After more than 30 years living and studying at Michael Singer’s Temple of the Universe, spiritual coach Tim O. Davis shares profound lessons on surrender, manifestation, and inner peace — and what it truly means to live The Untethered Soul in everyday life.
What happens when you spend over 30 years living and learning under The Untethered Soul author, Michael A. Singer?
In this conversation, Tim O. Davis - spiritual coach, meditation teacher, and longtime resident of The Temple of the Universe, joins me to explore the bridge between manifestation and surrender, how to live within community, how to make spirituality practical, and much more.
Here’s a peak at what’s inside...
⏰ Timestamps
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tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: [00:00:00] I think in terms of how I feel about it now, it was just incredibly comforting to know that if that's what it's like to die. Then big deal. No big deal. I'll be, I'll be down for that when the time comes.
Welcome to the Deep Coach, the podcast where we explore the transformational journeys that shape us and that propel us to change the world. I'm your host, Jonathan Hermida, and in each episode we sit down with those who have journeyed into the depths of spiritual transformation and who are now reshaping the world through their presence and their work.
In listening to these incredible human beings, you'll find insight. Inspiration and practical tools to support your journey as a coach and as a human being. Today's guest is Tim o Davis. Tim is a spiritual coach and meditation teacher who lived for over 30 years in the Temple of the Universe learning under Michael Singer.
If you're unfamiliar, Michael is the author of The Untethered Soul on the Surrender [00:01:00] Experiment. Two books that have played a pivotal role in my own development. Two books that I highly recommend. So I was really excited to speak with Tim, uh, around some of these things. And as added context, Michael Singer founded the Temple, 50 years ago.
So Tim lived there, you know, more than half of that time. And if you read the Surrender Experiment, you'll know that it essentially is a place where the entire story unfolds. Anyway, Tim is an incredible teacher in his own right who supports individuals to integrate the teachings of this work.
And this conversation was so insightful and filled with so much wisdom. I mean, I, I know you're gonna hear it in his voice, but he very much does convey, someone who has been deeply immersed in. This deep work for a very long time, which he has. we talk about the bridge between manifestation and surrender, how to live within community, how to make spirituality practical and many other things.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: I'm excited for you to meet Tim. Enjoy. Tim, it's a pleasure to have you here. I'm really excited to have this [00:02:00] conversation with you and one of the places that I wanted to begin was I was listening to a podcast interview that you had where you mentioned a near death experience that you had at 10 years old. Can you share a little bit more about that experience and what, how that began to shift your life?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Um, so I grew up in Vermont and um, I'm 65. So back then that would've been about 1970. So just to kind of frame the experience, it, I, I, I was not an urban child. I was very rural and you know, this is back when there was. Like two channels, three channels on tv. And there wasn't the internet and there wasn't broad knowledge, you know, shared with experiences like this.
So I had no idea that this was even a thing, you know, back, especially when I was, you know, 10 years old and I had a, a, a, a small surgery. Like I had a tumor, a, a, a benign tumor right on my chest and that, so they were gonna take it out just so I wouldn't grow like a, a mass there. And I remember [00:03:00] is being on this gurney, and they're wheeling me in and as they get to the operating room, they put this mask over me and they say, count backwards from a hundred, then you'll, you know, be gone.
And so I got to like 98 and I was like that. And what I remember is just my, the awareness of my being rising outta my body. Like just my consciousness rising up out of the body and I'm looking down at. Me, my physical form on a, um, an operating table and there were nurses and doctor, you know, like kinda leaning over me. And I just remember looking and then just kind of escaping, I guess you could say. It almost felt like I was escaping and I was like going out and I found the, this corner of the wall and I go up the corner of the wall and get to the ceiling. Then I went left and hit, you know, at the corner and went down sort of the edge of the ceiling and the, the wall.
And next [00:04:00] thing I know I'm going out in that tunnel of light that people talk about. And, um, so I'm just like in this tunnel of light and it's just my consciousness, not my physical form, but just, you know, my being. And, um, it was, it was amazing. It was just like, I just remember feeling so relaxed and at peace. Like, it wasn't a scary thing. There was like no mystery. It was mysterious, but there was no sense of unresolved fear or anything. It was just, this is an experience that we're having and it was beautiful. And I go down this tunnel of light and there was a Christ figure at the end of it. I, you know, I didn't see a face and I didn't, you know, I don't know what Christ looked like per se, but, um, I, when I got there, he was sort of, this being, was standing there with their arms extended almost like a, you know, just sort of a hug maybe. And, um, I just tried to go through, I tried to go past and I, and I was told, you know, and not, not [00:05:00] in any words or verbiage, but just this sense of, you know, awareness coming through. It wasn't time yet and I had to go back and I just sort of remember this sort of feeling of going, turning around and not going straight back, but almost like a left hand turn just going left and back, and then. awareness returned as a 10-year-old boy in his body.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Speaking of a 10-year-old boy in his body, I mean, you're, you're speaking of this as 65-year-old Tim. How was 10-year-old Tim, making sense of this once you came back into your body?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: You know, one of those things there, there's, I can't remember what it's called, but there's this thing that happens to people when they go, go through or see something that just doesn't make sense or that's completely outside of their understanding, where like you just kind of just let it sit there.
Like you almost just don't examine it too much. You just say, well, that happened and keep moving. And I don't remember telling a lot of people, like, I'm not even sure what I would've said and to [00:06:00] whom I would've said it. Right.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I didn't, we weren't from a religious or spiritual family. There was none of that.
Like we'd, you know, go to church a little bit, but that was about it. I don't remember even trying to make sense of it that, that a few years later, I think I was like 14. And I was in the, the school library. And somehow, like we had, we must have had like, you know, not that many books. It was very small, you know, the, the school that I went to was a public school for three towns and there were less than 200 kids in the school, and it was grade seven through 12.
So it was like a small place. I found, um, by Herman Hess, and that's really when I think it started to click in a little bit, Jonathan was just this, this feeling of, um, wow. That, that there's, there's a spiritual journey thing that can happen to people. And then perhaps it started to kind of in as like something that may have happened in, in that sort of mystical realm of, of energy.
[00:07:00] I, I, I don't know. I, I'm not sure that I really ever made sense of it. I, I think in terms of how I feel about it now, it was just incredibly comforting to know that if that's what it's like to die. Then big deal. No big deal. I'll be, I'll be down for that when the time comes.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, totally. So then how was that experience living within you over the years? Because it obviously impacted you, so was it something that was just there that every now and again you would remember? Or was it somehow a big part of you?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: it's a really good question.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: I.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I didn't immediately become a spiritual seeker per se. You know, I was just a 14-year-old kid. I was just trying to like find a girlfriend or play soccer or do whatever I was doing right. And then, but years later, when, uh, I was I think 30 and I found the Temple of the Universe and we started hearing [00:08:00] Michael Singer's teachings, one of the things that a lot of the Temple folks did was read, uh, paramount Yogananda, um, autobiography via yoga.
I'm sure most of your. Listeners are, are familiar with that. That was the book that Steve Jobs handed out at his own funeral. That's, that's how he held that. thought. But in that book and, and in a lot of the other spiritual books that I read, were a lot of mystical experiences being shared.
