469: Lindsey's Entrepreneurial Journey

Summary

The Heart & Hustle Podcast

Episode 469: Lindsey's Entrepreneurial Journey

Release Date: January 27, 2026
Hosts: Evie McLeod & Lindsey Roman

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Lindsey Roman takes center stage to share the intricate and inspiring path of her entrepreneurial journey—from her artistic upbringing and initial photography hustle to co-founding The Heart University and building multiple successful businesses. Lindsey opens up about pivoting her career, navigating big life transitions, downshifting to balance motherhood and business, and the lessons learned through both intentional and accidental business moves. Throughout, Evie jumps in with questions, humor, and encouragement, making the episode both practical and heartwarming for creative entrepreneurs at all stages.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Early Influences & The Unexpected Entrepreneur Start

• Lindsey grew up in a family with entrepreneurial roots, though at the time she didn’t recognize it as such. Her mom’s impressive Mary Kay sales career (including “winning a car,” [05:16]) instilled early marketing and sales skills, even as Lindsey initially dismissed the idea of business.
• Her original ambition was to become an actress, leading her to double major in film and theater in college.
• After graduating, an “aha!” moment with her camera—realizing the potential beyond using automatic settings—kicked off her love for photography ([08:59]).

2. Becoming a Photographer: From Hobby to Hustle

• Lindsey's church community provided early opportunities to photograph families, seniors, and church events.
• She realized her passion for evoking emotion through art applied just as much to photography as to acting.
• A pivotal step: investing in education early via a Hillary Rushford Instagram course, which catalyzed both her craft and her online presence ([12:57]).

Quote:

“Even as I was simultaneously growing my photography business, I also kinda knew… there is a clear shift if you scroll back into the depths of 2015… there is some sort of curation happening. Wasn’t good curation, but it was a shift.” – Lindsey, [12:57]

3. The Power of Saying Yes & Expansion Beyond Kansas

• Lindsey’s drive led her to seek out work outside her home state, hustling for opportunities nationwide, even traveling for jobs if clients covered her travel.
• Early destination shoots (e.g., Northern California) expanded her portfolio (“We’re not in Kansas anymore,” [13:42]).

4. Personal Life & Business: Marriage, Military, and Mobility

• Lindsey juggled business growth while her husband Andrew was finishing college, then joined the Coast Guard, which led to a huge move to Hawaii ([15:23]).
• The Hawaii move—originally second choice after Oregon—unexpectedly became the launchpad for Lindsey’s wedding photography brand, leveraging the island’s appeal as a destination market ([20:16]).

5. Mentorship & The Jump to Education

• In Hawaii, Lindsey’s visibility and success led to her first photography mentoring requests. She reflects on how “being just two steps ahead” can be enough to guide others ([22:48]).
• This first mentor session was a lightbulb moment, seeding her path toward education and ultimately co-founding The Heart University with Evie.

6. The Birth and Boom of The Heart University

• Evie and Lindsey hosted their first photography workshop in April 2018, which sold out immediately ([26:17]).
• Rapid workshop sellouts, a growing waitlist, and community demand led to expanding into online courses, digital resources, and podcasting.

Quote:

“At the time, we were like… we could literally do this forever and still not even make a dent in that waitlist. Like, there’s clearly demand here.” – Lindsey, [29:26]

7. Scaling, Motherhood, and Shifting Priorities

• The business saw major growth between 2018 and 2019, but motherhood (welcoming daughter Eloise in 2019) brought a necessary downshift ([32:10]).
• Lindsey openly shares the realities of associating out wedding shoots, the impact of a new baby on business capacity, and evolving her priorities.

8. The COVID-19 Pivot and Business Diversification

• The pandemic forced The Heart University to cancel live events and shift further online, launching a digital shop and expanding product offerings ([34:03]).
• Inspired by the company’s capital and success, Lindsey and Andrew began investing in real estate—renovating and flipping houses unintentionally, learning hard lessons about asset vs. liability along the way ([36:00]).

9. From Real Estate to ‘Silent Businesses’

• The couple parlayed real estate returns into new ventures, including buying and starting a “silent,” brick-and-mortar business in Florida with employees and business partners ([51:22]).
• Seller-financing a land sale led to another investment round and the acquisition of a second brick-and-mortar location.

Quote:

“It wasn’t a smart, intentional business choice at the time, but… favor of God and some ignorance.” – Lindsey, [45:44]

10. Downshifting the Heart & Rediscovering Creative Joy

• By 2023-2024, Lindsey and Evie intentionally downshifted The Heart, pulling back on live events, launches, and large-scale initiatives to focus on what was life-giving and sustainable ([56:56]).
• This allowed Lindsey to return more deeply to wedding photography, as well as to family priorities and homeschooling.

Quote:

“Putting [photography] down not fully, but like nearly… CEO in the heart… you lost a little bit of, like, the art and, like, creativity. That doesn’t get to come out as much when you’re just doing, like, launches.” – Lindsey, [58:38]

11. Memberships, Mom Life, & Multipreneurship

• Lindsey launched “Insiders,” a monthly membership for women blending education, coaching, motherhood, book clubs, and community ([59:15]).
• She highlights the challenge and privilege of building an untraditional family business—where she and Andrew both “do both”: working and parenting together.
• At the time of recording, Lindsey is pregnant again, and balancing multiple businesses with faith, flexibility, and joy ([63:11]).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On early dreams versus reality:

  “I was always like, ew, entrepreneurship, no… I think I viewed… oh, that’s, like, starting a corporation.” – Lindsey, [05:44]

• On leveraging art for connection:

  “At the core of it, I loved creating art that elicited emotion in people… that can obviously go towards acting, but it can also go towards photography very well.” – Lindsey, [09:00]

• On life’s unexpected pivots:

  “My life would be a million percent different if this was our path… But we didn’t get our first pick, we got our second pick, which was Hawaii, and thus changed our lives.” – Lindsey, [19:28]

• On diversifying and expanding as an entrepreneur:

  “We could literally do this forever and still not even make a dent in that wait list. There’s clearly demand here.” – Lindsey, [29:26]

• On making business moves (and mistakes):

  “It was probably a liability that God blessed you with an asset at the end for at least the first couple…” – Evie, [62:25]

• On lessons learned:

  “We didn’t blow the money. We didn’t take it and just, like, completely waste it. It was like half liability, half asset.” – Lindsey, [62:10]

• On embracing multi-passionate identity:

  “I went through like an identity crisis in there… Am I a photographer? Am I a business coach? Am I a mom influencer? What am I? I was all of them…” – Lindsey, [57:28]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Segment | Timestamp | |---------------------------------------------------|------------| | Introduction & Format | 00:00 - 04:45 | | Lindsey’s Family & Early Business Attitudes | 04:45 - 07:25 | | Acting Aspirations, Photography Beginnings | 07:25 - 12:57 | | Growing Photography & First Moves Outside Kansas | 12:57 - 16:08 | | Marriage, Military, Moving to Hawaii | 15:22 - 20:13 | | Mentorship & Coaching | 21:31 - 22:48 | | The Heart University: Workshops & Online Courses | 23:44 - 34:03 | | The heart: Growth, Motherhood, COVID Shifts | 34:03 - 36:00 | | Real Estate Adventures | 36:00 - 47:21 | | Move to Florida, Silent Businesses | 47:21 - 51:22 | | Downshifting the Heart, Rediscovering Creativity | 56:52 - 58:38 | | Launching Insiders Membership, Current Priorities | 59:15 - 63:11 |

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Lessons, Themes & Final Reflection

• Embrace the roundabout path: Lindsey highlights how each life decision—intended or otherwise—contributed to her skillset and opened new opportunities.
• Invest early in education and mentorship: Consistent willingness to learn and share led to exponential growth in both influence and earnings.
• Don’t fear the pivot: Lindsey narrates several points of necessary shift—toward family, toward new businesses, and toward rest.
• Balance is individual and ever-evolving: The journey underlines the importance of defining success by your own values, and being flexible as life changes.

