East Forest recounts his powerful experience meeting and recording with Ram Dass, and offers a live set of transcendent music seamlessly interwoven with Ram Dass’s timeless teachings.

Check out more music from this spiritual collaboration: East Forest x Ram Dass

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In this episode, hear East Forest perform and learn more about:

• East Forest’s profound and intimate collaboration with Ram Dass 
• How the peace of nature can be a spiritual tool for us 
• The integral role of psilocybin and psychedelics in Ram Dass’s awakening and teachings
• The synergistic relationship between the audience and the performer during live music
• Relating to the wilderness within our own hearts through music
• The technology of our breath and how it calms us down into the present moment
• The human connection to nature and nature as a manifestation of God
• Loving all beings and all elements of the world around us
• Letting go of everything within ourselves that we do not need

This episode was recorded at the 2022 Summer Mountain Retreat. Join us for the Open Your Heart in Paradise retreat this December in Maui! 

About East Forest:

East Forest is a multidisciplinary artist, producer, and ceremony guide. Since 2008, East Forest’s “lush” (Rolling Stone) and “blissful” (NPR) music has blended ambient, neoclassical, electronic, and avant-pop to explore sound as a tool for inner journeys and consciousness expansion. Known for being the first musician to collaborate with Ram Dass, his latest endeavor is the feature-length film Music for Mushrooms, a narrative documentary showcasing the transformative power of psychedelics, music, and community.

"I'm not up here generating something and presenting something for you to passively receive. It’s more that your attention into this space, the Bhakti space, the love space, the emptiness, it feeds the emptiness itself for me to hopefully channel that back out. It’s like surfing: we go in, we go out. In that, we can have a real experience together that can be whatever it needs to be right now.” –East Forest

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Familiarizing listeners with the five Buddhist hindrances, Trudy Goodman suggests a compassionate return to mindfulness of the senses.

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In this episode, Trudy Goodman outlines:

• The 5 Buddhist hindrances: desire, aversion, sloth and torpor, restlessness/worry, and doubt
• Remembering that being affected by the hindrances is not a mistake or our fault, but instead is an opportunity to practice mindfulness
• How craving pulls us out of the present moment and how our senses can ground us back into awareness
• Reflecting on the feeling of wanting something, and whether our desires truly align with our core values
• The four kinds of suffering, most of which we have all experienced
• Understanding that aversion is not inherently ‘bad’ and how it can be a kindness to turn away from something that causes us pain
• Shifting our attention away from hostility and turning towards curiosity about our emotions
• Practicing walking meditation as a remedy to sloth and torpor 
• Getting to the root of our restlessness and discovering what we are trying to change about the present moment 
• How, beneath the paralysis of doubt and inner cynicism, there is often a lack of inner confidence 
• Living our lives fully, not wasting a moment, and being completely present as often as we can

“We each have our favorites of the hindrances, but again, these are not mistakes, these are not your fault, they’re part of the practice. When the mind gets lost in them, the doorway back to being present is through coming to our senses. What we see here, taste, feel, in this particular moment of our life. We know this is actually the only real moment of our life.” – Trudy Goodman

About Trudy Goodman:

Trudy is a Vipassana teacher in the Theravada lineage and the Founding Teacher of InsightLA. For 25 years, in Cambridge, MA, Trudy practiced mindfulness-based psychotherapy with children, teenagers, couples and individuals. Trudy conducts retreats, engages in activism work, and teaches workshops worldwide and online. She is also the voice of Trudy the Love Barbarian in the Netflix series, The Midnight Gospel. You can learn more about Trudy’s flourishing array of wonderful offerings at TrudyGoodman.com

Aversion is also here to protect us from things that are painful in this life, the problem is that aversion doesn’t understand what true protection is. True protection comes from understanding that we can meet our suffering, that we have strong enough mindfulness and strong enough ability to be present, that we can hold it, that we can meet it, that it isn't going to flood us, overwhelm us, and destroy us, which is often the fear.” – Trudy Goodman

This recording was originally published on Dharmaseed.org

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Reminding listeners that they can be fully supported and guided by the Dharma, Gil Fronsdal discusses the Buddhist concept of taking refuge.

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/beherenow and get on your way to being your best self.

