Most people love the idea of having more energy. But what if I told you that most people don't lack energy, they leak their energy? Trying to accumulate more energy, pour it into this vessel, is like pouring water into a cracked glass. We're leaking our energy, and we often don't realize it. Now, these are just one of the powerful insights that I learned from our special guest today, and I'm telling you, he knows a thing or 10,000 about energy.

But this is one of these three science-backed E's that he's utilized to create incredible performance and results for his athletes, for all of the people that he's coached. And I'm telling you right now, this episode is powerful. It's not every day that you get to learn from somebody who's an intricate part of the world's number one anything But our special guest is a coach.

He's an intricate part of the team and the success for the number one women's tennis athlete in the world. His insights are invaluable because things like this don't just happen by chance. And if you understand the journey to get there, it's going to blow you away, but also remind you of how capable you are to rise to the occasion, to be able to deal with the pressures of life, and to succeed regardless of the circumstance.

And so without further ado, let's dive right in with our special guest and topic of the day. Jason Stacey is a world-class high performance coach, international speaker, and author of The Pressure Code: How Elite Performers Align Their Energy, Emotions, and Environment. Best known for his seven-plus year coaching position with the world's number one ranked tennis pro, Aryna Sabalenka.

He's also spent three decades coaching Olympic, world, and national champions across tennis, combat sports, dance, swimming, gymnastics, and more. His framework is a system forged not in theory, but in a life that went from homelessness at 13 to courtside at Grand Slams. His conviction is simple: You don't rise to the occasion, you fall to the level of your code.

Let's dive into this conversation with the incredible Jason Stacey.

All right. So I want to ask you-

JASON STACY: Yeah,

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right out of the gate.

JASON STACY: Oh,

SHAWN STEVENSON: working with superstar athletes like Aryna-

JASON STACY: Mm-hmm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: you are seeing a situation where they're exposed to the most high-pressure moments that- Mm ... you can imagine in sports.

Mm-hmm.

And you say something really powerful, that the pressure is already there. Yes. You don't need to add more. What do you mean by that?

JASON STACY: Well, that's it. I mean, it, it's there. People are, they're, I feel like- 'Cause it's a big moment, right? Let's say you walk into a final, the whole world's watching, you know, like, everything's on the line, you know.

And, and often, you know, behind the scenes, we all have these moments where everything's on the line, right? But in our situation with some of these athletes, you know, it's not just that everything's on the line, it's a huge moment for you, but the entire world is watching you. So if you have a bad moment, a bad day, or you slip a little bit, like, it's not like us where, "Okay, we made a mistake.

We failed. No one's gonna know." Like, if we don't wanna show it, it doesn't get known. But in that situation, everyone's gonna see it. And so look, all of those things are already there. You also have that al- that al- your own voice in your head that's always there trying to add to, you know, add some layers to that, right?

Some, some intensity or some, you know, make it worse and make it scarier than it is. It's, you know, your brain's trying to protect yourself all the time. So that's already there. Like, you didn't build that. That's just a human thing, right? Like, it's just there. It's nature. So why am I spending any more of my time?

I have a minimum amount of resources right now to do what I need to do right now. I'm about to face something big, good, bad, or otherwise, right? And so I need all the resources I have to be able to manage through that. So why am I wasting any of the precious resources that I do have available, that are in my control, on adding more crap on top of crap for lack of a better way of putting it.

And at the other side of that coin is that the fact of the matter is, is who you are and how you perform has nothing to do with that moment. I know we like to talk about those big moments and they, they... You know, we see the highlight reels, and we talk about it 'cause it's exciting and, and it's a real thing.

But at the end of the day, you know, what matters is all the things you did leading up to that moment. That's what's gonna show up. That's what you can rely on. That's what you can-- That's how you know you can perform your best for whatever that is for you right now, and you can sustain that performance because you've already done all the work leading up to that moment.

The moments are just like, "Hey, here's a, here's a quick, you know, screenshot of where you are right now, and see what else we need to keep working on." You know what I mean? It's, it's really that simple, you know. And so it allows you to separate yourself from that pressure and see it for what it is and see it as like, this isn't like a separate thing that people wanna talk about, right?

Everyone wants to make this, like this, this thing out of it, where it's not a thing separate from it, it is the thing, right? The pressure is the thing.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Hmm.

JASON STACY: It's like, like I said earlier, when we were just chatting off air, like, you know, the obstacle is the way. That's, that saying's been around for a long time, and that's, that is the fact.

There is nothing in this world that functions, that doesn't require stress and pressure to function well. Right? And so that's just a part of the whole process. You, you, you chose to be here, right? Right now, Sean, you chose to do this, right? So if you have rough days or you're, you know, trying to research, study, meet different people, have to be able to meet the person where they're at, have some great interviews, be able to like share this stuff to the world so that people connect with it and they want more and they, you know, improve their lives, it can be really hard sometimes, I'm sure.

Very demanding. But like at the end of the day, you chose to do this, right? It's, it's your choice. So just accept it and like let's just go through it.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Come on.

JASON STACY: Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Come on. Yeah, yeah. Well, this really starts to make sense even more why you strategize to create normalcy- Mm ... amidst the chaos. Right? Because again, the chaos is just like it's a part of the job.

It's just like... And it also, it's your perspective on seeing it as chaos.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: But obviously, you know, things can be, uh, really kinda highlighted. Things can seem really big. Things can- Mm ... s- there's all these moving pieces, but what you strive to do with Aryna for example, is to create normalcy-

JASON STACY: Mm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: in those moments.

Mm. Right? And so I would believe that you're l- probably monitoring and looking for that. Like- ... what, what's going on with the team, with everybody else? Is, is anybody else falling kind of victim or being influenced by the chaos? How can I step in and create normalcy? Let's talk about how you do that?

JASON STACY: Uh, I mean, you know, very few people that I've met have noticed that, um, that's a big part of what I do.

I walk in a room, and I'm just gonna kinda get a sense of who's what, what's where, and, and for whatever we're doing now or what we're about to face, what is the state that we need to be in? Like, where do we all need to be? How do I need to present myself? The person that has to perform, maybe in this case, it's Aryna, is she in the right place that she needs to be?

You know, a big part of my role, I guess you might say, is that, you know, making sure we have the right people doing the right things at the right time, right? And so

To be able to do this, there's two parts. One is what do I do in the moment to help kind of create that environment, you know? But for me to be able to do that, there's two things that need to exist. One, I first need to be really aware of who I am, like what I stand for, how I process my own emotions, how I present those emotions, how I walk into a room.

So I need to be very clear about who I am and what I stand for.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm.

JASON STACY: Right? What do I allow? What boundaries do I hold strong? What things I can be a little more flexible with. So once I really, really am very clear about who I am, I can walk into a room, it doesn't matter what's on the other side of the door.

I'll be ready to, to meet w- you know, meet whatever it is where it's at. So once I first have that, the next thing is to help look at that whole environment, like the interaction of the people with that same sort of lens of like, "Okay, what d- where do we need to be right now for what we're about to face?"

Right? Is this room a little bit overexcited? Is it a bit distracted? Is there too much noise? Is there, uh, attention in the wrong, you know, the focus on the wrong targets and the wrong topics? You know, whatever it might be. And even down to the layer of understanding that

Yeah. How would I put this? People are already putting out how they're feeling without saying a word.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: Right? Even if, I mean, I could have the ri- all the right body language, right? I know all the techniques. I know how to stand, how to hold myself. But if inside I am so anxious or I'm fearful or I'm, you know, over-aroused, whatever it might be- Yeah

the room's gonna smell it. You know what I mean? They're gonna know it, even if they're not aware of it. And 'cause most people walking around, they're probably not, uh, fully aware, like, unless it's pretty obvious. But their body, their physiology, their brain, their nervous system, it's gonna start to be like, "I don't know what it is, but something ain't right," right?

And if I'm in a room where I need to be stable, like you say with Aryna, but, like, I call it more, like, have, like, a really stable, consistent, steady, you know, environment, right? The normalcy, like you said. Then- If someone walks in the room and they're a little bit, they're there for their own reasons, their intentions aren't true, you know, they're not matching where we need to be, even if she's never thought about it, she's gonna start to feel something different.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: Her body's gonna pick up on it. And so I, I have to make sure who's close, who has access, you know, making sure everyone's okay. And I, and then, well, the other part about having a good team is that my responsibility is also to make sure they do the same to me, 'cause I'm human.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: I mess up all the time.

It happens all the time. You know what I mean? Yeah, I have more experience and more awareness, all these ki- I'm really good at this, things. I still have moments where like there's a match in the arena, I'm like, I'm like so overly hyped up for the moment. Anton just like puts his hand on my leg. I'm like, "Oh."

And just like a little like, "Oh," kinda got me back to, got like back, back to center for a second. You know what I mean? Or I'm getting really mad about something and I don't need to be and it's like, "Oh, oops, thanks." You just get a little slap in the face for a second, like, "Oh, I'm back." So yeah, there's a lot of layers there, but I think that that self-awareness is huge.

That's the first thing. 'Cause that's what, you know, not to keep rambling on, but like this is an important part. You know, we just always talk about like that star athlete or the leader or the, you know, the parent, the person that's, you know, from a, you know, hierarchy sort of standpoint, the, the person in charge is the leader.

But i- the way I look at it is every single person that's in that proximity and in that environment right now, they're all leaders in a sense. They choose what they bring to that room, and they, what they bring to that room will influence the outcome of what happens next.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: That make sense? So if everyone understands, I don't care what your role is right now, if you're new at this, if you've been doing it forever, if you're the boss or you're the new guy, you're the intern, how you show up in a room is gonna have an influence on yourself, but also the others around you.

