Starting a business or creative project is scary for many reasons, but one that is often overlooked is the anxiety related to whether this is really “the one.” To some, this isn’t a valid consideration while to others this is the only consideration. Some argue that what you work on, along with who you work with are the two most pivotal decisions you’ll make and so we’ve asked folks to tell us about how they came up with their ideas and how they knew this idea was the one.

Carl Leatherberry Jr

It’s kind of weird but at the same time funny, I say that because I was working at a nursing home in Hannibal Missouri at the time in dietary, there was a resident there I can’t recall the name, but one day in the start of my employment I had made some soup, simple vegetables and a “stock. Hoping they would like it ,but not expecting what would happening after serving it. This particularly resident was well known for his out spoken opinions on all the food that was cooked in there kitchen shouted out ” NOW THIS IS SOUP, AND NOT THAT DIRTY DISH WATTER YALL WAS SERVING US ” LOL. Read more>>

Tracy Christian

I’ve never not wanted to have Sante Grace. I’ve been taller and broader than other girls for as long as I can remember – and I was never ok with it. I went on my first self imposed diet at 10 years old. Read more>>

Euan Davis

Was one of those cloudy-overcast, Boston weather days, back in the mid 90″s. Myself and 2 other barbers were sitting around waiting for a cut to walk in. Read more>>

Cameron Carbone

My journey into creating a drum lesson business is quite a fascinating one. It all started when I graduated from TCU in 2014 with a music degree, then moved to Austin in the summer of 2015. I had the opportunity to tour and teach music in local school districts, which was a rewarding experience. But I quickly realized that it was challenging to scale my business, despite the fun and fulfillment I derived from it. Read more>>

Grace Onuegbu

Truthfully, I never intended to start a business. Back in 2018, I had rededicated my life to God after a broken engagement and I was going through many transitions. He placed it in my heart to start a Christian blog where I would help women deal with life stressors and emotional health through biblical principles and practical strategies. Read more>>

Kaitlyn Whitaker

I came up with the idea to start my own business during Covid year, 2020. Everyone was quarantined so I had nothing but time to teach myself something new & I was already in need of a career. The end of the previous year, I had entered a new chapter of my life. I got married and moved out of my hometown state. Read more>>

Michela Parisi

I started the Men’s Mental Wellness Center (MMWC) somewhat unexpectedly based off of the trajectory of my career. Two years ago, I opened Connected Brain Counseling (CBC). CBC is a group therapy practice that specialized in adult women in trauma. While we grew, I became more and more fond of my work with couples. Read more>>

Taylor Glaser

After quitting my full time job at an upscale country club, I was on a mission to create a business of my own. I was really interested in getting into the wholesale market, as I loved the ideas of working with retailers. I also am very creative, so that was how Uptown Blonde was born. About a year before I designed the Discodana, I wore a vintage mesh necklace to a Sam Hunt concert. Read more>>

Aaron MacDonald

My friend, Mike Harris, and I came up with the idea when he retired from the Grand Rapids Police Department. After asking him what he planned on doing he said he wouldn’t mind doing something part time or may be starting a business of some sort. He asked me if I would help him out since I had started a couple small businesses in the past, and of course say Said yes. I asked him what kind of business and he said maybe a nonprofit or something to help kids. Read more>>

Zachary Hartman

In the summer of 2020, during the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, I found myself in a difficult and uncertain situation. Earlier that spring, I had been laid off from my job, leaving me with no source of income. To make matters more challenging, I had recently moved to Nashville and was grappling with various bills, relying on the limited savings I had. Read more>>

Taj Noir

I have been a small business owner since the age of 18. Initially, I started with a boutique, but after relocating to Atlanta alone to pursue my dreams of becoming a successful entrepreneur, I realized that many others were selling similar clothing items. Wanting to differentiate myself, I took a leap of faith and decided to do something unique. Read more>>

