Podcasts about sufi

2 Lives - Stories Of Transformation After years of being forced to be a child bride in a cult and keep it a secret, today Tamara belongs to herself, but she still struggles with certain brainwashed beliefs and remains angry with Sufi leaders. 2 Lives “The second begins the moment we realize we have only one.” 2 Lives is created by Laurel Morales. Valerie Shively is the assistant producer. Christian Arnder is our illustrator and web designer. Music from Blue Dot Sessions. Become a 2 Lives patron at https://www.patreon.com/2lives Drop us a note on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter. You can learn how to support the show here. Episode transcripts are posted on our  website. Find out more about Tamara MC at 2lives.org.  

Pondering what it means to awaken spiritually, Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee examines the possibility of life beyond the illusions of ego that are fed by our distorted culture.Two cultural icons. Two unique perspectives... One understanding of the presence of the way.Ram Dass' Love Serve Remember Foundation and the Alan Watts Organization invite you to open your mind, open your heart, and tap into the living truth of Alan Watts and Ram Dass. Learn more about this special 4-week Virtual Course:"The Presence of the Way: The Dharma of Alan Watts and Ram Dass"In this episode, Llewellyn tells us his thoughts on:What a spiritual awakening can look and feels likeBeing here now for our individual self and the worldHaving an awareness for the distortions of our culturePerception versus what is presentCulturally created illusions and conditioningThe primal experience of life and creationThe relationship between humanity and the worldThe archetypal Garden of Eden and divine presenceWhen reality meets with our illusionsHow the ego manipulates our thoughtsThe non-existence of separateness in nature“A primary spiritual experience is to be awake in the moment, to experience life as it is. In this moment we experience life not through the patterns of the mind, or the illusions of the ego, but a simple, direct experience of life around us.” – Llewellyn Vaughan-LeeAbout Llewellyn:Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Ph.D. is a Sufi teacher in the Naqshbandiyya-Mujaddidiyya Sufi Order. He is the author of Sufism, the Transformation of the Heart, and the founder of The Golden Sufi Center. Check out his new podcast Working With Oneness.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hakim Sana'i, the first major Sufi poet to express the message of the radical spiritual revolution that would be carried on later by such voices as Attar, Rumi, and Hafiz, delivers the punchy nectar of divine intoxication that comes of annihilating the ego. Even a few bullets from this ecstatic shotgun of Truth can do the job on any ego who listens. Learn More About Shunyamurti: https://shunyamurti.org/

Dženita Karić's new book Bosnian Hajj Literature: Multiple Paths to the Holy (Edinburgh University Press, 2023) maps the diverse understandings of the hajj in relation to Islamic geography by Bosnian Muslim authors who wrote in different genres from the 16th to the 21st centuries. The study captures how hajj was imagined and constructed in relation to Islamic cosmology, rituals, Sufi saints, and political and temporal realities, while remaining unchanged in other ways. The book generatively theorizes geographies in relation to mobilities but also in relation to emotion, body, and embodiment, materiality, and the sacred. The book will be of interest to scholars of Bosnian studies, Islamic studies, and especially pilgrimage and ritual studies.  Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen's University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here and here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca. You can follow her on Twitter via @shobhanaxavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literary-studies

Dženita Karić's new book Bosnian Hajj Literature: Multiple Paths to the Holy (Edinburgh University Press, 2023) maps the diverse understandings of the hajj in relation to Islamic geography by Bosnian Muslim authors who wrote in different genres from the 16th to the 21st centuries. The study captures how hajj was imagined and constructed in relation to Islamic cosmology, rituals, Sufi saints, and political and temporal realities, while remaining unchanged in other ways. The book generatively theorizes geographies in relation to mobilities but also in relation to emotion, body, and embodiment, materiality, and the sacred. The book will be of interest to scholars of Bosnian studies, Islamic studies, and especially pilgrimage and ritual studies.  Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen's University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here and here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca. You can follow her on Twitter via @shobhanaxavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/islamic-studies

Dženita Karić's new book Bosnian Hajj Literature: Multiple Paths to the Holy (Edinburgh University Press, 2023) maps the diverse understandings of the hajj in relation to Islamic geography by Bosnian Muslim authors who wrote in different genres from the 16th to the 21st centuries. The study captures how hajj was imagined and constructed in relation to Islamic cosmology, rituals, Sufi saints, and political and temporal realities, while remaining unchanged in other ways. The book generatively theorizes geographies in relation to mobilities but also in relation to emotion, body, and embodiment, materiality, and the sacred. The book will be of interest to scholars of Bosnian studies, Islamic studies, and especially pilgrimage and ritual studies.  Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen's University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here and here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca. You can follow her on Twitter via @shobhanaxavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

The great Masters teach that the Sound of God is within everyone -- this Holy Stream of Sound is within every living thing. This is why those given to exploring Inner Space through a contemplative meditation practice, be they from the East or the West, have discovered this Reality playing within themselves. (Go Within) This Sant Mat Satsang Podcast is a spiritual gathering, a satsang without walls, dedicated to exploring this ancient school of spirituality, the Path of the Masters, Mystics, Gnostics, and Saints, today focused upon the spiritual practices of inner seeing and hearing, finding the inner Light and Sound of God present within the soul. The form of meditation making it possible to access the mystic Light and Sound is freely taught and communicated via the guidance of a competent Living One, a Living Master who is fluent in the spiritual experience of not only transcendental seeing and hearing, but also of traversing Inner Space, the Kingdom of the Heavens within, the inner regions, heavens, realms of consciousness beyond the physical-material confines that hold captive the attention of most people. The Sufi mystic and philosopher Ibn Arabi once wrote in his Bezels of Wisdom: "He [the Supreme Being] brought the Cosmos into being as constituting an Unseen Realm and a Sensory Realm, so that we might perceive the Inner though our Unseen [facility] and the Outer through our sensory aspect." We are children of both worlds. We human beings are a Tree of Life with roots in the earth and branches rising into a Mystic Sky! "The planes of heaven are about us everywhere. One has only to know this simple truth consciously, and then we will be free." (George Arnsby Jones, disciple of Kirpal Singh) As with the Gnostic Universe, the cosmos and multiverse of the Surat Shabd Yoga Tradition of Inner Light and Sound Meditation has the lowest or outermost plane being the realm of matter and dark matter, followed by progressively more subtle and luminous astral and akashic or causal regions, also a Universal Mind or Demiurgical (pronounced "Demi-urge-ah-KAL") plane. Above these lower and middle regions of mind and matter are levels of pure spirit, eternal, above time and space, and these are considered to be the True Home or Paradise of the soul, where we prodigal souls came from before the beginning and, full-circle, where we will return to again, as we awaken from the soul-slumber of the ages. "We have come from the Light and will return there again." (Gospel of Thomas and Mandaean Ginza Rabba paraphrase) As Kabir once said, "For millions of years you have slept. This morning, will you not wake?" (Peace Be To You) Today, readings from the mystic divine love poetry of Bhai Nand Lal Ji, disciple of Guru Gobind Singh, The Acts of John (New Testament apocryphal writing), the Sikh scriptures (Adi Granth, Gurbani), Naam Or Word authored by Kirpal Singh, Baba Ram Singh from a January, 2023 collection of satsang discourses on Naam: Sant Mat Meditation of the Inner Light and the Sound Current, the Sufi poets Rumi and Shah Niaz, Ajahn Sumedho on "The Sound of Silence" (from the Buddhist world), also from Anmol Vachan, a rare book of Q and A by Sant Garib Das of the Radhasoami Faith (another spiritual successor of Swamiji Maharaj), Shiv Brat Lal's Radhaswami spiritual classic Light on Ananda Yoga, Kirpal Singh's Spiritual Elixir, and... the mystic poetry of Edmond Bordeaux Szekely. (Namaste')  In Divine Love (Bhakti), Light, and Sound, At the Feet of the Masters, Radhasoami James Bean Spiritual Awakening Radio Podcasts Sant Mat Satsang Podcasts Sant Mat Radhasoami A Satsang Without Walls https://www.SpiritualAwakeningRadio.com    

Welcome to Day 4 of Adventures in Spirituality with davidji. In this course, davidji pairs ancient wisdom with daily meditations so you can awaken your sacred powers. You'll learn how to lift the veil of ordinary consciousness to see your life with more clarity, experience greater ease, joy, and love, and heal the wounds of your past. Day 4 – Your True Nature – The 12th-century Sufi poet Hafiz said, "I'm simply a hole in the flute through which the Christ breath flows." We're all just holes in the flute. This is a powerful teaching in the ancient wisdom traditions. We are releasing Days 1 through 5 of davidji's Commune program here on the podcast. If you want to watch the full video version – which includes 10 days of core lessons, practice meditations, and bonus videos – go to onecommune.com/trial and sign up for a free trial of Commune Membership, including the full-length version of Adventures in Spirituality. This podcast is supported by:Apollo NeuroThe Apollo™ wearable uses scientifically-backed touch therapy to rebalance your nervous system and support your circadian rhythm. Sleep better, feel calmer, find focus, and get energized with this groundbreaking new wearable. SPECIAL OFFER FOR FRIENDS OF COMMUNE: Try the Apollo wearable today and get $40 off your purchase at apolloneuro.com/communeThrive MarketThis podcast is supported by Thrive Market - Join Thrive Market today and get a FREE $80 in free groceries when you go to thrivemarket.com/communeTimeline NutritionTimeline Nutrition is pioneering a new approach to longevity, one that stands on a decade of scientific discovery to unlock the power within your cells. Your body is an energy generating machine, Timeline makes it more powerful. Use code commune to get 10% off at timelinenutrition.com/commune

Seriah is joined by Saxon and Chris Ernst for an episode of listener stories. Topics include a dancing ghost party in Scottland, Jeff Ritzmann, “The Haunted Mansion” theme park ride, a pair of bizarre events involving a massive blast of light at a school bus stop, abduction experiences, forgetting paranormal encounters, “Nur”-the heatless light of Sufi religious revelation, perception vs. reality, rare experiences, a foreign mental voice leads to intervention in a medical emergency, third man syndrome, Susanne Chancellor, Seriah's experience with ending up acting as a stranger's guardian angel, various beings in the Sufi belief system, Dharma and control systems, expectations based on appearance, a bizarre experience in 1960's Spain, power areas vs sensitive people, a conversation with Jeremy Vaeni and Jeff Ritzmann and Jaques Vallee, the attempted creation of a paranormal hot spot, a weird chiropractor and an unexplainable change of tea into coffee, Seriah's strange traffic experience, an incident of misperception by police, “The Invisible Gorilla” book, the “What Happened In Skinner” podcast, linguistics and paranormal experience, the difficulties of translation, strange lights in a forest, childhood Bigfoot experiences, an exorcism and a mysterious death, multi-generational alien experiences, extreme poltergeist activity, Irish traditional folk magic, a strange warning about the Moon, a weird disturbing neighbor, photos of orbs near a cemetery, hereditary paranormal experiences, a Paratopia interview of Debra Kauble AKA Kathy Davis, Budd Hopkins, “Extraordinary Contact: Life Beyond Intruders” by Debra Jordon-Kauble, UFO disclosure, Jason Colavito, Frank Scully, 1950 book “Behind the Flying Saucers”, a report of human-looking aliens dressed in Victorian garb with paper books, and much more! This is a rollicking conversation covering some fascinating stories!This show is part of the Spreaker Prime Network, if you are interested in advertising on this podcast, contact us at https://www.spreaker.com/show/4656375/advertisement

“When you move in the heart, all the barriers go away.” This is what Chandler Yorkhall has been passionately working on people with. As a Minneapolis-based healer, bodyworker, and Sufi teacher, he has been helping others find deep healing just as he had done for himself. Now, he has created a new method for healing and awakening to the divinity within called Heart Diving of sacred movement and sound. In this episode, he joins Debra Gaugnard and co-host Amany Shalaby to tell us all about it. Chandler takes us across his healing and teaching journey, from finding Qigong and Sufism to using music and movement in his classes. He also talks about trauma, healing beyond the body to the heart and soul, as well as talking about religion. There is so much wisdom shared in this conversation that will help you see healing in a new way. Follow along with Chandler to learn more!

