Happiness can be found in the darkest of times, if only one remembers to turn on the light.
—J.K. Rowling
My friends thought Big Dom’s last name was “Cool as Shit,” because that’s how I always referred to him: Big Dom, who is cool as shit. Dom DiSandro’s title might have been vice president of team security for the Philadelphia Eagles, but he looked like a bouncer at a trendy club and was as down-to-earth as they come. He was one of the most popular dudes in the Eagles locker room. One day during training camp in 2014, Dom came to the locker room to get me and ushered me into his office for what I can only describe as an intervention.
There, waiting for me on the phone, was my man Elko. I’d been talking on the phone to him a lot, because I was in a bad place. Obviously, he hadn’t liked what he heard. He enlisted Big Dom’s help in getting me mano a mano for an hour.
What was the problem? My marriage was crumbling. Julie and I had met when she attended one of my motivational speeches, and we got married in 2010. Out of respect to her—and, really, outta respect for that nondisclosure agreement I signed to save a whole lotta money—I’m not going to go into detail about how our marriage unraveled by year five. Suffice it to say, I started to learn she wasn’t who I thought she was. So there I was, talking to crowds about how happiness is a choice and about how liberating closure can be, and yet I’d fallen into a deep, dark hole.
I was losing weight. I was depressed. I was crying all the time. And I was angry. And when I say angry… I mean angry. My friends must have grown tired of all the expletive-laden rants I subjected them to. How angry was I? Man, I’m embarrassed to say that for the first time in my life, I had an inkling of understanding as to how my dad could have totally lost it. Deep, huh? Thankfully, because of all the therapy and self-talk, even while I was spiraling, I had the presence of mind to tell myself over and over not to be like my dad. Not to react in the moment… and lose everything.
Elko heard the anger and depression in my voice, and now here he was. “Jon, why are you so angry?” he asked.
“Man, I’m being put through all this shit,” I vented. “I’m pissed off.” Even though I’d practiced self-interrogation for the past two decades, I couldn’t hear the “woe is me” victim story I was telling myself.
“Yeah, but why?” Elko probed. “I’ve heard you speak a ton of times and you’re always talking about forgiving your dad. I’ve never once heard you talk shit about anybody. Why are you starting now? You don’t let people in your past affect your future, so why are you letting that happen now?”
Elko had a way of verbally punching me in the gut. Now he’d stopped me cold. “Damn,” I said. “I guess I kinda lost myself.”
“It’s all good, Jon,” he said. “Just find yourself and move on. Don’t hate, don’t blame. Forgive.”
In the course of an hour conversation, we talked about things I already knew but had let my pain obscure. How the downfall of man is ego, and how taking everything personally is nothing more than ego run amok. My best friend, Danny Emmons, who’d been running with me since junior high, had some wise advice. “You know what? You just have to step back and realize she’s not you,” he said. “And she might not think like you.”
It’s that prideful, egocentric part of ourselves that fights what is right in front of us, that resists closure. Expecting everyone to treat you the way you treat them is more about you than them.
“Your ex is not a villain, Jon,” Elko said, breaking through my judgmental, egocentric self. “The bottom line is you guys have two cups and they just need to be filled differently. Let me ask you something. Did you love your wife?”
“Yeah, I adored her.”
“Notice the past tense,” Elko remarked. “You’ve since found out some things about her. Do you love that woman?”
“No,” I said.
“So you love the image of who you thought she was,” he said.
One of the many issues between Julie and me was my desire to fly airplanes. It satisfied my thirst for adventure and helped calm me. Up in the clouds, I felt closer to Mom. Julie thought I was being reckless and stupid. Now Elko brilliantly connected the conversation to that.
“That image of who you thought she was? Why don’t you go find that person?” he said. “Jon, you’re thirty-five years old, you have no kids. You thought Julie was that person who could fly through life with you. She’s not. Now go find that person.”
Whoa. Elko is good, man. Go find your real copilot. That spoke to me. My ego was so busy assigning blame, it was keeping me from choosing my own happiness.
“There’s no reason to talk shit about your ex, Jon,” he continued. “You’re a growth-motivated person, and she couldn’t help you grow. It didn’t work out. You know how many guys I see who are married and in their forties and feel stuck? Send her a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue and thank her. And guess what? You’ll be free, close that chapter, have forgiveness, and then go find that woman who wants to fly with you throughout life.”
Within an hour, I felt myself returning to me. Elko had reminded me of who I was, and how I’d lost track of myself. Leaving Big Dom’s office, I popped my shades on and the old bounce in my step had returned. I’m back, baby.
The first thing I did after reaching closure over my divorce was change all my passwords to freeatlast. That was me, telling myself a story about my new reality. It was also how I felt: I was young, playing in the National Football League, and I was going to enjoy those two facts for a while.
Maybe it’s because my family was ripped from me at such an early age, but even in macho locker rooms, I’d always been the sensitive guy. Remember that journal I kept as a twelve- and thirteen-year-old? Well, I picked it back up at seventeen, when I’d met a girl. Reading it today finds an earnest, lovelorn voice:
My feelings for Amanda are new to me, for I’ve never felt this way about anyone before. She’s beautiful, cunning, smart… but I see a little girl inside her that I don’t think has ever been seen before… Holding her meant more than words can describe. A gentle caress and a smile. I know what I want. I want her to believe in me like I believe in her.
