• Yolanda Williams, 46, bought 3 acres in Arkansas and moved there with her daughter.
• She invited another single mom she met online to live on the property with her two kids.
• They now share expenses, childcare, and emotional support in what they call a "mommune."

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Yolanda Williams, 46, who lives in central Arkansas with her 9-year-old daughter on a farm with another single mom and her two kids. They help each other with childcare, mental support, and more. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

In 2021, after my daughter Gia and I got COVID, we decided to take a drive one day. I came across this one little road that I fell in love with.

We kept coming back, driving around this neighborhood in Arkansas, and it became our Sunday thing. We'd get in the car and get ourselves a sweet treat — me a coffee and her a cinnamon roll — and drive around for an hour looking at all the different farms and houses and really just visualizing the life we wanted.

We did that for two years before I found our 3.19-acre land in rural Arkansas. After visiting it, I purchased the land in 2023 on Facebook Marketplace, For-Sale-By-Owner. It cost $40,000 to buy, and I put down $12,000.

It was fully forested raw land, so I could only see part of it, but I used a real estate agent for the process. At the end of 2024, I secured a grant to help pay for the infrastructure, and I spent 2025 getting the land ready to move into. We didn't move until March 2026 because the land needed clearing and practical things such as a driveway and utilities.

The process was expensive because I didn't have much money left to build anything on the land. We got an RV as a place to stay, stash money, and build in the next five years.

Before I'm 50, I would like to have a permanent home built on the land

I'm from Southern California, and when I left in 2017, I was paying $600 to rent a guest room from my friend. Now, I pay $485 for my land mortgage and $400 for my RV payment a month. So, all in all, for me to be on this land, it's around $885 per month. Utilities run about $150 to $200 a month in the summer, and then $100 for water. It's exponentially cheaper to live like this, especially in Arkansas.

Here we have the freedom to roam and to be outside. I'm always in the garden. I've actually lost 30lbs since March because I move so much, and I didn't even realize it. I'm getting a lot more sun and exercise — so is my daughter. I feel more content, I feel more at peace.

However, this move has turned into so much more than that for us. I've been a single mom since my daughter Gia was born. She's 9 now, and I've never truly felt what it's like to have support, to have someone around all the time. By chance, that all changed this year.

I'm not sure who followed who first, but I met a single mom called Sunnie on Threads

She posted on the social media app Threads about wanting to buy land, and I commented back that she should consider Arkansas. I explained to her that land is cheap out here, and I gave her a bunch of information.

A few months later, I randomly saw her posting on Threads that she was in Arkansas with her two kids, who were 11 and 5 years old, looking for land, so I slipped into her DMs, and we exchanged numbers. I texted her to arrange a meet-up and to show her my land. Mind you, this was before I had actually moved onto the property.

The first time we met, we had pizza with the kids. They had a look around, and the kids played really well together. Gia likes the pizza crust but not the actual pizza, and one of Sunnie's kids likes the pizza but not the crust, so it worked out perfectly.

They helped me around the property as I was in the main stretch of getting everything ready for me to move on to. That's when we got to talking about her potentially living here while she searched for her own land.

Sunnie lived in a different city about an hour from me, and she didn't know anyone in Arkansas. I offered her the chance to stay with us to avoid spending money on hotels and Ubers. Although she wanted to buy her own land, I made it clear that she was welcome to stay with me as long as she wanted to. We now split the mortgage and utility costs in half.

That's how our "mommune" started.

Although we didn't know each other for long, I felt a strong connection and vibe

I loved that she was very much like, "I want to put my gloves on, and I want to help you," when it came to laying the foundations around the property, such as weeding, spraying for ticks, building planters, and sowing seeds. Now we garden together and grow as much as we can — like comfrey, lemon balm, mint, and basil. We even make our own fertilizer.

And you know, that's what's missing. A lot of people want this life, but they don't want to actually roll their sleeves up and get dirty to help one another.

Sunnie was essentially a complete stranger. But what I've been trying to do is listen to myself and trust myself. I really felt a great vibe from Sunnie, and my daughter really took to her. We got along, and it just felt right.

Yes, it's hard to build trust because you can't really trust anyone until you start to be around them all the time, but the whole thing with Sunnie is she came, and we sat, and we had a discussion about money and about expectations and about childcare. You just have to be willing to have the hard conversations in order to build a community, and I want to be around people who understand me.

We're now growing food together and raising wildlings.

This is our matriarchal community

What I always try to tell people is we need to decenter and deprioritize romantic relationships and just focus on relationships in general, whatever that support looks like.

Whether that's friendship or family, focus on building that community, and we will get the support we're looking for, but if you're only focused on needing a man or a husband or partner to have security to feel supported, then a lot of people will miss out on invaluable support with friends or other women.

For example, I was having a really hard time this Mother's Day — it's just a hard day for me. Sunnie saw that I wasn't in a good space, so she took the kids and left so I could get some alone time. Having that support and knowing that I can say "hey, I'm having a hard time with motherhood right now" and someone will not only understand but will help me through that by watching my kid for me, taking her to the park, or giving me some space — it has been life-changing. It's the support that I need.

We really just help each other out. When I have to leave and go somewhere, I'll ask her to come inside the RV or to watch Gia play outside, and she does. Vice versa — if she needs me to watch her children, it's really not a big deal. We just ask each other for favors like: "If you're out at the store, can you get me this?"

We communicate really well with each other, and we help each other out any way we need to, and that includes having dinner together sometimes, watching TV together, and I will let her kids come over here so she can have a break and be able to be in her RV by herself, or we'll go to the park so she can be by herself sometimes.

Ever since I met Sunnie, I can just tell there's a change in my nervous system. Having someone here means I can tap out. I'm 46 this year, and I wouldn't trade this mommune we've built for the world.

• Gary Brecka is a biologist who worked on predicting mortality for insurance companies.
• He's 56 and hopes to live to 120.
• He's purchased hyperbaric chambers and red light beds, but says sleep and community are more important.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Gary Brecka, co-founder of Ultimate Longevity Center. It has been edited for length and clarity.

I'm a biologist, and for years, I worked helping insurance companies try to predict exactly when their customers might die. I also expect to live to 120 — and I'm only 56 today.

Everyone on earth has a predicted life expectancy, based on large-scale data. When I worked for insurance companies, I used their data to analyze the specific factors that affected individual life expectancy.

What I found surprised me. For example, high blood pressure wasn't always associated with increased mortality. A lot of data from insurance companies ran counter to mainstream medical dogma.

My work was sometimes grim. One day, I found a potentially deadly medical error in a patient's chart, but I had no means to tell her. That was the day I decided I wanted to stop working to predict death and start helping people live longer, happier, healthier lives.

Skip the diets and cleanses, but move daily

A lot of longevity work isn't flashy. It's about the same healthy habits that we all know we should practice. If you show me someone's daily habits, I'll show you where they'll be in three to five years.

There's no evidence for dogmatic dieting, whether that's following keto, carnivore, or any other dietary trend. What extends life is the absence of processed foods. Likewise, you don't need to cleanse: if you're peeing, pooping, and sweating, you're already living a detox lifestyle.

Unsurprisingly, exercise is critically important. I know from working in insurance that a sedentary lifestyle is one of the biggest risk factors for death: sitting is the new smoking. Daily mobility is non-negotiable for me — I block off time for it on my calendar daily.

Put sleep on the calendar and don't use your phone in bed

Sleep is one of the most critical aspects of longevity. It's our human superpower, the time when our brains clear waste and form memories. And yet, sleep is the most bullied part of most people's calendar. It happens only after everything else is done.

I take the opposite approach: sleep is the first thing I put on my calendar. I am meticulous about keeping a solid sleep schedule, and I make my bedroom a sanctuary. To get good sleep — and all the health benefits that come with it — your nervous system needs to be regulated and relaxed.

I bring my phone into the bedroom, but put it on airplane mode. I don't scroll, watch TV, send work emails, or do anything else that could put my nervous system on high alert.

Build community around healthy habits

How often have we heard a story about spouses who have been married for decades, dying in quick succession? That's because relationships are critical to longevity — and they're something money can't buy. Your community and connections have a huge impact not only on your lifespan but also on your health span.

My kids range in age between 18 and 28, spanning all of Gen Z. Their peers are realizing how important community is. Run clubs are becoming more popular among that demographic. It's not just about physical health — anyone can lace up their sneakers and run a 5K — but about the community building that takes place before and after exercise.

We should all take a page from their books. Building social space with like-minded people who share your passions and purpose will help you live longer.

I've spent big on health technologies

The basic tenets of longevity — sleep, community, exercise, and unprocessed foods — will allow me to live a happy, healthy life. And they don't come with an unattainable price tag.

Because I have the means, I also use expensive technologies that can further support my health. I've spent well into seven figures on health technology, including saunas, cold plunges, red light beds, and hyperbaric chambers at my two houses.

I'd rather have a hyperbaric chamber than a Ferrari, and a red-light bed than a Rolex. But I also know that you can't skip the basics of healthy living, no matter what cutting-edge technology you have access to.

• Maria Sentmanat, 55, quit her six-figure job this summer without another job to go to.
• She started Why Not Wild, giving guided tours of the South Florida wilderness.
• She's not making any money and living off her savings, but says the move has saved her mental health.

This as-told-to-essay is based on a conversation with Maria Sentmanat, 55, who is based in Miami, Florida. It has been edited for length and clarity.

I'm a high school dropout who came from a single-parent family. My upbringing was filled with chaos and instability. I never thought I'd end up being the type to earn a six-figure salary, but that's exactly what I ended up doing — and walking away from this year.

On paper, I was definitely successful. I had a $153,000 paycheck managing one of the largest 5K races in the country, a job I'd held for the past five years. I could have made up to $180,000 next year if I had stayed on.

The job was a new opportunity when I really needed one

You could argue it was the culmination of the fitness career I had spent 16 years building, after becoming super overweight following the birth of my daughters. I became a personal trainer and ran my own wellness-focused fitness studio. I'd created something special.

But then the pandemic happened, and I lost everything. I couldn't run my studio anymore, and struggled to build it back up again once the restrictions were lifted.

