This conversation is a lived exploration of how trauma shapes the nervous system and how healing actually happens over time. Steve sits down with nervous system coach and breathwork facilitator Kristin Weitzel for an unfiltered conversation about vulnerability, survival, addiction, grief and what it really takes to change your life.

They met at the Heartland Gathering and connected instantly through honesty and openness. That moment of shared vulnerability became the foundation for a conversation that moves far beyond theory.

This episode explores nervous system regulation, orienting, neurofeedback, breathwork, cold exposure, men’s work, psychedelic medicine and integration. But beneath all of it is a simple and powerful truth. Nothing about you is broken. Your nervous system learns to survive and it can learn something new.

What You Will Learn & Key Takeaways:

• Vulnerability shifts rooms and acts as a filter for safe connection

• Trauma responses are adaptations, not personal failures

• The goal is not constant calm, but the ability to come back down

• Orienting is a simple, discreet tool to signal safety anywhere

• Shame often lives in the nervous system, not the mind

• Addiction is a survival strategy rooted in dysregulation

• Somatic practices can reach places talk therapy alone cannot

• Cold exposure and breathwork build real life resilience

• Neurofeedback offers visible data that helps remove shame

• Psychedelic medicine opens a door, but integration is where change happens

• Forgiveness can free the body even when harm was real

• Generational trauma can end with you

• Nothing about you is broken. Your system adapted to protect you

Leadership Soundbites & Pull Quotes:

“Vulnerability shifts rooms and shows you who is safe.”

“The goal is not calm. The goal is regulation and the ability to come back.”

“I lived my life like the world was dangerous. Then I realized everything that happened was for me.”

“I had an addict’s body long after I stopped using substances.”

“Forgiveness was easier for my abuser than for my father.”

“Nothing about us is broken. Our nervous systems learned to survive.”

Conversation Highlights & Chapters and Beats:

• How instant vulnerability created trust at the Heartland Gathering

• Why leading with honesty filters safe community

• The abandoned interview at Psychedelic Science and nervous system triggers

• Disappointment, heartbreak, and abandonment as somatic experiences

• The psychedelic moment that changed Steve’s life at a concert

• Childhood trauma, sexual abuse, violence, and nervous system wiring

• Addiction and success as parallel survival strategies

• Neurofeedback and seeing trauma on a brain scan

• Shame, airports, and everyday dysregulation

• Orienting as a powerful regulation tool

• Cold exposure and breathwork as resilience training

• Parasympathetic rebound and emotional regulation

• Men’s work, being seen, and breaking generational cycles

• Forgiveness, grief, and reclaiming life force

• Identity, worth, and unlearning the belief of being broken

• Advice to younger selves and reclaiming curiosity and wonder

Who This Episode Is For:

• Anyone who feels like they have done the work but still feel dysregulated

• People who struggle with shame, triggers, or emotional overwhelm

• Those navigating addiction recovery or an addict’s body

• Individuals curious about nervous system healing beyond talk therapy

• Men learning how to be seen and vulnerable

• Anyone ready to stop seeing themselves as broken

This conversation is a masterclass in empowered leadership.. not as a title, but as a way of operating.

Jojo Abot breaks down what it means to be an “oracle” and a “portal” in practical terms: someone who helps create an environment where clarity and transformation become possible, without controlling anyone’s path.

The core message is simple: stop outsourcing your power to perfect conditions, altered states, or external validation. Leadership is the sober, daily practice of listening deeper than the noise, moving with fear present, releasing identities that keep you stuck, and choosing co-creation over victimhood.

What You’ll Learn (Key Takeaways)

• Leadership isn’t identity—it’s action. “God is a verb” = your life changes when you collaborate with what you’re being called to do, not when you wait to feel ready.
• Courage is movement with fear present. Not “no fear” just decision and follow-through anyway.
• Forgiveness is an unbinding tool. It releases the “I’m the victim” identity and returns agency, energy, and focus.
• Discernment is a leadership skill. Intuition invites; fear commands. Learn the difference and you stop self-sabotaging.
• You’re not stuck—you’re at a threshold. “Stuck” is often germination: transformation happening under the surface.
• Community is strategic. Real power isn’t rugged individualism, t’s interdependence, discernment, and receiving support without manipulation.

Leadership Soundbites (Pull Quotes)

• “Leadership requires you to act on the invitation, before the conditions are perfect.”
• “Courage isn’t the absence of fear. It’s moving anyway.”
• “Forgiveness is how you stop letting your past define your operating system.”

Conversation Highlights (Chapters / Beats)

• The launch as leadership initiation: visibility triggers the body; the work is staying present anyway.

• Oracle + portal redefined: not mystical branding, creating space for clarity, perspective, and self-leadership.

