You’re working hard, things are going well, piece by piece you’ve built a life you are proud of, you’ve overcome obstacles and challenges, beat the odds and then you find yourself at the center of an unexpected dilemma – do you risk it all to keep growing? What if growing means leaving the job you worked so hard to get or the industry you worked so hard to break into? How we approach risk often has a huge bearing on our journey and so we’ve asked some of the brightest folks we know to share stories of risks they’ve taken.

Desha Peacock

I feel like as a business owner you’re taking a risk just by opening the doors! Beyond that risk, I’ve taken so many in my business. One was when I decided to shift into offering international luxury retreats. I fell in love with a beautiful upscale house in San Miguel de Allende. MX. It had five bedrooms, pool. jacuzzi, and came with a staff to help with meals. Read more>>

Carly Schroeder

I was never really afraid of taking risks. Before I graduated college I knew that I wanted to travel. It was senior year and I was in a fairly new relationship with my current partner, Ian, and I remember approaching him with a proposition. I said, “after I graduate I’m moving to England, do you want to come?” he didn’t even hesitate before he said “yes.” Read more>>

Steven Wise

In June 2019, I changed my employment with the school system I work for so that I was only working Thursday, Friday, and Wednesday afternoon. Financially, this has been a big change. As a part-time employee, I am no longer eligible for group healthcare benefits. Read more>>

Natasha Raulerson

Life is a risk, right? Whether we walk out the front door to do a daily routine, or take a chance on our wildest dreams. It’s all a risk. We never know what could happen. In 2014, I queried agents for a manuscript that took me about six months to write. That risk came with a reward. In 2015, I officially had a literary agent. We went through months of edits on my manuscript before submitting to the—at the time—big six publishers. Read more>>

Dylan McMains

There are three big risks I have taken in the pursuit of my dreams – the first was in 2019 when I was 19. My grandparents are both college professors so my whole childhood I saw my life going in the direction of graduating high school, getting a master’s degree of PhD, and falling into a normal career until you retire. I graduated from my high school with a 4.0 gpa and went to college with astrophysics as my major, seeing myself starting down that path. Read more>>

Brandon Beasley

The biggest risk I have taken was starting my business and building my brand. Going into business for yourself is scary knowing you can be the sole reason that your business is a success or a failure. Being a business owner is one of the most rewarding yet stressful thing you can ever do. Overseeing day-to-day operations, meeting deadlines, creating and maintaining budgets, is all in a day’s work for a business owner and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Read more>>

Jaqualyn Fleming

I have had my fights with life, I can say that I’m a strong soldier. I’ve taken a lot of losses , but I can say I never once truly gave up on myself. I was that kid that dreamed of being this singer of the family and giving back to my community. I found it hard to actually put myself out there and actually show the world what I’m made of. Read more>>

Emily Schleich

Starting a business as a *relatively young* single woman terrified me. I had always dreamed of opening this practice and serving this community, but I never imagined it would happen this fast. I was working in a non-profit community mental health setting seeing way too many clients and close too burnout when I knew that something needed to change. Read more>>

Lizz Dominguez

Trying not to go too far back, I would say the biggest risk I have ever taken is taking the little money I had saved in my bank account and a small chunk of money left to me by my Abuela and investing in the bar. This was a huge leap for me from what was comfortable and what I had known the majority of my adult life, into the uncomfortable and unknown. Read more>>

 

Jacqueline Abad

Well one of the riskiest things that I have ever done was starting this business. After getting a taste of a charcuterie board in 2018 in Houston, tx while out and about with my friends from college, I couldn’t help but to fall in love with the concept of charcuterie. In 2020 it seems that the charcuterie trend was popping up everywhere. It was constantly on social media and I was thinking to my self “I can do that”. I was in love with the concept of assembling different meats, cheeses, textures, flavors. I decided to take a charcuterie workshop class and began creating the idea of Jack n’ Cheese, I took a leap of faith and I haven’t looked back since. Read more>>

Aram Dominguez

My wife, Leticia, and I were both working full time jobs, working pay check to pay check, with over 100k in debt. Student loans, credit cards, and 2 car payments. As a teacher, my wife had the option to work during the summer but opted to not work and instead decided she wanted to pursue a different direction. She had always had the passion to workout and would even have her friends come over to workout with her. Read more>>

Francesca Jeanty

The Biggest risk I’ve ever taken by far is expanding my business in the middle of the pandemic. When news of pandemic, shut downs, and quarantine first broke I, like most business owners felt a mixed bag of emotions. What felt like over night , I saw small beauty businesses closing for one reason another. Read more>>

Christie Havey Smith

After a decade of teaching workshops and leading retreats in mindfulness and contemplative writing in Los Angeles, I had the dream of bringing this work closer to my home in Palos Verdes. I’d been practicing yoga and was studying holistic health when I had the idea for the Greenhouse–a place to take root, grow well as individuals and as a community. Read more>>

Juan Francisco

When I realized I had the ability to develop the skill of mediumship, I felt compelled to hone in on it, and share with others that they can do it, too. A long time ago, I had the idea of writing a book that compiles the spiritual experiences of my family members, whether they were apparitions of deceased loved ones or encounters with the supernatural in haunted places. Once I had my own experience contacting the departed loved one of a friend, this idea came back to me in the form of a podcast, which I would soon call Third Eye Sight. Read more>>

Alexis Edmonds

I think that right now the biggest risk I’ve taken is starting this business. I have always enjoyed the work I’ve done as a music therapist and want to make it more accessible to the community as a resource for mental health. The pandemic really helped shift my perspective about my priorities and going into business for myself will enable me to do work that I’m passionate about, which also includes music education and life coaching. Read more>>

