Episode 101 - Adam Weber and Stacey Finally Reveal What's The Do The Thing Formula?

I do really believe 100% from every part of me that everyone has the capacity to be able to do the things that they want and not to be held back by the mental baggage that's in our head that we want to push through.

Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. In each episode, we get down and personal with people who go after the things they want to make all their wildest dreams come true. Join us as we unveil and dissect a formula for what it takes to do the thing. Here is your host, Stacy Lauren.

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. This is your host, Stacy Lauren. So this is going to be a cool episode. I brought the founder of the platform that my podcast is based on, Adam Weber, on today. He is repeat do the Thing favorite that comes on often when I need his help with things. And I'm in that situation today because I have been trying to tell you guys the formula that I've uncovered for the do the Thing formula. Now, I think I've tried this at least four times where I've recorded different episodes, and it's just not coming out right. And I was, what is going on? What do I need to be able to really properly tell you this amazing formula that I've dissected over the hundreds of interviews that I've done. And. And it just came to me that I needed to have Adam here with me, doing it with me, because he's been part of this from the very beginning, from day one, when I was feeling stuck on even doing this podcast. His voice is the one that came to me and was able to say, like, how to get me unstuck and get out of that bottleneck that I was in. And so anyway, I asked him to come on so that I could tell you guys about the formula and finally uncovering it through all the interviews and seeing all the patterns that have had. And we're going to do that today, and we're also going to talk about just how this podcast has evolved from the way that it was in the beginning. So I am so excited to welcome Adam Weber to the show. Hi, Adam.

Hi, Stacy. Thank you so much for having me join you. I always love getting a chance to talk to you just to set the stage for any listeners right now as well. I'm calling in to your podcast from in my car in case there's any of that extra audio noise you might hear. So there's no studio process. Stacy and I have always just jumped right in and recorded whenever lightning strikes or the moment is Right. So I'm calling in from my car. And so I appreciate being here with you.

And I actually think that's so perfect about you calling in from your car. Because, you know this. Since I did my first episode in my car, and then I did my hundredth episode in my car, it's just that idea of showing that I'd rather be able to do something than to wait for something to be perfect. And I think that that makes it even more. More. It makes it even cooler.

It's very apropos of the beginnings of how you started. And it seemed like at the beginning there were all these things swirling around in your mind. I have all the little boxes you felt like you needed to check. And then finally you said, you know what? I was in my car, I hit record, and I just did it. And that's the catalyst of what it took to get you started, was to get away from the perfectionism and just hit record and start and give yourself the freedom to do that.

So, yeah, let's talk about that. So I set out to do this podcast basically because I wanted to interview people, really to help me write my book. Right. My book strategist had said, it's really good for you to interview people that have also done the thing, so then you can uncover how they did the thing and see if it was similar to you or different. And so that's what I set out to do, is do these interviews. Well, if I'm going to be doing the interviews, I might as well record it. And that's when we met where I wanted something easy to record on. And through the interviews, that's when really the pattern started to develop of how people do the thing. So I was interviewing person after person who's done remarkable things from starting a business to stopping sugar, to starting a new relationship, to. To traveling the world. Like, pretty much any. Anything that you could imagine. I interviewed them or starting like you. We. We interviewed starting a brand new podcast platform. So anyway, it's been person after person and then uncovering the patterns, and that's been how it started. And then through that process, I think it was like interview 10. I remember calling you and saying, okay, Adam, I'm starting to see a really common pattern. Mindset is coming up a lot. And I'm like, I really want to interview an expert on mindset. And I remember we even talked because that's when I started to get bottlenecked again because I'm, oh, do I need to do this thing with seasons? Season 2 is my expert season Pretty much. Then you were like, well, don't get caught up in all that stuff because it's just going to slow you down. Because I think you kind of felt that about me. It's. Once I slowed down, then my momentum would reduce. And so we didn't get caught up in the seasons or anything. So I interviewed basically, then I brought on experts who were able to help me speak to the patterns that I was finding. And so Mindset was the first one that I really uncovered because that's when I had Dr. Nancy DeAndrade on, who's my personal holistic coach, Dr. Amelia Case, who I worked with a lot, who does work with the brain and helps people like, with reactivity. And then Kate Middleton, who's a somatic therapist and also does authentic relating. And then those, those expert episodes were really good because we got into Mindset and then also helping the body connect. And so it really evolved at that point from just doing these standard straight up interviews to being able to actually talk to experts that are in this field and then being able to. To go through that and then from there, what happened next. So it was pretty much then, oh, I interviewed Alicia Reynoso, who I think you met now. Yeah, you did meet, who's one of the founders, or she's the founder of Challenge Makers, where they do challenges. And she was telling me how she sold her business and built her community through doing a challenge. And that's where she then created Challenge Makers, helping brands do challenges. And that's when the idea was planted of how cool it would be to do a challenge. And then that's when the do the Thing Dating Dare challenge was born. And then you even agreed to come on that expert panel. And that's where it evolved again, because then we did an expert panel basically with multiple people that were experts on the topic from you being from the fear aspect. And then I had other people from. Ted was a dating expert where he dated a lot in his 30s, so he gave his expert opinion on that. And then I had Kate and Dr. Nancy on there as well. And then Genesis, who's an erratic blueprint coach. And so anyway, I think that was really cool. I just thought that would be interesting to just kind of explore that for a minute is just how that whole thing evolved. As I didn't have any of this planned from the beginning. You know, it was just all just by me moving is where things sort of grew.

