The Work Before the Work: How I Built a Life They Can’t Ignore
On mastery, consciousness, and the long arc of becoming.
During my morning two-hour Peloton Zone II Heart-Rate Training series of rides last week, the air slipping beneath the open window in the room was cool and steady. In that moment, and as my family slept peacefully, I was unbothered by the concerns that often clutter the mind at dawn. I slipped on my headphones, pressed play on Cal Newport’s So Good They Can’t Ignore You (2012), and found myself drawn into a thesis I have lived—often unknowingly—for more than three decades. The book argues against the myth of “follow your passion” and instead lifts up something far more grounded: cultivate mastery, accumulate career capital, practise your craft so consistently that the world cannot help but take notice.
Halfway through the ride, I realised something quietly striking: this has been my journey all along. Not through design, not through branding, but through the long arc of becoming—an arc shaped by curiosity, service, discipline, and transcendent insight. Newport supplied the language, but life supplied the evidence.
The Myth I Never Bought Into
We live in an age where passion is marketed as the singular compass for one’s life. Find what you love, and the rest will follow, we are told. Yet passion, untethered from substance, often collapses under the weight of real work. I never operated from that premise. My life moved according to a quieter rhythm. I learnt early that passion is not a compass; it is a companion that arrives once the work has shaped a path.
Despite an early foray into corporate America, much of my adult life has revolved around college campuses—as an undergraduate student (twice), an employee, and later a graduate student on the very same campus—before decamping Atlanta to resume graduate study in Iowa. Over the last twelve years, my journey has led me to serve as Director of the Transcendental Meditation® (TM) program in Cambridge alongside my wife, Mina, quite literally a stone’s throw from Harvard’s campus.
What guided me wasn’t passion—it was calling.
Not a dramatic, cinematic calling.
A whispering one.
A nudge toward depth rather than excitement.
In 1993, a simple encounter cracked open what became a lifelong inquiry into consciousness and the nature of human possibility. Years later, I now recognise reading U.S. Andersen’s Three Magic Words (1957) all those years ago didn’t give me passion; it gave me curiosity and a knowingness that there were deeper layers to this existence waiting to be explored. None of it presented itself as destiny. It introduced itself as work—the inner work of self-discovery, the outer work of disciplined action.
And so my path unfolded in arcs:
university study and leadership,
early professional responsibilities,
immersion in the Masonic tradition,
marriage and familial commitments
decades of meditation and spiritual discipline,
doctoral research into mystical experience,
a commitment to teaching Transcendental Meditation,
and, eventually, building platforms like On Transcendence, Radical Scholar Inc., and the International Meditation Hour.
Nothing about this emerged overnight. In the interest of full disclosure, it was the accumulation of skill, refinement, repetition, and service. In that sense, Newport’s central argument—that passion follows mastery, not the other way around—rings true.
The Call to Craft
Newport calls it “career capital”: the rare and valuable skills one builds through deep engagement and deliberate practice as posited by Anders Ericsson via his well regarded academic research and subsequent book titled Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise (2016). When I look back, every chapter of my life is marked by precisely that.
Transcendental Meditation Teaching
Teaching TM since 2013 has been an exercise in precision, consistency, and honouring lineage. Over 2,100 individuals have sat across from me and Mina, each one seeking a better life. To serve them required mastery—not performance. It required steadiness—not spectacle. Over time, the Guru Dev Award arrived as acknowledgement of something I did not set out to earn: excellence accrued through service.
Scholarship and Consciousness Research
My doctoral research—exploring mystical experience among Freemasons—was not pursued for prestige. It was pursued because I needed to understand what had been moving within me since that first encounter in 1993 and bubbled to the surface the night of my Masonic Raising—Tuesday, 18 August 2009. The Model for Perpetual Growth and Progress, the Seven Layers of Manifestation—these were not inventions but distillations. Years of reading, teaching, interviewing, contemplating, writing, and revising condensed into frameworks that now anchor my public work.
Communication and Leadership
From early community leadership to nonprofit governance, from classroom teaching to podcast interviews, from curriculum design to public scholarship, each experience forged a skill. None of these skills appeared suddenly. They were chiselled out of time—slowly, sometimes invisibly.
Taken together, they form the craft.
The craft forms the contribution.
And the contribution forms the credibility.
It is only now, in 2025, that I see the mosaic clearly.
The Years Nobody Sees
Newport writes about deliberate practice: the kind of focused, often unglamorous work that builds true mastery. If there is a section of his book I understand intimately, it is this one.
Most people see the podcast interview with Dr. Dean Radin crossing 1,600 views in a week, (now 4,500 as of this moment) or the Substack reflections, or the public-facing models. What they do not see are:
the late nights coding websites when hosting companies were offline,
the weekends spent rewriting paragraphs until they finally said what the inner voice meant,
the early-morning meditations that brought clarity when the world was still,
the hours long Peloton rides to bring additional clarity to the mind and fitness to the body for the long-haul
the first, second, third, and now fourth Youngling with whom Mina and I navigate life daily and all the challenges such an endeavour entails,
the doctoral years of research and refinement that few will ever read in their entirety,
the manuscripts written, revised, discarded, and resurrected,
the moments when others discounted or misunderstood the work,
the organisational missteps and interpersonal frictions that create unexpected financial strain,
the discipline of showing up regardless.
In truth, nothing in my public life is new.
