In this Business Blast Podcast episode, host Tyler Wagner interviews Guy Adams, the CEO of Heart of the Horse Therapy Ranch in Clovis, California. Adams recounts a dramatic personal turnaround: after losing his HVAC and refrigeration business, his homes, and facing financial hardship, he turned to a horse ranch he’d known from childhood, marrying a “horse woman” and establishing a nonprofit therapy center. The ranch provides over 200 free equine‑assisted therapy sessions for medically fragile children and veterans, emphasizing that the work is driven by heart rather than profit. Adams shares his core business philosophy—happiness comes from making others happy—and offers personal advice to his younger self: avoid alcohol and drugs, finish school, and seek education to avoid business pitfalls. He discusses his limited reading due to an eye condition, noting the Bible as his most influential book, and cites the Golden Rule (“Do unto others…”) as his favorite guiding quote. Finally, he directs listeners to the ranch’s Facebook page and website for more information. The conversation blends personal narrative, mission‑driven entrepreneurship, and practical life advice.
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Welcome to the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Wagner. This episode is brought to you by Authors Unite. Authors Unite provides you with all the resources you need to become a successful author. You can learn more about Authors Unite and join the free community at authorsunite.com. Now let's jump into the episode.
Alright everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have Guy Adams with us. He is the CEO of Heart of the Horse Therapy Ranch in Clovis, California. So welcome to the show, Guy.
Thank you, sir. Thanks for having me.
Of course. We'll dive in. The first question I have for you is, what's the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
Well, the best story from my life was kind of funny when I lost everything, where God put me in a whole different life on a horse ranch working with disabled youth and medically fragile children. It just changed my life profusely. And it's kind of— go ahead.
No, sorry, sorry. I thought— I didn't know if you wanted to elaborate.
Well, I was going to say, you know, we went from owning an air conditioning, heating, commercial refrigeration company, owning 4 homes, to living on $1,400 a month and, uh, on this ranch that, you know, I knew about horses growing up and I married a horse woman and, you know, this is where we've been put and we do 200 sessions with medically fragile children for free. We don't do anything for money now. Uh, it's not a funny story, it's just a story that has changed my life.
Yeah, I mean, thank you for sharing that. It seems like it's a very good, uh, you know, obviously very good for therapy and You're doing just like amazing things for people. So thank you for that as well. The next question I have for you is, what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that is within your expertise or industry?
In my industry, the most valuable piece is to do it to help these kids and veterans out of your heart and soul and not do it for the money because there's not a lot of money in this kind of industry. But the rewards are so much more valuable. And if you're gonna do this, don't do it for pony rides, do it to actually change lives, help kids get out of their wheelchairs, talk, help their lives change immensely. And we've done that with movement by the horses, different types of horses, Arabs, thoroughbreds, quarter horses, everything has a different movement. And you know, that's, would be my advice for my industry.
And what's your best piece of overall business advice, so not necessarily industry-specific?
Overall, anything you do in life, uh, do it to make yourself happy. And what I found that makes myself happy is making others happy. When you can truly change someone else's life, whether it's in the air conditioning and refrigeration business we used to have, teaching gangbangers how to get out of their situation and helping them, your life is so much more enriched.
And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?
Stay away from that alcohol. Don't be doing them drugs and get home a little bit more, stay out of the bars. I was a little ruffian back then and I paid the price a few times. So that would be my advice. And finish school. I never finished high school. So my advice would be to get educated. I speak at different colleges to business classes. And one of the things that comes up eventually is, you know, what schooling do you have? And I have to be honest with them and tell them, you know, after wrestling season my senior year, I walked away from school. I got a job doing refrigeration. And, you know, if I would have— as successful as we've been in life, If I would have had that education, there would probably have been less pitfalls business-wise.
And in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?
As I said before, making people happy. When you can change somebody else's life, your life will be changed. It'll be blessed a hundredfold.
And what's the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?
Well, the reading part, I should have an eye problem and an eyeball popped out of my head at a young age. And so when I read words, the best way to describe it is like in a Disney film, when you see that inkwell and all of a sudden it's writing words and then it just goes to a black blur, that's what I see. So I don't read a lot, so I'll listen to books. And the Bible's the book I listen to most of the time. It helps me get through a lot of stuff, losing everything. And such was a pretty hard hit mentally on me, but it helped me get back onto it. So, you know, the Bible's the best book I've ever read.
And what is your favorite quote and why?
Do unto others as you'd want done unto you, because, you know, when you're mean to people, you know, karma comes back around. You know, it's just a way of life. It always has its way of getting you in the butt. So I just say, you know, be nice to others and do what's right in life.
Yeah, that's it. Thank you so much for coming on, man. The last question I have for you before we let you go is, where's the best place for people to find you online?
If they want to find us online, they can find us on Facebook at Heart of the Horse Therapy Ranch and see some wonderful videos and learn what we do. Or they can go to our website at Heart of the Horses Awesome.
Thanks again for coming on, man. We appreciate it.
Hey, thanks for having me. I appreciate your time. The podcast you just heard was recorded with Anchor. If you want to make your own, download the Android or iOS app completely free from anchor.fm/podcast. That's anchor.fm/podcast.
