Mark Matousek
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Can’t make it live? After each class, video and audio recordings are available to download and watch anytime.
Disentangle yourself from stories of the past so you can imagine a fresh new story that has you flourishing and embracing your true potential.
Have you struggled to release the tether of your past — holding on to an old narrative about your life that you know is holding you back?
Do you feel — deep in your heart — that there is more to life — and have a deep desire to live it to its fullest?
When you change your story, you’re able to transform your life. Surrendering the narrative of the past wakes you up to your true nature, far deeper than the personality you present to the world...
... and provides the ultimate opportunity for healing, so you can pursue your dreams and purpose in life.
When you excavate your truth — and start speaking and living IN your truth — your whole narrative changes. You start to admit dreams you haven’t allowed yourself to express out loud, drop bad habits, address addictions, leave unhealthy relationships or jobs, and finally...
... feel free.
With his unique and transformative practice of expressive writing for the self, author, journalist, and teacher Mark Matousek helps you gain self-awareness and precious insight that can encourage you to let go of the narrative that has run your life — and arrive at deep personal truths.
With awareness, courage, and love, you can find the strength to admit your truth and access the power trapped inside your outdated story — because stories are, in fact, survival tools that help you navigate a challenging, confusing world.
Expressive writing serves as a direct path to self awareness — and it is available to everyone.
Mark began his practice of writing to process some early losses and traumas in his own life. While it started as his personal survival mechanism, it eventually became clear he could turn it into a gift for others.
He now has more than three decades of experience journeying into the dark, shadowy past with others… and guiding them as they find the healing and nourishment that comes from the exploration of self through expressing the truth through the written word.
During these seven weeks, he’ll take you on a journey that allows you to explore the unknown depths within to help free you from old limitations, stories, traumas, and fears.
Wounds are part of the human condition. Not only do we all have wounds, but we also have aspects of our narratives that live under the darkness of the shadow. And yet, these forbidden parts contain essential elements of our true nature. They hold wisdom, energy, creativity, and power — and they need to be brought into the light so we can be free and whole.
How do you make this journey into your personal wounds, secrets, and shadows feel safe?
And how do you not get stuck in the same old stories or loops so you can set yourself free with a new story?
A practice of deep, transformative writing is one of THE most powerful ways to release and surrender your past and reimagine a new future.
This experience creates a safe, respectful, accepting, and loving space in which you’ll be invited to express yourself — wild, raw, uncensored, and free, in a space of total confidentiality.
You’ll explore all areas of your life — gazing deeply into yourself, your past, your relationships, your work, and the world. You’ll move past the substories and overarching narrative that’s kept you locked up and caged within.
The process of deconditioning asks you to dig into who you would be without your stories. It encourages you to approach life differently — and find new ways of moving forward.
With Mark’s loving guidance, you’ll have the time and space to fully open to your sacred depths and develop a powerful, transformative writing practice that expands your mind, heals your heart, deepens your relationships — and frees your soul.
You’ll learn to open to your raw and unfiltered truth, speak your dreams and passions into existence, admit things you’ve never allowed to see the light of day, and heal past hurts. You’ll access deeper and more trusting intimacy, enhanced creativity, and more powerful manifestation in the world.
When you start to see your writing as a sacred tool for enlightenment — and understand the reasons your stories have held you back — is when you can truly set yourself free.
When you know yourself fully, you become more authentic, insightful, truthful, generous, and creative. You’re not imprisoned by your past — and you can catapult yourself into a future that truly sets your spirit free.
By the end of the 7-week journey, you’ll be able to access and share your genius — your greatest gift — with the world.
During this course, you’ll learn how to use writing to safely unearth and work through the parts of your history (and the present moments) that bring you the most pain — freeing yourself from these inner wounds and allowing yourself to embrace life with greater joy and gratitude.
Mark is a brilliant writer, profound teacher, and humble friend who delights in sharing this approach to profound healing — and who has practiced it himself successfully for decades. If you’re ready to dive into transforming the stories of your past into blessings for a future that ignites your soul, this 7-week course with Mark is the perfect experiential program for you.
“You don’t need skill in writing to partake; all that’s required is the longing to awaken your heart.”
