When Getting Everything You Wanted Goes Wrong

When I first started out in my radio career, I set a goal for myself. By age 30, I was going to be the Program Director at one of the three biggest pop music radio stations in America, which at the time were in LA, New York, and Miami. 

I worked tirelessly for 8 years in pursuit of this goal and not once did I ever accept that I wouldn't achieve my dream. I had always been an overachiever and had a specific plan laid out in my mind for my life and career.

So when my company offered me the job to lead the legendary Y100 in Miami (the radio station featured in the "Kourtney and Khloe Take Miami" reality show) 6 months before my 30th birthday, it seemed like the reward for many years of hard work and focus.

Then I moved to South Florida to go live my dream life. I wouldn't say I knew from day 1 that it was a disaster, but by day 4, I came to two heart breaking realizations:

1.  Being a hotshot, young, program director, running a really important station was neither as fun, nor fulfilling as I thought it would be.
2. The job was not going to end well.

Within 90 days of me getting there, the people who hired me had all been replaced. A new boss came in and made it very clear to me that he wanted to hire his own team, which set off an embarrassing set of circumstances where he was bringing in replacement candidates to interview for my job while I was still in the building.  I felt as if they weren't just trying to get me to quit, but they were trying to take my dignity on the way out. Being young and rather stubborn, I refused to quit and give up my severance money. So after only 8 months in my "dream job", I was terminated two weeks before Christmas.

At the time, I was devastated. It was the first time in my life I ever felt like I had "failed".  To make matters worse, my girlfriend at the time had left a job she was successful in to move with me to Miami, and she made it clear that she resented that decision. We broke up a couple of months later.

I was left unemployed, single, and pretty broken.

But here's the funny thing. It's one of the best things that ever happened to me.

One unspoken law of the universe that I absolutely know to be certain is that anytime I have faced a challenge that I thought was unfair or somehow soul-crushing, it actually turned out to be the universe moving me in a different direction. And that direction always ended up being better than the path I was on.

The next job I was hired at was in Sacramento, California. It wasn't as sexy of a city as Miami, but that job turned out to reap the biggest professional benefits of my radio career, with the best company that I ever worked for. While I was there, I reconnected with my passion for acting, started performing onstage with local community theaters, and made some of the most amazing, and most important friendships of my life.

And I couldn't truly connect the dots on that until two years after I was fired in Miami. I now look back on my experience with Y100 with gratitude rather than shame. That awful 8 months was necessary to teach me a lesson and force me to pivot towards a better path.

So what is it that is hurting you right now?  Are you feeling stuck in your career? Are you grieving the loss of a relationship? Were you fired from a job and wondering what your next step is?

Let go of the sadness and anxiety and trust that the universe is actually supporting and guiding you to something better. Just because you can't see it right now doesn't mean that the bigger plan for your life isn't unfolding underneath your nose.

Thanks for taking the time to read this. If you know someone who might benefit from the message, please forward this along to them and encourage them to sign up at www.creativesoulcoaching.net for more free weekly emails.

Sending you love and good vibes for a wonderful week ahead!

Dan