I’m a firm believer that most things happen for a reason. It’s just a matter of interpretation.

I came to this belief when I was in my mid-twenties. Having worked in the pet industry for several years, I decided that I wanted to open my own pet store.

The thought was alluring. I’d be my own boss. I could select the products I wanted to sell and spend the day happily immersed with helping people with their pets. I found a location that would suit me well. It was a small space in the middle of a huge shopping plaza. As I sat there in the parking lot, watching people go in and out of the various stores, I was delighted.  This could really work for me.

I found suppliers who would sell me the products I wanted. I devised an ordering system, planned out the store aisle by aisle, and began working on my business plan. The only thing left to do was find funding.

As things turned out, finding investors was nearly impossible. No one wanted to loan a twenty-five year old woman the amount of money it would take to get started. After several months of searching, I finally was forced to give up. It was the worst moment of my life. All my hopes and dreams vanished in an instant. I turned away from my dream with tears in my eyes and went to work for someone else.  Then six months later, I saw the reason for the failed attempt.

The anchor store for the plaza went out of business.  One by one, all the cute little stores flanking it closed their doors as well. A year later, the plaza was nothing more than a ghost town. Had I opened a store, I would have been among them, losing everything I had and everything I worked for.

It took several years before I realized that opening my store really wasn’t my destiny. Something inside me struggled to get out. I began staring at blank pages in my typewriter, watching as they filled up word by word with stories. It didn’t take long before the words became a book, then two books, then three. I was an author!

Getting my books out to the masses was another obstacle. After being turned down by countless literary agencies, I realized that it wasn’t my time. I needed to live more, experience more, before I could truly be the writer I wanted to be. I finally decided to self-publish and the results have been incredible. I’m not a best-selling author with my books in major chains, but people are actually reading – and loving – my work. Had I reached my first dream, none of this would have happened.

Now, when something bad happens to me, I shake it off because I know that something better (or different) needs to happen to me instead.  If nothing else, it makes life easier, makes the bad things feel like opportunities to find good things. I just try to listen to what the universe is telling me.

It’s all in the way you look at it.

It’s just a matter of interpretation.

Joni Mayhan

Author of The Angels of Ember Trilogy- available on Amazon.com for Kindle or in paperback

• Lightning Strikes
• Ember Rain
• Angel Storm