Finding Purpose Amidst Life's Challenges with Barbara Majeski
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So much crazy goes on from this because at the end of the day, six months later after getting that award, I got diagnosed with stage three colon cancer. I'm sorry.

And now, Escaping the Drift, the show designed to get you from where you are to where you want to be. I'm Jon Gafford, and I have a knack for getting extraordinary achievers to drop their secrets to help you on a path to greatness. So stop drifting along, escape the drift, and it's time to start right now. Back again, back again with another episode of Like It Says in the Opening Man, the podcast that gets you from where you are to where you want to be. And today, ladies and gentlemen, today...

In this day after the election, when a lot of the country anyway is wheeling and trying to figure out what to do.

I got a guest, not in studio. She's where she is and I'm where I am. But this is a guest that, man, I saw her on the gram and she came flying down. And I just started doing a little bit of research on this person. And I kind of got into it, man. I was like, man, this is a person that's kind of got it figured out, has had that adversity in her life. She's had some things that have stepped up and hit her in the face and managed to keep pushing forward in a way that

that her view on life and just watching some of the stuff she does is really impressive. She is a frequent guest of shows like the Today Show, Fox and Friends, those sorts of things. She is the founder of the More Life Collective. She is the host of her very own Bearing It All podcast. And ladies and gentlemen, we are glad to have her in on the podcast today to get her point of view. This, ladies and gentlemen, Live in the Flesh.

it's barbara majeski it's barbara yes great to see you how are you i'm doing great i mean the election we know what we've got she conceded we can continue on with our lives right the sun came up today the uh the clouds are out nobody the world has not fallen apart uh you know here you

here you go my news feed is hysterical right now with the memes and the you know it's it's all good but at least it's you know it's never you know in something i posted yesterday well i mean this is like early in the day like early when voting first started and i i made this comment i'm just curious we're not gonna get political but i'm curious your thoughts on this because i said

Not supporting whoever wins the election tonight is like going to the doctor and hoping they misdiagnose you. Don't you have to kind of root for whoever you got to kind of root for them because rooting against them is kind of rooting against yourself.

It's true. I mean, you've got to find what, you know, what speaks to you and pick your team, like get your jersey on, get in the game. But, you know, some people aren't different. They're not really affected by the ebbs and flows of politics. So I can understand there have been elections in my youth that I was very meh about. So this one was a little deeper for sure. Yeah, it was. And, you know,

I'm glad it's over because me being in the business that I'm in and needing to advertise, holy crap, everything just got way cheaper today. It got a lot cheaper. Amen. Oh, it's hard. Our text message. Yeah, I can actually...

I can put something in somebody's... People will answer the phone again for my people when they call. I can put something in somebody's mailbox that is not buried with 800 other things. And man, clicks just got way cheaper on the interwebs, which I like. So I always let you know, high performing people, I like to do this nature versus nurture deal, right? So I like to kind of go back to the beginning of your life and how you grew up and

you had kind of extreme circumstances. You just got a lot of twins in your life, I think, including one of your siblings had special needs. So can we talk about that and what it was like growing up in that household? Where did you grow up? Tell me about that.

Yes. So it looks like you've done your homework. So I appreciate that. That's great. And yes, I grew up in New Jersey and I'm one of two sets of twins. I have a twin brother. I have younger twin brothers. So we're one of two sets and my mom's a triplet. So it runs in the family. Now, God gives you, you can handle and God...

made sure I just had three separate ones. So I do not have twins. - Yeah, how far, just out of curiosity, 'cause it'll frame kind of your mom a little bit for me, how far apart were the births for your mom? - Three years. - How much older? - Three years. I'm the older and I'm the oldest of the twin set, which is very important in twin world. And the younger set is three years younger. The interesting part is that both pregnancies, they told my mother she was having one.

And two came out. Yeah. My dear friend, Kendra Todd had two sets of twins inside of 18 months and she had four in diapers. I was like, dude, that's aggressive. That's a good, but your mom's still three years old and new twins. She was hustling. But one of your siblings had special needs. Yes. Yes. So twins run in our family as well as a condition known as fragile X, which is a lot like down syndrome. It's a genetically inherited form of,

of neurological impairment. And I always refer to my childhood as growing up Schwartz because it was just so chaotic and funny. But it was also during a time which special needs was more of like, you were kind of an outcast. You were shunned. People were like, oh, I'm so sorry. The schools weren't very efficient.

efficient with how to handle it. They didn't even know what to do. Like now it's just light and day. From the get go, you're really taught a trade as opposed to back in the eighties, the seventies, eighties, it was just like he was doing, it was just not that great. They had a special ed class, but it wasn't as what it is today. But I would also think that that time of growing up when things were a little less

When people were a little less empathetic, especially kids, younger kids, I can imagine that there was probably some sticking up you had to do for your sibling. I can imagine. Yeah. Go ahead. I was going to ask if that shaped your empathy. I was going to ask if that shaped the amount of empathy you have, if you think that that was a cornerstone or were there other things?

Well, there's just this crazy incident that happened when I was six. So I'm six, my twin brother and I are six, the younger set is three, and I'm giving the younger set a bath. Why a six-year-old is giving three-year-old twins a bath? This is the 1970s, everybody. So this is okay back then. Because mom had four kids. Mom had four kids.

And I was like the mother's helper. And I felt like these were my little baby dolls and you only put the water six inches high, whatever. And I'm playing patty cake with Michael. And I, you know, I always preferred playing with Michael patty cake because Steven is motor skills. Weren't there. Believe it or not. I can remember that.