And when you understand that and you live that and you just very, very hyper-aware of that, and you make sure all your actions are aligned with who you wanna be, then, like, you're gonna be seen as... People are gonna just feel it. They'll know it.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: So yeah. Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Man, this is so incredible. Thank you for sharing that because also, you know, it's really helping in creating a team- Mm

that humanizes each other.

JASON STACY: 100%.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Because we're human, you know? Yeah. We're flawed. We're going to make mistakes. Oh, man. Yep. And, you know, for other people to be able to have your back and hold you accountable and to support you even though you might be the guy who's- Sure ... the one who's bringing it to it most often, right?

JASON STACY: Of course.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And, you know, that is so incredible and so, like, that just blows me away. And also, when you talked about people can smell it-

JASON STACY: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: This is a literal thing. Like your, your pheromones. Yes. Like what you are producing, you are literally off-gassing-

JASON STACY: 100% ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: what's going on internally.

Like that's a, that's a real thing. Yeah. Not to mention humans, and again, like- We see this in other parts of the animal kingdom- Sure ... and we're just like, "Oh, that's pretty cool that those fish do that thing." Look at that. Yeah. But our nervous systems sync up with each other- 100% ... especially when you have rapport with another person.

JASON STACY: Yes, if there's a connection,

SHAWN STEVENSON: You immediately start to sync up. Mm. Our brainwaves start to sync up just being in conversation. Mm. This is what we do. Exactly. This is all, like, this unseen stuff that we now have modern technology to prove, like-

JASON STACY: Sure ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: you're saying the real thing. Yeah. We don't need to know about that.

Of course. We do know that we can smell it- Mm ... when the energy is off- That's right ... or somebody, like you just gave all those examples. And it's your job as a team-

JASON STACY: Mm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: to make sure that that stuff is balanced out.

JASON STACY: 100%. And, and again, you, you hit it right on the nail. Like, it's, it's funny when I said the smell part, I saw you, like, your eyes light up.

Like, "Oh, yeah." Yeah, no, it's, it's just that, again, understand that's a part of it, being aware of it, and just being very vigilant and almost aggressive about how well you manage that environment and how you present yourself. So, yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: So this is something for all of us to really take away from this, because it's super easy to fall into it- Mm

because we all have challenges. We all have our hardships. But to see the moment as it is and not make it worse than it is.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: You know? And, and to, to do our best to be more accurate. We tend to make things far more stressful- ... than they have to be, and far worse especially.

JASON STACY: Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: We don't tend to do that with the good stuff.

Never. Like, we make it way better. You know? Like, that's a, that's a rarity. But, you know, thank you for sharing this and just giving us some insight into it. Mm. Now, with that being said, I'm curious about some of these- Pre-match routines- Okay, okay ... that you guys have. Because obviously there's a- ... a super famous one out there with her drawing on your head.

JASON STACY: Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes.

SHAWN STEVENSON: So what's up with that? How, how did that come about?

JASON STACY: I mean, the, it's funny, is that most of these, I don't know, they come weird and kinda funny and silly, whatever, you know, things that we do. It's not one time... Actually, sorry, there was one time where it was planned, but the only, it was planned in advance about 30 seconds in advance.

All these things are just, it just kinda naturally happens. Like, we, we don't say, go, "Okay, what's the next kinda cool or funky weird thing we could do, or the next little, you know, routine we should add?" It's just we're doing our thing, something will happen, and it'll be like, she'll be like, "That's the thing.

You know, we're, we gotta keep doing that. That, that worked last time." Or, you know, just, it could be something silly. But the signature, that, that first time it happened was I had a friend, we were in Australia, wanted a ball signed for the kid, you know, his kid. I'm like, "Yeah, sure. Like, I mean, can you sign this?"

She goes like, uh, so she just jokingly signed my head, and then signed the ball. I'm like, "Yeah, whatever. I don't care." Like, "Whatever. You know, it doesn't bother me at all." I thought it was funny. Um, and then she went and won the match, everything, well, and she's like, "Okay, this is the routine now." Every, every day she's like, "Okay, come here."

So on match days it was this autograph. On not, non-match days she was, like, drawing different pictures. And one day they played Tic-Tac-Toe, or it was noughts and crosses, whatever you call it, um, on my head, and her and one of the other guys. And I was like, "Yeah, whatever. If it works, it works. I don't care." So yeah, so we have these different things.

And look, if I wanna shift gears a little bit and go back to kinda, like, you know, the deeper layer of these things, is that you see us having a lot of fun. We play a lot of games. You see me doing, like, visual sort of training stuff. Um, just like cognisc- cognitive conditioning type things. Little mini competitions, the games, the fun, the drawing on my head, the tattoo.

I had the tiger tattoo on my head that, you know, those two different years. And you know, again, that just comes out naturally. But a lot of the times I will add in those layers of like, "Let's, we're gonna, we need to play a game right now," or, "No, we need to do some sort of thing where her, she's having to focus on a specific target."

Because it goes back to that whole thing about what you're about to face now, you need to be in a certain state. So if you understand what, what state you need to be in to perform your best for whatever you're about to face, then my big thing is you use your body to train, to lead your mind, right? And so in those key moments, I don't, I cannot say things to her like, "Hey, you're l- you're looking a little bit over-aroused right now," or, "Your intensity's a little bit too high," or can't say anything like this, right?

Any version of that- Right ... and you're done. Like, you know what I mean? She's done. She's gonna be spiraling like, "What's, why? Why, what are you thinking? What's happened? What's wrong?" Like, "Oh, how do I fix it?" And like it's done. So you have to just, without words, get them to move their body in a way to get them in the right state.

So part of that is these little routines of just like, you know, we're about, literally happen, those things happen right before we walk on the court for a match.

Right? And it's like I, I like it because she's enjoying it, and she's just in that moment having fun and think it's the, the, the weirdest, funniest thing ever.

She's not thinking about anything else. And like right before we perform, sometimes you have a moment just to like, just be. Yeah. 'Cause there's nev- how, I mean, seriously, how often in, in your day and in everyone's day that their attention is not being pulled in 100 different directions?

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right.

JASON STACY: Everything around us is forcing us to, um, give the, our attention to it.

You know, you have all these voices going and all this noise in your head, and you're about to face something difficult, whatever that is for you. You gotta find a way to just pause, set, give, create a little bit of space between you and the thing, just to have a moment to reset so then you can walk through that door and you're ready to go.

Wow. Yeah. You know? So it's a, so the, yes, it's fun and goofy. It just happens naturally, but there's also some tension behind everything that we do.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Amazing. Yeah, so. Amazing.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: You know, you just mentioned state. Mm-hmm. You know? And this is such an important part of being human and us being conscious of our ability to change our state.

Mm. And the fact that you mentioned using our body to lead and change our mind, you mention this in the book as well. Mm. You know, we tend to act like our bodies are just, uh- ... taxis for our brain.

JASON STACY: Some random thing, right?

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right? Just like, this is just moving stuff around like we're Krang-

JASON STACY: That's great, yeah, yeah, yeah

SHAWN STEVENSON: from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But in reality, this is all one entity. Mm-hmm. And it's all deeply interconnected. And using that, the, the channel of utilizing our body to change our state is so powerful. Mm. And this is something that, you know, so many of the skills that you were able to bring to the table were just

I, I couldn't pinpoint in studying you, like, there's this one- Of course, like catalyst, mul- like, it is a true life just this, like, really complex patchwork quilt of things- ... that you're able to cover- Yes ... these athletes and to elevate them. Mm. And it's such a unique path in getting there, and you f- really understanding and evolving to this place of understanding state and state change, I could see that kinda come online very early on in your experiences.

Mm. And so let's, let's talk about that a little bit. Sure. Let's go back. Yeah, yeah. Let's hop in the DeLorean- ... and go back because, you know, your, your story and your- Um, your evolution as a human being, as a man is, is truly remarkable. And, you know, another thing that I saw in researching you is, like, you outwardly saying, like, "I wouldn't wish where I c- came from on anybody. But I am grateful for what it's taught me."

JASON STACY: What it's given you, yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm-hmm. And I'm grateful that you're here to share the story- ... about it. So

JASON STACY: Thank you. Thank you ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: let's, let's go back to age 11. Mm. And your father's in the Air Force.

Mm-hmm.

Right? And you have a pretty normal life, you know? Sure. You got your, your two younger siblings.

JASON STACY: Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: You got your mom and your dad, and then some things changed.

JASON STACY: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, well, it's... Father was in a motorcycle accident. Uh, he survived the accident. Um, but I remember he was at home, um, I don't know how long it was after, but he's, big old cast on basically most of his whole body. Um, and ended up having a blood clot and passed away.

So, um- And

SHAWN STEVENSON: you were there?

JASON STACY: Yeah, I was there. It was my j- he was... I mean, not to get too detailed, but he was sitting on the toilet, kinda going in and out of consciousness. My mom was in the other room, you know, in the bedroom. It was in their, you know, master bathroom thing. You know, calling the paramedics and, you know, doing whatever.

And she's yelling at me like, "They tell you keep him awake, keep him awake." So that was my job is to, you know, keep him awake basically, and, you know, it didn't work. So yeah. So anyway, that was pretty rough. And I, I re- I just remember seeing my mom and there was two paramedics, and I was never told that he passed there, but, like, you could see, like, the, the moment just sort of froze.

Like, the people stopped. There wasn't a lot of action. They just, like, looked at me, looked at each other, looked at me again, and then just sort of, like, put him on a thing and, you know, left, so. We went to school that day with my... My brother and sister, got them to school. Um, and then, yeah, they just brought us home early from school and told us the news.

