Deep Transformation

Ep. 105 (Part 2 of 2) | Shachar Erez, longtime spiritual practitioner and integrally informed therapist in Israel, opens his heart, sharing his pain and overwhelming grief since the outbreak of war with Hamas and revealing another dimension of what’s going on than what we see in the news. It is a profound experience listening to a sensitive, compassionate person openly, honestly, courageously sharing what it feels like to be living with his family under threat of extreme violence, struggling to accept humanity as it is, working to help survivors reframe trauma to prevent PTSD, all amidst utter uncertainty as to the future of Israel and its people. Universal questions are raised: How to remain human in wartime? How is an ethical, spiritual, peaceful person to cope? Is there any hope for peace between Palestine and Israel? And, we are all broken—how do we accept the brokenness and continue to function?

The sustaining power of an integral-spiritual practice is clear—it is practice (intense workouts and meditation especially) that gets Shachar through and able to muster up the energy to help others, which in turn is so helpful to him. Shachar marvels at how sitting in the therapist’s chair allows him to embrace all that he hears—all the realities, all the horrors—when if he heard it on the news, he couldn’t take it. As a therapist, Shachar is very much thinking ahead to the near unimaginable challenge of helping all the people who are hurt by this war, in Gaza and in Israel, after the fighting stops. “How do you find a shrink for 12 million people?” he asks, adding, “This should be an awakening all over the Western world—people should not be living in fear like this in 2023.” Recorded November 1, 2023. 

“People should not be living in fear like this in 2023.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• What is Israel to do in this situation? (02:04)
• Israel is inevitably dropping to lower developmental stages—to hope there would be no vengeance is naive (03:40)
• How to understand a level of motivation where you sacrifice your own people? (06:49)
• There’s no more left wing in Israel—what’s the future of this place? (07:49)
• Why Shachar left progressive Berkeley and returned to Israel (10:53)
• Can peace happen? The Palestinians have been taught to hate, but John reminds us how the U.S. and Germany, the U.S. and Japan, were reconciled very quickly after WWII (13:30)
• The most important practice now: high intensity workouts (17:45)
• If numb, do something small to regain functionality and motivation (18:21)
• Other helpful practices: talking to people, meditation, volunteering & helping others (19:41)
• In trauma, you always feel like you are alone, but Israelis are good at coming together socially if not politically (21:25)
• In the midst of trauma and hatred, human kindness is healing (22:43)
• What can we who are not near the battle do to help? Stay open to the suffering, to the questions, and avoid dogmatic certainty (23:27)
• What would be the most humane response? Holding compassion but holding strength (26:35)
• This should be an awakening all over the Western world – there’s something that needs to be realigned: people should not be living in fear like this in 2023 (27:31)
• What is the right response ethically, practically? (29:16)
• How to remain human? Being with our experience, open to the feelings of others, accepting our humanity (31:38)

• What are the stages of development? (Integral Life website: a cinematic journey created by Corey deVos portraying Ken Wilber’s levels of development)
• Don Beck & Christopher Cowan, Spiral Dynamics*
• Ken Wilber on Violence vs. Nonviolence (Integral LIfe website)
• The Bhagavad-Gita: Krishna’s Counsel in Time of War* 
• Shachar’s website (in Hebrew): www.beinghuman.co.il 
• The Generous Marriage podcast, co-hosted by Shachar Erez
• Shachar’s Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/shachar.erez

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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Shachar Erez is a marriage and family therapist living and working in Israel. On good days, he helps couples fall in love again. He’s integrally informed. And trauma informed. And has been practicing an integral practice for many years. Shachar is married to Judy and father to three beautiful kids.

Since the horrors that happened in Israel and the war that is still raging, he feels like he’s been practicing all his life for this moment. 

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Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 104 (Part 1 of 2) | Shachar Erez, longtime spiritual practitioner and integrally informed therapist in Israel, opens his heart, sharing his pain and overwhelming grief since the outbreak of war with Hamas and revealing another dimension of what’s going on than what we see in the news. It is a profound experience listening to a sensitive, compassionate person openly, honestly, courageously sharing what it feels like to be living with his family under threat of extreme violence, struggling to accept humanity as it is, working to help survivors reframe trauma to prevent PTSD, all amidst utter uncertainty as to the future of Israel and its people. Universal questions are raised: How to remain human in wartime? How is an ethical, spiritual, peaceful person to cope? Is there any hope for peace between Palestine and Israel? And, we are all broken—how do we accept the brokenness and continue to function?

The sustaining power of an integral-spiritual practice is clear—it is practice (intense workouts and meditation especially) that gets Shachar through and able to muster up the energy to help others, which in turn is so helpful to him. Shachar marvels at how sitting in the therapist’s chair allows him to embrace all that he hears—all the realities, all the horrors—when if he heard it on the news, he couldn’t take it. As a therapist, Shachar is very much thinking ahead to the near unimaginable challenge of helping all the people who are hurt by this war, in Gaza and in Israel, after the fighting stops. “How do you find a shrink for 12 million people?” he asks, adding, “This should be an awakening all over the Western world—people should not be living in fear like this in 2023.” Recorded November 1, 2023. 

“I feel I’ve been practicing my whole life for this moment.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• Introducing Shachar Erez, integrally informed Israeli therapist specializing in helping couples fall back in love (01:16)
• Roger’s hope that this podcast can in some way help allay the extreme partisanship and anti-Semitism arising as a result of Israel’s war with Hamas (04:07)
• Describing murder, kidnapping, funerals brings Shachar to tears (05:22)
• John’s early experiences gaining an understanding of Israel and the Jewish people (06:10)
• How can a man with spiritual values like Shachar get through this time of war and acute stress? (09:23)
• The first week just doing small things to keep functioning, then being there for others, working out, doing Integral practices, is what’s getting Shachar through at this point (11:50)
• The blessing is a knowing at a deep level that everything is “okay” despite the horror and the brokenness (12:52)
• Struggling to find the “other” inside himself, in this case the ability to commit horrific acts, as part of his spiritual practice (13:29)
• The Nova music festival massacre, and working to prevent PTSD later by remembering, telling the story, and reframing terror into resourcefulness (14:16)
• A therapist’s ability to contain the realities they hear, and the idea of being a sin-eater, eating people’s pain (17:21)
• Telling the story, as an Israeli to Americans, Shachar’s heart is torn open—he is usually more of a “tough guy” (18:53)
• We are all broken: how do we accept the brokenness and continue to function? (20:49)
• Shachar feels he’s been practicing his whole life for this moment (23:15)
• There’s something magic that happens when you’re willing to be with others in their pain (24:40)
• Agony, openness, and the deep knowing that everything is okay, even though everything is broken and could get a lot worse (30:33)

• Shachar's website (in Hebrew): www.beinghuman.co.il 
• The Generous Marriage podcast, co-hosted by Shachar Erez
• Shachar's Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/shachar.erez
• Leon Uris, Exodus*
• Leonard Cohen, Anthem (YouTube video) 
• Steven Jenkinson, Die Wise: A Manifesto for Sanity and Soul*
• Francis Weller, The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief*
• Carl Jung “Learn your theories as well as you can, but put them aside when you touch the miracle of the living soul.”
• Julian of Norwich, medieval mystic, “All shall be well.” Author, Revelations of Divine Love*

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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Shachar Erez is a marriage and family therapist living and working in Israel. On good days, he helps couples fall in love again. He’s integrally informed. And trauma informed. And has been practicing an integral practice for many years. Shachar is married to Judy and father to three beautiful kids.

