She Hosts Life-Changing Couples Retreats With 95% Success Rate (Here's the Secret)

✨  Debra Stangl spent 20 years as a divorce attorney ending marriages - now she saves them with a 95% success rate at her award-winning retreats.

After helping thousands of couples divorce, Debra had a life-changing vision of an Egyptian goddess who told her to leave law or die like her mother did. She walked away from her practice despite being $50,000 in debt, and within hours received a miraculous phone call that changed everything.

What makes her retreats so effective:
✨  10,000+ people helped over 23 years (Oscar winners to housewives)
✨  The "Sedona Proven Process" that finds and heals core wounds
✨  Couples work individually first, then together
✨  Everything is energy work and spiritual healing
✨  Award-winning results year after year

Shocking insights:
✨  Most relationship problems aren't what they appear to be
✨  Even infidelity isn't the real issue - it's the "gunk" underneath
✨  Marriage is a "crucible" that brings up wounds to be healed
✨  Women work harder to save relationships because they're wired for emotions
✨  People marry the same person over and over with different names

Chapters:
[00:00] Cold Open
[00:32] Introduction & Hosts Preview
[02:15] Meet Debra Stangl
[02:26] From Divorce Attorney to Marriage Saver
[03:52] Vision of Egyptian Goddess Isis
[05:00] Miraculous Phone Call Changes Everything
[06:00] Moving to Sedona and Starting Over
[06:48] How the Retreats Actually Work
[09:11] Dealing with Resistant Clients
[11:10] 95% Success Rate with 10,000+ People
[13:01] Core Wounds and Marriage as Crucible
[15:23] Why Women Work Harder in Relationships
[16:29] Practical Advice for Struggling Couples
[19:20] Spiritual Guides and Intuition
[20:46] The "Nothing is Wrong" Philosophy
[22:21] Stop Making Lists, Start Gratitude
[23:28] Real Change is Possible

Links:
✨  Website: SedonaSoulAdventures.com
✨  Free Book: "The Journey to Happy" (email us at gurusandgamechangers@gmail.com to receive your free book!)
✨  New Book: "How to Have a High Vibe Relationship" coming soon

📱 FOLLOW US:
📲 Connect with Our Hosts:
Stacey: https://www.instagram.com/staceymgrant/
Mark: https://www.instagram.com/mark_lubragge_onair/

⭐️ Watch/Subscribe to Gurus and Game Changers on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@GurusAndGameChangers
⭐️ Listen on any podcast audio platform

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Transcript

00:01 - Stacey (Host)
Mark, do you know why I'm wearing my fun exotic jungle shirt today? 

00:06 - Mark  (Host)
Oh, there's actually like leopards on there. I didn't even notice that? 

00:10 - Stacey (Host)
What's that Jaguar? 

00:12 - Mark  (Host)
I see a giraffe. 

00:13 - Stacey (Host)
Giraffe. Look at that. 

00:14 - Mark  (Host)
Okay, I didn't realize. But no, why are you wearing a fun exotic? 

00:16 - Stacey (Host)
Because our guest today, debra Stangle hosts amazing exotic couples retreats, but the interesting part of her is that she was a divorce attorney first. Yes, and so she was ending marriages. She took my punchline and now she's helping them grow and virgin and thrive. 

00:35 - Mark  (Host)
Yeah, she's saving them. 

00:36 - Stacey (Host)
She's saving marriages. 

00:39 - Mark  (Host)
Even the ones that are virgin blossom, even the ones that are. Paperwork is drawn up and this is like last ditch effort. She's gonna we're gonna go to this retreat. 

00:49 - Stacey (Host)
She has a retreat as you said in different places, exotic places, but also in arizona right? Not that arizona is not. No, arizona is amazing. I love arizona. Why would you right? 

00:59 - Mark  (Host)
but throw shade on ari, there's a lot of sun in Arizona so, given that she's very good, her retreats are award-winning year after year year after year for what they're able to do to transform the person transform the couple, save the marriage. But apparently you know, there's the good, there's the bad, there's the ugly. She said she's going to speak about it all to us, so we can't wait to talk to. 

