The Inner Wealth Podcast
Mike Kitko is the Founder and Creative Director of Inner Wealth Global, a personal and professional development company that helps business owners create aligned wealth, success, freedom, and deep fulfillment—without sacrificing themselves in the process.
As an author, speaker, podcaster, and coach Mike guides visionaries and impact-driven entrepreneurs to align their inner world with the life and business they are truly meant to live and create. His work helps you master your mind, energy, and emotions while building intense personal power so that wealth and opportunity flow effortlessly.
Through coaching, training, and transformational content, Inner Wealth Global helps business owners break free from unnecessary struggle, trust their path, and create a life deeply aligned with their soul.
The Inner Wealth Podcast
Ep155. Reclaiming Personal Power: Overcoming External Validation and Embracing Inner Wealth.
Ever wondered why we often feel the need to seek validation from others? Before diving into today's episode of the Inner Wealth Podcast, let’s rewind to my own childhood, where I was made to believe that I was inherently flawed. This episode unearths the roots of such conditioning and how societal and religious narratives can instill deep-seated feelings of shame and unworthiness. We journey back to our beginnings, recognizing that babies are born whole and perfect, but it's the external pressures and teachings that distort this natural state of completeness.
We shed light on how societal norms and educational structures reinforce the notion that we need to constantly seek external approval to feel valuable. You'll hear about the pervasive nature of these learned behaviors and how they erode our self-worth from a tender age. We define personal power as an internal state of clarity, trust, and self-love, and stress the importance of recognizing the agendas of external entities. By reconnecting with our intrinsic value and potential, we can start to reclaim the personal power we lost in the pursuit of external validation.
The final part of our discussion delves into reclaiming personal sovereignty. You’ll hear a compelling story about standing up for personal desires and how this reshaped my marriage and family dynamics. We explore the biblical notion that the kingdom of heaven lies within us, challenging traditional religious teachings that suggest we must seek God outside ourselves. Embrace self-belief, self-trust, and self-love to reclaim your personal power, resist societal pressures, and make decisions that honor your intrinsic worth. This episode is an invitation to journey inward, find validation within, and live a life of inspired and empowered autonomy.
Music Credit: "What's Left of Me" by Wes Hoffman & Friends
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Do you ever wake up feeling like there's something missing in your life? Do you ever feel the need to escape your business? Are you running your life or is your life running you? I'm Mike Kitko and I'll help you design and create a life so authentic and aligned with who you really are that you'll get excited just to wake up. I'll help you create real wealth, success and freedom from the inside out. Welcome to the Inner Wealth Podcast, where we learn and choose to live inspired each and every day.
Speaker 1:You know, for most human beings, there's over 8 billion people walking around the planet and for most human beings, the disempowerment of them starts from a very, very young age. Now, what I mean by that is they are taught and convinced that someone else controls them. Someone else controls their circumstances, and they are oftentimes programmed and conditioned to look outside of them, look outside of themselves for authority, for knowledge, for wisdom, for the answer. They are conditioned and programmed. We are conditioned and programmed to look outside of ourselves for what is right and what is wrong. Now, this is a very, very personal experience for me, and I've talked about it multiple times on the InterWealth podcast. This has been a very, very personal experience near and dear to my heart, because from a very, very young age, I was basically told that there was something inherently wrong with me and that I was too much me and that, you know, I was too much. I was, uh, I talked too fast, I walked too fast, um, I was too intense, I needed to slow down, I was too energetic. And then, on top of that, you lay that conditioning, you lay, you lay the conditioning on that on top of a religious education that teaches you that you are a shameful sinner and, because of your brokenness, somebody had to die for your sins and that you need God. You are never complete, you are never whole. Without going through Jesus you can't get to God. You're not even worthy enough to connect directly to God. You've got to go through some, somebody or someone else and you're like.
