Hannah is a 22 year-old writer, educator, and spiritual coach from San Francisco Bay Area. Her career began at the tender age of 16 with the founding of The Road to Hannah, a lifestyle blog that quickly gained traction due to her punk rock nature and no-filter attitude.
After participating in national ad-campaigns, collaborating with some of the world’s most notable brands, and even giving a TEDx talk, Hannah is on a mission to help people uncover their own spiritual power through utilizing the tools of manifestation, positive affirmations, and astrology. She joins us today to share everything she’s learned as a spiritual leader and about growing a successful business at 22 years old.
Hannah’s website: https://www.theroadtohannah.com/
Jessmyn:
All right. Hi, guys, and welcome back to Interact’s Creator Stories Podcast. Thank you so much again for being with us today. I’m your host, Jessmyn Solana, and with me today is Hannah Siddiqui. Hannah, thank you so much for being with us on our show.
Hannah:
Oh my goodness, thank you so much for having me. I’m so excited to be here.
Jessmyn:
Of course, of course. Just to give you guys a little bit of a background on Hannah, she is a 22-year-old writer, which by the way, I think you might be the youngest I’ve ever had on here. But you’re a writer, educator and spiritual coach from the sunny San Francisco Bay Area. Her purpose in life is to help people uncover their own spiritual power through utilizing the tools of manifestation, positive affirmations and astrology. Her career began at the tender age of 16, with the founding of The Road to Hannah lifestyle blog, that quickly gained attraction due to her punk rock nature and no-filter attitude. I love that.
After participating in national ad campaigns, collaborating with some of the world’s most notable brands, and even giving a TED Talk in 2017, she began to set her sights on photography, which she retired from in 2020 and has worked alongside the like of Adidas, Facebook, Toyota, and more. As of 2019, she is also a certified meditation and breathwork instructor, and teaches both online and in person at Anchor Meditation in San Francisco. Hannah is also a recent graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, having studied sociology and English literature. Congratulations, by the way, on that graduation.
Hannah:
Thank you so much.
Jessmyn:
That was wild. That is just like … I read so many bios, of course, but what gets me is just you’re so young and I’m sure you get this all the time. I really want to dive into all of that because I think it’s absolutely incredible. Yeah. First and foremost, tell us a little bit more about you, your current business, what you’re doing, and then-
Hannah:
All right.
Jessmyn:
… take us back to the start of it all. How did you get started in all this?
Hannah:
Yeah. Well, first of all, thank you so much for the sweet words. That really, really means so much to me. My business today, as [inaudible 00:02:19] said in my bio, I’m a writer, I’m an educator, I’m a spiritual mentor, astrologer, meditation breathwork teacher. I wear a lot of different hats. My work is really primarily focused on helping people to tap into their own spiritual tools and really create the lives of their dreams. It sounds really lofty, but one thing that I’ve come to understand throughout my own spiritual journey and my own understanding was that we all have so much power within ourselves.
We all have so much potential to live these lives that we dream of. I know this because it’s something that I’ve experienced firsthand. I’m super passionate about helping people to realize their potential through this kind of spiritual foundation. That’s what my work is really centered on. Pre-COVID, I was doing a lot of in-person workshops, and giving a lot of lectures, gave a TEDx Talk, as you mentioned. But now I am more in the digital education space. I create courses, do online workshops and see private clients.
That is, in a nutshell, what the scope of my businesses today. But if you had told me, six or seven years ago, this is what I’d be doing, I would have thought you were crazy and out of your mind because this is not what I expected to do. A very, very long story short, when I was in high school I was training in pre-professional ballet. I thought I was going to be a ballerina. That did not end up working out. I had an injury, change of heart, realized this isn’t for me. At the time, I had a family member show me a woman who had a fashion and lifestyle blog.
I’ve been a writer my whole life. Really, since I was 11 years old, it’s been my favorite thing, my driving passion in life. This family member was like, “You should start a blog. You could be really good at it.” Blogging wasn’t a thing back then. It definitely wasn’t the industry that it’s become today. It was more of just a creative outlet. I really thought about it. I was like, “You know what? this sounds really fun.” I started sharing my life online, really when I was in high school in 2014.
