Gregory Benedikt : Life Gets Easier When You Overcome Self-Doubt And Just Take Action, According To This Human Potential Coach

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. All right, guys, I'm in the middle of building a quiz right now, and it is called what is stopping you from doing the things that you want? And one of the Personas that has come up that I've been working on the results for is self doubt. And it's so interesting to me how I think this has been a new thing in the last six months that I really start to notice the signs that the universe sends me. And I'm able to pay attention now because I've been able to really calm the storm that happens around us as we're going through things. And I was in the middle of creating these results and going, trying to really get into that person of when they're wanting to do something new and they have that lack of belief in themselves or that voice in their head that says, don't do this thing, or why would you do it? Or I'm not good enough or whatever comes up in that way. But in the meantime, I actually also listened to a podcast episode from my friend Gregory Benedict, who has the Dare to Dream podcast, who's also a human potential coach. And he had shared a celebration interview with someone he had just completed a coaching with. And she was basically just talking about how he helped her overcome her own self doubt with the things that she's been doing. And I was like, okay, I'm not taking this accidentally. This is happening on purpose. I have got to have Gregory on to talk about this important topic because we were actually just talking about it right before we started about how self doubt can come into all of us no matter what we're doing and no matter how much we've conditioned our mind. It's so easy for that to. To come up when we're doing something new or something uncomfortable. So I am so excited to welcome Gregory Benedict to the show. Hey, Gregory.

Hey, Stacy. Thanks for having me back on. I'm so excited to be here.

Yeah, I'm just. I'm just so excited you're here. And I've loved having you. I didn't mention it in the intro, but I loved having you as part of our expert panel. I think you bring such a new and unique perspective to the way that you're able to see things and then also able to articulate them in a way that almost punches you in the gut feeling you can actually hear it and wake up.

Thank you. I love that. That would be. That is the highest compliment, is being able to wake people up. Because for so much of my life I was sleepwalking. And if I can help people have that awakening that really changed my life, that would be amazing.

Yeah, it's so good because I've been talking about this a lot lately. Maybe because I'm in the middle of writing the book, do the thing, but it's so easy to stay comfortable in what you're doing when there's nothing really that great or nothing really that terrible that's pushing you either toward or away from something. And a lot of times someone needs something major to happen before they can make a change. And I think it'd be great if people can also figure out how to tap into that without having to have something either devastating happen or something on the other side.

Yes. It's so interesting because the dissatisfaction with your current state has to get high enough, it has to be painful enough to where you want to make a change, where you'll spend the time, the money, you'll actually talk to someone about changing your life. And what comes to mind when you said that is there's this saying that you can either get the feather, the brick or the semi truck. And it's essentially saying that the universe is going to wake you up one way or another. Is it going to be a light little tickle on the arm? Is it going to be a brick through the metaphorical window of your life? Or are you going to have a full on semi truck life event where your whole, your whole world explodes and that's the only way to get you to wake up and pay attention.

Yeah. And if we even just think about what just happened with COVID right, All of a sudden now everyone's doing business differently, they're doing weddings differently, funerals differently. Everything's changed because we all had to wake up, right, and experience this huge thing. It'd be amazing for us to be able to figure it out before, like you said, having to have a major semi truck come in and wake us all up.

Covid was definitely the collective semi truck of what I think so many people needed.

Yeah. So I'd love to dive into the topic of what we're talking about. And this funny thing is, you were the ultimate do the thing. Cuz when I texted you asking if you were open to doing this interview on self doubt, you, I don't even know how long it took you, but by the you said yes, but then by the next day you had already written a blog post about it about self doubt. And I was like, of course he is the perfect do the thing person. Because as soon as you. You mention something and if it becomes alive with you, then you're able to just speak to it and do it.

Well, thank you. That makes me sound impressive, but it's really. I needed that. You texted me and I got so fired up I was like, yes, self doubt, what do I think about this? And for me, a really helpful way to articulate my thoughts and actually figure out what I think beyond just speaking off the top of my head is to write. And so I went and I wrote an article about it. And it helped me solidify the things that I already somewhat knew. But it always. Writing always helps me bring things together, put them on the page, and then it's really helpful to test if I actually believe what I'm writing about. Sometimes I write something that's like, do this and this and this. And I'm like, well, that's bullshit. That doesn't make any sense. And so writing really helps. And so I'm excited to talk about it today.

