Never in Your Time... Always in Perfect Time!
As a single mother of two sons, it’ s not always easy to focus on myself and my wants. I realize this is the same for many In order to break stereotypes, to break generational curses, to debunk the myths of who is and what a single mom can be and do I’ ve chosen to give intimate looks at single moms who are living their lives that go against all of the norms and status quos. The title of this issue is“ New Year, New THRIVE!” so I sought out to find a woman who was truly THRIVING in her life and living it on her terms, her way. I didn’ t have to search hard because I found her in one of the first people I met when I came to Atlanta; Joi Pearson.
Joi is a model, photographer, radio show host, inventor and actually a good person. On top of that she has an amazing, mutual beneficial co-parenting relationship with her son, Brenton’ s father. How is she able to not just balance all of these things but conquer them? How is she able to be a PINKTABULOUS mother, a PINKTOUNDING business woman, look so darn PINKTASTIC and HOTT and still THRIVE over and over again? Well you’ ll have to read the interview to find out but I’ ll give you a clue it has something to do with it never being in your time and an amazing village that starts with her co-parenting relationship.
Q: Who is Joi? A: Joi is a mother, daughter, friend, creative person who loves to help.
Q: When did you know you wanted to be an entrepreneur? A: Mom would say from the beginning. I always went left when everyone else went right. I sold candy in elementary school; always had the bug. Both of my parents worked really really hard and dad had the second hustle at night, a print shop. I knew the 9-5 wasn’ t going to cut it and I wanted it all not a piece and knew I needed to create my own lane to get it.
I always went left when everyone else went right.
Q: You hold so many titles, but what did you start out as? A: A Photographer. I always had a camera in my hand, since elementary school. I started out with the 35mm rolls of film that you had to take to Walgreens to get developed. My father always declared they better be the best photographs ever, but when they were developed they were out of focus, blurry or of no one at all but now looking back and looking at those photos and seeing how it bring back so many emotions that I can capture and hold on to it with a photo. Seeing how much satisfaction that comes from seeing someone else happy with something I was able to create for them, is why I’ m still a photographer and loving it.
Q: I know you started out in front of the camera. Tell me about how that started and how it has helped you as a photographer.
A: The easiest way to get print work as a model was to do hair magazines and since I’ ve always had hair down my back that’ s how I started. I first met Patrick Radley out of Virginia and with him I started doing hair shows and hair print work. I“ love being in front of the camera because you can turn into whoever you wanted to be.” Now that I’ m behind the camera it helps with directing the ones in front of the camera, because I understand what they are thinking and what the photographer needs as well. The best part is having a photography company that doesn’ t just shoot one time but lives with the clients shooting their life through all the milestones making them family.
Q: Where were you in your career when you found out a baby was coming? A: 6 years ago I was working for Marjorie Harvey, wife of Steve Harvey, as her personal assistant.“ She was amazing, they have an amazing family, and he’ s amazing”. Loved the job but I knew that the 80 hour work week and the traveling wasn’ t conducive to having a child or at least being the mother I wanted to be. All the while, I had still been taking photos as my side hustle. As luck would have it while pregnant, I was booked to cover Reginae’ s; Lil Wayne and Toya’ s daughter; 13th birthday. Although I knew nothing about being an event photographer, I did it and woke up to my pictures being all over the blogs and the internet. I called Necole Bitchie, owner of necolebitchie. com, and told her those were my photographs and she said I should get a watermark for next time. Not being a fully fledged photography business, I didn’ t have or know those things and that was the wakeup call I needed to get my business together and what
THRIVE MAGAZINE 9