Kelly Miles

My life is built on risks. When I stay in my comfort zone, I become complacent and restless, so I try to push myself and take risks as often as possible. I think it’s important to pay attention to the way your life will push you towards risks when it’s time to make a change. Those nudges from life are the defining moments that will either make you better or complacent, but you must pay attention, and you must be willing to take a leap of faith towards the unknown. Read more>> 

Jessica Johnson

A little over 2 years ago I made the decision to resign from my corporate job and pursue a full time career in makeup artistry and esthetics . This meant leaving my comfy salaried job of over 7+ years in private practice management. Throughout my time in corporate I always worked my passion part time. Read more>>

Brandon Parks

The biggest risk I’ve taken so far with regard to my craft is realizing that in order to achieve the level of growth I envision for my brand I had to move beyond what Atlanta can offer. There is only so much fashion infrastructure in the south and that means less access to raw materials and manufacturing. Read more>>

 Rex Andrews

Let me tell you a quick story about the time we spent $32,000 on a marketing system that didn’t work and I almost gave up on my business. At the time, my business partner, Jonathan Canales, and I were trying to grow our coaching business, Pathway Fitness, to be able to help more men take control of their fitness. Read more>>

Destiny Alexander

The biggest risk I’ve taken is the one I’m taking now. Almost a year ago I started working as a Customer Service Rep part time from home. I got that job because we needed a little bit more money coming in and the evening schedule was perfect for me since I still wanted to be available during the day to take care of my daughter. Read more>>

Laura Frnka-Davis

I’ve always played it safe and have never been one to take risks. Growing up, I was afraid of everything – including asking for what I wanted or at times, what I needed. When I found myself without a job in the fall of 2018, I put that fear aside and took a huge leap of faith to start my own communications firm. It’s something I always wanted to do, but fear was holding me back. I had visions of working for myself, being my own boss, and working on clients I enjoyed but I never thought those things were attainable. Read more>>

Gail Mancuso

Like so many people, for years, I had a fear of public speaking. It bothered me and I was determined to overcome this obstacle in my life. It had prevented me from doing things I wanted to do, one being to present my art in group settings and speak on artists’ panels. Read more>>

Amanda “Jo” Erven

“We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.” – Charles Swindoll This is one of my favorite quotes to share, because it paints the picture that hard situations – situations where you may have to take a risk – can turn out to be an opportunity to improve, gain knowledge, and perhaps even thrive. This is exactly how I would describe the “risk” I took having a preventative full hysterectomy and double mastectomy after receiving my positive BRCA genetic testing results. Read more>>

Georgie-Ann Neil

Every day you wake up and decide to get out of bed, you take a risk. One of the most significant risks I took was to follow my dreams. I know it sounds cliché, but I decided to go against family traditions and pursue my purpose a few years ago. I decided to get out of bed and do something different. I got tired of living in a box! Read more>>

Tracey and Vance Marino

Taking a risk is scary for most people. Change is hard, but there’s an old expression, “When you change, you grow.” Ever since we could remember, we wanted to write and record our own, original music. However, the technology at that time was too expensive, very intimidating, oversized, and out-of-reach. That all changed in 2002 when we bought our first professional, digital Pro Tools recording set up. Read more>>

Gel Raquel

On February 5, 2021, my life changed forever. My husband proposed to me, and with that proposal, came the promise not only would I vow to be his wife for the rest of my life, but I’d also pack up in six months and head to a new state with him while he attends seminary. This meant leaving my friends, family, and life as I knew it for the last 25 years. Read more>>

Franki Pineapple

As a solo artist, I officially became ‘Franki Pineapple’ and released my first single at age forty-five. Against the backdrop of ageism and sexism, it was confronting enough to release music so late in life; not to mention the song is called “F*ck It Man!” and uses The F-Word 26 times. To release such an explicitly un-terrestrial-radio-friendly song as my first single was brave or plain stupid. It was a challenge to find a PR team open to working with me, but I didn’t give up and eventually found publicists who were not just open, but excited to take a risk with me. Read more>>

Daniel Powell

I am a big fan of taking risks. I’d rather take a risk and fail than succeed at doing something easy, comfortable, or expected. As I writer and filmmaker, I’ve always admired and appreciated artists who take risks in their work and do something outside the box. Read more>>

Josiah Wooldridge

I’ve always just taken small risks with my art at first… Just experimenting with styles. I used to base most of my artwork on already existing subjects like video game characters, horror movies, etc. Read more>> 

Lisa Vogt

I don’t fancy myself as much of a risk-taker. I typically do things by the book. I’m a rule follower. I graduated from high school, attended college, got an advanced degree, and settled into a career that lasted thirty-two years. But, something inside of me kept saying “You need to own a business”. Even though retirement sounded like a great idea, I just felt I needed to do something more. I set my sights on becoming the “boss”. Read more>>

Barry Fourie

As far as taking a risk goes in business, you tend to make the leap because you believe the benefit of a taking a chance, or as in our case, making a change will outweigh the risk. It’s a scary thing at times, but can be refreshing and motivating as well. Read more>>

Julie Cohn

Taking any risk is scary, yet also exhilarating. When I’m out of my comfort zone I need to find support. That support may be only be one person, and sometimes that’s all I need. My scariest risk was to defy my family and my friends, even my husband, and to shift out of the typical routine for curing cancer. Read more>>