Oprah’s Super Soul – Tim Storey: How Do You Turn a Setback into a Comeback?

Release Date: January 28, 2026
Host: Oprah Winfrey
Guest: Tim Storey (Ordained Minister, Author, Motivational Speaker, Life Coach)

Episode Overview

In this deeply inspiring episode, Oprah sits down with Tim Storey, renowned for counseling celebrities and those in need of hope, to unravel the spiritual and practical principles of turning setbacks into comebacks. Together, they explore personal stories of loss and disappointment, the pathway through pain, spiritual calling, and reclaiming purpose and identity. Tim shares wisdom from his book “Comeback and Beyond” and provides vital teachings for anyone facing adversity, helping listeners find meaning, healing, and forward motion in the face of life’s inevitable difficulties.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setbacks: From Personal Pain to Universal Experience

• Tim’s Story of Loss ([01:45]–[03:20])
  • Tim shares losing his father at age 10, which shifted the “rhythm” and “vibration” of his household from joy to sorrow.
  • “I was in the middle of a setback at 10.” – Tim [01:45]
  • The aftermath: siblings medicated their pain, but Tim chose a different path, later taking on a leadership role.
• Recognizing Setbacks ([02:32]–[03:20])
  • Setbacks are felt long before they have a name.
  • Pain has a “scent,” and the absence of a parent creates a lasting void.

2. Getting Stuck: Why It Happens to Everyone

• Universal Nature of Setbacks ([03:57]–[04:11])
  • Tim: “I’ve never been here before. So when they fall down, they don’t know what to do to get back up. So they sit in their setback, and then they settle in their setback because they’re not trained.” [04:11]
  • Even wealthy, accomplished people linger in the pain of unhealed wounds (example: the 70-year-old man still chasing his father’s approval) ([05:18]–[05:49])
• Living from the Past
  • Oprah: “You try to go back and try to make it like it was and try to fix it the way it was.” [05:05]
  • Tim: “A comeback is not a go back.” [04:55]

3. Steps Toward a Comeback

• Acceptance Comes First ([06:46]–[07:19])
  • Oprah & Tim agree that spiritual teachers, including Eckhart Tolle, stress the necessity of accepting the now.
  • “Acceptance doesn’t mean you like it… They almost don’t want to sign for the package.” – Oprah & Tim [07:26-07:38]
• Stop Nursing, Cursing, and Rehearsing ([06:27])
  • Tim describes how many people “nurse it, curse it, and rehearse it” instead of moving forward.

4. Reclaiming Your Joy: Getting Your ‘Shout’ Back

• Losing and Reclaiming the Volume of Life ([07:56]–[09:57])
  • Disappointment “makes the heart sick” and “can take away your shout.”
  • Tim: “Life can knock the shout out of you.” [08:58]
  • But: “When life tries to take me down to a whisper, just shout on purpose.” [09:21]
  • Gratitude for being alive, regardless of age or current circumstances, as a daily ‘shout’ [09:57]

5. Calling, Purpose, and the Path Forward

• Finding Calling by Listening Within ([10:09]–[14:50])
  • Tim: “Live a life worthy of your calling. To live a life means to be alive in your life. Most people are not alive in their life today.” [10:16]
  • Oprah stresses: “Your life isn’t about a big break. It’s about one significant life transforming step at a time.” [10:38]
  • Tim: “Today’s decisions are tomorrow’s realities.” [11:25]
• Stop, Look, Listen ([13:54])
  • Tim encourages slowing down, listening to the dreams within: “Every dream that’s inside you is speaking to you. Your dream has a voice.”

