Show Transcript

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What is your favorite birthday memory?

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Do you even have a favorite birthday memory?

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Because chances are, if you're like me, you probably can't actually remember many of your birthdays.

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I know for myself, I'm 37 years old, and there's probably honestly only about

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a handful of my birthdays that I actually remember.

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Well, today, it's all about kind of changing that.

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Because we're joined today by Stephanie McLaughlin, a woman who was getting

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ready to turn 40 years old, and she decided to set off on something that has

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turned out to be absolutely incredible.

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It was an idea to have 40 drinks with 40 different people from her past.

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She thought it was just going to be something fun, something lighthearted.

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But as I said, it turned out to be something absolutely incredible.

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As you listen to her story, I hope that you'll think about your own situation,

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about your own next upcoming big birthday, and how you might celebrate it in

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a little bit different way.

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Maybe a way just like Stephanie is talking about today.

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This is episode 288. This is the story of Stephanie McLaughlin,

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40 drinks with 40 different people to celebrate turning 40 years old.

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What's up, my friend, and welcome to Grit, Grace, and Inspiration.

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I am your host, Kevin Lowe. 20 years ago, I awoke from a life-saving surgery

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only to find that I was left completely blind.

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And since that day, I've learned a lot about life, a lot about living, and a lot about myself.

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And here on this podcast, I want to share those insights with you.

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Because friend, if you are still searching for your purpose,

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still trying to understand why, or still left searching for that next right

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path to take, we'll consider this to be your stepping stone to get you from

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where you are to where you want to be.

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This week's prayer request goes out to a friend of mine, Jennifer.

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I would love to have all of us in praying for her for just helping her to get

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her some comfort and peace and just to let life be a little bit easier.

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I think all of us realize that life isn't so easy.

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It's not as grand as maybe we ever thought it would be. There's so many challenges.

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There's relationships. There's loss. There's heartbreak.

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There's medical issues. And I think we all get wrapped up in it sometimes.

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And I think we all just need to be there for one another.

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And today, I want to be there for Jennifer. So if you could join me in just

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saying a little prayer for her.

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A little prayer of encouragement for God just to show up in her life in a big, amazing way.

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If you have someone or something that you would love to have us praying with

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you for, please send it to me via text message.

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877-749-8178. Again, send your prayer request to be featured here on the podcast to 877-749-8178.

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I've been talking a lot lately about my love for the company MyPillow. Because why?

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of coffee. Thanks to MyPillow.

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I'm 39 and never married, single, never engaged, any of those things,

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and had been dumped by yet another terrible boyfriend.

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By text message at some point earlier in the year.

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Also, I'm a Leo, I'm an extrovert. I'm like all the things that loves a spotlight, right?

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But those two things that year was like, I just wasn't into the big party, the big four.

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Oh, you know, I'm the kind of girl who loves a good party.

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But that year in those circumstances, it just felt really kind of icky and gross

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to me because it felt like, you know, here I am turning 40 and this is what,

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like the wedding that I never had,

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you know, like you get to, you get to chat with people for, you know,

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five minutes, 10 minutes at a party.

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And, and, and it just, it just felt off for me.

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So I was trying to figure out something else to do for my birthday. And I did two things.

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The first thing I did was I went to Paris with some friends and my parents.

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And that was just as glamorous and spectacular as you would think it would be.

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It was fabulous. Trip of a lifetime.

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And then as my birthday came closer that year, I was trying to figure out what

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I was going going to do to celebrate.

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And the idea landed in my brain almost fully formed.

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And I decided that I would have 40 drinks with 40 people in 40 different locations.

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And then each drink that I had with somebody would have some sort of thematic

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connection to that person or our relationship that might relate to how we knew

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each other or when we were close or things like that.

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And I loved the idea mostly because it was ridiculous.

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Honestly, it was just the silliest thing.

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And listen, my birthday is August 1st. So for decades, I have been celebrating a birthday month.

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And frankly, I just think it gives me a great opportunity to say to friends,

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you know, who I don't see all the time, hey, let's have drinks.

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Let's, you know, let's have dinner.

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Like it gives me a great excuse to reach out to people. and so this was kind

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of that but on steroids and so my birth I could extend my birthday for as long

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as it would take me to have these 40 drinks.

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Yes. Incredible. So, so when did you actually start? Like when was drink one?

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Was it before your birthday or after? So drink one was about a month before my 40th birthday.

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I was out for dinner with my very best friend.

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We were going to a Red Sox game. I was in Boston and I hadn't seen him in a few months.

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So I was telling him about Paris and about, you know, the trip and that was was great.

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And then sort of turned the topic of conversation to this crazy idea I had.

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And my best friend Adrian is just always loves my crazy ideas and is always egging me on.

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So he heard the idea and he was like, I love it. You got to do it.

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And then a couple of beats went by, I don't know. And he, he just said, Steph, look at this.

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And he slid the cocktail menu over to me and he pointed needed something on the menu.

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And I had such like this like moment of like separation from everything.

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All I could think was, I wasn't really feeling like drinking rum tonight.

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And he was like, no, look at the name. And my friend Adrian is a journalist

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down in Boston, and the drink was called the Periodista.

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And that is a Spanish word for journalist list that sort of came to,

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I think in like the 1960s in Miami and Adrian is a native of Miami.

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So like all of a sudden it was like, it was like Tetris things just sort of

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like falling into place, click, click, click, click.

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And I was like, Oh, um, I think we're starting. I think we're doing this.

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Wow. Yeah. So it was kind of kismet though.

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That first one was just, um, you know, it was just kind of on a lark and it just off we went.

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Yeah. So was it after that? I'm kind of curious, like,

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Did you be like, okay, I'm going to get serious with this and try to write out

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your list of 39 more people?

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No. So, and that's the thing. Again, because this was sort of ridiculous,

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this was also a bunch of years ago now.

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So I like to say back when Facebook was fun.

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Yes. We all remember when that was, right? I also, side note,

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my day job is I own a marketing agency.

