How To Build Your Life After Tragedy - Michael Smoak (HigherUp Wellness)

Michael Smoak / @higherupwellness is a coach, creator, podcaster and online voice known for helping people turn pain into purpose through faith, fitness, discipline and brutally honest conversations about grief, masculinity and healing. In this episode of Origin Story, Michael sits down with David McIntosh Jr in Long Beach, California for a deeply honest and surprisingly life-affirming conversation about grief, faith, heartbreak, masculinity, death, purpose, family, emotional expression, and what it really means to become a man. From caring for his dying father, to processing young parental grief, to rebuilding his life through faith and service, Michael explains how the worst thing that ever happened to him became the foundation for his work, his message and his relationship with God. David and Michael also explore the “Dead Parents Under 30 Club”, why men struggle to talk about heartbreak, the danger of suppressing emotion, the difference between real strength and performative toughness, and why “you only live once” might be the wrong way to look at life. This is a raw, emotional and powerful conversation about grief, God, love, letting go, and learning how to turn pain into purpose before it breaks you. Follow David McIntosh Jr: Instagram: @davidmcintoshjr Follow Michael Smoake: Instagram/TikTok: @higherupwellness Sponsored by Neutonic — the nootropic drink designed for focus, energy and getting stuff done. Use code DAVID at checkout.