Poet and translator Haleh Liza Gafori joins us to closely read and discuss a poem by Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (1207-1273 CE), one of the greatest of all Sufi poets. We discuss the poetic constraints of the ghazal form, Rumi's encounters with the divine, and the significance of his friendship with Shams, a man who transformed his life and poetic practice. Haleh Liza Gafori's translations of Rumi's poetry appear in Gold (https://www.nyrb.com/products/gold) (NYRB Press, 2022). You can learn more about her work as a vocalist, poet, translator and performer here (https://www.halehliza.com/). To learn more about Rumi, visit the Poetry Foundation website (https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/jalal-al-din-rumi). Cover photo from The Walters Art Museum (https://art.thewalters.org/detail/77715/illuminated-preface-to-the-second-book-of-the-collection-of-poems-masnavi-2/)

Have you heard of the mystical poetry of renowned Sufi saint Kabir?Tune in Monday, August 28th at 3pm PT, 6pm ET, for a discussion with Thomas Rain Crowe, on his new #book Painting from the Palette of Love: The Mystical Poetry of Kabir.#MomentsWithMarianne airs in the Southern California area on KMET 1490AM & 98.1 FM, an ABC Talk News Radio Affiliate! Thomas Rain Crowe is an internationally published author, editor, and translator of more than thirty books, including the multi-award-winning nature memoir Zoro's Field: My Life in the Appalachian Woods (2005); Writing the Wind: A Celtic Resurgence (1997); The Laugharne Poems, written at the Dylan Thomas Boathouse in Laugharne, Wales (1997); two volumes of translations of the poetry of the Sufi poet Hafiz—In Wineseller's Street (Iran Books) and Drunk on the Wine of the Beloved (Shambhala Publications); and The Perfect Work: Poems of Hafiz, a work of poetry and music (Fern Hill Records, 1999). He has been an editor of major literary and cultural journals and anthologies and is the founder and publisher of New Native Press. He lived in San Francisco during the 1970s, working alongside the people cited in his book Starting from San Francisco: The Baby Beat Generation and the Second San Francisco Renaissance (Third Mind Books, 2018), and was an original member of the group responsible for the resurrection of Beatitude magazine during those years. https://www.shambhala.com/authors/a-f/thomas-rain-crowe.html For more show information visit: www.MariannePestana.com#bookclub #readinglist #books #bookish #author #authorinterview #KMET1490AM #radioshow #booklover #mustread #reading #bookstagram #poetry #Kabir #love #

This episode explores some basic considerations concerning the nature of the Sufi path. Included is a discussion involving the Names of Divinity as well as an account of spiritual abuse at the hands of an alleged Sufi shaykh.

