Ep246. Rewiring Your Nervous System: The Real Work Behind Breaking Through and Stepping Through Limitations.

This episode captures a raw and unfiltered moment as Mike records from Nashville at the start of an Inner Wealth Mastermind retreat. What begins as a simple setup quickly turns into a deeper conversation about the real work being done—helping people move beyond surface-level change and into the patterns wired into their nervous system. Through a powerful reframing exercise, Mike challenges listeners to question what they believe is “true” about their lives and uncover the deeper conditioning driving those experiences.

As the episode unfolds, Mike shares personal stories around visibility, body shame, and the fear of being fully seen, leading into a bold decision to confront those patterns head-on during the retreat. Using Marine Corps training as a parallel, he explains how repeated exposure to discomfort rewires the nervous system. This episode sets the foundation for doing the deeper work required to break internal limitations and step into a new level of freedom.

Key Takeaways

1. Your nervous system determines your reality.
   What you experience in life is not just based on circumstance, but on what your nervous system is wired to accept, reject, or create. 
2. Reframing “I am” reveals deeper truth.
   Shifting from “I am” statements to “my nervous system is wired to…” exposes the root of your patterns and where real work begins. 
3. Avoiding discomfort keeps you stuck.
   Growth doesn’t happen in comfort—it happens when you intentionally move toward what feels uncomfortable and confront it directly. 
4. Visibility can trigger deep internal resistance.
   Even when we consciously desire to be seen, unconscious patterns can create fear, shame, and self-sabotage when that visibility increases. 
5. Immersion rewires your nervous system.
   Just like in Marine Corps training, repeated exposure to discomfort can retrain your system to remain calm, present, and effective in previously triggering situations. 

Notable Quotes

•  “My nervous system wasn’t ready to be seen at that level yet. It wasn’t quite ready. I had some work to do before I could be seen and before I could be experienced at that level of public visibility.” 
•  “What most people don’t understand is what’s within them buried deep in their nervous system… it’s that that’s keeping all of that from them.” 
•  “We can’t do that by finding and seeking comfort. We’ve got to be willing to get uncomfortable.” 
•  “When you first experience that, your body basically almost folds… you’ve never experienced that level of stress in your life.” 
•  “When we release the blockages and the resistance that’s inside of us… things that are perfect and aligned and natural for us… they’ll start to flow into our life.” 

Call to Action

If this episode connected with you and you’re ready to stop rearranging your external world and start doing the deeper work that creates real, lasting freedom…

If you’re ready to understand how your nervous system is shaping your life—and how to begin rewiring it for what you actually want, email Mike directly:

mike@innerwealthglobal.com

You’ll connect directly with him—no assistant, no gatekeeper—just a real conversation to explore what’s possible.

