Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in health and wellness but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Roza Saveleva, founder of WE TAKE FIVE, located in Brooklyn, NY, USA.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

WE TAKE FIVE is a telecare startup. We host live 5-minute mindful movement sessions Monday - Friday. As a customer, you can easily follow along and log into your WE TAKE FIVE session from anywhere: your office desk, your home, and even a nearby park. The WE TAKE FIVE method helps you safely relieve physical and mental stress in just 5 minutes.

In real-time, we guide you through dynamic stretches, deep breathing, self-massage, visualization, and anatomy awareness, which helps you achieve a meditative state even if meditation is not something that is easily accessible to you. We encourage confidence and peace that comes with being in harmony with your body and mind, and we are on a mission to empower as many people as possible. Our sessions are great for busy professionals working 9-5, freelancers, teachers, students, and people dealing with an injury or recovering from one… Try it out for yourself. It's just 5 minutes.

Tell us about yourself

I am a professional dancer, choreographer, and a Reiki Master Teacher. I am very lucky because my education, my profession, and my practice all teach me to experience the world with my whole body. I have learned to view my body as an instrument and treat it with love and care; a musician would play the violin. Every day I tune my body, and the process of tuning teaches me more about who I am and helps me heal in an organic and joyful way.

My whole career, I have been searching for ways to share this curious experience through dance performances, through my Reiki practice, and finally through WE TAKE FIVE. Sadly, in our society, there is very little education about the body and how it functions. We went from no information at all to information overflowing from endless resources that are impossible to fact check. I believe that our bodies, minds, and hearts have the potential to be the most accurate GPS system, and I am determined to share the tools that help us all be more in tune with that system.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

Taking WE TAKE FIVE live. Initially, WE TAKE FIVE was supposed to be an app that picked pre-recorded videos for you. Though once we recorded the first versions of the videos, I realized that there was a disconnect between what we thought people needed and what they were truly looking for. In truth, in 2020, most of us were going through a kind of stress we'd never been through before, and we were doing it in isolation. Hosting the sessions online allowed me to have a direct relationship with our customers and quickly curate the session to what they needed exactly there and then. And not only that, it reminded us all how truly healing moving together is, even for a brief 5-minute moment.

What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?

When I just began building WE TAKE FIVE, I was treating it like I would my baby. I know for a fact that I am not the only entrepreneur who feels that way about their business, especially when they are passionate about the product or service they are trying to deliver. Realizing that this kind of mindset leads to inevitable burnout was one of the hardest lessons for me. Almost a year into developing WE TAKE FIVE, I was exhausted, uninspired, feeling the depression creep in, and was faced with an ironic split between how I was behaving and the kind of behavior I was encouraging in my customers. I felt like a fraud and chose to follow my own advice. I realized that the only way to build the world I want to live in is to start living it.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

  1. Be honest with yourself and get your priorities straight. Each of us starts a business for different reasons and operates with different resources. Being honest about where and why you are is most important, especially when you try to bring your dream into reality. I check myself every day, refining my "whats' and "whys." It keeps me grounded through all the changes that inevitably take place throughout the process. Reach out to people for mentorship. I was pleasantly surprised at how many professionals out there are willing to help. I've met a lot of incredible people on Linkedin and cofounderslab.com. Polsky Center is also an incredible place to speak to someone with lots of experience in any field.
  2. Listen to someone else's advice with a grain of salt. No matter how experienced or confident the person you're talking to, you are the one who knows your business the best. The only way to check if the strategy works for you is to follow it for long enough for it to work. There was a time when I was jumping from one strategy to another, which led me nowhere.

Is there anything else you'd like to share?

Feel free to send me an email at roza@wetakefive.com. I am always happy to chat and partner with fellow entrepreneurs.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: https://wetakefive.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wetakefive
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wetakefive/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/wetakefive
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/we-take-five/

If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solopreneur that you'd like to share, then email community@subkit.com; we'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

Feel inspired to start, run or grow your own subscription business? Check out subkit.com and learn how you can turn "one day" into day one.