Lessons Learned From My First Career
Covering a Sandite football game for the Tulsa World in 2021.
I started Sandite Pride News in 2014 as a simple Facebook page where I could post score updates for various Sandite athletic events.
Why? Because our school and our local newspaper hadn't fully entered the digital era yet. If you weren't at the game, there was nowhere to look up the score. The school didn't post it and the newspaper's website was hit or miss and usually days late.
The response was immediate. I had 1000+ followers before I could blink.
Before long my long-dormant childhood passion for writing was awakened and I started writing little stories about the games I was attending. But it was just as a fan--I wasn't trying to make a business out of it. I honestly didn't know a thing about sports. I played baseball in elementary but that was about it. I didn't even care about sports while I was in high school. I only took an interest in 2014 because I was a youth leader and had kids from my youth group participating who I wanted to support.
My first stories were atrocious. I didn't know anything about AP style. I didn't know proper stats. I didn't know anything about journalism. I was just a 20-year-old kid having fun.
But I put myself out there, ignored the criticism (and there was a lot), and that has made all the difference in my life. After investing in myself and committing to learning stats, sports, and writing, I think I ended up being pretty good at the job I stumbled into.
What started as a silly Facebook page turned into a decade-long career in journalism that quickly grew much larger than just sports. I've been published in multiple magazines and newspapers. I covered once-in-a-generation events like State Championships, floods, and pandemics.
Most importantly I met a LOT of people. Good people trying to make a difference in their community. City Councilmen, nonprofit directors, small business owners, coaches, teachers, and more. I think working directly with these people has helped keep me grounded in a time when everyone is so divided and mistrusting of each other.
One of the relationships I built during that time led me to the work I do now. It's crazy to think that writing stories about a local snow cone stand would one day provide me with the opportunity to work from home and provide for my family. Those relationships led me to some great friends and the church where I'm now raising my family.
I learned a lot of lessons from my time as a journalist in my 20s.
1 - If you want to start a business, don't do what everyone else is doing. Look at what nobody else is doing and fill a community need.
2 - Nobody is good at something when they first start. Put yourself out there, ignore the criticism, focus on bettering yourself. You only learn through trial and error. You can't fail at something you never start but you also can't succeed.
3 - Something doesn't have to be profitable to be a success. Financially speaking, Sandite Pride News was an abject failure. It never made enough money to support me. People gripe about advertising and gripe about paywalls. They think journalists should magically work for free. But it was spiritually fulfilling and it opened doors that are still paying off to this day.
4 - Invest in your community. Spending time active and involved did more for me than I ever did for my town. I attended City Council meetings, Chamber of Commerce events, Board of Education meetings, Rotary Club meetings, ribbon cuttings, groundbreaking ceremonies and so much more. Being involved makes you much more connected to your community and you learn a lot more about your neighbors and leaders.
5 - Life is about exploration. You don't have to have it all figured out. As a senior in high school I wanted to go to film school. When I couldn't afford it I decided to be a teacher. Then I ended up in journalism. Now I'm in digital marketing. Who knows where I'll be at 40.
Looking back, I'm grateful I didn't have it all figured out at 20. If I'd known journalism wouldn't pay the bills, I might never have started. If I'd known how much criticism I'd face, I might have quit. Sometimes the best thing you can do is just start something, see where it takes you, and trust that the relationships and lessons along the way will be worth more than you can plan for.