Teresa Pante

I get most of my inspiration from the small, everyday moments that surround me, often seizing ideas spontaneously during leisurely walks on the sidewalks, nature, and neighborhoods. During the COVID-19 around 2021, I developed a deep interest in collecting plants for my home and I stumbled upon a Pinterest video tutorial on how to make planters from concrete just from a recycled plastic bottle or soup container. My first concrete planter was made out of a Pepsi bottle and I was so stunned that I could never imagine something so unique and cool can come out from the mold of a recycled plastic. Read more>>

Lisa Foster

As a pediatric physical therapist during the pandemic’s peak, I had the privilege of working with parents and their little ones every day. It was heart-wrenching to see them isolated and relying on our sessions as their only form of social interaction. As a mother, I understand the value of having a support system during the parenting journey. Read more>>

The Gathering Learning Studio

The Gathering started over five years ago, with a restlessness that stirred our (the founder’s) souls every time we dropped off our children at school. We could not explain this restlessness nor understand why we had it. But every day, that “something is not right” feeling crept in. And yet, rather than digging in to figure out what was behind it, we kept going. After all, we had jobs and careers to attend to. Read more>>

Dan Spencer

The journey to creating Audio Sorcerer began with a passion for music and a desire to help other artists take their music to a new level. Ever since I can remember, music has been a powerful, almost magical force in my life. I would spend hours immersing myself in it, dissecting each element and understanding the layers that came together to create it. Read more>>

Gabe Eveland

The idea to start Gabriel’s Christmas started at a very young age. My family always decorated to the nines for Christmas with several Christmas trees around the house, thousands of lights outside, etc. I also had a great aunt who truly embodied the magic of Christmas and instilled much of her love for the holidays in me. Read more>>

Christopher Clark

So shortly after coming off of tour with Rapper Pierre Bourne, I started editing on cap cut because my cousin said you should take a stab at it . When I tried it, Immediately I got the swing of things and was hooked! This was Christmas Day BTW! By January I was making short projects for friends still on my phone, quick lil 15 secs reels and some content for my church . Read more>>

Hetty Pasquazzi

I moved to LA from MA right in time for Covid-19. During lockdown, for the first time in my life, I had to grapple with a world devoid of live arts and entertainment. Prior to the pandemic, I’d been very fortunate in that I had performed nearly every year of my life in some capacity– from school and community theater, to historical narration and reenactment, to improv and standup comedy. Read more>>

Candace Leos Valdepena

In 2019 I made the choice to get involved civically in my hometown of Compton, CA. I had moved away for ten years and when I returned I found myself frustrated with the deteriorating infrastructure and apparent lack of civic engagement in the city. I had never been a political person myself because it seemed to always cause conflict but I found myself curious about how I could actually be a part of the page, rather than just taking to social media and complaining. Read more>>

Jilleo Recio

In 2018, I had the opportunity to live in Singapore. It was an exciting time as I had never lived abroad. My first job in Singapore was at an influencer marketing agency and subsequently, a major music label, where I held roles as a business development manager. Both places of employment required frequent traveling throughout Southeast Asia. Read more>>

Caroline Kent

Mano Made came together naturally from my love of curating spaces consisting of special objects collected from my travels. On every trip to Oaxaca I would add more items to my collection, which would garner attention from friends and family. This jumpstarted the metamorphosis from passion to business. Read more>>

Jamie Galvis

Over the course of my combined seventeen-year career in sales and interior design, I came to realize that my true purpose revolved around the ‘feel-good’ effect. My mission became centered on tuning into my client’s needs and presenting them with alternatives that enhanced their overall well-being. This became the guiding principle behind my work and the lightning strike of inspiration that gave birth to the concept of h+f. Read more>>

Erica Pullen

In 2018 I wrote my first book, “Believing In Myself.” I was clueless who to contact about publishing my book. All I knew, is that I wanted to encourage and motivate my “little girls,” to believe in themselves, despite how social media and reality shows defined beautiful. My goal was to make a difference in the lives of our children and that’s exactly what I did. Read more>>

