Sold Out In The Hood

This blog post is going to be short. Just a warning...

So I spent the last week and weekend working on a show at my theater company with the youth called In The Heights. The show, which is set in Washington Heights and focuses on cultural undertones of the neighborhood as well as the threats of gentrification, really hit home for our cast, being that all of them, as well as myself, identify with the characters of the play.

We started this company back in fall of 2012 (I was only a senior in high school at the time). We would only average 3 - 4 people a show, generating virtually no income and just wondering and dreaming for the day that we would get people to our theater. What was the trick? The formula? We weren't quite sure.

Fast forward to tonight, where we closed out a 4 show, sold out run of IN THE HEIGHTS, with families cheering, donations abounding and such a demand that we had to turn roughly 50 people away and are getting bombarded with emails to extend the run of the show. This was surreal to see. It made me realize that in 5 short years, we had become such a hot ticket. Pair that with being asked to perform on Broadway, opportunities with major companies in Hollywood and sponsorship with financial organizations, all while owning who we are as an urban professional theater company, it made for such a heart filled night.

I thought about Wealthy Affiliate as I was in an Uber tonight, drained from the weekend but so excited for the future, and remembered the dedication and long nights that led to this result. I urge all of you to really take what you are building in this platform and push it.

Push it. Push it. Push it.

And don't stop.

The breakthrough is on the horizon.

But if you stop now, you'll never see the sunrise.