Episode 146 – Unstoppable Dyslexic, Author, and Reiki Master with Marnie Vincolisi

Yes, all three in the title are correct and there is even more. Marnie Vincolisi was born in Chicago in the 1950s. She and her older brother were raised by her mother and her grandmother as her father left the family and was not heard from for forty years. Marnie did not attend college in part due to the challenges of having dyslexia, although she did not realize her specific circumstances until later.

Marnie by any definition is an entrepreneur. She did work for a bit as a hairdresser in the main store of Marshal Fields in Chicago. However, she grew tired of that and so created her own toy-manufacturing business. She will tell you about the business and how eventually she realized that such also was not to be her life path. Near the end of her time building toys she had the opportunity to reconnect with her father whom she never knew growing up.

For the past thirty years, Marnie has been teaching Reiki as well as helping others develop and grow through her Reiki skills as well as through the use of other tools she has learned. Today her company, Light Internal, helps people around the world. She will tell us about that.

I trust you will appreciate Marnie’s thoughts and wisdom. By any standard, this incredible person is quite unstoppable. I hope her attitude and thoughts will help each of us be more unstoppable as well.

About the Guest:

Marnie Vincolisi, Founder and CEO of Light Internal, has been an entrepreneur for her adult life, constantly changing and creating businesses that bring her joy and align with her spiritual focus. For the last three decades, she has devoted her time to developing a unique way of transforming people’s lives through past life regression, energy clearing, classes, meditations, and the authoring of books.

In her material, the focus is on appeasing the intellectual left brain with detailed information, then allowing the intuitive right brain to feel the spiritual shift. Marnie helps you access your inherent intuition with guided practices, sometimes using pendulums, quartz crystal healing, or Reiki meditations but always using simple instructions to make learning Reiki and spirituality a fun experience. Anyone can make lasting positive changes with Marnie’s spiritual healing and products.
Her joy reflects in her private practice – online classes, blogs, and lectures. She continues to explore new avenues of enlightenment to keep her energy clear while sharing her discoveries with others.
She is an enthusiastic and well-informed speaker traveling internationally, conducting tours, seminars, and energy treatments. Marnie draws upon her business experience, extensive knowledge in holistic health, and refined innate healing abilities to guide others to clearly understand how to balance their mental, physical, and spiritual presence. Marnie does not teach anyone anything they don’t already know; she merely awakens the inherent knowledge within them.
Marnie’s initial Reiki training occurred in Frankfort, Germany, after which she returned to the States and developed the Light Internal System of Reiki.

Ways to connect with Marnie:

Marnie’s three books:
Finding Your Inner Gifts, Inner Gifts Uncovered and Claiming Your Inner Gifts.
Youtube: Marnie Vincolisi
Instagram: @marnievin
Tiktok: @lightinternal
LinkedIn: Marnie Vincolisi

Websites: https://lightinternal.com/
Book page https://bit.ly/3vV30UH
Book Amazon: https://amzn.to/3M99Mvq
B&N https://bit.ly/3FqknzE

About the Host:
Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.

Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children’s Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association’s 2012 Hero Dog Awards.

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https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson
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Transcription Notes

Michael Hingson ** 00:00
Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I’m Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that’s a c c e s s i  capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we’re happy to meet you and to have you here with us.
 
Michael Hingson ** 01:20
Hi, once again, this is Michael Hingson. Your host for unstoppable mindset. Today, we get to chat with Marnie Vincolisi, and I’m glad I asked her in advance because there’s an I at the end and my screen reader says Vincolisi, but it’s not it’s Vincolisi. Good, good name all the way around. Marnie has an interesting story to tell in a lot of ways. She’s written a number of books, she happens to be a person with dyslexia, dyslexia, she has formed her own company. And we’re going to get into all of that. And the best way is for money to tell her own story. So Marnie, welcome to unstoppable mindset.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 02:05
Thank you. I’m glad to be here and glad to share my story with your audience.
 