Wow. Yes. I was curious to find out from you what you think from the moment you started your podcast that being the catalyst and then this kind of yarn unraveling from there. What has. By you doing the thing and jumping in and just saying, you know what, this definitive date, I'm going to start from there to where you are now. You've just listed some wonderful people and this dating challenge and stuff. What, like, what has it kind of brought into your life? What have you. What kind of things has it done for you?

Yeah, it's been incredible because every door has opened for me now, and I really got out of my head and more into my heart. There's something about your voice and the power of being able to speak to the things that are true for you. And then also being able to have conversations like this. Right. Being able to just really connect with another person and have a deep conversation. And there's just something really magnificent about it. I get so much energy even today. I was feeling a little sluggish earlier this morning, and then I had a podcast interview, and I remember thinking, ugh, maybe I should cancel it. I'm not in the best headspace. But then when I did the interview, it just brought me back to life pretty much just because I was able to connect to someone on such a deeper level. So I think it's really just brought just a whole nother layer of life to me.

Brilliant. And when you say new doors have opened, why is that? And how is that?

Yeah, so this has been interesting. So when you think about it. So with the challenges, the cool thing is. So once I. I had an idea of what the formula was, it wasn't done yet. That's when I the do the Thing dating dare challenge. And so I was able to integrate the formula into that challenge, and so was able to test it out basically on the people in there. And it was funny, one of the people in the group said, we love being your guinea pig, because I told them that we were testing the formula. And then I was able to see what was missing from the first challenge through the exit interviews of the participants that had done the first one. And then I was able to then implement those changes into the second challenge. And so as I was building out, the second challenge is when I finalized the formula. So that's one thing that really came out of it, was the do the Thing formula, which we'll get into in a minute. But that's been unbelievable because once I identified the pieces, that was when I realized that this formula has really been embedded in a lot of things in my life. And then a lot of the things around me, it's almost I discovered the Matrix because I'm seeing it, seeing it everywhere. So that's one thing. And then the other thing is the idea that anytime I'm curious about something or I want to know more of something, or I might have bottleneck in something. Even our conversation today, I was bottlenecked on being able to talk about this formula. So I called you. It's anytime. Any wish that I have, I could do it now through this podcast. And just even recently, my daughter and I took a trip to Europe. And I had mentioned to her, hey, like, if you're open to it, I'd love to interview some people while we're there about do the thing and have some questions that we can ask them. And the last day of our trip, we interviewed people in Paris and in London about them doing the thing. And just seeing people from an international level on the street that we were just going up to randomly and talking to and just seeing how, like, we all have these same goals and same dreams. I don't know, it just. The doors have just opened up in a way that I never even imagined. So it's like the world is open now.

Yeah, it's brilliant. I love that you stretched yourself. You know, you go to these places, and instead of just kind of putting your head down or going to the touristy sites and keeping to yourselves, you actually went on the streets. Because you sent me some photos, and it looked just incredible. And all of a sudden, people are opening up and talking to you and sharing their stories. I just think that's a brilliant way to travel. You took this piece with you and continued on. I think there's so much bravery in that, and it can be so scary to talk to people. And here you are in another country out on the street doing interviews. So that's brilliant. So talk to me a little bit.

I was just gonna say it was really cool too, because we had a couple people, like even a little girl that came up to us, you know, like, saying, can you interview me? So it was. It was just cool having this microphone, what it did, where she wanted us to talk to her. And then we had a guy that had walked away saying he had to go. He had a. His job to go to. Ten minutes later, he came back up and talked to us and said, hey, listen, I'm sorry. I used to say no immediately. And I realized I did that with you guys. I really want to be more open and hear what you have to say. And we got to interview him, and it was really, really cool just seeing how face to face someone from another country was resistant at first and then was able to switch it and open his mind up to talk to us.

You know what I love about that story as well, is that this medium of podcasting is not just for us as the host, it is. You're giving somebody else the gift and the opportunity to expand themselves or to get out of their comfort zone and challenge or try something and express themselves and do something. So it's not just us. By us taking a risk, you allow somebody else to take a risk as well, which is a beautiful thing when they meet you there and. And try it out.

And it actually just reminds me of. I just edited. I listened to an episode today from this woman that I had met when I did this kayak adventure in the Channel Islands, and I wanted to interview her because when she was our tour person on the kayak, and she just was lit on fire when she was doing the tour. And I just. You could tell she just loved what she did, which to me is the ultimate do the thing. And I even mentioned it on the episode. I was telling her I was a little nervous to ask her at the end if I could interview her. And she said it was like an honor for her, and she felt almost seen and appreciated by someone by wanting to interview her. And so I think you're right. I think there's like a whole nother side that we don't even realize that's there, that we're giving other people that opportunity and the gift to do.

