Welcome to the Adaptive Mindset. I'm Brett Gallant, a cybersecurity thought leader and founder of Adaptive Office Solutions. Here, we don't just talk tech, we unlock the strategies, stories, and mindset shifts you need to stay secure, lead boldly, and thrive in a digital world. Let's get started. Welcome back to the Adaptive Mindset. I'm really pleased to have with me today, my guest, Stacey Shifflett. She is someone who truly embodies transformation and intentional living. She's a visionary entrepreneur, multi-time international best-selling author and founder and CEO of Modern Consciousness. She's also the co-author of Mindset Matters with none other than Jack Canfield. And she also served as producer for Lisa Nichols Broadway show, when my soul speaks. Talk about living at the, at the intersection of purpose and impact. Stacey walks her talk, having rebuilt her life after the collapse of a 28 year marriage and even led the acquisition of a $50 million company with no personal financial investment. Her story, her energy and her insights are powerful and real. Stacey, Really Thank you so much. We had a great small discussion before we started, and there's so many avenues where we can go. Let's talk about what you were discussing before. There was a few things that Yes. How important is it that we learn how to adapt to change? Because life is a series of adaptations, I suppose, right? And that's what growth is. Even growth, we're adapting to new capabilities, new thought process, new mindset, new beliefs, all of that. So, And I've adapted tons because I've done so many different things in my life, right? From the hospitality industry, you know, to acquiring a technology company, to having a construction company, to raising llamas on a farm for over a decade. So I have a natural tendency to reinvent myself about every 10 years, which I didn't realize till later in life. But yeah, when you look back and you don't really realize that I did not realize that until later in life. Yeah, I probably didn't realize that until maybe five, six years ago, because it was just naturally something that, you know, that I that I did as I aspired to move my So what do you think has led you to adapt like that, just by force or You know, I am a person, I don't know, I just have ideas, right? You know, when I was 16, I wanted to go to work. I had the idea that I wanted to go to work and I came home and presented my parents with a with a permission slip that they had to sign to let me go to work. It wasn't, you know, I was fortunate it wasn't a need from, you know, a very stable middle-class family. And, you know, I just always worked toward the next level, I suppose. And I don't know, it kind of came naturally to me. The first huge change I probably made professionally anyway, I ended up, I was doing well working in the hospitality industry and making money as a youngster, right? I was like, I don't need to finish college and I never did. But when I, yeah, when I got married in 1983, I'm divorced now, as you said, I was like, oh, I guess I better get an office job. So it seemed, you know, the hour seemed more conducive to married life. And so I made that, I made that change and through the, blessings of someone at my mother's church who gave me a job because it wasn't that easy to switch careers at that point. I did not have a college degree and I didn't really have the office experience. So I started keeping books for a lady and she started teaching me a little bit of word processing and it was a very small consulting firm. I have always just naturally stepped up to the plate. So as she was losing people, I kept stepping up and within a year, I'm going to date myself, but I rolled out the first IBM PC desktop computers to With no formal training, right? I had some good mentors. I'm pretty well self-taught. I took to it. I just learned it. I was eager to learn it. And that It's incredible. Like we were talking about adaptability, you The other thing we often forget to look at is who's in our network. the who can connect me. And you had that connection with someone in your church that helped you land that first, that job, that office job, and you adapted and embraced it and pivoted. And you had that mindset that I'm assuming that I got this, I can do that. Am I Yes, I always had a lot of confidence. Not arrogance, but confidence, right? And I have a lot of lived experience and that is Yeah, and that hunger to reinvent yourself. You mentioned earlier, you've reinvented yourself every decade. But what's, what's your secret to You know, I think, um, you know, I think there's probably a couple of them after I started working in the, you know, the office, the professional world and whatnot. Um, you know, I had some ambition. I didn't really know what that ambition was, except just to sort of get to the next best level for me. And I think, I think we often forget. when we're looking for a direction to go, that it is not by comparison with other people. It's the next best level for us. So along that way, I had gotten a job as a help desk person, a technical help desk for a software company that automated federal acquisition and procurement processes. And again, I applied myself, I loved the work, and I came to be known at that time as a subject matter expert in that field. And so, switched a few jobs around, that's the tech company that I did the acquisition of as well. And so I just fully step, when I step in, I fully step in, I'm committed, I'm present, I do it. The other side of it for me is I listen to my