Journey Back to Essence
Reclaim the pure loving Soul Child you were before
the world told you who and how to be
You probably know your Enneagram type and have studied its patterns, read the books, and attended some workshops. (If you haven't, we can get you up to speed.) But your type isn't really who you are. It's a protective shell and operating system you've been using for decades to shelter the purest, most radiant version of yourself.
I'm Dr. Joseph Howell. For 45 years as a clinical psychologist, I've guided hundreds of people beyond personality typing into the sacred territory of soul recovery.
If you've ever felt like something essential is still missing from your spiritual journey, or if you you understand yourself intellectually but still feel trapped in old patterns, we invite you to move beyond personality into presence and to discover the soul-driven life you've been searching for.
The nine types aren't personality categories. They're survival strategies. Brilliant adaptations your soul created when it was too dangerous to be yourself. You were born as pure essence. A perfect expression of divine consciousness. But somewhere in those early years, the world sent you a message that made your soul go into hiding. In its place emerged what we call the ego type or Enneagram Type with its magnificent protection system. It was the perfect vehicle for your particular soul to get into to survive.
But here's the tragedy... Most of us have been living in the protection system for so long, we've forgotten there's anyone inside worth protecting.
If you're like most people who encounter the Enneagram, you've studied your patterns and learned that you are not alone in your struggles. You even have a special language to describe them! But you're probably still stuck with the same reactions and the same limitations, and you still sense that something is missing. That’s because knowing your cage doesn't unlock the door. Understanding your protection doesn't automatically reconnect you with what you're protecting.
I discovered this truth not in textbooks, but in the crucible of profound loss when my wife and I lost both of our children.
And I can tell you without question... if we hadn't learned to access our soul consciousness, if we'd only lived from our ego types, we would not have survived that devastation. But because I'd discovered the pathway beyond personality into essence, we found something the world can't give and can't take away.
Peace ...
The kind of peace and joy that knows, at the deepest level, that all shall be well.
It’s not a worldview unique to us. Everyone began as a specific soul essence with that level of peace.
Hidden within your type is your Soul Child. It’s at the point you probably know as your “heart point” or “integration point”, but it’s more than that. It’s the sacred territory where your true nature lives. Your Enneagram Type is how your Soul Child survived in a world that couldn't handle their pure essence.
Here's what changes everything...
Your Soul Child never left. It never had a chance to fully develop and grow, but it’s been waiting for the moment when it's safe to emerge again.
Unfortunately, you can't think your way back to essence. Reading a book won’t get your Soul Child to come out and you can't analyze your way to wholeness. Your Soul Child doesn't speak the language of the adult mind. It speaks the heart language of pure knowing.
That’s why I’m inviting you to join the pilot program of Journey Back to Essence.
In my 45 years of clinical practice and in my role at the Institute of Conscious Being, I’ve developed a direct pathway back to soul essence using the Enneagram.
In this program you’ll rediscover who you were before the world told you to be someone else. Most people have never experienced this. They have no memory of their essence before they learned to protect it. In fact, certain aspects of our Heart Point really turn us off. Our Enneagram Types actively avoid the kind of things that sent our soul into hiding. When you reconnect with this original self as a now mature adult, everything shifts. We call this amalgamation of the ego and soul.
When you amalgamate, you step into wholeness. You become someone who knows who themselves at the soul level. Someone who trusts their own heart. Someone who can love fully because they know they're worthy of love.
Picture this... You wake up tomorrow morning and feel that spark of aliveness you remember from childhood. You walk into any room knowing, with absolute certainty, that you belong there exactly as you are. You love without holding back. You express yourself without shame. You never wonder if you are enough or too much. You feel whole. Not perfect. Whole. Connected to something larger than yourself and completely at home in your own skin.
This isn't just beautiful possibility. It’s already happening for members of the ICB community.
Angela from Birmingham came to us broken. A Nine who'd been asleep to life for 50 years. After our journey together, people tell her she radiates something different.
Joy. Peace. Presence.
Katherine calls this the most important thing she's ever done for herself.
Amy from Alabama was sick and searching. Now she's living from her true essence.
These aren't exceptions. They are examples of what happens when you systematically reclaim your essence and amalgamate your ego and soul. But this is the first time we are offering this transformation to the broader public in an online format
Traditionally this kind of deep soul work only happens in intensive retreats.
