Just four years ago I went from having millions of dollars in the bank, to less than $6,000 to my name after suffering a life-changing brain injury.

Yesterday we dove into the physical and mental healing process I went through, and today I’m going to share the five practical things I did to start making money and building back my financial foundation.

Within 36 months, these steps allowed me to go from $6,000 in the bank, to over $3,000,000…If you have any questions, feel free to reply to this email and I’ll answer them personally or in the next update…

Step 1: Surrender Your Ego
And Cut Your Expenses…

One of the hardest things for any real entrepreneur to do is surrender and admit defeat.

We’d rather go down with the ship (our business) trying to bail out the water, than jump into a life-boat and watch our baby sink.

Unfortunately, that stubbornness just compounds the problem.

The smart thing to do is drop the ego, use your logic, and make a strategic retreat.

I didn’t do that for the first two years of my health crisis.

I always believed I’d be better and things would be back to normal in the months ahead. So I kept the cars, boat, my team, and the nice house as they drained my dry by the month.

But I was wrong. And that financial pressure just made the healing process 10 times harder.

I eventually surrendered and sold everything… The cars, the boat, and eventually ended up selling my stocks and gold just to keep the bills paid.

If I found myself in a similar situation again, I’d immediately cut ALL unnecessary expenses and get down to the bare basics… In fact, if I could go back in time I would have just bought a used Air Stream and parked it in the prettiest RV park I could find here in the TX Hill Country.

It was a mistake to try and hold onto the lifestyle I had and desired for as long as I did given the circumstances and just made things more difficult.

When my friend Aaron was worth 8 figures at one time in his business career, and then went through bankruptcy a few years ago after his new venture failed to get off the ground.

He ended up moving his wife and kids into his mother-in-law’s home around the age of 40.

Talk about humbling.

Then he got a job at a local gym as a personal trainer while I went through his dark night of the soul.

He did what he needed to do to rebuild his life. Four years later he was worth 8-figures again, and had a completely new relationship with money and investing that has allowed him to build a SOLID foundation for his family moving forward that will never put them at risk again.

Step 2: Become Aware Of Your Unconscious Patterns With Money…

This turned into one of the single biggest blessings from this entire toxic mold crisis…

As I went through the deep mental and emotional work I talked about here in Part 2, I became aware of something that had kept me stuck in a pattern 80% of entrepreneurs will also find themselves in…

I call it the “make it, spend it, risk it” cycle.

The vast majority of entrepreneurs I know had a highly adrenalized childhood… Usually as the result of trauma related to bullying, abuse, or neglect.

This adrenalized state is our “normal” way of being. And it’s why we’re so comfortable taking the kind of risks entrepreneurs take.

It’s what drives us to go all in, take risks like climbing Everest, or race cars on the weekend.

When money comes in, we’ll always find something to spend it on like a new YouTube studio or office, or we’ll find something to risk it on like a friend’s new venture, or another business idea we’ve had.

All of these decisions will make logical sense to us just like they did for me, but in reality our brains are literally just chasing adrenaline.

When things get “good” and “easy”… When the business is profitable and working as intended… We feel bored and uninspired because that adrenaline isn’t there anymore.

So our subconscious minds find a reason to blow it all up and start again, or take unnecessary risks that will blow it up for us so we can start again and get back to homeostasis which is a high adrenaline state.

This “make it, spend it, risk it” cycle will continue until we become aware or it and resolve the underlying trauma at the root, or until we get too old to physically continue the cycle.

If the cycle isn’t broken before then, chances are extremely high that you will end up in your 70’s completely broke.

Step 3: Fall Back Onto Your Strengths…

When you’re going through a radically evolutionary process on a personal level, it’s easy to want to reject your past and move into something radically different.

But if you don’t have the financial situation to support that process which is like starting your entire life and career over from scratch, it can be nearly impossible.

When you’re struggling and trying to start over, usually the smartest move to make is to fall back onto your strengths.

I can’t tell you how many business ideas I had over the past 3 years.

I had changed dramatically as a person, and I wasn’t inspired by interviewing entrepreneurs and talking about business all day any more.

I wanted to get into deeper topics and conversations around personal transformation, spirituality, and plant medicines.

In fact, I built an entire podcast studio around the “Cosmic Ranch” brand I’d trademarked.

I had plans to launch (and still might someday), a health and supplement company built around detox.

I’d always known exactly who I was and what I wanted. But for the first time in my adult life, that wasn’t the case.

My identity had been turned into a puddle of goo and I was really struggling to figure out who I was and what I wanted to do next.

Every month I’d change my mind which was maddening.

But that struggle came to an end the moment I fell back onto my strengths… My ability to market online, and share the lessons I was learning.

This came to life in the form of Richer Every Day which shared the lessons I’d been learning about subconscious money programs… Combining financial education with deep personal development.

And Audience Factory which tapped into my strengths on building an audience and email list.

Once I took what I knew the best and combined that knowledge with my new insights and experiences, things took off…

Over 4,000 customers showed up to buy Richer Every Day and Audience Factory…

This generated around $3MM in revenue in the next 36 months.

