SRL's fifth anniversary + five things we've learned

Happy 5th birthday, Sassy Red Lipstick! This month we are celebrating five years since we decided to take the leap and start SRL. It's hard to believe that it's been a full five years since we first set out on this crazy journey in 2013. We were just two college kids in love, starting a new creative project together and dreaming big. We always hoped it would one day be as successful as all the fashion bloggers Sarah had been following since high school, and now we feel so blessed to be where we are. It hasn't come without a lot of hard work and sacrifice, but we wouldn't have it any other way. Waking up each day to build our dreams together has been so satisfying and it makes us feel so proud to look back and see how far we've come!Here's a fun little throwback to our very first SRL posts that popped up on our memories recently. We were just babies, haha!One of the most common questions we receive in DMs and emails is how we got here. Believe us, if we could sum it all up into one easy recipe for success, we would! But really the only answer is lots of blood, sweat, and tears across years and years. Every successful person in this blogger/influencer industry has just figured it out as they've gone along, that's really the only way in such a new space. That being said, Robbie and I have obviously learned so much in the past five years of building Sassy Red Lipstick into what it is today and we wanted to celebrate birthday #5 with five important things we've learned in that time.Thank you so much for following along this journey with us. So many of you have been along for the ride for quite a while now and have shared in so many life changes with us. We can't thank you enough for all your love and support over the years. It means the world to us!Love,Sarah & Robbie#TeamTripp1. It's a marathon, not a sprint. - SarahIn the past five years I've seen so many women start and stop, start and stop. Bloggers who I once looked up to as a marker of success seemed to fall by the wayside, and others have shot out of nowhere to rapid success. I've been approached by countless aspiring bloggers/influencers over the years, asking me how to build a website, how to get in touch with brands, how to do this and that, and then see those same gals abandon their blog just a few months later. One of mine and Robbie's main goals with our platform is to inspire people to chase their dreams. When you want to do something, do it! Don't make excuses and don't get discouraged. Because it's a long, hard journey no matter what you do or how you do it. The people who dedicate themselves to their goals each and every day are the ones who eventually achieve success. It's taken us five whole years to get to where we are today. From what I've observed and chatted about with other successful bloggers, that's the minimum amount of time it takes to create a great full-time income in this industry. Don't look at the road ahead as being too overwhelming, look at it as a fun journey that requires patience. Trust me, it's worth it!2. You have to take a big risk to win big. - RobbieMoving to San Francisco was the biggest decision we had made in our marriage and it turned out to be the best thing we ever did. However, you can only imagine how scary it was to move to the most expensive city in the country while making a modest salary that barely covered our expenses. When we first moved out here, I was still working as the director of marketing for a company back in Utah, and like most salary jobs, I was paid once every two weeks, two paychecks a month. Our rent in San Francisco ate up one entire paycheck each month, which means we only had the other one for everything else. We were still trying to build a steady income with Sassy Red Lipstick but hadn't quite gotten to that point yet. It was definitely a little tight, but our dreams were important to us and we were betting on ourselves. Even scarier was when I finally decided to take the leap and quit my salary job to dedicate myself full time to Sassy Red Lipstick and my other creative endeavors. It was such a risk since no paycheck is guaranteed when you're self-employed, but I knew I had to do it. Everything we have today is a result of our decision to go all in! We could have never grown our platform into what it is now without taking that leap. I am always encouraging people to take that risk because life is short and you don't want to look back with any regrets!3. Stay genuine. - SarahOnce anyone achieves a level of "success" or "status" or even "Instagram fame" as some call it, it can be easy to start believing in your own hype and thinking higher of yourself. It's true, the blogger/influencer game can be very superficial at times and is definitely filled with people who smile to your face but secretly pray that you'll crash and burn. It can also be a very materialistic industry, where there is a lot of judgment based on who has or doesn't have the hottest and trendiest of everything. But there's also so many amazing people I've met in this industry and I am so grateful for these friendships with other influencers. These genuine people are the norm, not the exception. It's really unfair how influencers get so much hate because of how they look or their lifestyle or how "unrelatable" their life is, but the truth is, most influencers are just awesome creative entrepreneurs. I am so proud to be a part of this industry! Regardless of all the noise that exists around us, I've always been committed to maintaining my values no matter how much success we've been blessed with. I hope you feel that every day when Robbie and I make it a point to reply to each one of your DMs and build a sense of community in our little corner of the internet. I have always said that I want followers to feel totally comfortable saying hi to me in person and feel like I am someone they could easily grab lunch with. I feel so blessed to have a platform that reaches a lot of people and I've committed to staying true to who I am. No matter how much money you make or how many people know your name, you should always stay close to your roots and strive to be a genuine, down to earth person.4. Ignore the haters. - RobbieMy journey in life seems to be a bit of a masterclass in this department, which is why I'm currently working on a book on this very topic. It's really sad to me how many people take joy in tearing others down online, attacking people who they've never even met and are simply judging based off a few photos they've seen or some rumors they heard. In recent years Sarah and I have really had to focus on staying close to the positive people in our lives and cutting out any negative energy that tries to bring us down. We've been at this long enough to see people who we once considered great friends turn into active haters. I will never understand how people have the time and energy to devote to such mean-spirited gossip and slander. Sarah and I have dedicated our lives to spreading love and positivity through our platform and we will always continue to do so. There will always be those who laugh at your dreams or judge you for your decisions, but at the end of the day, all that matters is who you really are, not who people think you are. Surround yourself with positive and loving people who want to see you be successful and happy, and forget the rest.5. Look forward, not sideways. - SarahThere is more than enough room for everyone to be successful. Don't get caught up in that poisonous trap of thinking that someone else's success takes away from your own. It's a natural human emotion to feel that way and sometimes I have to remind myself when I catch myself feeling down on what I'm doing. Being in the blogger industry, there are times where it feels like this catty attitude exists and it's so toxic. It prevents women from helping other women and it holds everyone back. Whatever industry you are in, don't get caught up in what other people are doing, focus on your own journey. Your dreams will not disappear because someone else looks like they're a little bit ahead of you. Look ahead and keep on moving forward! red sequin dressred Dior heelsRuby Woo lipstickrobbie's lip print shirtrobbie's red pantsheart balloonballoon tassel

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