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Published: Jan. 24, 2021, 5:22 p.m.

Connect with Mike today! https://mikeiamele.com/

Mike Iamele is a writer, life purpose expert, and brand strategist. With his proprietary Sacred Branding® system, he’s helped hundreds of people to connect the dots between their lived experiences to find the common threads that explain their subconscious motivations, unique genius, and life purpose. People use this work for all kinds of things — from branding and building a business, to exploring identity and sexuality, to finding their artistic voice, to even re-discovering themselves after a life-altering event, like divorce or retirement. Mike’s also the author of Enough Already: Create Success on Your Own Terms (Conari Press 2015). He’s shared his provocative and vulnerable take on life in dozens of magazines, podcasts, and online publications, including a personal interview with NPR about his viral story on rethinking sexuality in his first same-sex relationship. Prior to Sacred Branding®, at only 22 years old, Mike co-founded Torch Communications, a boutique public relations firm, specializing in healthcare and disruptive technology. He currently lives in Somerville, MA, with his husband and two adorable dogs.

Brandon Handley 0:00
4321 Hey, their spiritual dove is Brandon Handley. And I am on with Mike Iaconelli who is a writer, life purpose expert and brand strategist. With his proprietary sacred branding system, he's helped hundreds of people to connect the dots between their lived experiences to find the common threads explained their subconscious motivations, unique genius and life purpose. People use this word for all kinds of things, from branding and building to business to exploring identity and sexuality to finding their artistic voice to even rediscovering themselves after a life altering event like divorce or retirement. Mike is also the author of enough already create success on your own terms. He shared his provocative and vulnerable take on life in dozens of magazines, podcasts and online publications, including a personal interview with NPR about his viral story on rethinking sexuality in his first first same sex relationship prior to sacred branding relationship prior Okay, sorry. Prior to sacred branding, at only 22 years old, Mike co founded torch communications, a boutique public relations firm specializing in health care and disruptive technology. I'm not gonna tell you where we live. They can find that on their own. But here's the deal, Mike, first, first of all, just while I'm going through this, thank you so much for joining me today.

Mike Iamele 1:24
Yeah, thanks, Brandon. This is awesome. I'm glad to be here.

Brandon Handley 1:26
Awesome. So I'm reading this. It's funny, though, because I was reading this earlier. And when I read it in his first same sex relationship, so like, I mean, multiples or, like, I mean, you What happened? There was

Mike Iamele 1:41
a great question. Let's dive right in. Um, you know, I previously had no conscious knowledge, no interest in men. To my knowledge, I've only dated women. And it was a time where I actually woke up one day vomiting blood. And that didn't stop for a few months, I was really, really sick. I was going from doctor to doctor trying to figure out what was wrong with me. And my roommate at the time was a friend of mine, we actually two roommates, but one of them was a friend of mine who was in the healthcare profession. And so he kind of became my caretaker, I couldn't drive myself to these appointments. You know, he really took care of me. And after about two months, I felt like I felt something. It wasn't sexual. It didn't even feel romantic. It just felt like something was a little different. And I think if it were any other time in my life, I probably wouldn't have acted on it. But I thought I was going to die. And so there I was kind of saying like, Well, you know, and I felt really weird. I said, Hey, I don't know what this is. I don't know if this is anything. But I kind of have these feelings. And he reciprocated he felt something. He didn't know what he also had never dated a man. And that led us on a year and a half, two year journey of exploring what that is. We are married today. We've been together for over nine years. So yeah, yeah. Yeah. Thank you.

Brandon Handley 2:59
How cool is that? How cool is that? So that's usually not my first question. But when I was reading through that, I'm like, what is what is in here? Right? So here's my first question is, hey, look, you know, we're both in the spiritual realm, we both we're both in this space where the universe talks to us, right? We're conduits for some type of energy, right? In these body shades, forms, minds, whatever the hell right? So given that, when we're when we're having a conversation, people that are tuning in listening to podcasts are tuned into something that only you can deliver, right, at this time, you know, sources delivering what message to them through you right now.

Mike Iamele 3:38
So what's the message I'm delivering? Yeah.

Brandon Handley 3:40
What's the what's the message, the sources sources pulling through right now,

Mike Iamele 3:44
you know, the message is that it's ironic because it's exactly what you're talking about, that every single one of us has a unique way, energy flows, unique sensitivities, unique purpose. And the thing is, I get really fired up about this, because the way we talk about purpose is toxic. And it really induces shame. And the reason for that is we talk about purpose, like it is achievable and aspirational. So we'll say things like, Oh, my purpose is to be a life coach. My purpose is to write a book, my purpose is to get married. And that's awesome. But here's the thing, if you can achieve it, that means you can also fail it. And that doesn't make sense, like how you fail your purpose. And more than that, if you can achieve it, it implies you didn't have it at a certain point. So did we just not have a purpose as babies like that doesn't make any sense whatsoever? Sure. And so I talk about purpose, a lot more like sensitivities. And here's the thing even as a baby before I learned one word I was sensitive to some things. Some babies are sensitive to music, and they can probably hear notes that I can't hear. Some babies are sensitive to certain colors. Some babies are sensitive to freedom. And if you're sensitive to freedom, you're probably going to feel trapped a lot more easily than I am. You're probably going to look for opportunities to feel free all the time and you're probably gonna create your best work when you do feel free, right know that sense? activity is going to start to color your entire experience of life. Every moment of your life, every trauma you have, every job you have, every relationship you have, is going to be either expressing or suppressing that to some degree. We're going exactly through that sensitivity. So we're sensitive. That's how we experience life. We see taste, touch, smell life, there are senses, right? That's what purpose is. Now, if I've got a container that can totally hold my purpose, it's like talking to my best friend. And time just flies by and genius just feels out of me. And I'm tapped into that unique thing coming through me right through my senses. Yeah. And then we have those other conversations, were kind of like, Am I saying the right thing? Am I doing the right thing, am I and we're on that level of technical. And then when we say if we're on the level of technical, we have no idea what the essence is, we're not actually tapped into essence, we're just trying to kind of mold this awkward container. But when I know I have boiling hot tea, I'm not going to put that in plastic, I'm not going to put that in a cup with a handle, I'm going to choose the right container. The second that, you know, essence, everything starts flowing. And that's why whether we're talking about relationships, whether we're talking about spirituality, trauma, healing, you've always no moment of your life has been wasted. You everything has a purpose. Obviously, the word purpose means why. But we have containers that can hold that purpose and containers that can't. And my interest in life is just knowing who we are removing any shame and then finding containers that can actually hold us.