Since the horrors that happened in Israel and the war that is still raging, he feels like he’s been practicing all his life for this moment. 

---

Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 103 (Part 2 of 2) | “What if I lean into the pain and come out the other side and survive it—and what if I take you with me, as the reader, and together we deal with our pain?” asks Tyson Yunkaporta, author, senior research fellow, founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab. Tyson embodies this era of metacrisis, actively working with the global issues of our time in his work and in his personal life. His books are paradigm rattling and his whole life is a contribution—bringing forth ways in which Aboriginal Indigenous knowledge can help us, stating the need to find a collective narrative we can all agree on in order to survive, expressing himself with utter authenticity, and pointing out emphatically that each one of us is a web of relations, and that’s what matters most.

In his own uniquely raw, unguarded, authentic (and funny) way, Tyson describes his personal challenges with mental health and bipolar disorder and the states of mind he was in when he wrote his two books. Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World, was written in just weeks while manic. In dramatic contrast, Right Story, Wrong Story: Adventures in Indigenous Thinking was written while wrestling with depression. Tyson talks about disinformation and how we collectively need to get to the “right story;” about Aboriginal culture and what it means to be living in a colony; the amazing psycho-technologies Aboriginals have to deal with grief; the radicalization and polarization exacerbated by COVID lockdowns in Australia; the similarity between Indigenous knowledge and the scientific method; the sacredness of magic and how this cannot be scaled. Tyson is a window into Aboriginal Indigenous knowledge and a brilliant translator of that wisdom for the rest of us. Recorded September 21, 2023.

“Everything you are is a web of relations – you are a relational net.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• Introducing artist, academic, author, podcast host, and founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab, Tyson Yunkaporta (01:21)
• Aboriginal & white Australia is really just one world, with Australia squatting on top: living in the overlap space of the Venn diagram (02:50)
• How we survive: Aboriginal culture has amazing psychotechnologies of mourning and excels at cultivating humor to effectively heal the grief from facing death so often (05:45) 
• How the Aboriginals were indirectly responsible for the first corporation after spearing Dutchmen 500 years ago (06:57)
• Tyson’s new book, Right Story, Wrong Story spends a lot of time refuting his first book, Sand Talk (09:20)
• Sand Talk was written in a bipolar/manic episode in 2 weeks flat—it includes a lot of solid Indigenous wisdom as well as propaganda about Western institutions (09:51)
• Right Story/Wrong Story was written in a state of suicidal depression modeled on Dante’s Inferno (13:14)
• The effects of COVID and the harshest lockdowns on the planet on Aboriginal Australia & on Tyson (14:11)
• Right Story/Wrong Story looks at disinformation: how can we collectively get to the right story? (16:10)
• Tyson explains his mental health challenges and the paradox of being dependent on Western medicine and other Western institutions (17:55)
• The capacity to laugh is what gets you through (22:16)
• The neurological capacity of an echidna (22:58)
• How secular gurus, influencers, are nudging people in horrible directions like fascism, autocracy, exclusionary politics (24:31) 
• People get very depressed reading Sand Talk to where Tyson has to talk them off the ledge, similar to the effects of Post-Avatar Depression Syndrome (26:43)
• Tyson is a prototypical person, embodying the challenges of this metacrisis era: what if we all lean into the pain together? (28:45) 
• Where did the mania go during the 2 years of COVID lockdowns? And the descent into hell with Virgil (30:45)
• Sacred altered states are supposed to happen in ceremony only; mental illness is seen as something that impairs your hearing in Aboriginal society (32:20)
• Magic is not meant to scale; it’s supposed to be part of your custodial role in caring for the landscape (34:25) 
• Our hunger for Indigenous wisdom, for ancient wisdom, for nature’s wisdom (36:03)

• Tyson Yunkaporta, Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World*
• Tyson Yunkaporta, Right Story, Wrong Story: Adventures in Indigenous Thinking*
• John Steinbeck, Of Mice and Men*
• President Obama’s autobiography, A Promised Land*
• Ram Dass, spiritual teacher, master of acknowledging his mistakes
• Dante Alighieri, Inferno*
• Tyson Yunkaporta, founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab
• What is Deacon’s Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab? (YouTube video)
• Tyson’s podcast, The Other Others

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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Tyson Yunkaporta is an Aboriginal scholar, founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab at Deakin University in Melbourne, and author of Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World, and more recently, Right Story, Wrong Story: Adventures in Indigenous Thinking. His work focuses on applying Indigenous methods of inquiry to resolve complex issues and explore global crises. He is also an educator, traditional wood carver, arts critic, researcher, podcast host, and poet.

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Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 102 (Part 1 of 2) | “What if I lean into the pain and come out the other side and survive it—and what if I take you with me, as the reader, and together we deal with our pain?” asks Tyson Yunkaporta, author, senior research fellow, founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab. Tyson embodies this era of metacrisis, actively working with the global issues of our time in his work and in his personal life. His books are paradigm rattling and his whole life is a contribution—bringing forth ways in which Aboriginal Indigenous knowledge can help us, stating the need to find a collective narrative we can all agree on in order to survive, expressing himself with utter authenticity, and pointing out emphatically that each one of us is a web of relations, and that’s what matters most.

In his own uniquely raw, unguarded, authentic (and funny) way, Tyson describes his personal challenges with mental health and bipolar disorder and the states of mind he was in when he wrote his two books. Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World, was written in just weeks while manic. In dramatic contrast, Right Story, Wrong Story: Adventures in Indigenous Thinking was written while wrestling with depression. Tyson talks about disinformation and how we collectively need to get to the “right story;” about Aboriginal culture and what it means to be living in a colony; the amazing psycho-technologies Aboriginals have to deal with grief; the radicalization and polarization exacerbated by COVID lockdowns in Australia; the similarity between Indigenous knowledge and the scientific method; the sacredness of magic and how this cannot be scaled. Tyson is a window into Aboriginal Indigenous knowledge and a brilliant translator of that wisdom for the rest of us. Recorded September 21, 2023.