Michael Hingson ** 02:11
Well, and I hope my audience and I’m sure my audience is glad to hear your story that you’re going to share. Why don’t we start by you talking a little bit about kind of you as a young morning where you came from, and growing up in some of those things. It’s always fun to start at the beginning.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 02:26
Okay, well, let’s start at the beginning. I grew up in Chicago, my mother and father divorced before I was even born. So they’re, and things happen in the family that put them very far apart. And so I never met my dad never had him in my life, lived about 40 years. That way, I grew up in the 1950s in Chicago, raised by my mother and my grandmother, who were, you know, to single women alone in the 50s, which was not common. They lived in fear. They felt that, you know, things weren’t going their way, or they struggled with money, and they felt control was a really good way to raise children. And that didn’t work so well for me. But I, you know, I did it, I got through it. And so I’ve written, I’ve written five books I’ve talked about that. I will talk about that. I am dyslexic in the 50s. They didn’t know what dyslexia was, didn’t talk about it didn’t understand it. I remember dancing with my little black ballet shoes on and there was a red star on one side and a blue star on the other so that I would remember which foot I was supposed to use. So my dyslexia was right there when I was like three years old, going around and dancing, but no one ever connected that with reading at school, so I did pretty well in grammar school. But when I went to high school, we switched from Chicago to Skokie, Illinois, and our high school had a very high Jewish population. And those kids studied hard and it was, you know, going from city school to suburban school. It was so hard for me. I just couldn’t get what they were saying and and how to write down the concepts. So after about two years in high school, I realized I can’t even get through high school. How am I gonna get through college? So I dropped the idea of going to college and getting any other education and went into hairdressing. And I enjoyed it. I really had fun with it. moved from Chicago to Denver, and in Denver, I changed my vocation and I started a toy company, and it was called The Pee Wee TP company and I made a little play tents for children and Then I made costumes, and I travel around the country and I’d sell things at fairs. This is before the internet, this was before cell phones. So all the research I had to find on my products I had to do in the library and something called the Thomas directory. The Thomas directory had information about, you know, companies and where to buy, you know, different types of things, because I was putting all these things together. So this is a pretty successful cottage industry. I’m decided one day, well, things are happening. Okay, so my books that I write are on metaphysics or personal empowerment, and intuition. And, you know, intuition comes in many different ways. And I was running a toy company that was running pretty well. But I kept getting a message that needed to be doing something different. But I didn’t know what that was. And I certainly didn’t want to leave something that was bringing me income. So I, my van was actually my intuition. Your intuition comes through different ways. Some people hear it, some people see pictures. But this was my van telling me do something different. It never broke down the 15 years, I was in business until that last year, and it would break down on the road. And but I’d be right in front of a gas station. So it always protected me. But the last time it broke down, I was going, I was in Kansas, heading to Chicago to do some a big Christmas show, and then over to Texas. And I pulled into a gas station because the wheels were making this grinding noise. It was sort of strange. And I pulled in and the guy put my, my van up on a hoist, unhook my trailer, put it up on the hoist and the wheel fell off. He just fell right off. And he said, Lady, there was an angel on this wheel. I said, I know I put her there. So the bearing was fried. I said check the other bearing. He says, Oh, they don’t both go out at the same time. I said, Well appease me, he did. And sure enough, he said you wouldn’t have made it 30 miles on that bearing. So at that point, you know, he didn’t have the parts, you have to order them and it was going to take three days, I realized, I am not going to get to Chicago, I’m not going to be able to do that big Christmas show. And maybe perhaps I need to listen to what’s going on here. So this full story is in my first book that I wrote called Finding Your inner gift. But I won’t bore you with all those details. I’ll just let you know that. I stepped into what was a small hotel motel. And I sat down on the bed and I said, That’s it, I quit. I talked to the universe. I said, I’m not going to do this anymore. I quit this business right now this moment. So the Vanguard fixed, I drove back home, I cancelled all my shows. From September to December, I sell toys. This was a big deal. And I just went into that place of trust, just trusting the universe that something’s going to come my way. And what what came my way after about nine months, which I thought was an interesting gestation period was Reiki, someone mentioned that I should learn Reiki Reiki is a hands on healing modality. And so you might wonder, why am I jumping from hairdressing to Toy making to, you know, Reiki, because because I was dyslexic, I didn’t think I was smart enough to, you know, work for a company, I didn’t think I was a value. It took me decades to realize that I really am smarter than I think. And just because I don’t spell right. And I don’t comprehend when I read, I’m valuable, and I can bring that value to other people. So that’s how I started my metaphysical business. Well, along this way, somewhere along the line, I just I found that I could find my dad, I never seen him, never met him. And in my last book, it’s called they did the best they could discovering your path to compassion. In that book, I talked about how I found my Dad, how I learned all the stories about my family from the late 1800s in Italy, you know through now, just so many synchronicities and and stories and realizing how I was lied to all of my life. And you know, all those unrealistic expectations that I had, yet I was able to find compassion for the people that unknowingly hurt me. So that’s basically me in a nutshell.
 
Michael Hingson ** 09:58
What a story Yeah. That’s okay, though. Well, several things. So were in Chicago. Did you grow up? On the
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 10:07
north side? Okay. And after I got married, I live closer to the lake. But yeah, north north side, Chicago. And you lived in Chicago, but you were the south side, correct?
 
Michael Hingson ** 10:19
Yeah, I was born on the south side and live there only for five years. And then we relocated to California. Although I’ve enjoyed it every time I get a chance to go back, as we were talking earlier. We both Miss Franco minutes from Marshall Fields when i Miss Marshall Fields for that matter, but oh, yeah, Marshall Fields and Franco mints. But along the way, several years ago, while traveling through O’Hare Airport, I discovered Garrett’s popcorn. So that’s always a treat when I go to Chicago now, and I actually stayed downtown for a meeting, and got to go to one of the Garretts facilities downtown. And found it was just the same as it was at the airport. Very good.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 11:04
All right, yeah. Well, my treat when I go to Chicago is going to the art museum. I just love it. I run up the stairs and go see the Renoise and I have my special places. Monet, Georgia O’Keeffe are some of my favorites. But you mentioned Marshall Fields. And that’s actually where I was a hairdresser. So I was a hairdresser at Marshall Fields.
 
Michael Hingson ** 11:30
I like the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, although it’s been a long time since I’ve been there. And I’d like to go back. But usually when I go to speak, I’m never there long enough to be able to go see the museum. So I’ve got to work that out somehow.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 11:43
All right. Yeah. That’s, there’s so much information in Chicago. It’s just a wonderful place to be and I love the lake.
 
Michael Hingson ** 11:49
I’d love to like, well, so you grew up being a person with dyslexia, dyslexia being dyslexic? When did you realize what was really going on?
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 12:02
That’s a good question. I. But it must have been somewhere in my pocket when I started writing. And once I started teaching and writing, which was in my 30s, I realized that I had to really organize my thoughts in order to get that information out to other people. And so I would, I would bullet point things, I would, you know, write write the paragraph, but then underneath that bullet point, or number it so that it was very explainable and the things that people tell me about my books, my first three books are on personal empowerment. And people have told me gee, if I wrote a book about, you know, Reiki and hands on healing and intuition, I would write a book like this. And, and they often say, it’s so easy to understand. And so I had to make it easy to understand for myself, which helped other people.
 
