When Your Faith Says You Don't Belong: One Black Queer Musician Who Refused to Leave His Position. S2 Ep. 7

When Your Faith Says You Don't Belong: One Black Queer Musician Who Refused to Leave His Position. S2 Ep. 7

Troy Anthony's own choir petitioned to remove him as minister of music. Not strangers. The people who raised him. The woman he called Auntie. His grandfather sitting right next to him as the votes were cast four to three. His mother resigned. He did not. That decision — made at 17 in a church board meeting — cracked open everything Troy thought he knew. If they were wrong about that, they could be wrong about everything. About his sexuality. About who God is. About what it means to be a man. He calls that the greatest gift he ever received. Troy Anthony is now an Obie Award-winning composer and the founding creative director of Fire Ensemble NYC, a choir where you do not have to believe anything to belong except that people can change, and that includes you. His show The Revival, commissioned by The Shed, took everything the Black church gave him and made it available to everyone who was ever told they did not qualify. A God-given gift, he says, is not a church-given gift. This PRIDE month episode is for you if you have ever had a community, a church, a workplace, a family, tell you that you are is incompatible with where you belong. What You Will Hear in This Episode * Growing up in the Black Seventh-day Adventist church in Louisville — and how the church was a music conservatory before he knew what that meant * Voting no alone on a friend's excommunication — the first time he defied the institution * The Valentine's Day petition, the board meeting, and the moment his grandfather pulled him from his chair * What broke open when he realized they could be wrong about everything — his sexuality, his faith, his identity * Going to college and taking the red pill — why he could not go back to any church after leaving * What Black queer joy means as a practice and a lineage * Building Fire Ensemble as a secular space with the spirit of a Friday night church rehearsal * Writing The Revival — the first piece that truly felt like his * Why his queerness is not a sin to tolerate — it is a gift * Fire Ensemble's concert on June 16th in New York City Listener Takeaways * A God-given gift is not a church-given gift. It was yours before they named it and it remains yours after they tried to take it back. * The truth exists whether you acknowledge it or not. The sooner you acknowledge it the sooner you get to a more authentic place of living. * You do not have to believe anything to belong somewhere, except that people can change. And that includes you. * My queerness is not something I need to work on. It is a gift. Every moment spent not honoring your gift is not good news for you. * You cannot be free hating on me. That is not just a lyric. That is a truth. Content Note: This episode experienced some technical difficulties and has been edited to improve audio quality.   The conversations on Unpopular Decisions are for informational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing in this episode constitutes legal, financial, medical, or professional advice. Every situation is different. This episode launches during Pride Month. If you're navigating questions of identity, faith, and belonging, please consult a qualified professional who can speak to your specific circumstances.   CONNECT WITH US ✨ Subscribe to Unpopular Decisions for more stories about authoring your own story, despite the expectations of others ✨Help us reach more people by leaving us a review on Apple or Spotify! Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/@unpopulardecisions] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/unpopulardecisionspod/] | Threads [https://www.threads.com/@unpopulardecisionspod?xmt=AQG0y-oNrulUphvMCh69YewZXONqZf_EMbCtRzRbUdFgYDg] | LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/company/unexpected-collective] | Website [https://unpopulardecisions.com/]  CONNECT WITH OUR GUEST ✨ Follow and support Troy Anthony’s Fire Ensemble on Instagram @troyanthonymusic [https://www.instagram.com/troyanthonymusic/] AND website: https://www.fireensemble.com/ [https://www.fireensemble.com/] ✨ Join Troy for “All Things New” – A participatory fire ensemble concert experience on Tuesday, June 16th at 7:30pm in NYC. Grab Your Tickets here: Eventbrite [https://www.eventbrite.com/e/all-things-new-tickets-1988794734588] CONNECT WITH JAMEELAH ✨ Follow Jameelah Calhoun on social media LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameelah-calhoun/] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/lifeaholicny/] Are you in the middle of a career pivot? Book a consultation [https://calendly.com/jameelah-calhoun/career-reinvention-strategy-session-clone-1] with Jameelah for a Career Reinvention Strategy Session. My approach blends strategic clarity, emotional intelligence, and real-world experience reinventing my own career across 6 industries and 6 functions. The goal is to help people move from overthinking to aligned action with greater clarity, conviction, and momentum.

