Ep. 5: Fortune Sides with Those Who Dare

Welcome to another episode of Black Girl Fly. My name is Tenisha Nicole. And I'm Tashaunda Dixon. And here is where we talk about demystifying millennial wealth. And today, we're talking about taking risks. Taking risks. So where do you want to start? Oh, once again, you know, we get to this point where we there's so much to talk about. And so it's really hard. So I would have to say that today I'm going to talk about why taking risk is important. And failure isn't so hard. Right? Oh, Wednesday is hard. It's a blow. But it doesn't devastate Exactly. That's That's good. Temporary.

Just in the idea. I think. We're always told you can't fail. Right. You have to win. Well, that's what school teaches us. Failure is a bad thing. Right? Yeah. Everyone teaches us that. But if you look at look at people around us, if you look at all the people who made it, they failed so much all the time, but nobody talks about it. So this is another space where we talk about sharing your testimony. Right? I think it's so important. It's so important to talk about really, the journey. And the journey always includes failure. Yes, but that's not the part that people want to share publicly think about Instagram, Facebook, I see so many people who are so in love. And next week, they broke up. Because every I mean, life is hard. Right? And I have but I have this one saying that. I say it in my mind, and sometimes I say it to be okay. But life is only as hard as you are strong, right? Oh, wow. And it comes from that, like God will only give you my son as much as you can bear. Right? But it's like it's only as hard as As tough you are, if that makes sense. Yeah. So I don't know you kind of you meet the challenge where it is. And you can face any challenge is basically the takeaway that I have from it. Yeah. And so once again, I know you will notice that we are really optimist. I am a Reckless Optimist. Yes, I am. But But with that being said, though, I think that there's important things to acknowledge. One is that failure hurts. Yeah, it's, I mean, it's a blow to the ego. It's a blow to what you perceive as your image. Yeah. That was like, it makes you question yo. Host. Yes, yes. Yes. I have so many stories. Here like oh my goodness, but bit failure is hard. It's really hard. Yeah.

Take the Risk

I'd have to say though, is that the thing that I like most about failure, though, is that when it happens, you fall on your butt, you will hurt but for me, I'm going Oh, that didn't hurt that It wasn't like it hurt. But I made it so big in my mind. I was like, Oh, I can't fail. I gotta win. And then when I fall, I'm like, oh, that hurt. But uh, I can get over it. Yeah, we make this failure. We make it up to be this big thing like that it's going to end us. Yeah. When really it's just an obstacle, right? Something that you got to get past. It's not the end. Yeah, I would have saved so the biggest failure in my life. It was so as you get to know me, you'll, you'll realize that I've always been an investor in my head. You know, I've always been an old male head in real life. I'm saying when I was a kid, and we were playing school, I wouldn't be the principal, the principal or the school, right? I didn't want to be a teacher. I want to be the principal and that was it. So but the biggest thing for me though, was getting into real estate. I have wanted to be in real estate. Ever In fact, I've taken the real estate course, twice in two separate states to be a realtor. I am not a realtor. But I've taken all the qualifications you know they time lapse, but I could have been won twice in two different states. But but so for me, I've always wanted to invest. And a few years back, I had the opportunity to and I actually purchased three properties. Now this was a time in my life where there was a lot going on. A mom had just been diagnosed with stage four cancer and I decided that I was going to go be with my high school sweetheart again. I went through a divorce right? So when she says there was a Lego good, you need to say all the things. I decided that I wanted to kid and I moved out of the state that I've lived in for eight years. So all of this is the backdrop to me making this decision right. Yeah. So I purchased the homes re now one yeah. So she was extra tip like all around my way three, all at once. I didn't wait. I said I see three good deals, I am going after it so much to talk about that in that process. But I took this on, and life happened, right? things got worse. I just had at this time I just had my daughter. And when I was capable of traveling, I went to travel to see my mom. And my sisters had been not really telling me what my mom was going through that her condition had worsened. And they of course, were trying to protect me. They were like you were pregnant. You're about to have your baby, you have a newborn, but I saw the condition that she was in and I made a decision to drop everything and be with her. So I had these homes that I owned in Nebraska. We were in the middle of renovations on most of them. And she had just started a new job. So you Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so I had tenants in two of them, but they still needed some repairs and the third one needed a lot of repairs and So I dropped everything. I call my job. And I said, Hey, I'm going out on FMLA. And in fact, this wasn't even like a thought about decision. I had actually gone to visit my mom. And I didn't go back home. I saw my mom and I called my job and said, Look, I'm not coming back. And they said, Why don't you take FMLA? And I was like, Okay, if that's what we got to do, I'll be back. My tenants were calling me they're like, we need this fix. We need this fix. And I didn't have a safety net. I didn't have cash to make that decision. I actually was in a relationship, mind you. When I went to visit, it was me. And my newborn, my daughter was three months, maybe not even three months, six weeks, she was six weeks when you get in plain sight, confirm that it was okay for it to fly. And I called my boyfriend. And I said, I'm sorry, I know you're supposed to plan this move. I know we're supposed to talk about it. But I'm not coming back home. I'm not doing well. And he said, oh crap. He was like, what are we going to do to sound like you can't just make this decision, right? And I said, I don't know what we're gonna do. I can't think about that. I got to be with my mom. And he was like, you get rid of the houses. I'm gonna try to finish up what we're doing here and I'll be there. And that's what happened. And I ended up selling the houses for less than I paid for that's not had in it. I just and I knew I was making bad decisions when when I did it, but I didn't have a choice. And so I lost everything. The three homes, I want to say I took back maybe 30% of what I paid for them. And I was like, man, I didn't have much of that money to lose that was meant to grow. And it was devastating. This was the time where I was doing it. I was I was getting into the thing that I wanted to get into, and everything was failing. So my mom was she was getting worse. And she eventually passed. I didn't have a job. So I moved to that move back to Texas. And I didn't have an income. We had decided to start a business. It was my mom's Wish that we would build something that could be her part of her legacy. And so I was working in a billion hours trying to build this thing. So my mom would be proud. And I fell in that business, and we ended up kind of buying ourselves out of that business. Yeah. And I have to tell you, though, that sounds like a horrible story. Right? Because I'm like, Where's the silver lining here? He's fortune.