Music Credit: "What's Left of Me" by Wes Hoffman & Friends

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Transcript

The Feeling Something Is Missing

SPEAKER_00 0:04

You ever wake up feeling like there's something missing in your life? You ever feel the need to escape your business? Are you running your life or is your life running you? I'm like Gitco and I'll help you design and create a life so authentic and aligned with who you really are, 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. First of all, I want to address that this is not, we're not sitting in the optimal circumstances for podcasting. So if you hear a lot of stuff going on, like air conditioners and and trucks below us, yeah, that's we're in Nashville, Tennessee, and uh we chose to be somewhere near the uh the heart of everything, Broadway. And uh we've got our mastermind retreat starting today. We got uh some of our students coming in this afternoon, and tomorrow, uh tomorrow we have a full uh a session where we discuss soul sciences and uh and that's gene keys, natal astrology, human design. We'll do some some soul science work, and then on Thursday and Friday, we are in full sessions where it's it's really about doing body work, doing uh doing a deep dive into you know what's happening in our mind and body to start to clear out the clutter of what's going on. So that's what we're doing over the next couple days. Uh we're not in the usual tropical destinations or the mountainous, beautiful destinations that we're used to usually in for our retreats, but uh we wanted to pick somewhere kind of close to St. Louis where it was within driving range, you know, and that's why we're here. So uh so we're gonna we're gonna take imperfect action instead of no action. But listen, a lot of things have been uh coming up over the last week or so, all right? A lot of a lot of new reveals. And the other day I did a uh I did a video. And if you don't follow me on Facebook and TikTok and uh across social media feeds, if you don't uh if you don't follow me on uh my YouTube channel, go subscribe and go connect to all these all these different uh ways that you know that I share content in the world and share videos and and inspiration and podcasts and everything else. But go go connect to these things. Subscribe, like, share, you know, it helps us reach our expand our reach. But the other day, uh I I shared a video and it was a very simple message, and it was like even less than a minute long. And I said, here's what I want you to do. I want you to get a piece of paper, and I would challenge you to do this, right for your own. Get a piece of paper and write down everything that's true for you. And I'm gonna give you some some examples, right, to work through. Everything that's true for you. I am wealthy, I am broke, I struggle with money, I only just have enough. So get really clear about what that is. How about I am happy or I am unhappy? Or how about I am happy in my marriage or I am unhappy in my marriage? Or how about I am healthy, or how about I am not healthy? How about um we can pick anything. We can uh I love myself, I hate myself, I'm disgusted at myself. Uh how about I love my life? How about I hate my life? How about my life is full of struggle? Get clear about all these different things in the world. How about I love to show up and be seen? How about I I am scared to show up and be seen? Like whatever's true for you and get really, really honest and get really get really clear about what's true for you. And then it might take some re-sculpting and re-wording, but scratch out all the IMs and put my replace it with my nervous system is wired to experience or to be, or my my nervous system is wired for whatever that looks like. You gotta wordsmith it a little bit, but because this is where you'll find the deepest truth. That that turns I am wealthy into I am why my nervous system is wired to be wealthy. If if you're broke, my nervous system is wired to be broke. My nervous system is wired to be happy, my nervous system is wired to be unhappy. My my nervous system is wired to be seen, to love to be seen. My nervous system is wired that I hide from being seen. Whatever's true for you. I am what my nervous system is wired to be healthy, my nervous system is wired to be unhealthy. Whatever, there's where you'll find your deepest truth. And and when you experience that, that's when we can really, really, really get to work, not on just rearranging what's happening in the external world around you, but really getting to the deeper work, the more meaningful work about reshaping and recreating a nervous system that is capable of experiencing a different relationship with whatever those things are. Now, this is really, really deep, meaningful, impactful work. All right. And when I started doing some of this stuff, what I've noticed is let me tell you a story. Years and a couple years ago, about maybe about two or three years ago, we had a uh we had a boom in our business. Our mastermind expanded from around somewhere between 15 and 20 students to we we we blew up to like 75. And we had a we had a mastermind retreat in Miami, Florida. And it was awesome. There are about 55 of us in a house. My wife and and Kara Dossi, our operations assistant. They they rented this amazing Airbnb. It was a it was a the freaking, it was a just a beautiful mansion, I guess we could call it. And we had all 55 people hanging out, and not everybody was staying there, obviously, but but we were there, we were at the retreat, and and it was like living my dreams and kind of like what I really wanted to experience, where I could go to four different places and we had breakout sessions, and I had four different