Michael Hingson ** 13:04
Well, you and I gather that you’ve been pretty successful at doing that.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 13:09
Yes. And, you know, I’ve got, you know, of course, people that would go over, you know, my copy and, you know, we talk about what’s not clear or how I put in angles instead of angels, you know, different words, you know, letters that I would switch, but one thing that’s helped me a lot is Grammarly, and I don’t know if your listeners are aware if they write that much but Grammarly, I think, think you can get you can get a free version. And it’ll go through everything that you write, whether it’s on the computer, on your on your phone, on your tablet, it will you can download it so that it’s checking your spelling and your words all the time. And that really really saves me a lot. So I’m really happy with Grammarly that’s helped me I think I’ve
 
Michael Hingson ** 14:00
tried Grammarly, but it’s been a while and I found it to be a little bit inaccessible. And maybe it’s improved. But for me using a screen reader, there were some challenges with it. But yeah, I think that’s in the past. And maybe they’ve improved it because they certainly could.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 14:16
Yeah, yeah. And another thing I found that helped my dyslexia is when I was writing my memoir, when I was writing, they did the best they could. I took a class and an online class. It’s great courses, it’s called, and it was on how to write nonfiction. And I went through that whole course and I of course, took notes. And I followed what they said and it really helped me put everything together in a way that it would be interesting for people because, you know, one thing they talked about was, you know, if you write and you just list things. It doesn’t give the reader you know the picture and I’m sure you would understand this, when you’re reading, you want to see the picture you want to see, you know, what did it smell like? What did it feel like? What was the temperature outside? What were they wearing, you know, what were they looking at, you know, through their eyes. And I was able to really capture that. And they did the best they could. And many people have told me that as they read that book, they find that my stories are similar to theirs, you know, we all go through struggles as children. And, and so it shows I went through the same things, the characters may be different, the location could be different. But the hurt in our heart could be the same, you know, feeling unloved, or not honored. It all, it’s all similar. And so in my book, the second half of the book shows how you can deal with those issues, and not hold a grudge, find compassion for those that and, and people don’t hurt us willingly, it usually is unknowingly. And so,
 
Michael Hingson ** 16:03
and ultimately, no matter how much even if it’s intentional, they may hurt us in so many different ways. The reality is, we really hurt if we allow ourselves to be hurt. I mean, that is we’re dealing with a mental situation, we have control over how we deal with that kind of pain. Oh, absolutely. And we have the ability if we choose to exercise it to not let that kind of hurt, injure us or affect us to the point where we’ve turned negative and, and as a result become very bitter, which doesn’t mean that we don’t recognize that there was a hurt, but we do have control over how we deal with it. And I’ve used the example of the World Trade Center many times being in it when it was attacked by terrorists. We didn’t have control over the World Trade Center being attacked. But we do have control over how we deal with it. And I think that’s true. And in all cases, it’s really up to us as to how we want to deal with situations we face.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 17:12
Exactly, exactly. And I, you know, I do counseling. And as a Reiki Master, I’m able to move energy as well as counsel people and in their counseling. I do talk about, you know, how we can look at that person that unknowingly hurt us? And what happened to them? What put them in this situation, you know, people have, you know, these kinds of things at work, where they’ve got co workers or a boss that just really gives them a hard time. And so this is about how can we look at what’s the struggles that they’re going through so we can better understand their situation? And perhaps why they treat us the way they do. And once you understand that better, you can let go of that hurt and that pain and like you say, have have you have a different way of looking at it rather than saying, Oh, they did that to me. And it’s not fair. And it’s like, yeah, we move beyond that.
 
Michael Hingson ** 18:10
Yeah. And the other part about it is, Was it intentional or not, if it’s intentional, in a sense, that will only determine differently, perhaps how you deal with it.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 18:22
Right. And if it was intentional, I would say they even hurt even more than you do. Because someone that acts out and is mean to another person, there’s something that’s really hurting them inside, and you can find what’s hurting them, you can find compassion, you don’t have to forgive them for what they did. But you can find compassion for why they acted that way.
 
Michael Hingson ** 18:45
Well, but even forgiveness is a very important thing to do. Because even if they hurt you, and it was very deliberate, you can forgive them, which doesn’t mean that you’re going to put yourself in a position to allow them to hurt you some more, as my wife used to always say, Don’t put your sails in their wind. But it doesn’t mean that you can’t forgive them and recognize and move beyond it.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 19:09
Right. Right. I totally agree. And that’s the kind of things that I talk about in my book is is how to get through and just sort of float through through life. You know, they did the best they could. I was going to call that walking in grace. But I realized the title really didn’t tell you a whole lot about what’s inside the book. But you know, walking in Greece, that kind of thing of Yes, things happen. And I can be graceful about how I deal with it and be kind to people. And that’s what I look at. Yeah,
 