Failure is Temporary

That sounds like a horrible story. But that happened. And today, I am more energized. I'm ready to do it again. I was like, oh, that didn't hurt so bad. I've been I've been not purchasing things for 10-15 years at that point. I had been planning about it, dreaming about it, looking at things saying, Oh, I'd want to do this. I could do this. You know, if I only did this. I've been doing that for 15 years. And I failed in that instance. Right. I failed. You did. All right. You waited so Long to avoid the situation that actually ended up happening to you. And, and he was still breathing. Yeah, it was still. And by the way, I went through that I didn't work for that year. I didn't do anything. When I had to rebuild. I didn't like this. I surpassed the income, right. Or I doubled my income in a year. When you came back when you made the decision to get back in the game, yeah, to that. Yeah. And not only that, my mindset, I'm doing bigger things now. Then, I've done there. And it's all because I know now, though, you didn't hurt so much. And it taught me a lot of lessons. I won't buy three all at once, and renovate all of them all. Okay, that's a good check. Because what are you trying to do? Yeah, so right now, by the way, I'm building the system. I am putting the things in place to As a balanced bah, bah bah. And now, I don't need that money. Right? That's the other important thing, you know, invest with the money that you need. You make sure that you're good and that you have a cushion. Yeah, right. Your bills are paid every month and you have a cushion, right. And then with any extra money above and beyond that, that won't hurt to us. We lose it. Yeah, that is money that you can invest. Yep. And so I will tell you that more than anything, and when you think about really failure, the thing that's most important to protect is your mind. Right. And so now, at a place where I'm going to build something so much greater, because I was able to fall. Yeah, yeah. I agree with that.

The Legacy Dilemma

Like when I think about my journey over the last year, I kind of say that entrepreneurship happened to me. You know, I've always been somebody building a side hustle or something like that. The fact that I actually became a full time entrepreneur, it literally just happened. Like, it was a series of unfortunate events. And I don't know if I've ever actually told you about this, but so after mom passed, like, you know, luckily my job was very flexible. You know, I took some time off, but I was also able to work from home quite a bit. But like I was so not in a good place, like, even when I would go into the office, like I would end up locking myself in a conference room because I had just started randomly crying and like, when I cry I came up to you without notice bad. You might you can tell that I have been crying. So I would bust out in these random tears, it's all go lock myself in the room and try to get myself together. But you know, an hour turns into like, six hours later, I'm still in this room trying to get some work done. So eventually, I just stopped going in the office, right and then It was easier for me because some days I did not want to get out of bed. And when I, you know, when I could I would get on and work and if I would cry like it was cool because I was at home with my makeup, or no makeup on and off my makeup on if I had a video, right. So that was happening to me a lot. But, you know, it was getting harder and harder to show up fully at work because I really wasn't invested in, you know, thinking about what my mom's legacy was, and like, you know, she died at 50.

