Episode 288: Laura Carney: Inspiring Positivity and Gratitude in Life's Journey

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. This is your host, Stacy Lauren. Well, you guys, we're back again. It was so fun. I got to meet Laura Carney through the expert panel, start a book challenge, and then she came on my podcast after that. And then somehow, between the two of us, we decided to do a bucket list challenge, because her book just was kind of this kid catalyst in all things. Not just bucket list, but actually living out your dreams and realizing that we only have one life and we better do something with it. And so we ended up leading the Bucket list challenge in January, which I don't even have words for, and I'm hoping the words will come as her and I are talking about it and the experience, because that's why I wanted to have her on again, so we could just talk about what happened during that time, because it's just incredible when you're able to get so many people together for the same goal and the same desire of wanting something in their life. And then her book, My Father's List, was the catalyst that really kind of transformed the whole entire thing. So it brought on this energetic transformation that really has transformed all of do the Thing. I don't think any of us are the same now. And so, yay. I get to bring her on, and we're going to talk about it. We're also talking to her about what she's working on and all of the fun stuff. So I am welcoming Laura to the show. Hey, Laura.

Hi. Oh, wow. That was so nice. I'm so honored that everyone still is not the same. That's so cool. Is that true?

It's so true. So it's cool because it was last minute.

Right.

Remember, I wasn't even planning on doing a book club for your book.

Right? Yeah.

But then I knew I wanted to read it, and I guess because my whole thing is my people. Right? That whole piece of the do the Thing formula. And I'm like, okay, well, this would be a lot more fun to read this with other people. So then we get to connect and talk about it. And especially as we were preparing for the bucket list, I felt like it would. I would help kind of get into that energy. And so last minute, Remember it was three days before the challenge or something really quick. I didn't even ask you originally. I asked them if they were interested. They said yes. And then you saw it. You're like, oh, can I join? And I'm like, yes. And so it was just this amazing way to get started. And then what happened was through that, I remember even Madeline had talked about she had a loss, and she did a bucket list item through that. And we just all got connected together. Right through your book. But then what happened is as the challenge started, there were still people that got the book, and then some people couldn't get it till the end. But actual fact that people read it and were able to be part of your journey and part of that process, it sort of hugged the whole group. And so, yeah, I'm still seeing it. Where Lala, I don't know if you saw that. One of the people in the bucket list challenge, she ended up reaching her bucket list goal. She sent her picture of her singing, and I think she was in Spain and a few other places.

Oh, yeah. Oh, my gosh. I have to look that up. Reading it.

Yeah. Yeah, it's amazing. So, yeah, it was incredible. I'd love to talk to you about this because first of all, what does it feel like to know that you just even writing it right before anyone read it, you were just talking about you wrote the book, but then you were talking about it because it took some time for it to get published and released. Right. And before it even got released, knowing that something you've created and something that you did inserted something and inspired something that was able to change people from.

