Girl Gang the Podcast
Girl Gang the Podcast
Cassie Ebner, Palo Santo Studios
On this week’s episode of Girl Gang the Podcast, I interview Cassie Ebner, Founder of Palo Santo Studios (@palosantostudios).
Thanks for tuning into the podcast. My name is amy[inaudible] and I'm a creator and collaborator based in Los Angeles and the founder of Girl Gang, the label.com. We encourage the aspiring highlight, the doers and most importantly get real about the highs and lows of female entrepreneurship. Get ready world. The future is here and she's a boss. Hi, I'm Cassie, founder and owner of Palo Santo Studios. And you're listening to the podcast. I feel like I often don't know exactly what to say about my studio because it encompasses so many different things, but I've sort of labeled it in a few different ways. Uh, sales and creative collective, a wholesale showroom and all inclusive showroom, a creative space where brands can sort of bridge the gap between what they're creating and reaching the audience that they want to be selling to. What made you want to get into that specifically? I actually went to school for art and design and towards my later years since I had decided to stay in Los Angeles, I jumped right into internships and I worked for Disney. I was at the very bottom of the totem pole. I'm in an art department and I worked in production for quite some time and I realized that it was not the environment for me. It was very stressful. There wasn't validation, there wasn't this feeling of connecting the dots that happened for me and I thought, you know what? I've always loved fashion. Let's just jump into it. So I got an internship for a wholesale showroom, which was a world it didn't even know existed. I just went shopping. I had no idea how brands got there and I learned this whole secret back door to the business where there were these people who were sort of like agent who place an actor in a movie. They would place brands into stores. This sort of world of booking brands was so interesting to me. I ended up staying at that agency for seven years. That's where I learned everything I know about the business. I took my creative eye from design and fine art school and I started realizing that the brands that were performing the best were the ones who had the right assets. When I first started in the wholesale world, you could sell product if it was a good product and you had a white background product photo, fast forward five or six years, even the buyers were so inundated with instagram imagery and pinterest and that feeling of scrolling through something really aesthetic that they no longer wanted to buy in the traditional way is that they had prior, they wanted to be stimulated like a consumer, so I went to the owner of the company and I asked for an opportunity to take a test run. What if we took a brand who wasn't performing, who is in the negative, and we rebranded them. What if we did their lifestyle photo shoot? We put together, they're lying cheat. I called it my friend who is a photographer. My sister was a model. I was a graphic designer and we sort of bootstrapped and we took a tiny budget and we took a brand that was making negative dollars and that quarter it was their highest performing quarter that they had ever had in the history of the brand. I mean, it was undeniable that the second you put an identity there, it worked and they made money. I knew that there was this missing link and we could do it. We could make all of the things they needed to be successful. It was perfect. So I went to the owner and I made a creative proposal. Why don't I open this branch? I do all the creative. My assistant who had been assisting me for over three years and could easily handle sales. She could do the sales, let's do this. Unfortunately she wasn't interested in having a business partner, so I unexpectedly parted ways and that's amazing. Yeah. So, um, there were people around me that had always said you should be doing your own thing. You have all the connections, you've all the context. But I remember one of my best friends, tyler sitting at his old apartment at the dining room table years ago, and him saying, what do you want to do? And I said, what do you mean I already have a career? I'm so happy. He said, well, you know, like what do you want to really do with your life and in your work, how do you want to evolve? And I said, I want to work for someone forever. I don't want the responsibility of working for myself. Fast forward, I was sitting in that office and I with her and she said no, and I just thought I have to walk. Then I just have to do my own thing. But thankfully I had a really supportive system of people around me who after I had found that niche, there were people around me who were asking me to do it and we're like my friend Alisandra who had been an office manager there as well at the past agency. She was making the websites and she kept telling me, let's just do this. So we had kind of been operating as like this freelance creative program for the past six months without even realizing it. And we'd even put a name to it and I didn't realize we called it CNA because I was cassie and she was all a song rush and we. That was just how we referred to our project to keep our sanity and I was working from setup till sundown to do my full time job and do these side projects and we collected these clients and so when that day came and I had to leave, I realized I had already started my own business. It was already there. I had already been doing this. Dyad exceeded the learning opportunities there and that's my fault for not pushing forward and that was being complacent to not realize my growth had had stopped so all the stars were aligned and that's