Flavia LealCredit : Flavia Leal

Flavia Leal, the founder of the Flavia Leal Beauty School, hails from Brazil. She arrived in the United States in 2000 to pursue a better life for her and her family. The beauty expert and motivational speaker has overcome numerous obstacles and heartbreak over the course of her life, but it has all brought her to creating a stout career and life.

Leal worked well over 80 hours per week while also working on her college degree, raising her child as a single mother and living in less-than-average housing standards. Things got worse in 2008, when her father died, followed by her mother in 2009 and her daughter was then diagnosed with ADHD as well.

"Do what you have to do, not what you want to do," Leal said. "When our minds get tired, we don't want to open the door because of what is on the other side, but we have to do these things to grow."