“If you can get a fellow like me to line up and share a narrative with everybody else and an agreement on what is real and what is not in the world, then I guess there’s going to be hope for everybody.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• Introducing artist, academic, author, podcast host, and founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab, Tyson Yunkaporta (01:21)
• Aboriginal & white Australia is really just one world, with Australia squatting on top: living in the overlap space of the Venn diagram (02:50)
• How we survive: Aboriginal culture has amazing psychotechnologies of mourning and excels at cultivating humor to effectively heal the grief from facing death so often (05:45) 
• How the Aboriginals were indirectly responsible for the first corporation after spearing Dutchmen 500 years ago (06:57)
• Tyson’s new book, Right Story, Wrong Story spends a lot of time refuting his first book, Sand Talk (09:20)
• Sand Talk was written in a bipolar/manic episode in 2 weeks flat—it includes a lot of solid Indigenous wisdom as well as propaganda about Western institutions (09:51)
• Right Story/Wrong Story was written in a state of suicidal depression modeled on Dante’s Inferno (13:14)
• The effects of COVID and the harshest lockdowns on the planet on Aboriginal Australia & on Tyson (14:11)
• Right Story/Wrong Story looks at disinformation: how can we collectively get to the right story? (16:10)
• Tyson explains his mental health challenges and the paradox of being dependent on Western medicine and other Western institutions (17:55)
• The capacity to laugh is what gets you through (22:16)
• The neurological capacity of an echidna (22:58)
• How secular gurus, influencers, are nudging people in horrible directions like fascism, autocracy, exclusionary politics (24:31) 
• People get very depressed reading Sand Talk to where Tyson has to talk them off the ledge, similar to the effects of Post-Avatar Depression Syndrome (26:43)
• Tyson is a prototypical person, embodying the challenges of this metacrisis era: what if we all lean into the pain together? (28:45) 
• Where did the mania go during the 2 years of COVID lockdowns? And the descent into hell with Virgil (30:45)
• Sacred altered states are supposed to happen in ceremony only; mental illness is seen as something that impairs your hearing in Aboriginal society (32:20)
• Magic is not meant to scale; it’s supposed to be part of your custodial role in caring for the landscape (34:25) 
• Our hunger for Indigenous wisdom, for ancient wisdom, for nature’s wisdom (36:03)

• Tyson Yunkaporta, Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World*
• Tyson Yunkaporta, Right Story, Wrong Story: Adventures in Indigenous Thinking*
• Tyson Yunkaporta, founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab
• What is Deacon’s Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab? (YouTube video)
• Tyson’s podcast, The Other Others 
• Venn diagram
• Dante Alighieri, Inferno*
• Echidnas, sometimes known as spiny anteaters
• Jordan Peterson’s YouTube channel: The Dr. Jordan B. Peterson Podcast
• The movie Avatar and Post-Avatar Depression Syndrome
• Beat poet John Kerouac, On the Road*
• Argumentum ad antiquitatem: Appeal to tradition
• Argumentum ad naturam: Appeal to nature

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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Tyson Yunkaporta is an Aboriginal scholar, founder of the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab at Deakin University in Melbourne, and author of Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World, and more recently, Right Story, Wrong Story: Adventures in Indigenous Thinking. His work focuses on applying Indigenous methods of inquiry to resolve complex issues and explore global crises. He is also an educator, traditional wood carver, arts critic, researcher, podcast host, and poet.

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Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 101 (Part 2 of 2) | With extraordinary joyfulness and verve, Native American shaman Charles Lawrence tells the inspiring and fascinating tale of how as a young man, he left psychology, religion, and the white man’s domesticated world in the dust when he became initiated on his journey by mythologist Joseph Campbell, and a paranormal world opened its doors. “If you have a destiny, you better go gracefully, or you’ll get dragged by your heels,” Campbell told him. Indeed, to this day, now in his late 80s, Charles follows the call to ceremonies and Elder Councils all over the world, sharing his sacred shamanic energy and wisdom in blessing and benefit for all. Part Blackfoot by origin, Charles was baptized by traditional Hopi Elders, adopted by elders of Lakota and Coast Salish (Musqueam band), and acknowledged and accepted by Native American tribes and Indigenous Peoples near and far. Here, Charles transmits his love of life, his fearlessness around death, and his easy familiarity with the multidimensionality of existence, the limitlessness in every moment. “Is there joy in this moment in time?” he asks. “If not, why not?”

In regard to our collective future, Charles tells us that solutions await us beyond our normal consciousness; in relation to our personal yearning, he describes the transformative power of being seen, being witnessed for who we are at the deepest level, to free our souls and break out of the box. He urges us to sing, to dance, and to “cry our own cry.” (“Nobody has your cry, your experience. You’ve got to cry your own cry.”) Charles also shares his liberating approach to death (“Dying is simple, just pull out the clutch and go into neutral!”), about how he acquired “death medicine,” a wonderful ability to help people make the transition, and his own death medicine practice. One cannot help but be thoroughly inspired and reinvigorated listening to Charles—as Roger wrote him afterwards, “You left a legacy of joy in all of us. I will sing and laugh more and open the door wider to Mystery because of it. And try to practice my last 10 breaths.” Recorded June 1, 2023.

“I live by deliberate intent, my default place is joy, my ultimate place is ecstasy.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• Solutions are already waiting for us beyond the average consciousness (01:17)
• Being a hollow bone and how opening to the Mystery is an ongoing practice (03:42)
• Stepping over the threshold, you are not the same person coming out: how are you different now? (04:56)
• Once you have been witnessed, you are forever changed (07:10)
• Raisa Gorbachev, Grandmother Carolyn, a trip to Russia in 2001, and on to South Africa with the Bush people (11:18)
• Why buy death by default? Die individually and make it a glorious journey, take your last 10 breaths as a practice (14:30)
• What is death medicine? (17:05)
• Everything about the journey is sacred, everything is wakan, and some of us are wake-makers (18:47)
• Grief is one of our biggest teachers (20:14)
• What is it that’s just waiting at any moment to burst out of us in joy? (22:29)
• Singing and dancing: your joy is essential to the emotional well-being of the village (25:31)
• The multidimensionality of existence and the shadow issues of Western culture—but it can be win-win-win, a benefit for all beings (32:11)
• I live by deliberate intent, my default place is joy, my ultimate place is ecstasy (34:21)
• Charles sings a Wallace Black Elk song (36:18)
• Transpersonal spontaneity (37:56)

• Albert Einstein, “You can’t solve a problem on the same level that it was created. You have to rise above it to the next level.”
• Rumi, “Out beyond ideas of rightdoing and wrongdoing, there is a field…”
• Oliver Sacks, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat*
• Raisa Gorbacheva, Soviet-Russian activist & philanthropist, wife of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev
• Katherine MacLean, neuroscientist & psychedelic researcher at Johns Hopkins, author of Midnight Water: A Psychedelic Memoir*
• Islam-Judeo-Christian (IJC), religions centered around the worship of the God of Abraham
• Adyashanti, American-born spiritual teacher
• Louis Armstrong’s What a Wonderful World (YouTube video)
• Bruce Lipton, On the Future of Human Civilization (YouTube video)
• Carl Hammerschlag, The Dancing Healers: A Doctor’s Journey of Healing with Native Americans*
• Books by Roger Walsh: https://deeptransformation.io/books/#roger-walsh
• Grandmother Carolyn (Carolyn Tawangyama) worked all over the world to promote world peace and spiritual growth. In her words: “A small group of people who overcome themselves will unite the prophecies and bring back unity for all people.”