Closing Words:

“We’re both learning and growing in the process… In no way is this the end of her journey. She will continue more. It’s the beginning.” – Evie, [62:56]
“Hopefully, this was entertaining… a good updated version of where we’ve been since our baby photography journeys.” – Lindsey, [64:23]

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For Listeners

If you loved this honest and thorough peek behind Lindsey’s entrepreneurial curtain, or have questions about business pivots, real estate, education, or mompreneur life, both hosts encourage you to DM them on Instagram!

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Transcript

[A]

You are listening to the Heart and Hustle podcast. We are your hosts, Evie McLeod and Lindsay Roman. Welcome back to another episode, my friend. I believe two weeks ago you got an up close and personal in depth look at Ms. Evelyn's entrepreneurial journey. And so today it is my turn to take the bull by the horns. Is that the phrase? I don't know. And we are going to dive in into my entire entrepreneurial journey from the beginning up till now. And I will gloss a little bit over the photography part just because we have a past episode that we will share in the show on that specific segment. But I'm excited to kind of dive into my story and share the journey of how I've been and where I've gone and what I've done in my journey of entrepreneurship. It's been ups and downs and all the things in between. So stay tuned if you want kind of like an in depth look on where I've been in my entrepreneurial journey, why I did what I've done and all the things. Stay. Stay tuned. It'll be a great time. You started your business for a reason, huh? You're following your dreams because something deep, deep down inside your heart is on fire for it. And that's incredible.

[B]

But if you're still scratching your head.

[A]

On what the why behind your business.

[B]

Really is and what keeps you going day to day and how the heck to share your heart with your clients and customers, to connect with them and to stand out in your industry, well.

[A]

We'Ve got just the thing for you. We want to help you find clarity and nail down your reasons why. And once you do this, it's a total game changer when running a business. Because once you know your why, that's when you're able to tackle your goals, actually succeed and keep that fire under your butt.

[B]

So if you're ready to get really honest with yourself and discover some really incredible life changing vision, snag our Determine your why and how to share it with your Followers [e-mail] why. Hey hey.

[A]

I'm Lindsay Roman.

[B]

And I'm Evie McLeod and we are family and legacy focused serial entrepreneurs and the founders of the Hart University, a business education company with a mission to help you thrive in your business and life.

[A]

Welcome to our Entrepreneur Cocktail hour where business and marketing strategies meet faith, real talk and raw and life changing conversations.

[B]

At the end of the day, we are all in this together, figuring out how to navigate the ups and downs, the messy and the beautiful and everything in between. This is A community where you can come as you are and get inspired and walk away equipped to build a legacy filled life.

[A]

You're listening to the Heart and Hustle podcast. All right, Evie, here we are.

[B]

Here we are. Lindsay, give us the tea.

[A]

Oh, you're not going to interrupt me. Like, I'm going to interrupt you, so it's just going to be me talking.

[B]

Well, that's true. I, I, I don't, I'm not blessed with the same.

[A]

It's okay. Just feel free to, like, interject and, like, ask Clari questions. Okay. Input your thoughts and what.

[B]

I also feel like what I might need to do is reel you back in, possibly. Oh, maybe I might not need to interject. I might need to be like, what was your point?

[A]

Get with the program. What were you saying? It's also interesting because we're recording these back to back and there is some element of overlap as it relates, especially to the heart repeated information. But I'm, I'm just gonna flow as if you didn't listen to Evie's. Even though you probably rude if you didn't. Yeah, no, if you didn't go back two episodes. Yo, I'm offended. Go.

[B]

Listen, I forgive you, but I'm offended.

[A]

Okay, well, because while there is overlap.

[B]

They'Re, they're very completely different other than the, the heart. Well, our photography journey was a little.

[A]

Bit similar, but like, but still unique and different. And anyways, in every episode, we also said, like, that we, we both. When the podcast first started. Yeah, we recorded, like, our how we got into photography journey separate, like, like, truly solo shows where it was just Evie on one episode, it was just me on another, and that my episode was episode 36 back in good old 2020. Lindsay story, how to create opportunities for yourself step by step. So if you want, like, a very nitty gritty how I got into photography, I'm going. And I'm not going to go as in depth on that portion of my story as I did in this episode. So while it is an older episode, it still gives a lot of, like, very nitty gritty how I got into photography and, like, what I did step by step to actively grow it and build it into a successful photography business. So that's a great episode. If you've come to the podcast since April 28, 2020, and you have to listen to that. Go listen to that.

[B]

Start there.

[A]

Go start there.

[B]

All right, so, Lindsay, tell us your entrepreneurial journey. Give us the tea.

[A]

Oh, you know, I probably should have peed before we started recording, but Alaska lamb.

[B]

Hold the bladder.

[A]

It's moving on. Make me thr.

[B]

Make you go faster.

[A]

No, it's just gonna. I'm gonna be, like, on it. Okay, well, so I'm trying to think of how. Where to start. I would say I ironically did kind of grow up in an entrepreneurial family, but I didn't view it as that at the time. My mom was very, very good at sales. She was in Mary Kay. Please let's all do the MLM jokes right now. Just insert, like, MLM joke. I feel like people call Mary Kay like, a cult now, but at the time, she was popping in Mary Kay, and I remember she was, like, so good at it that she was, like, top level. Like, she won a hot pink car. Or maybe it wasn't hot pink. Maybe it was marooned. It doesn't matter.

[B]

What the freaking Mary Kay. Like, a soft, bubblegum pink car, maybe.

[A]

I don't think it was. No, I'm pretty sure it was, like, maroon. That's irrelevant to the point. The point being, though, that she was very good at it and, like, went to, like, Mary Kay conferences and, like, literally won a car. You have to be pretty high level to win a car. So I don't think I really understood that at the time, but I, like, I definitely got, like, marketing and sales jeans for, like, it's clearly in my blood in some capacity. But at the time, I don't think I viewed it as, like. But this was also when I was, like, very, very little. So that's probably also why I just don't remember it fully. But I remember growing up and, like, even going to college and, like, looking at. What's that called? Entrepreneurships electives and. And, like, looking at, like, the business elective and being, like, entrepreneurship. I was always like, ew, no, you know, like, I just. I think I viewed. I didn't know what that was fully. And I think I was like, oh, that's like starting, like, a corporation, which, I mean, yeah, that's exactly what it is, but also, like, in a sense, yeah. It's just funny that, like, I didn't view that, and it's because I didn't view it, or I didn't want to do that because I was on track to want to be an actress. I was very much in the mindset of wanting to do big things with my life. And the irony is that I feel like I got there kind of roundaboutly, but I wanted to be an actress, and I was in theater a lot. I. So I double majored in film and Theater in college. And then when I graduated I did. Which is ironically, it is similar.

[B]

Weirdly, you should really some mirrorings in our story, which is so, so different, but so similar.

[A]

I did an internship with my church.

[B]

So basically your version of my ministry school.

[A]

Yeah, kind of. That's what I'm saying. Because at that moment I had graduated college and before then like I had office. I double majored in theater and film. What are you gonna do with that? You're gonna. I wanted to go off to LA and like try to be an actress. But I. This is clearly God in this moment because I was like I. When I got to the place of graduating and like ready for that next step. I just knew that in. That was not. I knew that if I wanted to go off and be an actress, I had to. In order to make it realistically you have to like, want it. You have to put every single ounce of effort and make that your undying mission in life. And I just knew mentally, like that just was not where I was in that season of life. And so in that moment, that's where I did my internship with my church for I can't remember how long. And this was I think in 20. I think I graduated in 2014 because I did the Disney College Program in 20. No, I did the Disney College Program in 2014 as a character performer. That's just some Lindsay lore, if you don't know that. It means I was friends with Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse. Anyways, if you weren't watching YouTube, I winked like aggressively at the camera. Anyways, I was doing my internship at my church and at the time I had always loved photography. Did it as a hobby casually, but really wanted to get better at it. I don't know. This was clearly God. Also, like one day I just looked at my camera and I was like, I'm pretty good at. I use this on auto. Yeah. And I'm like, imagine. Imagine if I read the manual.