Brandon Handley 6:29
Now. I love that, right. There's a there's a lot in there. And I think that that's a I think it's a great message. One of the one of the things that I wanted to share to what you talked about is you're going through your branding system, right, and how that can help you explore, explore your spirituality. And one of the things that I mentioned to you right before we got started here was, you know, more people reached out to me on on spiritual dope than a couple other podcasts. But what I did also nothing that I recognized and some of my other podcasts, the people that did reach out to me, my first one was fatherhood for the rest of us. And I had like this kind of weird dad snare, everybody's got a weird dad snare and always got to the you know, whatever. But like, he was like, he heroin overdose died, stuff like that, right? Like, about 30 40% of people I talked to. That's similar story, right? So you would track kind of who you are. I'm not saying, um, you. But you track like, like mines, right? So the people that are reaching out to me are also experiencing kind of what you're sharing that this your sacred branding system, right? And recognizing that marketing, isn't this the skeezy thing? Right? There can be some goodness that comes out of going through understanding what is your branding? What is right, so let's talk a little bit about your sacred branding system so that people can kind of understand it from that perspective.

Mike Iamele 7:54
Yeah. Well, let me tell you how it got started. Because it is, you know, everything looks glamorous, or retrospect. But I promise you, it is not. So, you know, I was at this moment where I was really sick, like I mentioned before, and I was kind of sort of navigating this relationship with my roommate. And I went around from healer to healer. You know, I wasn't into alternative healing at the time, but I was really desperate. And so I started going to reflexology, and Reiki and acupuncture and you know, energy healing, you name it, I was there. And one healer said to me, you know, can I pull a card for you? Okay, that's what you want to do. And she pulled a card, and she said, Oh, my God, you are going through a shamanic healing crisis. And the second that you start to realize, and change your path and find new containers, everything will change, you will magically get better, and it's gonna change your life. So I took it with a grain of salt at the time, but I bought a few books that she had mentioned. And I went on my way. And through this process of discovering, I started realizing this new spiritual part of myself. And so this is happening simultaneously. I actually owned a PR agency. So as you mentioned, I worked in public relations and health care reform. And I never thought that would be fair job. I loved that job. I mean, I liked it. I should say it was good, but it wasn't fully fully right container. But it was good enough. And so this crazy thing happened, where I lost my passport, the day before my family was going to Aruba for New Year's, we always go for New Year's, my passport disappeared. I keep it locked in a safe wasn't there. So I drove back and forth to my parents house to my house. Like I didn't sleep that night. I was just driving. They were an hour for me, and could not find my passport. They went to Aruba. The next day. I was stuck at home. And so I you know, said to my partners, listen, guys, why don't I take off next this next week? instead? I'll work this week instead of being on vacation. And then I'll go Ruby late and meet my family there. And kind of uncharacteristically, they had some issue with us. And so I thought, all right, well, I will work but I'll work from Aruba. I'm going to Aruba and they said well, we don't know if You're really serious about this company. And I was like, You know what, maybe I'm not. And so I went to Aruba. I came back, and it was like someone else was speaking for me. I just said, I'll give you a year's notice, we're gonna restructure, and I'm leaving. So now here I am sitting there and thinking, what the hell am I going to do with my life, like, I don't have a plan, you know, I can sell my shares. I have a little bit of money, but I don't have a plan. So I went to herbalism school, I went to nutrition school, I literally went to two schools full time that year, while working while taking spiritual classes, while exploring this relationship. It was the worst year of my life. But I finished it. And I thought, well, I don't know what to do. So I decided that I was going to be the health and wellness coach for the Boston entrepreneurs, because I knew them all. Why not? Like I was an herbalist. I was a health coach, I can do this. And it was okay. I wasn't making a ton of money, and I really love it. And so I started writing a blog. And this blog got decently popular. And someone REACHED OUT out of the blue and offered me a book deal. And I thought, Oh, this isn't this is my purpose. I've always meant to be a writer, I'm going to do this book deal. So I write this book, I go on a book tour. And I hope not everybody's listening to this part. I didn't love it. It wasn't great. still buy my book. It's good. But I did not like just being an author and doing the book tour things, a lot of pressure. I didn't feel supported. And so I thought, well, crap, I'm wasting my time. I'm wasting life. How do I not know my purpose? Now I've gone through the crisis. I've done all the things that every book tells me to do. I've one on every life purpose webinar, every life purpose training, I don't know my purpose. So I go back to the drawing board. And I said, All right, what am I good at? What does the world need? And I've had circled that middle ground. Oh, it is so obvious. How did I not see it? I meant to create a blogging course. But this blogging course, is just going to be a blogging course, it's going to be deep, it's going to be spiritual, it's gonna help people find their voice. And it's gonna help them get booked deals and all this great stuff, right? So I create this course. And of course, you know, you got to go pro. So I put everything into this, like, I've got the lighting kit and the nice mic, and the Facebook ads, and the web designer and the business partner and all that stuff and put it out to the world. And five people bought it. The loss was extraordinary. I mean, that was the last of my savings, I was done. So I was mortified. I knew, I guess I will ask my partners to take me back after a year, who knows what's going to happen? I still don't know my purpose, after, you know, decades of trying, but really a year just focused on that I still can't figure it out. I'm a failure. And so I decided to host a failure celebration, right? Because at least you know, maybe I can flip the script and celebrate Well, maybe something good came from this year. And I went into a Facebook group I was a part of. And I said, I'm happy to, you know, do some branding for you. And some work that I came up with way back in PR. It's a simple system we use to help CEOs kind of think about their messaging in a very concrete simple way so that they can make sales decisions and messaging and interview talking points and press releases and all this stuff. Very simple. And so I went in there, and I offered it to these people. But these weren't the, you know, tech entrepreneurs and healthcare politicians I was used to. These were life coaches, and artists and healers and all types of cool people. And every single one of them said to me, Mike, you didn't just tell me my brand. You told me my life purpose. It's like, wait, wait a minute. They're like, What are you trying to say? And so I had to go back to the drawing board and figure out what am I actually doing here? What's happening that's telling these people claiming that they know their purpose in a way that's never been articulated before. And so I did the process for myself. And I discovered six words. And these sorts of six words are aligned, zany, free, unmistakable, successful, and vulnerable. And the second I saw these words, every moment of trauma in my life starts to make sense, because I started to feel every time the opposite of those when I was protected. When I felt like a failure, these articulated better than anything, the biggest trauma of my life, I started to look at what felt good about it my PR job, but what didn't, what made sense in writing, but what didn't. And as I started to do that, simultaneously, people started asking me, what do you call this? And I said, it's branding, but I guess it's sacred, I don't know, sacred branding. laughs That word on there. They start telling their friends and I was open for business. And I never went back to PR, which I thought I would the next day never did and that was six or seven years ago. Now. I