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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The Personal Reality of Charles H. Lawrence

With a flash or two of lightning, a personal reality is shattered! Synchronously, the doors of perception open wide enough for a “guardian at the gate”—Joseph Campbell—to introduce Charles H. Lawrence to having a destiny that MUST be followed, or be dragged to: From rejected to chosen, from the very limited (Western) perspective of life to the astonishing expansive spectrum of Indigenous Intelligence and intimate personal—far outside the box/cage relationship with all Existence. From prescribed, programmed, “follow-the-leader Western societies’ rules to discovering the command to “find one’s own way through the darkest part of the forest” (The Hero’s Journey). The endless, constantly evolving, transforming experience of being but a small yet significant part of a greater story, and assisting the unfolding of New Myths that are waiting to happen.

Discovering that one had been predicted to show up—at least a hundred years previously (Coast Salish/ Musqueam). Learning the difference between being a “seeker” and “one who was sent.” Being a deliverer of long-cried-for assistance in far off reaches of the Earth (South Africa). Seen by a Peruvian Shaman as the one to assist in creating a Healing Center deep in the Amazon jungle. Being acknowledged as a visionary (Alta messiah) by the Quero of the Altiplano of South America. Recipient of a glimmering (NW Indigenous term) that created, decades ago, a Ceremonial Community that continues to evolve and transform into “Circles/ Communities” that serve the “Cries” of today. This, and much more!

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Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 100 (Part 1 of 2) | With extraordinary joyfulness and verve, Native American shaman Charles Lawrence tells the inspiring and fascinating tale of how as a young man, he left psychology, religion, and the white man’s domesticated world in the dust when he became initiated on his journey by mythologist Joseph Campbell, and a paranormal world opened its doors. “If you have a destiny, you better go gracefully, or you’ll get dragged by your heels,” Campbell told him. Indeed, to this day, now in his late 80s, Charles follows the call to ceremonies and Elder Councils all over the world, sharing his sacred shamanic energy and wisdom in blessing and benefit for all. Part Blackfoot by origin, Charles was baptized by traditional Hopi Elders, adopted by elders of Lakota and Coast Salish (Musqueam band), and acknowledged and accepted by Native American tribes and Indigenous Peoples near and far. Here, Charles transmits his love of life, his fearlessness around death, and his easy familiarity with the multidimensionality of existence, the limitlessness in every moment. “Is there joy in this moment in time?” he asks. “If not, why not?”

In regard to our collective future, Charles tells us that solutions await us beyond our normal consciousness; in relation to our personal yearning, he describes the transformative power of being seen, being witnessed for who we are at the deepest level, to free our souls and break out of the box. He urges us to sing, to dance, and to “cry our own cry.” (“Nobody has your cry, your experience. You’ve got to cry your own cry.”) Charles also shares his liberating approach to death (“Dying is simple, just pull out the clutch and go into neutral!”), about how he acquired “death medicine,” a wonderful ability to help people make the transition, and his own death medicine practice. One cannot help but be thoroughly inspired and reinvigorated listening to Charles—as Roger wrote him afterwards, “You left a legacy of joy in all of us. I will sing and laugh more and open the door wider to Mystery because of it. And try to practice my last 10 breaths.” Recorded June 1, 2023.

“What is it that’s just waiting at any moment to burst out of us in joy?“

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• Introducing psychologist and Native American shaman Charles Lawrence (01:04)
• How Charles left Western psychology & religion behind in the dust, beginning with his meeting mythologist Joseph Campbell and the opening of several paranormal doors (02:33)
• Living your destiny: follow the guidance, the intuition, whatever shows up (06:42)
• Native American wisdom has much medicine for us today; the knowing that everything is sacred (08:02)
• The Native American attunement to nature, sense of interconnection, and knowing that elders are to be revered contrasts sadly with our present culture (10:11)
• Charles’ call to meet Wallace Black Elk and his wife, Grace Spotted Eagle (12:17)
• Indigenous people’s special lens on reality and the death medicine tradition of the Ojibwe (14:23)
• Charles’ first Vision Quest in the Rockies while still a newbie (16:51)
• The Ghost Dance, the legend of the Broken Hoop, and inquiring into what would happen if we started gathering together again: weaving the basket of connection (19:10)
• How John came to travel with Wallace Black Elk, a man of connection and love with all beings (24:18)
• It still is the age of miracles! They don’t just happen in the Bible (27:14)
• How elders witness people, see people, and wake people up (28:06)
• Death medicine (helping people die): dying is simple, just push in the clutch and go into neutral (30:08)
• There is a difference between someone who is seeking something and someone who is sent (34:32)
• How Charles learned to talk to groups of hundreds of people with no microphone and fulfill the legacy, the prophecy, the path of destiny (36:20)
• Having a mission & being guided by something greater than you is an antidote to today’s cultural vacuum (37:10)
• What happened with John when Wallace Black Elk passed away (37:56)

• Joseph Campbell, professor, mythologist, author, The Hero with a Thousand Faces*
• Jean Houston, scholar, prolific author, visionary thinker, one of the principal founders of the Human Potential Movement  
• Robert Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land*
• Swami Muktananda, founder of Siddha Yoga
• Jean Erdman, modern dance dancer and choreographer, avant-garde theater director (Joseph Cambell’s wife), co-founder of The Open Eye Theater
• Joseph Campbell, Myths to Live By*
• Joseph Epes Brown, The Spiritual Legacy of the American Indian*
• Margaret Mead, Continuities in Cultural Evolution*, Culture and Commitment*
• Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan, Life is a Pilgrimage*
• Wallace Black Elk, Native American shamanic teacher, Black Elk: The Sacred Ways of a Lakota
• Grace Spotted Eagle: Thunder’s Grace: Walking the Road of Visions with my Lakota Grandmother* by Mary Elizabeth Thunder
• Bates Wilson, beloved superintendent of Arches National Park & Natural Bridges, the “Father of Canyonlands National Park”
• Malidoma Somé, Of Water and the Spirit: Ritual, Magic, and Initiation in the Life of an African Shaman*
• Stanislav Grof, Books of the Dead: Manuals for Living and Dying*
• George Soros, investor hedge fund manager, author, philanthropist

