We recently connected with Tonisha Dawson and have shared our conversation below.

Tonisha , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about the things you feel your parents did right and how those things have impacted your career and life.

This is a great question because I give my parents so much homage as to who and what I turned out to be. Growing up my parents were sort of strict. I couldn’t just be outside and doing whatever I wanted to do. I had to have a destination, a time that I was going to be back, How I was getting there and how I was getting home. There was no “free” moments for me to just get into trouble. I danced 5 days a week and ran track 5 days a week. I was super busy. However, I started to realize at a very young age what I felt like I wanted to do or who I wanted to be when I grew up. I knew I wanted to be in the beauty industry and I wanted to get started as soon as possible. One day I had gotten into a fight with another student on the way home. I was over high school at that very moment and sat my parents down and asked them if I could withdraw and go to cosmetology school. My father was reluctant, but my mother considered it. She said if she truly knows what she wants to do, then we should just let her do it. My mother spoke to the school, explained my situation and they agreed to let me take an equivalency test to leave the school and enroll into cosmetology school. I passed with flying colors, and I was on my journey. My parents were also relationship advocates with a ministry coaching and leading couples to having greater and more fulfilling marriages. They instilled these values and principles into all of their children, and we learned so much from them growing up about the purpose of marriage, how to communicate effectively, leadership, servanthood, cause and effect, the consequences of choice, and so many other lessons, too many to count. My father sat with my brother and I every single night and gave us a lesson on the bible and spiritual principles to live by. My mother majored in psychology and was all about self-awareness and empowerment. She also led a coaching ministry where she coached women and men alike on various life issues I became her partner in that as I was Certified as well, and we worked together in that aspect. She was also certified in Personality Coaching and also taught classes regarding this. I think this upbringing was a huge catalyst in who I am today. They allowed me to pursue my dreams even though it seemed like it could have been a bad decision at the time. They also instilled lot of positive character traits, core values and principles in my life and most I still live by to this day. Their upbringing for me is a huge part of why I am who I am, and why I am impactful now as an adult. They sacrificed a lot to raise us correctly and did the best they could with the information they had and for that I will always be appreciative.

Tonisha , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My name is Tonisha LaVonne Dawson, I am a Master Beauty Specialist, an Author, a Reiki Master, a Metaphysician and a Holistic Life Coach with a focus on relationships. I became a beauty specialist at the age of 19 and after working in the industry for some time I became a skin care specialist. During this time is where I noticed the spirituality of the craft and how much it resonated with me spiritually. At this time, I was also a Minister and loved the way that I was affecting my clients not only on a physical level but on a spiritual level as well. After some time of doing this, I watched a movie called “The Secret” I watched this movie with my husband and while the movie was playing there were all sorts of people speaking and they all had titles and abbreviations after their name. I was super intrigued and told my husband we have to look up what these people are because what they were speaking about resonated so heavily with me, I did my due diligence and looked it up, and found that these people were called Metaphysicans. I immediately looked up facilities and institutions that offered this study and found The University of Metaphysics. My husband and I immediately enrolled! He studied Doctor of Divinity, and I studied Holistic Life Coaching with a focus on healing and relationships. I studied and studied and studied some more until I had a very vast handle on Universal Laws and principles, from there I studied Reiki and was attuned at level 1 and kept going until I became a Reiki Master myself and able to attune others to the practice. Because of the fact that I used to teach and Minister at church, I realized that I loved helping and pouring information that I have received into others. I wrote my first book in 2012 and have written 9 more since my first published, all available on Amazon. I am still in the beauty industry and use my skills collectively to bring peace of mind and harmony to all of my clients. I add reiki into all of my treatments at no extra cost just for their well-being and comfort. I am now running a podcast and facilitate a group called ” The Divine Feminine” where I give information, advice and counseling to women desiring to operate in their divine feminine essence.
As of now I am the owner of an Esthetics practice with my sister where we focus on Skin care treatments, Non-invasive Body sculpting, Cosmetic tattooing and other beauty services, I run a Holistic Life Coaching Business called Evolve University where I offer consulting to people looking to help grow their relationships, Podcasts on various topics, and courses that help those to understand Universal laws better. Eventually I would love to start a metaphysical university to help those who would like to know more about the topic. I am most proud of my books, and my ability to break down information into bite size pieces and share that information in a more palatable way for others to understand. I feel like my life and circumstances have perfectly positioned me to be able to unify all of these things collectively. I ABSOLUTELY LOVE WHAT I DO! I love helping women, love helping them feel beautiful and love advising them on how to become better and more evolved women because we are all on this learning journey together. I have been very blessed with the path that my life has taken, I do not take it for granted and thank God every day for the people that I am able to impact on a daily basis! I am on Facebook as Tonisha LaVonne, on Instagram as Tonisha LaVonne and on You Tube as Tonisha LaVonne.

