He grew up in a town of 900 people, deep in the woods of Upstate New York. No money. No connections. No roadmap. At 12 years old, he made a decision — not a goal, not a wish — a decision: he was getting out.
Before the sun came up every Thursday, he pulled on a snowsuit and walked house to house, digging through neighbors' recycling bins for bottles and cans worth five cents each. His friends called him Garbage Boy. He kept going.
He wrote a letter to every college baseball coach within six hours of home. One condition: biggest scholarship wins. The University of Rochester said yes.
Years of fitting and starting followed — an accounting firm, DC, New York City, back to Albany. Chasing titles he thought would mean something.
At 38, he thought he'd found it. Chief Marketing Officer. Fast-growing startup. More money than he'd ever seen. He was miserable from day one. But he stayed — because of what it looked like from the outside.
Then came the board meeting. He made a comment. The CEO stopped, turned, and said: "Haven't you realized by now that you were a vanity hire?"
That moment became the foundation of his TEDx talk — Stop Living a Life You Didn't Choose — and everything that came after.
He's not at his peak yet. He'll tell you that himself. That's not false modesty. That's the whole point. The goal was never to arrive. It was to love the process of becoming.
Speaker · Author · Podcaster