It was just me posting a photo of myself that my mom would take me standing in front of my garage before school, edit it in the VSCO filter app and then I’d write a little bit about my day. Really that’s how it started. From there, I was going into it with the intention of if one person reads this and is better off because of my writing, than I’ve done everything. I’ve made it. I’ve accomplished things. Really it just started to organically build from there. In 2016, I started my actual blog, The Road to Hannah, at which at the time was just the blog, not even remotely a business.
From there, life just really unfolded naturally. I was deep into this fashion and lifestyle blog I had started, which led me into a modeling career, which then led me into a full time photography career, which then led me into influencer work. There’s this whole path that was unfolding for me. At the same time, underneath this all, I’m having this intense spiritual awakening. I’m really diving into spirituality. I’m studying and I’m recognizing the power that these tools are having on my own life. Yet, I’m being completely vulnerable about all other parts of my life, but I’m so scared to share this part on my platform.
I was afraid people are going to think I was crazy, I was afraid that people were going to have no interest in this, whatsoever. I’m going through this and I’m [inaudible 00:05:59] other content, and I’m just feeling like something inside of me tells me that I need to share this with the world. It wasn’t until the end of 2017 that I really began to share my first inkling of spiritual content on my page. Really from there, I remember it was a positive affirmation I’d written, and I talked about sharing, the power of affirmations and using them in our life. It exploded. I had never gotten such a positive response from my audience on anything.
People were asking me to teach them more, to tell them more, to talk more about this. It really naturally unfolded from there in a way that I could have never, ever imagined. Really my story has taken all these twists and turns. But the underlying theme is that throughout all of it, whether I knew it or not, I was listening to my intuition and it led me exactly where I needed to go, exactly to a place that was so far beyond anything I could have imagined for myself. I think that’s the same ethos that I carry in my business today. It’s a very much an intuitively led business. It’s how I make decisions, it’s how I operate, and so far it hasn’t failed me yet.
Jessmyn:
Yeah. No, I love that. Because it’s like when you … Especially now that I’m doing these podcasts, I’m interviewing a lot of other entrepreneurs and they’ve been doing this, right? For so long. But usually, when you speak to people in this stage of their business, they are in their 30s or late 30s, or maybe even early 40s, or they’re like, “You know what? This is something I’ve been wanting to do my whole life. Now, I’m finally doing it,” which is also awesome, but to have the maturity and just vulnerability that you have at this age, I think it’s amazing.
I think what I want to ask you first is how did you deal with some of the stresses that comes with growing something online or growing a business? Because I know you said that it wasn’t really a business yet, but how do you go through all those stresses? You still haven’t even dipped your toes into the actual world yet.
Hannah:
Yeah. I think for lack of a better term, it’s honestly bizarre. It’s really bizarre. Growing up, I never really felt like I connected to people of my own age. I was definitely that kid that was labeled an old soul, from the time I was probably about two or three years old. I never really connected to people who were, again, my age. I really wanted to hang out with people who are older than me. I wanted to hang out with my parents’ friends, and making friends my age was really hard. Even now, I look at my friends circle, the people who I’m closest to, and they’re all 10 plus years older than me.
I think for me it’s been a really humbling experience to build a business that I am, because I recognized that while I have arguably come far in my journey, and I can witness that in retrospect, you don’t know what you don’t know and a lot of that does come with age. I see that married to me in the friendships that I have, in my mentors, in the people that I am surrounded by in my community. I think it gives me this sense of humbleness of just recognizing that I don’t necessarily see my success as success. I see it as, okay, I’ve done some things right and I’ve done a lot of things wrong, and I’m continuing to learn and continuing to grow.
Eventually, one day, I’ll get it and I’ll get there. But I’m open to the process of growing and learning and adapting and continuing to build. At the same time, I will be totally honest that the imposter syndrome can be very, very real. But I think that’s just how I’ve approached it as the fact that even though I’m young, even though I’m doing this, I still have so much to learn and I’m going to learn so much, and so I just have to keep going and trusting the process.
Jessmyn:
Yeah. I love that outlook. I think that’s … It’s just like I said, such a mature way of thinking. I didn’t learn that until yesterday. You started this online thing, you didn’t really know what was going to happen with it. It was mostly for fun, I’m assuming.
Hannah:
Yes.
