Hi guys! as I mentioned last week on our instagram, there hasn’t been any content here on the blog because we are trying to re-focus our intention with the site. To start off, I wanted to tell you the story of why I created A Hint of Life. Things are about to get a bit personal, so read along!
The simple story is, I wanted a little bit of life and light in my life. The long story, has to do with betrayal, heart-break and failure.
It’s not easy for me to write this as there’s some people who might be reading this and be affected by it but, I need to tell my story if I want A Hint of Life to fulfill it’s purpose.
It all started back in 2012, when a close family friend turned our world upside down. I had just graduated college and was opening up a small online boutique with my mom and dad. My dad having owned his own business for a while was helping me and funding the business. I did not get the money easily – I had to do market research, talk to advertising agencies, create a business and marketing plan, go to trade shows, complete legal forms and pitch it to my dad. After many pitches, the business was good to go and we launched it.
On one side things were great, our small online boutique was getting a few sales and we were growing it. On the other side, my dad’s world was crushing hard. His long-time childhood friend and business partner had betrayed him. Alongside the betrayal, came the downfall of my dad’s business. All of the sudden, we had lost everything. I considered my dad’s friend and for that matter, his entire family, my family. We spent every vacation, sundays and holidays together because in a country far away from our own, we had found a family in each other… or so I thought.
[wp_ad_camp_1]
It was hard, difficult and extremely sad, see my dad go through this devastating period. Having blindly trusted his own friend to come into his business as a partner in an effort to grow it and lose it all because of his doings destroyed me. How could he do this? How could he have lied to my dad for all these years? How could he look at us in the eye and smile? What type of person does this?
My dad not only lost his company but remained working in it for 1.5 years without receiving a salary by orders of “his friend”; The friend ended up owning 51% and my dad 49% so he had the power to do that. What this meant was, my dad lost all his life savings, his company, could not receive a salary and was trapped in a mortgage, overall “life” expenses and if that were not enough, he has held personally liable to pay all company’s debts as he was the legal representative of the company (and this was part of his friends manipulation).
This took the life out of me. How could I keep my business going when this was happening? How could I ask my dad for help? how? how? HOW??! I couldn’t. I kept my little online boutique going for 2 years but in the end it just became too hard. I wasn’t motivated. In my head, this “friend” had taken my dream away. He knew what I wanted, we had talked about it and always “supported” it so, again… how could this happen?
Eventually, I started doing less and less for the online store and focused in my studies and work; at the moment, I was getting an MBA and was working part-time at a clothing store so that took up a lot of my time. Within the online store, I had a blog in which I posted different ways to style the items we were selling and that got a lot of traction and so, after I closed the online store, the blog remained. This was during a point in my life when I was very numb and angry. Whenever I tried to do something to move forward, I couldn’t. I could not find inspiration, motivation, desire.
Anyway, I kept going because that’s the only thing we can do. Eventually my dad got a job at a Fortune 500 company, I finished my MBA and left my part-time job. Got a new job at LOFT as part of the management team and although I LOVED (and still love) fashion, I fell out of love with the industry. During this time, I still had the “style blog” but my heart wasn’t in it.
It wasn’t until I left LOFT and started working at a marketing agency that I became a little more inspired and motivated with life. I loved being part of a small company, bringing my ideas to the table and being able to execute them. I loved being a manager, having two guy bosses and having a voice. I loved coming up with new ideas, I loved leading, helping others develop… I thought to myself “This is what I’m supposed to do”. Not exactly sure when I changed the name of the blog to A Hint of Life but I know that towards the end of 2015 I had it. In February 2016, my boyfriend gifted my the logo that you see on the site today; so in my mind, A Hint of Life was born on February 2016.
From 2012 – 2017 so many things have happened. My dad is still working in the company that gave him a chance after failure, I now have an awesome job that gave me chance because of my hard work and I still can’t shake the feeling of sadness every time I think about this story. 5 years have passed and my dad is still paying off debt from the horrible years we went thru. 5 years have passed and I still think of my little online store as a failure although it wasn’t. 5 years have passed and I haven’t found it in my heart to forgive the friend.
Why I created a Hint of Life? Because I wanted a small space in my life where everything was about light, happiness and alive. I wanted to feel inspired and motivated to pursue my dreams. I wanted to know that it was possible to make it through to the other side when one fails. A Hint of Life started as a self-help project for myself and has turned into a small community that’s interested in pursuing their careers, in making their side hustle a full-time job, in living a beautiful and healthy life, in being fit, in being happy.
We often hear about success stories. How this and that person made millions, how to get rich, how to quit the job you hate so much. But they are missing the point. The point is to teach people to not give up, to have a purpose and work tirelessly to achieve it. To not compare themselves to others, to not go after the money but after what fills your heart. To not step on others to achieve your goals.
This is why I created A Hint of Life – to motivate and inspire people (women in my case) to keep going because it IS possible to be push forward and succeed when you are heart broken, betrayed and have failed.
[wp_ad_camp_1]
Fast forward to 2017 and my sister, Andrea and my boyfriend Luis are part of this project. Andrea is in college and brings her personal experiences in an effort to motivate and inspire girls going through similar life struggles and Luis is the idea guy that keeps me on my feet. He plans, sets goals and expectations for our growth to reach more and more amazing people that need a little bit of a push to achieve their dreams.
And that’s it! I know this was a much longer post but I really wanted to share this story with you. I think it’s important for you to know where I come from, how I have felt in the past and how I feel now. Although it’s difficult at times, it’s very worth it to keep A Hint of Life up and running. We have lots of things planned for the future and just want to thank you for your support. You can find new blog posts every Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 12pm so you can read it during your lunch break and get inspired!
Leave me your thoughts below or you can also send me an email at ahintoflifeblog (at) gmail .com
Thank you!!
Belen