coaches teaching these breakout sessions, and I got to see and experience work getting done with people in the mastermind, real work, real contemplative, real existential work getting done. And I just got to observe it instead of teach it, instead of lead it, instead of facilitate it. And that had always been a dream of mine, like for work to be getting done, but for me not to be always the one doing the work. It's something I wanted to experience. But I gotta tell you what I really experienced in that in that mastermind retreat is that there were a lot of people there, and there were a lot of eyes on me, and I was really, really visible, and it scared the living bejesus out of me. That there were so many eyes following me all around that house and watching what I was watching what I was doing and watching how I was showing up and watching how I was interacting with everybody, and that was a lot of eyes and a lot of visibility. And up to that point in my life, although I craved visibility, although I craved for that level of focus and admiration and attention, there is a part of me that knows I'm here to experience that and to and to be a part of that. I gotta admit that some of the deeper layers of me struggled with that because, you know, there was too many eyes, and I felt the judgment and I felt the rawness of they're gonna see who I really am and instead of this image that I have because they're gonna spend a lot of time with me. And in not this week with our retreat, we got around 13 people, but in that retreat with 55 people, that was that was a lot of eyes on me. And and that was a a whole new level of uh being seen that I had never experienced before. And when we came home from the mastermind of the retreat, unconsciously, unconsciously, I started kind of tearing it down. I started started peeling back layers and kind of condensing it all very unconsciously, and now I realize that my the deeper layers of my nervous system wasn't ready to be seen at that level yet. It wasn't quite ready. I had some work to do before I could be seen and before I could be experienced at that level of public visibility. Now, all these years later later, two through two or three years later, I'm doing the deeper work, the the more meaningful work of being seen. And let me get kind of give you an example of what this looks like. When I was a little kid, I was somewhere around seven years old, I went to, I was in Boy Scouts or Cub Scouts or whatever, but we we had some swim training that we were going to do. And we were we were down the YMCA and with our whole little troop or pack or whatever the hell we were at that time, we were in the uh we were getting ready to go to the pool area, and I was uh I was I was in the we were walking single file out to the pool and I was in the back. I didn't want anybody's eyes on me. And uh, you know, because I had my shirt off and I was exposed. But I walked out, you know, I was last, and and when we got out to the pool, I jumped in the pool as fast as possible because I wanted to hide my body. And they the instructors called me back out of the pool, and I stood by the side of the pool, and I put my hands on my boobs, and and I, because I was uh I was I I've been chubbed, I was almost 10 pounds when I was born. So there's always been some flub and some chub on on this frame of mine, right? But I was hiding the boobs and I was kind of shrinking my my torso because I didn't want anybody to really look and see my body. It's like I was born with this body shame for whatever reason. And uh, and I've been experiencing it ever since. When I was when I was in high school, I would never shower after gym class, as disgusting as that sounds, because I didn't want to be seen. I didn't have a girlfriend until I was 18 years old, because this was, I felt this was disgusting. So I didn't want to subject anybody else to that. And and I kind of deprived myself of a good social life and a good, you know, a sexual life. And and and all my friends were out and socializing, girlfriending it up, you know, being just human in the world, you know, being a teenager, being, you know, just chasing, chasing girls and chasing fun. And I was kind of buried and and I kept myself buried in the uh in my my room, my my house or whatever, wherever I was. So my friends, when I was in my you know, late teens and early 20s, my friends would go down the ocean every year for seven, 10 days. They'd always invite me, but I would never go because they went in hot tubs together. They went to uh you know, they went to the ocean together. And I just didn't want to be seen by by those those my folks, my friends, that I thought if they saw me and saw who I really was and what was underneath the layers, if they saw it and experienced it, then they reject me and I'd never get an invite again and and and they wouldn't want they wouldn't want me. When when I was in the Marine Corps, I you know, where when all of my friends were out chasing tail and and all of my my marine buddies, they were being chased by girls just because of the uniform that we were wearing, which that shit is real. You know, I was in my barracks room hiding away. I didn't want to be seen. So yeah, I've I've I've always experienced this shame of my body, right? And I've expressed it on here before, but at this mastermind retreat, I'm gonna do something different. I'm gonna do something different, and I'm sharing this because this podcast launches on Thursday. And by the time uh this podcast or when this podcast launches, the day of our first full day in session, I'm gonna do something that I've never done before, and I'm gonna do something to start really accelerating working through this. I am gonna come out and