That thing, Gosh, it feels like it's just an honor. So that's why I said it's an honor that there's still change. It's interesting that something I thought was just something I was doing that was making my life better is maybe universal as a thing that can help other people. And the best way I can explain it is I feel like you probably have this experience a lot. Just knowing as much as I do at this point where you're doing something that is just sort of your idea, it's unique to you, and you have this incredible energy surge of just being in flow and realizing, oh, this is my purpose, this is what I'm here to do. Because this just lights me up. And I mean, I was talking to a writer last night, and I was helping her not just get an agent or get published, but find some kind of new mindset of how she's approaching it. And it's like, I texted my husband afterwards, and I was just like, I think I'm a writing coach. I think I'm supposed to do this. It was one of those I'm so lit up feelings. And with the bucket list challenge and teaching other people through my own example. And I think reading the book Helps a lot, too. I think that was really smart that you did that, because I've done it both ways. I've talked with groups or done interviews with podcasters where they have not read the book, and I've done it where they have read the book. And it really is different. It's a different experience, I think, because people have sort of their own concepts of what a bucket list is, based either on the movie that we all watched with Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson, which was a lot of fun, by the way, was everything coming together. We all sat and watched that movie, but that's really where the term was invented by that screenwriter. He's the one who came up with it. And in that movie, it's two men who know that they're about to die. So they've made a list of things that they wish they had done in their lives and try to get them all done because Jack Nicholson has unlimited amounts of money that they can do it. Whereas for my dad, even though I call it a bucket list, because that's sort of what it is, it really was more of a list of his life goals. It was something he wrote when he was 29. It was just, I want to live a good life. It really wasn't, oh, I'm going to die sometime soon. Although I have met an old friend of his who said he had a premonition that he was going to die young. So maybe unconsciously it was that. But what I get excited about is just not. I think it's cool if you want to do a traditional bucket list and you're going to pass away and you're like, I really want to get these things done. I didn't do. But what I get more excited about is I want to live a good life. I'm going to take ownership of the fact that I've been given this life, and I'm going to do my best to make it a good one. And I don't mean make it a good one like, oh, I need to accomplish a bunch of things and seem like I'm successful, because I think a lot of people approach life that way, and then they wind up feeling somewhat unhappy because it's like, on the outside, everything looks great, but. But something is missing on the inside, and what's missing is them. I just want to live a life where my spirit is engaged and I'm doing the things I'm supposed to be doing. And God is. It's just such a cool thing that other people want that. And for some reason, when I Talk about my experiences, start to believe that they could have it, and start to feel like they can motivate themselves to do it. Because, yeah, that just really wasn't where I was when I started my dad's bucket list when I. Even when I. And that was a little closer when I started writing the book about it two years later or a year later. But I've been thinking about that a lot lately, actually, who I was before it started. And I was. I was the kind of person, quite honestly, I thought everybody was. I thought. And the people who don't take their life into their own hands as far as what am I going to do with it? And don't live consciously and intentionally, I find that they tend to believe everyone's living in the same reality that they're living in, so have. Whatever choices they're making are the same choices other people are making. And that's whether you're a very trusting person or you're a very mistrusting person. You kind of see the world as you see it. You think everyone else has the same motivations that you have. And for me, I really thought, well, when I was a kid, I was taught I'm supposed to be married by now, and I'm supposed to have kids and I'm supposed to have a house, and what am I if I'm not those things? And I was 38 years old, and I was like. I had just gotten married finally to the same man I'd been with for 13 years, who I had pressured multiple times to propose to me. And it had been like, what's wrong with me? Why can't you choose me? When I couldn't see. See that he was choosing me every day, and he was actually an incredible partner. It was because I was applying these societal standards to our relationship that I was sort of holding myself back from the person I could be because I was too busy trying to be the person I had learned I was supposed to be. And it was really also very, I would say, qualified by. I don't know if that's the right word, but it's still early. For me, it was. It was very, I would say, described by that age that I was. But that phase in my life. And I think it's sort of like the people who are attracted to learning about bucket lists from me or learning how to be more intentional with their lives or maybe even learning how to process grief the way that I learned how to do. I think they're almost always in a stuck moment like that. And there are Multiple reasons. For me, it was. I basically was living a false life because I had a few traumatic things happen around the age of 25. And I already was very much a people pleaser and very much a person who was an overachiever who kind of defined my worth based on what I was doing and based on what the people around me thought of me. And I'm sort of always living up to these standards that are being created not by others, but by my perception of others. And I, I do think it's true that a lot of people do that. But like I said, when I was living that way, I thought everybody did that. I thought, this is the reality we all share. Everybody lives like this. But I mean, that would have meant me living a life that had been prescribed for me, that had been defined like, okay, as long as you're meeting these standards with work and home and family and gender and yada, yada yada, then you can do the fun stuff, then you can do what you want. But you have to meet these standards first. And really, it's just, it's such a ridiculous way to live your life because you're not deciding anything and you're almost like a child playing dress up in a way. And I think for me, it just took these really traumatic things happening. I love how a minute ago I said a little bit traumatic, and I'm saying really traumatic. When I was 25, I was hospitalized. When I was 24, I was hospitalized for depression because I had a bad doctor who had put me on way too many medications that I didn't need. That happened right after my college graduation. And then a year later, I thought I was in the clear now, and I had moved to New York and I was living my own life. And I just met this wonderful man who I would, as I mentioned before, I would later marry. But then my father died because of a teenager making a phone call while driving.

And.

