Mind

Have you ever had a situation in your life that dramatically changed the course in which you were going? I had one of those situations when I was 23 years old. I was working as assistant manager at Fifth Third Bank in Indianapolis, Indiana. It was a cold winter day in 1991. And a gentleman came in and robbed us. Not only did he rob the bank, he decided to take a hostage. And that hostage was me.

That's right. He put the gun on me, said, "You, let's go. You're coming with me." Left the bank. Got into my car. And while he had his handkerchief covering his mouth, gun in one hand, bag of money and keys, while he was trying to start the car, he couldn't handle all the objects with just two hands. So he dropped his hand with the handkerchief away from his face. At that point I turned, in the car, in the passenger seat to get a real good look at him. At that point he raised the gun straight up at and he said, "You look at me again I'm going to shoot you right here. You look out that window."

So I immediately turned to look out the passenger window and we started to drive. We drove down the street. Went to a stoplight. Turned behind a strip mall. And all I kept thinking as we passed one dumpster, and another dumpster, and another dumpster was those scenes in the movie, where the brain gets splattered against the wall or the window. And as I'm turning, looking out the passenger side window and looking at each dumpster as we rolled by, I keep waiting to hear the crack of the gun and to see my brains against the window. And I would anticipate he'd just take my body, throw me in one of those dumpsters, just call it good.

Well, that didn't happen. He slowed down the car and he said, "All right, get out. Walk back the way we came." So I did. I took off running as soon as I opened the door and got out, pounded on the back of one of the stores. It happened to be a dry cleaner, and whoever opened the door, didn't even think about it or care, I just pushed past that person, ran right to the front of the store, grabbed the phone. called 911, told them what happened. But you know how that story ended? A few months later, they apprehended the guy. He didn't confess. We had to go to court and I had to point him out in federal court, FBI's key witness. And he kept looking at me the whole time in the court like, "I'm going to get you. You just wait. When I get out, I'm going to get you."

Now, I didn't sleep a wink that night at all. All I kept thinking about was how I was living my life, what I was doing. And quite frankly, I wasn't living my life for anything that I truly wanted. I was chasing every girl, anything that wiggled, the next good time, a great party. That's what I was interested in. Yeah, I was, I guess, successful from the world's standards. Assistant manager at 23 years old. Finance degree from Indiana University. But all the things I truly wanted in life, I was just letting go. I wasn't pursuing any of them. And it was that keystone moment that changed my life. I did a 180-degree turn and said, "No more. I'm not going to live my life that way. I'm going to live with the end in mind," because quite frankly, at 23, that could have been it.

So I fast forwarded and said, "On my death bed, who do I want around me? What do I want to say I'd accomplished? What's God going to say about me?" I wanted to be a husband. I wanted to be a father. I wanted to be a businessman. There's all these adventures, these things I wanted to do in my life. And I was pissing it all away until the bank robbery. Quite frankly, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. Keystone moment, drastically changed my life. And that's why I do a lot of the things I do. I don't want to be 90 years, old sitting in a retirement home, somebody feeding me jello and me wondering, "I wonder what if? I wonder what would have happened had I tried this or taken that risk?"

See, when I go, I want my life to be filled with memories. I don't want it to be filled with a bunch of dreams that I never tried to do. And that's why I do what I do. That's why I walked across Spain. That's why I run these marathons. And that's why I just finished this NCT, North Country Trail hike, 37-day, solo backpacking trip across the Upper Peninsula. In my next video I'm going to share what I uncovered and discovered on the trail, some epiphanies that I had. And I'm looking forward to sharing those with you next time. This is RJ Regan. Have a great day.
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