My story.

As I said last week, I might not be qualified to tell you how to run a business. But, at this point in my life I can consider myself a certified risk taker, soul searcher and creative problem solver—all things that I believe are the building blocks of entrepreneurship. This is my story.

It all started on the 4th of July after my first year in college. House music bumping, ping pong balls flying, friends throwing up in bushes. I looked around at these people around me—classmates who all seemed to wear the same clothes and tell the same jokes—and felt strongly that I was not one of them. I didn’t know who I was instead, but in a matter of months I had un-enrolled in my sophomore year at Trinity, and bought a ticket to East Africa on a service learning trip. To find myself.

And from there the searching didn’t stop—I went to an ashram in the Bahamas, an intentional community in upstate New York, a hippie school in Vermont, spiritual center in Hawaii, and Buddhist college in Colorado. I won’t bore you with the details, but over the years I got comfortable in the uncomfortable, I asked a lot of questions, and was clearly not on the path that most people my age were walking.

Now, what the heck does that have to do with entrepreneurship?, you might be wondering. Isn’t that just an entitled rich girl traveling the world to avoid taking responsibility for her life? In many ways, yes, it was. I made a lot of decisions I regret over the years—I prioritized my own journey over my relationships with others. I lost friends. I stunted my education and professional growth multiple times, like a blooming plant continually cut at the node, unable to fully grow. I got rid of everything I knew of home, seeing myself as somehow more enlightened than the people in my past, at that party and elsewhere. But I wasn’t. And now, now that the searching has ceased, I have my regrets, but I have to look for the silver lining.

While I have, since returning home, uncovered a newfound loyalty to all things I left behind—family, sense of place, staying—I have also found a home for the skills that I built in all my wandering, in building my own business.

I did not learn to process data in Excel, nor to improve my website for SEO. I did not learn how to blend watercolor or draw architectural designs. But I did learn how to go against the grain. I did learn how to dig deep past what everyone else thought I should do, to find what I really wanted. I learned how to get by with no mentors, no teacher or boss telling me what to do. I learned how to start things completely from scratch—a book display in a cafe where I worked, a spoken-word poetry performance, a blog, a monthly community meal, a monthly open mic in another cafe where I worked—and to figure it out as I went. And I learned, through it all, to keep going.

I don’t know that I believe we are made or destined to do certain things, but when I look back I can see how my roundabout path got me to here, and I am grateful for it. And now, I am making the choice to use that all as fuel. To keep going.

What experiences in your life have primed you for stepping outside the box, taking risks, and doing it yourself? I look forward to turning this into a space to share stories of grit, creativity and transformation for others on a similar roundabout path, slowly finding their way.