Ever hear of death by Google? Neither had Tony Dovale, until it destroyed his thriving business.
The South African native had conquered his childhood demons and was making big money sharing his self-awareness, spiritual generosity, and motivational productivity methods. Fortune 500 companies and individual soul-searchers from far and wide emailed him daily to book him as a speaker. He was living in a beautiful house with the woman of his dreams.
Suddenly, it all came to a screeching halt. No requests for his services came in for several days. Weeks passed. Then months. By the time he figured out that Google had reconfigured its search engine algorithms, dropping his ranking from number one to number 700, his income had already plummeted. Worse, his fiancé lost interest in their relationship.
“You’ll never be good enough.” The words he had heard throughout his childhood started coming back to haunt him. He had overcome those feelings of inadequacy years ago working on a frigate warship for the South African Navy during the Angolan Bush War. It had taken years, voracious reading, and fearless self-confrontation to become an internationally admired inspirational leader.
But when Google dropped his search ranking and decimated his life, everything his unforgiving father had ever said to him came flooding back with a vengeance. The charismatic man who’d motivated thousands of people around the world with his positive energy and enthusiasm now felt like the slight, frightened boy he used to be.
Instead of falling into an abyss of depression, however, Dovale chose to fly. He’d beaten the odds before, after all, when his radio station went silent years earlier. Asking what he could learn from a challenge was not new to this man, and he did it again, digging even deeper into his own history and personality to find the love, the peace, and the freedom he needed for true happiness.
Today, Tony Dovale has regained his previous monetary success. More important, he has achieved what he calls the “end goal” of success: A deep feeling of personal joy that can only come from inner contentment and daily selfless giving. He’s built an even more impressive body of work, including books, CDs, and mindset shifting systems that benefit individuals as well as corporations around the globe.
Dovale does not appear to be slowing down any time soon. He considers himself a work in progress, practicing what he preaches every day.