Brandon Handley 14:29
think. That's great. That's great. And I think that, you know, look, you you just stepped into kind of like your fear, right? And and you you surrendered a little bit, right? You just you just said you know what, this is what I got. I'm having this conversation. I'm gonna have the failure party, people are gonna step up. Do you happen to be in this group, like you said, of like artists and you know, these kind of spiritual people and you're helping them find their purpose, and if I recall correctly, you're like, I didn't even know what mine was. All right. Hold on a second. Yeah, I did what? Hold on a second. Wait, I'm gonna come back. I'm watching Oh, this works because now I'm gonna work. It's like kinds of hypnosis on yourself though, right? Like, all right.

Mike Iamele 15:11
So the irony about it is like, if we look at those words successful, I was hosting a failure celebration to make success, right, I was being super vulnerable, I was aligning with my type of people, like, when we start to unpack what that means, well, da, this was gonna be a moment of success for me. And that's why I always call this you know, a reliable, predictable formula for success and fulfillment that works in any situation without fail. It doesn't just work in job because it's kind of To me, it's like shooting darts, like most of us live life where we're shooting darts in the dark, we kind of sometimes stumble upon success, and we that feels good. But even if we have something successful in our lives, we don't actually know what made us successful. So we're an artist who might say, well, was it the medium I was using? Was I feeling inspired? Did I have a lot of spaciousness that day? Or if we're an entrepreneur, we think, well, was it the image? Was it the coffee was not asked these questions? Sure. relationships, same thing. What I often think is, when we do this work, what we're doing is we're mapping our experiences, you know, to do sacred branding, we're mapping out traumas, we're mapping our highest access points, we're starting to notice a pattern and boiling that pattern down. And it's kind of like flipping on the lights, doesn't mean I'm gonna hit the bullseye every time, but I know what I'm doing. I can practice, I can say, Alright, I know I need to be vulnerable here. It's really awkward for me, but I'm gonna keep practicing what that looks like in relationship until I can hone that sensitivity.

Brandon Handley 16:32
Right. Right now. That's fair. That's fair. The one of the things that I see out there is people trying to be vulnerable, but really, they're just vomiting, like, or, you know, just just doesn't come off as genuine. So how can you be authentically vulnerable on purpose?

Mike Iamele 16:52
It's a great question. You know, I think that I think that there's a difference between maybe intentional and strategic care. I think that this, you know, I guess the bottom line is, what is the reason that we're being vulnerable? And that's what I'm really interested in, when we go down to the brand energy level, is it about connection? Is it about intimacy? Is it about, you know, feeling aligned with somebody? Is it about being seen? Is it about feeling abundance, like, there's a reason that we're doing it in the first place. And if we're not really tapped into that we're kind of deceiving ourselves, we're basically like, I want to make a lot of money. And so I'm being vulnerable to make a lot of money. But I'm not actually conscious of that I'm actually owning that the shadow. So it starts to come across as inauthentic. But I think when we really know who we are, and what kind of owning and claiming that, you know, I often say you don't have to assert what's claimed, right? If I'm asserting something, I haven't fully claimed it. So if I have to be like, Oh, I am super masculine. That's not something I've planned. Oh, I'm super vulnerable. That's not something I've claimed, right. When I've claimed it, it's just internalized, and then I kind of exude it. And I think that's what I want for every person to be able to exude the authentic flow of who you actually are. Right?

Brandon Handley 18:01
I mean, that kind of goes back to like your beginning, right, you know, how can that person find out who they truly are? Right? And then helping them to figure out how to truly express that. Is that you know, I mean, that's kind of that's kind of, that's the business that you're in? Yeah, that's

Mike Iamele 18:16
right there. you boil it down. Absolutely. Yeah. No,

Brandon Handley 18:18
I love it. You know, me. And it's funny the story that you're telling, too, because it's exactly what happened to me, right? My first podcast was like, I gotta I gotta hit these notes. I got to do these things. I want to do it for money. Like, I didn't really want to do it for money. But I was doing it for money. I was like, yeah. And then and then like, I was, like, you know, switched out did another one. And that podcast was wasn't in straight alignment with who I was right? Like this. I was like, it's almost there. I've almost gotten it, right. And then this one is like, is better? Right? This one? I'm like, I'm almost there. Again, like so again, like, and and? I'm sure, right. I mean, would you talk to kind of how the universe opens up once you find your alignment? Like, what's that look like? For you?

Mike Iamele 19:02
Yeah, absolutely. Well, I think, you know, it depends what language we're comfortable using, whether we want to call it the universe, whether we want to say we're just putting ourselves in the place of opportunities, and the right thing comes.