But I turned to play patty cake with Steven and he was just laying on like the side of the bit, that bathtub. And I, I didn't understand what was going on. I was like, Steven, let's play patty cake. And he was not responding. So I called downstairs.

and my mother came up, my father came up. It ended up being a big scene. What my brother had was a seizure. So I took him out of the bath and ran him to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. I didn't see him again for almost two months. He ended up stop eating. He slipped into a coma and

And I was just six years old waiting for somebody to bring home one of my baby dolls. The twins were mine. They were in my life. They belonged to me. And before Steven came home, my mother sat my twin brother and I down and she said, "The good news is Steven's coming home.

you have to be kind to him. He moves slower. And it was at that time they had realized that he had had neurological deficits. They realized in the 90s it was a genetic disorder, but until that point, they had felt that his delayed development was...

like due to incidents or we they didn't really know but the fragile x wasn't uncovered until the 90s so my mother says stephen will likely never be able to speak um and i remember saying and this is the serendipity of it i said i said i don't i'll speak for him i said he'll never need to speak i got it i got it like just bring him home and i'll take care of him and you know as

as crazy as that is, it has definitely been my moral compass. My, okay, I got to redirect, how do I get myself aligned with my purpose, my calling? And there's just been time and time again when I'm lost in the sauce and I'm very reflective of

giving a voice to Stephen, giving a voice to those who can't speak for themselves, using my gifts in service of others. So I think it very much shaped the decisions that I ultimately made, if that makes any sense. No, it would have to, because I mean, you received a humanitarian award in 2015, correct? What was that for?

I mean, obviously, of course, the humanitarians. But what was the actual act of kindness or the great gift you gave to the world to get that award? You know, that's such a good question. And because it all does hinge on the fact that, you know, I knew like so I got on a

results for Operation Smile, which fixes cleft lips and cleft palates. Yeah, we'll join in parts of the world that won't have access to it. And I had gone on a humanitarian mission. There's so much to this story, but I'll try I'm just gonna keep it right here. And so

So I went on a humanitarian- - We're not in a hurry to be anywhere. - I'll tell you the funny part of this story because it's in alignment with the election total sidebar. So I had gotten a postcard in the mail for Operation Smile and it was to meet the founders. And I was like, "Oh my God, meet the founders of Operation Smile. I would love to." So I show up, I knock on this door, it's the dead of winter and Donald Trump Jr. opens the door.

I'm like and it's in the middle of The Apprentice and I'm like, oh Where did I just go because this is supposed to be my friend's house. Like I don't understand when was that? What year was this? This has to be 2007 or 8

All right. Cause you know, I was on the apprentice. Did you know that? Well, now I do. I was on that show. Yeah. Now early my season would have filmed in 2006. So it's been a minute. Yeah. I'm in the mix of apprentice season. So I know. That's so funny. See all roads. And anyway, so.

I ended up going to this, um, aberration smile at home meeting, learned more about it. I went on a mission after that. And when I came back from the mission on the flight back, I was like, I can do more. And I'll tell you, there were three rooms on this mission site. And,

at the end of like evaluation, parents are brought into one of these three rooms, room one and two, they find out about pre-surgery, post-surgery, and that their kid is qualified for the surgery. And remember, these are life-changing surgeries here in the United States. Yeah, it's a game changer. And

room three something something didn't the dots didn't line up and they don't qualify for the surgery they have to come back the next time and you would see these parents leave the room and it was awful and I asked the our host on the flight back I said what happens to room three what happens to the families and she said as long as we keep

sponsoring these missions, we'll go back and we'll take care of them the next time around. Because these kids could get the kibosh even if they have like a 99 degree fever. Like there's, they take no, like no risks. Any little thing, yeah. Yeah. So I'm like, okay, I'm like, well, I would like to...

how do you sponsor a mission? Because Colgate had sponsored ours for $150,000. And I was like, well, I'll raise $150,000. I'd never done that before. But I was like, well, I'll just figure it out. You kind of reverse engineer. And I've learned that through different iterations of my life of like, all right, where do you want to go? What do you want? Get clear on your destination. And then you got to reverse engineer. I'm like, all right, well, how do I

people do it. So I kind of was like, I'm doing it. I'm all in. And the thought in the back of my mind that you'll appreciate is that what if that was Steven? What if my brother needed a sister and didn't have one? What if Steven, it was like the Stevens of the world were kind of saying, hey, you've got a really big mouth. You've got great connections.

I had, I'd been part of a sales company that had scaled and I had epic amounts of connections. And I was one of the startups. So I knew everyone. And I was like, I think I can leverage my previous work experience and my connections to raise this money. So

it ended up just kind of going from there of, all right, I'll figure it out. And I'm, you know, it's just like that quote, quote and frozen, like just do the next right thing, like take the next right step. So ultimately I, you know, I raised the first $150,000 and this is where like the go-giver book is so good and everybody needs to read it. I really did that go that, that mission in like,

out of the goodness of my heart. I was like, I need to take care of the Stevens of the world. I need to use my voice for those who can't speak for themselves. And, and,

The serendipity of it is as soon as we qualified for that next mission, five of my friends that helped me raise the money went on the mission. They come back. They're like, we didn't raise enough money. They start hosting fundraisers. The thing starts taking off. It was called an Adopt a Smile campaign. Next thing you know, I'm raising hundreds of thousands of dollars and they call me and they're like, you deserve our Humanitarian of the Year Award. I love that.

So much crazy goes on from this because at the end of the day, six months later, after getting that award, I got diagnosed with stage three colon cancer. Well, we're going to get to that. I saw that as well. And believe me, we're going to spend a minute on that. But I want to back up a little bit. Yeah. Because when you went on this mission, I'm assuming you were gainfully employed, right? So this was something that you just scheduled into your life or how did you make time to

to give. Because I think that, you know, I order one every year. I just ordered Jesse Etzler's big ass calendar for 2025. I love Jesse. He's a great, he's a great dude where you schedule your life and then you work around the life you schedule. So so many people, I think, wrestle with that, right? So how did you schedule that into your existing busy life? Did you find it difficult? That's the thing is that, you know, you schedule things far enough in a

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advance whether it's a trip a humanitarian mission a goal you put a deadline on it you'll start working or working around it it's never easy it's never convenient there's oftentimes better things that you can be doing with your time in your mind you're like oh my god this is going to be i'm going to work for free but it was something that was something i really had said that i was going to do in this lifetime that was something i

I kind of said, you know, I wonder, I need to kind of get out of my own echo chambers, my own, you know, recirculated air and really see how, you know, see a third world country. So it's never easy, but if it's on your list of things to do and you write it down and you schedule it, you will work around it. It's just, it's, but it's gotta be on your list.

