Andreas - the man, the myth, the legend behind Andreas Philip Gross Enterprises LLC
International K-12 Educator, International Education Consultant, Success Coach, Science Teacher, English Language Teacher, Proofreader & Editor, Academic Leader, Private Tutor, Innovator, Problem Solver, Online Business Owner and Freelancer
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Hi, and thanks for stopping by my little slice of paradise here on the World Wide Web. My name is Andreas, and this is Andreas Philip Gross Enterprises! Like it says in the red box above, I am a lot of things all rolled into one! I sometimes think of myself as your "classic 1500s Renaissance Man," but first and foremost I am an educator and coach - your partner in self-growth and development! And this website is dedicated to just that!
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I am an International Coaching Federation (ICF)-trained professional coach and a career K-12 international educator with 14.5 years of experience and counting. You can check out my educator's resume here. I love my "day job." It's what I took the "traditional approach" towards pursuing and devoting my life to, but that doesn't mean it's the ONLY thing I love in life, nor does it mean that working my entire life in a "traditional-style" brick-and-mortar school for a chairman and school board is my ONLY career aspiration in life or the only way I want to make money in this life before I eventually die one day.
Since childhood, I've always believed in financial freedom and have always had the drive and passion inside of me to do more than just "work for The Man." And, no, I am not necessarily opposed to or against "The Man" - remember, I have worked for over a decade in traditional brick-and-mortar K-12 school settings and loved almost every year of it (of course, there were "bad" times in there - there's no escaping those even while working for yourself)! "The Man" has his place in the world, I do believe.
No, I am not one of those people who believes we should all rise up and quit our "day jobs" to go into business for ourselves. Some people want to do that and can succeed that way, and that's great for them! Others of us, on the flip side of the equation, actually like our "day jobs." Some of us have other reasons, too, for not dropping everything and going into business for ourselves right this second. As the famed and acclaimed Oprah Winfrey - the richest woman in the U.S. at one point in time - once said: "Do what you have to do until you can do what you want to do." This pretty much sums up my whole approach to life as well. There's a time and a place for everything, and not everything is going to be sunshine and butterflies all the time - our current world just doesn't operate that way.
Another way I look at it is through the eyes of a former English student of mine. She was a 3rd Grade Egyptian girl. We were playing a quick warm-up game one day in class generating self-created grammatically correct sentences in English. The only rules were that the sentences had to be school-appropriate in nature, be linguistically and grammatically correct in all aspects, and had to make sense. I will never forget the sentence she came up with: "Not everything you want is going to happen." Great advice to live by! I would add: "Not everything you want is going to happen all the time, every time."
Making money and being successful in life are not, and I repeat not, "one size fits all" types of endeavors. There will be hard times and there will be easier times; there will be times and things you don't like, and there will be times and things you really love on your journey towards fulfilling your dreams!
Also, having financial freedom and being successful do not necessarily mean you have to become a multi-billionaire (although it could mean that). Here at Andreas Philip Gross Enterprises LLC I explore the concepts of "success" and "making money" on a much deeper level than we normally throw these terms around in our daily casual conversations.
This website focuses on two major concepts: attracting success in life and making money. These are two different concepts that are often intertwined or otherwise somehow related to each other in one way or another, although they DO NOT NECESSARILY HAVE TO BE - let's be clear about that! Apart from hard work, which I firmly believe to be the key to any success, coaching and education are two major tools that can help us succeed at making money and finding success in the areas we hope to find success in.
I should also be clear that, when I refer to "education," I am not necessarily always referring to formal, institutionalized-style education through a defined educational system (i.e. attending a "traditional brick-and-mortar school"). Education, simply put, means "the knowledge and development resulting from the process of being educated," as define by Merriam-Webster. "Education" can happen in and through a plethora of ways and means. You could receive an education in certain things through this website, by learning things you had never known before (knowledge), or by looking at things you had known before in a new light (development), for example. But I am digressing slightly off the topic of this page now. You can read more about "Education" and "Success" on the "Coaching & Education 101" and "Attracting Success 101" pages.
