In December, 2019, I started working on a contract basis with a small FinTech startup. I was between jobs and looking for my next step, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity. They were close to having a product ready, would be bringing me on with a salary in just a couple months, and I was going to have an ownership stake in the company, so that when they were acquired, I’d receive a massive windfall. In the meantime, I was earning a small stipend each week. I found an easy placeholder job, and started planning for my future.

By February, 2021, I still wasn’t a full-time employee, and I had been bugging my boss about when that would happen. Each time I asked, I was told that we were just a few weeks away from the first iteration of the product and increased funding from investors, and things would be changing soon. I didn’t love my placeholder job, and I was eager to start making more money and working for the company full time. So when I logged into my weekly meeting with the President and CEO of the company, I was not prepared when he informed me that they were letting me go.

I was devastated. I had pinned all of my hopes on this opportunity, and in that moment, they were dashed. Most everyone who will read this knows that I have a history of self-destructive behavior - specifically, whiskey and weed. I could tell that I was starting to spiral: I was angry and depressed, feeling hopeless and abandoned. I hated those feelings, but I didn’t know how to move forward. I had no prospects. I was working in a dead-end job for a boss that, in my estimation, hated me. As a family, we were barely scraping by financially and not moving forward. Every week felt like robbing Peter to pay Paul, and I just didn’t know where to go.

In a song called “Don’t Let Your Memories…”, a band called The Elect sing a line, “Don’t let your memories be bigger than your dreams.” This lyric has been a bit of a mantra for me, and I was at a point where I didn’t have dreams anymore. I wasn’t looking forward to anything. I had no plans. I had no hopes. It was all I could do to just get by. That’s a scary place to be.

One Sunday morning, I walked down to the altar, off to the side by where the bannisters used to be, where people wouldn’t really notice me. I’m not saying my trip to the altar was perfunctory, but I didn’t sprint down in a desperate bid to get to God. I started talking to God about the things that I was struggling with, and before I knew it, I just broke down. I poured out my heart, let go of the anger and pain and disappointment, and finally asked for help from Someone who actually could do something about it. When I finished praying, I saw my brother, my dad, and my wife standing with me. I talked to my Pastor about the situation. He offered some advice and encouragement, and said he would be praying for me, and told me to keep in touch with him. Over the next week, he reached out to me and continued to encourage me, and told me that God had a plan - I just needed to trust the process.

A few weeks after this conversation, an opportunity fell into my lap - a Web Development Bootcamp from Eleven Fifty Academy was being offered for free through CARES ACT funding. I signed up and started working through the program. It was hard. It was really hard. There were several occasions when I wanted to give up, but my friends in class, my wife, and my family stood with me and helped me complete the program. I learned a ton, and had a blast in the process. After I finished the course, I wasn’t getting any traction on my new career, so to help make ends meet, I took a second job in the evenings and was working on moving things forward.

In January, 2022, a contracting agency I’d never heard of reached out to me about a contract opportunity they had for which I would be a good fit. In February, 2022, I started working as a Technical Editor & Writer for Comcast Business, but only as a contractor. It paid enough that I didn’t need to work two jobs anymore, so I had more time at home with my family and to be more involved at church.

In April, 2022, our church announced a new building program to remodel the church. We were asked to make pledges to support the building program, and my wife and I looked at our budget and prayed, and came up with an amount we thought we could give. I wrote the amount down, and felt a check in my heart. God spoke to me and said, “Double it. Trust me.” So I did.

In early May, 2022, I was scrolling through LinkedIn and found a couple of job listings that were interesting. I knew I had the skills to do it - skills I had developed through taking the WebDev course the previous summer. So I applied to them both. Within days, both companies called me to set up initial interviews. They both went very well, and I was invited in for interviews. One is located in Indianapolis, so meeting with them was no problem. The other job, the one that I knew I could do, but was a big reach for me, is located in North Carolina. I’m not prepared to move to North Carolina, but they were perfectly fine with the role being remote.

The local interview went well, and they agreed to hold the position for me to meet with the company in North Carolina. Last week, I flew down and met with the team in a half-day of interviews, and then came home. The next day, they called and offered me the job. When I started the interview process, the salary was exactly double what I was making at the beginning of 2022. When they called me with the job offer, they increased the salary again. The increase in my pay is 20 times what God pushed us to pledge to the building program.

The past 18 months have been difficult for me and my family. There was a time that the challenges we faced would have resulted with me in a bottle and spiraling. I couldn’t see it in February of 2021, but God was working. I didn’t understand, but He kept us, blessed us, and has opened up an entirely new world for us.

Beginning in June, 2022, I will begin working as a Senior Technical Writer for nCino, Inc. I couldn’t be more excited.