The New Dimensions Café

Sky Nelson-Isaacs is a physicist, musician, teacher, parent, and activist. He has many years of experience as a physics and math instructor and has also worked in the software industry. His current work involves research in the field of quantum foundations and has published a growing body of peer-reviewed work developing the foundation of a theory of synchronicity. He has also earned recognition as a singer, songwriter, and performer. He is the author of Living in Flow: The Science of Synchronicity and How Your Choices Shape Your World (North Atlantic Books 2019)

Interview Date: 5/10/2019   Tags: MP3, Sky Nelson-Isaacs, synchronicity, meaningful coincidences, choices, connection, authenticity, responsiveness, LORAX Process, momentum, Science, Personal Transformation, Philosophy

Kate Gustin, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist who received her education from Princeton University and the University of California at Berkeley. She’s worked in a variety of settings such as a mental health practitioner: Outpatient psychiatry, Community Mental Health Clinics, VA Hospital, College Counseling Services, and currently in private practice in San Rafael in Northern California. She integrates the science of positive psychology and leads classes, workshops, and trainings throughout the region. Dr. Gustin offers No-Self Help – an approach to identity, relationship, and responsibility that draws on the spirituality of eastern wisdom traditions and advances in western psychology. She is the author of The No-Self Help Book: 40 Reasons to Get Over Your Self & Find Peace of Mind (Non-duality Press 2018) 

Tags: Kate Gustin, no-self, no self, primordial consciousness, selfing, spaciousness, lamps of light analogy, Philosophy, Personal Transformation, Psychology, Meditation

Ellen Grace O’Brian is a yogacharya (an esteemed yoga teacher) and the founder and spiritual director of the Center for Spiritual Enlightenment, a meditation center and spiritual community in the tradition of Kriya Yoga, based on the teachings Paramahansa Yogananda brought to the U.S. in 1920. The Center for Spiritual Enlightenment is headquartered in San Jose, California. She is the author of many books including The Moon Reminded Me (a book of poetry)(Homebound Publications 2017), Living the Eternal Way: Spiritual Meaning and Practice in Daily Life (Center for Spiritual Enlightenment Press 2009), The Jewel of Abundance: Achieve Success and Prosperity through the Principles of Yoga (New World Library 2018) 

Tags: Ellen Grace O’Brian, Kriya Yoga, prosperity, true wealth, abundance, affirmations, financial wellbeing, ego’s default, small self, separation from source, Ela Gandhi, spiritual resources, essential wholeness, sufficiency, inner peace, worry, Spirituality, Personal Transformation, Meditation

Patrice Vecchione is a poet, author, and artist. She teaches creative writing retreats, collage and poetry workshops. She has also worked with children, leading classes in poetry and the imagination in elementary, middle, and high schools. She's the author of several books including Writing and the Spiritual Life: Finding Your Voice by Looking Within (McGraw Hill 2001). Step Into Nature: Nurturing Imagination and Spirit in Everyday Life (Beyond Words Publishing 2015), The Knot Untied: a Book of Poetry (Palaquin Press 2013) and Ink Knows No Borders: Poems of the Immigrant and Refugee Experience (coauthor Alyssa Raymond) (Seven Stories Press 2019)

Tags: Patrice Vecchione, poetry, immigrants, Gary Soto, bilingual, language, Javier Zamora, haiku, teaching poetry, remembering childhood, empathy, the five senses, Li-Young Lee, Writing, Social Change/Politics 

Mirabai Starr has taught philosophy and world religions at the University of New Mexico, Taos, for 20 years and now teaches and speaks internationally on contemplative practice and the interspiritual dialogue. She’s a certified bereavement counselor and travels the world speaking and giving workshops on contemplative practice and the teachings of the mystics. She is the author and editor of many books including Dark Night of the Soul: St. John of the Cross (Riverhead 2003), The Interior Castle: St. Teresa of Ávila (Riverhead 2004), Devotion, Prayers & Living Wisdom (Sounds True - six-volume Christian mystics series 2008), God of Love: A Guide to the Heart of Judaism, Christianity & Islam (Monkfish 2012) and Wild Mercy: Living the Fierce and Tender Wisdom of the Women Mystics (Sounds True 2018)

Tags: Mirabai Starr, transcendence, masculine paradigm, ascetic renunciation of the body, embodiment, earth, charlatan teacher, on fire for God, sexual abuse, guru disciple relationship, feminine leadership, collaboration, authoritarianism, circle work, spiritual discipline, efficiency and urgency, bereavement, restorative justice, feminine wisdom, Spirituality, Philosophy, Religion, Buddhism, Women’s Studies 