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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The Personal Reality of Charles H. Lawrence

With a flash or two of lightning, a personal reality is shattered! Synchronously, the doors of perception open wide enough for a “guardian at the gate”—Joseph Campbell—to introduce Charles H. Lawrence to having a destiny that MUST be followed, or be dragged to: From rejected to chosen, from the very limited (Western) perspective of life to the astonishing expansive spectrum of Indigenous Intelligence and intimate personal—far outside the box/cage relationship with all Existence. From prescribed, programmed, “follow-the-leader Western societies’ rules to discovering the command to “find one’s own way through the darkest part of the forest” (The Hero’s Journey). The endless, constantly evolving, transforming experience of being but a small yet significant part of a greater story, and assisting the unfolding of New Myths that are waiting to happen.

Discovering that one had been predicted to show up—at least a hundred years previously (Coast Salish/ Musqueam). Learning the difference between being a “seeker” and “one who was sent.” Being a deliverer of long-cried-for assistance in far off reaches of the Earth (South Africa). Seen by a Peruvian Shaman as the one to assist in creating a Healing Center deep in the Amazon jungle. Being acknowledged as a visionary (Alta messiah) by the Quero of the Altiplano of South America. Recipient of a glimmering (NW Indigenous term) that created, decades ago, a Ceremonial Community that continues to evolve and transform into “Circles/ Communities” that serve the “Cries” of today. This, and much more!

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Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 99 (Part 2 of 2) | In this riveting, disturbing, and hopeful conversation, addiction expert and recovery coach Dr. Bob Weathers explains the enormous difference it makes when we apply the Integral Model to addiction and recovery. It helps us cover all the bases in our understanding of addiction, from the neuroscientific to the spiritual, and offers a map for recovery in the form of integrated practices that target our physical, emotional, spiritual, relational, and system-coping needs. Bob’s mission in life is to educate—his clients, treatment professionals, policy makers—everyone who is affected by addiction one way or another (which is pretty much everyone) about this set of perspectives that is comprehensive enough to address something as complex as addiction. Bob is deeply familiar with addiction and the suffering it causes on a firsthand basis, and he shares his own experience with an open heart. He is also well informed about the big picture of addiction and shares the latest statistics: 46.3 million Americans are currently clinically addicted—only 6% received treatment last year.

What about the future of addiction? Technology is becoming increasingly capable of creating powerful “super stimuli,” making it ever more difficult for people to exercise self-restraint, and internet addiction and internet porn are through the roof. What can we do to influence the powers that be on a social/systemic level to guide us on a new path? One that recognizes that happiness correlates with connection, contribution, and flow rather than the never-ending quest for more acquisitions? Listening to this honest, heartfelt, and impassioned conversation, you will not be in the least surprised to find out Bob is the 2022 winner of the Most Dedicated Substance Abuse Education & Recovery Coach award. “Living a life of value, meaning, and purpose? If you want to talk about happiness, let’s talk about that.” Recorded May 15, 2023.

“We have got to begin to find creative ways to endorse restraint at all levels of our society.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• Making the turn towards recovery from addiction is like an “incredible lightness of liberation” (01:23)
• Transformative lifestyle changes (TLCs) and daily practice invite the grace to change (04:28)
• The crucial element of giving something up: surrendering self (06:50)
• Cultivating a daily practice of acceptance: How surrendered am I in this moment? (09:01)
• Addiction is a progressive disease—and it’s devolutionary (11:33)
• The changing face of addiction: internet addiction, internet porn, super stimuli, evolutionary traps, globesity (15:36)
• Is the plague of addiction going to get even worse? What happens when virtual reality goes online? (18:05)
• The importance of a soul-centric approach: finding your higher power and higher purpose (20:08)
• Richard Rawson’s research on the effect of drugs on the dopaminergic system in the body and the brain (23:44)
• 46.3 million Americans are currently clinically addicted—only 6% received treatment last year (25:36)
• To be human is to be enslaved: acknowledge there is no way we can compete with the stimuli we’re evolving, and the importance of restraint (26:06)
• What can we do as educators? Educate towards shifting public policy to something better than incarceration; harm reduction as opposed to a zero tolerance policy (27:38)
• What correlates with happiness? The illusion of acquisitiveness and how the happiest people are the ones who give back (29:43)
• The cultural roots of addiction (30:44)
• What makes Integral Recovery integral? (32:17)
• How would you define addiction and why can’t we be inclusive? (34:21)

• Roger Walsh, Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes (TLCs) Can Be Powerful Medicines
• Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self Reliance*
• Tish Warren, thought leader on internet addiction,  Managing Screen Time is a Family Matter (New York Times opinion)
• Carl Jung, “individuation is an opus contra naturam”
• Richard Rawson, Associate Director of UCLA Integrated Substance Abuse Programs, Current research on the epidemiology, medical and psychiatric effects, and treatment of methamphetamine use (National Library of Medicine)
• Gary Snyder, “the man who has the soul of the wolf knows the self-restraint of the wolf,” from Turtle Island*
• Martin Seligman, Authentic Happiness: Using the New Positive Psychology to Realize Your Potential for Lasting Fulfillment*
• David Courtwright, Forces of Habit: Drugs and the Making of the Modern World*
• What are the Four Quadrants? (Integral Life website)
• John Dupuy, Integral Recovery: A Revolutionary Approach to the Treatment of Alcoholism & Addiction*
• The Journey of Integral Recovery podcast with John Dupuy and Douglas Prater
• Dr. Bob Weathers, recovery coach: https://www.drbobweathers.com

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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Dr. Bob has created two powerfully healing and transformative guided meditations to which iAwake added brainwave entrainment technology. You can check them out here:

“It was a marvelous therapy for me. I’ve never been so candid and honest about myself and my past actions…it’s like months of therapy.”  ~ Nina

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Dr. Bob Weathers is a highly regarded addiction educator, recovery coach, author, and public speaker. Over the course of his professional career, “Dr. Bob” has provided tens of thousands of hours of therapeutic counseling and recovery coaching to satisfied clients. He has also committed over four decades to teaching, training, and inspiring graduate-level mental health providers at several southern California universities, including helping to develop their nationally accredited addiction studies certificate and mindfulness-based clinical training coursework. His two most recent books on addiction recovery are currently in press with Cambridge University Press.

