[INTRODUCTION]

Hal Elrod: Today, on the Achieve Your Goals podcast, I’m sitting down with my friend Danny Morel to talk about what it really means to awaken your highest self, not the Instagram version, not the motivational quote version, but the real inner work, the healing, the identity shifts, the moments where you’re forced to confront the beliefs that are quietly running your life. We’re diving into his new book, Awaken Your Highest Self, his three-part framework of awaken, heal, transform. And yes, we’re even talking about plant medicine, specifically ayahuasca and how that has transformed his life. This one is deep. Let’s go.

[INTERVIEW]

Hal Elrod: Danny, it’s good to be with you, brother.

Danny Morel: Glad to be here. I remember when I had you on my show, so this is cool.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. It’s been a full circle moment. Well, I’m a fan. I’m a fan of you, as a person, as a friend, your work. Now I’m a fan of the book. I finished this a few days ago. I’m on my second go around. I mean, dude, if you look, I don’t know if anybody can see, but like the amount of underlines.

Danny Morel: Wow.

Hal Elrod: It’s pretty much the– there’s like more underlined, encircled than there is not. So, yeah, man, I was excited when I heard this book was coming out because of who you are. So, yeah, thanks for putting it out, number one.

Danny Morel: Thank you. Thank you for having me, man. Yeah.

Hal Elrod: Before we dive into this, I want to know a little, for those that don’t know you particularly, and of course, you share a lot in the book, but your journey, what led to you personally realizing you needed to awaken your higher self? And then beyond that, of course, we can get into what led you right in the book.

Danny Morel: Yeah. I think it’s reaching this, the best way I can describe it, you reach this mountaintop that you thought you needed to reach your entire life. And then you get there and you realize, oh, my God, like I’m still empty. And that’s what happened to me. I’d achieved success in business. I had all of the stuff, and then my…

Hal Elrod: Million-dollar real estate company.

Danny Morel: Yeah.

Hal Elrod: Married.

Danny Morel: Yeah, married.

Hal Elrod: Three kids.

Danny Morel: Three beautiful boys. I had just built this beautiful Tuscan Italian home.

Hal Elrod: Oh, wow.

Danny Morel: A custom, like the whole thing. The whole thing.

Hal Elrod: So, from the outside.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: You’re living the dream.

Danny Morel: Yeah, from the outside, I was living the dream. But then my mom passed away, which I share in the book. And that just opened me up to, I think it opened me up spiritually. And questions started showing up that I didn’t have the courage to answer because I knew the answers. And that’s when everything began for me. Yeah.

Hal Elrod: So, I mean, so for years you’ve done your awakened events. You hosted The Higher Self podcast, which you mentioned. I was on that. So, you’ve been doing the work and I mean, you have 2.2 million followers on Instagram. Like, you have a huge following. You impact a ton of people. What prompted you go, all right, now’s the time to write the book?

Danny Morel: Yeah. So, when people come to Awaken Your Highest Self, the event, to me, and I think to the people that show up, it is the most beautiful thing to see, because it’s literally like taking them on a plant medicine journey without the medicine. Because we’re just starting to– we unravel all of the cocoon that they’ve built around their mind, their heart, their spirit, their soul for three days. And that’s why people literally call it more powerful than 30 years of therapy in three days because we’re going into the depths of who they are and opening that up, causing a metamorphosis, quite frankly.

And so, I just started getting so many people from all around the world who were like, I wish I could come, I wish I could fly there. But look, the stuff is expensive. You got to get your flights and your hotels. And so, I started understanding that and I just started seeing so many transformations that I thought to myself, like, I just got to get this out to more people. And so, that’s where the book journey began.

And listen, I’m just going to share with everyone, I am not– I was about to say I’m not an author, but I am an author. I’m not a writer. Like, I’m like, just put the people in front of me and I will let it rip. So, packaging all of that into a book was a process for me.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. Well, it’s funny because you went the opposite way. Most authors, like, they write the book and then they’re like, I should do events now. And I should, you know, right? Like, I should have a podcast. And you did all the– what I love about that is it’s one thing to write a book because it’s all theory. And it may not seem a theory because you’ve done the work and you’re like, I’m like Miracle Morning for me, like I’m sharing, I know this works. I did it, I shared it with some other people. It worked for them. But you, and I actually want to hear, I’d love an example, like you’ve been doing the work in person, three-day events with human beings watching them transform.

Danny Morel: That’s right. Yeah.

Hal Elrod: Watching them in tears. Break down, right? Go deep and then come out better on the other side. Do you have a favorite story of someone at one of your events that went through what you teach in the book and actually came out a better version of themselves?

Danny Morel: Yeah. There’s one– I have so many.

Hal Elrod: So many, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Danny Morel: So many. And the reason why I have so many is because it all has to do with your mother and father. So, I build the event and the book to get you to that place where the book is going to change your life. It’s going to change your life because it’s going to take you to all of the parts of yourself that you’ve been resisting. And part of what we resist is our power. So, what just popped in my mind was there was this woman that came from, God, I don’t know, Egypt or, I don’t know, somewhere in that part of the world. And she was saying like, “You’re not going to believe what happened.” I said, “Try me,” because I’ve done like 20 of these. She said, I was standing there, I take her through a spiritual journey. And Alexander the Great was standing in front of me.