something actually always tell my brand's designers' clients. The time when successful calm is when all your stars align, but you have to push and shove them into place and do a lot of work to get them there, but that's how it will feel when it's right. It's right. That's amazing that all that stuff was set up and it sounds like you guys just really had an underground creative community almost in a more mainstream part of the industry. You were disrupting it in a way is how I would describe it. And so you guys already cultivated that community? Yeah, absolutely. All of these people not only were really talented what they were doing, they also had followings on instagram. What was crazy to me is a world that I had never really cared about because I was so inundated in it, like I was so in it. I never cared about people's status or how many followers they had or what they did because that was my everyday life. Everyone just had that opportunity. Why aren't we using this for business? This is what everyone wants. They want an audience to sell to, they want to create and they want to all come together and work with their friends. And so that's what we did. And all the Saundra ended up dropping out because she, um, instead of doing websites, decided to open her own business. That also forced me to say like, okay, let me take a look at my identity, will let me decide like, what do I want my business to do and what do I want it to be called? In that moment I was searching for what my business would encompass and I knew it was going to be creative the day that I was thinking about what I would name my company, there was a designer who I briefly cross paths with her and she just happened to come into my life that day and she gave me a bundle of Palo Santo and said, here, I want you to have this, and I turned it over to the back and I had a little note from her that said, when you burn this, it releases all negative energy. It clears a space and it creates opportunity for creativity and growth and evolution. And I thought, Huh,
Speaker 2:Holy Shit. Like that's what I talk about. Stars align and you just have to star fall in your lap. Like the name by the way. Yeah. So I named it that that day.
Speaker 1:So that day I emailed the lawyer I want, I want this email, my accountant, let's do an s Corp. Everything was done. So I lEft my job. I get put in my notice at the beginning of march, my last day there was March 30th and then my business was incorporated as an s corp April 15th.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh. Just got. Yeah, and then I moved into my office in may. Oh wow. Okay. So it happened very quickly, but it was.
Speaker 3:I mean it probably seems quickly from the moment that you decided the name and really committed to this and open doors, but that this had really been a few year process at least sometimes you just need to get stuff done and you got to work instead of just saying, oh, maybe one day I'll just get a part time job on the side and wait till I figure out what I want to do. You have thoSe tough conversatIons and I think that's what we all should be having. Even if we are happy with where we're at, it's saying, what is my identity? Almost making a mission statement for yourself, figuring out what else can I do? It just opens up your eyes to what's right in front of you.
Speaker 1:There were a few people along the way that had to really push me, you know, it is a really beautiful story to kind of look back and say, oh, everything fell into my lap. It all fell into place and it really does feel like it happened that way, but if I think back there was how they're from one of the brands who still one of my clients now, and I remember she called me and she said, you need to leave. You need to go and you can do this. entrepreneurs take risks and they jump off cliffs and everything will be okay. What is the worst thing that happens? You can't pay your rent. Fine. Move out. Sleep on my couch. You don't have kids. You don't have a mortgage. Do it right now because it's the last time you're gonna be able to do it. And I started crying. I said, I don't want to do it because I wanted to stay and I didn't want to have to try to blaze my own trail. I was safe inside of a salary. I was so scared to leave that security and by taking that risk and taking that leap and by creatively fulfilling myself, I, you know, increased my profitability tenfold just as I do for My clients and my brands.
Speaker 3:You didn't go into it thinking I'm in a triple the salary. You went into it thinking I might have to sleep on a friend's couch. I might have to do this. I mean even cory and I lived at my parents' house for three months. The first place we ever lived my parents house, but it was because we wanted to be creating. I wanted to keep my business going. I wanted to get to la from san diego and to me it wasn't even a sacrifice. There's people out there willing to help you and your process of figuring out who you are and what your purpose is in life. Just jump. Why not? And I also have to say that I was working with a spiritual life coach at the time who had been guiding me for a 30 day period. I had done a program with her and when I first started with her, her intention through the program was for me to ask for a raise and by the end of those 30 days that I had been working with her, we. She was with me in that time when I said, oh my god, I have to leave my job
Speaker 2:and let's just say you've got the race. Sometimes
Speaker 3:festing, we're so focused on a specific thing like, oh, I would like to make more money at my job, and then all of a sudden you're like, wait. I definitely manifested all best. It's just not what I actually pictured, but so much better person.