And it was almost like it was just too much, like two years back to back, just as I was becoming an adult. And I'm thinking, oh, this is how cruel the world is. I've been living under some kind of illusion, but this is how it actually is. And I think there was something about the traumas that amped up all of the people pleasing stuff. And it amped up my wanting to fit in, my wanting to belong. Just kind of repressing and hiding all of my emotions around the tragedies. And I thought if I just do that, it will go away. And that's not. That's not how human beings actually work. We're feeling people. We need to process our emotions no differently than we need to exercise and we need to eat and we need to sleep. I think we're kind of mechanical that way. I mean, my friend Craig, who was in that experts panel we had is way. He has way more expertise on this than I do. You probably should talk to him sometime. But he has this theory that I know it's not his. He got it, I think, from Esther Hicks, but the course in miracles, but that you have 22 emotions. And it's like anytime I come to him and I'm very uncomfortable with an emotion I'm having, he'll help walk me through until I get to where I want to be. And that's really how we work. And you can't just ignore painful things that have happened in your life because you have to kind of have all of your facilities available to you so that you can be your best self and that you can live your best life. And that's really what I believe we're all here to do. I think I. Whatever gifts that I have, whatever lessons I've learned, whatever experiences I've had are here so that I can connect with other people and help other people have a little bit of an easier time of it. So I just. And I just fell into this. I fell into the opportunity to live more intentionally because my dad's list showed up exactly when it did, which I think was the moment that I needed it the most. So I'm also now a huge believer in chance moments like that that feel serendipitous, that feel like if you see something and you just know in your heart, this is what I'm supposed to do, you need to do it. Just listen to that intuition. Because that's how I ended up where I am now. And I'm just. I'm a much better person. I feel like I'm the person I was always supposed to be if I had been willing to take the risk. And the fact that I'm able to connect with people and help on that level. Yeah, it's just. Like I said, it's that feeling of I'm right where I'm supposed to be doing the things I'm supposed to be doing. And it's almost like you get to live a life where you're energized by the work you're doing as opposed to being depleted by it.

Yeah. There's just so much goodness in that, where you're so tapped in right now after this Experience. And probably as you were going through it to who you are, who you want to be, getting rid of all those false perceptions of everything. And then, oh my gosh, I don't remember exactly what you said, but I cannot wait to clip that. But it was societal standards, you know, of who we think we're supposed to be that was like, whoa. And it's so powerful. And I think that's what really helped magnify the challenge. And for anyone listening. And you weren't here during the bucket list challenge, basically it was a two week challenge where we didn't really tell them anything other than it was a bucket list. And I did have Laura's book in the stuff, but they didn't know they were about to go through a huge life transformation. And it's great. Cause that's how a lot of my challenges are. Right. Even my dating challenge, they come in for dating and then I end up giving them self love. Or the podcast challenge.

I did.

They came in for the podcast. They get the podcast, but then they get the listening workshop. And so it's kind of similar where they came in thinking it was a bucket list where we're just going to knock off all these really cool things. But what happened was so much more. It was a thousand times that. Because just even from the start. So when Laura and I strategized on what this bucket list would be and we had the expert panel with experts, this was incredible. Had a plan for what we were gonna do. And then I feel like this was a couple of these before. You're like, we've gotta add the values list. And that's gotta be the first error. And that's what set the stage for this whole thing because it got people to really kind of capture what's important to them. And not just some. I just wanna do this because it's fun. And while that's good to have that stuff on there, but it was also just this full rounded thing. I'd love to just have you share what that was about for people that either maybe they were part of it, but they didn't hear that part, or people that weren't here when this whole challenge came about in terms of.