That’s still kinda me today. I cry at chick flicks. Like, seriously. Notting Hill? When Julia Roberts, looking at Hugh Grant, tells the assembled press she’ll be staying in Britain “indefinitely” to be with him… well, that gets me every time.
After my divorce, though, I was having casual relationships. I wasn’t treating anyone badly, mind you. But I was probably licking my wounds and shying away from being emotionally vulnerable again. I also didn’t want the responsibility of worrying about anyone else. If I wanted to do something, I just wanted to do it. After my divorce, I took a vacation to Aruba—by myself, and I loved every second of it.
One day, my buddy Tim Mooney called. To refer to Tim as a “buddy” is an understatement. He’s been a mentor and father figure. I met him when I was playing for the Eagles. He does a lot for charity, and through a buddy, his request had come to me: he knew a ten-year-old kid who was dying of testicular cancer who loved the Eagles. Could I get him in to see a game? I could do more than that. I had Tim and the kid and his dad on the field prior to kickoff. The kid idolized wide receiver DeSean Jackson, and when I brought DeSean over to meet him, the kid’s eyes widened and he damn near started hyperventilating. Moments like those—seeing pure joy spread across a kid’s face, when joy would seem to be in such short supply—that’s what makes playing in the NFL worthwhile. Afterward, Mooney, a big, backslapping kind of guy, approached me with tears in his eyes.
I thought, This is one cool dude. A guy’s guy, like me, with a huge heart. He asked me to host an auction he puts on in Atlantic City to benefit the Atlantic County Special Services School District. I did the benefit, only when it came time to select the winner of the grand prize—a first-class trip to the Bahamas worth thousands of dollars—I reached into a bowl and picked… my own damn name. That ain’t right. So I disqualified myself, auctioned off the vacation, and raised another $6,000 for the charity.
“You won fair and square,” Mooney protested. But no, I didn’t like the way that looked; the emcee shouldn’t win the grand prize. “Man, all I can tell you,” Mooney said, giving in, “is you’re my guy.”
And he wasn’t kidding. I joined the board of his charity—he raises money for special-needs kids—and he mentors me in life, using his vast hookups throughout the entertainment and casino businesses. He’s a daily sounding board, the ultimate cornerman.
Now he was calling with what would turn out to be a life-changing offer. “Hey, Jon,” Mooney said. “I got this chick I want you to meet.”
“Cool,” I said, nonchalant. “But for the record, I’m not looking for anything serious.” He laughed, because he’d heard it before. After my divorce, I’d told him, “If you ever hear me say the word ‘marriage’ again, punch me square in the face.”
Now he had a girl for me. “She’s looking for love, and she’s got a great spirit,” he said.
The new “playa” in me wanted to get right to the facts. “What’s she look like? What does she do?”
“She works in Vegas at one of the casinos,” Mooney said. “She’s a six-foot blonde.”
I paused. “I’m good, Mooney, thanks,” I said. “The last thing I need is a six-foot hoochie mama from Vegas.”
Mooney explained she was actually a casino executive. But I wasn’t hearing it. Remember, I was in my self-centered stage. I wasn’t treating women with disrespect, but I had a newly cold attitude about dating: I’m divorced, I’ve got a good job, I’ve got time, and I don’t answer to nobody. It may have been a lonely life, but it was easy. This chick might be complicated.
Meantime, unbeknownst to me, Mooney was encountering some pushback from her about me. She’d been telling him that in Vegas, there were no guys for a woman in her thirties who was looking to fall in love. “Annalise,” he said. “I’ve got this great guy for you to meet.”
“Really? What’s he do?” she asked.
“He plays in the NFL,” Mooney said, and the hammer came down almost before the words had left his lips.
“Hell no, he’s a douchebag,” she said. “I’ve dealt with athletes before. And I hear stories. I don’t need that. I’m good.”
She was even more put off when Mooney explained that I was recently divorced and not looking for anything serious. But Mooney is one persistent dude. He stayed on both of us until we agreed to a phone call.
Her name was Annalise Davis—Anni (“Ah-knee”) for short—and her title was customer development executive at MGM Resorts International in Vegas. So much for being a bimbo. In our call, she was funny. And accomplished, but not stuck-up. That led to another call. Man, she was bright. That led to a third. She was positive—there was no “woe is me” in her story.
Before either of us knew it, we were talking every day. Then multiple times a day. Nine or ten hours a day. We’d both curl up in bed and fall asleep with the other’s voice in our ear. Looking back on it now, we’re grateful we didn’t meet online or on Tinder. Neither of us was ever performing for the other. We were just two voices on either side of the country, connecting through a phone line. Really connecting. To this day, Anni is the only person I’ve ever been totally myself with. Like, the disgusting jokes in the locker room? Most guys don’t share that stuff with their wives. For me, something didn’t really happen until I could share it with her.
