Crystal Ellison

I believe where I am today is not based on one single person or one single situation in my life. I believe it's a cumulative of kind of everything I've been in life. I come from a big family - I have 10 siblings actually, and both my mom and dad raised me, and I still have my mom and dad today. I really come from humble beginnings. We lived in a 3-bedroom household, and girls were in one room and boys were in another room, so we were all very close because we had to be, literally. We grew up with my mom teaching us to respect everyone - it doesn't matter who they are, it doesn't matter what position they hold. Everyone deserves respect. We grew up in the church, and we grew up with a dad who was an extremely hard worker. That foundation of who I am today really came from not only my parents, but my siblings as well, watching the mistakes that they made or watching the successes that they had and being able to learn from them. I can't tell you how many times I have talked to other lawyers or law school students where they say that they don't have the support from their family. For my law school graduation, over 60 people from my family showed up. I have a picture that I will always hold dearly with at least about 45 people in it. Along the way, I've had really good mentors. I have a mentor in the Air Force, Colonel Morley. He is exceptional and gives the greatest advice and helps me with any type of success that I've had in the Air Force. I would say it's an accumulation of a lot of things, but the foundation definitely came from my upbringing.

The first step is just believing in yourself. We often say things like the sky is the limit, and it truly is. You have to believe in yourself first. You can't wait for someone else to believe in you. You have to look at yourself and say, Crystal, you definitely can write a book. You definitely could write a children's book. It can definitely be exceptional. You can do it, and go ahead and do it. Another thing I would say is throughout the entire process, just remain humble, regardless of what level of success that you reach. Always remember that anything that you have can always be taken away. My mom used to always tell us, you know, it doesn't matter who you are, always treat people with respect. It doesn't matter if you're the CEO of a company and you have janitors that are taking out the trash, or you have window cleaners, or you have people that are vacuuming - that person deserves the same amount of respect as the person that you sit next to when you're in those CEO meetings. I always just try to remember where I came from, so regardless of what woman I would be looking at telling this to, I would say just always remain humble and treat everyone with respect.

As a JAG officer, the biggest challenge would be just making sure that I am up to date with the different laws that might take effect or executive orders that might be signed, because I am not an active duty JAG officer and I'm only part-time. So that's the biggest challenge, because I have to make sure that I am allotting time, despite not being on duty, that I'm allotting time to make sure that I know what's kind of coming down the pipelines and whatever evolving law there is that I have to stay up to date on.

Integrity is at the forefront of my values, because that is all about who you are as a person. I also value family and relationships. I value making sure that I am doing my part, regardless of what role it is - if it's a mom, if it's a daughter, if it's a sister, if it's a friend, if it's a mentor. I value maintaining good relationships. I value my religion in Jesus Christ.