Yeah, it does. It does seem to be an important part of this formula, doesn't it? I know you like formulas, so I feel like I should use that word. Stacy's a formula genius. Yeah, again, that's the thing I did by accident. Of course. Now I believe nothing is by accident, But I. About six months, I think, or so maybe eight months before I found my dad's bucket list in 2016, I actually just wrote out my own list of values. And it happened because I had been. I worked at Good Housekeeping that as a copy editor and I had an article that I was working on where they had two groups of women and they were both trying to lose weight, five pounds or something. And then one group, they were instructed to take 15 minutes and write down all of their values in life. And the other group didn't do it, they were more of a placebo. And the first group were the ones who lost the five pounds. And my initial goal was, I'm about to get married and I would love to lose a couple pounds. So maybe I'll try this and be like, well, completely superficial reasons. But then I sort of liked it. I just, I liked that I had this values list. And part of one of the things the article said was it wasn't enough to just write it, you also had to keep it. You had to look at it. It was the fact that the women kept it for that whole month and looked at it, that was the reason that they lost the weight. And I think the way they explained it in the article was that in this particular group of women, they had said that they tended to be emotional eaters. So that having that list of values was a thing that made them feel like they were filled up, but they were filled up with who they were as opposed to feeling empty, like something was missing inside of them. Which I think when people talk about emotional eating, that's what they're talking about. They're trying to fill some kind of void. So there's something about writing down all those things that you care about that does make you feel whole and makes you feel complete. And now I think the other part of it that's good is knowing what you value and who you are and what you care about. It's almost like doing a home cleaning. You're simplifying, you're making things kind of minimalist in your concept of self. And I mean, you're not saying, oh, this is my value list for the rest of my life. You can update it at any time. I've updated mine, I think two or three times now. And I just keep it in my regular everyday to do list. But I think there's just something about it that opens the stage for I need to get rid of some stuff that isn't working for me. And a lot of us have a lot of stuff that isn't working for us. I think that we have acquired because we thought we were supposed to, or we've just picked up and maybe at the toxic emotion or something and we don't know how to get rid of it. And now we're looking at life through that filter, basically. One of the greatest experiences of doing my dad's bucket list wasn't even so much these incredible adventures I got to go on and being reminded of how much he loved me and how much he loved life. It was what I lost. It was as I was having the six year experience, things from my life just kept peeling away, kept being stripped from me, whether due to my own decisions or just decisions that were being made for me. And a lot of the time it would feel like, wow, this would be a really devastating loss. Whether it was a job or money or at one point even my ability to walk because I got injured doing a list item. In normal times that would have been like, oh my God, my life is over. This thing I set out to do, that was who I was, what I identified as. Now something has made it so that I can't do that. But I think because I was looking at the bucket list for my dad as, okay, well, this is what I've committed to and this is starting to feel like part of my purpose and I have to see it through for him and I have to keep doing it. I think what was happening there was now I was really getting pure about my intentions in my life, which were now purely motivated by love and honor for someone. And even though I was doing it for him and in his memory, it became a habit. So now I'm starting to learn what it looks like to live heart first as opposed to head first. That's the best way I can explain it. And I would even, I think I've told you about this, I would even start to see heart shapes every day as I was doing the list. Because it's scary. It's scary because we live in a society I think, that is very head first because it's so scientific and patriarchal and it's like everything needs to be in its little category and hierarchy and, and so much of it is business and financially defined. And human beings are much more like nature. Like we're wild and free and that's not how we work. So I think to be living guided by my heart meant, hey, all this stuff that you thought you had to have in order to survive, it's gotta go. And I think maybe the timing of us doing that bucket list challenge was great because we were doing it Right after a pandemic. And one thing I started noticing during the pandemic is people all around me were now having that experience too, because things had been taken from them, from their lives, and they were freaking out about it. And it was funny to me at the time. I shouldn't say it was funny, but it was a little bit funny because I was just like, oh, this is how life is. I've been going through this for three years, guys, right? Chill out. It's going to be okay. And I was, for the first time in my life, in a position of advisor to people. And that was really weird. But, yeah, really, nothing, nothing is ever under our control. I always think it's funny when people say things like, you need to control what you can control. And it's like, well, that's nothing. The only constant in life is change. So it's like, either you get good with that and tap into the natural flow of what it is to be alive, or you resist it by building walls or just building things that aren't necessarily authentic to you. So that's, I think, a big part of why, when we asked them to sit down and do that values list for 15 minutes, it was almost like, I think some of them were saying it was like the first time they had in years they had sat down for 15 minutes and done something for themselves. And I think that's because sometimes as adults, although I'm sure some kids feel this way, but as adults, I think we can get so wrapped up in our responsibilities and define ourselves by the responsibilities, define ourselves by who we are to other people, that we forget to do things for ourselves, and we just kind of become a puppet for whatever anybody else wants from us. And we're being pulled every which way, thinking, this is how our parents lived and this is how you're supposed to live. This is what being an adult is. And it might be someone's concept of what being an adult is, but it's not what being a human is. It's like we miss. We forget the humanity inside of ourselves, and if we forget that, we're just not going to be living happy, productive lives. Does that make sense?