And she says, and I realize I’m his ancestor, and she says, my whole life, I felt powerless and smaller or lower than others. And I walked up to Alexander the Great and I put my head down and I bowed down to Alexander the Great, and I already knew what was coming because I understand when Spirit gives you these messages, what it’s trying to teach you. And she says, and all of a sudden, Alexander the Great grabs me by the chin and by the shoulders and lifts me up and says, you don’t bow down to anyone because no one is higher than you.

And I think that’s one of the biggest things that the book is going to help people with. We spend our lives comparing ourselves to others, judging ourselves, being mean to ourselves, not being loving to ourselves, thinking that we are lower than other people. And then, as a result of that, all of that energy creates the life that we live. And the truth is, is that we are the physical manifestation and representation of the divine. Like, we were perfect from the moment that we were born. And we’re actually here to remember that. And what keeps us from remembering that is resistance. And the energy that allows us to embody how beautiful and powerful we actually are is allowance, which is the feminine.

Hal Elrod: I love the part of the book where you walk through, you have this imagine being born, right? When you imagine a baby being born and you’re born into this, from a perfect place of love and safety, and now you’re separated for the first time. You went from being oneness and wholeness, love, and one is to fear and separation.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: And that begins a lifelong journey of trying to remember who we really are.

Danny Morel: That’s it, man.

Hal Elrod: Remember the divine within us. And you talk a lot in the book about the premise of, either we’re in the energy of fear and separation or the energy of love and oneness. And that birth example is kind of where it first breaks off. How do we get back to living in a state of love and oneness? What are the obstacles? What’s standing in the way? How do we get back to that place?

Danny Morel: Yeah. So, I like to take people through a three-step process. And the first one is awakening, right? And part of awakening, the first thing you have to do is to question, and I’m talking, Hal, question everything. Like I started to. I started questioning, am I happy? Do I love what I do? Do I love who I’m in a relationship with? Like, am I living my purpose, right?

Hal Elrod: And the answers were no, no, no, no, right? A lot of nos.

Danny Morel: A lot of nos, a lot of nos. And I think that’s the first step and the most important step because it’s the step what they’re most afraid to take. Like, we love to believe. We love to believe what the news feeds us. We love to believe what the preacher feeds us. We love to believe. We love to believe us, what we’re feeding you right now, but that’s not where your power is. And it’s why what’s happening right now is happening when it comes to gurus is we’re starting to realize that like there is no guru. You are the guru, right?

Now, there are guides that can help you remember that. But any guide or any teacher that is trying to get themselves to be your guru isn’t coming from love or truth, because the real teachers, the real healers, the real spiritual people, they just want you to remember that you are the one that you are seeking.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. Like Jesus, when he said the kingdom of God is within you.

Danny Morel: That’s right. That’s right. So, once you start questioning everything, you really just start to unravel. And we take you through this journey, but I would recommend, like really question everything. Like, are you happy with the money that you make? Are you happy in your relationship? Are you happy with your body and your physical condition, right? And that alone is going to start breaking some sh*t apart.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. So, that’s some brutal honesty. Brutal honesty is that awaken start. So, it’s awaken, heal, transform. What are the other parts of the framework?

Danny Morel: Yeah. And then with awakening, you’ve got to question everything.

Hal Elrod: Okay.

Danny Morel: Then you discover. And you start to really discover where the root cause of a lot of what’s holding you back in life actually comes from. So, you start to look at your childhood. You start to look at your relationship with your mother and father. You start to look at your masculine and feminine energy and how really afraid you are, quite frankly. And then you decide. You decide what you are going to do with the information that you just got.

Hal Elrod: So, as I’m reading the book and the book is like, it’s deep. It’s gut wrenching, like having you go so deep and into your past and looking at your parents. And one thing I’m reading it as is not only me looking at my parents and I am very blessed, I had a really supportive mom and dad, and there’s a line in there where you say something like, even if you had a good mom and dad, there’s still stuff that’s– and so, it really caused me because at first, I’m reading, I’m like, nah, my parents were cool.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: And then I get to that line, I’m like, okay, let me really be really honest. And then thinking about my mom and dad, and one of the things though that as I’m reading it, is I’m not just thinking about my mom and dad, I’m thinking I’m a dad and I’ve got a daughter. And so, this is, I’m going to have my daughter read this book as soon as she– she’s 16 and she’s in a phase of like, she’s like, dad, I don’t read yourself help. Like, I want to read what I want to read. And so, I’m like, all right, I’m not going to push hard, but it’s like, I have a note in there, have Sophie, this is one of the first books she will read when she’s finally ready for personal development, spiritual development. Yeah, it’s such a good book.