You know, like seeing your guru outside, you? know, like in the spirit or people being in multiple places at one. There's just a lot of, in the spiritual teachings, there's a lot of that kind of, um, things are happening. I guess what it did was it, it helped me to take, to hear these stories of, of people's experiences with their gurus and mystical experiences and sort of out of body experiences and not reject them. I, that's how I would put it. I, I was [00:09:00] talking to somebody just a few minutes ago about how think it's really healthy in this spiritual space to have a, um. Almost like a, an area over here where I believe everything I just heard, I believe this thing. over here I have, I don't believe that that is not true.
I, I deny that completely, but in the middle there's this huge space of stuff that I.
don't think I really know enough to classify it either as I believe it or don't believe it. This experience broadened that middle space of not really knowing and also giving lots of space for how people interpret their own experiences. I may have described it as going down a tunnel of light, and somebody else may put it another way, but that experience was real to them. So I can accept the reality of their experience without really having to worry if that was technically possible or not. Or within the rules of physics as we knew them back in 1960 or 1970.
Was that possible? I don't know. I don't care.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: been a, a [00:10:00] consistency of interesting experiences that people have had. I can put 'em in that sort of middle area until I have more information. That's what it really did was open my eyes to kind of the, the middle ground of not knowing.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm. Which is such a place of discomfort for so many people.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: You know? I think that's maybe the good point is it made it comfortable for me. Like I don't have to know. Right. I, I, I, I knew what I felt. I knew what the experience was for me. Can I say what the experience is for anybody else? No, certainly have a more receptive ear to other people's experiences now.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Yeah. I mean that, that is the, the true spiritual journey is living the, the not knowing and discovering from personal experience moment to moment what is present here and now, right?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, exactly.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: And how to pay attention to that, and then how to process it in a healthy way. Like have everything become for our growth,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: [00:11:00] Yes, yes. So,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: all these experiences.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: well, speaking of having everything for a growth, you mentioned in your bio that I've experienced deep emotional pain and know what it means to truly suffer, which is a strong line. What, what do you mean by that? Can you expand on that a bit?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, so I, I found the temple the universe, Michael, a singer's temple of the universe back in, um, 1991, I think it was. I've been, I've, my wife and I have lived here for 31 years, 33 years, excuse me. And in that time, like the whole purpose catch that one of the main exercises of living on a temple or an ashram or a spiritual community is to work with a lot of the underlying trauma pain, some scars that, that have, you know, accumulated over the course of life, right or past lives, depending upon, you know, how you [00:12:00] view the world and. In my 33, 34 years of doing this work, a lot of deep stuff has come up about love being, loved being, um, being, um, a legitimate like person who gets things done. It had a lot of stuff about success being successful. The, the dark night of the soul was a, a love situation, my heart got broken. And, and just like, just this sense of, um, it, it was just an old, old sense being triggered by a new experience. And what it did was show me how much energy, energy can be stored within this spiritual heart, the spiritual heart center, and. I don't think without the, the, [00:13:00] so I, so this ashram, this, the temple of the universe that I keep talking about is a spiritual community where we meditate every morning and every evening.
And we've got programs every day. So there's like a, a morning and an evening with, you know, very consistent Sona. And I didn't know that I could process so much pain. I think that's the point, right? Like all this pain came up that almost more pain than the situation should have driven, if you know what I mean.
It was like almost like this, this broke my heart open
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yes.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: pain that had been there, who knows how long, right?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: And, and I think the dark night of the soul was just working through that, like being willing to sit in that experience of discomfort and allow it to process, allow it to come up, to look at it, to feel. Not try to think it away. So much of what we, [00:14:00] you know, our culture is definitely oriented around how much people think, like how smart you are and how, like you're, you're able to think your way out of any problem and you can outthink like you wanna be the smartest person at the table. Just all that sort of heaviness around thinking and thought and your mind and what this experience showed me that the mind isn't the machine that will supply peace in my, in my being. That that's really what it came down to. Because I, I, I kind of had to just like burn out all thinking, oh, you have, you heard of a Zen Cohen? You know what a Zen Cohen is?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Absolutely. Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: So it, for those of you, it's, it's, it's a that the Zen Master asked the student in order to break their brain. And the classic example is what is, is the sound of one hand clapping and. The purpose of that is to break your habit of thought as the cure to all of your
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: discomfort, unease, pain. And this [00:15:00] dark night of the soul had the same effect. Because I could think about this and I could logic around this, and I could make plans, and I could do anything around this specific thing that happened, I couldn't, couldn't resolve it.
I couldn't like make, I couldn't bring peace into my being. And so the net effect is learning how to work with the raw energy as opposed to the thoughts about the event
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm. Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Does that make sense? Can you feel that?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Oh, it makes perfect sense. That is, that is the, the teaching. I, I think so often I think there is a place for therapy in this world, you know, talk therapy and even talk coaching and all that. But ultimately, if we're seeking true healing, it does have to happen at the level of the body and experience.
Experience
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: that, that, that's where the energies are sort of intertwined, entangled,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: you know, and, and I, I shared, um, I experienced something similar in my own journey where when I first started exploring [00:16:00] and sort of something cut me wide open and experience cut me wide open and I was sort of exposed to all that
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Mm-hmm.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: was inside of me, it really felt like it was so much more than what was just mine.
It felt like I cut something open that was lifetimes, uh, families, generations old.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: that is part of this journey as well, is that we're uncovering stuff that we're carrying unconsciously that is not just ours of this lifetimes, I feel. You know?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Family trauma.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Yeah. So it could feel worse before it gets better when you start.
This journey is the bigger point. Right. Which was what I'm hearing from you.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: it, it, I think it's not that it feels worse much, it is that we make a choice to feel
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: like, you know, there's, we, we, it's easily to drink, smoke, do all kinds of other things, seek success, seek money, do all these other things to kind of distract us from this express, this [00:17:00] feeling that we're having.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yes.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: And a lot of the work that we're doing is around awareness. That's why we meditate. That's why we, you know, do practices so that we become aware of the internal experience that we're having so that we can work with it in a productive way. And I think that's really what it was, was just that sense of, I've been broken open by this and now I have a chance to cleanse from this. Very deep wound that's coming up. And, and I, I, I, um, teach meditation in prison. I volunteer in prison. And this idea of family trauma is just so profound like that. I see these, these that I work with, incarcerated people that I work with, and they are releasing when, when they go into meditation and they start to release, they're working through stuff that's just generations old.
And the stories that they tell about, like, stuff that happened in front of them with their parents. And there's no doubt they're, there's no, no, no curiosity around when they're incarcerated. They've just been given a terrible hand to start with.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: [00:18:00] Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally, totally.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: they get to unwind all that, right?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Absolutely. Absolutely. So then you had this experience, heart of Heartbreak, that then sort of had you looking within, but it sounds like you overcame that heartbreak had gotten married and then at that point went to the temple. What was happening in your life that drew you to the work of Michael Singer in the Temple at that time?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: It was, um, I, I, I honestly don't know per se, but this near death experience as a kid and reading Sid Arthur and some other explorations, you know, I just think I was like there was something inside me that was looking for this. And I, um, I had a difficult, another difficult experience, another dark night of the soul, um, before I found the temple.
