Written by C. Michelle Bryant as told by Trina Johnson
Five years ago Trina Johnson was living what most would consider a dream lifestyle complete with an impressive attorney’s salary, a custom-built home with a beautiful sunroom and Jacuzzi. As a single woman she was definitely a force to be reckoned with among peers. Of course, things didn’t start out that way. Passionately driven, even as a little girl in the fourth grade, Trina always wanted to be a writer and went so far as to dress up as Louisa May Alcott for a class project. College bound, she studied Journalism at Ohio State and was well on her way to becoming the literary genius she felt destined to be throughout her entire life.
Upon completion of her college education, Trina worked as a reporter and in marketing for several years. It was through those experiences that she began to feel marketing was more suited as her “calling.” Landing a marketing position for Highlights for Children magazine and proving herself through her diligent work ethics and excessive work hour days, Trina reached management status rather quickly, was able to make presentations to the board of directors and reported solely to a Senior Vice President. And then it happened. Little did she know what followed next would brew the passion inside of her. Highlights hired a new executive to head up a marketing division. Although Trina had 60 people to report to her, this ‘younger’ man had two direct reports and very little work experience, and yet his wage was substantially more. Confused about the circumstances yet confident in her abilities, Trina prepared her raise request and several days later presented her case to her VP. Mid – sentence he stopped her, simply to inform her she was wasting time. He continued to say that she was way too young, female, and despite her hard work had no “advanced degree.”
This result catapulted the decision of hers to decrease her excessive “come early, stay late” work regimen and prompted her to look into MBA programs. What she saw did not interest her. So then she turned her attention to law school. A Juris Doctorate is an advanced degree, she thought. So she took the LSAT, but wasn’t sure. Applied to Capital University Law School in Columbus, Ohio, and got accepted, but still wasn’t sure. Still uneasy about this decision she told no one. Then she went to the new student orientation and found an interesting group of people who she knew she could connect with. The decision was made. Due to begin classes on Monday, she finally let her parents and friends know that her life was about to change the Saturday prior.
Law school was never meant to be a path to practicing law. Trina had a new vision and a new plan for her life and was passionately driven to obtain that dream. It was the dream of working as an executive for a major publishing company. She set her sights on one new magazine in particular, John F. Kennedy, Jr.’s ‘GEORGE’. Her sights were set on that prize and she was headed for the goal. She submitted articles as a writer, she sought out GEORGE staff members at publishing conferences, she got to know several of the editors. Her intention was to graduate from law school and move to New York City.
But something happened during her time at law school. She got intrigued with law. She realized that the world has lots and lots of opportunities to offer. She had not intended to take the bar exam, but when it came time, she said, “well, I should at least see if I could pass,” and started studying. About one week before the bar exam, Kennedy was killed in a plane crash and the dream of working at GEORGE was crushed. So now she needed a Plan B.
She was still working part-time at Highlights (after their initial displeasure at her cut-back in commitment, they were very accommodating with a flexible schedule). She passed the bar and was sworn in as an attorney in November, 1999. Co-workers began asking her to handle their legal matters. She and a friend rented an office and her role as an entrepreneur had begun. Within a year, she had partnered with another attorney and created an all-female attorney firm handling divorce, domestic disputes, bankruptcies and probate matters. They made a conscious decision to cater primarily to female clients. As a firm, they conducted seminars for their clients on money management and empowerment topics. However, after six years, the partnership dissolved due to her business partner’s pregnancy and choice to be a stay at home mother. Trina took over management alone and continued to grow until she had a staff of twelve. By 2009, the firm had handled over 2,000 cases.
On Monday, June 12, 2009 Trina’s life would change once again. Arriving at the courthouse, Trina expected a quick appearance before a judge to finalize a divorce and be on with the rest of her day. But the clients had other plans. What should have been a quick agreement turned ugly. The exasperated judge decided she had heard enough bickering and told the attorneys and the parties to come back in two hours and start a full-blown trial. The entire day was derailed. Trina was very late leaving the courthouse and ran by the office just to drop off her briefcase before heading to her parent’s house for a special dinner that was waiting on her.
It was after-hours and the phone rang as she opened the door. She glanced at the caller ID and her stomach knotted. She knew that number. That was a nightmare client from several years ago. She knew if she picked up that phone, she would be signing up for immense strains on her time, stress and pressure. At that moment, she hit her emotional brick wall. She put her head down on the desk and sobbed. “I hate my life,” she said to herself. “I have to make a change.”
She told her parents that evening that she was closing the law firm. They didn’t believe her. Their reasoning was sound: “You’ve invested so much.” “You have all those employees.” “What else can you do?” “What about the money?” “You’ve just had a bad day. You’ll change your mind.” But no, the decision was made. Trina became passionately driven to change the life and the circumstances that engulfed her and she started what would end up being a yearlong journey of self – reflection, and deep discovery.
