I had a long career navigating the treacherous waters of the Hollywood film industry, working in a high-stakes, high-paying, high-pressure job dealing with toxic executives, demanding actors, and competitive colleagues.
Eventually burning out on this brutal and often unethical environment, I dropped out and went on an epic adventure spanning 4 continents and almost 10 years.
My personal story arc is a journey of discovery. Believing I hated my job and the toxic industry I’d been working in for years, I ran away with the intention of never looking back. I truly thought I wanted nothing to do with filmmaking. That my life purpose was about something completely different.
Being a bit of an idiot, I didn’t understand that despite the inherent nastiness surrounding me in Hollywood, the film industry was firmly lodged in my heart and leaving it all behind wasn’t gonna happen no matter what continent I was living on.
And when it came back to bite me in the ass while living in Warsaw Poland, I created a niche business, working with professionals in the film and photography industries by developing their conversational English, teaching them industry specific terminology, and training them in standard Hollywood filmmaking techniques.
Culminating in a collaboration with a renowned Polish film producer who hired me to conduct filmmaking Master Classes for industry professionals in Kiev Ukraine, I brought Hollywood to Eastern Europe.
It was the most gratifying and rewarding thing I’d ever done in my life, and not only was it totally unexpected, it was something far beyond anything I could ever have dreamed of.
The point is that when we’re racking our brains over how we’re going to succeed, or what we’re going to do to earn a living, we’re limiting ourselves to what we already know and can conceive of. Possibilities and potential lie in the unknown. The place that’s beyond whatever shit we think we already know and that scares the crap out of us.
And once we get that the ‘un’ in unknown is the same ‘un’ in unlimited, our lives take off in directions we never dreamed existed and our souls glow as we manifest our purpose, confidently creating success and spreading joy.
