Dream Bigger and Do More with Mitch Matthews

Welcome to True Grit and Grace, a podcast designed to empower you to claim your resilience and thrive through life's challenges. I am Amberly Lago, a mindset coach, fitness expert and bestselling author. Each week I'll dive deep with the world's brightest thought leaders and elite performers to share tangible tools and practical advice to inspire you to keep your eyes on the prize and forge ahead. So get ready to conquer your fears, heal any trauma, lead with your heart, and elevate your life with grit and grace.

Hello, I'm Amberly Lago. Welcome back to the True Grit and Grace podcast. I have on the show today. One of my good friends, Mitch Matthews is here with us. He's a serial entrepreneur. You do it all. He is a best selling author, keynote speaker, success coach, and the podcast host of DreamThink Do. And this is really his approach to life too. His podcast is rated number one by the Huffington Post, top 5% of Apple, which is huge because there's so many podcasts out there. And whether it's through his coaching, his podcast, books, speaking and training, his big dream gatherings, he helps fun, successful people to push through their fear to dream bigger, think bigger and do more of what they were put on the planet to do. He proudly lives a high caffeinated lifestyle. I got my coffee here with you this morning in Iowa with his beautiful wife and two kids. Actually, your one son just moved out here closer to me, so I'm hoping that means that you come visit me more.

That's right.

And I love that you're a man of faith and I call you a master connector. Mitch, I've been looking forward to this. It is such an honor to have you here. Thank you for being on the show.

I am so flipping excited to be here to get to have this conversation that's so like we were talking about. That's the best reason to have a podcast is you can get to have great conversations with great people and you've always got an excuse to do it. So I love it.

Sure. For sure. And we are starting early this morning and let me tell you, I don't know if you heard from your son, if he's called you or maybe he slept through it, but we had an earthquake this morning.

I did not hear that. No yowzers. Okay. Is everybody okay?

And oh yeah, everybody's ok. Shaking off

the walls or whatever.

Yeah, yeah. But you know, I have this, I love like glass bottles. I have this glass bottle collection of these antique bottles and let me tell you, they shook so Loud that it scared. It woke my daughter up. But we're all good. We're all.

I was going to say, I bet a glass bottle collection is probably, you know, like, one of the best test equipments for, you know, any kind of earthquake issue is like, okay, are the bottles shaken? All right, let's go.

That's what it was.

Rally, people, right? Oh, my gosh.

Well, I, you know, Gassner Otting introduced us, and I had the honor of being on your show, and we had so much fun.

Oh, my gosh. And dreamthink. Doers love you. Oh, my gosh.

It was so much.

So much for bringing it. Yeah.

Podcast is amazing. You've had some huge guests on your show, but it's not just the success with your books and your speaking. I mean, you go out of your way to really make sure that your friends that get to know each other. So you've introduced. Introduced Antonio.

Yeah.

And he.

His.

He's on the Today show this morning. I don't know.

This morning. Absolutely. Blowing it up as we speak. On the Today show. Absolutely.

Yeah. And you are like the coach to the coaches. I see you've worked with Brendan Burchard, Lewis Howes, and so I'm like, okay, we got to dig in. And I want to learn, like, all your secrets to. To coach, because you are an incredible coach. But one thing that really stood out to me is that, man, you are just. I have a mastermind called your unstoppable life, and you are unstoppable. But it didn't always start like that. You grew up with a little bit of anxiety as a kid.

A lot of anxiety, Absolutely. Yeah. I grew up a worried little kid and a worried sick kid because I had what's commonplace now, an undiagnosed milk allergy, severe milk allergy. And as you know, it's one of those things that we've learned so much about health and nutrition and, you know, allergies and all of those things, But I was a little kid in a little town in Iowa. Nobody knew what was wrong with me other than I was just sick all the time. And I was, you know, kind of predisposed to worry and anxiety, but having health issues kind of just added all, you know, just put it all together and made for a really difficult, challenging soup growing up. And it's one of those that I would get sick and then stay home and then worry about being sick, worry about being away from my friends, worry about being away from school, and, yeah, those kinds of things just snowballed.

Well, how do you think you got over that? I mean, you're, you know, overcoming.

Yeah.

Constant warrior. How did you get through those moments? Yeah, stop the worry. Like. Yeah, I get that way where I'm, like, so worried about something and it ruins my joy. It kind of spoils the joy for. And prevents me from being in the moment and enjoying where I am right now because I'm worried about what I'm going to do in the future or even something I've done in the past.