So yeah. But that was one of the first... I remember that moment. It was really weird, you know, when the, um, when they told us That like, I don't know, just something changed in me, and I realized, okay... Sorry.

SHAWN STEVENSON: It's okay, man.

JASON STACY: Um-

SHAWN STEVENSON: Take your time ...

JASON STACY: that, you know, I had to sort of put what I was feeling aside. You know what I mean?

And be like, "Okay, I got work to do now." So yeah, it was tough. It was tough. I still sometimes get emotional about it.

SHAWN STEVENSON: It's all right, man.

JASON STACY: It's so weird. Sometimes I can talk about it fine, sometimes it just hits me. I don't know, so it just, it's crazy. So anyway, um, that was a very big moment, for sure, in my life.

It just helped me realize like, okay, you know, I, I, I did what most people do, I suppose, and what I'd done for many, many years, is that I got really, really aggressive at making sure I helped everyone around me. Yeah. You know what I mean? And that was like, okay, that's what my job was gonna be. And you know, my mom, it really messed her up, obviously.

Um, it was pretty rough. There was a bunch of, you know, stuff in between, but probably about two years after that, roughly, I was like on my own, homeless, just living on the streets, staying at different places with different groups of people.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Wait, we gotta go back. We gotta go back, because how does that, how does that happen?

Yeah. How do you end up, again, your father passed-

JASON STACY: True ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: from what I gathered, like, you know, he was basically taking care of everything- Yeah, of course, yeah ... and now your mom had to try to find a way to survive with three kids suddenly.

JASON STACY: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, she was a housewife- So- ... you know, housem- you know, m- um, you know, stay-at-home mom.

You know, she ended up getting injured, so she, one, she didn't even have, hadn't worked for a long time, you know, obviously, and didn't need to. And anyway, so I don't know. We, we had, uh, I remember I just, we got woken up in the middle of the night one night, we flew, we were in Arizona, flew to Washington where her sister was, and um, um, just left everything.

Just hopped in a car, got on a plane, boom, we're there. And you know, she did her best. And, uh, you know, again, it's really weird. People ask me like, "How, what happened in between that?" And it wasn't like a, there was this one moment and this ha- you know, it was just kinda this gradually, you know, I, I, I was trying to find work.

I had a newspaper route, a couple of those I was doing, just trying to make money. Um, there was this family who was, you know, that I don't know how or where they came from, but I was, you know, somehow I was like, "Oh, I'll go and stay with them, help babysit these three kids." And these people end up being like drug dealers, and they're all really messed up, and all their kids, you can tell they had been, you know, doing drugs while having these kids.

Mm-hmm. There were a lot of, lot of, you know, issues the children had. That was really rough. So I ended up just staying with them for a while And trying to look after the kids 'cause, you know, just someone needed to. And I don't know, I was... I, I don't know how it happened. I just remember they left, the family, and I went with them for a little bit to help again with this, 'cause they would just disappear for days.

And I was just like, I don't know. I had these little tiny kids I had to take care of to help out. And, um, you know, and these kids are mess- I mean, I'll tell you one short story. It's like one of the, the middle-aged kid, uh, might've been nine or 10 or something, I don't know. I was on the couch kind of half asleep, and I heard some, like, fumbling noises, and I woke up, and he had a freaking butcher k- a kitchen knife, and he was, like, swinging it at me, right?

And I'm like, I jumped up, got out of the way, and he's just, like, yelling, screaming. He's, like, chasing his siblings, like, swinging this knife. Like I said, these kids were like... There were some issues with them. Hmm. They were abandoned all the time, not fed. You know, it was pr- it was rough. And so that's why I didn't leave also.

I was like, "Okay, I gotta... You know, someone's gotta... Like, there's no one here." So ended up moving to another place with them, and, um, they just disappeared, and I don't know. I don't remember how it happened. I just remember going back to this project house, like, where we were, you know, my mom was at, and my brother and sister, and it was just empty.

And I just... I don't know. Geez. So weird. And, um, yeah, I just decided, like, "Well, let's go."

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: You know? It was like, I figured it's easier on my mom as well, you know, less people to feed, all that kind of stuff. Yeah. And, and I, like, I knew I could handle it. I was like, just... I just thought of like, I don't know.

I didn't have, like, a, a big conversation about it. I just sort of... No one was there. I looked, like, through the window. It was empty. I'm like, "All right." And then I was like, "Well, okay, gotta figure something out." And so I did, and it kinda got me in all kinds of crazy places and not very good. Saw a lot of crazy, violent things and some really disgusting things, you know, and, and a lot of things, you know, they were just very rough.

And, um, but I, I would just say, if you don't want me to go, you know, I can slow me down if you want me to. But, you know, one of the things, though, like you said before, how, you know, you wouldn't wish certain things on people. I don't have to go into the, to many of the crazy stories. I'm sure you can imagine.

But, you know, but I'm still grateful for the experience and what it taught me about myself, right? And a lot... And, and, and look, a lot of the skills that I had to learn to survive helped me become who I am, right? Yeah. Even so- sometimes some of those so- sort of ways prob- weren't healthy. You know, after the streets are gone and you're in a new environment, you have to learn how to manage that environment differently.

Um, but one, one of the things that... I, I would say, let me rephrase that. The thing that got me through all of that was that, and I, I don't know where it comes from, right? I've thought about it as an adult many times. You know, whether it's a genetic thing, whether it was just my early upbringing and the environment I grew up in.

You know, I was born in Japan, you know, with some martial art exposure. My father, military, like he was... You know, he had his issues, but, you know, you know, I don't know where it came from, but there was just I had this very clear set of values that I knew that, okay, if I'm gonna get through this, I'm gonna get through this.

Let me rephrase that. I'm gonna get through this, but the only way I'm gonna survive this is that I have to hold strong to who I am, and I first need to start to figure out who that is. Like, I need to know who I am. I need to know what I stand for. I need to know what boundaries that I am not gonna cross no matter what, 'cause I've seen what those boundaries, those crossing those boundaries do to people.

I saw... I could see it in very disgusting, very violent ways what happens, you know, if you don't know how to manage that well enough, right? I saw what happens when you decide to, like, get involved in drugs a little bit here and there. Like, you know, I see, I s- I could see what was happening. So I just knew that I had to hold very, very strong values, and that that was the only thing that I can control, right?

Hmm. That that was the thing that I had power over is how I showed up, what I stood for, and there was, there was times where I got injured very badly because I stood up for those values. And I would at no, no matter the cost to me in that moment, I knew that whatever it was gonna cost me in that moment was nothing if I broke that.

If I broke that value, if I gave in, what the bigger cost was gonna be. And I know people say these things about their life all the time, but I'm telling you right now, I, I know very specific clear moments in the, in those, in that period of my life that I would literally, I'd be walking for hours.

Sometimes days I would just walk. I got nowhere else to go, right? So I'd just wander, like I'd walk, you know, from one city to another for hours and days sometimes and just be thinking sometimes, and this was the, the, the thing that I would I, I mean, I, I knew. I realized that I was tell- I was talking to myself about this.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm.

JASON STACY: I was, like, trying to understand, like, why do I need to do this? I was reminding myself often because it was so easy and so tempting to go the other way. You know? It's so easy to just accept that, well, this is my life, this is who I am, when I knew that wasn't who I was. This was just a situation I was in, but it wasn't me.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm.

JASON STACY: And it wasn't gonna be me.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: And so I did everything I had to do and, and that was just slow, just making... You know, finding the right environments, the right people, trying to have... You know, this is where my pressure thing comes in, right? Where I just knew that there was a lot of things I could not control, especially at my age as well.

I was like, there was a lot of things that I, I, I, I didn't like, that were very scary, very dangerous, but I had no control over it, right? From what I knew and, and what I could do. But I had this sense that, like, if I'm just aware of the thing that I know I need to change, even though I can't do anything about it now, that that alone is power.

That alone is gonna be an opportunity at some point, because at some point, that thing that's hovering over me, holding me back, it's gonna... There's gonna be a crack somewhere in it. There's gonna be a tiny little crack. And because I'm already putting pressure on it, because I'm paying attention to it, I'm already gonna be through the crack, that little opening, before I even realize that it's there.

Yeah. Right? And that's how I lived my life, was just like, just knowing all the things that I could control, the things I couldn't control, why that was happening, and just, I was just vigilant about that. Like, aggressively just, I'm holding to those values no matter what. So that was Kind of a long story. Oh, okay.

Yeah But there's a lot of stuff in between that, but I mean, yeah, to me, that's the most important thing. That's still how I live my life. That's how I coach. That's how I parent. That's how I... I mean, every decision I make, I always look back at, who, who am I? What do I stand for? And make sure that that's every time I have any decision to make, that my action has to be aligned with those values, period.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: That's it.

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I, I, I gotta say this is, this code kept you alive- That's right ... and also has helped you to, and I don't want to even belittle this word, but to thrive. Hmm. Like, you are one of the most prized coaches for the number one tennis star in the world. Sure, sure. Like, and you were homeless, right? Like, this, it, it doesn't make sense unless you understand- Sure

the code. Like, you had a code even then as a child. You were 13 when you-

JASON STACY: Mm-hmm. I first happened

SHAWN STEVENSON: Came back home and looked through the window and everybody was gone. That's right. And deciding in that moment, like, "Okay, let's go." Like, "This is, I, I have to figure this out."

JASON STACY: Hmm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And having those, you know, those principles, the, these, the kinda code of ethics, the pressure code, you know, the beginnings of it- That's right

starting to form- Yeah,

JASON STACY: yeah ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: that carried you through and to help you to survive circumstances that, I mean, is, be honest, like-

JASON STACY: Hmm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: the vast majority of people are not gonna survive.

