“What’s heroic about what you do?”
Good question, isn’t it? This is posed in our CEO Mehran Assadi’s letter in our just released 2015 Annual Report. For many of us, we don’t think of ourselves as heroes. True heroes save people from burning buildings or are finding cures for cancer, right?
Right. But there is something heroic within so many industries, including ours.
For example, some might simply think we sell life insurance, but we think we protect the dreams of families.
Recently we learned of a young family who needed our help. Brett Gustafson and his wife Samantha ran a farm in Delaware. Farming was Brett’s passion and he and Samantha hoped to build the business and eventually pass it on to their kids.
They bought a policy with us when they started their family and planned for their future. Tragically, those plans took a turn when Brett discovered a lump on his collarbone. After finally getting it checked out with his doctor, he learned he had stage 4 Melanoma skin cancer.
After a six month battle from diagnosis, Brett, an otherwise perfectly healthy young man, lost the fight at only 28 years old, leaving behind his wife and two small children who were then only 4 and 2.
Samantha shared this:
“I have been able to accomplish amazing things with the comfort that our family is taken care of; such as going back to teaching (which is my passion), being an advocate for cancer, spending time with my children and more recently having my book published ‘The Prayer of a Single Mom.’ Being prepared for an uncertain future has afforded my family the opportunity to continue to seek joy in life after losing the heartbeat that was our family. That is immeasurable.”
Not long after this tragedy, we received an e-mail from the Gustafsons’ agent, Don Raper Jr. He wrote:
“We are truly helping people’s dreams to remain alive in the event death occurs in a family’s life. I am so proud to be part of the team that is protecting the dreams of countless people who trust us with those dreams every day.”
This is why we’re so focused on our cause; we know how important it is to help others, to help families and businesses all across America protect the dreams they hold dear.
The viewpoints expressed by Ms. Gustafson may not be reflective of the opinions and experiences of others.
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