A short motivational podcast by Jason Staats (Jan 8, 2026) aimed at accountants and accounting-firm leaders, offering three thought experiments to make 2026 their best year. The exercises are: (1) imagine your life as a TV show and listen to what an all-knowing audience would urge you to change now; (2) identify work that electrifies you—returning to peak excitement multiplies growth and performance; (3) reframe scary decisions as often "two-way doors" (Jeff Bezos metaphor) that are reversible, lowering risk and enabling bold experiments. The episode emphasizes that accountants are in-demand, that many feared moves are reversible, and that delaying decisions creates shame and inertia.
Chapters
My friends, Happy New Year. A quick one for me today as me and the team are kind of getting in the flow of 2026. Gang, this year is gonna be your best year yet. I have no doubt about that. We have more information at our fingertips than ever before to know what to do. We have easier access to other people who are doing it than we have ever had before. The thing that will stop us, the thing that will get in the way is, is what's happening between our ears, is what's happening up there. So three little thought experiments I wanted to run you through real quick. They've been helpful exercises for me as I'm planning what my 2026 looks like to get over the stuff that we just gotta get over. Number one. And I want you to think about this. If your life were a TV show, what would the audience be shouting at the screen right now? Somebody who can see into all the context, they know everything you've ever done, all the decisions that you've ever made, and they're sitting, watching you do whatever it is you're doing at the beginning of January. What is everybody shouting at the screen saying? This is so obvious. This needs to happen this year. You got to do it now. For me is a very, very clear answer to that. And I suspect for most of us, that thing, it already came to your mind. And maybe it's scary, maybe you've been putting it off for years, but if the whole rest of the world would tell you, here is what is best for you, here's what needs to happen. Nobody's gonna make that happen unless you do it now. Thought number two, here, a lot of us right now, when the alarm clock goes off in the morning or when we wake up, we're not shooting out of bed with maximum enthusiasm for what we're doing right now. In fact, think about in your life, when was the time when you were so pumped about what you did, what you had going on, that you would, like, shoot out of bed? Or maybe you even woke up early. It's like four in the morning. You're like, why did I just wake up? You're like, I don't care. Cause I'm gonna go do this thing right now. And you are just clicking your little heels, happy to get out of bed. For most of us, maybe you're operating there right now. But I could say for 80% of us, we're probably not operating in that space right now. And this is kind of like the whole idea of sort of operating in your zone of excellence. And the fact that so much of what we do in our performance is simply what is our energy level to tackle that problem? How excited are we to do it? Because it turns out you're really good at the things that you're really excited to do and you learn and you grow much faster. And so for most of the people who listen to this podcast, by any reasonable, normal standard, you are successful. And we may not afford this label to ourselves because we look around at all these other people that seem more successful than us, but by pretty much any normal standard, almost all of you that listen to this podcast are quote, unquote, successful. And if you're successful right now operating at the excitement level that you have today, which maybe it's high, maybe it isn't, consider how successful you will be when you can find your way back to that peak. Except excitement, maybe that's reconfiguring what your day looks like and the support team that you have around you so that you can operate within that. If you are successful right now, just imagine how successful you will be once you can find your way back to that thought number three, and this is the very best part of being an accountant in 2026 is most of us have a thing we're thinking about doing that we are afraid to do. Maybe it's a hard decision, something that we've maybe known that we needed to do for a while, but we're just, we're afraid to commit. That might be eliminating some stuff, you know, you don't need to do, that might be starting your own firm, that might be reducing the size of your business. Maybe it's repositioning the firm in a way that feels scary. Here's the thing about being an accountant or an accounting firm in 2026. Is that new scary thing, that other timeline that you could potentially commit yourself to, is there a world where you could get back to what your life is today? In most cases, the answer is a resounding yes. I think the most talked about version of this you see in the wild is Jeff Bezos talking about one way doors versus two way doors. A one way door, when you go through, you can't get back. A two way door when you go through, there is still a path back. And most of the decisions that we make in our lives, the things that we're considering, they're. They're actually two way doors. And if it's a two way door, it doesn't require the same level of planning and all that. Cause there's really not all that much Risk to it, you can go for it, you can learn, and if it doesn't work out, you go back. And most of the scary things that we are considering, they are absolutely two way doors. And part of this is just how in demand accountants are. So consider, even if you are really afraid of doing this new, this ambitious thing that you may not even know how to do yet, but you feel that, that pressure, that urging, where it's like, yeah, I'm pretty sure I need to go this direction. Consider, could you get your current life back? Oftentimes the answer is actually you could get a better life back because you have this new experience because you just ripped off a band aid where maybe you already needed to go to work for somebody new or let some of these clients go that they've just been hanging on too long. Most of the time the answer to that question is, I could absolutely get back to where I am today. It can be really easy to end up stuck in a place where, you know, you need to do the hard thing. And before you know it, five years have passed and the decision is now like this calcified thing where it's almost harder to make that decision because it's an admission that you should have done it five years ago. Give yourself some grace, because then the shame starts piling on and it just gets even harder to make that decision, right? And simply consider, if it doesn't work out, then what? That's literally the worst case scenario. And the worst case scenario for accountants has never been better than it is right now. Gang, this is going to be a great year for you. I want it for you, and I can't wait to navigate it with you. Let's go out there and do it.
