#23 The Heart of Business with Mark Silver
Podcast Summary: Heart of Business - Episode with Mark Silver
Introduction:
- Host Saqib welcomes listeners and introduces Mark Silver, a heart-centered business coach and spiritual healer.
- Mark’s book, Heart-Centered Business, is dedicated to Al Amin, highlighting the deep trust and love Mark strives to embody in commerce and life.
Mark Silver's Journey:
- Raised in a Jewish family, Mark dreamed of becoming a rabbi but felt something was missing.
- While exploring deeper spirituality and starting his journey with business owners, he encountered Sufism through teachers from the lineage of Sheikh Muhammad Jamal.
- Initially, Mark struggled with his transition from Judaism to Sufism, feeling conflicted about betraying his heritage.
- A profound spiritual experience led him to fully embrace Sufism, taking shahada and finding healing between his Jewish and Islamic identities.
Sufism and Business:
- Sufism’s teachings deeply influenced Mark’s approach to business, focusing on love, integrity, and the sacredness of relationships.
- He emphasizes that business, often seen as detached from spirituality, can be an act of love and service, challenging modern capitalism’s toxicity.
Heart-Centered Business:
- Mark founded Heart of Business in 2001 to help entrepreneurs integrate spirituality with the practical aspects of running a business.
- His approach involves seeing business as a dynamic set of relationships, not just transactions, encouraging entrepreneurs to cultivate curiosity, compassion, and a healthy relationship with money.
Key Themes and Quotes:
- Dedication to Al Amin:
- Mark admires the trustworthiness and integrity of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), striving to embody these qualities in his business practices.
- Love in Business:
- Love, if unleashed, could transform the world of business, making it a part of a culture that lifts and serves everyone.
- Essence of Business:
- Business lies in the aliveness of relationships, not just in transactions or systems.
- Healthy Relationships:
- Healthy businesses necessitate healthy relationships, avoiding the pitfalls of unhealthy dynamics.
- Curiosity and Shame:
- Cultivating curiosity is crucial as it shifts the internal narrative, softening judgment, and opening the heart to truth and possibility, countering shame.
- Seeing the Divine in Business:
- Every aspect of business, including clients, colleagues, and even money, should be viewed as an expression of the divine.
Practical Application:
- Mark's work involves practical business coaching, spiritual guidance, and retreats to help entrepreneurs align their business practices with their spiritual values.
- His virtual retreats offer a space for deep spiritual practice, helping participants gain insights and make decisions aligned with their heart’s guidance.
Conclusion:
- Saqib and Mark discuss the importance of integrating spirituality with business, emphasizing that such integration can lead to profound transformation and healing in the business world.
- Listeners are encouraged to explore Mark's work and consider how they can bring more heart-centered approaches to their own business practices.
Contact and Further Information:
- Listeners can learn more about Mark Silver and Heart of Business at heartofbusiness.com, where they can find resources, assessments, and information on joining the community for support and growth in heart-centered business practices.
Heart of Business
00:10
Saqib: Greetings. Welcome everyone. My name is Saqib, your host. It's been quite some time—a bit of a break between the previous podcasts I've done and the one we're going to listen to today. So, how have you been? I've been well. Quite a bit going on in my life, I guess. But today, inshallah, we'll be speaking to Mark Silver about a heart-centered business. What drew me to his work is the opening page of his book, Heart-Centered Business, which he dedicates to, and I quote, "Al-Amin, whose example of being worthy of deep trust and love, I strive to follow in commerce and in life. The peace and blessings of the One be upon him," end quote. That got me hooked. I reached out, and I had a really good conversation with him—a very heart-centered conversation, I would say.
A bit about Mark Silver: there's more information on the website and in the podcast notes. He has worked with heart-centered entrepreneurs to help them realize that the very act of business can be an act of love. Essentially, his business helps entrepreneurs become more heart-centered. Mark is one of the pioneers in integrating real spirituality with the nitty-gritty of small business. He founded Heart of Business in 2001 and is a designated master teacher within his Sufi lineage. He has received his Master of Divinity. As a coach, teacher, and spiritual healer, he has facilitated thousands of individual sessions with entrepreneurs and has led hundreds of classes, seminars, groups, and retreats.