JASON STACY: Hmm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And so, man- No ... this, this is unbelievable. Uh, and with that being said You have kind of broken down the pieces of this code.

And again, so much has happened since. That's right. And you've picked up these different skills over time. But I think a big part of that, and like the kind of affirmation and the expression of it and seeing a place where you can actually add value with it-

JASON STACY: Mm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: happened with this dojo.

JASON STACY: Mm, yes.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right? And so- Yeah.

JASON STACY: It gave me the language, the structure. Yeah Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And you would go, so you know, and I don't want to give too much away, but it's in the book. But... And this is just, this is actually just a small part of the book, but it's so-

JASON STACY: Sure. It's a big part, yeah ... it's, yeah. It's the thing,

SHAWN STEVENSON: yeah. It's just like, it's a few pages, but it's just like so much happens in these pages.

JASON STACY: I could write books just on that, yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: But you know, one of the things that you would do, like you were literally just kind of going and like s- looking in the window of this dojo. Mm-hmm. And then you got to actually just kind of go and sit in on the side. Again, you didn't, you were homeless.

JASON STACY: That's right.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And over time, you were invited to start to participate and- Mm ... you know, just went from there. So let's talk about that experience there with that dojo.

JASON STACY: Yeah, I mean, you know, the neighborhood we were in, you know, it was, you know, there was two areas where I was, spent most of that time in. You know, one of them was called, like the murder capital of the state.

It was h- crazy violence, like a lot. You know, this little dojo was this run-down building. There was a pawn shop and a porn shop in between, you know, on either side of it. So it was just-

SHAWN STEVENSON: The double ps.

JASON STACY: Yeah, double, exactly. So it was just all that kind of area, you know, just some run-down taverns and all this, you know.

So it wasn't like some fancy, you know, shiny place. But you know, I think I was born in Japan, and I think I just had this like connection with, you know, I'd done martial arts when I was younger, and I sort of, it was like a part of my old life kind of thing, I, you know, I guess. So I would just, I'd watch, I'd be interested.

And yeah, you know, like I said, I went in, got the balls to go in one day, basically. I actually go in the building, and just would let me sit and watch, and I'd just do that a handful of times. And then, um, beyond the, the main sensei there, and, um, Al, who's a, you know, ex-investigator, a cop, you know. There's a lot of like sort of ex-military, per- current military guys there.

There's like also like a military town not too far. Anyway, they invited me in and just wanted to know who I was and why I was there and w- you know, just kind of kept randomly showing up. And yeah, I mean, lucky for me, I think, that they allowed me to train there. I didn't have any parents to sign anything.

I didn't have money. Um, I mean, this was already me, you know, slowly getting off the streets, you know? So it was already a couple, two, three years of me already being, you know, living in that environment, um, that I got access to this community, you know? That's what it gave me. It really gave me like- Hmm.

Some structure obviously.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: Some understanding, you know, of there's more out there. It gave me a language to a lot of things that I thought I understood, and some things I did understand, but I didn't know the words. I didn't know how to, you know, had no language for it. I just was living it. Um, and like I said already is, you know, for a big part it was community.

It was like, wow, you know, this is a, what do you call it? Not, well, a safe place, but it was a place where it's like, you know, there was just different kind of respect.

You know? The way people interacted with each other. You know, it was like that first time where you can go, "You know what? You and I can go, like, beat the crap out of each other literally," right?

And then after we're done, we shake hands and we go have a drink or whatever, you know. Grab some coffee or whatever. I, I don't, I don't drink, but, you know, I just I don't know why I said that. But you know what I mean. Yeah. Like, there's this environment where you can literally... You have an understanding of each other.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: You're there to help each other get better, and you're helping each other get better through adversity-

SHAWN STEVENSON: Hmm ...

JASON STACY: through difficulty, through, uh, discomfort, through not allowing you to take shortcuts, you know? Like, even, we even had this thing where, like, if you and I are, like, working on some technical thing, right, where we're sparring, and, you know, let's say we're skilled, you know, similar skill level, and you're kinda letting me do something and, and, um, allowing me to do it even though it's not, it wasn't right.

Like, I didn't do it right, you know, whatever, say, the technique was, but you're kinda letting me do it. Not in a learning environment, but we're sparring or fighting or whatever. Like, to us, that's extremely dis- you know, disrespectful. It's like you're now, you're now allowing me to believe that what I'm doing is working, and it's not.

So how am I getting better? It's, it's actually worse than me not getting better. I have this false sense that I know what I'm doing. Hmm. And then one day I'm gonna have to go do that, and it's not gonna work out for me. Right? And so we had this very strong sort of sense of like, we're g- we're here to help e- make each other better, and we're gonna do that through these difficult things.

And we're not gonna let you hide in the, you know, in the corner and, you know, hide from yourself.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm.

JASON STACY: You know? And so on top of that, when I started getting like the black belt levels, you know, we had to read stacks of books on human behavior, psychology, nutrition, um, history, sociology. Like, sometimes on specific, you know, um, ancient sort of, you know, older books on Zen and, you know, just so many different books that he would give a stack of books and we had to write a paper about each book.

And then he would give us a topic. You know, like my very first black belt level, um, my first ... You know, when I got my black belt there, um, I had to write a paper on maai, which is s- like space conditioning. So like in, you know, martial arts it's the controlling the distance, basically, right? But this concept of space conditioning and how that applies to today's society.

I was like 19 or 20. I don't know. I was like I was so young. I'm like, "Say what?" So I had to ... It forced me to think about these, these, these things I was doing physically, or these, these principles and theories, but how can I take one thing, and how can that one thing apply to other things? So it really challenged your, your ability to, again, you know, take a skill- Mm-hmm

or understanding of one thing, and can you really apply that. Do you understand it at, on a level that you can walk into any room or you can go to any environment and understand how to take some skills and some tools from one thing and apply it really effectively in another? Yeah. So, so much about who I am in that sense and how I coach and how I parent, I would say is, is, was really built from that.

It gave me that structure.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: It goes back to that code. It does. Because that code translates into so many different areas of our lives.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: You know, these certain attributes, certain skillsets, certain mindsets.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right? I love the simple sentiment of how you do anything is how you do everything.

And this is something that I, you know, have instilled in my kids again and again.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: You better do these dishes like you're trying to- You know what I'm saying? It's like the most important moment of your life right now. Hit the winning shot in the game. You know what I mean? Like, take it seriously.

JASON STACY: Sure.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Because it's not just about you as well.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right? And being able to frame it. Like, do you want me to give you a, a, a dish that, you know, is, has like debris on it- Yeah, yeah, yeah ... and tell you to drink out of it?

JASON STACY: Of course.

SHAWN STEVENSON: You know? And just like, oh, I don't want that to happen to me. Let me take care of my family.

Mm. Let me look out for everybody. And if anything, look out for myself so I'm not eating off of dirty dishes. Mm. You know? But just like that translates over, just having- Having, um, respect for the work that you're doing. Mm-hmm. I s- I s- I saw that as one of the things. You, you said it as well, respect- Mm ... in this environment.

It wasn't about necessarily being a, quote, "safe space."

JASON STACY: That's right.

SHAWN STEVENSON: It's a, it's a s- it's a space with structure-

JASON STACY: Mm-hmm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: and with certain ethics and, and a code, right?

JASON STACY: That's right. Yeah, yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And so, and also, how you create an environment that you want to do that thing, right?

JASON STACY: That's

SHAWN STEVENSON: right. Yeah. And you're big on envi- we're gonna talk about environment in a minute- Yeah, for sure

which I, I got some great insights from you already. But one of the things that I've seen my, my kids do, and I, I'm seeing it with my youngest son right now. Again, we didn't tell him to do this.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: He just kinda picked this up from the environment.

JASON STACY: Mm-hmm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And now he's spending the last, like this summer, he spends so much time in the kitchen, like cleaning the kitchen-

and like cleaning the, the, the fruit. Like we get fresh berries. He, he- Yeah ... rinses them, whatever, puts them in these containers. We've seen many, many fruit purchases come and- ... go right into the trash- Of course ... right? Yeah, yeah,

JASON STACY: yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And so he's taken that upon himself because he loves the fruit- Sure ... of course, as well, but he saw that this was a gap in our- Mm

family structure, right? Yeah. And we were losing out on a lot of stuff, and he doesn't like to pick through and to see which ones are good-

JASON STACY: Yeah,

SHAWN STEVENSON: yeah ... right? For sure. So he found something, some value proposition for himself.

JASON STACY: Sure.

SHAWN STEVENSON: But what he does, man, he puts on his vibes- Mm ... that he's into. Yeah. He's in there ah-

JASON STACY: Just doing his thing.

SHAWN STEVENSON: He's in there singing, whatever, you know, singing. You know, listening to his f- you know, favorite artist or whatever the case might be. For sure. Just creates a vibe to where time disappears.

JASON STACY: Sure. Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And he's just in there doing these things. Just doing his thing, yeah. You know? And that's what you want to create-

JASON STACY: Mm

SHAWN STEVENSON: for yourself, and also that you're intentionally doing this with your athletes. That's right. First of all, I just wanna thank you for sharing. Mm. And, you know, just- Thank you ... kind of unpacking some of these insights and your thought process and these conditions and, you know, seeing this catalyst for change because in that, within that, uh, context in the dojo, you also started to teach as well.

JASON STACY: That's right.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And so obviously since then you've impacted the lives and coached people in, you know, e- every domain you can imagine really just-

JASON STACY: Crossed every bridge ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: you know, whether this is like, um, you know, the various sports, you know, people in business- Mm ... whatever the case might be.

