Needing to do something I agreed to be a Junior High School Bible Teacher in Jacksonville, FL at less than half my salary.  I agreed to do so for one school year while I prayed and searched for my next career.  My "ex-wife" had to also teach in elementary for us to make ends meet.

With both of us as teachers, life was so busy, we had no time for anything else.  This is probably why I don't have any photos of this year teaching.  Sorry.

I then went to work for a nation-wide Computer Consulting company.  I was hired as a Project Manager with an offer to earn $90,000 per year after my initial training.  However the Regional Manager in Jacksonville had not secured a contract with a new client for me to be a Project Manager.  Therefore I was kept at the $36,000 salary and placed on a Y2K project at a client called Guarantec where they billed the client $80 per hour for me to work there, while I was paid $36k/year.  Again, no photos of these days either.  Life was so stressful that there was no time for photo taking.

Chronologically, in January 1999, my ex-wife said she "no longer wanted to work" as a teacher any longer.  She said the "stress was too much" for her.  I told her she did not have to sign a teaching contract again, and I would work a 2nd job if I had to in order to pay the bills.  So after that school semester, she resigned as a full-time elementary teacher.

After 13 months at Guarantec, I was offered a position as "Resourcing Manager" -- a fancy title for "Head Hunter Recruiter."  Within 5 weeks, I was out-performing all Resourcing Managers nationwide.  This upset a number of people within the company, and after several strong disagreements I felt it best to just resign in February 1999.  The Jacksonville-area Regional Manager sided with my decision and courage to resign for moral reasons, that he resigned with me, giving up his long-term comfortable position.

At that point I was out of a job, and my ex-wife's small teaching income would also end June 1, 1999. So two IT friends of mine and myself started a small IT consulting firm of our own.  Two people donated $10,000 each to get it started.  I worked out of my home, but within months we could see it was not going to work for us.

So on May 5, 1999, I started as an independent contractor with Ameriplan USA (a home based business marketing benefits nationwide).  It started with 4 health care benefits and grew to include all health care benefits for under $40 /month for anyone regardless of health problems.  Later it expanded into Legal, Finance, Home, Auto, and Entertainment savings up to 80%.  My income soon surpassed my highest salary ever, and allowed me to volunteer ministry services on the condition that I would NOT be paid <= this has proved to be the most rewarding type of ministry for me.