My husband has been encouraging me recently with constant reminders that getting started is the hardest part of running a business. Last week I wrote about the challenge that has been starting my own business, and I mentioned that I didn’t have any new business updates.

Are you ready for this?

That’s right, y’all–it finally “boomed.”

The hardest part of starting a business is, of course, starting it. I am living in a new place and I don’t know people, making it very difficult to share with others. I had to hear a lot of “no”s and spend a lot of time fighting against failure. I didn’t want to share about it because who likes talking about their lack of success?

So my husband and I prayed. We prayed for encouragement and we prayed for opportunities to bless others, and then God introduced me to Tanja. Tanja is the mother of one of my husband’s childhood friends and her son happens to live near us now. They came over for lunch and somehow the conversation turned to oils and all of a sudden I had my first customer in months, then she started sharing with her friends and family and in the last two weeks my downline has grown significantly because God is good.

Now I have people to teach about oils. I have a responsibility to educate my new customers and I get to share in the joys of their successes. I can support them and encourage them and show them that our team doesn’t do this to make money, we do this because we have a passion. The new, dear friendships are pretty great too.

Starting takes time, and now that I’ve started, my business will grow as I continue to share and my customers begin to share. It doesn’t hurt that essential oils are consumable and once people realize how much sounder they sleep when they have Lavender oil running in their diffuser, they will come back for more. The people they share with will come back for more. It took a few months but, really, a few months to start my own business is not a long time by any means; many businesses require years of work to start breaking even. When people hear the phrase “multi-level marketing” they often recoil and turn off their ears because making sales is not a prospect that the average joe jumps at. I love this business because I don’t have to reach a quota, I don’t have to talk to a certain amount of people, I don’t get fired if I don’t make sales. I simply share.

A very wise mentor recently recommended to me that I be wary of writing about my struggles because people don’t want to work with those who they don’t see success from. While this is a completely valid point, I want my readers to be able to see my failures and then rejoice with me with I succeed. I don’t want my new customers to want to start their own business and expect it to flourish immediately when mine took time and a whole lot of effort to build–I want them to be able to see the journey I walked and be encouraged by it.

My business still has a lot of growing to do, but God has blessed me with an amazing team and a wonderful support system and finally finally finally I can tell you all that my business went over the edge! Of course, there is still a lot of growing of do–but one step at the time, right?