01 - What Happened to the America We Knew and How to Get it Back!
THE RESILIENT PATH: Forging Your Unshakable Life
I’m a middle-class American of Scottish-English-Native American descendancy, born in a mid-western town in the late 1960’s - an era where honesty, trust, and virtue were a norm. It wasn’t perfect, but life was generally good. EVERY town had a hardware store, a drug store, gas station, and restaurant. Everyone in town knew the owners and understood the importance of the services and goods those businesses brought to the local community. Small regional radio stations were commonplace.
Long-standing manufacturing businesses and household names such as Allis-Chalmers in SE Wisconsin employed tens of thousands of Americans, and was a beacon of innovation, powering American farms and industrial equipment. Public utilities such as Commonwealth Edison (a regulated monopoly) and manufacturers like Allis-Chalmers were the pillars of American greatness.
Across America, starting in the late 70’s/early 80’s, companies like Allis-Chalmers were slowly replaced by just a few large, private corporations through corruption, political lobbying, massive regional-then-national consolidation, de-regulation, off-shoring and other slow-moving, erosive currents. For myself and the rest of the American population, those currents have resulted in a hyper-consolidation of wealth in fewer hands, ecological destruction, two-tier legal system, widespread addiction to technology/substance abuse/pornography, continuous loss of dollar purchasing power, depletion of nutrients in food, intense urbanization, electricity monopolies, commodity-education, out-of-control property tax bills, and media monopolies.
What we have witnessed is a slow-motion collapse of our rural communities and private small businesses which has resulted in a fragile, on-edge, potentially perilous situation for the average American quality of life – most don’t even know it, some don’t care and the few that do care, don’t really know how to fix it.
I was blessed and am grateful to have had highly respected parents in our community when I was growing up. They set an outstanding example for me to follow. They supported and guided me through all the ups and downs of my life. Although I made so many mistakes, I learned, was taught, and know how to win!
I'm grateful to have experienced being:
an exceptional high-honor-roll student
a tall, good-looking, but foolish young man who made MANY mistakes
an extremely gifted, natural athlete - in 1987, at 18 years of age, 6’5” and 235 lbs, I consistently ran a 4.5-4.6 second 40-yard dash! Rare at that time for a young man of my size.
a high-school Academic All American (thank you for the nomination Richard Hyde, may you RIP)
a championship baseball player scouted for 10 years by several MLB teams and drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays at the age of 18
a devoted husband (I unfortunately failed the first time)
a good father, but like most made many mistakes, but always has had the best intentions
an Information Technology Systems Engineer and Architect for 30-years, innovating with some of the world’s largest, most advanced, state-of-the-art technology providers like Sun Microsystems, EMC, Oracle, Netapp, StorageTek, MTI, OpenVision/Veritas, Commvault, Citrix, Netware, Nutanix, HP, IBM, Sybase, Informix, SuperMicro, Onshape, Autodesk, Solidworks, PTC, Clearcase and Xyvision.
a manager of multi-million-dollar, audited budgets
a second-generation business operator of a 54-year-old business (thank you Mom, Dad and our clients)
a visionary entrepreneur
gifted with the ability to see trends of things to come 8-10 years in advance (until recently, it's been more of a curse than a blessing!)
a close collaborator with more than a dozen of the top global minds in their areas of expertise: Oracle’s Ecosystem, Highly Available Computer Systems with Zero Downtime, Diesel Engines, Utility Scale Power Generation/Distribution, State-of-the-art Trading Systems & Algorithms, Fisheries Ecosystem Biology, Maritime Navigation & Operations, Construction (Bridges, Skyscrapers, Power Plant), Water Treatment Methods, Holistic Wellness, Dentistry, etc.
I’ve applied this winning and losing experience to being a tenacious entrepreneur who’s determined to change the world for the better. I’ve also figured out the unique value of major failure and total loss.
Speaking of experience, here's an example of my father's unique mentoring style:
In the early 1980's, on a crisp, cold, raw, January winter day with 10-15' waves, 32 miles out in the middle of Lake Michigan (think "Deadliest Catch") - out of the blue, while pulling up nets, my father looked at me and asked me the most peculiar question: "son, do you know what the best experience is?".
As a young teenage boy going through puberty, I'm thinking to myself my father is going to give me some invaluable advice about dating or the birds and the bees. He waited and watched me contemplate a possible answer, any answer, to this strange question - and after about 10 seconds when I didn't respond, he answered it for me: bad experience.
The cliffhanger of all cliffhanger questions from a father to his teenage son and all I got was "bad experience"?
It left an impression on me - so much so, to this day I vividly remember his face as he told me those words, and how I felt.
Little did I realize how right he was and how much I've come to appreciate his words of wisdom that day.
Knowing what I know, he was not only right, he was so right.