This week, I talk to producer, creative executive, entrepreneur and meditation teacher Tim Duffy, who shares some amazing tools and tips to overcome the anxiety, stress, anger, frustration, worry, and disappointment that comes in the crazy world we live in today. I also dig into the latest efforts to unionize reality TV, which is very complicated, and how streaming costs are going to keep rising and rising. Plus, I address the struggles we are facing in unscripted TV amidst the rising costs of streaming and the slow decline in broadcast viewing. For information on Tim's meditation practices or to reach him, check out his website: https://www.timduffymeditation.com And check out the amazing food biz he and his brother created as well. https://yumcrunch.com Find me on social media here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/steve-berkowitz-5a09ab8/ https://berkreport.com https://twitter.com/steveberkowitz https://www.instagram.com/stevemberkowitz/   And if you're looking for a transcript of the episode, here it is: 00:00:00:09 - 00:00:22:21 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Welcome to another episode of the No Script No Problem Podcast on Bleav, the number one podcast network for professionals. Do you believe? Now, if you enjoy this show, please remember to subscribe and rate it with five stars. It's available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon music, and anywhere else you listen to podcasts. You also find it on Bleav.com and @bleavpodcasts. 00:00:23:01 - 00:00:48:12 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Follow me on social media, Twitter and Post News. It's @SteveBerkowitz and on Instagram and Threads @stevemberkowitz and also on Mastodon, Spill, Facebook, Snapchat and LinkedIn. If you're interested in advertising on the show, please contact believe at Leave dot com. All right, let's get started. I've got a terrific guest coming up who is going to calm your nerves and give you some great advice to weather the storm during these stressful times. 00:00:48:12 - 00:01:22:02 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ But before I chat with him, it's time for a little reality check. For the first time ever, linear TV viewership made up less than half of all TV usage in a measurement month. That is according to Nielsen's. The Gauge report for July broadcast TV accounted for only 20% of viewing and cable TV 29.6%. It was a record lows and down 5.4% and 12.5% respectively, versus the same period last year. 00:01:22:05 - 00:02:00:17 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ YouTube and Netflix lead the way in terms of your streamers. Streaming viewing rose 2.9% from June to July 2023 and was up 25.3% over the past year, accounting for 38.7% of total TV usage. That's huge. Now, the thing that's kind of interesting is that one of the shows that has kind of really given Netflix this bump, you know, a 4.2% increase in TV share over the course of June is Suits, which was a cable shows on USA Network right from 2011 to 2019. 00:02:00:17 - 00:02:21:03 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ So it's pretty wild that this show, which picked up 4000000000 minutes of viewing in one week, was on USA and virtually no one was talking about it during its nine season. I mean, a nine season run is incredible, but it wasn't like it was, you know, winning Emmy after Emmy. It wasn't a succession, you know, it wasn't a Breaking Bad. 00:02:21:05 - 00:02:52:08 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ And now it's like you look at comments people are making online and it's like suits. You'd think it's, you know, the greatest show ever. So it shows to me that it's not that people don't like broadcast programing, it's not that people don't like cable programing. They just prefer watching things on Netflix. They prefer watching things on YouTube. Now, the big irony here is that the average cost of subscribing ad free to a major streamer has jumped almost 25% in the last year. 00:02:52:08 - 00:03:20:04 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ That's according to the Wall Street Journal. All right. So after years of cheap monthly fees, right, that we all loved when we first got Netflix or we first got Apple TV Plus right where we first got that wonderful bundle of Hulu and Espn+. Right. And Disney Plus, that's all gone. Everybody wants to make money. Now. All the streamers need to make money, but they are now testing our loyalty, testing customer loyalty. 00:03:20:04 - 00:03:50:14 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ And they are all raising their prices. An average assortment of the top U.S. streaming services will be worth $87 a month come this fall, while an average cable package will be $83. All right. So just like we just talked about how streaming has surpassed broadcast and cable in viewers right now, the whole point of streaming, we didn't want to pay as much as cable. 00:03:50:14 - 00:04:16:05 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Now it's all shifting back and we're suddenly paying more money for streaming than we are for cable. Disney is raising its prices for Disney Plus and Hulu, and that follows on the heels of Peacock NetFlow, X, Max, Paramount Plus and Apple TV Plus All have raised their prices recently. It's going to keep happening. They're going to keep doing this until Wall Street is happy. 00:04:16:05 - 00:04:48:08 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ The business model hasn't worked unless you're Netflix. This is also why you're seeing a huge increase in free ad supported television. Fast channels. Right to Be is a perfect example to be doing well. Moving on to the wild world of reality television, former Real Housewives of New York star Bethenny Frankel, she's causing quite a stir, talking to dozens of reality TV talent, trying to get them to unionize and get involved in potential litigation as well. 00:04:48:10 - 00:05:22:20 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ She is encouraging reality TV stars to boycott along with SAG, is asking for residuals on her shows. You know, she thinks reality TV stars should get residuals, just like actors and actresses. We have talked about reality TV. You unions for as long as I can remember. But what she's doing is going a step further. Bethenny is throwing accusations around at Bravo about a so-called cover up, you know, during an incident that happened on set. 00:05:22:20 - 00:05:46:05 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ And she's hired two very high powered lawyers. They're accusing NBCUniversal, the parent company of Bravo, of exploitation and abuse. Among other things, they've asked NBC's lawyers to preserve discovery as part of their investigation session. It's getting kind of ugly. I can't speak to anything that has to do with the litigation or any of these things that they're accusing NBC or Bravo or the producers of doing. 00:05:46:05 - 00:06:13:01 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ But I can say that unionization when it comes to reality TV is complicated. That is a very nuanced topic that I've talked to dozens of producers and friends about. And I think Bethenny has some valid points when she talks about working hours and base pay rates. Those are valid points. But there are so many layers that come into play when you're talking about reality TV. 00:06:13:06 - 00:06:37:24 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ You know, she makes a point about, you know, I think she said, you know, she only made seven grand for her first season on The Housewives. Well, Raquel, you know, as it turns out from Vanderpump Rules, made $361,000 this past season. You know, Vanderpump Rules huge hit, their biggest season ever, nominated for an Emmy. But that's a ton of money, I think, when you're talking about reality TV, it's such a diverse genre. 00:06:38:01 - 00:07:05:14 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ You can't pay a contestant on The Bachelor or Survivor the same as you do a housewife in a small ensemble cast or you can't pay the same for a designer on HGTV as much as you do a family member on a TLC show or you do you pay the same for a guy who's on a boat on Deadliest Catch as you do somebody who's competing for love on 90 day fiance. 00:07:05:16 - 00:07:26:22 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ So the genre so diverse that it's really hard to just throw numbers in there. You know, for a first season show. I think there's a lot of things that you need to take into consideration. But I do think rules and regulations are a good thing. And I think it's it's very valid to bring this up that we need to have that discussion. 00:07:26:22 - 00:08:15:07 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ I don't know if a union is the right thing, but I certainly feel like a little bit more firm. Ground rules are good thing. I would be remiss, though, if I didn't mention that producers have no union as well in unscripted television. So no insurance, no overtime and no residuals, and that often goes unmentioned. It would be amazing to get residuals when the networks run reality shows all day long on E, Bravo, MTV, Lifetime, etc. In fact, the writers on Ridiculousness are asking to join the WGA, I believe, as they should, because that show runs night and day on MTV and those folks are literally writing jokes as lead ins to the clips. 00:08:15:07 - 00:08:42:13 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ You know, other clip shows like America's Funniest Home Videos, 2.0, those writers are in the WGA. There's no reason why the folks on ridiculousness should be as well. But as you kind of can tell, it's a complicated issue. All right. Well, stick with reality TV, because why not? An article this past week and deadline had a lot of folks worried and a lot of people in reality TV are freaking out. 00:08:42:13 - 00:09:18:13 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ The headline to the article reads Doom and Gloom in Unscripted TV Producers battled challenging conditions As mid-sized firms face layoffs. It appropriately addresses the, quote, Slow down of green lights and cost cutting and quote, within the platforms and networks and how it has led to a slew of layoffs and a dearth of work in unscripted TV. The article references this drought hitting reputable companies like being a murray half yard hot snakes, high noon and propagate all very good companies. 00:09:18:16 - 00:09:45:08 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ One unscripted producer told DEADLINE, quote, It's the toughest time to be in unscripted that I can remember, unquote. Another said it was a, quote, brutal moment. I would agree. I would agree with both those producers. We all remain hopeful that things will rebound. I'm not going to hold my breath, but I will continue to tread water, keep my head above that water. 00:09:45:10 - 00:10:11:00 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Nobody should feel alone, though. That is for sure. If you're struggling out there, you're worried, Hang in there, man. And that's why I got Tim Duffy coming up in a minute. Tim Duffy is my guest. Tim Duffy is an extremely talented producer, creative executive. He's an entrepreneur here, he is a founder and he is a seasoned teacher of meditation and mindfulness. 00:10:11:02 - 00:10:46:15 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ And that is why I wanted him to come on the podcast, right? So along with being co-founder of Yum Crunch and Ugly Brother Studios with his brother Mike. Tim is a peak performance and productivity specialist who combines 15 years of teaching meditation with 20 years in the C-suite to help executives, employees and organizations thrive. Now, as you'll hear, his style modernizes the ancient teachings of mindfulness and adapts them for modern professionals. 00:10:46:16 - 00:11:11:08 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ So with all the chaos going on in both the entertainment industry and in the world at large, I think he's the perfect guest. So sit back, find a quiet place, relax. Tim's got some words of wisdom for you. Enjoy. Well, welcome back to the podcast, my friend, Mr. Tim Duffy. A lot has changed since the last time we talked. 00:11:11:11 - 00:11:35:20 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ We talked last time about mindfulness. But you are now big into this world of mindfulness and meditation. You're now, I would call you a guru in this space. And this amidst your your role on world shifts and being, you know, being a founder, being a co-CEO with your brother in that space, in this crazy world that we're in right now with media and entertainment. 00:11:35:20 - 00:12:02:01 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ And I've talked about that on the podcast before, how, you know, everybody's kind of stressed out. I thought it was perfect for you to talk about kind of the way you deal with the stresses of this world with mindfulness meditation. So talk to me a little bit about when when the craziness comes into your world, whether it's as a dad or as an executive, how do you use mindfulness, how to use meditation to handle all the insanity that comes into the world? 00:12:02:03 - 00:12:17:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY First of all, thank you for calling me a guru, which means teacher, right? Which is true. I am a meditation teacher, but in our Western culture it also means douche bag. So do not call me a guru. 00:12:17:15 - 00:12:21:22 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Let me rephrase. You are not a guru. What's a better word? It's a better word. 00:12:21:24 - 00:12:28:02 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I'm. I am a mindfulness teacher. I've been teaching mindfulness for the past 15 years. 00:12:28:04 - 00:12:36:07 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Okay, I agree. I will take back Guru and I will just say mindfulness Teacher. Instructor. Yes. Okay. 00:12:36:09 - 00:13:05:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Do the woo woo of the mindfulness community is so funny to me, right? Because like, the thing about mindfulness is it's, it's a practice that we can learn and it doesn't really take any special skills. Every single human being on earth has the ability to be mindful. And the the my particular set of circumstances brought me to mindfulness because of my own friend's anxiety and depression. 00:13:05:06 - 00:13:32:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And when I was growing up, I had this kind of pervasive sense that I was not well. I had a fear of death, a constant fear of death when I was growing up, a general kind of like unsatisfactory ness that was like the foundation of my experience and the world outside of my internal world didn't quite know about it, right? 00:13:32:13 - 00:14:01:08 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I wasn't like talking about it because I was, you know, a young man with the bravado of youth and I was seemingly doing pretty well in school and and in my work life. When I went to college, my freshman year, I was a psychology major. I wanted to work with kids. And I took this class called New Directions in Psychotherapy from this old hippie dude named Norman Bradford. 00:14:01:10 - 00:14:12:07 GUEST: TIM DUFFY He had he was like a he was he looked like a guru. He had flowy white hair, a long flowing, like Z.Z top beard. 00:14:12:13 - 00:14:14:05 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. 00:14:14:07 - 00:14:44:18 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And he was just a hippie who was obsessed with creating different avenues towards wellness that weren't solely dependent on the methods of Western psychology and science. Right. Which is, of course, the language of the West is material science. So he kind of he started this class called New Directions in Psychotherapy. And every single week all we did was a new kind of meditation. 