I can say that I finally feel like I’ve found my purpose again.

Step 4: My Big Advantage…

In full transparency, I need to address the fact that I had a MASSIVE advantage that made this possible…

I still had my audience and email list.

I often went months without emailing you (my readers), because I just didn’t have the mental or physical ability to do so.

Obviously that’s not ideal, but having the ability to promote Richer Every Day and a few affiliate promotions was the foundation that I could rebuild upon.

I’ve always said that an email list is the most valuable asset any small business owner can build, and the past few years proved that to be the case in a massive way.

If you do not have an audience or email list, then you absolutely must make it your top priority.

There is nothing that can or will produce a larger return on your investment, especially during unexpected events…

Step 5: Creating New Money
Habits The Easy Way…

Once you become aware of your subconscious money programs and habits, the real magic happens when you start to change your behavior.

Building wealth is a habit. Nothing more, and nothing less.

Wealth is the result of the daily decisions you make when it comes to your money, and these new habits have get wired into your unconscious.

Why?

Because we’ll always fall back onto our default programming.

It’s why everyone quits the gym in February or March after making the conscious decision to lose weight on January 1st.

You can’t make a conscious goal and just say, “I’m going to start spending less money and making more today…”

Because the moment you experience stress, you’ll default back to your previous behaviors. That’s just how the brain works.

So you have to literally REWIRE your subconscious mind.

But here’s the amazing part…

Once you rewire in new programs that empower you to spend less and invest more without even thinking about it, building wealth literally becomes effortless.

It just happens automatically as a result of your new way of being.

Instead of “make it, spend it risk it”, your new programs will look like, “make it, keep it, invest it”.

So how do you rewire your mind for wealth?

That takes expert guidance and some pretty deep work.

The most powerful way that I’ve used is Timeline Therapy…

This allows you to go back to specific moments in your past when you made unconscious decisions that turned into subconscious programs around money….

The moments when your brain decided that you don’t have enough… Can’t make enough… Need to spend it… Need to risk it… Etc…

And then rewrite these life-changing memories into new ones that are actually aligned with your conscious goals.

Now the Timeline Therapy process is something that has to be done with a trained facilitator.

This is what we took people through over a 4 day period at our REWIRE events in person, and it’s exactly what Michelle does for her high-performance clients virtually.

If you really want to make some massive breakthroughs in your life when it comes to money, relationships, and success, I would highly recommend booking a call with her.

With that being said, please respect her time and don’t book a call unless you’re really serious about making these changes and are willing to invest a modest amount in yourself.

So these are the 5 steps that I took that allowed me to build my life back in just 2-3 years after losing almost every penny I’d ever made…

So Here’s My Question For You…

I’ve covered a lot of ground over the past week on some pretty big topics…

What would you like me to cover next, or go into more detail about?

What do you have questions about?

Shoot me a reply here and fire away… I’ll answer the best ones in my next email.

Sincerely,

Mike Dillard

The post Part 3: Here Are The 5 Steps That Allowed Me To Get My Finances Back On Track After Losing Everything… appeared first on Mike Dillard.

So what does doing mushrooms, DMT, and MDMA, have to do with finding God and rebuilding your life?

Well in my experience… Everything. And I’ll share some of my stories using these powerful medicines with you here today…

But first, I’d like to invite you to reply to this email, (or any email in this series), because I’ll be reading all of your comments and questions personally.

If you have a question, or just want to send in a comment, please send it in because I’d love to hear from you.

It Was Like Seeing Through The Matrix…

In a moment of pure fear and desperation, I called up my friend “Adam” for some advice… I’d recently heard him talking about the healing benefits of psychedelics, and specifically MDMA.

It was 2019 and I had no idea what was happening to me… Only that I was starting to lose my mind, and no one knew why.

He said a “mental reset” using MDMA might be helpful, and put me in touch with a couple who could help facilitate that in a safe way.

A few weeks later, I found myself laying on a table, pulling down an eye mask and a set of headphones after swallowing a carefully prepared capsule of pharmaceutical grade MDMA.

About an hour later, my body was flooded with a sudden sense of peace and relaxation unlike anything else I’d ever experienced, and the music coming through the headphones simply came alive…

It just penetrated straight into my soul in a way I didn’t know was possible.

My breathing slowed, and for the first time in over a year, the panic in my mind and nervous system melted away.

But what happened next would change my life forever…

You see, MDMA is what some people call an “empathaogen”…

It’s not a hallucinogen like mushrooms, Ayahuasca, or LSD… It doesn’t alter the world around you or your reality.

Instead, it releases a massive amount of serotonin into the brain which creates an equally massive sense of safety, peace, oneness, empathy, and forgiveness within you.

This sense of systemic safety also allows the brain to unlock traumatic memories and experiences that it had perviously stored away.

And as a result of this mental unlocking of “the vault”, I was instantly overcome with something I can only describe as “x-ray vision…”

I remember raising my arm up and telling my facilitators, “Holy shit, I can see EVERYTHING…”

I could go back to any memory in my life, (especially the hard ones), and see exactly what the purpose of that experience was.