Jessmyn:
It just grew naturally and organically, but you still also pursued an academic career at the same time. You actually went to school, you got into college, a good college, mind you. But how were you able to do both? Did you have to stop one or the other at some point? Did you have to choose or were you able to actually figure out that time management?
Hannah:
Honestly, I didn’t really see there not being an option to do both. I was raised by two parents who immigrated here from India, granted when they were kids, so they’re very American. But my dad in particular still held the same traditional Indian beliefs around education. I was pushed really hard in school growing up. I was raised with the idea of you go to college, study whatever you want, but you have to go to college. You have to get a degree.
Not getting a degree wasn’t necessarily something I saw as an option for me. At the same time, as this was unfolding and as I was starting to build what is now my business today, I recognized that there were so many opportunities showing up. This was something that I was so grateful for because I did have the awareness that this is special, not everyone has this, and this is a privilege that I have, and it would be, for lack of a better term, stupid for me to not take these opportunities. For me, I didn’t see there being an option of picking one or the other.
It was we’re going to do both and we’re going to find a way to do both. If that means we have to make some sacrifices, that means we have to make some sacrifices. I think one thing it taught me was just getting really good at time management, because despite building this business, which was a full time venture in itself, and despite going to school, I still maintained having a social life and dating and having friends. It was really hard. It was really, really hard, but … There were a lot of nights where I lost sleep. There were a lot of times where, I was not proud of this, but I was in lecturing class.
I had my lecture notes on one side and I was doing emails regarding brand collaborations on the other. It was just the price that I needed to pay, and it’s funny because even though I did that for four years, now that I’ve been out of college for a year, I look back and I’m like, “But how did I actually do that? How did that actually happen?” But I think it was just something that was so innate within me that I just knew you have to find a way.
Jessmyn:
I wonder if it’s like … I don’t know. I’m trying to go back into my own college brain and try to think about the time. I wonder if it has so much to do with mindset, right? Your mindset in this was it’s not an option to let go of one or the other for me because I’m so passionate about both, I need to do both. But I’m thinking of my own self. At the time, I was just like, “I’m just trying to get through this.”
Hannah:
Yes.
Jessmyn:
In my head at the time, it was always like, “Once school is over, I can do what I want. Once school is over, I can do this and that.” I actually saw something on TikTok yesterday that was enjoy the journey, stop thinking once X is over, it will automatically get better. But I just love the way you thought of it, as in this is something that I want to do and I’m going to do it, and now you’re confused at how you do it, but you did.
Hannah:
Yeah. I think one thing too that I definitely feel like I need to mention is the fact that I did have a lot of support from my family throughout this that enabled me to be able to do this. I had a really solid support system in all aspects that carried me through this journey. I think without that, it would have been a lot more difficult. At the same time too, I also had the constant reminder from those around me of you only get … At the time, I was a junior transfer to UC Berkeley, so you only get two years of a Berkeley experience. Enjoy it. Take the opportunity for what it is because you will never get this again.
I think that was something I always kept in the back of my mind because I know that I’m the type of person where my days get so busy, I’m juggling so much, I’m like a hamster on the wheel constantly that sometimes I get into a situation I’m just like, “Okay, well, what’s the next thing? What’s the next thing?” I know I had moments in approaching college where it was just, “Okay, one more semester and then we’re on to this. One more semester here.”
But I really tried to ground myself in those moments to remind myself that this is time that’s meant to be enjoyed, enjoy this, soak up this experience. With my last semester of college falling during the height of the pandemic, I’m really glad that I kept that mindset because it allowed me to enjoy the time that I was able to have at college.
Jessmyn:
I love that. Now that you’ve graduated, you don’t have to do both. What’s next?
Hannah:
Yeah. It’s funny because I had one of my friends tell me when I was in college, “Once you graduate, your plate is going to be even more full than it is now.” I was like, “No, I’m going to have so much time to be creative and explore.” Nope, she was so right. My plate is even more full than it was in college. I have been really, really grateful to be able to run my business full time now. That little blog has become a full time business. My focus is really there. At the same time, I’m also working on establishing a small startup, which we’ll see how that goes.