I am gonna start teaching and I'm gonna start sharing some of this exact stuff with my folks. And then I'm gonna have a rainbow speedo on underneath my clothes, and I'm gonna take off all my clothes, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be with them for about an hour from in the front of the room in a rainbow speedo. As from, you know, with with all in all my glory, I got, you know, it's uh I I was trying to think how can I keep this legal and be seen at the most level possible in order to start to work through this. And I know it's gonna be uncomfortable, I know it's gonna be frightening, I know I'm gonna hate it, I know it's gonna be the probably the most set unsettling hour or or whatever in my life, but it's something that's necessary for me to break through and to find the freedom that I know I want from myself and that I know I'm here to help people work through. Now, why do I need to take this drastic measure? Here's another story. When I I've got an America, I've got a shirt on, a t-shirt, if you guys aren't watching, but uh on YouTube, but I've got a t-shirt on, it says America, fuck yeah. All right, and I am a patriot. I freaking love this country, I love my country, I love the United States. I've hid that away a lot of times, and I'm working through that. And that's just one layer of being being seen and being accepted and being understood for who I am. That's just one layer, right? And I'm I'm doing this in all areas, all right? So it's making myself, putting myself in positions to face the discomfort in order to work through it. Now, my my America fuck yeah, shows my patriotism. And when I went to Marine Corps boot camp back in uh November of 1992, showing my age, when I went to boot camp in November 1992, I gotta admit, that first day you get dropped into boot camp and there's five people all around you, five Marines around you, and they they they very rarely do at that level at that time in our our uh our recruit training, they very rarely like scream at you by themselves. They always have multiple people multiple Marines around you screaming at the same time. And the reason being is because they are trying to they are trying to expose you to as much freaking chaos as humanly possible without being in a wartime cut situation. And it's not uncommon to have a drill instructor in front of you, a drill instructor on your left, a drill instructor on your right, and one even behind you, and they are just surrounding you and they are all screaming different stuff. One's telling you to stand up, one's telling you to sit down, one's telling you to take undress, one's telling you to get dressed, one's telling you it's just like complete chaos. And they there's in they're in no way organized, and they know that they are giving you mixed signals. And when you listen to one and you don't listen to the other, then the one that you didn't listen to is gonna scream, oh, so I now I don't matter, you don't take orders, and they're just exposing you to the craziest shit possible. And when you first experience that, you've never experienced up to this point, you've never in your life experienced that level of agitation and discomfort and chaos and and internal anxiety and struggle and and just tension. You've never, pressure, you've never experienced that level of stress in your life. And on that first day, it's like you your your body basically almost folds. Your body becomes paralyzed, and and you it's like everything that you do takes five times longer, and that makes it worse because now they're screaming at you more. And over the course of the next three months, not approximately 90 days, over the course of the next three months, your body becomes normalized within that chaos. And at the end of 90 days, at the end of recruit training, if there's ever four or five drill instructors around you, your body doesn't even react or respond or get triggered. In fact, when they're screaming at you by the end of boot camp, it's almost funny. And people start the Marines start or recruits, we're not Marines at that time, recruits almost start to like laugh and laugh at how freaking stupid some of these guys are being, and how you're you're in this situation where you can't possibly win, and you you might as well not even try because you know there's no way to win, and all they're gonna do is scream at you more. And that is the point of the whole thing, and the whole exercise and the reason for this immersion is that the first day of boot camp, your nervous system is wired to be stressed out in chaotic situations. And by the end of 90 days, your body is rewired to be comfortable and relaxed in those same exact, those same exact experiences in that same exact environment. And that's why in combat, Marines tend to keep their military bearing about them. They keep their head, they keep their wits, and they're able to take on, right, identify the mission of the Marine Corps, identify, close with, and destroy the fire by close by destroy the enemy by fire and close combat. Like that is the mission of the Marine Corps and the mission of the Marine Corps rifleman. As brutally honest as that is, that is your that is the the business of being a Marine, to locate, close with, and destroy the enemy by fire and close combat. And if you your body is stressed out by being in chaotic situations, then you don't have your wits. And if you don't have your wits, you can't take care of business. Meanwhile, the enemy hasn't been trained in chaos, so you automatically have a natural advantage. Now, this is what we're doing in the Interwealth Mastermind Retreat. It's beginning the process of becoming uncomfortable in that thing by first identifying how it is our nervous