Spiritual Bypass, LLC: Betting Against the Healing Bubble

Disclaimer: Before we go any further, let me say this clearly:

There are a lot of people in the healing world doing deeply meaningful, beautiful work.

People with integrity, depth, and actual presence.

This piece isn’t aimed at them.

It’s not even aimed at anyone, really—it’s just a reflection from inside the mess, where it’s easy to start seeing performance everywhere, including in the mirror.

I know the lens I’m writing through isn’t the only one.

And it’s probably not the most helpful one to live inside for too long.

It’s a little bleak. A little sharp. Maybe even self-defeating—if you don’t know how to hold it lightly.

But sometimes, touching that edge feels necessary.

To shake out the illusions.

To see the shadows we’d rather bypass.

To remember what’s real.

So no, this isn’t the truth.

It’s just a truth. One of many.

And if nothing else, it’s an attempt to stay human while we all figure this out.

Picture this:

You’re walking through a shimmering wellness mall. The walls are lined with Himalayan salt bricks. Sage smoke curls from every corner. Each storefront is glowing with golden lettering: “Somatic Sovereignty,” “Quantum Womb Alchemy,” “Sacred Nervous System Codes.”

Behind the counters are smiling facilitators offering $3,333 packages to help you “unlock your authentic embodiment.”

Everything smells like palo santo and high-ticket insecurity.

It looks legit. (Does it though?) Everyone’s nodding solemnly, speaking in soft, breathy tones.

The system feels stable… (Sorta).

But underneath it, there’s a lot of junk bonds of unprocessed pain.

Each offering is bundled with vague language, borrowed traditions, and half-understood science. No one’s reading the fine print—and the ones who are, the ones asking where the medicine came from or if the teachers ever lived it, often miss the heart of it, tangled in their own projections and judgments. Everyone’s just refinancing their trauma into new identities.

Zoom out.

This isn’t just the wellness wing—it’s one section of a much larger complex.

A sprawling mall of meaning, where every human ache has been monetized.

Want belonging? Head to the “Community™” section.

Do you think you’re looking for purpose? Try “Life Path Coaching.”

Need rebellion? There’s a store for that, too—“Conscious Dissent,” sponsored by an energy drink startup.

There’s something for every identity, every wound, every fantasy.

Masculine mastery. Sacred feminine rebirth.

Crypto temples and trauma-informed DJ sets.

Colon-cleanse cacao ceremonies for the spiritually constipated.

It’s a perfect ecosystem—because the market doesn’t care what you’re looking for.

It just needs you to believe you haven’t found it yet.

So you keep shopping.

Each aisle whispers, “Almost there…”

Each facilitator, influencer, and brand archetype offers just enough resonance to hook your longing,

But never enough to satisfy it.

Because satisfaction isn’t good for business.

It’s brilliant, really.

A self-replicating loop.

We built it, stocked it, staffed it—then got locked inside.

Now we wander the aisles with nametags and shopping bags, forgetting we ever had another way to live.

And it’s not exactly our fault.

But it’s not not our fault either.

We inherited the architecture, sure—but we keep renewing the lease.

We keep trading reality for comfort, depth for branding, breath for a curated version of it.

After all, our survival instincts are doing their job beautifully.

And so, the fight for survival continues—

Only now, the threats are increasingly playing out on a psychological level.

Half the time, we don’t even know what we are in a fight against—

Ghosts from our collective past, mostly.

We struggle to recognize our symptoms for what they are,

because modern life sells itself as free from disease,

as if we’ve outgrown the hardships our ancestors faced.

And yet, here we are—

running up against something we can’t quite name.

We didn’t mean to build a prison.

Just wanted to feel better.

To believe in something.

But the system we stitched together from our fears and projections

has become a gilded cage of our own unconscious design.

And from inside it, it’s almost impossible to imagine anything else.

That’s always the rub, right?

You need to leave one world for another, but you’ve only ever lived here.

You’ve only ever known these walls, these signs, this language of longing wrapped in itself.

So the future—whatever it is—gets mocked before it’s born.

Dismissed by the part of us that can’t yet see it,

can’t yet trust it,

because it doesn’t fit the known catalog of what’s “real.”

It feels naïve.

Embarrassing, even.

To believe in a world that hasn’t been branded yet.

But that’s what makes leaving so hard.

Not the door.

The doubt.

And somewhere in the back—near a cracked salt lamp and a broken sound bowl—there’s a dusty little kiosk with no sign. A few quiet people are sitting there. They’re not glowing. They’re not selling. They’re not even “holding space.”

They’re sweating. Crying. Breathing into shame. Naming the stuff no one wants to touch.

They saw the bubble.

They read the contracts.

They realized the emperor’s breathwork certification has no clothes.

That’s the short. No glamor. No algorithm.

Just truth, grief, and the kind of slow, steady integrity that grows mostly from despair.

Not a vibe—just reality.

Because when the strip mall collapses under the weight of the burden that built it,

Those people won’t be crushed.

They’ll already be outside.

Sitting on the ground—

With their breath, the earth, and each other.

Meanwhile, I’m the lunatic narrating all this like I’m not standing in the same costume aisle.

As if I haven’t also tried to spiritualize my neurosis, rebrand my pain—

In the same mall I’ve spent years critiquing while still shopping for meaning.

And that’s the moment you realize:

checkmate.

The jig is up.

Only it’s not.

Because there’s no exit from this contradicting charcuterie conundrum.

Only breathing through it.

Together.

On the ground.

It’s The Big Short, but instead of mortgage bonds, it’s spiritual bypass bundled in buzzwords.

Everyone’s selling peace.

Everyone’s selling presence.

Everyone’s selling sovereignty.

Peace. Presence. Sovereignty. All conveniently available—subscription optional.

People say “The Body Keeps the Score,” then build a brand on top of their scorecard.

They throw around words like “integration” and “somatic” as if they were seasoning,

sprinkled just enough to sound trauma-informed without ever digesting any of it.

Most of us are just narrating our nervous system as if it were a TED Talk.

I’m not “embodied” because I say it.

I’m embodied when I remember to feel my legs while folding laundry after a 9-hour shift—listening to a man scream bloody murder.

I’m not regulated because I have a morning practice.

I’m regulated when I don’t dissociate while driving to a job that barely covers my rent.

That’s the short position.

Not the anti-healer grift.

Not the sarcastic takedown artist who calls out everyone else’s performance while quietly crafting their own.

Not the guy pretending he’s above it all, sipping mushroom tea while scrolling through reels of people “doing it wrong.”

No. The real short is quieter than that.

It’s humbler.

It doesn’t need a brand or an audience.

It’s just the choice to stay human in the middle of all this madness.

To keep breathing even when the system makes you forget how.

And yeah—sometimes I write like I see through it all.

But the truth is, I’m caught too.

Caught between not wanting to perform and still wanting to be seen.

Caught between hating the circus and hoping someone in the audience claps anyway.

Caught between what’s real and what still feels necessary to survive.

So this blog isn’t a takedown. It’s a confession.

It’s what happens when you care too much to play the game,

but still show up every day with your face painted, holding a breath you barely have time to feel.

And maybe that’s where healing actually lives now.

Not in the ceremony. Not in the critique.

But in the space between pretending and giving up.

In the decision to stay present—not because it looks good, but because it’s the only thing that doesn’t lie to you.

So yeah. I guess I’m holding the short.

Not because it pays—

but because at this point, it’s the only thing that feels honest.

Not a stance.

Not a performance.

Just a quiet refusal to pretend.

Breathing.

On the ground.

Still here.

For now.