Trauma gets created in the mind and body when we have an emotional experience so intense that we don’t know how to process it.

So the brain compartmentalizes that memory and those emotions, and disassociates us as a safety mechanism.

Many times, it will store them in your subconscious… Where they will secretly and silently affect every decision you make in your life when it comes to people, relationships, or money.

The power of MDMA is that it allows us to go back and revisit these experiences with an entirely new sense of understanding, empathy, and love for ourselves, and the people who hurt us.

The kid three times my size in middle school that physically threatened me whenever I spoke? I could now see the pain that he was in and got a glimpse into the life he had at home.

This new sense of whole-system safety allows the stuff that’s been stored away in your subconscious to surface for the first time so it can be resolved in matter of hours, instead of years of trying to access it through traditional talk therapy that only interacts with the conscious mind.

Simply put, MDMA allows you to go back and look at those experiences through the unconditionally loving, forgiving eyes of God.

This allows you to see the good that came from them as well.

Strength, drive, ambition, boundaries… Those are all benefits that come from traumatic experiences like bullying, physical and sexual abuse, abandonment, and neglect…

This unique opportunity allows you to literally re-write those memories and those experiences into something positive that happened for you.

And when you do, the trauma gets processed, and it leaves the body and mind…

Now As For My Journey, The Real Breakthrough Came About Halfway Into The 5 Hour Experience…

And that’s when the fascinators took off my headphones, and asked me if there was a little forgiveness in there for myself.

Annnnnddd… CRACK.

The emotions and tears just started flooding out of a place that I didn’t know existed… Apparently there was an entire mansion in my mind dedicated to housing a lifetime of self-judgement…

All of the “I’m not good enough’s”, “wish I would have’s”, “wish I wouldn’t have’s” and “I can’t believe I did that’s…”

Until that moment, I didn’t even realize that I needed self-forgiveness, or that so much self-judgement had been stored up in my system.

By the time that 4-5 hour journey was over, I realized that my life would never be the same. There was “Mike” before, and “Mike” after, and there was no going back to who I was.

It unlocked the doors to entirely new levels of depth in life… Levels of emotional and spiritual experience that I didn’t even know existed.

Over The Next 3-4 years, I’d Continue To Use These Powerful Medicines In My Healing Journey…

9 Ketamine IV’s, 3 DMT journeys, 12 MDMA sessions, 2 San Pedro, and 3 psilocybin…

These experiences and the benefits I received from them were the gifts from the toxic mold…

Thanks to that exposure and brain injury…

I got to let go of a lifetime of emotional baggage…

I got to heal the wounds that had held me back from building meaningful relationships…

And I got to experience what I believe is the ultimate win that any of us can achieve in life… Genuine self-love.

In Part 3, I’ll dive into the life-changing ways this work altered my relationship with money, but now I want to provide you with some advice and guidance around these substances if you’d like to explore these tools for yourself.

What You Need To Know About Using Psychedelics…

First and foremost, these are incredibly powerful substances and tools.

1: They need to be approached with the utmost levels of respect and reverence.

Using them without an experienced guide is like walking into the Amazon jungle as a city-dwelling gringo alone and expecting to have a positive experience.

If you do not respect the jungle and the animals within it, you will learn that lesson the hard way.

2: These substances should only be used under the supervision of an experienced guide or therapist.

These are incredibly powerful experiences and unexpected emotions can arise that will need support.

There are also important health and safety concerns that need to be accounted for…

For example, MDMA is an illegal drug also referred to as “Molly” or “ecstasy”.

But in this specific use-case, we’re using masks and headphones to isolate our senses and go inwards, instead of putting ourselves in an outwardly stimulating environment.

The end result is a radically different experience, even if you’ve used this substance in a recreational setting before.

But it does bring quality control risks into the equation…

The stuff consumed in clubs is often laced with impurities and can even contain deadly fentanyl.

The MDMA used for therapeutic purposes should only come from trusted, pharmacy-grade sources.

NOTE: MDMA should not be used if someone is on an anti-depressant, MOA inhibitor, or SSRI.

Which is another reason why it’s critically important to work with an experienced facilitator.

And then you have substances like Aya and DMT that will literally open portals to the spirit world which could be positive, or not so great.

If you don’t believe me, I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t have either until I experienced it.

I can’t stress this enough… Do NOT do this kind of work with these kinds of substances on your own and without proper supervision.

3: Every substance has its ideal use-case…

You want to make sure you choose the right tool for the job.

For example, with my brain and nervous system in a place of extreme fear and fight or flight, MDMA was the perfect tool for me because it created safety in my system.

Ketamine and DMT? They were the wrong tools because they force you to let go of control which in my specific circumstance, just caused more trauma. (They can be incredibly beneficial for others).

The active compound in Ayahuasca is DMT which is why I have not pursued that medicine yet, and will not until my system is back into full balance and coherence.

4: Conscious preparation and intention-setting before a ceremony is critical.

Setting your intentions will align your conscious and subconscious mind on your intended goals.