It’s really in the baby stages right now. But I’m always circulating new ideas, focusing on how I can continue to build, and also supporting other people around me in building their own brands as well. It’s really been, again, an organic venture, but I would say that my mind is very focused on career and on building and how much can I continue to learn and grow even outside of the classroom?
Jessmyn:
I love that. That’s awesome.
Hannah:
Thank you.
Jessmyn:
Take me back to earlier when you were talking about your story and your journey of how you got here. You mentioned having a spiritual awakening. Tell me a little bit more about that. What was that like and what does that mean?
Hannah:
It’s a really good question. For me, in early 2016, I found myself in a situation where there was something I wanted really, really, really bad, but there was no conceivable way possible that I could have it. My mind was going through the mapping of how can we get from point A to point B, and there was no clear route. It was in that moment of trying to think about things and figure things out that I was led to this giant bookshelf I have in my room. Being a writer, I’ve been a voracious reader most of my life. I have this bookshelf that is just crammed with books.
At the bottom of the bookshelf, in the back corner with the books that I didn’t really touch at all, was a copy of this book called The Secret by Rhonda Byrne. This book, The Secret, is all about the law of attraction, manifestation, and it’s a lot of people’s gateway into spiritual teachings. My mom had actually bought me this book when I was probably about 12 or 13 years old. I remember reading it and thinking, “This sounds awesome.” Get it and put it on my shelf, and I was like, “I’ll get to it later.” [inaudible 00:18:14] was later and I found myself in mapping out the situation, feeling really called to go to my bookshelf.
I did and I was called to pick up that book. The book almost flew open to a page. The page was exactly what I needed to read. I really dove into that book. I flew through it in a couple hours, and I was like, “I need more.” It was really just this journey of here is this piece of information I found that is so powerful. How can I continue to learn more and adopt these principles into my life? I’m a big believer that spiritual texts like that will find you when you’re ready for them, and I was definitely ready at the time. It just became me really studying these ideas, these belief systems, these ways of living.
I’m just trying my hand at adopting them, trying my hand at manifesting something. I began journaling, I began meditating daily, and realized that these practices were making me a much better person. I was calmer, I was more grounded. At the time, I was dealing with a lot of depression and anxiety, and I was starting to feel joyful and more at ease again. I realized that these tools had so much power for me. My spiritual journey really came from the same way that I built my business, which was me just being open to learning and looking at all of the resources I had at my disposal and really utilizing them to its potential.
To answer your question on what a spiritual awakening is, I think the answer is going to be different for every single person because it’s going to look different for every person. But for me, in my circumstances, it was recognizing my own limitations as a person, as an individual fully operating from the self, and saying, “I need help. I’m open to help,” and being willing to open the door of opportunity for help when I heard the knock, if that makes sense.
Jessmyn:
It does. I love that. That’s really awesome.
Hannah:
Thank you.
Jessmyn:
Part of the reason too I was so interested in this was because I had recently gotten into basically the same thing, but not near as how you [inaudible 00:20:44]. It’s one of those things where you’re super interested, you want to be into it, rest of life gets in the way. But what I think is super interesting is, one, you were able to take something you’re super passionate about, create a business out of it, and two, it sounds like you’re also still practicing this as a way to overcome any challenges that you do have growing your business and then even going through school, I’m assuming, right?
Hannah:
Yeah. Absolutely. I would go as far as to say any of life’s challenges can be dealt with from this kind of foundation. My work and the thing that I teach to my clients and my students is that it’s really about developing your spiritual toolkit and your spiritual foundation. Whatever that looks for you, whether that’s developing a meditation practice, a journaling practice, whether that is developing a form of faith that feels really good for you, whatever that is it’s cultivating those tools and building them up.
When you enter these moments where life challenges you and test you, whether it’s in a breakup or during a move or during a pandemic, or whatever it is, you have the tools and the foundation to get through it a little bit more gracefully than you would without them, and therefore make the process a little bit easier. It doesn’t necessarily solve all your problems, but it just makes the process a little bit more bearable.
Jessmyn:
What would you say is something you can do to actually … I don’t know the right way to word this because I’m trying to make it make sense, basically. What I’m trying to say is I feel like a big reason, right? And why a lot of people in the world thinks this is weird. Like you said earlier, people are going to think I’m crazy for this. I agree with you that I’ve had people where they’re like, “Okay, what do you like?” Not doing some weird voodoo curses or something.
