Awareness Explorers

In this episode we explore relationships as a path to awakening that reveals obstacles to love, and how MDMA can serve as a catalyst to open-heartedness. The book we discussed in this episode is  Ecstasy for Couples: How MDMA Therapy Can Create More Love and Less Conflict In Your Relationship To learn more about Ecstasy for Couples, please visit:  https://xtcforcouples.net/ For more information about the amygdala, which was mentioned in this episode:  https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/neuroscience/amygdala Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ To Support Awareness Explorers, please consider clicking the "Donate" button on any AwarenessExplorers.com page, or becoming a Patreon supporter:  https://www.patreon.com/awarenessexplorers NOTE: If you are a Patreon supporter and have not been receivi

In this episode, we talk to Kate Alvo about Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises (TRE) how they can release tension held in the body from stress and from traumas of the past, as well as how releasing stored tension naturally quiets the mind, offering a physical pathway to presence that can facilitate awakening. • Includes a guided meditation to help listeners tune into their bodies and notice direct present-moment experience without judgement. To learn more about Kate Alvo, please visit:  https://katealvo.com/ The books we discussed in this episode:  The Revolutionary Trauma Release Process: Transcend Your Toughest Times by David Berceli  https://treglobal.org/recommended-reading/ Shaking Medicine: The Healing Power of Ecstatic Movement By Bradford Keeney  https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Shaking-Medicine/Bradford-Keeney/9781594771491 Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to li

In this episode, we explore how technology is accelerating human transformation and consciousness, and we outline the five key areas that are driving this shift: psychedelics, nootropics, gadgets, new techniques, and AI coaching. • Includes a guided meditation leading us to recall a specific, highly awakened or peaceful experience and how to amplify the feeling with deep breaths and visualization. Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ If you want to listen to the meditations alone, you can find all of our meditations excerpted either in this playlist:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLThffcko0gAVvivvVVGNfQgJxbWB6dF6Z Or on our Awareness Explorers website:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/meditations To Support Awareness Explorers, please consider clicking the "Donate" button on any Awa

In this episode we talk to Amy Islip about her experiences with guided MDMA therapy, the profound spiritual awakening that ensued, and the resulting embodiment of spacious, open-hearted, love. • Includes a guided meditation leading us first, to rest in what is, free from stories and plans, allowing our bodies to soften, dissolve, and expand, and then, leading us to draw that expansiveness back into our bodies, minds, and the roles we play in everyday life. To learn more about Amy Islip, please visit:  https://thinkbetter.com.au/ Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ If you want to listen to the meditations alone, you can find all of our meditations excerpted either in this playlist:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLThffcko0gAVvivvVVGNfQgJxbWB6dF6Z Or on our Awareness Explorers website: 

In this episode, we respond to ChatGPT's summary of the top 15 recurring themes throughout the 200 episodes of Awareness Explorers to date, and elaborate on the ways they point to the realization of our true nature as infinite awareness. • Includes a list of Brian's Key Principles of Awareness, which can serve as a guided meditation. And here is a link to Pamela Wilson's "Cave of the Heart" meditation that we talked about in this episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1ONEN_h__8 Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ If you want to listen to the meditations alone, you can find all of our meditations excerpted either in this playlist:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLThffcko0gAVvivvVVGNfQgJxbWB6dF6Z Or on our Awareness Explorers website:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/meditations T

In this episode we discuss gurus and spiritual teachers and explore the potential benefits as well as the potential risks involved in following a guru. • Includes a guided meditation leading us toward finding our inner guru and asking a deep personal question. Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ If you want to listen to the meditations alone, you can find all of our meditations excerpted either in this playlist:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLThffcko0gAVvivvVVGNfQgJxbWB6dF6Z Or on our Awareness Explorers website:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/meditations To Support Awareness Explorers, please consider clicking the "Donate" button on any AwarenessExplorers.com page, or becoming a Patreon supporter:  https://www.patreon.com/awarenessexplorers NOTE: If you are a Patreon supporter

In this episode we talk with Beth Miller, author of Awakening is Not for the Faint of Heart: Risk Everything for Love, about her profound shift in consciousness, the integration of therapy and spirituality, and insights from long COVID, which was ultimately a gift, providing deep healing and spiritual growth, and requiring intense presence, surrender, and trust in life. To learn more about Beth Miller, please visit:  BethMillerPhD.com  https://www.bethMillerphd.com/ Or email her at bmillerphd@gmail.com Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:  # 6 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 joy All time chart  # 6 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart  # 47 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, pleas

