Podcast
From Human Question Mark To Exclamation Mark: A Miraculous And Inspiring Transformation With Don Woodring
Life is not without its curveballs. When you get hit, you either wallow in those moments or get back up and move on a little stronger and wiser. However, doing the latter might be easier said than done. So how do you get out of that funk? In this episode, Janet Hogan sits down with the CEO of Mentorship.CLUB, Don Woodring. Just when you think life could not get any worse, Don’s story shows how he has endured some of the toughest things life could ever throw at you, including over 2000 surgeries, from which his body carries thousands of scars. But as brutal as these health issues have been, his greatest obstacle is one that goes way deeper than any surgeon’s knife. Join in this conversation as Don shares the miraculous transformation that took him from a human question mark to an exclamation point! Find inspiration now!
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From Human Question Mark To Exclamation Mark: A Miraculous And Inspiring Transformation With Don Woodring
Do you ever find yourself in one of those wallowing moments where you genuinely feel sorry for yourself and you don’t know how to get out of that funk? You’re about to learn from someone who has every reason in the world to wallow in his particular brand of misfortune. He’s endured some of the toughest challenges life could ever throw at you including over 2,000 surgeries from which his body carries thousands of scars.
He knows what it’s like to suffer from muscular dystrophy, strokes, heart attacks, high blood pressure, osteoarthritis, skin cancer. He’s had both a kidney transplant, a pancreas transplant and gone through the trials of organ rejection. He lives with chronic pneumonia. He’s 100% deaf in his right ear and nearly in the other.
The list of obstacles this human pincushion has confronted brings to mind an image of a steeple place constantly having to face one hurdle after another where on any day, he wakes up not knowing if it’s going to be an okay day or yet another one that will see him end up on a hospital stretcher. As brutal as these health challenges have been, they’re not the toughest challenge he’s had to face. His greatest obstacle is one that goes way deeper than any surgeon’s knife. He’s going to share with us what that was and his enormous journey to overcome it. I’m honored to welcome Don Woodring, the CEO of Mentorship.CLUB to the show, welcome.
Thank you so much. It’s a pleasure to be on your podcast.
Thank you. Before we go to this greatest challenge, anyone reading that intro must be wondering that how can any single person be struck by many serious ailments in one lifetime? Can you share with us what happened to you in your childhood that resulted in many health issues later on in your life?
First of all, I never even told my personal story until now. Even my best friends did not know about my story. I just published it. That’s part of the reason for me even creating this Mentorship.CLUB business. My family was a little unusual as all families are. My mom was a drug addict and an alcoholic. She took all of his kids out to live in a place called Compton or Watts, California where a lot of seriously bad things happen to us.
My father then later came out and brought us back to Pennsylvania where we were raised. At that time, I remember I had an aunt who kept telling my parents that I was diabetic and that they should get me checked out. Where I grew up until if you’re a guy, you don’t go to the hospital. A lot of those were as a result of that not taking care of diabetes.
“Accept who you are. That’s an important thing for you to focus on.”
You said there are some pretty dark things that happened to you in your childhood. Are you happy to share what those things were?
When we went out to California, my mom was an alcoholic and a drug addict. She used to take us, kids, to bars when we were maybe 5, 6, 7. My two older sisters and I were born in 30 months. We were close together. My younger brother was born four years after I was born. She used to take us to bars and drink.
When she took us out to California. We used to go to sex and drug parties. There was incest. I hate the word sexual abuse but there was a lot of sexual abuse and those things. Those are some of the darkest things. In addition, when my sister and I used to walk to school, we used to have kids that were much older than us take knives to our throats for our lunch money. It was that kind of environment.
You grew up in a tough neighborhood. I imagine a lot of what you’ve recounted, maybe you weren’t aware of for a large part of your life. Is that right?
I would say that’s correct. When I was a younger guy, 16 to 18, I had a horrible temper. If you knew anybody who’s known me for years, they would not believe that I had a bad temper. That was all part of that because I didn’t recognize it and accept it.
