Adapting Through Adversity: John Benjamin Jones's Inspiring Journey

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He's taught and spoke for decades about his experience within the profession and he's currently a financial representative with Magnolia Wealth Strategies . John , how are you doing , sir ? I'm good sir . How are you man ? What an interesting career .

As your life continues , just give our audience how you got here , your experience and how you ended up where you are now .

I was a Navy corpsman , I was FMF , so I was with the Marines for about three and a half years out of my almost seven-year tenure , for about three and a half years out of my , you know , almost seven year tenure deployed a smallie with them . But , uh , you know , just , god's plan is always going to prevail .

Like right , the best laid plans are , are never going to go up against what God has for you . Ultimately though , um , ironically , I was never interested in law enforcement as a youngster . I have an uncle who did 40 plus years in law enforcement , but I was never interested in that . It was always military , military .

My career came to an end from a medical issue and I've thought what can I do ? That would still be something that I would be serving others while providing a good lifestyle for my family , and it was either law enforcement or firefighting . You know , first responder field in general , right , firefighting was .

There were,500 applicants for about four openings , so that goes , but ultimately law enforcement is what I kind of fell into and I again , like I said , I wasn't interested in law enforcement when I was young , but absolutely the best field I could have gotten into outside of the military .

But because my background in the in the military was , you know , was traumatic medicine , I kind of fell into instructing that . I did some instruction with that in the military , so I just kind of fell into that .

Once I left the sheriff's department I went into contract security for a while because I thought I was actually going to just make more money is ultimately what it what it boiled down to . My family had grown at that point to six kids so you know I was just trying to provide a better life for them . Ultimately didn't work out that way .

So I went and pursued a career with the Fed , started off with the VA police and then I was able to move into Federal Air Marshal from there Within the Federal Air Marshal , you know , conducting security flights , protection , civil aviation protection .

But I got into full time instruction , specifically traumatic medicine , for the Los Angeles field office of where I was based , out of .

Because I keep talking to cops around across the country because we sort of were fed this sort of fill of lies . Right , it stops and ends with this law enforcement profession , right , right , but it doesn't . Your life can just get just beginning sometimes at the end of that career . You have a chance for a second life , so to speak .

So how did the things you did in the profession sort of set you up for success in what you're doing now ?

Law enforcement , by nature , is reactive , right , unless you're out there being proactive , looking for the violations . That translates perfectly into the financial services field , especially when you first get started . Nobody is coming to you seeking your advice , right ? So you have to get out there , try and make something happen .

And the fact that law enforcement you are talking to dozens of people a day that you don't know and you are the subject matter expert in what you're discussing with them from the law enforcement side , but , at the same time , not everybody you talk to is a suspect , right ? So you're talking to business owners all the time .

You're talking to victims , you're talking to the general public all the time . You're making rapport with people , so that translates very well into the financial sector as well . That would translate into any sector outside of law enforcement , but one of the reasons I went into the financial sector , though , is in law enforcement .

First responder field in general is one of the few fields where you still receive a pension on top of your 401k or TSP , which , whatever it may be , which , whatever it may be , a lot of industries don't have that anymore .

Even with that , though , you find that once you retire from that , unless you prepared properly , you still need to continue doing some type of employment . Once you retire from the first responder field , which goes into your point , the law enforcement first responder field , it does not end when you stop . You have to go in and try and find something else .

Now many people go and try and find something that those skills translate to starting their own training company , starting their own security company , going and working court security what have you ?

Do you find that officers get to the tail end of their career and they're struggling because they didn't pre-plan financially , thinking the pension would help me , the pension would take care of it ? Because you know , some pensions don't account for inflation , right ?

Sometimes COLAs are by the legislature and so that you may have had in 1995 and the pension isn't what it is today . And so do you find that same thing when you speak to law enforcement about this ?

And unfortunately I was kind of in that boat . I know a lot of my coworkers who have retired were in that boat . Some of them worked out well , others it didn't . So I do find that the pension , as great as it is to have that income coming in once you retire , it's kind of the catch-22 .

Just like you said , people think they're going to have the pension , so they don't plan at all . Yeah , yeah . So I'm trying to get people , I'm trying to educate our community to understand that you need the planner . Just like you need you need a coach to learn martial arts , just like you need a trainer to reach a goal in the gym .

You need some kind of professional to help you reach those financial goals .