Yeah, these. These pieces are important to remind ourselves because we can get in our own way with fear of. Or we come up with excuses or reasons. You know, I don't feel good today, or I'm feeling tired or just not inspired. But you showed up today, even though you felt down and out. And I've been there. My journey of 365 podcasts, it was almost each day I'd wake up with that little bit of dread of, oh, my God, I have to put myself out there. I don't want to have to do this. And there is something for some of us that is scary with having to connect with somebody that you do not know. But then the second you're done with that recording and conversation, it is so powerful. It just lights you up that you were able to make a connection and have that experience of talking and connecting with somebody. So it is very powerful stuff. I'm curious now. I want to learn from you more about. So you've gone on this amazing journey. You jumped in, you've done so many podcasts now. You've been recording and studying fascinating people, and you came up with the formula, and now you're at a place where. What, What, What. What is it now you're. That is making you feel stuck again? Or what is it right now that you're experiencing?

So now I've been wanting to share the formula just in an episode. So that's kind of what I'm hoping to do with you is where we could talk about it so then the listeners can hear it. Because, like, over the episodes that they've heard in the past, it's. I've been uncovering the person's formula as I've been talking to them with not everyone, but there's a lot of people, real time. Oh, okay. This is the formula. Like, so if you guys listen to episodes probably five through 50, there's a lot in there where you'll hear me say, oh, I see. This is the formula you've used to do the thing. Anyway, I started to then notice the patterns, and then that's when I came up with the actual formula. So I haven't really shared it on the podcast yet. I did share it in the group for the dating challenge, but I haven't shared it actually on a podcast. It's been more of in a private setting. And so one of the things I really wanted to do was have an acronym. So that was easy to remember. And so I had. I think I even sent it to you after I first had come up with it. Cause I was so excited. But I had originally had all these patterns written down, like, keeping it fun and I told you mindset already and controlling your attitude and goals and like, all these things. And then I realized I had the spreadsheet of 60 different pieces of the formula, which is just crazy. I need to simplify it. I need to come up with an acronym. And that's when I started realizing a lot of them could be chunked up. For example, like, keeping it fun is really mindset. Controlling your attitude is really mindset. So I realized a lot of the pieces were almost outliers. They needed to be categorized. And so once I categorize them, I wrote them down on index cards, and then I put them down on my kitchen table.

Let's start with telling me, why were you on this quest? Or how did the quest for the formula come up? And then why is it important and who is it for?

The quest for the formula came up because I noticed I have a formula for myself when I do the thing. And So I follow the same. Without realizing it, I realized as I was writing my book that I follow the same strategy every time I do something new. And so that's when I realized I really needed to interview other people to see if they have their own strategy to be able to do the thing. And so was I. What I wasn't expecting to find was something that every time someone does something new, that they follow the same pieces as the other person. And so that to me was really, really the new thing. And the reason why I wanted to do it was because as I'm writing the book, I want to be able to help people have a simple way, step by step blueprint, basically to follow so that anything they want to do, they can get. Like an example. I gained some weight over my European trip and I'm annoyed about it for a minute. And then I wait, I just need to do this formula and then I can lose the weight again. It's not. I know. It's certain that I know I now have a clear cut system with no matter what I want to do, I can do it because I now know this formula.

Yeah, I love that in that context. But tell me, why is doing something new some important?

Well, and I don't even know if it's just doing something new. It's really like. What I realized was by interviewing the people who are successful or not successful, by interviewing the people who have done these remarkable things, right. That is also them doing like a change. Because anytime you want to tackle something new or do something really great, you're having to acknowledge that you're making a change in your life. And that's when I realized that do the thing isn't just about doing the really cool thing. It's also about handling loss or handling transition. Recently I've interviewed actually you met Therese, who left her job after 21 years or someone getting divorced could be doing the thing. And so I realized it's not just about doing something new. It's about acknowledging change or helping with the transition in somebody's life through our life stages that we have. And so that's also where the formula can be used too, as well.

Right. I mean, I. I love it in this context of challenging yourself to do something new or something that feels scary or in all these places, there's so many of us that have always dreamed or wanted to do something, but there's something that holds us back. And through it seemed this formula, it is help guiding you to be able to conquer those fears and do the thing essentially can you tell us now, do you want to break down what the pieces of the do the thing formula are?