intuition and Yeah, and even with the acquisition company, I literally, or the company I acquired, I literally, Woke up one morning and said, I need to go buy this company. Now, I didn't tell myself no. I didn't tell myself I had no money. I had no idea how to do this. I had no mergers and acquisitions experience. I didn't tell myself any of that. I picked up the phone and I called the owner. I used to work for them. said, hey, I'd like to buy this company. I don't know how to do that. And he said, well, funny, you called because we just listed it with a broker. So I knew nothing about that process, but pulled somebody in with me to put all the presentation decks and all that stuff together. I knew all the people at the company. I knew what the company did. I knew the space. I knew the software. And it took nine months. of pushing that rock uphill, but I always had confidence that it was just meant to happen. Some others along the way, of course not, right? They called me a cashless investor and said I was crazy and a lot of other things. But it took nine months. And we did, you know, we, we, one of the top investment firms in the world put the money forth to buy the company. And I got a very lucrative employment contract out of it at a buyout agreement, right. And what they call sweat equity. And when they flipped the company in five years, I got out, but it didn't. doesn't really ever occur to me generally. It's a little bit harder later in life, I will say that. This has been a little, modern consciousness has been a little different experience for me. But I always had confidence that I could absolutely I can feel that for you. You spoke your future into existence when you did that. A lot of people, I was listening to a thought later this morning when I was on a six kilometer hike, feeding my mind and giving me energy. A lot of people will say, I can do this. But what he shared was, I will do this. In your own way, you were saying, I will do this. I will make Yes, and I felt it was meant to happen. I mean, I felt that strongly about it. And I feel that strongly about my current business as well. It's been interesting because I resisted the idea for modern consciousness and this theory of modern consciousness and the aspects and all this stuff. I don't know if you've looked at my website. It was just kind of coming in through meditation. a period of time where I dove very, very deeply into personal development work. This was after my marriage imploded after 28 years. And I have a little bit of different perspective than some. So when I launched this personal development journey, of course, I was wanting to learn about myself, but I also had this urge to really learn about humanity, right? The state of humanity and the human mind and our behavior and whatnot. It just intrigues me and it interests me. So when I was going through that, I was kind of looking at both. And then the ideas came for this company. And this Well, I was in my mid sixties, you know, and I just kept, I'm like, I, I don't know where all this is coming from, but I am not your girl. Right. This is so different. And I don't know how to do this. Yeah. I don't want to start another company and you know, so on and so forth. Um, but. It wouldn't leave me alone. It would not leave me alone. So I was here at the house one day meditating and I'm like, okay, fine. Tell me what to do, right? What do I do? What's my next best step? And I just got one word, which was write. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, I've been writing everything down, right? I was capturing all the information and the ideas as I was inspired to. But as soon as I said, okay, I surrender, I surrender. I will write. I don't know what I'm gonna write, but I'll write. And within an hour, I think it was, I had a text message from a friend of mine in Canada that said, yeah, from your great country of Canada that said, hey, I've got a book publisher friend of mine up here and she has an opening in And, you know, my eyes kind of rolled up to the sky and I said, yes, because how could I say no? I had to write a rather large check to do that as well, but it was through the process of writing the chapter in that book, Ignite the Hunger in You, that I realized, wow, I could launch a company along with this book. So that was the first iteration of the website and so on and so forth for this company. But yeah, I finally just had to surrender to it because it wouldn't let me go. And if you have something that is impacting you and inspiring you that strongly, you probably meant to follow it, right? At least do the due diligence to give it some consideration and Well, and I can connect with that in so many levels because there are some things that I'm contemplating doing. And what I see with what you did, it was something on your heart that you knew you were meant to do. And at the same time, when we do these things and we embrace that future version of ourselves, we're doing something we were meant to do, that we're meant to help serve. And with that intention, the universe responded. It brought that opportunity with less into your life. I actually have my journal here that I wrote yesterday. I wrote down something. There was a question about prompt. What would make today? Great. And I wrote down just something simple, but it meant a lot. I wrote She's older now and she was out of the house. She didn't call me yesterday. I wrote that yesterday. I just had a conversation with her about an hour and a half before recording this podcast. Just things