From 9 - 5 To A Full Time Professional Hair Stylist - Adefunke Adefule

My colleague in university told me once i think, you're going to check out find out yeah handbook. He wrote you're going to be if a hairstylist that'll be known, and i can't remember writing that. It'S just that. I'M sure that you're going to ask what's going to be in life, i had no clue and i'm like okay, what what can you possibly be in life and i'm like? I love hair and i just wrote that casually, so i had to go back and go and check my yearbook and i'm like oh wow. I wrote this five years ago and this is happening now, even though i'm doing here i still feel like. I don't want to be behind the chair forever. I still every day wake up and i'm like: what's the next plan, you're doing hair good, do you mean, like you get bored exactly? I feel like there's still more to break there's still more groundbreaking things. I can do i just want to sleep in my old days and feel like i did it all. I accomplished it. I i sought after everything i can and will be, and it happened welcome to another episode of vinspire with romeo levette, my guest today. She is a celebrity stylist. What'S so inspiring about her journey is the fact that she was able to navigate from a nine to five to full-time stylist. Ajani is so amazing. She didn't allow anything to hold her back, i'm sure you're going to enjoy this section. So, let's dive in i'm super happy to have you on the show. I'M excited to be here too. This is like my first interview, i must say so, yay, oh, that's so cool. So let's get the conversation started. I know that um you used to be on the nine-to-five schedule in the corporate world. Now your stylist. So can you please explain how does that happen? Okay, so for me, um working nine to five in telecoms for five years was. It was good because i feel like he helped me, set my work ethics and then he introduced me to a world field with like a lot of people i used to. I didn't used to be a people person so working in 95, 13. A lot of emotional intelligence taught me how to interact and interpersonally out of the workspace and also um. I think it was needed. You know how people say. Oh, i wish i started my business earlier. I don't think so. I felt like that was a part where i needed to have been mooded and reformed before i started my business because i can't imagine leaving my my university to doing a. I probably would have stepped on everybody's toes because i was temperament and all, and i really didn't understand how to express myself a lot but working in a nine-to-five environment having people you had to work with in a team project with he helped balance. That part of me, so what made me leave my nine to five actually was one i wasn't so fulfilled as much. You know how you feel, like i'm doing something, but i still go to bed asking myself questions like what is your essence. Was it a passion for you to like become a stylist yeah? So i feel the only thing i have said to my own journey is that um in your balloon they said: there's nothing, there's! No, how far you're going to join. You come back home so nice to be when i was a child. I have three sisters and i had so much hair. I would do all of their hairs all of it and i never for one strained or anything. It just came naturally, and my mom can't even do it to save her life. Trust me wow and when i was young she'll be so inquisitive about it, and then she just wondered like how can you do hair? I don't even know how to do it and i'm, like i just enjoy doing hair but then leaving i'm the firstborn of like well, four kids now so means i have a heap of responsibility on my shoulders. When i was leaving university, i didn't think of passion. I thought of survival. First of all, i thought of oh getting to the world and breaking even doing things that would make me stand out and taking my responsibilities actually so funny thing. My my my colleague in university told me once i think, you're going to check out find out yeah handbook. He wrote you're going to be a hairstylist that'll, be known, and i can't remember writing that. It'S just that. I'M sure that during the escalation to be in life, i had no clue and i'm like. Okay, what can you possibly be in live and i'm like? I love hair and i just wrote that casually, so i had to go back and go and check my yearbook and i'm like oh wow. I wrote this five years ago and this is happening now, so it wasn't like i thought to do it. I thought to be a woman that would make a difference in the world. I'M someone that i stopped, but i'm like i'm not average minded and that's one issue. I have. I always feel like there's more. I can do more. I can be more so when i went to nine to five. I don't even spend my growth in my career and until it comes, i would always want to do more. That'S how i started my job as an intern before my anyways and then they decided okinawa. Retaining you - because i was always here - and i think was because of that eagerness. I was uneasy at some point. I'M like okay, i'm here the sector is dying, i'm not doing more than like my daily routine at work. I want more in the course of more. I tried