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And so I kind of had a little, a couple of resources. So I was like,

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Hey, listen, let's, let's build this little website and let me write blog posts

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about each visit and each drink.

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And let me, you know, then share each of these blog posts on Facebook.

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And again, when Facebook was fun, people would comment on it and,

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you know, so it turned into kind of a thing pretty quickly.

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But what happened was I had two friends, friends of my brother from high school,

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like I've known them since I was a little kid.

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They were home. They lived away and they were home like two weekends later.

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So it was like, well, I only see you guys a couple of times a year. Let's have a drink.

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And then the next week, same thing. Somebody else was home who I hadn't seen in a while.

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So I had a drink with them. And then next thing you know, it was like,

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oh, wait, I've had seven or eight drinks.

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I went out one night with friends of mine. It was three guys.

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And we went down to Boston for a big night out. And I ended up having a drink

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with each of them. We went to three different places, three different drinks.

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I had drinks with each of them.

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And so like very quickly, it's like, oh, wait, I'm like eight or nine drinks.

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And I know I want to have, you know, one with my mom and one with my dad and

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each of my brothers and like, okay.

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So all of a sudden it was like, you get to like 12, 13, 14. And you're like,

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wait a minute, this is not an unlimited runway.

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All of a sudden you have to, you do actually have to start thinking about what

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you, how you want to spend the rest of these slots.

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Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. You know what? And when you put it that way,

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I guess it makes the whole idea of 40 people seem a little bit easier because

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at first in my head, I'm thinking, I don't know that there's 40 people from

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my past that I care to have a drink with.

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Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's interesting because, you know, first it's just who's nearby.

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And of course, there are people who raise their hand as soon as you say you're

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doing this ridiculous thing. And they're like, I want to be one of your drinks.

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So, you know, there's a handful of those.

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And then all of a sudden it's like, okay, well, these are all people that I,

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you know, see regularly. Or like I said, those few folks who were home.

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But what do I really want to do with this now that I'm starting to gain some momentum?

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I don't want it just to be like all the same people that I see,

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you know, within the course of a year.

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So I started digging through my brain and my history and my background,

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and I found people from grammar school, from high school, from college, an old boyfriend,

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people I worked at different jobs with.

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And so then I started really doing some outreach and kind of trying to like,

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you know, reconnect with some people I hadn't connected with in in sometimes 10 or 15 years.

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Yeah. And what a cool excuse to reconnect with somebody.

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Exactly. Well, and that's the thing. So for me, this air of ridiculousness was

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kind of one of the things that gave me cover.

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It gave me a reason to reach out to people that I hadn't talked to in 5, 10, 15 years.

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And I'll be honest, Kevin, I reached out to a couple of girlfriends friends

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who I had lost connection with, you know, over the, over time.

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And I really thought, you know, oh, I would love to reconnect with these, these women.

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I just, I adored them and, you know, friendships, you know, ebb and flow,

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as you know, and two separate women said, no.

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Hmm. They, they said, Nope, I don't think that's for me. I don't want to be a part of that.

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So it, you know, there, there was, you know, there were the,

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the wins and there were, there were a couple of losses.

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Wow. You know what? And you answered one of my questions I was going to ask

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is, is did you ever have anybody turn you down? And you did.

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Yeah. A couple of girlfriends.

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One of them said to me at the time, I just don't think I'm in the right place

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to to reconnect and to be a part of this.

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And, you know, you have to respect that. What can you say?

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And the other one simply just kind of said no.

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But strangely, she and I, not strangely, you know, in a lovely turn of events,

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she and I reconnected a couple of years later.

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And so, you know, life goes the way it goes. It's always, you know,

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wandering and meandering, and some people cross your paths, and then you separate,

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maybe you never see again.

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And then other people, you just sort of come back into their orbit again. Yeah, absolutely.

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I love it. So talk to me about when you look back on these 40 different people

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that you got to meet with,

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was there any that stand out that maybe, I don't know, for some reason,

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when you look back, that memory stands out more than any of the others?

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Yeah, there are a couple of drinks that... that I mean, I could tell you a story

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about every single one of them, but we probably don't have that kind of time

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because they were just, let me put it this way.

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Some people hear about this idea and they kind of recoil at the thought of like

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drinks and drinking and like, and it really turned out not to be about that.

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Although for many years was a person who was, you know, quite the party girl

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and, you know, always out at the bars and all of that stuff.

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But it, the, the project turned out to be not about that.

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It really turned out to be 40 visits with people.

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And if you go back to the concept of the big party, um.

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And only getting, you know, oh, I invited my girlfriends from grammar school, right?

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But I got to see them for five minutes or seven minutes or 10 minutes before

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I was pulled away or had to go visit with somebody else.

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Instead, I had, you know, a visit with them, just the two of them and me.

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So it was like, you know, I took this party and I spread it out among,

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you know, individual visits instead.

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So, so there were a number of, of stories that, that were just wonderful.

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One of them I'm going to tell just because I, I adore this. So the drink that

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I had with my dad, we had a drink called the creamsicle and we had this because

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when I was, I think I was 13 years old.

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My dad was a travel and salesman kind of guy, engineer, sales engineer kind

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of guy. So he was away, you know, several days a week.

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And And so it was some, I don't know, Tuesday or Wednesday night,

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he gets home, it's, it's eight o'clock, you know, my brother's,

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everybody's already had dinner.

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And so he says, he grabs me and says, Hey, let's go, let's go down downtown

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and just go out and get some appetizers.

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And so we, we go downtown, we go to this bar and I, sorry, not a bar. It was a restaurant.

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And I had been there with my mom previously for lunch.

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And I'd had this thing called a creamsicle. It's essentially like,

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you know, a, a, an ice cream shake kind of thing.

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So we order you know some potato skins and a

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i don't know mozzarella sticks and he gets

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a beer and i order a creamsicle and when

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the waitress brings the creamsicle i took a sip of it i said dad this tastes

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really funny and he took a sip of it and he called the waitress back over and

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he said um excuse me this has alcohol in it and she goes yeah and he goes she's 13.