Brandon Handley 19:10
I think that that's great, too, right? Because I think that a big a big challenge for the people that are like, you know, the spiritual ilk, or are super artsy, they're not going to be as comfortable with the business language, right? And that's, and that's why they're open to this other. Let's open up to the universe. Let's have a vision board, let's, let's do these things because they are these are goals, these are planning, these are all those other things, but it's in a language that they their brain, and their subconscious will not filter out, like, oh, we're gonna do it like this. That's great, man. My energy is in alignment. Let's do it. Right. Whereas like, if you're like, let's let's come up with a plan. I'm not much of a planner. I don't I don't write hate plans.

Mike Iamele 19:56
Well, I think the thing is, you know, we all have our own Attachment towards our own language, our own connotation. And that's why as much as I think things like, you know, MBTI or enneagram, with these systems are really awesome. I'm a big fan of, you know, speaking to our purpose in our own language through how we associate with words. And that's why you know, I don't really care. I tell people, if your words of Sally Bob and Jim awesome, if that means something to you, you go for it. And so my job is just to help them map how they use language and begin to boil that down to overarching themes. And it's a really cool process. So we can

Brandon Handley 20:32
do. I do I do. Okay,

Mike Iamele 20:37
so, do you want to be a guinea pig? Or do you just want me to speak to your guinea pig. So this is gonna be my super super, like, dumbed down shoddy way of doing it. But if anyone wants to reveal a little bit more real, you can just go to Mike iaconelli.com slash map, it's free. It's 36 minutes, and you're gonna get a worksheet. So it's super cool. But let's play now for 10 minutes. Okay, so Brandon, can you take a moment to close your eyes, and I want you to think about three jobs that you have had in your life. So just three jobs could be anything, it could be back in high school, you were, you know, a cashier, it could be a current job, it could be podcasting, just anything that you want. And when you get your mind in those three jobs, I want you to pick one of them and tell me what it is.

Brandon Handley 21:32
So, you know, once upon a time like that to my laptop, my eyes are not to show.

Unknown Speaker 21:37
Yeah, I know what's happening.

Brandon Handley 21:40
You know, so once upon a time, I mean, this is going back 20 years, like I used to do two bunches like the raves right the nighttime parties, but like I do the promoting for them, right? Or like help hosts are like pull, pull, pull, pull the gathers together, right? I mean, so awesome. So you know, getting people together and and seeing them having a great night. I mean, that that was it. Right?

Mike Iamele 22:01
So you're already getting ahead of the game. You're so good here. So I want you to tell me, what are three things that you either made people feel or you gave to people? And so my example is you might make people like you said feel happy or fun or connected, or safe? Or maybe you made them feel like energized and manic. Like what were three things? Yeah, look, I

Brandon Handley 22:21
mean, people feel a you know, look, if you're going if you're if you're on just as parties, like you get like, that's an experience, right? One time experience, probably never gonna happen again. And it's a life experience.

Mike Iamele 22:34
All right. experiential. We've got that 100%

Brandon Handley 22:38
straight bliss, man, right, dancing out dancing all night long. Right. You know, they stop dropping, I don't know, whatever spelling.

Mike Iamele 22:46
So it's experiential. It's bliss. Is there anything else that you wanted to make people feel? I

Brandon Handley 22:50
mean, is active, right? It's engagement.

Mike Iamele 22:52
Perfect. Perfect. This is great. So now pick a second job. And I want you to tell me a little bit about that job and then do the same thing.

Brandon Handley 23:00
The podcasting, right podcasting, the connections, like you can't, it opens so many doors, right? Like, I mean, it's a straight up opens. Like I can call I can talk to anybody, right? If there's, I literally just interviewed one of my favorite authors a week or so ago. Sreekumar Rao, right? I have a podcast, would you like to be on it? Right? This is my space. This is what I do. And I think you'd be a great fit, right? I mean, so connections and then being able to connect, like you to the audience, right. So So Mike, I'm always on I'm like, I don't just like Mike, you're gonna like Mike and here's why and, and just listen to him. Like, I don't have to tell you, you're gonna be able to decide for yourself. Right? So sharing those connections. And what's left, I mean, it's just, it's just fun. Because you get to you get to this, this is an amplifier. Right? The microphone is an amplifier, I get to share my message with the entire world. And if anybody is any, like stratosphere, right? This is like radio waves. It goes all awake, universal man. So communicating my story to everybody that

Mike Iamele 24:09
I love that got universal. It's amplifying. It's fun. It's connecting. Awesome. Got some great language. All right, one more. So the last job Tell me about it and tell me three things that you wanted people to feel from it. And,

Brandon Handley 24:25
I mean, I think bartending was probably just so much fun. And again, like it's just always about other people connecting with other people being mean that kind of, I guess, you know, and even in like with the podcast, kind of being that that hub, right, that that that kind of generates all that energy to make it all happen.

Mike Iamele 24:46
Mm hmm. I love that. I love that. Okay, we've got some good good mapping going on already. But now I want you to take a moment Brandon and close your eyes again. And I want you to think of a really challenging moment. It could be frustrating. It could be And successful, it could even be traumatic, although we don't want to go into any trauma that feels traumatic to think about right now. But anything that feels like this was a really tough moment in my life. And I want you, you don't have to tell me what it is, if you don't want that, I want you to tell me three things you felt in that moment.

Brandon Handley 25:18
So I think I think I've talked about it before, but like, there was a point when I was doing like my fatherhood for the rest of this podcast. And then I got offered an amazing job, right, like a great salary. And I was like, Well, I have to stop focusing so much on this father for the rest of us thing, right, not attached my identity that that I and I realized I was like, Oh, my God, I attached my identity that same time realize that I was willing to kind of throw that away for a bunch of money. So I was kind of battling that. Right. So that was it. That was conflicted. Right. And, and it kind of, it tore me apart in a way that I wasn't expecting, you know. At the same time, it also made me realize how much I attached my identity to what it is that I do.

