I get it. Companies have disappointed you. People have disappointed you. Maybe churches, governments, leaders you once looked up to — they’ve all let you down at some point.
And when you’ve been burned enough times, there’s a voice inside your head that starts to whisper something that sounds an awful lot like wisdom:
“This is just the way things work. Nobody stays. Nothing lasts. Why should I be any different?”
And honestly? I understand why that voice is convincing. Because the evidence seems overwhelming. People leave. Companies fold. Leaders fall. Marriages dissolve. Business partners betray. Friends disappear when things get hard.
So the logical conclusion — the safe conclusion — is to hold everything loosely. Never commit too deeply. Always keep your options open. Protect yourself.
I understand the appeal of that philosophy because I lived in its shadow for most of my childhood.
The Day Everything Split in Two
My dad left when I was 8 years old.
I don’t say that for sympathy. I say it because it’s the hinge point of this whole conversation.
When your dad walks out the door, you don’t just lose a parent. You lose a worldview. The ground beneath your feet cracks open and you’re left standing on one side of a canyon, staring across at the life you thought you were going to have.
And in that moment — whether you’re 8 or 38 — something inside you starts to form a conclusion about the world:
People leave.
That’s the lesson. And once it’s in there, it colors everything. Every relationship. Every commitment. Every opportunity someone asks you to believe in.
People leave. So don’t get too attached.
Now, I could’ve let that be the final word. But something happened that changed everything.
Or more accurately — someone happened. Two someones.
The Farm on the Snake River
My grandparents — Grandpa Ford and Grandma Carol — lived on 150 acres that bordered the Snake River in Idaho.
And when my dad left, they didn’t.
My grandpa was there for the father-and-son campouts. He was there to remind me I could do better with the choices I was making as a teenager. He was there to help us get wood for our stove to keep our family warm through Idaho winters. He was there to speak at the ceremony for my Eagle Scout award. One day he showed up in my driveway with a car he’d purchased to help me get to college on safer wheels.
He was there every Sunday in his chair, for hugs and laughs and conversations in his farmhouse, providing a rock-solid fixture and foundation for my mind, heart and soul for 40 years.
I could go on and on.
In short, he was there. He was there. He was there.
And so was my grandmother.
My cousin captured what she meant to all of us better than I ever could. Here’s what he wrote after she passed:
“A few years ago I had a wedding to photograph in Idaho so I stayed the night at the farm. I woke up at 7:30 AM to a full breakfast that both of them had prepared for me — complete with raspberry and huckleberry jam and toast, eggs, and cereal. She was probably 87 and he was 95.
I learned that morning she was going in to see a doctor about her feet. I left for a jog around the perimeter of their beautiful 150 acres. By the time I got back they were pulling into the garage. My grandpa was helping my grandmother out of the car with his arms around her. She needed help to walk.
As my grandpa was explaining to me that she’d had a toe amputated, my grandma was asking me if I wanted to take some green beans and raspberry huckleberry jam home.
‘Gramma, don’t worry about the jam — but yes I will take some — come in and rest.’
We walked her to a comfortable chair in the living room. I sat next to her as she began asking me questions about my kids and my wife like nothing had happened. What’s a toe anyway?
In a day where individualism reigns, my grandmother stands as a beacon of what a life looks like when you think so much about other people.”
And another memory:
“The last visit I had with her she was in a wheelchair and was not able to acknowledge our presence. We took her outside and for a brief moment she raised my hand to her lips and kissed it. Each of my kids and my wife in turn received a kiss as it was evident she was not willing to let anyone leave unnoticed.
In her supreme discomfort she was thinking of each of us still. Nobody ever was unnoticed.”
My cousin also wrote:
“She and my grandpa created an environment up on the farm that welcomed everyone. What they created was a refuge. The instant we crossed the canal to the farm we stepped into our heaven.
We made home movies, played bocce, drank Coke like the Irish drink whisky, played Atari, had fashion shows — even as adults — ate large farm breakfasts, went on lion hunts, rode four wheelers, rode cows, bailed hay, surfed the canal, broke sprinklers, broke four wheelers, went to the fair, climbed barns, fed calves, watched NBA games, caught fish and had fish frys, and my own personal childhood favorite — waded through manure in grandpa’s hip boots.
If you ask any one of my cousins or siblings if they would have rather gone to Disneyland or to the farm there is not even a question what the answer would be. Disneyland doesn’t have a grandma that makes you feel like you are special, wanted, and cared for.”
And then this, about the marriage my grandparents modeled:
“My grandmother called my grandpa ‘Sir Handsome.’ She often rode in the tractor with him so they could visit while working the fields. I never saw them fight, bicker, or cross each other. They respected each other, looked out for each other and spoke kind words about each other in soft tones.
They obliterated the idea that a relationship needs a little fight in it.”
The Choice
So there I was as a kid, standing in the middle of two wildly different models of how the world works.
On one side: a father who left. Evidence that people don’t stay. Proof that loyalty is a myth and you’d better look out for yourself because nobody else will.
On the other side: grandparents who never left. Who showed up for a struggling single mom and her two little kids. Who built a refuge on 150 acres that became heaven on earth for everyone lucky enough to cross that canal.