And as I’m reading it, I’m going, I’m just thinking about the trauma that she has from us or like from me and my wife Ursula and how hopefully she’ll read and go, oh, my mom and dad did the best they can and they love me and what did I adopt from them? What did I take on from their unknown wounds that you talk a lot about in the book? Yeah, so it’ll help her heal, and I want her to do it now and not wait till she’s 40. That’s the thing, right?

Danny Morel: That’s it.

Hal Elrod: I’m like, I want her to read this book, Awaken Your Highest Self, and start doing the work now before she has to look back and be like, oh, I screwed up this relationship and this relationship and my marriage because of what mom and dad didn’t know they were doing or imparting onto me.

Danny Morel: Yeah, that’s it, man. And that’s a lot of what’s happening right now in the collective is we are all on that journey of unraveling all those wounds. And the reason why I put that in the book is because you have no idea how many people we’ve helped unlock their fullest potential where they had a great mom and dad, but their mom and dad were just constantly stressed out. Something as simple as that.

Hal Elrod: Totally.

Danny Morel: Or their mom and dad unconsciously put their emphasis and energy and love into the sibling that was sick or potentially, maybe favored somebody, like, you know what I’m saying?

Hal Elrod: Yeah, yeah. Or I think a big one is you could have a wonderful mom and dad, but they settled for mediocrity, right? Like, they settled for so much less that they did not see the extraordinary, limitless divinity within themselves. And so, they just went to the work job they hated, right? The great mom and dad. But like they weren’t living as an example of possibility.

Danny Morel: What’s possible in life. That’s right. That’s right.

Hal Elrod: So, that’s a big one.

Danny Morel: Yeah, that’s right.

Hal Elrod: You talk in the book early on, and it really sets a great tone. And I got a lot from this because it’s a great frame, the journey to consciousness, and you talk about two types of consciousness, victim consciousness and creator consciousness. Break those down.

Danny Morel: Well, victim consciousness, it’s not something that you think, it’s not something that you consciously decide. It’s just this overarching energy that you embody and live from unknowingly where you believe that life is happening to you. And so, you look at everything from that lens, the wrong person gets elected. F*ck. Somebody breaks up with you, you lose a client. In other words, all of life is happening to me.

Hal Elrod: And it’s not my fault.

Danny Morel: And it’s not only not my fault. I don’t control it and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Hal Elrod: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Danny Morel: And when you awaken, you actually start to realize that the opposite is true. You start to realize that you are literally creating the attachment to the guy that got elected. You created the situation, when that relationship, you are creating the financial situation that you are in, and it’s all based off of the energy that lives inside of you. And that, my friend, when that happens, it’s like you just turn a light switch on, because your entire life paradigm shifts forever. And you can never go back.

And it’s really one of the beautiful things about awakening. And this is where the second part comes into place is healing. I like to use the example of a narcissist. It’s a hot topic right now. And a lot of people are in the energy of calling their exes a narcissist, which I just want to say I’m not in any way devaluing your pain, any abuse, anything you went through, but just hear me out here for a second. When you are in victim consciousness, then the pain that you felt from that relationship, you placed that pain out there.

In this case, you are placing it in a label and in a box called narcissist. Guess what you’re unconsciously doing? You’re giving it your power. The only way you can actually change your life is to grab that power back and the pain. Bring it right back in here where you’ve been avoiding, own it, go into it, feel it, process it, understand it, and then uncover all of the parts of yourself that created it. That’s the part we don’t like to hear. You take ownership.

And once you take ownership, it leads you to acceptance where instead of like blaming, you accept it as a beautiful part of your life’s journey. Yes, I said beautiful because most of the time, the way that we transcend consciousness is through pain. Not all the time, but most of the time. And so, then when you’re able to do that, that leads you to the next layer, which this one for sure as heck, most people don’t ever want to mess with, forgiveness, because when you could see the “narcissist” as not a narcissist, remove the layer, as a wounded little boy or girl.

Hal Elrod: Preach.

Danny Morel: Someone that also must have experienced trauma, a broken heart, their hearts shattered. And when you can realize that that person now is only being to you the way someone was with them when they were a little boy or little girl, well, then guess what? You get to find the parts of yourself that sees them. Not for this evil human that hurt you, but for a beautiful little boy or girl that was once hurt as well. And when you do that, guess what? Then you get to thank them, forgive them, honor them for the lessons that they taught you in your life, and you’re free and you get to move on.

And that’s the difference between victim and creator consciousness, man, is that when you stay stuck in victim consciousness, I’m just going to say it, you’ll never be free. You will never find peace. You will never find real love, because real love allows. It allows you to feel, to process, to thank, to let go, and fear controls.

Hal Elrod: Love that. The forgiveness, I see just the way that you explained it, as that is the thing that frees us.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: When we’re, I am the way that I am, right, victim consciousness, because of that person, either that narcissist, that was my parent or an ex, whoever. And then it’s like, you’re hanging on to this pain that you’re– it’s pain you’re holding toward them, but you’re holding it. You’re holding it, you’re recreating it. Every thought that you have about that person as the victim that you are, as soon as you forgive, and I love the way to get there is to realize that was just a scared, they were a wounded boy or girl that grew up and then projected their wounds unconsciously onto other people. Not because they were evil, because they were flawed, hurt.