With that being said, once you set your intentions, it’s critically important to let any desire for control or an outcome go completely.

Trust your mind and where it wants to take you.

5: Know how to navigate the experience…

Once you’re on this ride, there’s no getting off until the ride is over which could be 4-8 hours later).

So you need to know how to travel in these worlds before stepping foot into them.

For example…

The more you fight the experience or try to retain control, the worse it will get.

You MUST let go of control and swim with the current instead of against it.

When I was in this situation, remembering that…

“I’m safe. I chose to have this experience and I’m here for my greatest good…” was incredibly useful.

Your mind may show you things you don’t like or don’t want to look at…

Myself and many of my friends have seen stuff straight out of hellish nightmares. These kinds of visions are usually your subconscious trying to communicate its fears or pain to you.

Approaching these visions with curiosity like…

“Wow, that’s fascinating! What else do you want me to see?”

…Is the key to moving through them gracefully.

Then there’s aways the good old fall-back of…

“Just breathe mutha-fucka”

Which has come in handy on several occasions…

And finally, whenever you’re in fear or doubt, just send whatever you’re experiencing LOVE.

Coming up against a demonic black-cloud that wants to devour all life in the universe?

Send it love.

Having a particularly difficult time? Send yourself love.

That is the ultimate key to navigating any experience that arises.

With all of this being said, I would highly recommend MDMA as someone’s first step into the world of psychedelics.

It is loving, kind, gentle, and predictable compared to the other options.

My next suggestion would be a low-dose psilocybin, with Aya and DMT being reserved for people with some prior experience.

6: The Ceremony Is Only The Beginning
Of The Experience And The “Work…”

There’s a reason why this pursuit of deep personal growth and transformation is often referred to as, “doing the work…”

Integrating the experience in the days and weeks that follow is 100% required.

You absolutely must have the support a coach who can help you process what you experienced and learned.

Your brain will be in a very open and neuroplastic state which is your window for real transformation.

If you don’t have this kind of support and just go back to your hold life and habits, you’re not taking real advantage of this life-changing opportunity.

If you or someone you know needs an Integration coach and don’t have one, I would recommend working with my wife Michelle.

She’s certified in NLP, Hypnotherapy, and Timeline Therapy.

She has years of personal experience with psychedelics, and supporting those who are going through their own integration process.

The transformations she’s help bring about in her clients over the past two years has been absolutely incredible to witness.

If you are interested in Integration Coaching, or Performance Coaching to up level your life, you can book an initial consult with her here.

I’ve really just scratched the surface of this topic and what I can share with you, so tomorrow we’ll continue and I’ll share how these experiences made a direct impact on our income…

Sincerely,

Mike Dillard

The post Part 2: How Using Psychedelics Helped Me Rebuild My Life (And WhatYou Need To Know About Them) appeared first on Mike Dillard.

Yesterday, one of my oldest friends “John” called me in a moment of pure panic and desperation…

He hadn’t been able to fall asleep for the past six months…

He was no longer able to work, and was down to his last two months of cash.

His nervous system was on fire, and his world was crumbling around him.

I know exactly how he feels…

This screenshot above is what my bank account looked like in 2019 after perfect storm of events left me nearly penniless.

I wanted to finally share this story with you today because you never know what someone else is going through, or what you might have to endure yourself one day.

If you should find yourself in a similar storm I hope that you’ll pull this out, read it to the very end, and use it as a spiritual and emotional life-raft.

My story begins in 2015 when I was 38 years old…

I’d built three 8-figure publishing companies by that point in my career, and I was ready to take on a bigger challenge…

I had two ideas that lit my heart on fire…

The first… To develop the world’s first fully-automated hydroponic system for home food production…

The second… To turn SelfMadeMan.com into the SkillShare of entrepreneur education…

Over the next three years, I put millions of dollars into creating both.

I don’t know the exact figures, but it was probably around $3MM for the the development of the hydroponic system prototype, and another $1MM to build the SMM e-learning platform.

Normally, creating either one of these products would involve raising tens-of-millions in venture capital…

I was funding 100% of both by myself.

When you consider that my publishing business had a 33% net-profit margin, that means the $4MM in cash that I put into these two new ventures, actually required me to make around $12MM in revenue.

In other words, I went all in.
I continued to poor every penny I had into both of these projects, and had no reason to doubt their eventual success…

But Then The “Click” Happened…

It was Wednesday, June 13th of 2018…

I was sitting on the couch taking a break from work when I felt a little click in the back of my skull. It didn’t hurt, but something wasn’t right…

It felt like a circuit breaker in my brain had just tripped…

And that was the day that everything changed.

I couldn’t physically fall asleep for a single minute for the next 7 days.

I can tell you right now that being kept awake without a single minute of sleep for an entire week is a kind of torture unlike anything you can imagine.

In desperation I had my doctor call in scripts for Ambien and Valium.

The first night I used them, I got 60 minutes of “lucid-dreaming”, but no actual sleep.

A double dose got me 90 minutes of the same.

And that became my life… Day-after-day, and night-after-night for weeks, and then months.

