The Ripple Effect And a 30-Year Goal

The Ripple Effect: How a 30-Year Dream Teaches Fear Management & Stewardship 🐠

A cold, muddy dive planted a long-term goal: the Great Barrier Reef. 🌊

This self-help masterclass in patience and personal development is the full-circle story of a dream realized, teaching you the ripple effect of small choices.

We share how steady breathing and a calm guide transformed panic cues (the "call of the void" at 40 feet) into focus.

You'll learn:

• Long Goals Shape Us: Waiting 30 years meant we were ripening—becoming the people capable of the dream.
• Fear Management: Preparation and presence are the thin line between dread and delight.
• Stewardship Mindset: "Don't touch" is a love language to fragile ecosystems. Respect ripples from the ocean to your office.

Actionable Takeaways for Big Dreams & Impact:

• Dormant, Not Dead: If a dream hasn't happened, you're waiting to ripen.
• Anxiety to Attention: Use steady breathing to move past panic cues. Preparation + presence is the hack.
• Value of Guides: Experts transform fear into focus. (Believe in the people around you).
• Stewardship Mindset: Care is a skill that travels. Leave fewer scars.
• The Ripple Effect: Every choice sends a powerful ripple. Choose the positive effect.
• Perspective is Everything: Helicopter view: Wonder is fragile and needs guardians. (Believe in your circumstances).

Hit play and move toward your Great Barrier Reef.

• How to keep a long-term goal alive for decades.
• Managing panic and anxiety during scuba diving (or high-stakes moments).
• The ripple effect of small choices on personal growth.
• Ecotourism principles and responsible travel mindset.
• The value of a private coach or guide in overcoming fear.
• How to turn anxiety into attention and focus.
• "How does the law of ripple effect apply to personal development?"
• "What is the importance of setting long-term, ambitious goals?"
• "How can I manage panic attacks (or the call of the void) while scuba diving?"
• "Why is patience necessary for achieving big dreams?"
• "What is a stewardship mindset in ecotourism?"

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The 4 pillars of Living Lucky
Believe in yourself
Believe in the people around you
Believe in your circumstances and
Believe that God is working through you, for you, and always conspiring in your favor.

*Previously Recorded

Episode Transcript

Jana Shelfer (00:00):
Are you ready to create a life you crave?
Let's spin that doom loop ofnegativity into an upward
success cycle and startLiving Lucky®.

Jason Shelfer (00:14):
Good morning.

Jana Shelfer (00:16):
I'm Jana.
I'm Jason.
And we are Living Lucky®.

Jason Shelfer (00:19):
You are too.

Jana Shelfer (00:20):
We got to go scuba diving on the Great Barrier
Reef.

Jason Shelfer (00:26):
Incredible.

Jana Shelfer (00:27):
We are in Northern Australia, right outside of
Cairns.

Jason Shelfer (00:31):
Cairns.
Port Douglas.

Jana Shelfer (00:33):
Port Douglas is where the boat left.
And then we went out to thereef.
It took like an hour and 30minutes to get out there by
boat.

Jason Shelfer (00:42):
Yeah, it was 75 kilometers offshore.

Jana Shelfer (00:46):
And what was so crazy is while we were filling
out all of our scuba divinginformation, they needed our
actual certification cards.
Luckily, I brought them.

Jason Shelfer (00:58):
Yes, thank you.
Thank you for being soorganized.

Jana Shelfer (01:00):
When I pulled it out, one of the questions was,
when were you certified?
And it said I was certified onDecember 7th, I think, in 1995.
Actually, I think it was April7th, 1995.

Jason Shelfer (01:18):
That's a ways back.

Jana Shelfer (01:20):
Right?

Jason Shelfer (01:21):
That's a couple years ago.

Jana Shelfer (01:22):
And I remember taking my scuba class, which I
took my sophomore year ofcollege, and I remember saying,
I want to scuba dive on theGreat Barrier Reef one day.

Jason Shelfer (01:35):
So you went to school in Illinois at Champagne
Urbana Urbana.
I hear it mean Urbana, becauseI'm in uh Australia.

Jana Shelfer (01:44):
Because you're in Yana banana mode.
It's so funny.

Jason Shelfer (01:48):
I can't even say things like I I can't wait to
get back to the States.
But um and so your teacherthere teaching the
certification, and you'retelling him that you want to
scuba dive the Great BarrierRiver.

Jana Shelfer (01:59):
Yes, I remember.

Jason Shelfer (02:00):
It's like a pipe dream because you're what 18,
19, 20 years old.

Jana Shelfer (02:04):
Yeah, I was young.
I was very young, 1995.

Jason Shelfer (02:07):
We're gonna go get in this murky, cold water
here in Illinois and teach youscuba diving.
Everyone wants to scuba theGreat Barrier River.

Jana Shelfer (02:15):
Which was a miserable experience for me.
I must be, I must tell you.
In fact, I've gone on a lot ofscuba trips, and they have not
always been the best experiencefor me.
I will say that.

Jason Shelfer (02:30):
Well, you were telling me about your
certification, and it was likeit was freezing cold water.

Jana Shelfer (02:36):
Three-inch wetsuits, which I couldn't move
in.
Not millimeter.
I couldn't get it on, Icouldn't get it off.
By the time we got into thelake, I was so muddy.
There was like 50 feet of puremud just to get into the water.
And then once I got into thewater, then you had to swim out
further.
And they said, no matter what,don't touch the bottom of the

(03:00):
lake.
Well, just to swim out into thewater, I was dragging on the
bottom of the lake.
And then they made me wearthese flippers to keep my feet
warm.
So I had to wear these bootiesand then these flippers.
And literally, by the time Igot into the water, got under
the water, I couldn't tell thatmy flippers were dragging in the

(03:28):
mud, which was making it murkyfor everyone.
And then we had to do theseexercises where we had to use a
compass under this pitch black,freezing cold water, and we had
to make a triangle.

Jason Shelfer (03:42):
Oh no.

Jana Shelfer (03:42):
And I got so lost, I couldn't find where I was, I
couldn't see anything.

Jason Shelfer (03:48):
Like just pass her.
Give her a give her a pass.

Jana Shelfer (03:50):
The weights, they made me put on these really
heavy weights.
So I literally, like, becauseI'm a floater, for some reason,
I'm a floater in the water.

Jason Shelfer (03:59):
So they made me put on these super floaters.

Jana Shelfer (04:01):
Soup, thank you, Jason.
They made me put on these superheavy weights.
And then by the time I gotdown, I couldn't, I couldn't get
back up.
I'm like, I am this is a reallybad experience for me.
And then once you know thewhole dive was finally finished,
and the teacher literallypassed me just so that I
wouldn't take the class again.

Jason Shelfer (04:23):
I don't want her coming back.
The skimmer passed.

Jana Shelfer (04:25):
Once we the you know, once the dive was over,
then trying to get back into mychair, which was full of mud and
probably icicles at the time.
I was full of mud.
I had mud in my wetsuit, mud inmy flippers, in my booties, and
then we had to we took thesevans out to get there.

(04:46):
So try try, you know, notgetting the van dirty.

Jason Shelfer (04:50):
No wonder you wanted to scoop it out of the
Great Barrier Reef.
Right?
Because this was a beautifultrip.

Jana Shelfer (04:55):
I started asking questions.
You know, where are the warmplaces to dive where you can
just go in your little bikini?
I want those places.
I was shocked.
And I would like to manifest areally hot husband that can just
carry me in and out of theworld so that I don't have to
worry about this.

Jason Shelfer (05:17):
So close.

Jana Shelfer (05:18):
And here we are 30 years later, this dream has
come to fruition.
And it just it's really weirdbecause when I wrote down, you
know, the date that I wascertified, this memory came up
for me, and I actually had kindof forgotten about it because
I've been to Australia twice,and neither time, other time

(05:41):
that I came was I able to goscuba diving.
And I'm like, gosh, I'm soclose to being there, and yet
it's just not gonna work.

Jason Shelfer (05:50):
And it wasn't like you were here for a couple
of days, you were here for amonth.

Jana Shelfer (05:52):
You were here for a month, yes.

Jason Shelfer (05:54):
Each time you were here for about 30 days,
yes, and it just did not havethe opportunity in those 60 days
to go scuba dive the GreatBearer Reef.
I mean, it's a big continent.

Jana Shelfer (06:04):
And then here we are for a water ski competition
in Mulala, Australia.
And then my husband plans a fewdays for us to go and just
experience Australia, and one ofthem was scuba diving, which
Jason, how was the experiencefor you?

Jason Shelfer (06:23):
It was it was fantastic.
Now I was a little shocked whenwe got there because I didn't
plan to have a certified divergo with us, like a private dive
diver go with us.
And so that was a real shock,but also a blessing because I
was so glad we had a divediverse.

Jana Shelfer (06:41):
Wasn't that great?
This diver was pointing outthings and thank you, Addie.
I'm gonna just tell yousomething.
We were underwater and a shark,a shark.

Jason Shelfer (06:50):
A big beautiful shark came swimming by.

Jana Shelfer (06:52):
And if I didn't have a dive master down there
with me, I would have freaked usout.
I don't know what I would have.
I mean, I froze, uh, I probablywould have freaked out a little
bit.

Jason Shelfer (07:05):
Probably would have freaked us out a little
bit, but it was it was a reallybeautiful experience.
The whole, the whole thing, andalso just pointing out some of
the things that we probablywould have missed, you know,
because I was the best day of mylife a lot of times.

Jana Shelfer (07:17):
It was the absolute best day of my life.

Jason Shelfer (07:20):
I remember scuba diving off of Boynton Beach,
like out early uh uh not too faroff of Boynton Beach, but I got
squirreled off at a horseshoecrab.

Jana Shelfer (07:29):
Yeah, you did.

Jason Shelfer (07:29):
And we got caught in the current and then ended
up and seeing people close toshore.

Jana Shelfer (07:34):
Uh we ended up where the swimmers are.
All of a sudden we looked upand people's legs were right
above us.
I'm like, oh my God.

Jason Shelfer (07:45):
So this was a great experience.

Jana Shelfer (07:46):
And then in Curacao, you were.
Oh, that was a differentexperience.

Jason Shelfer (07:50):
Yeah, I had a panic attack in about about uh
40 feet.

Jana Shelfer (07:53):
And he was like, My f my ears won't pop, my ears
won't pop.
And luckily, I had some likedexatrim.
It was like weight loss, it waslike a weight loss thing, and
I'm like, here, take this, thiswill pop your ears.

Jason Shelfer (08:03):
There's something really interesting.
So there's there's this umphenomenon called the call of
the void.
And I experienced the call ofthe void when we're in hot air
balloons, and then also at about40 feet, 40 to 60 feet when
we're scuba diving, where I havethis minimal panic attack where

(08:24):
I want to take my aerator out.

Jana Shelfer (08:26):
Okay, this is a whole nother I know it's a whole
nother subject.

Jason Shelfer (08:29):
Okay, so just get past that.
But it was the most probablyone of the most amazing
experiences scuba diving.

Jana Shelfer (08:35):
It's the best experience for me, and it's
literally an anxiety as well.
Once I get underwatering for myhusband.

Jason Shelfer (08:41):
I get very into the moment once I get past my
little panic attacks.
Um it, but it was fascinatingbecause I was expecting the
water to be like cool and cold.
Uh-huh.
80 something degrees.
It was like getting into anice, wonderful little bathtub.

Jana Shelfer (08:59):
Uh-oh.
I mean, it was so much differentthan Kickapoo Lake in Illinois.

Jason Shelfer (09:05):
Kickapoo.
That's perfect.
That's apropos for the mud andmuck that you're swimming in.
The colors everywhere.

Jana Shelfer (09:14):
The vibrance, the vitality.
You don't even realize thesereef and these coral, they're
breathing, living creatures thatare underwater.

Jason Shelfer (09:25):
Undulating.

Jana Shelfer (09:26):
You go under there, there's a crab the size
of a uh king-sized bed.

Jason Shelfer (09:32):
Oh, that clam.

Jana Shelfer (09:33):
Clam, uh, the size of a king-sized bed, and then
all of a sudden, our dive masterputs her hand over it and it
clams up.
Just like what you would expectin The Little Mermaid.
Like it's exactly that.
And then, you know, we go overto this rock that have like

(09:56):
these little, they're likeloofah blooms.
That's how I explain them.
They literally look like thoseloofahs that you scrub your body
with in the shower.

Jason Shelfer (10:04):
I would scrub my body with those.

Jana Shelfer (10:05):
And they have these feathery little tentacles.

Jason Shelfer (10:10):
They look like Vegas to me.

Jana Shelfer (10:12):
And then, right?
They're like show girls, andthen all of a sudden you you
just wave your hand over thisrock and they like disappear.
It is so magical, though, to,and you don't even realize that
all this is happening underneaththe ocean all the time.

(10:32):
And here and then, and thenwhat was so great after we were
done scuba diving, whichseriously was the best
experience of my entire life,then we hopped on a helicopter
and we got to see the GreatBarrier Reef from the sky, which
we flew right over the areawhere Steve Irwin was stung by

(10:57):
the stingray and killed.
And to see the I mean, youcould see the stingrays from the
helicopter.

Jason Shelfer (11:07):
And the swarms of turtles.

Jana Shelfer (11:09):
Oh, and manatees.
Which I had no idea there wereeven manatees here.

Jason Shelfer (11:14):
Like sea cows or yes, they are sea cows.

Jana Shelfer (11:17):
Yeah.
So it's uh I mean, I we havemanatees in Florida.

Jason Shelfer (11:21):
I mean, I guess I just don't think about things
like that.
And I don't think of them, Idon't think of them in the
oceans.
I guess I just I'm not thatversed in what they are.
I think of them in all thesprings in Florida.

Jana Shelfer (11:33):
I was just so amazed at everything that we
were seeing, and then the wholeecosystem in itself and how
everything feeds everythingelse, and even that shark that
went by, where you know, youthink, oh, that's a predator,
that's a predator.
It was so beautiful and strong.
And seeing it swim by, I waslike in awe of its fierceness.

Jason Shelfer (11:57):
The other thing I really appreciate how um the
ecotourism here and how they arevery um conscious of informing
people when they come aboutdon't touch, be be um aware of
the fact that we are visitors inthis environment.

Jana Shelfer (12:17):
And also, I mean, you also saw a lot of the reef
is dying.

Jason Shelfer (12:22):
Yeah.

Jana Shelfer (12:23):
And that part was sad.

Jason Shelfer (12:24):
You're right.
And that's why we shouldn'ttouch it, because we want to
preserve and to Yeah, we wantthis, it needs to be here
because when you destroy part ofan ecosystem, other parts of it
are dependent on it.

Jana Shelfer (12:37):
So every we're all dependent on it.

Jason Shelfer (12:40):
Everything, every everything has a ripple effect.
And we I mean, that's this issomething we talk about in our
mindsets and in every part oflife, there is a ripple effect.
So, how do you want to affecteverything around you?
Do you do you want to have thatpositive effect or do you want
to have the negative effect?
So, what type of ripples areyou putting into the world?

Jana Shelfer (12:57):
I love that.
But the one thing that I reallywant to reiterate is that I set
this goal 30 years ago and itcame true.
So if you are listening tothis, just think about that.
Because sometimes we we putthings out there and we think,
oh, you know, it just isn'tisn't meant for me.
Well, maybe it is meant foryou, and maybe you're just

(13:20):
waiting to ripen.

Jason Shelfer (13:24):
Yeah, waiting for the the cards to land or the
deck to come together, the starsto align.
Yeah.

Jana Shelfer (13:29):
Ah Under the sea.

Jason Shelfer (13:34):
Under the sea.
Everything's better down whereit's wetter.
Just wait and see.

Jana Shelfer (13:39):
That is right.
Thanks for joining us.

Jason Shelfer (13:41):
Keep Living Lucky®.

Jana Shelfer (13:42):
Bye bye.
If the idea of Living Lucky®appeals to you, visit us at
LivingLucky.com.