Yeah. Well, it's amazing because you're so right. It's like worry is a thief, right? It steals our joy, it steals the moment. It steals all those things. And, you know, as I. As I grew up, you know, full transparency, I actually didn't get good at handling it. I didn't get better at handling it. I got better at hiding it initially. So by the time I got to high school, I look like. I looked like I didn't have a care in the world. But instead of, you know, all of that thing, all of those things coming out and they were just inside and just killing me deep down. And interestingly enough, I started to kind of get introduced to my faith, and that started to help. But I will say I had one of those wake up moments. And you know, you know how when we go on these journeys to try to learn about life, learn about ourselves, sometimes we can have these kind of consummate moments that. That change everything. And I did have one of those moments where my wife and I were living in Montana and I got invited to climb a mountain, Granite Peak, which is the tallest mountain in Montana. And interestingly enough, I was also afraid of heights. A little predisposition to worry. So, yeah, of course I'll climb Granite Peak. Why wouldn't I? Right? And it's an amazing mountain, and it takes about two to three days, depending on which route you go. Two to three days just to get to the mountain. And you go through some of the most beautiful country in the world. You see, you know, crystal clear mountain streams. You see flowers that only blossom in this area, area of the world. You see wildlife. It's just amazing. And I missed all of it because I was busy worrying, right? And I was putting my list together of the various ways I could die while climbing Granite Peak. Right. And it's one of those things where I did this trip to kind of learn about myself and maybe push through because, you know, a lot of things had been kind of coming together. And by this time, I was a professional. I was a salesperson. And A pharmaceutical company, all of those things. And I'm like, you know what worry is destroying my life. It's like you said, it was stealing all of my joy. And I said, you know, I've got to go try to do something extreme. But here I am trying to go and learn about worry and overcome worry, and I'm in the middle of all of that worrying. Right? Which is, you know, the greatest of dichotomies and ironies. But the day came when we were going to go and try to go after the summit, and we open our tent flaps to the best weather we'd had so far. Crystal clear skies. And we start to push towards it. You know, we started to go after the summit, four in the morning. You know how these things go. And we started to make our way up. And as we did, it started to snow, which was kind of pretty, but, you know, of course, it added a few more things to the way I could die while climbing Granite Peak. And then we get closer and closer to the top and a fog had rolled in, which also kind of made it eerie and ominous. But kind of the blessings of that is the last part of Granite Peak as you hike along this ridge, and there's about a 2000 foot drop off of one side, about a 1500 foot drop off the other side. So it was great that we could only see about 10ft around us. And our guide kept telling us, yeah,

that must have been. How many of there were you? How many?

There was four of us in this group, a guide, and then we had two other people. And me and our guide kept saying, don't worry, guys. You know, Granite Peak has this Tabletop Rock. So if you Google Granite Peak, you'll see this Tabletop Rock. And most people stand on Tabletop Rock with their hands raised triumphantly like Rocky Balboa. And we were all set to get that picture. And it's hilarious because we found it, you know, in this fog. We found Tabletop Rock. Two other guys that I was with, they did the Rocky Balboa. If you see my picture, Amberly, it's hilarious. One fist is raised in the air, the other, the other hand is, like holding onto this rock. I'm sitting on Tabletop. I couldn't stand. I'm sitting on Tabletop Rock. My hands are gripped around this white knuckle. My foot is like doing this crazy monkey grab underneath this rock. It's hilarious, right? But I made it so you were

able to get one. You're like, okay, I'm going to put more.

Yeah, exactly. And one of my things that I'd learned up to that point, point, my coping mechanism for worry was, well, once I do this thing, once I check this off my list, once this event is behind me, then that's when I'll finally be able to rest. That's when I'll finally be at my best. That's when I'll finally be in the moment. And interestingly enough, when my foot released its crazy monkey grab and I started to get off this rock, I heard this sound. It was like nothing I'd ever heard before, similar to a handful of firecrackers were thrown at my feet. And then our guide yelled one word. I'll never forget how it sounded. He said, lightning. And as it turns out, we weren't in fog at all. We were in the clouds of an electrical storm. And lightning started to flash and pop.

And you probably had, like, all this equipment that was, like, antennas.

Yes, exactly. We were four lightning rods atop tents with the metal pickaxes all pointing upwards out of our backpacks. We all had crampons with us, all these kinds of things. And it's hilarious. I mean, the greatest irony of all of this is I'm a pretty good list maker. I'm pretty creative. So I had a pretty robust list of the ways I could die while climbing Granite Peak.

And you're like, this wasn't on the list.

Hadn't even been on the list. Hadn't even thought about lightning.

Right.

