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
Ep201. The Power of Radical Transparency: Embracing Messiness as a Spiritual Superpower.
In this episode, Mike gets raw, real, and radically transparent about the unseen messiness we all carry—and the beauty that emerges when we stop hiding it. From awkward small talk to powerful stage presence, Mike dives into the truth of what it feels like to be fully exposed, seen, and still standing strong. With stories of struggle, solitude, insecurity, and service, this episode is an unapologetic reminder that your imperfections are where your power lives.
Whether you feel broken, incomplete, or just tired of pretending you’ve got it all figured out, this is your permission slip to embrace it all—and to know you’re never alone. Mike invites you into his world of radical transparency and spiritual chiropractic, where healing and wholeness come from sharing the whole damn truth.
Key Takeaways
- Radical Transparency is Freedom
The more you reveal, the more powerful and valuable you become. Sharing your shadows is the real path to wholeness. - Your Mess is Your Magic
There’s no need to hide the dark. Bringing your brokenness into the light is where true healing begins. - Solitude Isn’t Isolation—It’s Sacred
Choosing peace over peopling can be medicine, but hiding from connection out of fear keeps you stuck. - You’re Not Alone in the Struggle
Everyone—yes, everyone—is working through something. Don’t let the highlight reels fool you. - Real Transformation Lives in Exposure
When you expose your truth, you access your power—and you give others permission to do the same.
Notable Quotes
- “One of the greatest things that we can do is practice radical transparency.”
- “If you allow the imperfections to feel perfect, if you accept your imperfections, if you embrace your imperfections, you will find the perfection in who you are.”
- “The more we share what we’re actually feeling, the more we share what’s going on in our body, when we share what’s going on in our life, not only do we feel better, we feel more valuable, we feel more seen, but so will everybody else too.”
- “Everybody, every single person. And the more we share our messiness—not to get pity and sympathy, not to be validated—but the more we share our messiness, the more valuable, real, raw, the more transformational your life will become.”
- “It's not just a personality quality. It is that, but in many cases it’s driven by fear.”
Music Credit: "What's Left of Me" by Wes Hoffman & Friends
Join the Revolution
This episode is a reminder that you’re not stuck—you’re being called into a deeper version of yourself. If it feels like your life is stretching, cracking, or pulling at the seams… that’s because something true is trying to emerge. Join me for a conversation about breaking free, reclaiming your voice, and letting your next level rise from within.
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Mike Kitko is an executive self-mastery coach, speaker and author. He found external success through powerful titles, incomes, and material possessions. He ultimately fell into depression, toxic abuse of alcohol, and the near collapse of his family before he began a journey of internal happiness and success.
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:I once had a speaking engagement, but I didn't know I was going to have a speaking engagement. I went to a meetup and one of my friends was having an entrepreneur meetup and there was going to be 100, 150 people there and he was doing this monthly and I went to support my friend and when I walked in, I just walked up to him, gave him a hug and I said, hey, man, I'm here to support, let me know if I can help. And he goes. He said, oh, you're, you're going to help, all right, you're going to help and uh, and I'll let you know when, when I need you. So I just like everybody else there, I went and grabbed the seat and my wife was sitting next to me and there's a good group of people 100, 150 people probably and he started the conversation and he opened up the dialogue this way. He said you know, authenticity is a superpower, like the energy of authenticity is the most attractive quality and the most attractive trait that anybody, the energy that anybody can bring, like the frequency of authenticity, will dominate anything that's not real and crush it. So tonight, our topic of authenticity, to make sure that we are demonstrating the highest level of authenticity. The speaker that I'm going to have come speak with me doesn't even know that he's going to speak, but we're going to get up here and we're going to jam and I guarantee you you're going to be better off for it. And that's when he called me up, called me up on the stage. I stood up and I had literally no idea I was going to be walking up on the stage. And I got up there and he said all right, mike, tell everybody the background and the backstory and the recovery, like the death and the rebirth of Mike Kitko. And I set out in that I think we talked for probably an hour and a half.
Speaker 1:I set out and I talked about the near suicide, I talked about being controlled by alcohol. I talked about the collapse from Fortune 500 America. I talked about the almost collapse of my marriage, of my health, of my family, the physical, mental and emotional abuse that was inside of my house and sometimes the sexual abuse of my wife. I talked about all of the freaking garbage and all of the shadows garbage and all of the shadows and I just wanted to let them know who I was, let them see me. But there was another aspect of what people got out of that speaking engagement and what they took away. And after the speaking engagement, there was a line to speak with me and just about every person in that line said something along the lines of I feel more adequate, I feel more significant and I feel more valuable in some way, shape or form. They might not use these words, but in some way, shape or form. They said that they feel more complete and more whole because of my story, because oftentimes we compare our back office to other people's front office.