To sum it all up, operating under the logical assumptions that the vast majority of us everywhere in the world both 1) want to (actually, need to) succeed at something in life, and 2) need to work to make money somehow in this life, this website is dedicated to helping and inspiring my fellow human beings to get the best out of life as we all work our ways through it! Or, put another way, I hope this website can help and inspire you to figure out what you are worth and get what you deserve out of life - and you don't have to think of that in purely monetary terms if you don't want to!
But that's all mostly about the website itself - where did this site come from? Why do I, Andreas Gross, run a site like this? We'll let's start with this: I wasn't always so confident and self-assured in life, although I might have appeared that way on the outside much of my life. In fact, despite having a near-perfect childhood (except for the regularly-relapsing kidney disease I was constantly dealing with), you could say I've had it really good my whole life - and by most measures I really have!
Since childhood, I've always believed in financial freedom and have always had the drive and passion inside of me to do more than just "work for The Man." And, no, I am not necessarily opposed to or against "The Man" - remember, I have worked for over a decade in traditional brick-and-mortar K-12 school settings and loved almost every year of it (of course, there were "bad" times in there - there's no escaping those even while working for yourself)! "The Man" has his place in the world, I do believe.
No, I am not one of those people who believes we should all rise up and quit our "day jobs" to go into business for ourselves. Some people want to do that and can succeed that way, and that's great for them! Others of us, on the flip side of the equation, actually like our "day jobs." Some of us have other reasons, too, for not dropping everything and going into business for ourselves right this second. As the famed and acclaimed Oprah Winfrey - the richest woman in the U.S. at one point in time - once said: "Do what you have to do until you can do what you want to do." This pretty much sums up my whole approach to life as well. There's a time and a place for everything, and not everything is going to be sunshine and butterflies all the time - our current world just doesn't operate that way.
Another way I look at it is through the eyes of a former English student of mine. She was a 3rd Grade Egyptian girl. We were playing a quick warm-up game one day in class generating self-created grammatically correct sentences in English. The only rules were that the sentences had to be school-appropriate in nature, be linguistically and grammatically correct in all aspects, and had to make sense. I will never forget the sentence she came up with: "Not everything you want is going to happen." Great advice to live by! I would add: "Not everything you want is going to happen all the time, every time."
Making money and being successful in life are not, and I repeat not, "one size fits all" types of endeavors. There will be hard times and there will be easier times; there will be times and things you don't like, and there will be times and things you really love on your journey towards fulfilling your dreams!
Also, having financial freedom and being successful do not necessarily mean you have to become a multi-billionaire (although it could mean that). Here at Andreas Philip Gross Enterprises LLC I explore the concepts of "success" and "making money" on a much deeper level than we normally throw these terms around in our daily casual conversations.
This website focuses on two major concepts: attracting success in life and making money. These are two different concepts that are often intertwined or otherwise somehow related to each other in one way or another, although they DO NOT NECESSARILY HAVE TO BE - let's be clear about that! Apart from hard work, which I firmly believe to be the key to any success, coaching and education are two major tools that can help us succeed at making money and finding success in the areas we hope to find success in.
I should also be clear that, when I refer to "education," I am not necessarily always referring to formal, institutionalized-style education through a defined educational system (i.e. attending a "traditional brick-and-mortar school"). Education, simply put, means "the knowledge and development resulting from the process of being educated," as define by Merriam-Webster. "Education" can happen in and through a plethora of ways and means. You could receive an education in certain things through this website, by learning things you had never known before (knowledge), or by looking at things you had known before in a new light (development), for example. But I am digressing slightly off the topic of this page now. You can read more about "Education" and "Success" on the "Coaching & Education 101" and "Attracting Success 101" pages.
