Hey I'm Jared Brubaker, I'm one of the UGC coaches that paid $1,000 to newer creators for their first ever paid brand deal this past week in the 2026 sprint. I've got a lot of UGC Creators asking my story and background and I've never shared this publicly before, so here it is: My closest friend told me to 'get a grip on my life' when I left my 23-year corporate career to make videos on my phone. Five months and $117,394 later, he's asking me how to get started. before I found out about UGC, I led a 400-person corporate recruiting company for 23 years. On paper, I was successful. Six-figure salary. International business. Respect. Status. I had the whole thing on the outside. On the inside? I was at war with myself. I hated my job. I hated myself. I felt stuck in this loop where every day looked exactly the same and I couldn't see a way out. I had this gut feeling that there was more to life than boardrooms and quarterly reports and managing people who didn't want to be managed. But I kept going. Because that's what you do, right? You’re a “man”, you have a family to care for, you have responsibilities. You have a reputation. You don't just walk away from 23 years of financial stability just because you're "unhappy." So I buried it. For years. For years I silenced that inner voice and told myself to man up and toughen it out. But it was this one moment when everything changed for me. I was in Barcelona with my son. He was playing soccer, and I had way too much time on my hands. I was scrolling through TikTok one day and saw a post about brands desperately needing older Gen X creators. And I thought, "Why not me?" I'd been an actor in my previous life, a long time ago when I was younger. I was always comfortable in front of the camera. So I figured I'd give it a shot. Just to fill some time while I was out there in Barcelona. I always wanted to have fun creating content. I did five or six projects before I flew back to Salt Lake. And something clicked.