01:21 - Stacey (Host)
Deb, we're going to bring our audiences into like will this save their marriage? 

01:25 - Mark  (Host)
Yeah, maybe you should consider it right, Instead of just couples therapy. This is far more intensive and far faster and apparently far more effective. Hi, I'm Stacey and I am Mark and this is the Gurus and Game. 

01:41 - Stacey (Host)
Changers podcast. 

01:43 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
Debra, welcome to the show. 

01:44 - Stacey (Host)
Hey, debra, thanks. It's great to be with you guys. So talk to me about how you changed your life and transitioned from being a divorce attorney into what you're doing right now. 

01:54 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
I really hated being a divorce attorney. For five years I'd been praying and meditating and actually I was complaining and saying God, I'm so unhappy, please tell me what to do. And I would hear this little voice that would say you need to leave your law practice. And instead of listening to it, I would get angry and I would be like how can I possibly leave my law practice? We're $50,000 in debt. I'm our sole support. We have no money in savings. How can I possibly do that? 

02:23
And so I get to Sedona, I'm doing a session and all of a sudden, in a vision, the Egyptian goddess Isis you either leave your law practice now or you're going to die, like your mother did. And I figured out at the end of the session that I was exactly the age my mother was when she got cancer and died five years later, and I could see that I was on that same path. I was unhappy, I was miserable, I felt stuck like she did, and I went home and for two weeks I tried to figure out with my lawyer brain how I was possibly going to leave my law practice when I was $50,000 in debt, I was our sole support, no money in savings. And there was this one day where I had finished a meditation and I just opened my eyes and I said God, I'm going to do this. I don't know how I'm going to do it, but I need some help. 

03:20
And within four hours I got a phone call from one of my clients. His case was finished. I don't know how I'm going to do it, but I need some help. And within four hours I got a phone call from one of my clients. His case was finished. I don't know why he was calling me. At the end of the conversation he told me he had just bought a new business refinancing mortgages. I said could you get my mortgage payment reduced? I give him my address, he calls me back in 10 minutes and he says I can get your mortgage payment cut in half and I can get you $50,000 in cash. 

03:50 - Mark  (Host)
Wow. 

03:51 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
Now nobody knew that I was $50,000 in debt. I was embarrassed I wasn't telling anybody that and I took that as the first sign and I spent six months closing my law practice as the first sign. And I spent six months closing my law practice and then I spent the next three years coming out to Sedona. I would come out for a month at a time doing healing work with all of these different practitioners that I was finding and fast forward to two weeks before 9-11, and I'm doing another session and ISIS comes in again. Oh, wow. 

04:28
And she says it's time to move to Sedona. And I said for what? And my experience is that they never show you the whole thing, they just show you the next step. And by that time I knew that I had to be following what I was being told. So I went home, sold my house in three days they had said it would take six months and I moved out here, sat here for six months and waited and was like okay, I did what you told me. To. Now what? And I started having dreams about what would become Sedona Soul Adventures. We started with 10 practitioners. We now have over 50, and that was 23 years ago. 

05:16 - Mark  (Host)
Wow. It's a cool success story. If we were married, we came to you with problems, left feeling wonderful about each other. What are the percentages Like? Is it most work on individuals, is it most work as a couple, or is it mostly a spiritual thing? 

05:36 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
couple, or is it mostly a spiritual thing? It's all a spiritual thing, all of it, everything that we do, because what we are doing is moving energy and working with vibration. So quantum physics tells us Einstein proved this that everything's energy. So even the table that you're at, which seems so solid, it's just a bunch of subatomic particles running around in space. Everything is energy. 

06:01
And what we are doing is, first of all, finding the core wounds, the traumas, the fears, the limiting beliefs, the behaviors, the patterns, what we affectionately call the gunk. 

