UVU is a place where you make amazing things happen. Go out and meet people.
I grew up a gymnast, and I love gymnastics. So, in high school, I tried out for the cheer team because I really love tumbling — I like flying through the air. [When] cheer was over, track and field season was starting, so I tried it. I tried sprints and didn't love it, but then I tried pole vaulting, which is also very random. [Pole vaulting] had that element of flying that I love. I love a little bit of edge, a little bit of adrenaline, so I just stuck with pole vaulting and started training harder with that. I was eventually able to be recruited by UVU.
In my first year of track at UVU, I was very intimidated. There were all these older athletes. They just looked so cool and were so experienced, and I was new. I was dealing with pretty bad shin splints at the time. I had to sit out a lot, and I felt pushed to the side and not super valuable on the team. But luckily, I was able to still compete a little bit.
Eventually, I decided to serve a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. That ended up being a miracle, not just for my life but for my shins. Because those 18 months where I was serving, my shins got to rest, and they were fully healed after, so I was able to come back stronger and better than ever. My mission was the only reason I could keep doing track. I got back, and as time went on, I gained more confidence. I got faster, I got stronger, and my pole vaulting got better.
Last year at our outdoor conference, we were in Washington state, and it was kind of a rainy, crappy meet. I wasn't excited to compete in pole vault. If it's rainy, your hands can slip, so it’s dangerous, and the event [can get] postponed, and it just kind of ruins the whole vibe with me. I was just really nervous.
So, finally, it's the last day of the meet, and the weather cleared up just enough for us to compete. I was exhausted for some reason that day. I could not wake up. I literally felt like I was sleepwalking the whole day. I knew I had to turn off my brain and just go for it and fight for it. Every jump, I just did my best and kept going.
I remember thinking about the next jump, “If I get it, I'm going to break the school record.” But I also realized that if I got this, I'm going to knock off my senior teammate. I was conflicted because I didn't want to beat her, especially in her senior year. But I wanted to win, so I just jumped that last jump. She didn't get it, and I got it. I was like, “Wow, I have the school record right now.” I wasn’t jumping up and down. I was just exhausted. I sat down and just took a moment to myself and thought, “I can just sleep now.” I felt like my coach was proud of me, my team was proud of me, and my position on the team was finally getting noticed.
When I just started school, during my generals, I had the best entrepreneurship class with [Professor] Vance Gough. I was so inspired by the concept of creating something that you love and being able to make it your career. So, that became my goal from there.
We had this group project that was also a school-wide competition to make the parking better at UVU. Some people suggested building really tall buildings so you can park more cars. I was more concerned with the safety at UVU, so I suggested making safety cameras. I remember my group did well; we were all super different, but we worked together. We ended up placing in the competition and winning $1,000.
Later, I had this class with [Professor] Pete Robinson, and he challenged the class to start a business with one dollar. I felt that fiery feeling. That was the first time within my business story that I felt that fire in my heart. And then he said, “Whoever in the class makes the most money gets 100% in the class, and the second person gets 99%,” and so on. I knew I needed to do really well because my grade depended on it.
He said we could use supplies at home if we had any. I had a little tube of beads. I took those beads, and I started making beaded rings, and I sold them for three dollars. I started making some money. Then the semester was over. I took sixth place, and I got a decent grade. I really liked making jewelry! As a student-athlete, it's hard to work and do school. But I started selling beaded jewelry as my job.
When an opportunity comes, you can take it, or you can not take it, but you have the rest of your life to think about what could have happened. When it came to this business idea, I had this fire in my heart that I don't feel all the time.
I worked with my professors [and] I reached out to Breanna Hale, the director of the UVU Entrepreneurship Institute. I asked her for help. I told her, “I have this great idea. I’m really confident in it. But how do I even get started?” She just gave me a lot of encouragement and said, “I feel like you're the type of person that's going to make it happen, so let's do it.”
I competed in a business competition, Seed For Startups, at UVU, and I won the People's Choice Award. That was a big high for me. It was the biggest highlight of my whole life, and I won a little bit of funding for my business.
My store, Beadology, is a place where you come as you are, and then you make something that you love. You can make a beaded accessory, a bracelet, necklace, earrings, rings, whatever you want. It can have a certain word or meaning to you. My favorite part of my job is connecting with people and hearing about where they're from and their stories, but also seeing how that correlates with whatever accessory they make.
UVU is a place where you make amazing things happen. My advice to the students is to just go out and meet people — the person sitting next to you in class or someone in the hall. It's always easier just to say hi rather than sit there in silence. You never know what that connection might lead to. A lot of people that I met in class, in the halls, or at different school activities were super monumental to me being able to build my business. We're all studying great things, so everybody can help everybody just by meeting people.
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