Eileen Dada

My parents always told me I could do anything I set my mind to. That teaching — combined with their example — gave me the confidence to open my own business and help the world in the way I'm gifted to.

My mom owns the pharmacy she started with my father. Watching them build that from nothing, after coming to America from Africa, made one thing clear: you can make it regardless of which walk of life you come from. They kept me in art and craft camps growing up. They bought me my first jewelry supplies. My mom gave me the first $200 I needed for Spirit Stones — and became my first customer.

I've been collecting crystals my whole life — they've always reached me one way or another. I didn't know what they could be used for until a few years ago, when numerology opened up a door I hadn't realized was there.

From numerology my spirituality expanded into the five clairs, meditation, chakras, energetic healing — and finally crystals, which supplement every one of those practices. I wanted holistic ways to support mental health that didn't medicate people into a smaller life.

I met my business partner in college — we were lab partners in organic chemistry, both on the pre-med track, and eventually we were together. She was on medication for various issues when we met and I saw firsthand what those drugs did to her. When she wanted to come off them, we started looking for other things that could help. Crystals were one.

We practiced energy work with the crystals I already had. From that, the very first Spirit Stones design was born — a piece that holds crystals on the chakra points so you can meditate with them upright.

Spirit Stones is about fifteen months old. In that time I've lived through months of homelessness and the loss of my father. While homeless, my partner and I stayed in my car and kept running the business — making jewelry in libraries, hosting live sales from hotels, holding photoshoots outside, shipping orders on time.

When my father passed, I had to take the biggest break I've taken yet. I moved back to Maryland to be with my mom and started working in the pharmacy in his place. Forty-five hours a week, twelve hours away from the house most days — and still, I make posts, hold lives, vend in person, and keep Spirit Stones growing.

That's resilience to me. Not at my best — mentally, emotionally, physically — and still strong enough to keep going. I don't let anything become the downfall of this business.

Spirit Stones exists to give people wholesome, holistic support — clean crystal energy and the counseling to use it — without the side effects of substances and without the price tag of luxury wellness.

Next: in-person crystal healing events, energetic healing sessions, counseling, and jewelry-making classes. There's a lot still coming.