Yeah, and actually when you say writing. So as you know, I'm in the middle of the do the thing or it's about to start today, actually the do the thing, find your voice challenge. And one of the things I'm trying to encourage people to do is actually speak to things. Because from the podcast and me being able to activate my voice has been a huge way that I've been able to kind of free free my thinking and get more clarity on things. So I'm just curious, since you have a podcast too, have you been able to almost intermingle those things together with writing and then being. I mean, we're doing it now you wrote about it, now we're speaking about it. But is that kind of how it works for you too?

100%. And for me, it kind of just depends on what headspace I'm in on which comes first. Sometimes I'll shoot an audio message to my co host Vinnie, just ranting about something that I want to talk about on the podcast. So I'll speak to it first and then I'll write about it and then we'll talk about it on the podcast or a lot of times I write a weekly newsletter and I'll write something in the newsletter that I want to go deeper into. And so I'll write about it first and then I'll talk about it. I think they're really interchangeable and there's absolutely no right answer. So finding whatever works for you, whatever feels better to get that thought out of your head and into the world is the right answer.

Yeah. And I'm just thinking you have guys have got to do a episode on all those rambling thoughts that are on voice record and do like a, like, like a compilation of them all. I think that would be really fun.

It'll be really funny. I'll have to dig those up and figure out what. What things we can share with the world.

I'd love to talk about the episode that I listened to, which was a coaching client of yours and you had a. After the end of the completion ceremony of that one of the things you got to do with her was almost like a interview at the end of the coaching agreement where she really spoke a lot about self doubt and maybe just kind of for the listeners, kind of shared with them what that was about and. And then how we can kind of apply it in the situation of what we're talking about.

Absolutely. So at the end of every coaching engagement, I have a call that's called a reflection call or a celebration call. And the whole hour is dedicated to reflecting on all of the growth and all of the progress. And this is so, so important in coaching because I've had celebration calls where at the beginning of the call, the client is like, oh man, I feel like I didn't do all the things I said I wanted to do. And then I always have notes and I. We go back to the goals from session one. And the instance I'm thinking of in particular was the client came in, felt like she hadn't done everything she said, and by the end of it she's like, oh my gosh. I verbatim hit every single one of my go goals, like crushed everything that we talked about. And sometimes you just need that space to reflect and recognize and actually give yourself credit for the changes that have happened. And so this, this session in particular was with one of my clients, Jamie. And I'd say the theme of our reflection and celebration together was this overcoming self doubt and really finding the answers inside of herself, which is beautiful because that's the whole purpose of coaching. Coaching is not advice. It's not me telling people what I think they should do in their given situation or what worked for me in the past. It's really the art of asking questions to draw out the answers that people have inside of them. Because we all know somewhat of what we should do. We just don't take the time to create the space to think about it, to talk about it with someone, to speak it into existence as well. Just simply hearing your voice, going through the thoughts and coming up with potential solutions is super beneficial. And like I said, this was all about overcoming self doubt, realizing that she can do things, she can do hard things that she didn't need. This was my favorite part. She didn't need someone to come save her. She had the answers within herself and really just gaining confidence and clarity that she is capable that she can let go of these old stories that were getting in her way. And it was, it was a beautiful experience to witness.

Yeah, I loved listening to it and it just was so aligned with the work that I'm doing and the fact that she was at the end of that and was able to express kind of what it meant to her, I thought was really, really powerful. And yeah, that's why we're here. I mean, above everything else on this topic specifically, I'd love to talk about that. So I love what you said about finding the answer inside your. Because I think a lot of people, when they're going into that self doubt, they will ask other people, oh, what do you think? And what should I do? And what would you do? And Right. And that's, that's feeds the self doubt because then you're hearing other people's opinion and their advice, which is then getting to doubt yourself even more because you're not trusting yourself now. And so I love that idea of getting into the practice, building that muscle of asking yourself the question and then your librarian inside of you is going to, you know, muster it up. And I think it takes a little bit time to kind of like get into that, that practice for sure. But once you, once you, like you said, create the space and figure out how to do it and how it works, it really, it really can become really powerful. So I was just kind of wondering what your thoughts are with that in general.