The founder of this race event was a friend, so when she told me she needed a new race director, it felt like an opportunity life was giving me. I completed all the required certifications and threw myself into this new role, which was both incredibly stressful and rewarding.

But things started to change. I started to dread going to work, and my stomach was always upset. I felt myself going into "fight or flight" mode, with the trauma from my childhood resurfacing, that I just didn't need.

I felt heavy, and my daughters — who are now 25 and 27 — could see it. I would go out into nature to decompress, but I was always thinking, "What am I going to do with this massive thing hanging on the side of my neck?" I got to a state where I just felt numb, even though I was continually asking myself, "What are you going to do? How are you going to keep doing this?"

I quit with no other job lined up

I resigned in August 2026, with no other job to go to, which some people called crazy.

But I had a strong feeling that I needed to find purpose and passion again. I knew that would be through nature. That's where I heal. That's where I can find a place that I feel seen, heard, understood, and held.

So I knew I had to build something that centered on connecting people with nature, so "Why Not Wild" was born. I take people into the wilderness around South Florida, but it's not packages. It's completely personalized. I want to talk to you and find out what you need.

I'll take you hiking through the Everglades, but it's not like, "oh, look at this nice trail". You will have to walk through water, and for some people, that is a big thing to overcome. For people who don't want to hike, I do motorcycle adventures.

I want people to reconnect with an entity we have caused so much destruction to. I want to be the bridge. I'm using my social media platforms to create awareness of what's beautiful out there.

I'm finding purpose again

Financially, I'm OK. I've been super strict about my savings, even while paying $4,700, helping my daughters, and paying my SBA loan from my previous business. I owned a home in Mount Dora that I sold last year too. I could live comfortably for six months, even a year, but then I'd have no savings left.

My ex-husband and I divorced when the girls were young, but we still co-parent very closely. He has a key to my place, comes over to eat several times a week, and we even go on vacation together. Our kids haven't had that typical divorce experience, which we worked hard to be intentional about. He and the girls are happy that I have done this — they have complete faith in me.

I'm not making any money right now, but I wake up excited about every day. What door is going to open? What's going to happen? Even if this doesn't work out, I was brave enough not to get caught up in what was, in effect, a bad marriage. I'll know that I was brave enough to try.

I have lost all that income and future security, but I have gained so much more. I feel better mentally, physically, and spiritually.

• Michael Bowen started his career in church work, which he found unfulfilling and lacking stability.
• Driven by a love for Disney and a desire for change, he decided to make the move to Florida at 44.
• After a hiatus due to personal reasons, he returned to his job as a Disney bus driver this year.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Michael Bowen, a 51-year-old Walt Disney World bus driver and Disney content creator behind the YouTube channel "Incognito Mouse." It has been edited for length and clarity.

Most of my adult life, I worked in the church. I went to university and Bible school to become a minister. I went into this line of work thinking it would make someone else happy, and didn't really think about what would make me happy.

At one point, I ended up working at a smaller church that could not pay a full-time salary, so to support myself, I got a part-time job as a school bus driver.

In 2017, I took a vacation to Florida and visited Disney World. I remember sitting there on the last day of my vacation, in the beautiful, warm sun, by the pool, with palm trees beside me, and dreading going back to the stormy weather in New Jersey.

I felt I had to make some kind of change, or I was going to sentence myself to a miserable life.

I realized I could work as a bus driver for Disney

I first visited Disney World in 2013. I had thought it was strange — a bunch of adults, no kids, going to Disney. Yet, even on that first trip, I thought, man, what could I do to work here? There's no Disney church.

By the second time I went in 2017, I had followed Disney a lot more and saw it wasn't just for children. Now, as a school bus driver, I thought, "Oh, they do have bus drivers, and that is a legitimate career. I could actually do that."

I love Disney, and my ex-wife did, too. As huge Disney fans, we thought, why not go live in the most magical place on Earth and work there?

In 2020, at 44, I first moved to Florida

I was living out of state when I applied to be a bus driver at Disney. It's very difficult to get into it. It took several months to get to the interview, and I needed a Florida driver's license before I could get the offer.

I moved to Florida in January of 2020. After I got my license, I was put on a waiting list until a bus driver position became available. It wasn't until February 15 that I finally got the call to start the role.

For the first time in my life, I had a really stable job with all the benefits that some smaller churches aren't necessarily able to give: paid time off, pensions, retirement, things like that.

In particular, I had health insurance for the first time in a long time, and I was really happy.

I was convinced I was going to drive for Disney for the rest of my life and retire there. But in May 2022, I chose to leave after experiencing a difficult separation and divorce. I remember when I was leaving, I got the offboarding email, and it was the most gut-wrenching feeling that I had ever had.

I moved to Oregon, but I always wanted to move back

I decided to move to Oregon. I drove a city bus and things like that, but I wasn't happy.

During that time, I met another woman, now my wife, who was a big Disney fan like me. I rebranded my YouTube channel from church content to Disney around 2019, and started posting about being a Disney cast member in 2020. We met through the YouTube channel and decided to move to Florida together in 2025.

As before, I had to wait almost a year for a job opening at Disney. In the meantime, I worked for a different company contracted to drive the buses for Universal Studios.

Finally, in April 2026, at 50, I returned to Disney as a bus driver.

It's not seen as the most prestigious job, but I love it

For me, being a Disney bus driver is wonderful, but I feel like it's not the most prestigious job. Often, when people ride the bus, it's seen as just a way to get to the park.

However, it has its special moments. Once, there was a little boy visiting with his parents who, as he was getting on the bus, showed me two little toy buses. His mother told me he loved the buses so much and was so excited to show them to me. Little things like this just make my day, seeing people so excited.

I can enjoy all the magic of Disney and go to the park whenever I want. So it's the best of both worlds.

Walt Disney said, "It's kind of fun to do the impossible." If you'd have told me that I was going to do something like this several years ago, I would have said, " There's no way — it's not possible. I'm too old. I don't have the finances. I don't know what I would do."

But life is too short. If you are not happy or you want to do something else, you have to make it happen.

• Edward Tian co-founded GPTZero in college, building it into a success before selling to Superhuman.
• He said he thinks that creating 'artificial scarcity' for the product contributed to its success.
• He said he'd major in the humanities, not computer science, if he went to college today.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Edward Tian, the 26-year-old cofounder of GPTZero, who's based in New York. His words have been edited for length and clarity.

I was never planning to go down the founder path straight out of college. I had a visual investigations fellowship lined up for after graduation and was ready to start a journalism career.

My cofounder Alex and I went to high school together. When ChatGPT came out, he was pursuing his Ph.D. in computer science at the University of Toronto, and I was in my senior year at Princeton. Over winter break, we built an AI detection tool and put it online. The success was almost overnight.

Three years later, we sold our company, GPTZero, to Superhuman, and have stayed on board to work with the team. Superhuman is a very pro-AI company, and I think it was an unexpected move for us as an AI detection company to join them.

We didn't build GPTZero to say there should be no AI on the internet. I think that's the biggest misunderstanding about why we started our company, but my feelings on AI have changed.

I had a different job lined up for after graduation

I studied computer science at Princeton and worked with a professor at the Princeton Natural Language Processing Lab on AI research. I also worked on a few other startup projects in school, but I was always hoping to work in journalism.

While in college, I became very involved in the open-source investigation community. I ended up working on open-source investigative projects with the BBC and Bellingcat, and had a visual investigations fellowship at The New York Times lined up after graduation, which I was excited about but ultimately didn't take.

After ChatGPT came out, I was inspired to investigate where and when AI was being used online. It took about a week over winter break to build the first version of our AI detection tool, and it was released in January 2023.

We created artificial scarcity to help grow the business

My cofounder Alex and I posted on social media to market the tool so people could try it, but we didn't view it as a business right away. However, it blew up online pretty quickly. After seeing the success, we wanted to double down on the opportunity and turn it into a legitimate site.

One piece of advice I have for founders is that using a waitlist is really helpful for generating hype and excitement. We put the first version of GPTZero on a waitlist because it had reached capacity. So I think that artificial scarcity was also very helpful in the success.

We had a lucky combination of very talented engineers and some traction and buzz, so we started reaching out to VCs. Many of our early VC partners went to my alma mater, and kind of all knew each other. Jack Altman is also an investor, and I remember we had a call where I was in my dorm room, and he was like, "Oh, I recognize that dorm room too."

For founders raising funding for the first time, my advice is not to optimize for the flashiest name or the biggest brand because you think it will attract future talent. Go for where there's familiarity and trust; trust is the most important thing when working with an investor.

We raised around $3.5 million in our first funding round. I stayed at Princeton to finish my senior year and graduate, and we kept growing the business. My cofounder Alex left his Ph.D. program to focus on the business.

It was bittersweet to sell the company

When Shishir, the new CEO of Superhuman, joined in 2025, we spoke with him about his broader platform vision for a suite of products. He thought we could be part of the authenticity suite he wanted to create.

It was bittersweet to think about giving up something that we started from scratch and put so much energy and care into. At the same time, it was a lot easier because the team stayed on. I'm now a director of product at Superhuman.

For company acquisitions, a lot of folks think the three most important things for a great fit are product match, people fit, and economic sense. We had similar people philosophies, and the deal made sense financially. Then, product-wise, we realized we're definitely not against AI use anywhere in education. We just want to make sure there's some authenticity and truth with that usage.

Over the next few years, we're going to take our shot at building a startup within a larger company. I've seen a lot of startup founders go to larger companies and start their moonshots from within.

The bigger mission we have is to take steps to ensure people are being respectful of the person who's on the receiving end of AI generations and productivity now. We want it to be that we're reaping the benefits of AI without making other people deal with more work.

I wouldn't major in computer science anymore

When we first started GPTZero, I think I was actually more pro-AI than I am now. I believe people should know when something is AI-generated, but I wasn't saying not to outsource anything at all.

In the past year, though, I've started to see an over-reliance on AI among people who finished university after ChatGPT was launched, especially with writing. If I went back to college right now, I wouldn't major in computer science. I'd probably major in journalism and get a minor in computer science. I'd get a humanities degree because those are the important skills now.

I've started to see a friction point at work when people can't write or edit, and everything they send reads like AI. Part of what I'm doing now at Superhuman is working on responsible AI usage policies and guidance.