[B]

Imagine the possibilities.

[A]

Imagine if I learned what aperture meant. And so I did that. I quite literally opened the manual. Like it's. Guys, I could have googled. I could have really done some things. No, I literally read the manual that day and I just started taking photos. And I want. This is part that I won't go too deep on because I. I definitely went really in depth on the nitty gritty of. But over simplification of this. I started taking photo shoots of my friends and my roommates and families in my church. I still like was on staff with the campus ministry at this time. So a lot of events, I just was like, oh, you're a photographer now, Lindsay. You take photos. And so I just got kind of got like, event coverage experience by default. Even if the event coverage was like, the volleyball game, back to school gathering, like, whatever you like. What's that called? Whatever event. And so I started doing that. I started mostly doing families, but I started also doing seniors and just kind of exploring. I really started diving into the art that is photography. And I learned that while I loved acting, I think at the core of it, I loved creating art that elicited emotion in people or made people feel something. And I think that essence of, like, I love entertaining. I love making people feel something that can obviously go toward acting, but it can also go towards photography very well. And I think also my, like, journey in acting and. And training in that also made me good at public speaking, made me good at entertaining, made me good at being like a. I guess what eventually is kind of like an influencer that, you know, of today. And I feel like those things helped grow a photography brand very, very well. Yeah. And so where did I leave off? I was shooting everything. Also being on staff with my church and just being very involved with my church. Lots of Christians get married young, y'.

[B]

All.

[A]

They get married young. And so because I was just kind of like the photographer in the church on staff, a lot of my friends started asking me to shoot their weddings. And this was 2015 when I started doing this. And at the time, as I was, like, growing and developing, I lived in Kansas, I was just like, you know what? These cornfield. Not even cornfields. Wheat fields. These wheat fields are not doing it for me. I want the mountains. I want adventure. I want elopements. And I feel like maybe more so than. Than now, that was just, like, the trend. I mean, people still do it now, but I really wanted adventure in the great wide somewhere. Gosh. And so I started doing weddings with just people that, like, you know, were in my church and started growing my business that way, started hustling. And I remember I literally. I started my business, like, officially, I think, in March of 2015. And it was. It was then that I remember I took a. I took a Instagram course, like, from the get go. I was like, I'm investing in education. I know exactly what I want to do. And I took a. I took an Instagram course by Hillary Rushford, I think, and it was about, like, curating your grid and like, like, like ways to grow your Instagram brand. So even as I was Simultaneously growing my photography business. I also kind of knew, like, there is a clear shift. If you scroll back into the depths of 2015, there is a clear shift before March on 2015 and after March where you can tell I, like, started. It went from like, personal nor normal person Instagram to like, oh, she's trying. Like, there is some sort of curation happening. Wasn't good curation, but it was. You can tell there was a shift. That was when I started taking that course and like being like, I'm going to start an LLC for photography. I'm gonna do it. And again, as I started getting those things, or, sorry, the weddings and sessions, I was doing everything, but I knew that I was like, I want to do weddings and I want to do adventurous weddings. So I started hustling, growing. I would literally just, like, try to get as much work as possible outside of Kansas as I could. I would offer, like, I think I got an inquiry, like on DM of like, oh, I love your work, but we live in Baltimore and we just got engaged and I was like, pay for my ticket and an Airbnb and I'm there. Yeah. So it was a hustle for sure. But as that grew, I started like doing free trips, all the things again. I go into way more depth on this in that episode 36. But I started getting work outside of Kansas that was just visually more appealing in my brain than.

[B]

We're not in Kansas anymore.

[A]

We're not in Kansas anymore. And around this time, I'm trying to think of the date wise where Andrew had graduated college, but I started my photography business before he graduated college. I think, if I'm remembering correctly. Oh, when did he join? This is actually kind of difficult to suss this out timeline wise. I remember I was doing my photography business and making money while Andrew was finishing up college because I'm a little older than him. And I remember every, like, booking that I got went back to our bills, like, straight up, like, because we were just.

[B]

You guys were married?

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Oh, wait, when did we get married? We got married in 2016. Yeah. So that checks out because I started my business in 2015, did it that whole year. Hustle, grind, hustle grind. Got married in 2016. That. Yes. Okay. So his last semester of college was the fall of 2016. He graduated, like in December, technically. And I remember so, like 2016, I was grinding and, like hustling. And 2016, I think, was when I was really trying to get clients that weren't people that I knew and succeeding at that. But I remember the conversation kind of began of like, okay, he's graduating college. We don't want to live in Kansas anymore. And we were like, what are we gonna do? Where do we wanna go? And all of his. He graduated in engineering, and all of his connections were. All of his connections were like, he could easily get a job in engineering in Kansas, but we were like, we don't want that.

[B]

Not to us.

[A]

We wanna go somewhere else. And that was when he decided to join the Coast Guard, basically right after he graduated. So he went to boot camp in January of 2017. And again, I'm still hustling, grinding. I'm still like, ramping up, doing wedd all over. And I remember he went to boot camp. And immediately from boot camp, I think he went to a school in Petaluma, California. And so during that time I went to go. I had a friend that stayed or like, that lived in that area. And so I went to, like, go stay with her hustle, try to get shoots out there. So, like, from the beginning, even before we moved to Hawaii, which spark notes that's coming next, I was very much getting work that wasn't in Kansas.

[B]

You were getting, like, quote, unquote, destination work.

[A]

Yes, yes. Because I was hustling my butt off and using my own money to do so.

[B]

And that's where we met in Northern California while you were out there with ministry school and I was in ministry school and we both drove up and met kind of middle ground. And you did a shoot of Landon and I. And I did a shoot of you and.

[A]

Because Andrew couldn't come because he was in a school.

[B]

Yeah. And your photos of me and Landon were absolutely gorgeous.

[A]

And then they broke up and I could never share them again.

[B]

You showed them a few times before we broke up.

[A]

Well, yeah. No, I know. I. I am dramatic and I make a big deal about that.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because they were like, at the time. I remember that session, and it was like, you guys were magical. But also like, the. The location was genuinely still to this day, probably one of the most gorgeous session locations ever.

[B]

And I mean, you've ever seen Mendocino, California.

[A]

It's great. And the sunset was perfect. And I just remember at the time, especially given. Well, I remember I'm from Kansas. Yeah. So I got wheat fields, and I'm trying to make magic in wheat fields. And it's really. Only.

[B]

This is like, rugged, rocky coastline, gorgeous sun.

[A]

It literally looks funny. I've never been to Prince Edward island, but I would imagine that's what that looks like.

[B]

There are some similarities.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Well, what's funny is I remember Land and I broke up. Spoiler. And you asked or I told you. And I was like, hey.

[A]

You were like, totally. You were like. I was like, totally.

[B]

Keep posting them.

[A]

And I was like, I'm not a monster.

[B]

What's funny is I really did not care. Like, I understand, but I also in, like, intimately. I was in the same season. I was like, please keep using this portfolio. But you were kind and you didn't.

[A]

No, but I remember then. And then spark notes. I'll get to this. But we started the heart, and I still, like, kept them under lock and key. And then when you finally got back together and, like, announced it, I was like, I'm free.

[B]

I can share this work. Ironically, by that point, it was like, a couple years later because we dated for a while undercover, which wink, wink, undercover.

[A]

He was on your stories, like, every other day.

[B]

We were like, quote, unquote, friends for quite a while. And, like, literally, like, neighbors, basically. He lived, like, two blocks away when that was. Anyways, that was a whole thing. But the amount of people who, like, had no idea, I was like, wow, y', all. I really. I really fooled you. Or you're just really blind. Anyways, that's entirely irrelevant.