In this episode we talk to Michael McCord, president of San Francisco Zen Center, on bringing Zen practices into daily life and work, and how enlightenment is seen as an ongoing process of increasing awareness, not a fixed end state to achieve. • Includes a guided meditation introducing the Zen practice of breath counting. To learn more about Michael McCord, please visit these San Franciso Zen Center pages:  https://www.sfzc.org/ https://blogs.sfzc.org/blog/2024/09/10/meet-sfzcs-new-president-michael-mccord/ https://www.sfzc.org/teachers/sozan-michael-mccord and on YouTube:  @SFZenCenter Or email him at: michael.mccord@sfzc.org The Zen manual discussed in this episode is the Tenzo Kyokun (Instructions for the Cook).  This site has links to a few translations:  https://www.themathesontrust.org/library/instructions-cook-tenzo-kyokun Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listene

In this episode we talk to Stephen Zerfas, co-founder of Jhourney, which offers retreats facilitating rapid access to jhana meditation states, described as positive feedback loops between attention and emotion, offering profound states of gratitude, peace and non-duality. • Includes a guided meditation focusing on relaxing the body while turning our attention to positive concepts such as gratitude and wishing for the well-being of all others. To learn more about Stephen Zerfas, please visit:  https://www.jhourney.io/ and on X: @jhanatech  https://x.com/jhanatech?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor The Oxford professor Stephen mentions in this episode is Shamil Chandaria. To learn more, please visit his YouTube page:  https://www.youtube.com/@ShamilChandaria And the books recommended in this episode: Right Concentration: A Practical Guide to the Jhānas, by Leigh Brasington The Path to Nibbāna. How Mindfulness of Loving-Kindness Progresses through the Tranquil Aware Jhānas to Awakening, by

In this episode we discuss strategies for handling bad news as an awakening person, balancing awareness and action.. • Includes a guided meditation addressing the dichotomy between taking action and acceptance, and how to bring these two seeming opposites into a workable equilibrium. Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:  # 6 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 joy All time chart  # 6 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart  # 47 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ If you want to listen to the meditations alone, you can find all of our meditations excerpted either in this playlist:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLThffcko0gAVvivvV

In this episode we discuss the concept of the Middle Way and explore how to move beyond polarities in spiritual practice and daily life, thus finding a balance between extremes and recognizing the interconnectedness of all things. • Includes a guided meditation in which we bring two opposite energies together to sense how they are intertwined and to feel a balance and a gentle equilibrium as we use breath to weave the two together. Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:  # 6 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 joy All time chart  # 6 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart  # 47 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ If you want to listen to t

In this episode, we talk to Kat (Katrijn) van Oudheusden, author of Seeing No-Self, and Beyond Illusion, about discovering the illusion of separation, and her set of essential inquiries that use empirical investigation of direct experience to point to our true nature. To learn more about Kat van Oudheusden, please visit:  https://katoudheusden.com/ Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:  # 6 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart  # 7 in the Top 100 joy All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart  # 46 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ To Support Awareness Explorers, please consider clicking the "Donate" button on any AwarenessExplorers.com page

In this episode we talk to Samuel Jacob, a contemporary spiritual teacher specializing in radical self-inquiry. He emphasizes the immediate availability of awareness, completeness, and happiness in the present moment. • Includes a guided meditation focusing on being aware that all appearances arise “here” without effort, and emphasizing the relaxation of any attempt to arrive here, which is where the I, awareness is. To learn more about Samuel Jacob, please visit: https://www.samueljacob.org/ or on YouTube: @being-happiness or on Instagram: @samueljacobness Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:  # 6 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart  # 7 in the Top 100 joy All time chart  # 6 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart  # 45 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart To learn more about Awareness Explo

In this episode we explore the concepts of the inward and outward facing paths. They are presented as different approaches in various traditions that, if pursued to their core, eventually arrive at a direct experience of a unified life. • Includes a guided meditation that extends the ancient neti neti practice of excluding all concepts of what you conceive yourself to be, and then re-including all so-called outer experience, thereby seeing that all is awareness and not separate from your true self. Short phrases to help you get a handle on the inward and outward facing paths:      Nothing you can name or conceive of is awareness. Nothing you could name or conceive of is not awareness.      Meditating with your eyes closed and looking within at awareness, and meditating with your eyes open and looking at the world as awareness.      “Wisdom tells me I am nothing. Love tells me I am everything. And between the two my life flows.” ― Nisargadatta Maharaj The song Jonathan mentioned in this episode is “Impermanenc