I talk so much. I have it sitting actually right here. Like I talk so much about journaling and writing things down. And you just talked about Jesse Itzler. I can't begin to tell you the things that have

come to fruition for me, probably my whole life. Just the subconscious mind has no sense of humor. So what you put in there will start working towards it. So that, yeah, it's never easy. It's never convenient. - You know what one of my current superpowers is using AI, which I love, right? All these people use AI to make these stupid pictures of Kamala and Trump making out on a beach in the back of a car, something stupid, right?

The image generators on ChatGPT are the greatest vision board tool in the history of man. I mean, I have four images. I won't get into exactly what they are, but I have four images on the mirror in my gym at my house. And every morning when I'm working out, I look at these images. And I mean, they're real. I'll tell you one of them. So I got a book coming out in the not too distant future. And I literally have a picture and it's photorealistic, dude. It's like, it looks like it's real. Like I took it with my cell phone and it's my book in

in Hudson News in the airport with a little thing that says bestseller. But I look at that every single day and I'm like, man, that is just, I feel that every day. And I agree. I think the universe doesn't have any idea of what's real or what's not. You just got to put it out there. So I love that concept, which is great. When you were going and raising all this money,

Were you talking to businesses about trying to get like some sort of a purpose driven capacity into their like scheduled giving into their businesses? Which is something we're huge on here. I love that. Is that something you went after?

Absolutely. And at the time, the company had no real alignment with charitable giving, believe it or not. People did their individual thing, but they hadn't collectively come together. And it was still a growing... I mean, now that was to 2007, 2008, 2009. I could probably look at the award and read the date, but... That was almost 20 years ago. It was a long time ago. God, it's a long time ago. And

And really the culture of this generation is very philanthropic. So I had kind of come in at the right time and was willing to champion this cause and bring people together. And I think people are very drawn to humanitarian work and giving back and this alignment without being too like inconvenienced or put out. And I think I made it a lot of fun. That was another thing. Like I read my audience.

I knew who I was catering to. And I was like, listen, let's do some softball games, some volleyball games, a fundraiser, you know, bowling, um, pool nights, whatever. It just became like, who can put together the most fun fundraiser and team night or whatever, um, pizza night. So it just was injunction because it was a young, young company. Um,

There was a lot of dollar for dollar here. This wasn't like people stroking checks for a hundred grand. I mean, you were grinding it out. I

I was grinding it out. It was like make a little money off a lot of people kind of thing. And yeah, instead of people writing checks, really integrating philanthropy into their business instead of like, just check this box and give a dollar, but really talk about the philanthropy, the work that they do, why we're choosing this one. And I think just I was on, I was in the, I was

I think I was on message with this right generation and they really took the ball and ran with it, but I was very passionate. And then like the nuances of figuring out administratively how to organize this took a little, that got a little hairy. I'm like, oh, where do you send the money? I'm like, how does this all go? But again, like you reverse engineer and you figure it out. And that is the blessing of growing up Schwartz.

is you and growing up with a special needs brother and a bit of a chaotic home. Your resilience level is just through the roof.

A hundred percent. And not only that, it's like, figure the F out, like make it work. You've got to figure things out. Like you can't just walk away like with a special needs sibling. You've got to figure things out on the spot. You have to be resilient. You have to be creative and you have to have that. I'm going to make this happen. I'm going to make it work. And that kind of fortitude, resilience,

Tenacity, I do think gets lost as we make our children's lives very easy and cushy as opposed to- That is the struggle. I mean, as they say, hard times make great men, great men make good times, good times make soft men, the cycle repeats.

And soft men make hard times. And it just repeats. And how old are your kids? You got kids? Yes? You're mother of three. You said that already. Mother of three. You said that earlier. How old are your children? I'm just curious. 19, 20, and 13.

Okay. Well, 13. You still got mad home runs running through the house, which is fine. My biggest fear in life is raising worthless kids. And you catch yourself when you're like, dude... Because my kids now are 17 and 15. Or my daughter's almost 15. And

But I can remember little moments, like when I was six years old and my son had an opinion on airlines. I'm like, "Oh shit, this is not good. I got to reel this back." We got to try to create as much adversity as we can for them. And we've kind of done it through sports, which is good. That's why I love sports for the kids. But I think so many people have that issue with they're not getting that resilience. I mean, I tell people all the time, "That's my superpower."

Resilience is absolutely my superpower. When I was on The Apprentice, several seasons after I was done, the show psychologist or psychiatrist, whatever she was, Dr. Eliza Siegel wrote a book called Sweet Success or something, whatever it was, about the show and about the psychology of the contestants. And she called and said she wanted to interview me. I said, why? Why me after all these contestants? And she goes, you scored higher on resilience than any contestant ever had. And I'm like, wow.

And I was like, "Cool." So I mean, I'm officially certified. I think in that group of people who are all super type A success people, that's my superpower. So I tell people, nothing gets in front of me and gets me down. But this is such a good segue, man. I love when there's a solid segue in the show. Yes. So talking about resilience and nothing getting you down, here you go. You're doing what you love. You're raising all this money. Things are going great.

amazingly good in the world of Barbara, and then something happens that nobody would ever expect to happen, which is what? I got diagnosed at 42 in 2015 with stage 3 colon cancer.

I mean, that's just wild. What is that day like? What is that day like? Well, you need to know it was on the heels of my marriage falling apart. So I... Oh, so bonus. So bonus time. Okay. Yeah, there you go. It's funny because I'm like, oh my goodness, I need to... Well, let's back into that. Hang on. When your marriage was falling apart, was

Was that taking a heavy emotional toll on you already? Or was that something you're kind of like, we talked, was it one of those progressive, we talked about it and we're going to uncouple and everybody's kind of okay? Or was it like the, it was like our parents' good old 1970s divorce, which one was it?

Somewhere in between. It was definitely like out of an old soap opera and I didn't see it coming. It was more on his end and it was a

it just ended in a, like a dumpster fire blaze of glory that I was very blindsided by of like, Oh, not plan for this. And as I'm kind of, you know, recalibrating for my new normal, I get this,

cancer diagnosis and I can remember the doctor telling me and I'm like in such denial. I'm like, I really don't have the bandwidth for this diagnosis right now. - It's not a good time for this. - Not a good time for this. My husband at the time was very good through it. We were in marriage therapy, I was in chemotherapy. I mean, I did all the things and it was, and my kids were young. I mean, two out of my three kids still believed in the tooth fairy and Santa Claus.

um that's young to be diagnosed and um were the doctors telling you like get your stuff in order i mean was it that kind of that kind of diagnosis it was like we're going to see where we're at or they're saying you're going to beat this like where was your head based on the information you're getting h3 is a dicey one but it's better than stage four um they were they i have had very strong odds for sure but there's

I had great odds, I think, you know, anything that's not stage four, I think I had great, great odds of survivorship. So it was more of like, don't get you just get get down to the work. Like I was like, I don't want to do chemo. And they're like, you know, that it's like a non negotiable thing.