[A]

Anyways, anyways.

[B]

You, Andrew, was in a school going into the Coast Guard.

[A]

Yes. So after a school, the way that I don't have to get into the way a school works, basically, we got the choice of where to move next. Kind of like, we could rank out of all his duty stations that he could go to, we could rank our top. And I remember number one, y'. All. This is so funny. My life would be a million percent different if this was our path. We ranked Astoria, Oregon as number one. Oh, I don't know if you know where Astoria, Oregon is. I think it's the very top left corner of Oregon. And in my brain, guys, this is 2017.

[B]

Adventurous elopements.

[A]

The adventurous elopements are hopping Northwest. Pacific Northwest is where it's at. That's where everybody that was cool lived. That's where the Dawns lived. That's where India Earl. Well, she's in Utah, but still, like, everybody that was cool. Dawns, Don Jarvis.

[B]

Don photo was.

[A]

I think she was married at the time. Yes. The Dons. It was like, everyone cool like Catalina, Jean, Benj Heish, all of all. Everyone that was anybody that I wanted to be lived in the Pacific Northwest. And so we. We. We put that one as our top pick. And then there were two Hawaii Billets. So we put Hawaii as two and three.

[B]

Nice.

[A]

And obviously the way ranking works, you don't always. Because there was like 30 kids in his class. And so if two people put Astoria, Oregon as the first one, obviously only one person can get that. So we didn't get our first pick, we got our second pick, which was Hawaii, and thus changed our lives.

[B]

Thus began the adventure of the Romans in Hawaii.

[A]

And also in my brain, if I was based in Astoria, Oregon, I could market to both Portland and Seattle. So that's where my brain was. Like, neither here nor there. It didn't happen. So we moved to Hawaii in summer of 2017 and again, I was already charging forth towards, towards destination work. And I joke with everybody that like, his job moved us to Hawaii, but it benefited me a frick ton because.

[B]

Spoiler, Hawaii is a destination wedding location.

[A]

It's also the fact that like, little Kansas girl who grew up wanting to like, live in the big city and do big things with her life and like get escape Kansas and was already wanting to get destination work. And getting destination work, I will say the fact that I could go to a place that like, I could be shooting on a beach or a Mountain within 20 minutes of my home. Unfathomable. Unfathomable. So we moved there. My business blew up. It like was, it was a blessing. It was God, it was everything. Like, it was just the, the who I was and my brand that I was building and the destination work just like collided with Hawaii as a landscape so wonderfully. And so, yeah, that's, that's what really, truly blew it up. And at that time, we moved there in the summer of 2017 and then it was, I was rocking and rolling. I was starting to, I, I was going to a couple of photography workshops. I remember I did my first mentor session, I believe in October of 2017. And I remember it was a girl that had reached out before. Like, she reached out a couple times and was like, hey, do you do mentor sessions? And I was like, oh, I'm so fresh. I don't know. Like, I'm, I, I'm not, I'm a baby.

[B]

I don't know. I'm a baby.

[A]

Like, that's, I'm so flattered. Thank you. But like, no. And then she reached out again, like that fall and she was like, hi, yeah, no, I, I, I heard you the first time. But also, I really want to learn from you. You're clearly doing something that I don't know how to do. And I would like to glean from you and I. I was attending a workshop in New York City, and she was from Buffalo. And so we. We did, like, a mentor session in person then in October of 2017. And I remember that was, like, my first official, like, mentor session where I was like, oh, wow, I do know more than I think I know. And, like, I clear. Like, there's clearly. And this is just for anybody, like, no matter how far along on the scale of. Because again, I was looking at people like India Earl at the time or Bench Heisch, and I'm like, I'm nowhere near them. But I forgot that, like, there could still be people. If it's a latter analogy, I'm maybe two rungs up doing hustle in my grind, but there's still people that, like, haven't even started climbing the ladder. Yeah. So that was just eye opening for mentorships and education in general, which sparks notes to where we're going. And that was just so cool getting that experience. And, like, oh, wow. Also, she's, like, amazing. And we're still friends and, like, visited us in Hawaii later. And, like, we love you, Liana.

[B]

She second shot with me a ton.

[A]

Second shot with you. Second shot with me a ton second shot. Still to this day, my favorite wedding I've ever done. She's a delight. Absolute delight. And so we. We then Andrew, being in the military, he would be out on boats for, like, three months at a time. And I remember. I remember he paid my friends to come. To come, like, visit me or. Sorry, paid. Not paid them, like, paid for their travel.

[B]

He paid for our flights.

[A]

Our flights. He paid for the flights of people while he was gone so that I wouldn't be lonely. This was pre kids.

[B]

So sweet.

[A]

Very sweet. So I remember he paid for our friend Monica to. He paid for Evie to come in January of 2018. And this is the OG well, you didn't hit on this part in your episode, so I. I will. This was the OG where you came and visited. We had, like, a whole epic Marine man situation. That's some lore for another time. You'll have to go back. And I think we've shared actually that story on past episodes.

[B]

I think we started. Yeah. Talking about it on a random episode recently. Oh, favorite memories. It was that one.

[A]

The favorite memories episode this past year.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Anyways, we. That was her first time in Hawaii, and we had, like, a great time. But that trip was intended to. Because earlier that year, you had called me up and was like, I want to host a photography workshop and I want to do it with you. And that was like when we were first, like bite sized. Dipping into education. Yeah. And so while you were in Hawaii, that was the time where we were hanging out. But also we booked the.

[B]

The venue. The venue early.

[A]

Yeah, the Airbnb.

[B]

I have video footage of us booking.

[A]

The Airbnb for our first workshop. So that was in January of 2018. And then I remember you left like you left on a red eye that night. And then my friend Monica was coming that morning, but that next morning. This is kind of off topic, but I just was recently reminiscing with it. A friend who was there. That was I think January 8th, I think it was 2018. And that was the. If anybody remembers the news article of the Hawaii missile scare scare where like basically everybody on the islands got a text that was like, incoming ballistic missile. Seek shelter immediately. This is not a drill. Like, it basically said, you're gonna die in 10 minutes is how everyone read that message. And I remember, like, politically, we were not good with North Korea at the time. And so like it was very. If North Korea, which we were in a season politically of like, they could very much do something to us. And if they do something to us, us, Hawaii is the closest. Makes the most sense. Yeah. To hit. So it was very. It wasn't like a. Oh, that's far fetched. It was like a very much that's going to happen. Yeah. So Evie left that night. The next morning I thought I was gonna die.

[B]

Didn't so spoiler very much.

[A]

Anyways, we'll get back on the program. So then that April is when we did the heart workshop. The first heart workshop. I remember we had like 12 tickets, I think. And we announced it and announced it and sold tickets in the same time. It wasn't like we announced it and then like did a wait list. It was very much like, surprise. We're doing a workshop. We had like a whole little video that we filmed back in January and made it like a cute little thing. And we were like sipping wine.

[B]

I forgot about that announcement video.

[A]

And then we frolicked around Hawaii just to like get hype. Oh, A common theme for us.

[B]

Frolicking.

[A]

Frolicking in beautiful places and hamming it up for the camera to sell tickets.

[B]

Is our theme, apparently.

[A]

Yeah. Anyways, we then we sold out that.

[B]

Workshop in a day.

[A]

We sold that workshop in a day, which was wild. So then we did that workshop in April of 2018. And then immediately, like the next month, we're like, well, let's do another one this year. So we planned a Hawaii one, which.

[B]

We had people asking.

[A]

We had people asking. And we planned a Hawaii workshop that December, I believe, and that sold out within three hours. And so immediately we were like, well, let's, let's see if we could do another week. Yeah, like back to back. And I think the thought process was like, our demand is so high and we can physically do it. And also Hawaii, like, was a little bit less expensive just because I lived there.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So we really only had to pay for your plane ticket.

