The prospect of controlling devices merely by the power of one’s thoughts is compelling, especially for assistive technology applications. In the accompanying video, we show how we have strived to push brain–computer interface (BCI) technology out of the lab and into the real world, while simultaneously moving away from testing solely with healthy subjects to undertaking trials with patients and potential end–users. We describe the evolution of the motor imagery based BCI, which has resulted in a major milestone: the first patient trial of a motor imagery based BCI controlled wheelchair.