The HighExistence Podcast

East Forest is a man of many talents.

Composer, explorer, facilitator, innovator, digital shaman — the list goes on.

Many of us know him through the music he produces, the experiences he’s crafted, or for the meditations and retreats that he hosts. He recently burst back into the spotlight with his latest album release ‘Ram Dass’ — a collaboration project he did with the renowned spiritual teacher himself.

It was one of the last public projects that Ram Dass undertook before his passing.

We sat down with East Forest to go into the woods on everything with him: his creative process, his views on spirituality and metaphysics, the value of inner work and exploration, and a whole lot more.

East Forest has the makings of a wise elder — reserved and focused in his speech, but able to convey a level of wisdom and reverence that is truly stunning.

We hope you enjoy this conversation with East Forest, as well as a few samples of songs that appear on the Ram Dass album.

• What East Forest thinks of music and meaning
• The production of music as the birthing of the new
• Navigating uncertainty as a creator
• The metaphysics of meaning and human life
• Collaborating with Ram Dass
• Spontaneous emergence through courageous leaps
• Digital shamanism and the future of psychedelic experiences
• Slow down and tuning in with yourself, for yourself
• MUCH MORE...

Watch the video of this interview here.

Patrick McKeown is the author of the acclaimed The Oxygen Advantage.

I was first recommended this book by my friend and mentor Justin Noppé to help with my breathing during Brazilian jiu-jitsu.

The book blew my mind. I consider myself fairly knowledgeable about topics like health, fitness, anxiety, and stress...

But there was so much highly useful information in this book, I knew I had to started putting the ideas into practice immediately.

Then COVID-19 hit.

The more research I did on this disease, the more I wanted to talk to Patrick about it.

COVID-19 is a respiratory disease, so the world's leading authority on the Buteyko breathing method should surely have some useful input.

I reached out to Patrick and he agreed to speak.

It was an incredibly illuminating 90-minute discussion, and a few days later I attended his masterclass—did not disappoint.

Whether you're new to Patrick's work or already familiar, there will be a ton of value for you in this episode.

• How to breathe to avoid spreading and catching COVID-19
• How to breathe if you are suffering from anxiety
• The insane benefits of nasal breathing
• How to combine breath work and meditation
• The Wim Hof Method and its drawbacks
• How to measure the health of your lungs
• Simple ways to dramatically improve your athletic performance
• Simple techniques to improve your sleep overnight
• MUCH MORE...

https://youtu.be/i6bXKYS2mk4

“We appear to be heading for a level of existence that is beyond our ability to even imagine: the universe is being recalled; we are going home.”

Bob Frissell came into my reality in quite a fitting fashion: By synchronicity.

I was in a bookstore called Myopic Books in Chicago, perusing the esoteric and occult section.

A book caught my eye.

It was called, Nothing in This Book is True, But It's Exactly How Things Are.

I grabbed the book and began to page through it.

In the few days prior I had discovered and begun reading the work of Drunvalo Melchizedek, a fascinating spiritual teacher who discusses things like unity consciousness, sacred geometry, ancient civilizations, miraculous feats of spiritual masters, and Merkaba energy fields.

Paging through Nothing in This Book is True, I was serendipitously surprised and delighted to find mention of Drunvalo Melchizedek.

I realized the book extensively discussed Drunvalo's teaching and elaborated on the same general constellation of topics.

It became clear that it was "heavily indicated" to purchase this book and read it.

I would later learn that the book, originally published some 25 years ago, had become a cult classic and sold half a million copies worldwide.

I devoured the book in the coming days, greatly enjoying its mind-bending contents.

Then, on a whim, I decided to email the author, Bob Frissell, after discovering his website. I mentioned I'd be interested in interviewing him.

Within a couple days, he replied, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Bob and I 'sat down' digitally and had one of the most far-reaching, cranium-detonating conversations I've ever had.

It was a lot of fun.

If you're open to radical ideas that will challenge your understanding of history, the origins of humanity, our purpose on this planet, and what we're truly capable of, you won't want to miss this one.

Visit HighExistence.com for more podcasts. 

Important note:

The HighExistence dialogues are where the three creators Jon Brooks, Eric Brown, and Mike Slavin come together to discuss life, the universe, and everything in between.

But if you'd like to follow up with us individually, be sure to subscribe to our new YouTube channels. Here are some places you can find out more...

• Mike Slavin's beautiful video on how to navigate loss

• Jon Brooks's practical video on Stoic strategies for overcoming anxiety

• Eric Brown in conversation shares his masterful insights on how to be productive

When’s the last time you learned something for the first time?

It might have been a while.

For many, education stops the moment school is finished. Should it continue to be this way? How we can learn new skills so that we can stay sovereignty and adaptable to a future that is constantly in flux?

Learning is the ultimate meta-skill.

It is the foundation of acquiring any other skill. It is the foundation that resilient humans are built upon.

To this end, there are a number of techniques, mindsets, and teachers that can be instrumental in helping us move towards mastery.

In the latest instalment of the HEx Dialogues, we dive into the nuance and opportunity present in learning, bending reality, and picking up the pace of skills acquisition.