Tama Kieves graduated with honors from Harvard Law School but chose to leave a prestigious law firm to become a teacher and workshop leader. Her books include This Time I Dance! Creating the Work You Love (Penguin Publishing 2006), A Course in Miracles for Life Ninjas (Tarcher/Penguin 2014), A Year Without Fear: 365 Days of Magnificence (Tarcher 2015), Thriving Through Uncertainty: Moving Beyond Fear of the Unknown and Making Change Work for You (Penguin Publishing 2018) and Learning to Trust Yourself; Breaking Through the Blocks that Hold You Back (St. Martin’s Press 2025)

Interview Date: 3/21/2025     Tags: Tama Kieves, The Best Tool, love, fear, infinite intellegance, career, A Course in Miracles, attention, focus, external noise, self-doubt, self-trust, camouflaged angels, mentors, limitless energy, Personal Transformation, Psychology, writing

Margaret J Wheatley, Ph.D. is an internationally acclaimed writer, speaker, and teacher. She began caring about the world's peoples in 1966 as a Peace Corps volunteer in postwar Korea. She is cofounder and President Emerita of The Berkana Institute, a charitable foundation that works with people around the world to strengthen their communities using the wisdom and wealth already present in their people, traditions, and environment. She is a guide in leading people back to understanding who we are as humans, being able to create the conditions for our basic qualities of generosity, contribution, community, and love. She is a grand contributor in creating an Island of Sanity in the midst of wildly disruptive seas. Her books lnclude Leadership and the New Science (Berrett-Kohler 1998), Turning To One Another: Simple Conversations to Restore Hope in the Future (Berrett-Kohler 2009) and Opening to the World As It Is: Poems of Experience (Berkana Publications 2024)

Interview Date: 3/14/2025    Tags: Margaret J Wheatley, Meg Wheatley, conscious communities, Islands of Sanity, generosity, kindness, human spirit, despair, overwhelm, Teddy Roosevelt, singing together, Personal Transformation, Social Change/Politics, Indigenous Wisdom

Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D. is a psychiatrist, Jungian analyst, and an internationally known speaker. She is a former board member of the Ms. Foundation, an advocate for a 5th UN World Conference on Women, a convener of the Millionth Circle Initiative, as well as a permanent representative to the UN representing the NGO, Pathways to Peace. She is the author of many books, including Goddesses in Every Woman: Powerful Archetypes in Women's Lives (Harper Paperbacks 2004) and Like a Tree: How Trees, Women, and Tree People Can People Can Save the Planet (Conari Press 2010) and Ever Widening Circles and Mystical Moments (Chiron Publications 2025)

 Interview Date: 1/26/2011     Tags: Jean Shinoda Bolen, Trees, heartsoul, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Ralph Waldo Emerson, heartsoul, tree people, boreal forests, global warming, interdependent, Amazon, commodity, Wangari Maathai, activism, life assignment, Commission on the Status for Women, CSW, United Nation. Michelle Bachelet, circles, walking meditation, mystical source, Ecology/Nature/Environment, Social Change/Politics

Pam Houston is a prize-winning author and professor of English at the University of California Davis. She cofounded the literary non-profit Writing by Writers and also teaches in the Institute of American Indian Arts, Low Residency MFA Program and at writers conferences around the country and the world. Her books include Cowboys Are My Weakness (W.W. Norton 2011), Deep Creek: Finding Hope in High Country (W.W. Norton 2019), Contents May Have Shifted (W.W. Norton 2012)

Tags: Pam Houston, Ranching, wildfire, Bob Pinckley, Belted Kingfisher, donkeys, Irish Wolfhounds, power of routines, Living in extreme temperatures, Animals, Ecology/Nature/Environment, Community

Edwin Rutsch is a computer expert, a filmmaker, and the founding director of The Center for Building a Culture of Empathy. This center serves as one of the leading organizations of the global empathy movement and focuses on bridging social and political divides by designing a free online empathy training course and holding face to face and virtual empathy cafés.

Tags: Edwin Rutsch, empathy, cultural divide, deep listening, self-empathy, empathic, empathetic, empathy circles, political divide, Republicans, Democrats, Liberals, Conservatives, Sean Hannity, Rachel Maddow, Fox News, MSNBC, the 60s, personal freedom, Social Change/Politics, Peace/Non-Violence