Oh, yeah. It's so powerful. And you just said we forget the humanity from inside of us. And I'm like, yeah, I mean, I definitely saw that. And I think that's part of what inspires me to do what I'm doing. Right. Because we're literally bringing people and connecting them together. And so it's really cool how you were saying, well, I Love how you were saying you intuitively realized it had to be the values. Right. Came up, and you're like, wait, there's something's missing. And then all of a sudden, that came up. I had that, too, where during the challenge, I'm looking at everyone and I'm like, how are they going to do their list after this 14 days? And that's when I added the dare join a group of people for one of the things that you have on your bucket list. And the really cool thing about that is that's my whole core thing. Right. That's what my TEDx talk's going to be about my people. It's a whole thing in my life, and I didn't notice that I even. Because we had my people already in the group. So in my mind, I didn't need them to go look for my people. But as I'm looking at it, I'm like, wait, they're gonna. This isn't enough. They need more. And that was a really exciting moment for me because it was just activated by just seeing. I'm like, what do they need? And it wasn't coming from anything other than me seeing them and wanting them to succeed. And so anyway, it was just. It's kind of cool. We both had this big moment where we just felt it and then were able to follow it.

Yeah, I mean, I learned a lot from that. Because it's interesting, because something weird happened after I finished the list and I started doing press because it was such a press right away, and it was very overwhelming and surprising to everybody. I had sort of an intuition that that might happen, but that didn't mean I knew that would happen. But as that was happening, and then, of course, six months later when the book came out, and this is the time period where I met you, suddenly everybody just wanted to lift me up and talk to me like I was the superhero or something, or, how did you do this? And it was all about me. And as the figure of. And I realized, okay, well, someone has to be the face of this. I'm the one who. Whose dad it was. And I was the container, as my husband puts it. He says, you're the container of it. And I was the writer of the book. But the truth is, I had 54 list items to do and six years, so that means at least 54 people helping me. And so much of my growth came from the fact that I started trusting people again, and I started opening myself up to letting them teach me. And there wasn't money exchanged ever, except For I think I had to pay for my golf lessons. Other than that, people were just volunteering their time and energy because they believed in the project. And it was shocking sometimes to me because here I was coming as this person who for 10 years avoided talking about her father's death and avoided talking about these things that she thought made her less than. So now I'm forcing myself to talk about it, forcing the vulnerability that you promote so well in your communities. And people really responded to it. And the weirdest part was sometimes after someone would help me, they would have something happen in their lives that seemed totally unrelated to what we had been doing and just unique to them. But it was a thing where suddenly they had some vulnerability open up inside of them. And now that maybe it's that they were approaching something differently because now they were opened up too. So that was really cool that, that it wasn't always cool because sometimes this thing was very difficult or painful. But maybe now that I'm talking about it, maybe it was similar to what I was going through, where things were being stripped away from me. Maybe because they suddenly became more authentic, things started being stripped away from them too, which feels like a crisis at first, but it actually isn't. So I was really happy to learn from watching your group how much, really, how much this project depended on the people who helped me and also on my willingness to be helped because to watch the people in your community just, hey, here's my five bucket list items, and I'm going to do this. And here's my answer to this dare, and here's why. And then they have 20 people commenting on it and giving them support. I was seeing in real time how that vulnerability, authenticity and connection, how those three things are really the things that help support transformation and change. It's not enough to. For just the one person to want to do it. You have to also be open to accountability, really. And I mean, I don't like to ever talk about the bucket list. It's a thing you have to do. So I don't love a word like accountability, but I think it's more. Here's the space that supports me where here I'm safe to be who I am. And there's something about the energy of that that helped them, I think, to actually be that.

I'd love to hear what else you got from just that whole experience where we had this couple weeks together and you got to be a part of the whole collective transformation that basically happened during that time.

I mean, it felt very validating. I'LL put it that way. Because I could see sometimes I would wonder, do they see what's happening? I would see that they film themselves in your group talking about what they want to do and what they have done and how things are going. And it was like I could see the energy shifting in the videos. I could see this. I don't want to say confidence. I don't think it was necessarily confidence. It was more self belief. That's a really powerful word. I think I could see them believing. And that's a word that Oprah uses a lot. She has this video, I'm sure she has a few videos like this where she says, your life is defined by what you believe. People talk about manifesting all the time and like, oh, if I just want it badly enough, then I can make it happen. But really, if you do it that way, the universe will hear you and think, oh, this person is telling me that they don't have something and they want it. So they. The universe is basically always reflecting back what you're giving it. So if you're giving lack, it's going to give you more. It just maintains the balance, basically. But if you're giving it gratitude, it's going to give you more things to be grateful for. And I'm preaching the choir right now. You know all of this stuff and.