show They do. Yes, they do. I think the term for that these days is manifestation, right? Yeah. And it's an interesting process. And we've all experienced things like that, and not dissimilar to you. Oh, I haven't heard from so-and-so for a while. I really like to hear from them. And all of a sudden they call, you get an email or something. It's interesting. And I think that the thing is to appreciate those, to quiet your mind enough to notice them because so often we're so busy, we don't notice these things and these opportunities and these little nuggets of joy bypass us because we're so focused on what we're doing, right? The way that I generally phrase that, is that when the activities of your life take over the momentum of, create the momentum in your life instead of intentional decisions, I think that's when we get in trouble because we're not present. We veer away from what's most important to us just naturally, right? Because we're just busy and I'm going to take this in a different direction, because we're on the treadmill of life. Yes. And we're letting everything else dictate where we're going. And you're a person that really has forged their own path. And I see a lot of people that were just existing. And you I do, I do. And I have an interesting perspective on it as well, because I actually call that first, the first aspect of my theory of modern consciousness, I call automaton 2.0. And I call it 2.0 to honor everything that we've done and how we've grown to that point. But I have a little different take on it because I don't know how else it could be, right? Because we come into this world completely helpless. We are totally dependent on others around us that have to teach us everything and create all of our experiences for many years, right? Our families, the institutions that we're enrolled in, schools, so on and so forth. There's really not any other way for it to be. And then what I think, you know, I think that often, you know, we continue down that path and we're executing on decisions that we made sometimes decades ago, right? Where you chose a career path or get married or have a family and whatnot. And we're continuing with those decisions, but we've never really, we never really kind of stop and say, where am I in this season of my life and what direction do I want to gently move that toward now? And I think that's a very, very important process. An example that I often use is, and I'm sure you know parents that have their children enrolled in everything, right? Posture child here. Yeah. Live in hockey rinks starting Sometimes that, and we do that with the best of intentions. We really, really do. But our schedules will get so hectic that people can easily lose track of the outcome they were originally trying to create, right? So, you're running around, you're missing family dinners, you're eating in the car, you're at the soccer field or, you know, at the sidelines and Yeah, and you know, your kid's playing a game and you're checking email, but you're not really present. So, not you, you, right? The global you. And it's an example that so many parents can Yeah, yeah. And it's kind of like, okay, Let's use that time in the car instead of being on a conference call, you know, to spend with your children and nurture them and get to know them. Pay attention at the game, right? So it's a matter of intentionally, we don't, we're not present intentionally, right? We want to be present. We want to be part of that. But we forget and we get so wrapped up again, our schedules, our activities start driving our thoughts, our life, our choices, our actions, and we're not slowing down and going, wait a minute, this is what this is really all Yes, yes. I've heard that shared in another way, and I've been very mindful of it. Now, in the past, I was not the best at it. But what I do now, especially at home, my children come to the kitchen, and I might be doing something, and I have wonderful children, my six-year-old or my nine-year-old, and I have older children, they'll come up to me, Daddy, Daddy, I wanted to show you something. If I have my cell phone in my hand, I take the cell phone, I flip it upside down and put it aside so I don't, I'm present. I spend that time with them and connect, be there, not having that piece of technology as Yeah. And it's so important because things are not promised, you know, things that the future is not promised. And, um, you know, I think it is very important to take that time. You know, my, my, my son's in his thirties. Now the best example for me right now at the house on a daily basis is my two senior dogs, right? I have two dogs that are, I don't know, 12 and 13, I guess it'll be 13, 14 this year. And, um, When they want attention, I don't go, oh, wait, I'm, you know, generally, if I'm in the middle of a podcast, I'm probably gonna tell them to wait outside the room in one's One's pretty upset about not being at my feet here in the office at the moment, but it's catching ourselves in being aware, right? Because it's so easy to say, excuse me, you know, later, because I'm in the middle of something, as you just mentioned with your children. And that's why it's so important for us to be aware and not just automatically react to those things and go, oh yeah, let me sit, you know, let me talk to you, honey, with your kids or, you know, come here, Johnny and Rambo, let's sit on the couch for a minute. Mommy will love on you a little bit. Right. With the dogs. Um, because they won't be around forever. And, um, It's important. It's