Danny Morel: And by the way, Hal, I’m not even saying like, I’m not even like making them right for the pain they caused you.

Hal Elrod: No. Sure.

Danny Morel: It’s not about them is what I’m trying to get to. It’s about you. It’s like what are you going to do for the rest of your life? Carry that sh*t. Remember it. Join Narcissist Anonymous, f*cking coaching club, or like, what are you going to– and what good is that going to do? Versus you can let go.

Hal Elrod: It’s about your freedom. It’s not about them.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: And that’s so often, when we’re hurting over someone, it’s like, they’re not even thinking about us.

Danny Morel: No.

Hal Elrod: Right? Like, they’re living their life.

Danny Morel: They’re all doing their thing.

Hal Elrod: And you are recreating the pain and perpetuating it, indefinitely.

Danny Morel: And that’s why people hate it when I say this, because what people actually hate is the responsibility. They hate that they can own it. They hate that they can transmute it. Understand how deep this is. If you get to own this and you get to transmute this, guess what else you get to own? And guess what else you get to transmute? Your whole entire life. So, it literally shatters people’s entire paradigms.

Hal Elrod: And they don’t like it, yeah, because it’s like, it’s responsibility which is weight, which is fear, which is what if I– like I’ve been able to blame them, which is a really safe place to be.

Danny Morel: And it’s easy.

Hal Elrod: Yeah, it’s easy. It’s painful, right? But it’s easier. It’s easier. I don’t have to look within.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: Right? I just keep, it’s their fault. So, I get to stay in my story. Get a little bit of attention from other people for it.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: For me, what helped me bridge the gap with forgiveness was this paradigm that if I had lived another person’s life, I’d probably be exactly the same as them. Like we judge other people as well, like, I would never do that. That’s horrible. That’s wrong. That’s evil. That’s bad. It’s like, well, yeah, yeah, yeah, you didn’t go through what they went through. And if you had, you would have– and if you had their brain and literally process things the way that you– you’d be them. You know? And so, from that place, I feel like we can forgive and love all people, because we’re like, oh, yeah, if I had been them, I’d be them.

Danny Morel: And that’s oneness. Oneness is understanding that they are you and you are them.

Hal Elrod: Unpack that. Expand on that.

Danny Morel: Well, it’s either we’re separate. When we are separate, we get to look at how as separate than me and we get to look at who he is and we get to judge him. We get to criticize him. We get to compare ourselves to him. We get to look up to him, down to him. We get to classify him in a box. We get to judge him based off of the color of his skin, how much money he makes, what he does, all of that stuff. When we live in oneness, none of that exists. Because we realize that Hal’s just doing the best that he can with the cars that have been handed to him, exactly like you are doing.

And when you actually sit face to face and you get to meet other people and you get to tell them like, tell me about your life story, you are going to be astonished by how much their story is similar to your story. And that’s when you finally realize that we’re not separate, we’re all one.

Hal Elrod: So, talk about how you got to this place of higher understanding, higher consciousness, your own awakening in terms of your journey. For those that don’t know, even those that do, I want to hear it. I know it, but I want to hear it, in this moment, which is, you were running a billion-dollar real estate company. Like you said, you’d built this Tuscan home. You’re living the dream. Your mom died. You got a divorce. You went through some pain, but how did you bridge the gap from real estate business guru guy to spiritual awakening that’s talking right now about oneness and healing trauma and all of this?

Danny Morel: Ayahuasca. Yeah, plant medicine, but no. No, that wasn’t it. Forgive me. It was the desire for the truth. The desire for the truth is what led me down a path of doing whatever was necessary for me to discover the truth.

Hal Elrod: Now, when you say the truth, what do you mean by that?

Danny Morel: I mean, the truth about myself. The truth about life. I was highly religious, so the truth about God. I didn’t want to believe anymore, Hal. I wanted to know. I wanted to know. I wanted to know and hear, and since I didn’t know how to get there, I actually turned to the thing that I was afraid of the most, which was plant medicine. And the thing that I avoided the most and the thing that I criticized the most and the thing that I rejected the most.

Hal Elrod: Judge other people.

Danny Morel: I judge. It’s the same thing we do with the plant is what we do with people, because it’s a frequency that lives inside of us. And that’s what most people don’t realize. So, when I actually realized that I was rejecting and judging ayahuasca, I actually realized that that was the energy that I was living inside of me and ayahuasca was literally just mirroring back to me who I was as a human being. And once I saw that, I thought to myself, okay, I got to go do it.

Hal Elrod: So, this was on my list of topics I wanted to talk about.

Danny Morel: Sure.

Hal Elrod: And for me, personally, I have not done ayahuasca. It’s on my list of, I’ve thought about going to Rythmia, I want to take my dad. I’ve heard about amazing breakthroughs, but I’ve also heard the opposite side, which is I’ve heard the pros, the cons. So, I want to hear your huge proponent of it.