Mark is a masterful and loving guide. His wisdom teachings and brilliantly conceived questions will enable you to dissolve the coverings and open to life-changing truth. You don’t need skill in writing to partake; all that’s required is the longing to awaken your heart.
— Tara Brach, author of Radical Acceptance and True Refuge
Why Rewriting Your Story Is So Important
How Expressive Writing Is Different From Other Forms of Writing
Proven Benefits of Expressive Writing
During this heart-opening 7 weeks, you’ll:
- Learn how to step out of illusion and into your truth
- Understand that when you identify the lies you tell yourself, you release pent up energy and heal your pain
- Become a juicier and more dynamic being — when you come to see that your weakness and losses are often strengths and gains in disguise, your inner radiance will shine
- Discover how you sacrifice essential parts of yourself in order to belong
- Learn that boredom and apathy often point to where you’re withholding — and receive new ways to address these points of stagnation
- Learn how clinging to your past is detrimental to your life — and how regret, sentimentality, and nostalgia stifles creativity and growth
- Release your story from the past and increase your power and happiness
- Receive writing prompts to help you access and share your genius — your greatest offering — with the world
- Claim the powers of transformation as a never-ending process in how you live your life
- Heal from some of your most challenging past circumstances and wounds
- Experience enhanced authenticity, joy, and freedom through the deepening of emotional expression
What You’ll Discover in These 7 Weeks
In this 7-week transformational intensive, Mark will guide you through the fundamental spiritual skills and competencies that you’ll need to successfully navigate your past and mine old stories for your journey of healing through writing — which will, in turn, help transform the quality of your life.
The Power of Livestreaming Video
You’ll connect with Mark and experience his teachings through livestreaming video via any connected device. This connection is easy to use and will enhance the impact of Mark’s transmissions. Or you can listen to audio-only by phone.
(Can’t make it live? No worries! After each class, the video and audio recordings will be available for you to download or stream in a high-quality format at your convenience.)
Weekly Sessions Thursdays at 1:00pm Pacific
This course will feature LIVE teachings, interactive training sessions, experiential practices, and Q&A with Mark. Each session will build harmoniously upon the previous ones, so you’ll develop a complete holistic understanding of the practices, tools, and principles you’ll need to successfully let go of your old story as you reimagine a new one — freeing you from the past to embrace a life with greater joy and purpose.
Module 1: Overcome Obstacles to Discover Your Authenticity (August 25)
In this first session, you’ll explore the parts of your story that are inauthentic, unclear, or dishonest. Identifying the obstacles to authenticity that are “baked” into your personal narrative makes way for insight and imagination. The poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote, “I want to unfold, I don’t want to stay folded anywhere. For where I am folded, there I am a lie.”
When you discover the lies you tell yourself on a regular basis, you reveal the truth of who you are. When you realize that you are the storyteller, not the story, and that what you’ve believed is a fixed identity is actually changeable, fluid, and open to interpretation... it imbues your life with greater meaning and frees you to live more happily.
This process is like removing blocks from a flowing current... once the obstacles to authenticity are removed, you increase power and potential. Exposing your inauthentic parts also invites you to explore the psychological shadow, where deeper truths remain concealed.
In this session, you’ll:
- Discover that everybody’s personal story is a mixture of both truth and falsehoods
- Come to appreciate that stories are survival tools that help us navigate a challenging, confusing world
- Understand that when you identify the lies you tell yourself, you release pent up energy and heal your pain
- Realize there is no shame in uncovering lies; it’s an act of self-care that increases self-knowledge
- Invite more self-acceptance into your life by training the light of attention on your myths and losing your fear of the shadow
Module 2: Your Shadow Knows Your Wholeness (September 1)
In this session, we consider the psychological shadow, that off-limits part of yourself where you hide both your pain and your gifts.
In exploring your stories, you come to realize that your narrative includes missing pieces that you keep out of sight. Only by acknowledging and investigating these shadow parts can you move toward a narrative of wholeness and self-integration.
Identifying the holes in your story helps you retrieve unique, irreplaceable aspects of your originality that you’ve pushed away, judged, and overlooked. You’ll notice how fears, doubts, and stress decrease when you explore the shadow with acceptance and care, making way for insight and imagination. You’ll also notice that perceived limitations and weaknesses are actually strengths in disguise, integral parts of your unique being.
