I wish I had your job

Wow to get a statement like that. I wish I was like you or had your life. How can you ask for more than that?

This could be construed as a cocky attitude but you know, LIFE IS SHORT and life is what we make of it.

What I would have never imagined is that sitting in that foxhole circa 1991 during Desert Storm with my "Ranger Buddy" that he would have ever said something like I "envy" what you have. Rewind over 20 years ago we are 20 something kids sitting side by side for 12 hours a day. We shared dreams and goals, we read books, and discussed politics, religion, life and childhood. What an amazing 20 years! Now he is a super duper engineer with a government position and I am a self made, do it all entrepreneur.  Earlier this year we get together and I get the comment "I wish I had your life". At first this was just brushed off, as looking at my life as it's just nothing special. I'm here doing what I do. But........

Looking further as how others see you and your life compared to theirs you can see that a life lived in someone else's shoes is no life at all. You have to live your own life and if someone looks up to you or at your current state of affairs in a positive light this could be a good thing. What I'm trying to say is don't take a little comment like "I wish I had you life" as something small. This is a life changing event.

Two lives stuck in a fox hole. Can we imagine that they turned out exactly how we imagined? Personally I can't see that I imagined where I would be at this time and place. Who exactly could do that? Though what I can say is that I can say I am glad how my side turned out and that I'm not the one who commented that "I wish I had your life".

The turning point in my life started in 1998, when I decide that I wanted to take control of my own destiny. Deciding that I'm sick and tire of being sick and tired (even before Dave Ramsey coined the phrase). Taking control of your own future, your own finances are something that anyone can do.

My journey started on a warm summer day in 1998. We were living in Jacksonville Alabama and I was going to school to become a machinist. As I was on my motorcycle that day I didn't want to go straight home so I cruised around to do some thinking. I wanted to have some sort of hobby, but one that didn't cost money. That made me think that I needed to check out the bookstore, which I promptly headed that direction. After going up and down the isles I found the business and investing section and started browsing the titles. That's it! I said, investing doesn't cost you money it makes you money. I selected a couple of books and headed home to read. What I found was that it took money to make money and I had very little of it. Since getting out of the Army in 1996 we were a one paycheck family and it was hard to save anything "extra" to get started investing.

This brought me to the conclusion that we had to lower our bills and expenses in order to start saving to invest. I was also working a part-time job while going to school. Every little bit helped! Eventually we reduced some bills and had a few thousand dollars in the bank. What I found is that this is not an overnight process. Staying are track was hard but within a year we managed to have about 6,000 in the bank which I decided to take 3000 and open a mutual fund account. I continued to build this up and invest. But it seemed that there was always something missing. Some type of investment that I had control over.

Over the next several years I search, learned and continued to gain knowledge in finance and investing. We moved from Alabama to El Paso, TX and I was without a job. When you are a military spouse it's hard to have a steady career since you have to move ever couple years. You get established then Bam, military orders come for another part of the country or even worse overseas. After leaving Alabama my interest in finance continued to grow and I decided that I wanted to become a financial planner or a stock broker. (This was during the height of the dot come boom) and everyone wanted to get in on the game. It was easy to make money then, just buy a stock and it went up. A found an ad in the paper for financial planners, and the name of the company was Waddell & Reed. So I applied for a job, had to take a few tests and do an interview. I scored good on the test, but during the interview the interviewer determined since I was new in town, I didn't have enough contacts to build a business portfolio. Basically I didn't have enough friends to push their crappy investments on. Looking back I'm so thankful I didn't get hired, it would suck to become a financial planner now a days, folks are losing money left and right, no one knows who the Government is going bail out or not. Many folks have seen their retirement savings dwindle down to just a fraction of what they thought they had, not to mention all the people that took equity out on their homes thinking it was like a bank account.

Being bummed, but not ready to give up I kept on searching for that perfect opportunity that I really would enjoy. I wanted a "JOB" that I could take with me, do from anywhere, and help other people. One day I was looking for some oil to use in my F150 pickup truck. I had already been using synthetic oils, Castrol Syntec to be exact. I had always known that synthetics were superior to conventional oils, but didn't know how long you could go. Everyone would say you could go 5,000 miles instead of 3,000. I thought synthetics have to be better than that. I ran across this guy spouting off about this 25,000 mile oil, AMSOIL to be exact. I thought well, that's a little too far fetched, but was intrigued to learn more. After some research and coaching from the dealer that turned me on to the product I decided to take the plunge. I used the products in my truck with some skepticism. I kept doing more research and finding out that this product really lives up to it's claims.

Now the big thing that hit me, it was so big I couldn't sleep at night for weeks, and I had the excitement of 10 year old on Christmas eve. What did I find out? What did learn about this amazing synthetic oil? I learned that you can sell the products through a business opportunity. You could become an Independent Business owner. Wow I thought, this is a product that would help every car on the road. AMSOIL is a product that I could sell. Next step was to get started, I had no prior sales experience. What I did have was a burning desire to do something, to figure out a way to get these products in the hands of as many people as possible. Right off the bat I started reading the business manual (how to get started) and I started reading books on sales, listening to tapes, and learning about the sales process. It really came quite natural to me, and once I understood a little about the products (Features and Benefits) I was off to the races. Beginning with my first retail account E-Z Rider motorcycle shop on Dyer St in El Paso. My goal was to cover up El Paso with AMSOIL. Prior to my arrival I don't believe there were any retail places to purchase products. Within 1 year you could find over 25. Hows that for success. Not to mention the many, many individual customers that I worked with.

When I found this business I really didn't understand the power of duplication. I was a do it by my self if you wanted it done right type of guy. I was out there doing it all and really didn't want to hassle with someone else. After reading many books on the subject of MLM or Multilevel marketing I started to understand that really it's not about me, but more about helping someone else. Helping another individual have the opportunity to succeed and become independent - not dependent on their employer for that paycheck. Or not relying on the Government, Social Security, or any other form of handout to survive. Little did I realize back then how important this would be a short 10 years latter. There are millions of people out of work right now for extended periods of time. I've helped many people start and build a successful home based business and to this day they are glad they started. There are dealers that are not looking back wishing they had a JOB to go back to. The feeling of freedom from that slave of a job is hard to describe. What I can tell you, if my business went away tomorrow, is that it would be aweful hard to go back to the work force. Starting, running, and building a home based business has been a rewarding experience which I'm positive will continue to get even better. Just now as I've been helping others succeed in this business I've watch people that I've never met before start out, and become friends and business partners with us. I've help other dealers in our team achieve financial success and grow.

What I hope to do with this blog is allow you to see that working with a company and product that you can truly believe in can change your life. Maybe you don't see yourself as a salesperson.  I can tell you this, when you have a high quality product, a great company and support from your friends and family anything can be possible. I never had any desire to work in sales, but once I made the commitment to become a business owner I learned all I could about sales and networking. You could do the same. 

So how do you get the statement from a long time friend "I wish I had your job"? You work hard, help others, be kind, and have fun.

Now it's up to you to take the next step.

Michael Sparks--Entrepreneur