My business began as a confused twenty-something trying to find her way and purpose in the Big Apple. The vision for my life had been clear since I was a kid: get into NYU, move to New York City and make it here as a corporate lawyer.

By age 23, everything was going as planned. I had graduated from NYU and was accepted into law schools, all the while working as a paralegal on 42nd street. The truth was, however, I had no desire to be a lawyer. I had known that for quite some time, but was in denial because I didn’t know what else I wanted to do.

My current business and personal development coaching business was born from that question: what do I want to do with my life? How can I make it in a city like New York, but on my own terms? What’s the career of my dreams actually entail?

I initially started it as a blog documenting my journey away from law school, but always with the search for purpose in mind.

Success takeaway: don’t wait for all the answers to start something new. Answers don’t come from pondering their solutions. Solutions present themselves through action.  

After declining my law school acceptances, I left the legal field and ended up working at a nonprofit for the two years that followed, with my blog as my side hustle. I’d spend early mornings, lunch breaks and weekends working on it, desperately trying to crack the code on digital marketing.

 The truth is I struggled over those two years. At one point, I gave myself a deadline for how much longer I’d allow my side hustle to go on. I promised myself that if I wasn’t making a fulltime living from it by a certain date, I’d close the business.

After making that promise to myself, something incredible happened. I started to realize how much I had been holding back up to that point. I hadn’t been investing in my business because I was too scared. I wasn’t fully marketing my business from fear of rejection and judgment. That all started to change, and so did my results. 

Success takeaway: don’t expect incredible results from mediocre efforts. Going “all in” on a business will stretch you in ways you’ve never experienced. But if you don’t lean into that, it’ll be difficult to get the results you want. 

Sure enough, around eight months after that choice to go “all in,” I was able to hand in my resignation. I finally had the freedom I had worked so hard to experience, and knew I’d never work for another 9-5 job again. 

As my own success began to form, my business evolved to reflect that. I went from blogging about finding your purpose, to coaching women to do so. I also started coaching women who felt their purpose was entrepreneurship. After all, I had finally figured out how to work for myself, build an audience and leverage digital marketing.

Before I knew it, my business crossed the six-figure mark.

As exciting as that was, it was hardly the end of my story. It truly felt like just the beginning, honestly. And it almost took as much courage to keep going in those times as it did in the early days. 

That amount of business growth meant more responsibility. It meant hiring a team. Hire expenses. A higher tax bracket. More clients. More variables at play all the time. 

Success takeaway: when you know something might be challenging, don’t resist the challenge. It’s much easier to say you’re good at handling challenges than it is to handle challenges when you’re in it. Have the self-awareness to know when you’re experiencing exactly what you asked for.

Building my business has made my dreams come true in the most spectacular of ways. As a woman, it’s been the road to me “having it all” (or my version of that, anyway.) It’s why I:

* Have a career that fulfills me and positively impacts my clients more than being a corporate lawyer ever would have.  

* Make more money than I would have being a corporate lawyer. 

* Work only three days a week while spending the rest of my time being a stay at home mom with my newborn son.

* Lead a team of all women, including my own sister who I get to work with daily.

* Work from anywhere my laptop is, including balconies of Italy, first-class plane tickets, luxury hotels in Paris, or simply in my pajamas on a lazy day. 

I couldn’t be more grateful. But, it’s incredibly hard. One of my favorite tips on entrepreneurship came from Elon Musk who, when asked what his motivating advice for entrepreneurs was, responded that if you need motivation from others, don’t bother. 

Success takeaway: if you know entrepreneurship is what you want to do with your life, embrace the challenge and don’t let yourself question your decision over and over. It will drain your energy and stop your momentum. Own it and live it.