The chapters in our stories are often marked by wins and losses. Getting a new job, getting fired. Getting a life-threatening medical diagnosis, beating it and getting a clean bill of health. Too often, due to a societal expectation of modesty and humility we are discouraged from talking about the risks we’ve taken that led to those ups and downs – because often those risks draw attention to how we are responsible for the outcomes – positive or negative. But those risks matter. Those stories matter. We asked some brilliant entrepreneurs, artists, creatives, and leaders to tell us those stories – the stories of the risks they’ve taken, and we’ve shared them with you below.

Alejandra Carrasco, MD

My whole life, I aspired to be a doctor. It was like a spiritual calling, and since there were no doctors in my family I was forging a new path. It was an exciting, purposeful, and incredibly stressful journey that consumed my childhood, teen, and young adult years. After years of test-stress, completing undergrad, and passing the MCAT, my hard work paid off, and I finally got into medical school. Read more>>

Arizona Graves

Becoming a boudoir photographer! It was the height of COVID-19, I had been laid off from my 9-5 job and our world was on lockdown. I had never used a professional-grade camera before but had always wanted to try my hand at photography. With my newfound spare time I was able to learn and practice at a very progressive speed. I was super nervous to put myself out there and let the world know I wanted to photograph it, but I took the risk and advertised myself. Starting off by taking every session under the sun that came my way (family photos, seniors, lifestyle newborns, etc). Read more>>

Elize Mckelvey

Making a living in the art world means taking risks. You see, I grew up in an artistic family…my grandpa was an artist, and both my aunts and my mom were also artists. Even then, I remember saying that I wanted to go to art school but not to the one that my whole family went to an hour away…I wanted to go to a place 13 hours away…why? Well, I felt I was to shy and that being so close to home I wouldn’t grow…and apprently I could run college cross country and go to art school. (turns out I was the first artist they had on their team!) That was a risk, I was losing out on the connections of the local place and trying something new. Read more>>

Kennedie Byrd

Growing up I was always taught to always have a plan, regardless if the plan was finishing school, getting a 9-5, or even getting a corporate job. But as I have grown through the years, my creative and entrepreneurial side of me, required more and more attention than what I was I giving while I had a 9-5. Quitting my 9-5 job, was one of the scariest decisions I have made in my adult years but it was the best decision I made for my self mentally and financially. Read more>>

Ariana Melendez

Being a professional fighter its you and one other person when it comes down to the fight itself. So its up to me to be confident in my preparation going into the fight. The past year i was faced with a tough decision to either stay at a gym that has helped mold me into the fighter i was at the time or switch to a gym that had more accommodating partners for me to train with that would help me continue to grow and get ready for the tough competition outside the regional scene. Read more>>

Adam Schultz

The biggest life changing risk I have ever took was back in 2012. This was the year I decided to quit my job and go all in on my business. Leading up to telling my boss the news, I spent months and months after my job, working on my business to get momentum. 8-5 at the job, 5pm to midnight on my business. I was completely obsessed with my upcoming venture, I remember there were nights that I couldn’t sleep due to excitement. Read more>>

Ashley Seay

Growing up we’ve all been taught to be careful, look both ways before crossing the street, always be cautious. We are rarely taught to take risks. So when I decided to become an Entrepreneur and business owner I had to learn how to take huge risks! At the time I was a mother of one and I was working a great 9-to-5 job and I was unsatisfied with my life. Read more>>

Alysha Wehunt

When I first decided makeup was my passion (back in 2011) it wasn’t as popular because Instagram was fairly new. There were only a handful of known makeup artists and it didn’t matter how many followers you had. It matter how much you worked at your craft and the genuine relationships you built. So I made the decision to drop out of college in Orlando and move to New York to pursue my dream of being a celebrity makeup artist. Read more>>

Shamel Solomon

The biggest risk that I have ever taken was in 2009, a few months after I had my daughter. During my pregnancy, my doctor had already explained that there was a possibility that she would be born with Sickle Cell Disease and that it could be severe, but we would not know until she was born. She indeed tested positive at birth. The first few months of her living was very traumatic and life changing. Read more>>