Yeah, let's do it. So, yeah, when I first was realizing that there was the common patterns in pretty much everyone, that's when I started writing the words down on index cards. And so the words were the words that I had down. I'll kind of go through how it came up and then I'll kind of go through each piece specifically. But the words I had put down were mindset. It was why, which why is not new. Right. Simon Sinek talks about finding your why goals. There was, I had at the time I had surrender and then I had like minded people. I had accountability and then educate. And so I had the words down on these index cards. All of a sudden I look at the words and I see the word game come up and I'm so excited because I'm life is a game. Game is perfect. But I still had these other cards left over. So at the time the word game was the acronym and that that covered goals, accountability, mindset, and then educate. And then the words I had left over still were why surrender? And like minded people. And then a friend of mine was basically saying, well, wouldn't it be cool if you could do something like game on? And I was like, oh, that would be cool. I hadn't thought of it being with two words yet. And then I started looking at the words again and I realized why could be identified the Y for I and then M. I was technically I could use like minded people, you know, and use the M and the minded. But I realized that it was so much more than like minded people. When I was talking to people about who they were going to for help, it wasn't just people that were supportive and encouraging. It was people that were actually doing the same thing as them. And so that's when I switched like minded people to my people. And so, and then surrender. I had done a few more interviews at the time and I even did a deeper dive at one point with Dr. Nancy about surrender. And I realized surrender could be under mindset. And so that's when I moved surrender under mindset. And so the formula is actually an acronym and it's I'm game. And then I did switch mindset to the beginning. So I do. So it's I is identify the why, M is mindset and that's the I'm part. And then game is G is for goals, A is accountability, M is my people, and then E is educate.

I love it. It's Brilliant. I'm game. It's, it's. It feels like it's an action, it's a challenge. It's you kind of putting yourself out there and moving, kind of playing. Like you said, I mean, a game. It's life. And I think it's great. So how do you see that formula, kind of if someone were to walk through each of these stages of the I'm game, how do you see it impacting their lives? What kind of things do you hope for it?

Yeah, to me, it's just a really clear, predictable way that they're going to be able to get through anything new, any change in their life. There's so much in it that I'm excited about. And then I thought we could just go through each piece too, just to kind of. Because, I mean, I think a lot of the stuff isn't new. Right. It's just putting it together is the new part. But I thought it would be still good to talk about why each piece is important to it as well.

Yeah, let's do it.

Okay.

Start with the I. Yeah.

So the Identify the why. This is actually the thing that's been really cool too, and I've been able to do this through the podcast is, number one, I'm testing it real time by doing the challenges. But then the other thing is, once I uncovered the formula, then I was able to speak to it specifically through my interviews. And so I was able to get even deeper on each piece. So here's an example. I talked to somebody who was talking about seven levels of why, and I had never heard of that before. So here I am now, learning new ways to identify your why. And for anyone that doesn't know what identify your why mean, basically it means, like, when you're doing something new, you need to really identify why you want to do that thing. Because when it gets hard and tough and you run into an obstacle or roadblock, you need to remember why you want to do it. Otherwise you're not going to want to do it like you did with your 365 day challenge. Right. Like those days that you didn't want to do it, what was your why? Did you have something specific that helped power you through?

Absolutely. And it was important that I chose a subject that I felt meant something to my own life. So my subject, as you know, was fear. And the reason my why of doing this podcast every day was I was building this app called callcast, and I wanted to be able to test it in real time and see how does this app work what are the pieces that break? What are the pieces? So if I put myself in the shoes of a user every single day, there's no better or closer way that I could get to it. Plus, my why was so learn about the app that I'm building and make sure that it's all any I catch personally, the pieces that are working or not working, that was one facet. Another level of my why was putting myself in the shoes of a podcaster. What does it feel to record a podcast? How does it feel to ask someone to come on your show? So I could really then, if anyone wanted to start their own podcast, have walked that path and done it in a way that for me felt authentic, as a way to really, you know, use this app and use it every single day. And so I was exploring the world of podcasting in a way that I saw podcasting moving, which was it could be smaller on the go wherever you might be, be able to record, because we all have these smartphones, so you should be able to do it anywhere you are and schedule, record and publish all within the same day or the same hour. So that was my goal each day, and I knew I had to do it. Kind of you are doing these challenges, and I find that there's something really powerful behind setting a framework or a challenge for yourself in order to kind of inspire or motivate or hold yourself accountable. And so for me, I like the idea of an extreme challenge. And so 365 days, one podcast, every single day with a new person. That became my why of I want to know my app, and I want to know the experience of what it can. I want to know that I can do it for a full year, every single day.

And the days that you didn't want to do it, how did you access that? Why?

So I would say, out of the 3:65, me being an introvert, there was. It was probably the majority of time I would not want to do it. And there would be so many things where someone might stand me up or someone might cancel it. But I kept. I made a checkbox list, a visual, something I could keep visual. So, like, it had 365 little boxes, and I would check them off. And when you start putting together a streak and you see every check on this calendar, I was like, I do not want to miss a day now. So for me, the motivation was, I've done it. And I told myself I was going to do 3:65. After 365, I don't need to record another podcast. I'M not going to fail this goal. And so I just kind of held myself accountable to, I need to do this. I'm going to record. It was my mission to do it. And so I kept doing it. And the other thing that stood out to me, we spoke about it earlier, was the feeling that I got after I would record. So just kind of puffing it through and then that feeling of, you know, every single day hearing a different human's experience in life and what they were dealing with, what they were going through. And this was during the thick of COVID It became a really kind of cathartic, powerful moment, not only for me, but also kind of. I could hear these people who, you know, the subject was a very, in my mind, a serious matter, which was fear. And what, what did fear mean to us? And that's not to say that every single recording or interview was a home run knock out of the park, but it, to me, it just meant there was something special there, at least for me. Giving somebody that space to talk about their own fears and being able to just listen and connect. And then it just, it became special. I think there is, I think I am a believer in podcasting. I've, I've worked in building a lot of different tech and a lot of different platforms. And for me, it got to a point where I wanted to create a platform that, that resonated with me, that on a level that I felt was very special was very important. And to me, the ability to connect with, have conversations and learn. Podcasting is such a powerful, powerful medium. And that's what I've now watched you do, is kind of unlock this world where you can go for a hot air balloon ride and meet someone that you find inspiring or interesting and fascinating, saying, you know what, can I. Can I interview you later? And then all of a sudden you've now formed a connection with somebody, and then you might have formed another connection with another person, and then you bring those different people together and it's just, it's an incredible way to unlock doors and connect different people who might never have connected before, but you see what a perfect match they are because you've interviewed them. And so it's just totally.