The first thing I want to say is that it takes practice. Whenever I ask someone a deep question, the first answer is usually, I don't know. Then it's I don't know, and then they sit there and they go, I don't know, but. And it's this slow evolution where they, they turn inwards and they figure out that they might not know the correct answer. I'm using air quotes. But they do have an idea of how they should move forward because they're the expert in their own lives. They have ideas that they've thought about before. And so listening to your own intuition and your guidance is super important. You can still turn outwards the external world and go learn things when you have an issue you're coming up against that you don't know how to get over. But listening to yourself is an essential first step. And then also I really, I was so excited to talk about overcoming self doubt because as I read, as I wrote that article, I realized that as much as I want there to be, there's no sexy secret formula, there's no easy way to overcome self doubt. It's not a quick mindset shift, it's not a life hack. What I believe to be true about self doubt through my own coaching, through my own personal experience can be summed up in a single sentence. It's do it scared, do it unprepared, and then do it again. And this is a quote that I originally heard. I don't know if it's original or if he was just quoting it from a, a life coach, Sean Smith. And my short answer to overcoming self doubt is that self doubt will always be there. You just have to take terrified action. You have to do the thing that you're scared of over and over and over again so many times that your inner critic, that's the self doubt just gives up because it knows that you're going to take action regardless. So if it wants to bring up all these things you're worried about, if it wants to catastrophize, it does that. But you just ignore it because you're doing it no matter what.

It's so good. And it kind of leans into that. We've talked about that practice of discomfort before and how you can build that. And it's a muscle that you can strengthen to be able to do things that are uncomfortable. And so I was just kind of wondering what you think about, about that because I think a lot of people think they have to start off doing this huge monstrous thing, but until they practice that discomfort muscle, it's, it's almost like hard to imagine. But once you've leaned in more to each thing, then I think it becomes, it becomes easier each time. So I was Just curious what you think about that.

Yes, I'm looking over here because there's a quote that I heard recently that perfectly describes this and it's that I'm just going to read it. It's from Alex Hermosi. He says you don't become confident by shouting affirmations in the mirror, but by having a stack of undeniable proof that you are who you say you are. Outwork your self doubt. And that's a little intense, but to me it's, it's really doing the thing and taking the action. And I'm, I'm coining a phrase, terrified action, where you take action despite being terrified. You do it so many times that you prove to your self doubt that it's going to happen regardless. So you can either support me and help me and make me feel a little more confident, or you can just get out of the way because I'm not going to listen to you. And as you do the thing over and over again, it definitely gets easier. That's what resonated with me from that Alex Hermosi quote, is that you, you, you have a stack of undeniable proof that you are who you say you are. And I would take it a step further in saying that you have a stack of undeniable proof that you're gonna do the things you say you're gonna do. I think that piece is so important. You can become such a confident person and overcome many of the things where doubt gets in the way of if you know that simply saying, I'm gonna do this despite being scared, despite being terrified that it's gonna happen regardless of how you feel in the moment.

Yeah, that's so good. I. It's just like any kind of self discipline muscle too, right? It's just falling through. I mean, even just, oh my gosh, coming back from Europe, I gained weight and I'm wanting to lose weight again. And so I'm trying to go through, okay, what's my first step to get this extra weight off. And it's just falling through. Okay, today I'm not going to have, I mean, I'm not having cake, but we'll give an example. I'm not going to have cake today, you know, and then following through with that, it's like there's the one step and I think, I think it's just that same idea, right? Following through on the things that you say you're going to do, making sure that you're committing to doing whatever that is over and over again.

And I think there's so much advantage or permission in realizing that you don't need to be unafraid before you take action. I think in the past, I always felt like I needed to be fully prepared. I needed to have all the facts. I needed to feel confident about my next step before I took it. And that is absolutely not true. The times where I take a step where I'm half baked, still formulating, but I know in my heart that this is what I want to do. That's when the magic seems to happen.

Yeah. Do you have any examples of that?

I mean, the biggest one, off the top of my head, was that my biggest life change I've ever made was the least planned, which was leaving my job in finance. And there's caveats to that of I saved enough money to make sure that I could live for a year if I didn't know what was next. But ultimately, it came down to me taking that leap of faith and really trusting. It didn't come down to me forecasting my expenses for the year. It didn't come down to me trying to think about what was next, because what ended up happening next was completely unpredictable and unforecastable, if that's a word. It was me meeting a stranger on the Internet through another stranger and starting something together.