Speaker 1:I, yeah. If I look back, there was a point where I was sitting with this spreadsheet, a financial spreadsheet and I thought my bills are higher than what I make, what the fuck am I going to do? And then fast forward it was holy shit. I have my own business.
Speaker 2:I guess it's what I had to do. The bills are paid
Speaker 1:good news, but yeah, to be. I mean, to be honest, I went into tons of debt and I don't regret it because that's what lit a fire under me in order to start this business. If I didn't have that financial, that really high level of responsibility of increasing my financial stability, I don't know that I would have left that comfort zone. I would have thought everything's paid, everything's fine, we can go on as usual, but I thought I have to do something. I have to make more money. Like I need to pAy for my, my living that. I mean it's just a necessity so that that necessity level was very high for me. I had to do it and I had to find a way and if someone wasn't going to give me a raise then I was going to start hustling on the side. I was going to start making stuff happen and that kinda had been my mentality my whole life. And if I think back, even when I had my internships in college, I was working at a cupcake shop and babysitting in order to pay to be doing an internship that I felt could lead towards a career. And so I always kind of had that bootstrap mentality of like, cool, I can't pay my car payment this month. Get tO sell all my clothes, like going to work at a tanning salon. I'm going to do whatever I have to do. And I think that really hasn't changed. So right now I'm definitely on a spiritual journey of finding a really beautiful balance between having things and not needing to have them. Like I can have this business without a deep seated fear of losing it all. I can work with creative people and feel fulfilled and help these brands and gain more monetary success without the fear of what if they leave me? What if I add at the end have nothing? There's so many thoughts that come in everyday for me of what is this all stops? What if I'm not right? What if, what if I can't help people? And so my Journey now is to sort of take away those extremes and constantly just realigned myself and just follow what has allowed the stars to come into place for me in the past. And I feel like that is constantlY finding teachers. I always want to learn. I'm always taking classes, whether it be in design or you know, listening to seminars or personal finances. I'm constantly trying to learn and be a student and that in turn makes me humble and helps me connect better wIth my clients. And there's a whole branding method to my own company. So I have to constantly brand myself and make sure that my company is gaining more clients and getting more brands and onboarding the right type of people. Because part of what I do in the wholesale realm is a curation of brand. If I bring on a brand that isn't successful, isn't ethical, isn't, doesn't have a good sell through for stores, they're no longer going to trust me. And then my connections are worthless. So you know, free people is going to come to each season and say, what are your best selling items? What brands are you pushing and believing in and you know, I can't come to the table and, or if I came to the table and had 50 different brands and said here's 50, like take a shot at it, they're not going to trust Me either. So it's this really delicate balance of not overloading myself with work and not taking on too many projects, but making sure all of them really do mesh. Like what yOu were saying earlier when it feels like you're forcing something and it doesn't feel right. I've turned doWn clients when I just know it doesn't feel right for my company. This isn't gOing to progress me. I'm going to have to use a fifth brain to focus on this project because it's not in line with everything else I'm doing. So I think focus, alignment, learning and just trusting
Speaker 2:so much trust. What's
Speaker 1:that process been like to curate the brands that you have? Um, I would say the first six months of work I said no to nobody. I had to pay my billS. Yes. I was scared. I was excited. Um, I was in survival mode after six months and I finally had a stable client list going and I had an aesthetic that it was upholding and I had a mission that I was pushing forward. Then it was sort of interesting how so many brands came out of the woodwork and wanted to work with me and I really, the hardest thing was to say no, but I know that it served me correctly because I refused to take on a brand unless I honestly wholeheartedly believe that I can make them more successful and help them increase their profitability. I do not want to take someone's money if they're not going to get a return on it, they don't care to just be throwing their money at a traditional agency and saying, okay, I'm basically just buying contacts or that's, I could be wrong, but that's my interpretation of it. It's really a rolodex is the
Speaker 3:best thing they have because you're outsourcing for the photo shoots, you're doing all this other stuff. They come here to reimagine who they are. Oh, I love that. I've never said that, but I love that. That's really what I'm doing and everyone's that I look at. It's aside from your studio, I follow all the brands that you ever post about or anything. Oh, I love them and I'm really excited to get my wolf circus because I just ordered yesterday really excited. But um, all of them just have a very similar aesthetic in their storytelling. It just feels so authentic. And like year at every touch point, you know, it's not just like, okay, here's this brain slap on this color palette that's trendy. Let's give them all these buyers lists at nordstrom and free people in everywhere. Let's see how high they can fly or how low they are going to go. It seems like you are a part of every single brand. You personally, every single brand that comes through here. So I think that that's super impressive to people to do that scale and still have that and figure out other people that are working with you that have that same mentality so you can just trust others. The work is all very aesthetically pleasing and all aligned. I'm going to need you to do some freelance copy for my studio because I love everything that you're saying, but yeah, I absolutely love it. And just even being in here it seems you can tell they're different brands, but there's just something that's all the same about them. Thank you. And I love that.