JASON STACY: Sure.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And in this place that you are now, you are sharing the code with other people, which is invaluable if people really get this.

Mm. And so one of the things that you talk about in the book are these three Es. And so I wanna dive into each one of these. So the three Es are energy, emotion, and environment.

JASON STACY: Yes, sir.

SHAWN STEVENSON: All right? And something super powerful came up- ... in energy that was just like, "Oh man, he said the thing."

JASON STACY: Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: But first of all, let's just start off with ener- energy.

I think we have a superficial idea of why that matters. Like let's talk a little bit about energy and just some, a couple of tips in that domain for people- Sure ... to really help to cultivate that.

JASON STACY: Yeah. I love this one. Can I, can I sidestep for just a moment?

SHAWN STEVENSON: Absolutely.

JASON STACY: Is that okay? Is what you were just talking about with the respect and, you know, them taking action and, you know, taking some, you know, responsibility on their own is, you know, when you were first talking about, "Hey, go do the dishes.

Do it well. Do, you know, all these things," and, and, you know, it's almost like a respect thing. Like respect your environment, respect your family, respect the, you know, this and that. You know, when these things come up, you know, the way I- I saw the change in my own kids, um, when I changed it up a little bit.

Instead of saying, "Hey, why don't you have respect for X, Y, and Z?" It's like, "Why don't you have some respect for yourself?" Yeah. Like, at the end of the day, when you're doing that, it's like about how... You know, it's... Yes, the outcome might be that you're also showing respect to the, your environment and the people around you and, and whatnot, or the thing, but it needs to start with you.

Like, you're doing this because you have respect for yourself. You're not just half-assing something. You're not just kinda doing it. Uh, you have some purpose behind it, even if it's a small thing. And so that's, that's part of that exposure and that sort of mentality of when you're doing that, it's not just, "Yeah, what you do in it, that's not very res- res- respectful the way you're doing that," or, "It's more respectful that way for this reason."

It's like, well, no. Like, have some respect for yourself. Like, why would you wanna be that person- Yeah ... or to be seen that way, you know, if that's who you really are. So anyway, that's just a part, like the way I kinda flip it a little bit and yeah. I remember the first time I... It just kinda happened one day when I said it to one of my kids, and you...

I literally saw, like, this, like, this light. Like, you could literally see their facial expression just completely change, and it's like, "Oh, never thought of it that way." So anyway, had to share that. It was just something I thought about. Okay, my man. So energy. You wanna talk about that, huh? All right. Well, with the three E's, to me...

Uh, let me just explain first what I, what I, why I talk about these three E's so in- so passionately and why I think it's the thing, is that we live in this world that we're just trying to optimize everything. And I'm not saying that's a bad thing. Like, obviously it's... We all, we all do it, right? We all have the things that we do.

Um, and you know, all our social me- everywhere we go, it's just optimize, add, add, add, add. Adding layers and go do this, you need that, you need this, you know, and then eventually, you know, you, you see the general population or the people who are really trying to push themselves, suddenly they have, like, 80 different supplements they're taking a day.

They're measuring every little metric. They're, you know, they're just adding more and more layers, but that's, again, just taking more of their time and their energy, their attention, which is energy. It's resources being used up. And they're just inputs. And we're really good at it, and there's some awesome ones.

I, I do them. But what I find is missing is, is All of these inputs, all these hacks, all these programs and systems and whatnot, I look at those as like apps on your phone, right? And the three Es are the operating system of the phone, right? So yes, there's amazing apps out there. There's also some useless ones, right?

But, you know, everyone's out there chasing to add more apps. I bet you if we look at all of our phones in this room right now, we all probably have a ton of apps. We don't even know how we got them and why we got them. Mm-hmm. But at the time we needed it, you know what I mean? And we're, "Oh, that was the new thing, and this is the thing," and we don't even use them anymore, right?

It doesn't matter how awesome, how effective, and amazing an app is, if the operating system underneath it is, is corrupt or it's running in like a survival mode, then it, it... You know, I feel like a lot of people, and this is gonna lead into the energy part, is that they're doing tons of work to optimize their stressful sort of life, whatever that means for them.

But what's happened is they're just... They're in survival mode, and now they're just building a really optimized survival mode. And at the end of the day, a survival mode is still survival mode.

Yeah.

That make sense?

SHAWN STEVENSON: Absolutely.

JASON STACY: So, and that, and that's what I see where like so much people, so many people are like losing a lot of themselves, a lot of the resources.

They're doing all the right things, right? If you said, "Oh, yeah, I take this, I do that, I do my room temperature," like, oh, you know, all the, all the stuff, you know? You've written some awesome books about those things. They are so effective. But if there's deeper layers of like why and when they apply those things, i- if there's, if they're sort of living out of alignment of like who they say they are versus what they're doing, you know, there's a lot of layers here which we can talk about, then, you know, they're chasing and adding so much, and they're just...

But they're using up so much resources chasing the next thing with no real intention behind it, no purpose about how, how does it all work together. Yeah? Are you, are you adding those layers because you're... You need to, again, add a layer to your code, right? So it's all in aligned with what you're, you know, you're aiming to do or to, to improve.

So when I talk about the three Es, it's not just like there's these three separate things, and it's not even about how you can control or manage each of those separate things individually. It's how can you align those three things? How can you align those three Es? Now get into energy. So I had to kind of set the table sort of thing with this, so, 'cause it's a big thing to me.

It's, it's everything. It's everything. Anytime there's an opportunity, an obstacle, some good, some bad, whatever, any and every time, whether it's me, Aryna, anyone on the team, my family, if there's something we have to face, and there's all this noise, and it could be excitement, it could be terrible, it could be fear, it could be stress, every time those things happen, the way I'm able to kind of create a little bit of space between me and the thing happening so I can see more clearly, I can make a better choice in that moment, is that I just go back and I just cycle through those three E's.

Of those three things, what was missing leading up to this moment? What did I miss or do or not do up to this moment that made this go wrong or, you know, made it stressful, whatnot? And, and then I just cycle through those three things. So what it does, it gives me, like, this power. I can turn down all the noise.

I can turn down all the voices. I can save energy, right? All this mental and emotional energy that's just being used up with all this noise and this panic and this whatnot, because I have this platform, this, this operating system, this code that I know I'm building, that I know I need to be loyal to And now when I, when I would go into energy, I have two parts.

Well, there's three. Like, you got mental, physical, and emotional energy essentially, right? Like, we all kinda know this. And, and, and on a superficial level we have, well, how do we process our emotions, right? How we internalize them, how we process this information, this feeling, these emotions. And the second part is, well, how do we present those emotions?

How do we allow them out in the world, right? So with energy, we have, you know, our physical energy obviously, our mental energy, and even, you know, without diluting it or getting, you know, into the emotions side, this is emotional energy. But for, to keep it simple, we'll say we have physical and mental, you know, energy, right?

We only have so many resources available to us based on our, what, what we've been doing with our, uh, our bodies, with our sleep, with nutrition, you know, all our environment essentially. So again, they're all very connected. But with energy, you know, everyone talks about sleep, right? You know very well a lot about sleep, right?

Everyone talks about all these things on, you know, recharging your batteries. Like, you know, build up your, you know, recovery. We talk so many things about recovery out there, right? So there's all these things and, and again, people are constantly going and adding more things to help them recover better, right?

And the part about energy that I think, 'cause we don't have, you know, forever to sit here and talk, is the biggest part I find that people are missing maybe or that has the biggest impact isn't all these things that they're adding, 'cause a lot of them are really good.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: But it's, it's, like, where they let the energy leak.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: Right? And, and often I find it's in the things that they're either avoiding, right? There's some things that they know they need to face, and they're avoiding it. That weighs on you, and the longer you avoid it, the heavier it gets. The longer you avoid it, the more energy it's draining from you, the more resources it's taking, 'cause it's in the background just hanging out there.

The other thing, you know, it could be a conversation you're avoiding, right? The other part of that, so there's the avoiding, the other is that the things that you're allowing. So there's things that may be around you, whether it's conversations, content, you know, there's, there's things that you allow- That again might go against who you are, what you wanna do, where you wanna be, and that is taking energy from you.

Yeah. Right? So there's... I, I usually start with people, it's like instead of let's look at what we can add and optimize, 'cause it's not that we're, you know, the information's out there. It's not so hard to figure out, right? So much of it these days. But what I want is let's go a little bit deeper. Let's figure out where are you losing energy, right?

And I, I'm gonna add one more thing, 'cause there's probably three k- big ones, is I know I mentioned it earlier just subtly that everything in our world is designed to take our attention. Our attention's constantly, and, you know, our phones alone. It is so advanced technology that it doesn't matter if you can be the most mindful person in the world, you open that thing up, a half hour's gone, you don't know where it went.

You know what I mean? You go- how many times have you opened your phone to do one thing and suddenly you're doing something else and you forgot what the thing was, the only reason you picked up your phone? You know, and everywhere we go, everywhere, driving around, listening to co- everywhere we go, things are pulling our attention.

It's taking our resources, our energy. And one of the most powerful things I've ever seen happen for myself, my kids, the athletes and clients I, I, I work with, is getting them just to find moments throughout the day, 90 seconds, 30 seconds, five minutes just to stop. Like, you take some control of your attention, right?

You, you, you own it. It's your resource. And just, just stop. Like, literally just stop. Like, don't look at your phone. Don't worry about thinking or not thinking. Like, I have this thing, I call it don't fight it, don't feed it, right? You know, I'll give you an example what I mean by taking these moments. So I don't get very good sleep, right?

