Nim Stant of Go All In TV: “Commit first; figure out later”

As a part of my series about “Grit: The Most Overlooked Ingredient of Success” I had the pleasure of interviewing Nim Stant.

Nim is a success mentor, the founder of Go All In TV and the best selling author of The Yoga Journey and Go All In. She inspires high achievers to turn their ideas into success. She’s also the creator of #inspire apparel, where, for every hoodie the company sells, one is donated to a child in need. She works with several third world countries from around the world.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what events have drawn you to this specific career path

Thank you so much for having me! I grew up in the developing country of Thailand. Twenty years ago when I moved to the United States and told people where I was from, most of them had no idea where Thailand was on the map, which made me feel small and unimportant. I didn’t grow up in the kind of family where my parents planned my career success. I didn’t go to the best school. I didn’t have connections to get work or have anyone who invested in me. I didn’t have that kind of ‘get rich quick’ luck! In fact, there was no luck at all in my life. I have created all my success for myself! I invested in myself. I went out of my way to connect with people I admired. I believe that because I have invested in my life and studied “the mechanics of success” for the last two decades, I’ve been able to get to where I am today.

My journey started when I was 17 years old and considering suicide. I was completely unfulfilled, unchallenged, and deeply unsatisfied at the time. I didn’t see anyone there for me — not my parents or anyone else in my family, or any of my friends. I was quietly terrified and had no idea how to reach out and ask for help.

I was desperately lonely with no one to confide in and no clue which steps would move my life forward, so I became very depressed and bitter. My parents fought all the time and I became a control addict to compensate for the pain and helplessness I felt. I tried to make life bend to my will. When I didn’t get relief or anything close to happiness, I lost trust in the people around me and in God. I withdrew into myself even more and became reckless. It wasn’t until 8 years later, while living alone in India as a dance student, that I started my new life. At that time my entire world revolved around being a dance student and I didn’t know anyone outside of that. But it was in India that I found yoga and rediscovered God’s purpose for me. God opened my eyes one day with the simple clarity of perspective.

Can you share your story about “Grit and Success”? First can you tell us a story about the hard times that you faced when you first started your journey?

“I wanted to be successful in my career and finances, but fear of failure paralyzed me.”

I was a yoga teacher 15 years ago. I thought I was living my dream because I loved yoga, but I was unhappy, unsatisfied and sick. I was chronically anxious for many years. My day was a carbon copy of most people’s. I got up in the morning, checked my phone, emails, and went to work ( for someone else). As a yoga teacher, I was running around teaching yoga in 5 or 6 yoga studios and gyms throughout the day. Between the first 5:00 AM class until my last at 7:00 PM, I was working most of the time. I left my home around 4:15 every morning to open the studio, waiting for students to shuffle in. I worked the front desk as an administrator and then taught yoga classes, taking a break here and there throughout the day and kept going until my last class ended at 8. Then I’d wait for every student to go home (some of them wanted to chat after class for a long time) so by the time I got home it was already close to 9 pm.

I missed out on most of the day with my family. Not to mention that the kids were usually already in bed by the time I got home and I hadn’t had dinner with my family for many years! What a life!! I never wanted to end up like that, but somehow I got by like this for many years. I thought I was living my dream, but it wasn’t a dream made real…it was still a fantasy I wanted to grasp. My actions didn’t align with what my dream really meant for me and what I wanted for my life.

I was surviving like this until I said to myself, “I’m sick of being sick, tired and broke!” What was my solution? Get off the sofa, get out of the house and get into a new way of thinking. I made my way into the market, sought out opportunities, got in front of potential clients, and showed them what I could do! I was applying the concept of “I need to be seen to sell”. My life started to change because I couldn’t accept the way things were- being broke financially and emotionally was not going to define me any longer. I needed to restore so many things: my health, my relationships, my marriage, but it was that sickness that woke me up and let me know that I needed to shift into wellness. The opportunities started to open right away. In fact, they were there for me to discover as soon as I started looking! I began to meet the right people, the right mentors, the right friends: all at the exact time that I was seriously seeking and needing them! I attended a lot of networking groups just to get myself out there and connect with other people who do what I do and share similar goals and passions.

Where did you get the drive to continue even though things were so hard?

I got the drive to continue because I moved beyond my situation. I was fed up with being sick and tired, so I made the decision to go all in and started getting traction. I started adding more wood to my fire and I promised myself I wouldn’t stop until I “burned the place down”. Now, it’s a habit. I don’t rest. I don’t stop until I succeed. By taking action when I felt lost, I started a self-perpetuating momentum. Like a flywheel: once it gets going…it’s going to continue. Once I started pedaling and building up speed, I couldn’t stop that forward momentum. I put my mind there 100% and believe more than ever before that I could succeed!

So how did Grit lead to your eventual success? How did Grit turn things around?