06:16
We're finding, releasing and healing that. And then, because that's the stuff that's causing all the trouble I mean, no matter what somebody comes to us with, no matter what they're telling us, their problem is that's never what it is, even when you have a situation with infidelity. The infidelity is the thing that is causing all the upset, but that's not what caused the infidelity in the first place. There's just all this stuff underneath. So if people come to us and they're not living their life purpose, or they feel stuck in their work, or their marriage is on the rocks or they've had an infidelity, we are always the first part of the retreat going in finding, releasing and healing the gunk and everybody's got gunk, stacey's got gunk, mark's got gunk. Then the next step is we are doing sessions, modalities to move you into connection on all the levels physical, mental, emotional, spiritual and then that's when we're bringing the couples together, because when they have their gunk released and they're in connection with themselves as individuals, then they can come back into connection as a couple. 

07:37
That's some heavy stuff Makes such sense. 

07:39 - Mark  (Host)
But you must have people that are resistant. 

07:41 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
So we spend a whole lot of time talking to people before they come, to really get an idea of what's going on, what's happening, what do they want to have happen, so that we can start that process. Now we do have people that are resistant, and if we can help them to move that resistance which again is just energy and it's just the result of you know different thoughts then that's great and we have them come. But if we get someone that is just totally, completely, this is all a bunch of bunk, none of it's going to work. Then, in the words of that absolute woo, woo new age guy, henry Ford, there are two types of people in the world those who think they can and those who think they can't. So if you believe this won't work, this won't work, this won't work, guess what it's not going to work. 

08:38
We need to have people who at least have a little bit of an idea that there may be possibility of a spark, that possibly this might work, and a lot of people who come to us. They've tried everything. We don't have them come. If we just know we're gonna hit nothing but a brick wall, because that's just a waste of time and energy and money for them. We have had people who get there and they actually have way more resistance than we thought they did. Or suddenly they're saying what they're telling us when they get here is different than what they told us when we were talking to them, because they were, you know, trying to get their wife to come out here and not file for divorce. And even in those situations we've had people that after the first session the resistance is just gone because they can already feel it. 

09:28 - Stacey (Host)
That's incredible. So over 23 years, how many people do you think you've seen at Sedona? 

09:38 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
It's. It's somewhere around 10 to 12,000. And we've had everything from Oscar winners to Superbowl winners, to housewives, to, you know, literally everybody everybody and what's the success rate that you're seeing there? We have tried to track this in a way that we feel is really, really accurate, with feedback from our clients. The number that we have been able to track is 95%. 

10:10 - Stacey (Host)
Whoa, that's insane 10 to 12,000 people. 

10:13 - Mark  (Host)
Oh, I'm sorry. 10 to 12,000. 

10:14 - Stacey (Host)
95% success rate approximately. And why? Why does it work? 

10:20 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
Nobody else is doing what we are doing, this process that we use what we now call the Sedona Proven Process. What this does is allows people to do the really deep work, but we're doing the deep work in a really short period of time and then doing follow-up with people. But this is what we are doing. We are finding that gunk, which is the stuff that's causing all the trouble. Everybody is running around with some version of this, some thought process of I'm not lovable, I'm not enough, I'm not good enough, I'll never have what I want, I'll never be happy. You know, when you've got that going in your head, that is what is then influencing your emotions and influencing the energy of what you create, and so that's what you're going to have. So the problem is just changing what you think. Most people can't do that, and it's coming from this place that people aren't aware of, from this place that people aren't aware of. 

11:29
The biggest thing that we work with are the core wounds which, until those are healed and released, you simply cannot have a happy life or a satisfying relationship. It's not possible, especially in marriages, because what's going on in marriages is marriage is a crucible. We come into a relationship and we're triggering each other and stuff's going on, and what's really happening is our soul is bringing up for healing our wounds and our traumas. What's happening is you're in your relationship, you're triggering each other and instead of going, oh whoa, wait a minute, is this really about us? No, this is about, oh my gosh. 

12:11
When I was five years old, this happened and I got criticized my whole life and now I discover I've married my father and I'm being criticized all the time and this is just bringing up the core wound over and over and over again to be healed. When I was a divorce attorney for 20 years, I had a whole bunch of people that I did three divorces for and what I saw was they were marrying the same person over and over again. They just had a different name and that's because they weren't learning the lessons of the relationship. We're breaking that cycle. We are going in and finding what is the root cause of the problems in the relationship. What's the root cause of your unhappiness or of your lack of being able to really move into the life that you want to move into? When you deal with what is the underlying problem, that's when everything changes. 