We start by talking about his background and how he arrived at Sufism, guided by Sheikh Muhammad Jamal from Palestine, and his journey from his Jewish heritage towards these teachings. We also go through various quotes from his book and ask him to give his commentary on them, so you get a feel of what he's doing. I'll leave details of his website in the podcast notes, so feel free to reach out to him. I think he runs some courses to help budding entrepreneurs fully take a more heart-centered approach to their businesses.
That's it from me for the introduction. I hope you enjoy this podcast. If you are listening, please do subscribe and support the project. It helps us develop further. We are planning to develop some courses and membership tiers to make the project more accessible. More details about that in due course, inshallah. Without further ado, here's the podcast. Welcome, Mark, to The Hikmah Project.
04:03
Mark Silver: Thank you. I'm delighted to be here. I'm really grateful that you've invited me.
04:09
Saqib: Wonderful. I've been looking forward to this podcast for quite some time now, and I'm so glad it's finally happened. Shall we begin with a brief introduction from yourself about your journey towards Islam and Sufism?
04:28
Mark Silver: Absolutely. Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim. I was raised Jewish in a not very observant Jewish family and always had the belief or dream that I would be a rabbi someday. There are a lot of twists and turns in a person's spiritual journey. We could spend quite a lot of time just talking about that. We were part of a vibrant Jewish community in the Bay Area, my wife and I. I was wanting something deeper, yearning for a depth I wasn't feeling and hoping to reach it.
At the same time, I was just beginning my journey working with business owners. This was around 2000. I was running into folks who were emotional about business issues and realized I needed to know how to care for them emotionally. My wife already had a healing practice, and she had a best friend studying Sufism in the lineage of Sheikh Jamal. She had a profound experience with her, and I had a profound experience at a workshop with the teachers. We both ended up studying in this lineage and healing school.
Initially, I was bringing my siddur, making Jewish prayers in the mosque while studying. I had a very strong feeling of not wanting to betray my genealogy or my people. Then, very deeply in prayer one day at the school, I heard clearly, "You are loving the path more than you're loving Me." It destroyed me, and I realized I was very attached to the path. That led to me embracing the path of Sufism. Not too long after, I took shahada and began feeling a healing in my heart between Judaism and Islam. I started to see that they are not two different paths. The teachings are the same in many ways.
08:34
Mark Silver: For me, there was a deep healing needed in the Abrahamic lineage. I'm not saying that I'm the one bringing the healing, but personally, there was a deep healing in the lineage between Judaism and Islam. I raised Jewish, moved to Islam, skipping over Christianity, though it wasn't included in my personal journey.
I've been studying in Islamic Sufism ever since, but I don't not feel Jewish. The term "Jewfi" has been used by many, and so I’ve fasted for Ramadan every year for 20 years now. I identify as Muslim but also as Jewish. It has been a very interesting journey for me internally. I know there’s only one God, and we all have a path to reach that oneness.
10:09
Saqib: To expand on that point about idolizing the path of the real over the truth of the Divine: For our listeners who may not know a sheikh or have met someone of that spiritual station, surely he must have offered you some embodiment of the real, which transcended the path. Could you say more about your engagement with the sheikh?
10:53
Mark Silver: Absolutely. For a while, we were attending Jewish services and Sufi teachings. Interestingly, they were teaching on the same themes week to week. However, the experience in my heart in the Sufi context was very profound. My heart was deeply touched in a way that felt right for me and where Allah was leading me.
When I met my sheikh in person, he lived in Jerusalem but traveled to the US for about a month each year. The first time I took bay'ah (initiation) directly with him, I felt like I was buzzing, every cell in my body feeling a shift. Throughout my journey with Sufism, I’ve had quite a few experiences where some part of me melts away, and I face something much greater than myself, some essential access to love and oneness. These experiences have changed me and carried me over the past 20 years on this path.