If you find yourself wanting to become more adaptable, to level up quickly and consistently, this is a blueprint to doing exactly that.

• The great teachers and allies along the path
• A massive list of recommended readings and resources
• Jon, Mike, and Eric's take on what we're learning right now
• The fundamentals of skills acquisition and learning
• Is accelerated learning real? The potential and pitfalls
• The shortcomings of the current educational matrix
• How to bend reality and the journey to being superhuman
• The long and short road to mastery
• MUCH MORE...

Do you hear the call right now?

The call to rise up, to step into your power, to be the hero. To take actions for yourself, your community, and your world.

These are the tests that we've been waiting for.

This is the call to be a Hero.

This is where you can demonstrate the fruits of your inner work.

In times of uncertainty, the best things you can do are often the smallest steps. Take care of yourself and others. Remaining grounded and centered. Check-in on others and see what help is needed. Coordinate information and resources. Contribute. Show Up.

It is under this thread that we embark again today on another Dialogue, sitting down to riff on these concepts and far more, dissecting the mythological significance and opportunity that the COVID-19 pandemic is offering individuals.

With some reframing, some individual empowerment, and a lot of diligence – we can all find space here to step further into our power, to embrace this as an opportunity to rise up and be the Hero in a time that needs more of them.

• Cultivating sovereignty in uncertain times
• The slippery slope of framing humanity as a virus...
• The danger of listening to successful people
• What nobility looks like and why it's been lost
• How the Hero's Journey relates to global events
• The revitalization of the Warrior archetype
• How to be the hero that the world needs
• MUCH MORE...

The world is currently experiencing an unprecedented historical experience.

Many of us find ourselves somewhere amidst the confusion and seeming chaos, looking for a way to orient ourselves, to be of service to our families and our communities, and for the opportunity hidden somewhere within the fog of emergent confusion.

If you have been doing the work in your life, now is a chance to put this all into practice. To maintain your composure, to rise up in the face of adversity, to become a beacon of light in the dark.

But where do we go? What will we do? How do we make sense of what is happening to us?

These are the questions that we explore in our first HighExistence Groupcast. Come and join the core HighExistence team as we sit and discuss what's been happening and what we can do about it.

We'll be releasing a number of these informal Groupcasts together exploring anything and everything that's coming up for us.

Right now, we feel a strong call to show up, to be of service to our community, to you.

We dig into the what, why, and how of rising up, of how to be the Hero in this time, how to walk towards the Dragon of Chaos and rise up as the world wants to push you back down.

• Discovery of the Presence of God by David Hawkins
• Nondualism and 'lesser emotions'
• Fear and social contagion
• The presence and prevalence of COVID-19
• Practical and tactical steps to take for yourself and others
• The mythological significance of this time
• How Stoics respond to adversity and uncertainty
• Reclaiming play and peace during isolation
• MUCH MORE...

I get faced with the question, "Why would you do more than one plant medicine retreat or ceremony? What is the value?" And really, fundamentally, after doing one, you're a different person. Really. Completely. Particularly if you dive super deep into process, you can fundamentally transform. And with that brings a whole different life; a whole different set of goals; a whole different personality structure; a whole different set of problems and challenges that you face. So for all the same reasons that enabled you to go into one, you can go into more.

Using psychedelics is a fantastic way to see what your ordinary mind is like and how it works.

For many of us, psychedelics can reveal patterns that are going on all the time, but under the intense spotlight of plant medicine we see it less as a background murmuring and more of a strong soul-punch that makes us writhe around in agonising self-reflection.

There is so much advice out there on set and setting and how to navigate a difficult psychedelic experience, but one of the few people whose advice I would take seriously on this subject is Eric Brown.

Eric is the type of psychonaut that can dive very deep into process and yet still remember his training—breathing, mindfulness, cognitive distancing, trust, surrender.

Whenever I talk to him after an experience of his, I am amazed at how lucid his recollection is and how he navigated the difficult moments with Jedi-level calm.

So it was my pleasure to spend 3.5 hours (longest interview ever) going very deep into Eric's recent 3-week trip to Peru where he partook in a very strict plant diet, which included copious amount of sacred tea drinking, ayahuasca, kambo, and fasting from modern distraction and pleasure.

This episode of the podcast will show you in vivid detail how plant medicine works, how it can transform you, how to prepare, integrate, and generally think about working with ancient plant technologies.

• Eric's retreat and psychedelic experience.
• The trap of viewing retreats as the next spiritual high.
• The difference between lying and bullshitting.
• Eric's view on meditation and how he practices mindfulness.
• How to prepare for a psychedelic experience.
• What do do when a "bad trip" happens.
• Eric's story of the 3-week dieta in Peru.
• How to "communicate" with the medicine.
• The right and wrong way to integrate mystical experiences.
• WAY MORE...

Hangout with him at an Apotheosis Retreat

Read Eric's work here.

