confessions of a resilient entrepreneur

S ABOUTSAVVY

Frumi Rachel Barr, Ph.D.

PERSEVERINGTO SUCCESS

of aResilient EntrepreneurConfessions

21265 Stevens Creek Blvd.Suite 205

Cupertino, CA 95014

Confessions of a Resilient EntrepreneurPersevering to Success

By Frumi Rachel Barr, Ph.D.

Confessions of a Resilient Entrepreneur: Persevering to Success

Copyright © 2007 by Happy About®

All rights reserved. No part of this book shall be reproduced, stored ina retrieval system, or transmitted by any means electronic,mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without writtenpermission from the publisher. No patent liability is assumed withrespect to the use of the information contained herein. Although everyprecaution has been taken in the preparation of this book, thepublisher and author(s) assume no responsibility for errors oromissions. Neither is any liability assumed for damages resulting fromthe use of the information contained herein.

Released: March 2007eBook ISBN: 1-60005-040-9

Paperback ISBN 1-60005-139-5Place of Publication: Silicon Valley, California, USAPaperback Library of Congress Number: 2007922023

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Every effort has been made to make this book as complete and asaccurate as possible, but no warranty of fitness is implied. Theinformation provided is on an “as is” basis. The authors and thepublisher shall have neither liability nor responsibility to any person orentity with respect to any loss or damages arising from the informationcontained in this book. While the people and events portrayed in thebook are based loosely on real events, all the characters are fictional,based on composites of many people the author met or worked withover the years.

Praise for Confessions of a Resiliant Entrepreneur (from the back cover)

"No one is better equipped to coach and nurture female entrepreneursthan Frumi, herself a successful entrepreneur, mother, friend andcommunity leader. If 'The Little Engine That Could' were re-writtenjust for women entrepreneurs, 'Confessions of a ResilientEntrepreneur' would be it. Frumi understands an entrepreneur'sexcitement, temptations and fears intimately because she's 'beenthere, done that.' Reading her story is like swallowing a big dose ofcourage. You feel as though you could overcome anything becauseshe has faced life's hardest challenges with aplomb and transformedherself into a stronger, happier and better woman each time.”Cara Good, President, WunderMarx Inc.

"The Frumi Fix is a recipe for turning yourself inside out so your trueself can shine. Frumi reminds us it is in the stew of our total lifeexperiences that we have every ingredient necessary to create, andserve, our special offering to others. What she delivers is not herpersonal ingredient list, rather the inspiration and courage to mix upour own -- from the inside out. And that’s the magic. Once you'vedigested the Confessions and get your first taste of The Frumi Fix,you'll experience inside-out at it’s best. And I guarantee you'll returnfor a daily helping."Ann Hult Crowell, A Recovering CEO, Author & Speaker

"Frumi Rachel Barr inspires us to not let catastrophes get in the wayof our success. Sure, things can get crummy, but if we keep our focusup and our eyes open, we'll see doors open for us. In experience afterexperience, Frumi illustrates how asking ourselves the right questionsallows the best answers to show up. Frumi's book is a page turner,and I loved the advice she gives at the end. This special book is akeeper!"Joanne Rodasta Wilshin, Author 'Take a Moment and CreateYour Life!'

"Don't miss this book filled with personal courage as Frumi bares hersoul telling how she overcame whatever obstacles were put in herway. Resilience is Frumi's authentic real deal -- what it takes to createa purposeful, fulfilling life. A definite must read for everyone (not justwomen) who wonders if they have what it takes to follow theirdreams."Marilyn August, Author, 'Journey to Wealth & Wisdom'

"An endearing account of a strategist's relentless quest for personalgrowth and fulfillment. Frumi is a role model and inspiration for allentrepreneurs whether practicing or aspiring."Katharina Martinka, Business Advisor and Attorney, Martinka &Associates Consulting, LLC

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Dedication

To my Mother Layah Surchin Borod An extraordinary leader in hercommunity 1914-2006.

Acknowledgments

This book represents a labor of love and has been a long time incoming. There have been many friends, relatives and clients whohave watched my journey over my lifetime.

Special appreciation goes to my brother Manny, father and latemother; my fabulous friends, Ann, Marilyn, Susan, Heather, Katie,Joanne, Garry, Pat and Rachael – Thank you for all of your love andsupport.

I could never have written this book without Claudia Suzanne and myawesome coach, Dr. MaryWayne Bush. Once I expressed a desire towrite a book, there was no way MaryWayne was going to let me outof it. The power of coaching at its finest!

Let me not forget my children who have found my path intriguing andsometimes not too embarrassing.

And finally I’d like to offer a special acknowledgment to my clients ofthe last several years for allowing me to serve you and help you onyour own journeys. I owe my passion for coaching to all of you. Yoursuccess is mine!

Frumi Rachel Barr, PhD

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C o n t e n t s

Confessions of a Resilient Entrepreneur vii

Intro Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

Part I Frumi’s Story. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5

Chapter 1 Hatched for Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Chapter 2 Starting Out Strong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Chapter 3 Setbacks are for Working Through . . . . . . 19

Chapter 4 New Adventures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Chapter 5 Another Stale Marriage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Chapter 6 I Got the Clocks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Chapter 7 Out with the Old, In with the New . . . . . . . . 49

Chapter 8 Moving Out, Moving Up, Moving On. . . . . . 57

Chapter 9 Building—and Breaking—From Scratch . . 65

Chapter 10 New Company. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Chapter 11 New Man . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

Chapter 12 New Me . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Part II Your Frumi Fix. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .95

Chapter 13 How Coaching Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97

Chapter 14 What Really Matters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

Chapter 15 Where Are You Now. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Chapter 16 Work and Family. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

viii Contents

Epilogue Epilogue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Appendix A Book Summaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

Author About the Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

Your Book Create Thought Leadership for your Company . . . 137Why wait to write your book? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

Confessions of a Resilient Entrepreneur 1

I n t r o

IntroductionMy life has been about entrepreneurship fromstart to finish—or at least to present. I was raisedby an entrepreneur who was raised byentrepreneurs. I married entrepreneurs and,although I started out working a regular job, Iquickly became an entrepreneur. After buildingand running several companies, I switched myfocus to helping other entrepreneurs learn how toimpose a degree of balance between theirpassions and the rest of their lives.

So what, exactly, are entrepreneurs?

People who want to work independently, notcorporately or for someone else. People whohave an idea—or a whole series of ideas—thatbecomes their dream and drives what they wantto do with their lives. People who want to build abusiness and control how it functions, how itgrows—even how it dies.

Entrepreneurs will find any way to fulfill theirdreams, even when people consider their ideassilly or a lost cause. In fact, they persevere in theface of tremendous odds specifically becauseentrepreneurship is the belief that I can do whatI want to do.

Somehow, entrepreneurs find the solutions theyneed to do exactly that.

2 Intro

And it doesn’t matter if they suffer through a whole series of failuresbefore finding the one business that does work. Entrepreneurship is anapproach to life that says I’m going to keep doing it, keep doing it, keepdoing it until I get it right.

Corporate people have a different attitude. They want the security ofknowing their paycheck will be there every two weeks. They’re notinterested in having an entire company’s success or failure ride on theirshoulders. Corporate people have a driving need to be financiallyresponsible and secure, not for pursuing an all-encompassing dreamand its inherent all-encompassing liability.

**

As far as I can tell, I was probably hatched as an entrepreneur. Myparents brought me up to think the phrase “You can’t do that” onlymeant that I, as their child, could not do something right then—not thatI, as a woman, could not do it at all. In my house, if you wanted to dosomething, you were encouraged to do it. I had no idea women weretreated differently from, or had more obstacles in business, than men.When I discovered that truth later, I wished someone had told meearlier! But aware or not, being a woman never deterred me, becausemy parents’ language and attitudes during my formative years weresuch that I was bred to be an entrepreneur.

Which is how entrepreneurs are produced.

The conviction that you can be an entrepreneur comes from an internalbelief system created by your environment and by the way you areraised. It’s all a question of language and attitudes. The Director ofEntrepreneurial Studies at USC once explained it by describing afather playing catch with his son. Where some dads might say, “Oh, toobad, you missed the ball, ” when their son misses a catch, theentrepreneur-breeding parent would say something more like, “Oh, youalmost got it—if you just stretch one more inch, you’ll have it.”

It’s never: “Too bad, those are the breaks.” It’s always the moremotivational: “You can do it, you can do it, you can do it.”


Of course, sometimes the desire to be an entrepreneur is so great theobvious gets ignored. People get so enthused about their big ideasthey want to jump in with two feet without pacing themselves—which iscertainly part of the entrepreneurial “I can do it!” attitude. As an affiliateof Startup Nation, I get calls all the time from young people saying, “Iwant to quit my day job and start this company.”

I say, “Wait, wait, wait—transition into this. If you have a day job, that’sgreat. Prepare your business plan. Let’s look at what’s likely to happen.You’re probably thinking you’re going to have money in six months.What if it takes two years instead—can you quit your day job on thatbasis?”

This book is for all those young, starry-eyed entrepreneurs. It’s also forall those well-established entrepreneurs who have made their success,and now want to somehow fit a life into their dreams. We all knowpeople who claim to have twenty years of experience at something, butactually only have one year of experience twenty times over. Well, I’mone of those people with twenty-eight years of experience whose everyyear was brand new, and who learned to adapt the lessons fromprevious situations to the next thing I was doing—and use them tomove forward.

You see, that’s what being an entrepreneur really means: being in aconstant state of failure, even when you’re successful. The trick is to“fail forward,” as leadership expert John C. Maxwell says: to take thelessons you’ve just learned, add them to your strengths and leverageyour learning in your next experience.

I’ve done a lot of failing forward. I hope my experiences will help youleverage the lessons of your next move.

Frumi Rachel Barr, PhDFebruary 2007

4 Intro

Part IFrumi’s Story

"You must do the things you think youcannot do." - Eleanor Roosevelt

"Do or do not -- there is no try." - Yoda


C h a p t e r

1 Hatched for Success

I grew up in Canada, in Montreal, thedaughter of two hard-working parents. Myfather was an entrepreneur, manufacturingflavors for soft drinks. My mother worked asthe executive director of a women’sorganization, so my brother and I werelatchkey kids. Interestingly, my parents musthave taught me a lot because I never feltneglected or unloved. On the contrary, Ibrought my little brother home from school,gave him milk and cookies and felt verygrown up. I felt he was my wonderfulresponsibility. My kids would interject rightaround now, “… and they never fought.” OK,now they’re happy too.

My parents were a mixed breed: my father wasan entrepreneur and my mother was anexecutive in a series of non-profits. Together,they created two can-do kids.

My father grew up in Winnipeg, where hisparents were entrepreneurs and all his uncleswere involved in the family bottling company. Hewanted to carry on the R&D (research anddevelopment) part of the business, so he studiedfood chemistry in university. Then WWII broke

8 Chapter 1: Hatched for Success

out. Just before he went overseas, he met and briefly dated my motherin Montreal. They corresponded while he was away fighting and whenhe came back, he carried her off to Winnipeg as his bride. Within twoyears, though, my parents realized there was nothing for Dad to do inthe family business, so they left Winnipeg and he followed his bigdream of manufacturing a cola similar to Coca Cola. He never reallyhad any marketing skills, never really had any skills as anentrepreneur, but he definitely knew his business.

My mother, on the other hand, didn’t have a university educationbecause her brother went to medical school. At that time in families likemine, if the son went to medical school—which was a big deal—thatwas it. The daughter didn’t get to go somewhere else. Mom went towork in the nonprofit world, running charitable organizations and doingfundraisers across the country. She felt it was her duty to get a regularpaycheck, and she was very proud that she could support my father’sdream of having the ultimate extract company.

**

When I was very young, I wanted to be a doctor, like my uncle, until anaccident I had at age eleven changed my life. It left me with anulna-nerve lesion that required physical therapy. That’s when I metCarol, the wonderful physical therapist who became my inspiration.Carol actually walked me around the physical therapy department toshow me all the different machines and what the various patients weredoing. From then on, I got it in my head that no matter what happenedin life, I was going to be a physical therapist, just like Carol. From thatmoment until I graduated high school, my sole ambition was to go touniversity and get my degree in physical therapy.

Meanwhile, my parents were unknowingly sending me mixedmessages. For instance, my father let me know I could do anything Iwanted to do—except be a doctor, because women who becamedoctors didn’t have time for their families. Meanwhile my mother, intypical 1950’s fashion, told me women always had to be basicallysubservient to men. “Always let them think the big ideas are theirs,”she’d tell me. “Never let on that you have a big idea of your own.”


Yet Dad maintained that I needed to be independent. He didn’t wantme to have to go to a man and say, “Can I have a dollar to buy milk andbread?” the way his mother had had to. “You should be able to earnyour own money so you can make your own choices,” he’d tell me.

In other words, they were pretty typical parents who wanted the bestfor me and my brother, so long as we realized we could (and should)do anything we set our minds to accomplish.

Except be a doctor.

**

Another mixed childhood message was the result of starting grammarschool too early. I was only three, so I was always small. Also, whilemy grades were average—B’s and C’s with the occasional splatteringof an ‘A’—I was always behind the rest of the class, so I was alwaysafraid of being a total failure. In fact, I was afraid every day I went toschool: afraid that I wasn’t smart, afraid that I was stupid, afraid that Iwould never amount to anything.

Talk about pressure: I was three!

The Hebrew day school I attended went through the seventh grade. InCanada, high school starts in eighth grade. We learned four languagesin grammar school: English and French in equal proportions for half aday, then Hebrew and Yiddish the other half. Not being a languageperson, I wasn’t very good in the Hebrew and Yiddish part of things. Iwas okay in English, but being very shy, I didn’t raise my hand in class.As a result, no one knew how smart or not smart I was.

Years later, it occurred to me that maybe my parents worked reallyhard at saying, “You can do it, you can do it” because I wasn’t doing it.Maybe they encouraged me to counterbalance the fact that I wasn’t assmart as they wanted me to be. They always saw the difference withmy brother, having learned their lessons with me. They held Morrieback so he’d be a year older than the rest of the class instead of a yearyounger. As a result, he did brilliantly. He was the one who always gotstraight A’s. Obviously, then, he was the one who was smart.


And who had the beautiful blue eyes. I had hazel eyes.

For him, it was always, “Oh, what a gorgeous little boy!”

For me, it was, “Isn’t she cute?”

Fortunately, my mother told me that my little brother was mine, so I hada lot of pride in him. I would take him by the hand when we walkedhome from school. He would sit outside my door and wait for me whileI was with my girlfriends. We had a very loving relationship, a unifiedfront. We felt as if it was the two of us against the world. That was avery clever strategy on my parents’ part.

On the other hand, Morrie is still the favored son. We laugh about it allthe time. I’m the one who tries harder—like Avis!

**

Once when I was in third grade, I looked at my less-than-spectacularreport card and thought, uh oh—how am I going to take this home? Iwas afraid of disappointing my parents with my poor marks. So Ichanged them. I cleverly made all the minuses into pluses—in pencilso I could erase them when I took the report card back to school.Unbeknownst to me, though, my mother had a parent-teacher meetingto which she took my report card. I never had a chance to erase mychanges.

I remember lying in bed that night, waiting for my mom to come homefrom this meeting—Dad was out of town—and then hearing her talk toherself as she came through the door.

“What was she thinking? Why would she do that? I can’t imagine she’ddo something like that!”

My illegal action caused such a hullabaloo that, where I had beenafraid before, now I was terrified. The principal, Mr. Human (he neverseemed human to me!), wanted to immediately expel me fromschool—or so I thought. Luckily, my third-grade English teacher wentto bat for me. “I want to find out what’s at the bottom of this,” she toldhim. “Frumi’s such a sweet little girl; I can’t imagine she would dosomething like this without having a very good reason.”


She lived on our street, so we often walked home together. Beingsmall, I thought she was a speed walker. That day as I hustled to keepup with her, she said, “I know you’re having some problems, but whatmade you do that?”

“I don’t want to have to go to another school!” I blurted out. “I’m afraid.I don’t know anybody there. All the people I know are right here. I justwant to stay here.”

“Frumi, calm down!” she said, slowing down just a little. “No one’sgoing to make you go to another school!”

Yes, I got to stay in the Hebrew day school, “criminal” tendenciesnotwithstanding, but my self-image could never seem to catch up withthe mixed messages coming from my parents and teachers. At school,I sensed that I wasn’t very bright, yet at home, I heard that I could doanything. Add to the stew the fact that both my parents grew up in fairlyConservadox-type Jewish homes yet didn’t really live up to the school’sstandards—we kept kosher at home, for example, but didn’t eat kosherout—and my life seemed filled with hypocrisy and confusion.

Plus, I was shy—very, very shy—until I was thirteen, when my parentssent me to Winnipeg to visit an aunt and uncle. There, I entered a twistcontest with a third cousin. We won! It was a wonderful cap to thewhole experience of leaving home by myself and meeting strange newpeople in a totally different city. For the first time, I felt as if I could cope.It was the beginning of the end of my shyness.

The beginning of the end, not the actual end—I’m still shy. Untilrecently, in fact, I was afraid to stand up in front of a crowd—afraid,even, to introduce myself to twelve people who were going around theroom for the express purpose of introducing themselves. My heartpounded with fear. What if I didn’t say the right thing? What if I trippedover my words? What if I sounded dumb?

I did it, anyway. Entrepreneurs have to face down their fears every daythey’re in business.

**


When I look back at my childhood, I see the strengths and businesstools I learned at my parents’ knees. We were a pretty well-functioningfamily. My parents loved each other; they always snuggled andcuddled and appeared happy. In fact, we looked like the kind of“happily ever after” household you used to see on television. I didn’teven know we were poor. I had everything I needed because, in yetanother aspect of the entrepreneurial spirit, we lived totally inabundance. Totally.

And I know I took the best of both their outlooks and put them togetherto create my own perspective. As a working mother, for instance, Momhad to be a strategist and planner. She always said that if a woman hadto work outside the home, she was entitled to create support systemsin the home that allowed her some comfort and ease, a brilliant policyfrom my perspective. I listened to her planning processes andunconsciously absorbed her strategies and concepts.

My father, on the other hand, was the optimist, the one who believedthat whatever happened, everything would be fine. Consequently, Igrew up believing that whatever happened, everything would befine—if I just strategized and planned. I matched the two systems andmade them my own.

And so far, it’s worked.


C h a p t e r

2 Starting Out Strong

I started University at the ripe old age ofsixteen, totally focused on becoming aphysical therapist. This line of study taughtme some important guidelines—how tomanage time, how to look for symptoms, andhow to create solutions for those symptoms.These became the basis for my businesslearning. My MBA came much, much later.

After leaving the Hebrew day school andgraduating from Outremont High School, I wentto the School of Physical and OccupationalTherapy at McGill University in Montreal to getmy Bachelors of Physical Therapy (BPT). It wasa very, very heavy course, fully three times thatof the other students. McGill art students, forexample, had twelve hours of school per week.Physical therapists, on the other hand, hadthirty-six hours of specified classes along with asmattering of regular, general-educationclasses, such as Psychology 101.

I did fairly well by the time I finished. I got straightA’s my last year. I didn’t start out doing so well,though. The first year I went to university, Iactually failed two classes: chemistry andphysics. I had gotten well over eighty percent in

14 Chapter 2: Starting Out Strong

chemistry when I matriculated from high school, but I held Peter’s handall the way through the course at McGill. Unfortunately, Peter—myfirst-year heartthrob—used his left hand to hold my right, so I couldn’ttake notes! Clearly, my priorities were skewed.

Peter, however, was only my heartthrob, not my love interest—thatwas Richard. I’d met Richard in high school and had planned to losemy virginity with him at my senior prom because “everyone” said youwere supposed to lose it by the time you left high school. But I didn’t.

So there I was, a sixteen-year-old college student learning all aboutvirgins in some long English poem. I told my father, “There’s somethingwrong with me. I’m still a virgin. Richard thinks I should lose my virginitybecause everybody else has already lost theirs.”

I have no idea why I told my dad this, but—as any father would—heforbade me to ever see Richard again. My parents hated him. They felthe was arrogant and thoughtless and showed a lack of respect forother people. For example, he would park his car right down the middleof our duplex’s double driveway with no regard for anyone else’sparking needs. They so did not want me to be with him.

Looking back, they were right: Richard was a self-absorbed rich kid.His family had a lot more money than our family, something that scoredno points with my mom. But I was a university student who could doanything I wanted to do—I had certainly grasped that concept bythen—so I didn’t stop seeing Richard, I just spent more time with hisfamily. I liked their lifestyle. I loved his mother and two brothers. I hadfun hanging out at their house and going to their country place. And so,I lost my virginity to Richard in my first year of college.

**

In the summer between my second and third years at university, I wentto Israel to visit my grandparents. My family was very Zionistic. Myfather and his six siblings had gone to Israel in 1933 and my fatherstayed until 1940, when he came back to fight in the combinedUS-Canadian force called The Devil’s Brigade. It seemed perfectlyreasonable, therefore, for me to volunteer to go to Israel in 1967 whenthe Six-Day War was about to erupt. My family knew the Israeliemissary to Montréal personally, as he was one of the people who


came to dinner at my parents’ house every Friday night. I knew hecould sign me up as a volunteer. I also knew that, having just finishedwith my third year at McGill, I had a skill that would be valuable in amilitary situation. But since I was still only nineteen years old, myparents had to sign the papers for me to go.

They refused to sign.

I told them that considering our family’s history and their Zionism, theywere being hypocrites, and our emissary friend nudged them a littlemore at dinner. They finally signed and I got on the list of volunteers tofly over.

Once again, in retrospect, I realize my parents were right. My fathercertainly knew much more about war than I did. It turned out to be onlya six-day war, but it could have been a disaster; I might have nevercome back. When I think about how I bullied my parents into allowingme to go, I have to give them credit for letting me live my life the way Iwanted to, even when I didn’t know what life was all about. Againsttheir better judgment, they accepted that “can do” spirit they hadencouraged me to have all my life: devise a plan and go for it,regardless of the risk. Everything will be fine.

I believed them. So I went for it.

When my volunteer group got off the plane in Israel, the people incharge divided us into two groups: those with skills, and those whowould go to a Kibbutz to pick vegetables. They sent me to work at TelHashomer, a military rehabilitation center just on the edge of Tel Aviv.

The instant prosthesis was just being developed at that time. Until then,amputees had to stay in bed for two or three months until their woundshealed before they could get up on a prosthesis. But someonedeveloped a prosthesis that actually encouraged the wound to heal, sopeople could get up right away and not lose their walking patterns andneurological pathways. Working with Israeli amputees impressed meso much that I later became a specialist in lower-limb prosthetics.