In this episode of the BHNN Guest Podcast, Gil describes:

• The significance of going for refuge within the Buddhist tradition 
• How taking refuge can radically reshape your life and reorient your heart towards truth and freedom
• Analyzing our consciousness and what it is concerned with 
• Taking refuge in the right things (those which can be be depended on for safety, peace, support)
• Bringing 100% of yourself along to the refuge without holding back
• Why some people resist the concept of going for refuge
• Making the intentional, willful choice to live a life aligned with truth and awakening
• Trusting in the Dharma, surrendering, and knowing that it will always support you
• The wise story of a monk who always maintained an attitude of trust and positivity, to his own downfall 
• Taking refuge within ourselves and becoming independent within the Dharma rather than depending on other people 
• The essence of the Dharma: committing to a life that doesn’t cause harm 
• Taking refuge in the potential for awakening and freedom that we all have
• Finding refuge within the sangha, aka, our spiritual community 
• Offering refuge to others and ensuring that we are a source of peace for the world around us

“For me a very important aspect of this whole refuge thing is offering refuge to others, being someone that people can take refuge in, or being in the world in such a way that the world feels safe with you, supported by you, that the world has nothing to fear from you. Not just going for refuge or taking refuge, but offering refuge in return.” – Gil Fronsdal 

About Gil Fronsdal:

Gil Fronsdal is the co-teacher for the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California; he has been teaching since 1990. He has practiced Zen and Vipassana in the U.S. and Asia since 1975. He was a Theravada monk in Burma in 1985, and in 1989 began training with Jack Kornfield to be a Vipassana teacher. Gil teaches at Spirit Rock Meditation Center where he is part of its Teachers Council. Gil was ordained as a Soto Zen priest at the San Francisco Zen Center in 1982, and in 1995 received Dharma Transmission from Mel Weitsman, the abbot of the Berkeley Zen Center. He currently serves on the SF Zen Center Elders’ Council. In 2011 he founded IMC’s Insight Retreat Center. He is the author of The Issue at Hand, essays on mindfulness practice; A Monastery Within; a book on the five hindrances called Unhindered; and the translator of The Dhammapada, published by Shambhala Publications. You may listen to Gil’s talks on Audio Dharma.

This recording was originally published on Dharmaseed.org

"To take refuge is to be interested in shaping consciousness in a very different way, shaping our heart in a very different way, so that our heart, our mind, is depending on something that is worth depending on. Depending on something which can provide a stable peace. Depending on something which is dependable. Depending on something that can protect us, support us, inspire us, and even liberate us.” – Gil Fronsdal

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Framed by the Sufi wisdom of Rumi, a 13th century mystical poet, Omid Safi brings our awareness to the profound ways that we are interconnected with the divine.

This week on the BHNN Guest Podcast, Omid Safi discusses :

• Living as a reflection of the Divine—carrying ourselves as mirrors of God’s light on earth
• The gift of alchemy: the science that recognizes the whole of the universe as one essence 
• Transforming that which is lowly into that which is sublime
• Surrounding ourselves with communities and companions who bring us closer to God
• Polishing the mirror of the heart until we can shine divine qualities outwardly 
• Realizing that the beloved always was and always will be with us
• Experiencing the body as a vessel and conduit for grace
• The mystical whirling dervishes and their harmony with the universe
• Rumi’s best known work, The Spiritual Couplets, and its enduring inspiration
• Allowing our spiritual path to be supple, nourishing, and radiant with beauty
• Becoming what we already are (intertwined with the whole matrix of creation)
• Training our bodies to listen, to be gentle, to speak with love
• A brief history of the 13th century and the world Rumi was living in
• How the world can be healed through expansive love
• Death, dying, and embracing the infinite rather than being stuck in fear
• Befriending the heart and asking ourselves what feeds our souls

“When Rumi speaks about love, it is not just something sentimental and romantic. Love is nothing short of the unleashing of God onto this earth. Love is the very being of Allah. It is love that created you, it is love that brought you here, it is love that sustains you here, and if you can just get over this notion that you are a finite limited creaturely self, you can merge into this current of love and be carried back home.” – Omid Safi

About Omid Safi:

Dr. Omid Safi is the director of Duke University’s Islamic Studies Center. He specializes in the study of Islamic mysticism and contemporary Islam and frequently writes on liberationist traditions of Dr. King and Malcolm X, and is committed to traditions that link together love and justice. He leads spiritual tours every year to Turkey, Morocco, or other countries, to study the rich multiple religious traditions there. The trips are open to everyone from every country. More information is available at Illuminated Courses & Tours.

