We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Lilliauna Hopkins. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Lilliauna below.
Lilliauna, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.
Put simply, my business idea wasn’t mine. I know that might sound ridiculous, but just walk with me through this and you’ll understand.
Currently, I’m a creative entrepreneur that uses social media platforms to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with the world by telling my story and the hardships I’ve grown through since giving my life to Jesus. Something I never thought I, of all people, would be doing as a current PhD candidate who is passionate about social justice, racial equity, and education. Despite the seeming opposition these two roles seem to have, they actually coincide much more than I ever expected them to.
Before I was an entrepreneur, I was an educator, teaching all grades from K-12 to undergraduate courses, in all types of educational businesses, in public education and private tutoring services. Overall, I loved having the ability to interact with students, teach them new things, and help them grow individually in every way inside and outside the classroom. I’ve always been relatively skilled at teaching, and that, in and of itself, is a gift. Educational excellence was always a standard of mine growing up, and I came from two families of educators as well. I guess you could say there was no getting away from it. Until I did, just in a different way.
As of last year, I took on a transitional role at a private tutoring company and realized that even in private tutoring services, educators still aren’t as directly involved in the progressive development of their students. While working there, I realized very quickly, a student’s performance in the classroom was but one part of a holistic story that their lives were telling. More often than not, some students were brilliant but needed assistance with soft skills that public school educators didn’t have the time/resources to address in depth in the classroom, something we call executive functioning skills. As I started working more often and developing relationships with clients and admin, I was quickly promoted to an entirely unique role, Student Care Coordinator. In this role, I was not only able to address the soft skills of students, but I was able to teach my colleagues how to nurture these areas of students’ lives. This was a problem that I noticed across all educational systems, even in the wealthier areas. Though they were paying thousands of dollars for premier educational guidance, I felt that we weren’t addressing the holistic nature of students overall.
After excelling in my new role, I quickly realized that the company I worked for was more concerned about the financial advancement side of the business than the student development portion, and it grieved me. It was difficult for me to feel comfortable draining clients of funds when I realized we lacked excellence and integrity in our work largely. Additionally, sometimes an entrepreneurial mindset can be disruptive of the current standards and norms of work places, so there ended up being underlying tension between me and my superiors. Out of respect for them and their endeavors, I chose to bow out gracefully from the company and start my own.
It was June of 2024 that Deeper Waters Consulting LLC was organized and created. I was so excited to actually have the chance to work directly with students and holistically invest in them through my services. Through some major networking, I was able to secure my first client, a high school senior who needed some additional reinforcements to build her confidence before going to college. Despite her superior academic record, I realized she wasn’t being challenged in her work, and therefore wasn’t realistically prepared for the next level of academic rigor. With my background as a Undergraduate Teaching Assistant, I was able to familiarize her with college-level academics and rigor, as well as build her executive functioning skills and public speaking. Once she left for school in August, I found myself client-less and seeking direction for new acquisitions.
Until everything changed.
Another extremely important piece of information is that I surrendered my life to Jesus in December 2023, right before this whole entrepreneurial thing ever came up. Throughout this entire time, it was extremely uncomfortable being pushed out of what came natural to me in education. I had been used to doing the things that I was naturally inclined at, instead of seeking to embark on a new endeavor, with God’s strength, not my own. It’s not that I never would teach again, I would just be teaching in a completely different field.
As I continued to get serious about my walk with Christ, I felt the push to completely abandon the original education consultation work I was comfortable doing, and launch a business completely centered on increasing the individual development and discipleship of those who believe in Christ. Specifically, growing up going to church, I realized that we didn’t always operate with a standard of excellence in everything we did, especially investing into the lives of those around us in sacrificial ways (how we’re called to operate). The problem I’ve been seeing as of late is a performative faith that only goes to church on Sundays but is otherwise a stranger to other believers and Christ Himself. Put simply, frustration was an understatement. One experience changed everything for me and quite literally catapulted me into the Christian discipleship consultant space.
Remember that client I mentioned from the initial rendition of Deeper Waters Consulting? The high school senior? Thankfully, I got close with her family while providing them my services, so I learned that a family friend’s son (27 y/o male) had tragically passed away in his sleep and his mom walked in and found him deceased. They needed help cleaning out his apartment, and I offered to go since they were on my side of town that day. Being there with them that day radicalized me. When you’re confronted with the reality that this life ends one day, it sobers you quickly, and seeing the devastation it brought on their family and community reminded me of when I lost my mom to breast cancer in 2019. I struggled with suicidal ideations after losing her because I didn’t know how to exist in a world where my mom wasn’t in it. To this day it’s still difficult sometimes, but the hope I have in Christ now grounds me and gives me peace.
As I was leaving his vigil that evening with all his friends (none older than 30 years old),I cried out to God and pleaded that He’d use me to minister to everyone our age in this generation. I didn’t want anyone leaving this world without knowing the hope and peace of Christ and the eternal life we have access to in Him. This moment changed everything for me, and I may not have known what an evangelist was in that moment but I just became one.
That burning passion has caused me to trust God enough to completely shift my business model to the seemingly unwise risk of an entirely new field but one that I new I needed to be in. I needed people to know the truth. The hope. The life. The love. I’d shout it from the rooftops if I could, but I figured combining every single skill I’ve acquired along the way to have a business that can be wherever, whenever, and however I’m needed was a matter of life and death for some. Needless to say, this business idea wasn’t mine. It was birthed out of the adversities and pains of life where hope and healing desperately needed to be present.