While in Israel, I lived with my aunt and uncle, a Brigadier General inthe police force, and commuted every day from their house to thehospital. One day I was sick and stayed home. The bell rang. Ianswered the door to find one of my patients standing there.

This soldier had lost his leg above the knee in the Negev. He woke upon the battlefield wounded and alone, thinking he must be deadbecause everyone around him was dead. He actually resented beingalive because his whole unit—made up entirely of kids with whom hehad grown up—was gone. To make matters worse, his girlfriendditched him when he lost his leg because he was an amputee.

His name was the Hebrew word for miracles.

I let him in when he appeared at my door because I knew him. I neverthought he would rape me. But he was so angry over his girlfriend andeveryone else deserting him that he no longer had any rules orboundaries left.

Afterwards, I kept thinking, ohmigod, this is just what my father saidcould happen! Why didn’t I protect myself more? I not only felt violatedphysically, I felt violated mentally due to my conflict between protectinghis stump so it would not hurt or bleed all over the place and protectingmyself. I was traumatized but I knew I couldn’t tell anyone. I was afraidmy uncle would kill him or, worse, court-martial him. I was terrified thatI was pregnant. And I still had to see him every day at the hospital! Hewould tease me as if it had all been a joke. I told some of the othersoldiers not to leave me alone near him but I never told them why. Inever told anyone.

Other than that one sad incident, the soldiers were wonderful. I’ll neverforget Zvika. He had been on the Israeli basketball team but when I sawhim, he was spending his days sitting in the gym. He absolutely refusedto have an artificial leg. My heart went out to him. He just sat in hiswheelchair. He was so devastated. Only nineteen years old and hiswhole career was gone.

I had never been a basketball player but I started dribbling the ball,throwing it at the hoop and horsing around to try to make him laugh.After about a week, it worked; he started laughing. He thought I wasthe stupidest thing on two feet. But eventually, he started playing with


me and, at the end of my stay, he walked me to the bus stop—on anartificial leg. That was so special, one of the big triumphs of my stay inIsrael. Someone even wrote a newspaper article about us. I still have it.

Zvika’s triumph highlights yet another aspect of the entrepreneurialspirit, and one of the things I like so much about life: having the chanceto make a difference, however it happens. Being in Israel at that timewas very inspirational—so inspirational, in fact, that nothing was everquite the same. I returned to doing regular physical therapy when Icame home but it never meant as much as working with those heroes.They were all in tough situations, needing to be motivated, needing toknow that life was still worth living. I was only there for three monthsaltogether but those three months truly changed my life.

**

Every time I helped an Israeli soldier, every time I met another living,breathing inspiration, I thought about Carol. All the way through school,I had wanted to go back and tell her how much she had inspired mewhen I was eleven. She had given me a goal, and even though I hadn’tbelieved I was all that smart, remembering her had helped keep megoing to achieve my goal.

During my senior year at McGill, I attended an awards ceremony. Imust have attended a number of them, but this one stands out in mymind because the award was presented by her family in memory ofCarol, who had died from leukemia. I’d never gotten to tell her, nevergotten to thank her adequately. And yet, if not for her, I never wouldhave been a physical therapist and, if I had never been a physicaltherapist, I would not have been able to save my own life three yearslater.

That same senior year, I had a very short, very intense relationship witha guy named Jordie. It only lasted six weeks until February 29th, SadieHawkins Day, when girls could ask a guy to marry them. Jordieencouraged me to ask him, so I did. He accepted.

But the next morning, he called and said, “I can’t go through with this.I’ve made a mistake.”


I was heartbroken. I couldn’t eat; I couldn’t sleep. I had been totally inlove with him. I grieved for months. Moreover, I knew that if I didn'tmarry him, I’d have to go back to Israel that summer after graduationand work at the hospital. I had promised my cousins and grandmotherthat I’d return. But I didn’t want to go. It was more than being gun shy;the idea terrified me. So I turned back to Richard.

All through college, I would go out with someone, break up, then go outwith Richard again. He was my best friend, my fallback lover, my PlanB. He was lovable and familiar. And always there. He’d asked me tomarry him more times than I could count. Finally, I said yes. Poor guy,he never knew I married him to keep from going back to Israel—or thatI married him on the day Jordie and I had said we’d get married:December 22, 1968.

By the way, decades later when I was visiting Montreal, I actually calledJordie and said, “I’d like some closure. This has bothered me for thirtyyears. What happened?” It turns out he’d had his whole life plannedout—finish law school, go to Europe for a year, come back and open apractice—and I didn’t fit. He had met me the wrong year. I just didn’t fitinto his planned life. “Go for it” gone awry!

In any event, Richard and I had an all-out Jewish wedding. I wore avelvet dress with a ten-foot-long train that I could hardly drag along thecarpet. Doug, Richard’s brother and best man, tore up his preparedspeech and toasted us instead by saying, “A man is supposed to marryhis dead brother’s wife—so if Richard hadn’t married you, I wouldhave!”

An interesting wedding, a not-so-interesting marriage—and only thefirst of four!


C h a p t e r

3 Setbacks are for Working Through

At twenty-three, as the result of my physicaltherapy training, I was fortunate toself-diagnose Hodgkin’s. This was mycrucible, which taught me the value of life,the value of persistence, and the value offighting for whatever was worth having. Thatexperience became an important part of whoI was then and who I am now.

By the time I married Richard, I’d been workingat the Veteran’s Administration (VA) hospital forabout six months. I had started there when I firstgraduated because they had an opening, butwas really just waiting for an opening at theJewish General Hospital, where I had met Carol.As soon as an opening came up at JewishGeneral, I moved over.

In the meantime, I was doing my best to be agood wife, but I wasn’t all that enamored withbeing married. I felt as if I was always waiting.Richard was in the retail business—ladies’clothing stores—and usually worked very latehours. I was forever looking out the window,waiting for him. It was so disconcerting: I had onelife at work and a totally different life at home. Iwould do all kinds of things just to fill time

20 Chapter 3: Setbacks are for Working Through

because I didn’t have many friends except for the women at work.Regular physical therapy may not have been as stimulating as Israeliphysical therapy, but life outside of work was very ho-hum.

Work was an entirely different situation. Being a people person, I soonknew everyone’s name, from the chief of such-and-such to the janitors,especially once I moved to Jewish General. I’d walk through thehospital as if it were my community. I was passionate about helpingpeople. From a life-training perspective, those years as a physicaltherapist taught me two vital entrepreneurial concepts: timemanagement and how to look for symptoms and create solutions.

**

School fails to teach you so many things, some of which should beobvious, such as when you actually have a workload, you have to makeit work. You can’t leave out a patient because you just didn’t get there.I received a list of patients to see every day—sometimes a very heavylist—and each person had to feel they were getting my very best. I hadto manage my time well, which meant figuring out the little quirky thingsthat would allow me to do my job effectively. For instance, I realized Ineeded to start at the top of the building and work my way down. It alsohelped to plan how many patients I could do before lunchtime—simpleideas, but they nevertheless seemed to elude some of my coworkers.

I soon realized other people just couldn’t manage the same kind ofworkload I could. For the first time, it occurred to me that peopleworked at different paces and had different abilities—and that thingsweren’t necessarily fair in the workplace. Where I might handle twentypatients in a day, someone else could only handle twelve. But we wereearning the same wages. My first taste of inequality.

But I had to make it work and, at the same time, make everyone feelspecial. I didn’t use the term then, but now I would call it “The ClientExperience.” Everyone has to have a good experience with me. That’smy intention. My patients had to feel loved and safe or the physicaltherapy wouldn’t be as effective, something I’d learned from my rolemodel Carol when I was eleven. While making each person feelspecial, I still got through everyone on my patient list.


To me, it was a simple matter of strategizing and planning. I didn’t just“let it happen,” I figured out how and in what order I was going to getthe work done. If one person wasn’t available, I would see another. Iwas always strategizing, planning and re-planning, which, of course, isan entrepreneurial constant.

I also looked for symptoms and created solutions, anotherentrepreneurial concept that has served me well through many, manybusinesses. Patients had presenting issues or symptoms such as, “Myneck hurts.” But it wasn’t always about their neck. The pain might havebeen due to their posture or their back—or their back problem might bedue to their neck, which might be due to how they sat. Discerning theroot cause of the problem was a process. I wouldn’t just think, the sheetsays this person’s neck hurts. I’d think, why does this person’s neckhurt? It was a study with each person. Once I figured out the underlyingproblem, I knew what to do.

Over the years, I have found that people approach most businessissues in one of these two ways: either “Here’s the symptom, just treatthe symptom,” or “Here’s the person, let’s treat the person.” The firstway is the tried-and-true corporate path. The second is the spirit ofentrepreneurism.

**

Richard and I had been married about a year and a half and were livingwith my brother-in-law for the summer when mononucleosis broke outin the area. Douglas got mono. Fortunately—or so I thought—I didn’t.

One day that August, we went waterskiing and I fell. That night asRichard and I were eating dinner in a restaurant, he said, “What’s thatbig lump on your neck?”

At first, I thought it had something to do with the waterskiing but then Ifelt it. It was huge. I went to see a doctor the very next day. He told meI had torn a strap muscle.

I was a physical therapist; I could deal with a torn strap muscle. I tookdown my Grey’s Anatomy and tried to figure out what strap muscle Icould have torn but it just didn’t make any sense. So I called one of the


orthopedic surgeons I knew at the hospital. “Dr. Heller, Dr. So-and-Sotold me I tore a strap muscle and to forget about it, but I can’t believe Ishould. It’s huge. Can I come see you?”

It was five o’clock at night, but I went right to his office. He looked atmy neck and grimaced. “You know, you’re a good girl and I like you alot so I’m going to tell you something. This is something bad. You needto take care of it. I don’t know what it is but I’m going to send you to Dr.Steiner.”

I automatically began strategizing. “It’s five-fifteen, Dr. Heller. Dr.Steiner is in his office until six o’clock. Would you call him for me andask if I could come right over?”

Dr. Heller said yes. Dr. Steiner said yes. I was in a medical building atthe bottom of a hill and Jewish General was at the top, so I wentcharging up the rise. Later I realized that if the lump had been ananeurism, I’d have been dead by the time I got there, but since it didn’thave a pulse I just raced up the steps.

Dr. Steiner was a cardiovascular thoracic surgeon having a mid-lifecrisis, so he always wore torn operating room (OR) shirts that showedhis tanned, hairy chest. As I sat on his examining table panting, hesaid, “Why are you so out of breath?”

“It’s not because of your OR shirt, Doctor. It’s because I ran up thestairs.”

For some reason, that statement struck him as funny, and set us on thecourse to a close relationship. But the lump on my neck wasn’tsomething he handled, so he sent me on to the chief of surgery.

After that, things happened at whirlwind speed. I had a biopsy within aweek, confirming the diagnosis of Hodgkin’s. I had my spleen out withinanother week. (I remember my first thought at seeing thebreast-to-groin incision: I won’t be able to wear a bikini! Such are thepriorities of a twenty-three-year-old.) The pace of it—the swiftness inwhich I had the biopsy and the surgery—is why I’m still here.


The idea that I was dying didn’t hit me until I noticed five other peoplein the hospital who also had Hodgkin’s. They all died. I was the onlyone that didn’t. By then, I had realized I really wanted to live and wasterrified I wouldn’t make it.

But my fear was nothing compared to Richard’s. He was terrified I wasgoing to die. My devoted husband—the guy who had asked me tomarry him so many times I couldn’t count them, the guy who cried sohard when he heard the news about my Hodgkin’s—visited me onlyonce in the hospital. Fortunately, my mom, my brother—with hishorrible sympathy-pain stomachaches—and my mother-in-law were allthere for me. Richard’s brother Doug sat up with me all night before myoperation. In fact, both Douglas and Morrie subsequently went tomedical school and became doctors because of my illness. ButRichard couldn’t even bear to kiss me. He was afraid he wouldsomehow catch my cancer.

When the doctors took out my spleen, they tied my ovaries behind myuterus and told me not to have children. When I was in the hospital, Ihad nurses around the clock. When I underwent six weeks of radiationwith all its typical side effects—my hair fell out in back, I became veryfrail, I was in a lot of pain—my mother drove me to and from thetherapy. When my father-in-law thought I was going to die, hepromised to buy me a car. All of a sudden, everyone was feeling somekind of empathy.

But not my husband.

I didn’t work during radiation but went back to work as soon as I could.Not for the money—I didn’t want to be alone in the apartment! I wasalone all day and most of the night with all the fear and anxiety. As itgot closer to Christmas—which, in the retail business, means long,long hours—Richard worked morning, noon and night. It wasn’t muchof a life.

Even after the surgery was declared a success and I’d finished theentire course of radiation, he never lost his fear of my dying—or, moreaccurately, that we’d have a couple of kids, then I’d die, and he’d bestuck with the children. Later in life, he very much regretted his attitude,because he never got married again or had children. But at the time,he couldn’t see past the word “cancer.”


After a while, in fact, I started thinking I would die if I stayed with himsimply because we get what we expect and he expected me to die!Right around that time, a friend took me to see Love Story. As I sat inthat theater and watched Ryan O’Neil sit by Ali McGraw’s bedthroughout her entire illness and death, I started to cry—not becauseof the film itself but because there I was, living through something sosimilar, but with no support or love from my husband at all. I cried forthree days.

My prognosis was considered “Unknown” for five years. I had to go tothe doctor every couple of weeks, then every three months, then everysix months to have my blood checked. In the meantime, myrelationship with Richard just kept deteriorating. He still wouldn’t kissme. He couldn’t get over his fear, so in his mind, I was practically deadalready!

He was right about one thing, though: I really wanted to have children.When they told me I couldn’t, it became even more important. But,obviously, I wasn’t going to have them with Richard. We split up inDecember, two years after we got married. I wanted to live.

One part of me says I wouldn’t have known I had Hodgkin’s if it hadn’tbeen for him and the water skiing making the lymph node swell somuch it bulged out on my neck. On the other hand, my mother says ifI hadn’t married Richard, I wouldn’t have been with Douglas, who hadmono, so I wouldn’t have developed Hodgkin’s in the first place. Butwho knows? It might have shown up later in my life anyway.

My parents never really liked Richard.


C h a p t e r

4 New Adventures

In the early seventies, a patient of mineinvited me to tour his office furniture factorywhile the physical therapists were on strike.That little tour resulted in my taking a positionin the factory that evolved to the ChiefOperating Officer—although we didn't call itthat in those days. Along the way, I marriedthe owner.

December, 1970

Before Richard and I split up, my parents tookme with them to a beverage-industry trade showin Philadelphia. There I was, thin as a rail with myhair just starting to grow back, working at myfather’s booth, giving away chocolates filled withhis cola substitute.

One particular fellow from Coca Cola came to thebooth every day. He was thirty years old, blond,blue-eyed—and hitting on me. By the third orfourth day, this was very flattering. I spent acouple of wonderful afternoons with Jim. Hewould tell me I was a mess, which was his way ofsaying he found me attractive. I thought, Wow,I’m still a woman. I don’t have to not be kissed.

26 Chapter 4: New Adventures

I’m a very loyal person but I’ve done this a couple times in my life. Itwas the only way I knew to get out of a situation in which I felt trapped.It wasn’t a strategy on my part—I didn’t expect it, I wasn’t looking for it.It just popped up. And I was shocked; I’d never realized I would do sucha thing. But it was wonderful to feel like an attractive woman again afterliving all those months with Richard, who made me feel undesirable,rejected and pushed to the curb.

Richard later said he knew something was up because when I got backto Montreal, I didn’t stop at the store to see him, I just went home. Aweek or so later, I told him I wanted a divorce. We both sat in the livingroom and cried. I knew I was still sick and facing a long recovery but Ialso knew I wanted to live, and my “Unknown” prognosis terrified me.The anxiety and panic would build up in my chest every day. Not onlycouldn’t Richard do anything to help it, his constant fear that I would diejust made it worse. After the affair with Jim reminded me that I was aviable, attractive woman, I finally realized I could deal with the situationbetter on my own. Richard and I certainly weren’t going to make ittogether. It was time to move on.

So I moved back in with my parents, who transformed their basementinto a little apartment for me, and went to see an attorney.

“I can get you lots of money because his parents are rich,” the lawyersaid.

“How long will that take?”

“Well, divorces can take as long as three years.”

At that time in Canada, you had to either prove adultery or claim somemental cause to get a divorce. Richard had already said he wouldmake it easy for me. He’d get pictures taken of himself having anadulterous affair—just as long as I didn’t ask him for money. So I toldthe lawyer, “It’s not about money. I just want to be free. If I fight aboutmoney for three years, I’m going to be dead. I don’t want that. I want tototally focus on being alive.”

And that’s how I left my marriage with only the money from our jointaccount: $100. I had given Richard every penny of what I’d earned fortwo years. It wasn’t big money but it wasn’t shabby; physical therapy is


a profession. I had expected to find more in our joint account. Richardsaid he lost it all to poor investments. I didn’t understand that but Ididn’t ask for an accounting of it either. I was traditional. A nice Jewishgirl. Leave the financial matters to the man.

**

My parents were thrilled to have me back. I was the first of theboomerang children. I still had my job, which meant I could makemoney, live rent-free in the basement, and get back on my feet. So, ofcourse, the first thing I did was buy a car: an MGB convertible.

It cost $2100. I only had $500 and had to pay the $1600 overtwenty-four months. Even worse, it was the most ridiculous car forMontreal winters. Dr. Steiner took one look at it and said, “That’s a carfor someone in the fast lane.”

“Yeah, but if I die in the next five years, I want to at least have lived alittle.”

It made sense to me.

At that point, I was Dr. Steiner’s physical therapy specialist. He hadopen-heart-surgery patients and amputees. He also had a little girlpatient with lupus.

Beth was eleven years old and dying. She asked her parents if I couldbe with her when she died. All through my entire ordeal with Hodgkin’sand the rape in Israel and everything I went through with Richard, I’dnever had one Valium, but when that little girl died, my mother had tocome collect me. I was a puddle. As I took a Valium, I decided rightthen that I was too raw. I couldn’t do physical therapy anymore. I wasin the midst of five tough years, where every time I was happy I wasafraid I was going to die and every time I saw something tragic, I cameunglued. So I gave up physical therapy.

It was almost that simple.

**


Within a few months of leaving Richard, I started dating again. MostlyI dated doctors because that’s who I met at the hospital. It seemed likeevery one would eventually say, “You’re so great, we have so much funtogether. I’m really falling for you. But … we don’t know your prognosis.I think we should break it off.”

Ohmigod, I thought after this had happened several times, I’m nevergoing to have a normal life ever again! Everyone thinks we have to waitfive years. And I was in a hurry. At twenty-three, five years is a verylong time.

So I went to Florida with my girlfriend Evelyn to relax. Along the way(and unbeknownst to my parents), I took a short side trip to visit Jim,the Coca Cola guy. We spent a weekend in Atlanta enjoying the fallingsnow—and that was the end of that. We kept in touch for a couple ofyears. He was very sweet, but there was nothing more to it. He’d beena catalyst for me, a means to an end, not the end itself.

On the way up from Florida (and Atlanta), Evelyn and I went toBaltimore, where she introduced me to a doctor friend of hers, Andy. Iguess he must have fallen for me hard because he decided to comevisit me in Montreal where, unbeknownst to me, he called on my father.“You know, your daughter has had a really tough time, and probably noone would marry her because she’s been sick. But I’m a doctor and Ican take good care of her. I’d like to marry her.”

“Have you talked to her?”

“No, I thought I’d talk to you first.”

“I have nothing to do with it,” my father said. “I think you’d better talk toher.”

In retrospect, it was awfully sweet, but at the time I didn’t see anythingpositive about it. Andy went back to Baltimore and I went back to work.

Meanwhile, the divorce was moving forward. By the time I metKenneth, Richard had undergone an attitude adjustment. He felt soguilty about not being able to handle my Hodgkin’s that he decided theleast he could do was make me look good. If I was going to be single,then I was going to look gorgeous. He would invite me to the store and


shower clothes on me: a fur coat, mini-skirts, hot pants, all kinds ofoutfits. I’d never had so many clothes in my life. I looked great. Theshrinkage in his stores was very high that year.

I actually met Kenneth before I had my epiphany with Beth. He was inthe hospital for elective surgery on a bone spur and needed crutches.I went up to the ward and gave him the crutches—and from that pointon, he pursued me relentlessly. He was thirty-two years old, British,never married and sure I was “the one” for him—but he never told methe one-hundred percent truth about anything.

Everything was “show” to Kenneth. He had a lot of Britishclass-conscious issues. He lived in a really nice apartment—without astick of furniture in his living room. He claimed he owned “a fleet ofcars.” They were only two little station wagons, one for him and one forhis brother-in-law, but he had a need to present them a certain way. Myparents found that odd. They actually didn’t care for him anymore thanthey had for Richard, but he fell for me hard.

When the physical therapists went out on strike, Kenneth invited me totour his factory and see where he worked.

I was so taken with that factory! I’d never been to one before other thanmy father’s shop, which was really a lab that made soft drinks in greatbig vats rolled around on enormous dollies. Kenneth’s company madeacoustical office panels and decorative plants, two businesses in one,both for offices. Walking around with him, I was amazed at everythingI could see—and had a million-and-one suggestions. “Why don’t theydo this? Why don’t they cut the fabric this way?”

Kenneth was an industrial engineer yet here I was coming up with allthese concepts. He was as amazed as I was. “Well, hot shot,” he said,“why don’t you come work here while you’re on strike and see if youlike it?”

So I did.

I ended up working with him even while I continued as a physicaltherapist. When Beth died and I fell apart, I knew where I reallybelonged—in Kenneth’s business. I started doing the purchasing.Then I pretty much took charge of operations. We got engaged that


summer and married in November, shortly after I turned twenty-five onOctober thirteenth and just a few weeks shy of a year after my divorcefrom Richard. But first, while I was still living at my parents’ home,Kenneth sold his car.

“How can you just sell your car without talking to me?” I said. “What areyou going to drive?”

“I’m going to drive your car. When we get married, I’ll drop you at thehospital and then I’ll take your car and go to work.”

“No. Oh no. It’s my car. You can’t do that.”

My car was a symbol of my independence. The whole time I’d beenmarried to Richard I’d had to take three buses to get to and from work,and had been totally dependent. I could never come and go as Ipleased. That was not going to happen again. But by the time we hadthis, our first big blow-up, he had already sold his car.