You’ll see the ways in which you have compromised unnecessarily, and learn to pay attention to how the ego weaponizes shame and guilt to keep you small, safe, and a fraction of who you can be.
In this session, you’ll:
- Discover that your shadow contains both pain AND gifts
- Learn how the ego weaponizes shame and guilt to keep you small
- Understand how fear, doubt, and stress decrease when you allow yourself to explore your shadow
- Come to appreciate how originality calls for integration of the daytime self and the nighttime self
- Become a juicier and more dynamic being — when you come to see that your weakness and losses are often strengths and gains in disguise, your inner radiance will shine
Module 3: Compromise Only When Necessary to Live Your Truth (September 8)
How do you shrink to fit your narrative into what’s acceptable to your family, society, profession, relationships, religion, or political party? What do you fear losing if you change these stories? When is compromise useful, and when is it self-sabotaging?
This week, you’ll look at where you’ve compromised unnecessarily in your life, creating an incomplete story. You’ll see how your desire to please others, fit in, and play small has diminished your enthusiasm, passion, and power. Whenever you compromise the truth of who you are in order to belong, you remain stuck in the middle of the road, where you’ll feel both safe and stagnant.
You’ll experience a writing practice that will help reveal when compromise becomes evasion. This awareness will trigger your desire to be free, take positive risks, and stop interfering with your personal growth.
How and why do you tame your own wildness? What would you do if you were free?
In this session, you’ll:
- Explore how compromise can deprive you of authenticity
- Discover how you sacrifice essential parts of yourself in order to belong
- Learn that boredom and apathy often point to where you’re withholding — and receive new ways to address these points of stagnation
- Bring more vitality and joy for life when you uncover how you bridle your passion with compromise
- Learn how to say no when that’s your truth
Module 4: Release Attachments & Find Your Freedom (September 15)
To be free is to lose attachment to that which is inessential in you, and to accept your impermanence and the transitory nature of your story — which scares the ego to death.
Although we imagine that we want to be free, freedom can also be frightening.
This week, you’ll look at the obstacles to freedom in your life. You’ll explore the ways in which you entrap yourself — and stay imprisoned — by resisting the call to freedom. Is it easier to stay in your cage than to fly out the open door? What myths do you use to deceive yourself into thinking you’re free when you’re really not?
Freedom is a spiritual opportunity and is fundamentally an “inside job.” You can be free in the midst of adversity, and imprisoned in the lap of luxury, depending on how you tell your story.
As you go within and tell your story, you come to face your shame — the shame of wanting to be free — and overcome the impulse to curtail, restrict, and keep yourself collared.
In this session, you’ll:
- Discover that freedom means letting go of imaginary obstacles by facing your fear of freedom and shedding your desire to remain in comfort and familiarity
- Step out of illusion into your truth
- Gain the confidence to start your freedom story now — by coming to terms with the concept that it doesn’t mean changing external circumstances
- Find ways to release the shame that surrounds your innate desire to be free
Module 5: The Past Can’t Control You If You’re Fully Present (September 22)
How do you cling to the past to your own detriment? How do you define yourself more through the past than the present? This week, you’ll explore how your story is controlled by the past and how you define yourself through your biography. The spiritual realization that you are not what has happened to you is a quantum leap in self-awareness.
Aside from mating trout, you don’t find fish swimming backward. Like fish, our natural way of being is in the present, in the flow of life... not living in or holding on to the past.
When you claim the power to be fully present, and drop the obsession with looking back or judging yourself through that backward lens, your story can remain fresh, relevant, flexible, and open. Writing from this fresh perspective is key to changing your story, healing your life, and realizing your true gifts.
In this session, you’ll:
- Come to understand that you are not your biography, and the past does not define you
- Receive a deeper wisdom that writing brings you into the present and helps you untangle yourself from the past
- Learn how clinging to your past is detrimental to your life — and how regret, sentimentality, and nostalgia stifles creativity and growth
- Discover that your narratives of failure, loss, and trauma need not shape your future
- Release your story from the past and increase your power and happiness
Module 6: Silence Your Inner Critic & Find the Treasure Within (September 29)
Every single one of us was born with a unique genius that no one else possesses. This week, you’ll explore the nature of your true gifts and their impact on your authentic story.