People are allowed to use these tools however they see fit. At the same time, I feel a profound sadness for the internet at large. It's important to make sure we still have human-written content online.

Do you have a story to share about working on a tiny team? If so, please reach out to the reporter at aapplegate@businessinsider.com.

• Viaano Spruyt first became a caregiver as a teenager when his father fell ill.
• After his father died, he moved to Australia to study and build a life there.
• Three years later, he returned home to be closer to family after his mother's health scare.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Viaano Spruyt, 29, founder of Huddle, an AI-powered social network for fandoms. He is based in Singapore. It has been edited for length and clarity.

I first became a caregiver when I was a teenager.

My dad had an incurable respiratory disease, and he was on an oxygen tank every day. He would get breathless after walking for just a few minutes and needed help with day-to-day living.

Back then, my mom was the sole breadwinner for the family, and my sister was too young to grasp what was going on.

As the oldest child and only son, I took responsibility for his daily care. I fed him his meals and brought him to appointments at hospitals around Singapore.

He passed away when I was 19. Several years later, when I was 22, I moved to the Gold Coast in Australia on a scholarship. I earned my bachelor's in psychology, the first step toward my ambition to become a clinical psychologist.

Over the next three years, I built a real life in Australia.

I had assimilated into the culture, was in a serious relationship, and was set to pursue a master's degree. I was also in the process of applying for permanent residency.

My family was always in the back of my mind. Still, I wanted to experience life outside Singapore, and I was in the midst of building the future I thought I would have.

The call that changed everything

Then one day, I was reminded what it meant to be so far from home.

My mom was walking to catch a bus to work when her knees suddenly gave way. She kept calling me for help, but I'd missed her calls.

Unable to walk, she ended up sitting alone, crying for hours. A kind stranger eventually called for help, and she was taken to a local hospital. She was wheelchair-bound for the next few weeks. Later, she told me she wished I'd been there.

My mom is now 61 and has advanced osteoarthritis in both knees, with severe cartilage loss, meniscus damage, and joint degeneration.

When I asked why she had called me rather than my younger sister, my mom said she didn't want to distract my sister from her final exams and internship. Still, I was the first person she thought to call for help, even from thousands of miles away.

That was the exact moment I knew I had to come home.

Seeing what happened to my mom brought me back to when my dad was ill. I didn't want to be on the other side of the world when my mom was dealing with a health issue.

It wasn't just my mom. My grandparents, now in their 80s, were also getting older, and I realized my family needed me.

I came home and started over

After my mom's incident, I gave up the plans I'd made in Australia and moved back to Singapore in 2022. That was probably the hardest decision I have ever made in my life.

My Australian girlfriend moved to Singapore for a few months to see if we could build a life here instead. But things didn't work out, and we eventually ended the relationship.

Since coming back, I haven't had much of a social life.

I ended up starting Huddle, an AI-powered social network for fandoms, with my cofounder, Fabian. Starting a company was not the path I had spent my life working toward, but it became another passion.

At this stage, my life is very much centered on work and my family, with whom I live. I choose to have no other commitments outside those two things, which gives me some room to respond when my family needs support.

I make sure my mom gets the care she needs. I take her to the hospital and arrange her treatments. I do the same for my grandparents.

When I returned, my younger sister had just started university. I wanted her to focus on her studies, so I took on more of the day-to-day care for our family.

Once my mom is doing better, I hope to move to the US to grow my company with my cofounder, while my sister and I share responsibility for supporting her.

Coming back meant starting over in a lot of ways. However, I would make that decision again and again for my mom. Always.

This is an as-told-to essay based on a conversation with Michael Boyle, the 55-year-old managing director of HP Greater Asia, based in Singapore. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

I've been at HP for more than a decade, but I'm a musician first.

I've been in rock bands for most of my life in every country I've moved to, and formed bands across different HP offices. I've moved across Singapore, Barcelona, and Sydney for different roles in the company. I'm now the managing director for Greater Asia.

I joke that I wanted to be an international rock star, which didn't quite happen, but I got to play music internationally, which is still fun.

My days are long, starting early at 6 a.m., and often ending as late as 11 p.m. Music, workouts, and curbs on phone time get me through busy days.

I'm generally an early riser, getting up at around 6 a.m.

I'm Australian, so coffee — a flat white specifically — is a very important morning ritual for me.

Typically, I'll get in a workout after that. It'll either be running, which I find the fastest and easiest, or a swim.

The first thing I don't do when I wake up is look at my phone; I avoid it for the first 10 minutes of the day to help me wake up naturally and practice gratitude.

In terms of general phone use throughout the workday, I try to use it in 10-minute bursts to get through news and that sort of thing. I'm not someone who will spend hours flicking around on the phone. I see it as a tool to get work done, jot things down, and as another interface for AI.

I do a burst of work for an hour at home

I like to get a sense of what's ahead in the day before I head into the office. I do this so I can free up my time for when I'm in the office, because I want to be fully present and part of the team.

I head to the office around 8 a.m.

Around 8 a.m., I head into the office. If I'm feeling it, I run to work. I convert documents into podcasts and listen to them while running.

As a busy executive, I often have days when I'm not at my desk, so I use AI to summarize documents, stay ahead on my emails, and manage my daily agenda. AI is helping me remove clutter, so I have time to think.

Recently, I was working on an initiative in the company, for which I needed to give a pitch. I narrated my presentation and pitch to ChatGPT first, and it gave me feedback on where I was going off track, where I was staying on track, what the key punchline was, and suggestions for keeping the group engaged.

It trained me and gave me real-time feedback. Whereas in the past, I would've done that in a vacuum. I'd be in a hotel room, talking to a wall and thinking, "I hope this goes OK."

There are so many ways this tool can help us become better leaders, make time to think, and, hopefully, be more effective.

I leave the office at 6 p.m.

Daily exercise is non-negotiable for me; I find it's the best way to stay fresh and happy. I'm a 10,000-step person, often running back home from the office to get my steps in.

When I get home from the office, I don't look at my phone or anything for a while. That's blocked out for family.

As a family, we're very big on no device use at the dinner table. I'm happy to say that my twin daughters can go out to dinner and leave their phones at home, which is pretty rare for 21-year-olds. We've taught them a few good things.

At about 9 p.m. I have to fire up again for late meetings

The company is based in the US, so I often have meetings late into the night because of the time difference.

If I need to stay up late at night for international meetings, the best way is to pick up the guitar — it wakes me up again. It's my hack for when I don't want to drink coffee.

I just have to make sure I don't keep playing during my meetings.

At around 11 p.m., my batteries run out

I'm not very productive after that, so that's the end of my day.

At home, I'll play guitar and drums for at least an hour or two every weekend. That's when I allow myself to unplug and put my brain into neutral.

• Rick Nott has used AI to save himself a lot of tedious work as a wealth advisor.
• He said new AI products may help other advisors save time too, but they won't replace humans.
• Nott spoke to Business Insider about how he uses the technology to save him time now.

Rick Nott is a senior managing director and private wealth advisor at Santa Monica, California-based Angeles Wealth Management. He spoke to Business Insider about how he uses AI, and why he's excited and afraid when looking at AI-native financial planning platforms. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

When Claude first rolled out its solution for financial advisors, I felt fear and excitement. How complicated will it be? How will it work?

I'm not a software developer, but I have some basic tech skills. LLMs have allowed me to dig into coding, which I'd been avoiding learning because it's a lot of work. I know enough to know what I want, how it should look, and how to check the outputs, and now I can automate more of my process. AI has become the glue between the various systems we use and the different workflows we have.

I've shown some colleagues how I operate. One told me that I basically have another full-time employee's worth of output through the technology, by automating data collection processes and making it easier to analyze my clients' portfolios.

What AI unlocks

I started my career while still in college in the late 2000s doing data reporting work for a wealth firm. Between all of the software advisors use, there's a lot of manual work, typically done in Excel, to connect it together.

Previously, I could only provide balance sheet reporting for clients with more than $100 million because it took so much manual work. Now I can do it with someone with significantly less.

As a family's net worth grows, so does complexity. For many, understanding their overall financial system is their biggest pain point.

Banks and brokerage accounts are the easy part, but trusts, business ownership structures, and private investments, which all report differently and require cash on hand to make capital calls, can take huge amounts of manual work to analyze.

Imagine a wealth advisory business serving 30 families, each holding about 10 private investments. Each investment generates about 10 documents a year, including quarterly reports, capital calls, distribution notices, and tax documents. Each of these 3,000 documents takes a skilled analyst 15 to 30 minutes to analyze and distill into our reports.

That's 750 to 1,500 hours a year, most of it crammed into the few weeks after each quarter closes. With AI, that data is extracted and mapped as it arrives, and one analyst reviews the work instead of a team racing against a deadline.

Our goal is to create a one-page document or report on their phone that's as close to real-time as possible.

There's a lot you can do with all of your data in one place. For example, a two- or three-sentence prompt could expand into a full email to a client, with all relevant and accurate information already populated. You can then personalize that to fit the right tone for your client.

How AI changes the job

AI tools like Claude for financial advisors will be disruptive, and others will gain access to the same connectivity I've built.

I think of it as part of a dynamic that's been going on for years in my industry. Vanguard, ETFs, lower costs, and robo-advisors have all put a squeeze on financial advisors.

But if you believe a lawyer's only job is writing contracts, or a financial advisor's only job is putting together a portfolio, there's a fundamental kind of misunderstanding of what the actual job is.

As long as investing involves human judgment, financial advisors will have a job. AI doesn't improve investment decisions or results.

I tell my clients that my role is to be the architect of their financial operating system, and, as with an actual operating system, a centralized source of data is essential.

When you have a big-picture view of what your family's mission is, you can avoid getting distracted by market noise and news. From there, you can go a layer down to make strategic plans and ask if we're moving in the right direction, and what opportunities we may have. Another layer down, we work with a CPA to save money on taxes.

A full picture of a balance sheet makes it possible to actually know what liquidity you have available. Now I can spend more time developing relationships, the thing that runs our business. I get to know anything and everything about the clients I'm working with and those I'd like to work with.

