The Leading Edge

One of the most impactful ideas I've ever explored is the idea that there's an intelligent evolutionary force guiding us into wholeness, integration and complexity. Whether you call it the holotropic attractor, syntropy or the Tao, I believe personally harmonizing with this force can bring profound flourishing. So I am always looking to deepen and enhance my understanding of practical ways of doing so.

My latest guest Emily Lane is a delightful Irish entrepreneur who successfully climbed the corporate ladder and burned out twice before she finally got the message that it was time for a change. As she set out on a round the world trip in search of new horizons she had an unexpected detour when she effectively died during a rafting trip to Ecuador. The out-of-body experience that followed untethered her from a "matter-bound," personality-based perspective and led to a gradual series of deeper awakenings over the next twenty years. She now helps leaders and executives find effective means of harmonizing with what she calls "Evolutionary Intelligence."

The theme of my last couple of pieces has been sacred sites, sound, vibration and the divine feminine. My synchronicity-filled trip to Portugal led me to the work of historian and author Freddy Silva.

His research explores the alternative history of ancient civilizations and sacred technologies for the evolution of human consciousness. What he claims to have found goes right across the woo spectrum, and threatens to upend my understanding of our collective past.

This is a standalone part 2 of my conversation with founder and coach Brian Whetten. In this conversation we explored a new kind of leadership. It’s a growth path that remains fully within your control, even in chaotic times, and brings the greatest benefit to both yourself and those around you.

My conversation last year with founder and coach Brian Whetten was one of the more insightful discussions I've had. This was reflected in both the feedback and the number of listeners we drew.

Brian and I sat down for two more in-depth conversations. The first explores how to make money with integrity as a coach. The second is a broader discussion of what “authentic leadership” looks like.

Why is Brian worth listening to on these topics? He got a Berkeley PhD in computer science, was a successful Silicon Valley founder, and burned out twice, all by thirty. His own acute trauma then led him into six years of full-time training, coaching, counseling and a master's in spiritual psychology. In the 20 years since, he’s become one of the most senior executive coaches in the country and he makes an extremely comfortable living doing so. His engineer's brain is also able to illustrate profound concepts in simple terms I can understand.

The Greek-Armenian Georges Ivanovich Gurdjieff (1866–1949) was an influential mystic, philosopher and spiritual teacher. He spent much of his life traveling the world synthesizing the key teachings of the great mystery schools.

A central aspect of Gurdjieff’s teachings are known as “The Fourth Way.” It’s also the handle of the visionary mystical meme master The 4th Way , himself an expert in Gurdjieff’s work. He was gracious enough to spend some time telling me the story of Gurdjieff’s discoveries and where he thinks leading edge science is increasingly confirming them.

The Law of One material is a series of 106 conversations between Jim McCarty, Don Elkins, a professor of physics and UFO investigator, and “Ra,” speaking through Carla Rueckert. Ra states that it/they are a “sixth-density social memory complex” that formed on Venus about 2.6 billion years ago. Ra says that they are “humble messengers of the Law of One” and that they previously tried to spread this message in Egypt with mixed results. Jim is the only surviving member of the trio. The correct default response is obviously skepticism, but I invite you to suspend judgement until you’ve read the material and listened to Jim’s message. I recently read all 1,200 pages of the material, as did my fellow Leading Edge member Jeff Williams.

Jeff and I interviewed Jim for The Leading Edge.

Virtually every spiritual or mystical tradition emphasizes that love is the most potent force in the Universe. So it’s curious that any mention of love is noticeably absent from all of our most powerful industries, as well as from science itself.

I spoke to Dr. Julia Mossbridge, an expert on the science of love and time, and her collaborator Dr. Eric Smith, Executive Director of The Institute for Love and Time (TILT).

We discussed the power of Unconditional Love, precognition and their new app Time Machine.

Philip Shepherd is an author, teacher on the topic of embodiment

He’s written one of my favourite books (Radical Wholeness), one of my favourite articles (Why you are not living in the Present) and also given one of my favourite written interviews (The World’s Hidden Harmony).

Ky Dickens is a documentarian and the creator of the podcast phenomenon The Telepathy Tapes.

She sat down with the Leading Edge's Dr Sobhani, a neuroscientist and author on the topic of psi phenomena.