I have some issues with sleep still. I'm still trying to work through it. I even been to sleep clinics. S- I'm super systemic when I'm sleeping. Even though I thought I slept, I don't go into deeper stages half the time or most of the time.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And just to be clear- Yeah ... this is an extraordinary situation that you are in living-

JASON STACY: Yeah.

I've had people literally try- On the streets ... to murder me in my sleep. Yeah. Like, literally have people, like, you know, I've been shot at. I got... One of my concussions was, like, getting hit in the head with a gun while I was sleeping. You know, I've had all kinds of crazy things. Like, so yes, I, I understand where it's coming from now, but I spent most of my life just burying that and just helping everybody else.

Mm. Like, until recently when my health started coming, coming at me, knowing very well about how sleep works. I mean, I've written papers, you know, with, like, some of the schools and stuff, and I... Anyway, I know what it means. You know? It's not too difficult. But, you know, I'll give you a real example for me is that in my lifestyle, like, I might be coaching one place, I might be lecturing at some university, I might have a presentation to do, I might be, you know, got my kids, family.

You know, a lot- I'm in, like, 10 different places each day, let's say, on an average day And what I do is right before and after the thing I'm doing now, so before I came upstairs to hang out with you, I just sat in the car for five minutes, turned everything off. You know how quiet a car is when there's nothing on?

Like literally, you imagine all the sound 'cause you, you sealed, it's sealed shut for a reason, right? So when you turn off everything, you set your phone down, you sit there, and you can breathe if you want. You can just chill out. You can do whatever you want. Like, I have some breathing things I do, but just quiet.

And at first, you know how, how loud quiet is?

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm.

JASON STACY: It is heavy, and it is so much louder than you might have, like, could have ever imagined 'cause you never do it. You never just have things off. There's always sound, you know? Have you ever been in your house when the power goes out? Suddenly, like, it just sounds different.

You don't realize the constant noise that's going on all the time, right? And these things taking your energy all the time. They're taking energy, taking, taking, taking. So a, a big way I li- I like look at energy is look where the leaks are. Again, what are the things that you're l- avoiding or, or hiding from And as often as you can, just take a minute.

Like five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10 times, you know, throughout the day, just take a little break. So before and after you got up meeting, you know, before and after that thing you have to study, you know, before you go into a game, afterward, just take a few seconds, how much ever time you have, and just slow down your breathing.

Let your thoughts kinda... You know, don't fight anything, don't feed anything, just, just be. And that not only is, are you saving some energy, like, you know, you're not, you're not, you're not scrolling on your phone, or you're not answering some whatever, you know, email or whatever, or overthinking something that just happened previously.

You're actually gaining energy. Yes. That moment of just being present, that literally recharges you. Your nervous system's like, "Oh, yeah. Thank you. I needed that moment."

SHAWN STEVENSON: You already addressed the specific thing I was gonna ask you about with energy-

JASON STACY: Mm-hmm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: which was, again, we, especially in this community

but just, uh, we all know this stuff. We know, like, food gives you energy. Of course. You know, your, your sleep quality's gonna influence your energy. Obviously, the choices that you make with these things are gonna influence your, your energy, the inputs. 100%. Right?

JASON STACY: Inputs. Yes, yes.

SHAWN STEVENSON: But, uh, what I specifically was impressed with was this statement in the book is, and this is a direct quote from the book.

It says, "Most people don't lack energy." Right. "They leak it."

JASON STACY: Exactly.

SHAWN STEVENSON: All right? We've got plenty of energy. Of course. We're teeming with energy. Like, these atoms and they're doing all these things- Yeah. ... these molecules, we're teeming with energy. Uh, ATP is getting produced like crazy. It's doing its thing.

That's right. Yeah. But it's the fact that we're leaking the, the, our energy, and you said in the book as well, you wouldn't pour water into a cracked glass. Right? And so it's making sure that we're not just leaking energy-

JASON STACY: Mm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: and so that we can actually contain the energy that we're taking in. And you shared also there's these three moves with that ledger when it comes to our energy.

Build your reserves by creating deposits. That's the one that we tend to hyper-focus on.

JASON STACY: Yep.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Protect what you have by guarding against leaky withdrawals, and spend your energy wisely by investing deliberately.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: You know, again, so you've got some super just- Science-backed- ... simple insights when it comes to these things, when it comes to our nutrition, when it comes to movement.

And, but mostly this insight of, like, we've gotta guard against, and you've got a great section on this, draining our energy- Mm ... through having these leaks. And you, you talk about the specific ways that it tends to happen, which is attention drain, which you already covered. Yeah. The digital distraction, all that stuff.

People tax.

JASON STACY: Yes, sir. That's a big one right there.

SHAWN STEVENSON: That's a big one. And system friction, so sloppy environments, endless meetings- Mm. Dissonance ... and just all of those type of things. And these all, these three Es are integrated. It isn't just like, "Here's your energy over here. Here's- Yeah ... your environment over here."

Yeah, it's like ecosystem. But I wanna move on and talk a little bit more about emotion. So we hit energy- Sure, sure ... already. We set the table. So why is emotion so huge? Why is that one of the three Es?

JASON STACY: Well, I mean, for a lot of people s- unfortunately, I would say, is they allow their feelings and their emotions to drive the bus, as they say, to, to control how they respond in any given moment, you know?

And how we walk into a room, how we present ourselves, no matter how we're feeling, like, we have to understand, like, you know, if I have some crazy thing happening to me this week or this last night, you know, I landed here at 3:00 in the morning, you know, I had all these issues with the car, all these, if I bring all that garbage into this room, we're not gonna have a very good conversation.

The outcome's not gonna be a positive one. It's not gonna be a win-win for everybody. And so, you know- I have to understand that like, okay, I might have a way I'm feeling at the moment, but I have to understand how I present and how I respond to that is gonna directly impact the outcome, you know, what happens next, right?

And, and if I really want to improve my life, if I wanna have that normalcy, that steady, you know, safe, you know, high performance, whatever the environment is that you're wanting, whether it's what you have and you're trying to keep it, or you're trying to get to a place that you're not now, then you have to understand that emotions are powerful.

We h- our brain and our emotions are responding, like, before we even realize it, right? They're, they're the ones that are like, those deeper levels, they're trying to, like, control us. But, you know, the more we're aware of ourselves, the more we understand why we're experiencing something, the better that we can create a little bit of separation, like I like to talk about.

A little bit of space between this emotion and how you respond, 'cause that response is everything. Yeah. Right? It's, uh, you know, it's not my kid's fault if I had some crazy conversation on the phone or... Good or bad, doesn't matter. It's not my, you know, not Aryna's problem if I come with her. It's not ours if she has something.

Like, you know, it, it's, it's like this weird coin, there's two sides. It's everyone's responsibility and it's also nobody's. But at the end of the day, it comes from that coin is you. And so the emotion is, it's such a driver. It's very powerful, and if you just let it be and just let it do whatever, and you just, you know, fall into the bubble of whatever social media's feeding you because, you know, you know how that, how the algor- algorithms work.

You're like in a bubble in a bubble in a bubble. Mm. It's like your world, you know, you believe this, this thing to be so true 'cause that's what you talked about or what you said, and so then everything you read and see and hear and consuming is just that thing, so becomes your world. You know? And that, and that creates an emotion in you, and then you let that drive you, right?

And so then you really have no control of where your life is going, right? You have no... Like, there's, there's nothing there, you know? And then what ends up happening is that when peak moments happen in your life, good or bad or otherwise, a good opportunity for you to grow, to take a step forward or whatever, is that you've been living in such a disconnection from what you've been feeling and how you respond and, like, like the values you stand for and the actions you take.

There's such a separation there that when these key moments come, the emotion that takes over is the one that you've been building, that code that you've been building.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm.

JASON STACY: Right? That's the one that's gonna show up on the, on those big moments in your life. And the big moments don't have to be big. They can be small moments, but the ones that can shift the direction that your life is going next, the, the, the direction that you're gonna end up.

And if you let the emotion just take over and just let it do whatever it's gonna do, and you allow all these external things to, to decide who you're gonna be-

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm ...

JASON STACY: right? Instead of you deciding who you wanna be, and then making sure that those actions... And part of that is to understand, not to control your emotions so much, but understand who are you And, a- and, and why, why do I feel these types of emotions in certain environments or certain things?

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: Like with Aryna, I never went to change her, right? She was who she was. But I had to help her understand who she was, and then she can understand, "Okay, well, this is who I wanna be, so I need to act this way to get what I want." Right? "And I need to have... You know, I can still experience those emotions.

I can feel them. I can... They can exist." So I'm not saying you suppress them. You never wanna do that. Like I say, I call it, "Don't fight it, don't feed it." Right? You give it what it, what it requires for this moment right now. So I can have those emotions. I can experience all those things, and I'm going to. But most of the time, I wanna be the one driving them, right?

Occasionally, they'll take over because that's how it is, right? It's gonna happen to all of us. But I think just having that understanding that If you don't do the- these things with intention, and you don't understand what you stand for, and you don't be as mindful as you can about why are you responding, like why you have that feeling inside about something-

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah

JASON STACY: and then understand how you, your next thing that you do is gonna influence the direction your life goes, you know, it's, it's... You're done. You're just gonna be like everyone else, chasing their tails. Even the ones, even like your audience for sure, they're out there trying to do all the right things, but why are they still so stressed?

Why are they still exhausted? Why are they still chasing another thing? Why in the big moments are they falling apart? Because there's that deeper thing that they're just, they're not in alignment with.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: So yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: I love that you also illuminate the fact that our emotions are valuable. There aren't these bad emotions.