Like, I'm not even that creative. And we made our way down. You know, it's crazy, but, you know, one of the guys that was with us was a lightning bolt struck so quickly, and at that elevation, the lightning actually looks like it's originating in the rocks and shoots up. And he was so close to one, his hair literally was on fire. It was just nuts. Yeah. But our guide was able to find us, you know, some relative safety under this, like, rock kind of outcropping. And we threw all our gear about, you know, 20ft away from us, and we just waited out this storm. And I would love to tell you that the epiphany, you know, happened under that rock, but I was too busy praying, like, deal, deal. Kind of prayers, like, lord, if you get me out of this, I'll never do something stupid like this again. You know, all of these. But later that day, we obviously did make it. And later that day, we were back at base camp, and it struck me. And I think I was praying about it. And, you know, prayer is big for me, and I was praying about it. And God kind of nudged me. It's like, hey, kiddo, this is the way you've been living your whole life.

Wow.

Right? Like, you've been going from thing to thing, task to task, mountain summit to mountain summit, saying, you'll rest, you'll be at peace, you'll feel joy.

This is hitting me hard. Yeah.

And he's like, I don't want you to live that way anymore. And so I said, okay. And I broke down in tears, if you can imagine, like, how emotionally drained we all were. And then elated and then drained. I just. It was exactly where I needed to be to get that message. And I just decided to come down off that mountain and say, I'm not going to live that way anymore. And I will say that I haven't done it perfectly, but I try to get better every day. And so I've learned a number of strategies to kind of help me to overcome that worry, at least to deal with it and not to deal with it in the way that I had been trying to. To kind of say, well, I'll enjoy it once this is done. It's like, no. How do you find joy in any circumstance? How do you find peace in any season of your life? How do you find, you know, that belief, that faith, no matter what kind of the world is saying, that's the kind of life that I want to live more of. And so, yeah, that's. That's something that helps to fuel me.

Well, and you know what? Thank you for saying that you don't do it perfectly, because I will get those messages and, like, here's your wake up. Here's your wake up. You're. You're on autopilot. Get out of that or stop worrying and be in the moment. And, you know, every year, I pick a word that kind of guides me through the year. And my word this year was quality. And, like, not quality everything. Quality time with my family, quality health, quality episodes and guests like you. And then sometimes I mess up and I find myself, you know, almost not. Not that I'm in autopilot sometimes, where I'm just, like, going down the checklist. And I have been there where I'm like, oh, if I. When I just get this deadline done, then I can rel. Then I can be happy. And my mom just told me yesterday, I was talking to her, and she said, you know, Amberly, maybe because I work at home now ever since COVID like, I don't have an office that I go to anymore. My office is at home. Which makes it easier to work non stop because I love what I do. And my mom suggested, she said, you know, Amberly, maybe you need like office hours where, you know, after a certain amount of time you're not going to check your email or your social media or whatever. And I was like, you're right, Mom. And I need you to give me those reminders more, you know, but wow, you went, first of all, you were scared of heights and you were like, I'm going to go climb this mountain. And it's. I'm in a electrical storm, I can't see a few feet in front of me. I might fall off the mountain. What do you think that it is in you that gives you the courage to keep moving forward even though you have some fears?

I love that question. It is interesting. I grew up a scared kid, but one thing that I learned is that I did want to still live an amazing life. So I was aware of my fear, but I started to realize that if I push myself, not across the board, not in every area, not all the time, but if I saw something that I wanted to do, if I pushed through that fear, most of the time it paid off. And I think that over time I've just realized that it's kind of. You've heard that phrase, feel the fear, but do it anyway, right? It's that I started to realize even as a young kid that, I mean,

you started working when you were like 12 or 13.