It is simply visible now.
Mastery is forged in the obscurity of consistent effort.
Recognition is merely the last stage of a process long underway.
The Convergence
There comes a moment in long-term work when the seemingly disparate threads of one’s life begin to interweave with startling coherence. For me, that moment began unfolding over the past few years as each stream of my life—TM teaching, Freemasonry, scholarship, neuroscience, mysticism, commentary on AI and AGI, website ecosystems, conference engagements, and the evolving understanding of consciousness—began to converge.
My Doctoral dissertation discussing mystical experience among Freemasons was completed and the PhD conferred.
On Transcendence emerged as a natural platform.
The International Meditation Hour grew organically.
Radical Scholar Inc. found its purpose.
Transcendental Brain took its place in the constellation.
The On Transcendence Substack and Podcast became a repository for the public expression of decades of inner and outer work.
None of this was orchestrated.
It was cultivated.
What appears as expansion is simply the unfolding of seeds planted long ago.
Where Cal Newport Meets Consciousness
While Newport rightly underscores the value of mastery, he does not venture deeply into the interior dimensions of what enables mastery to flourish. That is where my journey diverges from and extends his thesis.
For me, the development of rare and valuable skills has always been inseparable from the cultivation of consciousness as the Model for Perpetual Growth and Progress denotes.
Meditation deepens pattern recognition.
Inner stillness sharpens intuition.
Clarity reduces wasted motion.
Alignment accelerates learning.
Purpose sustains endurance.
Transcendence integrates the parts into a coherent whole.
In other words:
Mastery without consciousness risks becoming mechanical.
Consciousness without mastery risks becoming ineffective.
Together, they produce competence of the highest order—the kind that shapes lives, communities, and, on occasion, the culture itself.
The intersection of Newport’s craftsmanship and the ancient understanding of inner development reveals a truth I have lived:
The more refined the mind, the more refined the work.
The more refined the work, the more inevitable the impact.
The Road Ahead
As I continued riding that morning, the sun lifted a little higher, and Newport’s words spoke again of the craftsman mindset—the idea that one must focus on what one can offer, not what one hopes to receive. I slowed the pedals for a moment, stood and stretched, then smiled.
That has been my path.
Not through ambition, though ambition has its place.
Not through passion, though passion often arrives as a by-product.
But through steady cultivation—of craft, of clarity, of consciousness, of service.
Today, as each piece of my work gains momentum, I see more clearly than ever that being “so good they can’t ignore you” is not a boast; it is a responsibility. It is an invitation to continue refining the work, deepening the service, expanding the understanding, and aligning more fully with the purpose that has been quietly guiding me since 1993.
And if there is one lesson I would offer anyone reading this, it is this:
Do not chase passion.
Chase depth.
Chase mastery.
Chase the quiet work that builds and fortifies your inner architecture.
Let excellence become your introduction and service become your legacy.
For in the end, I did not arrive here by following a passion.
I arrived because I followed the work—consistently, intentionally, and with an open heart.
And the work, in its mysterious way, led me to purpose.
The work reveals us to ourselves long before it reveals us to the world.
Where might your own commitment to steady, disciplined deep work lead you next—and what part of you is waiting to be strengthened, refined, or brought into the light?
Suggested Practice: The Craft of Becoming
Meditation Time: 15 minutes
Purpose: To help you recognise the quiet work already unfolding in your life and to align more deliberately with the path of mastery.
1. Settle Into Stillness
Sit comfortably, close your eyes, and allow the breath to soften.
Let the noise of expectation fade.
Let the mind grow quiet enough for recognition to arise.
2. Reflect on Your Craft
Gently inquire:
Where in my life have I already been practising mastery without naming it as such?
What quiet work have I been doing for years that deserves honour, refinement, or deeper investment?
What skill—or inner capacity—am I being called to cultivate more deliberately?
Do not analyse.
Let the answers come the way morning light fills a room: gradually, naturally, without force.
3. Identify the Next Deliberate Step
Ask yourself:
What is one small action I can take in the next 48 hours that strengthens my craft?
Choose something specific, actionable, and aligned with depth—not performance.
One step is enough.
Mastery is built through accretion.
4. Close With Intention
Rest your attention on the heart and silently affirm:
I commit to the work before the work. I cultivate the mastery that calls me forward.
Open your eyes when ready.
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About the Author
Dr. Baruti KMT-Sisouvong is a consciousness scholar, executive coach, and Certified Teacher of Transcendental Meditation® based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His work—spanning The Model for Perpetual Growth and Progress and The Seven Layers of Manifestation—explores how Pure Consciousness, neuroscience, and social-systems transformation intersect in the evolution of both the individual and society.
He is the Founder and Director of Radical Scholar Inc., a nonprofit organization dedicated to consciousness-based research and public scholarship, and President of Serat Group Inc., the parent company of Transcendental Brain, a consulting and educational platform bringing consciousness science into leadership and institutional development. He also serves as Host of the On Transcendence Podcast.
Alongside his wife, Mina, he co-directs the Cambridge and Metropolitan Boston TM Program and serves as Host and Founder of International Meditation Hour (IMH), a quarterly global gathering dedicated to the unifying power of silence.
He writes from the conviction that the most important race is not between nations or machines, but between the conditioned mind and the awakening soul.
To learn more about him, visit: https://www.barutikmtsisouvong.com/.