Michael Hingson ** 19:44
tell us about you. You finding your father You said that you after for two years finally did that. Can you talk about that a little
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 19:51
um, I can. Let’s see because I was doing art shows. I happen to be Are you traveling to Chicago for an art show? And two weeks before I was leaving, my, my mother called me out. And she moved from Chicago out here to Denver after she had retired. And she told me that a friend of hers in Chicago, someone that was actually in their wedding party said, they’re saying some prayers for a Tony, even police at our parish, do you think it’s the same person. And my mom, you know, didn’t know for sure, but maybe thought that it was. And so she called me up. And she said, Well, they’re saying prayers for your father at the parish, not that he was ever a father to you. And those words, just like, hit me in the heart. And when I shared with her months later that she said that she Oh, that’s a terrible thing to say, I would never say that. So it’s interesting how we respond to a shock. Here, my mom didn’t have any contact with him. As they say, they got divorced, the families were in kind to each other. And there was a confrontation, and my dad left the city and stopped paying child support after about a year. So that was really a hardship on my mom in the 50s, trying to, you know, raise two children. And what also happened to her is, she got divorced, and she moved in with her mother and father. And the month after the divorce was final, her father died. So now she’s got my brother, who was about a year older than me, myself brand new baby, and has to take care of two children and her mother. Because my grandmother didn’t work since she was instance, she got married. I mean, that’s how things were back in the, in the in the 20s, and 30s. And Grandma did have one job, when she was 19, she worked for the Western Union. And her job was to deliver the messages that came in. So they would come in on a telegraph. And they’d have to be quickly brought over to another room where they would be typed in and sent out. And they were rollerskates. So at 19, grandma took the messages and roller skated from one part of the building to another. So I figured well, in the late 40s, you know, her skill of roller skating was not going to really give her a very good job. So hence why she didn’t go out and get a job. So my mom, you know, here she is, you know, having to support, you know, two children herself, and her mother was really tough. And that’s how she lived the rest of her life. But anyway,
 
Michael Hingson ** 22:35
I can see her so roller derby wasn’t in her future, you’re saying
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 22:39
she wasn’t going to be a roller derby queen. So I can sort of understand why my mother was angry at my dad, and you know, but that that really hurt me. So her saying that you know not to do this ever father to you, I didn’t feel open to say, and Mom, give me the name of that friend of yours. So I can go find him. You know, that door was not open. And, and so in my book, I talk about how I go into my mom’s condo, I have my children take her out to lunch. And I go inside and I’m rifling through her index cards to try to find this woman may see and find her number. Yeah. And, and I did find it. I did call her up. So when we get we went to Chicago and brought the kids with us, but this confrontation of meeting my father, I didn’t know what would happen. So in the book, there’s a beautiful story of how I go to Macy’s house. And we look in the telephone book for his name. And, and it was there, which shocked me because my mother had an unlisted number. My father had an unlisted number, neither one of them wanted to find each other, you know, he would have been thrown in jail for not paying child support. And you know, so all that. So I thought, well, this, this can’t be this can’t be him. But I look at the address. And the address is around the corner, from Macy’s house, this woman’s house, who is in their wedding party, he lived around the corner from them, which I talked about synchronicities in this book, this one was way too bizarre. My mom would visit Macy, they would go out for walks on hot summer nights in Chicago, easily have walked by his house. Never saw him, right. So I’m thinking probably not him. But let’s you know, Macy said, Well, here’s his phone number. Why don’t you call him up? I said, What would I say? I said, No, I’m not calling him up. I’m walking over there. So my husband Macy and I walk over to his house and I knock on his door. And the it was hot summer day was the third of July, the wood door was open. The screen door was closed. An old four year old man walks to the door and white hair did They look really healthy. And I asked him, I said, Are you Tony vocalise? He says, Yes, I am. I said, Well, I said, Were you married to Lorraine? He said, Yes. I said, I’m your daughter, Marlene. And at that time, originally, my name was Marlene. And he looks at me and he said, I had a son named Jimmy. And with that, it just, it just shocked me. I was like, story of my life. You know, everybody, I felt my brother was more honored than I was in the family. Here I am Jimmy, Jimmy, Jimmy, once again, he doesn’t remember me. But he remembers my brother. And I just sort of took a little step back. And my husband placed his hands on my shoulders just on my back. And he just gave me a little nudge. And I could hear him his thoughts in my head, saying, Go ahead. You can do this is okay. And so I again spoke, and I said, Well, I’m his sister. I’m Marlene. And you said, I had a baby girl. I only held her once in my arms. I said, open the door, you can hold her again. Dead silence. He’s staring out into space. Nothing’s happening. No one knows what’s going on. And Macy finally says, Tony, Tony opened the door. This is your daughter open the door, you know. And with that, it takes him out of that shock. And he opens the door. And he falls into my arms and he just sobs and he says Marlene Marlene, I never thought I’d see you again. This is a miracle. This is a miracle. God sent you to me. And that’s how the story began or continued. Just a little blip of 40 years. Just a little blip, just just a little blip.
 
Michael Hingson ** 26:54
So you were able to reconnect. Well, how did your mother react to all of that?
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 26:59
Well, I that that that was another story. Yeah, I mean, I’ll tell you this, he had lung cancer. And if you know anyone that has lung cancer, he was not you know, the doctor told him the beginning of the year, he wasn’t going to be around long. And this was July. But he says to me, you know, we were sitting on the sofa and and he says, I’ve got to take you to my sister’s, one of the sisters had just passed on two weeks before that. And he says, I gotta take your two sisters. Well, all I had heard from my mom is how, how mean his sisters were to her. And I thought, oh my gosh, you know, here I am. You know, I’ve gotten through this part of actually meeting him and saying hello, and finding out that, you know, he does love me. But now I’ve got to be taken to the sister uglies, you know, so I’m like, Oh, my gosh. And then scarier than that was he said, Well, I’ll drive us there. And so here’s this man who can hardly walk, and he’s going to be our chauffeur. But it was okay. We got there and met the sisters. And they were just so so glad to see me. It was it was just beautiful. So yes, I come back home. And you know, I’ve got to tell my mom, I, you know, I didn’t even tell my brother I was going. And so I I call up my brother and tell him what happened. He says, You got to tell mom, I said, I’m not telling mom. He says you got to tell mom. I said, Nope. I’m not telling mom. I hang up the phone. And I paced back and forth for about a half an hour. And I was like, he’s right. I gotta go tell my mom. So yes, I did go tell her. She was definitely not too happy with me. But you know, it’s family. And over the weeks and the months, she softened, she got better. And I was actually able to have her reconcile with these sisters that she didn’t like, you know, my dad passed on and three months later, and I would travel to Chicago for business. And sometimes my mom would come with and visit her sister and I asked her to come with and I actually got her to go see my Aunt Mary. And they knocked on the door and it was, you know, bygones be bygones you know, beautiful Italian family that that forgives and forgets. And I really feel they taught my mom how to do that. Because my Mom hung on to her anger for a long time. But once she met them, they became friends again. And it was you know, it was beautiful.
 