Of course it's great.

Yeah, if you give it belief, I think it, it just will make those beliefs come true. It's like, well, I believe this. And I was like, okay, well then how about this? You're ready for it. There's just something about having beliefs and saying out loud, I'm ready for this now. Because I can't tell you how many times I talk to people who tell me they want something or want to publish their book or want to make something creative or want this job or that job, or want to get married. And all you have to do really is ask them, but is it really what you want? Are you actually ready for this? Are you at a place in your life where you can say out loud, I'm ready for this. Because if they can't, then that means there's actually something in them that's preventing them from whatever they're telling me that they want. And maybe they actually want something else. So. And I guess a perfect example of this is I was talking to someone last night and I actually said, where do you see yourself in five years? And they were trying to publish a book, they're trying to get an agent. And I was like, where is Publishing this book going to get you. What do you want to do with it? What do you see? Not what do you think? And hope will happen, basically. And they had all the answers. They knew exactly what it was that they wanted. They gave me a whole list and I said, well, how do you feel now that you have said that out loud? And of course, I'm also telling them to write it down because I'm very. These are like writing lists now. And they said, well, I feel unsure. I feel a little bit nervous about what I just said. And I said, why? And they said, because I've been burned before and these are things I've been wanting for five years and I keep not getting them. And now I'm at a point where it's like, I'll believe it when I see it. And I just sat there and I'm like, no, that's not how it works. You have it reversed. You have to believe it and then you will see it. Because sometimes I think people think of the idea of goal setting and writing down your goals as just writing down the craziest, most lofty thing that could possibly happen to you. That you wish is like a wish you're putting in a wishing well that you wish this for yourself, for your life. When what actually works better is if you can write down a list of goals that are achievable, that are things that who you are right now. It's like, okay, well maybe as you were saying with Lala, maybe I want to sing and speak. Well, then what has to happen for me to do that? And do I actually think right now I have the skills that could be developed or the courage that could be increased upon so that someday I can actually do that? It has to be a thing that you really do believe that you can do if you apply yourself. Because a list of intentions or goals or bucket list, it's going to be things that you're going to have to put a lot of work into. You're the person doing it. And I think people get confused about that sometimes with manifesting or wanting things again. It's. It's the difference between being a little kid playing dress up as an adult, wishing for a better life, and being the actual adult, being the human being who's living it and just setting out to do what you need to do, even if you don't know yet what that is. There are so many things with my dad's bucket list that I thought were one thing and ended up being something else completely. So it was almost like A combination of being willing to do the work and also being open to what it was going to teach me. So that's a big part of it too, I think. But just. I mean, I think your. Your initial question was, what was it like watching everyone go through this? That's what it was like. It was like I was watching them. It was like in the earlier videos, they were missing this ingredient of self belief, and now I was seeing them have it because they're now in this community where everyone's like, I believe in you, and I believe in you because I'm doing it, too. We're all in this together. We're all trying to find this belief in ourselves, but I know we can. It's like any race you ever compete in. I think doing the marathons I did really prepared me for that kind of community. Because the weirdest part, and I wrote this in the book, the weirdest part about being in a marathon is, well, you're running 26 miles, which is kind of strange, but it's a combination of being a solo individual athlete, but also being in a collective, because every person is struggling with the same thing you are, and you're all just trying to get to that finish line. And you have the choice of motivating each other, helping each other. Sometimes they have these videos of these marathons where they show someone who stopped because they saw someone who was struggling, and they'll help them get across the finish line. And it's just like, I almost want to cry because it's so moving when you see it happen, because really, that's what we're designed to do.

Well, I'd love to give everyone a sneak peek to the new thing that is coming up. You got your book selected for a book club, if you want to kind of talk about that a little bit.