Hannah:
Yeah, [inaudible 00:22:44]
Jessmyn:
But voodoo isn’t even like that. But, anyway-
Hannah:
Right. Totally.
Jessmyn:
… it’s like how do you open yourself up to the idea of using something like this/ The reason that I’m asking is because I think a lot of entrepreneurs could find actual anxiety really, from something like this. Even just meditating, it doesn’t have to be connecting with the stars or something. You’re aligning with the planet. It really could just [crosstalk 00:23:09] be centering yourself in your mind, but you have to be open. How can you open yourself up to the idea of just trying it?
Hannah:
I think it really comes from being willing to be honest with yourself. I find that we’re in a time where we have people who fall into two separate groups. We have people who are very vulnerable and focused on self improvement and feeling better and mental health and whatever it is, wellness-centered people. Then we have people who don’t necessarily want to confront those things. They want to hide, they want to sweep it under the rug, they want to pretend like it doesn’t exist. I’ll admit that, for a long time, I was that person.
I was that person who was like, “I don’t want to talk about my feelings, I want to pretend they don’t exist I’m just going to model them up. I’m going to just ignore them.” What I found throughout my spiritual journey is that that didn’t work for me. That did not get me into a good place because it got me into a state where I was constantly anxious, I was overwhelmed by life, I felt like I had no outlet and I had no way of processing or understanding. I got to the point where I was just sick of it. But I wasn’t sick of it, until I was honest with myself.
You have to really get real and be willing to sit with the uncomfortable things that show up for you, and say, “Okay, what is really going on for me, and how can I address this? Furthermore, am I willing to make a change in order to feel better?” If the answer is yes, cool. Awesome, you’re ready for this work. If the answer is no, then I think you also have to ask yourself, “What is it going to take for me to get there?” I think that’s also falls in line with the idea that I was saying earlier of we come to this work when we’re really ready for it.
If I had been say 16 years old when I was really starting my … plan my business, if I had really come and been aware of spiritual practices, then I don’t think I would have been ready for it and I don’t think I would have been open for it, and I would not have been truthful with myself in the way that I needed to be in order to get where I am today. It really took that time of growing, and also, honestly, getting sick of where I was at, to then be open to adopting these practices. I would say, if you’re trying to force it, probably not the way to go. Just be open to whatever unfolds and be willing to be truthful with yourself the whole way.
Jessmyn:
Wow, that was really well put. I think that’s cool. Because no, I think you’re so right. I don’t know. Something that comes to mind is you don’t have to hit rock bottom to get there, but-
Hannah:
No.
Jessmyn:
… you just have to be open. You have to be ready for it. It has to be [inaudible 00:26:04] you’re like, “Okay, I actually …” My fiance, every time he gets super stressed out, I’m like, “Why don’t you try journaling?” He’s like, “Nah.” I got him a journal and he wrote two sentences, and he is like, “I’m not into it.”
Hannah:
Yeah, totally.
Jessmyn:
But then comes back two days later, and he is like, “I’m so stressed out.” It’s like, “I don’t know what else to do to help you.” But it’s just that, yeah, you have to be open to the idea, you have to be ready for it. I think that if you are in that space, it can actually be super helpful because you’re actually allowing it to help you, I guess, in a sense.
Hannah:
Totally, totally. Like you were saying too with meditation, you can come at it from a spiritual approach, or what some people call a more woo-woo approach. If you want to do a full on moon ceremony and have a sound bath under the stars, go for it. I am all in support with you and I will join you in that. That sounds awesome. But if you just want to take a purely clinical psychological approach to meditation, that’s super cool and there’s plenty of teachers who do that.
I’ve taken classes and worked with instructors who fall into both ends of the spectrum and they’re both really awesome. I think it’s just about also working to destigmatize what these practices are, and say you can take the total clinical, non woo-woo approach, or you can go like … I was going to use a really inappropriate saying, but you could just really go for it and really take the full spiritual approach. It’s really what’s up to you.
