I picked at a nail and shuffled around the kitchen island in my slippers, talking to my art director and wonderful friend, Michelle, on the phone. I was calling to tell her I was officially taking another job and would be leaving our ad agency. 

My heart hung in my throat, a pit in my stomach. I loved Michelle. Dearly. She’s not the kind of person you want to walk away from at work. I won the coworker-turned-friend lottery with her. I learned so much from her in my 3.5 years at the agency (that all deserves its own blog post).

She knew my exit was coming, the writing on the walls for a few weeks at that point. On the phone that day, I declared out loud for the first time to anyone besides Mitch, I’m taking the offer.

We ping-ponged back and forth sentiments like it’s so sad to leave, but so exciting for what’s next and I’ll miss you sooooo much. And then she said something that stopped me dead in my tracks.

“Anna Rose, this is really good. This is when the really shiny stuff happens.”

I’ve been sitting on those words for months now, and they still hit hard, enticing me to keep turning them over in my mind.

This is when the really shiny stuff happens —

When we step into something new.

When we make the jump.

When we take the chance, officially decide, step into uncharted territory.

Weeks later, I found myself on the other side. I made it through the “thick of the beginning,” as another friend put it. Further into that new gig, I was settling in, finding new rhythms, starting to memorize my new drive to the new office, and distinguishing the quirks and personalities of the people I worked with.

I was still in the same industry—advertising. But I was in a different agency. I moved from big, shiny, and historic to small, scrappy, and dynamic. I went from a crystal clear siloed job description to owning a collection of mixed and matched hats, wearing them often all at the same time. To put it lightly, it was a shock to the system.

It felt, at moments, like I had made a big mistake, the ground spinning beneath my feet. It was a lot to take in, analyze, and understand before spinning out eye-catching, eyebrow-raising creative outputs. My eyes were heavy on the drive home each afternoon, my mind full of ideas, questions, possibilities, responsibilities, plus my life outside of the job.

Like I said, it was a shock to the system. And looking back now, it honestly wasn’t a good fit. It didn’t come naturally, I was a bit of a square peg trying to fit into a round hole. I can see that now. But at the time, I often scratched my head wondering why it was so. dang. hard.

It wasn’t too long after starting that job that I remembered Michelle’s wise words on one of those weary drives home. 

This is when the really shiny stuff happens.

“This sure doesn’t feel shiny,” my inner critic shot back at record speed, armed and ready to shoot down any signs of hope or positivity. 

But in a second of clarity, I pushed past the inner critic (I really do need to name her) and reflected more. 

This is where the really shiny stuff happens.

And the Lord brought Romans 5:3-5 to mind. 

“Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”

The job was disorientating. Unfamiliar. Painful, even, at times. It dawned on me in that moment that these moments of finding my way, building new relationships, and speaking up for myself all build muscles that lead to endurance. And then character. And then hope. 

Discomfort pushes us to a place where we either build new muscles, or we quit. After a couple weeks of very much not quitting, I could slowly look back and see that endurance and the character of God was building, refining, and strengthening within me. And to know I was already different, molded, and handcrafted by the hands of the Father after such a short period, I could see it. 

This is where the really shiny stuff happens.

This is where we become more like the person God created us to be. 

For anyone on the inside or on the verge of transition, this is your invitation to lean in. To press on, to go one more day and see what God does with it—with you—along the way. I have a hunch it’s going to be great. 

Here’s to change, courage, and chasing really shiny things. But spoiler alert: they’re not far out there, and they’re not the riches of the world or fame or fortune—they’re already inside of us.