Grit is not a gift or a talent. It’s not about education or money. It’s a commitment, a decision. You say that you are going to do it. And you do it. One example I have of persistence paying off is when I was naively posting some of my success stories in one of my mentor’s Facebook groups and ended up inviting her clients to know more about my business. Well, my mentor suddenly contacted me and told me that I had crossed a boundary by inviting her clients to join my group and work with me. I was horrified, because I felt like I had done something bad unintentionally. I wasn’t thinking very well and didn’t see that it was a big deal, but from her perspective, it was crossing a boundary. I was nervous, that I seriously thought of running away from the community, never contacting my mentor again and just pretending that nothing happened. I didn’t want to face the issue or her. However, I also knew that I needed to be professional and if I wanted to play a bigger game for my business, I needed to play like a professional.

I sat with my feeling of fear instead of running away and decided to do the right thing and contact my mentor. So I reached out to her and apologized, because I didn’t mean to cross the line and promised her I would never do anything like that again. Then something amazing happened. I moved from fear to creativity and got a great business idea. I invited her to be my partner in the coaching program I offered at the time and we would split the profit. She saw how committed I was to it, that I didn’t give up and kept punching fear in the face. So after just a moment’s thought, she said, “YES” and joined my big project. We both won the game! We found a perfect fit and we were both equally excited. It turned out to be a great success.

Based on your experience, can you share 5 pieces of advice about how one can develop Grit? (Please share a story or example for each)

1. When you know what you want, you don’t need to know how you are going to get there. The important thing is to know where you want to be.

The world behaves differently when you take continued action and go after what you want. A few years ago in 2003, I met professor Sadchidaanan Sahai at a seminar I attended. He gave a talk on Indian architecture. At that time, I was very interested in going to India to start dancing over there, but I had no idea how I could make such a trip happen. I went to the seminar because India fascinated me and I wanted to learn more about it. I listened to his talk intently, paid attention 100% to what he said and at the end of the seminar, something amazing happened.

He walked directly to me and asked, “Do you want to study in India?”

Oh boy, that got my attention! I was startled and excited. I just keep saying, “Yes, Sir…yes Sir!”

Then he helped me network and introduced me to exactly the people I needed to be in contact with and finally, he wrote a recommendation for me and I ultimately was selected for a scholarship from the Indian Embassy to get my Master’s Degree in India. See, when you put your focus and energy on what you want to accomplish, the path will open, the right people appear at exactly the right moment.

2. Commit first; figure out later.

Grit is an act of faith, because you accept the end result as a certain fact — even before you can see it. It feels good to be charged up and committed, but it feels uncomfortable too.

For many years, I knew that I wanted to share my message on TV but I didn’t know how to do that. So, I was looking for a mentor who can teach me to do that. After a few weeks of learning, I decided to make a big move by writing an email pitch to the TV producer for the Motivational Monday Show on TV3 in Arizona. At the same time, I took another scary step by calling the newsdesk and asking for the producer’s contact. After I reached out to the producer directly (which is really out of my comfort zone), the producer responded by asking if I was available for an interview the following Monday! So, not only was that a big YES from the producer, she also invited me to be on 2 shows in the same day. For me, that BIG YES was a reminder that if I committed first, everything else would open up for me in due time. I didn’t need to know how to start. I learned to commit first and figure it out later.

3. Remember that success comes with inconvenience.

Success requires making changes. When we can no longer change our situation, we are challenged to change ourselves and it will always be at a very “inconvenient” time. One of the toughest personal changes I went through was last year in 2019. I found myself at an intersection in my life. I realized that one of the ways for me to reach more people for sharing my message is to write a book. Well, English isn’t my native language and writing isn’t my best skill either. However, I decided to write it anyway. I started reading dozens of books, doing research that would support my writing. It took me many months of early mornings and late nights to write — and rewrite — hundreds of pages of manuscript before publishing it. In the end, it paid off because I was selling my book. Did I make a lot of money from writing that book? No. But it put me on the road to reaching my full potential because I grew and improved. Now, I’m writing my second book and I know that there will be a third, fourth, fifth…and many more books written by me in the future.

This transition between putting in the work and reaping the rewards of that hard work can be a real challenge. Most of us want to see the outcome right away. The change or the trade off feels like a loss. Some people deal with uncertainty very well while others don’t. You must choose to have a positive attitude and focus on the upcoming benefits of the trade off.

4. Finding a mentor is the fastest way to get results.

If you really want to be good at something, you need a mentor!

There was a point in my life when I knew for sure that if I kept doing what I was doing as a yoga teacher, my business would fail. I didn’t know when exactly, but I knew that someday it would . I wasn’t sure which direction I should go from there or how to continue making money as a yoga teacher. So, I started to look everywhere — both online and in person — for someone to teach me to get really good at running my yoga business. I found my first business mentor from watching her YouTube channel. Then I checked her website and found that she was offering a group in-person intensive workshop for yoga teachers in Santa Monica. So I booked a call and didn’t hesitate to attend the workshop. That was the first start of business training for me. The coaching wasn’t cheap, but I was willing to take the risk. I didn’t even have the money to pay yet, but I knew I would find a way.