Good experience is great, but bad experience is invaluable – it’s what teaches us emotionally-charged life lessons that make us who we are! It’s also why we so vividly remember very specific childhood experiences.
Being over 50 years old, I’ve witnessed how many people keep repeating the same life experience over and over again until in an instant they “realize” and “decide” that they must do something different to improve their situation!
The life lesson I learned from these observations was how to fail fast and small, minimizing the disruption to my life and degradation of my health.
To top it all off, I learned in my early 40’s the real value of human mortality and how precious life and our time on earth is.
I experienced several life-altering events in the span of two short years:
- I survived and finalized a multi-year, brutal divorce after 17 years of marriage
- A catastrophic truck wreck
- A near miss by inches from a falling 70’ Sweetgum tree
- I survived brain cancer after the removal of a stage 4 golf ball-sized brain tumor attached to my brain stem.
These two years felt like an eternity!
Pictures are worth 1000 words:
Above are several pics of the truck after the accident – it, coupled with divine intervention, saved my life. If you were ever a member of the military, you know the EXTREME force required to compromise the structural integrity of this vehicle!
In a split second I saw the tree falling towards me...and with a few giant strides, made it to safety in the garage as it hit!
Here's an example MRI of what I saw when I was diagnosed with an acoustic neuroma on my left side. Mine was too far along to be a candidate for radiation therapy and it had to be surgically removed.
Sample image from https://www.aboutcancer.com/
I am blessed to have an angel on my shoulder - I survived the multi-year, chronic, high-intensity stress of the divorce and destruction of relationships with my children, I walked away with a small scratch from the car wreck, escaped within inches of being crushed by the tree and made nearly a 100% recovery from the brain surgery.
Unfortunately, the brain surgery was a rough ride. The surgery induced 24x7 vertigo for 6 months, required I re-learn how to walk, re-learn how to speak, re-learn how to type and re-learn how to hear the location of voices and noises (I temporarily lost my “stereo” hearing). This was all due to the required disruption of my hearing, balance and facial nerves to perform the surgery.
After the vertigo subsided, I made an exceptionally quick recovery over several months in spite of all the “odds” due to much of what I share in this book.
I understand adversity, tenacity, recovery and resiliency!
If you think for a second, I survived this alone, you’re sorely mistaken. The value of a devoted spouse, family, friends, community and collaboration to my recovery and the path to a resilient life will become clear in later chapters.
Somewhere along the way, I figured out two of the mandatory requirements for getting America back to where it used to be: personal resiliency and personal responsibility.
This book and other works in the Resilient Path series provide a frame of reference from personal experiences and use of The Resiliency Code - demonstrating why these two key personal attributes above are required to travel The Resilient Path.
I’ve observed how incredibly fragile we as Americans have become. Whether it’s emotions, mental health, physical health, bad decisions, rabbit-holes of assumptions, poor communication, unhealthy relationships, leveraged finances, toxic work environment, food/drug/porn/gaming/social media addictions, living conditions or vehicle driving habits, there’s typically several issues facing all of us at any given time.
For instance, have you ever seen what happens when the power goes out at a store and it will only accept cash instead of cards? It’s incredible – people complain and/or walk out since 60-70% nowadays pay with a card of some sort.
People who are used to paying with cash don’t miss a beat!
I also figured out that we have voluntarily been convinced or duped to abdicate or subrogate most of the essential responsibilities in our lives! Attorneys, Investment Brokers, Accountants, School Boards, Teachers, Doctors, Mechanics, and HOAs are just a few examples...
Having come to this realization, and after more than a decade of searching, I could not find a comprehensive, well-researched, practical, action-oriented “framework” for re-empowering myself and others in such a way where we could collaborate and quickly revitalize American rural communities.
Given the size of the task and fact that an effective framework did not exist, after much personal reflection and discussion with family, close friends, and dozens of professional colleagues - myself and co-creator Nicole Connor decided to develop one.
This is how to get America back to what it was (and better) – but it will require commitment, resources, leadership and action to restore American resiliency!
It's called The Resiliency Code - a literal operating system for unshakable individual resilience.
This individual resilience equates to:
- pre-empting obstacles by seeing them with clarity
- achieving sustainable momentum (not burning out and starting over)
- transformation without crisis (moving out of the intentional destruction and re-build model in place today)
A revitalization can happen, one person at a time, each at their own pace and way!
Throughout this book you’ll find my personal experiences which reveal the simple, small steps to take now to be one of these people and contribute to an American Renaissance that lasts for generations.
Step out of the Victim, Villain, Hero loop, utilize The Resiliency Code and create your own Resilient Path.
Sign up to be notified when The Resiliency Code Handbook is available (free for all of The Resiliency Code Substack subscribers):
At https://theresiliencycode.substack.com you’ll find the experience, observations and resources to support your journey to being resilient.
Next: 02: When They Come Thirsty: Preparing for the Water Crisis No One Wants to Discuss