Jessmyn:
Yeah. No. I think too what comes to mind is it’s … I think it also stems from celebrities. Now that it’s bad that they do the more kind of woo-woo approaches, but I recently read Jenna Juan’s book that she came out with a few years ago. I can’t remember the name, but it’s sitting on my coffee table because it was so long ago. But she talks about going to the rain forest in the Amazon. She did some really spiritual bath practice that they do there, which in my head I was like, “Wow, that’s beautiful.”
But I can see how other people are like, “What? I can’t. How I’m I supposed to do that at home? I’m trying to run a business. I have kids, for example, or I have responsibilities. I can’t just leave to the Amazon to do this,” and then if you try to research it online, I do think there is a lot out there that do come at it from you have to have your crystals and you have to have the right space. But you can really just sit on your bed and try it out, and just keep quiet and center yourself.
Hannah:
That’s what I did. My spiritual awakening was in my bedroom at my parents house.
Jessmyn:
Wow.
Hannah:
It was nothing exciting. It was nothing fancy, but that’s where it happened. I think it’s so true. We see these different wellness publications. I’m not going to name any names, but I think people can can figure it out for themselves, that like to take these really sacred cultural indigenous spiritual practices, and for lack of a better term, colonize and commodify them to the point where they lose the intrinsic value and the deep rooted connection that they had.
I think that’s what a lot of people think is spirituality, because they’re spoon fed that narrative by Hollywood, by celebrities. Unfortunately, that’s not what it is. I think my role as an educator in this space and what I hope to see more people follow suit and is just remembering to acknowledge what these practices actually are and not just the mainstream versions that we tend to see, which represent the extremes of situations.
Jessmyn:
Yeah, yeah. No, I agree with that. I agree with that. Something I was thinking about to ask as we were speaking was you started out so young, and it was just regular blogging. It’s not you were trying to start an online business at the time.
Hannah:
[crosstalk 00:30:15]
Jessmyn:
But something that comes to mind is, especially starting much younger, you don’t have the same resources that somebody has if they started out in corporate, right? They’re like, “This isn’t for me,” and so they have maybe some money saved up, they know a little bit about how the real world runs, and by real world I mean just corporate business in general.
Hannah:
Yeah, totally.
Jessmyn:
But how did you figure all of that out, and how were you able to overcome that and actually build something out of it without having that type of experience?
Hannah:
Honestly, it’s so true because I feel there’s a lot of people who get held back from starting their businesses because they’re just like, “I don’t have the resources. I can’t pay $15,000 to hire a coach or to invest in this program.” Really how I started was utilizing the power of the internet. I literally-
Jessmyn:
Wow.
Hannah:
… Googled and YouTube searched my way through everything that I know. I spent hours watching YouTube videos, listening to podcasts. I took pretty much every free Instagram webinar that you could possibly find. I took them all. I was basically like, “How can I utilize as many free resources as I possibly can?” It’s not going to teach you everything, but it’ll teach you enough to get started. That was back in 2016, and even now, because of how this whole industry has exploded, and especially after COVID, just how many people are working online, there are so many resources out there. Even if you can’t invest your money into your business, invest your time wherever and whenever you can. Read those blogs, listen to those podcasts, take all those free webinars.
Even the ones that might seem a little crappy, I promise you’ll get something out of it. Just take what resonates and take what you need and leave the rest behind, and then eventually, you’ll build up to a point where you can invest and start hiring those coaches and taking those higher level programs that might give you a more detailed explanation of what you’re looking for. I feel like though that was only a place I got to maybe about a year ago. About a year ago is when I was finally able to hire a business coach. I was able to invest in programs and systems that helped me a lot and it helped me to scale really quickly. But I’m so grateful for all those years of putting in the time because it led me to that being able to receive the money.
Jessmyn:
I love that. When I think of those free webinars and I remember when I was … I think I was watching a webinar about … It was a career coach, I think it was. But I didn’t know. At the time, I was like, “I don’t know. This is a free class, I’m going to take it.”
Hannah:
Yeah, totally.
Jessmyn:
But at the end, what I realized was, oh, these are webinars that basically give you enough information to get you interested, and then they sell something to you.
Hannah:
Totally.
Jessmyn:
I’m assuming that happened a lot to you. How did you, I guess, get past either … Did you actually start buying stuff until you realized, “Oh, I just have to keep going with free, and this was a waste of money for me right now,” or did you already realize that very quickly, and you were just like, “Cool. I’m just going to get the free webinar, and that’s it?”