Speaker 1:I remember sitting in religious class and I went to I went to religious, catholic, religious education and I remember sitting in religious class looking up at the crucifix, looking and thinking, oh my God, he got nails in his hands because of me. Now, that might seem extreme, but this shit is real, like the education, and maybe that education hasn't been the case for everybody. Maybe you know, maybe, the severity of those lessons didn't land on other people as much as they landed on me, but I literally remember probably being six, seven, eight years old, thinking that guy died because I'm a sinner, because that is what, ultimately, what my education was teaching me that there was something wrong with me and that because there was something wrong with me and that, because there was something wrong with me, somebody else had to get punished for my sins, and that I was born with original sin and I had to be baptized so that my original sin would, would be washed away. Like a perfect fucking baby is born with sin and needs to be cleansed. I don't know if you've ever looked at and I've had two beautiful daughters and they're 19 and 22 now, but I'll tell you, when they were born they were perfect. When they were born, they were absolutely perfect, and I'm not just talking about because I'm their dad, I'm talking about the innocence of a baby is born, it's the parents and it's human beings and it's life and it's challenges and it's obstacles that start the process of fucking them up. But the baby is born whole and complete and I will defend that to my death.
Speaker 1:A baby is born with typically two fears fear of loud noises and fear of falling and everything else money fear, fear of abandonment, fear of betrayal all of these are learned behaviors. They're conditioned behaviors and we go from experience to experience. I think I heard a statistic one time that the average human being hears no 10,000 times before. It's like I don't know 12, 13 years old or something. It's something crazy. You're told no all the time. You're told no constantly and it's repeated so much that you start to feel. A typical human being starts to feel like they can't have what they want, it's not available to them and they can't make their own decisions. Somebody else gets to make their decisions for them.
Speaker 1:And if you look, you go through education where somebody's telling you that what you know isn't okay, that you need to know more and it's regimented. There's orthodoxy around this, there's doctrine, there's dogma. There's just so much programming and conditioning in this world that tells you, wherever you are, you've got to be at a different level. Wherever you are, you need to be somewhere else. No matter who you are, you need to be somewhere else. You need credentials behind your name. You need these things to prove that you're okay. You need licenses, you need certificates, you need diplomas, to say that you're okay, to say that you are valuable, to say that you're worthy. Some people measure you according to your accomplishments. Some people measure you according to your money. Some people measure you according to your accomplishments. Some people measure you according to your money. Some people measure you according to your body and the shape of your body.
Speaker 1:These little perfect babies become young teenagers and young adults and mature into adulthood. It just becomes normal for them to look outside of them for their okayness, and when I say okayness, I'm talking about feeling valuable, feeling worthy, feeling deserving, feeling complete, feeling whole, feeling impactful. I'm saying that human beings have internal conflicts that are completely unnatural insecurity, inadequacy, insignificance because these are handed down from person to person, and your parents passes on. Your parent passes on a belief, and this belief could be about economics and money. It could be about religion. It could be about the government. It could be about how hard life is. It could be about economics and money. It could be about religion. It could be about the government. It could be about how hard life is. It could be about relationships.
Speaker 1:Your parents tend to pass on all these beliefs what they believe is true to their kids and, in essence, every single belief contains a seed of fear in that belief. Every single belief contains a seed of fear. So, when you're passing on your beliefs to your children, you're passing on your fears to your children and you're only showing them, you're only telling them how you see life and you're ultimately convincing them to see life your same way. Well, if you're not living a whole, fucking complete, wealthy, successful, happy, fit, loving, intimate, like valuable, significant life, then stop fucking telling your kids how life is, because all you're doing is passing on your beliefs and in passing on your beliefs, you're passing on your fears, passing on your beliefs and in passing on your beliefs, you're passing on your fears.
Speaker 1:What happens, starting at a very young age? And I'm going to talk about a word combination that is near and dear to my heart, the word combination is personal power, and personal power is an internal condition, an internal state of clarity, of certainty, of trust in oneself, of authenticity, of value, of worth, of significance, worth of significance of self-love, of just such internal, freaking value that you know that your life matters and you know that you make a difference and you know that you are a miracle walking this freaking planet. That is personal power, and in almost all 8 billion human beings that are walking this planet. The elimination and the erosion of that personal power started from a very, very young age and we started looking outside of us for validation. We started looking outside of ourselves for validation. We started looking outside of ourselves for approval. We started looking outside of ourselves for adequacy. We started chasing education as a means to feel smart, looking for the typical big house with cars and a fence, fence yard with dogs and a couple kids and the perfect family as a means to fit in with society.