Life is too Short

And all I could think about was like, life is so short. Like I'm halfway I'm more than halfway there at that point. And I'm like, Is this my legacy like me going into this job. And so as the month progressed, like I just started, I mean, I continue to think about like, what I want my legacy to be, and so little things happened. But finally what happened is, I had now at this point given my apartment and I was like living all over the place. But I had went back to headquarters of my office and because we had a meeting, and on this really important meeting that I was leading on my way to this meeting, I almost got into a car accident where we were almost killed a homeless man or killed myself or seriously injured somebody else. And that was just like a wake up call for me I was so shook that whole rest of the day like that happened in the morning on my way to the office to go print out some stuff for this meeting that I had. So I literally had like an hour to get myself together. But that that moment, it was just like another reminder like if I died today, or if I was to kill this man, like, what will I have left behind? You know, what would be my legacy? And I was just like this name it. Like, this is not it. And so I started to think about like, what are the things that I've always wanted to do that I have never tried, really tried doing? And one of those things will be in a pilot So, you know, I gave it three days and I was back in I was in Savannah, Georgia actually, like just traveling. I called my boss and I was like, Look, I need to quit. I had no plan. Have a blade. I didn't have a ton of money at the time, but I was like, I need to quit. I don't know what I'm gonna do. I don't know how much you know, whatever needs to happen. I just need to quit. And the guy was like, well, maybe you should just think about I can tell this wasn't really thought out. Please take a few days and just let me know like, you know, later this week, like when you actually think. And so I went back to him and I was like, yep, thought about it. This was my two weeks started when I first told you so you only got one more we got to be in so that was like me becoming an entrepreneur like Well, that was me becoming an entrepreneur that was me quitting my staples. Very right with great benefits where I could work literally from anywhere in the world. And then I, you know, what they tried to convince me to do. I'm trying to make this long story short, but they basically we're like, Well, you could just take a leave of absence, or like a sabbatical kind of thing. And I was like, so I quit here. But so I in my mind, I quit, right? Yeah, yeah. But I didn't burn that bridge. Yeah, which became very important for me later on.

Bet on Yourself

And so you know, when I did pilot school full time, I was able to accomplish You know, one of my biggest dreams was like, you know, I became a certified pilot right now. It took me much longer than I wanted to get it though I did it. It tested my courage. I literally failed all the time. But in flying the most important lesson that I learned is that you know, you're only as good As your next move, yeah, like you can fail in an instant. It's good. And that's deep, guess what? You failed. But you cannot harp on that, because what's important is the thing you do next. Because if you keep making those bad moves, bad moves, that could be your last flight. And we say that a lot like you could easily not come back. And so you cannot harp on what has happened. You got to focus on getting yourself back on track. Yeah. Let's just stop here real quick. So that is a life lesson. And I would apply that to any of the circumstances that I went through. I could have said, I'm devastated in the real estate thing. And I could have said, I can't do this. Right. Yeah. And that could have been it. Yeah. So what do you do then? So I kept flying. I kept flying even when I didn't want to even when I was scared, and you know, some other bad things happen like that. I got lost and all that. But I found my way. Oh, but no So an opportunity presented itself I was literally running out of money at this point, right? Flying was super expensive. But because I didn't burn that bridge, the company that I was working for full time where they were like, We would love to have you, you know, if you have some time, so I now contract with that company. And that allows me to set my own schedule, set my own hours. Well, I have an hourly rate, right. And I'm able to do this on my own. So I know this isn't the subject, but I think that's really cool. Because how many of us have not questioned that? How many of them I didn't know that was possible. Yeah. I mean, cuz no one's volunteering that Right, right. But if you are an asset to that company, and they know that they want you and they don't want to leave you, they're gonna pay them a little bit. And they told me I took a sabbatical. And I was like, Okay, sure. I can, I could say no to projects I don't want and I could say yes, and I was still traveling. with them and, and I even had other clients that I had met through the company, but that wanted to contract directly with me. Yeah. And so you just never know. I mean, I think don't burn bridges, but also show up as your best self, you know, in opportunities that you do have because you never know how they will manifest in other ways. No fortune sides with those who dare amen to that. And now in this last year, where I've been a full time entrepreneur, I made the most money that I've ever made in my career, and I've worked literally fractures.

Conclusion

So yeah, you just, I mean, sometimes you got to step out on faith and just, you know, do what your heart is pulling you to do, because usually that's, you know, that's the Holy Spirit. Yeah. So don't be afraid of taking the risk. asking the questions, stepping out there. Don't be afraid of a little failure. That's just a stepping stone to get to where you want and keep going. And keep going. Yeah, that's good. That's good. All right, so that's gonna wrap up this episode for today. Until next time, I'm Tenisha Nicole, and I'm Tashaunda Dixon and we are Black Girl Fly.