And it was a, uh, I, I flunked outta college in Vermont. I went to the University of Vermont and after three semesters I flunked out. And it was like a, it was, it felt like a big [00:19:00] deal for me and. My girlfriend broke up with me and it was like this whole like cascading series of events. So I went to a real, like heavy duty Christian Church to, uh, try to, you know, find some solace.
And, and I was there for a couple of years and, and it helped from the standpoint that it gave me some guardrails and introduced me to Christ and showed me a lot of deep, beautiful spiritual teachings. But in the end I was a little pushed away from it. The, there just some basic premises that were difficult for me to agree with.
Right. so I just kind of put it down. I, I said, okay, well I guess church isn't the thing for me. I didn't know there were other, you know, I didn't know there was Buddhism or other outlets or ways to, you know, any other ways to find, you know, a version of God other than, you know, Christianity. years later when I went to, um. The temple and I started hearing Mickey Michael, a singer talk. It was like, I've just been waiting my whole life to hear this, like the way he talked [00:20:00] about energies and the way he talked about like how we work through our karma. The way he talked about, um, you know, just, just the rule, what karma was in general, and, and you know, the idea of Buddhist suffering and, and, and surrender and, and being, you know, fearful working from fear and working from attraction.
The just, all these ideas just hit a more subtle level and there was much less focus on sin and much less focus on, um, just sort of being a bad person. That, that this all is about growth. It's all about learning and growth and evolving as opposed to being, you know, punished. And that really appealed to me, and it, it opened the door towards, you know, real love, like actually viewing this, whatever the God experience is, that it's one of love. When you get down to it, it doesn't have to be like this heavy judgment confession kind of a situation.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. And, and you had an experience of that immediately when you [00:21:00] first encountered Mickey Singer, as I understand it, where he saw right through you in your own words and had this sort of unconditional acceptance of whatever he was seeing. Can you, can you share more about that experience?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I, we walked up to the temple for the first time and of course this is now back in 1991 I believe it was. So you know there, if you've been to the temple recently. Like, it's much more developed. Like the roads are paved all the way out now. We got buildings. Well, it used, didn't used to be like that. It was like just a building out in the middle of kind of nowhere. And I can remember like just finding my way out, like, you know, is this the right place? My wife and I were like going in and um, and we walk up and, and I can remember just like he was standing on the porch. I get, I think we were just walking in, not much, you know, at the same time he was. And he just looked at us I just felt like this guy could see all the way through me.
Like he could really like, have an energetic understanding what was going on in there. And it scared me because I had a lot of shame, you know, I just like, oh [00:22:00] man, I, I felt like he could see all the parts, you know? And um, beauty of it was that I was able to relax around that and say, you know, I'm not, I don't, just because this feels like shame doesn't mean I have to have shame. That's old conditioning. And so it allowed me just to have him. To be more open around him and to, to feel like I can trust this guy. I can trust this experience?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm. How long were you in relationship with his work before you decided to move to the temple?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Um, I think it was like eight, nine months. We, um, we were invited to move in, you know, we were, you know, young and, and very energetic and we liked to help. We, we, we, like, every time it was like, you know, like a Thanksgiving thing or some project that the temple still does. Years later we would sign up to help and bring food and, and we just made it our, our mission to really help, help the place and, and along with all the other beautiful people who've been volunteering there for, for [00:23:00] 50 years and longer. but yeah, it was, it was just like, once I heard it just, it made sense, right? And I would have this, this sort of thought experiment in my mind, like. If I could have done anything, like maybe, like I could, I could, I could have been a good basketball player, so I think maybe I could have played in college somewhere, or maybe I, if I just devoted all my energy, my effort to being a great basketball player, maybe I could have done it or, or a soccer player. And so as I did that thought experiment, what kept landing was, well, I guess what I would do is do whatever it was that would help all aspects of my life to help make me happier and smarter and just sort of raise my ability to deal with the things that happen in life. And I, at some point I realized that the temple?
was that, like, it's, it's an all around performance enhancing practice, you know? And, and it also room to experience like real brotherly love or like [00:24:00] real un unconditional love. And, and once that started to happen on occasion, then, then I was like, oh, this is it. I'm, I'm here, I'm staying.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: quick. Like, I really felt like that this is good stuff. Like it just, it felt very trustworthy and beautiful right from the start,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm. Yeah. It, it almost feels like you made the decision to go pro in, in spirituality.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: you know? Um, well, what I will say is this, you, you know, Malcolm Gladwell, right?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: The 10,000 hour rule, and I
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Right.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I'm like at 30,000 hours of, of, you know,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: temple work, you know, just on its own. So it's like, Yeah, that's what it feels like. Like that became the underlying interest of everything. So I still love sports and I love music, and I love, you know, all kinds of, you know, current media and, and, underlying it all is just this beautiful framework that's been, you know, true for thousands of years.
It's basically, I, I feel like it's the same exercise [00:25:00] that humans have been doing for thousands of years to, to stay happy and to stay at peace.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, yeah. Bo both the Untethered Soul and the Surrender Experiment have played such a critical role in my own development and understanding, um, you know, reality myself, my own journey. I often say that I feel like I've been living my own surrender experiment over the past 17 years of my own spiritual unfolding, where I really only feel like I've made one, uh, made one decision in my life, and that was to quit my corporate job and go off backpacking.
And that sort of created, created a cascading series of, uh, experiences, uh, opportunities. Up until today where I'm at today. So in that sense, it's been an influential part of my life. A lot of people in my world. I, I recommend the book both books to a lot of people. And it's interesting, especially with the surrender experiment, a lot of people feel drawn to that concept of surrender.
And particularly in the way that Mickey, uh, speaks to it, because it, it, it's a very [00:26:00] compelling story, right? It's a, it's not just, you know, I surrendered and I went off into the woods and, you know, became,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: from again.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: never heard from him again. He, he started a company, a, a, a software company and ended up selling it for a billion, basically right.
A
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: In, in the nineties, the late nineties. That's
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: in the, in the nineties.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: billion dollars.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Right, right. Which is, you know, five, 10 x whatever it is, you know, now. And, and so there's a sense of, okay, great, I can do the surrender thing because if I do the surrender thing, then I'll get some of that, you know, you know, this will lead to that and it's not necessarily the case.
And I wanna sort of talk about that in a moment. But before I do that, I find it interesting that you live through that era, a bit of him being the CEO of this company. What, what did you notice in him? What did you see? What can you speak to about him running this company as he was also a spiritual leader of this temple?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Well, I have to say it really inspired me. You know, one of the things that made me [00:27:00] want to, you know, a additionally in a, in addition to the teachings, one of the things that really drove me to love the temple?
experience was the fact that Mickey was a successful businessman.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I just, I just felt like that's, that's a huge part. And, and I'm not saying that you have to be, you know, wealthy, but the ability to, to participate in society. And, and do it from a place of love and, and, and, and providing, providing care and support to the rest of the world. Right? This was really important to me. Like I, that's how I wanted to be. So he was a great, he is a great example of that because he, that's what he does.