He literally said I'm not going to let you work with me if you don't enter this thing . As a 21-year-old kid you don't like . What in the world are you talking about , right ? So I got in it and didn't think much about it after that , but it's well over , obviously , six figures today , because that one leader sort of forced my hand on that .

And so what would you say to the leaders out there , people in the profession , that try to encourage people to do this ? Because I do think there's a responsibility we're very bad in the profession , john , about take care of them on the job , but then once they leave the job , good luck getting anybody to really care too much after that .

And so how important is that to be speaking about this to our officers very early on in their career ?

But it is as important because , like you said , the job is going to end eventually , whether you retire , medically retire or leave for something else . I mean , I'm sure you're aware of the statistic that you know average law enforcement career in the United States is about seven years . So people leave the job before retirement in different capacities .

So it's imperative to understand it and , as a leader , I would recommend leaders reaching out to financial professionals , especially if they have a background in the first responder community , to come in . Just invite them in half hour hour half hour during an academy or a FTO program to just come in and speak to them about the importance of it .

Maybe those officers , those first responders that have already been employed for a while that have not had that training , you know , maybe during a follow-on training event which I know it's difficult to get the time on those follow-on trains , I understand that the required legal you know , functional training takes precedent , but again it doesn't take a long time a

half hour , an hour to just let them give them the knowledge or the at least a brief presentation and give those folks a chance to talk to them on their own time . At least they know somebody right . A lot of times people don't want to talk to a professional because they don't necessarily trust them .

They don't think that they'll understand their specific needs as a first responder . But there are quite a few first responders out there . Just in Magnolia , the general agents of West Point , graduate . We have several retired military .

There are people who truly understand what's going on out there with the first responder and military fields , veteran fields who understand where you're coming from , understand the struggle of Right yeah , really dangerous job that you're doing and understand why the protections that they recommend are important .

They're not just trying to get you to file a financial plan or pay for this specific product , right . They're doing it specifically to help you reach the goals that you have set forth for you your family and your loved ones .

So I speak to a lot of people that they don't trust the stock market . They watch the buy gold commercials . Everyone's nervous . I get that we're sort of an untrustworthy group . What would you tell them about ?

What it is right is for first responders specifically is to do what you can talk to somebody about helping you maximize your income once the job is over . Yeah , right , so um , but just just like on the job , right ? You talk to somebody , you talk to them a little bit .

You can kind of get that gut feel about them If you just get that feel like they're just not the right for you . That doesn't mean that all advisors are not right for you , right , they want to talk to me . If they want to ask me a couple of questions , even if they don't want to work with me , that's fine .

I can help them find somebody in their area that they might be willing to work with , or at least somebody who's reputable .

He just wrote a book called A Higher Calling A Biblical Guide for First Responders , military and Veterans . John , talk to us about why you decided to write the book and what it means to the profession ?

Everybody was home , Nobody was really going out doing anything like that , and my wife was already working from home and I had been traveling in my capacity as a federal air marshal quite extensively . So I was home and my wife said basically you're kind of annoying me , You're here too much . You need a project to do .

So she said you always wanted to write a book . Why don't you write the book about the process you mentored some of these folks through . So that's kind of how it started .

It took about a year to write and the reason it's a four year process is because it actually got picked up by a traditional Christian publisher and then they sat on it for two years , which is apparently not having worked with traditional publish before . It's kind of a common practice .

So in the clause there was if it , nothing happened within a certain amount of time , I got my rights back , I worked with a coach and within about seven months of working with the coach . It was released . It was finally released on June 7th of this last year , 2014 .

If it comes to me first and I ship it out , I try to write a you know , a quick note in it , at least to you know , say thank you .

Whatever you're doing , it is . It's involved in that . It's involved with your relationships . It's involved with how you talk to your family members . It's involved , it's a part of the community , within your department or agency . It's involved with how you speak with the general public and it goes into every aspect .

But the biggest aspects of what I found in these fields the first responder military and veterans is it gives you a path . It's the guide for you to do these potentially horrible things or see these horrible things , and still understand that what you're doing is important , it's honorable , it's .

The book is called A Higher Calling , because a lot of people in these communities feel called into them and it's generally that you know . I'm a Christian , so I believe that God calls us into these professions .

But it's also God that gives you that guidepost to help you cope and deal with all that stuff that you see , and unless you have that spiritual aspect , something's always going to be missing . You're always going to try and fill it with something else .

There's so much more in life that is in front of you , but we have to have that purpose to do it .