Fifteen years ago, I came across the work of an enlightened Scottish welder by the name of Sydney Banks. His own pathway to enlightenment was not a traditional one, filled with decades of seeking, meditation, and study; he was not meaningfully religious, and had had neither a particularly happy nor tragic childhood. He simply heard a man say “there’s no such thing as insecurity”, and after 72 hours of letting that truth rattle around inside him, he had the following experience:
“I turned around, looked out the picture window at the ocean, and it was like being sucked down a tunnel. All of a sudden, I was buzzing and there was white light all around me, just buzzing, buzzing, and I was in the middle of this light. Nobody could see it. Just me. And it was like I was captured in this white light, and it was just buzz, buzz, buzz. Right there and then, I realized the true meaning of God. I started to cry.
I turned to [my wife] Barb, and I said, ‘I’m home. I’m free. I’ve made it. I’ve conquered this world. This means to say that you and I will be traveling all over the world. We’re going to change psychology and psychiatry so millions of people will be healed.”
Having been a seeker in my own life from my teen years onwards, Syd was not the first enlightened teacher I came across, nor was his story one I overly identified with. Yes, my father ran a factory and worked with his hands, but other than a short stint driving a forklift and shipping machine parts around the country, I’d made my way in the world by my wits and my voice, not my hand/eye coordination or feel for materials of the earth.
But when I heard him say that “every human being is sitting in the middle of mental health – they just don’t know it”, I had my own epiphany of sorts. I realized that despite more than 20 years of suffering from anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation, there was nothing wrong with me – I was as perfectly well made as I had been on the day of my birth. With that realization, my experience of life immediately began to change for the better.
It was as though the universe had offered me an invitation to reconsider everything I thought I knew about who I was and how life worked, and all I had to do was accept the invitation and take a fresh look at the world with “new eyes”. And in accepting that invitation, I met myself, began to walk in a new world, and to fall in love with life.
In this new program, I’d like to extend that invitation to you – the chance to meet your soul and get to know your amazing self at a whole new level of intimacy. You’ll have the chance to reconsider some fundamental assumptions our culture makes about the world, and draw your own conclusions so you can begin to live more from your own wisdom than the collected hodgepodge of contradicting ideas offered up by a confused, confusing, and often slightly nutty world.
“I am not a teacher: just a fellow traveler of whom you asked the way. I pointed ahead – ahead of myself as well as you.”
-George Bernard Shaw
Here’s how it all works:
Beginning on the first of September, you’ll receive a video from me with an invitation to consider something new and different about yourself, the people around you, and the wider world. Then we’ll meet for 90 minutes online to explore the ramifications of accepting each month’s invitation and saying “yes” to new possibilities and expressions of your deeper nature.
You’ll also be invited to share your experiences and questions in a private online group, and twice a month I’ll create a “video mailbag” where I take the questions I think are most universally relevant and answer them as directly and helpfully as I can for everyone to consider.
By the time we finish in January, you’ll be experiencing yourself and your life in a new, deeper, and more beautiful way than you can probably imagine.
Monthly Group Explorations
11am PT – 12:30pm PT
- Thursday 14th September
- Monday 16th October
- Monday 13th November
- Thursday 14th December
- Monday 15th January
All monthly webinars will be recorded and available on demand throughout the program
The cost for the five month program is $495 (or $99 per month). As well as a welcome video, I’ll send out some “previews of coming attractions” each month in the form of quotes, articles, and videos that I think will be useful in priming the pump for the kinds of deeper insights and feelings that are the natural fruit of accepting this invitation to look fresh, go deeper, and wake up to what’s truly possible in our lives.
Members of the Inner Circle can save 20%, 40%, or join for free with a Platinum membership!
“A modern day Alan Watts – Michael Neill does the brilliant job of using intelligence, humor, and heart to blend the sacred with the profane and gently reveal the deeper spiritual nature of everyday life.“
Mike Dooley, NYT bestselling-author and creator of “Notes from the Universe”
He has spent more than three decades as a coach, adviser, friend, mentor, and creative spark plug to founders, CEOs, celebrities, royalty, and those who are up to something in the world. His global client base is wide and diverse, having served clients in North America, UK, Europe, and the Middle East in the fields of investment, sales, energy, manufacturing, the entertainment and media industry, and more. He has been consistently ranked alongside Jack Canfield, Tony Robbins, and other legends in the field as one of the top 30 coaching thought leaders in the world, and continues to run a small private practice working with high performers in their fields of expertise.
A gifted communicator, Michael has authored six best-selling books including Creating the Impossible, The Inside-Out Revolution, The Space Within, and Supercoach. His books have been translated into more than 25 languages, and his public talks, retreats and seminars have touched and transformed lives at the United Nations and in over 60 countries and on six continents. His TEDx talks, ‘Why Aren’t We Awesomer?’and ‘Can a TEDx Talk Really Change the World?’ have been viewed by over two million people around the world and his blog and podcast, Caffeine for the Soul, has been entertaining and inspiring audiences around the world for more than 20 years.
I have been searching for the space before words for 30 years of my life. This space is peaceful, sweet, beautiful, and comes with a nourishing feeling. It is expansive and still. There is nothing and everything here. It is home. People often call this place “spirit” or “God”, and before working with Michael Neill I would touch this place for a nanosecond and then desperately try to find my way back.
My time with Michael has helped to wake me up to and deepen my awareness of this place inside me. It has allowed me to rest in and live more of my life from this space regardless of context – at home with family, at work with clients – anywhere and everywhere I go. Best of all, I can easily find my way back when it seems as though I’ve lost my way. If you get the chance to study with Michael, I highly recommend you take it so you can sit back, relax, and experience this space more and more for yourself while impacting the people around you through presence, love, compassion, and a deeper understanding of who and what we really are at core.