Danny Morel: Yeah, don’t go there.

Hal Elrod: Okay, all right. So, talk about it. Get the spots to go to. That’s the commercial spot.

Danny Morel: Well, look, before we started, you were mentioning that the founder does it every single day.

Hal Elrod: And I don’t know that idea.

Danny Morel: Yeah, yeah, but whatever. I just think that like, you want to be in small, intimate settings where you can trust where there’s love. That’s it.

Hal Elrod: So, let’s start here. For anyone who is not familiar with ayahuasca, maybe they heard of it, maybe they’ve never even heard of it. what is it and how did you discover, how old were you when you discovered it, and why are you such a proponent, such a fan of it?

Danny Morel: Yeah. Ayahuasca is a plant medicine that comes from a vine in the Amazon jungle that when you drink the medicine, gives you direct access to the divine, direct access to, in this case, ayahuasca is the feminine energy of God.

Hal Elrod: They call it mother, right?

Danny Morel: The mother/grandmother energy, yeah. So, imagine being held, being taught, sometimes being reprimanded by the feminine energy of all of creation. That’s how profound it is. I found it seven years ago or so, right after my 40th birthday. But I just came back this weekend from taking my son who’s 18.

Hal Elrod: Oh, wow. For his first journey?

Danny Morel: For his first journey.

Hal Elrod: Oh, wow. How was that?

Danny Morel: He loved it, man. He loved it.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. I have one of my friends. Actually, he was the director of the Miracle Morning movie, and his mom was so against anything, plant medicine, drugs, you call it whatever you want, right? And so, she was resistant. He finally took her and she’s going, again, like it was just transformative. And I want that for my dad. Let me ask you this. This is personally, for me, because I’ve done a very high dose of psilocybin, magic mushrooms, for those that don’t know, right?

Danny Morel: How many grams?

Hal Elrod: I think I did eight one day.

Danny Morel: That’s big.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. And what I did is I read it some, I can’t remember how I got there, but when I was going through chemo, some either, maybe it was my own idea in a meditation, I don’t know. But I was like, I got the idea. I read it somewhere, when I do chemo, to do psilocybin, to do mushrooms, to help kind of offset the effects of the chemo. And I was like, I’ll try it. And I had this chocolate in my freezer for like a year that somebody gave me. So, I have a gram and I’m laying there feeling, just, oh, the chemo, I feel so terrible. And like an hour later, I’m like, whoa, I feel great. And I spent the whole day in nature and journaling and praying and meditating, right? And I was like, wow, that was amazing. And I can’t wait till chemo next month now because I’m going to do it again.

And I kept ratcheting up to two grams and then three and then four. And then eventually, it was either six or eight, one of the two. That was like full blown talking to God. So, my curiosity is, doing high dose, heroic doses of psilocybin, how does that compare to ayahuasca? Because I’ve read it’s similar.

Danny Morel: It’s similar but very different. Because every medicine plays a certain role in your spiritual evolution. So, mushrooms is more like mental, mind, thoughts. Ayahuasca is more feminine.

Hal Elrod: Heart.

Danny Morel: Heart.

Hal Elrod: Body.

Danny Morel: Yep. All of that. Cannabis, by the way, is another great one. I used to judge cannabis, and now it’s the medicine that my wife and I use. Like when something’s coming up and we want answers, I’ll be right back. And we have a room and two hits with the right intention, that’s the key. And we go deep into journey. Kambo, which is this little dot right here because I just did– it is the serum from a frog. And it actually, I’ve seen people actually purge out chemo from their eyes. Like the energy of all of it just gets released.

Hal Elrod: I might need to follow up with you on that one, man. I’ve done a lot of chemo and it messed me up.

Danny Morel: Yeah, Kambo. Kambo will help you.

Hal Elrod: Wow.

Danny Morel: And yeah, man, and if I’m honest, I’m glad we’re talking about this because all of these journeys, the way that it changed my life, that’s what actually made me start awaken. That’s what actually made me do this. I remember being in the ceremony thinking every human on earth needs to experience this. And then I remember thinking, but there’s no way I’m going to get every human on earth to do this, because it’s scary. I understand that.

And then I thought, what if I made an event that made people feel like they were getting the experience of plant medicine without the plant medicine. That’s what awakening is like, and then that’s what the book is like.

Hal Elrod: Wow. That’s incredible. Now, for anybody listening that’s like, five minutes ago when we started talking about this, they’re like, whoa, whoa, whoa. What? Like, this took a turn. I wasn’t expecting this. What are your– well, let me share my opinion on it. The way I explain it, like, so couple things. One is, the US government classified this thing, drugs.

Danny Morel: Of course, they did.

Hal Elrod: Right? And they’re like…

Danny Morel: Of course.

Hal Elrod: Made in lab, meth, made in a bathtub, horrific. And then things that grow in the ground that God or Mother Earth created and they’re all in the same category, right? So, that’s like I always say, that’s why they call it plant medicine and I’m glad there is that category now versus it all being lumped into drugs. That’s number one.