When Caregiving Stops Being Your Identity: Why This Eldest Daughter Is Intentionally Child Free | S2 Ep. 6

She was the eldest daughter of six children in a family that could not afford nannies. So she became one. Molly Gazay spent her childhood as Militant Molly, the one in charge, the one who kept everyone in line, and even the one her parents came to when their marriage was falling apart. She spent her twenties and thirties doing the same thing professionally as a beloved nanny and caregiver. She was so good at taking care of everyone else that she had built her entire identity around it without ever noticing. Then she pushed the child she was caring for out of the way of a moving car and got hit herself. She finally decided it was time to create a version of life that wasn't defined by her usefulness to others. Molly is now an actress, director, and executive producer of Bad Blood Project in New York City. She is married and intentionally child free. And she has rejected eldest daughter syndrome consciously and deliberately. Not because she stopped loving the people who needed her, but because the part of her that had always survived needed to die so that she could actually live. She still cries talking about it. This episode is for the eldest daughters. But it is also for anyone who has spent so long being reliable, responsible, and indispensable that they genuinely do not know what they need for themselves. What You’ll Hear in This Episode * What eldest daughter syndrome actually is and why watching a YouTube video about it made Molly sob in recognition * Being called Militant Molly by her siblings and what it cost to be the family enforcer from age eight * Being her parents' therapist through their divorce as a preteen and what it took to unlearn that role decades later * Getting hit by a car while protecting a child she was watching and the second near-miss at a Starbucks two blocks away that finally made her quit * Why she and her husband chose not to have children and the unexpected complexity of that decision coming from someone who has spent her whole life caring for kids * The identity shifting work that started during the pandemic and has not stopped since * Old Molly versus Phoenix Molly and the nightmare she stopped having once she began the work * The shotgun effect: how eldest daughter syndrome creates a scarcity mindset that keeps you spread too thin to be known for anything * Being homeless for years, eating cabbage and cheese, sleeping in a car and arriving at a place of having everything she wanted and still feeling miserable * What her therapist said about the survival identity that needed to die so the real one could live * Her message directly to the eldest daughters listening Listener Takeaways * Eldest daughter syndrome is a survival technique. But a survival technique is not a thriving technique. And you have been surviving long enough. * The part of you that needed to survive does not want to die. That is exactly why letting it go is so hard. And exactly why it is necessary. * Being good at taking care of everyone does not mean you are supposed to do it forever. It means you have a superpower that belongs to you now. * Selfish is not always a bad word. Sometimes choosing yourself is the most courageous thing you can do. * The people in your life who love you want you to take care of yourself. The ones who do not is not your problem to solve. That is what therapists are for. * You have done so much for so long. It is okay to start creating your world now. Whenever you are ready. Content Note: This episode experienced some technical difficulties. Some segments have been modified and/or re-recorded for audio clarity. The conversations on Unpopular Decisions are for informational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing in this episode constitutes legal, financial, medical, or professional advice. Every situation is different. If you're navigating something significant, please consult a qualified professional who can speak to your specific circumstances. CONNECT WITH US ✨ Subscribe to Unpopular Decisions to hear more stories of diverse professionals choosing authenticity over approval ✨ Share this episode with the friend who’s feeling stuck Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/@unpopulardecisions] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/unpopulardecisionspod/] | Threads [https://www.threads.com/@unpopulardecisionspod?xmt=AQG0y-oNrulUphvMCh69YewZXONqZf_EMbCtRzRbUdFgYDg] | LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/company/unexpected-collective] | Website [https://unpopulardecisions.com/]  CONNECT WITH OUR GUEST ✨ Follow Molly Gazay on Instagram @mollygazayofficial [https://www.instagram.com/mollygazayofficial/] @badbloodproject [https://www.instagram.com/badbloodproject/] OR visit her website: https://www.mollygazay.me/ [https://www.mollygazay.me/] CONNECT WITH JAMEELAH ✨ Follow Jameelah Calhoun on social media LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameelah-calhoun/] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/lifeaholicny/] Are you in the middle of a career pivot? Book a consultation [https://calendly.com/jameelah-calhoun/career-reinvention-strategy-session-clone-1] with Jameelah for a Career Reinvention Strategy Session. My approach blends strategic clarity, emotional intelligence, and real-world experience reinventing my own career across 6 industries and 6 functions. The goal is to help people move from overthinking to aligned action with greater clarity, conviction, and momentum.

