My journey as a serial entrepreneur spans over two decades, beginning with operating a successful dessert catering company and bakery for 15 years. While outwardly confident, I carried a hidden struggle: high self-confidence masking a low self-worth. This internal battle, though it propelled me forward, ultimately hindered true prosperity and a sense of freedom. In 2018, guided by a purposeful redirection, I retired from catering and launched Smart Cookie Consulting, rapidly building it into a sought-after business development agency.

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But my path was shaped long before business strategy. As a teen mother, navigating a challenging situation, I learned about resilience and pressing on in the face of overwhelming odds. This early experience, born from trauma, forged an unshakeable spirit within me and a deep empathy for others facing "unseen battles" that influence every aspect of their lives, including their entrepreneurial journey.

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During my time with Smart Cookie Consulting, from 2020 to 2022, I also served as a Google Digital Coach for South Carolina, a role where I was one of only 20 business owners in the entire country dedicated to training and educating Black and Brown entrepreneurs on digital skills. This experience deepened my understanding of technology's power as a bridge.

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However, my path took another significant turn. In January 2023, I made the difficult decision to close Smart Cookie Consulting for what seemed like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: to run a global nonprofit dedicated to business education and granting capital to women of color around the globe. It was a dream, a calling! Yet, that profound professional experience abruptly ended in September 2023.

 

This traumatic and heartbreaking professional experience plunged me into a deep depression. This was exacerbated by a previous period where I faced severe generalized anxiety, battling panic attacks daily, feeling lost and overwhelmed, ultimately leading me to therapy and a diagnosis. I learned how past traumas—including childhood wounds, and the constant striving for external validation—had shaped core beliefs of unworthiness and not being enough. I witnessed firsthand how these personal strongholds and unhealed traumas manifested directly in my business, causing stagnation, self-doubt, and isolation, despite my best strategic efforts. Even as an entrepreneur, I hit periods of 'crickets' and constant 'no's,' which further fed into imposter syndrome and the fear of not being cut out for this.

 

However, 2024 became my year of intentional healing. Through a journey that included a physical surgery (my hysterectomy, which became a spiritual awakening to release past traumas), and deeply impactful therapy with a Christian therapist specializing in childhood trauma and anxiety, I began to unpack layers of pain. I learned that my worth was not tied to performance, achievement, or external validation, but solely to the fact that God is love, and He created me out of love. He fashioned me perfectly, exactly as He intended.

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It was from this place of healing and clarity that Melanin Innovations was born. I officially started Melanin Innovations in March 2024, and incorporated it in June 2024, driven by a passion to empower you to navigate this fast-moving digital world with clarity, purpose, and power, ensuring your business shines brightly and brings glory to God."