other career paths, i tried to be a programmer, then it was good. I could code, but i wasn't it wasn't fulfilling like. I don't wake up yearning to code and then i tried digital marketing. Now i stepped out through my classes. So then i just said: okay, you know: what can you do? What do you like to do and i'm like i like hair, so let me see if i can even work my way through it. Then i remember that you're, an overly people person. How are you going to survive? You don't like to talk to women. How are you going to manage it so going back to what you said about you want more? Does it mean that the corporate environment you're you're, not feeling fifa or you're, not hundred percent utilized? So i feel, like i can't say i was utilized i was over worked - is what i'll use, but as a person, you know when you're getting to even as okay. Let me use this my moment now, even though i'm doing hair, i still feel like. I don't want to be behind the chair forever right. It still. I still every day, wake up and i'm like: what's the next plan, you're doing hair good, you don't want to do hair. I see people that have 50, they still do it and i'm happy for them. But it's just not my fault. So do you mean that you get bored exactly? I feel like there's still more to break there's more groundbreaking things i can do. I just want to sleep in my old age and feel like i did it all. I accomplished it. I i sought after everything i can and will be, and it happened. So it's not just it's as a passion, but i keep telling my my mom and my siblings. It'S like a starting point, because a is me being exposed to the world right and the exposure would bring bigger things for me. So here's like, after her i'm going to business school, i want to see what i can do as a business mogul from there. I want to open different franchise. I want to go into real estate, you name it as as doing me i'll just do it wow. I love him good, but i mean i don't really be any cheer forever. That'S! That'S! That'S really! Really amazing! So another question. I really want to know how do you make that switch? So were you on your full-time job and then still doing your air business? How do you make that switch, or do you just stop and start the uh stylist? No, so in them in 2018 was when i was having it the most like i was having major crisis i would rely. I was, i was conflicted in my soul, so i kept on researching. I tried to even go to america for classes, but they kept on denying me visa. So one day me and my ex-boyfriend were talking there and then he's like oh um, see this lady. Take her online class, the air diagram, amazing woman she's, my first mentoring to her and i took her classes and from there i started following her on instagram, so that's on the instagram would do when you follow one person. It would give you like. I yeah like a list of other people. That knows that's it. That'S similar to that person, so i said just follow all of these other people and then and even about front house then for anything. The thing i do now with her and then i just checked one of this lady i named mr liato on instagram now and i saw she was doing and she was in paris and i'm like it was like voodoo, because i didn't understand the ideology then. So i was mesmerizing like i know this is what i want to try and learn, but then she was in paris. I was really thinking. Okay, am i going to get to paris the flight money? I was just already calculating. If i have the amount of money to go for that training, low and beyo, that was around um, maybe may and no not around match, and around me i just saw a flyer. No around april i saw a flight going up. Still i had to come to nigeria. What year was that 2018 and it was. It was almost like from my mouth to god's ears because i really didn't have that amount of money to spend, but i knew that i was going to take that class. So her coming to nigeria was like it was like a miracle for me submitted. I contacted the organizers and then i just paid for a class. Then it was a class of 10 people and i was like my first time trying a frontal any um install ever the class was great, but i felt like i wasn't up to it. So the next day i just took another hair brought another hair tried to my mum and i just kept on practicing so bam and all this period i was telling my nine to five, but i was just taking my time to practice. So after a while i felt like okay, maybe i should advertise on instagram and see if i'll get people traction, and i did - and i got a few people so i would do. Is i wake up? 4? Am i'll go and do someone's hair as a home service and then resume to my office 9 a.m and when i'm done in my office i'll go to standard person's house around 6 p.m. And i probably get back to my house around 12 1 2 a.m. So i was doing a routine from from, i think, um june july august i broke down terribly in october, like i felt sick. I was bedridden for like eight days because i literally was working on just two hours in a day now, but i knew that i needed to to strengthen my hand and see if i could go into the business properly before quitting my job. So after, like november december, i said