My first dream job at 13. Because at 12, I fell in love with bikes. Bicycles. And I lived in this small town of Newton, Iowa, and I set my sights on working at the bike shop. There was one bike shop in our little town. It was a little hole in the wall building two blocks off the square. And our square was just like one out of those Hallmark Christmas movies. Just an adorable courthouse with stores all around it. And we were two blocks off of. That was. But it was. Everything that was paradise in heaven to me was in that bike shop. And So I, at 12, even though I was scared, I was scared of things like people not liking me, getting arrested for loitering, you know, all those things. I just started to ride my bike up to this bike shop and do anything that I could to stay close to the bike shop owner and learn as much as I could. So I swept out the alley, I painted trash cans, I wiped, you know, any dust particle in the store. I tried to take care of it so that I wouldn't get arrested for loitering. I. I mowed his lawn sometimes with his permission, sometimes without. And at the end of the summer, he's just like, well, I'm not going to get rid of you. Obviously, like, you know, you've got dogged determination on that front. I might as well hire you. And he and his wife, Marty Doan, Sherry Doan, hired me and gave me my first dream job. And I worked there 13 through college. And I think that a lot of the seeds got planted about entrepreneurism for me there because I saw, you know, at first I got there because I was passionate about bikes, but once I was there, I started to learn the true passion was around entrepreneurism. And I started to learn what it was to understand an audience, understand a community, understand a customer. Then to be able to say, all right, how do we find out what that customer needs? And, you know, I just loved that part of it. And it's one of those that I've just, you know, that's one thing that taught me especially about pursuing dreams, is that as you go after a dream, oftentimes you're able to achieve that dream, but that's usually not the full reward. The full reward is what happens after the dream. Kind of what I call the back doors of that dream. To be able to say, I thought the dream was to get the job at the bike shop, but actually that was just a doorway to open up a whole new passion around entrepreneurism that I don't know that I would have gotten any other way. And so it's like, I'm glad when I look back, you know, I had to push through fears and again, I didn't do it perfectly. I probably, you know, they were probably, you know, if they had Google at the time, they probably would have googled restraining order, you know, for this 12 year old kid. Right, but, but you know, I love

that you share that you did the hard work, you did the stuff that a lot of people wouldn't want to do. And I think that's so true for everything now, any kind of job. People see the glamour of certain jobs or certain careers, but they don't want to do all the hard work that it takes to get there. Or people want this transformation, but they don't want to feel the feelings or do the work or the therapy or read the books or the exercises to get them to that place. And you said you were painting trash cans, you were sleeping, you were mowing, you were doing anything you could to get close to that. And I think, man, that's what grit is, it's that determination, it's that passion and perseverance that you have and you set your eye on that goal. And I like that. You also said that you didn't try to do it in everywhere and every place at the same time, but you focused on what was important. And I think that helps us, when we know what our values are, to get to where we want to go. Do you think that that's something that helps you make decisions in your life is whether it's business or being an entrepreneur or whatever it is, or your, your values or how do you make big decisions? What's the best thing? Values or standards or what is that?

Yeah, all the above, right. There's. There's so many different areas. We could go with this because it's interesting, like you mentioned that I get to work with a lot of, you know, I have coaching clients, but I also work with coaches and I've got a training we're doing tomorrow night. That's all about boundarying. And part of boundarying is, you know, being able to boundary clients. You work with clients, you know what that's like as far as you want to deliver excellence with those clients. And part of that is being able to boundary and to be able to say, all right, how do I contain what it is that I'm going to deliver and bring that with excellence, but also not have it run over my whole life. Right?

Yeah.

And then part of the boundarying is for us, right? It's sometimes it's external, like the client or what are you going to do on social media, you know, or more marketing, branding. But also sometimes the boundarying is internal, right? That inside, like how am I going to think, what am I going to look at? How am I going to make decisions to be able to say, what am I going to do? But also what am I going to not do? Right. That's one of my focuses for today is to make sure that I'm looking at my to do list. But what are some of those things that are on my to don't list? Like what are some of those things? I'm not going to worry about. What am I not going to worry about? I'm not going to worry about those things that are outside of my control today, right? To the best of my ability. That's something I'm going to focus on. And so part of it is just getting resolute on those things that you're going to do and not do. But to come back to your bigger question of how do I make decisions? I really do try to establish my life by a Set of values, beliefs that I have, but I try to. And you and I have talked about this being recorded, but also off recording. Prayer is a big part of my life as well. And so I always try to make decisions based on the values and beliefs that I hold. But I also, especially on the big ones, but even on the small ones, kind of try to check in with prayer, too, to be able to say, all right, am I getting a nudge on this? Am I getting any other direction that would help me to sometimes not violate my values, but maybe look at something a little bit differently or spend a little bit more time, you know, in a particular space or with a particular person? Not because it may necessarily make sense, but because we're just feeling that nudge to do it.

Well, you know, I. And I have to say I appreciate you and your prayer. I think it was before we started recording for your podcast. We said a prayer, and I said, oh, that was so beautiful. It was so beautiful that I actually called my mom afterwards and said, you won't. And I called my sponsor, and I told them both, those are, like, two really, really important people in my life, and told them about you and your prayer. And then I told you how much that prayer meant to me. So you recorded a prayer just for me and my family, which I saved. And so it's just. It means so much. And I'm the same. Like, if I. If I'm struggling with a decision, I will pray about it. And a lot of times in the morning, I will get the answer. And it's sometimes not what I expected or not what I want to hear, but it does. It really does help me make those decisions. Yeah, but the boundaries. I want to get back to that, because that's something that I seem to keep learning, the lesson of boundaries in my life. And I feel like when I say something, especially out loud, like, I need to work on my boundaries, the universe will just go, oh, really? Well, here, let's give you this and this and this and this and this.

