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CHAPTER 1
COLLISION COURSE
I was thirty-six years old and about to make more money than I'd ever dreamed. Still, I'd never felt more hopeless, more desperate, or more bankrupt.
My situation had been three years in the making — three years of nonstop work, meetings, and cross-country travel, all in pursuit of the glorious dollar. Yet my culminating moment of crisis was so startling that, on this frightening day in the fall of 1984, I couldn't move. Physically, I suppose I could have. Maybe. But mentally and emotionally? I was immobilized.
What I was dealing with, no fortune could fix. And for possibly the only time in my life to that point, the dollars didn't matter. They weren't even part of the equation. Suddenly, I wanted to be well, not wealthy.
In this terrifying turn of events, I would've given every penny that was coming to me if only I could have myself back.
Working My Plan
I'd prepared myself for business success my entire life. At age six, I aspired to own a men's clothing store because the man who ran the one in my little Texas town was the only entrepreneur I knew. Through high school, I racked up a full list of extracurricular activities.
First and foremost, I got involved in almost every service organization and school club possible — and sought to be a leader in each of them. I became president of my class, vice president of the student body, treasurer of the Key Club, and was a regular at church, among a lot of other activities. But one issue always hindered me when it came to my choices: I was an extreme people pleaser.
In situation after situation, group after group, I wanted the accomplishment but never the heat. For example, I turned down the chance to be Key Club president because it might mean making decisions that would offend people. Being class president didn't really involve any controversy; it was mostly a social position, so I was safe there. And of course, being vice president of anything meant the president was calling the real shots.
This was an insecurity I took with me into college and beyond.
When I went to Lamar University, I chose my major — and even predetermined my graduating grade point average — at the advice of my neighbor, an oil refinery plant manager who probably had the biggest job in my hometown of Texas City, Texas. He told me, "Study engineering; there's good money in that. And make at least a 3.0 grade point average so you can stand out."
And so I did.
When it came to grades, I was capable of better — I had nearly perfect math scores on my pre-college SATs — but in my mind, to do anything more academically was a waste of time. Why read an entire book when I could find summaries in the library and make "good enough" grades?
School was just a means to an end. The activities were my focus — serving as vice president of my fraternity and student president of the engineering department, and running a coin-operated foosball-table business in fraternity houses and beer joints for extra income. As my final semester of college approached, I knew what grades I needed for a 3.0, so I decided ahead of time that I would make two As and two Bs — just enough to reach the goal. And sure enough, I graduated with a 3.01.
During those four years I did a lot of notable things, the best of which was marrying my high school sweetheart, Doris, my junior year. But I never did feel at peace about me. I was always in a hurry to get somewhere and impress somebody, though I couldn't say where or who. Nevertheless, I believed that my future in business was bright and that my greatest successes were just around the corner.
Driving Hard and Fast
My first job after college was as a maintenance foreman at the agrochemical giant Monsanto. It wasn't my first choice — I really wanted a sales job — but when none was offered, I went back to Texas City where I knew people. Within two years, after working my way up from maintenance to pollution engineer, Monsanto transferred me to sales.
For the first six months or so of sales training, they didn't want me selling anything; I was just supposed to watch, listen, and learn from their team. This was very frustrating for me because I was interested in "doing." With a wife and a baby girl, Tanya, at home, I wanted to be let loose so I could start making big money. My boss, though, kept putting on the brakes. He went so far as to specifically tell an overly eager me, "Just continue your training, Terry; no selling for now."
In my zeal, however, I rushed ahead and didn't listen. I'm fortunate I didn't get fired, because I actually set up a client meeting, drove to the big city (Houston), and took a blank contract with me, hoping to snag my first deal.
The customer was willing to sign. I was so excited!
When I asked for the official name of his company for the paperwork, the man answered, "Dresser, Inc."
My embarrassing reply? "I didn't know you were also in the ink business." (Can you tell I never earned an MBA?)
Somehow I managed to recover from that blunder and was successively promoted four times in six years. I loved the marketing and sales work, and evidently it showed, because corporate kept giving me more responsibility. I even grew a mustache on my baby face in order to be taken seriously as a negotiator of deals.