Number two, when I was getting chemo and I was on death’s doorway, man, I was 125 pounds, I lost, I mean 40 pounds less than this and I’m already thin, right, I’m like. And they accidentally, a nurse one day was supposed to inject chemo into my spine to keep the cancer from going to my brainstem, right? Just so it was horrible. And she missed my spine and injected it into my nerve, along my spine, and this caused me to go into these horrific migraines. I got migraines as a kid growing up. I’ve never had anything like this. And it was 24 hours a day for like seven or nine days, something like that. It was horrible.

There’s actually a scene in the Miracle Morning movie where I gave my dad my cell phone. I said, dad, I want you to film me right now. He goes, you’re in bad shape. Why? I said, because I’m recording all these videos of me, like my positive mindset around this. I’m like, I want, this is the lowest. I’ve never felt so horrible. I want to capture this, right? So, we captured it.

So, they sent me home to the apartment near the hospital, like seven days. And they tried morphine, Oxycontin, to help the pain. Nothing worked. Nothing worked. And I’m in so much pain. I’m crying. I’m like, I can’t eat. I’m losing more weight. My wife is three hours away. We’re in Houston. She’s here in Austin. And so, my dad puts me in a wheelchair, takes me out to the car, drives me to the apartment, and I go and I’m sleeping. And he’s trying to feed me and I’m like, I can’t eat. I can’t even, I got an eye mask on. I got earplugs in, I got white noise on high, blinds up. So much pain.

And after a day or so, and so I’m like eight, nine days into this now. My dad finally goes, Hal, what about that marijuana that your friend dropped off for you? And I go, yeah, yeah, I’ll try anything. And I hadn’t done marijuana in probably years. And so, it was so funny because my dad had never done marijuana in his life. And he is like, so what do I– I have like this pipe and this. What are this baggy– what do I do? So, I’m going to unpack a little bowl and I take two hits off of the marijuana and keep again.

So, five minutes later, my dad leaves. Five minutes later, maybe 10 minutes at the most, I feel fine. I sit up. I walk out, I go, dad, I’m starving. Make me some food. And I mean, he’s been watching me for over a week in the state of I’m in and so…

Danny Morel: How many days was it? It was probably seven.

Hal Elrod: Oh, is there a spiritual, maybe it’s seven. But yeah, I have to go back. Let me see if I could find that. So, my dad makes me food. I call my wife and I’m like, hey, sweetie. She goes, what? How are you talking right now? I’m like, I took two hits of marijuana, a plant that grows in the ground. Well, we’ll get that later. Not pharmaceuticals that are damaging my liver, that they’re pumping me full of, and I’m fine.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: And my appetite’s back, my pain’s gone. I am fine. And so, anyway, I share that story as like that was a paradigm shift of I’m like, so wait a minute, you’re telling me that I was too hits away from total relief, and the pharmaceutical company, right? You know what I mean? So, that’s why I am such a proponent of plant medicine, one of many, many, many reasons, like you, it’s been transformative for me. It grows from the earth. It’s not made with chemicals in a lab. So, yeah, man, that’s my soapbox.

Danny Morel: Well just number one, I couldn’t help but think that the same physical pain that you were in was the same emotional pain I was in that made me say, I’ll try anything. Number two, if you think about it, anything that grows from the earth is literally from God. It’s literally from God. And then number three, anything that grows from a lab is literally from man. So, it’s like this really beautiful divide to see where are you actually living and putting your trust. Is it in man? Is it in the 3D world? Or is it in God, the divine, the spiritual world?

And this is where religion kind of messes with us a little bit, because whether we realize it or not, it actually has nothing to do with God. It’s like manmade. It’s a manmade creation that keeps you up here. And so, so much so that it makes you look at everything that I’m discussing right now and goes, no way, it’s evil, I was that way.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. Me, too.

Danny Morel: I would just ask you to feel. That’s it. I would just say feel. We have forgotten to be human beings and we are now human thinkers. And we spend so much of our times thinking and in our minds that we have forgotten that we can also feel. We can also intuit. And you can feel if what I’m saying is dangerous or evil or bad, or if it feels actually safe. Maybe a little scary, but safe.

Hal Elrod: Yeah, out of your comfort zone.

Danny Morel: That’s right. And that’s where you know and you discover your truth and you stop believing is by trusting what you feel.

Hal Elrod: Let’s talk about that, because that is one of my favorite topics when, whether it’s even just watching your social media videos or interview clips of you talking about God and connecting with the divine within us. I like the frame you mentioned, believing, which is most of our beliefs around God are literally beliefs that somebody else told us. What do you believe? Well, I believe what my mom and dad told me.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: And then what I heard and what I read, and it’s like, do you connect with God directly? Jesus said the kingdom of God is within. Are you connecting directly? Well, no, I read my works and I go to church and I listen to the– right? Nothing wrong. No judgment against that.

Danny Morel: No, no, no. And I actually just want to say like, I honor that. That’s where you’re at and, yeah.