We have the laboratory for that. Let's get in there. Let's do some experiments. Yes.

Yes. It can be very tough, and especially with friends coaching clients, because I love people. I want to help them. I want to do as much as I can. And I had to make a big decision last week, and my husband's advice was. He's like, amberly, you can't save the world. You can't do that. You need to put boundaries up. And it's like. But I do. I want to help everyone. And I want it. But it's tough sometimes to set those boundaries, and I think it helps to talk it through.

Yeah.

What are some of the tips that you would share with me and with everybody, with our listeners? This is selfishly, I'm wanting it for you listeners.

Yeah, I love it. So I know for me, it's interesting because, as you know, with your daughter Ruby, you coach your coaching clients, but also, you know, coaching also gives us an incredible tool set that helps us as parents and spouses and relationships and things like that. And one of the foundational principles that I really adhere to and remind myself of when I'm coaching clients, when I am even working with our boys and spending time with our boys, is to hold them as capable.

Yeah, that's powerful.

It is. It is really powerful. Because one of the things that I have realized, you know, with coaching clients especially, is if I hold them as capable, they will rise to that. Right. They will feel that. But if I'm not holding them as capable, a lot of things will. You know, that can come out in a lot of different ways. It might come out in. And I would never intentionally do this, but you might kind of send the signal. You don't think they could do something. But one of the other ways that you can fall short of holding something as capable or someone as capable is to basically feel like we have to do it all right? And it's interesting because I'll tell my coaching clients and my clients, I'm very blessed to say my clients pay a lot of money to work with me. And I will tell them, I have a very weird goal for you. And they're like, what's that? And I'll say, we generally will work together for three months to a year. And I'll say, my goal for when we get done is that you will be absolutely amazed, shocked, so happy with what you've achieved. But there will be this part of you deep down inside going, what the hell did Mitch do anyway? Right? Because I want them to feel like that progress, those breakthroughs, that plan, that vision, you know, the work that they owned it. Right now, part of my job is to help them uncover that. Part of my job is to help them own that. Part of my job is to help them clarify that and then start to go and achieve it, go after it. But if at any point they start to become dependent on me, I've not done my job as a coach.

I agree. When I have a client that I've had for almost 20 years, and I told her after a Year I said, okay, you don't need me anymore. You've got this. You don't need me. And they were like, well, that's weird. Don't you want me to. As a client, I'm like, I love you, but you know what to do. You've got this on your own. You're capable, you can do this. But they want the accountability they want and that's beautiful. And so that's why they continue. It's the accountability. But my goal is the same to. Nope, you have learned, you've got it, you're capable. But I actually wrote that down in big letters. Hold them capable. Yeah, because I think that helps with, you know, even with the discussion that I had with my daughter last night where she was did not agree with what her coach was doing with her horse. And it was like these words is like, oh, she can have that conversation with her, her trainer, her coach, you know. Yeah.

As a parent, as a coach, we often want to jump in and do it. You know, I think that's even when it comes to us as entrepreneurs, with, when it comes to us wanting to go and help the world, part of that, I have to remind myself, especially if I start to feel drained now, I am an introvert. I think we've talked about this a little bit. I'm an introvert who's learned to do extroverted things, right? So. And I'm an introvert who loves people, but I got to take care of my inner introvert. That inner introvert. If I really start to feel drained, it's because, you know, I've been spending and pouring out a lot and I've not been taking care of and energizing that inner introvert. And one of the things I have to remind myself of when I start to feel that draining, when I start to feel that exhaustion, is to say, wait, where am I not holding people capable? Right? Like, it's that whole thing of being able to say, okay, gosh, I just got to get one more post in, I got to get one more video in. I got to do this one more thing. And it's like, wait, am I holding people as capable or am I kind of saying a lot more depends on me than probably does my grandma Matthews. My grandma Jesse used to say, boy, people think about you a lot less than you think they do, which is a really good wake up call, you know, and that's way before social media. You know, I was always worried about what would people think. And that started to transfer over as an entrepreneur, as a Coach as a speaker is like, oh, people are thinking about me all the time. People need me all the time. It's like, actually my prayer is, lord, help me to create content so that when somebody needs it, they'll find it. Not how can I be out there all the time? How can I always be the one that's seen or whatever. It's like, that's kind of helped me to boundary myself, to be able to say, all right, when I need to rest, I can rest in one God. Help people to find stuff when they need it. If I put stuff out there, help it to be a blessing when they need it, and help me to take care of that inner introvert. Help me to rest. And I do think that it's wild, but, you know, worship, you know, people always like, how do I pray? How do I worship? And I think that rest is one of the highest forms of worship. Because if that rest is undergirded by trust, you know, and faith, then that's one of the highest forms of worship. So that's when I start to say, okay, I'm going to hold people as capable. I'm going to pray that they come across the content they need when they need it. And right now I'm going to rest and trust that God's got it.

