Making sacrifices, decisions, and not giving up even when the road ahead is all uphill.

      Most of you know that I've trained horses for the last 35 years.  My grandfather got me addicted to them when I was a little boy and I've never been able to kick the habit.  It is not as glamorous a career as most people believe.  Its dirty, the hours are long, the work is hard, there is no map to build a successful business from scratch, the operating expenses are exceedingly high, and the pay is dismal.  If you get the opportunity to ride and train a good one, there is nothing like it on earth.  I've been lucky enough to have several good ones.  Some Great, some not so great, I've had good customers and bad, and I've had bad moments as a trainer.  I always knew at some point I would have to have an exit strategy because successfully retiring from the horse business is rare.  I've watched some the the most successful and talented horse trainers finish out their years living on the welfare of others.  I knew that was not how I wanted to finish out my golden years.

     When I turned 45, which was my target date for exiting the horse business I was training and showing one of the finest horses that I've ever had.  It was a great year and I accomplished the goals that I had set for myself early in my career.  It was time for me to leave.  My parents never wanted me to train horses,  they wanted a better professional career for me.  My partner at the time hated it.  I was gone to much, we lived too far from town, it was dirty, and no amount of income was enough.  I decided it was time to make a change.  Some of you may be wondering why this is such a big deal.  The answer is simple.  When you've trained horses all of your adult life, you don't have much of a resume,  you see, Human resource departments don't consider "playing with animals" as job experience.  Balancing the books, paying bills, constant travel, insurance, veterinary issues, don't count for much in the HR World.  The job market was full of $10/ per hour jobs.  You know I like to drive my race car and that doesn't pay the bills let alone supply enough income for any extra hobbies. I had to have a plan.  If nothing else I needed some kind of professional experience to put on a resume.  That's when and why I started Arizona Motorsports Connection e magazine. It wasn't much, it was fun, and it supplied me with the opportunity to move up into operating and managing Rebound Magazine,  the official magazine of the NBA retired players association, which in turn allowed me the opportunity to become the operations manager for Moxie Distribution.  I could have stayed at Moxie until the end except for the good cop bad cop management style of the two owners and this year the day before my birthday I became the 4th employee in less than three years to look for employment elsewhere.  I lasted longer than all the others combined.  During that time I also decided that it was time to find some personal happiness in my life.  It was time for me to either live on my own, or find somebody in my life that was willing to accept me through the good and the bad and be willing to wait until I finished my transformation from horse trainer to business professional.  My mother retired from Farmers Insurance Group, and my partner Mark was the state sales coordinator for Aflac when he passed away.  I had considerable exposure to the insurance industry and I decided I was going to study and get my insurance license.  While that may not seem to be a big deal for most of you it has required considerable energy and time on my part.  I am a chronic test taking failure.

     However actually getting your license is just the start.  Actually becoming a contracted agent frankly is one colossal major pain in the ass.  The major players in the industry make you take more tests, personality, word problems, word associations, one had a section with nothing but algebra equations and one more wanted you to rank how you felt after reading a sentence.  Most wanted you to sign agreements binding you to them financially for at least 6 years, they will give you operating money but the payback is brutal.

     I am please to announce today that I have signed a contract to work for Physicians Mutual Insurance.  Initially I will sell Life,  Medicare supplement,  Dental, Supplemental Heath, Accident, Annuities,  and Funeral Planning.  I am hoping to have found a place to land and finish out my employment years.

     I have gone back to training horses during this time to supplement my income and I could not have done this without the encouragement and support of my customers and I wish to thank Brian for his endless words of encouragement and support.  He encouraged me to leave Moxie when the working conditions turned to shit and he has encouraged me to study, not give up, and to "go for it" while I have tried to reinvent myself in the professional career market.  I could not have done it without him.
     I am looking forward to my new adventure both Professionally and Personally.