Inspiration from John Legend + 27 entrepreneurs + VC team

Hi friends,

Welcome to My Business Baby. My Business Baby is a play on words, alluding primarily to the time and effort it takes to grow and nurture an early stage business into maturity while also making sure women know that they have the right to succeed in any way they want this world, whether that be family building, community building, culture building, or business building, and all the tools to do that, well… it’s our business, baby.

• Recap about me here or here, I’m building this.

• & now channeling thoughts into this newsletter (the one you’re reading)

  • Feel free to forward to a friend who can sign up here

• This edition is heavily inspired by:

  • Slauson & Co’s fund and team, the 26 other entrepreneurs in the accelerator cohort and speakers, Shaka Senghor and John Legend.

• Suggested soundtrack for this edition: One Man Can Change the World - Big Sean, John Legend

In mid March, I canceled a phone catch up with a friend because I was flying out to LA the next day. I needed to recenter and mentally prepare for 2.5 days of “extrovert Sheila” (which means trying to avoid awkward Sheila) to meet the investors and founders at Slauson & Co’s accelerator, of which I’m a proud member. Little did I know I was mentally preparing for the wrong thing. I didn’t prepare for the fortune and blessing of walking away with a new sense of belonging, resilience and community.

This newsletter’s edition highlight important reminders, maybe you’ll find it corny; but as adults it’s hard to find honest, aligned, sources of inspiration from someone who isn’t doing it for the likes - the team at Slauson & Co. and John Legend are real sources of inspiration; I was so moved by my 2.5 days in LA I wanted to share it you, with my people. 

The reading below is approximately 8 min reading time.

Peace, love and almond croissants, 

~Sheila

_{ps - mention of a celebrity who has made explicitly harmful comments about certain communities is not an endorsement of their commentary, this newsletter is simply an account of a conversation and the personal learnings that resulted from listening to those conversations}

The important reminders for the busy adult….

1. You belong. Sometimes you don't know you don’t belong until you find the place you do belong. Joining Slauson & Co. has been a lesson in remembering that you should not just let anyone into your journey, do your best to find the right team to have your back. If you aren’t making progress in a business community, move on to try the next one, if you feel that people think your idea is “cute” don’t take it personally. That uncomfortable feeling you feel is an intuition, follow it (aka it’s okay you didn’t belong). When you do find the place you belong, you will feel happy and sad and relieved all in one breath; you will find out later that others in the group feel just as lucky as you feel to have found one another. Stick with those people.

2. Being resilient doesn’t mean doing it alone. If you aren’t making progress in a business community, move on to try the next one. If you feel patronized by a person who thinks your idea is “cute” don’t take it personally, move on to the next person. But building resilience doesn’t mean that you hide yourself, it means that you lean more into yourself, into the right communities, it will arise. Now in my mid 30s I listen to so many of my friends who are doing grand and beautiful things in our communities. In the VC world they say it takes 100 no’s for 1 yes; but then when I hear my friends working on different projects or pitching their ideas to internal or external stakeholders in their fields and get really set back by a single no, I’ve told them more about this VC yes/no process - which it seems they’ve found helpful. Being resilient doesn’t mean keeping your chin up and stashing your idea into a random google drive folder. Being resilient means, continuing to reiterate not just on the idea but on pitching to different stakeholders or communities. Resilience is you doing the work to find the right person or community who sees and feels your vision.

3. Mad respect for your peers can cause a moment of self doubt. When you look around and feel like you’ve accomplished nothing in your life in comparison to the amazing room around you… remember this is normal (for < 24 hours). I felt this among the other 26 entrepreneurs in the Slauson & Co accelerator, but later realized this self doubt isn’t coming from a place of shame or insecurity it was coming from a place of profound respect, honor and pride for a group of peers I’d just met, and I doubted for a moment if I belonged in the room - but I do, we all do.

4. Showcasing an opportunity in order to build a team is not being an opportunist. John Legend attributed his journey to success by leaning into the people who saw the vision and the same opportunity. Kanye was the first person to invest in John as his producer, you could gather that John knew he wouldn’t be where he is today if he didn’t take the opportunity to build with Kanye who saw the opportunity in him, it was mutual respect not mutual opportunism. Learn by building a team of early supporters who believe in you. This brought me back to a quote from The Pivot Year by Brianna Wiest.

5. Share. John Legend reminded us that giving away equity is not a loss of power, it is an investment into the vision and sharing success with those who believe and have faith. This is essential to creating a category defining brand, it is not possible to do without a team. Share the opportunity with your team in meaningful ways, take the initiative to continue inspiring them, sharing takes effort from you.