00:14:44:20 - 00:15:11:06 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And one week we'd be climbing up a tree outside and just sitting in a tree and listening to the wind. And another week we would be listening to poetry, and another week we would be doing African drumming, you know. So this was the privileged life of, you know, a private college in Baltimore called Gautier, where I discovered these traditions. 00:15:11:06 - 00:15:53:22 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And I never looked back. I'd meditate, meditated every single day. Since then, I've accrued well over 10000 hours of meditation time in my life. I sit every single morning for about an hour in the morning. Meditation for me and mindfulness have become really kind of the backdrop against which absolutely everything that I experience is experienced. So that kind of dual path, right, of like growing up in the world, getting jobs and careers, and also simultaneously having this meditation practice in my life. 00:15:53:24 - 00:16:33:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY It was the the job and the career and the life and the death and the sickness. All of that was grist for the mill, for the meditation practice, right? We don't recede back into a cave and become a monk for ten years. Although that exists, most of us actually have to pay the bills. Right, And has a great teacher, a guru named Ram Dass, that he said, Remember your true nature, which is awareness itself and your Social Security number. 00:16:33:15 - 00:16:59:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And so it's the pairing of these these two things where mindfulness can really help us thrive amidst whatever is happening. And I and there's a lot happening in our lives right now. Steve. You know, not just in a post-pandemic world of how do we we're continuing to figure out how do we exist together, how do we re socialize? 00:16:59:13 - 00:17:10:22 GUEST: TIM DUFFY We're pretty far on the other side of this. Yet a lot of folks are still trying to figure out, you know, how do I get out of the loneliness cycle? How do I socialize? 00:17:10:24 - 00:17:36:20 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ I think that's a great point. The re socialization, at least for me, you know, being on set, being around friends was something that you took for granted in 2019, right up until the pandemic. And then we all became Zoomers In one of your posts that I saw you, you were kind of saying when you were I think your point was that meditation and mindfulness is for everybody. 00:17:36:20 - 00:17:47:04 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ What do you feel like if you're a beginner? What is kind of that that first problem or that the first issue that people have with meditation or mindfulness? 00:17:47:06 - 00:18:36:07 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I think we step back even further and we go, Well, why do we need meditation and mindfulness, right, to develop an adversarial relationship with meditation and mindfulness is just a continuation of the reason why we come to meditate, meditation and mindfulness, right? Which is because we suffer the foundation of mindfulness, which of course is pulled from Buddhism. It's kind of the secular, if you will, set of practices that we're born out of a Buddhist tradition, of course, which was preceded by Hindu tradition and the Buddha, he said, We suffer because we are attached. 00:18:36:09 - 00:19:10:24 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And it begs the question, well, what are we attached to? And the answer to that is we're attached to permanence. We believe that things are going to stick around. They're going to stay that our our lives are going to stay the same when things are going really well. We want things to change when things aren't going well, but when things are going really well, we don't want things to change. 00:19:11:01 - 00:19:50:15 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So we suffer for things to change when things aren't going well. That means that when things are going well, they also have to change. This is the nature of our human life. We are born into this body and we get sick and we age and we die eventually. This is the starting point for why we suffer. We rage against the machine of our own human body and our attachment to being young or being pretty or being thin. 00:19:50:17 - 00:20:31:12 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Right is creating harm in our lives. Being human is a sexually transmitted disease that always ends in death. What did the Buddhist doctor write on the death certificate as the cause of death birth? That makes sense. Yeah, right. So we we somehow think that we're going to evade this reality. Everything changes. Impermanence is a fundamental law of being human. 00:20:31:14 - 00:21:00:22 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And this is why we ask the question, how can I decrease my suffering? What is it that can come into my head that I can bring into my life and provide myself with some sense of relief? And to begin the process of relief is to acknowledge the fundamental truth of our existence, that it changes, that everything is impermanent. 00:21:00:24 - 00:21:33:08 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And I think this is very much on display in the entertainment world for us right now. The old ways of living, of the consistency of getting a job, the consistency of a paycheck, right, the consistency of the big media machine, knowing how to monetize itself and thriving, you know, and yet simultaneously continually pissing all over the people and the companies that are feeding the machine of media. 00:21:33:10 - 00:22:13:19 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Right. We're in two of our deals are in strike mode right now, negotiating with this incredibly ill defined impermanent force called big media, who in and of itself, big media, doesn't know how to make a solvent business? How are we negotiating with a business that doesn't know how to monetize itself? Right. It's essential that we stand up and present ourselves back to big media and say we deserve to be paid, we deserve to be treated in equitable way. 00:22:13:21 - 00:22:48:23 GUEST: TIM DUFFY But at the same time, how are we negotiating with the machine that doesn't know how to run it? So at the core of the mindfulness, teaching is a is a concept that was derived from the US government. The Army College, I believe, created a term called VUCA at the end of the Cold War to kind of define know what is this thing that we're feeling in a term as a as a global community. 00:22:49:00 - 00:23:26:22 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And VUCA was developed and it stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, right? So volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. Doesn't that sound familiar? In a word, impermanence And two words don't know. We don't know what's going to happen. We don't know what our future holds, right? We hold on to the past and we bring it into the present as concepts in our minds. 00:23:26:24 - 00:23:51:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And we we we carry this kind of this weight as we age. And this weight is like a suit of armor, right? The suit of armor somehow going to protect us because don't we know so much? I know who I am. I know what my skills are. I know what my what my future holds because of all these other things that I've done in my past. 00:23:51:15 - 00:24:21:22 GUEST: TIM DUFFY No, you don't. It could all end like that. And in fact, it does over and over and over again. We do not know what the future holds. The past is helpful in some regard in the present, but it cannot predict the future. And in fact, both the past and the future can only be experienced in the present moment. 00:24:21:24 - 00:25:09:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY The past as a concept in the mind. The future is a concept in the mind, and both exist only in the present moment. So what are we to do in this mind that is constantly future in itself and freaking out? And sometimes we call this anxiety. And what do we do with the present moment in mind that is also regretting things from the past, bringing statements about the solidity of what was into the present moment, which is not solid at all, at least from a mental perspective, which is the only perspective we have. 00:25:09:06 - 00:25:40:06 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So what are we to do? One of the core practices in mindfulness is derived from, again, the Buddhist teachings in mindfulness communities. There's what's called the Three Jewels, the Buddha, which is like the teacher, the idealized kind of like being, so to speak, that knows how to relate to life from the perspective of wide open space, right? That still human, but also resting in awareness from a place of non reactivity. 00:25:40:08 - 00:26:13:23 GUEST: TIM DUFFY The teachings themselves. Dharma right, is the second jewel, which is the kind of wisdom that we as human beings, the great wisdom, traditions of the world, be them, you know, the Christian desert fathers, the second and third century, the Kabbalah teachings from Judaism, Sufi teachings from Islam, right? Native American teachings about the oneness of humanity and the interconnect and the interconnectedness of us as animals with animals and the earth around us. 00:26:13:23 - 00:26:37:07 GUEST: TIM DUFFY These are the great wisdom teachings of humanity, and they are not particular to any religion. So we have the kind of idealized human over here as the first jewel, and then we've got the second joy, which is the great wisdom traditions of the world. And then the third jewel is what you're building. And it's called Sangat, which means community. 00:26:37:09 - 00:27:10:20 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So every time you put out a podcast, you invite your world of people in to the shared experience of being together. And when they bring that shared experience in, they're sharing the 10,000 joys and the 10,000 sorrows. As my teacher, Jack Cornfield says, together, every person that listens to your podcast right now has a set of impermanent characteristics by definition that are rising up in their lives. 00:27:10:20 - 00:27:41:03 GUEST: TIM DUFFY They've got the transition of life, they've got a baby being born or a parent or a family member dying. They've just gotten a new job or a raise or they just got fired and they no longer have income. All right. Their digest ing the food from lunch that will give them the energy to write the emails this afternoon. 00:27:41:05 - 00:28:22:23 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Right. This is all just process. We are interconnected with the world around us and Sangat is representative of community. And Vivek Murthy, the surgeon general, he writes about the epidemic of loneliness. If I don't think we should all jump in to becoming meditators and following a particular religion or or, or a particular way of viewing the world first, I think the first thing we should do is find a friend and have a conversation and then maybe find another friend and have another conversation. 00:28:23:00 - 00:28:42:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I think to recognize the suffering that exists in our world and to begin to alleviate that suffering, we should start by actually connecting with other human beings and saying, yes, I'm here for you. And by the way, also, I need help. Can we talk? Can we communicate? 00:28:42:06 - 00:29:02:15 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ I can relate to everything you're saying. And I'm I'm curious. Do you do you kind of utilize your meditation and your mindfulness, like in the morning? Do you do it right away? Or how does it kind of on a practical level, come into play for you personally? How have you found it to be effective in your life? 00:29:02:21 - 00:29:26:05 GUEST: TIM DUFFY There are two methods that I utilize in my life that are available to all of us. One is called formal meditation. We develop a ritual of sitting down in a particular way under particular circumstances that create a bit of a ritual that's signified to the body and to the mind. Now is the time when I'm going to do this, like sitting down for a meal. 00:29:26:07 - 00:29:54:17 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Some people say grace, some people hold hands, some people take a big, deep breath. Some people just dive right in and eat a meal together. It's about ritual to kind of establish that this is the safe container for this particular experience. That's what formal meditation is. And so I'll sit formally every single morning, but then periodically on an as needed basis, I'll also sit and meditate. 00:29:54:19 - 00:30:23:19 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And I begin by saying, okay, now is the time when I'm going to meditate. The second style of practice, which is called informal practice or in your life meditation. And this is like microdosing right throughout the day and all you're doing with informal meditation and is, you know, in in modern neuroscience tells us that we have a top down model of the world. 00:30:23:19 - 00:31:11:19 GUEST: TIM DUFFY What does that mean? It means that the mind is how we experience our lives. That and this is not a an overexaggeration or some kind of spiritual statement. Actually, modern neuroscience tells us that we actually are only capable of processing our experience through the mind, right? So we're not directly experiencing anything. Our mind is interpreting data as it comes through each of the five sense doors telling a story about that data and asking the question, does it match up with previous information If it does not match up with previous information, three things can happen. 00:31:11:21 - 00:31:41:16 GUEST: TIM DUFFY One, it just gets bored and moves on because it's nothing special is happening to it feels some sort of threat and it freaks out and turns into anxiety or depression. Three It gets invigorated because of the novelty of whatever this new story is coming in and that says need more, need more, need more, right? These are the three possibilities that we experience all day long, every day as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. 00:31:41:18 - 00:32:04:07 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Right? And so mindfulness allows us to kind of experience drop into a sense and set of awareness to a place of awareness of just about our. Does this feel pleasant? Does it feel unpleasant or am I neutral? Right? We can ask that question all day long. Am I feeling pleasant to my feeling unpleasant, or am I feeling neutral? 00:32:04:09 - 00:32:27:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And it can be that simple. You can just drop that question in to the zoom that you're having while you're pitching your show. Is this pleasant? Is this unpleasant or is it neutral? You can drop it into the tasting of an orange. You can drop it into the experience of sitting with your partner and having a conversation about their workday. 00:32:27:15 - 00:33:07:24 GUEST: TIM DUFFY You can drop it into the experience of laying down at night to go to bed all day long. These three filters, so to speak, of mind, are categorizing our experience. And when we become mindful of just this simple method, pleasant, unpleasant, neutral, we loosen the grip of of reactivity so that when something is unpleasant, for instance, someone cutting us off in traffic, we're not freaking out, honking on the horn and screaming at them and creating harm in the world. 