13:14 - Stacey (Host)
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13:35 - Mark  (Host)
So when we were talking earlier, I asked you who works harder to keep relationships together, troubled relationships together, and you said something like very definitely it's the women. What does that look like? Why is it the women? Why is it not the men? 

13:51 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
Because women are wired for the emotional. Men, primarily and especially in our culture, are wired for the mental, and you can't think your way out of your problems. You can only feel and connect your way out of your problems. So this is the work that we do discovering the core wounds, the nurturing needs and then also the communication piece, which is also based on your birth information. 

14:24 - Mark  (Host)
When you say birth information, you mean the numerology of your birth date or what sign you're born under. 

14:30 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
Not the numerology, but the date, place and time. 

14:34 - Mark  (Host)
The date, place and time. 

14:36 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
And location, yeah, very cool. 

14:40 - Stacey (Host)
Question just for our audience. Who's listening? And maybe they can't get away for a retreat? 

14:45 - Mark  (Host)
or something. 

14:47 - Stacey (Host)
Do you have advice, maybe three or four or five things that you can tell people that you've from your experience seen in Relationships that can help them? 

14:57 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
So I have a book that came out in 2016 called the journey to happy, and it has nine different processes that people can use that can start making them happy right now, and I would love to gift your listeners with an e-book an e-copy of that book so that they have it and it's something that literally, they can start using right now. 

15:26
And then I have another book coming out very shortly that I've written with my husband, who I've been married to now for eight years, called how to have a High Vibe Relationship, and that has all kinds of information about you know what we've just talked about Now, the number one thing that I would tell everybody whether you know we're talking about individuals or couples, you already have an idea, probably, about what your wounding is, and it's really kind of easy to look at your life and go where are the problems? Do you keep getting in relationship with people who ghost you? Do you keep getting into jobs where the same kind of thing is happening over and over again? The number one reason for every relationship to nurture the other person and especially to nurture them in the way they need to be nurtured. We don't see people nurturing each other. We don't see that as a goal. Can you imagine what our lives would be like if everybody was trying to nurture each other? And so that for relationships is the number one piece of advice. 

16:45 - Mark  (Host)
All right, you reminded me of when I was in college at St Joe's, with the Jesuit priests. St Joe's is a Jesuit institution. I had a father, Genovese, and it was, I think the class was Christian ethics, and he said I have a definition of love. And we all were like, okay, let's hear this. And he said something similar to what you said and it never left me. He said if you love somebody, it's really simple you just live for them. 

17:10
Everything you do, every thought you have, if you truly and you think about like your kids, like you live for your kids, you should do the same thing with your partner and it doesn't seem to end. 

17:18 - Stacey (Host)
Yeah, right. 

17:19 - Mark  (Host)
So, if you truly love someone, even if they're aggravating you, even if you're the back and forth of life and all that you're still living for them. Well then, that's just healing, and forgiveness has to go in there. 

17:31 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
Yeah, yeah. 

17:32 - Mark  (Host)
But the point is, if you love them day to day it's exactly what you said You're living for them. 

17:37 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
You can still be in your own power. You can still be living your life, but when you're coming from the place of how can I nurture you? That's a game changer. 

17:48 - Stacey (Host)
Okay, so can we talk about spiritual guides, because I asked you a question at the top of the show. 

17:53 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
If you receive messages from spiritual guides and maybe this kind of like folds into the type of practices that you guys have at your retreats, Well, the thing that I would say is, everyone has intuition and everyone has that sixth sense, and it depends on whether you're listening to it or not. I mean, when you walk into a room, can't you feel if the two people that are in there have been having a fight, even if they're not saying anything? I mean, that's you know, that's energy, so it's your intuition. And when you and when you meet people you know, very often you're just like Ooh, no, or the opposite. Where you meet somebody and it's so that is, that's intuition. Okay, and it really has to do with listening to it and starting to trust it. Question for you. 