He, he, he spent completely successful in the world, you know? And, and so to me that's part of spirituality is to, to know how to kind of manage your energies in the world. Now it's, it's not everybody gets to have that kind of success. And for some, for me, success was much lower level. Like I, I got to be a photographer for the, a photojournalist, and I've done a number of [00:28:00] things, and I would measure success in the amount of peace I had as I was doing that, as opposed to how much money I earned.
And, and so. That's what it was, was the, the ability to work in the world, do the things that the world has for you, serve actually do it with a sense of peace and focus and surrender, like you said. So that drew me a lot to him. That made me trust, like this was the right way to kind of experience spirituality because there wasn't just a leaving of the world.
There wasn't just a, as you say, like just going into hiding and never being heard from again. Like, I'd like to be out there making a positive contribution. And I think that's an important part of, you know, caring, you know, charitable and loving feelings and emotions forward is to, is to provide service
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. What would you say most people misunderstand about the practice of surrender?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: that it's a, an aspect of weakness. Right? I, so for me, when I [00:29:00] think about surrender. I feel that there is something happening that seems to be guiding us. Now, it's hard for me to say that's a God thing. I dunno if it's quantum physics,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: consciousness underlying the quantum feel. I, I, lots of interesting feelings about that. God has been taught with multiple names across thousands of years, and so who knows who's right? I don't know. But what I do feel is the universe create a path in front of us if we are receptive to it. And surrender to me is the ability to allow life, to be life to function well within whatever is real in that moment. Uh, and the stoics, um, really, I think they, they focused on that really well back in the day when they talked about just Amer fti, you know, that concept.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: I'm not sure of that concept. No.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Okay. So Amer is, is, is, um, Latin for love and FTI is fate, essentially. I'm, I'm, I'm probably [00:30:00] killing that. Essentially what they said was, love your fate.
Love what's happening to you. Because when you love what's happening to you, aside from it being good, bad, whatever it is, just be in love with the life that you're giving. Now you can engage with it from a state of enthusiasm and fullness instead of resistance. I see surrender being that same lesson that life is gonna do what life does, and it's up to us to accept that and try to make the most of it, but we can't just reject what's happening.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: So,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: do you
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: for example, for example, if I could,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: please.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: there's, there's a lot of, um, polarity around political thinking these days. You may have noticed that, that it's like just hard to have a conversation with somebody because you may or may not agree with 'em and it's just gonna turn into a fight. So there's, we have an interesting political thing happening and. It's, can, [00:31:00] the, the point of surrender is to accept that this is the, this is what it is right now. Like this is what it is. These are the rules. This is the chaos that we seem to have right now as somebody who's gonna get on a flight tomorrow. And, you know, the, um, you know, I'm not sure if I'm gonna be able to figures have, if I'm be on this plane, right, that there's a certain amount of chaos in the world.
So accepting that, just being like, that's what it is. I may have to come back, I may not make my flight, I may not do this. Now I'm gonna, in that space, not surrender in terms of trying to get to Austin, Texas, but I'm gonna do everything I can to get there. But it means that I have to accept the reality.
These are the conditions that are, that we're under. And that seems simple and it seems trite, but that acceptance of your specific conditions on a moment by moment basis
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yes,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: really powerful.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: yes, yes. To not be in resistance to what is, yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. that's exactly right. We, it's easy for us to, um, be in traffic. I think Mickey uses this, this [00:32:00] example, but just to be stuck in traffic or stuck at a job that, that feels difficult or whatever, to, to reject it or, or resist it. some point, acceptance means this is where I am. And accepting it fully means that you can then kind of find the clarity and the, the, the right force and the right energy and the right reason to leave and to do whatever comes next from a good place instead of a place of resistance or wanting to burn the place down just to, for lack of a, to make it a simpler concept.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. When you and I spoke, um, on Friday, I think it was, you had mentioned the law of attraction and that being something that you, you do believe in and that it, it is something that a, a sort of a force that maybe you work with. How do you make sense or, or bridge, you know, the, the concept of surrender with, you know, the law of attraction.
'cause there's a bit of a, a [00:33:00] yearning and desire for something to be here that isn't here. On that side. And then on the surrender side is the acceptance totally of what is here now.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, so for me personally, the law of attraction starts with awareness and we spend a lot of time working on awareness, meditation, et cetera. Just learning to be able to be present with our own functioning, you know, our own heart space, our own mind space, when we start to pay attention to the way our mind creates ideas and the way we talk to ourselves.
To me, that's the beginning of manifestation. Right. So I, I, in my work of, of just meditating and, and really becoming mindfully aware of what is going on in here, thought wise, I started to see a lot of really self-destructive thinking. I would call myself terrible names and I'd be really mad at myself if I made a [00:34:00] mistake at work, I would tear myself down and, um, really unkind.
I call myself a jerk or an asshole or a dumb fuck, you know, whatever that was, right? Just like, I would just like, and I still catch it coming from old if I make a mistake or something,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: those thoughts come through. So catching them and just sort of holding them and not letting them, resisting them, but not just, just seeing thoughts is what they are.
They're just a thing. They're not a. they're just a thing, but it's not who I am. It's not my identity. It's not so releasing that creates positive manifestation just by cleaning out the negative manifestation. 'cause every time that you allow yourself to think poorly about yourself or to make negativity of situations, you're creating a negative manifestation. So to me, the highest form of manifestation is to surrender and just let it be what it is without a human idea of this is bad, this is good, this is acceptable, this is unacceptable. It just is. It just is. [00:35:00] That's what it is. I am who I am. I'm growing. I'm learning. I'm gonna make mistakes. I'm gonna give myself a lot of space to make those mistakes, and I'm gonna love myself for trying and, and then that creates an open environment for facilitating beauty instead of pain and suffering.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, yeah. Which is at the core of the teaching of the surrender experiment, you know, that once we let go of those things, life unfolds in really magical, beautiful ways. And, and we, we can be with whatever is unfolding, whether, whether our mind considers it good or bad. I guess the point where I'm, I'm curious, most curious about is, is that aspect of, uh, will and desire.
So in, in, in, that's sort of implied in law of attraction. Like there's something that I want out there, so you kind of are, are yearning or trying to bring it in, in a, in a sense. H how do you, how do you work with that? Is that, how do you see the law of attraction or do you see it differently?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I, I think that's like, in terms of my own evolution That's right. Exactly where I [00:36:00] am is, um, learning how to discern what the path forward is.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: It's, it's like when you made the choice to quit your corporate job and, and go hiking, like you had a moment of clarity
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: yeah,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: where everything just sort of fit and made sense,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: And that, that fueled a choice. And that's, that's a really, like, having that kind of clarity is a beautiful thing.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: And that's right where I am. Like, I'm, I'm it, on one hand, it's fun to make imaginations and fan, I'll call 'em fantasies, but just to imagine like, great outcomes. I'm gonna be rich, I'm gonna be da, da da.