To sum it all up, operating under the logical assumptions that the vast majority of us everywhere in the world both 1) want to (actually, need to) succeed at something in life, and 2) need to work to make money somehow in this life, this website is dedicated to helping and inspiring my fellow human beings to get the best out of life as we all work our ways through it! Or, put another way, I hope this website can help and inspire you to figure out what you are worth and get what you deserve out of life - and you don't have to think of that in purely monetary terms if you don't want to!
But that's all mostly about the website itself - where did this site come from? Why do I, Andreas Gross, run a site like this? We'll let's start with this: I wasn't always so confident and self-assured in life, although I might have appeared that way on the outside much of my life. In fact, despite having a near-perfect childhood (except for the regularly-relapsing kidney disease I was constantly dealing with), you could say I've had it really good my whole life - and by most measures I really have!
I grew up living two lives. One life was that of a boy in a lake cabin in the woods surrounding Newman Lake, in eastern Washington State, USA. This was the life I lived every summer and at various other odd times over the years growing up. This was my family's "home base" growing up and through early adulthood. If you're interested, you can read more about that here.
My other life growing up was the life I lived during the school year. That was the life of a TCK (that stands for Third Culture Kid for those scratching their heads right now) growing up as an American attending international schools between the countries of Malaysia and India. My Mom was an international school teacher, like I later became myself, and my Dad worked in the biotechnology sector back in the 1990s. It was my Dad's job in biotech that took our family to Malaysia when I was in 2nd Grade.
We lived in Malaysia, where my sister and I attended The International School of Kuala Lumpur. We came back to the U.S. to live for a short time in the middle of my junior high years, then moved to southern India when I started high school. It was when I was living in India attending high school that I first seriously thought about the possibility of becoming a teacher as a career path in life.
We moved back to Malaysia for my senior year of high school, this time to the Penang Island, in northern Malaysia. Here I spent my final year of high school at Dalat International School. After graduating, I went back to eastern Washington State to attend undergraduate school (Washington State University, baby! Yeah, go Cougs! There, I said it!). After that, the rest, as they say, is history.
I became a K-12 teacher, getting my first teaching job after college back at Dalat International School. Over the years, I went on to teach in northern Mexico, Honduras, China (where I am currently located now - you can read more about that here and here, with more articles to come on that in the future), and even back in Washington State for three years. During this time, I also managed to get my Master of Education Degree in International Teaching from Framingham State University, Framingham, Massachusetts; complete an International Coach Federation (ICF) professional coach training program, and start a family. At this point in my journey, I have three kids and a wonderful wife.
Wait a minute, did you say kidney disease earlier? Yeah, you caught that! Yes, I grew up with what they call Minimal Change Nephrotic Syndrome, a non-contagious kidney condition of unknown origin, or, more correctly, a non-contagious immune-response disease of unknown origin, where my body's own immune system would attack my kidneys, causing the glomeruli (the filtration units of the kidneys) to become hardened and porous and spill protein over into the urine. At between a 1-3 in 100,000 chance (depending on where you are in the world) of occurring in the general population, it's not a particularly rare condition, but it's not particularly common either. I was diagnosed in the top 3% of "worst case scenario" cases of the condition.
It came on all of a sudden one day out of nowhere (like it does) when I was 2 years old. I spent the rest of that year and much of my time as a 3 year old (and numerous other points throughout my childhood) looking like the Michelin tire man - puffed up with edema like no other, all full of water. The only thing doctors said they could do for it was pump me up on high doses of cortisone steroids to bring down the swelling and fend off the body's immune response to stop attacking the kidneys. After a course of an even more potent anti-cancer drug called Cytoxan, which was supposed to help me respond to the cortisone treatments, the cortisone-based Prednisone started working as expected, but the Prednisone came with its own laundry list of ill side-effects, as any who have taken Prednisone and its derivatives will know well! And I was then "blessed" with having to regularly take high doses of Prednisone for extended periods of time for the next two decades.
Growing up as the sickly boy with recurring kidney problems, as well as often having that strange feeling of not really fitting in anywhere, even in my supposed "homeland," always left me feeling just not quite right on a certain level, despite all the adventures I was having in life. It was a feeling of being unbalanced. Sometimes I would feel lost and alone. At other times I would feel invincible beyond measure. Although I would occasionally find some balance from time to time, there was generally little middle ground between these two extremes.