00:33:08:01 - 00:33:34:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY We just have that little gap, a tiny little gap where we go unpleasant. Welcome back. Unpleasant, You know, or that person on social media that Facebook person on social media that always spouts crazy political bullshit and you're like typing up your response and you're like, citing reference points from, you know, all of your, you know, your bubble of information. 00:33:34:04 - 00:33:35:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Yes. 00:33:35:06 - 00:33:40:18 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ You've got the article ready to post straight into the comment. Yes, I've been there. 00:33:40:20 - 00:34:13:15 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I've been there, too. I went on Facebook for like eight years because of this. And I came back to Facebook from the perspective of pleasant, unpleasant, neutral, right When I read someone's post that spouting some idiot bullshit that I view as idiot bullshit and I'm typing up my response. I know that I've been caught, I've been hooked into reactivity and what am I doing on Facebook if I feed the war right? 00:34:13:17 - 00:34:55:12 GUEST: TIM DUFFY How are we contributing to the benefit of humankind when we feed the war? There's a place for thoughtful opposition, right? But we can't get into the place of action of speaking and acting to the benefit of ourselves and other human beings. Unless we have a firm foundation of I know what's going on in my internal world, what is going on in my internal world, I activated, I am pissed off, I am typing this and my job is to make that person look like an idiot in front of all their friends that never, ever, ever works. 00:34:55:14 - 00:35:34:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY There's a beautiful book called How Minds Change from an author named David McCranie, who did who explored the massive transition in California's view, both politically and culturally, about gay marriage. In 2008, 70% of the population was opposed to gay marriage. In 2008, 70% of the population was for gay marriage. What happened in ten years time for that shift? 00:35:34:06 - 00:36:06:07 GUEST: TIM DUFFY David McRaney talks about this. And at the core of it, spoiler alert is a method of investigation that political activists use called deep canvasing. And at the core of deep canvasing is deep listening, right? So when we come at a person with whom we disagree from the perspective of war, they will come at us with the perspective of war. 00:36:06:09 - 00:36:27:17 GUEST: TIM DUFFY But when we come at a person with whom we disagree from the perspective of I care about you and your experience in your life matter and I want to listen to you, and that doesn't mean that I have to agree with you, but it does mean that I will respect you and listen to you. That's where real change starts to happen. 00:36:27:21 - 00:36:54:03 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And that is the change that occurred in ten years time. With regard to gay marriage in California. Throughout our experience as human beings, there's that's part of the Dharma, right? That's human wisdom not coming from religion, not coming from tech, but just coming from one individual to another individual and saying, I care about you. I don't want to perpetuate the war. 00:36:54:03 - 00:37:22:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I genuinely want to connect with you. I want to build community. Our sangha is all beings on earth, and if we exclude one, we might as well exclude all of us. And it's from this perspective that we can actually take action and advance forward as a species to the benefit of ourselves and others. That's what mindfulness allows us to do. 00:37:22:15 - 00:37:28:14 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And there's tons of practices that we can explore and methods that we can explore. 00:37:28:16 - 00:37:50:00 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ So let's break down. You talk about kind of like the little moments of where you can bring thoughtfulness into your day and you use the example of somebody cut you off or somebody you know on social media. But let's talk about your on set and you have a disagreement with whether it's a colleague or a, let's say, talent. 00:37:50:02 - 00:38:08:02 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ How do you how would you or how have you kind of had that ability to go pleasant, unpleasant, right. And use some mindfulness to get yourself into a better place when you're having a disagreement or a bad moment on set? 00:38:08:04 - 00:38:37:21 GUEST: TIM DUFFY But one method that we can use is to acknowledge I love this maxim. If you can name it, you can work with it, right? And absolutely everything in our internal world is workable, right? Part of the foundation of what I help other peoples discover about themselves is our internal world is is like a dictator. Unless we recognize that the dictator doesn't need to lead the way. 00:38:37:21 - 00:39:12:11 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Right? The dictator is just an aspect of being human. It's called mind. And we all have this mind and it's a bunch of thoughts that proliferate in certain situations, paired with physical experience in the body. And when we push the dictator in a particular direction, the dictator fights back. So but we gently name the internal experience and we call it anger, for instance, and we just gently name it and we develop an attitude. 00:39:12:13 - 00:39:35:12 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Anger is unpleasant in the body, although it can be pleasant, seemingly pleasant for some people. Right. And there's no denying that either. Right? Some of us do feel that sense of anger. But on the other side of anger, when there's action and and it harms other people and ourselves, we have regrets. So we drop in to the space of saying anger is present quickly, just quickly write it. 00:39:35:14 - 00:40:23:08 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Anger, I name it. Anger is present. Take a big deep breath. Thank you. Host of Game Show or actor. I hear what you're saying. And we decide within ourselves in that moment that we are not the constricted accumulation of change yield energy that is that needs to be right. All that congealed, constricted energy is present in our system as anger, and we watch it from the perspective of awareness from the witness, we say welcome back. 00:40:23:08 - 00:40:50:19 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Anger gently in our mind as an attitude. Welcome back. Anger. I know you. I've worked with you before. You will continue to be present on and off for the rest of my life. So let's be friendly here and you're welcome to come and go as you please. Anger right? I'm not going to fight you. Anger. But what I will do is I will receive you in the wide open space of awareness and I will know your character mystics. 00:40:50:21 - 00:41:27:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Because when we feel anger in our body, it's never about the other person. It's never about the external situation. Anger is always us meeting ourselves in our internal experience. Always. There's never, ever, ever a situation where anger is caused by someone else. It's caused by the feeling we have when we encounter that extreme external force. It's our relationship to that external force that creates harm in our lives. 00:41:27:15 - 00:41:50:23 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So and it's our relationship really ultimately to the only force that forces that there are in our experiences, which are internal, the only thing we can ever experience in our awareness is the internal. So we say, welcome back, anger is present, take a big ass deep breath, recognize Anger's presence in our lives. Get better at recognizing when anger is present. 00:41:50:23 - 00:42:32:05 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And from that place of recognition and wide open spaces, awareness, we go now I will respond. Right. And if we can respond from the place of helpfulness, then great. We can respond from the place of neutrality and not causing harm. Great. If we respond from the place of harmfulness, that's okay too, because it gives us yet another opportunity to recognize anger's presence in our life and to relate to it in a in a more constructive, helpful way. 00:42:32:07 - 00:42:52:07 GUEST: TIM DUFFY We're not receding into the cave and becoming a monk. We're living our lives and we're growing with the experiences of our lives so that we can act and speak to the benefit of self and other. This is an ideal idealized state, and that's what we're talking about. 00:42:52:09 - 00:43:19:12 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Another scenario you and I both know you put your heart and soul into developing a project. A lot of people are trusting you. You have talent, you've told them that we're know, we're pushing this forward and they're trusting you, your partners trust you. You've spent a lot of time on this and nobody wants it. 00:43:19:14 - 00:43:22:03 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Yeah. 00:43:22:05 - 00:43:45:11 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ How do you how do you use your skills to kind of not feel tense and to not feel like it? Let me now say empty, but to not feel like all that time energy in a lot of cases as a freelancer, money that was all a waste. 00:43:45:13 - 00:44:13:17 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Thank you for that question. It's a great and important question for those of us that generate from our internal experiences, ideas and concepts that we believe the world should love. My father said to me long ago when I first moved to Los Angeles, he said, If you have just one good idea, you ain't worth shit, right? I love that. 00:44:13:17 - 00:44:44:19 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And what it does is it just creates a sense of humor around it. Okay? Like, yeah, it's just one idea. You know? That being said, when we spend money and time and energy and relationships trying to get someone to finance that idea, the sting persists. So how do we relate to that Sting One way to relate to the sting is to recognize VUCA, the nebulosity of why things don't work, right? 00:44:44:20 - 00:45:27:11 GUEST: TIM DUFFY There is a network of complexity within the entertainment industry right now, and as it's been the case, you know, forever, but it's particularly apparent in today's world. We referenced it earlier as VUCA, but what is NEBULOSITY? Why did someone pass on that idea? Why didn't it work? It's in some ways it's a fool's errand, right? So we acknowledge the nebulosity of why a thing didn't work as a can, as an aspect of the experience of creating something and putting it out into the world, and then the world saying no to it. 00:45:27:13 - 00:45:58:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And we try to hold it a little less tight, right? We try to release the fist, the grip, so to speak, around what we believe to be a perfect idea that someone should buy and and give us money for right. And we reset our relationship to the idea and to the process of pitching from the firm Foundation of I don't know. 00:45:58:15 - 00:46:30:09 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Right. We reset. There we go. I don't know. It's nebulous. I done there. I could try to pursue all the different patterns and paths and understand all the different forces of the hundreds and thousands of people that participate in the thing. No process or I could just say nebulous, I don't know. And then I come back to the idea and from the place of a calmer, less attached position to the idea, we can then begin to refine the idea. 00:46:30:15 - 00:47:06:10 GUEST: TIM DUFFY We can start having conversations with other folks about the idea. It might be time to just drop the idea and come up with something completely different. But often isn't it really that there's something very interesting that many people responded to when you pitched the idea? But and that thing was what everybody kept talking about, and it was maybe a particular character that you wrote about or a particular style of hero's journey in the story that, you know, began with the ending first or whatever. 00:47:06:12 - 00:47:31:21 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And we say, All right, what was the world telling me about this process that actually was kind of consistent across some of these communications that I had that I can actually lift up that aspect of the thing that I created and perhaps reform it and add new, fresh elements and perspectives into it. In Silicon Valley, this is called the pivot. 00:47:31:23 - 00:48:00:23 GUEST: TIM DUFFY You know, I've gone through multiple stages of investment for my businesses. I've watched three startups in my time in Silicon Valley, especially in Pre-seed investment. They're not investing as much in the idea as they are investing in the individuals, right? They're seeing people, founders of businesses as folks that can adapt. And here is the great word overused but still relevant. 00:48:01:02 - 00:48:34:14 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Pivot, right? What have we learned from the path we've taken to today and how do we apply those learnings to the benefit of ourselves and others with regard to this particular idea moving forward? We cannot adapt and pivot if we are stuck in the place of no one gets me or that idea was awesome and I should keep pitching that exact idea as the same way I pitched it that everybody passed on 100 times. 00:48:34:16 - 00:49:04:08 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Our life is a process. Ideas are conceptual, just like your belief that Steve is a person who is permanent and independent, when in fact really all you are is a process that's evolving over time because of impermanence concepts we bring out into the world and we try to sell our impermanent By their very nature. Children grow up because of impermanence. 00:49:04:08 - 00:49:15:01 GUEST: TIM DUFFY We don't want babies to stay, babies for babies to stay, babies which sleep in a sea of babies who can't figure it out. And then there's poop everywhere, all over the world. Yeah. 00:49:15:01 - 00:49:17:11 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ You know, I don't think anybody wants that. 00:49:17:13 - 00:49:42:17 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Our ideas are like babies. We want them to grow up and to evolve. We don't want to stop them dead in their tracks. So we hold our ideas the way we hold a newborn baby. We feed it and we love it. And at a certain point, you've got to let the baby go. But also at a certain point, when the baby becomes a 14 or a 15 year old, you got to figure out what the baby's you. 00:49:42:19 - 00:49:56:12 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Right. And what the world is telling you about your 14 year old and how do we support the 14 year old to proliferate forward in the process of itself? It's the same thing with ideas. 00:49:56:14 - 00:50:02:04 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ I think that's a great analogy because you can only take care of so many kids. 00:50:02:06 - 00:50:07:14 GUEST: TIM DUFFY You got to let some of those kids go. Some of your kids are assholes, right? Yeah. 00:50:07:16 - 00:50:17:02 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ You can't take care of all of them. You start to, you know, you get to the Elon Musk stage. I mean, you're not the richest guy in the world. You got like ten kids. You can only take care of so many. 00:50:17:02 - 00:50:19:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So yeah, you can't rename all your kids. 00:50:19:04 - 00:50:31:03 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Ex Exactly So I think that's a great analogy as each, each concept is, is a little baby and then it grows up and you got to let some of them go at some point. I think that's that's a great analogy. 