While on her journey to find her true self while also trying to wind down her law practice, Trina turned old things into new ventures and formed Success Point Consulting. She began mentoring and coaching people, mostly women, on how to create income for themselves especially in situations like when child support wasn’t coming or a job loss. In turn, she was recreating herself as well. She signed up for every webinar, seminar, or training program that came her way, learned and taught women how to buy products at garage sales or on sale and re-sell them on eBay. She also learned and then taught women how to build websites. Trina began blogging, started selling products as an affiliate, and learned Search Engine Optimization. Everything she learned, she taught. She learned social media then ran classes. She started “ghost-blogging” for companies around the world, tapping into her old dream of being a writer. She also wrote a book she felt was needed by many of her former bankruptcy clients, “The Small Business Owner’s Tax Guide.”
But the world still saw her as an attorney. It’s hard to re-invent yourself when you have so passionately been one thing and now you want to be something else. Trina began to feel it was necessary to change her surroundings completely. Having vacationed to South Carolina many times and being only a ten hour drive from Ohio where her family lived, she believed The Palmetto State was the place for her fresh beginning. Although it sounded good, she did have a home that
needed to be sold at a time when the market was at its worst in real estate history (2010). But she needed a miracle and asked God to give her a sign: if it was okay for her to move, then her house needed to sell. Three days after being listed, she had a full-price offer. Two weekends of personal moving sales and twenty days later she was on the road with a Budget truck, headed to her new apartment in Mount Pleasant, a quaint coastal town near Charleston. Having taken a leap, pulled out of a grueling career field, and transplanted herself all in a matter of months, Trina was ready to set fire to the passion that had driven her so many times before.
Being in a new location she felt the possibilities were endless but needed a job while she figured out her new environment. She soon became the Marketing Coordinator for a pilot program at H & R Block. This allowed her to meet new people, learn the area and gave her the flexibility to pursue personal ventures during the offseason and summers. During her first summer “off” she was able to produce, promote, recruit speakers and vendors, and emcee the Global Women’s Summit Charleston in September, 2011 as part the Women’s Information Network. It was her first attempt at event planning, but she attracted slightly over 100 attendees.
Despite the thrill and excitement of the event, the appreciation received through blogging, advice, coaching and tutorials she was providing on an as needed basis, Trina continued with H & R Block the following three seasons. Even though her territory increased to Savannah and then retracted back to just Charleston, she felt devalued and still searched for her personal purpose. Again searching deeper into personal development and questioning her life, Trina looked for other open doors.
Memorial Day weekend 2014 Trina’s church held a retreat near Asheville, North Carolina. Needing the personal reflection time, frustrated and seeking answers, Trina attended. During an emotional personal conversation with her Lord Trina cried out once again for answers. It was then, during her pacing that she heard a whisper simply say “you need to be writing.” Without hesitation, Trina sat at her computer and began typing. Much to her surprise, what started out as frustrated “I don’t even know what to write. I’m so frustrated with my life..blah blah blah!” turned into a 35 page business plan and it was then that she realized her mission, her purpose, her passion. To mentor women. To train women to think for themselves. To help women succeed. Trina said, “I have seen so many women struggle. For some reason, I know a lot of things. Maybe it’s my education. Maybe it’s my law background. Maybe it’s just that I can’t stop learning. But I just feel like I need to share what I know.”
Mirelli Entrepreneurial Training for Women is named in honor of her nieces Miranda and Ellie. “They are my motivation and it is their legacy,” Trina told me. “Their generation needs this.” Mirelli is an organization where women can connect, learn, grow, and prosper by helping women master the areas of Marketing, Management, Mindset and Money. Her vision includes an opportunity to offer short-term daycare because, although Trina has no children of her own, she knows the value of providing a safe place for children while women receive training they need to obtain their dreams. She offers not just networking but also entrepreneurial training on all sorts of business aspects. Offering mindset teachings, entrepreneurial thinking and blogging boot camps she is ahead of the competition and believes she is creating a new industry sector.
Just completing her first year of business Trina now has a rented office space where any of her over 60 members can connect, learn, train, make phone calls, etc. Through her Mirelli Entrepreneurial Training Center, she has thus far produced six events, held 31 workshops and training sessions, hosted three seminars and conferences, lead 39 round table discussions, and coordinated five networking events. When I asked Trina what one piece of advice or little nugget she would say to someone who may think “Is this as good as it is going to get?” she told me, “I’d tell them ‘It’s not! Allow yourself to dream big! We don’t dream big because we are not taught to use our whole humanness of us. We put ourselves and our capabilities in a box. We let others tell us what we should or could do. You make a difference when you let yourself go. Yes, there IS more.’”
Trina is now living life with passion and purpose and is making an impact, touching lives and sharing her knowledge and into her second year, has set goals for herself and her business. The passionately driven entrepreneur, once overworked, unappreciated, devalued employee has set her sights on having 100 members by the end of 2015 and to solidify her reputation in the LowCountry as THE entrepreneurial group for women for training in marketing, mindset, management and money.
More information about Trina or her Entrepreneural Center can be found at: http://mirellietc.com