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Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 98 (Part 1 of 2) | In this riveting, disturbing, and hopeful conversation, addiction expert and recovery coach Dr. Bob Weathers explains the enormous difference it makes when we apply the Integral Model to addiction and recovery. It helps us cover all the bases in our understanding of addiction, from the neuroscientific to the spiritual, and offers a map for recovery in the form of integrated practices that target our physical, emotional, spiritual, relational, and system-coping needs. Bob’s mission in life is to educate—his clients, treatment professionals, policy makers—everyone who is affected by addiction one way or another (which is pretty much everyone) about this set of perspectives that is comprehensive enough to address something as complex as addiction. Bob is deeply familiar with addiction and the suffering it causes on a firsthand basis, and he shares his own experience with an open heart. He is also well informed about the big picture of addiction and shares the latest statistics: 46.3 million Americans are currently clinically addicted—only 6% received treatment last year.

What about the future of addiction? Technology is becoming increasingly capable of creating powerful “super stimuli,” making it ever more difficult for people to exercise self-restraint, and internet addiction and internet porn are through the roof. What can we do to influence the powers that be on a social/systemic level to guide us on a new path? One that recognizes that happiness correlates with connection, contribution, and flow rather than the never-ending quest for more acquisitions? Listening to this honest, heartfelt, and impassioned conversation, you will not be in the least surprised to find out Bob is the 2022 winner of the Most Dedicated Substance Abuse Education & Recovery Coach award. “Living a life of value, meaning, and purpose? If you want to talk about happiness, let’s talk about that.” Recorded May 15, 2023.

“I’ll trade off the burdensomeness of addiction, of enslavement, any day for the freedom of transformative life practices.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• Introducing addiction expert, recovery coach, psychologist & author Dr. Bob Weathers (00:52)
• There are so many different perspectives on addiction and they often tend to be reductionistic (03:30)
• Fifty percent of people who see a therapist are clinically addicted (04:33)
• Bob’s own history with addiction and how he encountered 12-step meetings, Refuge Recovery, and eventually Integral Theory in the process of recovery (06:10)
• The neuroscience of addiction is often the missing piece in recovery and how incredibly important that piece is (11:39)
• The War on Drugs and the deinstitutionalization of mental hospitals in CA in the 70s resulted in drug related offenses accounting for 80% of those incarcerated (13:37)
• Providing conventional religious/spiritual responses to addiction doesn’t work for all (16:10)
• The road to recovery involves service (19:22)
• Do you need to have firsthand experience with addiction in order to understand and help addicts? And, the importance of knowing suffering (19:53)
• John’s portrait of addiction and the unspeakable hell of suffering it involves (23:15)
• John’s groundbreaking book, Integral Recovery, which applies the Integral Map to recovery (30:22)
• Where are we now with Integral Recovery and recovery in general? (34:15)
• How our understanding of the causes of addiction went from demonic possession to moral failure, from psychological to spiritual—and now is often a reductionistic neurological approach (36:10)
• One size does not fit all and the challenge of matching the treatment approach to the needs of each individual (38:28)
• It’s going to get worse as the technology to create & distribute drugs keeps getting more sophisticated (40:02)
• Integral practice is key: an integration of physical body practices, intellectual practices, interior/psychological practices, and spiritual practices (40:51)
• John’s song: A Drunk’s Prayer (45:32)

• Dr. Bob Weathers, recovery coach: https://www.drbobweathers.com
• Deane Shapiro & Roger Walsh, Meditation: Classic and Contemporary Perspectives*
• Noah Levine, Refuge Recovery: A Buddhist Path to Recovering from Addiction*
• Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory: What is the Integral Approach? (Integral Life website)
• Ken Wilber, Sex, Ecology, Spirituality: The Spirit of Evolution*
• John Dupuy, Integral Recovery: A Revolutionary Approach to the Treatment of Alcoholism & Addiction*
• Guy du Plessis, An Integral Guide to Recovery: Twelve Steps and Beyond*
• Trauma-Informed Approach and Trauma Specific Interventions (MentalHealth.org)
• Attachment theory
• Interpersonal neurobiology (IPNB) or relational neurobiology
• Ken Wilber’s Four Quadrants: What are the Four Quadrants? (Integral Life website)
• William Butler Yeats, “Things fall apart; the center cannot hold” from The Second Coming (poem)
• Rumi, “In this life many demolitions are actually renovations.”
• Allen Ginsberg, Howl (poem)
• iAwake’s audio recovery tool, Deep Recovery (guided meditation with brainwave entrainment music)
• Ken Wilber, Introduction to Integral Theory & Practice, AQAL, 2005 (RedFrogCoaching.com)
• Marco Morelli, co-author of Integral Life Practice: A 21st-Century Blueprint for Physical Health, Emotional Balance, Mental Clarity, and Spiritual Awakening*, with Ken Wilber, Terry Patten & Adam Leonard
• The Journey of Integral Recovery podcast with John Dupuy and Douglas Prater
• Michael Murphy & George Leonard, Integral Transformative Practice, see also Deep Transformation episode #58 with Michael Murphy, The Human Potential Movement Then & Now: 60 Years at the Leading Edge of Transformative Practice, Research & Action
• John’s song, A Drunk’s Prayer (on YouTube)

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

---

Dr. Bob has created two powerfully healing and transformative guided meditations to which iAwake added brainwave entrainment technology. You can check them out here:

“It was a marvelous therapy for me. I’ve never been so candid and honest about myself and my past actions…it’s like months of therapy.”  ~ Nina

---

Dr. Bob Weathers is a highly regarded addiction educator, recovery coach, author, and public speaker. Over the course of his professional career, “Dr. Bob” has provided tens of thousands of hours of therapeutic counseling and recovery coaching to satisfied clients. He has also committed over four decades to teaching, training, and inspiring graduate-level mental health providers at several southern California universities, including helping to develop their nationally accredited addiction studies certificate and mindfulness-based clinical training coursework. His two most recent books on addiction recovery are currently in press with Cambridge University Press.

---

Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 97 (Part 2 of 2) | In this moving, illuminating, and impassioned discussion, retired Police Lt. Chris Orrey and San Bruno Police Chief Ryan Johansen open our eyes as to the realities of policing in today’s world and offer solutions as to how the entire institution of police work could be transformed to become more effective and sustainable, both for police officers and for the communities they serve. Ryan and Chris explain that applying an Integral approach to police work—which BTW encompasses a lot more than simply law enforcement, to include the roles of social worker, mental health counselor, EMT, and more, in crisis situations—is exactly what is needed to turn around an institution that is controversial and flailing at this point. They point out that it is essential to prioritize officer wellness—not just physical wellness but interior wellness as well—and give officers the coping mechanisms and support they need to integrate the inevitable trauma of the job and role model resilience for the victims and survivors they interact with. An Integral understanding also paves the way for police leadership to become servant-based; where leadership puts the welfare of the officers first and foremost, and in turn, officers are in peak condition, mentally, physically, emotionally, to serve and protect their communities with compassion and skill.