And people are doing that all over the place. And you can, it's, no, it's not a problem to find people who wanna teach you how to do that, you know? But what I wanna know is, do you actually end up more, with more peace?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Right.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Are you actually happier we're famous for wanting things on one point in our life and then not wanting them later.[00:37:00]
It's, it's so interesting to see how like. The way that we are living right now, the Cho like whoever's listening, you, you're living in a certain set of circumstances of a life that you have largely created, you know, adapting to the current conditions, et cetera. But the life you're living is an answer to a previous problem.
Like it if you have manifested this life you have, and we just keep thinking, well, this is, this is close, but just not quite good enough. And,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: just to keep like, ah, if I can only get this much. So that's what I see as the problem is the sense that like manifestation about, we're trying to be happy.
The, the answer to the problem of humanity is to be at peace,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: enjoy, have unconditional love. And as long as your exercises and manifestation are really helping that to happen, then I'm down do it. what I see most of the time is people just want stuff, or money, or the things that they think will provide happiness instead of happiness itself.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. [00:38:00] Oh yeah. You know, I, I couldn't be more satisfied and happy with the life that I currently have. I mean, I feel blessed beyond belief, and if I were to have given the decision making powers to my mind, the decisions I would've made would've been, were, would've been completely different, you know? And so it's, it, it, it goes to show when you're really present with that, I, I don't know anything about what's in my best interest, you know?
And so it, it makes it easier then to seed the power away from that,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Yeah,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: you know? And in this, in this work that we do here at the Center with the Deep coaching, we, we talk a lot about sensing into the emergence. Sensing into the emergence of what wants to happen. And so there, there's a co-creation with life where we get really quiet and we're really sensing, which I, I see in your life in the way it's unfolding because you were living at, at the Temple for 30 plus years and you began to sense this emergence of something new, of going beyond the temple and creating something of your own, building off the teachings, you know, spreading the word in different ways, [00:39:00] sharing your impact in the world.
And, and it feels like you're stepping into that which you have been sensing,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: right? And so you're living that manifestation, but it's like this co-created dream that you and life are, um, creating other Yeah. Dancing with. Yeah,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. When it's at its best, it, it's, it's like you're dancing. You don't know who's leading.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: that's right.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: It's not my choice, it's not my desire that's leading me, but here I am and this, these things keep happening and it's beautiful. Um, but I have to keep like my awareness because I, I have, like, I've seen in my, you know, my own being, I do have still lots of desires, like, you know, nice cars and whatever.
Like, I just, I like cars and so I.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: There are things that I could be distracted by that would pull me in, pull me outta balance, I guess, is the way I put, I look at it. So I, I, I agree like that. My, my work is to stay focused on the deepest parts of myself and [00:40:00] just let it come, let it come and, and answer fully. there's another aspect too, which is like, there's an element of challenge around all this, I, I'm 65, I could be retiring, you know, I could be just like, you know, slipping away and just like, but again, I, I, I don't wanna go out like that. I want to face this choice that you're talking about to not go beyond the temple, but maybe branch it out a little bit or take some of the experiences that I've had and love and, and what's been given to me in the 30 some odd years and take it and share it. But I, it's like I'm not, I, I can't count on helping anybody because that's not my choice. That's not my outcome. I just do what I do, do my dharma, do my responsibility.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: lesson, share whatever I can, and then let universe take care of all that. So there's a way to do it really cleanly, I guess is what I'm saying, where it isn't about me,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: about my ego, it isn't about [00:41:00] I want to happen to me, at the same time, I have a responsibility to support myself and to, you know, be able to pay my bills and pay my taxes and do all the things.
So there's a real balance there that I'm, that I'm learn and, and what I'm gonna say out of complete honesty, Jonathan, is that's right where I'm learning how to walk. Like I see some people even able to handle this part of it really easily. And some people handle it, you know, it's a rough thing. Like they're always just kind of wanting something. So it's, I think there's a real balance there that I'm right on the edge of, of kind of working through.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, it's so, it's so beautiful because like we're always presented with that, which we're needing to move through and, and, and we're it, and that is an edge. I, I feel that we do carry this mind. That is sort of de designed to keep us safe. And so it, you know, and part of safety isn't just, uh, physical safety, it's also sort of societal, um, uh, emotional.
You know, we, we, we have these ideas of who we wanna be, who we should be, and that's part of the ego that we talk about, you know, [00:42:00] that personal, personal sense of self. And, and we don't wanna fully discount it because there is a sort of, um, yeah, there's something about it that we wanna be in relationship with.
I think, and,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: and Mickey speaks about it really beautifully. And, and it's sort of the difference between having preferences and desires.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Mm-hmm.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: all, the personality that is gonna want has preferences. I prefer this car versus that car. I prefer to, you know, have money than to not have money. I think it's, it's when the grip of desire, uh, yearning, you know, and these are all subtle terms, you know, we can kind of dissect them and be really nuanced about it.
Um, because yearning iss gonna be, their desire is gonna be there. But what is our relationship with that yearning and that desire? Is there an attachment to it, I guess is the thing. The attachment as a Buddha says is that which creates the suffering and the more attached we are to these outcomes, you know, the more we tend to suffer and create negative ripples, one can say,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: yeah.
I, I, I love that I, in my own life, when, when I was working [00:43:00] as a, as a photo editor at the Gainesville Sun, there would be times when I had to make judgment calls, right? part of me just wanted to be right for my ego's sake, but I also have the
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: of making a good choice. Right. And so doing my best to put all of my skill and ability and my training into effect in a even a very worldly way to make the best possible outcome from the use of this person's time or whatever, right? And so it became like, like I had to really be aware of my own personal ego investment versus like what I was doing dally create what needed to happen. And I think that's the fun part of this, is it's never like completely one way or another. And the exercise of awareness is all about becoming more and more familiar with your ways of getting things done and knowing how your internal clock works and your internal [00:44:00] discussion goes, and being at peace with all that so that you can work towards the best possible solution, even though the ego still will be involved a little bit.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. And, and that is the price of entry, I think, to living in this world. We spoke about going off into the woods or into the mountains and just becoming one with life, one can make that choice. And we wouldn't be confronted with the things that we're confronted with when we decide to engage with life, be in life, be in the world, so to speak.
You know? And so that, that, that, what, that's what makes this beautiful. This is also what makes this work relatable. I, everybody listening to this, I know for certain is wanting to be in this world, but also have the right relationship with it, where we, we feel that sense of freedom and connection and love consistently.
And so I think that's where we're all trying, everyone listening here, I would say in this room, um, we're trying to get to right that place of alignment with, uh, life and ourselves.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I think that's actually like why religions evolved in the first place. To go back to like First Man, you know, like the first like thinking [00:45:00]
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: True.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: self-aware human. That's essentially the problem that all these religions have been trying to solve the whole time. And I think that's also the beauty of it and which takes us back to the untethered soul, is that there is a tremendous consistency amongst like when you get past sort of the ex the weird stuff on the extremes, right?