Speaker 1:I think that I would define the thread between them as they're all minimal and design. I think there's is elegance and simplicity and I didn't make up that quote.
Speaker 3:Definitely said by somebody else we're going to put on our instagram, but I do think that all of these
Speaker 1:and there's a respect that ideal of that less is more and simplicity is harder than you think. So it's letting the product speak for itself. And an a new term that I've been using is mystic and I've touched a little bit on spirituality and I think it's because it's really hard in my opinion, to operate in the materialistic world and still stay centered and grounded. And so I think it's really special to work in an industry that is, um, for me predominantly my brands are in the fashion realm and so it's a really interesting space to navigate when you want to be grounded and you want to be centered. And I love brands like cam and magic and manifest in those brands that I'm working with who have this mystic quality to them. They know there's another layer to lIfe, but they can still have fun and have a beautiful fashion brand that's trend driven and be really relevant in the space without abandoning their ideals. And that sort of how I feel as a female business owner is doing what I need to do to get shit done but never abandoning my ideals and my ethics. Will you explain what we were doing again tonight? I don't want to butcher it tonight. What we're going to be doing is, um, I believe it's called a kundalini Korea session, which is a manifesting session and it's a breathing meditation exercise that focuses on manifesting. And then there's a brand called muse bath that's owned by a woman named kristin. And she actually is going to be, I'm doing a misting ritual where she has charged crystals and mixed different essential oils and natural elements. It sort of just helps you to focus and to me the sort of things are tokens. Like it's a good way to remind yourself of what do you want, what are you moving towards?
Speaker 3:So for something like today I gathered crystals, some shell, some sand, some blood orange juju, put it in a bag. And when we were leaving to come over here I thought it's so funny that I'm. I like spent my time getting ready. I love my new vintage pants I got and these slip ons I got. But really the most important things that I hold a value are these things in my hand which are sand and rocks and soil. And so I think it's finding that balance of being such a lover of the fashion industry, wanting to be a part of it, wanting to be a consumer in it, wanting to have a branding agency, but also figuring out how to be in touch spiritually, that it doesn't control you. And even for people that are in fact aren't in fashion, but just being an entrepreneur in general, not putting so much weight to money and because it will come if you let it go and you're just true to who you are. But I just love that moment today, like going through my little designer stuff to pick out what I'm wearing and thinking if I needed to sell all this stuff tomorrow, I wouldn't care. But if I lost these rocks or sandra oils, like I would just be devastated. Like these are the things I hold a value, but I want to be a consumer and a part of this world. So yeah, I think it's a very interesting dance and being able to figure out a way to monetize it ethically is something not a lot of people have been successful. And you're doing very well with that.
