The Smoke Trail S1 E4 - Deep Conversation with Dr. Michael Brabant
Smoke Wallin
CEO - Strategy - Global M&A - Gloria in excelsis Deo, et in terra pax hominibus bonae voluntatis
I hope you enjoy this honest and meaningful conversation I had with Michael Brabant, PhD . I certainly did.?? ????
About Dr. Michael Brabant
Dr. Michael Brabant is a seasoned specialist in fostering psychologically safe environments that lead to authentic and lasting transformation within CEOs, leaders and organizations. With a rich background in clinical psychology, leadership development and integrative practices, Michael brings a unique, precise and holistic approach to his consulting and coaching.
His deep understanding and skillful facilitation of individual, relational and collective dynamics allows him to guide teams toward greater coherence, trust and sustainable performance. While strategies are shared, the potency of Michael’s work is in his ability to create contexts where people can reveal what is real, honest and true.
By exposing the elephants in the room in a playful and dynamic way, huge amounts of trust and creative energy can be tapped into in a short period of time both individually and within groups. This reorganizes and optimizes the way people think, the ways that teams communicate and how an organization executes towards its goals.
Summary of Episode 4: The Smoke TrailDeep Discussion with Dr. Michael Brabant
In Episode 4 of The Smoke Trail, Smoke hosts Dr. Michael Brabant, a coach specializing in psychologically safe environments for transformation, for a rich, hour-long conversation blending spirituality, leadership, and personal growth. From Sedona, Smoke credits Michael’s nudge as the catalyst for launching the podcast, setting an intention to explore deep topics—spirituality, leadership, trauma healing, and higher power—fearlessly yet respectfully, aiming to inspire listeners through authentic experiences. Michael aligns, intending to serve the moment authentically, fostering a “1-degree shift” toward heart-opening and soul connection.
The dialogue begins with Michael’s childhood—hypersensitive and alienated in a conventional world, compounded by parental “weird stuff” and intergenerational trauma—leading to a breaking point of depression at a young age. Quoting Krishnamurti—“It’s no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society”—he reframes depression as suppressed expression, a soul misalignment that drove his search for more. Smoke resonates, sharing his own childhood incongruences—adults lacking integrity—fueling a hyper-independent, competitive ego that propelled entrepreneurial success but hindered trust and inner peace.
They delve into leadership’s energetic ripple effect. Michael highlights how CEOs’ unconscious need for control, rooted in childhood lack, creates incongruence between words and vibration, undermining team safety—a subtle echo of parental disconnect. Smoke reflects on his past “need-driven” deals, achieving paper wins (e.g., $5-50 million swings) but facing chaos until aligning with wholeness, now attracting others’ vulnerability vibrationally. Practicality emerges: Michael’s CEO client struggles with feedback despite seeking it, fearing trust loss, while Smoke admits resisting Michael’s input on his YPO talks (Miami, Istanbul), learning to integrate it despite ego defenses (“Perky”).
The episode explores ego as multifaceted—Michael breaks it into developmental “parts” (e.g., a 5-year-old needing love)—requiring specific inner “medicine” beyond generic meditation labels like “thinking.” Smoke’s “talent stack” of techniques (e.g., A Course in Miracles, plant medicine) unwound his ego, yet defensiveness lingers, now playfully acknowledged. They contrast external validation’s addictive ease with self-esteem as a verb, advocating fullness over consumption—an abundance mindset that enhances decision-making (e.g., avoiding misaligned deals).
Michael closes with a meditation, guiding listeners to step back energetically, breathe into sensations, and befriend a loud thought or worry as an asset, not a problem, fostering inner safety. Smoke praises Michael’s approach, sharing contact info (candorandcoherence.com) and affirming the episode’s depth charges—practical yet profound seeds for leaders to pause, probe internal causality, and lead from solution consciousness, not problem fixation.
How It Fits into The Smoke Trail Overall
Episode 4 deepens The Smoke Trail’s mission, aligning with its three content buckets—learnings, universal truths, and experiential examples—while advancing its themes of spirituality, leadership, high performance, perfect health, and bliss, as seen in Episodes 1-3.
The episode ties high performance to Michael’s leadership coherence, perfect health to Smoke’s ego unwinding, and bliss to their shared fullness, fulfilling the podcast’s ethos. Leadership shines—Smoke’s YPO evolution and Michael’s CEO work reflect guiding from wholeness, not need. Sedona’s calm backdrop enhances the spiritual tone, while practical calls (e.g., pausing reactivity) ground it, making Episode 4 a pivotal bridge from personal awakening to organizational impact, inviting listeners to take their first step inward.
The Smoke Trail - Podcast Pre-show questions
The Smoke Trail is a podcast built on themes of understanding, life, spirituality, and enlightenment, all while navigating the challenges of living in the material world. Through these conversations, I aim to explore each guest’s unique journey—how you’ve discovered what truly matters, confronted your shadows, and learned lessons that can inspire and help others on their journey.
This is about sharing deeply and thus giving back, an incredible gift to others really. A key theme throughout is leadership, as many of my guests are CEOs or leaders in their fields. I’m especially interested in how you’ve integrated personal growth and spiritual insights into your leadership style and decision-making.
Below are some key questions designed to prepare you for our discussion and to serve as a guide for exploring meaningful topics.
These questions will also be shared alongside the podcast to give The Smoke Trail audience a deeper insight into the conversation and provide thought-provoking areas for reflection.
Journey of Self-Discovery:
“Please share a pivotal moment or experience in your life that shaped your understanding of what truly matters? When you realized what truly mattered to you, did it challenge or conflict with how you were living at the time? How did you reconcile that?”
My journey of hitting a rock bottom happened early when I was 22. After battling mental health issues for 7 years at that point, prior to entering into graduate school to be a clinical psychologist, I knew that my presence and the way I lived my life needed to match my desire to help others or I would be a charlatan to others and lost within, due to the incongruence of not living what I was trying to help others live. I tried everything I knew from therapy, medication, exercising, eating healthy, etc. and there was a darkness within me that led me towards an existential crossroads where suicide seemed like the only viable option.
.... READ THE FULL Q&A HERE on SUBSTACK