I’ve never been smart enough to see all the red flags before amarriage. Kenneth wasn’t really making any money; he just appearedto be well off. He claimed he sold his car because his mother neverdrove; it was normal for him to have only one car in the family. But minewas an MGB, a two-seater. The stupidest car you could have! It didn’tmake any sense as a family car. I think the truth is he really liked myzippy little MGB and just figured he’d take it over. I was adamant thathe wouldn’t, so in the end he figured that his father, who was in thebusiness with him, would pick him up.

Because I’d been married once before—my parents had spent $10,000on that wedding—I didn’t want to have a big affair again, so we gotmarried in my parents’ house. It was almost like a competition. Wefigured we could get seventy people in the house, thirty-five of ourfamily and thirty-five of theirs. They didn’t have thirty-five familymembers; they had to scrape to find people to invite. But they neversaid, “You know what? We only need ten people; you can have sixty.”It was never like that. It was, “You’re having thirty-five? We’ll findthirty-five!” An interesting relationship from the beginning, although Igot along with his family for the most part.

But not entirely.


My parents didn’t believe in celebrating Canadian Thanksgivingbecause they were Jewish, but Kenneth’s parents did. So there wewere, married two years with a baby—Michael was born by then—andthey invited us to their house for Thanksgiving. The night before, wehappened to be over there and my mother-in-law said she was havingtrouble with her oven. She gave me the turkey to take home to preparefor noon the next day.

Now, I had never prepared a turkey in my life. I had no idea what to dobut I wasn’t going to tell her that. There was this little underlying rivalrybetween us and I think she kind of wanted to show me up. At least Itook it that way. So I just said, “Okay, I’ll bring the turkey back by noon.”

As soon as I got home, I called my mother. “I know you have a reallyquick turkey recipe, my aunt’s recipe. How do you do that?” Thesystem had to do with wrapping the turkey tightly in tinfoil so it only tooktwelve minutes a pound to cook. Well, it was the second Monday inOctober, already snowing, and there I was, driving all the way acrosstown in the snow, to pick up long tinfoil from my mother so I could getthe turkey ready by noon for my mother-in-law.

My aunt’s system worked: it was an unbelievably succulent turkey, nota dry morsel on the bird. My mother-in-law was blown away. Shewanted the recipe but I never gave it to her. Maybe if she had told mewhat to do or been nice to me … but no, she didn’t and wasn’t, so Inever, ever gave her the recipe.

**

After we got married, I transitioned to working full-time with Kenneth inthe factory. He reasoned that because he had invited his father into thebusiness, it would be good to have his wife in the business especially,as I learned over the years, because he was very over-protective andneeded to know where I was every minute. I reasoned that since weboth knew we wanted children, working together was a sensible way tointegrate our work and our personal lives.

And I loved the factory! Every day, there were issues, problems, andchallenges. I really got my teeth into it. I began to realize that I was anentrepreneur at heart, so this was a natural progression for me. I wascoming up with all kinds of ideas and implementing them—something


you don’t get to do when you’re working for someone else who has thefinal word on which suggestions to implement and which to ignore.Many employers don’t even appreciate employees coming up with newideas. But when you own and run the company, you can make anychanges you see fit.

For example, they would get an order for fifty acoustical screens. Theywould cut one piece of material, put it on the frame, and move onto thenext. I said, “Why are you doing that? How are you keeping order thatway? Why don’t you cut fifty pieces and put them to one side so thatwhen you’re ready to do this order, they’re already waiting? We canmove the screens out faster.”

Speed was an important issue because the orders always got out late.The factory wasn’t systematic at all. Kenneth had an engineeringdegree but he hadn’t applied any logical system to his productionsequence. Once again, it was a time-management problem: here arethe symptoms, this is what we aren’t doing, here’s how we fix theproblem. That’s exactly how I looked at everything.

I started keeping ledger cards to figure out how many frames weneeded, how much fabric, how much fiberglass, how much this andhow much that. It wasn’t all that difficult and I enjoyed it. Then I set upschedules: if it’s Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, we work on this order,then we work on that order. For the first time, the company was actuallygrowing and providing delivery when we said we would providedelivery.

Fortunately, my husband didn't feel threatened by any of this. It workedfor him. He only felt threatened when there was something that didn’twork for him. But we were making progress and soon, we were makingmoney. We ended up being able to buy a house. Then we were able tobuy a bigger house. Then we could afford to have two cars.

It all just worked.


C h a p t e r

5 Another Stale Marriage

When I was busy in my role as operationsmanager at the office-office furniture factory,I was also pregnant, seeing private patientsand teaching a biology class to continuingeducation students. Money was tight and Ihad a baby on the way, a fact my studentsthought was hysterical since I was teachingthem sex education. It was time to figure outhow I would continue working with a child athome.

When Kenneth and I married November 1971,we both knew we wanted kids. And, yes, I gotpregnant on our honeymoon—but we didn’t goon that honeymoon until the following July. Wewent to Europe and traveled by car throughAmsterdam, Holland and Denmark. Michael wasconceived in a tent and born the next April, in1973.

We had delayed our trip so that we could affordto take off an entire month. Before we left,Kenneth turned off the electricity in theapartment because, he said, we’d be away solong. I don’t know what he thought neededturning off. He was often too smart for himself.

34 Chapter 5: Another Stale Marriage

When we got back, we were met by a horrible smell coming out of theapartment and the refrigerator was covered in green moss. You can’tget that kind of a smell out of a fridge. But rather than just accept theresponsibility that we needed to buy a new refrigerator, Kennethsabotaged it instead. He did something to the plug to make it look likeit had shorted so the landlord would have to take care of the expense.

It was a small matter but it felt like a very big deal to me. It wasgradually dawning on me in those first few months that all the nicetiesfrom the pursuit were gone. In their place were so many untruths, somany things that rerouted our relationship. I remember discussing therefrigerator incident with my parents, who would have never donesomething like that—turning off the electricity or deceiving the landlord.All of us got really uncomfortable. I started thinking, who is this personI married? What kind of things does he do?

**

By that September, I was doing two other jobs besides working at thefactory because we didn’t have enough money to make ends meet.The first one was seeing private physical therapy patients, referred bythe hospital or one of the doctors with whom I used to work. Theyweren’t the same as critical-care patients; their problems were chronic.It was easier for me to go to them than for them to get to the hospital.

The second job was teaching continuing education. It turned out thatmy seventh-grade teacher, Lenny, was an old and good friend ofKenneth’s, and he needed someone for an adult biology class.

I had no experience as a teacher but Lenny figured I was crediblebecause of my physical therapy background. So there I was,twenty-five years old and pregnant, teaching biology and sexeducation to people of all ages who had dropped out of high school andwere now back to finish.

I remember the students calling to say they missed me while I was inthe hospital having Michael. I only taught one more semester after hewas born, though, because by then it was getting old. Teaching thesame stuff over and over for two semesters was enough. I did continuewith the physical therapy patients for a while but after a couple yearsthat got old, too.


To facilitate the changes that come with a baby, I created an office inthe house so I could keep up with my work for the factory. This waslong before anyone thought of home offices. I just figured, “If I can doall this work at home with the baby, then I can stick him in the car anddrive to the factory and deliver this or that.” We had a fax machine inthe house, so Kenneth and I could transmit instructions and such backand forth by fax.

I never really took maternity leave, not even when I had Jennifer, in1976. I had the office in the house and a planned schedule for visitingthe factory. I hired a baby-sitter for when I was out or carried my littlepapoose with me. As the years went by, I continued this routine. As hegot older, Michael would sit in my office at a tiny little Fisher-Price deskwith his Fisher-Price phone and, while I placed orders to FiberglassCanada, so did he on his own phone. He thought he was my mostvaluable employee. This was before computers and email—everythingwas still complicated and written up by hand. If I didn’t finish my workduring the day, it continued after dinner and after bedtime. It was all forthe “cause” of having a family. We were in this together, for the “cause.”

I thought I had it all.

**

The company had a number of financial issues. I don’t think Kennethever really knew how to run a business properly and, at the time, Ididn’t know any more than he did. I knew how to do operations but nothow to handle marketing. Then a lot of French-English issues came upin the Alberta government in 1977 and one of our biggest clientsblackballed us because we were from Quebec.

So we decided to move to Toronto. If only we could get to Toronto, Iremember thinking. We had to sell our house at a loss because of allthe political unrest and drive there in the travel trailer we’d left inVermont to use as a country house. We opened a factory but had tolive in the trailer for a couple of months until we could move into ahouse. I ran the office from the trailer with two little kids at my side.

We had moved to escape the political nightmare in Montreal but thebusiness still wasn’t managed that well. I wasn’t involved in its financialaspects; I just took care of getting the work done. Kenneth took care of


everything else. We had a bookkeeper but she was interested inpaying the bills, not in the company’s larger picture. I had a senseKenneth didn’t handle financials effectively. To top it all, Kenneth wasin denial that the business was going to go down.

Kenneth’s dad was no help. He was only concerned with the part of thebusiness that put together flower arrangements and trees, the internaldécor of the office. And his brother-in-law, who had been selling forhim, had stopped soon after we married.

Within eight or nine months of our relocating to Toronto, the businesswent into receivership.

**

At some point, I had thought that I would do things differently thanKenneth and wanted that opportunity. Besides, I needed something todo when the receiver came in and sold the company to its competition.I wasn’t going to go back to being a physical therapist. I would havehad to retrain. Ontario had an entirely different certification program.

I had let my private-patient efforts peter out as I got more and morebusy with the kids and trying to keep the factory working—and I had alot of guilt about that. When I was sixteen and impressionable and juststarting McGill, the head of the school said, “If any of you are herebecause you want to get married, you should leave. There are onlyforty places in this class and they should be taken by people who wantto make a career out of physical therapy, not someone who’s juststudying this to find a husband.”

I remember thinking, whoa, this is a big commitment. Of course, at thetime it was what I’d been working for since I was eleven. I neverexpected to leave physical therapy. When I did, I felt I’d let the schooldown.

I didn’t consider seeing patients at home as following the profession.So when my five-year reunion came around, I didn’t go. When myten-year reunion came around, I didn’t go. When my twenty-five camearound, I told myself I needed closure. I needed to go tell them theterrible thing I’d done, leaving the profession.


About fifteen of the forty original students were there, all sitting arounda table. They each introduced themselves; they were all heads ofdepartments at this or that hospital. When it was finally my turn, I justlooked at them. I was still shy enough to be terrified of speaking in aroom with that many people in the first place. I said, “I’ve let you alldown. I remember the head of school telling us this is for life.” Then Itold them what had happened with the Hodgkin’s and with Beth, andhow I just hadn’t been able to do it anymore. And I cried. Someonestood up, and said, “Hey, everyone. Can you think of a better reasonto become a physical therapist than to self-diagnose Hodgkin’s andsave your own life?”

They all clapped.

**

Just before Kenneth’s business folded, we had started to design a lineof decorative wall clocks for office furniture boutiques. When thecompany went into receivership, Lenny and I decided to buy that piecefrom the receiver and start a clock business.

My first company! I still knew nothing about money or marketing. I onlyknew how to produce the clocks. Lenny put up the money and weleased a small, 2,000-square-foot industrial space. That’s when I hiredmy first nanny, an au pair from Germany named Rosie. Michael calledher “my Rosie.” She didn’t live with us but reported faithfully to workevery weekday morning so I could go to my clock factory.

That’s also when I first started suffering through all the traditional guiltthat working mothers do. When I was at the office, I wanted to be homewith Michael and Jennifer; when I was at home, I thought about all I hadto do at the office. I also wanted to be like the other mothers and do mypart at pre-school. I remember one day standing at a sink washingpaint sponges with an apron over my business suit. I wondered what Iwas thinking—there was so much to do at the office and here I waswashing drippy sponges! My son knew I couldn’t be a regular at thepre-school, but I felt that every effort I made went into the ledger in hisbrain, letting him know his mother cared, and tried.


What I really didn’t understand was the mid-life crisis Kenneth wasgoing through at the same time he was losing his business. Of course,it had been hard to live with him for some time. He was very controllingand had very high standards for everyone else, so it was a difficultmarriage. I don’t know if he saw it that way, but I did. When Michaelwas small, he could never do anything well enough for his father.Kenneth treated Jennifer the same way. He wasn’t a very forgivingperson and certainly not an entrepreneurial dad. He expected toomuch from the kids and if they didn’t do it right, he sent them to theirrooms.

From the time they were born, Michael and Jennifer had been incompetition with each other. Who could run upstairs faster and so on.I didn’t like it but Kenneth fostered that competition. It’s really quiteshocking to look back and see how ineffective I was as a person. Butat the time, I felt it wasn’t worth the battle. Everything in our marriagealways seemed to turn into a battle.

Having been married once before and now having two children, Icertainly didn’t want my marriage to fail, but all kinds of little things keptpicking at me. For instance, he was always trying to take my car awayfrom me. Once I had the children and was home, he figured I didn’tneed a car. I figured I needed a car more than ever!

In retrospect, I felt as if I had a pillow over my face the whole time I wasmarried to Kenneth. Everything I wanted to complain about or stopwould evoke a fight so huge that it was easier—and safer—to just keepmy mouth shut and do my own thing when he wasn’t around. Beingmarried to Kenneth was a lesson in how women were really treated, insharp contrast to my parents’ you-can-do-anything credo.

And, again, when I was at work, I was a different person. At the factory,I was in charge and things were working and running. At home, I playedthe dutiful Jewish wife. I had not yet learned how to balance my life andwork. I only knew I wasn’t happy.

The first year of my clock factory was the year Kenneth spent withouta job until the competitor who had bought the bulk of the business hiredhim. During that year, Lenny and I moved our clock business, leasingfactory space from a landlord who custom designed it for us. Ted, the


architect doing the design (who later became my third husband),discovered early on that since Kenneth knew everything abouteverything, Ted didn’t have to inform him of anything.

In a classic illustration of Kenneth’s need-to-control that I didn’t find outabout until later, he told Ted that we needed so-many feet of turningradius for a forklift so the beams in the factory had to be exactlyso-many feet apart. This was my factory that Ted was designing butKenneth got involved with everything because he knew how it had tobe done.

A couple of years later, Ted and I were in another industrial building, amoving company. They didn’t have any beams at all.

“How come there aren’t any beams in here?” I asked.

“They don’t need to have beams.”

“Why did we need to have them?”

“We didn’t.”

“Then why do we have them?”

“Because Kenneth was so emphatic about where the beams needed tobe put that I didn’t feel the need to tell him that you didn’t need them atall!”


C h a p t e r

6 I Got the Clocks

We had no way to validate whether theclocks were going to be a good business, butwe forged ahead. I got the money fromLenny and bought the division from thereceivers. It was very foolish; I had noknowledge at all of how to start or run abusiness. Looking back, it was totallyridiculous, something I would never advise anew entrepreneur to do.

We called our company Deko Clocks. The clockswere solid wood, leather, or acrylic with differentgraphics—your basic kitchen or office clocks. Wesold them through the network of office reps wealready had. But truthfully, how many clocksdoes any office buy? It was ludicrous that weactually expected to make money doing thingsthis way. There was no real thought behind ourenterprise. It was all wishing and hoping.

And I built a factory for it!

**

Sears was Simpson’s Sears in Canada, anaffiliate of Sears Roebuck in the states.Eventually, one of the reps got an appointment

42 Chapter 6: I Got the Clocks

with them to sell the clocks. By that point, though, I was starting to seethe light and realize there was no way on earth I was going to makemoney with the business the way we were running it. I offered to go tothe Sears meeting instead of the rep. He looked at me and said, “Youknow, they’re probably one of the most difficult companies to deal with.And you’ve never sold a darn thing. What are you thinking?”

“Well, it is my business and I need to know the truth.”

Reality wasn’t really my strong suit. I went to visit Kurt, who had beena Sears buyer for a long time. He liked the clocks and was very sweetto me throughout our meeting. At the end he said, “I’m gonna keep yourclocks and put them in my sample room. We’ll make a decision inMarch.”

My mind started racing. This is January. If he doesn’t make a decisionuntil March, I’m not going to make any money until then. This is a losingproposition. So I told him it was very kind of him but I’d take mysamples with me.

“I think you’re just being nice to me but you could be even nicer byanswering a question: how does anyone make money in the clockbusiness?”

He roared. “You know,” he said, “as long as I’ve been a buyer, I don’tthink anyone’s ever asked me that question. But there is an answer.And I’m going to share it with you because I’ve been trying to convincedifferent people to create a certain kind of clock for me and no onewants to do it. They think it’s junk.”

He reached into his briefcase and pulled out a few brochures. I’d justbeen to the gift show in California, so I recognized them: simple framedpictures of a sunset or a scene with a battery-operated clock up in theright-hand corner. The clock face was printed onto the picture.

“These are going to be really big,” he said, “but no one wants to makethem. Do you think you could?”

I said, “Sure, that’s easy.”


I’d just been running an office furniture factory; of course I could getthem made for him.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said. “I’ll give you two weeks to come back herewith samples and a plan on how you’re going to do this. If you canprove to me you can do it, I’ll give you my business. And I’m taking ahuge chance, so the plan is important.”

We shook hands and off I went. This was before the Internet, so I wasdoing my research the old-fashioned way. But I’d always had the abilityto ask people for help if it wasn’t for me, especially if I was asking forresources. “Where do I find this? How do I find that?” So I went back tomy office, picked up the phone, and called dozens of people who gaveme leads to dozens of others who gave me leads to still others. WhenI found I could get lithographs from New York, I ordered a whole bunch.

I knew there were rehabilitation centers where people go foroccupational therapy that did things like woodworking. My physical-therapy background played into that. I looked up rehab centers in theYellow Pages and called around. I was looking to hire supervisedpeople who needed the work and worked cheap. I had the rehab centerworkers glue the pictures onto Masonite and put a wood frame aroundthem.

Then I called Kurt. “You gave me two weeks, right? Well, it’s been oneweek and they’re ready now.”

He was very impressed. I took him on a tour of the rehab center thatwould make the clocks the first season. If they were successful, weplanned to buy the woodworking equipment and make them ourselvesthe second season.

And that’s what we did. That first season Sears sold a ton of clocks.The next season we had some of the machinery at the back of oursmall warehouse and I looked for larger space. I ended up leasing15,000 square feet from a landlord who was putting up a beautiful, new30,000-square-foot building (the one in which Kenneth knew where toput the beams) and was very fond of me. He didn’t know any otherwomen entrepreneurs, so I was his key tenant. The building had two


round sections in the front and the offices were very pretty. Because Ihad Sears’ business, it was much easier to get business from the largercatalog houses. And that’s how I got the business going.

By that point I knew about operations and marketing but I was alwayslooking for new people and ideas. I met my receptionist, for example,while I was standing in her checkout line at the grocery market one day.She had such a good customer-oriented approach that I asked, “Doyou want to continue working in a supermarket or would you beinterested in working in an office?”

“I have no office experience,” she said.

“That’s all right,” I said. “I’ll train you. You have the right attitude.”

Another time I was having dinner at the Pickle Barrel and saw thisamazing guy bussing tables. He was so fast—he had incrediblemanual dexterity. I called him over and asked the same thing: “Do youwant to continue working as a busboy or would you be interested inworking in a factory?” Within two months of his starting work at ourcompany, he was the factory manager.

I read in a trade journal that the largest clock company in the UnitedStates was in Chicago. They manufactured all the ridiculously moldedclocks—owls with swinging eyes, cats with swinging tails and soon—that were so popular at the time. I knew I’d have to pay a huge dutyto import them into Canada but if I brought them in pieces, the dutieswould be much smaller.

I called the guy whose name was on the ad and told him I had a clockcompany in Canada and would be in Chicago the next week. I said, “Ihave two dates I’m contemplating. If you’re available on one, I’ll meetyou for lunch.”

He was, we did, and by the end of lunch, we had decided on areciprocal-license agreement. He would get my clocks and put themtogether in the states—the original design clocks I’d gone to Sears within the first place—and I would buy his components and put themtogether in Canada, which allowed me to buy the battery-operated


clocks in higher volumes. This was a lot of fun for our Canadiandepartment stores because they hadn’t been able to buy the importedclocks due to the high duties.

I sold mirrors and a whole lot of other stuff along with the clocks andthe company took off. We had a lot of problems—I learned everythingby making mistakes, some two or three times!—but I got down themarketing and sales parts. Unfortunately, I still didn’t really know thefinancial side.

I was using borrowed money with a line of credit because the companywas growing so fast that it was very hard to keep up with the capitalrequired. Interest rates started to climb and climb and climb. When Ifirst went to Sears, they were at twelve percent; by 1980, Canadianinterest rates were at twenty-one percent. I had a potential investorbeyond Lenny who was very excited about the company and I’drecruited a wonderful sales manager who came from one of thedepartment stores. The company looked like it had a very bright future.We were told we’d have half a million dollars in investment capital.Then, suddenly, that went away. The guy couldn’t perform. He had hisown issues. I went to the bank to tell them what was happening andthey said they were going to have to call in their loan.

**

This was one of those instances where I didn’t know that women weredifferent from men. Back in the seventies, when I first started thecompany, I had walked into the bank and asked for a line of credit. Afterwe concluded everything we were going to do, the bank manager said,“Oh, by the way, send your husband in to sign the papers.”

“Why do I need my husband’s signature?”

He looked surprised. “Because we don’t give women a line of credit ontheir own. Their husbands have to co-sign them.”

“Well, then, I’m in the wrong place,” I said, standing up. “Because myhusband isn’t part of my business, so he can’t sign. I don’t want him tobe part of my business.”


The bank manager waved me back into my seat, “It’s okay. Sit down.”He gave me the loan anyway.

What I didn’t realize at the time was that he called Lenny and askedhim for a signature. Because I didn’t have my husband sign, Lennybecame personally responsible for the entire loan, instead of thecompany. I found that out very late in the game. Lenny was a silentpartner; he mostly supplied the money and stood back. He was stillteaching but had received an inheritance and felt this was somethinghe wanted to do. He wasn’t in on many of the decisions. He only signedthe papers because he believed in the clocks.

Fast forward to 1980 and those high interest rates. I walked into theSears buyer’s office and said, “We have a problem. The bank isthinking of calling our loan, the interest has gotten too high, and evenif I make the clocks for you now, it doesn’t make much sense anymoresince your price is based on twelve-percent interest rates and now it’stwenty-one percent. But I have the solution. Here are the names ofthree of my competitors who would love to have your business. If youasked them if they’d like to buy my company, they’d jump at it. Thenyou’d be back on track for the Christmas sales.”

And that’s what we did. We contacted the three companies, theybought our inventory, and I was out of the clock business.