Absolutely. When you said that, you know, I'm thinking, you know, the future is not promised. We don't know what tomorrow will bring. We don't know if, if our loved ones will be with us. I'm actually, I don't know why I was thinking about it, but I had a, a really exceptional man that worked for me. Mike, he was in work and we had a good laugh, good moment. And he, he took the day off for the next day because he had a doctor's appointment. And it was in another city, drove for an hour and a half to that community. We lost him that day, lost him in And I'm thinking of Mike, an exceptionally gifted young man that had all the best of intentions, the future, and he was a gift to everyone. And we don't know, tomorrow is not promised. So I've been very mindful of that, even more so ever since that day, you lose somebody as special as that. We don't know if our children, if we're going to have that hug or if we're going to be able to, and the season of life I'm at, I have children, I have my youngest is six. So I know everything is going to be for the last time. The last, you know, last going to kindergarten, the last getting Mm-hmm. Learning to ride a bike, all of those milestones. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's all these, so embrace it. Every, every aspect of those moments is what I'm trying to do and being Yeah. And those, you know, that's, that's where most of our joy comes from is in those moments, you know, Not that we don't feel joyful when we finish a big project at work or any of those things, but those really heartfelt moments, they're not fleeting and they stack. So the more intentional we are and nurture that, the more it stacks. and the happier we are and the more joy we experience. And that's one of the things that I think is so important. Everybody has a default emotion, right? The emotional frequency that they are generally in and the one that they go to most often, right? I'm sure you know some people that think the worst is gonna happen. No matter what it We all do. Yeah, and then, you know, there are other people that, you know, pessimists, optimists, whatever, but I think it's really important to be aware of that and to intentionally change your default emotion as best you can, because not everything is joyful, but to one of joy and gratitude and find the joy and the And that's not to say that bad things don't happen and we grieve and so on and so forth, but, and we should honor those emotions, but we don't want to stay there. We don't want to stay there, you I look at some of those emotions as guideposts. What can I learn from this? What is true about that? What is challenging? Sometimes my perception could be, sometimes it is my own limiting beliefs. Yes, they really are good guideposts. I call emotions and then emotional triggers, which we chatted about for a moment before the show. I call them waypoints on our treasure map to joy because they give us so much information. right, if we can kind of unravel it and figure it out, and why are we reacting that way? Or why are we feeling this way? And where did this emotion come from? And why have I turned this into something negative about me or what have you, right? Because that's what we so often are inclined to do. I think Yes, I've heard Dan Martell share it Yes, yes. Well, your thoughts will show you where you're not free Yeah, and they very much, and that's really showing up for me in a lot of ways. The old, the version of who I am today, I look at that now in some of the similar things that have happened in the past, because I've grown and worked on myself and I handle those things emotionally much better and in different ways than I used to. It's like that. I don't know how that would show up on the treasure map, but I, I've at least embraced it and understand Yeah, it's important. I think one of the first books that I read was The Four Agreements. And I put two of those, you know, most of them we try to live by, but I put two of those into practice immediately and started really focusing on them. And one was not to make assumptions. And if you can train yourself to not make assumptions, that's also amazing. And to not get offended, right? So, you know, when we start to look at what's offending us, Um, you know, the lady in the grocery store checkout, that's, you know, kind of gnarly to you when you're checking out and doesn't smile and is a little bit Well, maybe she just got told she has to work that evening and, and can't go home, you know, for family dinner or see her kids play, or maybe somebody just died. Now I learned that lesson really, really well when my first son died. And I was just devastated and sad, but I still had to function in certain ways, or it took me a little while to get there, but I had to function. And my state of mind, other people, just as I said with the grocery lady, will interpret like, what's wrong with her? What's wrong with me? You never know. and give people grace and give yourself grace. And it usually has absolutely nothing to do with you, right? It I would agree with that, yes. We look at life sometimes through our own lens, but there's other perceptions and other truths that we neglect to really see. And sometimes we're blinded by that, but that person may have had something traumatic happen to them, or they may have had a customer that really gave them a hard time before you. I try to bring levity and humor to every interaction like that. My mother has been in the hospital since It's a long time. It's been a journey. So I'm often going to Subway in the