Overcoming false modesty is an important step to awakening. Can you apply your genius to the challenges of your life and bring imagination to adversity? Can you drop the stories that compromise your ability to bring forth what is within you? When you see that your geniusis a gift, you realize the only appropriate response is gratitude.
Exploring your treasure is bound to bring up the voice of the inner critic. Yet, when you counter these voices in writing, you come to trust your enthusiasm and the richness of what you have to give.
You are one of a kind. There is no other being like you on this planet.
In this session, you’ll:
- Learn that genius — your offering — can be practical or artistic, visionary or down to earth, noticeable or invisible to the outside world
- Explore ways to overcome false modesty so you can enjoy the riches you’ve been given
- Silence the voices of internal critics by writing about your treasure
- Realize how acknowledging your gifts enriches your story
- Receive writing prompts that’ll help you give voice to your particular genius and instill joy
- Experience a sense of flow and joy in what makes you feel most “yourself”
Module 7: Your New Future Story of Unlimited Possibilities (October 6)
In this final module, you’ll explore the theme of intention and the link between desire and imagination when you compose a narrative that helps you flourish.
You’ve come to understand that you’re not your past and that your story is always changing. Freedom no longer scares you — instead you see it as an invitation, a promising open door to the unknown.
Expressing your inner self through the written word during these seven weeks has helped you understand your shadow, which has freed repressed power and your true intentions for the future.
Writing has helped you focus your heart and mind, training you in present-moment awareness and the forward flow of your existence. You now understand that you can compose your life moment to moment without writing your story in stone. This frees you to live with fewer regrets and more opportunities for transformation.
In this session, you’ll:
- Discover how intention helps you compose a story that helps you flourish
- Experience freedom as an invitation to shift according to what is true for you
- Learn that your story need not be written in stone
- Explore the truth that narrative can never contain you, though you use stories to understand your life
- Claim the powers of transformation as a never-ending process in how you live your life
The Sanctuary of Truth Bonus Collection
In addition to Mark’s transformative 7-week virtual course, you’ll receive these special bonuses with leading visionaries and teachers to complement the course and take your understanding and practice to an even deeper level.
Writing as a Spiritual Practice
6-Part Audio and Video Course With PDF Transcripts From Mark Matousek
This personal study course will introduce you to the power of writing as a path of spiritual awareness and self-realization. In dialogue with your writing self, you’ll explore your deepest questions, investigate your darkest shadows, and articulate your boldest visions. Through a series of thought-provoking questions and lessons, you’ll discover that Writing as a Spiritual Practice can serve as a most trusted confidante, mindfulness teacher, and therapeutic guide.
Plus... you’ll receive these bonuses too!
Meeting Your Saboteurs
Live Video Teaching From Mark Matousek
In this live 75-minute video event, you’ll look at the internal adversaries that interfere with your reaching your fullest potential. As multidimensional people, we’re accustomed to conflict and contradiction among our mental saboteurs. This inner racket becomes the soundtrack of our lives, causing stress and a shortened attention span. Mark will talk about resolving core conflicts and guide you through two writing exercises that can help you heal the divisions that exist within you.
Plus... you’ll receive these bonuses too!
Original Blessing: Return to the Source
Audio Narrative With PDF Transcript From Mark Matousek
In this 30-minute talk, Mark explores the radical philosophy of “original blessing” as a counterbalance to our current global catastrophes. He also shares how the belief in “original sin” has distorted our understanding of human nature and our relationship to the planet. You can reclaim the goodness, truth, and beauty of who you are when you emphasize self-blessing over punishment, and you focus on healing, renewal, imagination, and play over the need for salvation.
Becoming Yourself: Originality in the Age of Impostors
Audio Narrative With PDF Transcript From Mark Matousek
In this thought-provoking 30-minute program, Mark explores originality in the virtual age and the epidemic of impostor syndrome. Our “first thoughts” and instinctive knowledge are our most dependable guides — yet, in a world where duplicity, disempowerment, and public pretense prevail, we often disregard the “still, small voice within,” and the spirit with which we were born. These are some of the questions Mark answers, “How can we be fully ourselves despite widespread pressure to become someone else?” “How do you ignore your personal genius in the process of fitting in?” “How would your life be different if you allowed yourself to be authentic?”