Michael Hingson ** 29:26
So again, what was your profession at the time that all this happens?
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 29:29
Or do you my I was I had I had a cottage industry making toys,
 
Michael Hingson ** 29:35
or you’re still in the toy business that I was in the toy business. Your van was not sending you strong enough messages yet to change
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 29:43
that at that point. But you know, you know we reach parts in our life that just completely change how we deal with life. And I think after meeting my dad and understanding that the love that I didn’t have was really there. I think it gave me the strength To stand up and say I can I can do something more, I can do something better. And the work that I’m doing now, which I’ve been doing for over three decades, is really heart centered. It’s helping people. It’s, it’s showing people how they don’t have to suffer emotionally or physically. And I really think meeting my dad catapulted me in into that position. I mean, I already I always have that. I mean, I was a child of the, you know, in this in the 60s, a teenager in the 60s, you know, flower child. So, I looked into meditations and yoga way back when no one was doing yoga. No, you know, I mean, well, people but you know, not not in the masses that they’re doing it now. And, and my toy company, even when I sold those toys, I saw my tents as a safe haven for children to go into, I would fill those with light. So that if there was any disturbance going on in the home, that the children could go into that little tent, and it would be a place where they would feel loved and peace. And so I always worked with energy through I’d say, from my 20s on. So stepping into the vocation that I have now is as an intuitive. It was easy. Yeah. It was familiar to me. And I think meeting my dad helped help do that.
 
Michael Hingson ** 31:24
Well, when you decided to change from toys, what really made you go into learning Reiki and being a Reiki Master and going into the whole profession that you have now? Because that’s quite a major change in direction.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 31:40
That is a jump, isn’t it? Five years before I started learning Reiki I, I looked, someone gave me a book said, oh, you should you should, you should look into this, you should do Reiki and I thumbed through it. I said, I’m not a healer and threw it off to the side. But within five years, and after meeting my dad, and just knowing that my business had to be different, and it had to be, I wanted it to be something that helped people more than I was doing now, rather than just games and toys and playing. And so someone presented Reiki to me again. And this time, it clicked in my head. I was like, Okay, I’ll look into this. But what happened was that the friend of mine that told me about Reiki says you need to go to my Reiki Master, I said, Okay. And she lives in Germany, outside of Frankfurt, Germany, and I’ll tell you, you know, Boulder, Colorado is a very metaphysical community. And you can throw a rock in any direction and probably hit a Reiki Master, you know, diamond doesn’t. But somehow I was guided to leave the country, which I’ve never done before. And go to this woman and and learn Reiki, so I went there. She was very German, she was very strict. She was very traditional, which is not how I teach Reiki now, but um, and, you know, why did I go there? Well, I found that I had a past life, in Germany, in this town at this church. I mean, I would say, maybe a year or so before that, in meditation, I saw past lives. And, and so I understood on a feeling level, at least I saw in my own mind’s eye lives that I’d had before and when I was in Germany, and as I’ve traveled more throughout the world, I find that when I’m at a place where I’ve been before I get emotional. In Egypt, I stood by Coptic jars, I had seen myself as the one in Egypt that took the organs out of nobleman and put them in Coptic jars. And when I started these particular Coptic jars, and I saw many there, I started to sob. And I walked away, I came back three times. And every time I stood by those jars, I cried, knowing in my mind that those were the jars that I worked with. So in Germany, I’m standing in front of this big church, we go into her small village, and we’re walking around, and I stand in front of these big wooden doors. And I started to cry. And I was like, I was a priest, in that church. And then I was guided to just turn around, and I turned behind me, and I saw ruins of a castle. And again, in my mind’s eye, when I did meditation, I saw myself tortured as a priest because I didn’t follow the way they wanted me to do it, which is how I am now. And I said, that’s where I was tortured. And even walking through the countryside, I saw a small church and again, tears came to me and I knew I had lived there. That was where I was my parish as a small boy. So why did I go to Germany, all these all these things that sometimes you just do because you just feel you Should Do you ever get that Michael? Oh, yes. And you don’t understand why, you know, why did I quit my toy business in the moment? Because I knew there was something out there. I knew it.
 
Michael Hingson ** 35:09
And that’s all the understanding, you need to make a choice. If you’re certain, then that’s what you do. My favorite example of that kind of thing is a real simple one. Do you ever play Trivial Pursuit?
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 35:21
Not very well.
 
Michael Hingson ** 35:24
But how many times do you play the game? Or do you interact with other people who are playing the game? Somebody asked the question, you know the answer, and you just say, Well, that can’t be right. And you give a different answer. And it’s the wrong answer. And the one that you thought at first was the right answer truly was correct. All the time and Trivial Pursuit. So when I play Trivial Pursuit, I have learned to listen, because usually, it’s the right answer. And we, we ignore our inner guide. So much, we ignore those things that are really telling us what to do. So as they say, in Australia, New Zealand Good on you for what you’re doing and how you do it. So what did what did you write?
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 36:14
Let me let me let me just segue on top of that, I’m going to give a little exercise that that I have in some of my books on how to build that intuition. I mean, just what you’re saying you second guess it. So I say this is what you do for the next, if you want to, if you want to create a new pattern, you do it for 30 days, or at least 21 days, you know. And so every time you have an intuitive thought, you should write it down. Just just by having a little notebook, of course, now we’ve got our phones. So in your phone, you could have in your notes and intuitive thought I wasn’t going to go down the highway this particular way. I’m gonna go the other way. And you find out that the way we’re first gonna go now has a block of of traffic. Yeah, it’s an intuitive thought you go to the grocery store, you think you need something, you get it? And you find out yes, indeed I do. Just keeping track of all those intuitive thoughts, because we have way more than we think we do, you will start building that confidence within yourself to trust as you found to go with that first thought. So that’s one practice. Okay, back to your question.
 