Hal Elrod: Yeah, yeah. And I think that, yeah, there’s value there. So, I’d love to hear you just talk about how the journey, the spiritual journey. In fact, let’s just go there. The spiritual journey you went from, by the book, very, very religious.

Danny Morel: Oh, yeah. I was.

Hal Elrod: Very, yeah. And then to where you’re at now and anywhere in between.

Danny Morel: It’s the difference between living your life from the outside in or the inside out.

Hal Elrod: Okay. Talk about that.

Danny Morel: It’s the difference between living your life from needing or being free. It’s quite frankly, the difference between searching and having found. In the external, there’s always going to be things there for us, waiting for us to take our energy. It can be pornography, it can be drugs, it can be our looks, it can even be a relationship, and it can even, yeah, be belief. And what we don’t realize until hopefully we do, is that whenever we are dependent upon something outside of us to sustain us, in this case, whether it’s pornography, alcohol, a relationship, forgive me for bunching it up into this, but religious beliefs, what we are unconsciously living is a life that is dependent upon the exterior, the outside. The answer is out there. That means you’re powerless.

Hal Elrod: Now, what if someone is saying, well, that’s blasphemous, that God, yes, God is out there. God is the creator.

Danny Morel: Hold on.

Hal Elrod: Okay.

Danny Morel: I would ask you the question, where did you get the idea that it’s blasphemous? Because not taking the COVID shot was blasphemous. Being a bad boy or girl right before Santa Claus came was blasphemous. It’s control. It’s control through fear. So, if I tell you that something is evil or blasphemous or whatever, and you are not here, guess what you’re going to do? Yes, sir, I guess it must be. I’m asking you, challenge it, question it. If it’s so right, you’re going to find the truth. And that’s what people are afraid of.

Hal Elrod: Do you know Aaron Abke?

Danny Morel: Yeah, I do.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. I love Aaron’s teaching on this, right? That he’s like, I left the church to follow Jesus, right? Like actually following Jesus’s teachings versus what my pastor told me, that I was separate and that I was bad and that I was flawed and that I was a sinner and that– and he’s like Jesus didn’t say those things, right?

Danny Morel: And I’m going to take it a step further. If Jesus were here right now, he wouldn’t want you to follow him. Jesus’ actual message was one of discovering the truth, the divine, and your power within yourself. If you think about it, like what kind of human being gets crucified and then says it’s okay, like they don’t know what they’re doing. What kind of human being is being murdered and still loves his brother and sister? That’s someone that had discovered that his power was in here. That’s what he kept talking about.

Jesus didn’t want followers. He wanted you to become the highest version of yourself because someone that can, becomes the highest version of themselves. The last thing on earth they would want is a follower. We’re right back to guru.

Hal Elrod: Because they’d want you to– they’d want everyone.

Danny Morel: They can go, they’d want everyone.

Hal Elrod: To awaken to the highest version of themselves.

Danny Morel: Ah, now you got it.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. And then you wrote the book called Awaken Your Highest Self. What are the big– I mean, we’ve talked about a lot of things that are covered in the book that are addressed. What are the biggest themes or messages or takeaways that you want people to gain from this book?

Danny Morel: I think number one is you can either live in fear or love. That’s the biggest thing. And I’m just going to just say that right now, humanity is literally in the process of shifting from fear to love. You’re seeing it happen. You’re seeing it with Epstein. You’re seeing it with like all of this stuff that’s coming out, it’s like the truth is coming out and it’s coming out so that it could finally click inside of you that everything that you’ve been dependent on is actually full of sh*t.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. Living in the matrix that the government’s in charge and they’re looking out for our best interests.

Danny Morel: All of it. And let’s just talk about the energy. The energy that causes you to be dependent upon everything out there is fear, because you’re afraid deep inside of yourself that you are not powerful enough to be the own leader of your own life. Love allows you to be that leader. Love also allows whatever is happening out there to happen and it doesn’t necessarily have to impact you. Like, I know things are happening out there, but it doesn’t bother me. I don’t give it any of my energy.

Hal Elrod: You know, it’s interesting. Actually, I think it’s funny, I’ve fallen more into the trap of paying attention to what’s going on and maybe giving some power away. Meaning, I remember for most of my life, I paid zero attention to politics and we brought like, oh, this person got elected. I’m like, I don’t care who gets elected. I create my life.

Danny Morel: That’s right. You do.

Hal Elrod: It doesn’t matter who’s in office and what they’re doing. And like, not that it doesn’t matter, but doesn’t matter in my life. Like I am the creator of my life. And I will adapt to whatever, new regulations or rules, are put in place, like all figured out. And I’ll create the life that I want. And to your point, I think about how many people are like, they give away their power to…

Danny Morel: Fixated on it.

Hal Elrod: Who got– yeah, fixated. They’re just watching the news. And again, I fell into this. 2020, as I started to like wake up, I was like, wait a minute, what’s going on? I think it was when we got locked in our house, I’m like, oh, this is actually affecting me for the first time ever, like where, I know there were tax policies and stuff before, but this is like directly affecting, I’m being told what I can and can’t do. I think that’s actually what sucked me in.