Okay, I'm hearing you. I'm hearing this message loud and clear. It's something I need to hear again and again because rest is hard for me, but I'm the same. And when I start to see, feel drained, I'm like, okay, I'm not taking care of, you know, my serenity, my peace, that introvert. And I do need that quiet time and that rest. I need time for worship. Time out, nature.

Yes.

Where I really just feel like filled up, you know, and so, wow, I am hearing that. And I also love what you said about social media, about praying, about. I hope that somebody that. And that's what I did when I wrote my book. And I want to get into your book. When I wrote my book, I thought, I hope that, you know, I pray that this just helps, you know, and I try to take the just. But I help, you know, not just one person. Now I'm like, I hope it helps many get through some difficult challenges I have. You should see all the screenshots that I have on my phone because I have your books on. I've got your ebook Ignite. And I'm like. And I'm like, screenshot, screenshot, screenshot, screenshot. So I wanted to ask you what inspired you to write your book?

Yeah, got a couple of ones, but the Ignite is one. It's really interesting because Ignite is all about helping people to uncover buried dreams and then start to build a plan that actually works. And. And what I wanted to do with Ignite was something a little bit different, and so I kept that one a little bit shorter. And I collaborated with a visual artist who helped me to then create images. She created unique photography.

Yeah. Thank you for that. I'm a better reader when there's pictures involved.

Oh, me too. I love. I grew up if my. You know, the teacher said it's story time, and there were drawings I was in. Right. So I thought, you know, I want it to be a reading experience so that people can. Can get more lost in their own thoughts as opposed to a lot of content. And so what I did was I would try to, you know, write a story, ask a question, and then let people write. And there's space in the book, as you know, for journaling and writing, because I want it. And I always say I want this book to be messy. I want it to be a laboratory where you're experimenting with things. And so what we've found, especially over the course of time, we do events when it's safe to do so, we do events all over the country called big dream gatherings, and, you know, get people together to dream. And that's been.

Yeah, you've been doing those since, like, 2012 or so.

Yeah, well, yeah, our first one was in 2006 by happy accident. It happened in our house.

Didn't happen in your house.

Yeah, it was an entrepreneurial dream, and everything had fallen apart. It was May of 2006, so we're approaching our 15th anniversary, and interestingly enough, I was sitting in my office saying, okay, this was a dream, and it's turning into a nightmare. And I just wanted to quit. I was embarrassed. I was tired. I was scared.

What was the dream?

I had the idea of a game, and I'd done all sorts of. You know, we'd had businesses around service and speaking and coaching and all those things, but I never had a product, and I wanted to create this game. And everything had been working, but then all of a sudden, everything fell apart. Our designer that we'd been working with for six months, her computer crashed, and she lost all of her files.

Oh, my gosh.

We had a manufacturer lined up. All of a sudden, that relationship started to fracture. And then. And I'm sure you guys have never had this, but In May of 2006, we had all these financial things all happen at once, and it just kind of. Our world just exploded. And I was ready to give up, and I was praying about it, just like we talked about. It was a big decision, right? How do I walk away from this? Do I give up on this? And I was praying about it, and I got this nudge. You're trying to do it by yourself, kiddo. It's like, well, yeah, that's how you get stuff done. It's like, well, yeah, let me know how that goes. You know, like, maybe you should ask for some help. And I started to think, well, who could I ask for help? And I started to think about some of my friends, some of my family. And then I started to realize I had this very, you know, this big epiphany of going, oh, my gosh, I could ask them for help on my dream, but I don't know what their dreams are. And I started to think, well, maybe if I invite them over to our house, we could talk about our dreams, get them down on sheets of paper, put them up on our walls, and then just compare notes to see who needs help with what. And so we did that. But this is proof positive, Amberly, that I married up because we're out of time, out of options, and out of money. And my big solution is throw a party, right? But my wife's like, okay, we're going to hurt. And so I sent out an email that said, big dream gathering. And I invited 30 of our friends over on a Tuesday night to come and do this thing. I said, I don't know how it's going to go, but come over. And we did just that. And we had 29 of those 30 people show up, which was crazy, but it was absolutely amazing. And some people knew exactly what their dreams were. Put them up on sheets of paper, put them up on the walls, and started to move around the room.