And do you think that. Did you build up that confidence of doing things for yourself when you'd made that move? Had you done other things before that that got you ready to do it?

I think what prepared me the most and what listeners could do to start strengthening that muscle, I think it really comes back to discomfort like you were talking about. It's becoming the type of person who can do hard things and becoming the type of person who not only puts up with discomfort, but they actively seek it out. So I had been practicing physical discomfort through ice baths and breath work and working out and more emotional discomfort. I don't know if that's the right term, but learning about ways to handle the complexity and the chaos of life. So I studied stoicism and got really familiar with a lot of the key tenants there about separating what you can control and what you can't control. And I felt like before. So before I made that big leap, it was definitely three or four years of lots of personal development books and podcasts and reading and attending webinars and seminars and just preparing myself to do the hard thing and kind of strengthen my muscle to do whatever it is that was gonna come next.

Hmm. And for your clients, have you seen what helps them the most Are they. Are they having that same mantra with doing it scared, doing it unprepared, and then doing it again, or have they. Do they have to do something first before they can get there?

A little bit of both. So all of the coaching calls end with action items. It's a small step that they can take between now and the next session that's going to get them closer to that big goal. And sometimes the action item is easy and there's no fear attached, but a lot of times it's okay. You said you want to do this thing. You said you want to go perform at an open mic. How does next week look? So things like that, where they do take small steps, it wouldn't be like we wouldn't jump straight to the open mic. It would be, let's find the smallest possible step you can take that's gonna flex some of that doing it scared muscle and gradually will work to the big goal. But it's a little bit of that and then it's also. That's the very tangible action piece of coaching. Then there's this less tangible part of coaching. I call it the magic of coaching, which is sometimes they'll just realize in a session that they've been holding onto this story for their whole life. That's not helping them. Or they'll have this paradigm shifting moment just by hearing themselves talk through me, asking questions through me. It usually happens through me. Reflecting back to them something that they have been unable to see. Whether it's a blind spot or an incongruency between. They say they want this thing, but this is how they keep acting.

Yeah. It's so interesting. It's going back to that whole, like the answers are inside of you. It's learning how to tap into that. Right. And it sounds like that's especially from listening to that. The celebration interview you did with your client. You're teaching them how to do that in themselves, which I really like because I think there's some coaches that make you think you need them forever, you know, and. And it feels like you're. You're doing it in a way of I'm helping give you the tools so you can discover it for yourself.

That is definitely the goal. Autonomy and being able to do all of these things that we work together on by yourself in the future is the goal. I want all of my clients to be fully autonomous, crushing it, doing really cool things, that I get to hang out with them in the future, not as a coach, but just as someone in their life cheering them on.

What Would you say would be a good mindset hack for this? When the self doubt creeps in, what do you think? Something they could either say to themselves or something that they could do to, I mean, overcome that story or to be able to move through the doubt.

The most helpful thing for me personally and for other people is to just realize that being scared is okay. Not even okay, being scared is good. It means that you're not a psychopath, that you have normal emotional intelligence and ranges. And you should be scared because you're doing something that you've never done before. You're doing something that probably means a lot to you. If it is something you're working on. With me, we're definitely talking about dreams. And you care a lot about it. So it makes sense that you haven't done it before. You care a lot about it. A lot of times it's going to be a shift from your normal day to day. You're kind of putting yourself out there. So all three of those things together equate to being scared to do it. And if you just accept that, okay, I'm scared, and that's okay, that has really helped me and maybe you can relate to this. Stacy, when you're giving a speech at Toastmasters and your palms are sweating and you're shaking, if the mental talk is, oh my gosh, why am I sweating? Why am I shaking? It's so unhelpful. That just makes, at least for me, it makes myself more nervous. Whereas if you're up there and you're like, yeah, my palms are sweating, I'm shaking, it's because I'm nervous, but I'm doing it. It's. It's such a more helpful mindset, I think.

Yeah. So it's almost acknowledging your body and what it's feeling and that it's normal and not that it's bad. And then you're able to almost accept that and move forward in whatever action you're doing, which helps you move through the fear even more.

