gallant thoughts were as wiped as I was by twelve hours of casting and watching auditions, followed by an important meeting about the film I was attempting to get off the ground. I would never make it out to the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf in Venice on schedule, and I just didn't have the energy or time to give. I was scripting out my cancellation text in my head while chatting with my mom, and I mentioned it to her.
Mom disagreed. “Taylor, you should go. You gave him your word. You can really help him out and give this guy direction.”
Mom was right. Mom knows best. I gathered up the very last of my energy and headed out to honor my word and live in service. I psyched myself up on the way over—maybe something good would come of this. Maybe something great. Maybe the stranger would be extraordinarily talented. Maybe he'd be lucky and get his breakthrough opportunity soon, and he'd kindly remember the exhausted lady who'd helped him prepare to nurture it. Sure, maybe I was just going to be true to myself, my word, and my service, which was more than enough in itself, but you never know—maybe this was my next breakthrough opportunity in disguise.
I had no idea what the stranger looked like or even his full name, but as I walked across the street towards the coffee shop, I recognized him right away. I'd seen this man before; I knew his eyes. They'd never been up on the silver screen, but I knew them as well as I knew my own. My heart skipped a beat as it recognized the breakthrough opportunity in front of me. This was the man I'd been praying for and dreaming of since I was eight years old. I didn't know his last name yet, but I knew someday we'd share it.
I apologized for being a few minutes late, and explained what I had been doing the past week and how long I'd been working on acting‐related things that day. When David responded, “There is no way I could do that,” I smiled. As I'd suspected, this stranger had no chance of becoming an actor. Even though I had not walked into the breakthrough acting opportunity of my life, I wasn't mad and I certainly didn't feel like I'd wasted any of my time or energy. I'd walked into the breakthrough love of my life. I couldn't have been happier.
It took several weeks of dating for David to admit that our first meeting had been a blind date—a complete setup. But I already knew the biggest breakthrough in my entire life didn't happen by accident. It wasn't just two random strangers meeting. David and Rich may have colluded, but there was more to it than just that. I had prayed and prepared myself to meet David for nearly twenty years, living in the service mode and using the gifts God gave me. And when that wasn't enough, when I almost canceled, I had the support and counsel of my mom. My suspicions were correct: this “stranger” was never committed to doing the work it takes to break through in acting. He was never interested in acting at all. But Mom was more right: I did give this guy direction … and he gave it to me. Now, we drive each day towards bigger and better breakthroughs, together.
David and I got married on June 23, 2019, and the first six months of our marriage were a flurry of breakthrough opportunities, personally and professionally. Though we were frequently on the road, even our “couch time” was productive. I'd wrapped up ABC's The Fix just before our wedding, so I prepared auditions for other even bigger roles; David sat beside me and wrote his first book, Pivot & Go. Knowing I was sharing top‐foreword billing with Jeremy Lin, I poured everything into introducing my brilliant husband's debut book to the world.
When David asked me to write a foreword for this one, his second book, I cringed. What more could I talk about? Hadn't I covered everything David is to me in the first foreword? What could I possibly say about breakthroughs in early 2021? The pace of our life changed dramatically in 2020, along with the pace of the rest of the world. Suddenly, my production schedules were postponed and shifted; David's speaking engagements were called off. We were told to sit tight—worldwide all non‐medical breakthroughs were postponed indefinitely, if not canceled altogether.
But while 2020 may have initially seemed like a slowdown in breakthrough opportunities, David and I actually found and created richer and deeper ones. David created virtual speaking engagements to inspire, motivate, and serve people across the globe dealing with uncertainty and fear, and he wrote another book; I found my head filled with original stories and characters I wanted to see on screen, and I dedicated myself to collaborating on scripts and pitching them to production companies and networks. We had time we never would have imagined to dedicate to our own growth, our growth together, and the growth of our team—including the addition of our puppy, Pivot. (Yes, he is named after the first book.) We had opportunities we could not have foreseen to act in service to our struggling communities. We had time to really reflect on our purpose.
Sitting on the couch with Pivot one night at the height of quarantine in September 2020, David turned to me and asked, “Am I the same person I was when I met you?”
I realized he wasn't the stranger I met at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf; he wasn't even the person I married the year before. Neither of us were. Though we will always be introducing ourselves to each other, and though we will always be soulmates, we are different now. We learn more and fall deeper in love with each other every day. Sure, I've fallen harder for him as we've traveled to amazing places together, but I've also fallen harder for him realizing he will never take the time to fold his clothes—that our dressers will always be stuffed with rolled‐up jumbles. Of course I've loved sharing gourmet meals with him—even after realizing that I will never be able to take a bite before he films the entire spread on his phone. Sharing these daily joys, even the ones that drive me a little batty, is our key to turning our opportunities into wider breakthroughs—and we schedule them into our time. Every night before bed, we tell each other all the joys we had throughout the day and celebrate each other. No matter what amazing things God has blessed us with as individuals, we celebrate each other every day—on schedule. We are a breakthrough team, and we prioritize each other's growth—not when it's convenient to us, not once it's reached a breaking point, but as a natural part of our daily lives.
As David launches his second book, I see a person who is even more sure of who he is, more sure of the mission he is on, and a leader for not only our family, but for the world. I met a man who said he would do things; I married a man who actually did the things he said; I am a life partner to a man who makes things happen. Everyone is always perplexed with how he does it, but I've got the inside scoop: he uses this Breakthrough Blueprint, over and over, each day of his life. The formula in this book is the one my husband actually employs to make impossible things happen. It's the one I've now adopted to make impossible things happen. I'm so proud of him, I am so grateful for him, and I'm frankly astounded he's giving away the secrets to breakthrough success like this. David might be a mindset magician, but he's always been tapped into a truth that takes most of us longer to appreciate: we break through by helping others break through.
David stole my heart the day I met him. He won my heart the day I married him. He is on a daily pursuit to make me feel like the most special person in the world—a true breakthrough and the blueprint to our amazing marriage! But David is also a servant leader. He is so comfortable in his own skin that, at times, I have to tell him to tone it down in public. He makes random strangers feel like they have been best friends since elementary school; he can drain himself of all emotional energy because he is so concerned about helping everyone he talks to and fully pouring himself into them. I know I have to share him with the world (even when I don't always want to), because everyone deserves the blueprint to the daily joy in their lives, their careers, their relationships, and their futures that David has gifted to me.
The pages ahead are the biggest breakthrough opportunity you have ever been presented. I hope you use them to their fullest potential.
INTRODUCTION
You are the best of the best. It doesn't matter if you're the CEO of a Fortune 500 company or the parent of a toddler way overdue for a nap (or both!), you are the smartest, most talented, best‐positioned individual to live exactly the life you were meant to live.
But