00:50:31:08 - 00:50:35:20 GUEST: TIM DUFFY This is the law of impermanence and it's so helpful in every aspect of our lives. 00:50:35:22 - 00:50:59:01 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Yeah. How do you, what, what advice would you give for somebody who's kind of nervously waiting to figure out what their role is in this kind of changing media ecosystem? That's kind of a vague question, but, you know, you and I both know if you're under 30, you're watching TikTok and YouTube and Netflix and pretty much that's it. 00:50:59:03 - 00:51:21:21 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ And if you are somebody who gets their work in the more legacy or traditional media, the cable networks or the broadcast, well, you know, life's going to be changing. And I think that's a big part of the problem with, you know, what's happening right now is people are watching content in a different way. We're still making content in a certain way. 00:51:21:21 - 00:51:45:01 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Not as many people are going to movies with the exception of Barbie and Oppenheimer. So I think we're kind of stuck in this mode of, okay, what do I do now? What do I do now? And you're right, everything you just said is right. How do you pivot? What kind of advice would you give to somebody who's in that kind of anxious mode of, okay, well, where do I fit in? 00:51:45:03 - 00:52:15:18 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Wow, what a beautiful question. I give this advice to people all day long. So, as you know, Steve, I've pivoted. I've been teaching meditation for 15 years to my friends throughout the entertainment community. And about a year and a half ago, the demand got so great and I was saying no, far too many people that I just decided that I needed to open up my my own life to support other people. 00:52:15:18 - 00:52:44:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So I, I work with executives and producers and and businesses to answer this question of how do we move forward and success in the face of VUCA, Volatility, uncertainty, complexity, ambiguity. So the first thing we do is we acknowledge VUCA. We don't know what is to come. 00:52:44:15 - 00:53:22:07 GUEST: TIM DUFFY We step back into awareness and we recognize let's talk about an individual, right? So we'll call this individual Bob. Bob is a show runner who's been extremely successful for 15 years. He's worked on many shows and he's not had a job for a year and a half. Bob is an expert in storytelling, but Bob is relying on external forces to validate his expertise. 00:53:22:09 - 00:53:53:20 GUEST: TIM DUFFY He's saying, I'm going to wait for those forces to signal back to me that I'm okay and that my belief in myself as being essential to the success of those external forces, big media production companies, television companies that I am essential to their success, then they will come around to me as a key element that will help them regain their success in their own worlds. 00:53:53:22 - 00:54:32:14 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Bob needs to recognize that VUCA is actually happening for them as well, and so he needs to step back and say, What is it that I'm hanging on to? What we often are hanging on to is a sense of fixed identity. We believe ourselves to be a certain thing. I am a showrunner, I am X, I am what I am a husband. 00:54:32:16 - 00:55:05:00 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I am a father. I am smart, I am, I am. Whatever it is that I've perpetuated throughout my life and felt as if I could rest in that identity. But what is that identity and where is that identity? Upon further review, we begin to understand that that identity is in our minds. It lives in the abstractions of mind. 00:55:05:02 - 00:55:37:24 GUEST: TIM DUFFY It lives in the non tangible abstraction of awareness, its thoughts, its physical feelings in awareness. It's tension, it's contraction. But yet on my LinkedIn page, it says all these things, right? Well, my LinkedIn page should be all you need to know about why you should hire me and why you should use me to solve your problems. Big Media. 00:55:38:01 - 00:56:01:16 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And we look a little deeper at our LinkedIn page and we remove our connection and our attachment to the identity of our LinkedIn page. We can start to see actually a pattern. What is that pattern? When we remove our attachment to us being a particular way, the pattern is actual skills that are useful and viable in the world. 00:56:01:16 - 00:56:41:15 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Storytelling, for instance, for Bob, is not what's going away. Stories will forever be what makes us human. There will always be demand for stories, and arguably there is more of a demand than ever for story. It's just that we are attached to the old delivery systems. So when I step back in my LinkedIn identity and I go, okay, maybe that my stories and my belief that my stories are valuable to Netflix or Amazon or to, you know, CBS or whatever, maybe I step back from that and go, Well, what is living underneath that? 00:56:41:15 - 00:57:06:14 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I'm a fucking Ph.D. in storytelling, right? And then I start thinking, Well, what else is in my resume? Well, I've always wanted to work with kids or I've always wanted to work in the wellness industry, or I've always wanted to work in. I'm obsessed with a guy. What is going on in the world, Right? A growth industry, by the way. 00:57:06:16 - 00:57:33:16 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And then we start to ask the question, what? I have this kind of life earned PhD in storytelling. What if I just disentangled it from the delivery systems with which I've grown attached to which I've grown attached? And I ask the question, are there other delivery systems that will allow me to use these skills in ways that people and businesses will benefit? 00:57:33:18 - 00:58:01:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And the answer is hell yes, there are. In fact, there's more opportunity than ever for people like us. We've been telling stories our whole lives. The only obstacle towards our ability to do so is our attachment to our own identity. Our ego. We have to let go, drop back into awareness and reposition ourselves from the perspective of, Oh, I actually have a choice. 00:58:01:06 - 00:58:51:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And in fact it's infinite. But I do not have choice if I believe myself to be this label in this world. And I can only exist in that as this label in this particular world dropped the labels dropped the world's reassess, and from the place of wide open space reemerge into the world and take action. Have conversations with folks, put the word out there that you're an expert storyteller to 50 brands that you're interested in working with, all of whom in today's world are likely to need some form of expert storytelling in order for their brands to evolve to meet the needs of their clients and their customers. 00:58:51:06 - 00:59:30:15 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So that is what that's the advice that I give and it's the advice I took my sales man. You know, I haven't launched three startups because because I felt so comfortable that television was going to give me everything that I needed. I disentangled myself from the belief that television was the only way, and I've reconfigured my own relationship to the skills that I have developed over time and redeployed them back out into the world by communicating with my sangha, with my community, which is much larger than it ever was. 00:59:30:17 - 00:59:41:01 GUEST: TIM DUFFY And why? Because I actually engaged and I asked questions and I said hello and hey, I need help, or Hey, can I help you? 00:59:41:03 - 01:00:06:10 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Dude, that's awesome. I think that's great advice. I think that is advice that a lot of people, myself included, could use. All right. Before I let you go, I have to ask you how you're feeling about your Philadelphia Eagles coming up this season. I mean, look so close last year. Is this a Super Bowl year for the Eagles? 01:00:06:12 - 01:00:27:02 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Around the birth of my second child, I had to let go of the identity as an Eagles fan. So, like so right now I have three kids now, a three and a half year old talk about letting go. So every time I engage somebody that talks about sports, I go sports. Yay! And I don't really know what's going on in the sports world. 01:00:27:04 - 01:00:37:23 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I frankly, I barely watched any Eagles games last year. Super Bowl was great, by the way. Philadelphia had a great year last year's Super Bowl, World Series, MLS Championship. 01:00:37:23 - 01:00:41:10 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ That's true. I forgot to ask. Yeah, I've got to ask about the Phillies. Yeah. 01:00:41:12 - 01:01:10:03 GUEST: TIM DUFFY The only reason I know any of that is because everyone that I used to connect with about sports from Philly was talking about it on social media. My son. Right. My community. Yes. And I couldn't I couldn't I had to pay attention when folks when they got to the to the championship games. But prior to that, frankly, I was like, you know, I've got to change a diaper. 01:01:10:05 - 01:01:32:04 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Okay. I don't know what's going to happen this year, but I can't wait to connect with with more people and maybe watch more games. And but I'm not going to stay attached to it. And now come really doesn't matter to me that much. It's really just about being able to see the joy in other people's faces. I was at Disneyland the week after the Eagles lost the Super Bowl last year. 01:01:32:04 - 01:02:09:13 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Right, with my kids. My kids were on a ride and we were with a bunch of other people. They went over to California Adventure and I hadn't bought the two pass ticket or whatever. So I'm like, You guys go over there, I'm going to hang back at Disneyland and I'm just going to get quiet. So I quite literally like the week after the Eagles lost the Super Bowl and I quite literally picked a bench at the entryway to the park and I put my earbuds in and I sat down and I started to meditate because I knew they would be gone for about an hour. 01:02:09:15 - 01:02:41:22 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So I'm sitting there, the weirdo sitting on the bench with a blank look on his face, just experiencing the presence of what was happening in front of me. And what started to happen in front of me was that bastard Patrick Mahomes and a parade of celebration. Oh, wow. Oh wow. That I had no idea was about that. And down Main Street, Disney starts happening in front of my face meditating. 01:02:41:23 - 01:03:17:03 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Wow, I have an Eagles hat off, right? And you know what? And instead of you know, and I say bastard, like, obviously. But like, what I witnessed was joy everywhere around me, right? A sea of the colors of the opposition, so to speak. And the man that right. It was Patrick Mahomes. I'm talking about it. Yeah. So. And the man that won the game literally walking directly in front of me as I'm meditating and I didn't feel hate and I didn't feel angst and I didn't feel anxiety. 01:03:17:03 - 01:03:34:14 GUEST: TIM DUFFY I felt joy because I was witnessing the joy of all these other human beings. I think that's the way we should live in the sports world, you know, And I think that's the way we should live in our lives. If we can feel joy for others, then we can actually feel joy for ourselves because everything is an internal experience. 01:03:34:14 - 01:03:50:17 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So when we feel joy for ourselves or for others, what are we actually doing? We're encountering ourselves in a joyful state, right? Waking up to that reality is a game changer. And I think mindfulness meditation can help folks in that regard. 01:03:50:19 - 01:03:58:11 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Yeah, I concur. All right. Last thing, tell me a little about Yum Crunch, your company that you have with your brother Mike. 01:03:58:13 - 01:04:18:24 GUEST: TIM DUFFY So Yum Crunch is a you know, we've won some Emmys for the food content that we've made over the years, nominated for nine Emmy and five James Beard Awards. We won two Emmys a couple of years back. Again, this is about the pivot, right? This is what's available to us. We looked at our skills and we're like, we have all these chef relationships. 01:04:18:24 - 01:04:42:18 GUEST: TIM DUFFY We have the ability to tell extraordinary food stories. Well, one of the frustrations that we experience with our food shows was big media wasn't giving our viewers the opportunity to eat what they see. So we created Young Crunch to solve that problem. So we work with some of the world's best chefs and influencers to create content that you can taste in. 01:04:42:18 - 01:05:23:12 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Go to Yum Crunch dot com. You can follow us on all of our socials at Yum Yum Crunch y you and Drew and see and experience the stories that we tell and have the opportunity to buy what you see. My consultancy is Tim Duffy Meditation Ecom. I specialize in science and mindfulness based peak performance for executives and producers and companies to re approach their lives from a firm foundation of being awake to the assets that they have available to themselves. 01:05:23:14 - 01:05:49:20 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Acknowledging the difficulties but not wallowing in the difficulties. Right. How do we advance forward in our lives if we're stuck in the old habits of mind, we can actually thrive when we let go of the old habits of mind, and we recognize the true potential of what we all bring to this earth to one another. So that's what I'm setting out to do with Tim Duffy, meditation Icon. 01:05:49:22 - 01:05:53:22 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Tim, thank you for doing the podcast one more time. I appreciate it, brother. 01:05:53:24 - 01:05:57:10 GUEST: TIM DUFFY Thank you so much. Much Love to You have a beautiful day. 01:05:57:12 - 01:06:31:19 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ Before I go, I'll recommend a couple documentaries for you. Feel up sports. Give Johnny Football a watch. That's the Johnny Manziel documentary on Netflix. Remember Big Johnny, Texas A&M, huge superstar, won the Heisman, then a lot problems when he got to the NFL. Very fun, very entertaining. And another one to check out the YouTube effect. It is a comprehensive deep dive doc by Alex Winter really shows you how powerful YouTube is and will continue to be. 01:06:31:21 - 01:07:03:01 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ All right. That is going to do it for another episode of No Script, No problem for everybody listening. Please remember to subscribe, download and show it five stars. It's available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon and tune in. You can also find it at Wycombe and I Believe podcast. Follow me on Twitter and Post News @SteveBerkowitz and on Instagram and threads @SteveMBerkowitz and also on Mastodon Spill, Facebook, Snapchat and linked and yes, seriously, TikTok coming for you. 01:07:03:03 - 01:07:16:06 HOST: STEVE BERKOWITZ You can also email me any questions. You have the No script no Problem podcast at gmail.com. If you're interested in advertising on the show, please contact Bleav.com. Thank you for listening. Until next time, I'm Steve Berkowitz for No Script. No problem.      

Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil Kheir (Abu Saeed Mubarak Makhzoomi) (967 - 1049 CE) was a famous Persian Sufi and poet who contributed extensively to the evolution of Sufi tradition. Referring to himself as "nobody, son of nobody" he expressed the reality that his life had disappeared in the heart of God.  This revered Persian Sufi mystic from Khorasan preceded the great poet Jalaluddin Rumi by over two hundred years on the same path of annihilation in Love. 

Junun is a musical collaboration between India-based Israeli composer Shye Ben Tzur, a group of Indian musicians called The Rajasthan Express, and composer (and Radiohead's guitarist) Jonny Greenwood. The music is in the ecstatic Sufi music style known as qawwali (made famous by the late Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan), and it's devotional music—sometimes in Urdu, Hebrew, and Hindi, and is built on a percussion-dense and brass enriched groove with everything to love. In 2018, the band was opening for Radiohead on tour, but they joined us to perform some of these ecstatic tunes, in-studio. (From the Archives, 2018.) -Caryn Havlik Watch the individual songs below:

Connie Zweig, Ph.D., author of "Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path: The Dance of Darkness and Light in Our Search for Awakening," joins us in an enlightening conversation that delves into the complex interplay between spiritual longing and the shadow self. This episode explores the journey of spiritual awakening, the challenges of betrayal and disillusionment, and the path to rekindling spiritual inspiration. In this intimate discussion, Dr. Zweig explains why we are drawn to charismatic leaders and what we unconsciously give away to them. She sheds light on how to reclaim our inner spiritual authority and how to recover from spiritual abuse. Through the practice of psychology and shadow-work, she guides us in breaking free from denial, projection, and dependency. We explore the lives of renowned spiritual teachers such as Sufi poet Rumi, Hindu master Ramakrishna, and Christian saint Catherine of Siena, whose spiritual journeys were marked by both ecstatic experiences and painful encounters with their shadows. Dr. Zweig also shares cautionary tales of contemporary spiritual leaders who acted out their shadows in destructive ways, leaving their followers traumatized and lost. Dr. Zweig emphasizes that meeting the shadow is an inevitable and painful stage on the path to spiritual maturity. Join us as we explore the dance of darkness and light in our search for awakening, and discover how to rekindle the flame of longing and engage in fulfilling spiritual practice once again. Don't miss out on this profound conversation that offers guidance for both inspired and disillusioned seekers! Show Links Connie Zweig's Amazon Page Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path: The Dance of Darkness and Light in Our Search for Awakening, by Connie Zweig Magick.Me: Unleash Your True Self at Our School for Magick, Meditation and Mysticism

Explore the mystical world of Sufi poetry with Ibn al-Farid, one of the greatest poets of the genre. In this episode, we delve into the life and works of this revered 13th-century poet, examining the spiritual and philosophical themes that make his poetry so enduring. From his famous ode "The Wine Ode" to the magnificent "Poem of the Sufi Way", as well as his spiritual musings on the path to divine union.Sources/Recomended Reading:Akkach, Samer (2007). "'Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulusi: Islam and the Enlightenment". Oneworld Academic.Homerin, Emil (2001). "From Arab Poet to Sufi Saint: Ibn Al-Farid, His Verse and His Shrine". The American University in Cairo Press.Homerin, Emil (Translated by) (2001). "'Umar Ibn al-Farid: Sufi Verse, Saintly Life". Classics of Western Spirituality. Paulist Press.Homerin, Emil (Translated by) (2005). "The Wine of Love and Life: Ibn al-Farid's Khamriyya and al-Qaysari's Quest for meaning". University of Chicago.Homerin, Emil (2012). "Passion Before Me, My Fate Behind: Ibn Al-Farid and the Poetry of Recollection". SUNY Press.Scattolin, Giuseppe (1993). al-Farghānī commentary on Ibn al-Fāriḍ's mystical poem "al-Tāʾiyyat al-kubrā". Mélanges de l'Institut dominicain d'études orientales du Caire. Volume 21.Sirriyeh, Elizabeth (2005). "Sufi Visionary of Ottoman Damascus: 'Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulusi, 1641-1731". Routledge.Todd, Richard (2014). "The Sufi Doctrine of Man: Ṣadr Al-Dīn Al-Qūnawī's Metaphysical Anthropology". Brill.#sufism #mysticism #poetry Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jamila Rodrigues's new book Sufi Women, Embodiment and the “Self”: Gender in Islamic Ritual (Routledge 2023) uses her dance and performance studies background to study women's hadra or zikr experiences of a Naqshbandi Sufi community in Cape Town, South Africa. This ritual includes engagement with sacred texts, music, and bodily movement with the aim of reaching union with Allah. This focused study on women's bodily movement during zikr and women's understanding of the mind and soul provides fascinating insights of what constitutes the “self” via ritual and performance studies. Rodrigues also uses auto-ethnography to situate some of this discussion on embodiment. The book will be of interest to anthropologists, Sufi studies scholars, and performance studies scholars. Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen's University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here and here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca. You can follow her on Twitter via @shobhanaxavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

Jamila Rodrigues's new book Sufi Women, Embodiment and the “Self”: Gender in Islamic Ritual (Routledge 2023) uses her dance and performance studies background to study women's hadra or zikr experiences of a Naqshbandi Sufi community in Cape Town, South Africa. This ritual includes engagement with sacred texts, music, and bodily movement with the aim of reaching union with Allah. This focused study on women's bodily movement during zikr and women's understanding of the mind and soul provides fascinating insights of what constitutes the “self” via ritual and performance studies. Rodrigues also uses auto-ethnography to situate some of this discussion on embodiment. The book will be of interest to anthropologists, Sufi studies scholars, and performance studies scholars. Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen's University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here and here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca. You can follow her on Twitter via @shobhanaxavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/anthropology

Jamila Rodrigues's new book Sufi Women, Embodiment and the “Self”: Gender in Islamic Ritual (Routledge 2023) uses her dance and performance studies background to study women's hadra or zikr experiences of a Naqshbandi Sufi community in Cape Town, South Africa. This ritual includes engagement with sacred texts, music, and bodily movement with the aim of reaching union with Allah. This focused study on women's bodily movement during zikr and women's understanding of the mind and soul provides fascinating insights of what constitutes the “self” via ritual and performance studies. Rodrigues also uses auto-ethnography to situate some of this discussion on embodiment. The book will be of interest to anthropologists, Sufi studies scholars, and performance studies scholars. Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen's University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here and here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca. You can follow her on Twitter via @shobhanaxavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/islamic-studies

Jamila Rodrigues's new book Sufi Women, Embodiment and the “Self”: Gender in Islamic Ritual (Routledge 2023) uses her dance and performance studies background to study women's hadra or zikr experiences of a Naqshbandi Sufi community in Cape Town, South Africa. This ritual includes engagement with sacred texts, music, and bodily movement with the aim of reaching union with Allah. This focused study on women's bodily movement during zikr and women's understanding of the mind and soul provides fascinating insights of what constitutes the “self” via ritual and performance studies. Rodrigues also uses auto-ethnography to situate some of this discussion on embodiment. The book will be of interest to anthropologists, Sufi studies scholars, and performance studies scholars. Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen's University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here and here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca. You can follow her on Twitter via @shobhanaxavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Jamila Rodrigues's new book Sufi Women, Embodiment and the “Self”: Gender in Islamic Ritual (Routledge 2023) uses her dance and performance studies background to study women's hadra or zikr experiences of a Naqshbandi Sufi community in Cape Town, South Africa. This ritual includes engagement with sacred texts, music, and bodily movement with the aim of reaching union with Allah. This focused study on women's bodily movement during zikr and women's understanding of the mind and soul provides fascinating insights of what constitutes the “self” via ritual and performance studies. Rodrigues also uses auto-ethnography to situate some of this discussion on embodiment. The book will be of interest to anthropologists, Sufi studies scholars, and performance studies scholars. Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen's University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here and here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca. You can follow her on Twitter via @shobhanaxavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/performing-arts

Connie Zweig, Ph.D., just released the book Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path: The Dance of Darkness and Light in Our Search for Awakening. A guide to rekindling spiritual inspiration after betrayal and disillusionment. Within each of us is a spiritual longing that prompts us to unite with something greater than ourselves. Yet, no matter the spiritual path we choose, we inevitably encounter our own shadow. This guide explores how to use shadow work to recover from spiritual abuse or betrayal and move from spiritual naivete to spiritual maturity. Explains why we are drawn to charismatic leaders, what we unconsciously give away to them, and how to reclaim our inner spiritual authority. Explores how to recover from spiritual abuse or betrayal by a teacher or group, including breaking free of denial, projection, and dependency, using psychology and shadow work. It extends #MeToo into the spiritual domain and tells the stories of contemporary clergy and spiritual leaders who acted out their shadows in destructive ways, leaving their followers traumatized and lost. Within each of us is a spiritual longing that prompts us to unite with something greater than ourselves, to awaken to our unity with all of life. Yet, no matter the spiritual path we choose, we inevitably encounter our own shadow, those unconscious aspects of ourselves that we suppress or deny, or the shadows of our teachers and their secret desires about money, sex, and power. Meeting the shadow can derail the journey, but according to Connie Zweig, Ph.D., we can learn to recover from losing faith and move from spiritual naivete to spiritual maturity. We talk about Explanation of the shadow Why shadow work completes us How the shadow can be projected onto others Religious betrayal and spiritual abuse Are you being gaslighted? Definition of spiritual integrity How culture is intertwined with religious, sexual abuse How to pick a spiritual teacher Spiritual integrity Consequences of spiritual abuse Watch the movie Wild Wild Country on Nexflix Our vision of religious and spiritual life must expand to include the human shadow. It is crucial to acknowledge the yearning that drives us toward the spiritual path, as it can lead us toward either ecstatic, transcendent experiences or terrible suffering. We must be wary of projecting this yearning onto an authoritarian teacher, priest, or guru who abuses their power, as this can have disastrous consequences. It is essential to learn from the cautionary tales of contemporary teachers of Buddhism, Hinduism, and Catholicism, who, by acting out their shadows, have left their followers traumatized and lost. We can learn from renowned teachers, such as Sufi poet Rumi, Hindu master Ramakrishna, and Christian saint Catherine of Siena, whose lives unfolded as they followed their spiritual yearning. Meeting the shadow is a painful but inevitable stage on the path toward a more mature spirituality. It is vital to use spiritual shadow work to reclaim inner spiritual authority, separate from abusive teachers, and heal from betrayal. Connie Zweig, Ph.D., a retired psychotherapist and former executive editor at Jeremy P. Tarcher Publishing, is co-author of Meeting the Shadow and Romancing the Shadow and author of the bestseller The Inner Work of Age: Shifting from Role to Soul and a novel, A Moth to the Flame: The Life of the Sufi Poet Rumi. She has been practicing and teaching meditation for more than 50 years. www.conniezweig.com