You got to have surgery, you got to have six months of chemo. And I was young. I just finished the New York City Marathon like the year before. I mean, I was not, I just wasn't really, I was like, I did all the right things. Like, this is very rude. But the universe is always conspiring in your favor when you can get through something. Conspiring in your favor.

In a very serendipitous way, I think I needed to you grow through what you go through. I needed that in my life. And the timing was crazy and it wasn't easy or fun, but it really allows you to take a good hard look at everything.

at your life and what you want and who you are and how are you going to live your very best life? Like you're the master of your own destiny. This is like, you're in charge. And it did, I mean, being confronted with your own mortality does give you this, all right, what, you know, like, I'm like, how do, how do I live out the best, the next best? If I get another shot and I survive cancer,

what am I doing with it? Like, like how am I living at the highest expression of myself? And I did ice chemo and me, we were no bueno. I did not do well in chemo. I got violently ill. And there was a moment where I was like, what if I don't make it? Like in the beginning, I'm like, I've got this. And I looked up the statistics and I'm like, if she survived,

this, I can survive that. And then about on my eighth or ninth round of chemo, I was like, I need to take stock of this situation and get real with myself because this really does suck. And I, you know, I had a funny revelation in that

I was like, you know, if I started like if I don't make this, what do I want my kids to remember about me? And I started like reflecting on all these things. The Humanitarian Award is one of them. I put myself through college. I started a business. I was part of a startup that ultimately scaled, did very well with that. Like I wanted them to know certain things.

And I thought through that, I was like, oh, everything that I'm proud of that I want my kids to remember, I wanted to quit. Like putting myself through college was brutal, horrible. And the startup I was part of, I went door to door selling telecommunications. I mean, it was really hard and we scaled it from there, but I always wanted to quit. And whenever I wanted to quit, I thought,

"If I quit, I can't take care of Steven." Even when I was doing the fundraising for the humanitarian work, I was like, "This is really hard." And like some people, like just it wasn't going as quickly and expeditiously as I had kind of envisioned. There was like the nuance that I talked about earlier with administration. I was like, "Oh, this is a beast."

I hadn't really calculated for, but it can't, anytime I wanted to quit, I was like, what about Steven? You got to make it work. So in that moment, I realized, wow, I'm so fortunate to have Steven to take care of because otherwise I would have quit all these great things. And it was at that same moment. I was like,

It was never really me taking care of Steven as much as it was Steven who was taking care of me. Of you. There's so much to unpack from that, dude. First of all,

You know, our friend, Jesse Lee, I don't know if you know who that is. She's incredibly successful, multi-level marketing. I was in a mastermind group with her and we just passed the one year anniversary for passing from exactly what you had. And none of us, none of us in that, in our, in our group, none of us would ever even thought that it was possible. She was going to die. I never went, that post went up and,

I'm still shook over that one. I got to be honest. That one does not math for me. The math is not math. No.

It was wild. And so there is an element of, you know what, man, we're all just dangling on strings here and it could be gone in a second. And one of my favorite quotes, and I don't know who said it as I'm recalling it now, but every time I say it, this is one of my favorite quotes. I don't know who says it, I just know I like it. But it says a man has two lives. It has the lives of...

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And I think that's one of the things. And the fact that you understood that you always kept that why, were very clear on your why, very focused on that, I think is probably what really shapes you. What a lot of people fall down is because they haven't identified their why. You know, I'm not comparing stuff. I just it's just I'm getting crushed with it right now as I think about this. So.

you know, it's funny. I'm one of those guys that I'm on a lot of stages and, and I do those things and you see these stories and the other speakers that go up before you, after you, they're like, you know, here's my soul crushing story of David Goggins gets up there and just lays out this whole

horrible, horrendous childhood. And I'm like, yeah, I'm like, man, you know, having to grow up on the second hole of the golf course instead of the 18th or the first, the walk to the clubhouse is further. Yeah. Nobody gives a shit about my story. Right. So I always think myself, even though through all of the things in my life, I've never had any real great adversity.

And I got zapped with something like a year ago that I'm dealing with right now. And hopefully I took four MRIs on Monday and hopefully I'll find out exactly what her course of action is. But I have something called tribal geneal neurology. I always want it. Be careful what you wish for is the moral of the story. You want that adversity. Okay, universe, here's some adversity. I got something called tribal geneal neurology where you have a nerve in your face, right? And it misfires. It's a neurological thing.

But literally, if I go outside right now and the wind blows on my left eyelashes, it feels like somebody's tasing me with a taser. I get electrocuted. And as we're sitting here talking, I keep getting zapped. So if I make a weird face, that's kind of what it is, is I'm literally sitting here getting electrocuted. Yeah, I'm going to get it fixed. We got a meeting on Monday. But yeah, there's my adversity that you need to be careful to wish for because the universe will serve it up to you in Spain.

Well, like you said, you test high on resiliency. So your perception of maybe what you've tried, you've had to overcome, figure out transverse is probably minimized in your own perception because you're like, I just have to, I've got to get, I'm getting through this. I'm going to figure it out. I'm going to make it happen. So there's that, that makes sense to me that you're saying that. Oh, I love when I, when I tell people about this and I'm so kind of jipper about it.

And then they look it up and they're like, dude, this is called the suicide ailment. I'm like, yeah, it kind of sucks. It's interesting, but we're working on it. But I'm bringing a voice to all those out there who are going to get electrocuted on their face today. I'm getting it fixed. I'm going to get this. There's a couple of things we don't get it fixed. But back to this. So you get through the cancer, you fight your way through the end of it. And then it's the end of it. Do you, I mean, you,

You got to have that moment when you know you're out of the woods, when you're like, okay, cool. Like I did all, I did a, I did a lot of A to Z in my first life. What am I going to focus on on life number two? Did you have that moment?

