Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Ashley Nicole. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Alright, Ashley thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s talk legacy – what sort of legacy do you hope to build?
There was a time, before I became a mother, where I wanted my legacy to be the books of poetry I published. I did not care to take the traditional career path seriously, and decided to dedicate my energy toward writing and performing poetry. I made every book I wrote my own personal platform to showcase my achievements. The more important it became to me, the more the world invited me to share my gift with them. Now that I am a mother, I pray that my legacy of entrepreneurship shines through the success of my family, close friends and supporters. I pray that every individual that I have the opportunity to influence knows that they can do all things with God, and that prayer changes things. By this, I mean that our dreams and hopes for the way would like to spend our time here in this world can be attained by daring to pray for your version of what peace and love looks like and understanding the seed of your dreams will become a forest in that type of environment. When I leave this world. I just pray that my name brings my loved ones comfort and inspires the world to live and love well. I pray to be remembered for how happy I truly am by saying yes to the things that are important to me.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
“For those of you who don’t already know, my name is Ashley Nicole. I write poems, I sell books, I perform on stages, and I make a beautiful living doing that. I was born and raised in San Diego, Ca, committed four years of my life to the Marine Corps, worked as an English Academic Coach for alma mater (Helix High School), attained a Master’s of Science degree in Marketing, and now I pursue writing, performing, and publishing full time. I have an outgoing personality so I tend to listen to my impulsive nature when I’m out in public settings. This can range from talking to a stranger in line at the grocery store, looking up local open mics in my neighborhood, attending 90% of the invites I receive, and much more. What I learned from this was my inner voice and thoughts were the ones navigating me to my destiny. Every individual pursuit no matter how small, created the ensemble of who I am today. There was no one or ten things that I had to do to shift my paradigm. I simply listen to the voice within me when it told me to go introduce myself, or ask if I could perform, or even googling the process of self publishing on Amazon. I listened to me even when I felt insecure for doing so, and ended up being someone that others in my community can trust or rely on for my contribution to society. Each conversation lead to an open mic, that would lead to a conversation about my performance afterwards, and this would almost always lead to an outside private, political, or celebratory event where more and more ears would accumulate into my vibrational tumbleweed. The secret is to keep doing what you already know how to do, then start to shape that clay of experiences into a beautifully packaged gem that you create once and sell a million times. The standard products and services I provide are books, publishing packages, coaching for writing, publishing, and network marketing; but I am more than my pamphlet describes. I become a professional friend with a priority of coaching writers and creatives through any stage of their creative career journey. My audience lets me know what they need and I either evolve to the challenge or create another boundary. I think that by living according to how much peace and love I can give and receive is what makes me different. I hug people heart-to-heart to increase the level of their vibration, like becoming an angel of encouragement for anyone in the vicinity. My clients and supporters always speak of the conversations we had that made them feel heard, or my down to earth nature that made them feel at home. I help others start the process by showing the way to some mutual common steps that most writers/authors take when searching for notoriety. I am most proud of this present moment, because in this stage of life I am alive, I have a reason to smile everyday, I defend my peace, I have a closer relationship with God and I make my own money. I want anyone reading this to pause for a second and think, “what could I be doing with my time right now?”, then do that thing right now! Hold yourself accountable to every step on your ladder. Do the best that you can and God will do the rest. I have read hundreds of blogs and books, and listened to as much YouTube as humanly possible. Turn each noted bullet point into an attainable goal that you collect in your tool box of knowledge, then put in the time it takes to come to full execution, whether it is perfect or not. The end result will be satisfaction with yourself. You will be so grateful that your mind can tell your body what to do that you will be satisfied with accomplishment alone and start to let go of some of the things you thought you once wanted. I believe the end goal for most is a smile in your heart that carries you through life with enjoyment and appreciation. I once thought that it was all about the money and how to get it, but it is all about our quality of life; how we treat, feed, and speak to ourselves.
Have you ever had to pivot?
When I found out I was pregnant in April 2021, I was so happy. I was sharing the news with my family and creative community, attending and performing at some local events, finishing my Master’s Degree, and getting as much sleep as possible. When I delivered my beautiful son, I was too wrapped up in the responsibility of taking care of another life and letting my body heal, that I forgot about my poetic career for the first two weeks. I started to embark upon postpartum depression, because I started to give up on having dreams and a life of my own. With a two week old baby, my goals seemed impossible, I barely had enough energy to shower or leave the baby’s room, how would I be able to pick my dreams back up? It took a counselor to let me know that I was allowed to start asking more of my community for help (my partner included). I was so use to doing everything alone that asking for help made me feel ashamed for not already being capable. I started asking my man for more breaks and more date nights, I asked my mother to babysit more and sit with me at the nail salon, I posted content of pictures that I would take of myself and my new baby and let my community know that I was ready to handle more as the time went on. By 2 months I was delivering live zoom performances, 3 months I was back performing for the San Diego Museum of Art , and by 5 months I was back performing in sold out night clubs and private events. I was excited to be performing again, but then I was also self conscious about my stomach and new weight gain. However, I did not let my insecurities stop me. I was grateful to have my dream back, personalized by the life of my baby boy. It was mentally tough, but I held on until my turn came back around.
How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?
Attending Open Mics and local community events consistently built my reputation within my market. Showing up to weekly mics (ex. Black Xpression) week after week while attending any other outside event almost everyday of the week filled my calendar and made my community and spectators remember my name. Posting it all on Instagram and Facebook boosted my credibility and my invitations to perform more. I say yes to every opportunity to perform and show up as my best authentic and confident self. It also helps when you smile big and practice perfecting your hygiene skincare/hair care routine. I also once heard that fame without fortune is a trap, so I do believe that by maintaining my business finances, I have the ability to refresh my inventory, my wardrobe, workout routine, take care of my personal expenses, and splurge on things from time to time. This allows me to remain consistent and confident.
Contact Info:
- Website: Www.Amazon.com/author/ashleynicolew
- Instagram: @AuthorAshleyNicole
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorAshleyNicole12?mibextid=LQQJ4d
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashley-nicole-b3a713111?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app