Right Relationship: How the Heart Can Also Be Wise
Audio Dialogue With Mark Matousek and Dr. Amir Levine With PDF Transcript
In this audio dialogue, Mark interviews Dr. Amir Levine, one of the world’s leading experts in the art and science of interpersonal relationships. A New York Times bestselling author and faculty member of Columbia University’s Department of Psychiatry, Levine talks to Mark about his seminal book, Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find and Keep Love. Discover why it’s so important to understand your “attachment style” when bonding intimately with others.
What Graduates of Mark’s Courses Are Saying...
— Gill Bolt: “It’s Like Being Reborn”
— Toby Needleman: “I Feel So Much Lighter”
— Emma Jarrett: “An Unending Source of Wisdom and Exploration”
— Cathy McBride: “Not Just a Way to Heal, But a Way to Transform”
— Cathy Roberts: “The Writing Seemed to Be Flowing Through Me”
— Krystal Dyan: “You Feel That You’re Held With Such Compassion and Such Beauty”
“Everyone on this planet needs to take this course!”
Everyone on this planet needs to take this course! I healed almost every aspect of myself (anger, depression, anxiety, etc.) and am renewed with so much love. I didn’t go in with any expectations except that I wanted to know how to finish my book. I was met with so much internal healing that my book became secondary, thereby allowing me to use my authentic voice not just in my writing but in all parts of my life. I wasn’t going to take this class because I couldn’t afford it but with the payment plan, I am so glad I did! To imagine the amount of money spent on therapy wrapped in a course that is magnificently priceless! Mahalo (thank you), Mark and The Shift Network!
— Claire Chun, Kaneohe, Hawaii
“Mark is an exceptional facilitator and shares his knowledge with such clarity and passion that it is difficult not to want to engage.”
This course came at the right time for me. I felt so inspired and committed to the weekly sessions. Mark is an exceptional facilitator and shares his knowledge with such clarity and passion that it is difficult not to want to engage. Thank you, Mark, and thank you, The Shift Network.
— Janice, Jersey, Channel Islands
“Mark has created a unique, beautifully presented way of awakening to our unconscious obstacles and fears.”
Mark has created a unique, beautifully presented way of awakening to our unconscious obstacles and fears. His wisdom is profound, gathered from years of exploration of spiritual awareness through many channels, not just writing. I am inspired to buy Mark’s book as I neglected to download most of the lectures. His years of gathered wisdom and self-realization are an invaluable source of reinforcement for our journey. I would take another course from him if possible.
— Isabel, Santa Rosa, California
“I’ve engaged in a healing journey on my own, and this course helped me get everything together.”
Over the years my childhood issues seemed to keep haunting my head and driving me crazy! I’ve engaged in a healing journey on my own, and this course helped me get everything together. It’s like the last thing that was missing to finally start feeling complete. Now I can move on because I have finally accepted my past as my own and I can finally feel at peace within myself.
— Sandra Maria Lopez, Guatemala
“Mark is a masterful teacher of the craft as well as a wonderful human being.”
Mark is a masterful teacher of the craft as well as a wonderful human being. He combines tremendous empathy; offers kindness when it’s needed, and helps each person personally. And when we are done he’s left us on steady ground with hopes for a journey before us!
— Wayne, Winters, California
“Mark is a very wise, compassionate, awake teacher, and an excellent guide on the journey to both self-inquiry and self-actualization.”
Mark is a very wise, compassionate, awake teacher, and an excellent guide on the journey to both self-inquiry and self-actualization. He is simply profound in his inspiration-guidance-kindness. The benefits of studying with Mark are deep, truly life-affirming, and healing.
— E.J., New York City
“Mark’s work provided many insights and tools to help us work through these challenging times...”
Mark’s work provided many insights and tools to help us work through these challenging times, to change perspective, gain clarity, and delve even deeper in order to discover our inner resources and strengthen a much-needed resilience. So grateful!
— Hayley, Italy
“Mark’s insight and ability to share his wisdom is unrivaled...”
Mark’s insight and ability to share his wisdom is unrivaled, and that together with taking the time to do the exercises has been hugely beneficial to me. I’ve understood things about myself for the first time in my life and then I’ve been able to make changes as a result of my insights. Thanks, Mark. It’s been a wonderful course and I"m sorry that it’s come to the end.