And get down to like the core teachings of whatever the, the source was for these teachings.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: pretty consistent. Know yourself, be okay with yourself. Let go of your, your, your internal struggle as much as you can. And, and try to love, try to love, try to approach the world with love.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I, I love that you brought that up because like really we're just in this long continuum of people all having a very similar experience just. With different varieties and flavors and tastes, you know,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Building off of that, you know, speaking of people with variety of tastes and flavors, what was it like to live in community for 30 [00:46:00] years with so many different types of people that I imagine came through the temple?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: it, um, it's really, it's really interesting. It's so funny this morning, um, I, I went to the temple?
and meditated and afterwards, um, I met a young woman from Vermont where originally where I'm from, and she, she lives in a Buddhist monastery in the Northeast Kingdom, which is a, a cool thing. And she was talking about how intense it was and how, um, like within the core group. They're just always sort of having to work stuff out, bumping into each other and sort of they are
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yes.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: own growth mechanism. And that's what I would say it was for me at the Temple too. Like, know, you, you go every morning, you go every evening. There's an a remarkable consistency to all that so that you are working with your deepest stuff instead of always new things coming in, like new preferences, new people, new this. There's a sense that like with this consistency of life, you're dealing with your deep stuff instead of the flavor of the day. [00:47:00] And when it's the same people and the same projects and you're singing the same songs and maybe one person's claps ahead of the beat and the other person, like just all it's, it's, it's amazing like the stuff that you can find coming up in your mind during these situations.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: what is it like, it's like in a family where you. Enthusiastically accept that whatever discomfort you're feeling is your own,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Oh yeah. Oh yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: instead of blaming it on them or telling, like, if you would change, I could be happy. And if you would do this, then that would make everything better. Like, no, it's like this operating assumption that it's up to you to be okay and that we'll figure it out together.
And I think that's what it is. Just, you know, one, a definition of mon Monastic, this was a semi monastery, if you will, like, you know, we would get together every morning, evening, but then we'd go off and work and like work at Real Jobs. And Mickey was, you know, building a company and my wife worked for the company and I was working for a few different places. But there's this sense [00:48:00] that, um, that the, the, the fable is that when you join a monastery, you're like rocks being dropped into a pouch with enough time and energy, like, and the rocks bouncing off each other, they will all become smooth and perfectly round. Like there's a sense of just chipping away all of the. Dros of, of like, of, of your being that doesn't need to be there. The ego and the difficulty and the preferences, just they monastic life tends to erode all that. Just from the sameness, just from the consistency of experience day to day.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, I, I feel like we're in an interesting time, evolutionary e evolutionarily, because I think two things are happening simultaneously have been, obviously we're, we're, we're connected to more people than any human has ever been connected to. And so we have that access. And at the same time, I think there is a de-globalization happening, meaning, I think there's a localization happening.
I think people are gonna be driven more to tighter communities because it's [00:49:00] been such an expansive, big world, you know? And, and we don't necessarily, I don't know, maybe believe the same things, wanna live the same way and, and all those things. So I, I do feel that the next stage of evolution is, yeah, we have access to all these humans out in the world through technology, but at the same time, we're gonna be living day to day and tighter communities.
I think we've seen this also with. Cities in Miami
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: neighborhoods become more sort of all inclusive, where you can find anything you need in that neighborhood and you don't have to venture off too far.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: that's a bit of the localization that I think is happening and I'm curious what your thoughts are on that and, and, and related to that, what the challenges of being in tighter community might be, given that some are gonna be conscious, some are gonna be less conscious, you know, there's gonna be a blend of that, I think, in the world.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I, what I'm gonna say is, the problem is never the other people.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Exactly. Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I, I, I, I think that's the most powerful aspect of what I walk away, you know, like, as I've stepped away [00:50:00] from, from, you know, going as much as I used to. The thing that I see is it's, it's still me. It's still me that I'm working on. Like,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: because I've pulled myself to some degree out of that environment, I still take myself.
Right? So, so it's still this thing that's driving my experience of life.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: so that's that part. And in terms of that, that, that local, I, I'm, I'm not sure how this is gonna go. I mean, I think there's a lot of, I think there's a lot of people who want to, like, Miami's a beautiful place. I love Miami, there's the Midwest and there's Mississippi, and there's Ohio and there and there.
Like if you are a yogi or you have a Buddhist belief system, you aren't, it's really difficult to find community in those places. And so you'll seek it however you can. And, and so that's what I think, that's what I see happening, is that we are going to be finding our tribe. As you say more [00:51:00] closely, but we may have to travel for the in-person part.
And I think that's the real challenge is, is that sense of humanity. Like, 'cause you can go to chat GPT and get a great discussion about your some scars and this and that and how to like work with your internal family systems and blah blah blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah. at the end of the day you wanna feel this human vibration of love and you wanna hug and you wanna feel like this person really understands and cares what, how this rolls through
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: agree with me all the time.
Like for example, right? So I think we are seeking our own world to our a fault. Like we don't, aren't open to other political beliefs and spiritual beliefs, but I think we're just all essentially doing the best we can. I mean, there's just so much information to process.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: think the challenge really though is just to, is to create systems where we can have human contact with people who deeply support us for the right reasons.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Agreed. Yeah. And that's my bigger point. I, I think folks are gonna be seeking that out more and whether it means travel or actually decide [00:52:00] to move a place where folks that you are more in vibe with one can say you, you know, I think people are gonna be seeking that out more, you know, rather than be isolated and, and only sort of seek it out virtually, which is great.
That's a huge, we, we are a virtual organization, you know, in, in that regard. We have folks from all over the world. But, but at the same time that in-person, we, we can't replace the in-person connection, the hugs, the eye contact, you know, um, that, that is a, a very special part of this process.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah, so true. So true. I I, it's been interesting to, um, watch how the temple has evolved. you know, prior to COVID, when when Mickey talked, we would record 'em on CDs and before that cassette tapes, I was part of that process. And then. When COVID hit, we started to record them as MP threes and they began to be distributed, you know, online. And that has brought tons of people into the area. Many of, and, and a lot of them have [00:53:00] stayed, have bought property in this neighborhood, in the neighborhood surrounding the temple. So that evolution that you're talking about is really happening that, that people are picking their home based on not just the climate or their job or whatever, but you can really pick your home based on the pool of people that are gonna surround you and what their ethics are, and what their ethos is and how they see the world.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Totally. Totally. What, what? We can't know. And then I think you were alluding to this, that we, we, we can't know how this is all gonna unfold. You know, there's a lot of moving parts, a lot of complexity.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: But what I think I'm, I'm confident about and that you're confident about is that folks are gonna be seeking out this kind of work, the work that you do, the work that we do, the work to better understand oneself, the, the work of better working with that which is within us, and that which is emerging through us.
And, and so again, people are gonna be seeking out. So what are you most, [00:54:00] um, I guess how are you positioning yourself out in the world? What, what is that, what is that message that is yours that you're looking to spread more of?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: it's, it's really about how that to become aware, I think is the simplest way I can put it, is to pay attention to what's going on inside. Because without that understanding of self, without that self-knowledge, you're just gonna be dragged around by stray energies and whims and ego, right? So what I try to help with. Is to help people willing to turn inward and watch what's going on inside. Watch the process of their mind. When we have, um, difficult situations, we have anxiety or fear, doubt or depression, there's a real distinct pattern of how our mind is working in those situations. And as we go through enough times [00:55:00] of watching that we can really help the release of the underlying problem that's, that's at this, at the root of that and that. All these external things ostensibly provide happiness, like the nicer car, like I like all the stuff I was talking about. at the end of?
the day, happiness is a deeply internal experience. And by doing this work with a mind, understanding the self that can evolve into going to the source of happiness, which is your own consciousness, your own heart, your own connection point with the energy that is the rest of the universe.
