How I Pursue My Dream with Kork-Ease x Zappos
Sponsored by Zappos . All opinions are my own.
Starting a blog was one of the best decisions of my life. What started off as a hobby has now become my dream job. Today, I'm stepping into a pair of Kork-Ease Nara from Zappos and sharing how I manage to pursue my dream. These are my favorite walking sandals. The leather straps are soft, the sole is padded and they are very flexible overall. Having sensitive feet, these are amazing for lots of walking because the inner sole is like walking on air!
What I am about to share with you is very personal but I think it’s important to share this because I understand that everyone has a dream and everyone's journey is so different but that's what makes it so inspiring.
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Not Your Typical "I quit my full-time job to blog"
My mom really didn't have enough money to help me through college. The plan was to work while going to community college and then apply for federal student aid to help pay for university.
After a couple years of on-and-off community college, I started working at a busy restaurant downtown Seattle. My motivation to finish college got lost along the way... I was making really good money and saw my friends graduate with huge student loans with jobs that barely paid for a living. This isn't your typical "I quit my full-time job to blog" because, to be honest, I didn't really have a career job. I knew very little about what I wanted out of life, but I hungered for more.
How I Started My Blog
Fast forward to end of 2013, I met and fell in love with Leif so what's a girl going to do? I moved to Chelan for him. Chelan is a small lake town 4 hours east of Seattle. Coming from the heart of a busy city, being in Chelan was QUIET. Too quiet. I started this blog as a creative outlet, a few months after I moved to Chelan as a hobby while I was in between jobs. I never read blogs before or knew anything about blogging, so I spent a lot of time on Google - researching how to take photos, learned basic HTML to code my blog, I learned how to edit, how to use Photoshop and Illustrator. This is when I fell in love with blogging.
But my blog still took a back seat.
While I would have liked to earn money from my blog, I honestly didn’t even know that was an option. I needed to make some sort of living and when I found out there was a local tanning boutique for sale, I jumped at the chance to buy it.
I didn't know anything about owning a business or tanning for the matter. I just knew that I didn't want to go back in the service industry and it has always been a dream of mine to own my own business and be my own boss. It was scary to make the decision to buy this business having ZERO experience. I didn’t know what to expect and I was terrified to fail. With perseverance, hard work, studying, researching, tears, frustrations, I was able to simultaneously build both my tanning business and my blog.
Three years into blogging, I was finally able to make a full-time living. I build my salon to the point where I am able to step away and hire employees to work at the salon and moved back to Seattle mid-2017, where I solely focus most of my energy on blogging. I still own the salon in Chelan so on top of being a full-time blogger, I am also a small business owner and have to manage multiple employees and the store.
Pursue Your Dreams
My point in all this is that even someone like me who didn't go to college, lived in a tiny small town, and have nearly no resources (except what's online) can achieve her goals and dreams! In fear of sounding too cliche, no one is holding you back, you are the only one that is responsible for what you can and cannot do.
If I let the fear of failure stopped me from pursuing my dreams, I probably would have never started blogging. And I wouldn't be here. Never again having to work at a job I didn’t love. Never again having to stress about drama at work that I don't care about, or having to work for someone else to determine how much I can make.
Don't get me wrong, blogging has been some of the hardest work I’ve ever done, and it has tested every fiber of my being. I put in LONG hours for years before feeling like I’ve gotten anywhere. But in the end, it is truly what I love and it is all worth it.
#OriginalYou
Whether it's blogging or something else, know that there isn't a special formula. Truth is when you pursue your dreams, sometimes formulas work. Sometimes they don’t. That’s how new formulas are created. That’s how you improve. Be an Originator and create your own formula to conquer your dreams. Be #OriginalYou.
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Kork-Ease Nara
I'd to thank Zappos for encouraging me to share how I tackle my dream in a pair of Kork-Ease.
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