Speaker 1:Thank you. I love everything you're touching on because I think there is this bigger topic of doing it all. You know, like there's an app I love called headspace. I can be a busy person and I can use technology to help me tap into something. And actually disconnect and to connect with myself and so there is a way to have it all. Like I have an incredible boyfriend who I love and I spend lots of quality time with yet I work, you know, plenty of time and keep my business moving forward. I think that there's all of these ideas that you can't have it all and maybe you can't have it all at the same time or in the exact way that you imagined. But I mean today I took off my chanel shoes, did my sound bath and walked in the ocean in malibu, you know, before I started my day and still got everything done that I needed. You know,
Speaker 3:we're setting up here. You're like, I hope you don't mind. I'm doing emails. I'm just like, oh my gosh, this is making my heart so happy. What I want is someone that's just just got back from malibu, needs to do emails up until the exact moment we start recording. So yeah, I think it's not having it all. It's just figuring out if we figure out what's important to us and we're willing to put in the work of the things that make us happy, deep rooted. The surface level stuff sometimes follows and as long as we don't attach our identity to it, money is entered.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it'll absolutely. It'll come. It'll go
Speaker 3:when you trusted, it'll come
Speaker 1:back instead of putting so much weight and like, oh, this is all I am as a human is the number that's in my bank account as a business owner. Like being a business owner I think is such a back burner to whatever you want to do. That's creatively fulfilling. I mean, I've struggled with my identity a lot. For awhile. I would say it was an entrepreneur because I owned a few businesses, but I didn't identify with an entrepreneur mentality and more recently in the last few months I've. I guess I've done what you did. I'm trying to rebrand myself and figure out what's my mission and I just say I'm a creator and collaborator and if someone wants to further discuss that I can talk about brands I own or this podcast I'm doing, but I just, I think business, entrepreneurship, all these things that we should be so proud of also have these negative connotations of you can only be successful depending on what's in your bank account and that's not necessarily creatively fulfilling. So yeah, absolutely. It's a journey, man. Yeah. Interesting that you, that we got into the money topic because you and I had actually gone to that seminar previously which was about personal finance, um, specifically targeted to women about just focusing on investing and budgeting and balancing. And I'm definitely on my journey of learning how to possess money and not have many possessed me. But I think, you know, putting together a spreadsheet and having to sit down and look at like, okay, this is what's coming in. This is what I'm allocating towards savings. This is what I'm allocating towards fun money. This is what I need to pay my bills and flowing energy towards responsibility. I mean, I've literally looked at my spreadsheet because I've been. I've been in the middle of the night. I had a panic attack and been like, oh my god, how am I going to pay my bills? And then I sit and I think, okay, well don't I pay a few bills, update my spreadsheet and see how it feels and I'll go through a pile of mail and I'll find a check for the exact amount of money that I needed because I took responsibility and I put the energy and the attention there. It's just like if I were to decide that I really want to increase my heart health and cardiovascular and if I put attention there and I went to the gym five days a week, it probably would achieve that. so it's kind of the same mentality. If you keep putting attention there and flowing energy towards it, you know, it's very possible you're going to achieve what you, what you want to do.
Speaker 3:I'm so, I'm so happy you brought up the talk that we went to because a few things they touched on there that are very specific to business owners and females especially, I think that's so important is how women don't talk about money a lot. If you're making too much of it, you don't want to be bragging if you're making too little, you're ashamed. And so therefore that might be one of the reasons there's such a, a wage gap, all these things because a lot of men are just people with more masculine energy feel and I feel like I'm touched into some masculine energy and I feel that for you too. So I think we're okay taking ownership of and like proud of financial success and can talk about it, but not everyone has that energy in them. And so, um, it's just not being talked about. And instead it's just this like deep, dark secret. I just picture someone like alone, like in their closet looking at their phone number, you know, having their panic attacks because we can't just talk about it like it's a separate entity. It's not who we are. It's just, hey, can I get some advice? I really want to be making more money. I'm just laying it out all out here. This is my situation. I want to get it to here. Cassie, do you have any advice to get me there? We don't really have those conversations as women in business and I think it's definitely holding us back for our individual potential. Absolutely. Yeah. I want to celebrate at the highs and the lows. Those are both people can help you when you're on a low and If you're on a high you can use that instead of not talking about it. You can use it as a tool to help other people get higher. But um, well I think we can parlay that. Okay. That actually