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So, you know, I always looked a little old for my age and, you know,

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my dad looked a little young for his.

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So I don't know if it looked like we were out on a date or something. It was kind of crazy.

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So, you know, there were things like that. Like when I knew I was going to have

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a drink with my dad, I was like, it's gotta be a creamsicle.

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There's literally nothing else it can be.

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So that's just an example of kind of that thematic connection.

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But one of the really interesting stories about these drinks was the two girls

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I went to grammar school with.

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Karen and Ginny. And when I

00:16:52.288 --> 00:16:57.148

was young, we lived in this rural town outside the city where we live now.

00:16:57.568 --> 00:17:02.088

And I moved into town in second grade and I met Karen at school.

00:17:02.328 --> 00:17:07.388

And then in fourth grade, the summer before fourth grade, Ginny moved into town.

00:17:08.296 --> 00:17:13.096

And she lived up the road from me. Now, I don't know how a nine-year-old like

00:17:13.096 --> 00:17:17.576

hears town gossip or something, but somehow I found out that there was a family

00:17:17.576 --> 00:17:19.736

with three little girls that had moved in up the road.

00:17:20.416 --> 00:17:22.036

Well, down where I lived, I

00:17:22.036 --> 00:17:25.676

have two younger brothers and in the neighborhood, it was all little boys.

00:17:25.796 --> 00:17:30.236

So, you know, lots and lots of boy energy, football, riding bikes,

00:17:30.436 --> 00:17:36.256

snowmobiles, all that kind of stuff. So one day I created this ruse where I

00:17:36.256 --> 00:17:40.156

put our dog on a leash and I said, I'm taking the dog for a walk.

00:17:40.536 --> 00:17:45.696

And I walked up to this house where this family had moved in and essentially

00:17:45.696 --> 00:17:51.736

like loitered in the street until an adult saw me and sent the children out to meet me.

00:17:52.876 --> 00:17:57.816

So we're at this visit and Ginny says, do you remember how we met?

00:17:57.976 --> 00:18:02.116

And I said, no, I have no, I said, I was fourth grade, right? Did we meet at school?

00:18:02.256 --> 00:18:05.616

And she said, no, it was before school started. And so she tells me this story

00:18:05.616 --> 00:18:09.756

and I'm just, you know, we're all laughing. Oh my goodness. Ha ha ha.

00:18:10.716 --> 00:18:16.736

And on my drive home that night, I, I, I was, you know, relishing my visit with

00:18:16.736 --> 00:18:17.596

these these wonderful women.

00:18:17.836 --> 00:18:22.416

And then thinking, wait a minute, Ginny's house was, where was it?

00:18:22.536 --> 00:18:27.796

So I go home and I Google map it only to find out that Ginny's house was a mile

00:18:27.796 --> 00:18:30.096

away from mine. I was nine.

00:18:31.796 --> 00:18:37.576

I was nine. And I like created this ruse, put the dog on the leash and walked

00:18:37.576 --> 00:18:39.816

a mile up the street to make a friend.

00:18:41.156 --> 00:18:45.236

So I said to my mom, you know, told her, I saw her at some point after this

00:18:45.236 --> 00:18:49.036

visit and I, I said, ha ha, can you, can you believe this story?

00:18:49.716 --> 00:18:54.076

And she said, of course I can believe it. Why do you think we kept you on such a short leash?

00:18:55.503 --> 00:19:02.223

And it was like, oh, you know, a bunch of things started clicking into place

00:19:02.223 --> 00:19:04.443

for me again, more Tetris click, click, click.

00:19:04.823 --> 00:19:11.103

I knew as a as a as an adult, as a young adult in my 20s, in my 30s,

00:19:11.103 --> 00:19:15.623

I knew I was sort of a bold person, an adventurous person, kind of,

00:19:15.623 --> 00:19:17.403

you know, up for anything kind of thing.

00:19:18.603 --> 00:19:26.843

But I didn't know about myself that it was that innate, that it was really, you know, built in.

00:19:26.943 --> 00:19:29.283

This was not something I had picked up along the way.

00:19:29.603 --> 00:19:35.443

This was, you know, a real core level kind of thing for me. And so that was

00:19:35.443 --> 00:19:40.583

actually Karen told us a story, a very similar story at that same visit.

00:19:40.643 --> 00:19:45.663

She said one day she had come over after school for a play date and she and

00:19:45.663 --> 00:19:50.183

I went out into the woods behind my house and just went like adventuring out

00:19:50.183 --> 00:19:53.523

into the woods on our own, you know, sort of path.

00:19:53.523 --> 00:19:56.323

And you know then when we finally showed up

00:19:56.323 --> 00:19:59.203

back at my house you know our moms were standing in

00:19:59.203 --> 00:20:02.903

the backyard you know red faces arms crossed they'd been yelling for us this

00:20:02.903 --> 00:20:09.483

is like I had no idea that I was just this adventurous bold do my own thing

00:20:09.483 --> 00:20:15.763

kind of person as a child but yeah I was so that was one of the first ones that

00:20:15.763 --> 00:20:17.523

kind of opened my eyes to like,

00:20:18.405 --> 00:20:25.445

Oh, wait a minute. People are telling me stories or they're reflecting back

00:20:25.445 --> 00:20:27.525

to me things that they know about me.

00:20:28.125 --> 00:20:34.725

And some of this stuff is stuff that I don't know about myself, or maybe I had.

00:20:36.065 --> 00:20:40.885

Overlooked or in, in another case had sort of like papered over,

00:20:40.945 --> 00:20:43.685

like wallpapered over, like, I don't know. I don't like that thing about myself.