David McIntosh JrhostMichael Smoakguest

May 27, 202652mWatch on YouTube ↗

CHAPTERS

0:00 – 1:30
Reunion in person & defining “turning pain into purpose”
David welcomes Michael back for an in-person conversation and asks for a defining moment where Michael transformed pain into purposeful work. Michael frames “alchemizing” as making the unconscious conscious, choosing meaning over bitterness.
- •In-person return and how life has changed since the last episode
- •Concept of alchemy as conscious choice in response to suffering
- •Jung quote on the unconscious guiding life as “fate”
- •Biblical framing: trials as a path to wholeness (James 1:2–4)
1:30 – 3:47
Processing grief after his father’s death: non-negotiables and growth
Michael identifies his father’s death as the clearest example of pain becoming purpose. He describes the prolonged stress of caregiving, the relief that can accompany the end of suffering, and how maintaining daily commitments revealed new capacity.
- •The drawn-out strain of watching a loved one decline
- •The taboo truth that death can feel like relief from suffering
- •Staying committed to training, coaching, and work during grief
- •Lesson: if he can function in deep pain, what’s possible in a peak state
- •Using his experience to teach others to process grief
3:47 – 6:10
Dead Parents Under 30: mortality, presence, and living with minimal regret
David asks what young parental grief uniquely teaches. Michael explains the “in-between” stage—adult but not yet fully established—then shares how end-of-life conversations clarified what matters: presence with loved ones, not productivity.
- •The unique limbo of losing a parent before building your own family
- •End-of-life clarity: regrets are about presence, not achievement
- •Commitment to “empty the tank” and live fully
- •Nomad travel as an expression of choosing life now
- •Not taking time or relationships for granted
6:10 – 11:23
Rocking-chair cinema & redefining risk through mortality awareness
David introduces the “rocking chair cinema” decision lens—choosing actions your older self will cherish remembering. Michael expands into how witnessing decline makes him prioritize experiences and view most “risk” as psychological rather than real.
- •“Rocking chair cinema”: decisions guided by future memories
- •Reframing YOLO to “you only die once; you live every day”
- •Watching autonomy fade intensifies urgency to build meaningful memories
- •Most risk isn’t physical—it's a mind-made narrative
- •Stoic reminder (Marcus Aurelius): mortality should shape speech and action
11:23 – 14:03
Caregiving, pride, and being placed there for a reason
Asked what caregiving taught him about service, Michael describes the humbling reversal of roles—tying his father’s shoes, bathing and feeding him—and his father’s lesson that “there’s no room for pride.” He also reflects on how a breakup kept him home, which he sees as providential timing.
- •The power shift and emotional strangeness of caring for a hero
- •“There’s no room for pride” as illness progresses
- •Gratitude that family—not strangers—could serve his father
- •Breakup as the event that kept him present for the final months
- •Interpreting timing as intentional rather than coincidence
14:03 – 17:10
Elective vs. unelective strength: the quiet nature of real courage
David contrasts chosen self-discipline with the forced strength forged by life’s hardest events. The discussion highlights how real strength is often invisible and unperformable online, and how hardship can require an old identity to die.
- •Elective strength: cold plunges, endurance, routines, challenges
- •Unelective strength: no-choice adversity that forges character
- •Lived experience builds a deeper bond than frameworks alone
- •Some acts of care and suffering can’t be “content”
- •Real strength is quiet—“strength shushes”
17:10 – 20:59
Letting the “boy” die: idolatry, dependence, and sanctification through suffering
Michael explains how his father’s death forced parts of him—helplessness, dependence, codependency—to die. He connects this to Christian ideas of idolatry and sanctification, sharing a metaphor of refinement: suffering as fire that reveals God’s image in us.
- •Loss cutting away boyishness and outsourced strength
- •Idolatry as over-attaching worth to finite things and people
- •Christianity framed as relationship and transformation, not mere ritual
- •Sanctification: becoming more like Christ through trials
- •Silversmith metaphor: refined when the maker can see his image
20:59 – 23:33
Belonging in a secular age: status, success, and the “God-shaped hole”
David notes that in secular culture, “heaven” is often replaced with fame and fortune, at the expense of community and moral anchoring. Michael argues achievement doesn’t heal identity wounds and reframes success as a “nice to have,” not a source of belonging.
- •Secular replacement of faith with follower counts and status
- •Loss of community, accountability, and belonging without spiritual roots
- •Success doesn’t fix deep identity-based issues
- •Wanting the feeling you think the thing will give you (not the thing)
- •Basic needs: being seen, heard, understood, and significant
23:33 – 26:15
Practical entry point: relationship over religion (Bible, prayer, and honesty)
Asked how non-religious listeners can find belonging, Michael clarifies it’s about relationship, not religion. He gives concrete steps—read an accessible Bible translation, start with the Gospels, and pray candidly for God to reveal Himself.
- •Distinguishing church attendance from relationship-building
- •Suggested starting point: NIV Bible for readability
- •Read the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) first
- •Simple but direct prayer: ask God to reveal Himself
- •“Wring out your heart” and speak honestly, not formally
26:15 – 30:00
Anger, free will, and surrender: radical acceptance as relief
David challenges the tension: suffering can push people away from God. Michael admits he wrestled with “why me,” then explains free will and shares a hard reframing—what if this was God’s will—before landing on surrender as the path to peace.
- •Natural spiritual conflict during prolonged decline
- •Free will as a core Christian answer to suffering in the world
- •Painful reframe: “What if God’s will is your dad dying?”
- •Peter Crone’s “hot pan” metaphor: suffering is resistance to reality
- •Surrendering control brought a felt, “supernatural” peace
30:00 – 35:52
Heartbreak advice for type-A men: feel fully, don’t suppress
David pivots from parental grief to romantic heartbreak and asks for advice tailored to emotionally guarded, high-agency men. Michael argues breakups and death share grief circuitry and insists that men must fully feel emotions to process them quickly and clearly.
- •Cultural masculinity often equals emotional suppression
- •Breakups trigger grief similarly to death (but with lingering access/hope)
- •Core principle: “What you don’t feel, you cannot heal”
- •Suppression → depression; expression is the release valve
- •Practical permission: cry, grieve, and “empty the bucket” to regain clarity
35:52 – 40:21
The shrinking grief ball & diversifying emotional “homes”
David shares an analogy: grief is a bouncing ball hitting a pain button less often over time as it shrinks through repeated contact. He adds that many men centralize vulnerability in one romantic partner, making heartbreak devastating, and advocates diversifying emotional outlets.
- •Pain-button analogy: touching pain is how the grief shrinks
- •Approaching grief intentionally rather than avoiding triggers
- •Men often offload emotional expression into one relationship
- •Diversify connection: friends, hobbies, purpose, family, community
- •Reducing over-dependence protects against identity collapse after loss
40:21 – 52:03
Reframing “loss,” choosing memories, and writing the eulogy with presence
Michael challenges the language of “I lost my parent,” emphasizing abundance: the relationship was worth the sorrow. David shares Vonnegut’s “So it goes” passage and explains choosing nourishing memories; they close by reflecting on eulogies and what it means to be remembered for presence and service.
- •Language shapes grief narratives: scarcity (“lost”) vs. abundance (shared life)
- •Vonnegut’s time perspective: moments remain permanent in memory
- •Choosing which moments to revisit (playing catch vs. the coroner)
- •Eulogies as a mortality framework: what people celebrate at the end
- •Michael’s eulogy values: presence, making others feel seen, and serving others