BABL 053: The Broke and Beautiful Life with Stefanie O'Connell

Stefanie O’Connell is excited about her life. She’s part actress, part budgeting ninja, and all awesome. She’s also the author of the recently released book The Broke & Beautiful Life. Stefanie’s education path took her through New York University and majored in musical theater & psychology. For the past 8 years, she’s been working as a “starving artist” in the musical theater scene, but as of the past couple of years realized that she could work in tandem on projects she’s passionate about -- like living a broke and beautiful life! While on a bus & truck tour (where you travel with other entertainers on a bus from city to city doing a show per night), she realized that maybe this vehicle wasn’t the dream she was pursuing. She started a blog on her musings about life, money, and art in general, and within 6 months had developed a solid foothold on the interwebs. Around the 9:00 mark, Stefanie talks about what she’s been doing the past couple years -- mainly focused on growth and investing any extra money she had on personal development. This was an interesting phenomena for Stefanie who admittedly was broke just prior, with only enough money to pay her bills and literally nothing else. “Walking into an audition room into NYC is probably one of the most miserable experiences…” (14:00) Stefanie says that many starving artists in the city are living paycheck to paycheck just waiting for their big break. As a result, the passion for what they do is limited to the auditions they go to, while the rest of their life doesn’t fulfill. Stefanie is now blogging full-time, freelance writing, and building her business. When she says full-time, she means it -- often working 10 hours a day building her income streams. And… she LOVES it! Books Stefanie Recommends: Rising Strong by Brene Brown The Art of Work by Jeff Goins The Broke & Beautiful Life by Stefanie O’Connell Find more about Stefanie: http://stefanieoconnell.com/ Check out her music video about student debt: http://thebrokeandbeautifullife.com/how-to-pay-off-student-loans/