Michael Hingson ** 37:20
People have asked me if I ever felt any nudge or reason not to go to the World Trade Center on September 11. Even though there was a very severe thunderstorm that came right over our house at 1230. That morning, I never had, and I can sit here today and say I never had a single inkling that I shouldn’t go. There was no message that said Don’t go. And what happened, though, at at the World Trade Center for me, I think justify that just all the experiences that I had that day, but the reality is that we we do get so many different kinds of things that if we would, but listen, we would be so much better off, but we tend not to we ignore them, or we say that can’t possibly be right. And then as you say, it turns out it is and I think your exercise is a very good one, that people who don’t listen to those inner thoughts really are, are missing out on something extremely valuable. Well, right. So, so go ahead.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 38:34
Yeah, well, and you know, you go into the Trade Center, we could call that divine order, because it completely changed how you work and what you do and, and how much more you can give to people than you were doing there. And I don’t feel divine order is necessarily God given. I mean, it can be if that’s your belief system, but I feel our divine order comes from within ourselves. We know within ourselves, we’ve got something more to do that can help people society life grow. And we follow that.
 
Michael Hingson ** 39:06
Well, of course, the reality is that is God. And I think it’s all interrelated. What did you make a master think of your past life experiences? I assume you divulge those to her when you were in Germany.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 39:21
You know, I can’t, you know, I don’t remember a lot lot with her. We talked a lot I shared it. She was she was very stoic. Let’s say that way. You know, so there wasn’t you know, a lot coming from her. And I’ll tell you this when I first learned the energy, I didn’t feel it. I mean, when I teach people Reiki, they feel the energy coming through their hands and all through their body, but with this woman, I didn’t feel anything happening there. It wasn’t because she wasn’t a good teacher. It was just, I was just different. I but I it was about trust. We’re going back to why did I follow through, I get attune to the energy which channels the energy into you and you feel it. I didn’t feel any of that I didn’t feel energy coming out of my hands. But in my heart of hearts, I knew this was my path. And as I continued to practice it and get move on to the higher levels, I started feeling a lot more energy. But it really helped me to teach people to tell them, I didn’t feel anything, but it works. And it’s channeling love into the body. Reiki is channeling the infinite love of the universe, into your head, into your heart, you channeled it out your hands to a situation to a person or to yourself. And it’s just working with love, it’s, it’s pretty simple.
 
Michael Hingson ** 40:45
Well tell us a little bit more about what Reiki is.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 40:49
Reiki, like I say, is channeling the infinite love of the universe, through your body into another one, when we heal at the deepest level, we heal through love. On some level, we’re allowing the medicine to work, allowing the procedure the doctors giving you to work, or just trusting that your body can be better. And so building that love in and around a person allows them to get better and understand things in a different perception. And we sort of talked about compassion, but you know, compassion, and we talked about looking at what goes on with other people. It’s perception, how do you perceive something that makes you ill, you know, a lot of illnesses that come in are from stress doctors, they’ll tell us that, you know, this is happening, you know, because you’re stressed, you know, your heart is hurting, or whatever. So if we could be less stressed, that means that we would have to have a different perception of what’s happening around us. And coming into a space of love or feeling love around you or asking love to come in you is going to put you to a softer space, so you can see things in a different way. So Reiki channels in loves and gives you a new perspective. And once you have the new perspective, you can act differently, you can feel differently, your body’s going to relax, because Reiki just doesn’t come into your physical body, we have four bodies, we have a physical body, we have an emotional body, which is an etheric body, it’s about you know, inter to offer our our skin, hence why we like to hug, why we shake hands, it’s that touching of that emotional body that we’re really looking for, the mental body is a little bit further out probably about 18 inches out, we’re all those thoughts that run through our head are right there in our face. And then the spiritual body is right at the edge. So Reiki not only comes into the physical body, but goes through the emotional body, palms that emotion goes into the mental body gives you a new perception of the thoughts that you’ve been having. And it’s charged with that spiritual body, which is that God given right that we come into our life with
 
Michael Hingson ** 43:01
is Reiki always hands on. So it’s a physical touch or something that you can do remotely.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 43:08
Yeah, some masters teach it hands on, yes, you can do it remotely. When you move up on the levels. It’s definitely can be sent remotely. And I work with people all around the world. And even though I do counseling, at some point, I might say, you know, just close your eyes relax, I’m going to direct this healing energy, this loving Reiki energy into and they you know, I always check in, you know, what do you notice? And what do you sense what’s different? What’s the same? And they feel it even across the miles? And that’s that’s the beauty of it.
 
Michael Hingson ** 43:41
That’s certainly pretty cool. And it’s great to have that that kind of experience. How about your, your family, your children husband? Do they do Reiki or
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 43:55
I have trained let’s see, two of my three children, you know, not all of them go along. But two of my three children have learned it and and use it not as practitioners but just in their everyday life. My little granddaughter I one time I picked her up from from preschool. And she says, Wait a minute, no, no, I can’t go right now I have to go help Billy. He fell down. And I have to go give him Reiki. And she went over to him and put her hands on him. And then you know, just a few seconds and then and then came back again. So it’s it’s sort of cool.
 