00:20:43.785 --> 00:20:47.305

So I'm going to like, you know, cover it up kind of thing so the

00:20:47.305 --> 00:20:51.445

the drinks started to reveal things

00:20:51.445 --> 00:20:54.505

about me that i

00:20:54.505 --> 00:21:01.385

didn't know and it was a completely unexpected element of the project isn't

00:21:01.385 --> 00:21:09.045

that just the coolest thing ever that here this crazy idea that's super fun

00:21:09.045 --> 00:21:11.765

it's quirky it's this neat way of celebrating 40,

00:21:12.465 --> 00:21:16.245

Who knew that you would then discover things about your own self,

00:21:16.425 --> 00:21:20.905

not just your past, but about who you are? Yeah. That's amazing.

00:21:21.385 --> 00:21:26.465

Yeah. And I'll jump to the punchline. And that is that at the end of,

00:21:26.505 --> 00:21:29.525

so it ended up taking me a year to have all 40 drinks.

00:21:29.765 --> 00:21:34.525

And at the end of the year, I was a completely different person than I was at

00:21:34.525 --> 00:21:35.245

the beginning of the year.

00:21:35.485 --> 00:21:37.785

The project changed me.

00:21:38.865 --> 00:21:44.085

Wow. Wow. Wow. while. What was the farthest you had to travel to have one of these drinks?

00:21:44.285 --> 00:21:48.845

Great question. So I live in Manchester, New Hampshire, which is about an hour north of Boston.

00:21:50.025 --> 00:21:54.565

And as you might expect, most of the drinks were in New Hampshire.

00:21:54.825 --> 00:21:58.865

There were a handful down in Boston, one down in Connecticut,

00:21:58.865 --> 00:22:02.545

and the furthest drink was Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

00:22:03.246 --> 00:22:08.006

Oh, wow. Yeah. Oh, my God. Now, who was that person?

00:22:08.206 --> 00:22:14.306

That was a friend from college. I happened to be in the area for a client visit.

00:22:14.666 --> 00:22:18.866

And I because it was because I was doing this 40 drinks project,

00:22:19.026 --> 00:22:22.606

I had a reason to reach out to this old friend who was a dear,

00:22:22.686 --> 00:22:28.406

dear friend through college and a bunch of years after and I hadn't seen him in probably 15 years.

00:22:28.726 --> 00:22:32.326

So I reached out to him and we were able to connect.

00:22:32.506 --> 00:22:37.786

And that was another one of the crazy, crazy stories from from the drinks.

00:22:37.986 --> 00:22:39.866

So do you want to hear that one?

00:22:40.086 --> 00:22:44.706

I do, of course. Yeah, you can't bring it to the edge.

00:22:47.526 --> 00:22:54.186

So in college, I was friends with a group of guys, a group of really cool dudes.

00:22:54.426 --> 00:22:58.126

A couple of them had joined a fraternity. So they, they sort of grabbed,

00:22:58.166 --> 00:22:59.806

you know, a handful of other guys.

00:22:59.886 --> 00:23:03.946

So there was like this core group of like five or six guys that I was friends

00:23:03.946 --> 00:23:06.406

with in college. And we did everything together.

00:23:06.606 --> 00:23:09.706

We, you know, we were always, you know, out and about on the town.

00:23:09.846 --> 00:23:11.826

We were, we were wild children for sure.

00:23:12.366 --> 00:23:18.086

Big partiers. But the thing was over the years and through the years that there

00:23:18.086 --> 00:23:22.206

would be nights when it was no girls allowed, but I wasn't, I was invited.

00:23:22.446 --> 00:23:25.246

There would be, there would be nights where it was no girlfriends allowed.

00:23:25.586 --> 00:23:28.706

But I was invited. There would be nights where it was, you know,

00:23:28.706 --> 00:23:31.806

kind of like no outsiders invited, but I was invited.

00:23:32.526 --> 00:23:39.586

So I created this story in my head that I was just one of the guys.

00:23:39.726 --> 00:23:43.806

And that's why they always included me in these, I don't know,

00:23:43.826 --> 00:23:46.326

in these adventures and these outings, everything.

00:23:46.706 --> 00:23:51.766

And that was something I interpreted myself, internalized myself,

00:23:51.766 --> 00:23:57.186

myself and really took that through, I don't know, maybe the next...

00:23:57.971 --> 00:24:02.911

You know, 15 years of my life, because after that group kind of faded away and

00:24:02.911 --> 00:24:04.211

everybody went different directions,

00:24:04.291 --> 00:24:08.711

I found myself part of another group that was a group of guys and,

00:24:09.091 --> 00:24:13.271

you know, men and women are, you know, eventually, but the core of it was,

00:24:13.351 --> 00:24:16.191

was a bunch of guys. So I just thought of myself as one of the guys.

00:24:16.411 --> 00:24:19.291

So I go down and I have this drink with, with my friend.

00:24:19.671 --> 00:24:25.071

And this was actually the one drink of the 40 that turned into a real real corker.

00:24:25.431 --> 00:24:32.051

We, uh, we, we went out and we did it up towards the middle or towards the end of the evening.

00:24:32.431 --> 00:24:35.671

He and I were sitting at a, at a bar in Fort Lauderdale, again,

00:24:35.751 --> 00:24:38.631

trying to figure out what our quote unquote drink would be.

00:24:39.271 --> 00:24:42.271

And I said to him, you know, we were talking about the old days and talking

00:24:42.271 --> 00:24:44.091

about college and the guys in the group.

00:24:44.111 --> 00:24:47.591

And I said, well, you know, some toss off comment about, well,

00:24:47.611 --> 00:24:49.091

that's what happens when you're just one of the guys.

00:24:50.051 --> 00:24:53.851

And it was like a a needle scratched on the record. It was like, what?

00:24:54.491 --> 00:24:58.211

And he looked at me and he said, what did you just say? And I said,

00:24:58.251 --> 00:25:00.951

well, you know, cause I was one of the guys.

00:25:01.351 --> 00:25:05.111

And he looked at me and he said, Steph, you were never one of the guys.

00:25:05.951 --> 00:25:09.211

And I was like, wait a minute. I don't get it.