Our talking went on for three months. Once, we started talking about what our dream first date would be. “Wait, don’t tell me,” I said. “Let’s hang up and text each other what it would be—otherwise, you’ll hear mine, and just agree.”
Sure enough, we texted each other damn near the exact same date. I said I’d want to cruise the harbor in a shitty boat together, listen to music and grab some tacos from Chronic Tacos, and laugh for hours. No alcohol. No fancy restaurant. Hers? She wanted to walk on the beach, eat an ice cream cone, and just talk and laugh.
Finally, I couldn’t stand it any longer. “Listen, I’ve had enough of the phone thing,” I said. “I’m coming to Vegas and we’re going to dinner.”
Finally, the time had come. The disembodied voice took real form in front of me. When I first laid eyes on Anni, I was surprised. I knew she’d be blond and six feet tall, but what I hadn’t anticipated was how her smile lit her—and everything around her—up. Some people have infectious smiles. I couldn’t imagine ever being sad around her.
I got a hotel room, but we agreed beforehand that we wouldn’t get it on. If this thing worked, we didn’t want to have a kid conceived in a Vegas hotel room our first night together. So what did we do? We had dinner in Vegas and then went to my place in Southern California, where we enacted both of our dream first dates. We took a Duffy boat through Newport Harbor and then walked the beach with ice cream cones. (Which, when Anni wasn’t looking, I promptly threw up, because I’m lactose intolerant. Good times.)
That week, Anni had a work event in Southern California. So our weekend continued back at my house in Huntington Beach. We held hands walking along the ocean, right near the spot where I talk to Mom. Anni listened to the whole story and held me when the emotion rose.
At the end of our time together, I went to LAX. I’d be heading to Boston to perform, and she was going to San Diego. Before takeoff, I called her while she was driving south. “Yo,” she said. “What are we doing?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
I’ll never forget this: “I think we’re going to regret not seeing where this goes,” she said.
Sometimes, doing nothing is the wisest course of action. This wasn’t one of those times. I blurted out exactly what I was feeling inside. “You know what? You’re right,” I said. “Do you wanna move in with me?”
There was hardly a pause. “Yes,” she said. “I love my job, I worked my whole life for it, but I have no problem quitting to move in with you, because I think you’re the love of my life.”
“I think you’re mine,” I said.
The only thing left to do was FaceTime Mooney.
“Hey, man, how’d it go?” he said, thinking he was about to get a down and dirty debrief from his bro.
“Oh, man, it was awesome,” I said. “We hung out for days, we laughed, we cried, it was just amazing. She’s moving in next week.”
There was a pause, like he was trying to gauge whether I was busting on him. “What now?” he said.
“Yeah, we’re moving in together,” I said.
“Dude, you were just supposed to hang out!” he said.
Later, Anni told Mooney that he’d better apply for some universal minister accreditation—because when we got married, he’d be conducting the service. “I can’t believe you guys,” he said, laughing. “You’re crazy!”
Crazy is right. But Anni diving all in? How freakin’ rock-star is that?
Less than two years later, there we were, Anni and me, dressed in all white in our barefoot beach wedding ceremony in Cabo. We rented out the posh Cabo del Sol golf resort, so we had a thousand yards of private beach, surrounded by peninsula.
I was in a white suit with an open shirt, and Anni looked smokin’ in a white Galia Lahav wedding dress. There was Mooney, all in white, too, officiating the service. All my boys were there, too—a point of personal pride that the dudes I’d played Bad News Bears baseball with back in the day under Coach Eckles were my groomsmen at both my weddings. Bros for life.
It was us, and the eighty most important people in our lives. We were introduced with a remix of Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On” and we surprised everyone with some cool fireworks on the beach. Everything just felt so right and so easy.
Standing on that beach, holding Anni’s hands and looking deeply into her eyes, I couldn’t stop thinking about what she’d done for me. It may sound crazy or corny, but she was my savior. “There was an emptiness inside me,” I told her. “And you turned my heart right side up.”
I’d never been with someone who so clearly thought the best of me. With Anni, both of us were in every moment, together.
I’d have never seen the pure goodness in her, though, if I’d remained bitter about my past. If I were still resentful—whether toward my dad or my ex or whomever—I would have never seen Anni’s true heart. That’s what depressed people do: they don’t see other people in their life clearly because they’re too lost in their own depression or bitterness. It’s an endless feedback loop: you’re depressed, your self-talk fuels your depression, and it all colors how you approach everyone around you.
But what I’d learned is that how you view and talk to yourself is the same way you view and talk to the world. Once I’d forgiven and moved on, I could see Anni for who she really was: the most kind, giving, loving person I’d ever known.
That day, on that beach, was the happiest day of my life, not just because I was getting married, but because I’d worked my way to the certainty that, every day, I was one day closer to the person I wanted to be. And now that person had what he had always craved: a soul mate who was a partner in adventure for life.
Elko, man, what a prophet. Sure enough, I’d found that person who would fly through life with me. My copilot. We’d be in for some bumpy rides. But we’d take on the turbulence, together.