How Losing My Dream Job Skyrocketed My Career

[Music]

two years ago

i found myself wearing cut off denim

shorts to a business meeting

that was about to change my life i

remember this vividly because although i

was supposed to be

running around planning a photo shoot

for the magazine i was working for

i was called into a mandatory meeting

with the head of publishing

mandatory was written in all caps on the

email invite with no

other details as i was in a cab crossing

the city to get to work on time

all i could think about was that i was

going to be sitting in a room filled

with

very important people wearing denim

shorts

i was 26 and had a job most people build

their careers up to

in three years i had graduated with a

journalism degree

was hired full-time at one of canada’s

most iconic women’s magazines

before i graduated and worked my way up

to the home editor position

meaning i was in charge of the entire

home decor section of the magazine

i was producing photo shoots writing and

planning content for a magazine

that had been in publication for 90

years 90 years i knew that this job

was a really big deal when i arrived at

the office

and stepped out of the elevator in my

denim shorts that thursday

i immediately knew something was wrong

the entire floor

was which was usually buzzing with

energy nails hitting keyboards

food wafting from the industrial kitchen

that produced the magazine’s recipes

was eerily quiet people were huddled in

groups of four or five

quietly whispering amongst themselves

somebody told me that a massive layoff

was about to happen

and we would be split up into two groups

one was safe

and one was not which group would i be

in

i felt as though i couldn’t breathe as

an anxious person

the feeling of dread is always bobbing

along the horizon of my mind

especially when i feel like i have

something really good

as if it’s not possible to feel

consistent instrumentable joy

without it being punctured by a massive

wave of letdown

and before this thursday i was trying to

hold on to that feeling of joy more than

usual

as one of the youngest editors on the

team i realized that i could bring

something different to the home decor

section of the magazine

which is why a year before this thursday

i had pitched a youtube video series

all about helping millennials decorate

on a budget after i began to see a gap

in the world of home decor

i noticed that a lot of my friends

didn’t put time or effort into

decorating their rental apartments

and when i asked them why they told me

why bother putting money into a home

that you’re just renting temporarily

and yet according to a study done by

onepoll

42 percent of american millennials

that’s almost

half say that they want to buy a home

but just can’t afford it

where was the decorating advice for us

where were those solutions and magazines

to make our not so temporary rental

homes

a little more stylish and functional

without breaking the bank

that’s when the homeprint was born and

alongside a team of videographers

i produced 19 youtube episodes over the

span of a year for the magazine

i would make over small rental

apartments bedrooms

bathrooms all the while sticking to a

tight budget

and layering in lots of attainable

decorating tips

each video got an average of 200 to 400

views on youtube

nothing much until about a year in when

we published the second last episode we

would ever film

over the span of about three weeks this

studio apartment makeover

went from 200 to 1000

to 10 000 to 500 000

to just over 1 million

views 1 million views

i felt like i was on the verge of

something big

i was on the verge of seeing all of

those long hours

studying for exams and all those

tireless nights worrying about my future

in university

pay off i was experiencing what it was

like to be successful

it was like this momentum i had built up

over a year

was turning into something i’d always

wanted to be doing

as i walked down the hall to the meeting

room in my denim shorts that thursday

single file behind 40 other editors i

kept telling myself that i wasn’t going

to be let go

i was bringing something new to the team

pushing the envelope on digital media

exceeding expectations with millions of

views on my latest video

but i knew it was over as soon as i saw

executives in business suits

lining the large glass meeting room

there was a man in a crisp black suit at

the front

and the head of publishing was standing

beside him crossing

and uncrossing his legs not looking any

of us in the eyes as we filed in

the room was crowded and warm and my

whole body was shaking

and i had to keep reminding myself this

is real

this isn’t a joke i cried with my head

down as the head of publishing

thanked us all for our hard work and

said that we would be let go immediately

i can’t quite describe the feeling of

losing something right when it’s at the

peak of triumph

but in sheryl sandberg’s book option b

she talks about how to build resilience

after experiencing a traumatic event as

she did

after suddenly losing her husband when

she was 45.