[B]

Yeah. And then between the weeks we were like, let's go like we'll go back to your house to like rest and recoup and then come back to the Airbnb for weeks.

[A]

Which if it were in a location where we both had to fly to back to back weeks would have been a little bit more expensive because we.

[B]

Had lodging in between. Yeah. Anyways, we did two weeks and they both sold out very quickly.

[A]

Very quickly.

[B]

If you are loving what you're hearing on today's episode, then we wanted to share something else you might love. The Heart Shop. It's our digital resource online shop for creative entrepreneurs. The Heart Shop is your one stop shop for all of our online courses, luxury website templates, PDF guides, social media, graphic templates and illustrations.

[A]

If you've been at your wit's end with your website design and you don't know where the heck to create a high quality pricing or welcome guide to give your clients an incredible branded first impression. Ooh, we got you. We created the Heart Shop to serve you with the best tools and resources you need to successfully run your business. Just head to theheartuniversity.comshop and start browsing the goods. That's theheartuniversity.comshop, and we'll see you there. Want to know what both Evie and I use for our skincare? Our absolute favorite non toxic skincare products are without a doubt primly pure.

[B]

Yes. If you've been searching for a natural non toxic skincare company you can actually feel solid about using, knowing that the ingredients won't harm you and are derived from nature, then I'm not joking when I say that you need to try primarily pure.

[A]

Evie and I have been using primally Pure for our skincare for a couple of years now and we are legit in love. Like we love that every product has minimal, sun safe, all natural ingredients that I'm not joking, smell divine and make our skin look and feel healthy and beautiful.

[B]

Yes. Some of our favorite products that we've used from primarily pure Are their charcoal deodorant, the cleansing oil, their lavender complexion mist, and their clarity serum. Like every freaking product of theirs. We're not kidding. Knocks it out of the park as far as quality and making our skin feel incredible.

[A]

For 10% off your order, you can use code HEARTANDHUSTLE. That's all caps, no spaces at checkout. Using the link in our show notes, we know that you're gonna love Primly Pure as much as we do. Again, that's Code Heart and hustle for 10% off your order today. So then at that point, this is like, summer of 2018. We're both like, well, okay, these workshops are selling out immediately. We had a wait list go live.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And people, like, by the thousands started joining this. And we were at the point where we're like, okay, we're still doing weddings, like, full time, both of us, but we. We could serve all of the.

[B]

We could do.

[A]

We could stop work or weddings completely do workshops full time. And we refused to make the workshops, like, bigger amounts of people per workshop.

[B]

We wanted the intimate vibes.

[A]

Yeah. Just keep the intimate vibes. And at the time, we were like, we could literally do this forever and still not even make a dent in that wait list. Like, there's clearly demand here. So then that fall, Evie flew back out to Hawaii, and we basically then did.

[B]

We, like, took the workshop curriculum and.

[A]

Turned it into an online course. We also. We expanded upon it, obviously, and made it into, like, a big online course. Flew our friend Brady out. He filmed it. So we filmed not only the course, but also, like, the promo hype.

[B]

Like, marketing material.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Trailer, I guess you could say for it. And then turned around and then launched that. That in January of 2019. So 2018 was a crazy. Also during 2018, I, like, went to Europe for the summer with my friend to try to get more destination work. There I was. I was flying all over. I went to the. I went to the Reputation stadium tour in Seattle also. And also, like, did a bunch of shoots there, too. I was psychotic. Yeah.

[B]

It's funny looking back and reflecting, like, I felt the same thing, like, sharing my story. I was like, holy crap. We were on, like, 100 miles an hour. Yeah.

[A]

Specifically 2018. 2019 also was 2017.

[B]

2018. 2019 for me. Well, actually, than 2020 and 2020. Whatever.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

We're crazy people.

[A]

Yeah. I. I calmed down, I think, before you did, but I think. Well, I'll get to this part. A child presented itself into my world in 2019, which physically kind of Slowed me down a little bit. Anyways, so this is January of 2019. Oh, yeah. Because I was pregnant.

[B]

Yeah, we found out you were pregnant.

[A]

We found out I was pregnant with Eloise.

[B]

We also share the story on the favorite memory we do, which was a.

[A]

Great time, but we found out I was pregnant with Eloise while we were recording the photo major.

[B]

Okay, well, let's be clear. We weren't actually sitting down recording an episode of the course while she found out, but it was in that week of recording that was discovered.

[A]

Yeah. And then I went to New Zealand. Anyway. Okay, sorry.

[B]

So bring it back in.

[A]

This is actually unhinged because I was actively pregnant with a child. Yeah. Going to New Zealand, hosting two back to back Hawaii workshops. Turning around, launching. Huh.

[B]

Of course, of course.

[A]

And then hosting the Utah Workshop in March.

[B]

Huh.

[A]

We were. We were psychotic.

[B]

We were crazy. Yeah, we still are a little bit.

[A]

Okay, so.

[B]

So the heart was exploding, Workshops were exploding. We were doing the courses. Photography was booming. You were traveling the world. And then you find out you're pregnant.

[A]

And then we host the Utah Workshop in March of 2019. And then I have Eloise in June of 2019. So. And I had already, like, I had booked a lot of weddings that summer that I then had to associate out.

[B]

Holla, Holly.

[A]

Yeah. And so I associated them out and then continued booking, like through 2019 into 2020. However, even once Eloise came in November of 2019, we started this podcast. So we were really in a season where like, the heart was booming and, and the course launch went very, very like the, the original first course launch of the photo major, which at that point was called the Heart University because the whole company was called the Heart Workshop. So then we just kind of renamed some things so that the whole company would be called the Heart University and the. The course, the photo course would be called the Photo Major. And we did that because we obviously wanted to create more courses. But that first course launch was a perfect storm of, of. Of demand. Demand, like building on hype, but also giving like a good product that genuinely helps people.

[B]

Many people, People actively sitting there watching our businesses explode over the course of like a couple years and being like, I need that.

[A]

Yeah. And so that showed us like, oh, we have something here. This is like, this was very monetarily successful. Let's get. Keep working and doing things. And so we created a couple more courses over the next few years. We started this podcast, we kept doing workshops, although then in March of 2020, obviously Covid hit and we had to cancel a Workshop. So we stopped the workshops temporarily while we still did a lot of online things.

[B]

Resources.

[A]

Yeah, we did an online shop. I can't remember when the online shop came out in the heart, but it was either Black Friday of 2020 or Black Friday of 2021.

[B]

It was definitely not Black Friday 2021. Okay, so then it's 2020 or 2019. I think it might have been 2019.

[A]

That's when we started the podcast, though.

[B]

I think it. I think it was 2019. Okay, but it could have been 2020, but I think it was 2019.

[A]

Anyways, regardless, we were doing lots. We were doing.

[B]

We were doing all the things.

[A]

Yeah, we were doing lots. And so a lot. Like we had the courses, we had digital resources like PDF guides and website templates. And honestly the impetus behind that was, okay, we clearly have an audience that's bought in, that loves our products, that loves what we're teaching and what we're doing. How can we diversify and create different offers?

[B]

Like, if we're going to teach them how to build a powerful website, why don't we have a template that is what we teach, that has the format, the strategy, like, you know, everything that we would instruct and give that resource for those who want it.

[A]

Exactly, exactly. So we basically diversified the heart in that way while we grew. And as the heart's growing and we're building a team and doing all of that, I physically had to downshift like weddings and then not do near as much weddings and sessions as I was before just because for like the last, since 2015, just because I, I physically could not, like, I physically couldn't do it. All of it.

[B]

The heart was a full time job?

[A]

Yeah. Oh yeah. Running the heart was a full time job in this season. And I had a child also. Andrew was still in the Coast Guard. So at certain points in, in life he would be out at sea like for three months at a time. So I'm like full time mom, which I will say with one child and they're that young, it's kind of, it's pretty easy to balance once they become able to walk. Less so, less easy. And so I remember what came next. What. Where am I at the timeline. I meant 2020.