okay, this was it was going so well that my boss then had to call me because everywhere around the office, i was air. So this was the funny part, because i didn't have a store. If clients give me hairs to make it as a wig during my break time i'll lower my chair in the office and i'll put the dummy head on like between my laps and i'll, be wigging and then i'll go to the bathroom, then i had like a Socket i'll go to the bathroom, i was always in the bathroom and i might be styling the wig, and it was so about that. He tried to warn me that she goes back to me again because literally everybody be banging on the door they want to appear. I would just be there blow drying and straighten and stuff, because i, like the only time i had to do it because after that i have gone delivered here. Maybe instantly then get home really late to it, and i was walking on the island and leaving the minute at that time. So what the journey was was a lot. So as a december, my boss had to come here and he was like. Do you want to do hair, or do you want to continue this? Your work because it's very clear, you're very divided, and i knew my heart that now i had to do hair because it was as much as i was going through stress - and i was barely sleeping. I was burning like i was. It was something new to me. Was fascinating to me, seeing all i could do with the all frontal and all, and i knew that i needed to venture into it. So i just decided, i know i'm done with the 95 or december 2018, which invoice was very brushed because it wasn't like. I had like a large client there. I had like really five to six clients, but i'm, like you know what i was young or i'm i'm still young anyway. I just read like it's like. I said i'm very spontaneous a person. If i think that i need to do something, i would do it if i feel at it. Well, life happened, but most at most times, i never really feel at it. So i just took a leap of it. Quit my job took the last one millionaire savings i ever had in my entire life, i rented an apartment of 900, something key, and then i started to like patch my apartment. Actually, you carry on my old store there. I was patching this small small any day i walk. I see more, i pouch then i had to borrow from some few friends and then around me again in 2019, things picked up when you now made that decision. You want to leave your full-time job and go into the hair thingy. Was there any fear? What was your fear at that time? So i was not afraid of nothing, and that comes from the fact that i'm a very spontaneous person, so my fear in life is failure. I i hate to be stagnant. I hate to feel stagnant. I hate to feel like, like i'm, not utilizing, my entire being. I mean maybe because growing up in most of my classes, i was the smartest everybody will always be like you're, smart you're integrity. So you know when everybody's looking at like a smart person, it means that you have to always make smart decisions in life. It means that at every point you're you're, looking at i said, like maybe you're, not as smart as you think you are so that challenge of me you're, not smart. Is it always pushed me so my only fact, i got a job with arm pensions. That'S the time i quit my job, so i wasn't like okay, my job, yes, was that's not the only if i had, i actually had another job in my office. Dave would know that i was me and hr started for like three months on that job, because i was trying to bargain for the moon. What the truth is. It wasn't the money, it was because i was just asking myself do i want to stand on 95 or do i want to do hair, and i knew i had to do hair. So i wasn't really scared. I was afraid of was more doing hair. So i just quit my job with the mind that if a bad pass, i'm gon na beg everybody. I know please. I need a job send my cv and i know that because i adapt easily, i can literally work almost anywhere, so i wasn't worried about getting another job. I was only worried of not doing the best with hair, so i don't think so, because i quitting my job. I started taking classes back to back and when i mean back to back, it means that if i saved 200k, somebody else came to meet me and say someone. People did come from other countries to us i'll take their classes. Knowing that i was broke and i'll come back and i'll be bro, but i just need that i need to do so. If i need to do anything, i knew was bet. It was paramount to my growth. I would do it regardless, because so a minute that you kept on investing, i didn't know myself training half of the business you're going to be into. I did that a lot i took so many. I think i took about six physical classes and about maybe four to five online classes in between the space of 2018 and 2019, i just kept on taking classes even in 2020, when there was corona, i still took courses online. What has it done to you personally? Making that switch and then deliver weight, clients daily different kind of human being, a space that you haven't been in before. So how was it for you? How is the experience going for you so initially it was. It was overwhelming because i hate to talk on the phone, i'm sure you, you know that i talk on the i'm, not