6. Community shows up in many ways. It shows up in so many ways, but in the sense of being a business owner it is a lonely journey. The tough part is to remember that other communities which show up for you do also care about you, even if they don’t show they care about your company. There are days when a family member or friend refers to your business as a project, unintentionally; it is hard to explain that you enjoy working, and it’s also so hard to explain that you can’t sleep at night until the vision is complete. Just like a single person cannot be your support system for everything in your life, neither can a single community. In America I feel that we’ve been brainwashed to think we can belong in any community because we’re all American. Inherently it’s not true, and in practice we try so hard to make it true. And then we realize it’s most definitely not true when we finally see ourselves in people like us who are aiming for things like us. The right community makes all the difference and provides motivation to achieve the variety of goals we have, and our only goal shouldn’t be our business and other strong communities where you belong will remind you of your value outside your business.

Quick Updates

Sometimes this section will be fact/news/journalism based, sometimes it will be purely my opinion.

Why include this?

Women have never (by societal default) and probably will never (by choice) just care about one thing. We want multiple things, we want to do multiple of the right things, nothing happens in singularity, we are all intertwined, with politics, culture, family, uteruses, hormones, goals and businesses. So below is more that matters.

Literature

The Midnight Library by Matthew Haig - I’m not done reading but it's a nice kindle read b/c most of the chapters are 3 minutes long (yay accomplished something!) but also because the author takes a positivity mindset approach to mental health and wellness, which is usually frowned upon from a clinical sense. Yet from a storytelling perspective, the mindset approach allows you to have greater empathy for those who might be suffering and provides space to consider their perspective during a depressive episode.

Personal Finance

Money Memories - Was fortunate enough to meet the host in LA, I look forward to listening to her unique interview style which discusses a guest’s first money memory and how that has shaped their personal finance story. What are your favorite personal finance podcasts?

Women’s Health - purely a personal (angry) opinion.

The Democratic Party needs to do more to vocalize its plan for reproductive freedom, quack jobs are getting air time for their meaningless support of “appropriate abortion bans”. This framework has normalized their extremism because it is simple to understand. This air time isn’t misplaced, because the right has created digestible talking points that the average American can visualize and normalize. The media is not to blame for these digestible talking points; Biden’s campaign has more than enough money to figure out how to showcase a plan, but I still haven’t heard a single Democrat share a path to reproductive freedom which laymen can understand, digest, and then compare to the right’s plan in order to determine which plan is actually logical, safe, and just. I ran a quick google on “DNC reproductive health and freedom plan” “Biden reproductive health plan” and the top clicks were. Not. It. Nothing digestible for the masses to understand, and more worrisome - some of the top links were right wing propaganda twisting Biden’s reproductive stance.  Any ideas on how to remind the Democratic party they are missing an opportunity?

Feminism and Culture

Check out these three Black female country singers, do any of them resonate with you? 

1. Reyna Roberts

2. Miko Marks

3. Chapel Hart

Black female country artists are getting a boost from Beyoncé’s two singles. I’ve actually been a fan of country since high school, I like the ballads, chords, strumming patterns and the word play that happens in the country. Plus there isn’t another genre that can explain the beauty of Texas.

Although Texas Hold ‘Em has been overplayed, I immediately thought of Lady Gaga due to some similar lyrics in Texas Hold ‘Em and Lady Gaga’s Poker Face, so hoping for another collaboration from both of them on the upcoming album. 

But most importantly, Beyoncé is showcasing that culture permeates - people of color and diasporas have a beautiful opportunity to showcase multiple heritages. We have all the cultures we’ve been born into and assimilated to, to thank for that.

She is reminding the masses, that skin color tells us very little about the way you previously and currently think, believe, feel, give, love, make choices, eat, sleep, and make music. Contrary to popular belief skin color is not a person wearing their experience on their sleeve. That is actually the job of art. 

I don’t want to get too deep into it, as we know art is inspired by our lived experiences, yet there is irony in the backlash to Beyoncé’s country songs. That culture wants so badly, to reign yet it becomes surprised when those that do not look like them have assimilated to said culture and begin sharing their experiences through shared arts (country music). Just let Beyoncé be.

Of course I am not Beyoncé, but what I do identify with is living between multiple cultures, some more magnanimous than others, and appreciating the art within every one of them. Every few months I get, you don’t sound Texan/Indian/Desi, you sound Californian/White; You don’t look Indian, you look XXX (insert any non western European race/country in the solar system).

Just let women be, just let people be, without defending their experience.

If you made it this far… wowza thank you!

I want to thank Slauson & Co’s team, all the other 26 entrepreneurs and of course Shaka Senghor and John Legend (going to pretend like he’s reading this) for creating the space to be ourselves, build and grow.

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