Speaker 1:into an even bigger topic, which I would say as business advice is learn how to talk about everything. No, there's no topic that makes me uncomfortable. I can talk about sex, I could talk about money, I could talk about loss, I can talk about gains. And that was a really long journey for me because I was playing, I respected authority, I wanted to be liked, I cared what people thought about me. And it took me a really long time before I got to a place where I was like, if I hold something in that hurts me, if I don't talk about this or learn or give myself the opportunity to gain more knowledge about it, I'm never going to progress. And so as just a human being, but also as a business owner, the best thing I think you can do, you know, with, with restraint, because you have to be careful who you talk to, but I think be able to talk about anything and that's going to open so many doors for you. And um, I think someone like shelby who works with both of us, um, who is just really incredible at networking. I think it's that idea of putting yourself out there, being able to talk about anythIng. She'll let the people over here at[inaudible] house and suddenly she's like, I have an interview tomorrow and I'm working with three companies that I'm doing all this amazing stuff. And I'm like, yes, that's what everyone needs to be doing. Like talk about it, make connections. People want to be connected with other people. And so I think a lot of us believe like, you need to do x, y, z in order to have a business you need to work somewhere for 20 years before you can get a raIse or whatever these old ideas might be that are in place, which I totally held to as well prior to kind of breaking free of that mentality. Um, but I think there's a lot of people, not just women who don't know that You can do whatever you want right now. Um, I did read a really amazing book by kelly cutrone, I think it was called, if you have to cry, go outside, which I hate the title, but something that was really amazing in that book was that she had quit her job at a pr company after only being there for a few months. She left with the client and she said that her first event that she did, she totally fucked up. And from that moment she said, a recommendation I have for everyone is anything you want to do, work for somebody else for two years, become an expert at It, and then go to your own thing. I waited a little bit longer and I got into my seven, but I definitely would say there's shame in learning how to do something. Once you've got it and you're an expert at it, go on and do it. Being an expert doesn't mean you know everything. It just means you're good at something. You're constantly still gonna have to learn. And like, that's been something that I've been talking about during this podcast is I'm still learning every day and growing and being open to things. Technology is changing rapidly. Consumers are changing every 30 seconds. I mean it's, it's, I'm constantly chasing, but I don't mind it because my mindset is that I'm a student and if I were in this sort of stagnant or static behavior of this is how things are and that's how they're always going to be. I'm not going to succeed being, you know, a business owner, you have so many opportunities to change your lens for how you look at things. And so if I decide the days are for work, I'm going to learn, I'm going to expand, I'm going to evolve and to grow, I'm going to do all these things. I'm never gonna feel hindered or held back or frustrated. And I think when I first sort of launch on my own, I had this idea of like, well now I'm my own boss so I can do whatever I want. My clients can't tell me what to do. Nobody can tell me what to do. I don't have to work nine to six and now I've settled into this really beautiful rhythm of. I like having a schedule. I likE being held accountable. I like giving my clients what they want and you know that that operating within that space is actually going to make me feel more fulfilled rather than constantly having to go against a green. So I think positivity is obviously something that has carried me through everything. So I think as long as you're looking through the right lens, you can kind of create any ideal situation within your workplace.
Speaker 3:and then once you take a step back and allow people to teach you, you allow yourself to continue learning and understand. You don't know everything. Those are when the breakthroughs happen. Those are when the exciting things happen. I mean I've instill go in best buy sometimes and try to get student discounts and they asked where I'm a student and I say, well, I'm a student of life just as credible. I'm not giving any university my money anymore, but like I am here on this planet to learn. Has that worked? Anyway? It's worked one time on my most recent laptop. That's amazing. I just think wanted me to leave, but my most recent purchase. But yeah, I think that that's where we really learn. We really grow, but we have to be willing to. And um, there was a lot of scary conversations that happen in there. Things you think you knew about yourself that you don't know, but once you can shut it away, your career and your personal life, you're just more set up for growth because you're accepting it rather than like I'm at. At any version where you, where you start to feel comfortable or that you peek. I say runaway either just like you said earlier, either get into a different department at a current job, go work in a different industry completely. Like do something that's helping you grow because we have to evolve. yeah. I think it was
Speaker 1:lena dunham. I read in one of her lenny letters that she said when she had achieved a certain level of quote unquote success that she thought this would be it, but then she looked into the distance. There was just another mountain to climb and another peak and she realized that any person who is motivated to constantly compete with themselves in a healthy way to achieve and evolve and grow, there's always going to be another mountain to climb and another peak treats and there's never going to be a final top. And so that was really a great place for me to sort of say, okay, it's okay for me to always want more, but also to acknowledge the accomplishment because you climbed a mountain that's incredible. You can give yourself a little break, but there's always another one. Decline.