i'm not talkative. If i'm not comfortable with you, if i'm comfortable, which i i can talk forever so the fact i had to pick up my phone every day, i had to reply messages i had to being nice was not even a hard work for me because that came with My nine-to-five job but managing people's emotions was it wasn't so hard because i had to deliver and living was something i'm used to. The only hard part was managing people like my communications with them. That was in fact it's still difficult. It'S just like the only part. I know that any of every other part of it. I think i try my best, because i always try to learn, and i will learn so with my clients complaining about something i put it to heart. Like last year, most people kept on saying you're over you're working on overdrive. You should get more people right and train them so this year, what i did was i got like eight more staff now and i'm doing like a training journal to train. So i like a two-year contract, everybody sign it and then i will train them extensively this january to fail right before we go into that. That was kind of interesting, i'm coming into that soon. So i, while in this journey right now, have you ever feel that i don't think this is what i really want to do. Should i step back, take a break. It'S becoming overwhelming um i'm losing to that motivation that drive for me to wake up and then do what i really love to do. Have you ever feel that way? Well, sorry, i never feel like. Oh, this is not what i meant to do, but sometimes i get. I guess i get bought easily. So when i get bored which was this year, i started to ask myself like okay. Nigeria is not looking like a stable country. I never my friend everywhere. I'M here in canada, canada, canada and my best friend she had gone like two years early and she then she begged me. I was still filming ninja baby like we die yeah, but now all my friends are going here and i'm conflicted in my soul. Like should i relocate because even my clients should be like you make a lot of money, you can. You know make a lot of money in canada. You know make a lot of money in u.s, you know, so all those things playing to my head, but one thing i know for sure is if, if it's god's plan for me right, yeah, i'm a very spiritual person, i'm not religious, but i'm spiritual. I feel like my spontaneity comes from a spiritual person within me that just says you know what my daughter. This is the way go right. So that's how like it's just how i feel so i don't feel like. I have any regrets doing it. I love doing hair. I love making women beautiful like when people leave my store. They have this glow and that glory irrigates with me, like sometimes i go, kali i'll come my work and and then one thing i set up myself when i was younger is you? Would die with kings and queens? I used to say to myself i said chad. I was very spiritual too. So my first year doing here i met the governor's wife and i was even like solid solid and i told my mom that i'm like mommy i've. Never even done hair for a long time, my first year and i'm doing the governor's wife's hair and to me that, was god telling me that this is a journey that you're starting right and it will still take you for the so. Every time i tell myself, you die with kingdom queen and i've truly met like important great people throughout my journey, and i feel like it's just like the beginning to the part where god has said to me. You were done with king and queen, so i don't think, like i said in my 95, i do not regret. I was thinking she tp, but i make my salary needy now, but i knew that. Oh, i know in my heart that i needed our five years to be groomed and prepped so for every journey, and i understand that it is necessary wow, i'm supposed to be here at the time, i'm here, because if i started earlier or anything when i started, I can say that god did lighten like turn on the lights on my head and shined me to the world because in lagos i know that if you name three people that would do your frontal, you name me and i don't even know i've been doing it For 10 years, so it doesn't matter how you start or when you start or where you stop for me, wherever you are now, i i have a strong believer of that is when god wants you to start this journey, so i have zero regrets about it. I'M believing in yourself that you can i'm a strong believer in myself. I believe, like you, believe myself is deep. It'S deeper than life, because sometimes my mom looked at me like you're, radical and i'm like nah. Don'T worry trust god trust me and it always works. Always it will definitely work so we're going to go on a short break and i will be right back. You stay tuned, welcome back to beansprout with romeola potay. So how do you function? I want to understand how you manage your schedule, because i remember the last time i tried to book you it's like begging, so how do you manage it to ensure that you're not losing potential clients and then maintaining the one you have currently um and one thing I'M sure of is that everything can be all good, so managing managing my shuttle is very hard because it's just me that does like the majority