Mike Iamele 26:04
Yeah, that's, thank you for saying I'm gonna try to remember that because it's something really beautiful. We'll talk about right after this process. But um, so what do you what did you feel? I know you say conflicted, but what do I mean? Did you feel like you were like, disgusted at yourself or wanting the money? Did you feel angry? Did you feel frustrated? Did you feel blocked or trapped? Like, give me a little bit longer? Yeah,

Brandon Handley 26:25
I mean, I could probably go with like a little bit of of trapped or locked, right? I mean, look, I'm, I'm a family man, when you're looking for, you know, make given stability to children and my wife and, you know, trying to give them that life. Give them you know, the the white picket fence and all this stuff, right. We've been trained very well for this

Mike Iamele 26:43
shot. Yeah, absolutely.

Brandon Handley 26:45
Yeah. So I mean, that's definitely it was, I think, traps kind of a harsh word. But I definitely felt like you know, I had to do that thing, because that's what was expected. Right.

Mike Iamele 26:56
So we're better word be obligated. obligated. Good. Okay, that's good. Okay, cool. So what, then if you felt conflicted, you felt obligated? What would you have wanted to feel ideal world if you could just magically have the perfect situation? What would you have wanted to feel in that situation? Yeah.

Brandon Handley 27:12
I mean, it should be easy, right? ease is what you know, ease, there should be no tension if you're doing the thing that you're in alignment in life.

Mike Iamele 27:21
Right. Right. So just flow II happening, okay. And maybe agency rights, not obligation, you're choosing it, you're just kind of Right, right. I

Brandon Handley 27:30
mean, I'm taking, you know, look like if you just take money out of the whole thing, like in this situation, like, Can you just go do what you want without money? Right, then then it's easier, right? Like, like, maybe

Mike Iamele 27:41
you're passionate, right? Because you know what?

Brandon Handley 27:45
I'm a 5050 on the word passion. Okay. I don't like to flame out on something, right? Because, like you like, you know, what is it? Is it better? What is it better to burn out? Definitely anyways, man, I don't want to I don't want to use it. I don't. And it's a trigger word, obviously, for me, right? You know, being passionate about something because I want I want to follow it through again, with ease, like, You figure if you're passionate about something, it's burning, all that energy is burning up quickly. Right. And, and it has the opportunity to dissipate, but at the same time, it could you know, be the igniter of the fire. But that's where I'm at with that.

Mike Iamele 28:21
I'm just gonna call it one thing. So I think it's really interesting here. First of all, you know, anytime we have a triggering word, it's where we have energy, right? So it doesn't mean that this is a word that we're interested in using. But what it means that there's something in this concept that feels interesting. And I think what's really fascinating for me, is we've talked about a lot of words, the very igniting very, very before we talked about amplifying and energizing for sure, excited, but we want something sustainable. So we just learned, okay for you. It's got to be a sustainable version of that. That's great, because all we're doing is mapping how your mind works right now. Right? All right. Now, last thing, close your eyes one more time. And I want you to think of the happiest day of your life, or one of the happiest moments that comes up. And I want you You can tell me about if you want, but I want you to tell me three things you felt in that moment.

Brandon Handley 29:09
So I mean, I have to say it was probably when my first son was born. Right? Um, man is just, there's just nothing. Nothing really compares to that. Right. I'm one of those reasons is, is you know, I never thought I was going to be a dad, right? I didn't have like a good dad experience. And so for this opportunity to just kind of present itself. I was like, this is awesome, right? I get to be a dad. I was like, I'm not gonna suck at this. Like, that was like the one thing I knew I wasn't gonna suck at. Right. So I was happy to take that on and to, you know, be able to have that role in my life, you know?

Mike Iamele 29:48
So, you know, and that's beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. So I know you felt you know, happy. What else would you say? What did you feel in that moment?

Brandon Handley 29:57
I mean, touched right. Like that's like, you know, we It's probably you know, if I, if I'm looking back, you know, connecting the dots backwards, I'm sure that I've been touched by source like several times, but like it was one of those recognizable times you just like literally feel blessed. Right? And I'm not I'm not I'm not a Jesus guy. I'm not a god and by but like, you know, you feel blessed you feel touched in that moment. So that,

Mike Iamele 30:23
yes, beautiful, and I'm getting the sense that you can correct me from your I'm wrong here. But that there's a sense of alignment. Like it almost feels like this was meant to be or kinda Yeah,

Brandon Handley 30:32
look, I mean, it's just there's no other way, right? I've got a friend of mine who's up in Boston as well, you guys just should connect. He gave me the acronym Tina, right? There is no alternative.

Mike Iamele 30:43
Yeah. Oh, this is beautiful. All right. All right. So you're I only picked these moments because these are emotionally charged. And we're gonna get you know, squeezed the most juice out of the emotionally charged moments. For everybody listening, you know, if you go check out that webinar, Mike on mlb.com slash map, it's a little bit more in depth, but I'm trying to keep it brief for everyone here. So one thing we've seen is we've seen a huge theme across your life of this feeling, you know, wanting to make people want yourself feeling energized in the flow, a sense of ease, you know, a sense of being touched or blessed by things, connecting and Amplifying Voices, whether you're, you know, club promoting, you're amplifying a message or energize people amplifying the voices. When you're doing that with podcasting, for sure you're doing that, you know, I'm sure that these are, you know, lessons that you want to send your kids or your child, so you know, helping to energize them helping to amplify their voice making them feel they have a strong voice, and they matter. These are themes that I've gone through your life, I'm gonna guess that if you look back to some of those traumatic moments of your life, you might feel there were points where you didn't feel like your voice could be spread out far and wide, or you didn't feel energized,

Brandon Handley 31:51
suppressed, for sure,

Mike Iamele 31:53
exactly. And so we're gonna see those shadows, the exact opposite to what we talked about, they're gonna start to, you know, to articulate some of the darkest moments of your life. And now we can start, let's say, all right, and I have with my best friends, yeah, I feel this. I feel like my voice matters. I can speak up, I feel energized, I feel excited this ease this flow. When I talk to these, you know, really awkward people and people I don't really like I don't feel those things. It's

Brandon Handley 32:15
like a blanket, right? I mean.

