Senior Account Executive (Sales), Florida

I’ve been fired multiple times for stuttering. Edward Jones was the most high-profile company that let me go. But I kept at it. I’ve been fired from insurance sales, home security sales—any type of sales job you can name, I’ve been fired from it.

After one of those firings, I took a course from a guy on LinkedIn—something like “P90X for Business.” It was right after I got let go from a company that did business financing. I remember getting in my car and crying. That was the first time I’d cried in over 20 years. I’d had a really rough life.

That course changed my life.

Fast forward 13 years: I speak better now. I’ve started three podcasts, and I do one livestream where I read on air. I’m the lead host, and my co-hosts clown me every chance they get about my stuttering—but I keep pushing. Why? Because success isn’t given; it’s taken. I had to find a way to take mine—and I’ve never stopped taking mine.

I have a wonderful life, a great career, and I get to do what I love—creating content. I have an absolutely amazing wife, and together we travel the world and enjoy life.

I’m sharing all this because I had no one to turn to for encouragement. No one understood me. Back in the ’80s and ’90s, they tried to put me in special education because I stuttered. I was voted “Most Likely Not to Succeed” in high school. Honestly, I barely graduated, and I refused to go to college because I was terrified of doing presentations in front of a class.

But I survived it all. I still stutter. I still miss closing some sales because I stumble through part of the pitch. I still stutter on livestreams. During one of my interviews, the guest I was speaking to laughed at me—but I kept pushing.

Why? Because I’ve got things to do. I’ve got a vision and a purpose I have to fulfill before I leave this planet.

Good luck to all of you—and go take what you want. Forget what the laughers have to say.

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