I think it's exactly that. It's complete acceptance of what is showing up. Whether that's fear, apprehension, excitement. It's complete acceptance and then realizing that the piece you do have control over is how you spin that narrative, how you take action. There's this famous parable in personal development where this. I believe it was Marissa Peer. It might be someone else. She is a therapist who works with really famous people and she worked with two rock stars and one rock star came up to her and was like, I can't perform on stage anymore. Every time I step out there, I'm in front of all those people under the lights, my palms start sweating, my hand starts shaking, my heart starts pounding and I get so nervous that I can't perform. And then there's another rock star who comes to her and they're talking about his passion for performing. And he goes, every time I step on stage, my palms start sweating, my hands start shaking, my heart starts pounding. It's the best feeling ever. I'm so excited and I'm ready to have an amazing experience with all these people. So I think it's accepting what is showing up for you and then choosing a story or a narrative that's helpful moving forward.

Yeah. It makes me think of a good friend of mine, she calls anxiety excited. So it's like a reframe. So when she's feeling, I don't even think she thinks, she doesn't even realize she's anxious anymore. Now she just thinks it's excited whether you're going down. I think her example was she was going on Shark Tank for the first time and she's in the line and everyone's like freaking out and, and she's like, I'm just feeling excited. It's the same feeling inside.

And it's actually, this is really cool. It's actually an identical physiological response in the body. Excitement and anxiety or apprehension are the same response. So might as well choose the one that's going to help you.

So good. And then what do you think in terms of the goal for someone with self doubt? What would be a good goal for them to be able to continue to, to move forward?

That's a good question. I would say that the best way to set a goal related to self doubt would be choose something you want to accomplish that scares you a little and excites you a lot and consistently take action towards that and prove to yourself that you can do the thing even though you're scared, even though there's obstacles. And I think it is like any other muscle, just starting small, starting with lighter weight, do the reps, put in the practice, achieve the PR and then you can move up to the next thing. I don't think it would be super helpful to say I want to go speak in front of a hundred thousand people. If you get nervous talking in front of five, like start, start at Toastmasters, talk in front of 10 people and then gradually work it up. But I think the best goal would be one that scares you a little and excites you a lot.

And what would Be a way, do you think, to hold yourself accountable to do that while you're still scared and being able to. To do it anyway?

I'm obviously biased because I'm a coach. I would say hire a coach. It's the reason why I have a coach and will have a coach for the rest of my life. It is so helpful having someone who not only holds you accountable, but provides the weekly or bi weekly space to figure out what is getting in the way, what are the actual obstacles and getting clear on those. Instead of it just being this huge, this huge landscape of self doubt, you can kind of break it down into small things to work on week by week. So that's option one. Option two is find an accountability partner who's a friend, a family member, someone who cares about you and wants you to achieve that goal, who's gonna text you, who's gonna hold you accountable. And I think even one step further than that is get someone to do it with you. So the two of you are both in it. You're both overcoming the self doubt together and you're holding each other accountable in a way where if you tell someone you're gonna wake up at 6am and go on a run with them, it's a lot harder to bail on. That is if it's just you going on a run at 6am by yourself because you actually, you're letting someone down.

Yeah, I think that's what you said is really powerful too because I've been playing around with this myself. I noticed I do peloton virtually and I have a friend of mine that I do it with. But then she started. We started adding more people to the group and it doesn't feel as. It's not as hard for me to say I can't do it because now it's not one person, it's multiple people. So I know they're doing it anyway. And I think it's important to know that how you operate and what you're, you know. Yeah. What I love it at one point. Like my boyfriend, he doesn't need any accountability, he can just get on the bike. But for me right now that's where I'm at. And so I think it's important to know what you actually need in order to be able to do the thing.

Yeah. Sometimes the bigger the group, the more places there are to hide. And one phrase that we use in this community I'm a part of, it's called men and women of discomfort. We're all about seeking voluntary discomfort to improve our lives is we, we say that we're going to put ourselves on the hook for something. So put yourself on the hook for something. Put yourself on the hook for overcoming your self doubt, for achieving that goal by simply declaring what it is that you're going to do and then telling everyone you know about it. There's nothing scarier and more motivating than publicly sharing your goal and what you're trying to do. Because that's when you can leverage the lizard brain, the thousands years of evolution that we have that's afraid of failing publicly in front of the the tribe or the community. So I think that's an option too.