I love that it's such a gift. And so for you guys listening, I want you to hear how clear Adam is on his why for doing this challenge, because that's why how he was able to do a podcast episode for 365 days. And so something else before we move on to the M. But I wanted to Say that I loved the other thing. I talked to Andres Gamboa, who I think you met at the expert panel for the Startup Podcast challenge. But he talked about how he identifies the why is. He basically treats himself like he's a four year old. He's why do I want to do this thing? And then he's but why? But why? But why? And he basically says but why? Until he starts crying because he wants to do it so bad. And so that's. So that's really what identify the why is. And I realize if you look at the things that you haven't done in your life, you might look and see that's the piece that was missing was maybe you didn't spend the time to identify the why of why you want to do that thing. Because if you've ever met a really successful business owner that was overweight or maybe was disconnected from their family or whatever it is. And so if they actually look at the formula in each piece of their, their life, that's where they'll start to see what pieces were missing. And so anyway, that's a little example on identify, unidentify the why, and then moving on to the next letter, which is mindset, which is one of my favorite letters. But everything is mindset. It's controlling your attitude. It's being able to really think of reframing something when you need to reframe it and things like that. I thought we could just stay a little bit and talk about mindset as well.

Yeah, I feel mindset is huge. And we've already been kind of touching on mindset when we talk about those moments when there's. We have a podcast later today and you're like, oh God, I don't want to do it. That's where mindset comes back into, into play totally.

And so, and I'm even thinking about somebody that's going walking or they want to work out and that simple shift of just saying, like, I get to do this versus I have to. There's just so much in mindset that I think people can really explore to see what pieces really click for them. And that's something too. Through these interviews, I've been really exploring. Exploring is just all the different ways that we can use mindset. One is, even Ted mentioned this on the expert panel for the dating panel is what can you celebrate today? So celebration is a mindset. It's really especially people that are perfectionists or that are hard on themselves. When do you really take that moment to celebrate something you've done and then give yourself that psychological win, be able to reward yourself in that way. And that, that's a mindset. There's also that perspective shift. Being able to see things from a different perspective is a mindset. And so there's so many ways that we can, we can really use that. And that's why it's part of the formula. Yeah.

I'm thinking when I had so many times where I would schedule a podcast recording and at the last moment, the person would cancel, or even worse, the person I would always confirm the day before, hey, just to confirm, our conversation tomorrow is at 4pm and they'd say, okay. And then 4pm would show up and they would not show up and they would just ghost me. And I remember it felt like a personal punch. Is there something wrong with me? Am I an idiot? Am I a loser? Is this not working? Is it? Whatever. And in those moments, it's so important to catch yourself. And I think here again is why. Setting a goal and a challenge for yourself, where I said I would record with a new person every day, which meant I would scramble to find someone new. And because I had that commitment to myself, it forced my mindset to say, oh, wait a minute, I can't waste this time worrying about, is this about me? I'm going to look for somebody else. And so I would always find someone else and then have a amazing conversation. And what a gift. This other person who stepped up to the plate to connect and talk with me, because otherwise this was a moment then that you got to capture and have that you wouldn't have had anyway. So maybe it was a gift, a blessing. So that mindset of pushing on, pushing forward. And then also, what can I learn from this? Oh, I learned that maybe I need to rest. Instead of 4pm I need to schedule all my interviews for 12 noon or earlier. That gives me enough time then to make sure I can find somebody else, not feel. Then you get in the mindset. At first, I let anyone, whatever time, so someone would pick 10:00pm Oh, I don't get off work till 10:00pm okay, well, 10:00pm rolls around and I'm too tired. I'm sorry. Well, I did that to myself by allowing 10pm to be an available time for me to try and always accommodate. So. And then you get into the resentment mindset of, oh, how could this person stand me up at 10pm well, that's my own fault. I should set. Make sure that I take care of myself or put myself in a position to say, sorry, I can only do calls at no later than 1pm and then that gives me X amount of hours to fill in another person. And then also keeping a list of anyone who wants to record spontaneously. If someone would sign up on the list to record, I'd have a fallback list of people to connect to. So taking pressure off yourself. So the more pressure we put on ourselves and in a tougher position, it's easier to fall into bad mindsets. So what can you do to take care of yourself to help make sure that you. You don't put unnecessary pressures on yourself? And so learning how to adapt and get better and improve is important as well.