[B]

I mean, I feel like you've kind of covered the heart's growth up until maybe like you could touch on like, oh, we implemented like conferences. But like other than that, you pretty much covered like the heart. So like, what else in your entrepreneurial.

[A]

Now I have go back to my notes, guys. I wrote down some notes as far as timeline, because I forgot. Okay. So the nice thing about the monetary success of the heart was we had a lot of capital that we didn't necessarily have just with photography. Not that photography wasn't a lot of capital, but just physically exchanging time for money. Yeah, you get a certain amount, but then exchange. Like doing a digital course where you create something once and then sell it. It just physically gives you more capital. And so I remember we. We had a lot of capital. And this was not. I'm. I'm sharing this in my entrepreneurial journey. A lot of what transpired next was real estate involved, but it wasn't really from the perspective of like, let's flip houses to strategically, like make the value of this house higher so that we can sell it. That was not an intentional choice. It was purely just, hey, we have money and we would like to live in a nicer. Like, we like to like improve our house a little bit. Yeah. But ironically, it did help us like semi grow wealth, which then just like transpired into later things, which I'll explain. But so with some cash that we had in the summer of 2020, while everything's happening, we renovated our Hawaii house. Not a lot, but we. It was like a little dinky plantation cottage house in Hawaii. And we chopped down like the walls of our kitchen to like make it more open concept. And. And by doing that, we like completely gutted and renovated the kitchen, which obviously in a. In a flip or like in house renovations, if you improve the kitchen, like, that's one of the biggest. Well, we did that in the bathroom, which are two of obviously like the main. They were just sad and tragic before. Yeah, they were rough. And so we. We just improved the house in that way. We also, I think changed the. No, we didn't. Well, we changed the floor right when we moved in anyways, so we renovated that in summer of 2020. And then in the fall of 2020, we bought a house in Kansas. And I guess that the part that I haven't shared yet is Andrew, I was. I was a breadwinner, cash queen over here in 2020. I'm Cash Queen.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

I knew it was cash cow, but I said, no, no, no.

[B]

I just.

[A]

I was just having fun.

[B]

Okay, move on.

[A]

And so Andrew got out of the Coast Guard in I think September of 2020. Money as an active choice as since we had had Eloise for a year that or a year at that point. And. And I. My business and the heart and then photography and coaching and all of that. Was. Was booming enough that we were like, we don't need the military. The military is only kind of taking him away. And. And while the Coast Guard, I feel like, is one of the more family friendly of the branches, it's still like at the end of the day, you always, even though they say like we prioritize family and as much as they. They can, they let you prioritize family. But at the end of the day, if the military says jump, you have to jump. And so like family always had to fall under that. And so that was kind of a choice of, of him getting out and kind of being a little bit more like Mr. Mom in. In that season while I was like full time working. So he got out in September of 2020. So then we bought a house in Kansas because the idea was to leave Hawaii and do van life life. We were still in like a wanderlust season of. Of life, and we wanted to do van life. And you can't really do van life on an island. You can only, you can only go in a.

[B]

Especially an island like Oahu where you can circle the entire thing in like three hours, literally.

[A]

Well, you can't even fully circle it. That's the, that's the annoying part that if you could just freaking go up the west side and then you can't get to the north shore. So it's like it's not even a perfect circle, which is just frustrating. Anyways, so the idea was to move back to Kansas temporarily. Because the reason for moving back to Kansas is when you get out of the military, the military will either keep you where you're at or they can move you back to your home of record for free. Like, if we would have chose to like move to somewhere like a third party, then we would have had to pay for that. And obviously moving either to Hawaii or off of island is expensive. And so if the military is going to pay for it, obviously we're going to choose that. So we chose Kansas, which is the home of record. Yes. Yeah, that's where we came from. So we bought a house in Kansas in 2020, but we're still in Hawaii. And the idea was it was a dump and we were going to renovate it. And so then in. Also in, in fall of 2020, I started doing presets, which is a. Just another diversification method that I've used in my own business as well as coaching and photography. So I started doing presets in fall of 2020, launched them in January of 2021, and then we moved out of Hawaii back to Kansas on the day that Joe Biden got inaugurated. I just. That's just linked in my mind because I just. That's just a great memory of inauguration.

[B]

Day and moving day.

[A]

I know. It was all. I remember we flew on, like, January 21st or whatever date that was of 2021. And then we started the road trip because we're. We're psychotic and we're wonderlust people. And so we. We flew to la, and then obviously the military could have, like, flown us all the way back, but we were like, no, no, just fly us till la and then we'll drive the rest of the way. And so we did like, a little road trip in, like, that spring of 2021, and we. We kind of took our time because Andrew's brother at the time was renovating our Kansas house, and we were pretty much completely gutting it. We got like, a little high on the renovation of. Of the Hawaii house. And we were like, we can do a whole house. And we. Again, the idea wasn't to flip that. I think the idea was that we had money and we also had sold our Hawaii house. And because we renovated it, we got a lot more.

[B]

You'd been there for, like, three years, so.

[A]

Yeah, the market went up in. What's it called? There's a word that I'm.

[B]

You're talking about equity.

[A]

Yes, but the market.

[B]

Market value.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, okay. Yeah, sure. There's a. There's a word that I'm not thinking of, but that's basically that. And I will say that was one of the things. It wasn't a smart or it wasn't like an intentional business choice at the time, but in Hawaii, we bought our first. Like, our first house that we've ever bought was in Hawaii, and It was like 500k, which is kind of unhinged when you think about, like, that's your first house. But when you're in the military, the military either puts you on a base and then you just live there for free, or they give you something called bah, which is like. Like housing. It's like a housing allowance, and it's based on where you live. So Hawaii's BAH is a lot more. Just because it's the cost of living. There is a lot more. And so in our brain, it was like, okay, either live somewhere for free, but then don't grow your equity or use free money that you're given by the government to then build equity.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And build wealth in that way. And obviously, like, that's pretty much what we did. And so we like bought the house in Hawaii, then renovated it. So I think I can't remember exactly what we sold it for. I think it was like 670 or something. And we had only put like 20k into it. Maybe. Well, maybe like 30k with the, with the kitchen and the bathroom. Regardless, we made money. Like, that was. That was a good chunk of change that we made. When we sold the Kansas house, I think we bought. Sorry. When we sold the Hawaii house. When we bought the Kansas house, I think that was just probably heart money or photography money that we made. And then I think with the sale of the Hawaii house, we started using those funds to renovate the Kansas house. Again, not necessarily thinking really strategically about this. We were just like, we like to live in the place that we want to live in. Like, we want it to look nice. There's some things that I would go back and do differently if, if I. If I could. But it all. It all ultimately worked out. But we took. I think we bought our Kansas house for 150 or 130, which is laughable.

[B]

In comparison, in comparison to the Hawaii pricing.

[A]

It's just like, obviously where it is based on is it matters. The dirt is either expensive or cheap. And then I think we put like 150 to 200 into flipping. And again, we didn't, we didn't consider it flipping, but ultimately that's what it was. It was like a whole gut renovation to our Kansas house. So I think we put like 200 into it. I. I think in cash. And so then we lived there. Hold on. This is where I have to go to my notes because things happen that I forget. Also, while this is happening, the heart's still booming.

[B]

Heart.

[A]

We're still cruising, introducing courses, introducing, like recording courses, doing the conference. We brought back the workshops, although I don't think that was until 2023. Regardless, while we're in Kansas, we've renovated our house. We're living there, living life. I'm still doing photography, although I am doing photography less. I will say, when we moved from Hawaii to Kansas. Kansas. I didn't intentionally, like, transition the photography side of my business as much because I was still in the space of like, I don't really want to be booking weddings in Kansas. Yeah, I think it was because we knew that it wasn't long term. Yeah, like, we knew that living in Kansas wasn't. It was like a pit stop. It was a pit stop, which in hindsight, looking at that, why did we put money into making like, it wasn't like fully a dream house, but it was like, we definitely, like, intentionally spent money to make, like, the tile what we would want. It's like, why would you do that on a place that you're not gonna stay at? So again, we learn and we live and it all worked out ultimately. But, like, I could have done so much more things with those 200k that we used in cash to renovate a house. And we, again, we got it back technically. But anyways, I digress. We'll move on.

