really trying to. To help people understand.
- [58:57]
C
Yeah.
- [58:58]
B
Is that sometimes we see these things. Where is this like cover of Forbes, super loud, millions of followers. All that stuff can be really great. But there is also another way to do things. And I think the more of us that are doing these things, the more we can support our businesses that are having a really hard time for those ones that do have the potential to have the flashy things and the big exits or whatever.
- [59:23]
C
Yeah.
- [59:24]
B
We can then invest in those things
- [59:25]
C
and keep them going 100. And even if we didn't have the money to invest, we could invest our skill, we could invest our knowledge, we could invest support. It's so much more than just money. I always say. I talk about generational growth, the docu series that I filmed with my niece. And it's about more than just wealth. It is about impact at every level. And if we think about impact, almost always money is not the thing that makes us happy, free or successful. It's a tool that we can use just like every other asset to really bring together an ecosystem. Ecosystem that's flourishing. So when I take that ideal client, she's about 28 plus, she's usually very wellness oriented. She usually has a high earning career. She cares about more than just one thing. So when you use the diversification approach, you're able to grow, use skill sets you already have. Have I said skill sets enough? Because it's really the thing that I think is less talked about. And then also you may have an asset you didn't realize was an asset that brings to the table that actually helps you cash flow and grow even More.
- [60:25]
B
Oh, my gosh. My brain is buzzing with so many things. But I actually, I want to kind of, before we wrap up, talk a little bit more about personal. The personal side a little bit more, which we've. We've touched on. And you've talked a lot about personal development. I would also really love to talk to you about motherhood because you have mentioned that you have two kids. What the audience may not know is that your kids are adopted. And so I would love to talk a little bit more about that experience of what it has been like adopting children, adopting school age children, and having this transition into motherhood that has been absolutely on your own terms.
- [61:03]
C
Yeah.
- [61:03]
B
But what it has been like to also incorporate motherhood into this very full life in a way that was not gradual.
- [61:13]
C
No. And it also wasn't planned.
- [61:15]
B
Yeah.
- [61:15]
C
I said I was going to keep it 100 today.
- [61:17]
B
Yeah.
- [61:18]
C
So at the end of my first marriage, I knew that kids weren't on the trajectory for me, which is funny to say now. And for years I worked in the fertility wellness industry. And so I had known that having kids was actually gonna be a bit troubling for me. I had a low egg count, and so I compartmentalized that part of who I could be and said, okay. So then I just. It's a no for me. So my husband and I essentially, like, pinky promise, swore that we didn't want kids. Kids. So then what ended up happening is that the first couple of years of being married, I realized I had all this free time. And because money wasn't the goal anymore, I realized there's more I could do with my time besides just making money. I mean, I'm good at it, honey, but there's more to life. And so I started volunteering. And I always had this heart for kids in foster care. I always felt like, honestly, if my dad had killed my mom, which is the reason we moved to America, I probably would have ended up in foster care. So I always felt like, wow, there's a little bit of this, like, survivor guilt there that I saw these kids really clearly as just needing a break. What I didn't expect is that the first kids that I would, like, take out into the community and be like, a fun aunt for would actually be my children. And so by our second visit, my daughter had looked at me and said, I think you should be my mom. And I just remember feeling so weird because I had had the thought already and felt so limited by that and also thought, well, the worst thing I could do for my Ambition is to go out there and be a mom. Which is funny, because becoming a mom actually grew my ambition so much more. But I needed women to hold space for that, just like you. And I talked about having more women of color, be able to see that what's possible for them and how they can use their money, create assets, have a skill set, come to the table with ownership. I needed to see and had. So lucky I had women that were willing to do this for me. Entrepreneurial women, successful women that were like, you wanna see how I do it with babies? You wanna see how I do it with kids? And so they really held space for me to realize that maybe it wouldn't suck. That's how I thought. And then I went into the whole mindset and learning and books around this idea of regretting motherhood. There's even a book on it. I read it called Regretting Motherhood. And by the time I finished the book, I realized that if I ever