“The sages in Rumi's tradition, one of them from India says, ‘the One beloved is closer to you than the ocean is to the fish’. It’s a matter of reorienting, realizing that here and now where you are, you’re standing knee deep in the water of life, that the One has never abandoned you, the One is with you now as has been forever.” – Omid Safi

About The Host, Jackie Dobrinska:

Jackie Dobrinska is the Director of Education, Community & Inclusion for Ram Dass’ Love, Serve, Remember Foundation and the current host of Ram Dass’ Here & Now podcast. She is also a teacher, coach, and spiritual director with the privilege of marrying two decades of mystical studies with 15 years of expertise in holistic wellness. As an inter-spiritual minister, Jackie was ordained in Creation Spirituality in 2016 and has also studied extensively in several other lineages – the plant-medicine-based Pachakuti Mesa Tradition, Sri Vidya Tantra, Western European Shamanism, Christian Mysticism, the Wise Woman Tradition, and others. Today, in addition to building courses and community for LSRF, she leads workshops and coaches individuals to discover, nourish and live from their most authentic selves.

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Immersing listeners in hope and optimism, author Anne Lamott helps listeners cultivate resilience through stories of honesty and service.

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/beherenow and get on your way to being your best self.

In this episode, Anne Lamott holds a talk on:

• Service to others and selflessness as a clear path to hope
• Listening to the one-man band of our inner selves 
• The Three A’s in the 12-step program: Awareness, Acceptance, Action
• Allowing ourselves to feel the pain all around us, in the world, in our families, etc.
• Remembering that there is a solution to everything and that it is always spiritual 
• Reframing death as a step to new life and regeneration 
• Generosity as a natural human tendency that can be tapped into 
• Talking to ourselves as if we are our most cherished friend 
• Paying attention to the beauty in life and within ourselves

Check out the book recommended by Anne, A Distant Mirror. 

"Service is always a path to hope. When we can get out of ourselves and be there for others, it's what heaven will be like—what heaven on earth is like." – Anne Lamott

About Anne Lamott: 

Anne Lamott is the New York Times best-selling author of many books, including collections of essays, novels, and long-form non-fiction, including the classic writing manual Bird by Bird and child-rearing memoir Operating Instructions. In addition to being a novelist and nonfiction writer, Lamott is also a progressive political activist, public speaker, and writing teacher. Keep up with Anne on Instagram.

This episode is also brought to you by Dharma Moon.

Join Senior Buddhist Teacher David Nichtern for a provocative and playful online discussion exploring the profound practices of mindfulness and the journey of becoming a meditation teacher.

Learn more and sign up for a free online talk about becoming a meditation teacher with David at dharmamoon.com/deepening.

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Opening our hearts in practice, Trudy Goodman takes us through her Jellyroll meditation to encourage the expansion of metta from the self to others.

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/beherenow and get on your way to being your best self.

In this episode, Trudy Goodman illuminates:

• The heart’s natural capacity to love and heal—reclaiming our birthright to compassion
• Beginning metta (lovingkindness) practice with those we deeply love and who love us in return
• Feeling into the warmth, care, and well-wishes from those we visualize in our meditation
• Softening the mental walls that block us from receiving love and emotional support
• Powerful metta phrases to offer ourselves and others
• Embracing radical self-love—accepting ourselves just as we are
• Expanding lovingkindness to those we feel neutral about, widening our circle of care
• Extending compassion and goodwill even toward those we struggle with
• Using the power of imagination to radiate boundless love to all beings everywhere

This recording was originally published on Dharmaseed.