— Glenda Spackman, Whakatane, New Zealand
Join the Global Community
The Sanctuary of Truth offers some of the most transformational online teachings available, within a thriving global community of learning and practice.
Join fellow students and practitioners to support and inspire each other as you integrate the teachings and practices Mark Matousek will share in this powerful training.
You’ll be part of an international community that’s on the leading edge of a global movement of people manifesting a world grounded in principles of cooperation, harmony, and reverence for all of life.
Here’s What You’ll Receive
Seven 90-Minute Class Sessions With Mark Matousek
Experience a unique opportunity to be mentored by and learn from bestselling author, teacher, and V-Men co-founder, Mark Matousek, creator of “Writing to Awaken” — from the comfort of your own home. Each class session includes a livestreaming video option and guides you to discover specific skills and abilities to untangle from your past and imagine a fresh new story. Course sessions are on Thursdays at 1:00pm Pacific.
Seven Video Recordings of Class Sessions
After each class, the digital video will be available for you to download or stream in a high-quality format. You’ll never have to worry about missing a session, and you can watch anytime and anywhere at your convenience.
Seven Audio Recordings of Class Sessions
After each class, the audio will be available for you to download in high-quality MP3 format. You’ll never have to worry about missing a session, and you can listen anytime and anywhere at your convenience.
Seven Transcripts of Class Sessions
In addition to the high-quality videos and MP3 audios, you’ll also receive the entire class transcription after each session is completed. You can then review, print, and highlight the most important insights and practices you were given.
Seven 30-Minute Interactive Group Practice Sessions
With live class attendance, there will be a 30-minute optional interactive practice session directly following each class. You’ll be placed in an intimate group with several other participants on the conference call to interact, share, and do additional practices to help you further integrate the weekly lessons. Practice sessions are available for live attendance only and are not recorded for playback. If you’re unable to attend the calls live, the Facebook online community group allows you to connect with each other and find alternative times to interact.
Interactive Exercises and Questions for Each Lesson
Between class sessions, you’ll have the option of completing related exercises, practicing new tools, and answering questions to accelerate your learning and integrate each week’s lesson.
Online Community
Our exclusive Facebook online community is the perfect place to continue your discovery process after each class. Here, you can continue the discussion about your course materials and interact with your fellow students to take your exploration to an even deeper level.
The Sanctuary of Truth Bonus Collection
- Writing as a Spiritual Practice
6-Part Audio and Video Course With PDF Transcripts From Mark Matousek
- Meeting Your Saboteurs
Live Video Teaching From Mark Matousek
- Original Blessing: Return to the Source
Audio Narrative With PDF Transcript From Mark Matousek - Becoming Yourself: Originality in the Age of Impostors
Audio Narrative With PDF Transcript From Mark Matousek - Right Relationship: How the Heart Can Also Be Wise
Audio Dialogue With Mark Matousek and Dr. Amir Levine With PDF Transcript
An Unprecedented Opportunity to Join the Online Training, The Sanctuary of Truth
We feel honored that Mark Matousek has chosen to partner with The Shift Network to offer this exclusive LIVE online training. This is a unique opportunity to interact directly with a bestselling author, teacher, V-Men co-founder, and the creator of “Writing to Awaken” whose powerful insights and pioneering work are helping us heal and awaken ourselves and our world.
If you’re serious about embracing your true potential, then you owe it to yourself, your loved ones, and our world to take this one-of-a-kind training.
If you’re ready to take the next step in evolving yourself, click the register button below to reserve your space now.
Your Satisfaction Is 100% Guaranteed!
Your satisfaction is 100% guaranteed! If you don’t absolutely LOVE The Sanctuary of Truth — or don’t feel that it meets your needs — please submit your refund request form on or before September 8, 2022 and we’ll happily issue qualifying customers a refund.
More Praise for Mark Matousek...
“Mark Matousek’s reflections and life-changing insights [are] filled with timeless wisdom and practical advice.”
As a scientist and clinician, I find Mark Matousek’s reflections and life-changing insights to be filled with timeless wisdom and practical advice. Let Mark be your guide as you journey to the depths of your mind to nurture a new way of being with yourself and with others.
— Daniel J. Siegel, MD, clinical professor at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and New York Times bestselling author
“His classes will change the ways in which you examine your life...”