In this episode, we interview John Travis, founding teacher of Mountain Stream Meditation Center, exploring his spiritual journey and teachings, and his emphasis on the importance of integrating mind, heart, and body in spiritual practice. • Includes a guided meditation grounding attention in the body and sense perceptions as a pathway inward to the recognition of awareness as encompassing everything, thus breaking the illusion of separateness. To learn more about John Travis, please visit:  https://www.mtstream.org/ and  https://www.mtstream.org/john-travis Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:  # 6 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart  # 7 in the Top 100 joy All time chart  # 6 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart  # 8 in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart  # 45 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart To learn more about Awareness Explo

In this episode, we discuss the relationship between trauma and spiritual awakening, and how trauma can not only obscure awareness but can also catalyze awakening. We also describe some effective trauma healing approaches. • Includes a guided meditation helping us to see an upsetting incident from the past within the larger peaceful space of pure awareness, which is unshaken by traumatic experience, and which holds and supports everything. The YouTube playlist mentioned in this episode: Spiritual Laughter Particularly, “Jeff Foster - All That's Left is Laughter” Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:   # 5 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart  # 6 in the Top 100 joy All time chart  # 5 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart  # 7 in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart  # 44 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart To learn more about Awareness

In this episode we discuss intuition, its nature, how to access it, and its relationship to awakening. • Includes a guided meditation helping you to cultivate the open receptivity required for intuition. Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:   # 5 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart  # 5 in the Top 100 joy All time chart  # 5 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart  # 7in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart  # 43 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit:  https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ If you want to listen to the meditations alone, you can find all of our meditations excerpted either in this playlist:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLThffcko0gAVvivvVVGNfQgJxbWB6dF6Z Or on our Awareness Explorers website:  https://www.awarenessexp

In this episode we talk with Robert Rugg, author of Awakening to Effortless Being: Realizing Your Infinite Self, about his spiritual journey, his teachings on effortless being, his approach to self-realization, and how to incorporate the principles of wholeness into daily life and interactions with others • Includes a guided meditation inviting us to rest in the stillness, the silence, the presence, the space of beingness, the aliveness which has always been here, and which is noticing and allowing everything, and to watch how life takes care of life. To learn more about Robert Rugg, please visit:  https://effortlessbeing.net/ And you can also view his YouTube channel, @effortlessbeing5162: https://www.youtube.com/@effortlessbeing5162 and check out his books: Awakening to Effortless Being: Realizing Your Infinite Self The Mirror is the Medicine: How to Help Others Heal without Fixing Them Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. N

In this episode we explore the topic of rituals and their impact on experiencing deeper peace, love, and joy in life. • Includes a guided meditation in which we reflect on past meaningful ritual experiences, imagine new possibilities for personal rituals, and consider timing and context for implementing new rituals. Don't forget to subscribe for more ingenious ways to tap into the ever-present stillness and joy of our true nature. NEWS: Awareness Explorers has made the following top listener charts on Goodpods:   # 5 in the Top 100 awakening All time chart   # 6 in the Top 100 joy All time chart   # 5 in the Top 100 awareness All time chart   # 7in the Top 100 consciousness All time chart   # 43 in the Top 100 meditation All time chart  To learn more about Awareness Explorers, and to listen to all of our podcast episodes, please visit: https://www.awarenessexplorers.com/ If you want to listen to the meditations alone, you can find all of our meditations excerpted either in this playlist:  https://www.youtube

In this episode we talk to Pernille and Todd Lent Damore, founders of the Awakening Curriculum, about the Wheel of Identification, which is their framing of the Ten Buddhist Fetters, as well as practical applications to wake up moment to moment in the midst of everyday life. Their focus is on direct experience with no resistance and no labels. • Includes a guided meditation exploring the felt sense of where “you” are located, by exploring where it seems to be showing up within the space of our senses, including visual, auditory, and bodily sensations, and looking at our raw experiences without labeling them. To learn more about Pernille and Todd Lent Damore, Guest Explorers, please visit:  https://theawakeningcurriculum.com/ Or if you have questions, you can email:  unfetterdmindfulness@gmail.com And you can also view their YouTube channels:  @TheAwakeningCurriculum on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@theawakeningcurriculum and @unfetteredmindfulness on Youtube  https://www.youtube.com/@unfetteredmindfulne