But mentioned a lot about you, too, and your wife, because you really have that. That energy that. Those good vibes when you're the kind of person. When I see your name pop up on my phone, I'm like, oh, my gosh. When I see an email from you, I'm like, oh, what good news is it now? Or what's going on with Mitch? You have that energy that people want to be around you. And I can't wait to meet your wife, too, because I know that she encouraged you to go up that mountain. I heard in one of the interviews that I listened to, I heard she was encouraging. So I cannot wait to Meet this amazing.

You're gonna love her. I think it's going to be a dangerous meeting when you two meet because you guys are like sisters, for crying out loud. So I think it's. I think it's going to be awesome. Yeah. So.

So 29 people showed up.

29 people showed up. And we did it for a couple of hours, you know, and sure enough, some people knew exactly what their dreams were. Most people, if they were being honest, didn't know what their dreams were. And these are successful adults, right. But they realized sometimes it was in quiet, like I didn't know what my dreams were. I got your email. I didn't know what I'd write down. So that's what made them say, I need to think about that. I need to go and maybe be inspired by other people. I need to go and see what other people are dreaming about. And so it was supposed to go for a couple of hours. We lost control of it and it went for a full week, which is amazing.

So it went for a week.

A week. So the people that we knew were there the first night, those people started inviting people. They didn't even tell us. People just started showing up at our house the next day to put more dreams up. And that just continued on for a full week, which is absolutely amazing. It was a little weird, but it was awesome too, because, you know, we had people, all walks of life, all backgrounds walking through our house putting dreams up on the walls. And it was absolutely amazing. And we kind of thought it was a one off thing. We got help, we got our product in stores by that Christmas. But we also saw so many other people start to pursue all sorts of different dreams. Big dreams, small dreams. And the bigger thing was we realized the magic of what happens when you dream together. And so we saw people that put up a dream. Like we had one, one gal put up a dream that she'd read an article about these kids that were living in Mozambique in a garbage dump and she just wanted to help them. Ever since she read that article, she just wanted to help them, but she didn't know how. She'd never left the country, she never traveled internationally, never done any of that kind of work, but she just wanted to do it well. Lo and behold, somebody that didn't know her gave her $1,000 to get her started on that trip. And within six months of that big dream gathering in our house, she was over in Africa helping these kids. Fast forward 15 years, she's actually. She and her husband are in the process of adopting A couple of those kids right now. And so you just never know. And so we realized there's something amazing that happens when you give yourself permission to dream and something magical that happens when we dream together. And so we've been doing them ever since, and we do them all over the country. And of course, during COVID couldn't do that. And so we worked on creating an app that would create the same.

That's what I want to talk to you about. Like, that app. So I have your app.

Yes.

And I'm so excited. I mean, you're on a mission to really inspire a million, maybe more. Maybe more people to go after their big dreams. And so I've got the app. I'm so excited about this. I hope to meet you at one of your big dream gatherings in person. But I'm excited about this app, and I want you. I mean, congratulations. It's a big deal.

Thank you.

It's such a big deal.

And it's the fruit of this kind of pursuit in that, you know, we aren't supposed to walk out these dreams by ourselves. And honestly, the app exists because somebody was really touched and impacted by the big Dream Gathering years ago. Back in 2010, the person that I partnered with on the app came to a big dream gathering and was so impacted by it. He's like, someday, I want to do something. I want to help with this. I want to spread it. And he wound up being very successful in the tech world and as an executive at a software company. And interestingly enough, as he grew in that dream pursuit, he started to move away from being able to code and some of the things that he loves. And he reached out to me about a year and a half ago, before anybody was saying Covid or pandemic or any of those things, and said, hey, I want to help you put an app together for the big dream gathering. It's time. And interestingly enough, I'd always kind of resisted it because I love, you know, what it's like. I love having people in a room doing this together. But again, I went back. It's another example of going back and praying to say, hey, one of my values had always been never online, always in a space. But when I prayed that time, I got the nudge. No, it is time to bring it to an app. And so Joel and I created the Dream Together app so that we could have that big dream gathering type experience where people from around the world can dream together, where you can go in there, created a profile. It's kind of like, you know any other social media, but you create your profile and then you can start to post some dreams and connect with other people within the community. And I know we're going to set up a community just for you.

So, truthfully, yes, we've already named it.