The future of financial advisors and AI

I have a natural excitement around tech, and watching the Anthropic webinar was incredible. My main concern is that it's not a subscription-based plan; it's token-based, which could lead to surprise bills for users who don't yet know how to manage their token usage.

At small RIAs without the expertise, people will be uploading 100-page PDF documents just to ask basic questions, like the ages of kids in a trust. That will rip through tokens.

We priced it out internally, and we would have to pay significantly more for a token-based plan instead of the subscription-based licenses we have now. Maybe eventually everyone will have to pay for tokens that way, and the cost of tokens is going down.

We learn to do things faster and at lower cost, but in this industry, we do that for a particular reason: to spend more time with the people we serve.

The primary way that our clients give us information is still by talking. There's a significant amount of nuance. You may be able to understand something and infer what's really being said. But note-taking software is still wrong all the time. You have to review it.

Money is emotional, and I seriously question whether AI can replace our need to connect with another human being.

Do I see someone sitting across the table from AI on a speakerphone? Probably not.

• Kate McNeil opened All the Tropes, a romance bookstore, six weeks after quitting her job.
• Despite concerns about market saturation, All the Tropes thrives as a niche community destination.
• Passion, perseverance, and local support helped McNeil launch her business.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Kate McNeil, a 41-year-old small-business owner based in Atlanta. It's been edited for length and clarity.

The idea to open a romance bookstore started during COVID.

I joined an online group of fellow romantasy readers, looking to connect with other people who also enjoyed my favorite form of escapism. That group had over 2,000 members, and it was difficult to feel a sense of community. Eventually, it broke off into local chapters.

After COVID, I didn't know of any dedicated space for these same readers to meet in Atlanta. That's how I started the journey to opening the first romance bookstore in my neighborhood. In the two years since I opened, more romance bookstores have opened up, including one less than two miles away.

I thought I'd retire from my teaching job

When I launched All the Tropes bookstore, I was working a job I thought I'd retire from. I taught theater at Decatur High School for six years. My students always came first. I didn't want those kids to feel like I wasn't present or that they didn't have my undivided attention, so the bookstore was a back-burner idea for a few years.

I'd get home from rehearsal at 11 p.m., conduct business research until 2 a.m., then get up at 6 a.m. and go to work the next day and teach.

I took my time to gain a full understanding of the market, but there were still challenges

I learned about dealing with publishing companies and book distributors, connected with local artists to showcase their work, and reached out to local authors. One of the biggest challenges was finding a place for the store.

I knew that I wanted to stay on the east side of Atlanta because I lived in Kirkwood and felt very connected to the community.

In 2024, I found a location a four-minute walk from my home, and I knew it was time to make my idea a reality. In May of that year, I quit my teaching job and prepared to open the bookstore by the end of summer on Romance Bookstore Day.

I had 6 weeks to get the store ready for opening day

I received the keys to the bookstore six weeks before the day I planned to open. The timeline I had for opening day came with a lot of risks. I had cashed in my retirement fund, quit my job, and had a large preorder of "Onyx Storm" before there were bookshelves in the store.

There were many times my friends and I didn't leave the store until 4 a.m. A local artist painted the shop; I printed my merchandise at a local shop in Kirkwood; and I created the fabric wall. There were many nights I had doubts that All the Tropes would come to fruition.

I was a mom with two young kids opening a niche business that, to my knowledge, would be the first in the state, but I was prepared. I had my accounts with publishers, and my branding was complete. Perseverance, my husband, my village of friends, and an invested community got me to opening day.

All the Tropes opened August 17, 2024, on Romance Bookstore Day. In the span of a few months, I went from a passionate high school teacher to the owner and operator of a romance bookstore.

An increase in niche romance bookstores in the city concerns me

Even in a city like Atlanta with several thriving independent bookstores, I wonder about the percentage of residents who read for fun and, more specifically, read romance. While becoming a general indie bookstore would allow me to sell so many other things, I still believe All the Tropes can continue to thrive in a niche market, despite oversaturation.

Unlike a large book retailer, All the Tropes is a destination spot people can come from out of town to visit. Our social presence and promotion of local writers and artists also offer something unique to readers.

All the Tropes could pivot to general fiction, but so far, more stores opening has not impacted store traffic or sales.

4 Things helped me turn my business idea into a reality

All the Tropes continues to thrive because of my original vision of creating a community space for romance book lovers to connect. We now have eight active book clubs and continue to see consistent revenue.

Passion, trusting my gut, therapy, and a supportive group of friends are the reason I was able to turn an idea I brainstormed late at night into a successful niche business ready to grow.

We are now ready for a larger space and to expand our three-person team.

Do you have a unique small business story to share? Email the editor, Manseen Logan, at mlogan@businessinsider.com.

• Nikita Chernetskii moved to New York City from rural Moldova when he was 18.
• He joined the Army and worked as a combat medic, which gave him a sense of purpose.
• He was worried about affording med school and starting a family.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Nikita Chernetskii, a medical school student at New York University's Grossman School of Medicine. It has been edited for length and clarity.

I've wanted to be a doctor since I was a little boy. In Moldova, where I was born and raised, you apply to medical school right after finishing high school. As I was applying for medical schools, my parents won the green card lottery, giving our family the chance to come to the US.

Suddenly, I had a huge choice in front of me. Do I take the chance to go to the US, or keep pursuing my dream? I'd always been raised on the idea that the American dream was alive and well. I was also young and naive: I thought I could just apply to medical school once I got there.

I'll never forget landing at JFK in August with my parents and sister, who was in fourth grade at the time. I'd never seen a building taller than nine stories, and suddenly I was looking at the Manhattan skyline. It was surreal. I can still remember the smell as we left the airport, of hot asphalt and summer in the city.

I felt like I was in limbo, seeing my friends chase their dreams

Living in the US was a shock, to put it mildly. New York was so, so different from the rural area of Moldova where we'd lived. I'd gone to an English-speaking high school, but it was set up according to old Soviet standards. Once I was in the US, I realized that I'd been taught English for people who would never speak English: my grammar was excellent, but my vocabulary was very limited.

I knew life wouldn't wait for my dreams. My dad and I started working as porters, making about $500 a week. Part of the job was taking out the trash to the dumpster, but I was pretty happy doing that. The pay was more than I would ever make in Moldova.

I realized that going to med school in the US wasn't realistic. I didn't have the money and didn't understand how college worked here. That sent me into a period of limbo. I would work and save money just to go visit friends in Moldova. I saw them moving toward their goals, while my life stayed the same. Psychologically, it wasn't the greatest time for me.

Joining the military reaffirmed my desire to be a paramedic

On one of those trips home, a friend suggested I join the military. Within a month, I was marching in basic training. My poor English meant I couldn't always understand the directions. I just ran where the other recruits ran, and hoped it was right.

I scored well enough on my aptitude test to become a medic. The work was so fulfilling to me, and helped me cope with the rushed decision to join the military in what was still a foreign country to me.

I was deployed in Germany when the pandemic hit. I'd work 24-hour shifts, sleep for four hours, and get back to it. That's when others started telling me I should become a doctor. I realized that desire was still burning inside me, and I wouldn't be able to sleep well if I didn't at least try.

I leaned on every connection I had to help get into med school

I used the GI bill to pay for college. While I was there, I was accepted into the New York University internship program that pairs aspiring doctors with faculty. I worked with a trauma surgeon at Bellevue Hospital and knew I wanted to spend my life doing what he did.

When it came time for me to apply to medical schools, I knew I needed to be at NYU. I shook all the trees I could. I had no shame and asked anyone for help. The whole process was so stressful that it was almost a blur to me.

The idea of taking on half a million dollars in debt for medical school was frightening. I think I would have done it, but it would have meant delaying other goals, like having children with my wife.

This year, when I was accepted to NYU's Grossman School of Medicine's three-year, tuition-free medical program, it was surreal. When I dreamed of practicing medicine as a boy, I thought I'd be making $300 a month doing old Soviet techniques. Now, I'm learning cutting-edge science that feels like it's plucked from a sci-fi movie. I'm the happiest I've ever been in my life, and I'm well on my way to my American dream.

• Matthew Kelson, now 43, grew up in Michigan and opened his first cinema in his 20s.
• He went on to work for Netflix in Los Angeles before getting transferred to Japan in 2020.
• After leaving his job at Netflix in 2024, he renovated a kindergarten and founded a cinema in Japan.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Matthew Kelson, now 43, who was transferred by Netflix from Los Angeles to Tokyo and is now the founder of CineYama, an independent cinema in Uenohara, Yamanashi Prefecture, Japan. His words have been edited for length and clarity.

Japan isn't new to me. In middle school, I spent two weeks living with a host family as part of an exchange program. I returned a couple of times as an adult.

I was working at Netflix in Los Angeles when the company relocated me to Japan in 2020. I was based in Tokyo for two years before moving to Uenohara, a small town about an hour and a half by train from Tokyo. I still spent time in the capital for occasional meetings and traveled extensively across Asia for screenings. Otherwise, I worked remotely from home. After a company restructuring, I left Netflix in 2024.

I wanted to stay in Japan. My daughter was six months old when my wife and I moved, and my son was born three years later. We thought it was a great place for them to grow up. I started thinking about how I could utilize my expertise in cinema and give back to the community.

While scouting for locations, I came across an abandoned kindergarten. In 2024, I started plans to turn the old school into a cinema. And in December, I got my permanent residency in Japan through the highly skilled professional fast-track program. A year later, I formed my company and spent another year renovating before opening a cinema in March.

Building my career in film

I spent most of my childhood in Michigan, in the Detroit area. My father was a professor of international business. He traveled for work often. It got me curious about the world around me.

At 23, I came across the Detroit Film Center and took a filmmaking course. A year later, I became a teacher and worked as a projectionist there. Through that, I started working at an independent art theater in the Detroit suburbs. I started as an usher, then became the theater manager.

Within the two years of working there, I fell in love with the film world. At 25, I renovated an old school's auditorium into a theater in Michigan using my savings. The theater ran for two years, but after disputes with the landlord, it closed.

I was looking for a fresh start, so in 2011, I moved to Los Angeles. At first, I knocked on the doors of all the film distributors I'd worked with until I met some people at an independent film distribution company. I joined as an intern and worked my way up. I landed a job on Netflix's creative team two years later.

