40th Birthday Marks Turning Point
My greatest challenge, and greatest life, leadership and success lesson began on my 40th birthday way I was thrust from the mountain of success into a very dark valley. My birthday represented a giant fork or rut in the road of my personal life and my career. It was a time when the gold I had created by the sweat of my brow had turned to dust. I had not done anything to justify what had occurred. My birthday came to pass far, far away from the success, financial security, social capital and material comforts I had worked so very hard to achieve and acquire.I landed far, far, away from my former success as CEO of a successful multi-million dollar company, and the accoutrements of success I had taken for granted. I faced a life crucible, an event of nightmarish proportion, that took me from the mountain of success to ground zero where I had to start my life and my career again. While I had overcome incredible hurdles to build a formidable career, the hurdles that I faced on my 40th birthday took me to the abyss where survival itself was in question.
I spent my fortieth birthday in a dark valley that was my greatest challenge and my greatest teacher, doing the most menial of jobs… cleaning toilets. A life crucible, a crime, a tragedy had