Yeah. That kind of makes me add to the do the thing, start a podcast challenge because you were an expert on that panel. And I'm thinking even if that's what your podcast is, it's just you wanting to do things and you using it as a vehicle to declare to the world what you're doing. That almost seems worth it right there.

A hundred percent. Just that declaration. Just putting yourself on the hook for anything, even if it's small, is going to be more effective than if you keep that internally and don't tell anyone about it.

I'd love to hear a couple of questions that you would think someone could ask themselves to like pattern interrupt the self doubt. So if the self doubt is creeping in, what would be a few questions they can ask to get them out of that?

I think step one would be ask yourself why am I scared? Which is probably some iteration of failing and maybe failing publicly. What else would I ask people or what should they ask themselves? I think getting clear on why you're scared is important for the first part. And then what's coming to me is that there's this. Okay, here we go. This is, this is what I think people should do. It's. It's not an original thought, but it's a stoic exercise that is really, really powerful. It's called fear setting. So you write out what it is that is scaring you, whether it's a goal or some other thing that's bothering you. And you go through every scenario. So you list out, okay, what happens if this works out great and it's best case scenario. What happens if this doesn't work out at all? I fail publicly, it's worst case scenario. Everyone finds out that I'm a failure. And actually taking that thought through to the end and writing it down in a journal is how I do, really helps show you that you're gonna be okay no matter What? Because when you write down like, okay, this is worst case scenario, you take it one step further and you say, if worst case scenario happens, how will I handle that? What will I do? And having that plan of attack to move forward, even if the worst case scenario happens really helps a lot with taking action and being less afraid. Because normally our mind goes, oh my gosh, worst case scenario. And then it just kind of ends there with a mental image of the world up in flames and everyone hating you. But it's not going to be like that. And there's always a way forward.

What would be a plan of attack to move forward?

I think it totally depends on the situation. Like, if what comes to mind right now is just giving a speech, if that's what you want to do, if you want to give a speech, I'll use a personal example. I wanted to give a speech. I did give a speech at my sister's wedding. And worst case scenario would have been me blacking out while I was up there, not remembering my lines, making a fool of myself. And that'd be worst case scenario. The step to move forward would be that realizing, okay, people give bad speeches all the time at weddings. People probably don't care about it as much as I'm caring about it, but my family's still going to love me. My sister's not going to excommunicate me from her life. And it would show me that I needed to join Toastmasters and become better at speaking.

Isn't that amazing when I think about it? Cause I think you told me that before that's what why you joined, right, was for that speech. It's amazing how we met now because of that speech. All these things that happen from just one decision that you make in your life. And you could have said, no, sorry, I'm not gonna do the speech. Right, or you could have decided to do it, but not have joined Toastmasters. But just that one single decision, like all these things have now rippled from that.

It is crazy to think about that single decision point and all of the magic that has come from that decision.

So cool. Well, I'd love to hear your number one piece of advice for the listeners on doing the thing. And we can say for the context of this talk, which is overcoming self doubt if you want. Or we could, we could do something different. But what would be your number one piece of advice?

I feel like a broken record, but it's literally to just act. It's to take that terrified action, to do it scared, and then do it again. I Skipped a step, do it scared, do it unprepared, and then do it again. There is no. There's, there's no way you're gonna achieve your goals, your dreams, there's no way to improve your life unless you actually take action. You can sit there and think about it all you want, but at some point, you have to put your foot down and you have to take action. It doesn't have to be a huge action. You can start small, but it's the little thing that sets the bigger picture in motion. To relate it back to what you just said, it was me signing up for Toastmasters that introduced me to you, that introduced me to all of these amazing people. And you never know what's going to happen. That's. That's the beautiful part of life. It's that unplanned, unforecastable part of it is you don't know what's going to happen. But in order to unlock all of that, you have to take action. You have to take that first step. So do it scared, do it unprepared, do it again, take terrified action.

And so I have one more question on that. So when they're doing it scared and they're doing it unprepared, I'm thinking there's something that happens in their mind in between there when they're going unprepared and they're like, I'm not prepared to do this. What's that moment? What. What are they saying to themselves right then?