Speaker 1:We've looked to religious leaders to tell us all about a God that they can't possibly know because, you know well, they can't possibly know any more than we do, except they're giving up their power to a book. We the process of giving up personal power starts at a very, very young age and, and for many, it continues for the rest of your life. There's a, there's a line that I've using and I've been on this journey for eight years of taking back my personal power, of recapturing all the power that I've given up into the world, all the power that I've. You know the choices that I've allowed people to make for me, the choices that I've allowed, you know I've given. I've looked to other people to teach me about God.
Speaker 1:Instead of connecting with God, I've looked to religious or political organizations to look to keep me safe. I've looked to news agencies to tell me what I needed to know. And you know what? Every one of these things, these entities, had a fucking agenda, and their agenda wasn't my best interest. Their agenda was in keeping me stuck and keeping me in a, in a state of giving up my personal power so that they could have some authority, they could have some control, they could have the benefit of keeping me in their machine. And I'm saying this across the board politics, religion, the economy, like typically all of these entities are geared towards keeping you from feeling your true power and potential, so that you need them because they need you. And if, if that power shifts and you realize that they need you more than you need them, then they're fucked. So they need to devise plans and guidelines and scripture and structure and fear-based freaking marketing and fear-based freaking marketing, and they need to design all this stuff to get you scared and give up your personal power and hand it over to them so that you are dependent on them.
Speaker 1:And over the last eight years, I've taken back my personal power, and the line that I use when I'm in a speaking engagement is, of course, I'm full of myself. Who else should I be full of? Who else can I be full of? What this means is when people, when someone says you're full of yourself, what they're really saying is I'm empty, and you should be too. I don't believe in myself. You shouldn't either. I shouldn't. I don't trust myself. You shouldn't either. I don't feel good about myself. You shouldn't either. I reject myself. You should too. I don't believe I'm worthy of feeling valuable. You shouldn't either. But when you do feel valuable, you do feel worthy, you do feel significant, you do feel adequate, you do feel secure in your own skin. You do trust yourself to make the best decision for you. When you don't look to a book to make a decision for you, you take back your power, and people who constantly give their power away will not like what that looks like because they don't know how to do it. What that looks like because they don't know how to do it.
Speaker 1:Now, early on in this journey for me, I know Angie and I were married for 16-ish years before we really started figuring some shit out, and what would happen is, I felt that marriage was two people giving up the life that they wanted to live together to create one watered down life instead of two lives, and I could say that we compromised away any sense of happiness, any sense of joy, we compromised away any sense of integrity, we compromised away any sense of purpose or inspiration in our marriage. And we had become so depleted. We had become so battle-worn from attacking each other, from hurting each other, from destroying each other from, because we were constantly giving up our personal power to each other and we were constantly wrestling the other's personal power away from them. We were compromising ourself and trying to get the other person to compromise themselves for our best interest. We were in such a state of just battle that there was nothing good about our relationship.
Speaker 1:And when I realized what the hell was happening because I started understanding what personal power is, that I am a sovereign being, a fucking adult man who can make my choices can, who can make my choices, who doesn't have to compromise myself, who can follow my own purpose, my own passion, my own mission. Who can say yes when I want to say yes. Who can say no when I want to say no. Who can look to books for guidance but not for decision making. Who can interact with people who are wise and ask for information, seek information but never let anyone make a decision for them when to turn off the television and stop the fear-based bullshit that's coming at you from a political and an economic standpoint, to stop letting any religion control you, manipulate you or keep you in the machine, because any organization that convinces you that you need them, that you need to stay, that there's only one way to do something, is called a fucking cult. If they're not helping you create more freedom in your life, then they don't have your best interest in mind. They're trying to keep you in the container. If they try to keep you in the container, they're trying to keep you contained, and if they're trying to keep you contained, it's not in your best interest in that relationship.
Speaker 1:When I started realizing this and I saw what was happening, that I had basically turned over all of my personal expression. I had turned over all of my personal power. I had turned over all of my personal sovereignty, all of my personal autonomy, to my work, to my wife, to religion, to politics, to the economy I turned over everything and I never trusted or believed in myself. I never felt capable of making my own decisions or standing on my own two feet. I felt dependent and I felt like a puppet of all of them. When I realized this, I started the process of taking back my personal power.