Absolutely. Absolutely. So I, you know, I'm really coming to grips with my own mortality as I'm like getting through the end of chemo and recognizing that I was given like this great gift, like the gift of purpose. I was given no backdoor, no quit, figure it out, make it work. Because if you don't, your brother is going to be institutionalized.

right? Like if I don't figure out how to make, you know, personal wealth and I don't figure out how to do well for myself and I don't make this, my brother's going to be an award of the state. Get your head out of your rear end and figure it out. And recognizing that I had been gifted such a

you know, immeasurable gift. Really, I said to myself, I'm like, if I survive cancer, I will never play small again. I will forever use my voice to speak for those who can't speak for themselves. That is what I was meant to do. It wasn't just a vow to Steven that I would speak for him, but I'm supposed to use and amplify my voice to give a voice to others. And that's

when I got to the other side of cancer, I remember thinking, I was like, okay. And I was sitting in this very seat. I'm like, all right, Babs. Babs is my badass bitch self. B-A-B-S. I'm like, all right, Babs. Yeah, I feel it. Yeah, I get it. Yeah, I get it. I like it. What you going to do with your badass self? And I'm like,

I think I want to go on television. I literally was like, you know, I think I need, I need a bigger platform. I need more exposure. I need, I need to get back out there again and do something. And mind you, I'd never done television. And I was like,

Okay, I'll go on TV. Okay, so like you're doing your vision board. I wrote it down. I was like, I want to be on the Today Show. Life is so funny. I wrote down, I want to be on the Today Show. This is a girl with a degree in community health education who was a door-to-door sales girl who scaled sales teams and randomly decided to run a fundraiser and do fundraising. Nowhere in this resume of Barbara Majewski does it read,

television personality but i'm like i'm 43 now and now i would like to be a television person which i mean let's call okay let's call a spade a spade 43 ain't exactly the age to break into the old television game either if we're being honest about what we're talking about not exactly the age you want to break in so hurdle against you as well you would think so but see

I just reframed all of it and I was like, I don't know unless you go. Like I have a very great way to kind of

talk myself into stuff of like, you don't know unless you go and unless you try things. So I never, like, I'm sure that went through my head. Like, who do I think I am? And like all that, like you're in your forties, nobody wants, like everybody wants everyone in their twenties. But I was like, listen, I don't know that I have to, I'd rather take a no than an, I don't know. And I just love that.

Right? Like I'd rather just be told you're too old as opposed to me assuming that or you're not a match for us. And it's been unbelievable. So here's the serendipity. Again, I write down that I want to be on the Today Show. I go and I'm like, well, I guess how do you be on TV? You have to go back to school and learn how to be in television or you go hire a media trainer.

So I end up on Instagram and I find this media trainer. And so I DM her and I'm like, you don't even know what to say to people or no, I didn't. I picked up the phone and I called her. But let me just tell you, I wrote her name down for a good month before I could find the chops to be like, hey, like, yeah, I don't know. I was a little nervous. Let's work together. Yes. You have to come up with your word. So we're

We're on the phone. I'm on the phone with our assistant. She goes, I like the sound of your voice. And she goes, what's your name? I said, Barbara Majewski. She enters my name into the computer and a Google search comes up. And at this time, I'm not Google searchable except for one thing. I want a humanitarian word where I spoke on stage. There's your there's your there's your there's your little there's your little foothold.

- She posts a video, holds a tape. - That's the only thing that got me in the door. So Amy Rosenblum grabs the phone from her assistant. She goes, "You do public speaking?" I'm like, "Yeah, I'll speak. I don't care. I'll do whatever." She goes, "I want you in here this week. I'd love to meet you." I go in to meet her. She's the former executive producer of the Today Show. My very first booking after going through training was the Today Show. And if you Google, you see I've been on there several, several times

- That's awesome. - But the message in this is like, then recently I read "The Go-Giver" and it's such a good book. I didn't do that humanitarian work so that I could get access to the Today Show. I did it because it was the right thing to do. And if sometimes when you're lost and escaping the drift, I think this is super important. Live a life of service, live a life of giving back. And when you're lost in the sauce,

Can you go to that space of how can I use my experiences to help others and get out of my own way and start getting more clarity and more gratitude? Because that humanitarian word not only led me to the Today Show in a very funny way,

I had gotten that award with Johnson and Johnson. They were the corporate humanitarian award. When I was diagnosed with cancer, the CEO, Alex Gorski, his assistant, Danielle, saw because I'd posted on Facebook that I had cancer. And she called me and said, Alex Gorski, the CEO of Johnson and Johnson, thank you, was like, whatever you need, Johnson and Johnson, you're back. Wow.

I was like, well, now I can't die because I got Johnson and Johnson. Yeah, you're like, hello, Mayo Clinic. I'd like to talk to you. Cedars-Sinai, room for one, please. I couldn't even like...

I was like, oh, this is, I mean, so again, like you're, you know, escaping the drift and understanding, like, you know, we all go adrift and we all get lost in the sauce. Sometimes we just have to go back to how can I live a life of service? How can I give back and serve those people?

at a space that resonates for me because we all have certain experiences and maybe it is getting tasered in the eye where you learn how to serve and help others through that. It's it, it, there's so many layers to it. So, um, yeah, that would be it. Yeah. Other than being able to power a small village with a, you know, sticking a light bulb in my mouth, I'm not sure exactly how I'm going to help anybody with this, but, but it's, it's funny. I mean, I saw a, uh,

I don't remember who it was. Gosh, just another thing. It's the guy that was on stage, you know, the same event I was doing a long time ago. He was talking about when he and his father would be down and out, down to their last dollar, right? Like living in a one bedroom apartment themselves before they found success. And now they're down to the last five bucks. His dad would say, time to go give, time to go give. Let's go give this money away. And he'd be like, we're going to give away our last $5. He's like, yes, we are. Because it will come back. If we go out and we focus on giving, it will come back.

