Meet Lizzy Mac | Company Partner, Commercial Print Model, Coach

We had the good fortune of connecting with Lizzy Mac and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Lizzy, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?

The thought process of starting my business was like… a conversation with the little girl version of me.

I have always been super competitive, but, like, with myself. I grew up with a really bad chip on my shoulder as the youngest of five born fifteen years after my siblings. There was love in the house, but also a lot of pain. My parents fled North Vietnam during the war. Growing up, my mom wasn’t the most physically present, and for a long time, my dad wasn’t emotionally. Constantly witnessing out-of-love dysfunction, low-income stressors, and post-war triggers made me grow up fast. Since a little girl, I have never been blind to the pain and pressure those around me deal with. I always knew it wasn’t an easy life for my parents and my siblings and I felt helpless being so much younger. Everyone was spending their days doing things they didn’t want to do just to survive. I refused to do the same. And amidst the cycles of agony in my household, I was also dealing with 7+ people, significantly older than me, always trying to tell me what to do and how to do it, watching my every move and pointing out every misstep, for years on end. Despite what might’ve been out of love, my childhood was scarred by feeling shame from judgement before experiencing acceptance from love. Humans, even those who love you deep, can only advise you to their level of perception and fulfillment. The adults around a child protect according to their personal fears and the limits in their life. Then there’s me: way too stubborn to listen, way too… not scared to hold back, and way too silly to take “punishment” seriously.

I grew to be a high achiever because I hated hearing anyone talk like they had say-so over my life. I made sure I did everything well just to shut people up. I got my first job at 15. I think my, like, third job was at a law firm. I graduated high school with a low GPA but somehow managed to get into the first class of interns for the current sitting Vice President while at city college. I was the first in my family to get a Bachelor’s which I finished a year early from Howard University with a cumulative 4.0 GPA. I got my Master’s too then landed literally every job I interviewed for. But none of these accomplishments brought the validation or acceptance I was seeking from my family. I was left with a long resume and an even longer list of complaints from people who’d find a way to say something about anything, regardless.

Then, this year, I got into a bad car accident. I had just quit a couple 9-5’s, one at Stanford, one at a mission based sneaker store. I decided I’d rather hustle on my own, and I was making ends meet by freelance modeling and coaching basketball. Physical jobs that I couldn’t do fully after the accident left me in bed. It was bad. I was concussed and I was scared I was losing my head. My spine would thizz, my body would go numb randomly. For the first time, I felt like my life was out of my control. But I grew 100x more fearless. I was already unafraid of loss after losing my Dad in 2020, but the accident made me unafraid of pain. It felt like I was suddenly enrolled in an insurance policy from God himself. Hahahaha. My focus shifted from acting off what has made me sad to choosing what would make me happy. I started focusing on who was showing up for me in real life and stopped worrying about who wasn’t. And somewhere between my life flashing before my eyes and consecutive mornings of being surprised I woke, I started Lmac Company with those who were showing up for me in real life when it felt as though I had nothing to offer.

Lmac stands for “let’s make a change.” My nickname growing up was Lizzy Mac, like, a remix of Lizzie Maguire. We are a people company. Our services include mac4kids and mac4biz. mac4kids is mentorship and care for kids. mac4biz is masterminding and consulting for businesses. We deliver both mac4kids and mac4biz through a consultancy process that programs humans with habits; a process I devised with inspiration from the education system in Sweden. mac4kids programs eleven (11) kids per school year and mac4biz programs eleven (11) businesses per quarter.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?

What keeps me busy professionally is that my job is to make a change. And change is literally the only constant in life. So the demand for my work is constant. There are more people who yearn for change than those who don’t. My business operates in a warm market. There will always be more people in need of what I can do and people who want what I’ve created for myself, than people who don’t. Additionally, all I need to carry out my work is trust from others and passion from within.

Trust from others has always come easy for me. I’ve had 3 Uber drivers cry to me this week alone… I don’t know why exactly but I know it always happens. I show up as my same authentic self in every room. And I never do anything I don’t want to. I think when others see that, they realize it’s possible for themselves too.

And passion from within, that has always come easy for me as well. For mac4kids, I just don’t want any kid on earth to feel the rejection and judgment that I felt as a kid. For mac4biz, I don’t want any trying person to work harder than they have to just because they lack knowledge. I didn’t have my mom around much growing up because of this so I want different for others.

And lastly, what keeps me busy is my belief that wanting is not enough. My cousin Trang, who raised me, never let me begin a sentence with “I want” growing up. I needed to ask directly, propose a plan, make it make sense. That is how I approach everything in my life now. It literally does not matter what you want. It only matters what you’re willing to do for the things you say you want. You have to be, you have to do. The idle man gets no say-so, and, well, I stay busy being, busy doing.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
Serving Spoon in Inglewood. Hawkins in Watts. Signal Hill in Long Beach.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?

Anyone who has ever taken the time to reach out and ask me directly, “how are you?” without any expectation for something in return. Bonus points for those who consistently offer support, in forms I’d accept, to make my life easier, especially after the accident.

In addition, my mom, for her demonstration of hustle. My dad, for the example he set in his relationship with God and his commitment to self. My cousins, Trang, Cindy, and Lynn, who all, in one moment, or a million, took on responsibilities that were never their own and filled my childhood with many moments of happiness. My mentors, David Youngblood, Britton Smith, Heather Hutt, who have all been a part of my journey since very early on and remain consistent in their support of each and every endeavor I take on. My alma mater, Howard, for taking in a hotheaded Asian girl, with edge, who probably would’ve never finished college if not for the acceptance, experience, and development provided on campus. My friends turned family, who show up for me, laugh with me, and care about me, especially when I fall short for myself. God’s love is very, very, very present in those around me.

And lastly, my talent representation, Kentagious Holdings, my Company partner, Billie Goring, and my investors at CP2 Capital, who believe in me, go all in for me, and never let me carry the weight of anything on my own.

Website: lmacco.com

Instagram: lmaccompany

Linkedin: https://linkedin.com/in/lizzymac