Speaker 3:When I was writing out my needs for this, one of them was, I don't really want to be making money off of advertising through guests that I'm bringing on shows and having my audience be customers. I want to have my audience have the ability to tap in on a conversation they may not otherwise be able to listen to. Especially people not in los angeles. They don't get to hear people like you tell your story. Um, so one of the things I thought was let's just monetize it through a website and create a line in our mantra and after the first week all of our equipment was paid for, but it wasn't something where I was, I just wanted to put out a feeler and say there has to be another way to monetize a podcast besides advertisements. I don't feel especially right away, anyone that would even want to work with me aligns with my consumers. I want to try to do it advertisement for you, let's see if I can do it. And a week later all the equipment was paid for and then a few weeks later we got to upgrade our equipment and now this one sounds so much better than episode two. It's like I just trusted it. I didn't set expectations like we have to hit it by this point. It just, let's trust the process. I think people will believe in this enough and now we get to be here without a. We're going to stop and talk for a minute. Let's talk about your skincare routine. What do you mean? Wow, thAt's incredible. Congratulations. Yeah, it's just fun, but yet when you just put it out there at sometimes comes back sometimes quickly, sometimes not. But um, I think it's an exciting thing to just put your energy out there and trust the process and not try to fuck with it.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Oh, I love that.
Speaker 3:What is something, either something specifically that's happened or a task that you do and you're getting paid for that you can't really believe as your real life[inaudible]
Speaker 1:a lot of times when I'm on a photo shoot, I'll sometimes I'm become exhausted and think what a long day this is, so labor intensive, what am I doing? And then I think, holy shit, this is my job. I get to be on photo shoots with cute models and sudden photographers and my friend styling it and you know, art directing it and then we spend a few hours shooting photos and then I got all of these beautiful deliverables that are essentially art. I mean, everything that these photographers do and these stylists do it. It's actually art. It's so beautiful. Um, so I think getting to create art is definitely one of the high points of my business and realizing when I'm exhausted by something because they don't even realize that it's work to kind of step back and go, oh my god, I'm at work right now. That's incredible. What are the things that I am most thankful for? And being man, business owner is the opportunity of endless expansion. If I were working for an accessory showroom, we would only carry accessories. If I was working for an apparel showroom that specializes in women's contemporary fashion. That's all you're going to be representing. But for me, I can make those decisions. I want to represent laundray. Let's do it up. One represent watches. Let's go for it. Jewelry. Okay. Ceramics. Yes, let's go. Which is how I ended up actually representIng a beauty and wellness studio, which you actually went to the other day. So one of my clients has ra, which they have a beautiful penthouse location downtown and adorable bungalow in west hollywood love. That's the one I went to. I absolutely loved it. I'm not going to go there for sure. They're basically the fred segal of beauty and wellness. They have these beautiful locations and then they, they opened their arms to the best people in health, wellness, fitness, beauty, and they vet them and they make sure that they're the right fit. So when you go to one of their studios, you know, everyone is of the highest quality and caliber to be doing what they're doing, but it's all under one roof. You can go to the loft and get a luxury haircut, get your eyelashes done, get a mani pedi, get a massage, do reiki healing, do a v steam and do yoga. I mean, you can do it all. And I think that's something that is actually missing, um, in especially the downtown community which is very urban and I actually live and work down here. So it's this urban retreat, such an escape to go somewhere that has this beautiful divine feminine energy. And it's opened up to anyone who wants to come and really deeply explore and nourish their, you know, genuine health and wellness. One thing that I love that we have in common is that we are both tapped into our spiritual essence, but still our business minded. Can you talk a little bit about your journey on how that came to be? I think that I've always been open to the spiritual side of life and connecting to something deeper and more multilayered than the surface of the life that I'm living. I've had many guides throughout my life who have helped me open up to different spiritual practices in different areas of life and become more practiced in manifesting and ritual and I think that one person who's recently been really influential, aside from my astrologer and my manifesting coach and my crystal dealer and my yoga teacher and my brain to have a good dealer for sure, but I would say that kristen from the brand cam, she is someone who always taught me that you don't run after spirituality with a full sprint. You basically ask questions and you inquired and you stay open to it and those things will find. You actually have a beautiful art printed. My room. It's a or an original work from kristen. She held a tea ceremony for me. Kristen and I sat together, uh, about six months before I started my own business and I