Nationwide, it is a time of catastrophic crisis in police recruitment and retention. Most departments are severely understaffed and morale is at a dangerous low. Chief Ryan’s San Bruno police department, however, is fully staffed and the officers have high morale. By applying the principles of the Integral Model and practicing a heartfelt, servant-based leadership style, Ryan has turned this national trend around. Whether policing impacts you directly or not, there is much to be gained by listening to this stirring conversation, which reveals so much about the realities of our society and the incredible courage, compassion, and outright nobility it takes to be a police officer—putting your life on the line to protect and serve others every single day. Recorded July 6, 2023.

“I think that most police officers are exceptional human beings in that they are willing to endure tremendous suffering on behalf of others, most of whom they don’t know and will never actually get to know, and many of whom a lot of society has simply decided to bypass and would prefer to not even see.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• The pendulum swing of society’s opinions about cops and the story of Isaac Woodard (01:26)
• We can’t ignore what communities have suffered at the hands of police officers—historically and currently (04:58)
• What would Ryan do to make things better for officers? Focus on legitimately taking better care of cops (06:24)
• What the pendulum swing is doing today: the middle way is the right way (07:44)
• The developmental levels aspect of the Integral model holds great promise for policing (09:22)
• The expectation of officers to check their whole identity/personality at the door and California’s allowance of tattoos and other physical details (15:45)
• How do we help a community see cops as people like them? Overcoming the us vs. them mentality (17:45)
• How to develop officers as exceptional people who will show up? (19:42)
• If cops internalize the idea that their paramount purpose is to defend and protect human life, it will help them make the right split-second decision (22:13)
• We as individuals project everything from our personal traumas, relationship to authority figures, etc. onto police officers (26:52)
• Conveying to cops that their fundamental role is to protect people at all developmental levels— that’s what makes being a cop so noble (29:23)
• Bringing the Integral understanding to cops can make an enormous difference to both police officers and communities (31:13)
• The current catastrophic recruitment & retention crisis is pushing cops we do have out and deterring new officers (33:37)
• How do Chris and Ryan nurture themselves in this process? (36:24)
• Setting the example and prioritizing wellness practices—they are part of cops’ service (38:40)
• The importance and effectiveness of Integral Life Practice: practicing with iAwake Technologies’ brainwave entraining audio tracks, biofeedback & HRV regulation (41:04)

• Police Executive Research Forum
• George Floyd’s murder by a police officer in May 2020 had global impact on the issue of police brutality and reignited the Black Lives Matter movement
• Isaac Woodard, African-American WWII veteran beaten by police hours after he was honorably discharged and still in uniform for nothing more than standing up for his dignity on a bus—an event that galvanized the Civil Rights movement
• Orson Welles Radio Programs
• Brown v. Board of Education ruled that racial segregation in schools is unconstitutional
• Spiral Dynamics, Don Beck & Christopher Cowan, Spiral Dynamics*
• Steve McIntosh, Developmental Politics: How America Can Grow Into a Better Version of Itself*, see also Deep Transformation episode #20, Consciousness Evolves, Politics Can Too: Beyond the Culture War
• Jeff Salzman’s The Daily Evolver: A Developmental Take on the News, see also Deep Transformation episode #1, Polarization, Being Woke, the Universal Agenda, Mindfulness Going Bad, and the Integral Vision
• Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory & the Integral Life website
• Build Your Integral Life (Integral Life course)
• Integral Life’s cinematic course: What Are the Stages of Development?
• Roger Walsh, The World of Shamanism: New Views of an Ancient Tradition*
• Institute of Applied Metatheory: Integral Policing Transformation Initiative
• Integrative Policing: Bringing vulnerable communities and law enforcement together for good
• Foundation for Inner Peace’s A Course in Miracles* 
• Ken Wilber, Terry Patten, Adam Leonard & Marco Morelli, Integral Life Practice: A 21st-Century Blueprint for Physical Health, Emotional Balance, Mental Clarity, and Spiritual Awakening*
• iAwake Technologies: Transformative Brainwave Entrainment Technology to Deepen Meditation & Spiritual Life, Relieve Stress, Release Trauma

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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Ryan Johansen currently serves as the Chief of Police for the City of San Bruno, California, a diverse community of approximately 50,000 residents located amid the urban sprawl of the San Francisco Bay Area. Ryan has been a policing professional for approximately 20 years, beginning his career as a patrol officer with the Southeastern Division of the San Diego Police Department. Ryan transferred to the San Bruno Police Department in 2006, and in the years that followed, he has served in a variety of positions and assignments, including: Police Chief, Incident Commander, Tactical Commander, Field Services Division Lieutenant, Administrative Division Lieutenant, Watch Commander, Public Information Officer, Traffic Sergeant, Patrol Sergeant, Detective Corporal, Gang Unit Supervisor, Patrol Corporal, and Patrol Officer. Ryan served as the Investigations Commander for the San Bruno Gas Pipeline Explosion in 2008, the Incident Commander for the YouTube Active Shooter Incident in 2018, and the Tactical Commander for the Tanforan Mall Active Shooter Incident in 2019. 

Ryan has a longstanding meditation and contemplative practice and is a certified mindfulness meditation instructor. He serves as Vice President of the San Mateo County Police Chiefs and Sheriffs Association and is on the Board of the CA Police Chiefs Association. He has provided training in officer wellness, police culture, active assailant prevention and response, and public/private partnership in critical incident response all over the United States. Ryan possesses a Bachelor of Applied Sciences Degree in Law Enforcement Management, and he is currently enrolled in the Masters of Homeland Defense and Security Program at the Naval Postgraduate School’s Center for Homeland Defense and Security.

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Chris Orrey is a retired police lieutenant with over 30 years of service with the Hayward, California Police Department. She is a graduate of California’s Command College, an 18-month program designed to prepare law enforcement leaders for the challenges of the future, and the LAPD Leadership Training Program, which is based on the West Point Leadership Program. In true Integral fashion, she will soon have a Master’s Degree in Comparative Religion and Philosophy and will be continuing her education at the California Institute for Human Science, pursuing a doctorate degree in Integral Noetic Sciences with an emphasis on Wisdom Design. Her Master’s thesis is on the application of Wilberian Integral Theory to U.S. policing and is titled “Integral Policing: Transforming U.S. Policing via the AQAL Map.”

Chris is also a blackbelt in kajukenbo-style karate and an ordained minister of A Course in Miracles. She lives in San Francisco, California.