That repressed rage comes bubbling to the surface at the slightest trigger.
You’re right about that.
I’m sure many people will relate to this. You mentioned to me that you came from a family that hated confrontation, hearing the truth and weren’t great at communication. That provided a context if you like for what would become the greatest obstacle that you had to encounter. All the health issues aside, the thing that was probably your biggest personal challenge. Can you speak to us about that, Don?
In my family, telling the truth or saying anything that happened inside our family was forbidden. That happened to me a couple of times. My mother would take me aside and tell me to never say anything again about that. What happens in our house, stays in our house. That’s the environment we grew up in. I was pretty good at compartmentalizing. That’s how I got through all of the sexual stuff earlier on, the incest and those things because I compartmentalize those. I also compartmentalize solutions. That was one of the ways I was able to get around that.
The other thing was I grew up in Central Pennsylvania and I was an athlete. I knew I was gay since I was thirteen. In my family, there was, “No way you can be gay. You couldn’t be gay.” In our culture in Central Pennsylvania in our little town, you cannot be an athlete and be gay. I wasn’t going to give up sports. My father used the N-word and the F-word and the gay vernacular frequently. There was no way I could have come out. If I would have come out, my parents clearly would have sent me away for electric shock therapy and the whole conversion and reparation therapy.
You describe your life as being a transformation from a human question mark to an exclamation mark. I want to know how you got to become an exclamation mark. You’ve created a backdrop that anyone would feel demoralizing and diminishing. How did you get to where you’re at today, Don?
Honestly, I’m the luckiest man in the world. I don’t think anybody can look at my background and say that I’m not the luckiest guy in the world. Let’s talk about the professional side. I was lucky that in spite of all those obstacles, I still won three state championships. I still took third in another championship in the state. I was selected for a scholarship to study abroad.
I was selected by a Fortune 500 company as their top national recruit. I became a country manager and a CEO of a public company when I was 29. A large part of that, thanks to some of the best mentors that I had. These were guys who were former CEOs and chairmen of Fortune 500 companies. They’re some of the brightest men I know. That has done a lot to help my career and be able to achieve the things I had.
It feels like it was this lurking shadow that must have been weighing heavily on you since the age of thirteen. What was the point where you allowed that part of you to break open? What was the catalyst for that?
After I got divorced from my ex-wife, which had nothing to do with the fact that I was gay, I still was dating women. I still tried to date women because it was mentally and emotionally difficult for me to accept the fact that I was gay. One day, I had this guy who asked me out on a date. It set me back on my heels but I accepted and we went out on a date. He became my first boyfriend. That was the catalyst for that. Shortly after that took place, I decided to come out of the closet to my family and my close friends. It took me a full year after I came out of the closet to accept the fact that I was gay and that was okay. That was a big burden.
I love the fact that you’re prepared to share this. I know that many people are living in that space of shame and fear. We all have different journeys and different paths. We all have different sources of shame whether it’s a sexual orientation, a feeling of failure on a business level or failure as a parent. Whatever it is, we have this dark secret that we’re custodians of. Our choice is do we continue to allow fear to rule our life? At some point, do we get out of that headspace and listen to the heart and let love rule? That’s what I learn when you share that story, love was speaking too loud. Is that right?
It certainly was. I had another boyfriend. I had a boyfriend for about six years. That was the progress there. The other thing that’s important to note is that the public company that I ran was this industrial business as you can get. They were not very gay-friendly. I never would have gotten that job if I would have been an out gay man, never in a million years, which means it had nothing to do with your talents and everything to do with your sexual orientation. The fear drove me and drives a lot of people even nowadays, which is unfortunate but it’s a reality.
I do work with Shadow integration. What fascinates me about that is that we tend to have a dark side which we’re scared of because we don’t know it. In fact, there’s nothing to be scared of. The fear itself is the delusion. Because that fear is compelling, it drives us into the overcompensating self. That overcompensating self can achieve a lot. You can achieve great things. The problem is it’s not sustainable. It does require almost superhuman effort.
