Spirited entrepreneurship

I started my first business when I was 10. I noticed that the boys in my class started doing some weird stuff. They were talking about girls. Actually at first it wasn't really girls, they started with women they'd never met.

To be more specific the woman they all seemed to be interested in was Brooke Shields. They talked about her incessantly. Not only did she invade our conversation but she also started to invade school books. My mates would stick her picture all over their books, on their pencil cases, anywhere they found space.

I was at home one day and I noticed one of my mum's magazines lying on a the table. I'd seen them around the house before, but had never taken any notice of them.  Brooke Shields was on the cover. Not only that, but there was 10 pictures of her inside.

A light went on in my mind. The boys at school wanted pictures of Brooke Shields. I had 10 of them.

I hadn't heard of the theory of Supply and Demand or any other economic terms, but I knew an opportunity when I saw one.  The next day at school I set up my 'Brooke Shields Picture Shop'. I mentioned my stash of pictures to the biggest loud mouth in the class and soon I had more customers that I could supply. I also had $4!

Mum's old magazine collection kept me going for a while for there were plenty of Brooke in them. Once I ran out of Brooke pictures I started talking up other models, pop singers and movie stars.

Once mum's old magazine ran out I started buying women's magazines myself (I got a few weird looks from the newsagent). I could make $4-$5 per magazine profit.  I was rolling in money (or so I thought).  My windfall was short lived when my teacher caught wind of my venture and told me it wasn't appropriate for me to fund my candy habit by taking advantage of the hormones beginning to appear in my class mates.

My first business promptly died.

It was followed over the years by a variety of other business ventures including selling handicrafts door to door to gullible neighbours (who bought more out of feeling sorry for me than anything else), and selling stationary out of my school locker to classmates.

Through high school I was drawn to business subjects. I did Economics, Accounting, Legal Studies, Politics and English in my final year of high school and studied Marketing at University. I always wanted to expand on these skills and saw myself as something of an entrepreneur. I enjoyed the creative process of starting new things, helping to give people what they wanted or needed and the challenge of finding ways of making a few dollars.
Business was my future. 

Or so I thought.

At the age of 21 I had a re-conversion experience. Out of a number of events I decided that I wanted to live my life more fully aligned with God's purposes.  I felt Him challenge me to a life of serving him. I didn't really know what this meant so started to ask around for advice.

The advice I received from some influential people was to quit my Marketing degree and go to bible college. Seemed like good advice at the time, I mean how could someone truly be a christian in marketing? Isn't that just about greed, manipulating people and accumulating money?

Surely a truly dedicated Christian showed their commitment to God by giving up such things and going into the ministry.

I quit my marketing degree, put aside my dreams of entrepreneurship and for the last decade have suppressed any inkling of business or enterprise that may have exist