Yes, exactly right. So they're going to be able to go in and dream just with you and dream with your community, your tribe, and think about this. I mean, I know you've got listeners and followers from all over the world. So now people, you know, your people can come in and dream together with the express purpose of posting dreams, but then connecting and helping each other with that. And sometimes it's the posting of the dreams that kicks it off. You never know. Like, we'll often hear people say, oh, my gosh, I went in there and I saw Nancy's dream and that inspired me. Or I saw this dream and that made me think, oh, my gosh, I used to dream about that. Why wouldn't I do it now? And so sometimes it's just the act of dreaming, giving yourself permission to dream, that creates the ripple effect. But sometimes it's just commenting and saying, that's a great dream. Go for it. Or have you read this book or have you checked out this website or I've thought about doing something similar. Maybe we should talk. All sorts of amazing connections are happening. We've had people start to write books, start companies, start products, nonprofits, all these kinds of things, and even get jobs because of it. And it's just been amazing because it's that thing. It's people giving themselves permission to dream and then feeling that magic of dreaming together.

Oh, I love that. And it's not. It's inspiring and you feed off those, everyone's passion. But it's about coming together. One of the hardest things for me was to ask for help. And now I'm like, nope, I'm not afraid to ask for help. I'm gonna, like, ask away.

Yeah.

And I think with this app, especially because you create these communities in the app, you can feel supported, you can feel inspired, and you have permission to dream big. You know, one of the things in your book that I loved as an example and it really made me stop and think about big dreams, is, yeah, what if money was no object and you could just do anything? What would that dream look like? You know, and so that helped me. But tell us about the app, where they can, you know, get it and then how they go about, you know, signing in. Maybe they want to start their own community. I hope you'll join mine. Mine.

Exactly.

Mine is True grit and Grace. As soon as I learned about it, I went to the app store.

But you're pure awesome. I love it. So, yeah. So go wherever you grab your app, just search dream together and you will see our little icon. Go ahead and download that. When you download that, you'll just create a profile. And because you're coming in through Amberly, you will want to come in through the True grit and Grace. It'll ask you for your group code and just make it one word. True grit and Grace. One word. And you will come into Amberly's group and then you can dream together within the True grit and grace community family tribe. But like Amberlee said, you can actually also create your own groups. So if you want to create a group for work, if you want to create a group for your church, if you want to create a group for your neighborhood or your family, you can create your own groups to just be able to dream together with those people as well. But I really encourage you to stay in Amberly's group as well, because all sorts of magic can happen when you're dreaming with people from different walks of life, different backgrounds, different passions. You just never know what kind of networks can happen. So go to just search dream Together. Wherever you get your apps, create a profile and add true grit and grace as your group code.

Oh, thank you, Mitch. Now, I want you. All of this information will be in the show notes. So if you're listening to this, you can check back, check out the show notes and you'll be able to get details for this. Please tell people the best way to reach you, because you, like I said, you're the coach to the coaches, but you coach all kinds of people. But you also hold these big dream gatherings and you've got your books. So tell people the best way they can find you.

Absolutely. The best way to find me is just go to mitchmathews.com we spent our whole ad budget on coming up with that name. I'm just kidding. Mitchmathews.com and it is a beautiful website, though.

Your website is gorgeous. So, yeah, y' all check out his website. It's beautiful.

It's one of those. As a recovering perfectionist, you'll know it's one of those where I go to my website and see all the things I want to change. Right. But it's that whole thing of being able to say, hey, just get it going. And we always say progress over perfection, so. Absolutely. So if you go to mitchmathews.com we'll be able to connect. That's one of the ways that we connect with each other on social media. All of my socials there as well. But absolutely we want to help people, and one of our big goals is to help launch a million dreams this year. So we think we can do that through the Dreamthink do podcast and the Dream Together app and from having friends like you spread the word. So thanks so much for the honor of getting to be on the show and be a part of what you're doing.

I adore you and everything that you do. So y' all please go check him out. Check his website out. I love your podcast. I feel so honored that I got to be on your podcast. Y' all check out his podcast and let him know where you heard this interview, because I want everybody to know about you and I want everybody's dreams to come true. So thank you so much, Mitch, for being here and I am excited about the True Grit and Grace community on the app. So thank you.

Absolutely.

I can't wait. I can't wait to see what happens. And it's just such an honor to be on the show and I just love being in the Dream Journey together. So thanks for all that you do.

Oh, thank you.

Thanks so much for joining us this week on True Grit and Grace podcast. If you like it, please please rate it or share it with your friends.

That would help, too.

If you're not yet on the newsletter list, come over to amberlylago.com and jump on it. While you're there, you can grab a free downloadable gratitude journal. And you might just want to check out my book or even check out my monthly motivational membership. Thanks again for tuning in and we'll see you next week.

Sam.