of the work, but what i do is i have a google sheet i use in booking people. The only issue is that i can book as much as people would have me book so last year as much as i had people, because i had like a few people tell me: oh, i didn't care, we tried to book you, but we couldn't get you. We tried to book you and i felt so bad about it, but i had to remind myself that those periods are trying to book. You were doing eight people party 10 people per day, so genuinely it wasn't like you're trying to ignore people. You just do not have the capacity right, so i just told myself that you know what this year. What i would do is work on capacity. Yes, i already made a statement that okay, i'm you go to for this. If you need this service, but then i need to be able to accommodate a larger clientele, so i'm getting more people this year and i'm trying to train them to be as good as i am by god's grace, so that when i'm too unavailable, i can be. I could just be like sorry mama, i'm unavailable, but i promise that if you come in my assistant or my colleague can do it and will do it well under my supervision right. So that way, people can then start to use, like my other colleagues and with time people get comfortable using them, so we can take in more clients. It'S not me doing the eighth and ten per day we can accommodate 50.. How nice so another question. I would like to, as we know that 2020 was a tough year for a lot of people could be 19 affected entrepreneur across all sectors right. So how would you be able to manage it? What was your experience like um, so for me, in the beginning of the year i was having anxiety and that's because, like i said, i'm spontaneous so when i made a lot of money, then i made in 2018, 2019 and typical pacific, probably just burning a small Shop and continue, i said, no already big space, so i went to rent a bigger space and then started to spend on the bigger space. So i spent over four to five million on my space and with the updates by this first quarter. Ending i'll make the money covered came so yeah. That'S that hits me like. Oh, i should have stayed in my small space. I saved this point, but i'm glad i did get a bigger space because i could communicate my siblings and then we doing covered. We had like a lot of bonding time together. So, yes, i wasn't making money, but i had more family time. I didn't have the year before, so it wasn't really too much of a hassle for me. Then people were making wigs as well, so it wasn't like. I was not doing anything at all. I was still making some jar a year and then i was using for feeding and after coffee went. It was like people were locked up and don't need to be free, booked them busy. So it wasn't a bad yeah. So what are the last thing that 2020 talked to you? The only thing it just it showed me is that life is fecal and cherish your loved one. So i had a friend guna effect and a lot of people probably know she died in 2022 and that that really that one got to me because it was so close to my heart, because she's the sweetest person i've ever met she's. She would book other people for me and still send me a message. I'M like. Oh thank you. So much sorry, we stressed you out and that to me is intentional, because it's not your service, you can just i can book you and then forget. I booked you for someone, but she will still come back and be like my love. I need to restress that i'm so sorry thank you for coming, so she was a very intentional being and she was young. She was 25 and she died. So that just reminded me that no matter how far you want to go in life or anything, one thing is inevitable and that's dead, so the people around you should matter at all times. So, as i said, covington really upset me because i had a lot of bonding time with my family. Like me, my sisters would tick-tock all day all night. It was good, so it reminded me of things that mattered. Sometimes we get carried away, trying to um, break, break things and break boundaries and go high and go higher, and then you forget that you're losing love with them. Like that, i can, i can know you are not talking for two years and every day. I think about you, but covey took my steps backwards. Made me. Remember that okay, money will come fame, will come, wealth will come accomplishments. You will get well. You should not forget the people that matter, because those people are actually what makes memories. Most of you don't remember how you made your first million as much or how you left being a millionaire to a multi-millionaire. Just realized that oh, i am a multi-millionaire, but you see all those little moments. You remember all that time we had this ah and then it just gives you this joy, so it just reminded me that well, that is more than money wow. That is powerful. I don't care. Thank you. I really really love that. So what should we be? Looking forward to this is 2021. What are the things we should be looking up to so, for me, 2021 is actually personal growth. So i i i feel like there's really not much. You can do business to come clients to come, we got things would work, but for me, 2021 is personal growth i