At some point, our system whether it’s our physical system, emotional mental system or even our spiritual system, there’s enough already. “I want my life to feel a little bit easier, that happened without so much effort.” We hear people say, “I want to be in my flow and find peace.” We start to gravitate to that it is a natural gravity point, that central position. Our darkest thoughts about ourselves aren’t true and nor are our probably most overinflated and hyperinflated thoughts. The truth lies somewhere in the middle.
I’m a great fan of practical tools and guidance steps. In this space, most of us feel lost. Many people feel stuck and don’t know how to move forward with their lives. You shared with me these nine steps that you follow and promote. Could you run through those? For anyone reading, I encourage you to get a piece of paper and a pen to scribble these down because it’s a great recipe for becoming a human. Could you share those with us, Don?
These have taken me years and years to get through and then to amalgamate that into a certain number of steps and those things. Most of these are not in sequential order but the first one is the first thing you have to do, which is acceptance. I was able to accept all of those medical issues that I had with pretty much ease. For diabetes, I said, “Where’s the toughest place to get a shot?” They said, “Your stomach.” That’s the first shot I took. All of those things. The toughest one for me to accept was the fact that I was gay. Acceptance is a huge point and it’s got to be the first thing that you do.
The second thing is your attitude. You’ve got to take an attitude towards something in a more positive light even though it may not be a positive thing. For example, probably the biggest adjustment I had was when I lost my hearing in my right ear. I’m completely deaf in my right ear and I’ve lost a lot of hearing in my left ear. I used to sing. For me, that was a pretty big deal. I like to myself a certain period of time, which is 15 or 30 minutes to get over it. That one took me a couple of days. Another important point here is these are things that work for me and timelines that work for me. Also, it’s important that people do what’s right for them. I’m writing a book about these nine steps.
“You just can’t give up no matter what obstacles life throws at you.”
The other thing is the sense of humor. It is not in any way to degrade or to discount what’s happened to you. You’ve got to maintain a good sense of humor about everything. The other thing is to keep things in perspective. A lot of people forget to keep things in perspective and that’s one thing I learned young and I always try to do. For example, in my case, my muscular dystrophy is an annoyance. Even with that, I was able to win three state championships. I didn’t let it affect me in many ways but that’s because of my attitude and perspective. It wasn’t going to kill me and that’s the way I looked at a lot of these things in the future, “Are they going to kill me or not?”
The other thing that’s important is that somebody maintains a support group there to support you through the good and the bad. You will find out quickly who are your true friends that are going to support you and who won’t. The other thing is to not blame others. It’s easy to blame other people. For example, with my health issues, I could easily look at my parents and blame them. For not coming out of the closet, I can easily blame my parents. What I do is I put timelines in perspective. It wasn’t until 1978 that the American Medical Association said that being gay wasn’t a mental issue. They used to show in films in middle school and high school about what they would do to gay men. It was horrible and horrific. The other thing is not to blame other people.
The other thing that’s important is you have to have the drive to improve constantly. If you don’t have that drive to constantly improve, it’s like a business that doesn’t have sales. You can’t just maintain your top line, you’ve got to always grow your top line. It’s the same thing. There are two other things. One is to never be a victim. A lot of people say to me that I was such a victim. I completely discount that. There’s a huge difference in recognizing that you were victimized and acting being a victim. I refuse to be a victim. I will not be a victim. It took me a long time to realize and accept the fact that I was victimized but that’s different than being a victim.
The other thing is never to give up. You can’t give up. The time you give up is when everything goes away. Everything goes away if you give up. You’ve got to continue to fight. Sometimes that’s hard. Sometimes you have to regroup. Sometimes you need to say, “I’m going to take a day to get my thoughts back on track or to get my perspective right or to get my goals in shape.” Whatever it is, you’ve got to not give up. You’ve got to be committed to that. Those are the nine steps.