One thing that I always took comfort in in my childhood was school. No matter where I was in the world, that was one thing that was always nearly the same. Sure, teachers, peers, classrooms, buildings, and all that jazz were different at different schools, but the routine was always the same - go there in the morning, attend various classes for 7 hours or so to soak up knowledge and skills, then come come. I loved it! That's one of the big reasons I went into teaching - it felt "natural" and "comfortable" to me. It wasn't until becoming an adult and teaching for over a decade that I really began to see and feel the problems everyone talks about in our modern world of education. But, then again, there have always been problems in ALL educational systems around the world since the dawn of time - they are human made systems, they are not perfect!
Anyway, this all goes to show that feelings of inadequacy can come from just about anywhere. It took me decades to start to really get real with myself about what I wanted out of life, and to realize that these two major "stumbling blocks" of mine - not always knowing where "home" is, and my cross to bear of Nephrotic Syndrome - are actually two of my greatest strengths. I had been choking on my own strengths and misinterpreting some of the advice of those closest to me most of my life up until just a few short years ago.
As the result of all my international experience since childhood, I can jump on a plane, fly to just about any country on earth, and unpack and start living. As a child and young adult, I didn't realize that I didn't "fit in" most places simply because a lot of people around the world simply can't relate to that, and often even feel somewhat intimidated to be in the presence of someone with such experiences, I later learned. Now, I'm not placing a value judgement on any of this. None of this is necessarily inherently "bad" or "good." It just is.
In term of my kidneys, they are still my body's weakest link and my cross to bear in this life, but it's all about not letting your problems get the best of you, although it's taken me years to truly come to grips with this and own this! We ALL have demons we are constantly fighting! Many of us are embarrassed to talk about them. I know I would have never dreamed of bringing up my kidney issues with ANYONE - much less writing about them here on the World Wide Web - before just recently. Why would I want to ADMIT to having a physical deficiency? I want to be "normal" like everyone else - whatever that really means!
It was going through professional coach training just recently in 2021 that really showed me just how precious of a gift my kidney problems could be if I opened myself up and let the "problems" be a teacher to me and a guide to me helping and inspiring others. My kidney issues have made it possible in a real, physical, tangible sense for me to really understand and relate to others who are dealing with otherwise "invisible" issues in their own lives, and not just health issues!
You see, kidney problems are largely invisible to others. To most strangers at first glance, I just look like a "lazy fat guy," and I'm often met with a plethora of snide remarks by strangers related to my weight; but I know the truth. I know what my body has been through and where the weak link in it is. Because of this, when others bring up their problems, issues, and tribulations to me, I tend to easily get into an "empathetic zone" of "let me listen and see what's going on here; it might be something that can't be seen with the naked eye," as opposed to just shutting them down and telling them to quit complaining because I can't "see" their problem (something a lot of people are programed to do). I know first-hand what it means to carry an invisible problem around your neck that others can't see the cause of - and that I myself don't even know the cause of - and even dare to judge you for, and it generally isn't pretty! This has helped me GREATLY in relating to others with largely "invisible" "problems."
I put both of these words in quotes for a reason! "Invisible" is in quotes because obviously the issue isn't invisible to it's bearer (he or she might not know how to deal with it effectively, but it's rarely truly invisible to the person dealing with it first hand!). I put "problems" in quotes because they are only "problems" when you can't deal with them or won't let yourself deal with them and learn from them. Your biggest "problem" can actually be your greatest superpower in disguise - you just might not know it yet because you are tripping over it like a stone, instead of climbing up on it like a step-ladder!
That's my story in a nutshell. I will gradually be adding more autobiographical articles to this site as time goes on.
On a final note, this site is the main business homepage for Andreas Philip Gross Enterprises, sole proprietorship, where all business activity related to A.P.G. Enterprises links back to. My Facebook page, A.P.G. Enterprises business cards and flyers, and a handful of other websites that I run all link back to this site.