Speaker 1:If you look on social media, people people share their wins easily. They share all their accomplishments. I closed this deal, I bought this business. Here's my portfolio, here's the amount that I have in my rental portfolio and I'm worth X number of dollars. And you see influencers getting on planes and flying and sitting on Lambos and you see all of the highlight reels for everybody, but very rarely does anyone share their deepest, darkest shit, the garbage, the shadows, the pain that they've been mired in or maybe that they've transcended, or maybe that has them in a stranglehold or a chokehold or a headlock right there in that moment. Maybe they're probably not sharing that, but they're probably having some sense of struggle or suffering in that moment and they're just not letting anyone know. They're just. They keep sharing their wins and what that does is, first of all, it's inauthentic as fuck, but second of all, it causes people who are in a state of struggle, who are in a state of pain, who aren't courageous enough to share even their wins or their challenges. It's making them feel even more broken, even more devalued, even more incomplete, even more just inadequate.
Speaker 1:One of the greatest things that we can do is practice radical transparency, and what I mean by that is share all of it, share the good, share the bad, because when we share the good and we share the bad, everybody can see that there might be some wins in our lives, but it's not. Those wins don't come with an absence of pain, of some sense of being bruised and battered and beaten up a little bit. Today, on this episode and I think this started off powerfully, talking about the power of radical transparency and radical honesty and sharing, and inside the Inner Wealth Mastermind, we share our wins and we honesty and sharing. And inside the Interwealth Mastermind, we share our wins and we share our challenges. We share all of it so that we can all understand where we're winning and where we're challenged, so we can pitch in and we can celebrate the wins, but also so we can bond together and unify and help people overcome those challenges, because if we don't know about a challenge, then we can't help people overcome those challenges, because if we don't know about a challenge, then we can't help. The reason I'm sharing this today and the reason I started this today is because I want to tell you about a personality quality that I've demonstrated that has a shadow aspect, and I want to help you understand what I'm working through right now. So maybe by sharing what I'm working through, maybe it'll help you feel a little more complete, feeling a little more whole, feeling a little more adequate and being willing to share not just your wins with people, but also being able to share something from a state of vulnerability to help somebody else feel more valuable, more complete, more whole. You see, I like to say that I'm not a real people-y person and I don't love peopling a lot. Now I do love people. I do love working with people within the Interwealth Mastermind, my inner wealth community, my one-on-one clients. I love speaking on a stage. I love helping people. I do I legitimately, authentically, absolutely head over heels, love helping people.
Speaker 1:There's a guy that Angie, my wife Angie, and I go when we go to a certain pub and when there's a bartender, and we got to know this guy and got to hang out with him a little bit. You know sitting sitting there having a pint. But we got to know this guy and and there's something about him, he's charismatic and there was just he's a, he's younger I was going to say he's a kid, but cause I'm 52, but he just turned 30. And there's something really, really cool about this guy and something like powerful that I just wanted to unlock and I started asking him questions when we were at, when we were at the, at the pub, and he's in the middle of a career transition and when I started digging into tapping into his soul a little bit. I have some assessments that I use to help people understand themselves and their path and kind of what's right for them, what's correct for them and I shared this with him and when I saw the results, this guy was this guy's a superstar, he's a powerhouse. And I told him this and then I invited him over to my house to talk about the assessment, to talk about his path, and you know what? There was nothing in it for me. I didn't ask anything from the kid. All I wanted to do was help. All I wanted to do was leave him better.
Speaker 1:I legitimately love helping people. I'm a selfless servant and I loved our session together and I know he left better than when he arrived. I don't love peopling, but I love helping people. Now, if we ever go, if you ever go to a big event and I'm there I want you to watch because you're probably going to see me on the outskirts of the event. I don't love being in the middle of the room. I love being in the front of the room, but I don't love being in the middle of the room. I would rather be an observer against the wall or in front of the room, commanding the room and teaching the room, and there's a certain element of me that would rather be home than in that room.