And you're making me think, this is what I love about the podcast, to be able to do these interviews, because with each person I'm now, especially now that I know the formula and I'm able to kind of question on specific ways that they attack the formula. And so like even today, the interview today, she was talking about her having like an internal hype squad that she has, even Beyonce hyping her up. She imagines it when she's doing something new or scary. And every day I'm learning something new about a new. About a way that someone approaches their mindset. And it's adding to this library of just all these amazing ways that we can incorporate to be able to get through hard things.

I love it. Yep.

And then we'll go into the next one. So we've got the I'm part of the formula of I'm game. So we have identified the Y is the I and then M is mindset, and then we'll go into game now. So you sort of touched on it with the, with your goals, but G is goals and oh my gosh, Adam, I've learned so much with goals because people can get so crippled by having to think they need to be the smart goals. Right. And having everything be so perfectly laid out and I need to have everything sewed down to the minute detail of a goal. And I think a lot of people can get crippled by that. And granted, yes, there is a space for that, but there's also a space, and I've learned this on the podcast as well. I interviewed Alexandria, who talked about having a rough draft goal. And that's basically just having an idea of a goal and then taking each step into that direction of the goal. And me talking about how my podcast evolved is a really good example of it. I didn't have a really specific clear cut idea of what I wanted from the podcast other than I wanted 10 interviews and now, within a year, I have over a hundred episodes. Like I say, it just went into a life of its own and all these things have happened. And so that's just one example of how something can evolve without you even thinking about it. But I love that idea of the rough draft and then looking at things as almost a science experiment and seeing, okay, if I do this, how is this going to work? And then how am I going to feel when I do this? And then you're almost following your own, Your own fun that way.

Yes. I love that it started with you with the do the thing and writing a book and interviewing people, and then it just kind of, it grows and evolves and knowing that if something has the ability to grow and evolve, you don't need it to be perfect out the gate because it's going to get better and better and better. And so to. To kind of have that awareness, which maybe it takes people you to come into their lives to see, like, hey, don't worry about it. You don't need it to be perfect to get started. You just need to start and then you'll see that it's going to kind of grow and blossom into something way beyond anything you could have ever planned for.

And then the next piece of the formula is a for accountability. And I love that you mentioned that earlier because I think that sounds like it's a huge part of how you did your 365 day podcast challenge, which was you marking down every day you did it. So then you got to see that visual and hold yourself accountable.

Yeah. To me, having that visual was so powerful and exciting because, you know, it starts out with one, whatever that saying is, where every journey starts with just one little step. You see just one box checked. But then after a few weeks, it's, wow, look at all these boxes now checked off. And then it just becomes more and more exciting till all of a sudden you're at 300 and you have just, what, a month or so left and two months left, and all of a sudden it's like, wow, I can't believe I'm at the tail end. I cannot stop now. So something to just visually show you and remind you of the journey you've been on. To me, you know, it was special.

Yeah. And the other thing I noticed too, it's what I was saying is through the podcast, I was able to expand on that too. Right. Like, that's one way that you could hold yourself accountable is by marking things down, seeing the visual and then following up on that that way I learned that I'm really motivated by publicly, publicly announcing I'm doing something. When I was doing that challenge 75 hard, I had a group of people that I was doing it with and they all ended up not doing it, but because I had announced it on the podcast that I was doing it and I told my daughter I felt I had to finish it. And so I realized how important that was for me. So now that piece of accountability is something I look at when I'm doing something else that's new. When I just did a comedy, I just did a stand up comedy thing. I don't remember if I told you, but it was really fun and it was a five week workshop and it ended up in me doing a stand up comedy routine and it was okay, I have to hold myself accountable. What am I going to do to do that? And so anyway, so it's just that idea of once you know what your button is to get you to move and do something, it could be as simple as you doing the checkbox thing like Adam was talking about or you might need to do something even higher and greater and announcing it to other people so they know you're doing.

Just to be clear, I, I announced it as well where in the intro to my podcast I put that I what my challenge was. So I publicly announced it and made myself committed to it as well. So there might be a piece of to what you've identified here where you need to say it out loud into the world in order for it to manifest and know that you've been accountable. And also in my, my write up the bio section of the podcast where you write what your podcast is about, I also publicly listed it there. So I wrote it down in public way to say this podcast is me doing a 365 day journey. I'll be talking to a new person every day, blah blah blah. So I announced it every day when I spoke to a new person in my intro as well.