Putting training and knowledge aside, what else do you think really matters in terms of succeeding in your field?

Other than training and knowledge for success in my field, I truly believe that you have to keep growing. You have to keep learning; you cannot stay stagnant. When you are in the business of helping others, you absolutely have to believe that learning and growing on an everyday basis is imperative for you to be impactful to your clients. Read, stay versed on current events, learn about the community you are in and even further you have to live what you are feeding to others.

I try my best to live up to every single thing that I am telling my clients to do, it doesn’t matter if it is something as simple as telling them to drink more water, or to stop being argumentative, either way I try my absolute best to be the example to those that I am teaching. I am constantly recognizing that we are all works in progress. I give my clients, students, and podcast listeners book recommendations, classes and other podcasters to listen to for information and inspiration.

Having good character, integrity, and being trustworthy is also something that I believe helps me to succeed in my industry and I also feel like it will help others in any industry that you embark on. Having a sketchy character will always haunt you even if it is decades later. Your honesty and reputation will always proceed you, and you will ALWAYS have that to fall back on when people think to question your motives or character. I have found that operating in integrity, being a good person, helping others and being genuinely concerned about others’ well-being goes a long way.

Lastly, what I would add is make sure that whatever you are doing you are not solely doing it for the money. If you are doing what you LOVE and you have genuine interest and passion in it, the money will come. People can sense when you are doing something with the motive and intent of getting rich off of them. They can also sense when you have a genuine love for what you do and would do it whether you were making an astronomical amount of money or not. Your love and passion for what you do will always permeate the room and any situation that you are in, and this will also be a big attraction factor for your business or whatever you promote.
Passion and love for what you do cannot be taught, it is something that emanates from the inside of you, it cannot be manufactured or faked.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

Honestly, I feel like there has been a few times in my life where I have had to pivot in life. I have gone through a divorce and had to bounce back from being a housewife with a home-based business, to actually going back and working out in the field. That was a hard transition because I had two small children at the time and needed to support them. I had to start completely over and rebuild my clientele on limited hours.

However, my most imperative pivot was when my sister and I decided to open our own business together as partners and I segwayed back into Coaching. I always had a clientele working at Spas and things of that nature and I have always loved it because I loved what I did and loved the fact that I could create my own schedule and have the flexibility that I needed for my children, but I wanted to grow and expand.
I trained my sister to become an Esthetician as well, she is also a nurse and we decided to embark on a partnership creating an Esthetics business together. I left my job of 6 years working for a well-known spa, with a big clientele and started our own business without taking any of the clients from my previous place of employment. This took time and innovation, but we did it. We built a social media page and operated in surplus from the day that we opened. We had to prove ourselves as professionals and pioneers in what we were doing, as we are one of the frontrunners of our industry in our community. There was no one who had a Body Sculpting business in our state before we opened ours. We were very proud of this fact and continue to offer exceptional service and professionalism 6 years later. We dedicated ourselves wholeheartedly to our craft and made a commitment to losing weight, working out, eating healthy and setting a physical example to our clients that if you worked and had dedication, all of our services will work for you.
As I embarked on this new health care journey, I also started to embark back into my Holistic Life Coaching and podcasting which was another pivot that I made. I had stepped away from it for a season so that I had the time to recalibrate my life as I had a huge house fire in January that cause me to lose everything that I owned. It was a devastating experience to say the least, but I endured and powered through it with positivity. Once I got everything back on track, replaced my computer and camera, lighting equipment and found new residence. I started my journey back up with a vengeance in my coaching business, and podcasting.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.tonishalavonne.com
• Instagram: @Tonishalavonne
• Facebook: Tonisha LaVonne
• Youtube: Tonisha LaVonne

Image Credits
Pure White Lens Photography