I was broken but not defeated. I continued to work through my grief in prayer, preparing scripts for Quinn’s Next Step in the morning, focusing on kitchen repairs in the afternoon, and spending quality time with my family in the evening.

And then came news that hit me harder than expected. Scott Adams had given his life to Christ, offered his final Simultaneous Sip, and passed away.

The man who taught me about persuasion, reframing, and heuristics. The man whose work had helped me understand the media landscape. His passing felt like a reminder that anchoring one’s life in Christ is the only way to withstand the chaos.

The week unraveled in a way I did not see coming. All my scripts were finished. AI shorts and video backgrounds created. My forty‑sixth birthday – the day before the studio owners would come by for dinner – included my wife, our son, and a friend who surprised me with breakfast and coffee. I talked to my grandmother, soon turning ninety‑five years old, for half an hour. It was a good birthday, maybe the best one.

But I had not yet put myself on camera. I had recorded nothing. I was not ready.

The undeniability of the Holy Spirit changed everything within a series of moments. My wife was concerned. She had spent the last fifteen years watching me struggle in my video pursuits and employment. She saw the joy and excitement I had when planning and pre‑producing documents, creating outlines, filling out formal essays, journaling, reading, and sharing ideas I was absorbing.

The Holy Spirit gave her clarity I could not see. She shared this with me, and something in my spirit settled. Thirty‑plus years in video had been a gift but I had also used it as an escape. The blessing of video revealed writing as a God-given purpose.

God did not wait long to confirm what my wife had told me. I invited the owners to dinner in a long email highlighting my appreciation for six years of contracts; affirming that I was not asking for anything, but would be available to help when needed; reiterating the lessons I had learned; and apologizing for anywhere I had come up short. They said my apology was unnecessary and unearned, shared that the Studios at Fischer would be closing, and noted the thoroughness of my email, asking, “Where did you learn to write like that?” My wife gave me the “I told you so” look as we laughed and continued our conversations.

I began writing this series. My wife and I edited and revised it together. We used AI as a tool, not a producer. We were literally working together on the same page of the same book – an idiom we had often referenced when we weren’t seeing eye to eye. I still felt the financial weight questioning my choices, even though I had loosely outlined the next twenty years of paying off debt. My writing wouldn’t earn me money.

I took an audio‑video teardown gig a week later. A colleague and I had political and spiritual conversations while moving gear. I told him about my writing, but not about my financial concerns. In a third moment of confirmation, he told me not to worry about making money, but to follow the Spirit as I was led in publishing.

The series I had the most notes on was my observations of the media landscape. I began publishing on QuinnsNextStep.com the next day. The media world wasn’t calming down. It was accelerating, but something in me had changed.

I continued to watch things break in real time. The same voices that had carried me through the last decade were still speaking, still debating, still fighting for clarity in a world determined to avoid it.

Candace Owens pressed forward with her investigations, refusing to bend under pressure. Tucker Carlson continued interviewing world leaders and dissidents, pushing conversations far beyond the boundaries of cable news. Megyn Kelly sharpened her independent voice, unrestrained by corporate oversight. Joe Rogan remained the country’s unofficial moderator, hosting everyone from comedians to presidential candidates. Dave Smith kept debating foreign policy and libertarian principles, even joining Judge Andrew Napolitano to debate Dinesh D’Souza in one of the most revealing exchanges so far this year.

Russell Brand, having given his life to Christ, prayed with each interviewer, often getting on his knees to do so at live events. Shawn Ryan brought long‑form integrity to military and law‑enforcement discussions. John Stossel kept exposing government waste and media manipulation with the same calm precision he’d always had. Theo Von brought unexpected honesty to cultural conversations, often revealing more truth in humor than most journalists did in print.

Michael Knowles and Matt Walsh continued their cultural critiques at The Daily Wire, while new channels like Redacted and creators like Tom Bilyeu pushed deeper into geopolitical and philosophical territory. The Kirk Cameron Show brought a faith‑anchored gentleness. Adam Carolla and Bill Maher, two men on opposite sides of the center politically, found common ground in their refusal to bow to ideological conformity. Jon Oleksiuk’s AI debates offered a strange but insightful mirror to the arguments unfolding across the country.

Other commentators drifted off my radar, occasionally resurfacing on X or YouTube: Tim Pool, Steven Crowder, Brandon Tatum, Ben Shapiro, the injured Dennis Prager’s PragerU, the bed‑ridden Jordan Peterson, the new direction of Turning Point USA, Alex Jones, NBC, FOX, Glenn Beck, and The Blaze. Disappointingly, even the PBD Podcast lost their nuanced curiosity. Corporate conservatism had failed its audience from where I was sitting.

I wasn’t watching to be shaped, persuaded, or to find my voice. I was watching to find clarity in my purpose, and from a distance. I no longer questioned my belonging. I stopped looking for independent voices and started to become one. My confirmation bias focused on the individual, created by God in His own image; the independent mind looking for Truth in a society of deception.

The media arc that had defined the last decade of my life was closing as my spiritual journey led me into the season of Lent. A return to prayer and fasting, a reminder of the greatest commandments – to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and to love thy neighbor as yourself.

I have stumbled in my own walk with God over the years. For the first time in a long time, I felt a quiet peace settle over the chaos. Not because everything was fixed, but because I finally understood the season I had walked through. Even in my darkest moments, I could not deny God’s glory, His sovereignty, or His ability to turn all things meant for harm toward good for those who love Him.

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