hospital, and she's at the point now where she's feeling better. So I go down and get some chips, Lay's chips. My mother loves that. There was this woman working behind the counter, and she was limping, and I could tell she was having a bad day. I just felt I could bring a little bit of humor. I said, would you like me to take care of your other leg? And the look on her face after I said that, she broke down into a smile. And it was so beautiful to see that she smiled and her day was a lot lighter. So when I left, after visiting my mother for some time, I came down, I peaked my head and I said, I just Yeah, it's important. I try to smile at pretty much everybody. We all remember the COVID days and wearing the masks. And that's the thing I hated the worst because you couldn't connect with other people, right? Yeah, you couldn't smile at anybody at the grocery store and everybody was afraid to walk by everybody. And it really deteriorated. human connection, you know? Because I smile at most everybody, you know, just like you said, and try to give a kind word or put a grocery cart back for someone or, you know, what have you. And those small acts make a big difference. And sometimes you don't know just how much it brightens that person's day or just how much they needed that little bit of Yeah, just making one little bit of an impact on somebody's day can have a compound effect, not Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, I'm thankful for those moments. I wanted to ask you, you acquired a $50 million company with no upfront investment. I have to ask you this. How did you do that? Yeah. I didn't have any idea how to do that. I had absolutely no idea how to do that. But I figured it out. And I... asked someone to join me in that process that I knew had some experience and could bring something to bear on that with So, um, you know, is that the same company we Yeah. And, um, and you know, we just, figured it out. I mean, I was working as a consultant anyway, so, you know, I was pretty good at putting a pitch deck or a deck together or what have you. And it would be so much easier now with AI, right? I didn't have AI back then, we just had to figure it out. But yeah, and we just made phone calls and pitched the deal. I mean, people thought we were nuts, really. Um, but we did it, you know, we did, we did do it. Yeah. You're, you're a person who's determined and has that mindset that you can, once you set your mind on it, it's Yeah, I was just like when I had the llama farm. We They're so cool. We had bought a farm and I was doing a little bit of technical writing and stuff. I was fortunate to be able to basically quit my job when my son was born, the son that's that survived. That's the son I have today, the first son. And I was looking for a way to create a home-based business and keep the land and land use and that kind of thing. And I landed on Llamas. I didn't have to I didn't have to slaughter them or any of that stuff. They're like big fancy show poodles. They're just, you know, a lot larger. But same with that, you know, I learned, I joined an association, I read, I had a great vet. You know, my ex-husband used to tell me, oh my God, one of those animal stubs, they're totally, you have the vet out. It wasn't quite that bad, but I got so good at vetting my own animals that I needed to vet less and less, right? It really got to where I only needed them in an emergency. And I remember, you know, and I had a breeding operation, you know, I bred and birthed animals. I could, if I had a breech birth, I could put those gloves on and turn that baby around and birth it. And my mother was visiting, I was from Miami, Florida is where I was born, right? I was a city girl all my life and my mom was visiting, she's deceased now, but she was visiting and she's like, where did you learn to do this? How do you do this? And I said, but again, I was interested, I was passionate about it, I learned about You jumped in, there was no excuses. You just, I can, determination. You have I used to sit out there at the barn and just kind of pinch myself like, oh my God, I can't believe I got my four board black fence in a barn and I have livestock. And you know, how cool is this? I always loved horses when I was little. It was the first word I said. And I didn't have the horses, but I had, you know, I had an amazing herd of llamas. I had up to 40 of them at one time and Yeah. Yeah. So you just do it. Don't let anybody tell you, you can't do it. You know, it takes, you have to put forth what I call right action. Is it perfect the first time? No. Second time? No. Third time? Probably not. But you learn, and that's how you learn. You experiment, you learn, you do it, you read, you The who that can support you. Yeah. The mastermind, your community experts. Yeah, and you work toward that goal and it helps to chunk it down. I think we forget to do that so many times too. We have our eyes set on that next huge goal. And I actually learned this from the llamas. because when training the babies, you know, halter training, it really doesn't do very good to grab that animal and put that halter on and fasten it and hook a lead to it and start dragging them around the place, right? Then that creates stress, tension, fear, you know, so many negative qualities. So I would chunk it down. The first thing I would do is just let them smell the halter and get used to me putting it to their nose and letting them smell it. And then I would just put the edge over their nose and take it off. Put the edge over their nose