I'm actually really glad you brought that up because do it unprepared sounds somewhat flippant, like, oh, you don't need to prepare, you'll just go for it. When I say do it unprepared, what that means to me is you're never going to be as prepared as you'd like to be to do something scary. Right? You could always prepare more. It's more just getting to a certain point where you're. You at least know you're not going to die when you do the thing. So it's, it's, it's balancing the fear with the realization that you could spend the rest of your life preparing and never take action. So between, between taking on the task, putting yourself on the hook for the scary thing, and then doing it unprepared, there is some time to do a little bit of practice, do a little bit of whatever it is. I mean, it's so scenario specific. If someone asks you to give a toast at a birthday party, you don't have time to go into the bathroom and write it down and rehearse it. You just got to jump in and do it scared, do it unprepared. But there's other things where you have a little more time. Maybe you have a week to write something down or you have a week to do X or.

Yeah, yeah. And I think part of the reason why you're in that group, the discomfort group, it's the more that you're doing things scared and prepared and then moving, the less scary it becomes and the more exciting it can end up becoming. Because you're practicing that muscle of seeing what's on the other side 100%.

The rest of your life gets so much easier when you do hard things because you can always relate it back to, okay, well, I did this really hard thing. This probably isn't as bad. You also, there's this concept of the cookie jar. David Goggins talks about this a lot, is that every time you do something scary, every time you do something really hard that you're proud of, you put a cookie in the, in the mental cookie jar. And then whenever you come up against something that's really challenging and you're questioning yourself, that self doubt is coming up, you reach into that mental cookie jar and you, you pull one out and you look at all the things you've done and you say, wow, I did this thing in the past. I didn't think I was going to be able to do it, but I did. It's probably the same scenario here.

So good, I'd love you to share with the listeners about you because I know since I've had you on and since you've been on the expert panel, your coaching program has evolved even to another level. And I think a lot of it's from these celebration interviews you're getting to do with your clients. So you're becoming more and more in tune with the people that you're helping. So I'd love you to kind of share more about that as well.

Perfect. This is exactly what we're talking about. I'm gonna put myself on the hook or just speak into existence what I am moving towards, what I want to happen. So the first shift was realizing that human potential coach feels so much more powerful and exciting than life and leadership coach. I've always been obsessed with human potential. This idea that you can increase your capacity to do life through studying, through learning, through practice, that's, that's human potential. That's like the theory. And I put an emphasis, an emphasis on practice. The practice is what you do on a daily basis, it's how you build yourself up through habits and mindsets. It's doing hard things like seeking discomfort. But what I'm most excited about is that I got clarity on who it is I want to serve. My mission statement has been in the past. My mission in life is to help people realize their potential. But it felt like there was a key piece missing there. It's like, okay, that's kind of generic. How do you realize potential? Can someone even realize their potential? Isn't potential limitless and endless? And I got really clear that how you realize your potential is through having extraordinary life experiences. I think that's why we're here. Ultimately, we're here for love and to positively contribute to others and create love and form relationships. But having legendary, extraordinary, whatever adjective you want to throw in their life experiences is what lights my soul on fire. It's what I'm going to remember at the end of my life when I'm laying there old and wrinkled. All these amazing adventures I went on. I think that's. I think that's why I'm here. And specifically, I'm here to help other people realize their full potential through having these legendary life experiences. And that's the kind of person I want to work with. I don't want to work with, to be honest. I don't want to work with someone who is super content with their 9 to 5 and they don't really have any hobbies. They don't really have any passions. There's nothing wrong with that. Please don't mishear me. But I want to work with the person who's like, oh my gosh, I want to backpack across Antarctica on a unicycle. Like, just crazy things. And they want to involve other people. They have these big dreams that they have always wanted to do but haven't done yet. That's. That's what I'm just. I'm on fire thinking about it.

It's amazing. And it. It just makes me think too, is there might be someone listening that can't even imagine that yet. Right. But then the more they're able to lean into the discomfort and doing it, scared. It's like all of a sudden your dreams get bigger, you know, which is then kind of where you're able to lead them into that.