Two models. One question.
Which one would I follow?
I think every person reading this has faced some version of this same crossroads. Maybe not the exact same circumstances, but the same fundamental question:
When the world shows you disloyalty, do you become disloyal too? Or do you become something different?
Loyalty as Faith
Here’s what I’ve come to believe:
Loyalty, like all ethical values, is more of a faith than a science. It’s an adherence to a higher ideal that most of the world doesn’t understand from a purely logical, self-serving point of view.
Think about it. If you run the cold math, loyalty doesn’t always add up. The disloyal person often gets the short-term win. They jump to the better deal. They leave before things get hard. They take the path of least resistance and from the outside, it looks like they’re winning.
But loyalty isn’t a math equation. It’s a conviction.
It’s the choice to be there for those who’ve been there for you. And in the cases where people failed you — where they didn’t stay, where they didn’t show up — it’s the choice to be the change instead of following their example.
My grandmother didn’t become bitter because the world is full of selfishness. She became a beacon of unselfishness in spite of it. She didn’t need the world to earn her kindness. She gave it freely because that’s who she chose to be.
My grandpa didn’t step in as a father figure for me because it was logical or convenient. He did it because that’s the kind of man he was. He was loyal to the principle that family shows up — even when others don’t.
That’s what loyalty really is. It’s not blind allegiance. It’s not staying in a burning building because someone told you to.
It’s a conscious, deliberate choice to commit to something higher than self-interest. A principle. A person. A community. A vision. Something that falls into that “higher” category.
The Part I Can’t Prove (But My Experience Confirms)
I choose to believe that this kind of loyalty will count for something in the great beyond. But while here on earth, I can tell you from experience that it counts for something too.
I’ve spent 20 years building residual income. And if there’s one thing that experience has taught me, it’s this:
Loyalty is a pillar of building residual income.
Not the flashy kind of loyalty where you wave a company flag and shout from the rooftops. The quiet kind. The kind where you make a commitment and you honor it. Where you show up on the hard days the same way you show up on the easy ones. Where people look at your track record and they see consistency — not a trail of abandoned projects and broken promises.
In the residual income world, people don’t follow opportunity hoppers. They follow people who’ve planted their flag and stayed. Because if you won’t stay, why should they?
Every time you jump, you reset the clock. You don’t just lose momentum — you lose credibility. And credibility, once lost, is brutally hard to rebuild.
But when people see that you’re loyal to something worth being loyal to — that you’ve weathered the storms and you’re still standing — something powerful happens. Trust forms. And trust, compounded over time, is the foundation of every residual income stream that lasts.
The People I Want to Follow
I want to follow people who are loyal to that which deserves their loyalty. Be it a principle, a person, a community, a vision, or anything that falls into that “something higher” category.
I want to follow people who chose to be the change when they could’ve followed the example of those who let them down.
People like my grandparents, who built a refuge instead of a fortress. Who welcomed everyone instead of shutting people out. Who gave instead of guarded. Who stayed instead of left.
People like my business partner Mike, who shows up, day in, day out, when the sun is shining and on the days it’s raining.
People like my friend and business partner Amy, who’s been a picture of loyalty, standing, serving, loving and leading in the vision we’re building for ourselves.
Or my friends Dirk and Muriel, who had every reason not to trust anyone in home business again, but chose to have faith that we could build something different together.
Or Kevin and Kim who’ve been with us since before the beginning.
Or Robin who serves, helps and builds belief constantly, without ever asking for anything in return.
People like my wife Corene, who could have easily left me during hard times, but stayed to be my loyal partner in life, and mother to our children.
I like to think that the right ones — the people worth building with, worth investing in, worth locking arms with — are this way too.
My cousin wrote something that I think captures the ultimate truth about loyalty and its ripple effects:
“She demonstrated to me that one human being can make a whole lot of difference in a whole lot of lives. Since September I find myself thinking about her more and more. I wake up with greater determination to think of others, especially those closest to me. I don’t feel the need to save the world so much as I do just to do the dishes and smile about it. She is a reminder that I can be more, love more, and serve more.”
That’s the case for loyalty in a disloyal world.
It’s not logical. It’s not safe. And it certainly isn’t popular.
But it’s the path that leads to a life — and a legacy — worth building.
My grandpa taught me to be there for those who need me to be there. And now that he’s gone, I’ve realized that maybe my work to be a great grandson is really just beginning.
There are voids in the world and shoes to be filled and people to be there for.
I have no idea if I’ll be able to live up to the example that was left for me to follow. But I’ll do my best.
And I think that’s all any of us can do.
Choose loyalty. Choose to stay. Choose to be the change.
Not because the world has earned it. But because something higher is calling you to it.
Thanks for reading and whatever you do, always go for your dreams.
Paul
PS: If this post resonated with you, I’d be honored if you shared it with someone who needs to hear it.
PPS: And if you’re curious about the vehicle I’ve committed my loyalty to — the one I built because I couldn’t find anything else worth staying in — click here to learn more.
*Special thanks to my cousin Casey, for capturing the photo in this post, and the memories too.
wn at some point.