Speaker 1:I love my alone time. I love my aloneness. I love my alone time. I love my aloneness. I love my solitude. It's medicine for me, it's very calming. I get to choose my peace, I get to connect with my peace and I get to honor my peace and it feels really good to be me when I'm in a state of solitude. That wasn't always the case, and if you look at my natal astrology chart, I have three planets in the fourth house and that's that's the the house of, of peace, of solitude, of home, of being home. So, anyway, I do love to be alone and I I feel a lot of times I feel insecure around people.
Speaker 1:I don't love engaging in small talk.
Speaker 1:I don't love the get to know you conversation. I don't love that. I don't love the getting to know your favorite sports teams and I don't enjoy doing life on the surface. I love getting really, really deep into the mire and into the muck of pain and suffering and struggle and all the hidden places that people like to keep people out of. I love to get into that so that we can do something with it, so that we can make something out of it, so we can heal it, so we can resolve it. I love getting into those messy spaces. But knowing your favorite color and knowing how many kids you have and knowing you know if you're married, those things they're not very interesting to me and I find myself, when I'm out and about, that there's a lot of people that engage in really really shallow conversation.
Speaker 1:I get, I'm not entertained, I'm not amused, I don't enjoy it and I often find myself very socially awkward in those situations. Now, if we're in a room and I shake your hand and I say what's your deepest, darkest pain, and you start to share, I'm with you, I'm in the mix. But man, if somebody like when I first meet somebody, it's, it's, it's a struggle for me, I feel socially awkward, it causes me to feel really really off offset, off balance inside and I can't describe. It just gives me these feelings that that aren't enjoyable. It just gives me these feelings that aren't enjoyable. And although I am electric in a room and I am, my presence is. It brings peace and it brings power and it brings purpose to people's lives. Those first moments, meeting people, it's very, very awkward and it's just easier to be an introvert. Meeting people, it's very, very awkward and it's just easier to be an introvert.
Speaker 1:Now, in my business, the more I'm in rooms, the more I'm with people, the more I interact with people, the easier it is for my business to grow. People get to know me, they get to trust me, they get to like me. They get to see that this tough marine exterior it's it doesn't match what's really inside, the ooey gooey like helper, servant person that loves to, loves to help people heal and resolve their shit. See, the outside of me doesn't match the inside. The inside's all gooey and mushy. The outside of me doesn't match the inside. The inside's all gooey and mushy. The outside, yeah, it looks like it's tough and it looks like it's intense and I am intense. But the outside looks like it's tough and it's rugged, but inside it doesn't feel that way.
Speaker 1:And especially when I'm in a room and I'm introducing myself to somebody that I don't know, now when it there's times there have been times and it's happening more frequently where when I'm in a room, people know who I am, especially in the St Louis area, especially in the St Louis area, I go to real estate meetups and my wife is known and my wife has a presence and I have a presence and I've helped a lot of companies and I've helped a lot of people. And people tend to know me and they will approach me and it's obvious that they're uncomfortable. But what they don't know is I'm as equally uncomfortable as they are. But I wouldn't say. I had one guy one time say, well, you're famous, and I'm like I'm not famous. I'm known. I'm definitely known, especially in the St Louis area, but I'm not famous by any means. And when someone feels uneasy to meet me, I just want them to know that they're not the only uneasy person that's engaged in that conversation.
Speaker 1:Now, there's a couple things I can do with this. One is I can keep saying that I prefer my solitude over being in a room, which is true, prefer my solitude over being in a room, which is true. Or I can start to put myself in the room and start to show up and start to find freedom in the insecurity instead of freedom from the insecurity, and that's where magic lives. It's when we feel the insecurity, we feel the inadequacy, we feel the insignificance and we continue to put ourselves into places where that feeling might be present, but we still do the thing anyway. When we're feeling these things, we've got choices to make. We can either pretend that they're going to go away at some point, or we can lean forward in them and bring forth all the messiness into the world. The more we share what we're actually feeling, the more we share what's going on in our body. When we share what's going on in our life, not only do we feel better, we feel more valuable, we feel more seen, but so will everybody else too.
Speaker 1:Guys, I am in August, on August 19th. I am in August, on August 19th. I've got a new book coming out. It's called Inner World, outer World, and I should receive my first author copies here in a week or two. And the last time I published a hard one publication day, I woke up in a cold sweat and was like what the fuck did I do? Oh, my God, I was scared to death.