18:47 - Mark  (Host)
So in reading the reviews for your books, the people that put out to it very highly reviewed right. Yeah, several people kept referring to your nothing is wrong mantra rule. Describe that nothing is wrong. They said it was very powerful and life changing for them. 

19:14 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
Well, it's an approach to life. With everything that happens in our life, we can either approach it from the standpoint of everything is happening in divine order for my highest and best good. Every single time, and when we're operating from that and ever since I started operating from that it is amazing the synchronicities that happen and the ways that things line up. The best example of this that I can give is that the worst thing that's ever happened to me is my mother's death, and it was just all of it, just nothing but awful but awful. 

19:50
Now, as I look back all these years later, I can see these huge gifts in that Number one. It started me on my spiritual path. The other thing that happened was that my very stoic German family never said I love you to each other until after my mother passed away, we finally started doing that and we finally started really talking to each other. Until after my mother passed away, we finally started doing that and we finally started really talking to each other and connecting with each other Hardest thing that's ever happened to me. But when I look back on it now I'm like, oh my gosh, that had so many gifts for me and it was so huge. And so now I find that, the more that I'm able to do that, it's unbelievable how that will shift things around. 

20:36 - Mark  (Host)
So what's your advice to people that they have the list? I have the list for my wife. She has a list for me. This is what's wrong with our marriage. Your point is it's not, it's something else. 

20:49 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
I have two points. The first one is stop focusing on the list of what's wrong with the other person Just because every time you think it and talk about it, you're adding energy to it. And, instead of making that list for 30 days, do a gratitude journal about what you love and don't tell the other person you're doing it. Don't tell the other person or anybody else. Do a gratitude journal where every morning you get up and you just spend three minutes writing three things that you love about that other person, or even that you like, and it can even be things like you know their beautiful brown eyes. Do that for 30 days and you will be amazed at what can happen in shifting that energy. 

21:41 - Stacey (Host)
Yeah, focus on what you love. That's amazing. 

21:43 - Mark  (Host)
It is one of the nine stepping stones. Yeah, yeah Go ahead. 

21:47 - Stacey (Host)
You got one final no. I just wanted to make sure that you are getting everything out in the world that you want to get out in the world on this podcast as we close. So what else do you want our audience to know? 

21:56 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
I want them to know that real and lasting change is possible and that you can have the life and the relationship that you dream of. 

22:12 - Mark  (Host)
Simply beautifully put. 

22:13 - Stacey (Host)
Mic drop there you go. Debra, you're amazing. 

22:18 - Mark  (Host)
Thanks a lot I love your energy. 

22:19 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
This was really fun. You guys asked good questions too, so cool. 

22:22 - Stacey (Host)
Thanks, we really enjoyed it. And there's so much more I could probably dig into, but then, mark, if I yell, we could do a whole show on the spiritual side of this for sure. So enjoy doing that show. 

22:30 - Mark  (Host)
No, I'm kidding Debra, really thank you. Thank you for the earlier call. 

22:34 - Stacey (Host)
Thank you for the time spent with us and your book, say your book, again your website. Let's get one more last plug. 

22:39 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
So our website is SedonaSoulAdventurescom. And then my book, which I'm gifting to your audience, is the Journey to Happy how Embracing the Concept that Nothing is Wrong Can Transform your Life. The book that is coming out shortly is called how to have a High Vibe Relationship. 

23:04 - Stacey (Host)
I love this. 

23:05 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
I like the way that sounds and it's a definite have to book. 

23:08 - Mark  (Host)
And thank you for gifting that to our audience. 

23:09 - Stacey (Host)
We'll definitely include that link in the show. 

23:11 - Debra Stangl (Guest)
Thank you so much for sure. Thanks you guys, and thank you for what you're doing. I love the combo of the two of you. Thank you. 

23:20 - Mark  (Host)
She's a special person. 

23:22 - Stacey (Host)
Do you mean special in a nice way? You're still here, You're still listening. Thanks for listening to the Gurus and Game Changers podcast While you're here. If you enjoyed it, please take a minute to rate this episode and leave us a quick review. We want to know what you thought of the show and what you took from it and how it might have helped you. We read and appreciate every comment. Thanks. See you next week.