6. The God Thing vs. Good Thing: Destiny and Divine Purpose

• Being Pulled By Calling ([15:18]–[16:01])
  • Tim explains difference between a human-manufactured “good thing” and a divinely inspired “God thing.”
  • “You could have the right plan, be the right person, have the wrong partners, and then you’re in trouble.” ([16:01])
  • Relationships and right partners are crucial to staying on your “yellow brick road.”
• Tweetable Moments ([16:49]–[17:41])
  • “You are a mighty person in the making.” – Oprah [17:04]
  • “A masterpiece in progress. A miracle in motion… a vessel of honor for his purposes.” – Oprah [17:09-17:35]
  • Tim: “You really are a miracle in motion. We are all going through recovery and discovery at the same time.” [18:00]

7. Using Pain and Failure Constructively

• Fail Forward ([18:27]–[18:51])

  • “There’s a lesson in every one of those failures...We could fail forward. It’s not final because of these mistakes.” – Tim

• Knowing You’re On the Right Path ([18:51]–[19:37])

  • Tim: “There is an innate peace that comes... even if there’s turmoil around you.”

8. Unique Value and Divine Identity

• Created in God’s Imagination ([19:51]–[20:37])
  • “You’re made in his image, in his likeness. Number two, you’re made with his imagination… I’ve been born an original. Why do I want to die a copy?” – Tim
• The Value of Being ‘Spoken Over’ ([20:48]–[21:09])
  • Tim: “When someone devalues you, you’re devaluing someone that God spoke over.”
• Needing External Validation ([21:09]–[21:58])
  • Both discuss celebrity culture vs. inherent worth from the divine speaking over every life.

9. Setbacks Don’t Discriminate

• Pain is Amplified, Not Diminished, By Fame ([24:01]–[24:41])
  • Tim: "Being famous...everything's just amplified." [24:10]
  • His approach: “Let’s knock out the noise… don’t get dramatic in the midst of the drama… play it down and pray it up.” [24:41]

10. Returning to Innocence: Remembering Your Essence

• Healing Through Memory and Compassion ([25:41]–[27:21])
  • Tim discusses taking people (including celebrities and athletes) back to their childhood places or showing baby pictures to help them remember their innocence and truest self.
  • “The real you will remind you of the person you’re supposed to become.” – Tim [26:52]

11. Lessons In Challenge and Divine Order

• Asking: ‘Why is it here?’ ([27:21]–[27:53])
  • Tim: “If [difficulties are] there, I want to figure out: Why is it here? What’s my lesson?” [27:43]
• Known and Unknown Corners ([28:11]–[29:08])
  • Life has “just around the corner” moments—sometimes fear and unworthiness hold us back from them.

12. Worthiness, Mind Renewal, and God’s Opinion

• Addressing Unworthiness ([29:08]–[31:03])
  • Oprah: “How can you ever fully step into the destiny that God has designed for you if you don’t feel worthy?” [29:40]
  • Tim: “Be renewed by the spirit of your mind.” [30:02] (Romans 12)
  • “God’s opinion of me makes man’s opinion irrelevant.” [30:59]

13. Relationship, Not Religion

• Prayer as Relationship ([32:12]–[32:43])
  • Tim: “Prayer is communication, but to me, it’s communicating with my father. I believe that God is my father…he downloads purpose to me.”
• Setback as Distance from the Center ([32:43]–[33:23])
  • Oprah: “Isn’t our sadness, our setback… proportional to how far we are from the center of God?”
  • Tim: “100%.” [32:56]

14. Healing the World’s Greatest Wound

• Misunderstanding and Healing ([33:23]–[34:07])
  • Tim: “One of the greatest wounds is misunderstanding…How do we heal it? By listening.”
• Root of Racism and Prejudice ([34:07]–[34:31])
  • Ignorance and an unwillingness to listen drive prejudice.

15. Living in the Light

• Choosing Your Input, Guarding Your Energy ([34:38]–[36:12])
  • Tim: “We can create boundaries...I cannot let that stuff seep in me.”
  • Oprah agrees about the importance of controlling one’s energetic space: “I can listen to it if I choose whatever it is to come into my sphere.”

16. Defining God and Spirituality

• Father, Not Just God ([36:19])
  • Tim: “Father… He’s a father to the fatherless. I go to the Father side of God.”
• Religion vs. Spirituality ([36:27]–[37:09])
  • Religion: Man striving to reach God.
  • Spirituality: Yielding and accepting love from God, resting in relationship.