Thank you so much for sharing that. You are a living and breathing example of those steps. It’s interesting. What makes a victim and what makes someone who is not a victim? You’re being judged on what’s happened to you but not how you’ve responded to it. What’s happened to you might sound like a recipe for being a victim but it hasn’t created a victim of you from what I see at all. You’re someone who goes, “Give me the blow and now here’s how I respond to it.” It’s the response that defines whether you’re a victim or not.
That’s a whole mentality piece.
I remember being in that victim space. My life compared to yours has been a walk in the park. It’s interesting how those of us who have had the most privileged life can veer towards victimhood. It’s a mindset. It’s not so much to do with circumstance. I remember we had this terrible tax audit where we were under the microscope of the taxation department for about two years.
I chose to become a victim at that point. I would regale anyone who came into my orbit, a poor person, with this terrible story of how we suffered at the hands of the taxation department. I realized when I look back on my life how much I’ve grown from that place and what an awful space it is to be in. You bring everyone else down with you, that’s the other thing.
It’s that whole aspect of having a desire to improve, grow or keep expanding. There’s no such thing as stasis. There’s no such thing as a static place where we can all be comfortable. As much as we might like to believe that. The only choice we have is either to expand or contract. It’s either to get bigger or become smaller, more blaming, more complaining, more bitter and resentful. What I see is that choice. I’d love to know how in this space of perpetual gross, where has that brought you to now? What are you doing with your life? What floats your boat?
One of the things that get me up in the morning and that drives me is one day I was sitting in my office and thinking about how lucky I was. I’m the luckiest man in the world to go from living in the worst place in the United States to becoming a CEO at 39. At the time, I was only 1 of maybe 10 people in the United States who was a CEO of a public company at 40. To take a look at that huge transition, I remember thinking about how fortunate I was to have such great mentors.
My mentors were people like the CEO of DHL, the CEO and founder of a Fortune 500 company, the CEO of Coke manufacturing and the co-chair of Ernst and Young and people like that. I had unbelievable personal mentoring. I worked with these people directly. It’s not like they picked me up someplace else. I had close supervision by them or management by them and then great mentorship.
One day when I was thinking about that, I thought, “I’m going to make a list of people that I know.” It was a longer list than I expected. There were about 250 CEOs and other C-level professionals. I made calls to them to see if they would participate if I created this platform where somebody could come and ask questions and get different answers to their questions.
Nobody can beat our mentors. We have the best mentors in the world. I know a lot of people. I’m lucky because of that. That’s what I did, I made this platform called Mentorship.CLUB where we can connect these people who are wanting or need mentorship, which is different from coaching and those things but who want mentorship. The value it has is tremendous.
This sounds like a wonderful resource. Climate change is a huge issue. There’s a number of people I’ve spoken to and even interviewed for this show who are devoting themselves to that. That is the issue that they want to contribute in whatever way they can because it’s a massive problem. My daughter, Clover Hogan is very much involved in this space. She says, “It’s a massive problem with seven billion solutions.” That’s a good way of looking at it. How do you apply what you care about to this particular problem?
I can see a whole generation of young people emerging, let’s call them the Gen Z group, who are taking on huge responsibilities, starting up foundations and programs to create change as quickly as they can. We know that things aren’t happening nearly fast enough. I can see that these people are not going to get a coach. A mentor is probably exactly what they need to do a fast download of all the wisdom that’s out there that’s badly needed.
We’ve got a ticking clock that’s ticking faster than it’s ever ticked before. We are only seconds to midnight. I can see that there’s such a need for this service that you provide where people who are in a position of agency and creating change need to speak with someone who’s been there before because there are many obstacles that they have to face.
The other thing is when you take a look at how young a lot of these people are who are new founders of businesses, that’s tremendous. Even my youngest son, the amount of knowledge he’s gotten compared to the amount of knowledge I had when I was his age is infinitely different. All of these people are entrepreneurial, which is outstanding.
