May Li

It's not just hard work, it's not just do it. You gotta be aligned with your dream, you gotta listen to the dream, you gotta visualize it, you gotta revisit it. Because so many times we get caught up being mothers, or employees, and we just get through the day, get through your life, one week passes, and eventually you're like, oh my gosh, my kids are grown up, now what? So what I attribute it to is don't ever forget the dream, always keep visiting it, and if you can, just keep putting in time on your schedule to keep working on it, because eventually it will manifest, it will come to fruition. And don't let other little things get in the way. A lot of women had to put their careers on the side to raise their family, they couldn't take too many risks, which is understandable, but eventually when they grow up, don't just sit back on a rocking chair. Go for it, keep going, keep going.

One mentor who really influenced me was an optometrist whose mother had 7 businesses. She learned from her mother how to start a small business, and she didn't just become an optometrist who sits there and sees patients - she turned that into an entire business. She runs two offices with 4 doctors working for her. She took all her money and kept investing and investing, and now she has multifamily properties and is up there in the 8 figures. Her whole story was that when she started off as an optometrist, she and her husband lived like students, even though they were making money and had their degrees. They lived so frugally and kept putting their money away until they could invest in a business, then start investing in other ones. You can't spend every penny you get as soon as you make more. You need to plan for the future, you have to do some little bit of initial sacrifice. That's how I hear all these incredible, successful people do it.

I totally believe in something called self-expression. There's something inside all of us that wants to come out, that wants to be voiced or written in words. It's a tiny voice sometimes, and it's very tentative. Years ago, I said I'd like to be an author, I'd like to write a book, but it was so tiny, and the bigger voice was, you can't do it, nobody's going to read what you say, nobody wants to hear what you write about. And that voice was so overpowering that the little voice got supplicated, snuffled. Finally, I started listening to that little voice. So you gotta believe in that dream that you have, that calling, and let it come forth. It takes a lot of little steps at a time. Every day, you have to push against it. That's why I call my platform Power on the Edge, because you reach an edge where you can either back down or keep pushing forward, and that takes effort and determination. But if you don't do it, you'll end up being in the same place 10 years later, still dreaming, or you have a book with two words on it or two chapters, and it's sitting there. Your identity hasn't solidified as an author. You're still tentative, you're still scared to say something meaningful, you don't believe in what you want to say, you don't think anyone wants to hear it, and that is so wrong. I want to help younger women, or any woman at any stage that has so much self-doubt and hesitation - you need to overcome that, and I can help them do that.