You Matter! A Simple Strategy to Change the World for the Better. With Angela Maiers

04/30/19 • 48 min

My guest is Angela Maiers. Angela founded Choose2Matter, which is a non-profit that helps individuals to embrace their value and their potential contribution. Choose2Matter has evolved into a movement that now supports students, parents, educators, and employees, literally around the world. Her work at over 60 thousand classrooms across 100 countries has rallied more than a million children to be together to launch over 170 social enterprises. Listen To The Podcast: Resources: www.AngelaMaiers.com www.Choose2Matter.org Transcription: Mitch Matthews: Angela, welcome to the podcast! Angela Maiers: Well, I'm so honored to be here my friends. It's wonderful to watch you in action and be a part of this, you were just a huge supporter of my mission and my work and I feel like we've connected at a soul level, so it's great to reconnect. Mitch Matthews: It's crazy because we go way back to when the Big Dream Gathering was just getting started. Angela Maiers: I know, yeah. Mitch Matthews: Your things were just starting to explode. So it feels like a class reunion. Angela Maiers: It does. Mitch Matthews: I love it. Well, DREAM THINK DOers are going to love you and love your story. Let's tell them a little bit more about Choose to Matter. Let's give them a snapshot of what it is that you do. As well as you can in a condensed way, tell us a little bit more about Choose to Matter. Angela Maiers: I think I have created a framework for people to make a commitment to contribute their best self to the world. And by best self or best selves, that could be individual, that could be organizational, it could be our entire community and humanity. And when you look at the reasons why human beings don't contribute their best self to the world, with not just confidence but with also a sense of calmness, is because there is a terror in the world, and I use that world not lightly, of insignificance. Angela Maiers: It is the single most common ailment of the modern world. And it doesn't discriminate. Even though Choose to Matter started with my mission in education, the feeling that we don't matter doesn't discriminate by age, by title, by position, by role. We're all fighting for our enough-ness in the world. Mitch Matthews: And you've been studying this, you've been teaching this. And I know it's a generational thing, you've been going back deep into the science of it and all that, but would you say, and this is probably just a softball question, but would you say, how has social media and all of that contributed to kind of that "see me" feel? That longing to be seen. Angela Maiers: I think that you see both the best of humanity, social media or media in general or technology is neutral. It is an amplifier of human behavior and emotion. Mitch Matthews: Yeah. Angela Maiers: So part of the addiction in social media is our DNA level need, not just desire, but DNA level needs to be seen, to be heard and to understand that we have value. And so just the simple act of saying another human being's name is such a rarity, believe it or not. It's a rarity even in schools. Kids can go period after period, week after week, semester after semester and never hear their name. It's the most important word in the human language. It defines our existence. Angela Maiers: And so when you hear your name over, or where we have not given people real pathways and real practices to acting and behaving as if they mattered, so they pick shortcuts, like the naughty kid. We just want to be noticed and so we'll do it in any way that we can. And we have a whole world of naughty kids. Mitch Matthews: I was just going to say, that's not limited to the classroom, right? Angela Maiers: No it's not. Mitch Matthews: It's so true. And I know that so much of what you do could be defined, the simple arts, but the simple arts are so important of literally looking someone in the eye and saying, "You matter" right?

Previous Episode

Write YOUR Book! (5 Keys to Writing Your First Book!)

5 Keys to Writing Your First Book We’re talking about getting YOUR book written and published! We're doing a deep dive on the subject of writing and publishing a book. Have you ever thought about writing a book? I'm betting you have. I'm hoping you have because I think every person has at least one book in them but, hey, if you're a DREAM THINK DOer, that probably means you've got five, maybe 15, maybe 25 books in you. And what I've learned about people is that they need to just learn a system for writing a book. Once they have that system down, it is entirely possible to not just write one, but many books. Listen To The Podcast: Resources: Lise Cartwright’s FREE resource for DREAM THINK DO-ers: Specific Steps for Writing Your First Book! Click to get the FREE workbook! Amazon's Self-Publishing: kdp.amazon.com 5 Keys to Writing Your First Book Transcript: I'm going to be telling stories about people who have written books and turned them in Bestsellers. So, we're going to dive into strategies that they have used, strategies that I have used to be able to achieve best sellers, but more importantly, get that book done and get that book out there. We're going to dive into specific steps that you can start taking immediately. How does that sound? We're going to get into the nitty gritty and have some fun as we do. How about that? Are you in? I hope so. And I'll tell you what. I'm going to tell you more about this at the end but just to tell you right now, go to mitchmatthews.com/224, there's going to be a lot of different resources I'm going to reference some different tools that you can use. But one of these tools you're going to want to grab right away and that is a workbook specifically designed for the DREAM THINK DO family by Lise Cartwright. Now, you may remember Lise Cartwright. I have interviewed her I think three times now and she is a multi-time best-selling author. I mean, she's had best sellers, at least 28 now, best sellers that she has written and then self-published. She's a rock star and she's a huge fan of DREAM THINK DO. So, she has offered up ... she has created a special workbook just for DREAM THINK DOers. I want you to go get it. It is absolutely free and she actually will also help you out in different ways, that kind of stuff. You can find out all sorts of free resources from Lise. So, just go to mitchmatthews.com/224 and you'll see it right there, super easy to click through and grab that workbook just for us DREAM THINK DOers. Go do it. Go grab it. Okay, now, let's dive into some stuff here. Okay, so writing books ... I once saw a quote from Tony Morrison that I absolutely love. It just grabbed me. She said, "If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it." Whoosh! How about that, right? Like, that is the truth from somebody who's written a ton of incredibly impactful books. I don't know about you, but I'm guessing that maybe you've just had that feeling inside, that knowing that ... Maybe it's a memoir. Maybe it's some stories from your life. Maybe it's some things that you've learned through some of the challenges that you've faced over time. Or, maybe you've just learned a set of strategies for something you're like freakishly good at and you just want the world to know those strategies. You want to share them with the world. Or maybe it's something you've learned about your faith and it's just made a huge impact on you and you just want to reach other people and help them to experience the same kinds of things. I'm not sure what it is for you, but I'm guessing there's that knowing, that knowing that you're supposed to write at least one book. Maybe you feel called to it and it's just that there's that longing. You're not quite, you can't even explain it but you just know it's there. Or maybe it's that satisfaction, oh, man, just that thought of having a book done.

Next Episode

When God Gets Your Attention with ABC News’ Paula Faris

My guest is Paula Faris. As you probably know, Paula is a Senior National Correspondent for ABC News, and she's had one heck of a journey. She's won multiple Emmys reporting on politics, sports, entertainment, major stories of the day, she's interviewed political leaders, athletes, newsmakers, and even celebrities. Listen To The Podcast: RESOURCES: TWITTER: @paulafaris JOURNEYS OF FAITH WITH PAULA FARIS TRANSCRIPT: I've got to say, to my fellow geeks out there, Paula has interviewed the cast from the most recent Star Wars movies, as well as The Avengers... like as in ALL of the Avengers. I mean, come on, right? Last fall, she walked away from a couple of the most coveted positions within her industry, being the co-anchor of Good Morning America weekend edition, as well as being a co-host of ABC's The View, all to do something she felt called to do. One of those things was to launch a podcast called “Journeys of Faith with Paula Faris.” Now I can tell you, this podcast has become one of my own favorite podcasts because Paula's doing this incredible job of talking with some of the world's most influential people about how their faith and spirituality guide them through the best and worst of times. I've got to say, it's pretty revolutionary. I don't think that's too strong a word, because she's open about her own faith as a Christian, but she's talking with people from a wide array of faith backgrounds. Like when I say that, I mean she's really talking with people, she's connecting, she's not debating, she's talking. She goes in curious, she honors the people's stories, it's just so interesting, eye-opening, refreshing, you've got to check it out. Seriously, this was a bold move, to launch something like this and do it in the way that she's been doing it. The more I've been listening to her show, the more I've wanted to have her on DREAM THINK DO, so we could talk with her about her journey and dig into some of the things she's been learning along the way. Let's get to this, Paula Faris, welcome to DREAM THINK DO. Paula Faris: Thank you so much, Mitch, I'm so honored. Mitch Matthews: This is awesome. Okay, so I know people probably know your name, they've seen you doing your thing, but what is an average day, a "normal" ... I'm doing air quotes because I'm guessing there's not really a normal day. Paula Faris: Yeah, let's do some air quotes. Mitch Matthews: What does a normal day look like for you right now? Paula Faris: A normal day, well it's a lot different than my normal day, say, a year ago, which weekends I was getting up at like three, 3:30 in the morning and going to anchor at Good Morning America weekend edition, and just working crazy hours, Fridays I did “The View.” Now I work primarily Monday through Friday, a day for me is, like for instance, today I got up early to do GMA, I filed a story for Good Morning America weekday edition, and I'm doing this podcast now, I have a shoot later for Good Morning America at Disney down in Brooklyn. It's a little bit of everything right now because I am a Senior National Correspondent. I'll file for Good Morning America, I'll file for World News Tonight, for Nightline, the various ABC platforms that we have. Then I do podcasts, so I've recorded a couple of podcasts this week for my new podcast, Journeys of Faith. By the way, I appreciate you plugging it and listening and supporting it. It's a mixed bag, but I'm really enjoying this new lane and this new kind of venture. I walked away from those two dream jobs, as you mentioned because I just needed some more balance. Now it's primarily Monday through Friday, and I'll fly, I'll travel occasionally for those interviews like you mentioned, The Avengers, Star Wars, that took me to LA and Chicago for those interviews, which is great. Mitch Matthews: My wife freaked when she also heard you were at the royal wedding last year, like are you kidding me? Paula Faris: I know,