And God, by whatever name or idea or concept, you wrap around those three letters.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm. What is your,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: that's my work.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: yeah. What is your definition of happiness?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Peace. I, I, um, have been through enough difficult situations to know that as I go through them, it's an amazing opportunity to learn and grow. So [00:56:00] one hand there is difficulty, but there doesn't have to be suffering.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: There is the processing of difficult situations, difficult energies, difficult, you know, people, but it doesn't have to take away my sense of peace.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: So peace is almost like the, the, the, the floor, the foundation of this experience. But the other part is like when I walk out of the gym and it's a beautiful, sunny day and I just stop for a minute and get in my, before I get in my car and I look up at the sun and I just feel the weather and feel the sun and just take a deep breath and just realize that it's a magical fucking experience to be alive, just to feel like this beautiful nature park that source us on earth. And to be grateful for that.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: That's really what I'm trying to do. Just like take away through awareness, allow [00:57:00] distractions to be replaced by conscious. Awareness of peace.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Hmm. And that's the biggest hurdle for the human mind in most people. You know, the, the thoughts are so compelling. The story is so compelling to be drawn in it, entangled in it, it's a, it's, it's the thing that, that folks are most drawn to. So it's that. And, and I think that's where spiritual experience becomes so important for people to begin tasting.
What it's like to, to, to not always be in the mind, to have that separation, to have that deeper connection because then that becomes at least something you can work towards.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. I heard an interesting theory that, um, that our mind activity is a. As a result of sort of Darwinistic thinking, right? Like we've evolved to be taller and stronger [00:58:00] and faster, people who survived had really active super, um, on point minds that
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Oh, sure.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: trying to process every threat, every, and now we live in an era where that's not necessary.
Like in a way you could look at like obesity, like, like we've been trained through Darwinism to eat. Like whenever there's food, you better eat it. 'cause we don't know how long it's gonna be. And now, of course, now our society, there's McDonald's on every corner. So there's, that's not the problem anymore.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: problem anymore isn't safety, it's ego now. Like our ego gets threatened and the mind is constantly spinning it to try to protect the ego
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: and to appreciate that that's not necessary. And to catch it and just relieve yourself of the mental burden of protecting that is so powerful like that. That's a, it's a huge step towards peace,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: That's it. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. Step one is the awareness, so learning to become aware of that which is inside of us. And then [00:59:00] the next most important step to really untangling it is the discernment.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Discerning, discerning what is of me, what is in what relationship do I want to have with this, you know, and begin letting go.
That's where the surrender happens in that discernment I, I believe.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: You know, when we're doing things that we're good at, we are in a state of high consciousness. You know, we, we have consciousness. Like if we're dumb example, we're throwing a baseball, we're just throwing a baseball. Like, and we have very conscious awareness of what it feels like when the ball hits the glove and what it's like when we throw it and what it feels like.
And through like, it's amazing that people can throw a ball or a basketball and hit like a very tiny target under great duress, you know?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Sure.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: So as consciousness builds around a certain behavior activity, we get deeper and deeper wisdom and, and it gets quieter around that. That's really what we're looking at, is to fill in those spaces where there's no, like, [01:00:00] awareness is the first step, but as we sit through it and stay more calm, stay in peace, like breathe in a way that tells our body everything's okay, consciousness, just this deeper awareness around everything that's happening to us, because we're not being threatened, you know, we, we feel safe in that environment.
We can just allow ourselves to be in situations that used to threaten us.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: happens, then our sense of consciousness and awareness just grows and grows and grows and grows exponentially. And then we can be eventually at peace in almost all circumstances.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: we can, one thing I talk about in prison is that. Our mission, I I in, in the, when I volunteer in prison and I teach meditation, I talk about how, you know there are gonna be times when you need to fight to protect yourself. It just, that's the nature of being incarcerated. That, that there's physical altercations, but awareness and consciousness helps you to make the best choices [01:01:00] around how you engage that you're not engaging from an ego aspect to try to beat the crap outta somebody 'cause they didn't respect you. It's about creating the quickest path, the path to resolution in any situation.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: That's really the way I see peace, is that when you're operating from peace, you're creating the circumstances of coming back to peace.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yes.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: When you get distracted, peace becomes a habit, peace becomes the direction that you're always headed in, that we seek distractions for what they are. Just momentary things that came from outside. And we can allow them to take our knowledge of peace away for a moment, but not for long. That we're always kind of reverting back to allowing gravity to bring us back to the deepest source of peace, which is inside us, our consciousness, our will, the self capital s self
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Beautifully said, be beautifully said. Is there a particular inmate that stands [01:02:00] out as someone that has really taken hold to this work? And you can see the fruits of it in their being?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: one. So I, I, I work primarily out of a, a dorm at Lancaster Correctional Institute. W that's built around spiritual work.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Like to get into this dorm, you have to be sort of at a level of trying to, you know, make something of yourself. And, um, one, one story I will tell is, and I'm gonna not say any names or try to do anything to identify this person, but, um. They had had a lot of childhood trauma, they had a lot of things happen to them, you know, in their upbringing that made them easily distracted in certain directions. I'll just say that. Okay. And as we started working through meditation and this person started sharing with me like these memories and working through them, really got to a point where they could see full awareness, the [01:03:00] destructive quality of what was coming up inside them. And so eventually they were released and they had to go through a lot of, jump through a lot of hoops in order to, you know, get out into the world, find a job, do all the things. in moments when they were at most, at risk, when, when, like, there were moments when they had to, to like call their, their probation officer, do something like that and, and they couldn't, couldn't get to a phone or whatever. This person would just be under incredible stress because it could really threaten his ability to get back to his family and see, you know. was going on with visit his, his, his home and he would just start to, um, turn inward. In those moments, he was able to see and the distraction of stress and realize that the enemy wasn't the thing that was happening. The enemy was his response, an ill [01:04:00] ill conceived response to stress.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: And so when he, he became really like super aware and able to release as he was in the middle of difficult situations and he just started making better and better decisions and he's doing great.
He's, he's got a job and he's been at it for years now. And he's, that, that's the example. And forgive me for not like saying more about him, but,
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: It's okay.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: and, and another just like the sense that. That when you're in prison, when you're incarcerated, and, and this won't be one particular inmate, but one of the, the things that's most important for them is that their lives aren't over once they're incarcerated, like they still are having a human experience. And it can be a very growthful, powerful human experience and that they can still be at peace and even sometimes happy when they're incarcerated. [01:05:00] And I think that's a key aspect to, um, reducing recidivism and rehabilitation is just being okay no matter where you are. 'cause if you can be okay in prison, you have a better chance of being okay out in society where it's actually in some ways harder.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. And I would say, you know, at peace, happy, and, and finding meaning again in their life,
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Yeah.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: because I think the journey of growth then becomes, and everything that they experienced prior becomes the, you know, uh, uh, propellant for what's next and where they're going, you know, which is, yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: and, and I really try hard to create the work I do as non-denominational because while, you know, I had my choice and, and process with Christianity, it's different for everybody. I work with Christians and Buddhists and Wcan and just all sorts of different, you know, that's what I love about the untethered Soul and the concepts that are written is they apply to [01:06:00] all levels of spirituality.