100% the more you give, the more you get, which is so cliche, but it is so karmically real. And I remember hearing about this group of kids in like a very urban area, very poor area. And they were always taking handouts. And this teacher came in and was like,

we're gonna go ahead and help others in the community. And so they reversed it and it ended up really empowering them. And it was just a game changer for the trajectory of their life. So always remember you do have gifts and you are, we're meant to live a life of service. We're meant to use our gifts to serve and help others. And I think that's what's always really rerouted me.

at all times of like, I got to get back to, I got to get back to what I'm going to most feel my legacy is about. Well, it's funny. It's funny. We're going to segue again because it's a good segue point for this, which is, you know, talk about being of service to others. And I look at,

Again, bringing the election back into this a little bit, I find the people that were most upset about the results today, the people that in me were, and if you go on Twitter, there's just streams of people just bawling over whatever perceived thing they're going to do. And if I had to put one thing in common for all of these people, blindly without knowing any of them, but just basically just saying, this is a box I'm going to put you in, I'm going to say victim is

is a huge box for all of them. They're a personal victim. And to me, people that put themselves in the victim box have no sense of personal accountability. And I know that that is something that has become very important to you in helping others achieve.

So let's talk about that. Yes, it's so real. I identify with what you're talking about so much because I do feel that you can't change what's going on. Crying, falling apart, have your moment, have your moment and then proceed. It's not going to change anything. What's the great quote?

you can't control the waves, but you can learn how to surf. And just being able to understand, like taking inventory of what you have control over and you don't have control over. You have control over your attitude, your work ethic, and your intention of what you're working towards. Like control, focus on those things and the rest will fall into place. And I do feel, I read J.D. Vance's book. This is where my like- Amazing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Amazing.

I read it early on. Did you read it when it first came out? Oh, dude. Tim Ferriss put it on his mailing list, which I love Tim Ferriss' mailing list. Yeah. And what I'm reading right now, Hillbill Elegy. I'm like, what is this book? The name caught me. And I got the book way before Ron Howard ever knew it existed. And it was just, I read it on a flight. I think I read it from a flight from New York to LA. And I think it was four hours. I just pounded the whole book down. And amazing.

Amazing what that guy has overcome. It's incredible. Amazing. And the takeaway, and I'm sure this will align with you, resonate with you. My takeaway, now I read it when it first came out. I don't know when that was.

But the takeaway is what he figured out in living growing up in Appalachia is that there was a systemic mindset that it was never their fault. So if they got fired from a job, even though they were always late or they never showed up on time or they didn't, they were no call, no show when they ultimately got fired, everyone had the same narrative. Like it was their fault and you know, who do they think they are?

and everybody fed into this narrative. And for whatever reason, JD Vance was able to look at that because he was able to say, well, you kind of sucked as an employee and you got fired. And I remember this, like I read it yesterday thinking, wow, that is like so profound. And being able to say, you know what? I'm the master of my own destiny. If I constantly blame everyone else,

I'm never going to solve the problems. It is such a great message to really start saying, I'm like, what could you have done better? Where can you take accountability? And I think this next generation is definitely struggling with that because there's very much like this oppressor,

and victim and the oppressed. And like, you've got to fall in that paradigm. You can, you know, which is not serving this generation at all. Like you gotta, everybody's got to be a victim. Otherwise they're the oppressor. These are your options. Well, I don't want to be an oppressor. I want to be the victim. So maybe just always feed the victim narrative. And like, I have,

It's super frustrating. And I can always say, be direct. You can't always bring colonialism into your everyday life. You didn't lose your job at the Quickie Mark because the British took over the Virgin Islands. You can't get there. You can try, but you don't get there. I find the easiest first step in personal accountability for anybody is to change the

one word, one phrase in your everyday life, which is if you're not going to do something, stop saying I can't and say I choose not to. Like, oh, you should lose weight. I just can't lose weight. No, no, no. You choose not to.

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Blue Nile.com. No, you choose not to. Oh, I can't, I can't find a job. No, no, no, no, no. You're choosing not to. There's a lot of things. And if you just change that one phrase, it first will sting, but then can become incredibly powerful because when you realize that you are the master of your own destiny, you are the captain of your own ship, it becomes a little bit, a little bit more fun to, more fun to live. Yeah.

Absolutely. When you're a passenger, it sucks. How many people are out there in the passenger seat of this runaway car of life they're in? And how terrifying and miserable must that be? I know you have this 14-day accountability plan people can get. Talk to me about that. I'm just curious.

Yeah, no, I, oh, I love doing it. There are three W's the water walking and writing. It's just a great, I do resets for people of like, all right, let's get organized. Like when you're, you're drifting out to see where are the best places to start? Well, for me, it's always grab the pen, grab the notebook and let's start getting organized. And I think when you do things with a team, it makes it that much more like accountable. Like it's like, all right, we're going to do this together. I need to see your post.

and your steps. And it's just these three W's that really do get you to a better place. There's nothing like walking. Walking is hands down the best exercise that anybody on earth can do. 10,000 steps a day easily. And when you start getting like conscientious, right? I'm at 82, 65 right now. You're going to hit it because now it's... I hit it every day.

I think all of us do drift and I'm like, all right, let's do a reset. I want you to do in 10,000 steps a day. You're going to drink water. You're going to walk and you're going to write for 14 straight days. And each day I go live and I talk about different things in personal development and help them help organize thoughts. So it's, it's, it's great. It's easy. It's manageable.

It's not like, you know, 75 hard, I think is amazing, but so many people don't complete it. And it just validates these storylines in ourselves of like, I'm a failure. I don't finish what I start. Whereas I'm like, this is something you're going to start and you're going to finish and you're probably going to do it again. So I'm really big on helping people take those steps, those incremental steps to optimizing themselves.

Well, I do a guest podcast that comes out every Tuesday and a solo pod that comes out Thursday. Solo pod is much shorter than this. But I talked a couple of weeks ago about my daily routine because people ask, right? They're like, how do you get so much stuff done? What's your daily routine? I'm like, bro, I don't get up at four o'clock in the morning and get an ice bath. That ain't me.

That's not what I do. And it's okay if you don't do it either, right? It's like the entrepreneur culture. If you don't get up at 4 a.m. or 3.30, you don't have to do that. You just need a routine that works for you. And it doesn't matter what anybody else is doing. This is about what's good for you. And I think so many people get caught up in, like you said, 75 Hardware. And it's sold many, many times. A wonderful dude. And it's a great program for people to complete it. I'm proud of you.

