Kymberlyn Lacy owns International Flair Designs, a Little Rock, Ark.-based company that has been tackling interior design and residential and commercial renovations since 2008. Over the years, she has partnered with the likes of Target, Williams-Sonoma and Pottery Barn, while working on philanthropic projects with organizations like Ronald McDonald House Charities.

Lacy didn’t have an easy path to entrepreneurship. She lived through a devastating fire in her childhood and later navigated teenage motherhood, she told us in a previous interview. But today, she’s raising her family alongside her partner and sitting atop an ever-growing firm. She has created a company charitable program that teaches architecture and interior design to underprivileged youth in her community. She recently started a side project planning destination weddings. And now she’s penning her first book.

Indeed, much of what Lacy does, professionally and personally, is focused on giving back. “Success for me has never been measured by the amount of tangible things that I could acquire within my lifetime, but instead, in the number of lives that I can impact while I’m working,” she says.

But owning a successful firm gave her something crucial: a solid financial footing that let her free her family of debt. After a lifetime of ups and downs, she says it “hasn’t been an easy road for my life partner and I, but achieving financial freedom has been one of the most liberating experiences.”