13:50
There have been plenty of times where my ego would much rather be Jewish. It feels more familiar, but I feel placed here and strive to listen and surrender. There have been struggles about where I’ve been placed, but I am now quite content. My heart drinks deeply, and I know all of our hearts thirst to drink from the divine source.
15:25
Saqib: Moving on to your book and the theme around heart-centered business: Before diving into your book, could you say something about the concept of heart-centered business and how it came about? The subtitle is "Healing from Toxic Business Culture So Your Small Business Can Thrive."
15:56
Mark Silver: Most people are aware of how toxic our economy and business culture have become. Modern capitalism has removed love from business, and it’s killing us—pushing the environment to its limits, causing catastrophic climate change, species extinction, and so on. This is all from the pursuit of profit. However, business can be healed and loved, transforming it into something that cares for one another without harm. Small businesses and self-employed individuals often bring heart and care to their communities. Business needs to be healed from within, calling forth the heart of business.
19:59
Saqib: Let's unpack that through quotes from your book. Here’s the first one that struck me: "This book is dedicated for Al-Amin whose example of being worthy of deep trust and love, I strive to follow in commerce and in life, the peace and blessings of the One be upon him."
20:43
Mark Silver: I was on a conference call with Sufis from different tariqas (orders). Someone mentioned the importance of following the example of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, not just after he attained prophethood but also before, as he was being shaped for it. This struck me deeply. Reading about his life, how much he honored women, his integrity as a merchant, and his trustworthiness in business deeply influenced me. What would it mean to walk with that much integrity? This dedication to Al-Amin reflects that aspiration.
24:47
Saqib: Next quote: "Love, if it were unleashed with strength, wisdom, and compassion, would annihilate the world of business as it is, turning it into something entirely different. If love had its way, business could be part of a culture and society that lifts us up and serves us all."
25:47
Mark Silver: One thing I love about Sufism is its strong language. Annihilation is a concept introduced early on. It’s about destruction and rebirth. When love moves through me, it can destroy old patterns and create new possibilities. For example, in 2018, our business needed radical change. The old form was washed away, and a new business model emerged. If enough of us allowed love to annihilate the old toxic business culture, the world of business would be unrecognizable and filled with goodness.
29:59
Saqib: Next quote: "The essence of business doesn't lie in the things transacted, nor the elements of transaction, nor the individuals involved in transacting. The heart of business rather lies in the aliveness of the so-called space between—its dynamic relationships, not particular things and persons and systems and structures that constitute the essence of business."
31:37
Mark Silver: Curiosity is a critical human capacity. Cultivating curiosity is one of the most powerful antidotes to shame. It shifts the internal narrative in a way that softens judgment and opens the heart to both truth and possibility. Cultivating curiosity brings healing. What happens if you don’t have this perspective? Everything goes to crap. If I fall into fear and forget the divine presence, I can treat people badly, shut down, and undermine trust. Forgetting the sacredness of relationships turns interactions into mere transactions, which harms both the business and the individuals involved.
44:55
Saqib: Mark, can you tell us more about your business, Heart of Business, and how it supports entrepreneurs in cultivating heart-centered businesses?
47:30
Mark Silver: Absolutely. We are very practical in our approach. We help people who are bringing their heart’s work to the world and making it a better place. Usually, people start by reading my book or taking our online assessment to understand their business's stage. We have an online learning community designed to support people at various stages with compassionate accountability structures, learning modules, live calls, spiritual nourishment, and virtual retreats every other month. For those in more advanced stages, we offer small group coaching and individual sessions. Our aim is to help people integrate their spiritual values into their business practices.
1:23:42
Saqib: Mark, thank you so much for being with us today. It's been an honor to speak with you, and inshallah, I look forward to more engagements in the future.
1:26:11
Mark Silver: Thank you. I'm touched and grateful for the space you're holding with The Hikmah Project and for the work you're doing.