About Trudy Goodman:

Trudy is a Vipassana teacher in the Theravada lineage and the Founding Teacher of InsightLA. For 25 years, in Cambridge, MA, Trudy practiced mindfulness-based psychotherapy with children, teenagers, couples and individuals. Trudy conducts retreats, engages in activism work, and teaches workshops worldwide and online. She is also the voice of Trudy the Love Barbarian in the Netflix series, The Midnight Gospel. You can learn more about Trudy’s flourishing array of wonderful offerings at TrudyGoodman.com

“It's also a great practice to offer some loving kindness to the difficult parts of yourself. The parts you wish you could just have an 'ectomy' and get rid of them. A shame-ectomy or a blame-ectomy, whatever parts of yourself you find difficult to love, just hold them in some tenderness and care." – Trudy Goodman

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Gil Fronsdal reflects on Anicca, the Buddhist teaching often translated as impermanence, and offers a more precise lens for Western minds to understand its meaning.

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/beherenow and get on your way to being your best self.

In this episode, Gil offers wisdom on:

• How to create inner conditions that support the natural arising of wisdom
• Understanding inconstancy as a flow of coming and going, not a fixed state of change
• A powerful fable: The Emperor of China’s quest for a painting that embodies peace and wisdom
• Calming the agitated, restless mind through meditation and mindful awareness
• Discovering true peace and safety within ourselves, rather than chasing it in the external world
• The value of noticing the flow of change and where our minds are caught
• Knowing that it is not just the world that constantly changes, but also our perception of the world
• Floating in the river of change rather than trying to swim against it
• Seeing Anicca through the lens of insight meditation 

About Gil Fronsdal:

Gil Fronsdal is the co-teacher for the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California; he has been teaching since 1990. He has practiced Zen and Vipassana in the U.S. and Asia since 1975. He was a Theravada monk in Burma in 1985, and in 1989 began training with Jack Kornfield to be a Vipassana teacher. Gil teaches at Spirit Rock Meditation Center where he is part of its Teachers Council. Gil was ordained as a Soto Zen priest at the San Francisco Zen Center in 1982, and in 1995 received Dharma Transmission from Mel Weitsman, the abbot of the Berkeley Zen Center. He currently serves on the SF Zen Center Elders’ Council. In 2011 he founded IMC’s Insight Retreat Center. He is the author of The Issue at Hand, essays on mindfulness practice; A Monastery Within; a book on the five hindrances called Unhindered; and the translator of The Dhammapada, published by Shambhala Publications. You may listen to Gil’s talks on Audio Dharma.

This recording was originally published on Dharmaseed.org

"The mind is like a waterfall, furious and violent. There's not much peace in it. In that state, there's not much wisdom, not much clarity. This is one of the functions of meditation: to help us quiet the mind, settle it, and show the mind that there is an alternative to being restless and agitated. Teach the mind that the safety that it's looking for is found within.” – Gil Fronsdal

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Synthesizing the divine love found in Sufism with the primal emptiness found in Zen practice, Llewellyn reveals how each path has impacted his spiritual life. 

This episode is a companion to BHNN Guest Podcast Episode 213, Angels & Devas with Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check it out!

In this week’s episode, Llewellyn goes over:

• Understanding the essence of Ch’an (Zen) as a harmonious fusion of Taoism and Buddhism
• Interweaving the mystical threads of Sufism and Zen practice
• How both divine love and pure awareness dissolve the thinking mind
• Awakening to the inner light and Buddha nature within every being
• Becoming veiled by the play of illusions that we call life
• Llewellyn’s return to love after a childhood without it
• The mystery of divine love as a selfless force that seeks nothing in return
• Wisdom from Llewellyn’s Indian guru: “There is nothing but nothingness.”
• The vast, primal emptiness found at love’s distant shore
• Integrating pure consciousness into everyday life—not just on the meditation cushion
• Moving on from the drama of awakening into the calm silence of emptiness

About Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee:

Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Ph.D. is a Sufi teacher in the Naqshbandiyya-Mujaddidiyya Sufi Order. He is the author of Sufism, the Transformation of the Heart, and the founder of The Golden Sufi Center. Check out his new podcast Working With Oneness.

"Love gradually became part of my life. Like an invisible scent, a perfume from a hidden garden, it began to permeate me, and in one of the greatest mysteries that can happen to a human being, my heart woke up—that spiritual organ of divine perception that is the direct connection with the source of love, what the Sufis call the beloved." – Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee

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Deepak Chopra explores the inner universe and explains how turning inward connects us to God, higher consciousness, and the boundless intelligence of the cosmos.