And I interviewed this guy named Michael who is part of the app called Heroic. It's app that basically helps you manage your the things that you want to do essentially. And he was talking about this eyeball study where just by there's some study and I haven't looked into it yet but he said it's like a real thing where you there's a study where they identified. Let's say you don't want to eat cookies out of the cookie jar. If there's a picture of eyeballs on the cookie jar, you're not going to Eat them as much as you would if they weren't there. So there's simply the idea of just eyes looking at you makes you more accountable, which I thought was so fascinating. So now we're moving on to the M in game, which is my people. My people is probably my favorite one because I realized I mentioned this earlier, but that distinction between like minded people, which a lot of people talk about like minded people, having the five people around you and you're the average of your five friends. And I totally believe in that, of course. But my people is different because if you're running a marathon and you have a supportive, encouraging friends and they have, they're not runners, it's a lot harder to do that thing than it is to be around other runners. And so I realized that through the dating group too. It's a lot of the people that were in the group had a lot of friends that were married. And so it was hard for them to relate and connect to what they were doing. And so when they joined the dating group, it was great because they're around other people that are doing the same thing as them. So they're able to get more courageous with the things that they're doing and expand because they're getting to learn from the other people around them and feel they're part of a community and having the connectedness that we all need to feel a part of something.

Yeah, I think it's huge. I think putting yourself into a community of people, a tribe. I think Seth Godin coined a long time ago, back in the day of just building communities and tribes to help keep us inspired and surround ourselves with. With people who on the inside with us in the journey. And it's huge. So, yeah, that's. I'm 100% on board with the what are. This is the M is yes.

My people.

My people. Yep.

And then the E in game is educate. And this was really cool because I mean, educate seems obvious, right? Like when you're wanting to do something new, you want to educate yourself. I love it being at the end though, because I think it's really important to be already moving with the thing before you get stuck in constantly learning about the thing. So I think it's important that it's at the end. But the learning part I think is really cool in terms of hiring a mentor or reading a book or listening to a podcast or watching a YouTube video or taking a class, whatever it is you could do to get educated. But the thing that I thought was really cool that I learned, I Mean, only just a few weeks ago, I interviewed someone from Al Anon that had gone through the 12 step program, Al Anon. And she was talking about what really works for her with Al Anon and why she's so successful with it. And people have so much success with actually the 12 step programs in general is because they're able to educate others. And so educate really has two pieces to it. It's educating yourself and then educate others. And actually, I forgot mention this, but you remember how you connected me with Esprit, who had that cohort for. For everyone that didn't hear this part, but basically Adam had connected me to someone who was doing a cohort for 70 people who were starting podcasts. And I was three weeks into my podcast. I still hadn't published it, but he had recommended me since I was moving and I had the momentum going. And even though it wasn't published yet, I still had episodes recorded. And then I was an expert on her, on her in her cohort, because I was three weeks ahead of the people that hadn't started yet. And there was something about me being able to educate other people and then seeing their response to that. It just. Then it lit a fire under me because it just felt it wasn't even about me anymore. It was about the impacts that I was able to have. So that educating other piece that's new, that I just have been loving exploring a little bit more.

Yeah. And I love that it's right up next to my people because it's that kind of giving back into, like you said, you were three weeks ahead of them. And then you just being able to share, hey, I've been on this journey and I'm learning these things and I'm doing this stuff. And then you're kind of passing this torch of fire back to them, which then reignites your own fire because people are. You see how appreciative they are of you being willing to kind of walk this path that is scary to someone who is still at the very beginning stages.

And then it helps you learn more. I noticed that with Toastmasters, because you. They have. You do a role, which actually that leads into accountability. And my people, but they have you do a role. And then until I actually took the role on myself, was when I learned how to do it. I can watch someone all day long, but until I'm actually doing the role, then it's not connecting as much. And so there's something really, really powerful about that too, is how you're learning and evolving even more by you being able to teach something.

Yeah, absolutely. And that's why it's also great that it's at the end here, because you learn by doing. And so as you're going through this journey, you're learning what works, what doesn't work. And that's, for me, like I said earlier, why it was so important that I use the app, because by using it every day, I started to be able to empathize and put myself through the experience of what does it feel like to be a host? What does it feel like to get turned down? What does it feel like to invite someone on and start a podcast and start asking them questions and make them feel comfortable on the show? And how do you even end a podcast? Or how do you, you know, all the little facets and pieces you have to put yourself through it, and then once you learn, you can then start to help other people who then are ready to embark on their. Their journey and their experience. And then the other beautiful thing is, in terms of education and even working with people is you. You've been through it, but then going through it again as somebody else is going through it, you start to learn new things and see new things through as you help and work with them on their podcast, which is really cool.

So there you have it. The formula has been uncovered. I forgot to mention that's what the funny part was. I think it was episode 80 or something, is when I had finally uncovered it and realized all the patterns. And then I remember there was a moment where I was like, am I going to continue on with this podcast now that I've uncovered the formula? And then I realized that that's when there was so much more that I could do with it by, like, integrating into these challenges and then also getting different layers of each piece. Even more. What I mentioned, which adding new ways that people use each piece. And so it sort of has evolved in that way, but. But, yeah, but it's exciting. So, yeah, we have. I'm game. So it's identify the why mindset and then goals, accountability, my people and educate.

Yeah, it's such a brilliant formula. Each step makes such sense to me in terms of it's such a vital piece as we embark on new journeys and really expand ourselves and open ourselves up to new opportunities and possibilities that might be holding us back in life. So for you, what are your hopes, dreams, and aspirations for Endgame?