People invest thousands of dollars and travel across the country for this level of transformation. But this work is too important to be available only to those who can do that. Your Soul Child doesn't care about your bank account or your ability to take time off work and fly around. It just wants to come home!
That’s why we created this program. We want everyone to find and operate from their highest and truest selves.
This pilot version of the program includes
5 Two-Hour zoom workshops (with replays in your portal if you miss)
A private ongoing community group
Deep inquiry and sharing with fellow participants
A member portal with replays of the sessions
Extra online group gatherings after the class
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Dates: The zoom workshops will be held on Mondays, starting Nov 3, 2025
(Nov 3, Nov 10, Nov 17, Nov 24, & Dec 1)
Time: 9am PST - 11am Pacific,
Price: $388. (Use coupon code IEA for a $88 discount - making it $300)
For less than you would pay for a weekend retreat or a few private therapy sessions, you can
change the entire trajectory of your life.
Here's what makes this even more valuable.
You're not just getting the teachings and processes. You're getting them LIVE.
Later cohorts of this course will be taking the classes “on-demand” as videos. But you’ll get seven weeks of direct access to Joe and his amazing team. Plus, you’ll benefit from live small group breakout inquiries with others on the same journey. You’ll also have the opportunity to get personal guidance for your specific type and circumstances. Plus, you’ll get long-term access to a private community group discussion and the class recordings.
Soul work isn't a destination. It's a gift of Grace and a way of being.
The question is whether you're ready to stop hiding and to really love your whole self. Whether you are ready to stop living from the outside-in, and start living from the inside-out.
I can't guarantee that you'll be ready. Only you know that. But I can guarantee this... If you show up fully to this process, if you're willing to start remembering what you've been hiding...
Your Soul Child will meet you there. And when it does, you'll remember what you’ve been searching for your entire life. You'll realize (and deeply feel) that you are perfect. Exactly as you are. Right now. You've actually always been perfect. You just forgot.
Your soul is calling you home. Are you ready to go?
If you are, click the button below and join us for this seven-week journey back to essence.
Dr Joseph Howell
“We don’t teach people how to be spiritual,” says Joe. “We help them remember that they already are."
For over four decades, Joe Howell has walked the sacred bridge between clinical psychology and spiritual transformation, helping hundreds of people remember who they truly are beneath the masks they've learned to wear.
His journey began at Samford University and continued through Yale Divinity School, where he studied under Henri Nouwen—a mentorship that awakened him to the soul's deeper territory and the place where healing becomes homecoming.
After completing his Ph.D. at the University of Virginia and his Fellowship in Clinical Psychology at Harvard Medical School, he began what would become a lifetime of guiding others home to themselves.
Dr. Howell discovered what most miss: the Enneagram isn't a personality system. It's an ancient map back to essence. While others teach typing, he guides soul recovery. While others focus on ego management, he facilitates the sacred reunion between who you've become and who you've always been.
His approach was forged not just in academic study, but in the crucible of profound loss. He and his wife Lark endured what no parent should—the death of both their children. It was through this unimaginable grief that he discovered the difference between living from ego and living from soul. One breaks under such weight. The other finds an unshakeable peace that surpasses understanding. "The ego asks 'How do I survive this?' The soul whispers 'How do I remain whole through this?'" This distinction has guided his work for decades.
Dr. Howell holds:
• Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, University of Virginia
• Master of Arts, Yale Divinity School (Religion and Psychology)
• Fellowship in Clinical Psychology, Harvard Medical School
• IEA Accredited Professional Teacher certification
• 35+ years teaching the spiritual depths of the Enneagram
He has worked with luminaries like Don Riso, Richard Rohr, Sandra Maitri, and Patrick O'Leary, but his greatest teachers have been the thousands of souls he's guided home to themselves.
As founder of the Institute for Conscious Being, Dr. Howell offers something rare in our performance-driven world: a return to essence. His groundbreaking books, Becoming Conscious and Know Your Soul, reveal what the ancients knew—that beneath every protective pattern lives a radiant soul child, waiting to be remembered.
His work isn't about fixing people. It's about helping them return to who they've forgotten they once were.
This program is the first in a series that will ultimately lead to a certification in
Spiritual Amalgamation
If you feel called to help yourself and others experience the profound transformation that comes from soul-led living, or if you would like to guide yourself and others through the deepest levels of Enneagram work, beyond personality into soul essence, then this foundational course is where your sacred work begins.
"I now have a tool to grow in my own honesty and essence
and to help others grow in their own essence."
— John Shoulders
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