I'm not sure about you, but for open enrollment this year Iaveraged between 65 to 70 hours per week. It was a nice reductionfrom last year's 80-hour weeks!

But one thing I'm struggling with right now is that after allthe chaos and hustle and bustle of December, January has got me offto a little bit of a deflated start.

This “Blue January, ” as I'm calling it, doesn't seem to beaffecting just me. I've talked to several other brokers who arefeeling it, too. We absolutely killed ourselves over the pastcouple of months, and it seems as though the sense of urgency andthe sheer panic in the voices of clients calling to get coveragehave fallen away.

We're seeing the next wave of calls being the “I don't have myID card, ” “I have to go to the doctor and they still haven'tprocessed my application,” and “Why did I get an invoice when Isent in a check?”

We actually had a call yesterday where the woman wanted us tosend her a check for $527 since her application had not beenprocessed yet! Never mind that she sent it on the absolute lastpossible day for Jan. 1 coverage….

As many of us are in this same boat I just wanted to provide youall with some words of encouragement. I had a friend that recentlytold me when he knew I had a bad day, “Some days you eat the bearand other day it eats you! ”

I absolutely loved this. I've heard of the windshield vs. thebug one, but never this one. We're all amazing fierce brokers whoare working in a market we never thought would come. We're theexperts in this field, and we're more relevant than ever! Consumersare drowning in misinformation (and information overload) andthey're relying on us to help guide them and navigate this systemfor them.

Just hang in there friends and I promise you that your BlueJanuary will lead to a Green February when all the commissionchecks start coming in. Hopefully.