For tax purposes, please be aware that I am NOT currently able to accept clients who are located in mainland China.
If you notice anything questionable on the site, would like to make a polite suggestion, come across a broken link, want to hire me, or just want to connect and say "Hi," please reach out to me at admin@apg-enterprises.com. I'm always happy to connect with people and my inbox is always open!
My other life growing up was the life I lived during the school year. That was the life of a TCK (that stands for Third Culture Kid for those scratching their heads right now) growing up as an American attending international schools between the countries of Malaysia and India. My Mom was an international school teacher, like I later became myself, and my Dad worked in the biotechnology sector back in the 1990s. It was my Dad's job in biotech that took our family to Malaysia when I was in 2nd Grade.
We lived in Malaysia, where my sister and I attended The International School of Kuala Lumpur. We came back to the U.S. to live for a short time in the middle of my junior high years, then moved to southern India when I started high school. It was when I was living in India attending high school that I first seriously thought about the possibility of becoming a teacher as a career path in life.
We moved back to Malaysia for my senior year of high school, this time to the Penang Island, in northern Malaysia. Here I spent my final year of high school at Dalat International School. After graduating, I went back to eastern Washington State to attend undergraduate school (Washington State University, baby! Yeah, go Cougs! There, I said it!). After that, the rest, as they say, is history.
I became a K-12 teacher, getting my first teaching job after college back at Dalat International School. Over the years, I went on to teach in northern Mexico, Honduras, China (where I am currently located now - you can read more about that here and here, with more articles to come on that in the future), and even back in Washington State for three years. During this time, I also managed to get my Master of Education Degree in International Teaching from Framingham State University, Framingham, Massachusetts; complete an International Coach Federation (ICF) professional coach training program, and start a family. At this point in my journey, I have three kids and a wonderful wife.
Wait a minute, did you say kidney disease earlier? Yeah, you caught that! Yes, I grew up with what they call Minimal Change Nephrotic Syndrome, a non-contagious kidney condition of unknown origin, or, more correctly, a non-contagious immune-response disease of unknown origin, where my body's own immune system would attack my kidneys, causing the glomeruli (the filtration units of the kidneys) to become hardened and porous and spill protein over into the urine. At between a 1-3 in 100,000 chance (depending on where you are in the world) of occurring in the general population, it's not a particularly rare condition, but it's not particularly common either. I was diagnosed in the top 3% of "worst case scenario" cases of the condition.
It came on all of a sudden one day out of nowhere (like it does) when I was 2 years old. I spent the rest of that year and much of my time as a 3 year old (and numerous other points throughout my childhood) looking like the Michelin tire man - puffed up with edema like no other, all full of water. The only thing doctors said they could do for it was pump me up on high doses of cortisone steroids to bring down the swelling and fend off the body's immune response to stop attacking the kidneys. After a course of an even more potent anti-cancer drug called Cytoxan, which was supposed to help me respond to the cortisone treatments, the cortisone-based Prednisone started working as expected, but the Prednisone came with its own laundry list of ill side-effects, as any who have taken Prednisone and its derivatives will know well! And I was then "blessed" with having to regularly take high doses of Prednisone for extended periods of time for the next two decades.
Growing up as the sickly boy with recurring kidney problems, as well as often having that strange feeling of not really fitting in anywhere, even in my supposed "homeland," always left me feeling just not quite right on a certain level, despite all the adventures I was having in life. It was a feeling of being unbalanced. Sometimes I would feel lost and alone. At other times I would feel invincible beyond measure. Although I would occasionally find some balance from time to time, there was generally little middle ground between these two extremes.