The good news was that we took care of the customer; he didn’t losehis credibility or his reputation. The bad news was that neither mypartner nor I really got anything except out of the business. That’swhen I found out Lenny had signed with the bank. He lost a lot ofmoney. He had to pay back what he’d pledged because he had signeda personal rather than a corporate line of credit.

And so I lost my friend. I didn’t have the money to pay him.

**

By the time Deko Clocks folded, Kenneth and I were separated.

The company had started in June 1978 and we had separated at theend of November 1980. It wasn’t his company but he was my husband,and he was the industrial engineer who had planned the space and


how the equipment would work as if the company would last fifty years.It had lasted about three. From morning until night, he’d had ideasabout what I should be doing and if I didn’t do them, he wanted to knowwhy not. The reason I could give him was that I didn’t agree with all hisideas. That’s what brought the marriage down. From morning untilnight, I had someone on my case about everything I was doing—andwhether I was doing it well enough for his standards.

When I would be on the phone in my office with the Sears buyer, forexample, Kenneth would be there, listening. As soon as I hung up, he’dcriticize every last thing I had said. Yet I was the one who had therelationship with Kurt! I remember telling him a funny story oncebecause I wanted him to laugh so he would remember what I wassaying. When I got off the phone Kenneth said, “That was a ridiculousstory. You were wasting his time and yours.”

“Yeah,” I admitted, “but we had a good time with it. You weren’t talkingto him, so you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Needless to say, Kenneth’s constant critique was very undermining. Ihad enough pressure between having a partner, running a business,making decisions, and raising children. I didn’t need Kenneth’sconstant critique. He had a set idea in mind about how he wantedeverything laid down and I never followed any of his sequences onanything. It was all just too much.

For example, when the kids got to school age, I started them early at aHebrew day school. Michael did okay but Jennifer couldn’t cope. Iwanted to pull her out of school. I’d been a much more passive childthan Jennifer; she was a little hellion. It was easy to see she wasn’thappy; she acted out constantly. She wouldn’t even let me dress her.Since she’d already made one big change when we moved fromMontreal to Toronto, taking her out of school didn’t seem like such alife-threatening act.

But Kenneth never believed she was really struggling. He thought Ionly wanted to change her school because it would be easier for me,even though it was actually harder because I had to take Michael toone place and then take her somewhere else. After Kenneth and Iseparated, I took Jennifer in for psychological counseling to see how


much she was struggling but Kenneth still refused to believe she washaving trouble. He always saw everything I did from the worst possibleperspective, as if it was all for my own benefit, never for anyone else’s.

I finally had enough and left him. At that point, I believed I could do iton my own. The investor was interested and I had another season linedup with Sears. Everything was going right, which was importantbecause leaving this marriage wasn’t going to be as easy as leavingthe last one.

But then, my parents had never really liked Kenneth, either.


C h a p t e r

7 Out with the Old, In with the New

The real fun was just about to begin. I wentthrough a bitter divorce. My ex-husband triedto take my children away because heconsidered me an unfit mother—I was out oftown at trade shows thirteen days a year! Ifollowed my attorney’s advice and foughtabout the money, not the kids, and by thetime the divorce was final three years later,the kids stayed with me.

Okay, I didn’t really have the courage to leave onmy own. And I didn’t like that fact. But Ted and Ihad become friends when I was going throughthe hardest time with Kenneth about how to buildthe factory and what machinery we needed. Hewas very attractive, very good looking—and verymarried. He was a very safe person with whomto have an affair since he was as unhappy in hismarriage as I was in mine. I didn’t expectanything from him except emotional support.

We talked to each other a lot and listened a lot.We were both at a place in our lives where weneeded someone who understood us. Whenyou’re married, you don’t always talk about yourproblems, even with close friends. Whatevergoes on in your house is private; you try to work

50 Chapter 7: Out with the Old, In with the New

it out. Some people have a best friend or a mentor or a coach to talkto, but I didn’t. I didn’t have anyone. Ted and I understood each other’smarital distress and business woes. We touched something in eachother.

Eventually, though, I realized the idea of sharing him with hiswife—who I couldn’t stand—became appalling. I was living in spurts,like a fireman, controlling one crisis after another with no time to thinkabout the future and no idea of how to avoid situations that would leadto another crisis. Most of the time I felt oppressed and abused, as if Ihad to fight to keep my head above water. So I stopped seeing Tedaltogether and asked Kenneth for a separation.

No sooner had Kenneth moved out than Ted knocked on my door. “I’vejust left Cindy,” he said. “It’s now or never.”

He moved in. It felt like the two of us against the world, going throughwhat I later realized was an insane period. When Kenneth heard Tedhad moved in, he kidnapped the children, took them to his parents’house and refused to bring them back. Then he got a restraining orderto keep Ted from living in the house. Ted immediately moved out of myplace and into a spare bedroom one of my employees had, whichallowed my lawyer to get Michael and Jennifer back for me by the endof the weekend. In time, he also got the restraining order lifted and Tedmoved back in again.

This time, no one had to contrive grounds for divorce. I was an abusedwife. I hadn’t been physically mistreated, I’d been psychologicallybattered. I didn’t even realize I had been abused or what the term"abused" meant. And I had certainly never experienced anything likethis at home, which flies in the face of conventional wisdom aboutabused women. First I’d married a coward—no one in my family hadever been cowardly—then I’d married an abusive man. Both had beenso controlling! Yet I’d grown up in a household where everyone hadtheir “happily ever after.” I guess “happily ever after” didn’t prepare mefor real life. I was incredibly naive. No one had ever told me there weresnakes in the grass.

Kenneth went to court and told the judge I was an unfit mother, partiallybecause of Ted, but partially, he claimed, because I was alwaystraveling for business and wasn’t around for the kids. I went over my


calendar; I was gone thirteen days a year! So we all went for testing:Kenneth, Ted, and me. It turned out that Ted and I were better parentsfor children growing up because we were better at fosteringindependence, while Kenneth was a better parent for a baby whoneeded extreme nurturing and care. At five and seven, Jennifer andMichael weren’t babies anymore. And since Canadian divorce takes upto three years, my lawyer had a different strategy this time around.

“Children or money?” she asked.

“Children,” I answered adamantly.

“Good,” she nodded, “then we’ll fight about money. After three years ofliving with only you, no judge is going to take them away. They usuallyleave them with the mother anyway. So let’s fight about money andhe’ll forget about the kids.”

So we fought tooth and nail about money for three years, which had noeffect on me at all because what I wanted out of the marriage—besides“out” of the marriage—was the kids. From the distance of time, I cansee how none of this was quite fair to Kenneth. I don’t think I wouldhave done these things with anyone else. But I was so fearful, not justthat Kenneth would take my children away from me but, like anyabused wife, I was just plain afraid of my husband. I needed a knighton a white horse. Ted was my rescuer.

Ted had no children of his own but he really loved mine and was a gooddad right from the start. We were like a classic joke. At thirty-two, I wasan older Jewish woman with two kids. He was a childlesstwenty-nine-year-old Catholic. My parents weren’t happy. Neither werehis. In the beginning, my father wanted to sit Shiva (as if I had died)because I was with someone who wasn’t Jewish. He wouldn’t talk tome for five or six months. Ted’s parents wouldn’t talk to him either. Butthey all came around. In fact, my parents liked Ted!

We moved out of my house within about eight months and found aremote farmhouse on a beautiful piece of land in the northeast cornerof the city, quite off the beaten track. Getting the kids to school wasquite a drive. But for a while, we both felt as if it was us against theworld.


**

I had made a deal with the company that bought Deko Clocks that Iwould work for them for the first year. We had a small office outside ofToronto. They liked the relationships I had with all the customers; whenthey bought me, they bought the relationships. They wanted it toappear as if Deko was still in existence. But after a year, the personwho had previously been in charge of marketing wanted the job. Iagreed that the relationship was over and started looking for otherthings to do. I tried a couple of different things, such as selling physicaltherapy equipment. I couldn’t find a good fit.

Meanwhile, Ted had just started his architectural firm and it wasbeginning to grow. One day when I was waiting for him I heard hissecretary say, “I think the books balance. They’re about ten centsoff…” Well, I remember thinking, that could mean they’re ninety-ninedollars up or ninety-nine dollars down—somebody should check thebooks.

When I brought it up to Ted, he started telling me about his company.People owed him a ton of money. I said, “Maybe it’s time for me to learnabout finance and bookkeeping.” He was really worried at first aboutmy getting involved with his company because we’d both be drawingfrom the same well. If the company wasn't a success, it would be bad.But it had always been part of my philosophy to try to incorporate mywork into my life and my life into my work. We both enjoyed workingreally hard, so we figured we might as well be a team. I’d take care ofthe office, he’d take care of the architecture and design and finding thecustomers. So I learned to be a bookkeeper and managed the officefor the next twelve years.

The company grew and grew. At one point, we had as many as sixtyarchitects. We even acquired another company. As computers becamepopular, we started to shrink the number of employees because wecould be more cost-efficient with fewer people.

In the meantime, the kids went to Kenneth a couple days a week andevery other weekend. It was always difficult. Being kids, they didn’talways want to go. Being Kenneth, he always blamed that on me,


claiming we were saying bad things about him to the kids. We weren’t,of course. Actually, it was nice having someone to take the kids off ourhands every other weekend. Better than having to find a babysitter.

Ted was far more of an entrepreneurial father than Kenneth had beenand liked the way I parented, so we parented very well together. Hewas very kind and loving. When he took over with the big kids, he triedto use what his father had called the “board of education,” which wasa paddle, but he never did much with it. Neither one of us ever reallybelieved in it. A light tap on the hand was usually enough. Instead ofpunishing them, we usually reasoned with them.

During the entire divorce-pending interlude, Ted was the one whotalked to Kenneth. I just couldn’t. I felt so much anger and pain that Icouldn’t bear to talk to him. The judge eventually said that even thoughI didn’t have the factory or the job anymore—I was working part timewith Ted—I could have earned a good deal of money, so he split themoney down the middle. I walked away from the marriage, again, withno resources. But I got the kids.

**

At the end of those three years, Ted joined my family. Since he didn’thave any kids of his own, we decided to have some together. Michaeland Jennifer were ten and seven by then, so I felt we needed tonegotiate how we would continue to expand the family and still allowme to “do it all.” I loved working in the firm and felt I had to contributeto the financial security of our family.

Ted and I negotiated everything: how we wanted things to be, whatwas important, where we could compromise and where one of us hadto give in. Coming from Milwaukee, he had strong family values, so hewas a willing accomplice and easy to negotiate with. We came up witha plan for integrating our work and family so we could grow ourbusiness and enjoy our children together. Unlike with Kenneth, whereit was pretty much all on my shoulders, I couldn’t have managed thisplan alone. It took both of us to implement a plan of this nature.

This is when the balance in my life finally kicked in and I started livingholistically.


Our first “deal” called for me to continue working and for us to hire alive-in nanny. We advertised for someone willing to work in an active,noisy household with lots of visiting children and lots of laundry andcleaning. The ad didn’t draw a lot of attention but our one call camefrom a very willing person. I only needed to use this ad a few timesbecause my housekeepers always stayed a long time.

Our second deal made sure we were always home for dinner atfive-thirty so the children didn’t get hungry and cranky. We’d put thekids to bed and go back to work.

I wanted the kids to be able to lead active lives with after-school sportsand things like that. I didn’t want them feeling like their mother alwaysworked, so I made sure I could go to a school play in the morning orwatch a ball game after school. To compensate for the lost time, I oftentook work home.

As computers became more popular, we actually rebuilt our house witha computer room so the kids could all participate. Our little place in thecountry grew from quaint-sized to a 7,500-square-foot mansion. Westarted right after Michele was born. I gave birth in May and demolitionbegan in June. We continued living on the property in a500-square-foot three-bedroom trailer for six months so I couldsupervise everything.

This trailer was something else. Our two semi-grown children each hada bedroom with the crib in the middle—Michael had to climb around itto get to his room—and we had the third bedroom. Also in residencewas Dusty, our Wire Hair Terrier, and somewhere in these confinedquarters was my huge, 1984-vintage “portable” Compaq computer.

The place felt like a zoo.

Every morning the construction people would thump up a plank to thetrailer and pound on the door. I’d appear with baby on one hip anddrawings in the other hand. I was the general contractor for the housewhile still handling the bookkeeping and other matters for thearchitectural business. Ted brought me whatever I needed from theoffice. The work was similar to what I did at the factory, but much, muchmore complicated.


I was being Superwoman! I even wanted to get my MBA at that pointbut Ted insisted it would be too much.

As winter approached, crossing the front yard to the house became atreacherous battleground. I fell one time too many and announced itwas time to move into the house.

Now, picture this house: there were no stairs to the second floor so Ihad to climb up and down a ladder, baby and all. Ted and I slept on ourqueen-sized bed in the bathroom. The night after the constructionworkers put the insulation in the ceiling, it fell all over our sleepingbags. What an adventure in itchy living. Still, life went on, work wenton, and the house was eventually finished.

Ted and I both went to the office every day and usually got home intime for dinner. Afterwards, we went to the computer room. In fact, weworked at home for the most part, which is why the kids didn’t reallyknow how hard we were working. On the weekends, their friends wouldcome over and play in the backfield. To them, it was all so easy.

**

A few years went by. Apart from work, I juggled getting my olderchildren to their school on the other side of the city and taking Micheleto pre-school. Our housekeeper was a tremendous asset but I stillwanted to show my face and participate in the madness—and ourfourth child was on the way! I nearly lost my cool when we decided tomerge with another firm and the closing date landed just after my duedate. I was a little concerned about job security as the new partnerswere not that keen on having a wife in the mix—especially not as thefinancial person.

My youngest son had just arrived a week before the merger but Idecided to be in the office that day anyway. I ran home at lunch everyday to feed Cody, hoping staying with the housekeeper wouldn’tpermanently damage him. What a Godsend Nanny was! She and herhusband Poppy lived in our basement, the perfect residentgrandparents.


An average day began with Michael leaving bright and early withPoppy, then catching the bus to school with a skateboard for additionaltransportation. He came back to the office each day and we left forhome. We chose an office with a Bally gym so we could work outwithout losing travel time. Life had to run like clockwork. I must admit,keeping to the schedule was a bear. Spontaneity went out the window.

Somewhere in all this work and organized living, we still had a marriageto address. Every now and then, I gritted my teeth and booked avacation somewhere because, we came to realize, it was essential toour functioning well both as a couple and as business partners. Wealways came back refreshed, recharged, and full of new ideas for moreproductivity and changes at the office.

None of this was perfect. It was a series of trade-offs, many of whichthe children felt the most. They once complained, for instance, thatother mothers left cut strawberries in the fridge for their kids. I’ve neverfigured out if that was true or not but I sure did feel guilty that I didn’thave those strawberries waiting for them. According to my kids, I neverwas quite like other mothers.

Of course, they also claimed other mothers played football andbecause I was pregnant, I couldn’t comply. That was probably pushingtheir luck.

By 1986, computers had improved a lot. All six of us had a computer inour upstairs computer room, even two-year-old Cody. Ted worked onhis architectural masterpieces using AutoCAD, I used my accountingsoftware, the older kids turned out state-of-the-art school assignmentsand the younger kids played games. I’m convinced Cody’s math skillsare a result of those nights in the computer room. It was a crazy, hecticzoo but it was working.

Or so I thought.


C h a p t e r

8 Moving Out, Moving Up, Moving On

In 1991, we moved to California. Both Tedand I started over, as we had sold ourarchitectural practice. About a year and halflater, I found myself living in a badcountry-and-western song. His taillightsreceded down the road, leaving me with fourchildren, a mortgage, no family for support,and a fledgling new business. Everything justgot harder

At the end of twelve years together, Ted wentback to Milwaukee to visit his parents. Threemonths later, he told me our relationship wasn’tdoing all that well, so he’d had an affair while hewas in Milwaukee.

I said, “That was three months ago.”

“Yes.”

I took a deep breath. “Now you’re going to tell methe woman you had the affair with is pregnant.”

“Oh no,” he said, “but I’m telling you because I’mworried about you. I haven’t heard how she is.”

58 Chapter 8: Moving Out, Moving Up, Moving On

I knew right then it was his girlfriend from high school with whom hehad unfinished business.

He said, “How did you know?”

I said, “I’m not sure. It just makes sense.”

I had no idea what had happened that the relationship suddenly wasn’t“doing all that well.” In today’s terms, he’d probably use the term“alienation of affection.” The children kept me so busy that he feltneglected, as if he wasn’t important to me anymore. Of course, I stillran his office; I still saw him all day, every day. But I spent my time atwork staying on top of the books so we always knew where we stood.I knew the company financials were vital, so I always finished themonth-end statement by the seventh of the next month. Everythingworked well. We went to Europe every year. We had a beautiful home,a wonderful life.

Until he got someone pregnant.

I felt as if I was living in the Big Chill. Ted’s old girlfriend was thirty-nineand still nice looking with no kids. Along comes her old boyfriend, alsostill looking very good and now very successful as well. I rememberedhis telling me years earlier that she had sold her picture to Playboy for$10,000. I’d never thought much of her.

“She’s going to call in the next week or two and tell us she’s pregnantand demand something from us, right?”

“No!”

He refused to believe she would do anything like that. I refused tobelieve he hadn’t stayed in contact with her, and I didn’t want to believehe could be so stupid as to not realize she’d set him up. Sure enough,she called. He passed her on to me. She said, “I want $5,000 a monthin child support or I’ll make sure the police arrest Ted at the airport thenext time he comes to Milwaukee to visit his parents.”

Wisconsin had serious laws about deadbeat dads.


I told her we couldn’t afford to pay her $5,000 a month and that she hadmade a choice. This was 1988, so ample birth control was certainlyavailable. If she’d wanted a baby so badly, she could have just hadone, she didn’t have to call Ted and demand money. Clearly, she justwanted a child and saw an opportunity to make some money from thesituation, as she had with Playboy. We ended up buying her an annuitythat provided $500 a month in child support until the baby waseighteen, which was more than I’d ever gotten. Plus, Ted maintained arelationship with the child.

Meanwhile, my dreams felt shattered. Of course, I knew we had startedby having an affair, so I figured what goes around does, indeed, comearound. Being Catholic, Ted wanted to stay in the marriage no matterhow many thousands of Hail Marys he had to say. But he was also partItalian, which meant that part of him felt I should be a good littlestay-at-home wife while he played around. In fact, he wanted to telleveryone about the baby and include it in his—our—life. How was Isupposed to tell my teenagers, who adored him, that their step-dad hadfooled around and created a child out of wedlock? I didn’t even tell myparents until much, much later.

**

Clearly, Ted and I needed to work on our relationship; just being aworking team wasn’t enough. We also clearly saw thegoods-and-services tax taking effect and another recession coming, sofelt it was as good a time as any to wind everything down. In 1991, wedecided to leave Canada and move to the United States.

We gave our clients to another architect’s company and helped ourpeople move on. We were trying to choose between Seattle andNewport Beach when Ted’s best friend David asked him to move toNewport Beach and get into investments with him. So we left our houseon the market and off we went.

We loaded up a forty-five foot trailer, including our boat, and sent it onahead. Jennifer spent the summer in Toronto with her dad andMichael, then eighteen, stayed behind in anticipation of leaving for theUniversity of Western Ontario. Ted stayed behind as well, to handlebusiness-transfer matters. So Michele, Cody and I ended up drivingour conversion van all the way across the country by ourselves.


**

After cold, damp, northern Toronto, California was like being droppedinto paradise. We started out renting a beautiful house in Big Canyon,with its golf course community. Talk about culture shock.

Mothers have a lot more to do around here, what with year-roundsports like water polo first thing in the morning and soccer and baseballin their seasons. I was always coming and going and dizzily trying tokeep up. Being new and shy and fiercely independent, I had a hardtime asking other mothers for help. Besides, most of the other mothersdidn’t work. Their lives revolved around carpooling, tennis, and thePTA.

Our first year here, I learned that all the mothers helped prepare for theSpirit Run, a five mile race or walk around Fashion Island. Myparticipation demonstrated how much of an anomaly I was. I went tothe orientation, where I learned of the nine-day ordeal coming up whenthey expected me to report to school every day to count the formsreturned by the parents. The first class to have all their forms in wouldwin a pizza party.

Being the entrepreneur I am certainly guilty of being, and strategizingbeing one of my core strengths, I came up with a strategy. When thepackets were ready, I launched a telemarketing campaign. I calledevery parent and asked for their assistance by sending back theirpacket on the very first day. Otherwise, I knew, those forms would justsit around the kitchen. “This will help our kids win their pizza party,” Ireminded each mother. I had my son follow up by calling eachclassmate to remind them to bring the packet to school the next day—alittle pressure from a key accomplice.

All twenty-nine packets, of course, came back the very first day. Cody’sclass, of course, won their pizza party. And I, of course—the instigatorof this incredibly efficient campaign—was never invited back.

But my son was proud of me.

**


Meanwhile, Ted kept flying back and forth to Toronto to close the dealon the business—and probably have another affair. I knew by then thathe’d had many affairs before me and probably while he was with me,too. It was just his way. He had a lot of good qualities plus one verydisreputable one.

Once he sold the business back in Toronto, Ted no longer wanted tobe an architect. He wanted to be an investment banker instead. Herewe had moved all the way to California to start a whole new lifetogether but we weren’t going to work together anymore. Ted andDavid and another partner began looking at different start-ups. Theydid it from our house instead of going to an office but I wasn’t included.Ted apparently did not want me involved in anything now that he hadDavid. In fact, he’d led David to believe the previous business hadbeen his alone, that I was just a bit player on the team. David believedhim.

By then I had come to recognize when Ted was having an affair, so thenext time it happened I went to a marriage counselor. Margaret said weneeded to discover if Ted was a philanderer or just having affairsbecause a philanderer needs a different kind of help. Philandering islike a disease, she said, like being addicted to sex. The man needs thevariety, the chase, and the experience to get the kick.

I couldn’t live with the real possibility of another fifteen women over thenext five years, so if Ted was a philanderer, I figured I would just get adivorce and live without him. If this girl turned out to be a fling, though,he’d be the one with the choice.

“If he’s just having flings,” I said in one counseling session, “he shouldgo back to Toronto and figure out if he wants to be with her or with meand his family.” I couldn’t keep living on the edge without knowing whatwas going on, especially since AIDS was rampant at the time. I had noidea what I would be catching.

Finally, Margaret sat us down one day and said, “As far as I can tell,he’s just having flings.” Ted said he’d go to Toronto and think about it.And that’s when I heard the country-western theme playing in the backof my head, as I stood there in the driveway watching the taillights ofhis van drive down the street. I had three kids in school, a business Iwas just starting and an enormous mortgage to pay on the Big Canyon


house Ted had bought for me out of guilt, not unlike Richard all thoseyears ago. But we still hadn’t sold the house in Toronto yet, whichmeant he conceivably might not come back.