00:25:09.271 --> 00:25:11.911

And I sort of, you know, went back to him and said, you know,

00:25:11.931 --> 00:25:14.491

I was always invited, but how could that be?

00:25:15.271 --> 00:25:19.591

And he said, well, we just thought you were such a cool chick that we always

00:25:19.591 --> 00:25:20.531

liked having you around.

00:25:21.051 --> 00:25:27.791

So commence mind blow emoji, right? So like, holy cow.

00:25:27.971 --> 00:25:33.751

All right. So this, this character trait that I had internalized and then built

00:25:33.751 --> 00:25:38.571

stories around and built a decade of my life on turned out not to be true.

00:25:39.351 --> 00:25:43.131

I was telling another friend, this was probably a couple of years later,

00:25:43.171 --> 00:25:48.111

I was telling another friend of the story and he kind of pushed back at me and he said, so what?

00:25:48.191 --> 00:25:50.311

What does it matter if you weren't one of the guys?

00:25:50.511 --> 00:25:53.751

And he really made me think more about it.

00:25:53.811 --> 00:25:59.391

And I realized that the thing about that is why was that so pivotal for me to

00:25:59.391 --> 00:26:00.911

find out that I wasn't one of the guys?

00:26:01.211 --> 00:26:09.831

It's because I never would have given myself the credit that I was cool enough

00:26:09.831 --> 00:26:14.831

to hang out with those guys and to always be invited and always be included

00:26:14.831 --> 00:26:19.191

if I hadn't sort of handicapped myself that way.

00:26:20.431 --> 00:26:26.351

I had cut myself down to say that that was the reason that they included me

00:26:26.351 --> 00:26:29.971

all the time instead of building myself up and saying, well,

00:26:29.991 --> 00:26:33.571

geez, I must be the coolest chick around because these cool dudes are always,

00:26:33.711 --> 00:26:36.191

you know, want to include me in our adventures.

00:26:36.511 --> 00:26:40.131

So that was another one that really kind of like, that one left a mark.

00:26:41.451 --> 00:26:45.731

Yeah. Wow, wow, wow. Wow. And that was the one in Fort Lauderdale. Yeah.

00:26:46.211 --> 00:26:54.831

Wow. I mean, again, this just profound way of turning something silly.

00:26:56.216 --> 00:27:00.116

Into something truly just life-changing. Yeah.

00:27:00.616 --> 00:27:07.896

Yeah. And, and for me, that was one of the takeaways is that if I had endeavored,

00:27:07.936 --> 00:27:11.396

if I had set out to do something life-changing,

00:27:11.516 --> 00:27:18.236

if I had set out to go about querying my friends and family about myself to learn about myself,

00:27:18.436 --> 00:27:21.116

I don't think I ever would have followed through.

00:27:21.116 --> 00:27:27.796

I think because the project was wrapped in such a silly, you know,

00:27:27.796 --> 00:27:34.456

wrapping and it was very no stakes, there were no stakes when I set out to do

00:27:34.456 --> 00:27:35.796

this other than to be silly.

00:27:35.916 --> 00:27:39.696

And I think that's what allowed it to turn into something profound.

00:27:40.496 --> 00:27:47.276

Yes. Yes. I love it. But talking about profound, let's get to the to the drink

00:27:47.276 --> 00:27:52.176

that led to marriage, because that seems pretty darn profound.

00:27:53.416 --> 00:27:54.776

Let's hear that story.

00:27:56.116 --> 00:27:59.296

So this was the project started in July.

00:27:59.456 --> 00:28:04.636

And by the following April, I had already had, you know, a bunch of the drinks.

00:28:04.716 --> 00:28:08.976

And, you know, some of these changes were already underway.

00:28:09.136 --> 00:28:12.836

A lot of these realizations and some of these big drinks had already happened.

00:28:13.036 --> 00:28:17.576

And I was out one night with some friends, a girlfriend and I were out for dinner

00:28:17.576 --> 00:28:21.536

and a bunch of friends showed up, but the restaurant was too busy to sort of accommodate us all.

00:28:21.636 --> 00:28:25.076

So we said, well, just go next door to the dirty dive karaoke bar.

00:28:26.016 --> 00:28:32.936

And so we're hanging out there and I met this guy and I had this really cool, really cute, funny guy.

00:28:34.016 --> 00:28:39.056

And I knew he was something special, but well, as we started out,

00:28:39.096 --> 00:28:42.156

we, we know my track record with men has not been been great.

00:28:43.076 --> 00:28:49.296

I've had some pretty not great relationships. And so when I found out that,

00:28:49.336 --> 00:28:51.636

you know, when I realized that this guy was something special,

00:28:51.776 --> 00:28:55.256

I said to myself, you know what, I'm going to do things different this time.

00:28:55.456 --> 00:28:58.336

So if I want to call him, I'm not going to call him.

00:28:58.656 --> 00:29:03.596

If I want to text him, I'm not going to text him anything that I would normally do.

00:29:03.736 --> 00:29:08.296

I'm going to do the opposite of and see what happens because I want a different

00:29:08.296 --> 00:29:09.536

outcome come with this guy.

00:29:10.456 --> 00:29:15.336

And wouldn't you know it, I got a different outcome. And I think he was probably

00:29:15.336 --> 00:29:23.216

one of the most obvious markers that I had changed in the course of that year,

00:29:23.256 --> 00:29:26.796

because my husband is just such a sweet,

00:29:26.896 --> 00:29:29.316

such a sweet dude, such a great man.

00:29:29.983 --> 00:29:36.443

And I know that had I been the same gal I had been the year before or a couple of years before,

00:29:36.703 --> 00:29:41.623

he might have been amused by me for a couple of months, but then I just would

00:29:41.623 --> 00:29:45.403

have been a little too outrageous, a little too much of a party girl still.