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In this deeply intellectual episode, Deepak Chopra holds a lecture on:

• Three levels of existence: physical, quantum, non-local domain
• Defining God as the immeasurable potential of all that was, all that is, all that will be
• How we are intrinsically connected to the cosmos and universal intelligence
• Accessing the wisdom of the universe by turning inward
• Experiencing the divine through our own awareness, identity, and perception
• Ways we negotiate with the world and looking at the fight-flight response 
• The four control dramas rooted in childhood behavioral conditioning
• Our innate ability to be in touch with our inner observer—our soul 
• Understanding that consciousness can evolve 
• Freeing ourself from the past, from the known, and not being victimized by our memories
• Invoking Hindu deities like Ganesh for what they symbolize, their knowledge, their energy
• Numerous levels of God, the creative response, visionary response, sacred response, and beyond

“As is the atom, so is the universe. As is the microcosm, so is the macrocosm. As is the human body, so is the cosmic body. As is the human mind, so is the cosmic mind. If something is inside here, it’s everywhere. If it's not here, it's nowhere. You, by going inside, can have access to all the knowledge in the whole universe.” – Deepak Chopra

This episode was originally recorded in 2007

About Deepak Chopra:

Deepak Chopra MD, FACP, FRCP, is a Consciousness Explorer and a world-renowned pioneer in integrative medicine and personal transformation. Dr. Chopra is co-founder of DeepakChopra.ai, his AI twin and well-being advisor. He also co-founded Cyberhuman.ai, a transformative suite of personalized health and well-being solutions. Dr. Chopra is a Clinical Professor of Family Medicine and Public Health at the University of California, San Diego, and serves as a senior scientist with Gallup Organization. He is also an Honorary Fellow in Medicine at the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow. He is the author of over 95 books, translated into over forty-three languages, including numerous New York Times bestsellers.For the last thirty years, Dr. Chopra has been at the forefront of the meditation revolution. His mission is to create a more balanced, peaceful, joyful and healthier world. Through his teachings, he guides individuals to embrace their inherent strength, wisdom, and potential for personal and societal transformation. In his latest book, Digital Dharma, Dr. Chopra navigates the balance between technology and expanded awareness, explaining that while AI cannot duplicate human intelligence, it can vastly enhance personal and spiritual growth. Learn more about this book and others HERE. 

“The old paradigm said that human beings are self-contained; we are all independent. But, the new one says that human beings are focal points in one unified field. Unified means everything. Space, time, energy, information, and matter are all part of the field and we are inseparably connected with the pattern of intelligence and the whole cosmos. We are all a web of relationships.”  – Deepak Chopra

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Vipassana teacher Trudy Goodman shares how we can alleviate suffering by holding both universal and personal truths in our awareness.

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/beherenow and get on your way to being your best self.

In this episode, Trudy Goodman provides wisdom on:

• The interwovenness of the sacred spiritual world and the conventional world 
• The liberation found in not clinging to the personal or the universal
• How the ‘Big Mind’ of awareness can make our ‘small self’ vanish
• Using the fine details of daily life as doorways into vast awareness
• Reclaiming the sacred in the mundane: renewing presence in everyday moments
• Seeing ourselves in the world and the world in ourselves 
• Accepting reality and finding the goodness in all situations 
• Heart-opening stories of resilience and optimism amidst personal tragedy
• Lessons from Qigong: discovering depth and mindfulness in every movement
• Having room for personal heartbreak, but also knowing that everything is alright

About Trudy Goodman:

Trudy is a Vipassana teacher in the Theravada lineage and the Founding Teacher of InsightLA. For 25 years, in Cambridge, MA, Trudy practiced mindfulness-based psychotherapy with children, teenagers, couples and individuals. Trudy conducts retreats, engages in activism work, and teaches workshops worldwide and online. She is also the voice of Trudy the Love Barbarian in the Netflix series, The Midnight Gospel. You can learn more about Trudy’s flourishing array of wonderful offerings at TrudyGoodman.com

This episode was originally published on Dharmaseed

“The personal, the particular expression of life in the form of you, of me, of every single sentient being, is a dharma door opening into the vastness.” – Trudy Goodman

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