Michael Hingson ** 44:32
Well, it really is and it’s always good to explore.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 44:37
It is and and it’s fun. And what I find with Reiki is that when when I trained someone in Reiki and they can go home and place their hands on someone and someone actually feels calmer. Their headache subsides. Their backache goes away. It makes them realize, Oh my gosh, if I’ve got this within me, and I can do this, I can do anything. And, and I’ve seen it over and over, over the decades that I’ve taught that people step out of their vocation that they had and moved to something that serves them better. They, they moved to new locations, they change family, they change, not family, but you know, friends, it really empowers them, it really is an empowerment kind of thing. It’s not like you’ve got to learn it and, you know, be a practitioner and give treatments to people, but it just shows you that you have the power to change your life, and understand and perceive what’s best for you and follow it. Right. So there’s a lot of aspects to it that people don’t think about when they think of Reiki hands on healing. But again,
 
Michael Hingson ** 45:42
it requires you to be open, and to absorb information and process it. And I noticed when I was reading some of the information about you, you talk about getting information into the left side of the brain, and then allowing the right side to accept it spiritually.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 46:03
Yeah, it well and spiritually, because the right side is the feeling sensing part. And that’s the part that we don’t trust. Yeah. And once we start trusting it, we can get a deeper a deeper connection to what we see as as spirit or power beyond us, or power within us. You know, however we focus on that. And, you know, Reiki is not the only thing I do. I mean, I also you know from that it stems out into meditation, which again, helps people understand that they have the power to do what they need to do for themselves to come, there’s themselves down, you know, they don’t need to, you know, take take drugs to be more relaxed. And that, and vegetation, people get so scared about meditation, I’ve got to have absolutely no thoughts. It’s like, no, that’s, that’s not what it’s about. It’s about just changing that thought from that auto rewind that you have. And So meditation is putting in a different thought, seeing a different picture. And you don’t have to do it for hours on end. 20 minutes is good. And when I start people out, I say do it for five minutes, just close your eyes, you know, just think about ocean waves, I often start with the breath, watching how your lungs rise, and just drop down. And when we breathe, the rising of our lungs take some effort, but when we exhale, they just drop all by themselves. And it’s going into that space of letting go. Breathing in and letting go.
 
Michael Hingson ** 47:37
That’s really it. It’s not about having no thoughts, it’s not having directed thoughts, it’s letting go and letting your mind really go where it chooses to go. And you just doing that and following along and not trying to control.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 47:55
Right. And it gets to be fun. I mean, there’s a sensation in your body that is so uplifting when when you meditate that like, yeah, I want to I want to hit that again. Yeah. Yeah.
 
Michael Hingson ** 48:10
And, again, if you learn how to do that, and to let go and to let your mind direct you, if you will, again, that will enhance your your being in your life a whole lot. And it will help you in understanding so many things about other people. And and what’s happening to you as well. Yeah, well,
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 48:33
you know, we we give our body a rest, we will lay down at night and we sleep. But we never really give our mind that that reprieve and meditation, just 20 minutes a day gives your mind that rest and we start figuring things out better and start working with both sides of the brain. And we know the left side is our that analytical side, the right side is the feeling side. But if we could be in that whole brain thinking we could we could do the analytical and allow the intuitive right brain to tell you which direction to go. And so just like you were talking about trusting your intuition, you can do that if you meditate because you’re gonna get that whole brain thinking going on. So you’re not battling it. You know, when you’ve got that one idea that comes in and the other one says, No, that’s not it. You know, the intuition comes in. And the other one says, Now that can’t be it. They stop arguing. Yeah. They start they start communicating better. Yeah. And I just got here I’ve got meditations on my website. I know you’ll put it up for your, for your audience. It’s light internal.com And there’s mp3 is on there. And you know, when you start with meditation will listen to somebody it’s a lot easier to have because as as a meditator and as a Reiki Master, I’m able to bring that calm energy into my voice and into you. So you’re gonna get into that space a lot faster. And if you don’t listen to mine, there’s other People out there, but find someone that sounds good to you feels good to you makes you relax. And it’s a lot easier to listen to. One, when you get started,
 
Michael Hingson ** 50:10
you know, you were talking about sleeping, and we don’t really let our brains do the things that that they should. The fact is that there should never be anything wrong with taking a few minutes at the end of the day just to relax, maybe just think about the day, think about what worked, what didn’t work, and let your mind direct you as to how you deal with it tomorrow. But we don’t tend to learn how to be introspective,
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 50:37
right, and you know, at work, and now not that many more people are working at home. But when people worked more in the office, there were you know, you would get coffee breaks, yeah. And then they stopped, the coffee breaks, but people that smoked would go outside and smoke, they would take their break. So I would I would tell my students tell you what, you know, you don’t have to go out and smoke. But just give yourself five minutes, just put your hands on the computer screen and close your eyes or a keyboard. And just close your eyes for five minutes and give yourself the break that other people are taking. But yours is much healthier.
 
Michael Hingson ** 51:14
And more productive. And more.
 
Marnie Vincolisi  51:16
Yes. And and I think companies are beginning to learn that, that people are more productive when they’re happier when they’re relaxed. And there’s ways to give them that.
 
Michael Hingson ** 51:28
Tell us about the different products and services that your company does and the name of the company again, and just a little bit about how people can reach out to you and learn more about what you do and so on.
 
