“In the end, only three things matter: how much you loved, how gently you lived and how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you.” – Buddha

Life is navigating through a series of headaches and heartaches, with bigger ones replacing previous ones and the passage of time giving you perspective that whatever was ailing you previously was meant to be, or not meant to be.

As WatchMojo celebrates its 15th year, I was thinking of how everything happens for a reason.

Not getting into McGill’s Management program led me to look at Concordia’s John Molson School of Business – which paved the way for a more entrepreneurial path, giving me the prerequisite chip on my shoulder.

Wall Street’s 2000 crash pushed me to pursue a career online in the startup environment, giving me a privileged front row seat to the titanic shifts that changed media for good.

When IGN acquired my old company AskMen, I wanted to move to New York City. For a myriad of reasons, that didn’t happen. Disheartened to have my destiny in the hands of others, I reluctantly embarked on my entrepreneurial journey, launching WatchMojo. Obviously, getting snubbed by my former bosses was one of the best things to have happened to me professionally, as it paved the way for WatchMojo.

WatchMojo will go down as one of the most successful media startups of all time, but its fate was the result of a barrage of heartbreaks and headaches, all of which ended up charting a better path forward, even though at that moment, each setback left me gutted and disillusioned. I’ll expand on some of those in the days and weeks to come but ultimately, 99% of it stemmed from me thinking others shared my principles, work ethic and drive.

Some people never look back, never regret. Those are just some of the lies we tell ourselves. Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it. To paraphrase Michael the Great of Jordan, you succeed today because you failed yesterday.

When you face headaches, hardships and heartaches, don’t bottle it in or try to be too stoic. It’s ok to feel the pain, voice the frustration, want to talk about it. Balance isn’t pretending everything is fine, it’s going through the emotions to get through to the other side.

Everything happens for a reason, but you have to be persistent and patient, including the lawsuit that nearly killed, but ultimately helped WatchMojo.