Mike Iamele 32:18
So what we're doing here is we're just mapping your sensitivities, we're understanding and you can go back and use this work for past trauma. You can use it for healing, you can use it for business building, because now we know all right, you do really well, when you have guests on who are energizing and exciting and alive. You love connecting with people, you love Amplifying Voices of people who matter to you. So you need to make sure that you've got guests on that you really believe in their mission, and you're excited about it, and they want to help amplify your podcast too. And now all of a sudden, start changing the business decisions you make and how you show up. And you asked me before you know about vulnerability and authenticity. For me, if I mean for you, it's really going to be about showing up with energy and that voice and giving the message because that's what you do when you're most authentic. And I just think I mean, this is my shoddy way of doing it with you today. But I think it's so beautiful when we know that because again, it's like we turn on the lights. And now we can practice hitting that Bullseye doesn't mean we're gonna hit every time, right? We know how now,

Brandon Handley 33:13
right? So now that was awesome, man, I really enjoyed I enjoyed that. And and you know, that practice would be built into your branding, right? So a lot of a lot of times I think that people will be like, Hey, I don't I don't know, my art type is right. Or I don't know what my you know, I don't know what my niches I don't know, I hate the word niche. I don't do niches right. Like and so, or, you know, you know, I don't want what's the you know, avatars are dumb man, you know, so. So, this this practice sounds like it, it kind of can substitute for some of those marketing pieces, right? Or branding pieces without robbing the the non marketer guy or girl wrong, right?

Mike Iamele 33:57
Absolutely. Well, I think one thing you said that was really interesting is you talked about how so much of your identity was in what you did. And then podcasting and it's really hard to let go of. And I don't think that that is abnormal. You know, a lot of us we do one of two things, the big containers in our lives, our relationships, or jobs, right? Those are the two containers where we're talking about life purpose, we're probably talking about one of those two things. And the thing is, those are just containers for those energies to flow that we just talked about. So is your healing. So is your morning routine. So is the way you get dressed. So is the way you decorate your house. So is the way you do yard work, or your friendships like these are all just different containers. And when we are so attached to a container, it means we don't really know what the essence is, because we don't think we can get that same essence somewhere else, right? When we know that essence. It's like, oh, that job went away. Now how can I make my new job? You know, be connecting and energizing and amplifying all these things? And then we're going to start to look at like, Alright, where am I gonna fight for my voice in this job? Where am I gonna win? What am I not willing? To settle on, and what am I willing to settle on? And that's really important to me. Because when it comes to marketing, you know, a lot of people think it's something really different and hard and complex. And the truth is, it's just another container. I had no plan for this conversation. And you know, sure one of my energies is vulnerable. So I show up and I share whatever it feels called. And I'm zany, and I'm loud. And I like to be crazy and play a little bit. And that is part of how my energy flows. I don't know, what do you call this marketing right now? Maybe, maybe not. But it's just me being myself. Sure. So is working with people and so is, you know, getting to teach live and hanging out with my husband and the way I dress? Right? Well, I mean,

Brandon Handley 35:40
not for nothing, right? Like, so I mean, what's your, your, your, your kind of like zona genius, or, you know, whatever you want to call it is, is, is being able to help somebody get clarity on themselves? Right.

Unknown Speaker 35:50
Yeah.

Brandon Handley 35:52
Right. Right. Right. And that's a real challenge. I think that for an individual to go through I think, I think, and this has been my experience, right? I think it's a real challenge for a lot of people who would like to get into podcasts and YouTube and whatever, you know, the the, is there a name for like, what's happening like now like, in in the kind of industry, it's not like just social marketing, but maybe it is right. But the deal is to try and run at it alone can be very frustrating, and especially when they see how easy it is for Mike. Right.

Mike Iamele 36:27
Thank you for saying that. Because I love to, you know, share all my vulnerabilities. Believe me, everything I said earlier, looks graceful in retrospect, it's not it's never retro, you know, graceful in the moment. And I think the thing is, you know, we do this work, because this system can run independently of me, like, you can go check out that webinar, you can go, you know, sign up for our course, later on, like, eight works, because everybody thinks they're all over the place. Everybody thinks, oh, Mike, but my jobs they don't even make sense. They're not remotely similar. You don't know. I can tell you that's true of me. Right? I work in health care form. And then I'm, you know, this herbalist, and then I'm like the spiritual teacher, I don't know what the heck I was doing. But you know what, it all boils down to connecting dots. Here's the thing. I literally align vulnerabilities and people's zaniness and idiosyncrasies to help to free them from the stories and make them successful and understand that unmistakable ality that my energies told me that they told me what I do, and everyone else's do your lived experience has the blueprint for success, the blueprint for fulfillment, because you have been successful somewhere in life. Yes, that's all Yeah, we can map Why then we start to understand your formula. That's not something exclusive to me. I know people listen, I said, screw you, guy. Like you don't know what I've been through. That's not I can promise you that because I thought I was the most fucked up of all.

Brandon Handley 37:47
Well, and I think that you bring up a good point there too, once you kind of understand the pattern, right? Once you once you understand how you can connect one or two dots, like you can connect the third. Yeah, fourth, or fifth, right? So going through the work, right, what would you say that means to you?

Mike Iamele 38:09
It's a bold question. So you know, the work can mean many things. So if we're talking specifically about sacred branding, which for me, it's all the same, like the work spiritual work for me is safer branding, because it went about the person going through it like, like, so if somebody's going through sacred branding with you, and they have to do the work.

