#96: Kicking Ass & Taking Names With Stacy A. Cross Jenn T Grace: You are listening to the Personal Branding for the LGBTQ Professional Podcast, episode 96. Introduction: Welcome to the Personal Branding for the LGBTQ Professional Podcast; the podcast dedicated to helping LGBTQ professionals and business owners grow their business and careers through the power of leveraging their LGBTQ identities in their personal brand. You'll learn how to market your products and services both broadly, and within the LGBTQ community. You'll hear from incredible guests who are leveraging the power of their identity for good, as well as those who haven't yet started, and everyone in between. And now your host. She teaches straight people how to market to gay people, and gay people how to market themselves. Your professional lesbian, Jenn - with two N's - T Grace. Jenn T Grace: Hello and welcome to episode number 96 of the podcast. I am your host, Jenn T Grace, and as we near the end of October, as I promised I have another interview for you. Today's interview is with Stacy Cross, she is the founder of Comfort Killers, and this was probably one of the most high energy interviews that I have done in a very long time. So Stacy really got into a lot of mindset conversation, we talked a lot about personal branding, and how she has developed and created her personal brand over the last six months. You will walk away from this I believe inspired, but then also perhaps equally as exhausted because it was a really high energy conversation. So I really hope that you enjoy this. If you would like to see a transcript, or you would like links directly to anything that Stacy and I discussed, you can go to the blog at www.JennTGrace.com/96 for episode number 96. And if you would like to get in touch with Stacy or you have any n that you would like for me to hear, you can do so at pretty much Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn; all of those places I'm at Jenn T. Grace. Or if you'd like you can send me an email at Jenn@jenntgrace.com. Regardless of how you'd like to get in touch with me, please, please do. I’m happy to make an introduction to Stacy I'm happy to make, or if you just have general comments or feedback I always want to hear from you. It is never a wrong time to reach out so please, please do. And with that being said I'm going to cut the introduction short and get right into this conversation with Stacy. So let's just start from the top, and let everyone know who you are, where you're located, what you do, and how you got to this place in time. Stacy A Cross: What, where, when, and how. Jenn T Grace: You name it, all of it. Stacy A Cross: Well thank you so much for having me on your podcast. I appreciate it greatly. I am Stacy A. Cross, and there is no E in my name, and I am currently living in Philadelphia, moved here roughly about three and a half years ago, been here since, ready to be nimble again and move on. I move with opportunity. I am the owner and founder of the company The Comfort Killers, and I know it sounds negative Jenn, but in this case two negatives does equal a positive. The comfort- to me being comfortable is such a negative word, and of course killers is a negative word. But the comfort killers is what we do, and we provide products, and solution, and content, and services to those seeking success through personal development, and I've been living it so the value is in my experience. And that's who I am, my mission is huge, my mission in life is to teach millions how to get uncomfortable, to think better, to live better, and to act better. And that's who I am in just a nutshell. Jenn T Grace: I love it. So how did you get to the place where you decided that you were going to go with Comfort Killers? All possible negativity aside, what was the impetus to say it's comfort that really is what's getting in people's way? What was your kind of revelation around that word specifically? Stacy A Cross: Definitely, because I believe that tradition and conventional wisdom led us to this comfortable life, right? We want to go to high school, get that great diploma, then take that diploma, go to college, get another diploma, then go off into the workforce, then of course get the picket fence with the home, get the kids, get the dog, get the car, and go to a couple baby showers in between, and be happy with a few vacations. That's a comfortable life. I wasn't even at that comfort level, but the revelation, the 'aha' moment in my life was realizing that I want so much more, but I don't know how to attain it because going through this comfortable path, I've been just getting this same type of result, these same outcomes. So what is it going to take? So I look for inspiration and motivation outside of me at one time, this external. So I was going to a seminar and on Valentine's Day in 2016 I went to one seminar, pumped everyone else up, and for me I just wasn't getting pumped up. I wasn't feeling it. And I was like, 'But I'm a motivated person already.' And then I realized you know what? I'm going to walk out of this seminar. I'm going to take a step back and walk out and I'm not going to feel guilty about it. I remember the day clearly because I did feel guilty about it, but I said, 'What can I do differently that I haven't been doing,' and that was one answer was get uncomfortable. Do what people won't do. Do the dirt, and that's what I've done, and I've built a company. So upon coming home from the seminar that day, I wrote so many articles, I created the company in one day. I started writing a Comfort Killers handbook which I finished in 24 hours, and then things just started happening, result-based things. And I realized, 'Wow doing the opposite of comfort really allowed me to grow in my space,' and I think more people should apply their lives to living an uncomfortable lifestyle. Jenn T Grace: Wow, I feel like you are saying so much with the time already, so we've been recording for like four minutes at this point. I feel like people can immediately get a sense of your energy level which is through the roof, and you're really motivated, and you're out to like kick ass and take names. Where do you see the direction and your ability to kind of be branding yourself with this? Because Comfort Killers is a really kind of perhaps polarizing type of statement for people who are stuck in their comfort zones. How are you finding other people who really just need maybe that kick in the ass to kind of get them going, or really have you be their personal motivator? Where are you finding those people? Are they reluctant to hear the phrase of 'Comfort Killer'? Do you find that you have to explain what comfort killing is? I know that's a lot of questions in one shot, but hit me. Stacy A Cross: I understand where you're going with this, and yes, in the beginning it was like, 'Okay well how am I going to explain this?' It's easy to naturally just say The Comfort Killers, I am Stacy Cross, and there is no 'E' in my name, but then there's got to be some explaining. Okay what is it that I really do? I want to motivate people, I want to teach people how to get uncomfortable. It's been a blessing so far where people are naturally drawn to this idea of change. They want to change, they're in a place that I could easily explain to them that I was in the same place, so it comes from my story, and what my story relates to is a sense of addiction. I was a gambler, I didn't even know it. Right? So I had to overcome that but thought I didn't want to go to an AA meeting, right? So- and I came from a place of procrastination. I've started and stopped so much times that it became known that if Stacy says something it's probably not going to be done. It takes a while to reverse that aspect. So when people arrive at my domain, when people arrive at my face, when people come to me or essentially I go to them, I have this big humongous story, this personal story that I've written that I believe is so relatable to any facet of anyone's life that's willing to change. But here's the deal, change doesn't come easily, right? The seeds have to be planted. So I only work with people that have planted these seeds and that are willing to take the next steps, because the next course of action definitely is an accountability action; you have to want it, you have to go for it. So how do I purposely drive myself to these people? I put it in my articles, my website, all that jazz. Or really when you're talking to me face-to-face, I don't give you back pats. I'm not in the game to make you feel good. Tony Robbins even turned me down from going to Business Mastery. He said I needed more credit. I understand it, here's the deal, I am not here to say everything that everyone already said, it's been said. If you could motivate yourself from that, that's fine, but the reason you came to me is because none of it worked. Jenn T Grace: I love all of that, and so I feel like it takes a really strong personality to be able to say, "Listen this is where I'm sharing my story, and it's not all roses. I was known for not actually following through with whatever it is." How are you leveraging that aspect in terms of maybe relating with the people that you're working with to say, "Listen you're coming from the same place that I came from, and now I'm going to be able to navigate you through this because I personally went through it." Because I think a lot of coaches out there, and strategists, and people who are counseling, and motivating; they don't have that real credible story behind them.