We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Grace Harvey a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Grace , thrilled to have you on the platform as I think our readers can really benefit from your insights and experiences. In particular, we’d love to hear about how you think about burnout, avoiding or overcoming burnout, etc.
Being an entrepreneur will keep you working day in and day out. One of my models is you work the business don’t let the business work you. I started several businesses that I really enjoy doing one of my nonprofits is a Youth Organization and another non-profit is a women’s ministry. I recently added on a youth art program and a community engagement program as well. In the daytime I am a Pre-K teacher. I am also a student at army University Montgomery where I’m majoring in early childhood education. I have three beautiful kids well they are adults now but still your job is a mom is never done. When Cody hit a couple of years ago I was forced to work from home. I also was forced to perform virtual workshops for my Youth Organization and for my women’s ministry. During that time I didn’t realize how bad of a shape my health was in mentally and physically. I started to feel pain in my mouth and in my stomach area. I ended up having to have three surgeries. And I mentioned this because during the whole time before covid I didn’t feel anything going on with my body until I was actually at home. The symptoms were there but I was so busy with work that I didn’t even notice or took the time to really take care of myself. I am very grateful for the time that I had to stay home. This really helped me with setting boundaries for myself taking care of my well-being mentally and physically and putting the focus back on me. I had to realize that focusing on me it’s not a selfish thing but it’s a responsible thing to do I cannot help others if I’m not helping myself. Today I have my alarm set for when to pause and stop for today and do self care before bed every night. This has helped me tremendously.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
I am a Early Childhood educator of 22 years children are my world and I do believe they are our future. 11 years ago I started a Youth Organization for girls: pink and Pearls for girls Youth Organization the fast learning opportunities and education family engagement and character development for girls and young women. In 2018 I started a women’s ministry: all things are great focuses on providing purposeful and fashionable fun events for women. I am the I am an online entrepreneur for the community Smorgasbord and Non-Profit Organization. Recently the city of Montgomery along with the Builders and Backers Heartland Forward program awarded me funds to start a youth art program in Montgomery Alabama. The most thing that I am excited about is having the opportunity to teach and mentor children in my community. In the future I plan to study humanity and philanthropy.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
One of the qualities that I really admire about myself is that I really pay close attention to participants that I serve in all of my nonprofit organizations. I am an intentional planner. I aim for all of my events activities that I plan and so forth are meaningful and supportive to my participants. I value their thoughts opinions comments and suggestions. I listen well to my participants to where I plan to best support them. This did not happen overnight for me I remember at one time struggling to be a leader and had no leadership skills at all. There were many bridges that were burned because of my lack of leadership and having an attitude of thinking that “I’m the boss and I don’t have to listen to you nor your suggestions or opinions.” I thank God everyday that I had great people around me to support me in doing better and Leadership than the one I was doing. It takes real people to really tell you the truth about yourself. I appreciate those real people. My advice would be to entrepreneurs is to value your team, to listen to your audience, to really plan everything with them always in mind.
What do you do when you feel overwhelmed? Any advice or strategies?
To all entrepreneurs that may feel overwhelmed or grow weary. I want to give you an advice and my advice is to give yourself permission to take breaks when you need to. I have allowed myself to take a month off from everything and I let my participants know in my team know. I have had such support that when I do have to take breaks they understand that. And when I return they are always there waiting for me. I don’t do this often maybe once in a couple of years to be honest. But knowing that I have respect for myself and boundaries that, I am not afraid to put myself first and take the breaks and the time on what I need to regroup.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: pink_pearls_for_girls
- Facebook: Pink and Pearls For Girls Incorporated
Image Credits
By Grace Harvey