REWIND: When Your Biological Clock and Career Collide: A Wall Street Woman's Decision to Become a Single Mother by Choice

Connie Rutherford had achieved almost everything that she was taught led to a successful life. The Wall Street career, wonderful friends, and bucket-list travel experiences.   But, she was missing the thing she wanted most. She wanted to be a mother, ever since she was 16 when she was caught doodling baby names in her diary. At 41, on Wall Street, in the middle of a pandemic, she finally achieved her dream of motherhood, but not in the way that she, her family, or society expected. She decided to become a single mother by choice using donor sperm. Because, she had finally asked herself the right question. What would I regret for the rest of my life if I did not do this? Connie is Black and Taiwanese. Her father is Black, military, and a devout Catholic. Her mother is from Taiwan and deeply traditional. Neither of them was happy when she told them she was pregnant. Her mother told her she felt sorry for her children for being denied a father. Connie did it anyway. This is the episode that started Unpopular Decisions. And in AAPI Heritage Month, it felt like exactly the right moment to bring it back.  This episode is for you if you have been suffering from 'not now' syndrome. You have been waiting for the right partner, the right timing, or the right conditions before giving yourself permission to pursue your dreams, and you are starting to wonder how long you are willing to wait. What You Will Hear in This Episode * Growing up with parents who said getting pregnant would mean getting kicked out * What dating in New York looked like after a devastating breakup that taught her never to let someone have that much power over her again * The trip to Grenada with her best friend where the conversation finally shifted from dating strategy to a different kind of plan * Freezing her eggs at 38, what she did not know going in and what she wishes someone had told her * The Wall Street stigma she was navigating being a woman of color in a predominantly white environment and the fear of being seen differently as a single mother * The five failed cycles, the embryos that came back abnormal, and the midnight article that changed everything * Her father's cancer diagnosis and what it clarified about time and legacy * Why she declined the genetic screening on her final cycle and what happened when she trusted the old school approach * What she would tell women who feel like it might already be too late * What dating looks like now and why having her daughters completely changed what she is looking for Listener Takeaways * The question is not what are the pros and cons. The question is what would you regret for the rest of your life. Those are very different calculations. * The conditions will never be perfect. The right time is the time you finally decide it is. * Get your fertility checked. The information is not the enemy. Not having it is. * There is no one path to motherhood. Donor sperm, donor eggs, surrogacy, foster care, adoption, etc. all leads to the same profound destination. * Asking for help earlier is not weakness. It is the one thing Connie says she would do differently. * Choosing this does not mean you have given up on partnership. It means you stopped letting the absence of one determine everything else. The conversations on Unpopular Decisions are for informational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing in this episode constitutes legal, financial, medical, or professional advice. Every situation is different. If you're navigating something significant, please consult a qualified professional who can speak to your specific circumstances. CONNECT WITH US ✨ Subscribe to Unpopular Decisions to hear more stories of diverse professionals choosing authenticity over approval ✨ Share this episode with the friend who’s feeling stuck YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/@unpopulardecisions] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/unpopulardecisionspod/] | Threads [https://www.threads.com/@unpopulardecisionspod?xmt=AQG0y-oNrulUphvMCh69YewZXONqZf_EMbCtRzRbUdFgYDg] | LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/company/unexpected-collective] | Website [https://unpopulardecisions.com/]  CONNECT WITH OUR GUEST ✨ Follow Connie Rutherford on Instagram and TikTok @searchingfortadpoles OR visit her website: https://www.connierutherford.com/ [https://www.connierutherford.com/] ✨ Buy her memoir Searching for Tadpoles [https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/searching-for-tadpoles-connie-rutherford/1147818448?ean=9798317801779]: The Journey To Motherhood of A Single Mother By Choice  CONNECT WITH JAMEELAH ✨ Follow Jameelah Calhoun on social media LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameelah-calhoun/] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/lifeaholicny/] Are you in the middle of a career pivot? Book a consultation [https://calendly.com/jameelah-calhoun/career-reinvention-strategy-session-clone-1] with Jameelah for a Pivots & Positioning Strategy Session. My approach blends strategic clarity, emotional intelligence, and real-world experience reinventing my own career across 6 industries and 6 functions. The goal is to help people move from overthinking to aligned action with greater clarity, conviction, and momentum.