I couldn’t work, I couldn’t sleep, and I couldn’t think.

I would lay down on my bathroom floor for hours each night trying to meditate so I wouldn’t go insane.

The bills started to pile up and my life’s savings was a giant piece of gardening plastic in my living room…

Unable to work for months, my business revenue had dried up and was a fraction of what it was just months earlier…

And Then Things Got Even Worse…

I’d been funding these two new projects by selling a course called List-Grow for $1,497…

And it had a pretty incredible feature that was changing a lot of people’s lives…

When you purchased List-Grow, it came with an incredible opportunity…

If you completed the program and built your marketing funnel like I taught at any point within the next 12 months, I’d give you 100% of your money back.

It created a massive win/win… My customers got a real incentive to use the product and create a result, which turned into more success stories for the program…

Here’s one of my students holding up the receipt for his Completion Challenge refund..

It was really amazing…

That is… Until my business and List-Grow sales came to a stop.

For the next 12 months, an additional $20,000 to $30,000 in redemptions would continue to pour in.

In total, I’d give back over $1 million in Completion Challenge refunds to my List-Grow customers.

But at this moment in time, they were literally draining my accounts dry.

I met up with a close friend for lunch one day, broke down in tears and shared what was happening.

He generously wrote a check for $50,000 and handed it to me as a gift to help cover the growing mountain of expenses.

It was one of the single greatest acts of generosity I’d ever experienced in my life. He said I was not allowed to pay him back, so I simply promised him that someday I’d pay it forward.

By November of 2019,
This Is All I Had Left…

I went from having millions of dollars just a year before, to just $6,000 to my name.

I hadn’t been that broke since I was waiting tables in my 20’s, so I took this screenshot to remember the moment.

About this time I found out that severe toxic mold exposure from the building I’d been living in the previous three years had caused the brain injury.

It was the highest levels the lab or my doctor had ever seen in a patient.

The lab test results were measured on a scale from 0 to 50.

My result was 21,000. I was dying, and frankly, I should have already been dead.

I remember trying to write a Happy Birthday card to my friend Aubrey…

I’ll never forget that moment because I almost couldn’t.

My hand trembled fiercely with early on-set Parkinson’s as the myelin sheath in my brain continued to deteriorate from the mold.

By that point, the financial devastation was done.

I was weeks away from losing my home and coming to terms with the fact that I would probably have to move in with my parents at the age of 39.

Everything Was Stripped Away…

At this moment I became acutely aware that my entire ego and identity had been wrapped up in being a successful “entrepreneur”.

And without that, my ego it shattered.

God literally stripped me of everything… My ability to think, sleep, work, write, play, race, exercise, or even numb my pain with the simple pleasures of a pint of ice cream or a glass of wine…

All of it… Everything I loved and strived for was stripped away until there was nothing left.

And that’s when my work began.

It’s when I realized that I’d have to learn to love myself without the ego, identity, or purpose that I believed my value was derived from.

I would have to love myself just because I was.

My spark of consciousness existed, and that was enough.

When my friend John called me yesterday, that’s where he was…

Stripped bare of everything he owned, of every part of his identity, confused, and without hope at the age of 47.

I told John what I have been able to realize now that I’m 6 years into this journey…

That God has a greater purpose for you, and that you are being called to change and evolve in order to serve that purpose.

You are being stripped of the things you thought were important, and being shown what truly is…

You are being stripped of your old identity and the limitations that it had…

You are being forced to purify your body and spirit… Forced to remove a life-time of toxic substances and emotions that have accumulated in your tissues and organs.

And your soul is being strengthened as you find love and compassion for yourself so that you may lead others toward the light in their darkest hour.

“You And I Are Stubborn S.O.B’s” I Told Him…

“We would not make the changes we need to make unless they were forced upon us to such a degree that we had no other choice but to surrender.

And so they have been.

But understand that this is a gift for you, just as it has been the single greatest gift in my life.

You may not see that now or the purpose behind this experience, but you will, and it will be the best thing that’s ever happened for you…”

The source of our suffering and anger is always the same… It’s the unmet expectations we have for ourselves or others.

The moment you drop those expectations for who you think you should be, or what you think you should have, and just start giving thanks for the fact that you are here… That you exist… The suffering will stop.

The fact that I could be there for a friend who is currently waste deep in the same confusion and suffering I am just coming out of was such an incredible gift for both of us…

He finally had someone he could talk to who knew what he was going through…

The same sleep deprivation… The same toxin over-load… The same financial distress and stripping of the ego and identity…

And I had the joy and honor of letting him know that he’s not alone…

That this is all for a greater purpose…

That I have his back…

And that this experience will become the greatest gift of his life.

48 Months Later…

Fast forward just 48 months, and (almost) everything has changed…

As a result of this experience…

I have removed all alcohol and toxins from my life and my body for the past 6 years…

I’ve brought the mold (mycotoxin) level down from 21,000 to 18.

I’m currently removing high levels of mercury and lead from my system…

I’ve pursued the deepest and most difficult levels of emotional healing a human can experience.