Yes. Probably not for me, right? Because quite frankly, dude, if I'm going to go out to a really expensive dinner and I'm under a glass of wine, I'm under a glass of wine because that's what I want to do, right? It's just, you know, I'm not a heavy drinker, but I want that option.

and i don't think that's hurting me for day i i don't so whatever um but yeah it's just about having a routine that works for you so is the more life collective is the 14 day account is like the first step of getting into that or let's talk about that what is more like yeah so you know i have these um accountability challenges in the more life collective and it was just something i started to help other people i felt like i was getting the same questions over and over again of like i am just lost in the sauce i don't know what i want

I don't know where I'm going. I don't know who I am. You know, I'm bordering on depression. I, I've gained weight. I'm not, I'm not optimized. I'm not living my best life and I don't even know where to start. And I think a lot of people get, you know, we get, you know, by the, um, by the stair master or by the gym membership or by the supplement and you're sold the outcomes and there's this

gap between like building the habits, building the patterns, the neurological, what are they? Neuromuscular pathways of automating good habits. And I've just, I realized that I'm like,

Like my mother used to buy like Weight Watchers memberships and gym memberships, and then they would just, her goals would never materialize because there's a gap between making the purchase and getting the results and it's the doing. So I really wanted to focus on that middle ground, that the doing part and not have people invest in another Peloton or Stairmaster or weight loss supplement or fitness, blah, blah, blah.

wanted to teach people that how not the just the why you know your why you want to look good you want to be fit all the things i want to give you the how i like that was my jam that's been my jam of like let me give you that let me help you just stop buying things to get the things you got to do the things to get the things so i start that's more life collectivist do the things to get the things you can't just buy it so there's nothing in my program to really buy except

the 14 day accountability. Sometimes I do them live. They are, some of them are automated. I haven't done one in a while. I really wanted to get through this election. There's people out there today. They're looking for some help. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I need to, I used to do Christmas and like the holidays. Oh boy.

Yeah. Poor Rachel Maddow today is in a safe space somewhere. I'm sure she's having a meltdown. Some of the meltdowns I like. Some of the meltdowns are very productive. But I was like, okay, it's great.

Well, for me, talking about getting organized and getting on the thing and the hows and the why, for me, I like to take the resistance out of anything. Like for example, and granted, I understand that I'm in a certain economic bracket that I can make some of this stuff happen that other people might not be able to. I understand that. I'm not talking down anybody. I'm not, "Oh, sure, John. You can do whatever you want." That's not what I'm trying to do. But like for example, the gym. Do you know what I hated the most about the gym?

driving to the gym. I hated it. Parking. Parking at the gym drove me crazy, which is the dumbest thing because you're like, you're going to exercise anyway. You have to walk far, blah, blah, blah. So I do. I built a gym at my house. Now, I walk downstairs every morning. I go to the gym in my house, right? I want to watch TV. That's not good for me, right? So I just attach that vice of occasionally I want to watch TV to the only time I watch TV is if I'm on the treadmill. It's the only time I watch TV. If I want to watch something, I got to walk to do it.

Which is why I always hit my steps, right? So for me, it's about trying to connect my vices, whatever they might be, with something sort of positive or taking the path of least resistance to the best choices I can make.

- 100% and in my programs, what I do every once in a while, if I do like a 90 day or whatever, I incorporate, I encourage people to do like coffee walks. Like instead of meeting your friend for coffee, grab a coffee and go for a walk. And there is no bad weather, there's only bad clothing. So don't tell me it rained.

I don't care. I walked in chemo in the rain because that was my vice of like, I can't work out because of the nausea, but I can walk and walking helped the nausea. But it's so true. You've got to make it work for you. And this is why I do love 75 hard for all those that need just a massive reset and discipline and to get, you know, get themselves reorganized and that's their jam. But my big problem is it kind of sets up a lot of people for failure because it's just

So not sustainable. You can't, that's just not very, I mean, I don't know who else, I don't want to work out twice a day. I need showering twice a day. I'm like, if I can't even like now, but, um,

I like to set things up like you that are sustainable, realistic, enjoyable. And I almost like tricked myself into do it. And the best thing is for people who just can't get out of their own way and they're like, whatever. I'm like, go for a coffee walk. It is you get two women on a coffee walk. They might never come back. I mean, we are just like, so I think I think it comes down to.

I think the word goal is a dirty word for me, and I don't like the word goal. And I'll tell you why I don't like it. I use this analogy all the time. Is that first press conference with every NFL coach midway through training camp. And they go, Coach, what are your goals for this year? And they're like, goals are to make the playoffs and go to the Super Bowl. And every single one of them, all 32 of them will say the same thing. That coach knows his quarterback sucks. He already knows it is...

It is impossible for them to achieve that, but yet they still throw it out there as a goal. And so many people throw these things out there that are just not even, like, not there. So I prefer the word commitment. In my sales organizations, my teams, my businesses that I do, it's always every weekly, what is your commitment this week? What are you committed to getting done? And this ain't something you hope is going to get done. This is a, I'm going to be awake at 1159 the day before I got to come back and see you and figuring out how I can accomplish this because it is a hassle.

have to. And I think when you get away from the word goal, which I think has gotten diluted and watered down to something you're absolutely committed to doing, I think you're better off.

I agreed. And finding out what that is. And they've got some great, who is it? Brian, who I'm forgetting his name right in this moment. But he gives us a great piece of advice, like write 10 things down and then circle the one that most sticks out for you that you want to accomplish over the next six months, over the year, whatever that might be. And then focus all your energy towards it. Again, reverse engineering of what you want. And

It's amazing what you can get done and what you can accomplish when you start putting your mind towards something. It starts with getting clear on what does this life look like to you? For anybody that's listening that just is like, "I have no idea," one thing that I always love telling people to do, I don't know if I have something good over here to show, but- Oh, let's hear it.

I'll have people, I'll like, okay, do that. This is my one activity. I'm like, go to the bookstore, go to the magazine section and go buy five magazines, whether it's travel or homes or DIY or I don't know. What is your...