Yeah, I mean, and this is. I think it's the perfect example of that concept of letting yourself be vulnerable and trusting in the collective. And I, at one point had an opportunity, right before my book came out, to meet the actress Melissa Gilbert, and she wanted to interview me. So we did that back in October, and that went well. And then they wanted me to do something with their community, which is called Modern Prairie. We weren't quite sure yet what it was going to be, but just the timing of those meetings in early January was the same time that Stacy and I were doing the Bucket List challenge. And I just said, hey, you might want to check out this cool thing I'm doing on Facebook with Stacy Lauren, which is challenging people in her community to do their own bucket list. And they loved it so much that they basically said, yeah, why don't we do that in our community too? So now Stacy and I are basically taking our act on the road and doing it for Melissa Gilbert and her Modern Prairie group with the summer, which is going to be. It's a different group. It's a different group than yours. And what's so great about you is you're so adaptable and I love the way that you work because you'll sit there and you'll notice who is here and what do they need. And I totally trust that you'll be able to do that as soon as you meet the women in the group. And it's all women. And it might. I think they might be a little bit older than your group for the most. I mean, they're all, I think over 50. So. Yeah, they're gonna have different needs.

Yeah. And your book was selected also for their monthly book club.

Yeah. Too. Yeah. That's really. I think at first I didn't realize what a cool honor that was, but it's cool.

It's really cool.

Yeah. It's a little nerve wracking because they're in the app talking about it right now. They are.

That's so neat.

Kind of reign myself in from checking it and looking at it.

Yeah. Well, we'll have to come back on after the book club after the challenge with them. And I'd love to do this again because it's great because we kind of keep growing and learning and evolving. And as we're doing that, people are being a part of that process and having their own experience, which is great feeling.

We'll be asked many times to do this. Just a hunch.

I love the taking the act on the road.

Yeah. Well, I think we're a good team and I'm never going to pretend to know how to do what you do. And I think your group would definitely say this, that the bucket list challenge that we did together, it really was just the combo of those energies.

A hundred percent. Well, I'd love to hear your number one piece of advice for people on doing the thing. I like to get it every time because it evolves right as we go through life.

My number one piece of advice on doing the thing. Which you invented.

Yeah.

And the thing.

The thing could be anything.

Follow your bliss. That's my number one. I'm a huge acolyte of the author, Joseph Campbell, who always talks about the importance of following your bliss because Joseph Campbell believed that since we don't know if heaven exists or not, we can have faith that it does. But as in our time being incarnated, being human beings and bodies, we don't know, why not try to create the experience of heaven while you're living? And that's what follow your bliss means. It means when you feel a pool to do something that excites you, that is. And I don't mean just, oh, I'm so excited. I'm dancing and going out with my friends. What a fun night. I mean, excites you, fills you up, fulfills you, makes you feel like I'm doing exactly what I'm supposed to be doing. That's bliss, and that's everything in your life kind of revolves around that, seeking for finding that thing. And that's what I always think of the ultimate expression of what do the thing is. Because until you have a taste of it, you don't know. You don't know what that means. It's like life is more like a struggle than an experience you're grateful for. And I would say start with gratitude. I mean, you don't have to write out a full values list, but it helps. You don't have to write a full bucket list. But if you get to that point, that's going to help you a lot too, because at least it's giving you guidance. And I think part of why I like to ask people, like I did with my friend last night, where do you see yourself in five years? What do you want from this thing that you're doing? Is because I think a lot of people live life like, oh, someone will discover me, or someone's going to give me the opportunity, or someone's going to show me where I need to go. If only I could just find that person who could help me. When really it's like, you can figure it out. You can decide for yourself what your goals are. You just have to follow your bliss. And if you can choose and actually figure out for yourself what that thing is, you'll get there. Because you can't get anywhere if you don't know where you're going.

Oh, my gosh. Please share where people can follow along with you and also get your book if they'd like to get that too.

You can follow me on my website's bylauracarney.com and my Instagram is where I usually post things. That's my father's list, and that's the name of my book. My book's called My Father's List. How living my dad's dream. Set me free.

Thank you so much for coming on and for all you do and for just being part of everything. It's just so wonderful to be in this space with you. I appreciate you.

Thank you. And when I set out to take something that was painful and make it positive, I didn't know how I was going to do it. But every time I meet the Stacy Lawrence of the world, it confirms that I'm on the right track. Thank you so much.

And for you guys, do the thing. Don't wait for opportunity. Create it. And hey, have you checked out my Facebook group yet? Go to do the Thing community dot com. And I just started do the Thing collaboration dot com.