Life is 10% what happens to you, 90% how you deal with it.
Scott Churchson didn’t exactly runaway to join the circus, but I guess America’s Got Talent is today’s equivalent. Before his escape, Scott was a Regional Manager for Primerica for 7+ years with 34 people reporting to him. “Nothing like Monday morning sales meetings where you get up in front of 50 other salespeople (including many of your own) and put your numbers on the board for all to see. “
After burning himself out working 70-80 hour work weeks (7 days a week most times) he gave it all up. He turned in his Series 6 & 63 licenses, his life insurance and variable annuities licenses and switched over to the entertainment industry. Scott had always wanted to do something in the entertainment/acting/stunt field. Oddly enough after responding to an add on Craigslist he got started doing extra work. Since then he’s been on America’s Got Talent season 10, HBO’s The Deuce, fought in the end of Dark Knight Rises & did several stunt and speaking roles for MSG, CBS and other places as well.
Lessons Learned
Scott’s time in corporate America actually prepared him for the challenges of the entertainment industry. “I was fortunate to learn a lot about building a business through the financial field and believe it or not there is a lot of similarities. They’re both a style of sales that deal with rejection, fear and not having a 40 hour a week mentality”.
Scott is always learning. He prefers audiobooks because he can play them in his car or while he is doing dishes and still get educated at the same time. Some of his favorites include anything from Brian Tracy (including Psychology of Achievement especially), Earl Nightingale and Rene Godefroy. He has become very conscious of how much time the average person wastes in a week. “15 minutes a day equals 7.5 hours a month of legit study and no joke that is time on the toilet, in the car or any other mundane activity that doesn’t even cut into Netflix and PS4 time. However as Brian Tracy puts it, One hour per day of study will put you at the top of your field within three years. Within five years you’ll be a national authority”.
Biggest Change
Since escaping the 9 to 5, Scott’s stress has gone down tremendously. Having 34 people reporting to him and always knowing he had numbers to put up had his cholesterol and weight much higher than he would have liked. “Now it’s just me. I still have the work ethic and understanding of rejection but it feels like a huge weight is off my shoulders. Also it’s nice having conversations with people and not have to think in the back of my mind how I NEED to sell them something”.
What’s Next?
Scott is changing gears a bit and focusing a little bit more on the broadcasting and hosting aspect of things. He has a podcast through Kevin Smith’s people and is working on building his audience. “I think my biggest challenge now is keeping the momentum going. This is a faster and faster paced world; forget about being yesterday’s news; it’s last hour’s news. If you don’t keep things moving you’ll forgotten about quickly and it’s 4 times harder to get things rolling again”.
Primary URL: http://www.scottchurchson.com
Montage of My Stunt Beatings – https://www.youtube..com/watch?v=PO62J9510Ms
MSG NJ Devils Commercial – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYD_AH52VZA
