We recently connected with Steven Odell and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Steven , you’ve got such an interesting story, but before we jump into that, let’s first talk about a topic near and dear to us – generosity. We think success, happiness and wellbeing depends on authentic generosity and empathy and so we’d love to hear about how you become such a generous person – where do you think your generosity comes from?
My generosity comes from my trips sourcing tea in China, Taiwan and Japan. I’ve been traveling to Asia for the last 13 years sourcing hand-made, small batch, family style tea. When I visit families, farms and villages people open their hearts and homes to me in ways that go beyond a simple business relationship. I spend many days to a week in each village working directly with tea producers and community building real family style relationships that transcend mere transactional exchange. I’ve watched their children grow, I’ve been called Uncle and included in family gatherings. This quality of connection and sharing has effected me deeply.
It’s my responsibility in running my own teahouse to impart some of that generosity to those around me to my clients and guests, employees and friends. While a business must be functionally successful first and foremost to make an impact in community, it must also strive to share inclusively with those who consider it a hub for community connections and conversations.
Through years generosity impressed upon me in my travels sourcing tea, it has become imperitive to offer it any way I can to those who, in kind, come for a cup of tea at Enthea Teahouse.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
Enthea Teahouse has travelled directly to China for over a decade, building family style relationships with farmers and tea producers to source exclusively hand-made, small batch tea. We value whole spectrum trade from tea plant to tea pot, where the experience of brewing is enhanced by that intimate line of connection through quality and care.
As well, Enthea has cultivated relationships with local tea ware artisians in the Pacifc Northwest to offer primarily hand-made, locally-curated PNW tea ware in their 120 year old Victorian brick and mortar in SE Portland, Or. In this way, we hope to continue building bridges between Gongfu tea culture in China and here in the PNW to contribute to deepening authentic community connection both locally and abroad through sharing quality hand-made tea in more meaningfully ways together.
Every Friday for the last eight years we implement this ethos through our tea community conversation night called SpeakTeasy. As we feel mindful, alcohol-free nightlife is still sorely lacking in this country. So to be able to share a moment with friends and friends-to-be with tea can, at once, be both matter-of-fact and revelatory in its simplicity.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
The three most important qualities or skills I acquired through my journey of success in building in independent business from scratch is what I call the three R’s resilience, relationship and resolve.
Resilience is the most important because when you do what you love and there’s no blueprint, you will have people outside you and voices inside you trying to tell you to shoot lower, expect less, aim shorter, soften your expectations. But if you are truly passionate about something inside and out, nothing will ever stop you from achieving your goals. With resilience also comes a wild crazy commitment to that which you love to do thought too. You have to be so resilient that in moments where it isn’t working how you hoped, doubt never wins.
Relationship is what connects us to each other. Honoring and recognizing that as a keystone to how others support you and you support others is the ultimate understanding to true success. Success isn’t about exploitation because the fruits of your labor are had alone. Success is about recognizing the connections we share with each point of contact in the line of production or creation that has an intimate tie to its quality and value. When we take the time to recognize that and value that wholeheartedly, that’s a success that rises all boats together.
Resolve is the tool used to follow through. Having clear communication, clear boundaries, clear vision with employees as well as clients helps everyone understand what you offer, and how to help you succeed. All it takes is one clearly communicated passion to get someone to want to support you. But it takes resolve to know what that vision is and how you want to implement it clearly.
All the wisdom you’ve shared today is sincerely appreciated. Before we go, can you tell us about the main challenge you are currently facing?
My number one obstacle right now is growth. We are currently at the carrying capacity of employees size and my physical/ mental/ emotional capacity as a small business owner who has had to run five other jobs behind the scenes since the pandemic just to keep a float. As a very small business we are still recovering from the pandemic. We are grateful to be here and every day is barely above water. We currently make enough to keep things as they are, but in order to grow to the carrying capacity that is substantial and not constantly asking me to sacrifice my personal life and relationships on the altar of my small business, we need more growth.
And we can’t get that without more capital to support that growth, but we can’t get capital to support that growth without growth. It’s a viscous cycle that we are currently plateaued at. The resolve is currently happening as we retool our entire website to represent our offerings in a more in-depth and consistent manner. We look forward to having an updated website and more online exposure to support that.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://Rabbitsmoontea.com
- Instagram: @enthea_teahouse
- Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/entheateahouse
- Other: We’re an easy google search under ‘Enthea Teahouse.’
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