I’ve built a relationship with God and my soul that would have never been possible before…

I’ve created the deepest and most meaningful relationship of my life with Michelle…

We’ve built our dream home…

I’ve re-wired my relationship with money, spending, and risk-taking that had previously been driven and steered by trauma…

And I’ve been able to pay that $50,000 gift of generosity forward to a brother in need who’s going through his own crucible.

I have one final step left in my journey…

To overcome the Chronic Fatigue I’ve had to navigate daily for past 5 years as a result of the severe nervous system damage done by the mold.

But I have the help I need, and that is coming to an end as well.

Once that work is complete, I cannot wait to see what God has in store next as I reenter the world as the healthiest, most experienced, energetic, and compassionate version of who I can be.

Above all else, do not give up. Things can and will get better faster than you can imagine.

Have faith, and know that you are in all ways, and at all times, enough…

Click here to Read Part 2: How Psychedelics Helped Me Rebuild My Life, And What You Need To Know About Them…

Sincerely,

The post Part 1: A Few Short Years Ago, I Lost Every Penny I’d Ever Made And Much, Much More… Here’s What To Do If Life Goes Sideways On You… appeared first on Mike Dillard.

In 2018, I was building two new startups, but something was different… My ability to handle stress started to decline rapidly. I started to get more emotional than usual and my patience levels decreased significantly.

My sleep started to get worse as well and I had to start taking sleep supplements for the first time in my life.

And then on June 13th, 2018 I felt a little “click” in my brain while sitting on the coach. That was the last time I could naturally fall asleep for the next six years. 

After 7 days and nights without a single minute of sleep, I could feel my body starting to shut down.

This wasn’t “insomnia…”

Nothing I could find on the internet or YouTube came even remotely close to describing what I was experiencing.

It felt like the path in my brain to sleep had been cut.

As soon as I would start to go unconscious, it felt like my brain hit a brick wall… My heart rate would increase, my breathing would increase, and I’d get flashes of adrenaline shooting down my legs.

There was no amount of melatonin, Unisom, or any other sleep medication that would make a difference.

To literally be unable to fall asleep and have no idea why was terrifying.

On Day 8, I reached out to my doctor out of desperation… He put me on Ambien and Valium which are two drugs I’d never taken before.

The first night, I got about 60 minutes of disassociation… It felt like lucid dreaming. I was in a dream like state, but never went completely unconscious.

I doubled the dose of both drugs the next night, and got about 90 minutes of the same. It wasn’t working.

My brain started to deteriorate. I couldn’t think straight, and the Ambien started making me suicidal. I stopped taking the drug and within a few days those thoughts went away.

My life turned into a living hell. I spent all night in my bed trying to fall asleep, and all day on my couch because I couldn’t.

My brain was filled with paranoid thoughts, and my memory was completely gone.

I was in survival mode for the next 6 months, and no one could figure out what the source of the problem was. By this time I started to get symptoms of early-onset Parkinson’s. I remember trying to write a birthday card to my friend and I could barely write the words through my trembling hands.

I had to walk away from my business, my friends, and everything I used to do in life as I could barely function or leave my house for almost a year.

Around that same 6 month mark, I found something that literally saved my life… THC.

My friend as going through chemo and suggested I try some.

I did, and for the very first time in 6 months I was able to actually fall asleep and go unconscious for about 2-3 hours.

The disassociation affect of the THC allowed my brain… And whatever was keeping it on such an extremely alert level… To go off-line for a period.

This 2-3 hours of sleep saved my life.

During the next 6 months, I tried anything and everything I could to figure out what happened, and to heal myself, including…

MDMA
Neurofeedback therapy
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation therapy
Hypnotherapy
Float-tank therapy
EMDR therapy
Somatic Trauma Release
Meditation
Ketamine IV
Huachuma
NLP

And over 50 different blood and DNA tests…

At the 12 month mark we finally figured out what caused it… Toxic mold.

About 6 months before I felt the “click” in my head, the building I was living in (The Bowie in Austin), flooded. It had a pool on the roof and after a week of extreme rain, the pool flooded the entire building down the elevator shafts.

I can only assume that mold started to grow in the walls an AC ducts throughout the building.

I finally connected with Dr. Ann Shippy who’s a functional medicine doctor in Austin. She’s was the first doctor to give me a mycotoxin test for mold.

We were absolutely shocked when we got back my results…

As you can see below, two different types of toxic mold had started to take over my system…

Aspergillus which is measured on a scale from 0 to 20. A score of 0-4 is safe. Mine was 29.

But as you can see above, the real whopper was Penicillum. A test score of 0-5 is safe. Anything between 6 and 50 is dangerous.

And my result on a scale of 0 – 50?

20,936.

Yep, nearly 21,000!

We couldn’t believe it, and even had to call the lab to make sure the results were accurate.

They were.

We had finally discovered the problem… Or at least the first major one a full 15 months into this journey.

But the damage to my brain and nervous system was so severe at this point that it would take me a full 6+ years to recover.