The journey to opening a cinema in Japan

Getting the permit to renovate the abandoned kindergarten was a long process. I had to negotiate with officials at city hall and the residents about how I'd use the building, establish the company, deal with fire and health regulations, and construction in a language I don't speak fluently.

I learned that pushing harder is not necessarily what gets things done in Japan. It was about patience, building trust, and showing people that I was serious and that the project wasn't going to disappear in six months.

There were days when I wondered why I had chosen to make my life so difficult. But every milestone, from getting the building, the inspection, installing the projector, and finally opening the doors, made me more determined.

When the cinema first opened, the elderly residents seemed cautious. After a preview, they told me they were impressed to see the place cleaned up and put back into use. It's important for me to have screenings that kids and families can come to and enjoy the space.

Tickets cost 1,500 Japanese yen, or about $9.50. We offer a discount to seniors and residents. I stick with showing content that is harder to find elsewhere, so that it gives viewers a perspective on other ways of life and culture.

It's mostly family-run. I manage the operations, and my wife helps out sometimes. My kids stamp the tickets when they're around.

Living up to the challenge

Opening the theater in the US was different from doing it in Japan. I was in my 20s, had little money, and was just figuring things out in Detroit. The one in Japan came after 15 years of working in film distribution, creative production, and international screenings.

It's been exciting living over here, having the cinema, and meeting people from all over the world. While life in the US would've been much easier, I like the challenges in Japan. That's why I was at Netflix for so long, because it wasn't an easy job either. I learned life in hard mode.

• After a friend told Lau Wen Loong about Hyrox, he signed up for a race and trained for six weeks.
• It's now been two years since he got started, and he's already competed in 21 races in 11 cities.
• These three host cities have been his favorites.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Lau Wen Loong, 37, who, over the past two years, has competed in 21 Hyrox races in 11 cities around the world. It has been edited for length and clarity.

I hadn't exercised regularly in two years when a friend said to me, "I think you'll be interested in this." He was taking part in Hyrox, an endurance race that combines running with fitness stations. You can race individually, as doubles, or in a relay, and there are both amateur and professional racers. He asked if I wanted to race with him.

My friend ended up doing the race with his wife, so I decided to do it on my own. "Don't be crazy," he told me. But I signed up six weeks before the event and completed my first race in Singapore in August 2024. My final timing was just under 73 minutes. I was a cross-country runner in high school, but for the first time in my life, I understood why some people hate running.

After finishing one race, I started asking myself what I wanted to do next. I'd put so much time into training for that first race, and I didn't want to lose that momentum.

The competitions come with demands

It's been two years since I got started in Hyrox, and I've completed 21 races in 11 cities, including Chengdu, Bangkok, and Mumbai. I have seven more lined up for this year. I'm in between jobs at the moment and working on an AI startup with my brother.

Each race costs about $150, while flights and other expenses can add up to $1,500. In terms of race prep, I recently bought a yearlong membership at a gym in Seoul, where I'm currently based, for about $55 a month. I've become an ambassador for several Hyrox-related brands, and they help cover some of my costs.

Hyrox is a good mix of running and weights. I think I may be the fittest I've ever been. I never imagined I could be faster than my younger self.

So far, these have been my three favorite host cities:

1. Osaka, Japan: January 2026

Every Hyrox venue is different. Similar to F1 tracks, the setup is tweaked, and the runs between stations are never the same for each race. It was my first winter Hyrox, and I hit a personal best of 61:51.

The winter part was interesting, because the race was held between two halls in a small venue. You ran in one hall, crossed to the other side to do the workout, and crossed back to run again, getting a blast of fresh air in the process.

I spent seven days in Osaka, most of it around the race area, but I managed to do a bit of shopping in the Dotonbori district. I had dinner at a famous crab restaurant with my father, who sometimes comes to support me at my races, depending on his schedule and whether he likes the city.

2. Incheon, South Korea: May 2026

It was my friend's first Hyrox. He raced before me, and I got to see it. Not only that, but I also came in first in my age group and did a personal best

Like many Hyrox races, the Incheon edition was held in a major convention center. The layout provided for a very smooth race, unlike at other races, which can sometimes disrupt your rhythm

I'm based in Seoul, so I went there daily. It was one hour each way. On the first day of the race, when I hitched a ride back with a friend, I got to try out the hyugaeso, or rest stops along the highway. They are like mini shopping malls, and the one I went to had three floors and lots of small stalls.

In the course of my races, I have made a lot of friends, like my doubles partner Ian, and Yvonne, a Singaporean working mom who has done 55 races. A couple on the plane from Seoul to Singapore also noticed my Hyrox bag, and we started chatting and became friends.

3. Jakarta, Indonesia: June 2026

The race venue was in a beautiful part of Indonesia I'd never been to — I hope to return.

It was the very first Hyrox race in Indonesia, so it was new for everyone. It was held in a convention center in one of Jakarta's green spaces, which is very scenic.

It was my first time doing two doubles races, and I didn't even know the guy I was racing with until I met him on the day. We were introduced through a mutual friend, and we only trained together once.

The drive to finish and win

I was competing in separate races at the September 2026 Hyrox event in Beijing, where Joanna Wietrzyk soiled herself. I saw her from afar, but didn't see what happened firsthand.

I've tried to put myself in her shoes and wondered if I would continue. I don't think I would or could. I do hope that she'll bounce back from it.

I've seen a lot of people crying at Hyrox. Whether it be tears of joy or tears of frustration, it still surprises me. Hyrox is a bit like therapy, as you are processing through your body. I intend to continue racing for at least another year.

I think the biggest benefit is that it enables you to be more self-aware.

• Leslie Hodgin and her husband had dreamed of moving abroad.
• They finally took the leap in January, deciding not to waste time in their 50s.
• Hodgin said the move was expensive and time-consuming, but she's been happy with their relocation.

This story is based on an interview with Leslie Hodgin, a 55-year-old marketing consultant who moved from the US to the Netherlands with her husband, John Lyman, 52. It has been edited for length and clarity.

Until 2026, I was living in Richmond, Virginia, with my husband and our cat.

My dad was in the Army, so I grew up all over the world, but Richmond is my adopted home. I lived there for about 10 years.

During that time, I got an offer to move to Seoul, South Korea, for my marketing job. My husband, John, and I were dating at the time. We got married one week before moving to Seoul for two years.

After the contract ended, we returned to the States. I love Richmond, but it did feel small after I had been in Korea.

Some events happened in both of our families that made us want to move abroad again sooner rather than later. My dad died. My husband's mom died. We had a couple of dear friends pass away. It was all very quick. And it made me think, "What are we waiting for? We don't have promises for tomorrow. Now is the time."

We don't have kids, so that wasn't holding us back. We had some money in the bank to move, which I know is a privilege. It was like, "Let's just go and live our lives. We shouldn't just keep hoping for someday because there may not be someday."

Moving to the Netherlands

John had gone to graduate school in the Netherlands, so we'd visited before. Through my work in advertising, I also had a fairly large network of people living there.

There's a visa for Americans called the Dutch-American Friendship Treaty (DAFT) that allows freelancers and entrepreneurs to live in the Netherlands. It made the country seem like a great choice for us.

My husband works for himself, so it was easier for him to pick up and go anywhere. I started my own consulting business and left my agency. I knew there was an advertising community in the Netherlands, and I planned to freelance if my consulting business wasn't doing well.

My husband's dad is in his 90s, and my mom just turned 80. Moving far from them was probably the hardest part of the decision. I have a little guilt for that, but they're excited for us. I've promised my mom that I'll be home for any big family and important events.

That's a hard thing to do, but we felt it was right for us not to put our lives on hold.

Downsizing our lives

We moved in January. We did it in six months. We'd sold our house about a year before moving and were living in an apartment.

We decided to sell almost everything we owned to keep costs as low as possible. We shipped a half-crate over, which is quite small, so we had to get rid of a lot of stuff. We made close to $12,000 selling everything and used it to pay for the visas and help with some of the moving costs.

When we moved, we had nine suitcases, including a large piece of art. It was the largest oversize item that would fit on an airplane, and we had a special museum-packing company pack it. And our cat, of course, came on the plane with us.

We live in a two-bedroom apartment. It's an old, old building, but the apartment is newly renovated and has a patio.

We do feel lucky that we found a place because there is a housing shortage, and it's quite hard to find housing, particularly if you're American or from another country and you don't have Dutch income. We had to pay six months' rent upfront to secure our rental.

Life in Europe

It still feels surreal that we live here. My husband and I will frequently look at each other and say, "Oh my God, I can't believe that we're here." I never want to lose that feeling.

Business seems to be going really well. I also already knew some friends, but I've met so many amazing people through social media and made some great friends with our neighbors.

We love the sense of community. I appreciate the social contract that people afford each other in the Netherlands, from the opportunities the government provides to the respect and trust they show each other in general.

Recently, there was Open Monumentendag, or Open Monuments Day, with over a thousand monuments, churches, houses, farms, and historic places across the Netherlands open to the public for free. They do that every year, and it feels so special. It seems like every other weekend there's a festival.

There are always challenges. I'm very slow to pick up the language. Most people speak English, but I feel like I need to be better.

Moving also costs a lot more than you plan for. Even if you've tried to pad all the numbers, it still costs more than anticipated. Because our work was quite slow earlier in the year, we were like, "Gosh, what have we done?"

Our cost of living is fairly similar to what it was in the US. We don't have a car, so we don't have that expense. We would be paying double the rent in New York City for this same apartment.

A fresh start

I feel alive again. I felt a little stagnant in Richmond after living overseas, and moving has opened a lot of doors for my creativity.

On social media, I've documented trying one new thing a week. It's gotten us out to meet people and have some interesting experiences.

There's a risk in moving abroad. You have to get yourself over the hump, and you have to be brave.

Believe in yourself. If there's something you want to try, like moving overseas, going on a solo trip, or taking a cooking class, take a chance on yourself. You're never going to regret trying it if it doesn't work out. If you don't ever put yourself out there, you're going to look back in 20 years and be like, "That would have been great. Why didn't I give that a shot?"

