Did my years of selling actually serve my clients, or just me?
You spent decades getting good at this. Now, late, the question arrives: did I serve them, or did I sell well and call it the same thing? Notice that the doubt showed up with no evidence attached. That is worth distrusting as much as the comfort you once took in your own skill. Two things got mixed together over the years: your competence at matching a person to the right coverage, and whether that competence was always aimed at them. You cannot resolve this by thinking harder about it. You resolve it by checking the work — file by file, client by client — the same way you'd check anything else you were paid to get right. You don't have to do this alone, and you shouldn't. A team checking only its own easy cases will find only easy answers. Bring your pod in. Divide the book. Let someone else's eyes catch what yours have learned to skip past.
You will not settle this by brooding. Brooding is not within your power; looking is. Pull a set of files. Call the clients. Ask if the coverage still fits the life they live now, not the one they had when you sold it. What you find is your answer — not the doubt.
What changes unlock by starting
- A concrete list of which clients need a call, replacing a vague feeling of guilt
- Fewer people carrying coverage that quietly stopped fitting them years ago
- A standing practice, shared with your team, of checking work rather than only closing it
- The doubt either answered or reduced to a known, specific, fixable set of cases