Hannah:
I realized very quickly that it was a sales tactic, and-
Jessmyn:
Nice.
Hannah:
… it really was just like, “You know what? I’m just going to sign up for the free webinar. I’m just going to take whatever tidbits of information I take, and even if I just learned one thing out of this 30 minutes of time I spent, I learn one thing, and that’s great.” You can’t really be picky with those things. You just have to be open. Again, I think everything boils down to just being open. With these webinars and whatnot, it’s being open to what shows up for you, what resonates for you, what you learn. Hopefully, you’ll learn at least one thing you can walk away with, and then you can move on to the next thing.
I would say I didn’t start investing in programs until probably 2019. About two years ago was when I bought my first program. I think that came into a place when I was already at a place where I was generating revenue from my business, and the investment made sense from the level that I had reached at the time. Don’t feel like you have to put in all this money and time and energy into these programs right away. Be selective with the programs that you take because make sure that they’re of value to you and it’s something that you feel will really help you and provide a direct ROI for your business. Also, you go crazy on the free webinars and learn as much as you possibly can.
Jessmyn:
I think your perspective from it, too, is so useful because you were so much younger and didn’t have a backup plan, right? You didn’t have backup money that you could just be like, “It’s okay if I spent $2,000 on this is.” It’s like a savings account. I think what I’ve noticed, at least in my time at Interact, is people get caught up in this, “Oh, yeah. This program is going to be the end all for me. I’m going to learn so much,” and a lot of times, you probably do but maybe it’s not quite the right time yet or wasn’t the right program for you, and now it’s like, “Great, I spent $2,000 on this.”
Hannah:
Right. Right, totally. It’s so true. It’s so true. People will just get so caught up in these programs and think these programs will give them the answer that they’ve been looking for for their business. But really the program is what you get out of it. It’s how much do you put in? How much time and energy are you willing to put into this program to be able to get out of it what’s going to help you to grow your business? If you’re not willing to put that time and energy into the free webinars, you’re not going to be willing to put that time and energy into the paid program. That sounds really harsh, but that’s the approach that I’ve taken, is I’m not willing to put in my time and energy for the free stuff, why am I going to carve out the time just because I’ve made an investment? And granted, there is an investment there, but it needs to be the same approach both ways.
Jessmyn:
I like that a lot. It’s really interesting. I don’t know. I think coming from people that I have talked to, where they started out, they did your normal, okay, I just need to get through school, and it’s just school, make my way, then I start out at a job, they’re in corporate, and because they do have this sort of worldly experience of it, they make decisions much more differently. Whereas in your case, you didn’t, so you’re just like, “I’m just going to do it. I’m just going to do it however, and I don’t really know what I’m doing,” which I think sometimes ends up working out, right?
Hannah:
Yeah.
Jessmyn:
What this makes me think of is my brother. He’s a nurse, and he did his NCLEX exams and he was like, “I heard somebody say something about how if you know nothing about the medical field, you actually could do better on this test than people who actually went to school for it. Because you’re not so caught up in the different, “Oh, it might be this, it might be that, Oh, but what if it could be this?” You just try to think at the top of your head what logically make sense, and he was like [inaudible 00:37:48] this question. I don’t even remember what it was. But I was just like, “oh, you would do that first,” and he was like, “Wow, I feel this is real.” Anyway, I think it’s similar to your experience.
Hannah:
I think so too. I’ve never really taken a formal business class. I’m not really formally trained and all that stuff. If I was, sure, I could have avoided a lot of mistakes that I’ve made, and I probably could have experienced growth in different areas. But I think for me, I again take a very intuitive approach to my business, [crosstalk 00:38:20] and that works for me, and it’s something that I encourage my clients and my students to do as well through their work. It’s just trust your gut and don’t be so reliant on what the books or even the experts or whatever are going to tell you. Take that with a grain of salt, learn as much as possible, but ultimately put that information into action in a way that feels best and feels right for you.
Jessmyn:
I love that. We are coming up on time, but I did have one more question that I wanted to ask you before we do wrap up because I think that’s a really good one. I don’t know. Tell me if you get this question all the time, but being as young as you are, and I’m sorry that a lot of my questions because I’m just [crosstalk 00:39:05]
Hannah:
No. No.