Say hi on... Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

“Here’s the thing. You are not responsible for other people’s feelings. They’re not incompetent children. They’re adults who can handle their own feelings. They can work through disappointment, hurt, anger, sadness, and upset. In fact, doing so will make them stronger and healthier in the long run. You cannot stop others from feeling all discomfort, or all pain. It is an impossible task, a fool’s errand.” 

There are four main models of how anxiety is caused.

The first three are fairly obvious:

1. Exposure — we get anxious about the things we avoid
2. Cognitive — our irrational thoughts can make us more anxious
3. Biological — changes in our biochemistry can make us more anxious

The fourth however, is a little harder to grasp:

"The hidden emotion model."

This model stipulates that we can get anxious because there are very obvious things in our life that we are not addressing.

The hidden emotion model, is really just another way of saying "niceness."

When we are "nice" we let things slide, we don't speak up, we suppress our emotions, we make sacrifices we wish we hadn't...

All of this can lead to suppressed feelings, and ultimately anxiety and depression.

This used to be me, until I started consuming information by Dr. Aziz Gazipura.

At its core, being nice is about being liked by others by making everything smooth. No waves, no friction. It’s based on this (woefully inaccurate) theory: If I please others, give them everything they want, keep a low profile, and don’t ruffle feathers or create any discomfort, then others will like me, love me, and shower me with approval and anything else I want. 

Dr. Aziz is someone who has all the charisma of someone like Tony Robbins (who he trained with), but has a PhD in clinical psychology.

What does this mean? His work is both entertaining and scientifically sound.

Dr. Aziz has many profound insights about life, psychology, and transformation, but he specialises in social confidence.

In this episode, I had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Aziz.

Here’s what we discuss in the episode of the HighExistence Podcast:

• Why he focuses so much on "niceness" in his work.
• The role of trauma healing vs. self-optimisation.
• The importance of Shadow work, and how to do it.
• Finding balance between being assertive and compassionate.
• Dr. Aziz's transformation out of shyness.
• How to express yourself unapologetically.
• And much, much more...

• Read his book Not Nice (highly recommended)
• Podcast: Shrink for the Shy Guy
• Website
• Youtube channel

In today’s episode of the HighExistence podcast I sit down for a wild and wide-ranging discussion with Eric James.

Eric is a serial entrepreneur, award-winning photographer, magician, app developer, and all-around polymath who has discovered principles that help him engineer his own luck.

It just so happens that I met Eric in a stroke of luck 5 years ago at a dinner party.

He walked in and I instantly recognized him but not as a person I had met before.

He looked like a celebrity to me but couldn’t quite place it.

As I started talking to him suddenly it clicked.

Eric had started one of the first online magic shops.

It just so happened was watching his video when I was in 8th grade trying to become a magician myself.

And now here he was standing in front of me 10 years later.

We hit it off so well that we ended up becoming roommates for 2 years.

And this little anecdote is just scratching the surface of Eric’s stories of surfing serendipity (wait until you hear about Elon Musk and Richard Branson).

Here’s what we discuss in the episode of the HighExistence Podcast:

• White Swans: How positive plot twists and happy curveballs in our lives can change everything (and why it’s important to hold the faith in the face of adversity)
• How a bed bugs, a breakup, and 200K in tax debt lead to an important encounter with Elon Musk
• Eric’s path to meeting Richard Branson in an attempt to become a space photographer (see his photography here)
• The counter-intuitive truth on goal setting: Why big bold goals are easier to accomplish than small ones
• Living laterally, portal jumping and leaving traditional career paths behind
• How Red Light Therapy can be used to boost energy

Mentioned in the podcast:

• Eric’s Photography: https://jamesazure.com
• The Dear Moon Project: https://dearmoon.earth/
• The Overview Effect: https://vimeo.com/55073825
• Excellence vs. Genius: https://www.edge.org/response-detail/23879
• Red Therapy: https://redtherapy.co/ (use code “highexistence” for $25 off)

Mike Gilliland and Euvie Ivanova sort of remind me of a Sagacious Power Couple from another dimension.

Their Future Thinkers Podcast—focused on evolving technology, society, and consciousness—has garnered 3.5 million downloads since its genesis in 2014.

They've interviewed Titans of Insight such as Daniel Schmachtenberger, Ken Wilber, Jordan Peterson, Charles Eisenstein, Jordan Hall, and Nora Bateson.

They've spent years traveling the world, earning a living as digital nomads, and have spoken at myriad events on multiple continents.

I was fortunate to befriend Mike and Euvie some years ago and first met them while traveling in Bulgaria.

From our original meeting, I've been impressed by their humility, groundedness, centeredness, penetrating insight, and no-nonsense approach to life and spirituality.

I think of them as two of the most actualized humans I've had the honor to know in this lifetime.

As such, I was supremely delighted to have the opportunity to interview them for the HighExistence Podcast.

Naturally, I wanted to ask them about all the juiciest stuff:

Enlightenment...

God...

No Self...

The human shadow...

The future of Earth...

Their relationship...

Their impending parenthood...

And their most profound transformational experiences...

So I did, and we traversed some truly rich and expansive territory.

I hope you enjoy this Kaleidoscopic Journey as much as I did.