00:29:45.523 --> 00:29:49.803

And I don't think it would have worked, but because I was going through some

00:29:49.803 --> 00:29:58.623

of these internal changes, I had sort of settled inside inside myself enough to not be so constantly,

00:29:58.783 --> 00:30:03.343

I don't know, trying to, you know, get what I needed sort of out in the world.

00:30:03.603 --> 00:30:07.383

I think that that's a probably a reasonable explanation, right?

00:30:07.483 --> 00:30:10.043

Like always trying to like be out and get and do and, you know,

00:30:10.043 --> 00:30:15.043

be a part of things. And, and, and instead I was starting to settle inside myself.

00:30:15.383 --> 00:30:21.423

And so I didn't, I wasn't as compelled to be doing all of that craziness as much anymore.

00:30:22.083 --> 00:30:28.423

Yeah, yeah, I love it. One thing that just came to mind as you're talking about

00:30:28.423 --> 00:30:34.403

this and I'm seeing that this whole thing is just taking on such a deeper meaning in your life.

00:30:34.783 --> 00:30:40.223

Did you continue the original intent though to blog about each one of these?

00:30:40.583 --> 00:30:44.163

I did, yeah. I wrote a story about every single one of my drinks.

00:30:44.943 --> 00:30:48.643

Wow, wow, wow, wow. That is incredible. Yeah.

00:30:48.783 --> 00:31:00.643

So the question is, is after the 40 drinks with 40 different people, what was the result?

00:31:00.683 --> 00:31:08.263

How did your life exactly change compared to Stephanie before that happened?

00:31:08.263 --> 00:31:13.823

Yeah, I think I was just sort of starting to touch on it, that settling inside

00:31:13.823 --> 00:31:18.143

myself and that being open to other people.

00:31:18.992 --> 00:31:25.972

Versions, other impressions of myself that I hadn't been previously allowed

00:31:25.972 --> 00:31:30.272

me to really start, I think, calming down.

00:31:30.452 --> 00:31:35.492

Is that the right? Settling, I think, is probably a good word for it.

00:31:35.692 --> 00:31:40.032

Another big shift for me towards the end of that year, and it was happening

00:31:40.032 --> 00:31:44.972

just after I had met my husband, was that there had been a group of people that

00:31:44.972 --> 00:31:49.532

I had been friends with for, oh, I don't know, six or seven or eight years.

00:31:49.792 --> 00:31:53.212

And we were tight. I literally called them my framily.

00:31:53.932 --> 00:31:59.432

And that group of friends was starting to kind of fall apart.

00:32:00.652 --> 00:32:06.692

And it was really upsetting for me because I'm a very social, very outgoing person.

00:32:06.752 --> 00:32:10.792

And as a single person, you know, it's nice to kind of have that, that group, right?

00:32:10.832 --> 00:32:13.912

Everybody, most people, you know, are sort of married and they've got their

00:32:13.912 --> 00:32:16.012

kids and they're off and they're doing their grownup lives.

00:32:16.252 --> 00:32:21.432

And so this group of friends was incredibly important to me.

00:32:21.912 --> 00:32:29.552

And I remember bringing my husband around to meet them and they were terrible to him.

00:32:31.592 --> 00:32:36.492

They were terrible to him. They were not welcoming. They were not interested.

00:32:36.932 --> 00:32:41.792

They were, and he really came away with this like kind of of weird taste in

00:32:41.792 --> 00:32:44.592

his mouth. Like those are your best friends.

00:32:44.892 --> 00:32:52.052

And it, it really opened my eyes to like, Oh, who am I surrounding myself with here?

00:32:52.512 --> 00:32:56.472

You know, I felt like other people had come into the group, you know,

00:32:56.472 --> 00:32:59.812

and I, you know, with, they'd start dating people and I would always be so welcoming,

00:32:59.852 --> 00:33:03.792

like, Oh my God, you know, come in, you know, making sure they felt welcome

00:33:03.792 --> 00:33:06.472

and not, you know, outside the group. And yet.

00:33:07.136 --> 00:33:10.316

When I started dating somebody, it was the exact opposite.

00:33:10.496 --> 00:33:19.216

So there were a lot of shifts in the people around me as that year came to a

00:33:19.216 --> 00:33:20.976

close and sort of beyond.

00:33:21.396 --> 00:33:25.336

It was almost a replacement of quantity with quality.

00:33:25.956 --> 00:33:32.276

Yeah. Wow. Wow, wow, wow. I keep coming back to it. And what I love about our

00:33:32.276 --> 00:33:38.016

conversation today is the fact that I got to understand such a deeper meaning.

00:33:38.176 --> 00:33:43.476

I mean, I had no idea. I mean, I knew that I knew that one of the dates turned into a husband,

00:33:43.576 --> 00:33:49.476

but I had no idea about all these other just literally life changing moments

00:33:49.476 --> 00:33:55.116

that compounded with one another over the course of this year. It's fascinating.

00:33:55.396 --> 00:34:01.836

It is. It really was fascinating. but let me take it one step further for you.

00:34:02.376 --> 00:34:10.076

I was so fascinated by what happened to me and by what I experienced that I

00:34:10.076 --> 00:34:13.296

kind of started getting curious about it.

00:34:13.396 --> 00:34:23.816

And it turns out that I'm not the only one that goes through some sort of major shift around age 40.

00:34:23.976 --> 00:34:31.716

It turns out that That this is a period in time where many or most of us experience

00:34:31.716 --> 00:34:35.456

some sort of shift or transition in our lives.

00:34:35.636 --> 00:34:42.436

It's actually a pretty predictable developmental stage for adults. Yeah. Interesting.

00:34:42.756 --> 00:34:48.796

Very, very interesting. For the person like me who's thinking to myself,

00:34:49.176 --> 00:34:53.996

this would be incredible to do for any milestone birthday.

00:34:53.996 --> 00:34:59.756

What kind of tips, pieces of advice would you offer for anybody thinking,

00:35:00.076 --> 00:35:02.236

oh my gosh, I want to do this too?