What they’re missing is the gap between some of the experiences that us, I’ll include you and me in the same age group but between our generation even a little younger than us and a little older than us. The experiences that we’ve had, the mistakes that we’ve made and the knowledge that we have. One of the things I say all the time is, “Dying empty.” What I mean by that is it’s your responsibility to pass on the knowledge you have to others.
Don’t take it with you. Once it used to be, “You can’t take your toys with you.” Now it’s, “Don’t take your wisdom with you.”
The knowledge.
Wisdom is knowledge plus emotional intelligence or the intelligence that comes from the experience of making lots of mistakes and blending that together that you can’t necessarily find online. In terms of understanding ourselves, developing that emotional intelligence, one of the things I love to do is to take people through this exercise called the Magic Triangle Quiz. I’m a great lover of tools and anything that can help people get to a better understanding faster as to who they are.
You talked about living in this space of trying to be the other as we all do and then finally going, “The real me is an exclamation mark. I’m going to champion that. That’s me.” How do we get to that real me as fast as we can? We probably all have to have our particular dose of suffering. Does it have to take so long? Do we have to be in that space of suffering more than it’s required?
In this process, you isolate the three core needs. These are things that if you had more of these in your life, it would be the greatest benefit to you, make the biggest positive difference to your life. At the top of the triangle, we have financial freedom. At the base of the triangle, we have love and wellness. Each of these words means something different to different people. Every word is loaded with meaning. Tell me about love. Can you expand on that? By bringing more love into your life, what does that look like exactly?
I’m lucky because my boyfriend that I had for six years was the first time I ever loved somebody who I knew loved me. That’s on a romantic basis. It’s not only my parents who love me and those things. That was the first time I knew love. I’m grateful to him for that. He and I even talk about that because we still have a pretty strong bond but it’s more of a friendship bond. What I’m looking for is another relationship like that.
“It’s your responsibility to pass on the knowledge you have to others.”
For example, in the gay world and particularly in the men’s side of the gay world, it’s easy to have sex. To fall in love and have a long-term relationship is difficult to get. Particularly if you’re working hard, it’s difficult to meet people and those things. That’s what I’m talking about. For example, I do work a lot but I try not to let that override anything else. Some of it has to do with where you live. I live in Richmond, Virginia. It’s a terrible place to live if you’re a gay man, a horrible place. Hopefully, in the near future, I’m moving up North of Philly which is a great place to live if you’re gay. What I’m looking for is some other romantic love relationship and a long-term relationship.
It’s interesting with the age that we reach, we want something deeper than the visceral, the physical. It’s also companionship with someone who’s there. I hear this from a lot of female entrepreneurs who have spent their whole life proving that they could get to the top of that corporate ladder and then going, “It’s up against the wrong wall.” Now, what I’m scared of is dying alone. How do I find that person without seeming to be desperate and needy? There are a lot of people in that space. Thank you for sharing that. The next one is wellness. Tell us about that.
That has to do with all the health issues that I continue to have. I’m going to have two major surgeries, one on my eyes and the other is to have knee replacements. My hope is that it all goes well. I’ve got an issue that they can’t identify but hopefully will identify here in the near future. That’s what I’m talking about when I was talking about wellness, the health aspects.
We could expand on that wellness in terms of other areas. Would these be as well emotional or spiritual wellness? Do you feel you’re already there? I want to get clear on that.
Emotionally, mentally and spiritually, I’m in good shape. I feel comfortable in those areas. It’s more on the relationship side. The other reason is I know and have known for a long time that I’m not going to have a normal lifespan but I can still live another maybe 15 or 20 years. I want to at least be able to have good wellness to live those years that I have left.
You of all people know what it’s like to have that wellness taken away. I can appreciate that. That’s a genuine need. The final one that’s at the top of the triangle is financial freedom. Give us your definition of what that means.
