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The first time I told myself 'I love myself' was awkward and unfamiliar. I knew something was wrong with how distant those words felt. That was three years before I would arrive at a defining moment on my journey when I was confronted with the opportunity to meet my shame, disappointment, grief, bitterness, anger, and fear with love. Imagine facing yourself and seeing in you for the first time what was keeping you from unconditional love all the while was you. This was the start of the journey to myself, my journey back to my wholeness, and in doing so I had to begin stripping myself of everything I thought I knew about myself and everything that I thought I needed.
There is so much backstory that would reveal how connected I have always been to the journey of journeys, self-love, but I will leave that for another time. A year later and inspired in a way that I had never experienced before (purpose alignment) I knew that I couldn't keep this peace and unconditional love for self that I had found to myself. On February 22nd, 2022, I decided that I would be a self-love coach. Then on April 20th, 2022, SenterME, my love child, was born. My innerstanding of self-love had deepened and I knew that emotional wellness was the gateway to growing in the largely untapped intelligence of the body and it is by connecting with the entire body that we support our physical and mental health and wellbeing.
I would visit group homes and shelters to volunteer coaching for women and later that year I was delivering my first keynote speech and facilitating self-love workshops at colleges and universities. The imposter syndrome was so real but I was moving from a space of purpose and I can't explain it in any other way than, I just couldn't quit.
There had proven to be a demand for SenterME but by the first anniversary, I felt this conviction that there was more that I could be doing and there was more impact SenterME could make. I like to call the next season of my journey 'failing forward.' Looking back, it was so exhilarating because even though my endeavors weren't working in the way I wanted them to they were doing two very important things every founder would benefit from the most:
I was building my tolerance for failure and in turn, this cultivated the necessary patience needed for the journey to the impact-driven vision of SenterME
I was learning that there were no shortcuts to relationship-building, SenterME needed a community and network that truly believed in it and that takes time.
By the end of the summer, I had begun tapping into the Triangle Entrepreneur ecosystem with one goal, build my network. Before I knew it I was swimming in the uncharted waters of tech and pitching SenterME to a crowd that included two of the most important people in this world to me, my 9 y/o son Caleb and 5 y/o daughter Zola. What a magical journey this was becoming. But SenterME was still very much in the early stages and before I could execute a plan to build this wellness EdTech company I had to educate myself on many different sides of the business, tech, funding, and most importantly finding the right people to surround myself with because one thing is for certain, I couldn't do this alone.
The more I learned, the more conversations I had with the women I serve, and the more clear I grew on what SenterME was to become, at least the start (MVP). Meanwhile, my personal journey was beginning to see the worst parts of entrepreneurship. I was struggling financially and finding a job that would work with my availability being a single mom was not only difficult but added to the disappointment of not receiving one of the dozens of grant applications I applied for.
This is the part where I create space for the gratitude that I have deeply for my family and friends. Without their support, I don't know where in my journey I would be. So many women entrepreneurs are forced out of their dream to share their gifts and passions with the world not only contributing to solutions big and small but making entrepreneurship a more inclusive space as well because they lack the necessary support systems for this journey.
There is this narrative that entrepreneurship is a lonely endeavor but why when it doesn't have to be? As humans, we are social creatures and our response to the hardships that come with entrepreneurship should mirror our most common response to trauma, social support. Support systems are essential for emotional wellness, entrepreneurship, and the overall quality of our lives. They are the result of abundance behavior such as asking for help, searching for resources, being open to receiving help, and connecting with those who have been where you are and those who are where you are to enrich your perspective of the infinite possibilities of success that await you.
The financial struggles I experienced yielded essential benefits of their own:
I learned to get very creative in budgeting and being honest with myself about what I actually needed vs what was more of a want helped tremendously.
I created a stress management system (emotional wellness best practices) for myself that supported the navigation of financial-induced stress with ease. In other words, I grew more present and solution-oriented. I began moving from a space of abundance as I became more aware of the behaviors of scarcity. Talk about self-awareness improvement.
I began to see more strategically how to build SenterME without financial resources starting with a team.
Moving into 2024 I decided there was no better time than now to get started on building the first-ever platform dedicated to providing emotional wellness and stress relief education and support for women professionals everywhere starting in the North Carolina Triangle region. Now a team of seven passionate impact-driven professionals, we are dedicated to creating a useful, immersive, and inclusive safe space that is diverse allowing each of our members to feel seen, heard, and inspired to redefine success for themselves, exist in true work-life harmony, and experience greater daily fulfillment.
I invite you to follow our #Journey2SenterME as we anticipate a soft launch in May this year and with the help of the RIoT Accelerator Program, our now growing network and community, and our vision to pioneer a transformative wellness approach, unlocking pathways to professional advancement and entrepreneurial success for women everywhere, every day we are destined to win. And when SenterME wins, everyone wins.
To help us, we are always accepting surveys and conducting interviews that will give us more insight into how to best serve women professionals who desire emotional wellness support and growth. We are also searching for wellness professionals to join us in creating immersive and engaging content for the platform such as therapists, coaches, and experts in different areas of wellness that support emotional wellbeing. If you are interested in helping in any of these capacities, email us at info@senterme.com
Thank you in advance for your support and belief in our mission. Remember, wellness is your birthright and self-love is true freedom.