Cristina Placyk

When I started my business, I had no idea where to begin. I work in the Medical Field as a Practice Administrator. I have basic knowledge on how to start a business but having an E-Commerce Store is completely different from a medical practice. I consulted with fellow business owners on how to begin. I had to learn the process of opening an E-Commerce Store as well as online marketing to promote my brand. Read more>>

Vanessa Barnes

The biggest risk I have took, is starting a blog from scratch. Taking a different approach by focusing on transparency with the consumer. There has been a shift in the last decade, of what’s being marketed and sold to the consumer. The consumer has more say in what type of products they like. This would eventually lead into starting a small business. Which I had never intended on doing. If I never started blogging, it wouldn’t have lead me to where I currently am period. Read more>>

Karen Larrea

The biggest risk I have taken as a woman over 40 is to restart my career in the entertainment industry. I never thought that I would be given the chance and cast on a hit Reality TV series on a major streaming service as HBOMax after 40 years old! I have shifted my full focus into being given this second chance to inspire women to go after their dreams no matter their age and circumstances. I am carving my way also as TV and event host along with building my brand aligning myself with major companies. Read more>>

Nieshia Crawford

Everything meaningful in life begins by taking some sort of risk. The risk could range from something small to something grand, but if you look back on the big milestone moments in life that you’ve experienced I’m sure you’ll find something that you were afraid to lose at the core. My risk came with my career. I was 28 years old and holding the biggest title I’d ever garnered at a prestigious PWI in Atlanta as Senior Audio Visual Technician. Read more>>

Paolo Jay Agbay

The biggest risk that I’ve taken in my life would be my current situation as a business owner of my photography service. When I started learning the art of photography I did not expect it be sustaining me full-time as a career. At first, it was a hobby that I enjoyed with my iPhone, but now I am making a living off of this art. There have been many ups and downs of my journey and there still is, but in the end of the day, I remind myself that this is only the beginning of my journey. Read more>>

Amy Taylor

Honestly, now 10 years into my profession as a photographer, I started to lose my passion. Life Happened so quickly and before I knew it, my fire was out. I was TIRED. Our personal lives play a big factor in how much drive we have and sometimes damage flows into the career we’ve built for ourselves. I had been in the same enviroment., around the same people and life just wasn’t adding up anymore and neither was picking up a camera. Read more>>

Janel Nichole

“Sometimes you have to risk everything for a vision only you can see.” The biggest risk I ever took was leaving my full time 9-5 to put my all into my business. It was a very scary thing, I’ll admit. I remember how I felt leading up to the decision. I went back and forth asking myself was I ready and would this be the right thing to do. After sitting on this idea for awhile, I had to realize there was no such thing as the “perfect time”. Read more>>

Fajr DeLane

A time when I had taken a risk was when I decided to go after my education. In high school, I had heard about the Bill and Melinda Gates Millennium Scholarship and found out ways to be an ideal candidate. Throughout my high school experience I was involved in a lot of various activities, community projects and services that gave back to the community. I worked hard in my classes and developed my business “F^3: Fun. Fit. Fabulous.” Read more>>

Ambika Thiagarajan

The conventional everyday life scares me, a life build around routine, pattern, and winding down the day being happy with everything that I had planned being done. I would rather everyday be some type of risk in itself, an unexpected adventure, not abiding by rules set by society, not caring about a particular plan but instead working with my heart. Read more>>

Tatiana Skroskis

Initially when I was going to go to college I was going to pursue law, and intuitively something told me to just go to art school. In life, like many people I was always torn on taking a “responsible” path versus taking an expressive one. I went to art school and graduated, and life did not pan out the way I was hoping for my plans for becoming a celebrity photographer and artist. I began to surrender instead of resisting and ended up going what I felt “off course”, which then later on I would understand that the universe would be granting me my “Eat, Pray, Love” moment to find myself amidst feeling like I was failing myself, others and my purpose. Read more>>

 

Rajam Roose

Creating the San Diego Pain Summit (SDPS) was a huge risk. I didn’t have any prior conference management experience and the topics I wanted to host just weren’t widely considered important in the clinical world of healthcare. I felt it important to have talks on viewing pain through a biopsychosocial framework. It seemed talks around this concept were largely ignored at clinical healthcare conferences. I felt (and still feel) really motivated to try and make a difference in how pain is managed. Read more>>