want to so i pay why i work so hard, sometimes because i take your family. So sometimes i don't pay attention to my personal self. I pay attention to the fact that to make a lot of money so that i'm not stranded, should anybody come with any issue i full ground but 2021. I actually want to do things for my personal self like explore the canada thingy i mean i've been holding back on it. Neither have any excuse. The one they'll ask you to have your account. I think i have it the time to learn. I think i can make it so there's no excuse on that. I'M also trying to go to cosmetology school actually because i do have freelance, but i feel like if i need to set up a proper salon that people would get the best quality service. I first of all need to go and be trained in a school properly and be licensed. That way. I can also be an educator. I can also like make my product just go through the right channel, because i always believe that anything you do be diligent at it, so i plan on going to cosmetology school as well. So, for me, 2021 is more of me personally growing and grooming myself to be a better person for my next, for who i am in the next five years. So that's what i'm joining on this year actually - and i could i consider that going to happen because you're kind of girl that believes so much in yourself and then that go for exactly what you want. So i have so much positive in like positive things going on around you, which i really really appreciate seriously. I'M happy that you are, you are who you are and then you are actualizing your dream and then you have kept on saying something about family family. Your family, oh like because i say all the time i call myself all your sisters around you family. I see people around you and out, so i must also uh say this. You you're good at what you do. Thank you. The first time i came to your place, i was like, oh my god. This girl is expensive. You should do it. I was like charlie, but then, when i saw it i was quite happy. Nobody has ever touched that lace except you i'm like. I would definitely if it's not, they found care, it's not anyone else. So, what's the final word to people oh trying to they're currently on their nine-to-five job, they have so much fear sure of uncertainties and all that so what's is your you've tried it yeah right? So what is the word for them? What do you have to say? I'M sure - and everybody probably said i think i'll say leap no say plan. I didn't leap first, i planned i'm planning the planning phase won't be easy, like i just i think i mentioned how i would go and do home service then go to work, but there are times when you take out of my salary, like thank you per day. 5K party, because i was actually getting late to work and then i'll stay after i will go and work again. So all those period. I was actually grooming myself mentally for the for my movement and i was also saving because the truth is most people that have fears because they do not have any backbone or financial assistance coming from anywhere, so you're afraid of what. If i feel so what i did was i didn't. I didn't ask for anybody to help. I i walked myself out until i could save yeah, because i was paying my sister's tuition fees, and so she wasn't see you then so that's why i was always broke. So i need to save a lot of money which mean i was a lot of money, but i need to save that money so that i could get a space. So i mean by all righteousness, if you need to, if you feel like you need to live and do something for yourself. Do it but plan properly, so you do not fall or sink and understand the kind of business you're doing, because i knew my business was trying to go into a service. I knew that my hands were the major equipment i needed. So if you know that it's product, you know that you have to plan, you have to buy, you have to ship so plan everything properly before taking that leap, but take you with the faith that you would succeed, because the strongest belief is in yourself, if you Believe in yourself you will do so well and it won't be easy at anxiety or through 2019 i'll sleep walking. My sister literally pull me and be, like you know, you're still talking like oh yeah and then i'll just wake up in my heart to palpitate. But we walked out because i believed strongly myself and god and i knew that god with me, i mean who can be against me and christ in the hope of glory, so yeah just believe in yourself plan and then take the leap. I think that's that's so powerful. Thank you so much for coming you're. Welcome. So thank you so much for watching. I'M sure you grab a lot from water from kessar. I really enjoy our story. I enjoy a conversation and she said a lot of things that really strike me. I love is the fact that she was able to move from a full-time job as an accumulator, a culture in her that culture airport to set up a homeside business. Wherever you have now, you can start building it and don't judge job you have to plan planning. Should be your number priority? What is your plan for 2021 if it is what you want to do start planning now i'll see you next time on baseball with romeo levite bye. For now you