• Lonni Pike got sober at 51 after years of addiction and felt ready for a fresh start.
• She rejected expectations that older women should dress conservatively or fade into the background.
• Now 62, she's a fashion influencer, Twitch gamer, and advocate for aging on her own terms.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Lonni Pike. It has been edited for length and clarity.

Eleven years ago, when I was 51, I got sober after years of struggling with addiction. I felt vibrant again and ready for my life to start.

What I was met with was messaging on TV, social media, and even in day-to-day life that I had missed the train. I was too old, too boring, and I would just need to move along.

Everything associated with women and aging seemed to be negative. Even women themselves were negative about aging, and started hiding away, blending in, or getting treatments to chase youth.

But that wasn't going to be me. I was tenacious and determined to live the life I had another chance at.

I started expressing myself through fashion

Loving fashion, I started finding clothes that told the world who I was. Fashion is much more than clothing — it's the way people feel about themselves.

Most women my age had given in to the expectation that an aging woman is meant to be drab and boring.

For a bit of fun, I went to a clothing store and asked a staff member to help me find something to wear. She chose a pair of tan pants and a button-up, plain top, with a pair of loafers.

We are told not to show our arms because they are too flabby, not to wear miniskirts because our legs should not be seen, and to avoid bold colors so we don't stand out in a crowd.

I'd break out of this noise and dress in a way that made me feel good about myself.

With the help of my son, who studied broadcast journalism, I started posting on social media about what I was wearing.

I remember people telling me I looked like I was dressing like a teenager, or asking why I was wearing men's clothing. I often responded by saying that clothes don't have an age or gender, and that I was dressing to represent myself.

I've now created a community, mostly of women, who are watching my content and being reminded that aging isn't something to fear. It isn't the end.

My quest to age in the way I wanted didn't end with fashion

I shaved my head because I hated my hair and felt that a buzz cut would make me feel more like I felt inside.

Three years ago, I started a gaming channel, and I've become a TikTok gaming live pro and Twitch partner.

My sons had always played video games, and it looked really fun. But I knew it was a notoriously young crowd. I asked if I was too old to game. It was when I found another gamer, Tactical Grandma, who was around my age, that I knew I should try it.

I started solo hiking because, after getting sober, I needed that time alone outside, moving, to reflect. Slowly, I built up my fitness.

In October, I'll run my first 5 K. This was a goal I had after watching people run a half-marathon. I thought half-marathoners would be young and super fit, but there are so many different ages and shapes.

Having gotten tattoos for years, I was determined to continue getting them as I aged. They are my life's journey inked out on my skin. I don't worry about the wrinkles or a changing body shape that might alter how they look. The canvas the tattoos are on doesn't have to be perfect — I love the tattoos for what they represent, not for how aesthetically pleasing they are to other people.

Next month, I plan to get bird tattoos along the right side of my neck.

As I continue to age, I want to be louder. Not "in your face" kind of loud, but I do want to talk more frequently about aging.

Women can be comfortable getting older. They don't need to be perfect to be beautiful. In the world of AI, injectables, and cosmetic procedures, this is a powerful message.

It seems that growing old is becoming a dying art. That's why I want to pop up in their feeds to say that none of it's true. Aging doesn't have to be something we dread.

Sometimes, my body doesn't keep up with my brain. Running had been hard and ruined my feet. Gaming for eight hours a day has been hard on my body. And that's OK — I'll pivot and pursue something else instead.

I tried new things in my 50s and 60s, and I'll continue fearlessly trying more until I can't anymore.

• Hayley and Mo Molina built a house on Hayley's parents' 400-acre family ranch in Oklahoma.
• Now they live steps away from Hayley's parents, grandparents, and brother and sister-in-law.
• They both enjoy spending time with the family, and everyone has grown closer.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Hayley and Mo Molina, 30 and 49, a married couple who live on a 400-acre ranch in Claremore, Oklahoma. Hayley's parents bought the ranch in 2021, and now four generations of family live there. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

Hayley: I was born in Bluffton, Indiana. Then my family moved to Oklahoma when I was three.

We always lived in town, and my family knew nothing about ranching. They were golfers; I didn't listen to country music until I was in high school — we were city people. But then my parents sold their house and were looking for something new, something different.

They were actually looking for something smaller and with not as much land to take care of, but we started talking about a family compound, found Hook Ranch, and just jumped in headfirst.

When my parents first found the property, it was about 170 acres, give or take, and they just kept buying more land and growing it bigger and bigger until it landed on what it is now.

When my parents were talking about doing this, the future goal was for me to be out here. For me, it wasn't the goal right away. I wanted that in the future, but I didn't know what the future looked like for me.

My grandparents ended up moving out here and living in the barn, where they live now, because I wasn't planning on moving out there or building anytime soon.

They were like, "OK, well we'll just take your spot then."

Then Mo and I met, and honestly, I don't even know if we ever had the conversation about living out here.

Mo: We really didn't bring it up early on. And when we first thought about it, I was like, "There's no way I'm living out there with all them family. There's no way." Not because I didn't like them; it just wasn't in the plan.

But then, as I got to know them, loved them, and we hung out with them almost every weekend, we were like, "Wait a minute, we love it out here."

I proposed out here, and after that, it took off from there. And then it was normal.

It's not weird to be living this close to my family

Hayley: On the property, there's us, my parents, my mom's parents, and then my brother and sister-in-law and their two daughters.

My family's always been so close. We're the type of people who always hung out on the weekends. We always went to my parents' house Friday night. It was so normal to be so close and always together.

Mo: For me, it was just my mom and me growing up, and we lived in the city, but I'm a country boy. I knew I always wanted to be out in the country. But it looked like I was going to be in the city the whole time. But with Hayley being close to her family, it all came together.

Hayley: We actually moved in with my parents first. We sold my house in March 2025, and then moved in with my parents.

Mo: We lived there while we were building our house.

Hayley: We got married in September, moved in with my parents in March, and lived there for seven months. We moved into our house in October of 2025.

Our house is only about 100 yards away from the barn, which is where my parents and grandparents live.

My brother and sister-in-law are about 200 yards away from the barn — it's like a seven-minute walk. It's literally a one-minute walk from my house to my parents' house.

Mo: I didn't know if there were going to be any benefits to living that close or not, especially when my father-in-law built a trail that goes right from the barn to our house.

It's kind of cliché, but if we don't have any eggs, we can literally walk down there.

Hayley: But honestly, we have so much privacy. You wouldn't think that, but I can't even see my parents' house or my brother's house from my house.

We can be in the backyard, the front yard, and I have no idea what's going on at their houses ever.

We can go weeks without seeing anybody. There's a lot of privacy out here because everybody respects each other's privacy.

Mo: It is weird knowing that we're this close and then a couple weeks go by, and I'm like, "Man, I haven't seen anybody," or "We haven't gone down there," and they're 100 steps away.

We've built closer relationships by living on the same property

Mo: When we first started dating, she was always hanging out with her parents almost every weekend, and I was living my single life, and I was hanging out with my buddies, and we would go out almost every weekend.

Hayley: Friday nights, we know what my parents are doing, because they do the same thing pretty much every Friday night.

So if we don't have anything to do, we are just going to go join them. Sometimes I just want to hang out with people, but I don't want to have to drive anywhere, and I don't want to have to get ready. So we'll have a game night at the barn with the whole family: my grandparents, us, my parents, and my brother and his family.

Mo: Hayley used to come and hang out with my friends, and then it didn't take very long before I went over to her family's place and hung out with them. I was like, "Man, this is kind of cool." They're awesome to hang out with.

At first, I was like, "I'm not hanging out with your parents. This is not a cool Friday night." In less than a month, I would say we were literally hanging out every weekend with her parents.

Hayley: I think we all have gotten so much closer. I have learned so much about my grandparents and gotten closer with my grandma.

My grandma comes over to our house every Monday morning and washes our sheets for us. While the sheets are washing and drying, she cleans the floors for me, and while she's doing that, she and I chat.

That's been really nice because I get to connect with her whenever. Before, I couldn't really do that because we only saw them every once in a while. Now I can do that every week. And she goes to my brother's house and does their laundry on Tuesdays.

Mo: Getting to know her family more and seeing how they do things and what they like and what their everyday looks like has been a benefit.

Her family works so hard. Her mom is the hardest worker on the ranch, and I would've never known that when I met her.

Her parents run a business, and her dad is constantly not in the house — except to watch college football.

I've learned so much from him.

I think getting to know that part of her family was huge for me. That's what's different. If we lived where we lived before, I probably would've never learned, or wanted to learn, that. So that was big for me.

• In his 40s, Jonathan Yang decided he wanted to get hot — and stopped feeling ashamed to say it.
• His paycheck funded hair transplants, a nose job, and GLP-1s, which he continued post-layoff.
• As his body changed, he said he felt more confident and also noticed that people treated him better.

This is an as-told-to essay based on a conversation with Jonathan Yang, who was laid off from Meta in late 2024 after more than three years on the office design team. The 43-year-old shares how his job, cosmetic procedures, and weight loss shaped his confidence. The following has been edited for brevity and clarity.

At Meta, I worked really hard. I had golden handcuffs. I did not prioritize my health. You go to Meta, and they call it the "Facebook 15." Well, it was probably more than 15 pounds because of all the food that's available and all the stress. So, I just really let myself go. I put in everything I could to keep the job.

One upside was that having a bigger paycheck allowed me to start exploring things that I'd always wanted to do — emotionally, physically, aesthetically. I could finally afford a $10,000 hair transplant.

I also got a nose job. I've also had another hair transplant. Looking good and feeling good, to me, are fundamentally tied together. That's for me, and not everybody needs that. A lot of people out there are very successful being their own person and not letting that get to them. I'm not that strong.

I just wanted to get hot

Doing these things started to change how I felt about myself. It started to take away some of the shame that I had around getting aesthetic treatments. Because, as a man, it's seen as superfluous, and it's frowned upon. Before that, I had done a lot of soul-searching, therapy, and all kinds of things.

I hired a trainer, and I felt good, but the change wasn't happening fast enough. Then GLP-1s came out. I'd been waiting for something like that. I finally got on them, and then the weight started to come off, and I just started to blossom.