In time, however, my job became so stressful that it affected my health. I mostly suffered from indigestion, which maybe isn't a big deal when you're fifty, but it was pretty significant for me as a twenty-six-year-old. The company awarded me a $2,000 bonus for my work on a successful deal. It was the first bonus I'd ever received. Yet as grateful as I was for the money, it didn't relieve my health issues. Finally, after several months of trying to juggle everything, I reluctantly gave back one of the product lines I was managing — it was just too much for me.
One year later I received a big promotion, and the family and I moved from St. Louis to San Jose, California, where I served as regional manager for petrochemicals. Regional sales were small enough that I also made sales calls. One of my frequent calls was to a super successful entrepreneur out of Las Vegas named Ken. Gravitating toward entrepreneurs as I did, I was in awe of Ken and his lifestyle. He and his colleagues were not only inventors but innovators — the company founder had invented the Styrofoam "clamshell" for burgers that revolutionized fast-food packaging back in the '70s — and they'd all made a fortune. Someday soon, I hoped I could do something revolutionary myself and enjoy the payday that came with it.
Scratching the Itch
My sales roles meant traveling. A lot. Which meant being away from my young family, which had recently expanded with the birth of our daughter Jeannie, for days at a time. I was doing breakfasts, lunches, and dinners with clients, leaving me with nothing but fumes for my wife and kids.
Not surprisingly, Doris and I were struggling. Between my job and my excessive drive to succeed, I was essentially forcing Doris to be a single mom during the week and then expecting her to be an attentive wife on the weekends — never mind that I had very little left for her!
I was putting our marriage in jeopardy, but I was too focused on my pursuit of success to admit it.
A year and a half later, in 1979, I was transferred back to Houston as a manager in Monsanto's biggest petrochemical region. Doris says of me at that time: "Whatever role Terry was in, he was always looking at what hat he would wear next."
That's true. And now that I'd experienced the corporate world, the hat I most wanted to try was that of entrepreneur. My childhood itch for having my own company had never gone away. If anything, the itch was getting harder to ignore. I yearned for my own thing, not another position buried within the hierarchy of a huge conglomerate.
The secure paycheck had been a blessing in the early years of my career while Doris and I started a family. However, I was well aware that the only way you make money in a Fortune 100 environment such as Monsanto is to climb the ladder. As I looked to the rungs above me, I saw no future: I wanted neither my boss's job, nor his boss's job, nor his boss's job! So I resigned and, as a next step, switched to a smaller company. I joined a privately owned, Houston-based refinery, eager for a new challenge and excited to learn the oil business. Unfortunately, three months after I changed jobs, President Reagan decontrolled oil, and the company I was with quickly started bleeding red ink. Heeding the writing on the wall, I kept my ear to the ground for another job, and within several months I was able to join Ken in an energy-marketing company that he was starting.
Ken and I had stayed in touch after I'd left California, and the timing of his business launch was perfect. Most important to me were the opportunities to have unlimited income potential and to be involved from the ground floor. It was like kerosene to my entrepreneurial fire.
Addicted to Success
Our business was a zoo. And Ken was brilliant.
He was also an unbelievably driven man who demanded perfection.
My addiction to success and my lust for money couldn't have been a better match for this startup world. I did deals all day long. When one was done, I was already anticipating the next three or four, absolutely absorbed with the prospects and possibilities of more. Like twenty-four-hour talk radio, my mind never turned off. Neither did Ken's. He and I would be on the phone at least an hour every day (on landlines, no less!), sometimes late into the night, no matter what time zone either of us was in.
All our overtime hours helped the company grow rapidly. With four regional offices, money was rolling in fast. Ken eventually awarded me a 10 percent share in the company and designated me second-in-command. His office was in Vegas, and I was in Houston; between us, we ran it all.
To keep up with the excessive demands of our increasing client base and manage our entire staff of more than 150 employees nationwide, I had to be constantly on the go. Yet there was more to my frenzy than "keeping up"; I was also trying to make my relentless business partner happy — and fuel my own need to be noticed.
The pace was wearing me out. Even worse, my neglect of my wife and daughters was becoming a way of life. Each night during the workweek, Doris would prepare my dinner on a mustard-colored plate, along with dinner for her and the girls, and then set it aside for whenever I got home. Most nights, my dining-room chair remained empty until long after their dinner was done.
I was absent so much that when my eldest, Tanya, would check the stands at her grade-school gymnastics meets, the question in her mind was always: Is Dad here? Did he make it? She never doubted whether she'd see her mom or her younger sister, Jeannie. But too often I was barely on time, if I made it at all.
