There have been a number of posts in the past few weeks about some of our community being at a crossroads in their lives. Many of us have been through this and it can be very difficult. Society makes it seem like these times in our lives should be loaded with purpose, meaning, and clearly defined future goals. Those of us that have been through these moments: Graduating from High School/College, getting married, buying a home etc, know that they're often just moments like any other and don't necessarily come with any increased clarity of purpose.

For me, the moments that have had the greatest impacts on my life (outside of the birth of my children) have largely been ones I could not have predicted. I'll give an example of one below, but first one last word of wisdom to those going through a rough patch: We are made to think that we should know what it is we aspire to be, do etc. We often feel like our peers have it figured out more than we do. As you get older you begin to realize that NOBODY has it figured out and that everyone is just a pair of legs, a body, two arms, hands and a neck supporting a head full of indecision and insecurities. Once you realize this, you take comfort in it and bam it's all good. -Good luck

One of my surprise, life changing moments

I used to work for a food distribution company when I was younger. I would sell restaurants food, supplies and equipment. It was my first "real" job outside of working for restaurants. After about 5 years of doing it I was getting burned out and started looking for other options but unfortunately, I had dropped out of college my junior year and most of the careers in sales/business development that I would aspire to required a degree.

At my current company I was the "rookie of the year" and a two time "Presidents Club" winner and had just won "Chairmans Club". This was a pretty nice accomplishment for a guy as young as me and I was well thought of there. Because of my accomplishments and because of my lack of a degree, I entered in to their management training program and had pretty well resigned myself to spend my career with this company.

One day, my boss was spending the day with me. We visited restaurants all day, selling food, begging for restaurants to pay us what they owed, getting greasy and smelly as we attempted to "up sell" the latest designer french fry... -man, I hated this job.

At the end of the day I was driving her back to her car when I received a phone call from a sales recruiter. "Steven, this is John Salesrecruiter I saw your resume on linked in and think you may be a good fit for thisisyourdreamjob inc, can you talk right now?" I looked over at my boss sitting next to me and said, "John, thank you for calling, I appreciate the compliment but I am quite happy in my current position."

I blushed and explained the conversation to my boss, reassuring her as to how excited I was to be in the "management training program." I dropped her off and went on my way. Then about half way home I pulled over my car because a customer called and had forgotten to order some meaningless thing and insisted on getting it that night. I hung up with the customer and called John Salesrecruiter back.

"John, this is Steven, we spoke earlier regarding the position. Yeah, disregard everything I said, I am very interested." Two months, 5 interviews and one drug test later I had my dream job. Within 14 months I would be tripling my highest earning year at my previous job and I would be learning an entire new industry. My new company reimbursed a portion of the tuition required to finish my degree in Business Management. I've been with them 5 years now in July and I've since been promoted. I used to work about 60 hours a week before and now I do not. I have flexible hours and work from a home office. It's the shizzle.

I had literally accepted that my career would be one thing and with a phone call, that all changed.

By the way, a friend had told me about Linkedin and suggested I create an account. I never really thought it would actually do anything. -Big proponent of LInkedin.

It's amazing how much things can change in a short span. For me, that moment when the sales recruiter called me is one of the best, most unexpected moments of my life.

What about you? What's your unexpected moment(s)?