Growth Is Exposure Therapy: What Nobody Tells You About Reinventing Your Life | S2 Ep. 5

Sometimes growth doesn’t feel exciting. Sometimes it feels like your entire nervous system filing a complaint. In this solo episode of Unpopular Decisions, Jameelah Calhoun talks about what actually happens emotionally when you’re trying to become someone new and why reinvention often feels less like empowerment and more like intentionally triggering yourself. Because every leap she has taken, her divorce, her career breaks, launching this show, has followed the same pattern. The thing the leap required her to do was always the exact thing she had been most afraid to do.  We talk about the psychological hangover of major life decisions. Leaving jobs. Starting over. Becoming a beginner again after years of being competent. The grief of losing the identity and safety systems that once made your life make sense. And the uncomfortable reality that the things you avoid most aggressively are often the exact skills your next chapter requires. This episode pulls together lessons and clips from previous Unpopular Decisions conversations, including a first gen professional who hid her career pivot to tech because of imposter syndrome, a Black woman who sued her employer, an executive who lost her life savings to romance fraud, and a high-earning daughter of immigrants who walked away from her career three weeks postpartum.  Because sometimes the panic isn’t proof you’re making the wrong choice. Sometimes it’s just proof you’re no longer hiding from yourself. This episode is for you if you are in the middle of a change that is not yet feeling like the liberation you expected. This is your sign that you are not doing it wrong. What You’ll Hear in This Episode * Why reinvention can feel psychologically destabilizing * The emotional side of career breaks, divorce, and entrepreneurship * Growing up associating competence with worth * Why being a beginner again feels humiliating at first * The difference between danger and discomfort * How immigrant-family expectations shape fear and achievement * Why your next chapter often requires the exact thing you avoid Listener Takeaways * Anxiety isn’t always evidence you’re making the wrong decision * Familiar pain often feels safer than unfamiliar possibility * Starting over threatens identity before it builds confidence * Growth can feel like grief before it feels like freedom * Staying stuck is still a decision The conversations on Unpopular Decisions are for informational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing in this episode constitutes legal, financial, medical, or professional advice. Every situation is different — if you're navigating something significant, please consult a qualified professional who can speak to your specific circumstances. CONNECT WITH US ✨ Subscribe to Unpopular Decisions to hear more stories of diverse professionals choosing authenticity over approval ✨ Share this episode with the friend who’s feeling stuck Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/@unpopulardecisions] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/unpopulardecisionspod/] | Threads [https://www.threads.com/@unpopulardecisionspod?xmt=AQG0y-oNrulUphvMCh69YewZXONqZf_EMbCtRzRbUdFgYDg] | LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/company/unexpected-collective] | Website [https://unpopulardecisions.com/]  CONNECT WITH JAMEELAH ✨ Follow Jameelah Calhoun on social media LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameelah-calhoun/] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/lifeaholicny/] Are you in the middle of a career pivot? Book a consultation [https://calendly.com/jameelah-calhoun/career-reinvention-strategy-session-clone-1] with Jameelah for a Career Reinvention Strategy Session. My approach blends strategic clarity, emotional intelligence, and real-world experience reinventing my own career across 6 industries and 6 functions. The goal is to help people move from overthinking to aligned action with greater clarity, conviction, and momentum.