and take it off. Chunk it down until they were fine with that. It was like, yeah, I'm not phased about that. Then try to hook it up. you know, chunk it down into meaningful steps. And that's one of the things that I do. I mean, I believe in it wholeheartedly in my program, my Elevate Your Life program. That's what we do is chart your unique treasure map to joy, but in a way that is practical, efficient, and effective in your life, to move you in the direction of your aspirations. Because we start moving in that direction, and then it creates more momentum. But we have to take right action. It's not just gonna fall in our lap, generally speaking, without at least having the intention, the awareness, taking some action, so on And sometimes, I think there's a couple of angles that are resonating with me. There's number one, there's Often, sometimes people don't take action because of fear. And the other thing is, which I picked up from you during our conversation, you're a person who is very disciplined. And what I mean by that, when you make a decision, and discipline is a decision, so you were disciplined to learn everything you could to support the lamas, to the business growth, to the new identity that changing every 10 years, to this new phase of your life. I'd like you to shed some light and just give our audience a little bit more, shed a little bit more light on what you're doing now. Let's invite people into your world and tell people more directly about what you do and how they can connect with you. You're a person of so many gifts, it's Thank you, thank you. Yeah, if anybody goes to my website, which is modernconsciousness.com, and you know, the company name, Conscious Living in the Modern World, wow, With all of the modern stressors and everything else, right? Let's choose to do that. Everything we do is a choice, you know? And so that's how the name of the company came about through meditation or whatever, but that's the idea behind it. And you know, what I do, with my clients, well, if you go to my website, modernconsciousness.com, I actually have a free resource on there. I have a couple, but the one I'll share with you today is navigating your emotional triggers. It's a workbook. And like I said, if I could just have one piece of advice for people that is absolutely life-changing, it is that. And that workbook helps you go through that process and you can use it over and over and over again. And so what I do with clients is the first thing I do with every client and due to demand, I've pulled this out to be its own standalone module at this point is I call it a life assessment, get clarity. You cannot, charted path to where you want to go unless you know where you are today, right? It's just like a GPS. And so often we make decisions without really consulting our life, right? All of the different domains and how it's going to affect everything. Um, and we tend to look at things separately. We don't look at everything together. So I look at all of the life domains in a, in a very holistic way. And that we look at each individually what's going really well, what's not, um, you know, obviously we need to look at both, but we all, we often forget to to really articulate what's going good, what's going well, right? We want to say that too. And then look at how every area impacts the other, because they do. Because I find if you're having an issue someplace in your life, that issue is somewhere else as well. It's just disguised. It looks different. So I think doing the life assessment and gaining clarity on where you are today is the absolute foundation for you to create your future. Otherwise you try to solve the wrong problem, go off in the wrong direction, you create more stress, you know, whatever. We often end up creating things that we're really not wanting to create by doing that. And then we, you know, we look at aspirations, you know, what do you aspire in each area of your life? I look at that in terms of, you know, achievements of course, but I look at that in terms of how do you want to feel about that area, right? How do you want to feel in your relationship? How do you want, how do you want to feel in your home? How do you want to feel in your job, right? Let your emotions reflect back to you. And then we say, okay, so how do we get there? We're going to architect a bridge between where you are and where you want to go. But, but the thing that I do, people tend to bite off too much at once. And that's a Oh my God. I've seen so many people go to seminars and you know, and, and yes, you have epiphanies and yes, you have breakthroughs and you go, oh my God, I never thought of it that way. You know, I'm going to be a totally different person when you get home. Well, you can't just be a totally different You have to do it bite by bite. I often hear it One bite at a time, one bite at a time. And that's what my program does. We say, okay, where are we going to get the most positive And the other thing that's a little bit unique about my program, I'm a program analyst, program manager at heart. It is a process. It's a generic process with unique outcomes and it's repeatable. So once you have it and have gone through it, you can use it time and again, right? We evaluate so many things in our life, right? We look at our checkbook balances or our business metrics or whatever, the kid's great, whatever we're looking at. But we don't sit down and really reflect on where our life is at, at that moment. So it's something I really recommend people do at least once a year, but