Breanna Hicks

I have always loved reading since the moment I learned how and secretly dreamed of being an author some day. Sadly, I never believed I could because ‘only famous people were authors’ and I never cared for my English classes in school. Therefore, I never told anyone about this dream of mine and pushed it to the back of my mind. Read more>>

Charlotte & Allison Millington & Dixon

Myself and my mum (business partner) was in her kitchen one day and just started talking about how cool it would be to start making wax melts. So that evening we ordered a starter kit from Amazon and within the week we were making wax melts… not very good ones at that 🤣 Read more>>

Daniel Maloy

The idea to write a book wasn’t mine. I walked out of a church service one Sunday morning, I began to slam my bible together against my wife’s bible like they were swords, and I heard the Lord say to me, “…They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more” (Isaiah 2:4b, NKJV). Read more>>

Yolanda Hayes

The story of how Rosie’s Recovery Center came to be begins with the deeply personal and painful experience of witnessing my daughter’s battle with substance abuse. It’s a journey marked by a rollercoaster of emotions – from the initial shock and worry about Rosie’s addiction to the relentless search for the right care and support that would help her overcome this affliction. My family, including Rosie’s five children, undoubtedly went through moments of despair, hope, frustration, and a burning desire to find a solution. Read more>>

Luis Tobon

I started growing because a college biology professor gave us a tomato plant to grow and do a report ion it for class. I got the variety Green Zebra. I attempted to grow it but it didn’t do so well. I didn’t end up getting any fruit from it but I was bit by the gardening bug. Read more>>

Kristen Brown

Imagine a world where creativity is stifled by the constraints of commercialism. That was the world I found myself in after college, feeling the crush of commercial art production, yearning for something more meaningful, more connected. I was striving for a stable career in the arts, which, as I learned, demanded far more than mere hard work. It required a catalyst for change. Read more>>

Kimberly Barrett Luttery

My first book entitled Grandma Had a Grandma Too was the title that ultimately led me to establish my company Azure Dusk Publishing, LLC. It was inspired by the relationship between my mother and niece who was about 4 years old at the time. I authored a poem based on their relationship because it was so heartwarming to watch their interactions with each other. Read more>>

Kaeley Clark-Reed

.Like a lot of people, Covid drastically changed things for me and my family. In 2020 I was teaching 2nd grade, and at that time, I had no idea that when I packed up my classroom for spring break that March, I would never be coming back. Read more>>

Daniel Guyton

I run a writers’ group called Atlanta Dramatists, and we get together twice a month and read through plays and screenplays written by members, and then give comprehensive feedback to help each writer enhance their scripts. Of course, no idea is created in a vacuum, and the idea behind this group was inspired by decades of personal experience as a member of similar groups. I was in college when I first started writing plays, and my roommate and I were both actors. Read more>>

Darren Ford

I decided to start Steppers of Dystinction also known as SOD is an organization that was founded on November 17, 2021, in Charlotte, North Carolina. We later registered with the North Carolina Department of the Secretary of State and became a licensed entity better known as STEPPERS OF DYSTINCTION LLC. Our mission is to provide a safe, structured and fun space for kids to simply be kids while empowering them to be the best that they can be on and off the stage. Read more>>

Rachel Robinson

I created my victim rights law firm, The Ray of Justice Legal Services and Holistic Care, in April 2022 after being a prosecutor for four years. It was a natural progression for me because of my understanding of the Victim Rights Act, my knowledge of the experience of crime victims in the court system, and a belief that true justice includes holistic wellness. Read more>>

Hazel Simpson

Hazel Simpson is the creator of the well acclaim movie series “Sisters and the shrink “( international independent film awards) Coming up with the idea started with seeing the need to make a difference. The difference in movie content bringing a long lasting impact, not just creating a story based on real life stories but introducing a guide to self help through drama, comedy and more. Read more>>