I missed out on a lot during those years. My family, though, paid the biggest price, enduring broken promises, scrapped plans, and a lot of disappointment while I chased down the next dollar. Sometimes it was smaller neglects, such as promising Doris or the girls early in the week, "We'll go to a movie on Saturday," and then being too exhausted to follow through on the weekend. But I also ignored my family's needs in much bigger ways, such as when our seven-year-old, Jeannie, kept asking me to help with her math homework, which was my specialty. Rather than giving her my time, which is what she really wanted, I opted for a more "convenient" solution that would let me stay focused on my plans: "I'll hire you a tutor, honey." (Naturally, she declined.)
Another time, about thirteen years into our marriage, Doris had major surgery, and I actually told her, "I'll come with you to the hospital, but I will have to leave later and let your mom take care of you. There's a cocktail party scheduled, and lots of industry people will be there."
Things between Doris and me had been strained for a long time, to say the least. In my obsession with work, I denied what I was doing to us and blamed her for our problems. In truth, no matter what she tried, I didn't please easily. She would buy me clothes (I don't know how many pairs of blue jeans she picked out for me), but none of them were ever quite right. Instead of affirming everything she did to keep our home a loving, organized, life-giving place, I would pressure her — "Join the Junior League; get out of the house and volunteer" — because I thought that was the image we needed to have.
It was so unfair. Doris was focused on what really mattered — being a remarkable parent to our girls, serving as taxi driver and disciplinarian and helper as our daughters needed in my absences — and I wanted her attending swanky luncheons and hobnobbing with Houston's elite.
She admits now that she never felt good enough in those days. What woman would, with a husband who treated her as I did?
It wasn't only her, though; I was never satisfied with anything. Not the car I drove, or the deals I made, or the nice house we owned. No matter how good things got, no matter how well I or anyone else did, it was never enough — never good enough — in my eyes.
My perspective was so messed up that one time, before leaving on a business trip, I told Doris over lunch, "I'm not sure I love you anymore."
She shot back, "Yes, you do; you're just confused."
"It was a God thing that I stayed," she says now. "My role was being a mother to our precious girls and providing as happy of a home for them as I could — and that included staying married to Terry."
Running Scared
I understand now that at the root of my perpetual discontentment was the perpetual fear that I wasn't good enough; that no one — my parents, my business partner, my wife or daughters or anyone else — could ever accept me unless I kept achieving and accumulating. I was essentially running scared, trying to outdo whatever I'd done the day before in hopes of silencing, once and for all, the insecurities that had been driving my decisions since childhood. Yet each day was the same as the one before: somebody would be upset or another deal awaited or there was money to be made — and somehow, the more I was so fanatically pursuing was never sufficient. Around and around I went, ever circling but never reaching a place where I could catch my breath and freely enjoy the view. Instead, I drove myself harder and justified my absences and nonstop activity as righteous sacrifices backed by the best of intentions.
The millions I'll make will provide every material thing my family could want. That was how I consoled myself. Deep down, though, I was a people-pleasing, money-chasing little boy — and no amount of cash or accomplishment was going to change that.
I had entered myself in an impossible race I couldn't win. A race with no finish line and no water breaks. The only break I ever took was on Sunday mornings, when I would pause long enough to attend Bible class and church with my family. I did this every week. This wasn't a matter of heartfelt commitment; it was more of the same old thing: more about appearances and trying to gain favor with God (and maybe with my wife too). Deep inside, I was telling myself, See? I'm a good man! And a good Christian. And that's what I wanted everyone else to think. But as soon as church was done, I was back to the real me — the me that couldn't stay off the gerbil wheel.
I just wouldn't stop. I'd envisioned being an entrepreneur for far too long. What's more, I had forfeited my career track at Monsanto for this chance. I figured, The hours are simply the price you pay to be in business.
My "Crazy Days"
As I went faster and faster on this track with no restraint whatsoever, Doris saw me deteriorating before her eyes. She remembers that during my "crazy days," the pink phone slips we used were constantly falling out of my pockets — reminders of calls I needed to make and people I needed to see. Even so, Doris was helpless to stop the madness because I wouldn't admit the extreme pressure I was feeling. Given my mindset at the time, to admit anything like that would have amounted to a betrayal of my dreams.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Sacred Pace"
by .
Copyright © 2019 Terry Looper.
Excerpted by permission of Thomas Nelson.
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