[B]

So you've. You flipped the Kansas house too?

[A]

Yes. You're like, really digging into these renovations on these two houses? Well, it's because when I'm thinking of, like, my entrepreneurial journ, so much of. Of that was using the capital that we got from either businesses or purchasing and flipping in unintentionally houses. Yeah. So it's like I. I'm derailing a little bit into real estate. But it's ironic because it wasn't like an intentional business move. It just was like, favor of God and some ignorance. Endless.

[B]

So you bought the Hawaii house, renovated it, sold it, and. And got money. You bought the Kansas house, renovated it, eventually sold it.

[A]

Well, we're not there yet.

[B]

Okay. Can we get there?

[A]

Yes, yes. So we. You're like, I'm getting lost in the woes of real estate. I feel like this is like the. The details of, like the tile you've chosen. No, I didn't go into. It was terracotta and I'm kidding. Oh, my God.

[B]

Even though I didn't go there, I can go there if you want.

[A]

Anyways, during this year, when we were thinking we were going to do Van Life, God came into our hearts. And we had visited our friends Ryan and Chelsea in Florida. And literally out of nowhere, God spoke to both of me and Andrew separately and was like, I want you to move to Florida. And so at the time, there was land there that we were like, let's move there and build our dream house and that's gonna be that. So we had cash in the bank somehow, after all of what I just described. Cause we're still. This was when we were renovating the Kansas house, so somehow we still had an extra 100 to 200k just sitting there. Somehow. And so the harbor's booming.

[B]

Did we say that before?

[A]

So we bought land in Florida. So pivot. No Van Life. We're going to take the money that we were going to do with Van Life and now move to Florida. And the goal was to. So anyways, so we moved move into renovated Kansas house. But now we have land in Florida that we've also purchased. And I think I did mobile presets in the fall of 2022. I don't know if that's relevant. It's just part of. It's something else that I did to make money in this journey. I was still doing weddings, but again it was a lot limited and none of them were in Kansas. They were all destination. And so then In October of 2022 we sold. Maybe like a little bit before that we sold the Kansas house. And I think we sold. I remember we were. Because we flipped it basically. And it was, it was a flip. Let me tell you, if you go on my blog, you can see before and after photos and it's literally a dumpster fire trash house to like a mid century modern dream. So it was it. We did. Well again, we didn't intentionally flip it with the idea of profitability. Hindsight's 20 20, but we, I think we sold it for 450 and we bought it for 130, put 200 into it. So again, choices were made that I would maybe not agree with monetarily because like we could have, if that was an intentional money making choice, we could have not, you know, had that terracotta tile. Because it's like we, that's where I'm just like, why did, why did you choose? Like, yes, it's nice to live, to love where you live.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But there's just, there's choices there that I'm like, we could have still made it nicer and flipped it but for cheaper and made more. But again it wasn't. Again, you live and you learn and you grow. So we sold that and then moved to Florida and at the time we were still planning to build. Build. Well, I guess no, we had to have bought the house in Florida first. Lord almighty. I think, I think if I'm remembering correctly, we bought the Florida house before selling our Kansas house. Regardless, we're not flipping this house. I guess not too much anyways. So we moved to Florida and the, the idea of buying the house in Florida was that we would move there because it takes forever to build or I'm my, my, my dates and my. It's.

[B]

It's all land in Florida. But you also then bought a house in a subdivision in Florida.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

That you could move to much more quickly while you were still building the house on your land.

[A]

Correct. But I, but I think at this time we decided to sell the land okay. Because we realized as, like, we started to go into it, that it would be way expensive to build, take a very long time. Also, our friends that we were like, had land next to us had also sold their house. And they. That was a whole conversation. They felt very bad. They were like, we don't want to ditch you, but God's calling us to sell this land. And then we were like, okay, do we buy this land because we want to build it, or do we buy it to be next to them? And it was obviously both. But as we looked into the price of. Of genuinely, like, getting a blueprint for an architect and all the things to, like, actually build it, we were like, oh, that would not be the best use of our time. So we. We learned. I think. I think we learned from the Kansas house. We were like, in this season of life, we need to be investing in things that make us money, not that. Turn our house into something pretty. Yeah.

[B]

We need to be investing in assets, not liabilities.

[A]

Thank you. Wonderful. That's exactly it. So we moved to Florida. And then. Then, because we. So we sold the land. So again, we have. I feel like we got a lot of money at the beginning of our career from photography in the Heart. And then we just kept reinvesting. Reinvesting. It ultimately is what happened, but.

[B]

And I feel like, too, we continued. It was like, the minute we started having a reasonable. Like, both of us, a reasonable amount of capital, we began reinvesting it. And we've continued doing that through our entire careers.

[A]

Yeah. So to a point, it's not that we wasted. I wouldn't even say that we wasted it. There's things that I would go back and do differently. Yeah. But it's also not like I just took it and I said, I'm going to Paris.

[B]

Right.

[A]

And I'm living large in the Ritz.

[B]

It was reinvested in for both of us. Real estate, new businesses, whatever.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. So we moved to Florida. We have a good chunk of capital that we got from our Kansas house sale. And I also remember this is maybe a little more relevant. Yes, this is relevant. We. When we sold the land, the Florida land, we sold it via seller finance, so that the person was paying us, not a bank. That's what seller finance means. And so they were paying us, like, 1500amonth, very small, with, like, a balloon that would be due in, like, 2024 or. No, 2025. And so that was just like, again, like, money that. That was gonna come later at that point in time. So we. We Had a chunk of change from our Kansas house sale when we moved to Florida. And we were like, we want to invest it in something that's not making our house pretty as much as I really, really wanted to because we moved into like a builder grade house in Florida that I still. It's fine, it's great, but it's not like dream home. The dream home. But I learned my lesson in Kansas. We were like, we don't need a beautiful home in this season. Like this is the money making investing season where if we have capital, we need to use it wisely. So Andrew started looking at like businesses to buy and ways that we could smartly invest that chunk of change. I think we had like 1-50-200. I don't know what the math is. I'm not going to do the math right now, but we had a good chunk of change. We were like what can we do with this realistically that would help actually bring us cash flow and build our business. And at the time, I'm not going to say exactly what it is because this is now our silent business, but it is. We found an opportunity to buy by. It was kind of by kind of start ish a brick and mortar store here in Florida. And that is now our silent business. And it's brick and mortar. It has employees, but it also doesn't need employees. It depends on the model that you do, whether it needs employees or not. But we, we started with no employees and it was great. It was like self sustaining. And then we expanded the business business late. So I think we started this in 2023 because we moved in fall to Florida in fall of 2022 and then took like six months to figure out and search for a business opportunity and then use that capital to buy that business, start that business, whatever you want to call it. And then about six months later is when we kind of expanded the resources or the offers and then like added employees to the store. And so that is where, where we've been cruising ever since as far as like with that business. And then remember how I said we sold the land with a seller finance note? It was he, he'd been paying us like the guy that bought our land had been paying us monthly with a balloon, meaning that like the rest of the money that is due is due was going to be due in June of 2025, which would be now except he paid it off a year early. So he paid us in June of 2024. So then we had a huge other chunk of capital that we were like, okay, let's. And again, I was tempted to just renovate my kitchen, but we were like, okay, what can we do? Can we. Should we use some of this to invest in our silent business? Like, what do we want to do? So we hang. We hung onto it a little bit for a while, and then Andrew got another opportunity to buy basically a second. Second building or a second business of the same type as the. The one that we have right now. So now we own two of them of the mysterious silent business that we have. And so those are cruising. Those are doing really well. We brought on some business partners as well for that business, for both of them, just because our friends Brooke and Daniel are our co laborers with us, and they handle a lot of, like, the HR and, like, employee stuff that I just don't want to handle. And so the way that that's kind of delegated is now Brook handles, like, operations and hr. Andrew handles, like, growth and kind of, like networking and gaining more assets in that. Daniel Brooks husband does, like, maintenance. I'm not trying to be intentionally vague, but also, it just is. And then I handle marketing for the most part. So that's what I did there. That's how our entrepreneur. I'm not trying to be intentionally vague, but that's just what it is. That's been the journey since we moved to Florida, which has been really fun, really exciting. And then on the photography end, because I, like, downshifted, I guess I didn't even talk about the downshift of the heart. I feel like you hit that a little bit in your episode. But as, I guess also in all of this, I kept having more children, Popping them out. Popping them out, kept having more children. And so my capacity with photography, the heart kept growing, doing all the things, having babies. Like, my capacity only hit so much, especially as Eloise got to an age where she kept approaching, like, homeschooling age more. And we also just felt really called to homeschool and not do any. What's that called? Public education or even private education. We just really wanted to homeschool. And so as. As that awareness dawned, I feel like we both came to the separate decision of down. Sorry, excuse me. Downshifting the heart. Yeah. And so in that.