For the most part, when I got divorced from my ex-wife, I made many mistakes but she had sole control over 95% of our assets. She stole them quite honestly. I’m essentially starting all over few years ago. The good news is I know that I can recreate some real wealth. The financial freedom is so I don’t have to worry about where my next meal is coming from. I heard somebody say once, “It’s okay to be rich or it’s okay to be poor. It’s not okay to be old and poor.” I want to make sure that I’ve got a house that’s paid for and I’ve got income that feeds me.
I was watching that new documentary on Netflix about Leonard Cohen. It was describing his life and that point where he left the monastery only to discover that his manager had sequestered all his millions. He genuinely had not one cent to his name. Effectively, he relaunched himself because he didn’t have any choice. As a performer at the age of 75, he was making $15 million a year which was more than he made in the older years leading up to that point. It’s interesting when you have a passion and a reason to get out of bed that can create miracles. I do believe that.
Let’s look at this triangle. What’s interesting about the triangle, as uncanny as this seems is that the 2nd and 3rd core needs that sit at the base of the triangle are what will create what’s at the top. In effect, it’s like 1 plus 1 equals 3. Let me explain that. You’ve described love as a partnership. I would maybe also expand a partnership that is an absolute something that your heart desires at this point. I love what you do.
I do get a feeling that you are genuinely passionate about what you do. What if we broaden that definition of love to include your work as well? Sometimes how we attract a partner into our life is through that moment where we are most lit up. If it’s work or mentoring people someone witnesses you in that space, that’s you they fall in love with. I feel that love of what you do is an important component in this journey that will get you that partner ultimately.
Through the love of what you do, of who you are, of self-love and bringing those into your life, that to me feels like what’s going to attract that person into your life. Regardless of that, we don’t attach to that outcome, having love in your life as you do through who you are and the work that you do. In combination with wellness, wellness in the physical sense and also energy, bringing you energy and the ability to perform on a day-to-day level, those two things are what make financial freedom ultimately possible for you.
This comes from you. We all know what we need to know. Sometimes we need tools to bring it to the surface. That’s a personal mission statement. If you want to simplify it right down, it’s through love and wellness I achieved financial freedom. Financial freedom is where you have the ability to create income but it’s not just money. It’s a state of prosperity but also fulfillment in your life, which is true wealth by doing what you love. That’s going to keep feeding itself.
What’s interesting about this is how our inner self is reflected in the outer world. This works the same way. When you stay true to this path, staying true to what you love doing and showing up in interviews like this, this is an act of love too. Your frankness and forthrightness are you wanting to end suffering in others who might be where you were a few years ago. These acts are how you start to fulfill these needs. The needs then become values.
At that point, as these core needs become valued in who you are and what you stand for, these are ultimately the gifts that you have to give to others. Financial freedom is why you do the work that you do. In mentorship, it’s probably helping younger people coming through the system, helping them achieve and make a living doing what they love and being able to support themselves through their work. In other words, financial freedom.
That’s the thing that gets you out of bed. It’s the knowledge that you’re not just doing it for yourself but for others. Without that other component, it starts to lose its meaning. Wellness is the what. What you bring to the table is wellness. In this context, wellness to me feels like wellness including those other three states. What you bring to the table with the people you’re mentoring might be physical wellness, the pain of not having there. It could also be emotional, mental and spiritual wellness. You’re giving them the emotional support that they need to stabilize.
I never looked at it that way.
Also, you have encountered a lack of mental and emotional wellness through the story shared with us. I always trust people who have encountered a lot of pain. Our human response to the pain is to heal it in ourselves. The way we heal it in ourselves is to heal it in others. It makes sense that’s what you would want to bring to the table, wellness on those forefronts.
How you do it is through the love of what you do and genuine love for others. That’s your how. That’s how you speak to people, the compassion in your communication, the passion for what you do. There you have it. That’s your inner path. In achieving the inner path, you also have how you’re showing up in the world. How does that resonate?
