y By DAVID E. APPEL
Buy Your Tomorrows Today By
DAVID E. APPEL
“People Insurance”,
one agent's guide to taking clients and their professional advisors to a new level of process and service.
Forward
It is critical to get your “people insurance” plans in
place today when there is no medical reason to do so. It is too easy to procrastinate and to put off today what you can do tomorrow; however, for most of us tomorrow comes and there are more excuses, more reasons why we cannot get it done. When one of the things we are putting on the back burner is our overall estate plan, planning for life, disability and long term care insurance the procrastination and reasoning can become worse. How often have you said I will wait until I’m older, this won’t happen to me, it happens to others, we have longevity in our family, my parents were healthy, I won’t get sick or disabled, I won’t die young, my friends have not done any planning, why should I plan now? The bottom line is none xv
of us having a crystal ball; we do not know what our future holds. We have to structure and plan our lives with our own crystal ball. We need to secure and make sure our future plans are in place. It is irresponsible of us to not plan for our loved ones in case our future dreams don’t become our reality. I want to share with you a story about a client that epitomizes why I am so passionate about “buying your tomorrows today” and why I am so zealous and enthusiastic about the “people insurance” business. It’s the reason why I get up excited to go to my office and do what I do for a living. I want you to picture this. You have a client who is a strong amateur tennis player, who is in need of some minor knee surgery – no big deal. He schedules the surgery and is informed that a pre-operation examination is required by the hospital based on his age. The client thinks that this is a waste of time. He has checkups with his primary care physician annually and was only 34 years old; however, a policy is a policy so he schedules an appointment with his doctor. The doctor takes his vital signs, listens to his lungs, checks his eyes, ears, nose and throat and bangs his knee with a reflex hammer to watch his leg jerk. The doctor like always began pressing on different parts of his body but something seemed different this time. xvi
The doctor hesitates around his throat first in the front then in the rear then back to the front again. The neck exam is extremely thorough. Then the doctor says, “I’m concerned. I feel a bump. I want you to get another test done.” The test is completed and reveals a tumor the size of a lime was growing on the client’s left thyroid gland. The results of the biopsy were inconclusive; however, due to the size of the tumor, and the abnormal cells that were present in the sample the surgeon was concerned. The surgeon tells the client that a surgery to remove the mass is necessary. That night, at home, the client conducts hours of intense Internet research. The Internet, what a great place to go for data gathering, you can find almost everything you are looking for in the entire world and a lot you wish you never found. Based on his amateur Internet research he determined that he might have a deadly carcinoma a vivid picture of not being present in this wonderful world much longer. Questions, concerns, distress, his imagination began to run wild. Was he living a nightmare he wanted to know? His grandfather died of esophageal cancer just three months after his diagnosis. Would he be dead in three months too? But negativity was not his normal style. He was a glass half-full kind of guy. After some deep soul searching, this client vowed to xvii
himself that that night would be the last time he would let his mind think negative thoughts. The client knew he needed to stay positive. He had to be strong for his family who he loved very much. He had to go on living his life; thinking positive thoughts about his future well being, his wife, his children, his extended family, and the success of his business. Unfortunately, good thoughts and a positive attitude are not always enough, but sometimes they can make all the difference in the world. I know this well because that client was me! Can this really be happening I asked? I was thirtyfour years old. I had a four-year-old daughter, a two-year-old son, and a third child due in less than two months. This must be a miss-diagnosis I thought. I had never been sick outside of sports related injuries. I had a successful life insurance practice to run, clients that counted on me to be there for them day in and day out, and what about the countless prospects and clients I had yet to meet and help protect. After hearing of my ordeal, one of my close friends said to me, “David, you need to learn to accept those things in life you can change, and recognize those things that you cannot. In the process, you will learn to appreciate the differences.� Hmmm, “I needed to learn to accept those things in life I could change, and recognize those things that I could not. In the process, xviii
I would learn to appreciate the differences.” This was a lesson that helped me put my situation into better perspective, and advice I will never forget. It was not my turn to die. I recognized that I had accomplished many things, but there were still plenty of unfulfilled dreams and goals I had yet to seize and turn into a reality. The words and phrases I had said to my clients and prospects on a daily basis were being replayed in my head. Things like: “if I were to die young was there enough capital to generate an income for those that I left behind?” “Did I want my children to have their education taken care of whether I was here or not?” “Did I want my wife Erin to have the option of going back to work because she wanted to rather than being forced to?” And “if my children had just lost one parent because of an untimely death should they be forced to lose the other because of a lack of money?” My personal financial plan took center stage in my mind during this time of adversity. This was something I knew I could control so it got my immediate attention. I had to ask myself did I do as good a job planning for myself as I had always done for others? This was not an office role-play, this was real life and the answer for me was clearly yes! There was disability insurance, permanent life insurance, and convertible term life insurance at the best rates in place. The best underwriting rates, an underwriting category I will never see xix
again. You can bet I share that piece of data with all my new prospects and clients “buy your tomorrows today” I tell them. All of my legal documents were signed and in place. A sense of calm came over me. Whether there was a mishap with the anesthesia during the impending operation, or the tumor in my neck was an incurable cancer, I had made the necessary plans to secure my family’s future at a time when there was no medical reason to do so. If their Daddy and Erin’s husband did not make it through the surgery they would be financially taken care of. The tumor was removed. The doctor came out after the surgery and told my wife and father that based on his past surgical experience; there was a 70% chance that the tumor was benign. Boy was that great news. It gave us a feeling of safety and refuge. Little did I know, seven long days later, a date I will never forget, January 19th, 2005 a phone call would come? “I am sorry to tell you David but your tumor was malignant. You have Stage 2 thyroid cancer.” Back to a part of life you can’t control. This news was not easy on my family. My fouryear-old daughter Ally did not understand why Daddy needed to get his neck cut open for a second time, and my wife was now only five weeks out from her due date. There was good news too, my prognosis for a long life xx
was great provided my body scans post radiation treatment came back clean. My team of doctors wanted me to begin my radiation therapy in three weeks. This therapy required me to be isolated from my wife and kids for approximately two weeks. How could I possibly balance my family, work, a new child, and cancer? Life was getting overwhelming and complex, but as my dear friend said, you need to accept the things in life you can change, and recognize those things you cannot. My wife Erin was induced two weeks early to ensure that I could be by her side when our child was born. On March 19th we had a beautiful baby daughter we named Georgia. One week later I moved out of the house to begin my treatment. Georgia’s birth reaffirmed the number one reason I am on this earth; to be the best husband I can be, the best father I can be, and to be there for them as a mentor, counselor, and best friend. I would not let cancer stand in the way of those responsibilities. Georgia’s birth was just what I needed to remind me that I had my whole life to work. My business suffered terribly through the first quarter of that year. Business was at an all time low, my prospect inventory was stagnant, but there were still eight months left to bring the business back and qualify for MDRT. That’s what you do as member achievers at MDRT; you overcome obstacles that stand in the way of your success. xxi
Four months later the final body scans revealed the cancer had indeed been isolated to my neck. The margins were good and the cancer had not spread beyond the tumor that had been removed. I thanked my physician for sending me to a specialist and my ailing body for having a bum knee on that tennis court. Those two unrelated acts allowed me to catch my cancer in time. More importantly, it allowed me to do something we all need to do more frequently, ask ourselves if we’ve properly planned for the future of our families whether we are dealt a good or bad hand in life. The lessons I have learned about life following this challenge have allowed me to professionally succeed and personally triumph beyond my wildest dreams in the years that have followed.
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