I got so much more out of it than I even expected. I stayed in a small hostel, ate noodle cup soups for every meal during the training, because I didn’t have any extra money to spend except on the coaching and my flights to Santa Monica and back. See, when I started my own business, I didn’t have any money, didn’t have any connections or even the education. I didn’t really have anything, so I KNEW that I needed someone to show me the way to gain success or I would just keep losing money, trying to figure it out on my own. I probably never would have become successful. At the very least, I would have taken a lot longer to get there.

If you really want to excel at something, you need a mentor!

5. Start now.

So when should you start?

The answer is most definitely, NOW.

When you learn something new, get some new ideas and then you wait….most likely you won’t do it because procrastination will set in. It’s our enemy. Human nature is to stay in our comfort zone. We have been trained for a long time to protect ourselves and not take risks. Ever since we were young, we’ve known not to take risks, not to run too fast, not to do things that are “hard”. So your mind has programmed that information for a long time and each time you strive for new results, you need to implement different actions and you must start right away. If you procrastinate, you won’t see the results you desire. Most people think if they have more money, then they will start a business. If they had more time, then they would exercise. Once their kids grow up and leave the house, then they will follow their passion. However, those things won’t happen if you wait.

When I decided to share my message with more people, I learned and prepared my pitch to TV stations and other media networks, I was afraid they would reject me or tell me that my message wasn’t good enough. Would they be interested in what I had to share? Am I smart enough? The list of doubts went on and on…BUT I did it anyway.

I was sending out a lot of emails to different TV producers and pitching them my ideas. The next morning, I took another scary massive action by calling the newsdesk and asking to connect directly with their producer. Once I got her information, I sent out another email to her. Then I let go of what I was feeling and thinking. I had done everything I could, so I relaxed and let it go. A few hours later, the producer reached out saying that she loved my ideas. Then she asked me if I was available to be on their show next Monday!

I replied to her right away saying, “YES, I am available.”

Was I ready for a live interview? No. But I said ‘yes’ anyway. The next day, the same producer emailed me and asked if they could interview me twice that day because they really liked my ideas and what I had to offer.

What did I say? Of course, I said, “YES!”

Was I ready for two interview segments? No. Did I know what they would ask me? No. Did I prepare for my interview the best I can? Yes! So that day, I was on a TV twice and everything went well.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped you when things were tough? Can you share a story about that?

I have so many mentors, but there is one particular person who I use as a mentor even though I have never met him in person. I am looking forward to meeting him someday and that day will be a dream come true. Michael Bernard Beckwith is a New Thought minister, author, and founder of the Agape International Spiritual Center in Beverly Hills, California. I have listened to and follow his teaching every day for many years now. His teaching has uplifted my spirit and strengthened my will power to keep going for my dream vision of success.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

I am very thankful for the opportunity to produce Go All In TV, a personal growth and life transformational TV network for people around the world. My vision about this online TV is to help motivate men and women around the world to use the power of grit to take inspired action and achieve their goals.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Yes! I am very excited to share my two new projects that I have been working very hard for many years now. First, Go All In TV, a personal growth and life transformational online TV network to motivate people around the world to take action and achieve their goals. Second, my “ #inspire ” brand apparel. This is a very exciting project too because, for every single sweater sold, I will donate one sweater to a child in a third world country. These are two big projects of mine that I am very passionate about and very excited to see where they will take me and others.

What advice would you give to other executives or founders to help their employees to thrive?

We live in the world of exchange! What you want, you give first. If you (executives or founders) want to see the best performance or results for your company or team, you need to go beyond the paystubs to more personal benefits that you offer your employees. Help your employees understand that this is their investment too and motivate them to work from their heart, passion and discover why they’re doing what they do. I think this will help improve the team’s performance and outcome.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

Thank you so much! This is a very powerful question! I love it. I love designing charity projects. I want to create an educational project that will help teenager girls in third world countries get an education and learn valuable skills to prepare them for career success and prevent them from being victims of sex trafficking. Sadly, that’s a real problem in Thailand. I want to create opportunities for those teenage girls to be in a safe and motivational environment so they can keep believing that they can achieve abundance in life.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“ If it doesn’t challenge you, it doesn’t change you.” I have been using this life quote for many years and every time I remind myself of it, I feel like I am calling the power from the unknown source to me. I feel like this quote has killed all fears and excuses for me. Another quote that I love is “ I will persist; I will win”. It is such a powerful quote for me because I’m all about not giving up. I believe that we all can achieve our goals and reach our ‘big wins’ in life, but most people just quit too soon. Being persistent is one of the most powerful keys to success. So, when I face each day’s challenge, I tell myself, “I will persist; I will win”.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

Thank you. Please find me on my instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/nim_stant/

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

Thank you so much as well. I hope my message will help you keep going until you meet your success.