When Stacey Lauren was eight years old, a girl who was deaf came to her house and fell in love with her Smurf collection. Stacey gave it away. All of it. Every last Smurf. Her mom was stunned. Stacey did not think twice.

That instinct, giving without being asked, never left her. It drove 20 years of running a staffing company with 1,260 combined employees. It drove the identity crisis she fell into when she exited. And it drove the question she could not stop asking: why do so many people know what they want to do and still not do it?

The answer she found was not about motivation or mindset. It was about rooms. The right rooms, full of people chasing the same goal, change everything. Not your friends. Not your family. People who are doing the thing alongside you. That discovery became a podcast, a methodology, a movement, and now the Do The Thing Collab Network, a platform connecting people around shared goals, community engagement, and fundraising that ties it all together.

Bart and Stacey talk through her Comfort Circles framework live, using Bart's real-life event that evening in Washington DC as the case study. They unpack why most communities think people are connecting when they are not, why vulnerability in a Senate building hallway can outlast the meeting that sparked it, and why the person who needs your message does not care about your shower cap.

This episode is for anyone who has been doing the thing alone and wondering why it feels so hard.

What You Will Walk Away With

You need people with the same goal, not just people who love you. Friends and family will cheer for you. But the people who are doing the same hard thing you are doing right now are the ones who will keep you from quitting. Stacey calls it Like Gold. Find your rooms.

Horse mode is not failure. It is the first step. The Comfort Circles framework begins with the horse: non-verbal, not yet engaging, camera off or hanging near the bathroom at the networking event. Knowing you are in horse mode means you stay in the room. That is the whole win.

Most communities are connecting at the surface. That is the problem. Showing up to events, doing the activities, checking the boxes does not mean people are actually connecting. Real engagement requires a shared goal inside the community, not just shared attendance.

Stop doing it for other people. Stacey went live for 80 episodes with her camera off because she was scared of how she looked. The shift happened when she realized the person who needs your message does not care what you look like. Get your voice out. That is the whole job.

Education by contribution is the secret to community. When people share their ideas out loud in a room, not just receive information, the room transforms. Stacey calls it the E in her I'm Game framework. Bart saw it live in a Senate hallway when 99 out of 100 people stayed after the panel ended because someone was finally being real.

Doing the thing and having your voice in it are two different things. Stacey always did the thing: sold books door to door, co-founded a company at 25, scaled it for two decades. But she did it without her voice for most of it, doing what she thought others needed instead of what she was actually built for. That gap is where most people live. Closing it is the work.

Learn more about Stacey Lauren and Do The Thing Collab Network at dothethingcollaboration.com. Connect with Stacey Lauren on LinkedIn and find the Do The Thing podcast on all major podcast platforms.

Most People Don't. But You DO!