Becoming the Person Who Can Create Such a Thing: Mike North, PhD CEO & Co-Founder on Shiftwave, Grief, and the Body’s Intelligence
Theresa Hubbard, LMFT
Becoming the Person Who Can Create Such a Thing: Mike North, PhD on Shiftwave, Grief, and the Body’s Intelligence
What does it ask of a person to create something that may help others return to themselves?
In this deeply human conversation, Theresa Hubbard sits down with Mike North, PhD, CEO & Co-founder of Shiftwave, to explore curiosity, grief, invention, friendship, trust, the body, and the responsibility of creating something that touches people’s nervous systems.
Mike shares about the child he once was — curious, free, and building forts in the woods — and the adult life that shaped him through intensity, overdrive, body signals, loss, and unexpected collaboration. He speaks about Dan, the soul brother whose death changed the arc of his life, and Alan Macy, whose goodness and scientific brilliance helped open the doorway to what would become Shiftwave.
At the heart of this conversation is a powerful insight:
“The thing of creating, and becoming the person that can create such a thing.”
Real creation is not just output. It is transformation. The thing being created asks something of the creator. And if the creator says yes, they do not remain the same person.
Together, Theresa and Mike explore Shiftwave not simply as a technology, but as part of a much larger question:
What helps the body remember what safety, regulation and capacity feel like?
This episode is about more than nervous-system technology. It is about the human journey behind creation — and what becomes possible when grief, science, integrity, play, friendship, and care converge in service of helping people come back to themselves.
WHAT YOU’LL HEAR IN THIS EPISODE
• Mike’s early curiosity, creativity, and the freedom ofbuilding as a child
• How overdrive, intensity, and body signals shaped hisadult life
• The role of friendship, grief, and Dan’s death in changing thedirection of Mike’s work
• How Alan Macy’s brilliance and goodness became partof Shiftwave’s origin story
• Why meaningful creation asks something of theperson creating it
• How Shiftwave emerged from science, experimentation, care, and nervous system inquiry
• Why the body’s intelligence matters in healing,recovery, and regulation
• What it means to create something that may helppeople return to themselves
• The responsibility of building technology thatinteracts with the nervous system
• How grief, play, curiosity, and integritycan become part of service
ABOUT MIKE NORTH
Mike North, PhD, is the CEO & Co-Founder of Shiftwave - engineer, scientist, researcher, artist. His work brings togetherscience, technology, nervous system regulation, human performance, recovery, and a deep curiosity about what helps the body return to greater capacity, safety, and resilience.
In this conversation, Mike shares not only the story of Shiftwave, but the personal journey, relationships, losses, and collaborations that helped shape the person capable of creating it. www.shiftwave.co
ABOUT THERESA HUBBARD
Theresa Hubbard, LMFT, is a Licensed Marriage and FamilyTherapist and founder of Kansas City Neuroplasticity Institute in Liberty, Missouri. She is the host of the My Inner Knowing podcast, where she explores self-trust, nervous system regulation, relationships, trauma healing, embodiment, and the process of learning to listen inwardly with more honestyand compassion.
Learn more:
www.theresahubbard.com
www.kcnpi.comwww.shiftwave.co/kcnpi
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