did it, I wouldn't regret it. But I wasn't gonna do it. That was about six months before I met my daughter and her. Her brother. And then when she said that, it sparked something in me that I don't know I ever had, which was a desire to do more than just for me and even my local community and my very big, you know, audacious family. And for about nine months, no pun intended, I sat with that, crying, hoping, and knowing that it was probably a no, because we had pinky promised, swore to never have kids, and this is my forever husband. And so I had to bring this up to him in a way where I was. It was so sheepish, like, you see me today, and I'm all brazen and get your assets together, ladies. But I was like, so here's the deal. Little shift in the plan. What do you think about. And you know, boy, when I tell you a forever husband is truly a forever husband, when he looks at you and says, let's do all the work, as if we're going to. And no matter what, I'm with you, but we're gonna make this decision together. So nine months, no pun intended. We took the time we actually had to get licenses, foster care, parent, because that's part of the system that is just kind of created right now. And I stepped down as their CASA volunteer, which is what it's called a court appointed special advocate, which is still the coolest thing I've ever done and highly recommend if anybody wants to be like a cool auntie. Like, great place to start. You do not have to take them home. You're not supposed to take them home. And I did. And it has just been like, what an amazing shift in our lives. I did not expect it to grow our wealth, and I did not expect that just three years later I could sit here and tell you that the epigenetic background of my children have changed from being kids who were born to drug addicted parents. And, I mean, they lived in the hood in Las Vegas and had no understanding of who they could be and what they could do. Cut to a few weeks ago. There was a day off of school and we went for a walk in our neighborhood. And my kids are looking around and they're like, hey, mom, I think we need to acquire a business so we could maybe run a neighborhood one day. Because that's the level of abundance that they're thinking in now. They're thinking in, how do I grow my assets? My daughter keeps saying that she's got. She used to have $10.84. Now she just made about $30 doing some chores and some additional jobs. And she's like, what can I buy with this? How do I get my compound interest? It has blown my mind to see the impact that I could have even as a reluctant mom, a proud reluctant mom, because I want someone to hear that your story can shift and ebb and flow, and it can be the very best part of the story as being someone who is malleable and adaptable and really willing to grow in more ways than one. The money part sounds great, but what I'm most proud of is when those kids start talking about their legacy and what they're gonna do with the assets that we're building right now.
- [66:19]
B
And seeing them have a loving, supporting home, that really opens up all of the potential in them, which I'm sure Will was, was quite different from their origin. It's really beautiful.
- [66:30]
C
It was really hard for them. I think stability was the only thing they never had, and being able to provide that for them. I really thought a lot about this decision, and every time I came back to it, boy, this is gonna feel so full circle for a second. I kept thinking about the skills that I had in business. The way I nurtured other people's babies. All the time, they just looked like this business and that skincare company and this construction business. And I thought to myself, how could I do the right thing professionally and just completely overlook it personally? And every single time, what stirred within me is that there's room for both. You can hold two truths. You can have Two skill sets that may seem different and use them in different ways at different times. And I always say for a reason or a season, they always work out. They always come back to this full circle experience of being the very best person we can be, living our truest potential. Which now, when we talk about our next investment or we've been looking at a lot of acquisitions recently, that's what my kids bring to the table. They ask about, mom, will this help me get to my truest potential? And to see a multigenerational, multiracial family be able to do this together and really prove that it's not where you're from, it's not what you were born into, but. But it's truly what are you willing to do with what you have access to. It feels really, really exciting.
- [67:58]
B
Oh, kk, thank you so much. That was like. I'm like, chill.
- [68:02]
C
This is so crazy from that last story.
- [68:05]
B
I'm curious if there's any final takeaways you have for our coworkers, which is our lucky girls here, as they look to continue managing the business of them and understanding their assets and really investing in themselves and the lives that they want, have what's one last takeaway you have for them.