Mark Matousek’s writing instruction is transformative. His classes will change the ways in which you examine your life, and how you think about yourself as a writer. He approaches your work with a deep sense of empathy, allowing him to help you tell your story in your voice. No matter what stage of the process you are at, time spent with Mark will yield extraordinary results.
— Libuse Binder, author of Ten Ways to Change the World in Your Twenties
“Mark Matousek is a truly gifted writing coach.”
Mark Matousek is a truly gifted writing coach. With an interviewer’s ear, he listens deeply and hears what people have to say. With the determination of a midwife, he helps them give birth to themselves through their words. As my “book whisperer,” he is showing me that writing is truly a spiritual path, leading not only to publication but personal transformation. Don’t miss the opportunity to learn from him!
— Gwenyth Jackaway, PhD, associate professor at Fordham University
“I’m deeply grateful for the experience.”
The writing course I took with Mark Matousek was an amazing journey into the soul of each who took it. We found we were able to trust each other, thanks in large part to Mark starting our first class with the words, “You’re all here for a reason, even though you may not know what that reason is.” Over the course of just a handful of short sessions, I’ve come to realize that not only was I there for a reason, but that this reason was more important to my wellbeing and self-understanding than I could have possibly fathomed when I first signed on for this class. I’m deeply grateful for the experience.
— Brian Carr, president of Solid Threads
“This course was a blessing to me as I navigate some stormy waters in life.”
After relocating to a new city and being without work, I was able to use this course to pull my life stories apart and get a good glimpse of where I've been. With that insight, I have started to get a better sense of where to direct my ship for the next course of this life adventure. While I've gained a better sense of the direction to navigate, I know the journey has only just begun again. The practice of writing that this course has helped me develop is like a steady and trustworthy guidance system that will be by my side whenever I need to assess what's going on, where am I, where do I want to go, and what's propelling me forward.
—Eric van Leeuwen, Portland, Oregon
About Mark Matousek
Mark Matousek is the author of two acclaimed memoirs, Sex Death Enlightenment: A True Story (an international bestseller) and The Boy He Left Behind: A Man’s Search For His Lost Father. His other books include When You’re Falling, Dive: Lessons in the Art of Living... Ethical Wisdom: The Search for a Moral Life... and Writing to Awaken: A Journey of Truth, Transformation & Self-Discovery.
A former editor at Interview magazine, he’s a featured blogger for PsychologyToday.com and HuffPost, and has contributed to numerous publications, including The New Yorker, O: The Oprah Magazine (contributing editor), Harper’s Bazaar, Yoga Journal, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, and The Saturday Evening Post. His essays have appeared in many anthologies, including Voice of the New Millenium, Wrestling With the Angel, and A Memory, A Monologue, a Rant, and a Prayer, among others.
A popular speaker and teacher, Mark offers courses in creativity and spiritual growth in the U.S., Canada, Australia, and Europe, based on his book, Writing to Awaken. He’s on the faculty of the Esalen Institute, 1440 Multiversity, the New York Open Center, The Garrison Institute, Omega, Kripalu, Mindvalley, and other institutions of higher learning. He’s the founder of The Seekers Forum, a global online community focused on nonsectarian dialogue and exploration, and the president of Mark Matousek Media, a digital publishing company that promotes creative and spiritual excellence through online learning.
As a founding member of V-Men (with V, formerly known as Eve Ensler), an organization devoted to ending violence against women and girls, he curates the V-Men essay series, an ongoing anthology featuring personal writing by men on the subject of violence against women.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What is your refund policy?
A: Your satisfaction with The Shift Network and this course is our highest priority! We offer a satisfaction guarantee for a full two weeks so that you can try out the course risk free. The deadline to receive a refund is two weeks from your date of purchase. To request a refund, please click here to submit your Refund Application Form. Your refund will be processed within five business days and we will send you an email confirmation when your refund has been completed. However, we’d love to have a chance to address and resolve your concerns first. If there’s something we can assist you with, please email us at support@theshiftnetwork.com, and we’ll be happy to help!
Q: How can I reach Customer Support?
A: Please visit our Customer Support Center, where you should be able to find the answer to your question or the solution to your problem. And if you can’t, you can submit an online request form and we’ll get right back to you.
