Beaumont businesswoman shares her spiritual journey

Beaumont businesswoman shares spiritual journey that has brought fulfillment, success with skin-care products, beautifully scented fragrances

By Donald J. Lee

Nearly three years ago, Senior Deputy Clerk of Jefferson County Denicka Colbert, fed up with being in what she says was a hostile working environment, took a leap of faith and resigned.

She stepped away from an entity she’d worked for, for 12 and a half years. Colbert said good-bye to the comfort of knowing that despite the daily challenges that threatened her peace the paychecks she was getting were providing a remnant of tranquility.

“I went from getting a paycheck, knowing where my money was coming from to now connecting with God, living a simple life. My life has gotten more simple since I’ve connected with God,” Colbert, 45, says.

She credits God with leading her from a place of distress to that of joy unspeakable, as an entrepreneur.

Now, Colbert enjoys mixing various ingredients with oil-based fragrances that create “exclusive smells” through Unlax Self, the company she founded in 2018 and operates from her home in Beaumont.

Colbert mixes the fragrances into Shea butter, which is an unrefined, natural anti-inflammatory moisturizer that she gets from Ghana, in West Africa. She also produces Hemp Zest and Earth Zest.

The Hemp Zest has in it the hemp oil. It also has serenity essential oils and natural oils. The Earth Zest is for sensitive skin. It is made with Aloe vera, Rosehip essential oil and other natural oils.

In essence, Colbert --- who absolutely loves smelling good --- is in the business of creating products that make people smell exceptionally good while also moisturizing their skin.

Sabrina Chachere, a patron of Colbert’s, just adores the fragrances she gets from Colbert. Chachere also likes that some of the products come in containers small enough to take with her lots of places.

“It’s a very desirable fragrance. When I first got it, the design of it was really pretty. It was easily accessible, and I can take it almost everywhere,” Chachere says, noting that it can fit in her pocket or purse. “It’s uniquely special. It’s a two-for-one kind of special.

“The type of work that I do during the day, I sweat a lot, and the lotion and stuff that I use, they help amazingly,” Chachere says. “They’re a perfect match to my skin.

“You know how you have people who sell you stuff: Well, this product embodies the person who sells it. It’s soft, it’s sweet, it’s blessed. It’s great; it’s perfect.”

Another of Colbert’s loyal customers, Clarence Lee Thomas, calls the items Colbert sells, namely the moisturizing cream, multi-purpose products.

“It’s a good product. I feel like if you can use it on your hands, you can use it on your knees, on your elbows, on your whole body,” Thomas says. “It’s a cream that functions like a lotion.”

While Colbert is more than pleased with her customer’s expressed satisfaction, she takes great care to not lose sight of the one who has made the wonderful life she lives possible.

“God is the CEO of my business and I’m just a worker,” she says humbly. “He gave me a product to start with because I walked off my job on faith. God presented a product to me that I was already using, myself, as a natural detox.”

Colbert references the bath salts that she makes, which consist of the Himalayan salt and serenity oils. The products, which go in the bath water, help those who use them to relax.

Colbert, who is very vocal about her walk with God, says He gave her the wisdom to mix together the ingredients that go into producing a sense of calmness. She saw that the feeling of euphoria that inhabited her spirit would also bring peace into the hearts of others.

“I was on my spiritual journey and I would put all of my negativity in the water. Then once it goes down the drain, I have a fresh start,” she says.

“Even today, I take a detox to give myself a fresh start,” Colbert says. “I just feel like everybody needs a tool for a fresh start for wherever they are in life. And so that’s how I came up with the bath salts.”

Though God gave Colbert a plan for success in running her own business, she didn’t realize it until after an immense struggle even after she left her job at the county.

“I had an e-commerce store with Shopify and it didn’t go well because I think it was something Denicka wanted and not what God wanted,” she says. “Anything God wants is successful.”

Colbert says she’d often seen where experts in business would share information that included 12-step models to attain success. But she had to get to a point of understanding that somebody else’s formula for getting to the mountain top wasn’t necessarily the blueprint that God would have her to follow.

“When it was all said and done, the bath salts got me closer to God. Because that’s when I detached from the world’s system of doing things and went straight to the Bible,” she says, referencing the 12 steps to success that God outlined for her versus the 12 steps other people recommend.

“God revealed that He was going to give me my own, unique 12 steps that He had strictly for me,” Colbert says. “So, I had to (spiritually) die to myself and come back in the Spirit, my only reason for being here anyway.

“Once I detached from the worldly system
(of doing things) for eight months, I got closer to God. So instead of promoting my product, which was the bath salt at the time, I had to kill my flesh, come back in the Spirit, which gave me a new beginning, and now I’m closer to God,” Colbert explains. “Now, God is showing me the difference. I am spreading God’s Word 90 percent of the time and talking about my product 10 percent of the time.”

So, as God would have it, Colbert shut down her e-commerce store. And after the past eight months of dormancy, business-wise, she hit the reset button.

“The Holy Spirit told me, ‘It’s time to relaunch your business because you’re walking as a new creature (in Christ). And you know all of your success and knowledge and wisdom are going to come from the Bible.’”

“Now I’m on my own success journey with the business, not somebody else’s,” Colbert says.

Leroyal J. Colbert III, Denicka Colbert’s husband, lauds her for her tremendous focus and dedication.

“I’m proud of her. I’m a go-getter, myself. It’s only fitting that you have another go-getter by your side,” he says. “And everything that she has done up to this point, I’m very proud of her. She puts a lot of time and effort into what she does. She really cares about what she does, and she wants everybody to be happy.”

Denicka Colbert says Unlax Self is moving in an “awesome” way in terms of sales, thanks to word-of-mouth PR and promotions at different vendor spots and on Instagram. Colbert says she goes to Winnie’s Trade Day, which is like an outdoor flea market.

She’s also about to get “a pop-up shop,” which is when vendors set up their own portable stores, such as tents or booths.

Colbert has been back in active business for just under a week after her eight-month hiatus (at press time) and she’s already moving products at an impressive rate.

“God let me know that this is the time,” she says. “Everything is falling in its proper place and success is happening really quickly, now that I’ve let God take over. He let me know that I can be successful in this.”

Because God has shown her how to relax through turning to Him for guidance, Colbert says it made sense for her to give her business a name that reflected that.

And that is how the name “Unlax” came about, she says.

“Unlax really means relax. When I was getting my name trademarked, I had an attorney who looked up the data bases. And ‘Relax Self’ was too common. So, I prayed and then I went to the Thesaurus.

“And then that’s when ‘unlax’ jumped out,” Colbert explains. “And when I told the attorney ‘unlax,’ she looked up the data base twice because nobody had ever done anything with the word. It takes a whole month for anyone to come up and say ‘this is interfering with my business.’ And I wouldn’t have been able to use it.”

But after 12 months of working the data base and nothing surfacing that would indicate a name discrepancy with another company, Unlax Self was cleared by the United States Patent & Trademark Office to be an established business.

Donald J. Lee is a freelance journalist and author. He may be contacted by calling (225) 773-2248 or by e-mail at leedonaldj@gmail.com. Also, visit http://www.DonaldJLee.com.

For more information about the Unlax Self products, e-mails can be sent to contact@unlaxselfshea.com, Follow @unlaxself on Instagram. website: https://unlaxselfshea.com