Exploring Life & Business with Imari Tuakli of Protagonist

Today we’d like to introduce you to Imari Tuakli.

Imari, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I’m the product of two worlds: filmmaking and personal development.

I’ve always been obsessed with human behavior and those quiet moments where people actually tell the truth you know? So the first chapter of my life was spent behind a camera, finding those stories and directing them. I ended up becoming the first director at Jubilee Media, which was wild, because suddenly my ideas were reaching millions of people.

Then around 2017, I stumbled into this leadership program in LA, and that’s what pulled me into the coaching world. It gave me the tools — and honestly the confidence — to take everything I’d been learning about people and actually use it to help them. I started out coaching artists and creatives, and as my brand grew I found myself working with founders, executives… and then getting invited to speak at some pretty cool places like TEDx and Harvard speaking on concepts like leadership and purpose.

So I’ve been in the transformation game for about eight years now and the same pattern just keeps hitting me in the face: people don’t struggle because they’re broken. They struggle because they can’t stay consistent long enough for their potential to catch up to their intention.

And that’s really the seed of the Protagonist project.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Protagonist is the biggest thing I’ve ever taken on.

Making a video that hits a million views is one thing… building something that might actually impact a million people is a totally different one. I’ve had to learn everything on the fly — fundraising, talking to investors, managing engineers, giving feedback to literal rocket scientists. It’s been life-changing but there’s times I’m Googling terms in the middle of a meeting.

And the timing of all this was pretty wild to be honest. About a week before I went all-in on Protagonist, I lost a business and a relationship in the same 24 hours. Within a 5 day period I went from feeling like I had an idea that could light up the world to having to rebuild my life from scratch. Nuts. I think most sane people would’ve taken it as a sign to just slow down or play small.

But, you know…here we are.

Ironically, the whole thing keeps teaching me the exact lesson I’m building the app around: if you want your life to change, you have to become someone you haven’t been yet. If this was the big transformational scene in the movie of your life – what would your character do?

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Protagonist?
Protagonist is an app that pays you to accomplish your goals.

You put money in, the AI helps you clarify your goal and the plan to accomplish it, and every day you make progress towards your new habits – the AI verifies your progress and pays you back some of your subscription money.

If you do it often enough, you earn a streak and we make a donation to a charity of your choice on your behalf.

So – people can literally make the world a better place by just doing what they said they wanted to do anyway.

It’s built for people who are just tired of saying “I’ll workout tomorrow” or “I’ll start that business next year”. People who are just tired of their own shit you know?

Every element of the app is designed based on the psychology of what makes people act when they otherwise wouldn’t. Wether it’s financial incentives or community accountability. Whatever it takes to motivate you, we’ve built a system around it.

If there’s one thing I want people to get, it’s this: your goals aren’t out of reach. The only reasons you have to not go after the life you want are because you either 1) don’t know what it is or 2) you don’t know how to get it.

And I’m telling you we’ve taken care of both of those problems.

Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
On the team side, Issac Hicks and Marco Ruiz are the reason that the app exists as more than just a figment of my imagination. They run the technical side of things but also really understand the mission – which is non-negotiable when you make something like this. And also Austin Ambrozi deserves a shoutout. He connected me to the team when I shared the vision with him and I believe having day 1 homies who get the dream will always be an ingredient of achieving something big.

You’ve also got people that have helped either motivate me as I built a motivation app or given me real tips on how to navigate the startup space. People like Ruchita Poddar, Bruce Languren, Anthony Trucks, Nick Connolly. None of this is real without the support of these people. And first backers like Mike + David Anderson, Marva Gordon, and my cousin Travis.

Pricing:

• $144 for the 1st month (You can earn 100% back)
• $98 for the ongoing monthly subscription. (You can earn up to half of that back)

Contact Info:

• Website: https://waitlist.betheprotagonist.co
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/betheprotagonist.co