[B]

That was 2023.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

That we made the plan and began to make the moves. And then 2024 was the big, like, that was the first fiscal year that was like a big downshift. Completely downshifted the entire year.

[A]

Yeah. And. And when it's downshifted, we basically went from like live launching, having an active, like, conferences, workshops. The podcast. Like, we, we were doing all this stuff and when we downshifted it, we basically do this podcast regularly. And then we also do the workshops. And that's kind of it. And that's sustaining.

[B]

And the, and the digital shop is still there and still.

[A]

But we're not like, adding more to it, at least for the time being. Yeah, we might in the future, but for right now, that's where it's at. And so I, that freed up my time a ton to get back into photography a little bit more than I had because I had almost like put it down. And then I also went through like an identity crisis in there. A little bit of like, as I started having kids, I was like, oh, I'm an, I'm a momm blogger now. I'm a mommy Instagrammer. I'm a mom's influencer. And so there was a journey in there that was just like all over the place. I was like, am I a photographer? Am I a business coach? Am I a mom influencer? What am I? I was all of them. But like, you know, identity crisis. When we moved to Florida and downshifted the heart, that's where I was almost like, oh, I actually really loved the art of weddings. Like, I genuinely loved the art of photography and, and putting it down not fully, but like nearly big business CEO in the heart was like it, it, like it. You lost a little bit of like the art and like the creativity element. That doesn't get to come out as much when you're just doing like launches and like high level.

[B]

You're like CEO, COO mode.

[A]

Yeah. And so I, I, I started picking my business back up in Florida as far as like the wedding side. And I always did coaching throughout all of it. That didn't really change. I don't think much, much because that was always just like a side part of my business that I did and that I could easily do. But as, yeah, as we move back to Florida and Andrew kind of like took the reins on the silent businesses. Like, I help, but he's definitely more like head honcho. I, where am I? I think I'm caught up, but I.

[B]

Am doing a lot more photography again. And your insiders too.

[A]

Oh, forgot about that. Something else that we were in, we were in a season where in starting the silent businesses and downshifting start, we, we needed a little bit more cash flow and especially just because you're established at first, I'm talking wedding photography or any photography type. When you move locations even if you're established. I feel like it's. It's a new groundwork to get established in a new market, especially if it's like a wedding market, where it's like, I need to get settled. So while I was kind of getting my feet wet in the Florida wedding market, I was like, I have a platform, and I want to do something that could be a little bit more of a reoccurring income. And I love empowering girls. I love, like, coaching, and I love talking and, like, connecting with women in general. And so I was like, how could I combine all of that where it's almost like a combo of education, but like a girl chat, but like a Bible study and just like a place online that you could connect with women. And I'd saw. I'd saw a couple of other, like, influencer educators do this, and I was like, I think I could do this. And so I started my Insiders membership, which is just a monthly membership where you can join it every month. And it's. It's. It's really a combo. I. I've, like, almost done. We have, like, group DM chats on different topics, like pop culture and motherhood and politics and just like, a bunch of different things. But we also do group coaching in there. We do a book club in there where every month we ch. Choose a different book. And I feel like it's just like a wonderful combo of all my interests and loves, but also combining it with, like, education and motherhood and like, a conglomeration. Um, and so that's been really great as we've kind of, like, transitioned and. And, you know, done a little bit different journeys in business. And, like, especially the. The silent business that we do is a completely different industry in almost every conceivable way to what, like, I've grown up in and. And learned in entrepreneurship, whether it be photography or online education. Um, and so it's just diversifying our wheelhouse. But I feel like the Insiders has been really, really great for extended cash flow in addition photography and that. So I feel like that's where we're at now. Still doing presets, still doing coaching, still doing photography. Yeah, we love it. I just feel like I talked so much. You didn't interrupt me as much as I interrupted you.

[B]

I tried to. I tried to speed you along on the. The renovation part.

[A]

Well, that got into the weeds because I was like, it really truly, though, led it. It ultimately led us to be able to buy and kind of start our silent businesses. Which is a huge part of what we do now. But, yeah, to get there, I had to kind of. I could have probably rushed through it a little bit more, but there was, like, three house purchases in there that or like, flips kind of totally. Because even the land, obviously, like, the land didn't make more money other than just time. Well, we made a little bit.

[B]

I was gonna say there's, like, interest on it.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

And, yeah.

[A]

Not that any of them were smart business decisions that were very methodically thought out as far as, like, this is what we're doing to increase profit. But I will say we didn't blow the money. Like, we didn't take it and just like, completely, absolutely waste it. It was like half liability, half asset.

[B]

It was probably a liability that God blessed you with an asset at the end for at least the first couple.

[A]

He's like, I see what you're trying to do. Let me just. Let me just help you a little. God. But you really didn't need that terracotta tile in your master bathroom in Kansas, did you?

[B]

I love it.

[A]

Oh, well.

[B]

Well, that is Lindsay's entrepreneurial journey, ladies and gentlemen. And we. I feel like both of us are still learning and growing in the process. Learning and growing. So in no way is that the end of her journey. She will continue more.

[A]

No, it's the beginning. I have great.

[B]

Many more things.

[A]

I have great goals for myself, but.

[B]

That'S caught up to today and kind of where we're at and she's at today. So hopefully that was fun. A little peek into the Lindsay Roman experience and journey over the last 10 years.

[A]

Yes, it's been a fun time. It's been great. Great. I feel like if I had to look forward, I would love to do. I would almost love to pick weddings a little bit more up than I, because I laid them down mostly for a while. So I'd love to pick them a little bit more back up. Although I am currently pregnant, so, you know, we're still dealing with that. Dealing with that. I mean. I mean, like, the pausing of, like, maternity leaves and. Yeah, it's a joy. It's a joy. And then now me and Andrew are balancing homeschooling as well as, like, multiple businesses. Multiple businesses. And both doing. Both is what we call it, where it's like, we're both working, but we're also so both parenting. Parenting. So both do both. So it's very untraditional as far as, like, one person doing childcare and homemaking and one person working. It's kind of, like, we're a conglomeration, which I know is a huge blessing and a privilege that not everybody has the ability to have, but it's working for us in this season, and we love it. I love it. That's where. That's where we're at. Hopefully, this was entertaining. There was a lot of real estate stuff in there that got lost in the weeds, but if you have any questions, feel free to DM me. I know Evie also said that on her episode, but hopefully this was, like, a good, updated version of where we've been since our baby photography journeys. Yep. Yep.

[B]

All right, friend. We love you, and we will see you on the next episode.