Against the Grind: A Conversation With Jackie Knechtel
The startup world is obsessed with ‘the Grind’.
12 hour workdays are normal, and many founders preach the mantra of constantly working on your business. The result is that many entrepreneurs are stressed and burnt out. In the strain of such a high-pressure environment, they’ve lost sight of they what they really wanted in the first place.
Jackie Knechtel aims to change that. She’s the co-founder of The Flow Consciousness Institute and Flow Mastery, an 8 week online training course. She leads workshops, retreats, and works with a select few for one-on-one coaching. We had a conversation with her in August about her work and her philosophy.
“We teach entrepreneurs to have effortless success in life and business, and are working to tear down the whole paradigm of hustle and grind,” Jackie says. Rather than trying to control everything and getting stuck in the trap of fear and self-doubt, which leads to anxiety, depression and dis-ease in the body, she encourages a mindset of trust and surrender. What she says is most important is to identify what you truly want to be doing, to let go of “the how”, and then to do that without concern over questions of logistics or practicality. “What we teach in Flow Consciousness is to always follow your highest excitement and inspiration in every moment,” she says.
Flow isn’t just something that Jackie teaches, she’s been living it and practicing it for years. “My life is like Burning Man,” she says, referring to the free-wheeling, open-minded, gift-giving culture of the iconic festival. It’s no exaggeration. Her life and career have been anything but typical, taking her around the world and constantly providing her with unique experiences.
Jackie started her professional career as a therapist for children with autism in NY. She built a private practice over the course of ten years, utilizing her unique, holistic approach to treatment.
After some time at a world-renowned clinic in Manhattan, Jackie’s path took her to Beverly Hills, Dubai, and Saudi Arabia to work with the families of high-level government officials. She’s currently seeking funding for her vision to revolutionize the therapy delivery model for special needs. “Not the typical life of a therapist,” Jackie says, showing a gift for understatement.
Jackie has several projects coming up. She will be teaching Flow Consciousness at a retreat this November in Bali, and hosting a retreat for entrepreneurs in Hawai’i in February called Evolution Retreat. She is also speaking and giving workshops throughout the US and around the world.
The catalyst for her approach to life and work came after a personal tragedy. Jackie’s brother passed away seven years ago, and in the aftermath of her loss, she felt a moment of clarity. “When you face mortality, it makes you think, ‘I might not have tomorrow. How can I live each moment as if it’s my last? I asked myself, If I was really living for myself, what would I be doing?’” She said her answer was really quite simple: “I’d be traveling the world”. And so began her globetrotting career which has taken her to over 60 countries, affording her lifetimes of personal and professional experience.
During this time, she never knew where she would be or what she would be doing more than a day or two in advance. “Last year, after Summit at Sea in November, I got off the boat and was talking to some friends. They said ‘We’re going to Uganda next week,’ to which I replied, ‘I want to go!’ They said to come, so two days later, I was on a plane to Uganda to track gorillas in the wild.” This is one of the core tenets of Flow: “Trust your intuition and live moment-to-moment.”
Of course, Flow Mastery is certain to have its skeptics and doubters. Many will argue that it can’t be that easy and will be reluctant to let go of the pragmatic concerns and a need for security and certainty. Jackie insists, however, that effortless success is ultimately a matter of belief. “You might believe that you don’t have the finances or can’t do something. It’s about uprooting these limiting beliefs at the mental, physical, energetic and cellular levels and shifting into limitless thinking.”
“There are misconceptions about manifesting. People will say ‘I want to manifest a Tesla,’ or ‘I want to manifest a million dollars,’ but if they hold a conflicting subconscious belief such as ‘money is the root of all evil’, ‘I’m not worthy, I don’t deserve success, or I’m not whatever enough’, it isn’t going to show up. Whatever results are showing up in your life are a reflection of your subconscious belief structures.”
Jackie holds up her own life as an example. She’s traveled the world without making any advance plans, staying for short periods with various people in her vast network of friends around the world. She lives her own life believing that truly everything is possible, and has been met with significant evidence to support that. Given all this, it’s no surprise that Jackie is firm in her convictions. “The only limits people have are the ones they create for themselves,” she says. “They’re just an illusion. In every moment there are infinite possibilities, but you have to be open to them. Which makes me ask, why hustle when you can Flow?”
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This piece was co-written with Matthew Jasinski as part of Checkmate Creations’ “On the Board” series, where we share the stories and insights of the entrepreneurs in our network. If you would like to be featured in “On the Board”, contact us at hello@checkmatecreations.com.
