After a couple of months of pavement pounding that had only generated a part-time assistant position, I submitted my résumé to a television station in Tucson, Arizona. I landed a phone interview, and then a second, and more correspondence that eventually progressed into an in-person interview. With great excitement, I flew to Arizona to meet with the station.
As excited and bright as I felt in all the previous steps leading up to the interview, the moment I arrived I went dark. I couldn’t understand why. Every person I met at the station I enjoyed, and the position was a great opportunity for me.
At the end of my interview, they asked me to join their team. With all the steps we had taken together, and especially with me flying out for the final interview, it seemed I would have answered yes right away. But inside, my body still felt dark. To everyone’s surprise, including my own, I asked to have a couple of days to think it over.
The entire flight home I kept hearing my inner voice: “Don’t take it.” I asked many people their advice on what I should do. Everyone I asked, including my father and all of the syndication contacts I had made who were mentoring me, advised me to take the job. But still I heard the inner voice and now I had begun to feel sick to my stomach thinking about taking it.
I had told the station I would take three days to think, and at the end of my three days I turned down the position. I followed my inner knowing despite the “on-paper” advantages. This was a very uncomfortable thing to do, especially given how much time and resources both the station and I had poured into the interview process, and especially since I couldn’t give a reason for my decision. I had no answer as to why I was saying no—I just knew I had to do so.
A couple of weeks after I turned down the job, my father died shockingly and unexpectedly in a plane crash. It was at the same time I would have been just starting the job at the station, had I said yes. I would have been in a strange city, with no friends or family around to support me, and I would have had the stress of a new position. Instead, I was still in Dallas, a familiar city where I was surrounded by friends and close to home. Was this the reason why I felt I shouldn’t take the job? I have no idea. But I do know I’m very glad that I followed my inner knowing.
There’s a part two to this story. Just a day or two before my father died, I had interviewed with a company that made my body feel bright. I liked each person I met there, and by the end of my interview I knew I wanted the job.
While I was at my father’s funeral, the woman whom I would be directly working for at that company called my apartment with the intention of hiring me. My roommate answered. Fortunately, I had told my roommate about the job interview, and she suddenly remembered this as she was writing down the message.
My roommate immediately told the woman what had happened with my father and about how much I had talked about wanting to work at her company. She knew there was a need to fill the position quickly, and I had not told her when I would be returning because I hadn’t known myself, nor did she want to call me and disturb me at that time. So she asked the woman to take a chance and wait for me to return from the funeral before filling the position. The woman did not agree or disagree, but said she would consider it.
The woman did wait, and when I returned we met for lunch. After lunch she offered me the job. This job opened many doors for me and my boss became a very important mentor, and later friend, in my life. We remain close friends today. She told me months after I had been working for her that she had felt in her intuition she should hire me, though she had many doubts about hiring someone for a demanding job just after such an unexpected event. Yet, she felt she was somehow put in my life at that time to sort of watch over me. Knowing what I did about my experience with Tucson, I also felt that this meeting was meant to be, and meant to be in its timing.
A year and a half after taking this job I had a similar test with my intuition. One of my syndication sales mentors had introduced me to a man named Lonnie who ran the research department of a major entertainment studio in Los Angeles. I was told that getting a job in his department could lead to a job within the studio selling syndication—my goal. When we talked he was very kind, but he was concerned about my lack of experience and had no current openings. Something sparked for me in the call, though, and so I went full force into asking him for any opportunity to let me show him my abilities.
Lonnie graciously gave me numerous projects. I say “graciously” because I know I was a bit of a pain in hounding him for them. He acted with integrity, however, and each of the projects was a test to see how much I really knew about the industry. I worked on them at night or on weekends. But still no job offer.
After a year of talking to Lonnie and preparing projects for him, I moved of my own accord to Los Angeles. Lonnie still did not have a position for me and so I began interviewing at other studios in earnest. Lonnie and I became friends, and he also became a true mentor. He continued to give me projects to hone my skills and to teach me about the industry. Through Lonnie, I became much more professional and versed in the business. Then I had an interview with a small, startup syndication company.
The start-up company was run by a very skilled man who did things in the business that many people didn’t think were possible—such as starting this company. He was a bit of a rainmaker and a master salesman. When I met with the company, my body felt bright. They liked me, but didn’t have a job selling syndication, so they offered me a job working on one of their productions with the promise that if something became available in syndication I would be in position for it.
The same day I received this offer from the start-up company Lonnie asked to take me to dinner. At the dinner, Lonnie beamed that a position had just become available in his office and that he could, finally, after all this time, hire me! He was thrilled. One would think I should have been. But, inside my body, I felt dark.
With great fear I told him I had to think about it. He was aghast, and rightfully so. After over a year of basically badgering this man for a job, almost any job, I now had one offered to me and I was asking to think about it. I explained to him the situation, and that I thought the other position might lead more quickly into my getting a job selling syndication. He blew up and told me at least forty reasons why I was wrong—start-ups go under, they had nothing to sell, his was a legitimate position but what the other company offered me would be a step back on some little production, etc. I heard him, but I still told him I needed three days to think about it.
During those three days, Lonnie called me several times a day to give me reasons as to why I should take his job over the start-up. I am very grateful for his generosity in doing this. He was acting as a true friend who was genuinely worried I would make a decision that would derail my career. Lonnie’s reasons were sound: his offer was at a giant, established studio with name value, it would afford great experience to set me up for my goal, the studio would generate networking and other door-opening opportunities, his position paid twice the salary I was offered at the other job plus benefits, and so on.
I greatly appreciated Lonnie’s attempts to sway me to his job. I thought each of them through. But my inner voice kept telling me to take the start-up. After my three days thinking, I did just that. Despite my fears that I would lose a great friend and mentor, I followed my inner voice and turned down Lonnie’s job offer.
My job at the start-up was the lowest level production position available. I did grunt work all day. However, true to their word, when a position opened up for a syndication sales job I was allowed to pitch myself for the role. I got it. The start-up had led me to my goal in less than a year.
The new position came with a salary that surpassed what Lonnie’s studio position had offered. More important, it evolved into a five-year successful working experience that opened far more doors than would have opened had I taken Lonnie’s studio job. I also made some of my closest friends at the start-up, including a future business partner. And, five years later when I was ready to move into a new venture, so, too, were the heads of the company. They left the start-up to form a production studio and brought me over to run it for them.
A few years into my working for the start-up, Lonnie and I were having dinner together. He suddenly said, “You were right.” I asked about