Into that world and to kind of go full circle on what we've been talking about. That's what hit me on Friday. I had this beautiful moment where I realized that all of these steps I've been Taken in different areas of my life where I have no. No idea what I'm doing or where it's going. I feel like they're starting to come together a bit. So there's the coaching piece, which is I am professionally trained to ask questions that evoke awareness and elicit and reveal what people really want to do with their lives. That's a really helpful skill because, as you mentioned, a lot of people don't know what their dream is. I had no idea what my dream is. I couldn't articulate it. I just had this burning desire inside of me telling me that what I was doing with my life wasn't it. And not being able to pour that energy into something was killing me. I remember being in my jobs and wanting so much to pour that energy into something and change the world and live a big life, but I couldn't because I didn't know where to put that energy. So the coaching is a huge piece of eliciting that from people and helping them find what their dream is. And then on the other hand, I realized I started a podcast called the Dare to Dream Podcast two years ago with my buddy, and we've been all over the place with it. We started out, it was just us talking together, talking about what it's like to quit our jobs and follow our dreams. And then we had a stint where we were bringing on lots of amazing guests like yourself. And we're kind of at this point where we're going to keep doing that. But I had this vision where maybe the Dare to Dream podcast is meant to be more of a narrative style podcast that tells the story of clients I work with. It shows the character arc of their hero's journey and ends with them accomplishing that, that big dream experience. And so it feels like everything that has happened in my life and that I'm working on is starting to come together a little bit more with the ultimate intention of helping people realize their potential through having extraordinary life experiences. And that just lights me up.

So cool. Well, I can see it for the listeners that are listening. You just feel it, I'm sure. Please share where they can listen to your podcast and then also get involved with your coaching as well.

Absolutely. So the podcast is the Dare to Dream Podcast. You can listen to it on Spotify, on Apple Podcasts, Just Google it. It'll come up. And then for coaching or to just learn about me or send me an email and just talk. Www.gregoryrusslebenedict.com is my website that's the best Place you can learn more about me. You can book a call with me to chat about coaching, chat about life. You can also join my newsletter there that I mentioned. I write a weekly newsletter talking about what I'm learning about, what I'm thinking about, quote of the week, what I'm reading. As you can tell, I love to learn and I love to share that. So those are all great ways to get connected with me.

So cool. Thank you so much for doing this with me. And it was so sudden, too, and you just were able to come on and give your. Your nuggets of wisdom like always. I really, really do appreciate you and having you a part of the do the Thing community has been really extraordinary.

I appreciate you, Stacy. And I want to share one final thing. You sent me a text a couple weeks ago after we were talking about something, and I took immediate action on it, and you texted me. You're like, oh, I love how you just take action right away. And it was a really powerful affirmation. And that ever since you've said that, like, I've been. It was almost the evidence I needed. That myself needed is like, oh, yeah, like, I can do things right away and just do the thing. And so I want to thank you for that because ever since you said that, I've just been like, boom, like, knocking it out as soon as it happens. And it's been making a big positive impact in my life.

It's so cool because it's that identity, right? Once you're. Once you have that identity, then you just felt your. Your whole body and your being follows through with it.

Yes, 100%.

And it's funny because I don't know you any differently. So, yeah, that's so cool.

Now I have to keep living up to that.

Thanks so much. You're. You're awesome. I really appreciate. Oh, wait, let's do a little tagline. I've been playing around with taglines for the Thing. What do you think a good end ending do the Thing is for the listeners?

What do you have so far?

I mean, it's been different every time. Just whatever comes alive at some point. I'll probably listen to them all and then aggregate them. But do the thing that really fires you up, that you want to do, coming from inside of you, like, something like that is kind of what's coming up.

I mean, what. What Vinnie and I always say is, I don't know where this phrase came from, but it's like lighting your soul on fire. So do the thing that lights your soul on fire. But I want it to be. I want it to be personal and specific for you. And what. I think you have to come up with that.

Yeah, no, for sure. I'll have to think about it. But no, that gives me a good. It gives me a good framework. For sure.

Give me. Give me one more take of it.

Okay. Yeah.

Just practice.

Do the thing that is right for you. That feel. Oh. Do the thing that feels alive for you. Do the thing that feels alive for you. I like that. That actually might work.

Okay. The feeling alive. I don't think I've heard anyone say that before. You. And whenever you say that, it resonates.

Thank you. Thank you. All right, well, thanks so much.

Thank you, Stacy. I appreciate you so much. And we'll talk more about the other stuff soon.

Totally.

Thanks for listening to the do the Thing podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. But even more, we hope you'll be inspired to do the Thing. Do you have a burning question on Doing the Thing that you'd like answered? How about an inspiring do the Thing story of your own that you'd like to share? We'd love to hear all about it. Just leave us a voice message at dothething callcap or email us@helloothethingpodcast.com.