In January 2025, I officially rebranded Deeper Waters Consulting LLC as a Christian organizational development consultation business that specifically caters to the growth and development of those in the body of Christ, especially those in leadership positions. Whether you’re a pastor, worship leader, or just an attendee, we all need to be desperately chasing after Jesus Christ in everything we do. In a hope to spread the burning passion I have along with others, I use my business to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ everywhere I can. Part of that is my podcast, Out The House, where I share my entire life to demonstrate that the love of Jesus reaches even to the depths of darkness, because it was never dark for Him. I share sobering biblical truths that we need to be held accountable to as Christians to improve the health of our relationships with Christ, instead of adopting a performative theology and lifestyle that’s limited to weekends. When I first started the podcast in October 2024, I wasn’t sure how everything would fit together, but I’m grateful to say after rebranding my business, it’s all aligned now. All I had to do was trust that God was going to work it all together for me, even if I didn’t see it yet.
Now, I’m a flourishing Christian creative entrepreneur that’s a YouTuber and podcaster, while also wrapping up this PhD at the same time. The idea was never mine; it was God’s. I just had to take a risk to trust that He really had something wonderful for me, better than I could muscle together myself.
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.
My name is Lilliauna Hopkins! As a woman of several different endeavors, I sum it all up by calling myself your friendly neighborhood A.C.E., which breaks down to Academic, Consultant, and Evangelist. I’m a follower of Jesus Christ that just recently surrendered my life in December 2023. Since then, my entire life has changed for the better. I’m a faith-based business owner that specializes in Christian discipleship, organizationally, individually, and communally. Whether your church needs assistance, you’re looking to take a chance on a dream God’s placed in your heart, or you’re looking for a community that’s authentic and vulnerable, I’m your A.C.E. with all your needs. I offer organizational development consultation, one-on-one individual coaching, and a community centered around Christian discipleship to address all levels of interaction for the believer to mature in Christ.
For my clients, I am most passionate about holding space for the hearts of all to prioritize Jesus Christ in all that they do, and nurturing back to health the hearts that have been traumatized by Christians (or Christian spaces). I’m most passionate about engraining our spiritual beliefs with mental maturity and emotional healing, so that we are holistically healthy disciples who can be the salt and light of the world. I apply biblical principles to practical wisdom and accountability for believers who are in need of support, community, freedom, and healing.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
As an entrepreneur, I’ve learned very quickly that people pleasing and perfectionism aren’t productive approaches to launching a new business, and even pivoting to a new idea.
Sadly, people pleasing and perfectionism were engrained in me as a trauma response to avoid rejection and abandonment as a child. When I was younger, I learned quite quickly to avoid conflict and rejection from those I loved by changing myself into whatever version of me mostly clearly appeased them and caused the least resistance. As early as I can remember when I started school, what used to be a healthy reverence of a little sister for her older brother (because he could do no wrong in my eyes) quickly turned into me conforming myself to whatever docile version of myself would cause me not to get yelled at by my family. Therefore, I’ve been in survival mode for the past 20 years of my life, easily.
Since I gave my life to Christ December 2023, I didn’t realize how heavy these things were until I realized that freedom, peace, and security in Christ were accessible to me. My whole life, I wasn’t aware of the benefits associated with coming to Christ. Thankfully, in that process, I finally had the boldness to step outside the typical mold and chase after a dream that honored God and also shared the hope and freedom I had accessed through Christ.
I’ll be completely honest, it was NOT easy at all. Too often Christians slap some Jesus glitter on everything and act like it was okay. No. It was devastatingly painful to heal the wounds and scars I’d developed from changing my identity and personality like clothes to mold to who everyone else needed me to be and do. I was exhausted. Unlearning people pleasing and perfectionism meant I’d have so much to sacrifice: my normal, my comfort, certain relationships where that was the standard, and the ways that I chose to survive previously. Thankfully, where there was pain, healing replaced it. Where there was exhaustion, peace replaced it. Where there was bondage, freedom replaced it.
In my mid-twenties, I’ve actually been restored to my childlike joy and optimism for the world, learning the wonderful creation God called me to be in the first place before anyone told me who to be.
How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?
Singlehandedly, authenticity has built my reputation within my market. For so long, trying to be someone else, or conduct business the way someone else has, can cause you to be chasing after something or someone that you were never meant to do/be. There wasn’t another you created to impact this world with your presence. If you’re constantly trying to be someone else, who will be you?
Though it sounds easier said than done, there is a cost to trailblazing and charting a new path that’s never been done before.
Within my market specifically, there can be a lot of individuals that use Christ or Christian subculture as a means to an end for exploitative reasons. On another note, when you’re authentic and you actually live out the services you’re providing, there will be a specific grace and ease that you’ll have operating in those fields. As entrepreneurs, it’s too much effort and energy in order to pursue business ideas that are inauthentic to our paths in life. Though they might be frugal, it’s imperative to understand that money is not the only reason as to why we pursue entrepreneurship. It’s to solve problems and provide innovative solutions for problems in our society.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.lilliaunahopkins.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/outthehousepod
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/deeper-waters-consulting
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@OutTheHousePod
Image Credits
Image Credit for professional headshots go to Agwe Studios