Breaking Free of Golden Handcuffs: A First-Gen Mom Walks Away from Her Six-Figure Career | S2 Ep. 4

"I don't have to do this anymore." After another frustrating conversation with a micromanaging boss, Bie Aweh realized that she was ready to break free from the golden handcuffs. But, growing up, her Haitian mom would zip up her coat every morning and remind her that as a Black girl, you have to work ten times as hard. She built a multiple six-figure career at DoorDash before the IPO, negotiated her first real salary when a mentor refused to let her undersell herself, and became a VP of HR at a fintech company. She did everything the responsible way. Then she had a baby and came back from maternity leave straight into 12-hour days. She found herself walking her newborn at midnight with no streetlights around and realized she had to make a change.  Three weeks ago, she quit. But, she has not told her immigrant parents yet. This episode is happening in real time. Bie does not have a clean story. She does not have a plan for what comes next. What she has is a seven-month-old who reminds her every day that she has only scratched the surface. This is what the messy middle actually looks like. This episode is for you if you have been sitting with the feeling that the career you worked incredibly hard to build has started to cost you more than it is giving back. And if you are trying to figure out what healthy courage looks like versus recklessness. What You Will Hear in This Episode * What golden handcuffs actually are — the equity, the RSUs, the lifestyle inflation — and how they keep high earners in place long past the point of fulfillment * Growing up first-generation, watching her Haitian and Cameroonian immigrant parents work as CNAs, and what those lessons about resilience and endurance cost her later * How a mentor at DoorDash refused to let her accept her first offer and changed her financial life * The IPO that transformed everything and what actually happened to all that equity * The night she was walking her newborn at midnight in a Houston suburb with no streetlights and finally understood she needed to stop * Why she has not told her parents yet, what she is afraid of, and how she is planning that conversation * The FU fund: what it is, how she built it, and why she watched it every single morning as a reminder she could leave * What identity grief looks like when your entire sense of self has been built around performing excellence in professional spaces * Why 300,000 Black women lost their jobs at the beginning of 2025 and why she chose to leave voluntarily in the middle of that * The FMLA resource every employee needs to know about and how to use it strategically before making a bigger decision * What success looks like for this season and why her blood pressure numbers are the metric she is watching first Listener Takeaways * Resilience is a gift and a curse. The same thing that gets you through impossible situations will also keep you in situations you should have left. * Your child does not need you to provide everything. They need you to show up as your best self. Those are not the same thing. * FU money is not a luxury. It is a plan. Six months of expenses minimum. Twelve is better. Start building it before you need it. * The in-between feels unproductive. It is actually doing essential work. Give yourself the time to decompress before expecting transformation. * You can leave with integrity. Four weeks notice, performing until the last day, leaving the bridge intact. You can bet on yourself and still be strategic about how. * Always be interviewing. Even during your career break. Stay sharp, stay relevant, stay ready. ✨ Subscribe to Unpopular Decisions to hear more stories from first generation professionals betting on themselves (Youtube [https://www.youtube.com/@unpopulardecisions] | LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/company/unexpected-collective] | Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/unpopulardecisionspod/] | | Website [https://unpopulardecisions.com/]) ✨ Follow Bie Aweh's journey on Instagram @allhailqueenbie [https://www.instagram.com/allhailqueenbie/] ✨ Share this episode with the friend who’s feeling stuck with golden handcuffs The conversations on Unpopular Decisions are for informational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing in this episode constitutes financial, legal, or professional advice. Every situation is different. If you are navigating a significant career or financial decision, please consult a qualified professional who can speak to your specific circumstances. FMLA, Family and Medical Leave Act, provides eligible employees up to 12 weeks of job-protected leave. Eligibility requirements and paid leave provisions vary by state and employer. Consult your HR business partner for specifics.