How I Bought Myself Out of My Full-Time Job

yesterday was my last day as an employee and my first day as a full-time entrepreneur. i’m still in disbelief as a i write this.

two years ago, i was bald from chemo when i walked into a luxury retail boutique in northern virginia. i timidly handed in my resumé and prayed for the best.

at the time, i had no idea how much stylists earned or if i would even get a call back.

however, i knew that i had to do something different.

within two years, my mother had been diagnosed with cancer, i’d been diagnosed with cancer, and i lost a close family member in a tragic accident.

my life had been turned upside down.

READ: I Quit My Job as a Lawyer: You Won’t Believe What Happened Next

as a result, i decided to reclaim my time. i refused to continue to deal with high stress and toxicity at work. i was done with being overworked and underpaid. i couldn’t continue to hide parts of myself.

i finally embraced the radical idea that i deserved to be free.

so it was a sign the day that i heard back from one of my favorite luxury boutiques. after a series of interviews, i was offered a position while attending a blog trip. the serendipity couldn’t have been more perfect. i was clearly being guided into a different life.

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i’m so grateful for my two years in luxury retail because it gave me the chance to be free. my blackness, queerness and womanhood weren’t fuel for micro-aggressions. i loved my colleagues and laughed so much some days until my stomach hurt.  i created a million dollar book my first year and earned an almost identical salary to my job as an attorney working in public policy.

money was good, and i was thriving in my role.

however, i’m also thriving as a business owner. in january, i signed a huge contract that i knew would change my career trajectory. plus, i continued to book additional clients, including two on a monthly retainer, despite the pandemic. by this fall i’d more than doubled my salary through my side hustle income.

i knew it was time to make a decision. i could no longer work seven days a week in both roles. my side hustle had become my main hustle.

i’ve been marching towards entrepreneurship unknowingly since the day that i handed in my resumé. this next step was ordained, and your girl is ready to not just fly, but soar.

i’m sure folks will ask, how sway? how was all of this possible, especially during a pandemic? well, first let me be one hundred percent transparent.

i’ve been hustling for over two years. in fact, much longer if i consider how i’ve monetized my blog and accompanying social media platforms. me transitioning to full-time entrepreneurship didn’t happen overnight.

READ: How My Side Hustles Earned $36,000

let’s get to the nitty gritty. the four most integral steps that allowed me to buy myself out of my full-time job are:

1. shifting from a fear to abundance mindset
2. getting serious about my business finances
3. learning how to live on a budget
   
4. monetizing all of my passions

Shifted from a Fear to Abundance Mindset

for years, i struggled to believe that i was worthy of entrepreneurship or that i would be able to successfully monetize my passions. i was embarrassed to admit my passion for style among my previous colleagues for a fear that i wouldn’t be taken seriously. i was laughed at for leaving my job as an attorney working in public policy to start my career in fashion.

but the naysayers can kick rocks. their feedback was limited by their own capacity to dream big. they were only projecting their fear and scarcity mindset. i’ve realized that abundance is all around me. it is my birthright.

my breakthrough came from a lot of therapy and personal development resources. specifically, jen sincero’s you are a bad ass at making money and gabby bernstein’s spirit junkie played a major role in shifting my mindset. i devoured both resources with a notebook, highlighter and pen like i was in a graduate school course. now i know that outside of their wisdom, the greatest gift that i gave myself was self-discovery.

i spent hours answering the questions, “who am i?” and “how do i want to live my life?” the answer was loud and clear. i wanted to have control over my time and live my dreams out loud.

i had to adopt an abundance mindset in order to believe that full-time entrepreneurship was possible. today, i’m walking steadfast into this belief knowing that i will and can receive every single blessing that God sends my way.

Got Serious about My Business Finances

blogging and creating content is my passion, so is social justice and supporting organizations along their anti-racism journey. i’ve been doing all these things professionally and as passion projects for more than a decade. so when money started rolling in from them outside of my 9 to 5, i didn’t quite know what to do with it.

by the time i hit the third quarter of 2019, i knew that my side hustles were quickly going to grow into my main hustle. i had to get my head outta the clouds and actually get a handle on my business coins. i wasn’t gonna go out like wesley snipes or lauren hill due to unpaid taxes.

first, i worked with little fish accounting to answer my accounting questions. during my one-on-one call with its founder keila, i realized that i didn’t need a bookkeeper, but bookkeeping software that i could manage on my own.

she encouraged me to download quickbooks and get started. her advice helped me to understand that my bookkeeping didn’t need to be perfect, but i needed to separate my personal and business finances fast and in a hurry. this means that i also opened a business account and started to pay myself a salary.

putting these systems into place allows me to invoice my clients, collect payment via direct deposit and estimate my quarterly taxes. i now have peace of mind knowing that i can and will manage my financial obligations like health insurance and retirement savings without receiving a bi-weekly paycheck from an employer.

Learned How to Live on a Budget

i’m super OD when it comes to budgeting. i have to be because my natural tendency is to spend money like it’s going out of style. in fact, i joke (somewhat) that if i had a million dollars in the bank, i’d find a way to spend a million and one. blame it on my need for a rich auntie lifestyle.

so it’s no surprise that i need a damn budget.

my budget journey started about five years ago when my partner lost her job and we were living on a single income with no real savings. once we started to budget out of necessity, we quickly learned that we didn’t need as much money as we’d thought. money had just been pouring out of our bank accounts like water.

our lives changed dramatically once we started giving every single dollar a purpose. since then we’ve eliminated our credit card debt, started aggressively saving and bought our first home. today, even if my businesses don’t earn another dollar, we’ve built a lifestyle where my partner’s income can pretty much sustain us. plus, we have a fully loaded emergency fund sitting in a money market account.

all of this allows me to sleep at night knowing i’m jumping into entrepreneurship with a solid financial plan in place. living on a budget has helped to finance my dream.

Monetized My Passions

i shared in the previous youtube video all of my 2019 side hustles that helped me to earn $36,000. my side hustle income continued to grow this year because i wholeheartedly believe in monetizing my passions. what do i mean by this? well it’s simple.

monetizing my passions means that i’ve found a way to get paid to do things that i love. i’m not pigeonholing myself, and i’m actively pulling down multiple streams of income.  that’s the beauty of being a full time entrepreneur in our new freelance economy. i don’t have to be any one thing, but instead can put all of my skills to work for me.

currently, my buckets of income include:

1. equity consulting with organizations seeking to execute their mission through an anti-racism lens. since the pandemic, this has included a fair amount of meeting planning for non-profits and membership organizations who have had to shift to hosting virtual conferences.
   
2. partnerships with brands that i love for a social media and/or blog features. 
3. the 21-day happiness project is my passion and one of the income streams that i’m excited to grow in 2021. currently, i host workshops, masterclasses and sell my downloadable toolkit. i’m looking forward to creating products next year and expanding my vision even larger.

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i wrote this post almost as a diary entry to track how far i’ve grown and where i’m headed. however, i hope everyone reading this also gains valuable insights about pursuing your passions. people have asked if i’m nervous, and the answer is not one bit. i don’t believe in saving my faith for fear. instead, i’m off to soar into the next chapter of my life.

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