The Gathering Pod welcomes neuroanatomist Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor to talk about her new book, Whole Brain Living, which Martha describes as “brain science from a user’s perspective.” In 1996, Jill experienced a severe hemorrhage in the left hemisphere of her brain causing her to lose the ability to walk, talk, read, write, or recall any of her life. Then she rebuilt it back to full function over the course of eight years, emerging with a truly transcendent worldview. (Originally aired: Jue 13, 2021)

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Most people in our community have explored meditation, centering prayer, or other forms of spiritual contemplation … and may have come face to face with THE VOID. (Dun dun dunnnn.) Martha explains that when people encounter nothingness, they often feel fear and despair. Her own first experience with finding the void through meditation felt that way, but in this discussion she explains how we can transform our relationship with the void into one of creativity and genuine joy. (Originally aired: June 6, 2021)

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As we move toward life after Covid, many of us are feeling overwhelmed and paralyzed. We’re facing a deluge of decisions demanding attention, causing bottlenecks in our brains that make it impossible to focus on anything at all. Martha explains that the Practical Wayfinding: Creativity Mindset is the answer. Instead of allowing us to freeze up, it helps us remain curious, explore our options, and focus on building solutions. She offers us a few hacks to help us access our creativity under duress. (Originally aired: May 30, 2021)

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As any artist will tell you, creativity is rarely tidy. Lately Martha has been expressing her creativity by drawing and painting, relishing the trail of brushes, rags, and sketchbooks she leaves in her wake. Then, after working intently on one canvas, she decided she’d RUINED it … before she remembered that before order, there is chaos. When we decide to build something beautiful out of our lives, it will be messy. And when we see the mess, we are very close to success. (Originally aired: May 23, 2021)

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While promoting her new book, Martha found herself tapped out and exhausted. She quickly realized she hadn’t been using the one skill that helps her manage the rollercoaster of life: non-attachment. In this conversation, Martha explains that despite its somewhat uninviting name, this skill makes our good times last longer and go deeper, and makes our bad times easier to weather. She also explains how it relates to spiders and tells us how to apply it to our daily lives. (Originally aired: May 16, 2021)

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Ever think if you just try harder or achieve more, you’ll FINALLY feel whole and happy? Martha warns us that this is a misconception shoved at us by culture, which insists that fame, money, and accomplishment are the answers to everything. In reality, doing things that don’t feed our souls will be unfulfilling. We must go back to the first principles of what we love, back to the fundamentals of our true nature, to find activities and ideas that will be deeply rewarding. (Originally aired: Apr. 25, 2021)

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In this conversation, Martha reveals several freaky-deaky stories that she couldn’t quite squeeze into her new book, The Way of Integrity! She talks about finding and moving to her ranch in California, meeting a massive rattlesnake, a very unusual flock of turkeys, how she acquired her own personal labyrinth, and more. (Originally aired: Apr. 18, 2021)

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Just before the release of her latest book, The Way of Integrity, Martha describes feeling pulled in many directions and drifting away from her true self! She describes the ups and downs of preparing to release a huge creative project into the world, and her realization that she must get off the roller coaster of human emotion and back into the truth of her spirit. When your mind, heart, soul, and body are all telling the same story, everything in life flows more easily. (Originally aired: Apr. 11, 2021)

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Martha identifies as a codependent: someone who helps others even when helping is to her own detriment. Since many of Martha’s listeners have similar personalities, she shares a coping technique she formulated after reading Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss. People who don’t experience empathy, such as narcissists and psychopaths, are very hard for codependents to understand. Managing these relationships means acknowledging that empathy and reasoning are absent, and acting accordingly. (Originally aired: Mar. 28, 2021)

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This conversation took place right after the Spring Equinox, a time when day and night are equal in length. Martha points out that this is a time of transition and a reminder that life can be experienced cyclically if we so choose. She adds, though, that while we are experiencing spring again as part of a cycle, we are also experiencing this particular spring for the very first time. Perhaps it’s time to start an entirely new life, with fresh eyes and an open heart. (Originally aired: Mar. 21, 2021)

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