It resonates perfectly with me. When you said that I love to help others and I love what I do, I’ve always loved what I’ve done. I was lucky because of that. I love nothing better than to help other people. For example, the last few Christmases, I hate to even say this because I’m not looking to pat myself on the back or anything like that but I give my children $100 extra.
I tell them that’s for them to give to somebody else who’s in need of something whether it’s a gift, money, cash or whatever it is. I wanted them to understand how great the feeling is when you give to somebody else. One of the best comments I got was from my youngest son. He said, “Dad, why don’t you think I do that?” That was a great reflection.
It’s humbling having wise kids.
“The time that you give up is when everything goes away. So you’ve just got to continue to fight.”
I’m lucky that my kids are bright.
That’s why we call it the Magic Triangle because it speaks to your pain. For me, pain is the greatest gift and it’s something that we belittle. We try to stamp it out. We try to take an analgesic. We are trying to anesthetize ourselves. We don’t allow ourselves to feel pain. When you can transmute pain into something else, that’s the magic. I see you doing that.
Before we finish, I like to ask you one final question. There are people out there stewing in this dark space of shame, guilt, fear, for whatever reason, it might be their sexual orientation or it might be fear of being a business failure or whatever. What do you have to say to those people who are living in the shadows?
I know that because I lived in that shadow for many years. The other thing I would say to them is I was never confident in my entire life. Even though I achieved a lot of things in my life, for some unknown reason, I had no self-love, no lack of confidence except in business. I had a lot of confidence in business. That’s also what helped get me through.
What I would say to those people is to look inside yourself and be introspective. If you have kids, ask your kids because that’s probably the most unfiltered feedback you will get. Ask close friends to be honest with you. Find out what you’re good at and get your confidence from that. Having some level of confidence in an area of your life or multiple areas of your life will get you through many different things. That’s one of the things I would suggest.
That’s a beautiful piece of wisdom. Thank you. I’m a bit of a word nerd. I love pulling words apart. Confidence comes from the Latin with faith. Fido means I am faithful. That’s true. It gives us faith in ourselves. To take that sometimes it’s still difficult. There are many people who would love the idea of having some mentor in their life. That can escalate them quickly and catapult them to where they need to get to maintain their emotional, mental, spiritual, physical health and fitness so that they can become the change-makers that the world is crying out for. I love the work that you’re doing. I wish you all the best.
Thank you so much. The other thing I’d love to do is for people following your show, if they email me at the email that you’re going to provide, I will give them a 30% discount on our already reasonable prices. All they have to do is email me and reference your show.
I urge you to do that. There’s nothing to be lost. There’s much to be gained. Allowing people who have made many mistakes before you to offer you a few shortcuts is a brilliant tactic. Thank you, Don. All the best.
Thank you so much, Janet. I enjoyed this.
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About Don Woodring
Don is the luckiest guy in the world. His mother was an alcoholic and drug addict and took him and his siblings to live in the Compton/Watts area where many bad things had transpired. His father then brought them back to Pennsylvania where they were raised. From those humble beginnings, he then paid for his own college and was selected by a Fortune 500 company as their top national recruit.
Due to the societal, familial and religious pressures, he married a woman and they had 2 beautiful boys. He also experienced some severe medical issues including Muscular Dystrophy, Type 1 Diabetes, heart attacks, strokes, skin cancer, kidney transplant, pancreas transplant, sudden and complete loss of his hearing in his right ear and will be legally blind in a couple of years.
He created a way to overcome those obstacles, however, the only “issue” that he truly struggled with was the fact that he was gay. Today he speaks on these topics and is writing a book on the topic of overcoming obstacles and how to succeed in spite of them.
Regardless of those issues, he was still able to win 3 state championships, take 3rd in another, received a scholarship to study in Mexico and receive personal mentorship from some of the best business minds in the world, including CEOs and Co-Chairmen of Fortune 500 companies.
He became a Country Manager at age 29 and the CEO of a public company at age 39. He was only one of about 10 under the age of 40 at that time. He truly feels that he is the luckiest man on the planet!