And these emotions are really signals. Yes. Uh-huh. And again, really aligning with who we want to be.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Sometimes a signal can show up, and it might not be in alignment with the person that we're choosing to be right then. Correct. So the signal can show up- ... and typically it would just take over.

That's right. Right? That emotion would take over.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And again, it's not right or wrong. Somet- it's just, it, it, it could be

JASON STACY: It is.

SHAWN STEVENSON: It's what it is, yeah ... it could be what it is. But the signal can also come up, and we can catch, see the signal- Mm ... and we can make an adaptation in that moment.

JASON STACY: Mm-hmm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: But for most of us, what happens is the emotion comes up and it takes over.

Mm. And a lot of times, especially with something like anger- Yeah ... it has to run its course.

JASON STACY: That's right. Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right? Yeah. Before we kinda can reset. It's like the Hulk. Exactly. You know what I'm saying? Like until your pants get- It takes some time, you know what I mean? It takes time ... massive, like you shrink back down.

Wait a minute. Wait, pause. What?

JASON STACY: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Anyways, um, with, you know, when the Hulk come, becomes, you know, and he's just like, "What did I do this time?" Yeah. Why? Yeah. You know what I mean? And it's when the emotion takes over.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And instead of like having a plan, because that emotion needs a place to express.

JASON STACY: Of course, it needs to

SHAWN STEVENSON: exist. Right? Yeah. And so again, if, if anger has been a tool that you've used to succeed-

JASON STACY: Mm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: right? To fight.

JASON STACY: Yeah.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And this, I think this is a great, uh, kind of description of certain stages with Aryna.

JASON STACY: 100%.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right?

JASON STACY: Yes.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And versus when that, it, the anger might leak or kinda take over- Mm

and then it can affect your play in a negative way.

JASON STACY: That's right.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Right? So it's being able to use that to your advantage, to be aware of who you are-

JASON STACY: Exactly ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: right, and your superpower and not allowing your superpower to also become your kryptonite.

JASON STACY: Exactly, which it can very easily if you're not, if you're not careful.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: 100%. But, uh, it's, I, I do talk about that a lot with emotions, that they're, it's just signals. It's data. It's information. It's real, it's important, but, you know, you don't need to always have this like, "Well, I'm feeling it, so it's it. It's, it's real. It's fact. It's just the way it is." It's like, well, no.

You know, I, I heard an analogy. I put it in one of my, my cards in this card deck thing that I made is that, you know, these, these feelings, they often lie, right? 'Cause our, you know how it is. Our brain's always trying to protect us. You know, there's all these little things that our, our, our brain's trying to do to us, and our environment even.

But, um, is that, you know, these feelings or emotions, I know there's some differences, but feelings and emotions, it's like, it's like the weather, but it's not the climate, right? There's gonna be moments, right? The, the, there'll be sunny, there can be rainy, the wind's gonna come. There's a bit of hail out of nowhere, you know, you didn't expect.

It's supposed to be a sunny day, suddenly it's, there's a, a monsoon. I'm in Florida, you know like it's, where'd all this water come from? Half hour later it's sunny again. Like, that's just weather. Things kinda come and go in your life, and that's just, that's the way it is. Doesn't matter what you do, it's gonna happen, you know?

But the things we're talking about is that, you know, it's not the climate, not that bigger picture of like, okay, how do we really exist? Who are we really and where are we going? So it's just those, those... be able to zoom back and kinda just separate yourself a little bit. It's very hard to do. Especially, again, going back to what I just said, if you don't take those little moments throughout the day just to stop for a second, you, all those external things are gonna control you.

They're gonna drive, they're gonna decide where the destination is for you.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: You have no control over that now.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: And

SHAWN STEVENSON: we, we don't have- I've seen videos of her doing some breathing-

JASON STACY: Yeah,

SHAWN STEVENSON: yeah ... exercises.

JASON STACY: Yeah, of course. Gotta use the body to control the mind, my man. Like, you know

SHAWN STEVENSON: What, what is your kinda go-to recommendation with the breathing exercise?

JASON STACY: Oh, you know, look, I, I think there's a couple things. I would, I would say it depends . There's a couple things. One, on a sorta just real simple way of looking at it is when I have people breathe in a certain time, like the, as like, "In this moment I need you to breathe" Often it's like I'm not even gonna tell you exactly how to breathe, just want you to stop and just slow down your breathing for a second.

That's it. Like, don't overthink it. Don't analyze. Oh, it needs to be four, six, 10, or just, you know, like, oh, we have all these numbers and all this science and like, again, it's real. I use it, so I'm not saying that's not a thing. Don't get me wrong here. However, you know, most people, you know, just, just if you just slow down your exhale for a second, just take a nice deep breath in, hold it for a couple seconds, exhale slow as you can.

Doesn't matter if it's six seconds, 10 seconds. I don't care. Like, it's what are you capable of doing? Why, how, what if I asked you to do like, you know, a certain number of seconds breathing, but you're like super out of shape, your mobility's really tight, you're s- stiff everywhere. You can't... You know, your ribcage doesn't move.

Your diaphragm's like, you know, just been in a nap for like 20 years. You know what I mean? Just chilling. You know, you know what I mean? You're living in a stressed state, so always breathing really u- up in your neck and your shoulders and all that, and I'm asking you to take a deep breath right now. You know what?

How are you gonna breathe? You know, it's gonna be all neck, all tension. Yeah. All it's, it's tension. It's systemic again. It's like, "Eh," right? Mm-hmm. So I need to find out, well, what are you capable of? Where are you? And just, just first step, take a nice long exhale. Just reset. It doesn't even matter how long it is.

I don't care. 'Cause again, I don't want you to be thinking like, "Oh, I have to do this thing. I have to add another input. I have to do it this way, or else it doesn't work." 'Cause that's the, that's the, the part where everyone's trying to over optimize almost where they, they're... It becomes a stress in a negative way because it's like, "Well, I have to do this or else," or, "I need to do it this way."

Oh, you know, I- they said I have to, you know, be in bed by 10:00 or 10:30 or else I'm gonna lose all these things. Some of them might be true. You know, obviously, it's, I'm not saying there's not real evidence behind some of these things. But if you give it to people that way, then the, it's like it- it's, it's too constraining.

They'll do it for a little while out of compliance, but not out of, out of a commitment. Yeah. Right? It's, it's not them. So meet them where they're at. So my first thing is, you know what, take a d- a, you know, breath in, you know, try a relaxed deep breath, hold it for a few seconds, and just exhale slow as you can.

And just do that, and then just breathe normal for a few reps, and then do it again. That's it.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Great advice.

JASON STACY: So easy.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: Right? Just- I have a lot of other things with, like, breath holds, and I, I mean- Right ... there's a lot of things I do. But, I mean, honestly, man, sometimes that's just the missing, like that simple little thing.

Take a time out, slow down your breath, and you're good to go.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Amazing. So, so simple. Again- Mm ... the longer exhale, right? Just, it literally, if you are listening to your heart, when you breathe in, your heart rate goes up a little bit. When you breathe out, it goes down.

JASON STACY: Yeah. Right? Sympathetic versus parasympathetic every time.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Just little bio hack, which again, that word has been- ... bastardized. It has been. But just- But it's real ... being able to exhale as long as you can just a couple, just a couple times. Yeah. A couple breaths can help your body just kind of find a, a new, a, a, a new state.

JASON STACY: That's right. Well, it gives you, it gives you just that, just enough space.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah, the space. Yeah.

JASON STACY: Just enough space to kinda, like, see what's really going on around you.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: And that's all you need sometimes. The

SHAWN STEVENSON: space between. That's right. Who, who sang that? Was that Dave Matthews?

JASON STACY: Maybe. I don't know.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Why do I know that?

JASON STACY: I don't know. We'll have to Google that later, I guess, huh?

SHAWN STEVENSON: All right.

So I know somebody's listening, like- Yeah ... "Yeah, that's it. That's my guy." That's that guy. All right. Uh, lastly-

JASON STACY: Yes, sir ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: I wanna talk about environment.

JASON STACY: Oh,

SHAWN STEVENSON: boy. All right, so the three Es, energy, emotion, environment. Mm. In the book you say, quote, "Your environment doesn't just surround you, it programs you."

JASON STACY: Mm. "

SHAWN STEVENSON: It teaches your body and mind what's possible, what's dangerous, and what's normal."

Let's talk about that. It's not a

JASON STACY: bad quote.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah, it's fire. It's fire,

JASON STACY: actually. Um, look, it, I, I don't like to put any of the, you know, either of the three Es as one's more important than the other. It's a very strong ecosystem. Each one influences the other, and it just cycles around all the time.

Environment is... I'll break it down to you like I did the others. We have environment, we have an internal environment and an external environment. So internal environment, people usually think what? Nutrition, hydration, you know, maybe even the air you're breathing. You know, this, these kind of things will influence your, your overall health, your wellbeing, the s- you know, the kinda stressors, good or bad, that your body's going through based on, you know, what you just ate, what you're drinking or didn't drink.

Um, so it's that part that we already kinda understand, the internal environment. The other part about the internal environment that I think, again, I like to highlight more so is, is- The conversations that you're a part of, the content that you're consuming, the conversations that you allow. Like, you may not be directly a part of it, but, you know, you're in an environment where you, you know, these are the things being talked about or, you know- Yeah

discussed or highlighted or whatever, you know, made into some big thing that doesn't need to be. It's given it all this stuff it doesn't need to exist. So those things that you allow, the things that you are part of, the things that you initiate. So, and again, with our phones, the things that you're consuming, all those things have a strong influence on your internal environment, the way you see the world, the way your thinking is, the way your emotions are, are acting, um, responding, you know.