If You Or A Friend Is Going Through Toxic Mold Or Heavy Metal Poisoning, Here’s What You Need To Know…

Around 25% of Americans have a gene mutation that prevents our bodies from removing mycotoxins from mold effectively.

By the age of 30, 90%+ of Americans have some degree of leaky gut syndrome as well thanks to our modern diets filled with sugar, alcohol, pesticides, etc…

Throw in some antibiotics and glyphosate covered fruits and vegetables, and the American body becomes a perfect host for Candida overgrowth.

Candida takes root in our intestines, and it starts to poke holes in it causing a “leaky gut”.

This allows even more toxins like mycotoxins and heavy metals from fish, dental fillings, etc… To get direct access to our blood stream.

If you have a leaky gut, you also have a leaky brain barrier.

Which means you have mycotoxins and metals heading straight into organs including the brain.

Your body stores these neurotoxins in your fat cells to try and isolate them from the body, and unfortunately our brains are made from fat.

My toxin levels were so high, they literally caused a physically injury in the brain.

But my symptoms are pretty rare… Mold and metals in the body can cause a dozen different symptoms including allergies, skin rashes, brain fog, insomnia, fatigue, and a host of other issues.

If you have high levels of toxic mold in your system, it also means you likely have high levels of heavy metals, parasites, and candida.

Once your body’s ability to handle these toxins gets overwhelmed, all of the bad things start to build up in the system.

Here’s What To Do If You’re In This Situation:

Step 1: Get Tested.

You’ll want to find a good functional medicine doctor, as 99% of traditional MD’s don’t have any knowledge or experience when it comes to toxic mold, metals, and parasites. They’ll just prescribe you drugs for the symptoms which will make things worse.

Have them test you for Mycotoxins (mold), heavy metals, and parasites.

The Mycotoxin test is a simple urine test and will tell you if you have toxic mold in your system. If you do, that means you’re being exposed to it somewhere you spend a lot of time… Usually your home or work place.

Have them test you for heavy metals as well… I didn’t do this until I was 5 years into my healing journey, and that was a major mistake.

Over the past five years, I’ve met two other people who had the same kind of sleep issues I had. Both of them had mercury poisoning.

I finally got tested for metals in 2024 and the results came back with really high mercury and lead levels.

IMPORTANT: Heavy metals tests are urine-based as well, but you MUST get tested while doing a provoked chelation IV with EDTA and DMSA.

If your doc tries to send you home with a heavy metal test kit and tells you to pee in the cup without a chelation IV, find an other doctor.

If they give you oral versions of these drugs to take, you results aren’t going to be accurate either. 

I took a heavy metal “challenge” using oral EDTA and DMSA. 

My mercury level came back at 2.0/10… Not really high enough to warrant therapy.

Well two years later I was seeing a new doctor who insisted we do another heavy metals test using an EDTA and DMSA via an IV… 

My mercury results came back at 8.7/10. 

We’d finally found the second major cause of my health and sleep challenges. 

Metals are stored in our fat cells, and they won’t show up in your urine unless they’re “provoked” with two specific drugs… EDTA and DMSA.

These drugs pull the metals out of your fat cells and into your blood so they can then be removed through the kidneys and into your urine.

The IV at the doctor’s office should take 1.5 to 2 hours. You’ll collect your urine there during the IV, and for the next 6 hours.

Step 2: Move.

If you come back with high levels of mycotoxins and your symptoms are bad enough that you’re reading this blog post, you’re in serious danger. You DO NOT want to end up in the same position I did.

Please listen to me… Your healing journey will NOT begin until you are out of the exposure.

You can get all of the air purifiers and supplements you want… It won’t matter.

You can try remediation, but that’s only worked for one friend of mine.

I had to move 6 times in 12 months during 2020.

Why? Because every rental property we moved into had mold in it as well.

We finally had to buy a new construction home to get me into a safe environment.

And that’s finally when I started to heal.

If you can’t afford to do that, consider buying an RV and living there for 12 months. I know that’s extreme, but I’m telling you from experience that nothing you do is going to help until you get away from the mold.

Any house or apartment that’s 3-4 years old or more is going to have mold in the AC ducts, so at a bare minimum, have a company come out and remediate the AC and ducting.

Once we were in the new construction home, we installed a central dehumidification system and UV sterilization lights in the central AC to prevent it from growing. 

Step 3: Supplementation And Detox:

There’s really only one way to detox mold mycotoxins from the body… “Bind and clear”. It’s all about opening up your methylation (detox) pathways, binding the mycotoxins, and then cleaning them from the body.

Stripped down to the basics, this will consist of using the following “must use” supplements. Don’t go cheap on these. Buy the highest quality that you can. The doses are what I took and are not a personal recommendation.

1: Liposomal Glutathione from Essential Pro twice a day. This is your body’s master antioxidant and detoxing agent.

2: Biotoxin Binder from CellCore. 3 capsules 2-3 times per day. This is your primary toxin binder.

3: PureGenomics B-Complex from Pure Encapsulations

4: InterFase Plus. This is an enzyme that will start to break down the bio-film in the gut that protects the fungus, Candida, and bad bacteria from being removed by your immune system. 2 capsules 2X per day.

