How Doug Noll Turned Trauma, Law, & Neuroscience Into Life-Changing Conflict Mastery

The Mike Litton Experience

Mike Litton

Careers, Kids & Family, Business, Parenting

5 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 2 December 2025

⏱️ 70 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Discover the extraordinary journey of Doug Noll — award-winning lawyer, mediator, author, martial artist, neuroscience researcher, and co-founder of the groundbreaking Prison of Peace project. In this powerful episode of The Mike Litton Experience, Doug reveals how childhood disabilities, elite education, a 22-year legal career, martial arts training, and neuroscience transformed him into one of the world’s leading experts in de-escalation, empathy, and conflict resolution.

From helping settle impossible disputes to training thousands of incarcerated men and women with a zero recidivism rate, Doug shares insights that will completely reshape how you think, lead, and communicate—especially in an age dominated by AI.

In This Episode, You’ll Learn:

How Dartmouth’s early computer science program shaped Doug’s analytical mind
The case that used linguistics and AI-style analysis decades before AI existed
Why a law degree builds unmatched critical-thinking skills
How martial arts and Tai Chi broke his arrogance and reshaped his worldview
The emotional-listening breakthrough that changed his life in 2005
The neuroscience behind conflict, emotions, and why rationality is a myth
The origin and global expansion of Prison of Peace
Why empathy is the most powerful leadership skill of the 21st century

Whether you’re a leader, a parent, a communicator, or simply someone who wants deeper human connection, this episode delivers practical wisdom you can apply immediately.

If you enjoy this episode, don’t forget to LIKE, COMMENT, and SUBSCRIBE to The Mike Litton Experience so you never miss inspiring conversations that push your life and career forward.

Connect with Doug Noll: [email protected]
Learn more: DougNoll.com

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	I started out as a trial lawyer.
0:02.4	And the way we were resolving to speech was through adversarial process, right? Right. Then I become a peacemaker. Yeah. I'm stepping into the conflicts after the conflict has arisen to try to help people find peace. And now I'm at a place where why have you have a fight in the first place. So the problem is I didn't have a lot of influential people. A lot of people just didn't have the patient.
0:21.8	It was sad that a lot of adults didn't have the patients to really work with me.
0:26.6	And I mostly I have to learn everything on my own.
0:29.6	And that was, it was rough.
0:31.1	I took that exam four times and failed three and finally on the fourth time I passed. And every time I failed, it wasn't because of my technical knowledge or my teaching ability. It was because I wasn't a good, strong enough skier. So what I changed to pass that fourth time is I took up the martial arts. And I ended up studying martial arts, uncontrollable deep sobs for like three or four minutes. Pushed the tissue box over, he blows his nose, wipes himself up, and he looks across the table and says,
0:57.3	that's the first time you've listened to me in 25 years.
1:01.5	And they settled the case and walked out holding hands.
1:05.2	And I sat there dumbfounded.
1:07.0	Yeah.
1:08.9	Like, what in the world did I just do?
1:11.2	Did you know there's a technology that's actually an app on your phone that uses sound waves to tell your brain what you want your brain to do?
1:18.8	We had a young man that was a guest on our podcast, the Mike Litton experience, who had a traumatic brain injury.
1:24.6	He was sleeping three hours a night.
1:26.6	He's using Newcomb now and he's
1:28.0	sleeping more. Go to Newcom.com. Mike 15 promo code. Newcom promo code Mike 15 for an extra 15%
1:35.7	off. Go today. Welcome to the Mike Litton Experience podcast. Everyone has a story and our passion
1:44.1	is to help them tell it. Mike is passionate about being a
1:47.9	father, a teacher, a realtor, an investor, and a leader. And now introducing the host of the
1:54.6	Mike Litton experience, Mike Litton.
2:00.4	Doug Noll, thank you so much for being our guest on the Mike Lytton experience.
2:05.3	I'm super excited for our time together.
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 16 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Mike Litton, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Mike Litton and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.