Once I started seeing the results, I just wanted to get hot. I wanted, at 43, to finally feel confident enough to say that out loud without having any kind of qualms about it. I think working out is a segue for people to think about improving their lives emotionally — to talk about those things — and fitness is an acceptable way for men to kind of go into that.

At work, I would get up onstage and be much more confident. Before that, it wasn't a conscious thing where I knew why I was so meek. When I look back, I would be nervous. I wouldn't smile. On GLP-1s, I started to really change and show up differently at work, and I was getting promotions. I just felt like I had more command because I lost the weight. My coworkers and managers all treated me better.

Now I'm on a lower dose of GLP-1s. I have to pay for it myself now that I'm self-employed. That's not something I'm going to stop.

People look at me differently

After my layoff, my weight was something I could control. I had to build a new routine. My body needed it, too. I had sciatica, and I had all this nerve pain. It really was like my body broke. I had never felt something like that.

I became hyper-focused on wellness, keeping fit, and eating well. Losing weight gave me the confidence to share my story. It allowed me to shed any insecurity or cringe. We say that a lot, but it was like I'm at this point now where I've only got one life to live. I know what it tastes like now.

After all the changes I made, people looked at me differently. A thing that people don't really talk about is how, on the surface, it really is about looks. I would walk into a situation with this naive sense of, "Oh, they're not looking at my weight."

As soon as I started looking more conventionally attractive, I noticed that was the first thing people would comment on. I would meet people, and they would say, "Well, you obviously go to the gym a lot," or "Oh, look at those arms!" I was like, "Wow! We live in this world where we're told, 'Aesthetics don't really matter. People look at your character.' Unfortunately, it's not true. I wish it were.

Do you have a story about how your appearance has affected your work or career? Contact this reporter at tparadis@businessinsider.com.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jeff Kinney, the 55-year-old author of the "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" series, who lives in Plainville, Massachusetts. It has been edited for length and clarity.

When I wrote "Diary of a Wimpy Kid," I worked on it for eight or nine years without thinking I was writing a book for kids.

I thought I was writing a book for grown-ups that would feel like "The Wonder Years" or "A Christmas Story" — looking back on childhood through the lens of an adult.

The first thing that surprised me was that my publisher said I'd actually written a children's series; it caused a lot of cognitive dissonance.

But what also surprised me was that kids understood the irony in the books. They understand that Greg is an unreliable narrator; they seem to get the joke.

After writing the series, and after raising two kids of my own — ages 21 and 23 — I've learned a few things about kids. Here's my best advice about getting kids to read, screen time, and more — plus a few things I'd go back and change if I could.

1. To get kids to read, feed their interests

I recently heard author Jack Gantos say that after dinner, he and his family would get out their books and read. I think that's really cool and also very old-fashioned, in a way. I wish we'd done it when raising our kids.

With reading, I think the most important thing you can do is feed your kids' interests, whether they're interested in Pokémon cards or sharks or tornadoes. Get them books or magazines that speak to their interests, rather than trying to give them books that we read as kids or books that are too high-minded for their age level.

A lot of authors who write for kids start with some sort of a lesson, and there's a time and place for that. But kids read for the same reason that adults read: to be entertained. If we start from a position of trying to teach kids a lesson, they'll sniff that out and turn away from it.

It's really important to encourage kids down a path that gets them reaching for the next book. I want them to feel a feeling of success in having finished a book because that's an important act of completion. But mostly, I'd like them to keep reading, whatever form that might take.

2. Listen to them

In everyday parenting, sitting at dinner with our kids and hearing about their day without judgment is a really good foundation. Just about everything that kids today are going through, we've been through in some form. The most powerful thing that we can say to kids is "I understand," or "I've been there myself," and share stories, making sure that they feel seen and heard.

As parents, we should make ourselves vulnerable to our kids by telling them about the struggles that we went through.

If we do that without moralizing and without judgment, I think it draws us closer to our kids and turns us into a resource for them.

3. Envision your future relationship

I've always thought about my relationship with my kids by imagining, How do I want our relationship to look when my kids are adults? I've tried to anticipate that and treat my kids that way the whole time.

I think it's working out because my kids will call me and want to go see the Patriots or the Celtics with me. I think that's partially because I've always had this version of our relationship in mind.

4. Don't get too wrapped up in kids' sports

As parents, we live and die by our kids' successes in sports. I certainly got too caught up in it and couldn't really anticipate that there would be a life beyond sports for my kids.

If I were to go back in time, I probably would change my approach on that. We like to see our kids succeed, and of course, sports is a big stage where there's a lot wrapped up in their success, including social issues and self-esteem.

When our kids are thriving, we feel really good for them, and when they're failing, it's tough for them and us. I can understand why that happens with parents, but I can also see that it's good to take a step back.

5. Help them understand that social media manipulates

Social media bullying is something that we never had to face growing up, and it's really unfortunate and damaging.

Screen time has changed things — you see studies finding that kids are dating a lot less, and there's a loneliness epidemic.

As parents, we can help kids by educating them and helping them understand that social media companies are incentivized to make you spend more time on your screens. The more that my kids, who grew up immersed in the social media world, began to understand that, the more they wanted to move away from it.

They get out there in the world — touch grass, play sports, and pick up basketball. My son will put lockouts on his social media.

It's important for us to think for ourselves before we turn to AI

As AI becomes a part of schoolwork and daily life, my concern is that AI makes a lot of things very easy.

At times, I look for solutions through AI that I could conjure up myself, so I worry about how that rewires the brain when you feel like there's always an agent that can solve your problem for you. It could reduce your own capacity for problem-solving.

It's really important for kids to be able to think for themselves before turning to the tool.

To counteract that, getting out in the world and interacting with one another is really important. Put kids into social situations; for example, my son has been working as a bookseller this past year, where he's had to interact with lots of different types of people and solve problems.

A lot of kids or young people in this generation are more isolated. They spend a lot more time in their rooms on their phones, and so I think that getting them out there interacting with other human beings is going to give them a competitive advantage.

• Brian Rooney, 60, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2024.
• During his late wife's illness, he built up medical and credit-card debt.
• After she died, the grief made it difficult for him to sustain his business.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Brian Rooney, the 60-year-old founder of Chapter7Reset.com, who lives in Conroe, Texas. He lost his wife in 2013. The essay has been edited for length and clarity, and the details verified.

When you're grieving, you're not thinking about how to move a business forward, capture new market share, or adapt to new technologies. You're not thinking straight because you're overwhelmed by a cloud of loss, pain, and sorrow. Some days, you're just trying to get through morning to night.

In 2013, I lost my wife, my partner, and my life. I still had to deal with the financial reality. I had underestimated what grief would do to my ability to run a business.

Tina was the yin to my yang

My wife, Tina, and I had 24 great years together. She was the yin to my yang. We met through a mutual friend, got to know each other, and fell in love. She was a strong, independent thinker. She was loving, kept me in check, and was an outstanding mother.

Our five kids were all born close together, and I was very involved in their lives. One of the reasons I started a business was because I wanted to be the dad who could be at home, coach my sons in basketball, and play in recitals with my daughter.

We'd tried both working early on, but Tina stopped early on in our relationship. I was the breadwinner, and she managed the kids.

I launched my email-marketing business in 2000. For a time, it did very, very well.

My wife was diagnosed with cancer

In 2011, things felt almost too good to be true. Then Tina noticed a little bump in the roof of her mouth. She went to the dentist; they did a biopsy, and we didn't think too much about it. Weeks later, I was sitting in my home office when she came over with the phone. With a very disturbed look, she said, "I have cancer."

Our lives turned upside down.

At first, because the cancer wasn't very aggressive, we tried homeopathic remedies. Then came chemotherapy, radiation, and major surgeries. The treatments were costly, and while the Affordable Care Act covered quite a bit, we still had high deductibles. Some hospitals wouldn't admit her until the deductible had been paid.

I would sit at the table with spreadsheets, trying to work out the finances. I was trying to be strong for my wife, but sometimes I'd go to the corner of the room and cry. The unspeakable thing to consider was that I might lose my wife because I couldn't afford to pay for it all.

A lot of the medical bills were paid with credit cards, and we ran up a lot of credit-card debt. I had six mouths to feed, for which I relied mostly on credit cards. I sold my music gear, like my guitars and amps. We moved from a beautiful rental house in a nice area of Texas to a much less expensive apartment. We weren't going to shows, basketball games, or on trips. None of that bothered me. The focus was on getting Mama healthy.

Friends and family stepped in here and there to help out. My kids were approaching adulthood, so they didn't need much looking after, but working from home let me adjust my schedule as needed.

I couldn't keep the business moving forward

There were days when I couldn't touch the business. It was mostly automated, but there were things I needed to step in and manage. If a server went down, I'd need to stay up all night to fix it while checking on my wife in the other room.

I wasn't resting or sleeping. I wasn't able to drive the business forward.

During that time, the industry was changing. New technology became available, and we weren't able to keep up. I was so focused on Tina's care that we missed opportunities. We had contractors and a business partner, and I wish I'd outsourced a lot faster. I didn't realize how fast I was losing.

I became a widower at 47

Tina died in November 2013. She was 49, and I was a 47-year-old widower.

Those first few weeks, I'd wake up, roll over, realize she wasn't there, and know that she never would be again. I would talk myself out of bed, one body part at a time.

The business was still there. My business partner was focused on the technical side, but I had the marketing and entrepreneurial mindset. A lot of things that needed to get done didn't get done. Honestly, at that point, I didn't care. It was a dark time for me

I wanted a clean slate

The business was declining, and meanwhile, I'd built up hundreds of thousands of dollars in credit-card and medical debt. I thought I could put everything on my credit cards, turn things around, and pay it down. Things never turned around, and as the business continued to decline, there was less money to draw from it.

I spoke with bankruptcy attorneys, but I was convinced I could fix the problem.

In 2021, I got remarried. My second wife knew about the financial mess I was in. The interest and penalties were compounding so quickly. There was constant pressure from phone calls, letters, and demands for payment. I wanted relief and a clean slate.

In early 2024, after speaking with my business partner, we decided to dissolve the business. Later that year, I filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

I felt both relief and shame after filing for bankruptcy

When I filed for bankruptcy, I had no assets because I'd sold them all to pay my bills. When the debt was wiped out, I felt relief and shame, but the relief took over once I stopped getting phone calls and letters.

