The Story of SAEG

I’m an only child. And I moved almost every year growing up. Newburgh, NY to Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Tampa, Pembroke Pines… Stone Mountain, Atlanta… Woodruff, SC… Gainesville… Savannah… Los Angeles… then back and forth again as life kept shifting. When you move that much, “Where are you from?” stops being a simple question. You learn how to adapt. You learn how to watch. And sometimes… you learn how to be alone in a crowd.

Music became my safe ground. The place I could belong without asking permission. I grew up in a conservative culture that didn’t really believe in pursuing art professionally, so creativity became something I held quietly—something I used to survive, to make sense of myself, to express what I couldn’t say out loud.

Because I was always in a new place, I was always hearing something new. The Beatles. Peter Gabriel. Five For Fighting. Etta James. KRS-One. And then I heard Eminem for the first time and something cracked open. I didn’t just want to listen. I wanted to build worlds with sound. I was obsessed with the way he gave everything to the persona, like he was representing an idea more than a person. That hit me deep. Because when you’ve been alone for a long time, you start dreaming about community, whether you know it or not.

I went to the University of Florida with no real plan. I didn’t even want to go. I felt family pressure, and I was in a heavy depression, so UF became a last-minute attempt to start over somewhere new. My first roommate was a producer. He pushed me to record with him. And the moment I did… I knew. This wasn’t a hobby. This was lifelong.

I changed my major to business because even then, I could feel a bigger vision forming. Something like a future media company in my head. Back then I was going by Tila Khana, then TK. After graduation I moved to Savannah for my master’s in Sound Design at SCAD, got deeply involved in the community, and wore the nickname “Furious” for a while. But on the way to California to pursue the dream for real, I fell asleep and had another dream that was clear, potent,....undeniable. I saw the name SAEG and a vision of what it could become. In 2018, I stepped into it: Self-Determination. Authenticity. Evolution. Greatness. “Be like water,” Bruce Lee used to say. That became my reminder. Change is life. And the mission is to embrace the full flow of humanity, without shame.

Los Angeles was the first place that felt like home in my heart. I worked multiple jobs and built a successful catering company just to stay afloat while I kept creating—releasing, performing, pushing. I earned every inch of ground the hard way. Stages, show after show, project after project. I ended up performing 500+ shows, building a catalog, and finding my voice through repetition and risk.

I learned what independence really means: nobody is coming to hand you a life. You build the bridge while you’re walking on it. I sold over $20K independently, hit over 1M streams, reached 2M+ views, and placed Top 5 on BET Freestyle Friday—but the real win was learning how to keep going without being seen every day. Then Covid hit. I lost the company. I relocated back to Woodruff, SC, and the fall-out turned dark—financial ruin, deep depression, and further suicide attempts. Still, I kept creating. Because the dream wasn’t just to survive off art. It was to give back. And to find real community with creators who think deeply and feel deeply—people I struggled to find consistently while always moving.

I built We Are SAEG because I got tired of watching creatives get drained. Grant applications. Rejections. Waiting forever for a little help. Working endless jobs just to survive, with nothing left for the art. And the loneliness—always the loneliness. I wanted community so badly, and I couldn’t find it in a way that lasted.

So I made what I needed. A creator community where thoughtful, like-minded artists can be real—while also building real opportunities. A place where we can support each other in art and business. A place where income doesn’t have to come from burnout. A world where no creative feels like they have to do it all alone.

What’s next is simple: we grow the community, we expand the platform, and we keep putting opportunity into creators’ hands. If you’ve been creating in isolation… if you’ve been carrying the whole dream by yourself… you don’t have to anymore.

Join The Circle. Come build with us. Come be seen.