Check Out Kenneth Andrews’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to Kenneth Andrews. 

Hi Kenneth, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I struggled in life and in many ways still do. I’ve knocked on tens of thousands of doors working on and even managing political campaigns. Yet every time returned home with less money than I had left with, and the promised opportunity for advancement never being realized. I’ve ran for office and lost. In fact, I’ve grown somewhat used to losing. It’s sort of what I do. But I don’t let it drag me down, and keep pushing forward to better myself. In that pursuit of self-betterment, I’ve learned a lot about myself in the last couple years. 

I’ve learned to not be a people pleaser. I cut out users, time wasters, and people that would gaslight me out of my life. I’ve learned that I’m a loser because I surround myself with people who are losers. But I don’t have to that. I don’t have to lose. I don’t have to surround myself with people that drag me down. 

I decided to become an independent Insurance agent because I was tired of working tirelessly to make other people money while I get poorer every day. I recently left a Job working as an EMT. I loved helping people and still do. But low pay, long hours, and mandatory holdovers drained all my energy and left me gaining weight and losing sanity. Again, I’ve learned that I can’t help people if I lose myself in the process. I’d still love to volunteer once I move to a city with an on-call fire department. But in the meantime, my EMS career is on hold. I’ve learned that to be successful; sometimes you have to put the world on hold and focus on yourself. 

Why should I knock thousands of doors to be paid less than minimum wage on the losing side of a political race when I can knock on those same doors and secure clients and income for myself? Why should I spend time with people that drag me down when I can network with people that pull me up? Why should I work 12–15-hour shifts for someone else, when I can put 12-15 hours into building my own business. 

I’ve only recently joined the insurance industry, but I’ve accomplished so much in this short time by focusing on myself for once. I’ve started reading again, exercising, spending time with family, etc. I’ve regained my sense of self-worth and self-love that I feel has been slowly beaten out of me by life and toxic people. If all I’ve gotten of this experience is self-love, then I’m already successful. 

We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I might have gone into too much detail in the first post, but here is a summary of my situation. 

I have struggled my whole life with understanding the world. Being autistic has made view things differently. It’s harder for me to relate to people and understand them. Bodily language and tonality that people pick up subconsciously are things that I have consciously focus on. I’m a chronic overthinker that can learn advanced concepts quickly, but simple things that other people have no problem with elude me. Having autism is like being an alien on a planet you don’t understand. The inhabitants look like you and talk like you but think very differently. You can’t understand why they do the silly things they do. They cannot understand why you do what you do. This has spilled over into my professional life and made it a challenge to succeed in a very corporatized world. People whom I respected and craved the approval of would push me away like a burden. Constant rejection in my career ambitions led me to become bitter and angry at the people that I thought were my friends. It’s taken me a long time to overcome this rejection. Maybe I just got used to it. This is why I don’t tolerate people who don’t support me in my life. This has led me to be impatient as well. I can set my sites on something and learn everything about it in a short time. But the world wasn’t built like me. I could convince myself that I could manage a hedge fund. But no matter how much I teach myself, I don’t have an Ivy league degree. It’s not going to happen, and I waste my own time with ambition that’s unrealistic. 

I recently went through a breakup. It was hard, but it was harder being in the relationship. I paid all of the bills, took care of everything, and slowly made compromises that chipped away at myself respect without even realizing it. When I finally ended It, I peace in my home for the first time in over a year. 

Part of my struggle with people is that I can be brutally honest and speak my mind. While I see honesty as a benefit. It definitely hasn’t always benefited me. I have to avoid negativity of social media or be dragged into a toxic mindset. I’ve had to learn to bite my tongue and not argue with people whose minds won’t be changed anyway. I am not perfect at this, and it is a daily struggle to keep a positive frame of mind. 

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I provide Insurance services for families and professionals. I specialize in the commercial space. As an independent agent I can work with my clients to find the best coverages for them. What sets me apart from other agents is that I do the work. I use due diligence to do what’s best for my clients. I don’t miss things that can save the clients’ money or pose a risk. I can almost always save my clients money just by looking at little details other agents might miss. Many agents just look for what’s cheap, which can leave gaps in a client’s coverage which will cost the client financially eventually. 

Have you learned any interesting or important lessons due to the Covid-19 Crisis?
To be honest, I didn’t have the time to reflect or learn anything from the Covid situation. I was busy working as an EMT. I’ve transported quite a few covid patients, some in worse condition than others. It’s a weird virus that barely affects some people and is deadly to others. I remember I took a lady to the hospital that seemed only to be in pain, with no real ability to communicate other than moaning. She was not short of breath; her skin had a healthy color, etc. Oxygen saturation was in the 60s. I mistakenly believed the PulseOx reader was in error, as there is no way someone in the low 60s wouldn’t have purple lips and be gasping for air. These machines were often prone to error as cold fingers, low battery, a thready pulse, or anything would throw them off. It was only after we got to the hospital that we discovered just how bad of shape she was really in. It was a valuable learning experience for me. 

Without going into too much detail, I also learned just how ridiculous and disorganized the whole healthcare system is, and in spite of all the extreme measures to prevent the spread of covid, how little basic protocol was followed. Contact restrictions, masks, gowns, etc. were all pushed. But You’d be surprised how often people don’t wash hands, or grab clean gloves out of a fresh box after touching a MERSA-contaminated patient. Many healthcare workers follow the required protocols when people were looking. The same nurses that would enforce a mask requirement on a trach patient that breaths through their neck would be the ones to take off their masks when nobody was on the floor. 

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