Are You Really an Entrepreneur?
Conversation with Dana Chanel, Founder of Sprinkle of Jesus and Ariel Fuller, Co-Owner of Dunamis Woman Enterprise, LLC.
Dana Chanel: As an Entrepreneur I realized so many people are frustrated about money! They can’t even concentrate and worry about becoming a better person emotionally and spiritually if they can’t even pay their bills, get a meal, or keep the lights on. That’s stressful and that’s how the enemy tries to take control of our situation.
Ariel Fuller: I’ve been there many of times! I had to develop grit and not allow certain things, like financial burden to bother me. I tell people you have to continue to keep pressing and use the gifts God gave you and be confident in that avenue. Not everyone can be a true entrepreneur. I see people who say that they’re entrepreneurs and they still have a job.
DC: That’s not a business, that’s a hobby!
AF: A true entrepreneur doesn’t work a job. You can never understand the risk and reward that comes with true sacrifice and entrepreneurship, when you have a financial cushion to rely on. However, if you have a job take control over what God has given you and be a good steward of that. Use your job in a wise way to be able to go to the next level. Not everyone can walk this walk on just true sacrificial entrepreneurship, and that is okay. I definitely understand people’s financial struggles, but at the same time entrepreneurs need to learn how to let some things go. God is not caught up in the worldly things we stress about or buy.
When you can move and press through on your last dime you will see how God provides for you throughout the way. I think that also comes with being a servant leader. I live by my own quote, “Every time I give, I’m receiving… every time I teach, I’m learning and every time I give love, I feel love in return, because God has an awesome way of taking care of me, as I take care of others.”
DC: And that’s exactly why people are still struggling. You cannot be serving Him and not know who the heck He is!
AF: I tell people don’t think what you “do” for God in a faith-based business is who you are in God. Just because you’re putting His name on your products, doesn’t mean you know Him. I don’t want people to meet Him in their final days and He’s says, “You didn’t do anything I called for you to do, you didn’t even fulfill your purpose. You had this business, obtained success using My name, but you have not served Me.”
AF: What advice would you give to faith-based entrepreneurs who are just starting?
DC: The first advice I would give would be to stop making excuses. Today, we have so many resources at our fingertips for free, it’s just how disciplined you are and willing to use those resources. We started Sprinkle Jesus with zero dollars. I couldn’t even afford to pay my cell phone bill. I hear people all the time who say we are not ready for an app or we are not ready for a website. I think people are afraid to invest in themselves. People think because I’m a Christian it should be available for free, but people literally are afraid to invest in themselves and give. We are afraid to share and that is such a pivotal point in your relationship with God. You must understand that the only way to survive in this world, business wise & spiritually, you have to give. Think about all the laptops that we buy and iPhones. That adds up well over two to three thousand dollars over a course of time; now only if we can just take that money and invest it in ourselves. You can’t be afraid to go against the grain, the grit, the hard times; it’s so worth it!
When you sit at a job and get paid a salary, they are dictating what kind of car you’ll drive, what kind of house you buy, what kind of community you live in, because the money you make is the standard for what you can afford. The Lord will always provide for you but working a $40,000 salary and living in a $400,000 house is not going to work. I’ve been through the struggle, I’ve been to the projects I don’t want that kind of life. There are certain things that I had to worry about as a child that I don’t want my kids to worry about. There’s no miracle pill things are just going to happen, you just have to work at it.
AF: Have you had mentors that have helped you along the way?
DC: My father. He literally has been the biggest mentor. He and I didn’t have a great relationship. The Lord was not in the midst of this situation and the devil took control of our mouths. But, once seeking the Lord and asking him to restore not just my relationship with my earthly father, but with Him as well, He literally brought us together. He’s my best friend, my partner; he’s everything that I would’ve ever needed in order to fulfill my purpose that God has given me.
AF: God is an Author of time and even when you’ve missed things in your younger years, He can restore that back in your older years. Not everyone gets that opportunity to be able to restore his or her parental relationships. You rarely see daughters working with their Dad. In reverse, I don’t see many mothers and daughters working together like my mom and I. The best thing the devil can do is try to bring tension between a daughter and her parents, so that daughter can be by herself and prey to the enemy.
DC: He respects me, values my opinion and my knowledge. I’m literally the only one that can come at him and he’ll come at me. We grow together and that’s really the most important part. Anybody out there that needs to restore a relationship with a parent, prayer was my best friend; praying alone, praying with them, and at the end of the day loving them through their issues. There are times when you get older, you feel like you’ve seen a little bit of the world and start to dismiss what they tell you, because they weren’t there in your growing process. However, my dad is still older, wiser and there were things that he could teach me. I had to humble myself, be a servant, understand, and listen.
To read Dana’s magazine interview in Dunamis Woman & Real Awesome Men Magazine download our Dunamis Woman app on Android or iPhone! #BeDunamis #BePowerful