Today we’d like to introduce you to Mia & Nash Ream
Mia & Nash, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
Our story as a couple began in San Francisco, CA. By our late twenties, we had both built successful careers in finance, but we were struggling to meet our job demands AND achieve our personal goals. Continuing to grow professionally was important to us, but we didn’t want to waste our best years stuck at work. We wanted a better quality of life, but we didn’t know how to achieve that without sacrificing the careers and savings that we had worked so hard for. Additionally, the thought of having a family that depended on us financially one day made the decision to leave our jobs even more difficult.
The traditional job market tends to be one size fits all. Dreams and desires are not, however. We felt as if we had lost sight of the life we truly wanted, held back by the notion that we had no other option than what we were doing at the time. But the reality is that the world has changed. It has never been easier to live a more balanced lifestyle and create the mix of life, work, and travel that best suits you, even with a family. That’s exactly what we did.
We’ve spent the last eight years traveling the world WHILE engaging in work that we are passionate about AND starting a family. We’ve visited nearly 30 countries together and bounced back and forth between Europe and the U.S. multiple times before finally making homes in Charleston, SC and Sofia, Bulgaria. We love the flexibility of living where we like and being present with our two girls (1 and 3 years old). Today, we prioritize our relationships with each other and our children, our health and wellbeing, and our freedom to live the way we want above all else.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It hasn’t been easy to get away from the one-size-fits-all work/life model. It has taken us years to find a way in which we can do meaningful work remotely, while being present for each other and our children. We’ve turned down high paying jobs because the work demand was too high. We’ve watched some of our former colleagues get promoted and go on to to big things while it felt like we were on the sidelines a bit. It’s one thing to say you are going to deprioritze work and focus on your family, but after doing it a certain way for 10+ years, it took some adjusting to actually be at home with our children instead of hard charging at work.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
We run two businesses – a business consulting firm and a content creator/social media business. We met at work while we were working as consultants and eventually investment bankers, specifically helping companies better manage and montetize thier intellectual property. Most recently we helped lead the IP consulting practice at KPMG, when we decided to leave and start our own firm with a couple of trusted partners. So that’s what we did. Our firm, Venndigm LLC, works with companies and investors to value, buy/sell, and raise capital using thier intellectual property.
Our social media business was dreamt up during our travels, which is when we became passionate about photography and began posting our travel photos to Instagram. We grew a small following of people who shared our love for travel but our creative work always took a back seat to our “real careers”. When we had our second daughter, we transitioned to creating fun, relatable family content instead. Early parenthood is such an intense relatable period in life that there is no shortage of content ideas. We try and bring humor to the harder moments and keep it in perspective – these are rich, yet challenging times. To our surprise, within a year we were established family lifestyle content creators and influencers and our social media business was finally starting to make money.
Do you any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
Mia – I inherited my love for travel from my parents who always took me along on their trips. Some of my happiest early memories are from these trips – Morocco, Dubai, South Africa… My parents gave me the incredible gift of seeing how incredibly beautiful, diverse and exciting our world is very early on in life. That has stuck with me and guides my life choices to this day.
Nash – When I was 5 years old, my parents took us on a two week trip to Hawaii. It was my first time leaving the continental US and visiting somewhere truly different from the mainland 48 states. We stayed at the Royal Hawaiian hotel in Honolulu. The Hawaiian culture, people, and beauty created a curiosity in me about the world at a very young age.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://miandnash.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/miandnash/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/miandnash/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@miandnash
