Life…It’s Precious

I was in a 7:30 AM meeting the other morning. It was fascinating. I was listening to a doctor talk about the heart. He said that our hearts beat over 100,000 times per day. He had met with an 80-year-old patient earlier that week who had a leaking heart valve. The doctor did the math and discovered that this 80-year-old patient’s heart had beat over 3.3 billion times and was still going.

The doctor showed us a diagram of the heart; its valves, the blood system, veins and arteries, and shared with us that the heart actually feeds itself first. Meaning, the heart pumps blood back into itself first to sustain life. That was intriguing to realize.

The heart takes care of itself first.

It reminds me of the stewardess on an airplane announcing that in the event of any loss of cabin pressure, an oxygen mask will drop from above and that we are supposed to put the mask on ourselves first, then our children, or others. Again, we must put the oxygen mask on ourselves first so that we are taken care of first.

Life can be very precious. Our perspectives change as we go through life experiences. Experiences, good or bad, if we let them, can give us greater clarity and understanding.

I had one of these “perspective changing” experiences recently.

It was a Tuesday morning. I was home almost walking out the door before leaving my house for work. I checked my phone for email and there it was. I stopped in shock and surprise; disbelief really. I had just received word that one of my clients had passed away. His sister-in-law had let me know that he died while surrounded by family earlier the prior morning.

He was a doctor, only 40 years old, married with three young children. He had lost his fight with stage 4 cancer. Not only was he a client, but he had become a friend.

What you don’t know is that three years prior he and I met and slowly began to put his financial house in order; his life insurance, his wealth strategies, his legacy plan, and systems that would not only allow him to grow more wealth, but at the same time protect his family from a premature passing.

At this time, he had no idea he would be dealing with cancer.

So there I was stunned by the news, thinking of his family, and feeling empathy and sorrow for their loss.

I also felt extreme gratitude that he had implemented my recommendation to put in place proper life insurance for this very situation. He had implemented his full Human Life Value. He had put in place the maximum amount of life insurance that he could get; permanent insurance and term insurance. He had economic certainty in his favor because of this plan.

He had taken care of himself first.

He had peace in his life to do the things he loved even before it was discovered that he had cancer. Why? Because he knew that he had the maximum benefit in his life and that he couldn’t do any better than the maximum.

I wrote an article a few months ago titled, Falling From the Sky, (you can read that article here).

I shared the story of my 16-year-old daughter wanting to go skydiving for her birthday…and she wanted me to go skydiving too. As a husband, and father of 5 children, I had originally told her no because of the worry of dying.

However, after thinking about it I made the decision to skydive with her. I wasn’t scared or fearful. I was excited! What helped with my decision was that I knew that if I did die, my family was protected.

I have a plan in place and that plan ensures that my family will be financially secure.

Just as my 40-year-old client had the maximum in his plan, I also own the maximum amount of life insurance possible. I do this for protection.

I’ve learned that protection leads to greater production. When you have the maximum, you have more certainty. This is the Security of Maximization.

Having the maximum amount of protection in your life, and this type of planning, will give you exponential peace of mind.

I’ve learned that it is better to go through life with peace of mind knowing that your financial house is in order. This will positively affect every other area of your life. It will act like a ripple effect that will consciously and subconsciously be a part of your existence.

We are all going to pass away. We may live a very long, fulfilling life. But, we might also pass away prematurely. Either way, we can plan.

Just as my 40-year-old doctor friend was able to do, your plan can include permanent whole life insurance. You can leverage the living benefits today, i.e. cash value, banking, guaranteed growth, etc., and leave a death benefit to your family as a legacy upon your passing.

 

Sincerely,

 

Barry Brooksby