Brandon Handley 38:27
Right. What does that mean? So

Mike Iamele 38:29
it means, you know, basically committing to your energies, here's the thing that will happen. Inevitably, almost every person who's done my work, will after a year or two years, say, oh, Mike, I went through a monumental shift in my life, I got to redo it, my energies are wrong, I got to redo it. And what's happening there is not that their energy is wrong, because anyone we've done this with wife, kids, anyone over the age of 13, their vocabulary and their conceptualization of language isn't changing enough for their energies to change. What's happening is their understanding of those energies is changing. And so what it's asking for is intimacy. intimacy is when we commit to something and we learn more about it, it's a lot easier to just run away and try to change say, this is

Brandon Handley 39:11
one more time and intimacy is what

Mike Iamele 39:13
Yeah, when we commit to something and learn more about it and ourselves and when we're deepening right? If we commit to a relationship, a relationship is gonna challenge us of course, we have to learn about ourselves, we have to learn about our partner through that relationship. But if we every time we get challenged, run away, that's not intimacy. That's not commitment. So what doing the work is is actually committing saying, alright, what can this interview this moment right now teach me about aligned, zany, free, unmistakable every fight I have every you know, challenge my life is to ask myself, what can I learn right now about success? What don't I know about it? And it starts teaching me more about myself. And then we start doing deconditioning because here's the thing we've got a lot of toxic conditioning in our society, both some we've talked about on this podcast, but also some we haven't. And that's not a That's not something we're born with. We were born was

Brandon Handley 40:02
like, What? Yeah, what's one or two?

Mike Iamele 40:04
I'm talking about misogyny and racism and homophobia. I'm talking about, you know, beliefs about making money and spirituality. I mean, there's a lot of conditioning out there. And so when we we weren't born with that we were born sensitivities. So we weren't born with conditioning.

Brandon Handley 40:19
What's the deconditioning? Well,

Mike Iamele 40:20
what I'm saying is that if we to know what we aren't, we have to know what we are. And when we know those brand answers, I used to ask myself, what about this moment isn't actually vulnerable or unmistakable? What's wrong here? What do I believe that's not actually that, and when I can anchor it to something, I can pull out what isn't that it starts I mean, we do this at the higher levels of the work, but it starts to become a lot easier to say, Hey, you know what, I'm ready to let go of that belief. Because actually, I can see my truth, and I can feel it. And you know, I it's a sensitivity so I can literally feel it in my body, it's not just a thought I have in my mind, it's something that I can feel and you know, at higher levels, we start thinking about, okay, let me feel what successful feels like my body. Now, let me feel unsuccessful. And so when I walk into a room, and my stomach tightens, immediately, I know I feel unsuccessful, I'm gonna say no to that opportunity, it starts becoming intuitive because your body, it's your senses, right? Your taste, touch smell, it can tell you these things, your thoughts, your conditioning can't do that, because it's not really who you are. So the more we start tuning into who we are, we can actually trust our intuition more, we can trust our bodies more. And that's why we get better at hitting that bull's eye, right? Because now we know the opportunities that will lead us to success, you know, the flow with the universe. And, you know,

Brandon Handley 41:32
you tell me, tell me about tuning into your intuition, right? And how, how do you begin to trust that intuition, right? It's funny, because guys, anybody's listening to podcast knows that. Nine times out of 10, I'll jack up a name. and nine times out of 10. I know, I should have asked before we got going. And what's funny is that, before we got going on the podcast, they like followed his intuition. You know, also something that maybe it not only you know, is has he had the experience of people butchering his last name, but he knew, connected like an intuition to me and said, Hey, do you need to know how to pronounce my last name? Sure. Right. So how do you, you know, how, how do you begin to trust your intuition? And not just in a negative sense, right? Because a lot of people are like, Oh, I shouldn't do this. And and they follow that to a fucking tee, right? Like, like, Oh, I shouldn't? If it's a no, I'll follow that. Sure. But how do we encourage people to follow their yeses?

Mike Iamele 42:34
You know, I think it's the same thing we talked about with intimacy before and commitment. It's really about saying like, Okay, first of all, if my energy is vulnerable, I know that when I am in safe, vulnerable space, I'm going to be more intuitive. I know that when I speak a lot, like I do a lot of processing, just speaking out loud. It's why I can't shut up, you're probably like, Mike Shut up. I can't because that's when things start flowing. For me, I know that I know, vulnerable. So what will I do to do that? Well, sometimes I'll close my eyes when I want to be intuitive to be more vulnerable. And what starts to happen over time is, the more I do it, and for me, it's got to be in safe space with people I can be vulnerable with, I practice being intuitive for a long, long time with people I trust to like it. So I internalized that vulnerability. Because at first, we think it's outside of us, right, we've got to be in the perfect vulnerable condition. And we've got to be in the perfect zany, you know, where people can be playful. But over time, we internalize that sensitivity. And now I don't care who's around me, I don't care if you think I'm fucking crazy, I'm gonna be vulnerable, I'm gonna be who I am. And trust my intuition. And so I think, for me, it really starts with knowing again, I mean, I am obsessed with the brand energies, I'm obsessed with my work because it's knowing who we are. And then it's just tuning into that and practicing, it's throwing at that bull's eye over and over and over again, until we know we can hit it. But we can't practice if we don't turn on the lights. So we need to connect those dots.

Brandon Handley 43:57
Awesome. So you're, you're you're lined up with your purpose, you're fully charged. Can your purpose change?

Mike Iamele 44:04
So great question. I love you throw the good ones at me. So your containers can absolutely change. And they do change containers, the temporary relationships and your physical body changes your desire for sex changes, your, you know, your home changes, your job changes all these things. But what you want from that, and what you give to that doesn't change, because that's your senses that you've had since you were born. So I teach classes on your sex intimacy all the time. And people always say this while my body's changing my desires changing all the time. But sex that's just about getting off. isn't all that interesting, in my opinion, like, sure it can sustain us for a little while. It's not interesting. We always want something specific from sex. It's to us, we might want a space of vulnerability, a space where we can be playful and explore our deepest fantasies, a space where we can explore submission or dominance or whatever. That's what we actually want and would probably want to explore that over time. Now, the definition of what that looks like is going to dange vulnerable sex to me today very different than it's going to be in 50 years. I understand that. But I still know when I'm actually looking for. And so I don't have to be so attached to the container like you before with Oh, the podcast is the only way I can say that. Yeah, exactly. We let that go. And now we just have the essence. You know, you

Brandon Handley 45:19
bring up a good one, too. In the sex energy piece, I actually had somebody reach out and ask about, you know, why, you know why I might think that, you know, nuns, priests monks, abstain, right? Or even how does sexuality play out in spirituality? Right, is spirituality like? And the question was, was it is, are they missing it? Right, maybe, like, maybe they missed, like, just how the connected in spirituality was. But I think that kind of what I'm hearing you say a little bit too is like, if we just follow our basic needs, like the running as it were, right? That's not so spiritual. Whereas you can explore these vulnerabilities and make that into a spiritual, evolving experience.