I was terrified once again.

He left on a Friday. Margaret had said to come back and see herafterwards, so I went to her office bright and early Monday morning.She said, “I think I’ve made a mistake.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well,” she said, “I’ve listened to the tape again, and now I feel maybehe is a philanderer.”

“You call that a mistake?! I sent my husband off on a journey becauseI believed what you told us.”

“I know it’s going to be really difficult for you,” she said. “We’d betterset up a series of appointments.”

I just looked at her. “Oh, no,” I said. “No, no. Now that he’s gone, youaren’t what I need. I made the decision to move all the way across thecountry based on what he said and I made the decision to send him offto Toronto to sort things out based on what you said. I think I’d be betteroff on my own.”

So I looked for a different therapist, one for me, not us. I neededsomeone once a month or so, who could give me the tools I needed toknow what to do next. I didn’t realize it then, but I was looking for acoach, for the very help I now give my own clients. But coaches werenot available at that point in time, so I found a therapist who talked methrough my options. I decided that if Ted came back and had anotheraffair here, that would be my cue to end the marriage.

It was. He came back and invited his lover to the house when hethought I was out of town. That last straw ended our relationship. Butthis time, I was beyond heartbroken. I’d loved him deeply, despite hisinfidelity. He had been my business partner, my lover, my husband,and my best friend. He had been my rescuer all those years ago. Hehad fathered two of my children.


One of the things that helped me through the devastation was BillMurray’s Groundhog Day. In the movie, the radio alarm would go offevery morning at six, playing the same song with the same chatter andleading into the same day as the last. The day after I saw GroundhogDay, my alarm also went off at six in the morning. As I rolled over toshut it off, I started to laugh. Well, I could do what he did in the movieand learn the lessons over time, or maybe I can learn the lessons fromthe movie and start living for today. So I made a choice. I didn’t wantto be miserable. I didn’t want to wake up in fear anymore. It was like anew dawn.

I made another choice: we no longer needed the five bedrooms,swimming pool and enormous mortgage of the Big Canyon house. I putit on the market and Ted and I agreed to split the mortgage until it sold.

Unlike Canada, California has a no-contest divorce. We’d gotten herein July 1991, filed for dissolution of marriage in 1993, and were legallydivorced in March 1994. Very easy mechanically. Not so easyemotionally. By then I was forty-six. I thought I had finally married myone true love. I hadn’t expected to be a single mom with three kids athome, another away at university, and a brand new business.

Good thing I had already jumped back on the entrepreneurial wagonagain.


C h a p t e r

9 Building—and Breaking—From Scratch

It’s hard to say life is tough when you live inSouthern California. On the one hand,Newport Beach is paradise; on the other, it’sexpensive and difficult for a single mom. I letthe housekeeper go and forged ahead on myown.

Back in the early 1990s, in the midst of the familysettling into Newport Beach, my father hadintroduced me to a Brazilian company thatwanted to market an exciting hair-care product inthe States. At first, I dismissed the idea but Tedencouraged me to look at it, so I sent a sample toa friend who was black and he tried it on hisdaughter. She got excited because she wassuddenly able to take care of her own hair, so Igot excited about the product, which seemed toenhance people’s independence as well as theirself-esteem. In 1993, I started a company tomarket Rio.

Well, I’d picked one hell of a business—theproduct crossed races! There I was a whitewoman with incredibly straight hair, selling anon-caustic, supposedly all-natural relaxer toblacks and Hispanics. Rio softened the hairbonds the way an old telephone cord stretches

66 Chapter 9: Building—and Breaking—From Scratch

out over time. People had been using it in Brazil for fifty years to makekinky hair soft and manageable. Some people said it was the productresponsible for Brazilians having all that beautiful hair. Whatever thecase, our customers totally fell in love with it.

I realized quite early, though, that my walking into black hair-careshops wouldn’t work. Not only was I white, I wasn’t a hairdresser. I justcould not be credible in those stores. I had to find people to pitch theproduct for me.

I called Essence and Ebony, a couple of magazines which were ownedby and targeted to Blacks, and spoke to the management. Eventually,they led me to Mary, a Puerto Rican. She tried the product and fell inlove with it. We agreed to split the work: I’d raise the money, she’d sellthe product.

The company limped along for a couple of years before I realized ourapproach wasn’t really getting us anywhere. Finally, I met astockbroker who, in turn, introduced me to Peter, an infomercialproducer. He called himself The Hair King.

Looking back, I trusted Peter too much. I didn’t investigate him enough.I sat in his office while he told me a story about how he hated not beingable to trust people. He had trusted one of his employees too much, hesaid, and had been disappointed. I felt the same way. He sucked meright in.

I showed Peter what Rio did and how it boosted people’s self-esteem.Female customers across the country were sending in amazing storiesabout how the product had changed their lives. He got very excitedabout it, too. I ended up signing all the licensing rights over to him andtogether we produced an infomercial with me acting as the liaisonbetween the company and the infomercial people. Meanwhile, since Istill had my half of that huge mortgage to cover and three kids tosupport, I worked for my friend David for the nine months it took to getthe infomercial up and running.

David feared delegation because he never before had anyone to whomhe could delegate anything. He’d had to keep control over everything.Then I showed up.


David was renovating an old airport hanger and turning it into a studio.A good part of the building had to be presentable in six weeks for theAmerican Film Festival. First thing, I said, “I know you’re wrapped upin the renovations, but you have other things you need to take care of.Why don’t I take over the renovation project?”

His eyes flew open wide. “Do you know how important this is? Do youknow what the due dates are? What if it isn’t complete? What if youcan’t get it done on time?”

I said, “Just leave it to me. I’ll devote my time to it and it will be readyin six weeks.”

And it was. I got it done in six weeks, complete with a kitchen for thestaff, because movie companies give their staff a lot of perks. It hadn’tbeen that hard. After all, I’d worked in an architectural firm and hadbeen general contractor on my own house. From then on, Ishadow-coached David, doing everything for him from opening his mailto following him to meetings. I was his one-woman entourage. But Ialways managed to get home by the time the kids arrived from schoolto be sure they did their homework. I got one of the first pagers so thekids could 9-1-1 me if something came up.

We always stayed on top of technology.

**

The licensing agreement between Peter and me paid me an escalatingroyalty. The product holder traditionally gets a flat five percent but Inegotiated the deal so that the more we sold, the higher mypercentage, up to twelve percent.

The infomercial featured Mary and Andre, a hair stylist. During thefilming, Andre did something unscripted that just drove the audiencewild. He stuck his finger in the product, put it in his mouth and said,“This is so natural, I can even eat it.” You certainly couldn’t do that witha caustic relaxer! We shot up from selling almost nothing to sellingtwelve million dollars worth of product.


The key to successful infomercials is having people buy the productonce a month. Our infomercial aired over the summer and through thefall, about six months all together, and became a phenomenon. Peterwas paying me a huge royalty. Somewhere along the way, though, Istarted to realize he was actually selling more product than he wasimporting. Soon after that, he decided he wanted to do away with myroyalties.

He could only “do away” with my royalties if an issue arose, like theTylenol scare where the company had to apologize to its customers.So Peter staged an “issue,” and suddenly people’s hair started to burn,turn green or fall out.

Now, that could not have happened if they were using the real product.Granted, it could turn hair green, but only if used over a prolongedperiod of time on blonde or gray hair. Grecian 5 had performed thatway originally, too, but we hadn’t been selling Rio long enough for thatkind of effect to occur. People were passionate about the product,which meant they were passionate about these alleged “issues” aswell. They didn’t want anything to happen to their Rio.

Peter asked Mary to go on TV and claim that the FDA had removed theproduct from the market. The FDA was a curious entity. They hadoriginally told us we didn’t have to do any testing but the momentsomething went wrong, they wanted to see test results. As a result, theinfomercial blew up in November 1994.

Peter then asked Mary to go on TV and say the problems were all theresult of a single bad batch—but she wouldn’t. Mary knew thatwhatever was harming people wasn’t her Rio and she was incrediblypassionate about people not thinking it was. All this happened aroundthe same time as the OJ Simpson white Bronco chase, so the newsreports would flash back and forth between Rio and the OJ car chase.Peter finally took the product to Nevada and totally shipped it out. Heowed me half a million dollars in royalties when everything ground to astop.

That’s when I got hit with the class-action lawsuit.

**


The class-action lawsuit sued Peter as the infomercial producer. I gotattached to the case because of our affiliation and because I had beenthe person bringing the product in from Brazil. Fortunately, I knew moreabout what Peter had done wrong than the prosecutors could possiblyhave discovered, so I cut a deal on the criminal piece attached to thesuit and worked with them to bring him down. I felt almost as much avictim as our customers.

I suspected Peter had produced some kind of knock-off. I couldn’t thinkof any other reason the product would suddenly behave so differently.I had no evidence to prove anything, though. I only had evidence thathe shipped more than the company purchased. If he didn’t make it,where had it come from?

Meanwhile, I knew the original product had never harmed anyone’shair, so we got it tested at an independent lab. The results proved thatRio was less harmful to the eyes than Johnson’s Baby Shampoo. Isuppose we probably could have won the lawsuit but it would havetaken more money than I had. We decided instead to let our liabilityinsurance pay off the plaintiffs.

Receiving a letter from an attorney telling me how horrible I was andwhat terrible things I’d done when I hadn’t was a unique experience.My first reaction was, “What are they talking about? I didn’t do any ofthose things!” I launched into a defensive response. But as I learned,it’s better to get a nasty letter than no letter. When you get nothing,there’s nothing to respond to and you can’t strategize. As a result, myattorney taught me a wonderful lesson: everything is an opportunity.Even the nastiest stuff is an opportunity. All you have to do is recognizeit as such.

The other day, for example, I was getting ready to go see a client andrealized that, because every day is different, I had miscalculated. Thetime I’d set for my leave time was also the time I’d set somewhere inmy brain for my shower time. When I got out of the shower and lookedat my watch, I realized I’d miscalculated by forty-five minutes. So I gotin the car, called the client and told her I’d screwed up. People oftencelebrate when that happens but I wanted to make an opportunity outof this. I suggested that instead of meeting at eleven as scheduled,we’d meet at eleven-thirty at a restaurant and I’d take her to lunch. She


readily agreed—she really needed to get out of the office. That’s whatI learned from the lawsuit period. Instead of thinking, “Woe is me,” Inow think, “How do I turn this into an opportunity?”

Turning something one could construe as negative into an opportunityhas become a daily habit for me now. It’s a wonderful way to look atlife. Losing a pair of glasses becomes an opportunity to get anotherpair!

With that attitude in mind, I started to look at every horrible letter Ireceived differently. The experience took me to a different level oflooking at and dealing with adversity. I learned what to worry about andwhat not to worry about, when it was time to be in fear and when itwasn’t.

Meanwhile I was still getting calls from all over the country. Customerswould call the factory in Brazil to see how they could get their Rio backand subsequently found their way to me. The entrepreneurial husbandof one our original customers promised me he would become aninvestor if I would try again. I really believed in this product. I had tofigure out how to get Rio back to this enormous customer base.

But first, I had to let all the bad press and bad feelings dissipate. ThenI could start over.

**

All in all, 1994 was a tough year: my divorce from Ted came through,the infomercial started and ended, and I got hit with the class-actionsuit. But, as they say in the world of infomercials, wait—that’s not all,because 1994 was also the year my oldest daughter went into deepcrisis.

Jennifer had a hard time adjusting to the tenth grade when we first gotto California. By the time she turned eighteen and was graduating highschool, she was going through a rough time and wanted to live at thebeach for a summer. I didn’t think that was appropriate, so she stageda fight so big and raucous that the little kids ran around with their handsover their ears because of her language. I finally asked myself why Iwas holding her back—it was so toxic. So I let her go. Her best friendmoved up from Florida and they lived at the beach.


That fall, Jennifer started Orange Coast Community College. ByOctober/November, they had lost their electricity because they hadn’tpaid the bill and there were fruit flies in the air. Worse, Jennifer wastotally on drugs. In Newport Beach, a pretty young girl didn’t need tobuy drugs, people simply gave them to her.

I realized she wouldn’t listen to me; I had no influence with heranymore. Michael went to see her. He came back and said, “If we don’tget her out of there soon, we’re going to lose her. She’s into somehorrible stuff.”

The kids had been going back and forth to Canada to see their fathersince we first moved to California and Kenneth had always said thedoor was open for his children, so I shipped Jennifer off to Canada tolive with him. It got her out of Newport Beach and back into a structuredenvironment. She had to do another year of high school because hergrades weren’t good enough to get into college up there, but sheeventually went to Montreal and got her degree. She’s a magnificentyoung lady now. Her dad gave her a good start, but I think shestraightened out mostly on her own.

I had to straighten out my business problems on my own as well.


C h a p t e r

10 New Company

Perhaps part of my success was that I neverbelieved it was a different world for women.When I was raising money for my infomercialproduct, an investor I respected refused todo business with me for three reasons: 1) Iwas a woman, 2) I didn’t have my MBA and3) he didn’t like the liability issues. I wasshocked! I think the first two reasons cloudedhis judgment about the third. In any event, Igot my MBA—and created a strategy for theinvestor to feel comfortable.

The class-action suit went on for a couple ofyears. I kept getting phone calls from women allacross the country saying they wanted their Rioback, they wanted their hair back the way it hadbeen. Some of them were from the deepest partof the South and I could hardly understand whatthey were saying.

I knew I had to start a new business. I spent 1995getting down a new set of standard operatingprocedures (SOPs) and doing all the testing andthings I should have done for Rio. In 1996, afterthe suit had resolved and the bad press haddissipated, I started Copa and spent that yearlooking for funds.

74 Chapter 10: New Company

One of the southern callers, Barbara, was working as a customer-service rep for a telephone company in Atlanta after leaving an abusivemarriage and losing fifty pounds. She insisted that if I ever started upthe company again, she’d come to California to help me—sightunseen. And she did. She believed so strongly in what we were doingthat she up and moved out here to become my head of customerservice.

Meanwhile, I had written a profile of my ideal partner: someonebetween thirty-five and forty who had taken a direct-marketingcompany public, cashed out, and wanted to work part-time. It was briefbecause I figured either people would know someone who’d done thator they wouldn’t. It was like asking, “Do you know anyone who drivesa Porsche and lives in Newport Beach?” You either know someone oryou don’t. I looked for a person, not for money, because peopleintroduce you to people. With that profile in hand, my hard-to-getinvestor realized he knew the perfect person, so the three of usbecame partners and Copa got funded.

We couldn’t import the same product—that would have taken too longfor FDA approval—so we had to manufacture a new product in thestates. I knew I had to prepare myself for the FDA because it wouldhave been criminal to market any product at that point without doing allthe things I should have done for Rio. I certainly couldn’t pretend Ididn’t know what they were at that point. We worked with the Brazilianfactory to create and license another formula that worked withoutcopper because the FDA would base its objections on the copper.

One day as I waited at a bus stop in Vail, Colorado while visitingMichael, I approached a man and struck up a conversation. He turnedout to be a lawyer from Los Angeles. I started telling him about myclass-action lawsuit, and mentioned that I was looking for someonewho could help me with FDA compliance procedures. He said, “I knowthe perfect person. She’s an expert in FDA compliance. Her name isLillie. Would you like me to connect you?”

Lillie was wonderful, just what we needed. Copa turned out to be onlyabout eighty percent as effective as Rio but with Debbie Allen as ourspokesperson, we started production on another infomercial in 1997which ran during 1998-99.


**

As before, I took a job while the infomercial was in production. In fact,I spent another nine months commuting to Los Angeles, this time tohelp out my new silent partner, “George.”

Michele, Cody, and I still lived in the expensive Big Canyon house.Jennifer was in Canada with Kenneth; Michael, who had already gottenhis degree in philosophy, worked in Hollywood. I’d leave the houseevery morning at six and get to the office about seven. The kids wouldwalk to the bus stop on their own. At one-thirty, after the stock marketclosed, I’d leave Los Angeles so I could be home in time to pick themup at three. It was a perfect case of integration.

“George” had an enclave of executives from his different companiessharing a suite and was more than happy to have me in the suite—aslong as I had my Copa phone next to my desk so I could stay on top ofthe new company I was putting together and he hoped to finance. Itemporarily replaced his Executive Assistant, “Clarice,” who had beenwith him for ten years. Her last day on the job she said, “Even a dayworking with George yelling at me is better than where I’m going,”which was to work with her son for three months, something she feltshe had to do to help him get his business started. “Don’t you darechange a thing,” she warned me. “I want to come back to find thingsexactly the way they were.”

I ignored her warning.

Clarice returned after six months but by then I had computerized theoffice and moved it into the modern age. A major part of the job waskeeping track of George’s stock-market transactions and Clarice usedto make a big production of disappearing into her office for weeks at atime to sort out all the stock transactions at tax time. I had set up asystem using computer spreadsheets and handled everything daily. Infact, I had systems that allowed me to keep on top of everything.Clarice was furious. “The way it’s set up,” she fumed, “any moron coulddo the job now.”


She refused to come back, so I stayed for another three months andthen replaced myself with two people. Even though it wasn’t my ownbusiness, I still looked for symptoms and developed solutions. In fact,“Catalyst for Change” is part of my logo. Nothing ever stays the samewhen I show up.

**

Copa had a rocky beginning. The new product carried both the memoryand taint of the old product. The people who had loved Rio bought it;the people who hadn’t been sure about Rio didn’t.

For the Rio infomercial, I had licensed the product to the producer,Peter, and had only been involved with collecting royalties andmonitoring communication. That, I realized, had been one of thereasons for Rio’s failure: I had disconnected too much from theprocess. For this second infomercial, I stayed more involved.

Copa was a virtual company. We had a fulfillment house, a call centerthat doubled as our customer-care center, and an FDA-compliantmanufacturing plant. I coordinated the operations but the system didn’twork well. When someone else ships your product, you have to dependon them to actually ship it, which means they also, at least initially,handle your customer service.

There was something inherently wrong with our shipping centeranswering where’s-my-package questions. The fulfillment center gotpaid every time it answered that question, so it almost paid them not toship the package on time so they would get the phone call.

We realized what the problem was a few months into the infomercialairing and decided to take over the customer service and fulfillmentfunctions ourselves. We created the fulfillment center, which keptgrowing, but used an established call center, Forestville and Tucker, tohandle our customer service functions. They hired the best people andour people worked for them. We moved our offices into the back of thecall-center so we could coordinate everything on site.

If we had started the business that way, it probably would have beensuccessful for many years. Instead, we were trying to regainmomentum we’d already lost. Ultimately, it just didn’t work. Then


George, who was in his sixties at the time, had a skiing accident andhurt his neck. One thing led to another, and he decided the time hadcome to get rid of all his aggravations—and we were one of thoseaggravations. He—we—ultimately sold the business in 2000 to acompany in New York. We were supposed to create anotherinfomercial for the product but the new owners never went through withit. Debbie Allen went on her way and Barbara moved onto somethingelse. After the September 11 catastrophe, business everywhere simplyground to a halt for a while, especially in New York. Copa neverrecovered.

**

I wanted to get my MBA throughout the entire Rio/Copa period, butcould never figure out how to fit it into my schedule. One day I told myfriends I needed to find a program on Tuesday and Thursday nights somy classes wouldn’t infringe on the weekends I had the kids.

Within two weeks, I got a fax about California State University, Fullerton(CSUF) opening a new campus in the technology area of Irvine, rightdown the road from my office. Would I come to a meeting?

The classes would be held on Tuesday and Thursday nights.

I worked on my masters all the way through Copa. Just as the companywound down, I finished my MBA. When the business was sold in 2000,Forestville and Tucker’s CEO invited me to be his Chief FinancialOfficer (CFO) and help him grow his business. He enjoyed workingwith me, he said. He would make me a partner. I didn’t even have tobuy in; I just became a partner.

I joined Forestville and Tucker to help them look for money and installdifferent accounting and operations processes. They specialized inhandling the Red Cross’ 1-800-HELP-NOW disaster campaigns.

Ironically, I left them in August 2001.

Meanwhile, the Big Canyon house sold and we moved into a house onSpyglass Hill. I finished my MBA in October 2000 and graduated inJanuary 2001. Somewhere in there, I married and divorced a great guywith whom I actually had nothing whatsoever in common.


C h a p t e r

11 New Man

I was married to Richard for two years. I wasmarried to Kenneth for nine, Ted for twelveand Gregory for two. I never receivedalimony or child support from any of them.Every time I left a marriage, we just went ourseparate ways and I shouldered all theresponsibility. In between, I took care ofbusiness.

I’ve noticed a definite pattern in my life wherebusiness and marriage are concerned. WhenKenneth’s business stumbled, so did ourmarriage. When Ted and I sold the architecturalfirm, our relationship started to fall apart as well.When I built and lost Copa, I did it concurrentlywith marrying and divorcing my fourth husband,Gregory.

I had started seeing Gregory in 1996 while I wasworking on developing Copa. I met him at thegym. We were both always reading and we usedto trade books. Eventually we started leavingbooks for each other. We were just good friends.He was married—or so I thought—and I wasInternet dating.

80 Chapter 11: New Man

I had met someone from Chicago who decided to come out to see mewithout really telling me he was coming. He hadn’t been quite truthfulabout himself at all. He wasn’t well and he had a lot of skin issues. I feltit had been a bit unfair to tell me all his medical problems at the lastminute. I’ve since learned that’s what people do: they reveal whateverthey’ve been hiding at the very last minute.

One day at the gym as I pedaled away on a bicycle next to Gregory, heasked what was up with me. I said, “You know, I’m here as a kind ofescape. I have this person visiting me from Chicago and I’m just so fedup with the whole idea of dating that I’m not going to do it anymore.”

“So ...,” Gregory said, “just what are you looking for in a man?”

I knew he was married; what harm was there in having a conversation?I started telling him what my kids were involved in, and how, wheneverthey had a game on the weekend and I wanted to go, whoever I wasdating tended to say, “Why are you going? It isn’t your weekend. Tedwill go.” I’d have to explain I went to my kids’ events because I wantedto go, not because it was a responsibility.

The kids always spent most of the week with me but Ted and I hadalternate weekends and he took them Tuesday and Thursday nights. Itwas a wonderful way to be divorced, really, since we each had built-inbabysitting. But if it was my weekend off and Cody had a baseballgame or Michele had a soccer match, I’d go and it was very hard forme to connect with a man who thought I didn’t need to do that. I wantedsomeone who understood the importance of my family, someone whorealized that if I wanted to go to a game, he should either come with meor plan to see me afterwards.

“In other words,” I finished telling Gregory, “I want someone who willactively enjoy my children.”

A couple weeks later, Gregory asked me out for sushi.

“I realized later that you must think I’m still married,” he said that night,“but I’ve actually been divorced for a year and a half. I just realized thatwhat you were describing that day at the gym is exactly what I’ve beenmissing.”


So we started dating. And got married about six months later.

I’ve always succumbed to the big rush.

Gregory was a very fun guy. He got very involved with my kids veryfast. He could have been a successful attorney if he’d put his heart intoit, but he never did. He liked to play; he liked to take Cody golfing in theafternoon. And he liked to smoke pot. He called it a “nice break in theend of the day.”

By that point in my life, I no longer even thought about ever workingwith a husband again—Gregory or anyone else. All my attention andenergy went into getting my MBA, handling the business, and beingthere for my kids. Having Gregory around was very helpful because heloved driving the kids everywhere while I studied.

But we were never really comfortable with each other. I didn’t realize ituntil I read The Five Languages of Love1, but we didn’t even feel lovethe same way. Gregory’s love language was acts of service. Hethought he was showing his love for me every time he drove the kidshither and yon or did the shopping and other little things around thehouse. My love language was quality time and conversation,something I’d had in common with all of my previous husbands, evenRichard. All Gregory’s acts of service really had no effect on mewhatsoever.

I soon realized he hadn’t been telling me everything, just like myInternet dates. When he said he didn’t have a mortgage on his house,for example, I took it to mean he had paid it off. Later, I found out he’dgone bankrupt a few years earlier and had no mortgage because hismother held it. He also had two kids—he’d been married fourtimes—but wasn’t very close with either of them. It didn’t make sense;if he wanted to be actively involved with children, where were his?Gregory’s life story had a lot of missing pieces. Over time, thosediscrepancies eventually contributed to our marriage not working out.

1. See the Appendix for a list of Book Notes, including this one, available at www.clarityandresults.com


We got married because we both liked being married but we haddifferent ideas about what marriage was supposed to look like. Hedidn’t agree with my belief in property separation, for instance. Iwanted a pre-nup to protect what I had, which, at the time was cash inthe bank. He had assets to protect as well. Yet one of the first thingshe wanted to do was sell our two cars and use my cash to buy a$40,000 Suburban. I shook my head. “I’m not comfortable doing that,”I said. “Why should I buy the car if you’re going to drive it? I’ll pay half,but I’m not paying it all.”

What is it with men and cars? They always have to change the carsright away. I liked my Explorer; his car was the one getting old. Lookingback, I think he hadn’t bought a new car because he didn’t have themoney. A Jewish Newport Beach lawyer and he had no money.

What he had was a very wealthy mother. His retirement was well takencare of.

Gregory did a hodgepodge of family law and business transactions toearn his living. He was a good lawyer but not an entrepreneur—heprobably should have been a corporate attorney. Very often he wouldsay, “I don’t do that kind of law,” when some potential client or businesscame up.

“Then why don’t you associate with someone who does that kind oflaw,” I would ask, “so you can refer people back and forth?”

His answer was always that he just didn’t want to. I don’t think he everthought out the basic concept of his business. He had no plan, nomarketing or business strategy; he just bumbled along. By the time wemet he’d been in business for years and wasn’t about to change. AfterRichard and Kenneth and Ted—all hardworking go-getters—Gregoryfrustrated me. He’d call around 9:30 in the morning to say he’d alreadyaccomplished so much that he didn’t need to work for the rest of theday. By one o’clock, he’d be home, lying on the couch, reading a book.

I guess he just wanted to be a stay-at-home dad. He was already in hismid-fifties, so there was no way he was going to develop any ambitionat that point, which was just one more reason why our marriage didn’t


work out. He had no ambition and I had nothing but. I was runningCopa and going for my MBA; I had no time or inclination to help himdevelop his business.

I did make suggestions, though, trying to help him figure out how hecould become more productive so he could be happier, but—just like“Clarice”—he still lived in the dark ages of doing everything by hand.I’d suggest using this or that computer system, but he always said no.Then he’d accuse me of not being interested in his business

“Of course I’m interested in your business,” I’d say, “but we keephaving the same conversation. Why don’t you follow through onanything we discuss, so we’d have new issues to discuss? We’re justhaving the same discussion over and over. If nothing’s going tochange, there’s nothing to talk about.”

He finally got a computer and moved forward. Again, I was the catalystfor change but he resisted that change every step of the way.Sometimes, I suspected he liked being stuck.

Another one of our issues, of course, regarded how we handledmoney. He wanted a joint credit card. Every time he brought it up, I’dask how much he owed on his current card and whether he had paid itoff that month. He’d always say no.

“Well, you know I pay mine off monthly,” I’d say, “so when you catch upwith your card and decide you want to do it my way, we’ll talk. Untilthen, I’d rather not.”

Conversations like those, he insisted, made him feel I treated ourmarriage like a business transaction. Maybe I did. After all, this was myfourth time around. I’d had business successes and failures andmarriage successes and failures. Sooner or later, a person recognizeswhat it takes to stay afloat.

**

Gregory and I did share the cost of certain things. We’d each putmoney into an account every month to cover rent and utilities and thenI’d pay the bills. But apart from that, everything was separate. Includingyet another house.


Shortly after we got married, Gregory sold his house to a friend, andTed and I finally sold our place in Big Canyon. Gregory and I rented fora few months, but then, of course, we wanted to buy. I didn’t want toput all the money I’d just gotten into a new house, and he, of course,hadn’t gotten anything from the sale of his place because it had beenin his mother’s name. So I went and had a talk with his mother.

“I think it would be a good idea for Gregory and me to buy a house,” Itold her, “but we need to be on equal footing. I think we should eachput $25,000 into the house. I was hoping you would lend it to him, andwe could pay you interest.”

She agreed and I have to admit, Gregory and I had fun buying thehouse together. It was in Harbor Ridge, a gated community at the topof Spyglass Hill—in Newport Beach, of course. Once I got to California,I never left Newport Beach. My kids made it clear that if we ever movedto Irvine, we might as well have moved to Connecticut.

The house was very pretty. We bought it the day after we saw it andthe four of us—Gregory, Michele, Cody and I—moved in. Later the nextyear, Jennifer moved in for a few months, right as the marriage wasending. That might have contributed a bit to the marriage ending, too.

**

Gregory was a hunter with lots of trophy heads: moose, deer, bears, allkinds of stuff. I had art on my walls. When he moved into my place, myart stayed and all his trophies moved into his ranch and a friend’shouse. Eventually, his friend wound up with a whole wall of heads.

After we were married, Gregory won a lottery to hunt for a big-hornedsheep. It’s an expensive sport but he was very excited about it. Findinga guide and getting prepared became the focus of his existence. Hehunted and got the sheep. Later in an interview, he said, ”Hunting thatsheep was the best moment of my life.”

“Is that true?” I asked him.

He said, “Yes, absolutely.”


I thought, Boy, I’m really in the wrong place. I didn’t know what I wasdoing there.

Gregory took the sheep’s head to the taxidermist, planning to hang inour house. By then Jennifer had returned from Canada and moved in.When she and Michele saw the sheep head on a workbench in thegarage, they started giving Gregory a hard time. “We’re gonna throwup every time we walk by it in the house,” they promised him.

Poor Gregory; he got no support from my kids. Or from me, either, asfar as he was concerned. He wasn’t happy. He was in the wrong place,too.

By the time we separated in October 1999, Copa was windingdown—once again, as the business went, so went the marriage.Jennifer had already moved to San Jose to work as an inside-salescoordinator, and Michele had just gotten her drivers license, whichmeant she could drive herself to water polo. I sold the house and sliddown from Spyglass Hill to a two-bedroom townhouse, although withMichele and Cody still home, we really needed three. Michele and Ishared a room while I built a room in the garage. The room wasn’t legaland I was given two years to comply with taking it down—which I did,right at the end of those two years, when Michele went off to college.

She loved that room.


C h a p t e r

12 New Me

After graduating with my MBA in 2001, I tooka certification course to become a businesscoach and found my true calling: helpingleaders develop their life plans andbusinesses. Coaching has been an evolutionfor me. When I first started, I just wanted tohelp people in transition. But that’s not whymy phone rang. It rang because peoplewanted to know how I had done what I haddone.

My two partners at Forestville and Tucker werevery young: one was twenty-five, the otherthirty-five. I made good money and had a carallowance, but I always felt like the mother hen.Of course, that may have had something to dowith the fact that, as the finance person, I wasalways the one who had to say yes or no. Theyusually wanted “yes.” I usually had to say “no.”

Around March 2001, Joanne Rodasta Wilshin,an author friend who wrote Take a Moment toCreate Your Life, organized a group called TheGaian Sisterhood. We’d go around the room andtalk about what we wanted to do in our lives.When it was my turn, I said I was bored to tearswith my partners. Working for Forestville and

88 Chapter 12: New Me

Tucker didn’t feel right anymore. I felt burned out, exhausted. Thebusiness had come as far as it could go and I had philosophicaldifferences with the two men with whom I worked. I offered anexample.

We had decided to attend a trade show in Las Vegas. The CEOsuggested we cut a check for $1,000 each as a perk. The three of uswent to the show and ate at the Paris Hotel, spending $500 for dinner.I had trouble with that—it was more than my monthly grocery bill. Howmany calls would the company have to make to earn five hundredbucks?

The other two partners took their $1,000 each and went off to gamble.With mine, I bought a stuffed leopard (that I still have) and an outfit. Asthe three talked in the car on the way back, they both admitted theyonly had two or three dollars left. I had eight hundred dollars left, plusa leopard and a sweater.

“My life sucks,” I summed up for the Gaian Sisterhood.

Joanne told me to close my eyes. “Imagine it’s three years in the future.You’re just getting up in the morning, feeling the carpet under your feet.Now tell me,” she said, “where are you and what will you be doingtoday?”

I’d never experienced or even heard of anything like that before. Theexperience was shocking. I said, “I’m going to go talk to people and bedeep in conversation.”

I opened my eyes. “How do I know that? What does it mean?”

“You don’t have to have all the answers,” she said. “Just see where itleads you.”

The next morning, I happened to bump into my friend Mariy. We talkedfor a few minutes. “ What are you doing these days?” I asked.

“I’m coaching for a living.”

“What’s that?”


“I meet with people and talk to them,” she said. Then she went on todescribe exactly what I had been thinking of the night before. Joannehad said to see where my vision would lead me. How could I ignore thisinterchange?

So I called my friend Katie, who suggested a coach she knew, Tony.Mariy suggested a fellow she knew as well. I talked to him first. He saidhe’d teach me everything. “You go look for the clients and I’ll split thefee with you, sixty-forty.”

That stopped me. If I were going to go out and find people, whywouldn’t I do it for myself? I was an entrepreneur! I already knew Ididn’t like working for someone else. Why would I want to just switch toworking for another “someone else?”

So I called Katie’s friend Tony, who directed me to the Hudson Institutein Santa Barbara, a wonderful coaching school with a very goodmethodology. Their program essentially sounded like another master’sprogram. I enrolled in April 2001.

**

The Hudson Institute’s adult-development theory leads to a lot ofintrospection. The work itself revolves around your life roles,responsibilities and purpose. It really makes you reflect on who youare.

I discovered that I had never actually looked at my life in its entirety orat the choices I’d made. I had never looked at, “Who am I, why am Ihere, what does it all mean?” I had ignored the big questions of life—Ihad never even considered that I had other options. As I had gonethrough life, I figured that what happened, happened. It had never beenabout conscious choice.

I also learned that most people do the exact same thing. They go toschool, get their degrees and say, “Okay, this is what I have to do nowthat I’ve set it up.” They never think beyond their initial five-yearplan—if they even make one in the first place.


I had a very interesting time at Hudson. They divided us into smallgroups so we would interact with other people during growth sessions.Early on, someone recognized my tendency to assume the leadershiprole. “How about this time, you don’t do that?” one of the instructorssuggested. “How about this time, you just take a back seat and letsomeone else lead?”

As a result, we ended up not really having a designated leader—and Ilearned to lead from behind by making suggestions instead of givinginstructions. Rather than say, for example, “Stephanie will read thesebooks, Carol will read those, I’ll read the rest and we’ll compare notesafterwards,” I learned to say, “If we have so many books to read, whydon’t we each take a couple and make book notes?”

I came to love this different, exciting kind of leading.

I also learned that I needed to “dial myself down,” as they called it. Myenergy and ideas were always on “high.” I had to lower my personalvolume to medium or low. So my learning during that year was to leadfrom behind and dial it down. It was wonderful.

We were supposed to finish the course in eight months but one of ourfour-day intensive-training sessions fell on the weekend of September11, 2001. I wound up graduating in January 2002 after havingincorporated my coaching company in October 2001. Michele, Codyand I still lived in the little townhouse, but now, for the first time, myhome office wasn’t in addition to another office.

**

The more I got into coaching, the more I wanted to help people findtheir “next thing.” My first year out of school, I organized retreats,mini-models of what we did at Hudson, to explore clients’ “what’snext?” I would take people away, one-on-one, for half a day at a timebecause not many people had three solid days to spend away fromtheir home and business, although my very first client did. He came infrom San Jose, stayed in a suite and worked with me in that suite forthree days. It was great. It gave him direction.


But I didn’t have that many takers for this new plan. I was trying to dosomething new, something that didn’t have anything to do withbusiness or entrepreneurs. I was making the mistake most peoplemake.

When people decide to do something new, they usually want to leavebehind everything they did before. They don’t think to take the best partof it, the part they liked or the strengths they had developed. They justwant to chuck it all. That’s exactly what I was doing, and it wasn’tworking.

Instead, I kept getting all these, “How did you…” calls: how did I raisemoney for this company, how did I organize those finances, how did Ido this, how did I do that. I started meeting people for lunch just toanswer their questions. I had decided that telling them how to fix theirproblems wasn’t my real work, so I felt fine giving the information away.I wasn’t coaching; I was just answering questions.

I discovered it was easier to answer a specific “how did you” questionthan a general one. For instance, if someone asked, “How did you raisemoney for Rio?” I could answer it. I not only had the attitudes andpolitical and psychological tools I’d learned and created, I had thereal-life experience. People knew that about me; that’s why my phonekept ringing. But it wasn’t coaching.

At least, that’s what I thought.

Then someone invited me to freelance as an adjunct coach for VenturePoint, a small business-development center affiliated with the OrangeCounty Business Council and catering to high-growth, high-techcompanies. I hadn’t collected a paycheck since I’d stopped working forForestville and Tucker the previous August and my savings werestrained to the limit, so I said yes. I worked with entrepreneurs lookingfor help with preparing their ideas, business plans, and pitches forventure capitalists. Venture Point used what they called a coachingmodel rather than a consultative model to help people develop theirbusiness-plan thinking. Unfortunately, their advice was sometimes lessthan constructive.

“That’s a terrible idea,” I heard people say flat out when I first got there.“I don’t know how you think you’re going to make money doing that.”


Wow, these people really don’t understand entrepreneurs, I thought.What they needed to say was, “How can we validate this idea?” Soinstead of stomping on people’s dreams, I’d say, “I’m sure you don’twant to go down the road five years to find you’re the only one whothinks this is a good idea. Let’s prove it’s a good idea. Do surveys,study it. Then, should you come to a place where you discover it’s nota good idea, you might also discover you’ve come up with somethingelse along the way that will lead down a different path. Don’t think thatif this venture doesn’t work you won’t find anything better.”

That was the real starting point of my new career. I started out thinkingI was helping new entrepreneurs with their ideas and pitches only so Icould earn so-many dollars an hour while I built the rest of my practice,but in the process I discovered I knew more than I realized I knew. Icould relate to these people because I understood how they thought.They didn’t want to know why it couldn’t work; they wanted to know howit would work. And they valued my opinions and advice. It started methinking about who else would value me.

I realized I’d been a CEO, I’d been a CFO. I knew what it was like toworry about money and operations and schedules—and I knew thoseconcerns were the same whether the company had five employees orfive hundred. I remember walking into the CEO’s office of a $50 millioncompany and saying, “I’ve been a CEO. Not at your scale, but Iunderstand your issues.” We had an immediate rapport.

And that’s when I realized why my phone kept ringing. People whowanted to start a business or fund a business wanted my help, myadvice—my coaching. They would get my name by referral, frompeople telling other people, “You should give Frumi a call. She’s donethis, she’s been there.”

My very first clients came through Venture Point but when I stoppedworking for them people came to me from my circle of influence, frompeople who knew I wrote Book Notes that indicated my areas ofexpertise, and from general word-of-mouth. I didn’t have to becomesomething new, I already was something new: an Executive Coach, acatalyst for change for business leaders and their teams.


Once I knew who and what I was, I also knew I needed to define amarketing niche, an area of focus unique to me, making it easy for thepotential clients to find me. Since I loved working with financial peopleinside companies, I targeted them.

I continue to do most of my marketing through my Book Notes, locatedonline at www.clarityandresults.com, and through my connections todifferent organizations. For example, I served as Vice President ofFinance on Professional Coaches and Mentors Association’s NationalBoard for eighteen months. When the person in line to be presidentdecided he didn’t have the passion for it anymore, I became Presidentof PCMA’s National Board.

**

To help me find my own power, I hired MaryWayne Bush, a verypowerful woman and well-respected coach. At first, I didn’t understandwhat “finding my own power” meant; it sounded almost evil. I learned itrefers to the ability to know when to say yes and when to say no—inother words, to recognize your personal boundaries. MaryWaynehelped me learn how to design and build my life the way I wanted it,rather than always being there for everyone else— quite a novel ideafor a mom of thirty-one years. I had always felt selfish putting myselffirst. MaryWayne encouraged me to think about being selfish. What aconcept!

I soon realized that my clients needed the exact same thing. Whethermale or female, everyone needs to learn how to find his or her ownpower. Everyone needs to recognize whether they are living their liveson their terms or on someone— or everyone—else’s terms. I think onereason I’ve been so successful as a coach is because I’ve walked somany miles in my clients’ shoes!

**

I’ve found that having a coach makes all the difference in my life, justas it does for my clients. For example, after Michele finished highschool and moved to San Francisco and Cody left for University ofSouthern California, I didn’t need an entire townhouse for just me, so Iput it up for sale. I wanted a change. I wanted to cash out and livedifferently. I wanted my own time and space.


The house sold but the buyers wanted a quick, four-week escrow so Iimmediately had to start looking for an apartment. I found the one Iwanted and put my deposit down. Then the house fell out of escrow.

I knew giving up the apartment and not moving until the house soldwould be the responsible thing to do. But I didn’t want to lose thatapartment!

I discussed it with my coach. “Why do you have to sell the house?” sheasked. “Why can’t you move anyway?” That had never occurred to me.My belief system and inculcated behavioral patterns would never haveled me down the path to that conclusion. But MaryWayne was right. Irented out the house and moved into my dream apartment.

I might have suggested the same thing to a client but this wasn’t aclient, this was me. My emotions. My memories. I’d been takingreal-estate courses and looking for investment properties, so notrealizing the townhouse’s potential seemed even more foolish. Butsometimes, we need to hear someone else, someone outside our ownhead, ask the question.

That’s the value of coaching. Coaching helps us recognize what wealready know, but would never think of until we hear someone else askthe question.

My mom would never have asked the question; she would have“known” the responsible thing to do. My friend would have just said,“Oh, that’s disappointing. But maybe the house will still sell.” It tooksomeone looking at it from a different perspective to say, “Have youexamined this option? What other options do you have?”

Isn’t that what we all need? An executive coach, a catalyst for change.

That’s who I am.

Part IIYour Frumi Fix

"How wonderful it is that nobody need waita single moment before starting toimprove the world." - Anne Frank

"We are each the sum of all our choices."- Frumi Rachel Barr

I’ve always been something of a helperwhich is why I initially became a physicaltherapist. I’ve always had the kind ofcuriosity that prompts me to ask the kindsof questions that change people’s lives.These days, I see it all the time in mycoaching clients. I even affect my friends!They’ll call me and say they need a “FrumiFix.” I never understood what they weretalking about before, but now I know it’sabout people needing inspiration, aboutneeding to know how to get somethingdone.

So, when it comes right down to it, mycoaching is all about providing executiveswith a Frumi Fix. In the next few chapters,I’d like to provide one for you.


C h a p t e r

13 How Coaching Works

Yes, I’m a Certified Coach–but even more,I’m a business advisor. Coaching is how I goabout doing my advising. I provide thecatalyst for the change in people’s lives. Myclients tell me that when I start uncoveringthings, it’s a positive “Frunami” of change.

Most people are used to thinking just one way:work is work and life is life. Coaching clientsbegin to think creatively so they can learn toholistically blend their work into their lives andtheir lives into their work. Before I got intocoaching, I’d never consciously thought of livingthat way. Why? Because no one had ever askedme the question. That’s the advantage ofcoaching. These ideas don’t just pop out of us onour own, especially when we’re totally wrappedup in creating, developing, and maintaining abusiness.

**

Before you begin working with a coach, makesure you have a common pace between the twoof you. For instance, I’m a very “fast” person–myenergy is always on high, even when I dial itdown–so if someone is very slow, I find it painful.

98 Chapter 13: How Coaching Works

I don’t mean I expect people to be able to make decisions on the spot.We all have to sleep on things and think them over first. I’m talkingabout the ability to pick up things quickly. Leaders are typically smart,dynamic, fast-paced individuals. That makes a good fit with me. Youhave to figure out what makes a good fit with you.

When I coach, I never worry about the issues. Whatever they are,they’re solvable. I’m more concerned about the personality andintegrity of the person. I think most coaches would agree with thatapproach. I maintain strict confidentiality; I like to provide a “safe placeto land” for my clients. When you look for a coach, check to see if thatguarantee is part of his or her standard contract.

It's a two-way street; coaches need to feel safe with their clients, too.After all, most coaches are like me: I will go to the client or meet themhalfway, both physically and emotionally. Some people choose to havebreakfast while others prefer lunch, a coffee shop or meeting on a parkbench. I meet them wherever they want, physically. Meeting themwhere they are emotionally demands skill. Ask your potential coachwhere she or he expects to meet; is it comfortable for you?

I usually work with my clients for an hour every two weeks. You maywant to meet more or less often. If my clients say something relating toa prime concern on the fifty-ninth minute of the hour, we’ll keep going.I figure if it takes that long to get it out, it’s important and we’ll see it thewhole way through. Ask your potential coach about his or hersession-limit policies. At the end of every year, my clients and I holdstrategic sessions to talk about what’s worked, what’s gotten in theway, and what could be better next year. Does your potential coachhave a similar practice? Is it adaptable to your needs?

Between sessions, my clients can email or phone me for what I call“just in time” coaching. Sometimes, for example, a client wants moreinput right before or after a difficult conversation. When someone getsinto a crisis, whether it’s a turn of the conversation or an emergencydecision, I’d rather they call than wait two weeks until their nextsession. By then, it’s too late to do anything about it. This is aninvaluable part of coaching. Will your coach be available to you duringemergencies?


One great coaching benefit is the opportunity to think out loud. As soonas something comes out of a person’s mouth, they’re listening to italong with me. That can lead to astounding things, because sometimesthe spoken idea just doesn’t sound as good as it did in a person’s head.Sometimes it might even sound more reasonable. When you work witha coach, you not only expose your dreams and plans but your fears andfoolishness as well. Does your potential coach have the right kind andlevel of empathy for you? Trust your instincts.

I’ve taught coaching at Chapman University–“Here are the steps: youhelp leaders find their voice, you help them find their vision”–but the actof accomplishing that transformation requires intuition and art. I needto hear things in someone’s voice or see it in their body language.When I was first studying coaching, I missed something very importantwhen someone laughed; I now know that laughing is as important areaction as crying. At this point, nothing escapes my curiosity. Ifanything is different from what a person usually does or presents, I aska question. Part of the coaching art comes from curiosity. Where acoach can safely ask questions out of curiosity, simply demanding ananswer is intrusive. Your coach needs to trust his or her intuition aboutyou—and you need to trust yours about him or her.

**

I truly believe that we get whatever we focus on; we can manifest ourdesires by focusing strongly on what we want. First, of course, we haveto reach the right vibrational level to allow what we’re seeking into ourpsyche, which means we have to be self aware enough to use ouremotions as a guide to attracting whatever we want. I tend to attractthe type of clients who don’t find that kind of concept ridiculous. Theyare business people who are aware of their own spiritual natures andare grateful to find another spiritually oriented person in the businessworld.

And I do mean spiritual, not religious. I’m referring to the kind ofthought process that acknowledges we are all spiritual beings inhuman form. Those are the people I feel best equipped to help themost.


What kind of vibrational level are you comfortable with? What type ofspiritual, religious, ethical, organic or moral nature would make thebest fit for you and your coach?

**

I always use one client as an example of a coaching failure, althoughhe would not agree on that term. He was in partnership with two otherpeople and I kept harping on the fact that they were not addressing ashareholder’s agreement. He kept telling me he had everything undercontrol.

After two years, the shareholder’s agreement still had not been signedand the client was left with no choice but to abandon the business. Hehad wasted two years because he would not listen.

Another time he accepted a CEO position in a company that didn’t offerhim equity. I pointed out that if he didn’t get equity in his contract, thecompany might not renew it when it expired. He nevertheless spenteighteen months building the company’s profits from zero to seventeenmillion, after which, as predicted, they didn’t renew his contract.

When he came back to me again with yet another idea he wanted helpwith I said, “You may not realize this, but I regard my relationship withyou as a failure twice now. The first time because you didn’t listenabout the shareholder’s agreement and the second time because youdidn’t listen about getting equity in this business. What’s going to bedifferent the third time?”

“I don’t consider either of those situations as failures,” he said. “It’s notlike you hadn’t mentioned those things. I knew what you thought whenI ignored your advice.” It turned out we had totally different values: hewanted the experience and I wanted to keep him financially secure.Now I know to determine up front exactly what the client wants toachieve so I can determine whether or not I can really help him.

You and your coach have to be on the same page, even if you do notknow exactly what you're trying to achieve when you first begin workingtogether. Your coach cannot help you if she or he is trying to steer youtoward something you don't care about, or away from something youdo.


**

Most people I work with have issues about choosing the right peoplewith whom to partner because most large businesses are partnerships:Hewlett-Packard, Lord & Taylor, and so on. Few large successfulbusinesses grow from single entrepreneurs working sole proprie-torships. It’s hard to find the right partner; so much needs to beestablished up front.

Partners always fear losing the other partner. They fear they can’t doit on their own. Consequently, instead of saying up front that they don’tfeel the split should be fifty-fifty, for example, they’ll go along until thepressure of the status quo becomes unbearable. But it’s even harderto say, “I’m doing this and you’re not doing that so we need to changeour partnership agreement,” two years down the road. What happensif their partner runs out on them then? They’ll really be stuck.

I think partner problems have become more acute due to today’sever-increasing technological pace. People need to start off agreeingon the rules of the road; how to make decisions together, how to usethe resources of the company, what people to hire, how to spendmoney, when to move to new premises. Each partner has a differentfilter; each partner comes from a different place in the decision-making.All partners, whether their business is large or small, struggle toresolve these same issues.

They all also struggle with denial. From time to time, everyone gets tothe point where they don’t want to look at themselves in the mirroranymore. This usually happens when they start to see things aboutthemselves that they don’t want to see, things that are getting in theirway. People don’t always want to face reality. That’s the time they needme the most. In fact, I even warn my clients about this right in thebeginning. I tell them, there will come a point when they just don’t wantto see me. That’s usually the exact time when something significant isabout to happen. You have to trust your coach to have your bestinterests at heart.

**


Another focus in both my clients’ and my own life involves noticingeverything. How are the relationships working? Are decisions beingmade as conscious choices or automatic reactions?

Since becoming a coach, I’ve started to recognize how all the choicesI had made up to that point had affected me. We always think, “Well,those are my choices and I’m stuck with what I chose, right?” No. Wearen’t stuck. We can make choices about what we want next. In fact,we can change the choices we’ve made so far: “Wait a minute, that’snot what I want anymore.” Whether concerning relationships or work,just realizing that you can make a conscious choice–and that it can beflexible, revised or even discarded when it becomes unnecessary,obstructive or destructive–is one of the most empowering learnings aperson can experience. This is one of the greatest benefits ofcoaching!

**

Picture this scene: a little girl comes down for breakfast. Her father issitting at the table about to drink his coffee. Excited, she jumps on him.His hands go up and the coffee spills.

Dad now has two choices. In the first scenario, he gets upset and yellsat the little girl. He growls that they have to be at the school-bus stopin five minutes so she’d better get ready, then leaves her alone whilehe goes up to change. She’s so upset she doesn’t get into her clothesproperly. He ends up leaving his briefcase behind as he runs out of thehouse to drive her to school. Result: his whole day is messed up—andso is hers.

In the second scenario, he takes a deep breath and says, “That’s okay,honey. Stuff happens. I’m going to go upstairs and change. We needto be out at the bus in ten minutes.” He changes, she gets dressed,they get her to the school bus on time, he remembers his briefcase,and they both have a wonderful day. All because of a choice he madefrom the onset about how he was going to treat his daughter.

Everything is about choice. We can even choose our attitudes andreactions. For example, when the father in the first scenario gets to theoffice all upset and calls me, I listen, acknowledge his decision andfeelings, and then talk about what different decision he could make


next time. One of my questions would be, “What conversation shouldyou have with your daughter when you get home?” By the end of theconversation, he would recognize the reaction options he had for thesekinds of situations instead of simply falling back on his automaticemotional ones. We wouldn’t ignore the problem or leave it alone. Wewould explore his emotions and create a set of options to handle themeffectively and satisfactorily. In other words, we would look forsymptoms and strategize solutions.

**

My coaching comes down to three things: Clarity, Communications andResults. Clarity refers to being very clear about who you are, whereyou’re going, what you want, and what you don’t want. It meansunderstanding how you made decisions before, and how you want tomake them in the future. That’s the first thing we work on.

Communication means not only communicating those thoughts butalso being more courageous about what conversations you need tohave, who they should be with, and when they should occur. I often findthat people’s relationships aren’t as rich and authentic as they could bebecause they aren’t having the conversations they should have. If youdon’t communicate in a work situation with the people over you orunder you, for example, how do they know whether they—or you—aredoing a good job? Communication is all about asking key questionsand getting feedback.

Results mostly involve preparing people for conversations they don’twant to have, usually because they don’t know how to have themsafely. We all know that saying, “We have to talk, things aren’t the waythey should be,” could be paralyzing to the other person. I help peoplelearn how to approach their conversations more effectively. “I value ourrelationship and I’d like it to get even better.”

When you start a conversation that way, the other person isimmediately curious. “What are you talking about? How are we goingto get better?” If you then tell them the positive outcome you want,you’re more likely to have a richer conversation and obtain thoseresults.


These simple components—Clarity, Communication and Results—canmake a big difference in a person’s life. They can change how yourelate to just about everyone.

**

Coaching is not therapy. To me, therapy means looking in therear-view mirror: what have you done, why did you do it, what was yourbelief system at that point, how did your parents and their belief systemaffect your decisions? I do that only once with a person so I canunderstand the context of their current situation. I need to know, forexample, if they’ve been making certain life decisions because theirfather committed suicide when they were nineteen. One session of“therapeutic questioning” helps me understand my client’s attitudesand strengths and the value/belief system with which we’re starting.We may refer to those aspects occasionally but coaching is aboutforward through the windshield. Rather than sort through, “How did Iget here,” we work on, “Here’s where I am now, here’s where I’d like tobe, how do I get there?” That’s the first layer of coaching.

The next layer involves, “What resources do I need? Do I need certainskills? Do I need to meet certain people?” I help clients figure out howto determine and find those resources.

The third level happens while the client is on the way to acquiring thoseassets. Once things have been set in motion, new situations,conversations and relationship issues will come to light that, if notaddressed immediately, might prevent him from getting where he’sgoing. That’s the value of “real-time coaching.’’ We create anunderlying plan in our regular sessions but I’m always there to help withthe implemental conversations and situations as they occur.

I like to think of the process in terms of a closet. All your life you’vebeen putting things in the closet, throwing in one item after another.Along comes a coach like me, a catalyst for change, who opens thecloset door. As things spill out, I hold a light on them so we can look atwho you are now and how you can get to where you want to go. It’s alla matter of becoming self-aware. Once you’re aware, you can startmaking changes.


For example, I sometimes coach people to help them change certainbehaviors, such as a management style that’s tough on everyone else.When someone becomes aware that just before they blow up the pit oftheir stomach starts to writhe, they can learn to think, “Oh, there it is.I’m about to blow my stack. I’d better stop.” That’s a significant and verypositive change.

**

People come to me when they’re healthy and want to move on, whenthey want to know how they can move forward faster, or when theyneed help coping with an avalanche of change. They want someone intheir corner. It’s the person locked in the tower—“It’s lonely at thetop”—who has no one to talk to because everyone around has his orher own agenda. Or it’s the person who wants to quit his or her job anddo something different, only to have the spouse say, “But what aboutthe mortgage?” Or it’s the CFO laying off fifteen people and thinking,“Oh, God, what if I’m next?”

Where can they turn for an impartial opinion? The advice and inputthey get from the other people in their lives comes complete with thatperson’s own fear. I only have one agenda with my clients: a retainercheck. Otherwise, everything that happens in their lives is theirs.Consequently, I can be much purer in my advice and in helpingsomeone achieve his or own clarity. People come to me because of myknowledge and experience but they choose what advice to accept orignore, and they bear their own consequences. They have to makechoices with which they can live, and arrive at those decisions that arein line with who they are.

In a way, I’m a paid friend. I get to know someone’s inner heart, fears,and doubts. Almost every business leader I work with starts out bysaying, “I know everyone thinks I’m big and successful, but I’m really afake and a phony.” They have no idea how they got to their position butthey want to know how to stay there and become the leader they’resupposed to be. That’s where the fun begins, because when I can helpthose people, it’s a beautiful thing to watch.

**


If you’ve read this far, you probably understand why people call me acatalyst for change but it took my own coach to help me see it formyself.

MaryWayne and I were working on figuring out who I am at my core.The more questions she asked, the more I realized that nothing everstayed the same when I showed up. Interestingly, as soon I realizedthat, I started getting affirmations in emails from people going backthirty years!

One was an old boyfriend with whom I’d gone to senior prom and who,much later, had been my brother’s economics professor. Morrie raninto him in Montréal and gave him my email address. During oursubsequent Internet exchange, he commented that knowing me hadbeen very significant for him—in fact, it had changed his life. A coupleof weeks later, another former classmate found me throughClassmates.com and wrote something similar: he’d never forgotten meand how I had changed his life.

I kept thinking, “What did I do?!” How could I have changed anyone’slife that long ago?”

But I’ve come to realize, nothing ever stays the same when I come onthe scene. I am a catalyst for change in people around me. My friendscall to ask me for a “Frumi Fix.”

So, when it comes right down to it, my coaching is all about providingexecutives with a Frumi Fix. In the next few chapters, I’d like to provideone for you.

Don’t just answer the questions at the end of each section with the firstidea that comes to mind. You’ll get more out of the exercises if youreflect on the concepts instead of dashing off glib responses. Thinkingthrough the answers will bring you closer to self-awareness, which willbring you closer to change. Remember, there are no “right” or “wrong”answers—just honest and unaware ones.

Ready? Let’s get started!


C h a p t e r

14 What Really Matters

You can do it all if you understand that thereis no such thing as work-life balance. Rather,integrating your work into your life is abalancing act.

First, we’ll take a quick look at someself-awareness ideas you might not haveconsidered before.

• Do you feel ready to burn out?

• Do your kids know who you are?

• Do you wonder how you'll ever have time for kids?

• Do you want to have dinner with your family?

• Do you want to watch your kids’ baseball games?

• Do you want to prepare for your presentations andreceive promotions?

**

Let’s start where the rubber meets the road:values. We all talk about values but most peopledon’t actually walk their talk. We all think weknow what is important to us. We certainly know

108 Chapter 14: What Really Matters

what should be important to us. Yet, if you analyze two importantfacets—how you spend your time and how you spend yourmoney—many people come up short. Are those facets in alignmentwith what you say is important in your life?

Everything we do, every decision we make, every course of action wetake is based on our consciously or unconsciously held beliefs,attitudes, and values. We face new choices at every turn. Ideally, wemake our choices based on the values we hold, on those principles andpriorities that are important to us.

I know unequivocally, for example, that education is one of my parents’core values or critical priorities. They were not well-to-do during mychildhood, yet they chose where we lived based on how close it was totheir handpicked school. They were quite prepared to sacrifice manythings in order to provide both my brother and I with a private educationuntil high school and a university education after that.

I had to examine my own core values as part of the introspectiveprocess of studying to be a coach. I said my parents were a priority butI could see no evidence of that in my behavior. I visited them once ayear or so and spoke to them every other week. Those phone callsalways felt strained because they never remembered whatorganizations I belonged to or who was who among my friends andacquaintances.

If my parents were one of my core values, our relationship neededsome work.

To improve that relationship, I started emailing my parents every day.Now they have a list of the alphabet-soup of organizations I belong to(PCMA, ICF, etc.) and a directory of what I call my “cast of characters.”I work on being a good daughter every single day. I’ll never regret whatI didn’t do.

Many people say their children are terribly important to them but howdo they demonstrate that to their kids? One of my accountant clientsfrequently lamented that his work was so frenzied his son would growup before he could find any time to spend with him. To rectify that, westarted with something small to integrate his son into his workday.


Every day when the son arrived home from school, my client’s watchalarm rang to remind him to call home. Without this simple tool, overtime he would forget to make the call.

Imagine how valued a child would feel when his or her mom or dadcalled every day to check in. No, it’s not the same as being there inperson but even small wins count.

Make a list of your core values. Which ones do you activelysupport? Which ones need your attention?

**

We all spend our time fulfilling commitments in a variety of roles. Somepeople’s roles are very complex; others’ are simpler. Your roles mightinclude being a spouse, a son or daughter, a sister or brother, and amother or father. You may also have a network of friends. Theseconstitute your personal, family, and couple roles.

You also have roles in your external environment, such ascommitments both up and down the hierarchy of those you report to,your peers, and those who report to you. You may have vendors,clients and numerous people in your business network. Your socialroles may include actively contributing to or participating in anorganization.

Phew—that’s a great number of people and obligations taking yourtime and energy. Just as we collect items in filing cabinets and closets,we also collect roles as time goes on. Now that you have reviewed yourvalues, you need to look at which roles are meaningful to you now.

Take some time to reflect on your friendships. Are there any unhealthyones you should clear out? Are there conversations you should havewith friends, relatives, or colleagues that are weighing you down? Oneof the principles of time management is to take the clutter out of yourhead and list all your pending projects. You can do the same thing withyour roles and relationships.

Make a list of all the people who fall into your different rolecategories. What actions can you take to spend energy only onthose that are meaningful, significant and fulfilling?


**

From the time we are very young, we make choices based on the waywe interpret the world around us. These interpretations create ourbelief systems, and our behavior—how we act in the world—is basedon those internalized beliefs. Our behaviors in turn determine ourresults and our results determine the shape of our lives. All the choiceswe make along the way impact us.

All choices are either heart-based or head-based: how we makedecisions, how we negotiate to get what we need at work or home, howwe deal with conflict and unpleasant circumstances. Either we makethese choices consciously or our brain uses its default mechanism tochoose for us. But only seven percent of what goes on in our brain isconscious; the other ninety-three percent is unconscious. That’s prettyfrightening isn’t it? To be on top of how you make choices, you need toexercise that seven percent and make conscious choices.

Here’s a favorite example. I love anything chocolate, especially if itcomes with ice cream. If someone were to put a piece of mud pie infront of me, my unconscious brain would open all my internal files andexamine the history of chocolate, most of which is positive: browniesare good, cake is good, dark chocolate is good, and so on. My brain’sdefault position therefore would direct me to go ahead and eat the mudpie.

But if I wanted to make a conscious choice, I would ask myself, “Do Ireally want to eat this dessert? Do I want to work out for sixteen hoursjust to work it off? Is it worth it to me?”

I don’t know about you, but for me it’s a stretch to make that consciousdecision.

Being aware of what you are thinking and how you will make choicesin the future is an important aspect of integrating your work and life.First, you have to know where you are and what you think. Next, youhave to examine how you have made your choices in the past. This isa reflective journey. It’s important to know how you got to this point soyou can decide where you want to be in the future. Then you can fill inthe middle with a plan.


Start a journal. Make notes about your impressions of yourselfand your decision-making process. Are you happy where you arein your personal, business and social lives? Did you get to herebecause you followed a plan or did things “just happen?” Wheredo you want to go? Are you happy with the way you makechoices? What kind of decision changes would you like to make?

**

Let’s look at your self-talk, about the internal dialogue going on in yourhead as you navigate through your busy day. The mind createswhatever we think about, so be careful to make what you think work foryou.

I’ve always been fascinated by the ideas in Take a Moment to CreateYour Life. According to Joanne Rodasta Wilshin, you can create whatyou want in your life and, equally, what you don’t want. When I workedwith Joanne, I created many new things just by making the declarationthat I would. One of my favorite creations was a new home.

This was the period after Ted and I had sold the house in Big Canyonand Gregory and I were renting in Corona del Mar. It was an expensiveneighborhood and I was a little discouraged about how hard it wouldbe to find something in the right price range in that school district.

Michele was surprised at my concern because she’d heard me so oftentalk about the things I was creating. Bolstered with a new resolve, wewent to visit open houses the next week. There were signs leading intoa gated community I knew was very pricey but Michele gave me “thelook” when I hesitated, so we drove in anyway. There, at the crest ofthe hill with a view to the ocean and the city lights, was a townhousedevelopment I hadn’t known existed. My offer was accepted withinhours.

Even if your faith falters every now and then, you can create your life ifyou believe you can.

Be conscious of what you are thinking about so you can createexpectations that stretch you. Pretend you are in the balcony of yourlife’s theatre watching yourself on your life’s stage. When you knowhow you behave every day, you can start making small changes to


integrate your work into your personal life and include those peopleand things that are important to you. You cannot change how you aredoing things until you know what you are already doing.

We all have a committee in our head passing judgment on everythingwe do. As you start to pay attention to what you think, ask yourself,“Whose voice am I hearing?” Is it a critical parent, a not-so-helpful oldfriend, or an ex-spouse? You can negotiate with the voices you value,fire the committee members who aren’t helpful, or ask them to replacenegative thoughts and suggestions with supportive ones.

Your core beliefs will pop up often in the form of these voices. Recently,I was thinking about investing in a real-estate training course. Mycommittee was very active, suggesting I was wasting my money onsnake oil and telling me I wasn’t good enough or smart enough to bean investor. I had to change my self-talk and insist on the support ofevery committee member. I wore an elastic band for a week so I couldsnap it every time a negative thought came up. In just a few days, thenegative voices receded to a whisper instead of their initial roar.

Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings totalobliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me andthrough me. And when it is gone past me I will turn to see fear'spath. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I willremain.

Frank Herbert, Dune

Fear is that dis-ease prevalent in the people and organizations allaround us. Fear prevents us from making the changes we need tomake to have a better life. The answer to fear is faith—faith in yourselfto find the answers and faith in your higher spirit.

Add another aspect to your journaling: what are you afraid of?What are your fears holding you back from accomplishing? Whatkind of changes could you make in your committee’s voices tofeel more secure and help you move forward toward your goals?What would you do if you were not afraid?

**


None of this is easy. Making changes in the way you run your life is abig deal and takes a serious commitment.

I met a woman who decided not to work as an attorney anymorebecause it was too stressful and she wanted more time with herchildren. Her husband, an attorney, left the house at the crack of dawn,long before his children woke up. I asked the couple if they everthought about having a home office. They hadn’t and immediatelydismissed the possibility. I couldn’t help wondering what would bedifferent if the wife could continue working to some extent and thehusband could leave the house later and come home earlier.

The most difficult trade-off for a mother is making the decision to workoutside the home and relinquish the care of her precious little peopleto others. I greatly admire the women I’ve met who made the choice tobe a homemaker, such as my friend Sharon. She was just asindustrious in her world as I was in mine, baking pies, making jam,making minced garlic and being heavily involved in her three sons’sports teams and her daughter’s figure-skating world. But, I’ve alsoseen the trade off for stay-at-home moms: when their children arelaunched, they suddenly lack purpose.

I also greatly respect the women in the corporate world for hanging inthere as they raise children. To me, that is the most difficult trade-off ofall: the children go to day care while their mothers work hard andstruggle with guilt. When at work they want to be at home; when athome they think of all the things left undone at the office. I can’t evenbegin to imagine the wrench of leaving a sick child at home.

Perhaps that’s why more and more women are leaving the corporateworld to become entrepreneurs, the obvious, albeit not easy, path to“doing it all.” They don’t have to answer to others for their choices butthey sure live an uncertain life—ninety-five percent of all newbusinesses fail in the first five years.