she talks about how we can apply the

same tools of coping with the death of a

loved one to losing a job

and says that not only is it devastating

but losing a job can also trigger

anxiety

depression and rip away self-confidence

when i woke up the next day my head was

foggy and my eyes were tight from crying

my dream career and this newfound

momentum

was taken away from me in the span of

ten minutes

the grief of knowing i was never going

to get this thing back that consumed my

whole life

took over my whole body and i felt

really empty

the home print was no longer mine the

lights used to produce the videos the

editors the videographers

the budget the one million views i had

accumulated just three weeks before

they were no longer mine the momentum

was there

and people were engaged and wanting more

but how was i going to keep this going

without those resources

a week later i started my own youtube

channel

uploading home decor hauls and small

makeovers that i did for my friend’s

apartments

i tagged every video with the home primp

so that viewers finding that viral video

would have more of a chance of finding

my new channel

my friend carla who shot the home primp

was also let go and said she shoot she

said

she’d shoot and edit a few videos i used

my severance money to pay her

and we began to shoot every week after

three months i joined an influencer

network who helped me land brand deals

and sponsorships

which for many is the main form of

income as a youtuber

i kept putting out a video every week on

my channel and six months after i lost

my

job my own channel had over 30 000

subscribers

i landed a couple of brand deals and my

videos were monetized meaning i was

making a small amount of ad revenue from

youtube

but the question of how i was going to

produce these videos and make them

bigger and better and with what money

was still looming over my head a month

after hitting 30 000 subscribers

just before the holiday season i got a

really bad chest infection

and i was in bed for almost half the

month i wasn’t shooting and therefore

wasn’t uploading any new content

and therefore wasn’t making much ad

revenue

i also wasn’t landing any brand deals

because it was the end of year for

brands

most people were on holidays and plus my

channel following was still quite small

it was at this point that my severance

money had run out

it was then that it hit me how did i

ever think i could do this as a

full-time job

for the first time in six months after i

had lost my job at the magazine

i let myself think about job searching

at the beginning of march i made a call

to the influencer network i had signed

with

and told them i thought i needed to quit

i remember saying out loud

how could i have thought this was going

to make money how did i think i was

going to fund this

i was embarrassed that i thought i could

ever have my own company

and make money as a youtuber i hadn’t

even been to business school

i know that so many people are probably

feeling exactly how i did

that march there is so much uncertainty

smothering us all and as a student who

has just graduated

i can imagine that having the whole

world at your fingertips feels

terrifying

and not in a and not in an exhilarating

way

like it typically would as a new

graduate

instead of feeling like you’re getting

on the world’s largest roller coaster

with no idea how the ride ends i would

instead imagine

that it feels like you’re completely

lost in a gigantic theme park

where none of the rides are working you

don’t even have the option

of getting on that scary roller coaster

you’re stuck

i was there too but less than

24 hours after i made that phone call

wanting to quit

i got an email that i had landed a brand

deal that would fund my videos for the

next

six months there are two things i think

can happen in a situation like this when

we feel as though we’ve lost

everything we either keep going with

what we know

like hopping back into a nine to five

that we’re only mildly passionate about

or we decide to trust that there’s

something

even greater on the other side of that

loss and seize the opportunity to do

what we

really want in life maybe that’s

backpacking across the world

going back to school in our 50s or

starting a small art business from

scratch

in a 2019 study done by elena christina

and michael g pratt they researched the

morning patterns and career paths of the

employees of a company that went

bankrupt and found that there’s two

different kinds of responses to job loss

as people search for new employment

christina and pratt use the words

recreators and repurposers to describe

the two different paths that people end

up taking if they’ve lost their jobs

recreators

are those who find similar positions in

the same industry

repurposers usually leave the field all

together to pursue entrepreneurship

in this particular study they noticed

that it wasn’t money or networking that

guided the path these employees chose

after losing their jobs

instead it was what they chose to hold

onto from their jobs

instead of focusing on what they lost

both groups of recreators and

repurposers

tried to figure out what they could save

from their experience

at the company they were let go from

one of the questions i get asked the

most is how he became an entrepreneur

and looking back on my experience i

always say well it was just so simple

i just did it but i realized that i too

as a repurposer

tried to figure out how i could take

what i had gained at the magazine

and producing these videos and how i

could do it on my own

without the support of a massive brand

i try to remember when people ask me

this question how scary taking that leap

of faith to start my own channel was

and how i almost didn’t make it past the

six month mark

i think about how many people must come

to this crossroad at least once in their

life

and not have what i believe is the

secret ingredient to coming out on top

of a huge

loss like this it’s trust

because the truth is i was already

equipped with so much of the knowledge

from the magazine on how to produce a

youtube channel

i had been doing it for the last year

the hardest and most difficult part that

i feel we have

all felt at least once in our lives is

trusting that i could make it happen for

myself

i would have never left my dream job if

i hadn’t have been let go

because i never thought i could bring

the happiness it brought me

all on my own it never occurred to me

that i could create my own stability

with a high paying salary

and it also never occurred to me that i

could be my own boss

it’s been a year and a half since i

almost quit and then landed that deal

i have built up a channel with over 300

000 subscribers and counting i have a

six-figure business

and two full-time employees and two

part-time employees

and i think back to last year when i

made that phone call

and how i was on the verge of something

big

but this time i was on the verge of

losing

losing something that’s so much more

important than success

youtube views or money i was on the

verge of losing the trust

that i could make my dream career happen

by myself

when i think back to getting let go in

my cut off denim shorts

i can still feel the grief and emptiness

i was left with that thursday

and i think about how i could have

chosen to go down a different path

the one where trusting myself wasn’t an

option and that really scares me

because if i hadn’t have lost my dream

job that day and trusted myself enough

to take what i’d learned

and kept going i wouldn’t be here now at

the peak of the happiest life i could

have

ever imagined for myself we’ve all heard

that you should dream big

but that doesn’t seem possible when

you’ve been dealt a hand that crushes

your confidence and your ambition

wake up every day and do that thing you

know how to do best

keep doing it until you realize that

your dreams

have suddenly come to life and that

they’re bigger than you

ever imagined they would be thank you