Mike Iamele 46:07
Well, I think what we're talking about here is empty containers, right, we have a bunch of them in our life, so we can buy beautiful art, or we can shop at home goods, I'm not shaming anything about that. But the Home Goods piece isn't gonna make me feel something as deeply as an artist putting their intention in because it's full of assets. And so we've got a lot of, you know, like, sex feels good. Most people like sex, but it's not going to nourish us deeply if it's not full of essence. So it's just kind of like, Alright, this is a biological need, I get off, this feels good. And I move on. And now I didn't have that deeper transformation. I didn't work through my shame or trauma, I didn't feel this great, you know, divinity or connection with God, I just thought, that's cool, but it's empty. And over time, it's slowly killing us. Like we live in a world right now, where we are not sensitive enough, we're not we're numbing out, right, we have an opioid epidemic going on right now. Um, you know, there's a lot of whether we are coping through this pandemic, with, you know, food, or drugs, or alcohol, or movies or TV. And those coping mechanisms aren't inherently bad in themselves, but they can be ways of escapism, and this association, right, for sure. And what I always say is, look at art, great art, when an artist puts their heart and soul on it, it moves us, he can make paintings dance, and spark cultural revolutions and political movements and make words jump off the page. It makes us feel alive, it makes us feel more sensitive. When we feel essence, when we feel someone so tapped into their essence, we become more sensitive, not to them, but to our own essence, because that's what we grow up that

Brandon Handley 47:38
no, yeah. And you know, that that also brings up the whole idea of, you know, look, our energy fields, right, raising our BB around people that are, you know, high vibe, right? Where is is as long as you and I are like connected in the same way, a kind of vibratory field if I'm vibe and higher, and I'm, you know, strong with that, like, I can help bring you up, right, and vice versa, or transfer transfer feeling without like, craziness.

Mike Iamele 48:04
I mean, it's basically our vibe is naturally high when we're fully here and fully ourselves. And so yes,

Brandon Handley 48:10
it's part like the essence part. I know you said essence like several times, would you would you? Would you? Would you liken that to connected to source

Mike Iamele 48:18
Sure. Exactly. Connected to source, lifeforce energy, and we know what sexual energy if we're talking about sex, any of these things, essence brand energies, you know, life purpose, whatever you want to call it. I'm not a stickler on language. And I've purposely used a few different language in this talk, because I don't really care. Like I your brand energies are your own language, you choose that yourself, it's what resonates for you. But when we are fully in our bodies, and we aren't, you know, a lot of times we have trauma, so half of me is back in this past memory, and half of me is over here and half, you know, it's like a Harry Potter Horcrux. Right, we're split in a million different ways. But if I'm fully fully present, I've a lot more power here. And so I want to fully be present and sense the world see, taste, touch, hear smell more of the world. And the more I'm tapped into lines and zany and frayed, that's how I do that. And that's how I do it for other people. That's why I love podcasts, because we just get to hang out and activate people make people more sensitive to themselves and it's so much fun. And so yeah,

Brandon Handley 49:17
percent i think that's you know, that's, that's, uh, you know, what they, you know, I don't know how many episodes it took me to get to activate somebody right? Like that's what this that's what it's for. Right? That's exactly that's what 100% it's like, you know, looking for one person out there This podcast is for one person to be activated. Right and so like that's what you just did you just you know, self when you activate it somebody out there congratulations. Yeah.

Mike Iamele 49:40
And yours while they

Brandon Handley 49:43
love it. I love it. Well, man, look, look anybody. I think you got a great feel for what it is that you kind of deliver even though you know you kept saying shoddy. I think that you know it was very well done. had a lot of fun with having you on here and they would be Recognize that if they should reach out to you that they should, right? And where should they go again? Like,

Mike Iamele 50:07
yeah, so Mike iml.com slash map ma p for mapping your sensitivities, and it's 36 minutes, you get a whole training, you get a worksheet, it's free. Go ahead and do that, because you'll start to know your sensitivities.

Brandon Handley 50:19
Who's your ideal customer?

Mike Iamele 50:21
Oh, gosh, so many. I mean, people use this word for so many freaking things. But I really love people who haven't felt at home and other spiritual practices, you know, it feels very dogmatic. It feels like they've had to internalize a lot of stuff that doesn't match up to critical thinking. And I, you know, we're intelligent beings, like, it doesn't make sense to talk about purpose as achievable, even though we're told that like, Oh, your life purpose is to be a life coach, or we say that this pisses me off, you join a life purpose webinar, right? And they do one or two things, they'll say, at the very end, your life purpose is to love. Great, awesome, I'm all about love. How does that help me with my trauma with my relationship with my business in my marketing, that doesn't help at all, we'll go the other way. And they'll say you love writing your purpose is to be a writer. And again, like you if I internalize that, and I did for a while, well, now when I give up my writing job, I feel I have no purpose.

Brandon Handley 51:13
You want somebody to detach from your sense of a day,

Mike Iamele 51:16
right? We see that with people who go through a divorce or get laid off or lose a job or change jobs. You know, we see this breakup all the time, these problems with mostly its job or its relationship containers, when they break down, we lose our sense of purpose. And that doesn't make sense. So I really like people who actually want to take some critical thinking and say, wait a minute, let me think about this. Let make sense to me. And then feel right to me in my own language. Hmm.

Unknown Speaker 51:41
Nice.

Brandon Handley 51:42
I love it. Well, man, Mike, thank you so much for coming on and being a guest on spiritual dope today. Yeah, thanks

Mike Iamele 51:47
such an honor.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai