May 19, 2024

Living the dream with doctor and author Dr. Cindy Starke

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Join us in this inspiring episode of the Living the Dream podcast with Curveball, where we sit down with the multifaceted Doctor Cindy Starke. With her compelling story of overcoming childhood trauma and her journey through medicine, Dr. Starke shares her insights on mindset, relationships, and personal growth. Discover how she brings out the champion in others through her work in Soul Circle Academy and her transition from full-time medicine to entrepreneurship. Plus, delve into her experience with Ironman triathlons and her book, "From Fear and Failure to the Finish Line." Don't miss Dr. Starke's powerful message on breaking generational patterns and creating a fulfilling life.
www.drcindystarke.com

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> Speaker A>Welcome, um, to the Living the Dream podcast with Curveball. Um, if you believe you can achieve Chee Chee, welcome to the living the Dream with Curveball podcast, a show where I interview guests that teach, motivate and inspire. Today, we're going to be talking about bringing out the champion in you as I am joined by doctor, entrepreneur, and author, Doctor Cindy Stark.

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> Speaker A>She deals with activities like mindset, sleep, relationships, food, eating habits, all that good stuff. And she works with people to help them bring out, bring out the champion in them. So we're going to be talking to her about everything that she's up to and anything that she might have upcoming. So, Doctor Stark, thank you so much for joining me today.

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> Cindy Stark>Hey, Curtis, thank you so much for having me. I'm so honored to be here and talking to your guests this morning.

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> Speaker A>Why don't you start off by telling everybody a little bit about yourself.

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> Cindy Stark>Yes, sir. Um, my name is Doctor Cindy Stark.

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> Cindy Stark>I'm an internal medicine physician up here in Gainesville, Georgia. And I always kind of start by telling people what led me into medicine. It was a series of unfortunate events that happened in my childhood that made me really want to get far away from some things that, uh, were happening to me in my childhood home and, uh, including some, uh, sexual abuse at the hands of my brother's friends when I was 14 to 15 years old. And I really saw education and medicine as a way of kind of, uh, keeping myself busy and away from those young men and, and their drugs and alcohol for a good 17 years. You know, I didn't realize when I kind of left at the beginning and I was, I was starting on a pathway of just getting a bachelor's degree. I didn't realize that I was going to keep on going and not really finish school till I was 32 years old, but that's what I did. And, um, it really opened my eyes to a whole other way of living, Curtis. And, um, it was, I met a lot of wonderful people on the way and I, uh, think most of the people that I met, they all were kind of going into medicine because their moms or their dads were medical doctors.

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> Cindy Stark>But that wasn't the case with me. It was more to, um, escape some childhood trauma. And so it was, um, it was a blessing. It was really hard, um, but I persevered and I did it.

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> Cindy Stark>And, uh, I always, always say that, um, I'm really happy that I kind of carved my own path and kind of, um, marched to the beat of my own drum, you know.

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> Speaker A>Well, definitely congratulations on that.

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> Speaker A>So you're also an entrepreneur. Is that different than your doctoral practice, or. Let us know about that.

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> Cindy Stark>Oh, yes. Um, so I had been practicing medicine for almost 30 years, and I kind of realized that I really wasn't helping anybody really get a whole lot better in their life. My patients just seemed to, as soon as I would kind of patch them up and get them better from, from whatever disease or infection that they were, um, succumbing to in that moment in the emergency room, and then I would hospitalize them. Cause that's the kind of doctor I am as a hospital doctor.

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> Cindy Stark>Um, I just realized that these same patients, they just kept coming back a month later with the exact same problem. And I said, I'm not really helping these people get better at all.

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> Cindy Stark>I'm just kind of putting a band aid on a bleeding artery.

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> Cindy Stark>And I said, I really want to make an impact in people's lives. And I just realized none of these people are really getting any better. Uh, I'm just making numbers look better on a sheet of paper. And so I kind of started. It actually, um, happened during the pandemic. I was gifted with a lot of extra time on my hands, and I underwent a lot of, um, therapy to kind of heal my childhood trauma that I've been running from. Curtis. And I realized I could help other people overcome their childhood, um, trauma. And I developed this really cool online group of men and women called Soul Circle Academy. And we call ourselves that because it's like a bunch of us souls united in a shape of a circle, like holding hands. Imagine, like, a bunch of men and women holding hands in a circle. And we, um, kind of walk each other through making kind of making sense of what we were raised with. And we're like chain breakers.

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> Cindy Stark>And, um, we do a lot of, uh, inner child resourcing, and we do not want to repeat the mistakes of our past.

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> Cindy Stark>So that's my entrepreneur, um, kind of direction that I've gone creating these online academies. And then also, I just, I quit full time medicine. I retired from full time medicine, and I just changed instead, Curtis into really doing what lights me up, which is still seeing some patients in the bedside, but I'm just kind of like a moonlighter. So I just kind of work a few shifts whenever I can help out different small communities in the north Georgia mountains. But then I also do some work with home health and hospice, too. So I'm kind of like a jack of all trades. I take care of people's mindsets and body. Mind, body and soul.

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> Speaker A>Well, tell us about the genetic research that you did and got published and how that's helping people.

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> Cindy Stark>Well, you know, that's not really helping people right now with what I'm doing. I never really used any of that, to be completely honest. Uh, my genetic research was, um.

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> Cindy Stark>So I was in medical school and graduate school together, and I got published in seven different journals. Um, but that was a bacterial research. It was studying, um, the intricacies of DNA replication and transcription of rna. And that really has nothing to do with what I'm doing right now at all. I never was able to, uh. I always tell people I don't use my PhD except for that it made me think critically in a different way. Um, I'm not using that, um, in any kind of patient care or in, uh, clients that are in my soul. Circle academy? No, sir.

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> Speaker A>Okay, well, one thing you are using is your book titled from fear and failure to the finish line.

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> Speaker A>Award winning author. So tell us about that book and why you decided to write it and what listeners can expect when they read it.

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> Cindy Stark>Yes. So I did a triathlon in my mid forties.

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> Cindy Stark>I was hanging around with a bunch of people that were really into fitness, and I was a group fitness instructor at this military academy where I live. And we had groups, uh, of men and women that would meet at 530 in the morning, ah, every Monday through Friday.

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> Cindy Stark>And, um, we all did all these, uh, insane challenges together, um, to try to push ourselves to the limits of what we can do. And we were just all really into just seeing what all the human body is capable of, you know. And I did this Ironman triathlon at age 46.

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> Cindy Stark>I trained for two years, six, uh, days a week. I hired a coach. I got this amazing bike. I got a swimming coach, a biking coach, and was ready for this event. Curtis, like I said, literally trained almost every day for two years.

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> Cindy Stark>And when I came up to that, that day where I started to swim, I did my 2.4 miles ocean swim down in Panama city beach.

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> Cindy Stark>It was a beautiful morning. And then I transitioned into my bike, and I got 80 miles done out of the 120 miles that was ahead of me that day. And I looked up. So I was well over halfway into the day of the biking and running and swimming, and there was a big group of people that were standing, um, in the middle of my path and making me stop, and I didn't. I was like. I was in a twilight zone. I'm like, what in the world is happening? I mean, I've been racing for 8 hours at this point, and um, they said, you're ten minutes too slow and you're going to have to leave the course now, Miss Stark. I said, what?

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> Cindy Stark>And I looked around me, Curtis, and there were like 40 or 50 other men and women that were in the same situation. And they put us all, all of us and our bikes in the back of this van and took us back to the start line. And anyway, I was absolutely devastated. And that book is how. The book, I had to write that book because I said to myself, I am not going to have spent two years of my life doing all of this and have my story in this way with a big, fat failure. And so I talked to my coach. I said, what can I do? How can I make right of all this? And what had happened is that I hadn't memorized the route of the bike route that day. And I had gotten. I thought I was lost.

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> Cindy Stark>And I started going really, really slow, and that's why I was ten minutes too slow. So it wasn't through inadequate training, it was just inadequate preparation of knowing the routes. He said, cindy, he said, we can find you another one to do next week. And next week, that that day was Thanksgiving day in Mexico. I'm like, I'm not going to go to Mexico in a week at the drop of a hat and miss Thanksgiving with my family. I said, I can do one, maybe in January, but I'm not.

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> Cindy Stark>I'm not doing. I'm not going to leave my kids. I've left them enough for these two years from all this training. Right. So the book is about how I found another Ironman triathlon to sign up for, and I crossed the finish line. Curtis. I repeated the training and I showed up and did the dang thing and got the medal and wrote a book to tell the story about, uh, it. And it was the best day ever.

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> Speaker A>Well, congratulations on that.

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> Cindy Stark>Thank you.

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> Speaker A>What do you feel like is the key points that readers should take away from your book?

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> Cindy Stark>Oh, goodness. Um, well, the message of the book is how, if you will divide, if you will divide, a really, really, really big task, no matter what it is that you want to do in your life, if you have a really clear picture of what you want to do. And in the book, of course, the end goal was the completion of an Ironman triathlon. It was a 17 hours endurance event. It was two and a half hours of swimming, eight and a half hours of biking, and, like, 6 hours ish of running at the end of the day starts at seven in the morning, ends at midnight, and. And that seems absolutely undoable and impossible at, um, the outset. But if you divide it into little bitty pieces, and by little, I mean I did no more some days than run 30 minutes or bike 30 minutes or swim 20 minutes. But you do it over and over and over again, you will be able to complete your goal. And so that's message number one. No matter what you want to do in life, if you can divide it down into small enough pieces, you can do it. And then. And you gotta stay committed to it, uh, to all the daily activities. And number two is find yourself some mentors or people that are rooting for you.

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> Cindy Stark>And, um, it's like God sends little angels and helps you along your way to get things done. So, uh, the message is there's power in numbers and to let people help you. Don't try to be an island or a rock and do it all yourself.

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> Speaker A>Okay, well, tell us about some of the biggest challenges that you face throughout your life that have taught you the most or the most important lessons.

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> Cindy Stark>M. I feel like I just talked about a bunch of them. Um, but, uh, I can just reiterate, number one is that even if you come from a family of alcoholics and sexual abuse and uneducated people, you can do whatever you want to do if you are able to dream enough and you can, you know, set your mind to anything you want. And number two is, you know, again, the message of the triathlon, that if you get people to support you along the way and accountability and stay focus to your goal, you can accomplish anything in your life. And, um.

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> Cindy Stark>And then the other thing that I shared earlier about being a doctor, even if you've been a doctor for 30 years and it's not lighting you up anymore, it's okay to quit and pivot and find a way that, you know, whatever it is that you were doing in your life, it can still light you up, but you just do it in a different way and a different rhythm and a different cadence and. And, um, um, and make your happiness a priority. And even if no one else is doing it, you can do it. And so just believe in yourself, really. And those are the big messages in my life and what I've learned the most about leaving full time medicine, leaving my family's generational patterns, um, of destruction, and then, um.

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> Cindy Stark>And then that failure of that triathlon.

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> Speaker A>Well, tell us about any current or upcoming projects that you're working on that people need to know about.

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> Cindy Stark>Hmm. Well, right now I am. I just started a podcast of my own, so I need to have you on my podcast. It's called build a fulfilling life, and it's all about people. Um, we haven't released it yet. We're just doing, um. My friend Melissa and I are doing some pre recording right now, but we, um, are, uh, working on getting a message out of how people can build a more fulfilling life using these tools that she and I have become certified in.

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> Cindy Stark>We help people rewire, uh, their subconscious mind and get rid of limiting beliefs that come from their childhood. And, um, we inspire people that they. They don't have to be the, you know, the sum of their past.

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> Cindy Stark>And, uh, I don't know when it's going to be released yet because we've only recorded two or three of them, and we just got this idea. But, uh, yeah, that's what's coming up next. And then a book that I'm writing with my psychologist about, um, how I escaped my. My, um, the limitations of my childhood and a very, uh, destructive, painful marriage. And, um, and came, uh, out with learning lessons that. That will kind of carry me through the rest of my life. So, yeah, a book and a podcast. And I don't have the title of either one and the release date, but that's what I'm working on.

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> Speaker A>Okay, well, I be. I'd love to be on. Just let me know.

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> Cindy Stark>Okay.

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> Speaker A>I will throw out your contact info so people can keep up whenever you get the titles and release dates for your projects.

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> Cindy Stark>Okay. Yeah, everybody can find me. Um, it's just my name, drcindystark.com.

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> Cindy Stark>And Stark has an e on the end. And, um, you know, my existing book is there, and then my next one will be there. And then every podcast I've ever been on. And I actually also have a 30 minutes training that I have on there, too, Curtis, that people can watch. And, um, I try to upload a blog there every week. And, um, it's everything. Me is on that one, that one place kind of one stop shopping.

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> Speaker A>Okay. Doctor cindystark.com. Close us out with some final thoughts. Maybe if that was something I forgot to touch on, that you would like to talk about it. Just any final thoughts you have for the listeners?

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> Cindy Stark>Yes, sir. Um, again, just. Just really to reiterate that you can. I just want your listeners to know that they can do whatever it is that they want to do in their life. And if they're feeling like they're kind of stuck in Groundhog's day, where every day is a carbon copy of the day before, and they're not getting where they want to go in life, in their relationships, in their business, just in self confidence. Um, watch my training and I kind of go through, uh, what's required. But there is a way that's out there that we can teach you. And it is how to rewire your subconscious mind for success. And I always say, Curtis, it's easy, but it's not simple.

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> Cindy Stark>It's a very easy method. It just takes 30 minutes every other day. But you have to commit 30 minutes every other day and do it. But you can literally go in and delete any kind of uh, negative and limiting societal programming, parental programming, um, religious programming, educational programming, and really live your best life with all the confidence that God intended for us to have.

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> Speaker A>All right, ladies and gentlemen, so if you're interested in that training, checking out everything that Doctor Stark is up to.

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> Speaker A>Drcindystark.com is the website.

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> Speaker A>Please be sure to follow rate review share this episode to as many people as possible. If you have any suggestions or feedback for the show, see Jackson 10 two. Net is the place to send them. Jump on your favorite podcast app.

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> Speaker A>Hit that follow button. Leave us a review.

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> Speaker A>Thank you for listening and supporting the show. And Doctor Stark, thank you for joining us and sharing your expertise.

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> Cindy Stark>Thank you so much again, Curtis. I really appreciate being here with you today.

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> Speaker A>For more information on the living the Dream podcast, visit www.djcurvefall.com.

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> Speaker A>Until next time, stay focused on living the dream.

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> Cindy Stark>Dream.