We always hear stories about the lone wolf. The man who against all odds blazes his own path through sheer ruggedness. Many times he shows up in a new country with nothing but the clothes on his back and the money in his pocket and ends up building an empire.

This is a very sexy and provocative idea but in reality a VERY rare way that someone creates success in their lives. I find that more often than not there are some key relationships that are left out of such stories that are necessary to frame it correctly. The people we meet and relationships we develop I find to be the most valuable commodity that there is and the real secret to successes. Even if a man has stuck out on his own and built an empire, if he does not have good relationships in his life then it is not the kind of success that I am interested in.

For this reason I have always settled in places where I know at least one person who knows the area. This is not to say that I do not love to visit a strange new city and get lost exploring (in fact it’s one of my favorite things to do) but if I am planning on staying somewhere for an extended period of time and especially doing business there I find it necessary for me to have at least one person that can show me the ropes first.

For my move to San Miguel de Allende this person was Jim Karger.

Acapulco Daze

Around a year ago I came to a crossroads in my life. I was in a position that most people my age would have given anything to be in. I was managing a hotel right in the heart of the most lively place in Acapulco bay. As part of the job I was staying in a beautiful suite on the 30th floor which I considered to be the best room out of all 600 rooms in the hotel. Every evening my room would be lit up with the oranges, violets and blues of the breathtaking sunsets which I could never get tired of watching. The work was not hard and once I was done I could choose to go to the pool, beach or any number of restaurants and bars within minutes walking distance. I had different women coming to visit me at all times of day and night. In other words I was living the fantasy of most men in their 20’s.

The problem that I didn’t realize at the time was that I was not living up to my potential. Although I had all of the material objects I wanted I was not at peace with myself. The job was not challenging me enough and out of boredom I was seeking hedonistic pleasures that led me to live most of my life in a dream state. That dream had to turn into a nightmare before I was able to wake up.

There were two near death incidents that happened within a week of each other that made me want to make a change in my life. One was a jealous girlfriend who smashed me over the head with an onyx statue and the other was a moped accident which landed me in the emergency room for three days. I don’t feel the need to go into detail about either of these right now but the point is that these incidents made me start to second guess the euphoric state that I was living in.

Although I started to have my doubts, even this was not enough for me to realize that the universe was giving me a not so subtle generic levitra legal hint that it was time for me to make a change in my life. It took a teacher to point out the obvious to me, in this case the teacher was a mushroom. One afternoon while hanging out on the beach with some local friends I thought it would be a great time to down a large dose of Psilocybin mushrooms. They were in full effect as the sun started to set and I could see the rays of the sun and the purples and pinks in the sky melt together with the white sand to make incredible geometric shapes that I had never seen before. Apart from visual effects psychedelics also have the ability to bring things to your attention about your life that you may have been ignoring. Not only do they bring them to your attention but shove them in your face and refuse to let you ignore them. In this case I had two messages  which were made loud and clear. 

1. You should be more vulnerable with the important people in your life (cultivate your relationships better)

2. You should get the HELL OUT of Acapulco

The Path to Sanity

The next day I was on a my new mission to reach out to more of the people in my life. One of the many e-mails I sent out was to Jim Karger who I had met while he and his wife were visiting Acapulco six months earlier.  We got along well and had written back and forth many times since then. I sent him an e-mail explaining that I was ready to move on from Acapulco but not sure where to go next. He welcomed me to come stay in one of the casitas on his compound while I check out on the city. I told him I would take him up on the offer and immediately jumped on a bus.

When I arrived to San Miguel de Allende I was blown away. I felt like I was transported to a city in Spain with the cobblestone streets and local artisan food. It was small enough to still be classified as a town but still had the weekend nightlife and attractions of a big city. The city is in most ways completely the opposite of Acapulco, which is what I was looking for at the time.  I decided pretty quickly that this would be the place for me to start the next chapter in my life.

Jim introduced me to everyone in town that I needed to know. The bank manager, attorney, real estate broker and many other people that I do business with today are contacts brought to me by him. These contacts were enough to help me put together the sale of a close to million dollar property without a hiccup in my first month of being here. These are the types of results you can get when cultivating your relationships.

I thought that Jim’s story was worth sharing so I asked him to sit down to do this video. We talk about why he chose to leave his law practice and move to San Miguel de Allende. There were some technical difficulties but I think it turned out well and will be interesting to anyone who may be thinking about moving out of the United States.

If you are interested in visiting San Miguel de Allende and getting set up like I was, contact me.

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