17. Final Reflections

• I believe… ([37:22]–[37:26])
  • Tim: “That all things are possible. That even in the midst of biggest challenge, while you’re feeling the sting of your setback, God is preparing your comeback. All things are possible.”
• Gratitude ([37:41]–[38:06])
  • Tim: “I am most grateful for the opportunity to help change people’s lives. It blows me away.”

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “A comeback is not a go back.” – Tim Storey [04:55]
• “We nurse it, curse it and rehearse it.” – Tim Storey [06:27]
• “Acceptance doesn’t mean you like it.” – Oprah [07:28]
• “When life tries to take me down to a whisper, just shout on purpose.” – Tim Storey [09:21]
• “You are a mighty person in the making. A masterpiece in progress. A miracle in motion.” – Oprah [17:04-17:09]
• “God’s opinion of me makes man’s opinion irrelevant.” – Tim Storey [30:59]
• “Prayer is communication…but to me, it’s communicating with my father.” – Tim Storey [32:12]
• “The real you will remind you of the person you’re supposed to become.” – Tim Storey [26:52]
• “I’ve been born an original. Why do I want to die a copy?” – Tim Storey [20:18]

Key Timestamps for Important Segments

| Timestamp | Segment | |---------------|-------------| | 01:45-03:20 | Tim’s childhood setback and loss | | 04:11-05:49 | Universal experience of getting stuck, story of 70-year-old man | | 06:27 | Nursing, cursing, rehearsing setbacks | | 07:19-09:57 | Acceptance, getting your “shout” back | | 10:38-11:49 | Life is a series of small, meaningful steps | | 13:54-14:50 | Finding your calling by listening within | | 16:01-16:49 | Right plan, right person, wrong partners | | 18:27-18:51 | Failing forward | | 20:18-21:09 | Divine imagination and worth | | 24:01-24:41 | Setbacks for celebrities and amplifying pain | | 25:41-26:52 | Returning to innocence via baby pictures/memories | | 27:43-27:56 | Challenges as teachers—“Why is it here?” | | 29:08-31:17 | Unworthiness, mind renewal, God’s opinion | | 32:12-32:43 | Prayer as relationship | | 33:23-34:07 | Healing misunderstanding by listening | | 36:19-37:09 | Defining God and spirituality | | 37:22-38:06 | “I believe…all things are possible.” & gratitude |

Overall Tone

The conversation is equal parts gentle, affirming, and powerful—rooted in spirituality but accessible to anyone facing adversity. Oprah and Tim speak intimately and passionately, embracing vulnerability and faith, while equipping listeners with actionable wisdom. Their rapport is warm and respectful, punctuated by laughter, “tweetable moments,” and memorable insights from personal experience.

For Listeners Seeking:

• Guidance on healing from setbacks,
• Steps to “accept the now” and move forward,
• Wisdom on purpose, calling, and identity,
• Spiritual tools for transformation,
• Validation that pain is universal—fame and fortune do not exclude anyone from life’s challenges,

this episode offers profound comfort, hope, and practical direction.

Recommended listens within this episode:

• The story of Tim’s childhood and processing loss ([01:45]–[03:20])
• Oprah and Tim’s exchange on acceptance and setbacks ([06:46]–[07:43])
• Insights on “the shout,” reclaiming joy ([08:05]–[09:57])
• Life as a series of steps, not big breaks ([10:38]–[11:49])
• Handling life’s unknown “corners” ([28:11]–[29:09])
• Clarity on God’s calling, imagination, and destiny ([19:51]–[21:09])

Listener’s Takeaway:
Pain is inevitable, but getting stuck is a choice. Acceptance, gratitude, deliberate joy, and deep listening bring us back into the flow of life and spirit. Each setback can be the soil for a comeback—if we step forward boldly, remember our unique worth, surround ourselves with the right partners, and stay open to the “just around the corner” surprises of a divinely led life.