Let the magazines come to you. Get lost in the magazine section, buy five or six, whatever you want, take them home, start cutting out pictures, start getting those visuals. Like, I don't know, this is like, look, I don't know, maybe you want to be a size zero. I don't know. Maybe you want to go hiking that, you know,

Go hike in the Himalayas and start creating this like vision board for yourself. Maybe it's a house. Maybe it's vacations. You know, life was meant to be lived. There's nothing you can't have if you're willing to do the work. But like I said, like I said earlier, I would go back and I would take that now and I'd say, okay, this is what I would do. I would say if I want to go hiking in the Himalayas, I wouldn't, I wouldn't cut a picture of the Himalayas out and put it on a vision board. I would go to chat GPT.

And I would say, make a picture of a hand holding an airline ticket with my name on it one way to Nepal.

make that where I can look at that and I can say, man, there's my name on an airline ticket and dude, it'll spit it out. Put that up there, make it that real, that appealing. And I think going that far, but also I think when people are doing that stuff, right? I think one exercise they don't do enough is they don't go deep enough in the why, right? Like, come tell me, come and wants to work with me. You know, where'd you go? I'm gonna make $250,000. I

I don't care about that because you're never going to hit that unless there's a why behind it. Like you, it's down to the end of taking care of your brother. But a lot of people are like, oh, because I want 250 because I want to buy, I mean, I'm just going to make this so materialistic, it's going to be terrible. But let's say, because I want to buy a Porsche GTR. Okay. Why do you want a Porsche GTR? Because I've always wanted a Porsche GTR.

What's that? A private plane. There you go. Private plane, which I do not advise. I do not advise to do that. I've done that. It's not good. It's not. It's fun for a minute, but then it's very expensive. I would not advise that. But yeah, you kind of get back to like, well, why do you want to purchase a TR? Because I've always wanted one. Well, why have you always wanted one? And it comes down to because I want

It can be as, you got to get to the, you got to be real with yourself. It can be as petty as, you know, when I was a kid in high school, everybody had the cool car and they laughed at my Ford Escort with the broken door with the wired up. And I want people to look at me and feel, I want to know what it feels like for others to look at me and feel envious. Well, dude, that's a real emotion, whether it's positive or not, I don't care, but I can tap into that and say, okay, let's like, let's make people jealous of you. And that will drive people to accomplish their goals.

But you got to be honest with yourself. Yeah, I think. And there's nothing wrong. Things were meant to be experienced. I think we try to put things out. Well, that's materialistic. I'm like that. We were meant to enjoy the fruits of life, the big things in life. And my dad is crazy. Again, growing up, Schwartz would take us to Ferrari dealerships. We were we had a van and we were living at my uncle's house in California. And he would take us to Newport Beach.

to go look at Ferrari's and his I know I know the dealership yeah like can you imagine we'd park our little you know dank van around the corner that had no seats in it and go with my special needs brother and go look at Ferrari's and my dad would say because I was like we don't even have a place to live right now and we're driving around a van but yet

here we are looking at testarosas, but okay. His philosophy was someone has to buy these. You just have to figure out what they did to get what they have and do those things. That's it. He's like, it wasn't like they're just gifted or they must be nice. Or who do they think? My dad had a very clear way of making a very simple, someone's got to buy it. Someone figured it out. You just have to do what they did to get what they have. And

because he never put it on like they inherited or they were lucky. It was that nothing to do. It had everything to do with do the things to get the things, right?

do the things to get the things. And that's where why I ended up in entrepreneurship and building and scaling a business and why I do the things and then get, you want to be on TV? Do the things that are going to get you on TV. Don't wait for television to come to you. Don't wait. The Porsche isn't coming to you. Do the things to get the things. And that's. But I think there's one thing we skipped over about your television thing, which we didn't talk about, which was, didn't you hawk your wedding ring to pay for that? Like you burned the boats.

Yes. So I mean, I could have taken that wedding ring and done a lot of things. It was a pretty nice ring. But I took my sold my wedding ring. You did your due diligence. Yes. So my wedding ring and I put that towards me, me like a media trainer. And I was have been like all in on how do I what is what does it mean for me, Barbara Majewski to live her best life and I've just and we all have different iterations of our

What we have that, what we want at any given time. So it's just, it's been fun to be part of the journey of like, now I'm looking at getting a realtor's license, going back to law school. Like to me, nothing is off the table. I just don't, I don't care how old I am. I just feel like if I want to do it and if I'm willing to do the work, there's nothing I can't do.

I just have to do the work. And I did take a flight lesson to learn how to become a pilot. And I wanted to sleep the second I got into the air. And I was like, piloting is not for me. But I did. I love that my business partner, my wife is so funny. My business partner for like the first probably four years in our business open, it was just handshake, right? We just we've been friends a long time and business going and, you know, the operating agreement just I just going back and forth. And we were just never like, I

I would make a revision, I'd send it to him and he'd sit on it for six months. And then he'd make a revision, send it back to me and I'd sit for six months. This went on for like four years. In the meantime, my partner is also a semi-professional race car driver. His wife is buying him helicopter pilot lessons for Christmas. My wife is like, "Could you please get this on paper with this?" Yeah. Yeah.

you're not going to have anything on paper. But anyway, dude, it was such a joy talking to you today. I loved it. I loved every minute of it. If they want to find you and connect with you, learn more about your coaching programs, all the things that you can do, how do they find you?

Barbara Majewski.com or Instagram at Barbara Majewski. I think it's the same for TikTok. And yeah, those are the best places to find me. I'm a little more sassy on Twitter, so don't look me up there. I love it. I love it. I love it. Well, thanks so much, Barbara.

If you guys were on this today, man, I hope that fired you up. And just understand, dude, life is going to throw you some curveballs. And it's just going to. And how you deal with that, how you overcome, how you face that adversity head on. I say this all the time, dude, but it's like my favorite line from Die Hard. Nobody's coming to save you. Save yourself. We'll see you next week.

What's up, everybody? Thanks for joining us for another episode of Escaping the Drift. Hope you got a bunch out of it, or at least as much as I did out of it. Anyway, if you want to learn more about the show, you can always go over to escapingthedrift.com. You can join our mailing list. But do me a favor, if you wouldn't mind, throw up that five-star review, give us a share, do something, man. We're here for you. Hopefully, you'll be here for us. But anyway, in the meantime, we will see you at the next episode.

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