If you follow us on Instagram, you’ve probably seen me post about our documentary series, Unbreakable, which is streaming right now on Amazon Prime, Tubi, and Spark TV.
Season Two is currently in production.
We’ve already got one episode in the can featuring Kevin Sucher and the yacht rock group The Docksiders, and we’re very close to beginning the editing process on two episodes featuring 3 Doors Down guitarist and Fourth Door Media co-founder Chet Roberts and his brothers in the band.
Our hope is that each episode inspires even just one person to “go for it,” even when times get tough and life doesn’t seem to make sense.
Why did I start the series in the first place?
That’s deeply personal to me.
Someday, when the time is right, I’ll share it publicly.
Suffice it to say, one of my goals is to look the doubters — and the people who give up on others simply because their journey is taking longer or life has gotten difficult — right in the eye and say, “Your opinion has absolutely no power over me.”
Zero.
Zip.
Nada.
One of the most powerful perspectives shared with me during Season One of Unbreakable, happened in Hollywood.
It came from artist, entertainer, and entrepreneur Goldie Heart, who said:
“One of the most important, valuable and core belief truths anyone has ever told me is that what other people think of you is none of your business. And what you think of yourself is absolutely everything. The worst things that happen to us in life are not meant to break us. They are to show us how strong we are. You get a little bit stronger every single time.”
When she told me that at her LA home, I almost fell out of my chair.
When she said, “what other people think of you is none of your business,” that hit home.
And she’s right.
Why waste time worrying about what other people think about you?
My primary goal with this series is to inspire people to tune out the doubters, believe in themselves, and never, under any circumstances, give up on their dreams.
I know that sounds cliché.
That’s okay.
I mean it when I say it.
To me, the best dreams are irrationally outlandish.
The ones that make no sense to anyone but you.
But dreaming is one thing.
Having the backbone and determination not to be deterred is another.
Consider two-time Country Music Songwriter of the Year Ben Hayslip, the man we featured in the very first episode of Unbreakable we ever produced.
He was a Georgia boy who moved to Nashville to pursue his dream of becoming a country music songwriter.
You know where this is going, right?
He moves to Nashville…
Supports himself by selling ball caps and T-shirts over the phone from 7:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. every day.
At 1:00 p.m., he would put the phone down, grab a bite to eat, and find a buddy to write songs with from 2:00 p.m. until about 10:00 p.m. every night.
Ben did that for a decade.
He wrote a song a day four or five days a week and had very limited success — so limited, in fact, that he had one single in five years.
What did Ben do?
He nearly packed his bags and went back home.
Feeling broken, Ben got on his hands and knees and said, “God, if I’m supposed to be here, give me a sign. If not, I’ll just go back home.”
The very next day, he got a call saying his next single was about to be released.
All is good, right?
Nope.
He went through another very long dry spell.
He wrote tons of songs.
For years.
Crickets.
He admits he thought about quitting.
Good thing he didn’t.
Today, Ben has more than 20 number-one hits to his name and is on speed dial with some of the biggest stars in country music, including Luke Combs, Luke Bryan, Morgan Wallen, Blake Shelton, and many more.
One of my favorite moments from Ben’s episode is a line that perfectly captures the uncertainty so many people face while chasing a dream:
“Sometimes you don’t know if you’re on the one-yard line about to score a touchdown or on the one-yard line about to get tackled in your own end zone.”
There’s real truth in that.
Sometimes the biggest breakthroughs happen at the exact moment you’re about to give up.
It’s the old saying: one door shuts and another one opens.
I’ll leave you with this quote from Rachel Luba, an MLB sports agent who represents former Cy Young Award winner Trevor Bauer.
I sat down with her in Arizona for two episodes.
She gets as much — or more — hate online as anyone I’ve ever seen.
She told me, “The more you fail, the closer you’ll get to success. If you’re not failing, it’s almost like that’s a failure in and of itself. The moments where I felt like I was at rock bottom, to be sitting here today enjoying the success I’m having, it’s just another reminder that I’m unbreakable.”
She says, “You can’t break me. I’m never going to stop. I will always find a way. And I think that is a core piece of who I am.”
That’s the spirit.
Where are YOU today?
Feel like giving up?
Feeling broken?
Let’s fix that.
Together.
Unbreakable is attainable.
I hope you find something in this article that inspires you to keep going.
You’ve got more in you than you probably realize right now.
You’ll see.