51:41
Okay, well, my website’s a great place to go light internal, a lot of people want to call it light, eternal, and it’s like, no, it’s the light that’s within you. Okay, lightinternal.com I write a weekly blog. And in there, sometimes I’ll have meditations that you can listen to. I talk about things that are pertinent with what’s what’s going on how we can see things differently, how to deal with, you know, angry people or things that upset us. Lots and lots of information in there. And so you’ll find that on the site, as I’ve got YouTube videos, so if you put my name in, you know, Marnie, Marnie, Vin or Marnie Vincolisi, I’ll pop up on YouTube. Facebook, not so much. I got hacked on Facebook a few years ago, and was able to get back on I was like, Oh, well, let that go on Instagram. I’m on. I’m on Instagram. My products are I’ve got five books. Three of the books, the first books I wrote, we’re about personal empowerment using Reiki and other meditative type techniques. One is called Finding Your inner gift. Second one is inner gifts uncovered. And the third one is claiming your inner gift. And then you asked about my family. So another grandchild who lives in San Francisco, I was telling her story, as we were going through San Francisco, I was in the backseat with her my daughter’s driving. And you know, she’s getting sort of fussy, and the story that I told her turned into a book. And it’s, it’s called the House who found its home. It’s a children’s book, it’s a good reader for early readers, because there’s repetitive statements. And it’s about a house, it was living in a place that was too tight and too bright and too noisy. So the House took off to find a new place to live. And of course, it’s because it’s my book, The House learned a valuable lesson. Yeah, and the last book is they did the best they could discovering your path to compassion, with beautiful guidance on how you can work through issues that might be bothering you. But as I said, there’s mp3 there’s as well. And you know, and anytime that you’ve got issues, I’d love to work with you through hypnosis, guidance. Counseling, does moving energy for you. And that’s my counseling. So it’s all there on the site on lightinternal.com. And
 
Michael Hingson ** 54:13
you do that worldwide. So anyone who is listening who wants to can certainly reach out to you and I hope that they will
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 54:20
write and all my books I can, I can ship worldwide as well.
 
Michael Hingson ** 54:26
Did you publish them yourself?
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 54:28
I did. I did do self publishing the first three books I did self publishing, because they were my processes. And I didn’t want to give them away to a publisher because I know if it doesn’t sell the way they want and the books off the shelf. Yeah, you know, once I learned how to do that, I just continued with my other books and self published. And I just love the creative nature of it. The last book, you know, I created the cover the background that you see here is is the cover of my latest book. And let’s see I can sort of see it here. I worked with fonts and how to do the layout and just that creative part of me that right brain, Mason, create your own books and create how they lay out and do your covers. And it’s just fun.
 
Michael Hingson ** 55:14
So that’s certainly not allowed dyslexia to stand in the way and your brain has dealt with that.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 55:21
It has, it’s some pretty good,
 
Michael Hingson ** 55:23
which is cool. I want to thank you for being with us again, on unstoppable mindset. And clearly, if we’re going to talk about someone who’s unstoppable, that would be you. I am so glad that you, you found us because you actually found us and said, I want to be a guest on your podcast, which I’m grateful for you to have done. So very much. That was great.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 55:45
Right? And I’ve so I’ve so enjoyed meeting you and hearing, you know how you’ve dealt with diversity and what you’ve gone through. I mean, I love your story about riding your bicycle at seven years old by yourself and a neighbor complaining. May I May I take a moment and ask you that. So my father in law was blind. And so I learned, you know, a lot of things through him. So when you were riding your bike, did you listen for how the air went by you to know if there was something along the side of you? I mean, you knew how far I mean, how many turns to the end of the quarter? Yeah. How many times did you go around? Tell me how you did it?
 
Michael Hingson ** 56:22
No, it’s not so much the air going by you. It’s just all the echoes and all the sounds. I mean, it’s like, how would you describe to someone when you’re riding a bike, what it looks like, and what you see how do you describe that sense. And it’s the same thing, you’re using different senses to do the same thing. And the fact is that with all the different kinds of noises echoing and so on that you can hear, it’s possible to ride a bike. Now, I’m not going to probably want to be a bike messenger in New York City. But I, I enjoyed riding a bike. It’s been a long time since I’ve written but I’ve enjoyed it. And you learn to trust your senses, which is what we’ve talked a lot about here.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 57:04
Yeah, yeah. Well, thank you for sharing that with me. And thank you for having me on. I’ve really enjoyed meeting you. And I hope I get to talk to you again.
 
57:12
Well, I think we definitely ought to stay in touch by by all means. And and when you’re listening out there, please go off and give us a five star rating, especially if you can go to iTunes and do it. We love that five star rating is always helpful. But we want to hear your comments and read your comments. So feel free to leave those as well. Email me at Michaelhi at accessibe.com or go to www dot Michaelhingson.com/podcast. And you can hear all the episodes and leave us comments there as well. But definitely, we really appreciate you giving us your feedback and giving Marnie your feedback as well. Reach out to Marnie. I know she would be very happy to talk with you. And if you feel there’s some ways that she can help them. Let us know how it goes. We are always interested. And we’re not going to we’re not going to let Marnie get away. We’re going to have more times to chat definitely we have to do more of this as we go forward. But I really enjoyed you today and you having us be a part of your life. And I want to thank you one last time for doing this and for coming on a sample bites.
 
Marnie Vincolisi ** 58:25
Thank you. And thank you for being here, Michael.
 
**Michael Hingson ** 58:33
You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you’ll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you’re on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of any one or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hingson.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you’re there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free eBook entitled blinded by fear. The unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessiBe and is sponsored by accessiBe. Please visit www.accessibe.com. accessiBe is spelled a c c e s s i b e. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for listening. Please come back and visit us again next week.