Jessmyn:
But being as young as you are, do you ever feel like people see your services, think it’s really cool at first, and then they’re like, “Wait, she’s only 22? What? I guess I wonder, do people wonder about the credibility there?
Hannah:
Honestly, it’s only happened a handful of times.
Jessmyn:
Nice.
Hannah:
Thankfully. I’m super grateful for that. There’s only been a few times where people have questioned whether or not I’m, for lack of a better term, entitled to charge my rates or do what I am doing. I just like to respond with, “I have put in as much time and energy and effort and also money as I possibly could into this, and I feel that my rates are reflective of the expertise that I bring. Just because I came into this at 20, 21, 22 versus 40, 41, 42, it doesn’t really make a difference.” Yes, there’s a lot of life experience.
But when it comes to this information, the information is being delivered in the best way that I possibly can. When people do have that kind of reservation, I just let them know that it’s probably not going to be a fit for us to work together, and that’s okay. I can refer them to someone else. But thankfully, that doesn’t happen very often. I’m super grateful that my clients, even though majority of them are much older than me, that they trust me and have faith within me. It’s something I don’t ever take for granted.
Jessmyn:
I love that. Well, I’m a fan. [crosstalk 00:40:41] But yeah, no. I love it. I think it’s awesome. Okay. We are coming up on time now. But thank you so much, and I do have my two last questions that I do-
Hannah:
Sure.
Jessmyn:
… wrap up every show with if you’re up for it. What are three things that most people wouldn’t know about you?
Hannah:
Three things that most people wouldn’t know about me. I think the first one is that I’m an introvert. Most people who-
Jessmyn:
Wow.
Hannah:
… follow my work do not know that I’m super introverted. I have five friends who I love to death, but I’m not a super social person. I’ve learned how to turn it on for my business, but I’m definitely introverted. Two, with that, another thing people wouldn’t know about me is that my favorite way to end my day is by curling up in some cozy PJs, making a nice dinner, and playing my Nintendo Switch. That’s my favorite thing ever. Three, a third thing that people wouldn’t know about me is that I think if I weren’t doing the work that I was doing, I would want to do something with interior design. I love interior design. I’m super passionate about it. But it’s not something that I think I would do professionally given the path that I’m on.
Jessmyn:
I will say, for those of you who aren’t watching the video version of this, her background looks really cool.
Hannah:
Thank you.
Jessmyn:
I [crosstalk 00:42:09] watch the video to see the background. I can see that. But awesome. My last question is if you could give yourself a single piece of advice at the start of it all, what would it be?
Hannah:
I think the single piece of advice that I would give myself is just to relax and trust the process more. It’s something that I’ve done, but I know one thing about myself, is that even still, I’ll have moments of getting really caught up in about how’s it going to work out? How’s it going to happen and what’s going on? It can be really difficult sometimes. I think every time that I have stressed and worried about how something is going to come together in my business, how is that launch going to go? Are we going to meet our goals, our KPIs for this quarter, how is that going to happen?
Every time I’ve stressed about it, it has always turned out better than I could have imagined, and there was no reason to stress in the beginning, and really all I did was cause myself a lot of turmoil for no reason. I think one thing that I would go back and tell myself, and that I’m still trying to tell myself today, is that you don’t need to stress because it’s going to be okay, the universe has your back, and it’s going to work out somehow.
Jessmyn:
I love that. Well, Hannah, thank you so much for being on our Creator Stories Podcast. Can you please let people know where they can find you online?
Hannah:
Yeah, absolutely. First of all, thank you so much for having me. It was such an honor. You can find me everywhere at The Road to Hannah. Hannah is spelled Hannah, H-A-N-N-A-H. My website’s theroadtohannah.com, which has details on all of my offerings, how to work with me, my programs. Instagram, @theroadtohannah. On TikTok, @theroadtohannah_ because someone took The Road to Hannah. That’s a whole other story. YouTube, Twitter, pretty much everywhere you can find me there. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to DM me, message me. I love getting to talk to people.
Jessmyn:
Awesome. All right, guys. As always, you can find her links underneath our actual podcast recording of this if you’re on our site, or in the description. But thanks again for being on our show with us and we’ll see you next time. Bye.