- [68:25]
C
You know, Clovers, I would tell you that this 1% better thing is not just about your health and your wellbeing. So what I said today may sound really glamorous, but we didn't get to talk about as much is the depths that I had to go to get here. And I would want you to know that whatever thing you're thinking of that makes you feel, like, not good enough, like you don't have the right pedigree, you don't live in the right place, you don't have the support. I want you to know that there's 1% something you can do despite what you can't do. I always say you're both the problem and the solution. And I say that with love. But that means if we're thinking about that's a very Japanese Kaizen way of thinking that I can't get out of me. But if we're thinking about that incremental, consistent change, it can't do just be for our hair, our nails, our skin. It has got to also be for the asset that is ourselves. And I know that we can do that.
- [69:23]
A
Yeah.
- [69:23]
B
Yeah. I feel like the more that I have these conversations, the more that I sit down and that I learned from women like you, the more that I realize that the gap between even where it feels like you and I are is actually so much smaller than we think. The gap between where we are and where we want to be or where we think we should be or this thing that seems really lofty. Right. It is actually so much smaller than we think. Even if you hear these, like, big numbers, all this money, all these assets, all these things that seem so out of reach truly are so much closer than we think with aligned movements and steps.
- [70:04]
C
Oh, 100%. I can. Can still remember when it was just me and Caramel. I can still remember the first thousand dollars. I can still remember when there was nothing in the bank account. I still have the same bank account since I was 16. So I can truly remember when, like, it was 99 cent gas and I would have to go fill that up and kind of figure out, like, was there enough on the card? And I say that with humility to know that I'm. I'm never going to forget where I came from. But that's why I'm being especially loud, especially. And proud. Sure. But also reminding anyone who needs to hear this that it's actually not about me. I'm actually not that great. I'm just someone who's figured out what are the things I'm good at, what am I willing to do and how far am I willing to connect those dots. And that means that that success is up for the taking for anyone and everyone. And I want to represent that more than some big number or some milestone because. Because that's the thing I get out of bed for now. I want everyone to know that they can invest in themselves and it can go really well.
- [71:06]
B
Perfection. Thank you so much for being here.
- [71:09]
C
This is going to be really fun. I want to see what your community does with it. I always say let's grow.
- [71:13]
B
Yeah.
- [71:13]
C
Personally and professionally, those things are constantly intertwined.
- [71:17]
B
You can't have one without the other.
- [71:18]
C
You truly can't. They're inseparable. So imagine what's going to happen when we all grow together.
- [71:22]
B
I'm excited. I'm excited to see what the Clovers do and what they grow.
- [71:26]
A
And thank you all so much for
- [71:28]
B
tuning into this week's episode. So if you are not already subscribed to. She's so lucky. I don't know what you're waiting for, but you need to hit the subscribe button right now. Whether that's on YouTube, whether that's on Apple, whether that's on Spotify. Leave us a comment and let us know what your biggest takeaway was. And one way that you are investing in yourself as an asset after listening to this episode. Thank you for tuning in and I'll see you next week.
- [71:53]
C
Foreign
- [71:57]
A
thank you for tuning in to this week's episode of she's so Lucky. If you're ready to create your own luck, hit that subscribe button wherever you get your podcasts or on YouTube so you don't miss an episode and head to the show. Notes for resources, links and discount codes. And if you are really feeling lucky, we would appreciate your rating and your review. It really helps us be able to improve the show. Take get great guests and to understand what you want to hear more of. Thank you for tuning in and I'll see you next week.
- [72:34]
D
Hi, I'm Lobazar Natali and I'm so excited because I'm a first time mom. Over the last decade I've built wellness products for millions of women at my company. Company Love Wellness, but nothing has rocked my world quite like having our miracle baby. Not even close. Tell Me I'm a Good mom is my new podcast about navigating motherhood in real time. In a culture where we obsessively document our kids but quietly sideline mothers, motherhood comes with endless advice but very few honest conversations about how it actually feels to be a mom. So that's what we're going to talk about because we deserve more than parenting tips. We know we're not bad moms if our kid cries while we take a shower. Frankly, we deserve a rebrand. We deserve context, language and a place in the culture. This is Tell Me I'm a Good Mom.
- [73:26]
B
Please note that this episode may contain paid endorsements and advertisements for products and services. Individuals on the show may have a direct or indirect financial interest in products
- [73:36]
A
or services referred to in this episode.