Meditation has been, you know, on the books for thousands and thousands of years as, as, and in all the different books is a way to get closer to God, whatever that, you know, by whatever name you call God. That's how you get there. It's just the Christian world, I like to, uh, point out the, the text. It says, um, the Kingdom of Heaven is within you. Right. and that really paints a picture that I think is true. It's, it's, it points to your Buddha nature. It points to consciousness your soul. But there's this experience inside, and some would call it this, the wisdom of the silence, right? When you go past, like the senses and you go past the layers of distraction and go past the, you know, the flavors of whatever this life is that we're living in this day and age and this culture deep enough and we're all at this point
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Hmm.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: the heart opens and we taste consciousness and we experience this oneness. Like, that's, that's really where I'm trying to go. And that's, that, that seems [01:07:00] to fly across all religious philosophies and dictums and, and, and ways of seeing the world.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: No doubt, no doubt. You wrote a workbook based off the teachings of the untethered soul. Tell us more about that.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: So one of, after I left journalism, I worked for a company called National Center for Construction Education and Research here at Alachua, Florida. it was a great job. We, we built, um, curriculum for 70 different craft areas, carpentry, crane, just all across the board of what it takes to, to do building in, in the United States, do building well and safely. what I learned was instructional design. the Untethered Soul is a narrative. It's 19 chapters of narrative about an idea. And I went through the Untethered Soul and. a description of each of the chapters and then made learning objectives for each of the 19 chapters. And, and each of the parts, the sections of the book have a, have a theme [01:08:00] and I built on that theme and then provided, you know, learning exercises. So, uh, you can find that, you can, uh, download it. I, I have it available as a PDF where you can get it as a full color printed book from Amazon. Um, you can get it on my website, tim o davis.com. And I also do courses based on that book. I've got an online course that I've been teaching for years now, and people really love it as a way to kind of go deeper with the untethered soul. And the way I like to do it is I assign reading and then we, we build a cohort of 10 to 12 people that becomes your, your group for the eight weeks that you go through the Untethered Soul and we share. And so every once a week we'll do a, uh, a zoom meeting where we talk about what was the point of this, um, this chapter and how are you experiencing the inner roommate and, and what is that.
Um, you know, the voice inside your head, what is it saying and how are you experiencing your heart? And it's an am It's amazing. Like as we were talking before that that sense of shared. Experience really drives growth. And that's, that's what, you know, we try to [01:09:00] do with these teachings is to, is to create like a sga, you know, a spiritual community that lasts often beyond the, the run of the course so that people have a support network and they feel, like you said, the, you know, the look in people's eyes when they understand and a sense of compassion when people get you and some of you checks on you and you're having a, a difficult day.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Oh, that is wonderful. That is wonderful. Yeah, I'm to shared on Friday and I'm, I'm.
To close this episode, if you can leave listeners with some insight, a practice, something to support their own transformational journey, what might that be?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: Well, one of the things that served me the best is in the early days of, um, back in the mid early nineties when Mickey was building his business, he would tell, he would talk about, um, how some of the things he did to stay conscious or stay aware during the day. And he, and this is prior to cell phones and prior to, um, even like the internet mostly, right? [01:10:00] He would talk about walking across the office and he would, like, if he picked up his phone, he would just pause for a moment and just take a breath. Or he would talk about, like, before he went through a doorway, he would just kind of check in with himself. I, I developed that into like a real process for myself.
So I would meditate in the morning and meditate in the evening and set these kind of bookends of balancing my, my energy and my awareness, right? But then during the day, um, every hour before, um, I would do anything, I, I, I would just, I, I would, did a three breath meditation. so it's like, say it's almost 11 o'clock, right?
I would take a breath and just like, feel my heart and, and not, I'm talking about my spiritual heart. My energetic heart. This, this place inside where, you know, we feel our experience of being human and just check it. Like what's it like? Is it, is it hurt? Is it feeling broken? Is it feeling pain? just take a breath in [01:11:00] with awareness of the heart and release the breath with a sense of relax and release around that. And then I would take that same concept and put it on the mind. I would take a breath in, bring a prana energy shakti into my system, and focusing it on the mind, the, the, the, the consciousness, the, the mind, the thinking part. a breath, bring that energy, the prana into that space, and then turning awareness to it and not from the standpoint of trying to rip the part, the thoughts apart or see what I was thinking about.
But almost like the same way you look at your dashboard of your car, like your tachometer is, is spinning, and your check engine light is on this sense of how is your mind handling the events of the day and relax. And then exhale that breath with a sense of relaxation, with a sense of releasing pent up stored energy. And then I would take a [01:12:00] last breath, and with that last breath, I would energize my whole being. And just think, okay, what do I need to get done in the next hour? What's important? What's the priority? How can I make the most of this beautiful life that I've been given? This will, that's a gift from God and energy and memory and strength to make the most of this time that I've been given on earth?
What do I need to do in the next hour? And I would release the breath a sense of relaxation and then just take that focus and go.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: So, so, so powerful. I, I see it being, it's so simple and yet so powerful.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I, it, it really is a useful technique. I would
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: use it before I had a difficult conversation. Or a meeting with somebody, and I would say, okay, I would even get down to think, what does it, what does a win look like for this meeting? Like, what, what would an accomplishment be from this meeting that would make the time worthwhile?
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: And it's amazing by getting centered [01:13:00] first and then contemplating like you, your being what you, who you're representing, your company, your effort, your work, and then put your awareness in the other person. Like what, what's the experience they're having of meeting you? Like what do you represent to them and what's their goal?
What's their mission? And by embodying both sides even briefly, and feeling the energy that you feel from both those situations, I would find that I was more prepared to have a good meeting. I could listen better, I could be more aware of what they're saying, have more sensitivity to the expressions on their face. It was just a, a really great tool for conducting yourself as a human and as a business person.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Yeah. Yeah, totally. Tim, such a pleasure connecting with you and getting to listen to your wisdom and everything you got to share.
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: same.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: Is there, is there anything you'd like to share before we close?
tim-o--davis_1_11-10-2025_094946: I think you've got it. I'm looking forward to seeing you when I come down to Miami and, um, you know, I'll, I'll be, um, doing some talks in Miami. I haven't got my, my schedule, you know, sort of [01:14:00] centered yet, but if you, if anybody'd like to email tim@timodavis.com, I can provide some details and, um, I'll be working with the Evolve group down there on some projects.
So I'm really looking forward to, uh, seeing you around art.
jonathan-_1_11-10-2025_094946: That'll be great. That'll be great. I'm looking forward to it. Thank you.