And maybe for a lot of people, 2020 was a shift in so many ways. I think in some ways, our consciousness was elevated and expanded and we started to see the veil being pulled back. But I think also, at least I could say I’m guilty of, I was pulled into it way more than I ever had been before. And I’m like, wait, what’s going on? Who’s Epstein? Who? What is it? They’re doing what? Yeah, so it’s interesting.

What do you– how do you define freedom? And I want to ask in the context of feel like, feel free to share, like you’re living a beautiful life right now, not just with the success and all of that, but like, you’re married to an amazing woman in Jen, you have a daughter that you received a message during, I think it was a plant ceremony journey that you were going to marry this woman, have this daughter, but what does freedom look like to you?

Danny Morel: And my boys.

Hal Elrod: And your three boys. What does freedom look like to you?

Danny Morel: Freedom looks like going into the depths of who you are and disconnecting yourself from any fear energy within you, the fear of being yourself, the fear of speaking your truth, the fear of loving someone fully, which is a very deep fear for people.

Hal Elrod: Fear of rejection, yeah.

Danny Morel: The fear of being loved, the fear of being abundant, and disconnecting yourself from anything external that you are currently dependent on, that’s when you’re free.

Hal Elrod: I love that. And what are some practices to do that in the book you talk about life’s medicines, and you’ve got yoga and meditation and breath work and the plant medicines? You cover kind of the whole gamut, but what are some practices for people?

Danny Morel: I legitimately say that, I say this humbly, but I really believe that the book is a great practice in and of itself because it’s going take all of this and make it applicable to your life and it’s going to make you start like, you’re going to have an experience. Like, some things are going to come up, but the– you know, man, I think I’m going to answer that question this way. I think that the only practice you need to worry about is the practice of unraveling any blockages around your heart. How that looks for different people? It’s going to look different for different people. But as long as that’s your commitment, then the how will show up. The practice for you will show up, because maybe it might be different for me than it is for you, and that’s okay.

Hal Elrod: Yeah. So, to wrap up, awaken– we’ve got the three-part framework that is central to your work.

Danny Morel: Awaken, heal, transform.

Hal Elrod: That’s awaken, heal, transform. What’s left to be said on that?

Danny Morel: Well, we talked about awakening, and the final step of awakening is to decide, right? Decide what you’re going to do. Are you going to take the red pill or the blue pill? That’s really the moment, by the way. And then you go in and you start to heal. And you start that journey by going deep into the parts of yourself that you discovered in the awakening or fragmented. And you go reparent your inner child, you go rebalance your masculine and feminine energy, and then finally, you transform. And that starts with integration.

Integrating everything that came up for you during the healing journey. It also goes into you creating life from this new perspective, not from the afraid version of you, not from the separate version of you, but from this new whole version of you. And I’d like to say that that’s, I think the most beautiful part about the journey is that most of the time, what we want isn’t what we actually want. It’s what the wounded little boy or girl inside of us wanted or was searching for when they didn’t get love. And if you are going out living life from that energy, you ain’t never going to find it because it ain’t out there. It’s in here.

Hal Elrod: I love it. That was one of my favorites. I was watching, I think it was you on Lewis Howe’s show. And I think you might share the story in the book too, but when you were asking God, when am I going to find the one? Where is the one, right? And the hand goes…

Danny Morel: Literally. My hand literally went like this.

Hal Elrod: And it comes back.

Danny Morel: It literally, Hal, was like this? And I’m like, crying my eyeballs out. That’s one I like.

Hal Elrod: Yeah, because you find the one when you realize that you don’t need the one because you are the one. And anyone that you would add into your life, a partner, a significant other is just to compliment your wholeness, your [inaudible 48:24] definity, right? Well, hold on, let me see. Drop the book over here. The book is available at AwakenBook.com.

Danny Morel: That’s right.

Hal Elrod: And anything else that you want to leave people with, Man? I highly recommend this book, y’all. Again, I’m having my daughter read it. It is Awaken Your Highest Self: The Limiting Beliefs That Keep You Stuck– And the Heart Work That Sets You Free. It is deep. It is a life manual. Like I said, I’m going through it again. It’s one that I think I’ll just keep studying, keep doing the work. It’s not the one where you…

Danny Morel: Thank you, Hal.

Hal Elrod: Yeah, you don’t just read it and go, ah, yeah, that was a good one. It’s like, oh, wow. This book is deep.

Danny Morel: Yeah, yeah, I appreciate it. No, I would just say pick up a copy. I think it’s going to take you, yeah, into the parts of your life that you’ve been trying to figure out, but haven’t had like that guide. This isn’t motivation. This isn’t rah, rah. This is deep. It’s going to cut and take you to the root, but that’s actually what you want because that’s how you change your life.

Hal Elrod: Indeed.

Danny Morel: Yeah.

Hal Elrod: All right, Danny. Love you, brother. Thanks for being on the show, man.

Danny Morel: Love you, too, man. Thanks for having me.

Hal Elrod: All right, till next time.

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