Laura Perkins

I took a big risk when I chose to start photographing bachelorette party sessions several years ago because when I started doing them it had never been done before. There was not even a niche for it, I had to create one! I decided what style of photos I wanted to produce (unposed, in the moment, unstaged, etc.), and then I teamed up with bachelorette party planners to reach wedding couples looking to have this experience. Read more>>

Jordan Marcotte

I would say that our whole career is built on risk. Music is what brought us together but a lot of work and dedication has been what’s kept it alive. Before we got married, we both had our own version of what music looked like in our lives. We had dreams and desires and I’m not sure we ever imagined that starting a band with our spouse was something either of us thought would happen. Read more>>

Reyna Sandoval

Starting Sauvvy was a huge risk. I let all of the negative reasons why it wouldn’t work get the best of me but once I let that goI was able to move forward with my dream. This was the third attempt at building a boutique and I was honestly terrified that it wouldn’t work and no one would take me seriously. I was in a rough season of my life and I just figured it was all or nothing. I knew that if I didn’t start Sauvvy now, it probably wouldn’t ever happen. It was me vs, me and I decided to put my head down and get work. Read more>>

Natalie Martin

Being in a band is an amazing thing, but never thought it was the right path for me. I always heard that “bands break up, solo artists break down,” and I knew right away which one of those fates would best suit me. I’ve broken down plenty of times, and I always manage to get myself back together, whether through reinvention or sheer determination. On the other side of that coin, among the dozens of bands I’ve been in, none of them have ever gotten back together after breaking up. Read more>>

Patrick Jones

A big risk I’ve taken was moving back to Houston, Texas from Greenville, South Carolina with no hearing aids…moved back to South Carolina after the passing of my grandfather and then eventually moved back to HTX late summer 2019. I first moved to Houston, Texas June 2017 while only knowing 3-4 ppl from the city. My cochlear implant processor (An advanced hearing-aid for the deaf) broke few months before the Hurricane Harvey happened. Read more>>

Markeisha Samuel

Who has a wig cleaners? When I first started networking, I heard that question repeatedly. Even the words “wig cleaners” always had a question mark at the end of it. When I came up with the idea of creating a wig cleaners, I knew it was an out of the box idea but that is one of the reasons why I did continue down the path of getting my business off the ground. Out of the box thinking is what was needed in this industry but comes with a lot of risk. Read more>>

Ana Quincoces

As someone who has always sought control in all aspects of my life, giving up a 20 year career as a lawyer was a huge risk. Something I never imagined I would do. While being a lawyer is something I’m very proud of, it is only one facet of who I am. I knew that if I didn’t take the risk to launch my Skinny Latina brand, I would live to regret it. Read more>>

Morga Honeycutt

The most important risk that started it all was the risk of MHA’s first year. Magnolia Heritage Academy was a thought for me for about 2 years prior to an actual opening. I just couldn’t get it off the ground because God’s timing wasn’t aligned yet. 1st year there was a church ready to house us but then the following year the pastor took a call and I lost the location. It was a scary place to be not knowing if MHA would ever become “real”. Read more>>

Irma Barbee

I didn’t know what the next 10 years were eventually going to mean to my family as our moving van drove away from our hometown of Visalia, CA to join the urban sprawl of Houston TX. We were coming over to join a church planting vision, what I call the “boat” that shipped us from there to here. In tug was our pre-teen son, a teenage daughter, and an about-to-be-an-adult son, who all insisted we were ruining their lives at the time. Read more>>

Laurence McElrea

Over the years I have taken many risk. Most of the time the risk have paid of for me, however there have been times when I have been scammed or lost money. When this happens you just have to pick yourself up, keep moving forward, and learn from your mistakes. I found out there is a lot of risk when trying to get into the Movie/Animation industry. If you don’t know anybody in the industry, there are a lot of scammers out there looking for people like you and me. Read more>>

Susan Jenkins

I am a self-taught jewelry maker. My motivation and passion has always been about reducing waste and finding interesting, unique ways to reuse and/or repurpose items that end up in the trash. Because I am an avid cyclist, I was very concerned that I was irresponsibly adding to the landfill with my discarded tire tubes. After awhile I started collecting everyone’s tire tubes knowing that I could do something with them. Read more>>