Speaker 1:And this one, this one's not quite as scary, but it's it's also. There's also some fear in there, there's also some insecurity, there's also some inadequacy. And I've distributed my book to all of my, all my students in the mastermind and in the community and and some, some of my my closest allies. I've given it to them and I'm getting some really really good feedback from this, unsolicited. They don't have to give me this feedback, I'm not asking them, but they're giving me back feedback that's. That's phenomenal. And they're giving me back feedback. That's phenomenal. And they're giving me back feedback that didn't exist for the first one, for the first book, the first hard copy published book. But this one I'm starting to get some really good feedback and you know what? It's making me even more nervous?
Speaker 1:And those nerves are about being seen. What I mean by nerves is those feelings, but it's about being seen, it's about being known, it's about people understanding me at a deeper level. It's about people seeing the real messiness and the real beauty of what's happening inside of my Kitco, in my mind, in my body, in the containers of knowledge and wisdom that I have in there. Because when you're seen, and you're fully seen, then you're exposed, right. And when you're exposed, people can use it against you. Will they use it against me? No, but we all have these stories that if I let down my guard, then people will take advantage of me, and those stories have started to creep in.
Speaker 1:I've been doing spiritual work and healing work for nine years now. I started in March, right around the end of March, early April of 2016. And I've been doing this spiritual work for nine years now and there's always work to do. Every single successful and wealthy person that I know, they they call me when, when something well, most of the wealthy and successful people that I know when there's something that's not right in their life, when there's something that they're facing, when there's an internal threat that they're feeling, when there's this existential crisis, they call me and we work through these things. See, we're all working through something, every single one of us.
Speaker 1:There's 8.22 billion people on the face of the planet and every single person that you see is working through something has something internally that needs to be adjusted. I call it spiritual chiropractic. When people call me, we jump on a phone and we start to work through something. It's like doing a spiritual adjustment, an energetic adjustment, and by the end of the phone call, the adjustments made and they're back in action. They're back in motion until they're triggered again and then I get another call Until there's something else that's got them in a headlock or got them in a chokehold.
Speaker 1:But don't confuse the fact that every single person you see on the face of the planet is working through something. Don't feel like you're the only one that's incomplete or broken or feels insecure or feels inadequate, feels insignificant. I work with some of the most elite people in the, at least in the St Louis metropolitan area and from coast to coast, and I'll tell you that they're all dealing with something. They're all dealing in messiness. Everybody, every single person.
Speaker 1:And the more we share our messiness not to get pity and sympathy, not to be validated, but the more we share our messiness, the more valuable, real, raw, the more transformational your life will become, because we all, in some way, shape or form, feel incomplete. It's a lie, but it's a lie that we get to lean into by exposing it to the world and exposing it to light, because darkness doesn't doesn't stand a chance when it's exposed to light. And that's what happens when we tell about all of our messiness and all the shadows and all the things that you're scared of sharing with people. That's what needs to be shared most and if you're looking for a place to do that, lean into me, either me or one of my containers. The Interwealth Mastermind, the Interwealth community, my retreats, my intensives.
Speaker 1:I've got a container that can help you step into a room with people doing the exact same work, sharing their shadows, sharing their messiness, not to get pity and sympathy and all shucks, but to just feel whole and complete in the messiness, knowing we're all messy together and no one has it all figured out and there'll always be work to do, and the only time the work ends is when you take your last exhale.
Speaker 1:So here's what I'm calling you to task to do. Number one first and foremost, connect to your completeness and connect to your wholeness. Connect to your perfection, but that perfection includes everything imperfect about you, because we're all perfectly imperfect together. And if you allow the imperfections to feel perfect, if you accept your imperfections, if you embrace your imperfections, you will find a perfection in who you are. And that's when you'll realize the miracle that you are. And that miracle that you are.
Speaker 1:It comes with some messiness and you'll never rise above all of the messiness, but you can become a human in the messiness, with all of us, and I'm calling you forth into that place from my messiness. I'm calling you forth in your messiness to come and be messy together so that we can continue to grow and evolve as spiritual warriors and keep doing the work and keep growing and keep looking deep, deep, deep inside of ourselves for more messiness that needs to be cleaned up, because the more messiness we see, the more we can heal, and the more we heal, the more valuable, the more powerful, the more purposeful we'll feel. Don't ignore the messiness and don't pretend that it's not there. Allow it, accept it and embrace it, and that's where your true power really lives. Really lives. If you enjoyed what you heard and you want to learn more, go to wwwinnerwealthglobalcom for more tools and resources.