So that's our internal environment. Our external environment, yes, of course, we have like, you know, sleep, you know, the, the darkness, the temperature, the, you know, the setting, all these things that people already kinda know r- really well about. But for me, when I talk about the external environment, to me it's the people.

100% it's the people.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah.

JASON STACY: The, it's... That's the most important thing I, I believe, and that's, again, you can't always control who's around you. So I, I look at it, there's like three circles, right? You have like your, your inner circle that you're around most of the time, spend most of your days with. You have sort of a bit of an outer circle, so people kinda come and go, maybe different phases at different times, more or less.

And then, like, the peripheral, and this is the part I think sometimes people miss, is that, like, let's say, you know, let's say you and I work together. We, we spend a lot of time together, let's say. You know, we've been, we have projects we're doing. We spend a lot of time. Um, then we have a few people kinda coming and going in our business, and we're, you know, you know, we're still s- spending more time with them or with our family, people coming and going.

But what we don't often think about is, like, well, who do you spend your time around when, when I'm not around? Like, 'cause those people are gonna influence who you are, and then you're gonna bring that into where, into my environment now. Ooh. And so this is the part that people kinda miss, you know? Like, you can come in here and put on a facade and, and, you know, say you a certain way, and they have certain values, and you have a certain intention, but if you spend most of your time around people that aren't like that or that's not your environment, and you're not mindfully trying to, you know, be different than that environment, then you're gonna bring that garbage into my environment.

And people miss that all the time. That's a, for me, that's a big part. So when it comes to environment, yes, internal environment, all the normal things we, we, we talk about all the time, for supplements, nutri- everything, et cetera. Um, but remember, the content you're consuming, the conversations you're having and allowing and initiating, those are ev- powerful.

More than anything else, it doesn't matter. You can do all the right things with your sleep, right? But if you just co- you know, if you're in this, again, like the survival mode like I talked about, and you've been optimizing your survival mode, so you've optimized your sleep, but you're still in this environment that is, is just influencing you in such a negative way, or it's not going the direction, or it's out of alignment with who you, you're w- who you are and what values you wanna stand for, then you can go ahead and lay there.

You can do all, check all the boxes. You know, "Shawn told me I gotta do ABC. I'm doing everything." You know? And it's, and it's the best things, but I'm still laying there in a horizontal position still with that same mentality, that same internal, you know, noise going on, and it doesn't matter how much I optimize it.

I'm still gonna be optimizing a survival mode.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Mm.

JASON STACY: You know? So that's the thing we have to be very, very mindful of. For me it's... And as we talked about earlier, it doesn't even matter. Like, they might say the right things. They might have the right body language, but you gotta know who they are. What's their real intention in this environment right now?

And then also, what are they bringing into that environment? And being aware of like, does that environment need this right now? If I were to give you an example, like even just with Aryna and our team, there's different times that... So each of us have our own, like sort of, you know, official job. Then each of us have sort of like these sort of, you know, more peripheral sort of external other things that we all kinda do just to make sure that everything's going really well for the whole team and for each other.

Um, and sometimes those skillsets or the personality what the team needs now, or let's say even what Aryna needs right now, like I know what she needs right now. I know, I know what she needs to hear. I know what she needs to do. But you know what? In this moment right now, if it comes from me, it's not gonna be heard.

Not the right way. But I know if, you know, if Helen, like our physio, if a female, she's the physio, they kinda have some quiet time together doing stuff. You know what? I'm gonna talk to Helen about something and see if she can just kinda like, you know, "Hey, how you feeling about this?" Or whate- whatever it is, you know?

It can be a physical thing, a mental, it doesn't matter. But you see what I mean? It's understanding, like, you know, you don't have to be the guy-

SHAWN STEVENSON: Yeah ...

JASON STACY: like all the time. You have to understand the environment and who would bring the most value at this moment. It doesn't devalue the others, and it doesn't lift up the other, you know, the person who's, who's in charge of that time.

It's just understanding that this is a, a, a living, evolving ecosystem, and if I really want the most for everyone around me, and I want us to be able to achieve whatever it is that we're, we're trying to achieve and sustain that while maintaining our values, while maintaining true to ourself so we, you know, can look back with, you know, a positive memories of these things, these experiences, then you have to understand that, like, you know, y- you can have someone who's the least experienced, the newest person on your team or in your environment, and there's just a moment, like what they bring to the table is, is so much more powerful than it came from me.

There's times that, like I remember early days with Anton. He was, you know, he's half my age. You know what I mean? I think I'm older than maybe their parents. I don't know. I don't know, but you know, and, and he was new at coaching, so, and we used to talk every night when we, when he first started coaching Aryna about how we're gonna approach the next day and what we should do, what we should say, how we should structure things, you know, physically and mentally, all that stuff.

And, um, and I remember this one time, and that was a great reminder for me, and I was... We were talking about what we should approach this, this, this challenge that we're ha- we're facing, right? This thing that we're struggling to figure out how to help her with. It was like early, early days. And I come up with an idea and a plan, so I started talking about it, and then he, I don't even remember, I wish I remember the words, but he just said something in just a few words that it like literally just, like, it just threw me back.

I was, I was blown away that this young guy had said something so much more impactful than anything I had come up with for that particular thing. That's something I probably would've never come up with because he's different generation. He's actually part of the same generation as she is, from the same country.

So they shared a lot of things that I, I, I might know, but I never understand.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Hmm.

JASON STACY: And so just being aware that, you know what? I'm, I'm out, I'm not... This, you got it. Go do your thing. Whatever you feel is right in that moment, you're doing it. 'Cause that is like, I gotta write that down. That was really good.

You know what I mean? Yeah. So it's just understanding how all those things really interact and that you can learn so much from each other In a good and bad way, so be very, very careful who you allow in that circle. So-

SHAWN STEVENSON: This is amazing, man. I've enjoyed this thoroughly. Yeah. I've gotten some great insights myself prior to even meeting you, just, you know, reading the book and, you know, and studying you and your, your, your, your wisdom.

You just expressed that wisdom again, like I don't have to be the guy, right? And just being able to understand the value of a team. And when it really boils down to it, in this life experience, like you've literally had the experience of not having that team- Mm-hmm ... like, to the extreme- ... that most people would just...

Ah, I mean, I, I don't even have the words for it. Yeah. You know? Most don't survive that, yeah. So again, I'm, I'm grateful that you were able to share that, and I was, I'm grateful that you were able to sur- survive that and to figure those things out. But truly, in this lifetime, the thing that gives us the most value, the thing that really helps us to have the life that we desire and deserve to live- Mm

are the people around us and that team that w- we, that we create.

JASON STACY: Mm.

SHAWN STEVENSON: And we create these different teams and these different kind of social constructs.

JASON STACY: Sure.

SHAWN STEVENSON: But we are a reflection of that. Mm. And your insight of, like, who is your teammate associating with?

JASON STACY: Exactly.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Like, these are getting to those layers.

Like, man, you're, I mean, you are dropping some serious insights. And for th- things for... If, again, if we're gonna stack conditions to where our environment is making these things automatic for us-

JASON STACY: That's right ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: like, man, it's so rich, so powerful. So I appreciate you so much. Can you tell people where to pick up a copy of The Pressure Code?

JASON STACY: Yes, sir. Well, first of all, thank you very much for having me and all those nice words. I really appreciate that. Um, The Pressure Code, yep, it's, uh, probably the easiest way, just go thepressurecode.com. Go to my website. There's links for that. There's a newsletter you can sign up to, um, uh, just sharing insights sort of behind the scenes of what I'm up to, what I'm thinking about.

Um, it's probably the easiest way, and it's available all around the world online already. It's rocking and rolling, baby. Yeah. I'm excited.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Amazing,

JASON STACY: man. Yeah, yeah. I'm, I'm

SHAWN STEVENSON: very grateful, very grateful. Yeah.

JASON STACY: Thank you for

SHAWN STEVENSON: sharing that. So last question. Yes, sir. What is the model that you're here to create for other people with how you live your life personally?

JASON STACY: Whoa. What is the model? Say that one more time. I like that.

SHAWN STEVENSON: What is the model-

JASON STACY: Mm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: or the example that you're here to set or to create for other people-

JASON STACY: Mm-hmm ...

SHAWN STEVENSON: with how you live your life personally?

JASON STACY: Mm. I think- Know what you stand for, and be sure that everything that you do aligns with that. So live what you say, lead by example, and for me, the biggest thing is, you know, be there in service of others, 'cause that all comes around for you.

And if everyone had that same mentality that I'm here for you, and you had that same mentality for me, then it, it's gonna be a win-win-win no matter what goes on.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Good morning.

JASON STACY: So yeah, that's what I say.

SHAWN STEVENSON: Amazing. Thank you so much, man.

JASON STACY: Of course, man. Thank you for having me. This was awesome.

SHAWN STEVENSON: The one and only-

Jason Stace everybody. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode today. I hope that you got a lot of value out of this. If you did, you already know what to do. Share this out with the people that you care about. Share the inspiration. There's so much hot mess out there that's getting shared abundantly.

Let's share some hot goodness. All right? Share this on social media. Take a screenshot of the episode. Tag me, I'm @ShawnModel, and tag Jason as well. I know that he would love to see the love. And of course, you could send this directly from the podcast app that you're listening on, write to somebody who you care about.

All right. Again, keep the positivity going. Keep the conversation going. Listen, we've got some epic masterclasses and world-leading experts coming your way very, very soon, so make sure to stay tuned. Take care, have an amazing day, and I'll talk with you soon.