Speaker 1:When I started the process of taking back my personal power, I started realizing that there's 8 billion people on the planet and everyone is significant and I'm one of them and I'm significant, just like them. And I is significant and I'm one of them and I'm significant just like them. And I'm valuable and I'm worthy. And I started putting myself first. I came downstairs in my basement and I jumped on the treadmill and my wife literally tried to guilt and shame me to get me to stop, and that had worked before, but this time I didn't let it work. Whenever I started to try to improve myself, she attacked me because she wasn't improving herself. Whenever I started to put myself first, she used guilt and shame, anger, threats and blame to get me to stop putting myself first and to put myself second, just like all of us in our family who were all putting ourselves second, who were all compromising ourselves, who were all neglecting ourselves. All four of us were doing the same thing and all of us were miserable Me, my wife, my kids we were all neglecting ourselves because we were all putting ourselves second and we were all putting everybody else's needs above ours. And we were all fucking miserable. And I taught my children how to be miserable and how to neglect themselves.
Speaker 1:And when I saw the delusion of this and I took back that personal power, my wife went on the attack. And when she went on the attack, I filed for divorce. And that was the first time in my life that I ever ever stood up for myself, that I ever claimed what I wanted and demanded that I was going to get what I wanted, because I was going to have a peaceful marriage. I just didn't know if it was going to be with her, and I told her that. And I told her that and together over the next seven years seven and a half years we created a peaceful marriage. Together we created a peaceful home. We created an empowered, inspired, supportive, connected, intimate relationship based on friendship and love and encouragement and support.
Speaker 1:And all of that happened because I stopped giving up my personal power and I started taking control of my sovereignty, and sovereignty means that you are capable of making your own decisions for yourself. And in order to recognize your sovereignty, in order to recognize your divinity, you must stop listening to authorities outside of you to make your decisions. And if you look around in the world, it shits everywhere it's on television, it's in marketing, it's in religion, it's in now we're going through an election cycle and start making your own decisions, not based on fear. Say yes when you want to say yes, no when you want to say no and let the consequences occur, because all those consequences means that the expired things in your life are going to start falling away. And as the expired things in your life falls away, then the things that are most meaningful and prevalent in your life are going to come into play.
Speaker 1:Guys, I don't have this agenda against religion, but religion created, there was a wound in me. I don't have an agenda against religion. I have an agenda against anything that hurts people and keeps them trapped and keeps them a puppet in the fucking system and in the machine. And right now, what I'm realizing more than ever is the machine is everywhere and it hates people who have personal autonomy and personal sovereignty and demonstrate a freedom of being themselves and isn't susceptible to fear. And in order to recognize this, you must start taking back your personal power right now. Stop looking outside of you for approval. Stop looking outside of you for being adequate. Stop looking to any initials to validate your intelligence, and when I say initials, I'm talking about MBA and MD and PhD. Stop looking to any MSW, master of Social Work. Stop looking at any of those as your means to be significant or adequate. Stop looking outside of you and start looking in.
Speaker 1:When you look inside, you're going to find that in the Bible it says the kingdom of heaven is within, but most religion don't want you to understand that. They still want you to chase a God that's outside of you and everything you need is locked deep inside of you. And what I was taught when I was a kid is if I rely on myself, I'm going to hurt a lot of people. If I believe in myself, I'm going to hurt a lot of people. If I trust myself, I'm going to hurt a lot of people. If I trust myself, I'm going to hurt a lot of people. And what I found out is that is the exact opposite of what's happened.
Speaker 1:The more I believe in myself, the more I rest in myself, the more I love myself, the more I trust myself, the more I allow myself to feel valuable, worthy and deserving, the more positive impact I make in this world and the harder I love the people that I serve in this world. Stop looking outside of you for approval and for a means to be okay. Start looking in and you're going to find all the answers that you've ever searched for, all the answers that you've ever searched for. It doesn't mean you can't see guidance outside, but don't turn over your personal autonomy to anyone. Reserve that for yourself. Accept feedback, accept counsel, but you are the chooser of your destiny. Make sure you're not giving that up to someone just because you don't feel valuable enough to make your own decisions. If you don't feel valuable enough to make your own decisions, if you don't believe in yourself, if you don't trust yourself, if you don't feel worthy and deserving, it's your conditioning and your programming talking and it's time to let that shit go.