probably a couple of times a year to just say, okay, am I on track? And am I moving in the direction that I want to go to? And oh my God, if you have a big life upheaval, it's certainly time to sit down and do that before you It's interesting you said that of being on track. In the group I'm in, I do cybersecurity. I meet with my mastermind every Thursday. What we do once a quarter, collectively, we say, the leader and the mastermind says, okay, where are we? We go around the table. Are you on track? So when you were talking about this, I thought, hey, my life, this is something we should be doing almost every quarter because there's always a new understanding of where we are based on new experiences, new life challenges. Hey, am I on track? We can take your resource to help us with that. Make sure we're on Yeah. And with your cybersecurity meetings too, you have defined what on track means, right? You And again, in the busyness, we lose sight of the outcomes unless it's, I want that next promotion or I want my revenue to be this or whatever those are. Look at it in a human way, in the human capacity and in the whole container of your life. What outcome are you seeking? And I think we want to be happy and joyful and safe and secure. Is your life taking you in that direction? And if not, what changes? And sometimes there's small changes. You have to rewire your brain, right? You have to develop a new habit, but they're not always, these monumental things that you have to change, but you tweak it and you do it consistently, and then you develop that habit of thinking, and then it's second nature. And then you go, okay, what We could acquire a $50 million company with no upfront investment. Actually, but you're living testament that to that, we could, whatever that is for somebody. So yeah, like, I love this. Yeah, whatever, whatever that is. I mean, I never thought I would have a farm and raise livestock. You know, I had the opportunity to do it. And, you know, we had the resources, but still the opportunity and the resources without any effort. don't I have to ask you this question before we go. Brought it up and I should have picked up on the string. You talked about AI. I wish I had AI back then. How are you leveraging AI right now for you? What hacks I have. At first I was like, I don't know, I think this stuff is gonna dumb us down. Yes. But. It's not, it's an amazing resource. GPT is what I most often use. I've used a variety of tools. I have a paid version so that it is my private space. I am not training the model on my unique perspective in my company. And it gets to know you. You know, it gets to know you, it gets to know your voice. It edits writing for me quite frequently. You know, I can have it go through something. I will use it to help me. What I love is I can sit down and say, okay, I have this concept. I posted a blog series here just this week and last week or something. I ended up doing this little crazy social experiment. But I can talk to it and say, okay, this is what I'm doing and this is what I'm thinking. And so I put my original thoughts It knows the framework of me. It knows my voice at this point. It knows the framework of modern consciousness. So I can say from a modern consciousness perspective, what do you think, right? And the other thing is, don't just take back what it says. You can argue with it. It's your- Challenge it, yes, yes. It's your creation. It's not the tool's creation, right? It is there for a tool for you and support your creativity. I use it quite similar to you. I think of it as Yes. And if you need to do research, oh my God, you Right? Because, you know, even, I mean, I'm pre-internet day, so I go way back, but, you know, even with the internet and Google, right? Think how long it takes to get all of those pieces of information. And you can go into the tool now and say, I want you to research this subject and I specifically want to see this perspective and that perspective. And then you just ask it a lot of questions, but it's your questions, it's your personal thought and input that Yeah, I do that too. I actually give it a roll and I ask it to interview me one question at a time and give me three ridiculous answers and two thought-provoking answers. And then the content that I get and then I go back and forth and trigger. challenge it, and it challenges me. It's really interesting you're using that. I thought when you told me that you wish you had AI, I probably would have had an easy, well, we wrote a winning deck anyway, we made the deal, but I didn't know what went in it. I had to research all that stuff and figure it out. Now I can say, okay, if I need to do a presentation deck to acquire a company, give me the table of contents, tell me what needs to be Yeah, it would have shortened the process for me a little bit, probably, but, Incredible. Stacey, thank you so much for being a guest today. I had a The biggest way our listeners could pay it forward is not only by going to your website, but sharing this episode. Let's share the episode that we can help somebody learn from all the great thoughts that Stacey shared with us today. And perhaps there's one or three, one to three people that, you know, share the episode. So people get to hear from Stacy so they can benefit from her wisdom and what she shared today. So thank Thank you. Thanks for tuning into the Adaptive Mindset. If you found value in today's episode, don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who's ready to thrive in the digital age. Stay secure, stay