It was time to rebuild. I got a sales job, which I hadn't had in decades. I did AI certification training and started rebuilding my credit with credit-rebuilding cards. I launched ChapterSevenReset.com, a free guide to help people in a similar position.

One of the hardest lessons was that we didn't have a life-insurance policy on Tina. It never dawned on me because she wasn't contributing financially. I never considered how caring for her and my grief would take away from my generating income. My second wife and I both have life insurance policies for each other.

Nowadays, my friends say the "old Brian" is back. I've made peace, as best you can, with the fact that Tina is gone. I'm like an amputee. There's a part of me that's missing, and that part will always be missing. It itches. It's always there.

• Danielle Fewings, founder of Get Clear Beauty, has invested in cosmetic treatments since she was 27.
• Fewings' journey with aesthetic procedures began with a breast reduction and includes Botox and filler.
• Her $150,000 investment in herself has supported both personal confidence and professional success.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Danielle Fewings, a 40-year-old entrepreneur from New York City. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

I started my career in digital marketing and ran my own agency from 2020 until 2025, when I sold it. I'm now the founder of Get Clear Beauty, an aesthetic treatment marketplace, which I started in 2026.

I've always felt like there was something missing from my appearance, as if someone much more confident was buried beneath it all. I got my first procedure done in 2013 and have had many since.

I don't regret any of them.

I'm the most treatment‑forward person in almost every room I'm in

In my broader New York circle, routine maintenance is completely normal. People are getting Botox and lip filler, and a few have had breast augmentations. Most are dipping in rather than going all in.

I'm honestly the most treatment-forward person in almost every room I'm in. In any given conversation, I'm the one who's had the most work done, which is a little wild when I think about it.

For most of the people I know, the max is Botox. Routine maintenance is common around me, but no one I'm close to has done anywhere near as much as I have.

My first major decision was my breast reduction at 27

I wore a 32G and desperately wanted them smaller. I call this my gateway surgery because it was honestly a very easy recovery, so I had this ease as the template, which gave me the confidence to keep pursuing additional treatments.

It made me more willing to put myself out there, both in dating and especially in showing up online to create content for my business, which matters enormously when you're building something. It shifted how I approach relationships, too, both friendships and romantic ones.

When you feel confident inside and out, you see yourself as more valuable, recognize your worth, and become more selective about who you let into your life. As I've felt better about myself, I've been more intentional about the relationships I keep close, and I see a direct correlation between the two.

I've never made decisions due to outside pressure

My choices have always been personal. I've never done any of this for another person or because of outside pressure. It has always been about putting my best self forward, and if that takes some tweaks and some money, I'm willing to do it.

I'm a very confident person — I just haven't accepted every imperfection. My upper blepharoplasty is a good example: most people would say I didn't need it, and they would be right, because no one needs any of these things. I wanted it. My eyelids felt heavy, and I chose to change that.

I'm fully committed to antiaging and the maintenance it requires. I go to my quarterly Botox appointments and my annual lip filler appointments, and I'll be ready for a facelift when that time comes. The idea that aging gracefully means avoiding treatments is absurd; aging gracefully is doing whatever feels good to you as an individual.

The cost breakdown

Because my first breast surgery was a reduction, I paid $6,000 out of pocket, and my insurance covered the rest. I had a full-body makeover in the Dominican Republic, which included a tummy tuck, skin tightening, and two further breast surgeries after major weight loss, costing around $12,000. I've also had liposuction, scar revision, an upper blepharoplasty, Sculptra and filler, a Morpheus8 treatment on my legs, tattoo removal, lip blushing, microblading and shading, Invisalign, and teeth whitening. These procedures have cost about $50,000 in total.

The maintenance I keep up with regularly includes manicures and pedicures, which I have gotten every two weeks for the past 10 years; lash extensions, which I have gotten every three weeks for about 15 years; Botox; more filler; peels and lasers; tanning; and haircuts. The recurring maintenance has cost about $105,000 over time.

What struck me is that the one-time procedures come to about $50,000, but the quiet, recurring maintenance is over $100,000. The costs nobody tracks are the ones that add up the most. That is exactly why I built Get Clear Beauty.

Each procedure served a purpose

My whole philosophy has been doing high-maintenance things to stay low-maintenance. The lashes, manicures and pedicures, lip blushing, and microblading are all upkeep that let me feel put-together with minimal effort, and because of them, I barely wear makeup, so some of that cost is a trade-off.

The bigger procedures came from real changes in my body. My weight has gone up and down for years, and that has driven a lot of it. The Morpheus8 on my legs was for skin laxity, because I'm not ready for a leg lift and probably don't need one. I've had three breast surgeries total.

I'd never do CoolSculpting, and I'd never have a nose job. I don't think CoolSculpting is cost-effective, and I've grown to love my nose.

My appearance impacts confidence, and confidence impacts business

When you're on 15 Zooms a week and constantly recording content to win business, looking and feeling your best matters.

Appearance affects business outcomes, but for me, it works through confidence. When I feel good about how I'm showing up, I represent my company more powerfully and carry my knowledge into the room in a way that lands.

I love how I look. 10 years ago, I never thought looking this way was achievable, and it's the result of a GLP-1 medication, surgeries, and really taking my appearance by the horns. I'm in a genuinely happy place with it.

• Hilary Tang and her college friends bought an akiya in Hiroshima, Japan, for a little over $11,000.
• The group of friends spent months living at the property while renovating it.
• They plan to use it mostly for gatherings but are open to renting it out to cover yearly costs.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Hilary Tang, 23, a recent college graduate from Hong Kong who purchased a home in Hiroshima, Japan, with her college friends. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

I graduated from Minerva University in San Francisco last May.

I was planning to work at a startup in San Francisco, but I decided that I wanted to take a gap year. At Minerva, our cohort is pretty diverse, and I have quite a few friends from Japan. One of my friends had this concept: "There are these akiyas, but no one actually buys them."

I actually never saw any of those videos about akiyas before, but I did know about the 1 euro house in Italy thing. I didn't know there was a similar concept in Japan.

My friend was initially planning to buy a house with his high school friends, but they backed out very early on. After they backed out, he asked if we were interested in buying a house.

That was in June. We bought the house in late July, and then we got the keys on August 6.

At first, we were trying to recruit people, but no one really wanted to. We even tried to recruit outside our school. I tried asking people from Hong Kong, but no one wanted to go somewhere random and buy a house in Japan because there's quite a lot of risk.

From the initial six people who bought the house, five people are from my university.

Then two other people joined, because my friend's friends also came over after we started the renovation. They're from Japan and really liked the house, so they decided to chip in as well. So currently, we have eight people.

We always wanted to have eight people in the house — it's just easier if we have a bigger budget.

We wanted to buy and renovate the house for less than $20,000

After we assembled the people who decided to buy the house, we had an initial meeting to understand each person's motivations and expectations, because that would determine what kind of house we buy and how we want to treat it.

When we were talking about things we would want in the location, something that was common was that, firstly, we all preferred being in nature or easily accessible to nature. Within the group, most of them are Japanese and already live in Tokyo, Osaka, or another big city, so for them, they wanted to have a second house in a more rural area.

Secondly, we wanted somewhere that is easily accessible, even internationally. Another friend is planning to work in the US, and there's also a Korean member, so it's better if there's more motivation, or it's easier for us to actually go there if there's an international airport nearby.

And thirdly, we wanted somewhere with better weather and with lower earthquake and tsunami risk.

We ended up finding a house in Hiroshima.

The house itself was 1.8 million yen (or $11,371), but the price was negotiated because the house was initially listed on the website at 3 million yen.

We also had to pay the agent fee and other fees, so we spent about 2.3 million yen in total.

The house is around 315 square meters (or 3,390 square feet), and almost 500 square meters of land.

We have nine Japanese-style rooms, which are rooms with tatami flooring, and two Western-style rooms, which are rooms without tatami flooring.

Initially, we wanted to do the whole renovation within $4,000, but since we have more people chipping in, our budget expanded. We still haven't used up our original $20,000 budget. Just for the renovation, we've used around $1,262, as of start of October.

We hang out there once a month, but we're also thinking about renting it out

We've been staying in the house the entire time we've renovated it, and luckily the house was in better condition than we expected.

The timeline was so tight that we couldn't actually go there to see the house before we bought it. But the agent did a video tour, and we looked around, and it was quite nice.

We also talked to our neighbors, because the person who lived in the house passed away about five years ago, and then afterward it was left vacant. But before he passed away, the neighbors said how the previous owner was really diligent with cleaning stuff; that they always saw him cleaning, even toward the end of his life.

When we got there, we realized it was actually a lot more well-maintained than we thought, so we didn't have to do a very big renovation. At first, we thought we'd have to change all the tatami, or rebuild certain parts, or put down certain parts. But it turns out there hasn't been a super big expense that would require us to rebuild the entire thing.

We did paint and also repaired some curtains and lights because they weren't working. We added a fire alarm and air conditioning because they only had one or two aircons, and it gets really hot in Hiroshima during the summer and really cold in the winter. Those wooden houses don't insulate very well.

When we first got there in August, there were five of us. Then maybe for the first three days, there was always someone new coming, because there are a lot of friends who wanted to come here. So there are always visitors, and they also helped out because there's a lot going on — we even had friends' parents come over as well.

That's been my favorite part.

You see sides of people that you don't know. Everyone has some sort of expertise to bring. For example, some people are really good at painting. Our friend helped us paint the bathroom wall — he wanted to paint a Fuji mountain, but none of us really knew how to paint. So I'm really glad he came and helped us paint.

There's a girl who went to a lot of auctions growing up, so she specialized in artwork and helped us go through the things the previous owner left behind.

It would be nice to do Airbnb and learn about the process and to experience what it's like to manage an Airbnb. Maybe with the house on Airbnb we can cover at least the running costs every year.

Still, we want to prioritize us hanging out.

Every month we try to gather there, and so far we've been going consistently once a month.

We wanted to create a place we could always come back to whenever life gets a little overwhelming, where any of us could take a break, have some space to ourselves, and take time to process whatever was going on in life.

We see this house not as an investment, but as a shared place among us.