00:35:02.851 --> 00:35:09.531

Yeah, that's a great question. I think that for me, going out and being social

00:35:09.531 --> 00:35:14.131

and being out at the bars and having drinks was very much in my wheelhouse.

00:35:14.231 --> 00:35:18.731

So it was an easy thing to commit to and to say, I can do that.

00:35:18.871 --> 00:35:24.531

But I think you could do this same kind of project with almost anything.

00:35:24.531 --> 00:35:30.791

Anything, you know, is it lunches? Is it coffees? Is it walks?

00:35:31.111 --> 00:35:34.251

Is it hikes? Is it a bike ride?

00:35:34.491 --> 00:35:37.431

Whatever it is that you're interested in, you're due.

00:35:37.531 --> 00:35:45.411

Is it, you know, scrapbooking? Is it any kind of thing could be used as the

00:35:45.411 --> 00:35:47.811

basis of this same kind of project?

00:35:47.871 --> 00:35:54.331

The idea would be to bring yourself or to expose yourself to people throughout

00:35:54.331 --> 00:35:57.591

your life, right? Do a, this is your life kind of thing.

00:35:57.931 --> 00:36:02.971

That was the big part for me was exposing myself to people that I hadn't communicated

00:36:02.971 --> 00:36:06.491

with or really been in touch with much in a long time.

00:36:06.671 --> 00:36:10.111

Those were where the big revelations came from.

00:36:10.231 --> 00:36:14.811

People who were in my life on a day-to-day basis, they saw me as I was now,

00:36:14.911 --> 00:36:20.031

and they didn't have things to reflect back to me that were quite as profound

00:36:20.031 --> 00:36:22.851

because we were kind of aligned on who I was today.

00:36:23.411 --> 00:36:30.171

So it really was the digging through my past to find some folks who maybe we

00:36:30.171 --> 00:36:33.211

used to be friends or we used to be close or we used to hang out.

00:36:33.491 --> 00:36:40.551

And those were the folks for me that offered the most interesting insights on my life.

00:36:40.651 --> 00:36:43.431

And not that I went asking for them or looking for them.

00:36:43.451 --> 00:36:50.531

It merely was a part of the conversation because every drink kind of had the same format.

00:36:50.791 --> 00:36:53.651

You know, you'd get to wherever it was you're going, you'd say hello,

00:36:53.851 --> 00:36:55.751

you'd, you know, get settled in.

00:36:56.514 --> 00:37:00.934

And most of the time we'd grab a drink, any old drink, because you'd have to

00:37:00.934 --> 00:37:04.274

figure out what the quote unquote, our drink was going to be.

00:37:04.494 --> 00:37:09.914

And that might require us looking back to what are the thematic connections?

00:37:10.854 --> 00:37:16.754

So Karen and Ginny, we had, we ended up having a shot called the birthday cake

00:37:16.754 --> 00:37:20.754

because we always used to go to each other's birthday parties every year for

00:37:20.754 --> 00:37:23.154

like a decade as all growing up.

00:37:23.294 --> 00:37:25.874

So that was our thematic connection.

00:37:26.514 --> 00:37:30.994

So there were a lot of things that just organically the conversation kind of

00:37:30.994 --> 00:37:35.634

turned and included, hey, remember when we used to do this or remember when

00:37:35.634 --> 00:37:38.334

you did that or remember how we would this.

00:37:38.714 --> 00:37:42.954

And that kind of thing happened in almost every drink.

00:37:44.054 --> 00:37:47.194

Interesting. And you brought up a whole nother component that I didn't realize

00:37:47.194 --> 00:37:53.754

was this idea that each of these 40 drinks with 40 people that you guys decided

00:37:53.754 --> 00:37:58.594

on a drink that was your drink. for that moment. Yes. We decided together.

00:37:58.954 --> 00:38:03.734

There were very few of them that I went in knowing exactly what I wanted to drink.

00:38:03.874 --> 00:38:08.234

My dad was one of them, but yeah, there was another girl I met,

00:38:08.234 --> 00:38:11.914

but from high school when we were girls and we used to, you know, again,

00:38:11.974 --> 00:38:16.974

get into some trouble and we had something called a naughty school girl that

00:38:16.974 --> 00:38:21.494

had like little dum-dum lollipops in it for its garnish.

00:38:22.334 --> 00:38:28.874

What else did I have? There was a friends of mine, a couple that the guy and

00:38:28.874 --> 00:38:35.054

I used to vacation together with a group of friends for, I don't know, three or four years.

00:38:35.274 --> 00:38:39.714

And on one of those vacations, he met his wife. So So,

00:38:40.193 --> 00:38:44.013

She became, you know, great friends with us as well. So I'm out to drinks with

00:38:44.013 --> 00:38:48.033

these two and trying to figure out what it is that we're going to have for a drink.

00:38:48.733 --> 00:38:52.193

And we all used to vacation on this island. It's called Block Island.

00:38:52.333 --> 00:38:53.293

It's off of Rhode Island.

00:38:53.853 --> 00:38:57.213

And so we ultimately ended up coming around with the Seabreeze.

00:38:59.453 --> 00:39:02.593

Amazing. Oh, my gosh. This is incredible.

00:39:03.153 --> 00:39:06.393

Thank you. This is so awesome. It was so much fun.

00:39:06.833 --> 00:39:10.113

Yeah. Now, are these all the blog posts?

00:39:10.253 --> 00:39:15.473

Are they available where we can still read any of those? They are. They are. Yeah.

00:39:16.113 --> 00:39:20.453

So their website is 40drinks.com and spell out the word 40.

00:39:20.653 --> 00:39:24.473

Okay. And when you get there, you'll see that a couple of years ago,

00:39:24.493 --> 00:39:27.353

I started a podcast, which I can talk about in a moment.

00:39:27.473 --> 00:39:32.093

But so at the top on the navigation, it says the podcast and then the project.

00:39:32.193 --> 00:39:35.933

And if you go to the page that says the project, when you scroll down,

00:39:35.933 --> 00:39:37.913

there's pictures of all the drinks.