That’s quite a trade-off.

What are the trade-offs you’re making in your life right now? Whatare you willing to trade to get to where you want to go?

**


When you are starting to think about your life holistically, what happensat home matters as much as what happens at the office. That’s wherethe five different Love Languages—Words of Affirmation, GiftsReceived, Quality Time, Acts of Service and Physical Touch—comeinto play.

My Love Language is Quality Time and its subset, QualityConversation. When I’m in conversation with my clients, I’m showingthem love and I’m feeling loved, which is totally congruent with who Iam. I want them to know that I care and are listening so they will getthe results they want to get.

What is your Love Language? How do you demonstrate yourlove? What do other people do that makes you feel loved?


c h a p t e r

15 Where Are You Now

One of my favorite coaching tools is the “lifeline.” It reflects your story and the choicesyou have made until now.

You are your "story." Each of us lives within adramatic pattern that reveals who we are, whowe should be with, what we should be doing andwhat will happen to us.

Your "story" contains plots, characters andthemes. This Lifeline exercise is an opportunityfor you to become more conscious of your "story"so you can become more clearly the author ofyour own future.

What is your adult lifeline—the basic contours ofyour life story since you came of age? What wentwell and reached a "peak?" What did not go welland hit a "valley?” How does your story go?

**

Use the age line below (“Create Your Life Line -the Story of Your Life”)

116 Chapter 15: Where Are You Now

to guide your story from past to present, movingfrom left to right, and ending with today. Be sureto put a date on each peak and valley so you canrecount your story. When you are done, insertvertical lines to indicate the chapters of your life.This is a wonderful starting point for working witha coach.

You can use this tool to examine which of yourstrengths helped you through your peaks andvalleys of your life and thus create an inventoryof your strengths, or you can also ask yourselfhow you made decisions at each stage of yourlife.

• Did you ask for help?

• Were you spontaneous?

• Did you sit anywhere too long and let life pass byyou?

• What do you wish you had done differently?

• Did you integrate your work into your life at anypoint?

• Did you have personal life/work balance?

Confessions of a R

esilient Entrepreneur117

Create Your Life Line - the Story of Your Life

Peaks Peaks Peaks Peaks

>____________________>_______________________>______________________>_____TODAY

Valley Valley Valley Valley

118 Chapter 15: Where Are You Now


C h a p t e r

16 Work and Family

Work, for most of us, is the largestrelationship we have. We spend the majorityof our waking hours thinking about it, gettingready for it, driving to it, being at it and drivinghome and recovering from it. It is thereforemost important that we make it meaningful,effective, and successful so that everythingelse in our life gets better as well. Lifebecomes more joyful. We become better rolemodels to our kids.

**

Our society regards working hard as veryrespectable. Many people feel that workingeighteen-hour days is a badge of courage thatdemonstrates dedication to their job, and manycompanies reinforce this concept. But there is aline between working hard and having a workaddiction which can have devastating effects notonly on those individuals but also on those wholive and work with them: their partners andspouses, their offspring, their businessassociates.

120 Chapter 16: Work and Family

Work addiction as defined by Bryan E. Robinson in Chained to theDesk: A Guidebook for Workaholics, their Partners, and Children is “anobsessive-compulsive disorder that manifests itself throughself-imposed demands, an inability to regulate work habits, andoverindulgence in work to the exclusion of most other life activities.”

Many people use work as their “drug of choice.” Like food, alcohol ordrugs, it helps them forget their worries, relieve emotional pain, boosttheir self-esteem, and entertain themselves. Work can provide “anemotional sanctuary while distancing them from loved ones andfriends.”

Of course, this does not mean that working long hours to meet financialcommitments makes one a workaholic. True workaholics are driven bydeeper, internal needs. Workaholics often create or look for work to do,while healthy workers enjoy their work, often work long hours and focuson getting the job done efficiently. Healthy workers think about andenjoy whatever they are engaged in at the present moment.Workaholics think about working a disproportionate amount of time,even during social activities or leisure times, when their minds wanderand obsess about work.

One of the ways to determine if you are a workaholic is to ask thosewho are close to you whether they find themselves lonely and isolated.Often at the same time that friends and employers applaud workaholicsfor their accomplishments, family members question their own sanity.

• Workaholics are always in a rush and super-busy.

• Workaholics play the control game. They perceive delegating tasks orasking for help as signs of weakness or incompetence. They over-planand over-organize. Spontaneity and flexibility are limited.

• Nothing is ever perfect enough for a workaholic, so they often get angrywith others who fail to meet their high standards.

• Workaholics’ relationships fall apart in the name of work.

• Workaholics produce work in binges. They create personal deadlines thatmandate binging on every project.


• Workaholics are restless and no fun. Workaholics feel guilty and uselesswhen they do something that does not produce results.

• Workaholics experience work trances—they literally tune out the present.

• Workaholics are impatient and irritable. They hate to wait (e.g. in lines). Inthe long run, their impatience can result in impulsivity.

• Workaholics think they are only as good as their last achievement andseek self-worth through performance and achievement.

• Workaholics have no time for self-care. They pay little attention to theirphysical needs, like nutrition, rest and exercise.

If you are uncertain if you fit these criteria, discuss your behavior withthose near-and-dear to you.

**

Being the sole breadwinner of the family, as men traditionally havebeen for centuries, imposes a tremendous burden. To be successful inthe old linear way of thinking, men have to find a profession or tradeand apply themselves strictly to bringing home the bacon. They workhard for power, for financial gain, and for whatever is unique to theircircumstances.

But that eighty-plus-hours-per-week pace is a trap. There is no way toget off the hamster wheel when so much—ever bigger houses, moreand more plentiful toys—depends on your peddling faster and faster.Whoops—the kids are grown up and ready to leave for college. Can’tquit now!

Many men go through a “mid-life crisis” somewhere between forty-fiveand fifty-five because of this perpetual hamster wheel. By that time,their wives no longer know them, so at the point when they need themost support, they have no one to whom they can turn. How can youtell your wife you want to get off the hamster wheel when she lives inthe home and environment you have created as the status quo?

I prefer to call this a time of mid-life “questioning,” when men startthinking about what life means—how can they now find significance?It’s a shame this is the norm rather than the exception.


What can you do when you are stuck on the hamster wheel? Start bybeing very aware of what your world is and how you operate in it. Thinkabout doing things differently. You may think you’re productive allthose long, working hours, but life is not only about timemanagement—a good deal depends on energy management.

As I turned forty, I realized that life was slipping by and I hadn’t triedmany of the things I had hoped I’d get to do eventually, such asdownhill skiing. When I received an invitation to join a Wednesdaygetaway from Michael’s ski school, I felt I was missing out on whatstay-at-home mothers could do. So I signed up for the sevenWednesdays involved.

Ted was appalled that I was leaving the office mid-week when hecouldn’t. But there I went, off on a big bus with the other mothers anda few fathers. I had a fabulous day. In fact, one of the women I sat nextto on the bus became a wonderful friend as the result of bonding on theski hill that first day.

When I got home, I was full of energy and stories. Ted was stilldisgruntled. I challenged him to figure out how he, too, could rearrangehis heavy schedule and come enjoy some fresh air and fun. He met mychallenge.

For the next six Wednesdays, Ted stayed up much of the night beforeso he could go, and slept all the way to and from the ski hill in the backof the bus. It’s interesting what solutions you can find when you’remotivated enough and someone challenges you to do thingsdifferently.

What fun activity do you feel unable to do because you’re“trapped” on your hamster wheel? How can you challengeyourself to do something differently so you can enjoy thatactivity?

**


I had no idea what types of struggles working women coped with untilI started coaching. I never realized how different my working motherwas from the other, non-working mothers of my childhood. I thought allchildren were encouraged not only to have ambitions but, also, to goout and fulfill them.

I’ve since learned that, as late comers to the world of business thatmen have controlled for centuries, women have to learn to play by therules created in their absence. The following are several of the issuesI have observed through working with women as clients, and on whichI occasionally give teleclasses.

• Women often work much harder than men yet receive the samecompensation. They often feel that unless they work very hard and givetheir all to the job, they are “cheating” somehow

• Women tend to wait to be given what they want. I once had a client whonever thought to ask for a car allowance until she realized that everyoneelse at her management level was getting one.

• Women will sabotage themselves by polling before making a decision.Jennifer used to do that. She didn’t realize that every time she asked fiveor six people what she should do, she was leaving behind the messagethat she couldn’t make a decision on her own.

• Women often assume responsibility without authority. I’ve done thismyself. I once assumed the role of conference co-chair without asking forthe title. Fortunately, I realized it in time to correct it—which served toelevate my brand!

As Lois Frankel writes in Nice Girls Don’t Get the Corner Office, theseconcepts are important. If you are stuck in an unhappy balancing actand not getting all that you deserve, it’s time to become self-aware,recognize what you need, and ask for it.

Are you working more or harder and not receiving adequate orequal compensation? Are you waiting for something you could beasking for? Do you self-sabotage by trying to reach consensusinstead of making a decision? Are you taking on extra workwithout receiving the recognition you deserve?

**


We’ve all heard that when you work with purpose and passion, itdoesn’t really feel like work. But sometimes what you used to lovedoing gets old and stops being fun. At that point, you have to make achoice.

You could “repurpose” yourself and find a “calling” or something elsethat resonates with your heart. You could repurpose your work andmake it worthwhile again. Or you could reenergize yourself byremembering what or who you are working for.

If you started your career doing something to satisfy a spouse or aparent, maybe it’s time to do something for you. Just because you’vespent ten, twenty or even thirty years doing one thing doesn’t mean youcan’t take your strengths and move on to something else. Clearly, youmight have to make some sacrifices, but it’s so much easier tointegrate life and work when your work is worth doing and your life isworth living.

Are you happy doing what you do for a living? What would you doif you could start your working life over now? What kind ofsacrifices are you willing to make to change your work intosomething you enjoy again?

**

Work greatly affects who you are when you come home. You can’tavoid it—you take who you are at home to work and vice versa. Aperson unhappy at work carries that negative energy home with them.Sometimes this is a temporary situation. When it’s not, it’s time tore-evaluate what is keeping you on your particular hamster wheel andwhat options are open to you. If nothing else, creating the dialogue withyour spouse or significant other can surface how this “disconnect” isaffecting your relationship. Once you have a mutual awareness, youare in it together. You might think of creating a quiet time or a ritual thatallows you to decompress so that you can be fully engaged in yourhome environment afterward.

If you are consistently miserable at work, what do you need fromyour partner to allow you to transition into your home when youget there?


**

Work can also be a unifying element for a family. Remember, you area role model for your children. If you hate your work, your children maythink that all work is negative. Discuss your choices with them so theyunderstand the trade-offs you are making, what your thoughts are forthe short term, and what your plans are for the long term. Always thinkabout what conversation you could have with your spouse and childrenthat would create a more supportive environment for everybodyconcerned.

I didn’t do such a good job explaining what my work was all about toMichele as she was growing up. I didn’t take the time to describe andinvolve her in what I did, so she got the impression that working in anoffice or a business meant sitting in a chair looking at a computer fromnine o’clock to five o’clock.

As a result, she decided to become a teacher and to give the world ofbusiness a wide berth. While she was in school, she worked in a cookiestore for a while, then for a frozen-yogurt franchise. Later, she had anopportunity to work for a company that sold knives through students. Ayear later, her boss told me that of the 800 students hired, a very largepercentage sold only $200 worth of product. A small percent sold$2,000. My daughter, who supposedly had “no interest in business,”sold $35,000 of product. When she became an assistant manager inthat same company her third year in university, she switched her majorfrom Humanities to Marketing.

Michele said that what she enjoyed about her job was the variety ofrecruiting, training, demonstrating, and managing. At one point, sheinvited me to speak to a group of her employees because she felt manyof their parents were not supportive of their jobs. She wanted them tohave another perspective.

Whether you want to be or not, you are the role model for your children.Your attitude about work influences their development.


How are you modeling work attitudes to your children? Are theyabsorbing the feeling of having pride in their work or are theygetting the impression that work is horrible, boring, stressful, andto be avoided at all costs? What kinds of changes can you maketo model a more supportive, positive impression?

**

Just as being unhappy at work affects your home life, being unhappyat home affects your work. Trouble at home can manifest as troublefocusing on and achieving your goals at the office, and no boss ormanager will allow you to go on too long without living up to theirexpectations.

From time to time, a senior executive apologizes to me when ourconversation veers off to personal challenges—but no apology isnecessary. This is often a breakthrough to understanding what is reallygoing on and what is getting in the way of progress. The opportunity todiscuss options brings the decision-making chaos out into the open sopossible solutions can be examined.

Where does your unhappiness originate, at home or at work? Areproblems at the office negatively impacting your family? Or areproblems with your personal life carrying over to createdifficulties at work?

**

Whether or not you have children, family is usually high on mostpeople’s list of priorities. Certainly having the support of family can helptremendously when you come home from work.

Creating a family team may or may not be a new idea for you. Whenyou involve your family in decisions that impact them and in yourpurpose for doing what you do, you not only teach your children, butalso gain their support at the same time. It can also explain to them whyyou are tense or irritable at the end of the day. You may be surprisedhow sharing your thoughts will change your family’s interpretations ofwhat’s going on.


As my children were growing up, we had a “Family Council” meetingevery couple of weeks on Sunday night. This was an opportunity foranyone to voice their thoughts on how to make home a happier place.We aired our grievances and looked for solutions. Later, FamilyCouncil nights turned into regular family-night dinners. I was surprisedwhen I mentioned to Michael once that one of his sisters was movingback to Southern California around the same time he was. Heimmediately said, “Great! We can have family dinners again.”

Family dinner times are a great opportunity to review family values andexpectations and to be supportive of the challenges we each face.There is no substitute for showing that you care, even if not everyattempt is successful.

How does your family operate as a team? What can you do to helpencourage more family support for yourself and other familymembers and enjoy a happier home?

**

Sometimes you just have to say no. It’s not always possible to doeverything you want to do for yourself in addition to those things youhave committed to do for others. You have to decide what you can letgo.

The trick is to eliminate those things that are not in alignment. Let’ssay, for example, you want to have a “portfolio” career—the type ofcareer where you do a variety of things for different people—and thatseveral people ask you to do business development for them whileanother potential client asks you to devote sixty percent of your time totheir marketing plan. This would probably create quite a bit of anxietyas you try to choose between two conflicting sets of activities, unlessyou choose to do only the business-development activities. Then youcan look at the common denominators in order to network and interactwith people who are all in alignment with each other.

Being in alignment also means maintaining your personal integrity. Ifthe values of your company are uncomfortable for you, you will not bein alignment with the company. When there is a lack of alignmentbetween an executive’s behaviors and those of colleagues, no one willbe happy, much less fulfilled.


Do you feel in alignment with your company, your superiorsand/or your partners? What would it take to realign your work lifefor greater satisfaction?

**

For many of us, reluctance to ask for help is just about one of thehardest behaviors to change. We will go to any length to remainindependent. We actually stop ourselves from asking someone else togive us a hand. Sometimes we are not even aware that we don’t askfor help.

As a coach, I often hang around with the rest of my tribe. A couple ofyears ago we did an exercise in which two people were “handcuffed”together using ropes. We had to figure out how to undo the ropes. Irealized well into the game that there was no rule preventing us fromasking for help. A good friend had already figured things out but it wasstill a major decision for me to ask her partner how they did it. It wasonly when my partner got too frustrated that I decided it was okay toask for help. My big take-away for the evening was the surprise that ithad taken me so long to ask.

Don’t think I learned my lesson just from that event. Years later, I wasin a seminar where the trainer announced a contest. Only one personin a room of 550 went to the trainer and asked if he had any clues hecould give to solve the puzzle. Only one person. What makes us all sohesitant to ask?

How do you feel when someone asks you for help? Isn’t it a pleasureto help a friend, meet someone who wants some advice or picksomeone’s child up with yours? What stops you from asking for thesame thing?

There’s a big difference between being a “taker” and recognizing thata little help now and then can make a big difference.

Do you recognize when you need help? Can you ask for it, or doyou resist admitting that you cannot do it all? What kind ofchanges would you have to make to allow yourself to ask for helpbefore a situation reaches the crisis stage?


E p i l o g u e

EpilogueLife is a journey and we all go through itcontinuously, no matter how expert we are indifferent areas of personal growth anddevelopment. More often than not, I seem toattract the clients who have something toteach as well as who need to learnsomething from me.

So, where are members of my family now? Thechildren are all doing well. Michael is anattorney, happy in his new field and far fromhome. Jennifer is thriving as the westernbusiness-development manager for a companythat offers paperless solution technology.Michele is graduating this year with a BA inmarketing. She opened an office for her knifecompany last summer and was tenth out of 200in the nation. Cody is at the top of his class atUSC, taking a double major in finance andaccounting.

As for my ex-husbands, I have no relationshipwith Kenneth at this point, possibly because ourpaths simply ceased crossing. He's still inCanada while I’ve been in Southern California forsixteen years. Sadly, we’ve never had theopportunity to work out the pain between us. It'sa shame but that's the way it is.

My relationship with Ted, on the other hand, hasevolved into being best friends and extendedfamily. We have Sunday dinners together, often

130 Epilogue

with one of his girlfriends present. He’s my "In Case of Emergency"number and I’m his. Sometimes the divorce works better than themarriage.

I’m loving life as an empty nester and continuing to grow my business.At this point, I am developing leaders within organizations less bycoaching and more by helping them have conversations that count. Bythat I mean having conversations with my client that make themrecognize how they may be letting their team down by not doing whatthey said they would or by creating silos within the organization. At thecore of life, it’s all about communicating.

I've discovered that life is a journey of becoming self aware, authenticand real, which is also what coaching is all about. The most importantlearning about one’s self is recognizing that we are all human and weall will make many mistakes. Forgiving ourselves for our mistakes isthe first step to forgiving and being empathetic and compassionatetoward other people. Those are the kind of thoughts that show thematurity in the journey.

Part of my maturity is recognizing the real, biological differencesbetween men and women. Although more of my clients are females,the majority of clients who pay me directly are male. Men seem moreready to understand the difference between making an investment inthemselves and spending money. So the only way I get to coachwomen is when their organization thinks they’re worth coaching. Andeven then I consistently get questions like “How much money are theyspending on me?” and “I don’t think I’m worth all of this.”

Why? I believe it’s in the female genome, in our DNA. Women have abasic need to be taken care of. It’s only in the last fifty years thatwomen have become really self sufficient and professional.Nevertheless, they still have that lingering sense that someone shouldbe taking care of them and they almost have an anger about it. Men'sDNA gives them the sense that they’re supposed to take care ofpeople; when they can’t do it, they get angry. They’re often afraid to getinto relationships because they cannot support the woman. How couldonly fifty years change six generations of DNA, which is how far backour genes go?


As for me, I’m quite happy to be real in myself and let what wants tohappen, happen. And even at this age I’m loving being old enough torecognize what it is that I’m experiencing.

132 Epilogue


A p p e n d i x

A Book Summaries

I’m an avid reader of books aimed atpersonal and professional development, andI chronicle my efforts in book summaries thatI share with friends, clients and colleagues. Iprovide a list of these book summaries andrecommendations at http://www.frumi.com.Please feel free to click on Books andReports and peruse as many titles as youlike. I update the list every month, so sendme a note at [email protected] if you’dlike to be added to my email list.

Below are just a few examples of what you'll find at http://www.frumi.com/index.php/weblog/books_and_reports/

Book SummariesThe Attractor Factor by Joe Vitale

Building Trust In Business, Politics,Relationships, and Life by Robert C. Solomon& Fernando Flores

http://www.frumi.com

http://www.frumi.com/index.php/weblog/boo

134 Appendix A: Book Summaries

Change Your Questions Change Your Life ByMarilee G. Adams Ph.D.

Confidence: How Winning Streaks andLosing Streaks Begin and End by RosabethMoss Kanter

Confronting Reality: Doing What Matters toGet Things Right by Larry Bossidy & RamCharan

Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman

EQ Edge, The by Steven J. Stein, PhD andHoward E. Book, M.D.

Execution: The Discipline of Getting ThingsDone by Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan

Failing Forward: Turning Mistakes intoStepping Stones for Success by John C.Maxwell, Thomas Nelson

Fierce Conversations: Achieving Success atWork & in Life, One Conversation at a Time bySusan Scott

Four Agreements, The by Don Miguel Ruiz

Good To Great by Jim Collins

Last Word on Power, The by Tracy Goss

Power of Full Engagement, The by Jim Loehr& Tony Schwartz

Winning by Jack Welch


A u t h o r

About the Author

Frumi Rachel Barr, PhD, a veteranentrepreneur, has founded or been a partner innumerous companies, holding both ChiefExecutive Officer (CEO) and Chief FinancialOfficer (CFO) positions. Her hands-onexperience ranges from manufacturing to serviceindustries to direct-marketing enterprises; herconsulting and coaching experience has takenher into virtually every type of corporation andsmall business. Her success has been soencompassing that clients, associates, andfellow coaches have dubbed her a “Catalyst forChange.”

Dr. Barr specializes in inspiring leaders torediscover the strengths and values thatenergize them so they can, in turn, renew theircolleagues, employees and business operationsand has a proven track record for helping

136 Author

entrepreneurs and leaders balance the needs ofgrowing their businesses with the needs of theirpersonal and family lives.

Dr. Barr holds a Bachelor of Physical Therapy(BPT) from McGill University in Montreal,Canada, a Masters in Business Administration(MBA) from California State University, Fullerton,California (CSUF), a Coaching Certification fromHudson Institute, Santa Barbara, California anda doctorate in Business Administration fromPacific Western University. She is a boardmember of The Entrepreneurship Institute inOrange County and immediate Past President ofthe National Board of the Professional Coachingand Mentors Association (PCMA). She has alsobeen a member of the advisory board forChapman University’s new Business CoachingCertification Program, International CoachingFederation (ICF), and the Mentorship Program ofNAWBO (National Association of WomenBusiness Owners).


Y o u r B o o k

Create Thought Leadership for your Company

Books deliver instant credibility to the author.Having an MBA or PhD is great, however, puttingthe word "author" in front of your name is similarto using the letters PHD or MBA. You are no longMichael Green, you are "Author Michael Green."

Books give you a platform to stand on. They help you to:

• Demonstrate your thought leadership • Generate leads

Books deliver increased revenue, particularly indirect revenue

• A typical consultant will make 3x in indirect revenue for every dollar they make on book sales

Books are better than a business card. They are:

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138 Your Book

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Confessions of a Resiliant Entrepreneur 139

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