system is wired, and then leaning in and running into the discomfort so that we can become wired for what we want instead of what we don't want. And the reason for the the Rainbow Speedo is because leaders gotta lead by example, and and the the best way to get people's attention and the uh the work that's most meaningful and most beneficial. The way that I'm planning and choosing to do this is by be the being the example, doing the thing, doing the work, letting them feel their discomfort. Because when I'm in a sp a rainbow speedo, they're gonna be just as uncomfortable, if not more, than me. Because they're gonna know how uncomfortable I am. I'm gonna tell them. And they get to face that discomfort. And this is why, this is how when we're wired for being broke, we gotta, we gotta get into situations where you feel why you're how how you're wired for for being broke through shadow work, through self-reflection, through contemplation, get into our body and find where these pockets of pain, these pockets of resistance, these pockets of belief are so that we can kind of like expel them. Find them, move them, and expel them, release them. But we can't do that by finding and seeking comfort. We've got to be willing to get uncomfortable. And if you're afraid to be seen, you've got to be, you've got to put yourself in position to be seen. There might be people that they're at the front of the room, they don't know it yet, but they're gonna be singing a cappello by themselves. They're gonna be screaming because their voice has been timid their whole life. They're going to just be speaking and speaking their truth in front of a room because they've always withheld their truth. They're going to be doing some things, and I'm gonna put them in certain certain circumstances that's gonna make them radically uncomfortable. Whatever they're facing, that's gonna make them radically uncomfortable so that they can finally lean into the discomfort and start to work through it. But I've got to do it from example. By the time you you see this or or see this or listen to it, the work will probably already be in process and progress. And next week, on next week's podcast, what I plan to do is talk about the experience that we had in the room with that. And uh, I plan to share pictures and videos on social media because listen, my body doesn't look pretty. I've got I've got a dunlap, I've got rolls, I've got back hair, I've got stretch marks, right? I've got extra skin everywhere, and my body is all my mind and my ego and my nervous system's always said, hey, if we run enough and if we lift enough, if we become skinny enough, if if we become buff enough, and I'm talking about me, then we can show our body. But you know what? My body was never ever built to be okay with my body. And I know, I know a human being, I and I admire this guy that doesn't have a naturally skinny build. And oftentimes he's very, very big. And sometimes he gets smaller, but sometimes most of the time he's he's on the larger side. And you know what? When he when he shows, he goes on he goes to the beach and he has no problem in his skin, he has no problem showing showing his body, and uh that's because his nervous system is be is built to not be ashamed of his body. Where my body is built to be ashamed of this body. And it's time to face that. What, with all this that I'm talking about and talking you through and sharing with you, what is the thing that's been a pattern and a deep-seated source of blockage in your life that's kept you small, that's kept you from experiencing a bigger life, from experiencing more in life by from experiencing more wealth? Is it asking for a sale? Is it asking for more? Right? In some cases, and one thing I didn't say, I have, I am uh courageous and open sexually. Some people are their nervous system is built to be open and courageous sexually. And some people are built to wither on their, you know, even thinking about sex and asking for sex. So these are things like you we we deserve. Everybody deserves an abundant life, a wealthy life. Everybody deserves happiness, deserves health, deserves lots of awesome sex, deserves being seen and sharing our gifts with the world. But not everybody's built for all these things. And while most people are share are chasing circumstances in their life, what most people don't understand is what it's what's within them, buried deep in their nervous system, that's been conditioned and programmed and buried for so long. It's that that's keeping all of that from them. And the the work in inner wealth and the work in inner wealth mastermind and in all of my work, my teachings, my workshop, is to find what's in there that's keeping you blocked and get after it. Finally get after it. Because when we release the blockages and the resistance that's inside of us, things that are perfect and aligned and natural for us that that we've desired pretty much our whole life, that yeah, they'll start to they'll start to flow into our life and we'll get the opportunity to receive them. All right. But we got some work to do. All right. I'm sharing this because I'm teeing it up for next week. This is gonna be a lot of fun, uncomfortable as fuck for me, but I'm not just here for comfort. I'm here to set myself free. And hopefully the work that I do also helps to set you free. I love you guys. Check back next week and I'll I'll decompress with you and share my experience and the experience that we had in the room. All right. This week, do some contemplation on what that thing is that's keeping you blocked. And next week, let's get after it. If you enjoyed what you heard and you want to learn more, go to www.innerwealthglobal.com for more tools and resources.