One thing that I always took comfort in in my childhood was school. No matter where I was in the world, that was one thing that was always nearly the same. Sure, teachers, peers, classrooms, buildings, and all that jazz were different at different schools, but the routine was always the same - go there in the morning, attend various classes for 7 hours or so to soak up knowledge and skills, then come come. I loved it! That's one of the big reasons I went into teaching - it felt "natural" and "comfortable" to me. It wasn't until becoming an adult and teaching for over a decade that I really began to see and feel the problems everyone talks about in our modern world of education. But, then again, there have always been problems in ALL educational systems around the world since the dawn of time - they are human made systems, they are not perfect!
Anyway, this all goes to show that feelings of inadequacy can come from just about anywhere. It took me decades to start to really get real with myself about what I wanted out of life, and to realize that these two major "stumbling blocks" of mine - not always knowing where "home" is, and my cross to bear of Nephrotic Syndrome - are actually two of my greatest strengths. I had been choking on my own strengths and misinterpreting some of the advice of those closest to me most of my life up until just a few short years ago.
As the result of all my international experience since childhood, I can jump on a plane, fly to just about any country on earth, and unpack and start living. As a child and young adult, I didn't realize that I didn't "fit in" most places simply because a lot of people around the world simply can't relate to that, and often even feel somewhat intimidated to be in the presence of someone with such experiences, I later learned. Now, I'm not placing a value judgement on any of this. None of this is necessarily inherently "bad" or "good." It just is.
In term of my kidneys, they are still my body's weakest link and my cross to bear in this life, but it's all about not letting your problems get the best of you, although it's taken me years to truly come to grips with this and own this! We ALL have demons we are constantly fighting! Many of us are embarrassed to talk about them. I know I would have never dreamed of bringing up my kidney issues with ANYONE - much less writing about them here on the World Wide Web - before just recently. Why would I want to ADMIT to having a physical deficiency? I want to be "normal" like everyone else - whatever that really means!
It was going through professional coach training just recently in 2021 that really showed me just how precious of a gift my kidney problems could be if I opened myself up and let the "problems" be a teacher to me and a guide to me helping and inspiring others. My kidney issues have made it possible in a real, physical, tangible sense for me to really understand and relate to others who are dealing with otherwise "invisible" issues in their own lives, and not just health issues!
You see, kidney problems are largely invisible to others. To most strangers at first glance, I just look like a "lazy fat guy," and I'm often met with a plethora of snide remarks by strangers related to my weight; but I know the truth. I know what my body has been through and where the weak link in it is. Because of this, when others bring up their problems, issues, and tribulations to me, I tend to easily get into an "empathetic zone" of "let me listen and see what's going on here; it might be something that can't be seen with the naked eye," as opposed to just shutting them down and telling them to quit complaining because I can't "see" their problem (something a lot of people are programed to do). I know first-hand what it means to carry an invisible problem around your neck that others can't see the cause of - and that I myself don't even know the cause of - and even dare to judge you for, and it generally isn't pretty! This has helped me GREATLY in relating to others with largely "invisible" "problems."
I put both of these words in quotes for a reason! "Invisible" is in quotes because obviously the issue isn't invisible to it's bearer (he or she might not know how to deal with it effectively, but it's rarely truly invisible to the person dealing with it first hand!). I put "problems" in quotes because they are only "problems" when you can't deal with them or won't let yourself deal with them and learn from them. Your biggest "problem" can actually be your greatest superpower in disguise - you just might not know it yet because you are tripping over it like a stone, instead of climbing up on it like a step-ladder!
That's my story in a nutshell. I will gradually be adding more autobiographical articles to this site as time goes on.
On a final note, this site is the main business homepage for Andreas Philip Gross Enterprises, sole proprietorship, where all business activity related to A.P.G. Enterprises links back to. My Facebook page, A.P.G. Enterprises business cards and flyers, and a handful of other websites that I run all link back to this site.
For tax purposes, please be aware that I am NOT currently able to accept clients who are located in mainland China.
If you notice anything questionable on the site, would like to make a polite suggestion, come across a broken link, want to hire me, or just want to connect and say "Hi," please reach out to me at admin@apg-enterprises.com. I'm always happy to connect with people and my inbox is always open!
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