• Owning your gifts without becoming a guru: accountability, humility, and integrity.

• Plant medicine vs sober power: insight is easy, embodiment is the real leadership path.

• Courage and forgiveness as core leadership virtues: conditions don’t need to be perfect; identity can evolve.

• Audacity as a decision: “meet the invitation with a yes.”

• Life as your guru: difficulty is often resistance + perspective, not reality.

• Capacity building: nervous system regulation, breath, and the ability to hold discomfort.

• Interdependence > independence: receiving support is part of maturity and leadership.

• Leaders, founders, and creators who feel stuck, frozen, or overwhelmed

• People who are spiritually inclined but want practical power, not performance

• Anyone learning to move from insight → embodiment → action

• Anyone rebuilding trust with themselves after fear, trauma, or a major life transition

Who This Episode Is For

• Oracle + portal redefined: not mystical branding, creating space for clarity, perspective, and self-leadership.

• Owning your gifts without becoming a guru: accountability, humility, and integrity.
• Plant medicine vs sober power: insight is easy, embodiment is the real leadership path.
• Courage and forgiveness as core leadership virtues: conditions don’t need to be perfect; identity can evolve.
• Audacity as a decision: “meet the invitation with a yes.”
• Life as your guru: difficulty is often resistance + perspective, not reality.
• Capacity building: nervous system regulation, breath, and the ability to hold discomfort.
• Interdependence > independence: receiving support is part of maturity and leadership.

Who This Episode Is For

• Leaders, founders, and creators who feel stuck, frozen, or overwhelmed
• People who are spiritually inclined but want practical power, not performance
• Anyone learning to move from insight → embodiment → action
• Anyone rebuilding trust with themselves after fear, trauma, or a major life transition

In this episode, Steve sits down with artist Nerissa Balland, who also happens to be his niece, for one of the most honest and tender conversations you'll hear on this podcast.

Nerissa opens up about her path from being a kid who loved to create, to working in the corporate art world, to receiving a cancer diagnosis while pregnant that changed everything. She talks about how for years, survival and achievement drove her choices and how illness forced her to slow down and finally ask deeper questions about who she was and what mattered.

It's a conversation about courage, presence, and the messy, beautiful work of turning suffering into meaning and it leaves you with this: you don't need to be fixed to be whole. Broken crayons still color.

She explains:

⬛ Creativity often begins as survival and becomes healing when intention changes.

⬛ Cancer and illness can radically disrupt identity and open new psychological and spiritual pathways.

⬛ The stories we tell ourselves are not always true and can be rewritten.

⬛ Intuition is quiet and must be cultivated through stillness and self trust.

⬛ Healing starts with the relationship you have with yourself.

⬛ Art can regulate the nervous system and support transformation without diagnosis.

⬛ Spirituality does not require certainty, only curiosity and engagement.

⬛ Trauma responses are adaptations, not character flaws.

⬛ You do not need to be fixed to be whole.

⬛ Broken crayons still color.

Chapters:

00:00 Introduction to Nerissa's Journey

01:31 The Power of Art in Healing

07:17 Navigating Life Changes and Identity

15:01 The Cancer Diagnosis: A Turning Point

23:49 Spirituality and Personal Growth

30:21 Listening to Intuition and Self-Discovery

44:19 The Role of Spirituality in Healing

56:33 Understanding Relationships and Self-Expectations

57:30 The Journey of Self-Discovery

01:00:39 Navigating Relationships and Healing

01:03:00 The Importance of Silence and Self-Reflection

01:05:06 Transforming Trauma into Art

01:09:07 The Ongoing Nature of Healing

01:12:42 Finding Balance in Life and Art

01:15:32 The Power of Personal Stories in Art

01:18:14 Creating Art as a Healing Process

About Steve

Steve is a longtime entrepreneur and former finance professional who built significant external success while carrying the hidden impact of severe childhood trauma and addiction. Through years of deep healing work including somatic therapies, psychedelic assisted processes, and brain based interventions, he experienced a profound internal shift that reoriented his life toward service, storytelling, and mental health.

Through The Neuro’s Journey, Steve shares his ongoing process and amplifies voices exploring honest, evidence informed, and heart led transformation.

Follow Steve:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theneurosjourney/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theneurosjourney

About Nerissa

Nerissa Balland is a visual artist, therapeutic arts practitioner, and two-time cancer survivor whose mixed-media works range from intimate to large-scale. As a visual storyteller, she draws on spiritual symbols, patterns, and natural elements to explore universal themes of self-love, acceptance, and protection. Nerissa holds an MFA in Painting from Pratt Institute, a BA in Studio Art from the University of Maryland, and studied Digital Design at the University of Copenhagen.

Follow Nerissa:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nerissaballandart

Website: https://www.nerissaballand.com