Yeah, that's a great question. Honestly, it's. I have so much. I'm actually having a friend of mine building curriculum right now. On the formula and the pieces, and I'm deciding on where I want it to go still. I had originally thought I wanted it to help people that were coming out of prison. And so that's where it was kind of motivated by. Because when I had my staffing company, we helped people get jobs that were coming out of prison. And that was such a huge piece of fulfillment for me, was helping people make a life for themselves again after coming out. But I realized I'm still interested in that. But I realized people aren't as interested in talking to me without my staffing company. When I had my staffing company, people were. That was the vehicle, right, to be able to help the people. And I have been running into so much resistance. Not saying that I don't want to still do that because obviously I know I can still keep going forward, but I can't have it limit me do other stuff. So I'm hoping that'll come back around. But in the meantime, I asked myself why I wanted to do that. And then I realized it was even more than people coming out of prison. It was, I want to help people with second chances, People coming out of divorce, people selling their business not knowing what to do, people that really just maybe have gained a ton of weight and they want to lose weight. So I think it's just. Or people that want to open up a business. So it's really. It's come to be even more. It's just giving someone, like, a second chance at life. You know, maybe they've lived that prescribed life and they're ready to move forward. And so that's one way that I want to be able to incorporate it, is kind of give people the framework to be able to use the formula and realize that once they've used it once with something even small, even if it's just adding water into their diet, that then they can use it on something bigger, and then they could use it on something bigger and then bigger. And so that's what I'm excited about, is that idea of having them be able to have this framework that they can use over and over again and go bigger each time.

When do you expect the curriculum to be ready for people?

I am not sure yet. So I'm kind of working on the book and the curriculum at the same time. So the book will probably be ready the end of 2020 this year. Now, since we're in 2023. So end of 2023, and so it may. We'll see. I'm sort of trying to have it Evolve as it. As it feels right.

And are you still going to be then throughout 2023, running challenges and using kind of experience, experimenting with finding people to go through the I'm game curriculum experience and then take people through that or that's been.

The exciting thing is I'm learning so much by doing these challenges. So my next challenge was going to be the do the thing, start a podcast challenge. And then I had a bunch of people that were interested initially, and then I had a whole nother bunch of people that were, like, not interested. And I realized as I was setting up people on beta podcasts that they were so in their head and they weren't able to break through yet to start the podcast. And so I realized I was being rigid by like saying, well, you have to have the podcast in order for you to be able to get the benefits of the podcast. And so when I took that vacation to Europe with my daughter, I had some space from it. And I realized that the challenge could be the vehicle for them to be able to experience. Experience the same things that I've experienced with the podcast, at least to at least give them an easier way to. To do it. And so instead of doing the do the thing, start a podcast challenge first, I'm going to do that. I'm going to do a do the thing, find your voice challenge where they're just going to be recording voice notes and they're still going to be getting to interview people with the challenge as a vehicle. So I'm really excited about. I'm really excited about that. Number one, I'm excited that I noticed in myself my rigidity by thinking it had to be this way for them to get the result. And then I was able to, like, loosen up a little to realize, like, oh, there is another way. And then the after the find a voice challenge, then the people that want to continue on and do the start a podcast challenge will. Will be able to do that.

Yeah. I mean, I really love that you put yourself out there over and over again with everything from starting your business to then selling your business to then starting a podcast or wanting to write a book and figuring that out and putting, you know, as you go, you just keep evolving, adding new pieces, removing, oh, well, maybe this is an obstacle. Push that to the side, and you're just evolving and growing and finding new opportunities. And in so, in doing so, your world has become larger and more interesting and just more connected, which is such a powerful component. And if the I'm game can help people achieve and find the same kind of appetite to put themselves out into the world and try new things and do new things. Really special, amazing things come from that. Just like that guy in Paris who walked away at first and then remembered that, wait a minute, I told myself I was going to be more open to experiences, opportunities, and gave himself permission to come back and then talk to you. It's the same thing of just giving ourselves opportunities to have experiences, to grow and connect with more people and just get ourselves out there. I think our world expands, and that's such an important piece. So I commend you on that.

Thank you. Yeah, and I wanted to thank you, too, because you've been such a huge part in this. I mean, I can't believe last year at this time I didn't have a podcast, and now it's like I have over 100 episodes that I've done and met so, so many amazing people that I can't even begin to tell you, like, from a way that's not even an acquaintance way of meeting them. It's from a really intimate, deep conversation way of me feeling like I know them at their soul and their core, from having this opportunity to talk to them. And that's all because of this platform you created. And then from the times that I needed your help, you were able to talk, to talk me through it. And so I. I appreciate everything you've done.

And I'm excited also as we push forward, because you're on the inside, we'll be talking about it, and you and I will record a podcast about it in the near future. But having the opportunity to bring the I'm game to kids and release it as a curriculum combined with podcasting, I think will be really cool. So I'm excited for exploring and kind of, when the time is right to start working on those pieces and get that kind of figured out.

Oh, yeah. I'm so excited. I'm so excited about that. Well, thank you so much for doing this with me. I appreciate it.

Congratulations, Stacey. I'm really excited and I look forward to what this new year is going to bring.

So cool.

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