THE
PARADIGM OF GONE BEYOND
A new way of being human and leading in the world
Gone Beyond is an invitation into a different way of living and leading. Rooted not in self-improvement, but in self-remembrance.
For so long, we’ve been taught that to be fulfilled we must fix ourselves, that something is missing, and only through enough work, effort, or mastery will we finally arrive. It sounds logical, but it’s a recipe for quiet suffering.
It keeps us chasing wholeness by starting from the belief that we’re broken.This is the old paradigm — the Have → Do → Be model: first acquire what you lack, then work harder, and only then can you be happy, successful, complete. It creates a loop of striving that keeps fulfillment just beyond reach.
Sometimes, this approach is true and necessary. There is value in developing skills, discipline, and resilience, in improving how we communicate, lead, and perform.
Self-improvement has its time and place. But to truly meet the complexity of modern life, we must move beyond it. Not everything can be met through problem-solving and external mastery. What’s being asked of us now are internal shifts, new ways of seeing, being, and relating that allow us to navigate life from a deeper, wiser intelligence.Gone Beyond points to this new paradigm, the paradigm of Unfoldment.
You are already whole and complete.
You are innately resourced, creative, and wise.
You were born with the capacity to meet life as it is…
to thrive in its complexity, not by controlling life, but by being in relationship with life.
The challenge is not that you are deficient; it’s that you’ve become cut off from your innate resourcefulness. Conditioning, pace, and pressure narrow your contact with yourself, others, and the world. And so too does the woundedness of being human, the inevitable trauma and developmental pain that come with living, loving, and losing. These experiences can fragment us and close our hearts. But they are not proof of brokenness; they are invitations to heal, calling us into depth.
Unfoldment is the practice of returning, of deepening contact with what’s here, including the wounds and contractions we’d rather avoid. When we can meet them with awareness and compassion, they begin to soften. As they melt, more of our natural intelligence and creativity become available. We begin to see that what once felt like a problem is actually a doorway into deeper understanding and freedom.
And at the heart of this work lies free will, the sacred capacity to choose how we meet our lives. Gone Beyond is not about surrendering our agency; it’s about reclaiming it. To remember that we can choose presence over performance, truth over protection, love over fear. To take a stand for the kind of human we want to be, and to live in alignment with that choice… moment by moment.
Gone Beyond is also a play on words. Most of us spend our lives trying to go beyond what’s here, believing that the next insight, next achievement, or next version of ourselves will be the one that brings peace. But the path home isn’t somewhere else. When we land fully in the moment, in the body, the breath, the realness of what’s true now, we discover depths that have always been here, waiting.
“You do not need to go anywhere or attain anything. What you seek is already here, unfolding in the immediacy of your own being.”
— A.H. Almaas, The Unfolding Now
Gone Beyond is an invitation to walk the path of being real, to love what’s real, to open to ourselves with compassion and curiosity, and to explore, together, what it truly means to be human. Free to choose, awake to life, and alive to what’s possible.
This is the essence of leadership through presence: the courage to be with what is, to meet experience as practice, and to allow wisdom to unfold through reality itself.
Gone Beyond is not a belief system; it’s a living philosophy — a way of learning to trust the intelligence already moving through you and through nature. It’s about letting be, not trying harder. It’s about deepening contact until what’s most essential reveals itself, the quiet knowing that who you are, right now, is already enough.
And it’s not about prescribing the way to be human. It’s an invitation for each of us to cultivate our own way of being human. One that feels natural, honest, and capable of meeting the complexity of our times. Because we can’t solve today’s challenges through the same mindset that created them. What’s required is a deeper way of seeing, a way of being that gives rise to new possibilities, beyond problem-solving and into creative emergence.
“The outward work can never be great if the inward work is small.”
— Meister Eckhart
MY PATH
I grew up learning how to do hard things. In fourth grade, my dad had me wearing ankle weights to school to get faster. At ten years old, I was getting up at 5 a.m. before school to run, spending weeknights shooting hoops until 10 p.m., heading straight to the basement after class to lift weights, and, keeping up with homework and making A’s. I was the kid who organized the neighborhood street hockey games every Sunday and pushed everyone to show up.
From early on, I learned to delay gratification, to take things seriously, to get things done, to win. That drive carried me into college athletics, where I played football and baseball at Dartmouth, and later into the Marine Corps, where I learned more about discipline, operating in high-pressure environments, and leading in combat.
But for all that strength and focus, what I didn’t have was ease. I didn’t know how to rest, how to let go, or how to feel joy without earning it… how to feel anything for that matter. Grace and playfulness were foreign to me. My life was, and often still is, if I’m not paying attention, defined by doing: constant motion, control, and self-imposed pressure.
It worked, until it didn’t. When my father died, the scaffolding that held me up collapsed, and with it went the identities I had clung to: son, athlete, warrior.
For years after leaving the military, I did what I thought I was supposed to do. I chased success, achievement, and belonging in all the ways our culture promises will make us whole. But inside, I was restless. stuck. pretty numb. Cut off from the vitality, clarity, and purpose.
Then my son was born. Something ancient and alive stirred in me, a fire that burned for something real. I didn’t suddenly have the answers, but I knew I couldn’t keep living on autopilot. That moment began a long, humbling descent, one that continues today.
I slowed down.
I started to pay attention.
I began the work of healing, really turning toward my pain and hurt. I started to see how trauma, conditioning, and inherited patterns had shaped not only who I was but how I loved, led, and lived.
Through years of deep practice, teachers, and endless mistakes, I’ve come to see that transformation isn’t a destination. It’s a relationship, the living craft of meeting life as it unfolds. A practice of honesty, presence, and allowing.
As I continue to realize there’s nowhere to get to, I’ve learned to live in practice, a way of being that keeps bringing me closer to truth, closer to love, closer to what’s real.
From building a purpose-driven business where I can serve others, to keeping my marriage fiery, raising and unschooling four kids, healing my body and nervous system, and messing up daily with as much grace as I can muster, the path keeps unfolding.
These days, I live with my family by the ocean in Wilmington, North Carolina. We’re raising our kids close to nature, and I’m enjoying surfing and improv.
Gone Beyond grew out of my own practice, out of the mistakes, the healing, and the slow work of becoming more real. It’s a living inquiry into what it means to be human, to lead, and to love in a time that demands both courage and tenderness.
And it’s from that inquiry, not mastery, that I now serve others, as a fellow traveler, guiding men and leaders into their own work of healing, transformation, and freedom.
Walk your path with intention. Together we can uncover the fulfillment, growth, and expansion you’re seeking.
TESTIMONIALS
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