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Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell

Ep. 96 (Part 1 of 2) | In this moving, illuminating, and impassioned discussion, retired Police Lt. Chris Orrey and San Bruno Police Chief Ryan Johansen open our eyes as to the realities of policing in today’s world and offer solutions as to how the entire institution of police work could be transformed to become more effective and sustainable, both for police officers and for the communities they serve. Ryan and Chris explain that applying an Integral approach to police work—which BTW encompasses a lot more than simply law enforcement, to include the roles of social worker, mental health counselor, EMT, and more, in crisis situations—is exactly what is needed to turn around an institution that is controversial and flailing at this point. They point out that it is essential to prioritize officer wellness—not just physical wellness but interior wellness as well—and give officers the coping mechanisms and support they need to integrate the inevitable trauma of the job and role model resilience for the victims and survivors they interact with. An Integral understanding also paves the way for police leadership to become servant-based; where leadership puts the welfare of the officers first and foremost, and in turn, officers are in peak condition, mentally, physically, emotionally, to serve and protect their communities with compassion and skill.

Nationwide, it is a time of catastrophic crisis in police recruitment and retention. Most departments are severely understaffed and morale is at a dangerous low. Chief Ryan’s San Bruno police department, however, is fully staffed and the officers have high morale. By applying the principles of the Integral Model and practicing a heartfelt, servant-based leadership style, Ryan has turned this national trend around. Whether policing impacts you directly or not, there is much to be gained by listening to this stirring conversation, which reveals so much about the realities of our society and the incredible courage, compassion, and outright nobility it takes to be a police officer—putting your life on the line to protect and serve others every single day. Recorded July 6, 2023.

“The only way to meet the community demands of modern day policing Is to deploy officers who are healthy, happy, and well adjusted human beings, with a deep commitment to a well articulated purpose.”

(For Apple Podcast users, click here to view the complete show notes on the episode page.)

• Introducing San Bruno Police Chief Ryan Johansen and retired police Lt. Chris Orrey (01:00)
• What does it mean to be integrally informed? (04:46)
• Law enforcement is possibly the smallest component of what police do: the larger picture includes the roles of social worker, mental health counselor, big sister/big brother, emergency medical personnel, and more (05:49)
• Good cops embrace the role of societal “backstop” and excel at working with other agencies who carry on after the initial emergency (09:59)
• Is the training for cops enough? It’s gone from 3 months to 6 months (in CA), but it could really benefit from an Integral perspective (13:53)
• Training is often used as a scapegoat: every time there is a problem in policing people say this is a training issue, but whose fault is it really? (17:20)
• Integral leadership is essential in modern day policing (19:59)
• The four quadrants explained and how they apply to police reform (22:32)
• Healthy & toxic cultures in a police department are just like any other organization; they stem from how cops are taught to cope with the job and how they identify as a group (24:31)
• The goal is resilience: cops need to embrace the trauma of the job and integrate it; trauma + integration = resilience (25:59)
• A good integration requires a deep rooted peer support program, confidential counseling, a full paid hour of physically working out the stress of the job, wellness time, mindfulness training (27:53)
• Reframing trauma as not just a horror to be repressed but as an inevitable part of the profession that needs to be honored (31:04)
• Reframing trauma can also help cops better identify with victims and survivors and model that we can emerge stronger for going through the trauma (31:49)
• The top sources of stress for a police officer are 1) watching what humans are capable of doing to others, especially children, and 2) their own police administration (34:30)
• The double standard of expecting officers to practice procedural justice on the street when leadership is not practicing organizational justice to the cops (38:24)
• The critical importance of servant-based leadership (39:15)

• U.S. Dept of Justice’s FTO (Field Training Officer) Training Guide
• Institute of Applied Metatheory: Integral Policing Transformation Initiative
• Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory & the Integral Life website
• Build Your Integral Life (Integral Life course)
• Ken Wilber, Sex, Ecology, Spirituality: The Spirit of Evolution*
• What Are the Four Quadrants? (Integral Life website)
• This links to an article that touches on several studies on police stressors, with the O’Toole 2014 work being perhaps the most relevant: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/261440806_Introduction_to_special_issue_police_stress_and_trauma_recent_perspectives

* As an Amazon Associate, Deep Transformation earns from qualifying purchases.

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Ryan Johansen currently serves as the Chief of Police for the City of San Bruno, California, a diverse community of approximately 50,000 residents located amid the urban sprawl of the San Francisco Bay Area. Ryan has been a policing professional for approximately 20 years, beginning his career as a patrol officer with the Southeastern Division of the San Diego Police Department. Ryan transferred to the San Bruno Police Department in 2006, and in the years that followed, he has served in a variety of positions and assignments, including: Police Chief, Incident Commander, Tactical Commander, Field Services Division Lieutenant, Administrative Division Lieutenant, Watch Commander, Public Information Officer, Traffic Sergeant, Patrol Sergeant, Detective Corporal, Gang Unit Supervisor, Patrol Corporal, and Patrol Officer. Ryan served as the Investigations Commander for the San Bruno Gas Pipeline Explosion in 2008, the Incident Commander for the YouTube Active Shooter Incident in 2018, and the Tactical Commander for the Tanforan Mall Active Shooter Incident in 2019. 

Ryan has a longstanding meditation and contemplative practice and is a certified mindfulness meditation instructor. He serves as Vice President of the San Mateo County Police Chiefs and Sheriffs Association and is on the Board of the CA Police Chiefs Association. He has provided training in officer wellness, police culture, active assailant prevention and response, and public/private partnership in critical incident response all over the United States. Ryan possesses a Bachelor of Applied Sciences Degree in Law Enforcement Management, and he is currently enrolled in the Masters of Homeland Defense and Security Program at the Naval Postgraduate School’s Center for Homeland Defense and Security.

---

Chris Orrey is a retired police lieutenant with over 30 years of service with the Hayward, California Police Department. She is a graduate of California’s Command College, an 18-month program designed to prepare law enforcement leaders for the challenges of the future, and the LAPD Leadership Training Program, which is based on the West Point Leadership Program. In true Integral fashion, she will soon have a Master’s Degree in Comparative Religion and Philosophy and will be continuing her education at the California Institute for Human Science, pursuing a doctorate degree in Integral Noetic Sciences with an emphasis on Wisdom Design. Her Master’s thesis is on the application of Wilberian Integral Theory to U.S. policing and is titled “Integral Policing: Transforming U.S. Policing via the AQAL Map.”

Chris is also a blackbelt in kajukenbo-style karate and an ordained minister of A Course in Miracles. She lives in San Francisco, California.

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Podcast produced by Vanessa Santos and Show Notes by Heidi Mitchell