00:39:38.053 --> 00:39:42.253

And if you hover over a drink, you click that, it goes straight to the blog post.

00:39:42.373 --> 00:39:47.273

So you'll be able to see what I was thinking about and talking about and how

00:39:47.273 --> 00:39:50.673

I was describing these people back when we did the project.

00:39:51.693 --> 00:39:56.013

Oh my gosh. I will be sure that your website, the link is left in the show notes

00:39:56.013 --> 00:39:56.913

for anybody interested.

00:39:57.333 --> 00:40:02.373

I mean, because that is just incredible. And then also for anybody who you are

00:40:02.373 --> 00:40:09.393

interested, you can also just head on over to graceinspiration.com slash 40drinks.

00:40:09.833 --> 00:40:14.433

And that will also be in the show notes. So that way, if that's easier to get

00:40:14.433 --> 00:40:18.493

to, then trying to scroll down in your app and find show notes, just go to that website.

00:40:18.813 --> 00:40:21.733

So with that said, though, I want to be sure people knew how to find it.

00:40:21.793 --> 00:40:22.913

Talk to me about the podcast.

00:40:23.333 --> 00:40:27.673

As you know, the idea is sort of, you know, crazy and very compelling and engaging.

00:40:27.853 --> 00:40:32.313

So for several years, a friend and I, a friend who is a ghostwriter,

00:40:32.313 --> 00:40:35.153

and I tried to sell a book proposal.

00:40:35.313 --> 00:40:37.773

We wrote a book proposal. We tried to get a book published.

00:40:38.213 --> 00:40:42.013

And as it turns out, the publishing industry is highly risk averse.

00:40:42.193 --> 00:40:45.233

And so if you don't, if you're not Anderson Cooper or Oprah,

00:40:45.333 --> 00:40:50.613

or, you know, somebody with a built-in audience already, they're very unlikely to take a flyer on you.

00:40:50.693 --> 00:40:55.393

So, so that for years, I tried to do that. But then a couple of years ago,

00:40:55.493 --> 00:40:58.133

I became not aware of podcasts.

00:40:58.373 --> 00:41:01.473

I knew of podcasts, but I went to a workshop that sort of showed me under the

00:41:01.473 --> 00:41:03.653

hood and kind of behind the scenes.

00:41:03.773 --> 00:41:07.113

And I thought, well, what if I turned 40 drinks into a podcast?

00:41:07.633 --> 00:41:12.313

And so my first thought was, well, I could talk about each of my 40 drinks,

00:41:12.393 --> 00:41:14.373

but then the podcast would be over.

00:41:15.193 --> 00:41:21.553

But if I zoomed out a little bit and I used this theory, this whole thesis that

00:41:21.553 --> 00:41:27.073

many of us go through a transition around age 40, what if I talked to other

00:41:27.073 --> 00:41:29.313

people about their transitions?

00:41:30.093 --> 00:41:36.053

So that's what I do. It is primarily an interview show. And I talk to people...

00:41:37.042 --> 00:41:42.282

By and large so far, it's been people who are beyond their transition and who

00:41:42.282 --> 00:41:47.302

are reflecting back on the lessons they learned and how they made it through their transition.

00:41:47.662 --> 00:41:52.702

But I also sometimes have people on who are in their thirties who are looking

00:41:52.702 --> 00:41:56.422

forward at age 40 and kind of trying to think, trying to reconcile,

00:41:56.682 --> 00:42:00.502

you know, their thought process around who they are now with what they think

00:42:00.502 --> 00:42:04.802

about turning 40 and what their plans for their 40th birthday are, those kinds of things.

00:42:04.922 --> 00:42:10.202

So my goal with the show is really to one, make it common cultural knowledge

00:42:10.202 --> 00:42:14.562

that there is a transition around age 40, because I don't think there really is.

00:42:14.782 --> 00:42:20.002

And then number two, to showcase so many versions of that transition that anyone

00:42:20.002 --> 00:42:24.082

out there who's either approaching or recently turned 40 with,

00:42:24.202 --> 00:42:27.982

you know, dread in their heart or quaking in their boots, you know,

00:42:28.022 --> 00:42:32.282

they'll know that they're not alone because they'll be able to really experience

00:42:32.282 --> 00:42:36.342

other people's transitions as well. I love it. Oh my goodness.

00:42:36.522 --> 00:42:42.002

I love everything about you. I love everything about this whole kind of just

00:42:42.002 --> 00:42:46.022

theme that you've got going, this whole just purpose and mission.

00:42:46.162 --> 00:42:48.402

The 40 drinks is incredible.

00:42:48.842 --> 00:42:52.422

You are incredible. Oh, Kevin, thank you so much. Oh my gosh. Yeah.

00:42:52.502 --> 00:42:58.662

Oh my gosh. I have enjoyed hearing your stories today so very much.

00:42:58.662 --> 00:43:03.122

And like I said, I will be sure that links are all in the show notes for your

00:43:03.122 --> 00:43:07.242

website, for the articles, for the podcast, all the things.

00:43:07.682 --> 00:43:11.402

Thank you so much, Stephanie, for being here. Thanks for having me,

00:43:11.442 --> 00:43:12.382

Kevin. It's been my pleasure.

00:43:12.942 --> 00:43:17.202

Absolutely. For you, my friend, be sure to check out today's show notes.

00:43:17.242 --> 00:43:21.022

Go to her website, 40drinks.com.

00:43:21.202 --> 00:43:26.062

You heard it. Go check it out because I'm telling you, you got to get some more

00:43:26.062 --> 00:43:31.842

of this lady in your life. So, this is Kevin Lowe with Grace and Inspiration.

00:43:31.942 --> 00:43:36.922

Get out there, and hey, today, why don't you consider going having a drink with

00:43:36.922 --> 00:43:37.882

somebody from your past?

00:43:37.840 --> 00:43:56.341

Mu