hadn't really talked to anyone openly about the idea of wanting my business and because it didn't really actually as itself and until those final moments I had said things to her that I hadn't said to anyone about what I wanted and my desires and what I wanted to manifest. And we were sitting tea and she does this beautiful tea ceremony that she's been trained in. We sat together and had three cup silently, which was meditation. And then after that we sort of spoken freely float about all of these hopes, schools and ideals I had. And what I didn't know was that she took the tea leaves from that session, had saved them. And then a year later gifted me a piece of art where she had let the tea leaves sit on top of the paper and spoken to them and create a beautiful work of art that she framed and gifted to me. So now I have that framed to the side of my bed. So every morning when I wake up, I remember to just be grateful for where I am because there was that moment where I didn't even know what I wanted and I just let things be and I asked questions and I put myself out there and everything that I needed found me. so I do think that she's been a really big influence in teaching me. Like, you know, it's just like when you want to start a startup with sport, you get an idea like I want to learn how to ski and you spent a thousand dollars on equipment, you go wants to mammoth and you know, you never ski again. It sits in the garage. You don't want to do that with spirituality. You want to ask questions. And I remember thinking crystals are kind of cute. What is it? What is the deal with crystals? How can I get more into that? And that same week that I asked that question, my friend crystal gave me a crystal, not actually for my house warming gift. And that same week that she gave that to me, my first crystal kristin said, hey, I have a project that we're doing for a photo shoot. It needs these crystals. Could you go to a house of intuition and grab some for me? So here I am now a week later standing at house of intuition. Handful of crystals deciding, okay, I think I'm here. I think it found me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love it. I love how some intuition is actually where I get all my crystals from to the crystal candles. But um, that place I think definitely catapulted me into this spiritual journey specifically. I've always loved jusT collecting rocks. I used to submit my god collections to the ventura county fair when I was in elementary school to like maybe middle school maybe went a little too long or you stopped, like freshman year of high school I was always so drawn to them and thought they were beautiful. And I like just getting lost and studying them, which I think definitely it's just a different form of meditation, but when I started utilizing them as tools later on in learning more about the meanings, I realized that it's not just a rock, it's a symbol of what you want and a constant reminder and you're allowing yourself to put it out on your desk or on your bedside water ever. You want it. You're saying, I welcome this energy and that includes being insecure about something. So if I want to get better at something, I first have to acknowledge that means I'm not as good as I'd like to be at it and now I'm willing to let the energy and the space to get better at it. And I would like this physical reminder.
Speaker 1:Yes. I think that's really important. I would say that I have the almost the exact same mentalities you about it. These are
Speaker 3:tokens. These are symbols. These are ways to create reminders for herself and to aid in meditation and to aid and focus, but there may be magical qualities inside of them, but my practice with them in my belief with them is that their reminders, they are tools and assets that we can use to access what we need, which is actually already inside of us and I love the house of intuition candles so they even have specifically what you're going for on them. So when we want abundance or love the money candle and I'm just like, no shame. I want to turn up this week. Let's light the money candle and just see how hard it burns. But you let your burn all day and night and you don't blow it out. put it in the sink or the bathtub. How do you safely do that? We just put it on our kitchen counter. Do you have any other rituals that you really love that maybe I could adapt because I feel like I have a few things that I do and I love learning more things because the more structure I have today and the more rituals that I do often and put in place, I feel like the more st am and the more successful, oh, I love. Have you read the artist's way or do you know about that book? No, it speaks to people that just have a creative energy and they want to get more in touch with it and let it evolve, and so it's a 12 week course just through a book. I think that book's very powerful and a tool that utilized throughout that is called morning journal. you're just supposed to put down your initial thoughts of the day. One sentence, a bullet point, three pages, whatever you want. She just says through the 12 week program, you have to do this every day and after this, do whatever you want, but answers are going to surface and they did for me, so. Wow, that's incredible. Thank you girl gang for listening to our podcast. If you enjoyed it, please take a minute to leave a review. It helps us out so much to learn more about this week's guest and see behind the scenes footage of our podcast. Go to girl gang, the label.com. Enjoy 10 percent off of all support your local girl gang merchandise with code girl gang. If you have any feedback, guests, recommendations questions or just want to say, hey, email me at amy at girl gang. The label.com.