5: ONNIT Gut Health. This is a great probiotic/enzyme product that will bring your gut biome back into balance.

6: LV-GB from Designs For Health. This is a bile and liver support product to help your liver which will be doing the majority of your detox work.

These six products are the basic foundation for a toxic mold detox protocol… Your doctor will likely add another 10+ supplements to these based on your lab results.

During the primary years of my detox, I was taking around 20 supplements a day.

This isn’t going to be a quick process. By the time you have severe enough symptoms showing up to bring you to this post, it’s likely that almost every major system in your body is out of balance… Brain, liver, gut biome, immune system, hormones, chronic inflammation, (CIRS), leaky gut, parasites, etc…

If your tests come back positive for heavy metals, there’s a whole separate protocol for that.

The fastest way to detox heavy metals is to use EDTA/DMSA Chelation IV therapy, which is basically the same thing you did for your heavy metals test. High levels in the red will take 10-20 IV sessions. 

These must be administered by a doctor, as they will remove ALL minerals from your body, including the good ones you need like zinc, iron, and calcium which must be monitored and replaced with supplementation.

How Long Will It Take?

1: Your healing clock doesn’t start until the day you move into a clean environment and out of exposure. I lost an extra 2 years moving from house to house until I finally got into a strike new construction home.

2: Depending on the severity of levels, it will likely 1-3 years to fully remove the mycotoxins from your system. This is assuming you’re no longer being exposed at home or work.

During this period you’re likely going to be doing a heavy metal detox, and parasite cleanse as well.

Your body can and will heal with the proper care, but it will take time so be patient and give yourself grace.

Using a sauna to sweat 2-3 times per week will dramatically increase the detox process and is highly recommended if your body can tolerate it. I was too sick and my adrenals too shot to use a sauna unfortunately.

3: This isn’t going to be cheap. I was probably spending $1,500-$2,500 per month on supplements, doctor visits, and lab tests. If you’re on a budget, you can make solid progress with $500 to $1,000/Mo.

I lost almost every penny I had after the first 3 years of dealing with this health crisis. You can read more about my financial story and how I built it all back here.

4: Healing the nervous system. Mycotoxins and heavy metals are both neurotoxins that affect the brain and central nervous system. If you got to as bad of a place as I did, you’re going to need to focus on healing your nervous system as well which is still la work-in-progress for me 6 years later.

One of the most helpful therapies for me was MDMA psychedelic therapy. MDMA is not legal in the US, so you’ll have to find a back-channel through friends in order to find a facilitator. I talk more about this here in this blog post. MDMA is incredibly powerful at calming down the nervous system, reducing fight-or-flight, and healing trauma. After every session, I saw profound and lasting benefits.

DO NOT do any kind of psychedelics if you are still being exposed to mold!!! They create a neuroplastic state in the brain which is great, but if you do them and just go back home to a moldy environment that sets off your brain’s alarm system again, that sense of alarm can get stronger.

I made a huge mistake by doing psychedelics like Ketamine out of desperation before I knew I was dealing with toxic mold.

If you are experiencing chronic fatigue symptoms, fibromyalgia, or chronic pain, these are all symptoms of a brain that’s been locked into fight or flight and it’s trying to get your attention.

The good news is that you can turn these false alarms off and you CAN fully heal from these conditions. I’d highly recommend working with the team at CFSRecovery.com

Doctor Recommendations:

If you are in the Austin area, I’d highly recommend working with Dr. Philip Oubre. I’ve worked with 5-6 amazing functional medicine doctors, but he’s been my favorite. 

He’s the most organized and has specific protocols for mold, metals, parasites, etc, with specific timelines, supplements, etc. It is $1,000/Mo just to become a patient, but you get direct access to him and his entire team. They also do the heavy metal chelation IV’s on site.

If you are on a budget and live outside of Austin, I’d recommend working with my friend Dr. Torrie Thompson who went through her own mold, metals, parasite journey years ago. She works virtually with patients all over the country. She can have the test kits sent straight to your home.

The Good News:

Going through this experience was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done in my life. I would not wish what I went through on my worst enemy…

And yet it turned into the best thing that’s ever happened FOR ME…

It forced me to give up alcohol, and caffeine and to eat a healthy organic diet. (I haven’t had a drink in 6 years now and it’s the best thing ever).

It forced me to completely cleanse my body from all forms of toxins.

And it forced me to do some DEEP emotional healing and trauma work that allowed me to heal all of the emotional baggage from my past.

None of this would have happened if I hadn’t been forced to go through this healing process.

So while it may feel like your’e going through hell now, keep going… This will end up being one of the biggest blessings of your life.

With love and compassion,

Mike Dillard

Questions?

I’ve really just scratched the surface here on my journey and this topic… If you have any questions, please leave them in the comments below and I’ll do my best to answer them…

The post Extreme Toxic Mold And Heavy Metal Poisoning Almost Killed Me. Here’s What I Did To Heal And Recover… appeared first on Mike Dillard.