#055: “Raise your words, not your voice. It is rain and not thunder that grows flowers.” ― Rumi, Sufi mystic*Trigger Warning: In this episode, you'll hear some sensitive topics. So if you got little ones around, please grab your headphones now.Today's interview is my friend, Tanya Veluz, LMFT, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist.  Knowing her purpose in life early in her childhood has set Tanya on an inspiring path to help the people she serves heal from trauma.  In today's interview, we dive into:Tanya's origin storySoul's path: knowing her purpose in life early in her childhood.Therapy 101: What is therapy and what it isn't.Changing tides: what has shifted these past few years with her clients' traumas.Biggest misconception about therapy that isn't true.Tools: EMDR and HaveningAdvice to our audience on how to calm themselves if they are going through stress or anxietyJoin our Boom Vision family and hit subscribe!  ➡️ Follow me on Instagram @benjaminyehIf you'd like to get the links and show notes for this episode, head to:https://www.benjaminyeh.com/ep-55-healing-trauma-through-therapy-w-tanya-veluz

Pujya Sir K.C.Narayana ( KCN ) Messages  (Meditation, Raja Yoga, Training, Spirituality, PAM - Pranahuti Aided Meditation, Divinity, Divine Service & Research, Babuji Disciple) Pujya Sri Ramchandraji's Disciple & Founder of  “Institute of Sri RamChandra Consciousness”  *Messages delivered by Pujya Sir K.C.Narayana ( KCN ), Hyderabad, India.  Dedicated his life for the Spiritual service of Pujya Sri Ramchandraji's Pranahuti Aided Meditation, Research, Meditation Trainings, Audio Messages, Books & SatSangh   For Meditation Info Contact: www.sriramchandra.in  Biography: kcnarayana.org Episode Notes: MEDITATION IS NOT ENOUGH K.C.Narayana Many abhyasis are of the opinion that it is enough if they practice meditation, cleaning and prayer methods as advised by our Master. Master himself has stated that it is not enough if we just do meditation and follow the methods as advised and we need to develop love and devotion to Master. However in the many mails I received and also during the course of discussions and talks many make me feel that they have done the routine practice as advised and they need to get results from such a practice. This is a very interesting and fairly common expectation. But there is much more than the routine meditational practices in the system advocated by our Master which we call satya pada marg. The truth is that there's a lot more in authentically liberating and transformative spirituality in satya pada marg than just meditating. The most important point to take into consideration is the way we spend the remaining period of time of the day when we do not actively do the meditational practices. Many of my friends and relatives even ask me as to why I meditate and even suggest that much time need not be wasted like that. I used to think why should I meditate at all and waste my time on this rather amusing exercise for the sake of enlightenment or realisation of what I really do 1 not know and while clarifying escape into the word “ Nothingness”. I wonder what my motivation is. What am I looking for or even lacking, for that matter? To think that our system is all about meditation is to misunderstand it. Many of us think even as our Western country brethren attracted to Eastern thought and practice often make the mistake of seeing meditation in the narrowest sense of going into a quiet room and closing our eyes. In fact, there's a lot more to these things, both externally, internally, and ultimately the process of spiritual development is an integral and holistic endeavour. The concept of constant remembrance in our system is more similar to the mindfulness of Buddhist thought rather than the concept of Bhajan that is popular in our Country and this is not the same as meditation. Constant remembrance can be practiced formally while sitting and while walking, or informally in whatever activity in which we may be engaged. Being present, wakeful and efficient in all aspects and walks of our life, beaming with the awareness of the presence of the Master in the core of our being, is more important than any particular posture or set of words of prayer in which we are engaged. Master asserts that finally we find the Ultimate is in us and adds further that it is ourselves. He wants us to understand that we are masters in essence and that it is only the coverings that need to be removed to bring to light the true nature of our self. In fact we 2 are all masters by nature, and through sadhana we only have to recognize and awaken to that fact. In reality what we seek, we are; that realisation is not far away, in future time or in another place, but in fact is inseparable from samsara (the cycle of birth and death governed by karma) and found hidden in the here and now. The lives and teaching of our Masters Revered Lalaji Maharaj, Revered Babuji Maharaj, Ishwar Sahaiji, Saint Kasturiji, Revered K.C.V. Revered Kumara swamiji, Revered Parthasarathy and many more apart from many tales in the classical enlightenment literature about karmically ripe individuals experiencing awakenings --while engaged in all kinds of ordinary activities prove this point more eloquently than any logic can. It is over four decades that I have been meditating for more than a minimum of two hours a day and certain days over eight hours. Strain in the physical realm was present in the initial days of practice and it was all the time invigorating. So far as I understand meditation is more about being than doing routine practice. Master has advised us to see or examine our condition after the routine practice of meditation for an hour and also after the performance of purification process and offering prayer. Each day I was finding after the influx of Pranahuti there is introducing and unveiling of a new way of seeing, far beyond sitting or just keeping still. Yet I found on my part, there is inevitably some 3 appropriate effort, intention, and attention involved. There is no other way I am aware of by which we can go about the task of being with the Master and be attentive to him. Meditation is called by Master even as puja as we may see in the Commandment number 1. Yet, it is my experience oflate that meditation is more of a listening to Master than the usual supplicant's so-called submission to Master. The voice of the Master is more keenly heard when our submissions end and an absolute silence in the presence of the Lord is maintained. Surely this means that we have left the realm of desires not to speak of seeking gratification of desires. Then the stage of intercommunion or receipt of orders arises and in that blessed state the individual mind and infact the entire internal apparatus is put off totally. This is really the final state of constant remembrance of prayer. This is verily the core factor of enlightenment. From my understanding of the Masters instructions gleaned through books and through the inter communions, I have found several factors that characterise enlightenment. I understood, IT, through the core of my being as blessing splendour. The great joy of awareness of inseparableness with Him is another factor in enlightenment. The awareness of the intimate proximity grants a courage and confidence that is beyond all rational understanding. With all the handicaps of the physical and mental functioning, 4 there is a competence almost intuitive in character more particularly in the work related to spiritual help to fellow brethren. There is a sense of joy accompanying every act of seeing, knowing and doing which acts in an almost instinctual nature. The equanimity that accompanies these acts has in it as though embedded the nature of perseverance, concentration, serenity, and analytical investigation. The balance of these factors is something that is usually not disturbed. According to my understanding there are actually three liberating trainings in the path of the Master: the ethical self discipline, the meditational practices, and wisdom. Without the moral discipline and wisdom I may state that meditation alone is not enough for enlightenment. If we ask how to undertake and accomplish in the path of enlightenment, and how to implement and practice these three trainings, we only need to study in depth our Masters' books particularly the one relating to the Ten Commandments he has given us to follow. That is the practical guide in a book form while other books give us the philosophy and his modified Rajayoga systematically. The book Towards Infinity is a description of the path he has taken to accomplish what he accomplished and eventually the same is the path we take to become just like him. 5 I have tried to explain how the experience during meditation becomes our guiding spirit in the path, in the book Imperience Beckons. True seekers would have noticed that in these Ten Commandments, the steps to enlightenment. They would have also noticed that there are practices that suggest ways and means to enrich ourselves with Wise Livelihood and Sagacious living. These practices are not solitary or/and contemplative in nature but engage us fully in daily life, through constant remembrance that may be considered as mindfulness and loving kindness expressed in all our actions and tasks. We should note that spirituality is never learnt through books. Master while writing about this book said “ In this book I have endeavoured to put up in words those spiritual secrets which have up till now come down from heart to heart...” and also added that “ it is not only difficult but almost impossible to express them adequately in words.” One needs to live with and understand the masters to understand the WAY. But it is almost impossible without having the proper attitude as simply staying with the masters never help much. Physical proximity is good but spiritual nearness is what is required. Love at work, compassion in action, spiritual and social activism, efficiency in discharge of duties without undue attachment as well as devoting ourselves to the welfare of the world is an important part of spiritual practice in the system of Master. It is the practical wisdom that we observe in the master 6 that really guides us. It is an age old wisdom that we may not do great things, but can do small things in a great way. For that the path given to us by the Master has been very efficacious for many seekers. The spirit or soul of every spiritual path without exception is some kind of basic morality and self- discipline. If we wish to live wisely and contribute to a better world, we must try to become better people-- authentic people, honest, straightforward, and decent and more particularly serve all beings unselfishly. Practices such as truth-telling, non-harming, non- covetousness, non jealousy, peacemaking, balancing, showing generosity and engaging in selfless service are too often overlooked by many in their urgent and mad rush to gain Grace of the Master to achieve higher states of blessedness. They seem to ignore the fact the above mentioned characteristics are in reality off shoots of small gains in the path and they need to be nourished and developed by sincere and conscientious efforts through constant remembrance. Sincere attention to them may even be called as yogas, and in fact they enable us to connect with divinity on a firmer basis. They then reveal to us an inherent beauty and sacredness of life which otherwise presents a picture of meaningless detachment. Yoga that means union, then only can be said to yoke us to the highest and deepest form of spirit in expression. 7 Nowadays wherever I am, I meditate and attend to purification process and in a sense continue to live in constant remembrance. One thing I would like to state is constant remembrance is really sinking roots deep into the present moment and living in the present and is not trying to think about the Master or Goal (whatever that might mean) as an object of achievement in either the near or farther future. Another important factor that I feel like sharing is that there are innumerable ways to worship and awaken. “There are countless ways to kneel and kiss the ground,” sang the Sufi poet-saint Rumi. Especially in our diverse, multicultural, pluralistic era, I feel we must be respectful and tolerant of the many options people have discovered for pursuing spiritual development, even within each faith, not to mention among the different faiths. Moreover, we must be patient with ourselves and our karmic condition, and we should try to be more kind to ourselves and avoid indulging in expressions of guilt, shame and self- bashing in the name of deep spiritual aspiration. Surely we need to repent for the wrongs done but we need not kneel so low as to totally lose our awareness of individual endowment and end up in self pity. We should learn to understand that the spiritual weapon of self-purification, intangible as it seems, is the most potent means of moderating our internal and external environment and to a large extent loosening the external shackles. We find the purification process 8 works subtly and invisibly; it is an intense process though it might often seem a weary and long-drawn process. Purification process given to us may appear too simplistic but to practice this we require faith—an unshakable rock like faith that flinches from nothing. Though I have many times stated that I am a slow learner few agree with me. Otherwise why should I be doing sadhana for over four decades? As Master has stated if only we enter into his consciousness he would deliver us within a few months. May be many of the aspirants in the path can gain such an entry into his consciousness. One of my sincere prayers has been this that all should some how sneak into his consciousness to solve the problem of their lives. Getting into Masters Consciousness is tough enough but living in the same is tougher. The purity of the consciousness of the Master does not permit any blemish in us of any kind. That is the real problem. Total vaccumisation of our selves is not possible. The goal of reaching the state of Nothingness is always a never ending journey to the Infinite. Infinite humility is the real goal. That is the real enlightenment. We need to develop enormous capacity to put up with our own flaws in action, fallacies in thinking, and prejudices in our relationships with co-born - the entire expression of the Divine that we are aware of. Development of fraternity is not possible through intellection. The lowliness of our nature needs to get 9 established in heart in every sense of the term. This is a prelude to accepting others mistakes or lapses. Only because we fail to accept our lowliness the problems of rage, outbursts, insults and prejudices arise and these are the factors that need to get literally burnt into ashes and exhausted out of the system as smoke and vapour. Then and then only it becomes possible for us to develop greater tolerance and patience. Talking of compassion without these virtues of tolerance and patience is talking of the blue moon. Only when we understand that single factor of our acceptance into the path by the Master, which he expresses through the influx of His Blessing Splendour that we call Pranahuti, do we make ourselves eligible for any progress. This is what I understand by the word YIELDING. Many aspirants asked me how to develop yielding attitude. How else can we do it, than by recognising our total unworthiness for the Divine blessing that we have. If we in the path of the Satyapad judge ourselves well and understand our real nature of unworthiness that gets remarkably worthy and noble then it becomes possible to yield to him and stop judging others. That is the dawn of real patience and tolerance. This learning is possible only through observing the Masters than reading the books. When patience and tolerance is developed the way to develop compassion becomes easy to tread. Karuna is a very special quality of the Divine. The lowness of the other is not a matter of ridicule but a 10 matter of sincere awareness of our own deficiency. The flaw in others is a flaw in us. This is the key to move in Universal consciousness or Brahmand mandal. Accepting these handicaps of our real being, is the training required to attend to cleaning of others. We need to develop the capacity to Evaluate others than Judging others. Evaluate, recognise the problem and solve the same is the way Masters teach us when we observe them. No book does this. Guru Kitabis can never reach this stage. When compassion sprouts in the core of our heart the seeds of altruism are sown. A small digression on ‘altruism' before I end the topic. The Tamil classic Tirukkural or the Voice of God, I understand says “The crow does not conceal its food but calls its kind to share it; Prosperity will abide with men of such a nature.” I understand the spiritual prosperity of the crow as much as my forefathers and I am sure most of you in this glorious land of Bharat do the same. One needs to practically know the ladder in spirituality and one gains more by sharing than saving for the rainy day. What goes by the phrase ‘practical wisdom' is not many times compatible with real wisdom. The laws and codes of the Lower human nature are different from the laws and codes of the Higher human nature. Regressive tendencies and Progressive tendencies are infact the same line. The moral code of Sukra or Sukraneethi is entirely different from Brhaspatineethi 11 or moral code of Brhaspati. We know the former is the code of conduct of Asuras and the latter that of the Devas. No wonder there has been confusion in the minds of many who do not differentiate between these two sides. But it is worth noting both are spiritual masters. Which side to extend our choice and seeing the masters one can decide. The book on the Commandments of the Master is His Master piece. I have found that reading the book is being with my Master in every sense of the word. I hear his voice as audibly as I hear the voices of others here and now. The sound reverberates in the mind and I lapse many times into a state of deep contemplation as if I am by his side. His advice on the book on commandments- “Read it again and again. You will find each word and each sentence commendable and when you begin to understand, I am sure you will be greatly pleased.” There are no important sentences and unimportant sentences in this book. He adds in the same context that “It is a virtue to make (correct) oneself and to make (guide) others.” Virtuous living is the key and there is no virtue greater than the understanding that we are infinitely insignificant and Master is infinitely significant. As I have expressed above getting into Masters Consciousness is tough enough but living in the same is tougher. It is obvious when we live in his consciousness we have none of our own. I pray that this may this happen soon and we live and move in a world of non possessive abundance. 12 It is obvious that we can live like that only when we make a conscious choice to be with the Master. Meditation is just one aspect of the problem solving. As far as my knowledge and understanding goes meditation on the heart imparts the basic message, that we should maintain the delicate balance of the system: first in the individual, then in the cosmic and there afterwards in the para-cosmic realm. In the three realms three different laws apply but the principle is the same: be aware of the insignificance of individual being and the absolute need to maintain the law of balance in each plane. One more factor that we learn is there is a progressive reduction of self awareness and simultaneous awareness of the inviolability of the Divine Law or Rtam. 13 Part – II The most troublesome aspect of meditation is the curtain of thoughts that we reckon with. This can be a thick one or a thin one; colored one or colorless one. But every one of us faces the curtain as an obstacle in realizing the true nature of self. This veil of thought first should be recognized as present and then one needs to peep within. This realization is often missed. Famous saints and seekers have appealed to the Divine for help as we find in the songs of Tyagayya (Tera teeyaga raada) and Annamayya (Pannagapu doma tera pai ketta velayya) Until and unless this is realized one wanders ceaselessly in the mind fixated in thoughts and forms trying to make "it work" and wondering why it doesn't. This missing is neither cultural nor social. The fact that discontent is global irrespective of the subject matter and geographical location is enough proof of this veil of Nescience. This "civilized world" keeps looking in sophisticated ways to fix "it" when ideas and circumstances fail. In the present day we have many salesmen for ideas, methods, drugs, and enlightenment too and they put in enormous effort to educate us as to how to create the right circumstances, both legitimate and otherwise to achieve our ends. But the fact remains that people keep seeking always something more new and the solution whatever is not accepted. This exposés our 14 insatiable quest! Please ask yourself whether you have ever known anyone one who has ended this seeking and come to rest in any area of activity or thinking except in the case of masters of wishes. Even the best possible circumstances always change, ideas are limited, and drugs wear off and have side effects. All this is dubious. A conversation with a dear friend has brought to light a preconceived notion that many entertain and I am share my knowledge with you here. This notion or belief is that the mind is a gauntlet that is impassable. This idea that governs so many is not true. Master has asserted that mind is the very instrument we have to use to reach our goal and it plays monkey only in undisciplined persons. The veil of thought is so thin that all one has to do is look at it and it disappears. Try to catch a thought and you will be unable to hold on to it. Just try and you will fail. This is what many persons complain when they say they have too many thoughts that are disturbing. They all disappear like dreams in the morning and nothing you can do will stop it. This is what the abhyasis tell when they say they are not able to recall the thoughts and they feel they miss a lot of them. This is due to the habit of identifying oneself with the thoughts, the alleged thinker, or what the thoughts are about (what you call ‘you') and then struggle as that falls apart which it will in any way sooner or later. 15 What can be said here is that doubt is a fundamental trick of the mind, it is the flip side of faith and both faith and doubt need belief to exist. In other words doubt and faith are all just nothing more than thought. Neither has anything to do with who you truly are. Doubt and faith are NOT clarity. They are both the minds pathetic substitute for the absence of clarity. When my friend begins to doubt that he and other "normal people" can never get out of the rut of mind, he is reinforcing things that are untrue. 1) First: that anyone not bound in the mind is higher or gifted in some unusual way. 2) Second: that the mind is powerful. Truthfully it only has the power that one endows it with in the mind. Mind is a self appointed despot. 3) Third: that what goes on in the mind actually stands as real. It is but proper that we should test these assumptions. If we are in fact who we think we are, then consider who we thought we were years ago, or even yesterday. At that time we had the same confidence in those ideas that we have in the ones today. Yet they don't exist anymore. In fact life has shown us that they were utterly false. We may think that the ideas "about" us today are more accurate than in the past, because we have more knowledge but the fact is that today's sense of self is made of exactly the same substance that it was years ago and that substance is thought. Therefore the sense of self can't be any more 16 real today than it was in the past. Thought can't be who we are. Mind is like any other part of the organism with specific functions and it need not be deferred to beyond those functions which are useful. The veil of thought is so delicate that if we look at it directly it dissolves before our eyes. The unfortunate predicament of the human condition is that the perceiving of reality through the veil of thought distorts everything that is perceived. This is called delusion, maya or samsara. This problem gets worsened for all those who dwell in the virtual images of the small or the big screen and surely the computers. The more we get accustomed to the virtual plane the more farther we move in reality and poor mind need not be accused for this. Perception we know is not who we are either as some of the modern thinkers hold. If we go blind or born without eyes the seer is still there without windows to the world. What is the source from which even perception comes from when the eyes are gone? It is my understanding that this source is the original Prana from which all mind arises and also the changing views of the world we develop. Once we realize this inside immediately we recognize the outside. This is our nature and irrespective of the degree of suffering or enjoyment the reality remains untouched by those responses. Whether we are in the realm of the plane of the limited self or have moved 17 into the rarer realms of the cosmic or para cosmic planes this is true. Prana alone exists. It is worth investigating this in the core of our being sincerely. It is an enterprise for freedom in the real sense of the term and without true inquiry there will be no enjoying of that freedom that is our nature. We need to meditate in the silence of our being that persists in the midst of the most tormented or pleasured or any state of mind. When we do meditate on the Divine light without luminosity and touch the core of the Reality in expression (that is our heart) we see that it is untouched by both pleasure and pain. We see who we truly are and then enjoy our freedom. Many persons are in the habit of finding reasons and excuses for not living this freedom and surely the masters were not very appreciative of this lapse in responsibility for ones' own happiness and that is why our Master had to write the small and brief note on “Determination”. I shall try to share some more thoughts on how meditation is not enough. During meditations one of the factors we should appreciate is that there is enough inertia of mind. Looking at the problem from a new perspective we find that the highest state that can arise in the mind is the mind's ability to see its own limitations. Master had to many times tell me and also on certain occasions warn me of the intellectual 18 approach in sadhana. It is not that by that time I was not aware of the Divine possibilities of my little self and to be fair to my Master I had considerable recognition of my mental powers. But understanding the limitations is from my understanding of spirituality, far more greater than mere recognition of mind powers. Because of this understanding that arose in me, I consider myself a blessed person. The mind can never take us beyond the mind, but the mind can recognize this fact utterly. To be able to understand what the mind can do, and then to understand what the mind can't do, is what is attempted to explain here. I found enough reasons for feeling blessed. When I understood there is no-room for the mind and its doubts and beliefs and faiths I found there is no deception because this is a no-mind condition. The head is gone and that is a great freedom! When I found myself not working hard with mind I found that all that I am left with is truth because I found truth doesn't change as a result of my effort. Truth naked is the reality that I encounter and there is no deluding in this no-mind plane. This is so simple it is no wonder I missed it for decades in spite of Masters guidance. Many may not understand me when I say that we have to work hard to get deluded. Delusion is not a natural state. It requires rationalization, fantasy, denial, and various other forms of artful self-deception to essentially rewrite and replace what actually ‘IS' namely our small identity. When I started thinking 19 about the Autobiography of our Master and found how unmixed it is from any type of fantasy or imagination, I understood how hard I have been working to find a meaning to my individuality mixed with real and contrived notions about my self and was desperately creating a story of my life. This lesson in insignificance is a blessing splendour of the Master. The desire to write our stories is an odd one and yet by the number of biographies and autobiographies that were written and continue to be written is so large we need to examine what it is that they try to express. I find that this is one of the most intimately and closely held desires of any reasonably successful person. The awareness of the all pervasive presence of the Prana should make any sane person avoid such an adventure in mis-information. One more caution before I end this paper: in any attempt at sharing personal experiences in sadhana there is a peculiar type of ego factor. Generally there needs to be an element of truth to what the speaker is saying, and the more disturbing that truth is the better. This truth is written or spoken into a forum where it will be recognized and agreed with, usually because it is self-evident. This is the nature of reports submitted about ones' lapses or short comings or sins of commission and omission. There are certainly a lot of shocking truths in the world, and there is nothing wrong with speaking them, for that is one of the ways people help one another. Funnily it is the lapse or omission that becomes the starting point of the 20 greatness of the speaker or writer and ones' individuality thus gets established on firm foundation. Once an emotional truth is spoken, a truth that most people wouldn't have spoken, there is an opening in the body-minds of the listeners. That opening is trust. The expectation that is sought to be set up by the author is simply that the next thing this person says or writes will be true because the last thing he said was obviously true, and in that opening the so-called authority has an opportunity to say anything he wants because the opening is there. The opportunity to inculcate even the most well intentioned idealism rides as the truth into the body-mind of the listener and most of the time goes unnoticed. This I added only to persuade aspirants in the path not to try to impress others with their personal experiences. Two things are achieved there by: we serve our interest in avoiding that particular brand of Ego (the tiger in the garb of goat) and the aspirants of delusion. That is quite a prize for the small effort we put in insignificance. The distance between insignificance and nothingness is quite a leap: the real state at this stage in spiritual life is jumping the ocean with neither the hands nor legs nor wings- we are just cosmic and para cosmic dust particles-with no individuality and bare essential identity.  

What does it take to be happy? Do you look for things to make you happy? Or maybe you seek happiness to abate sadness. When we rely on things to make us happy – people, places, events, material goods, food, alcohol, drugs – we associate happiness with feelings of elation, which are temporary. To have true lasting happiness, we must find contentment. In the Sufi teachings, contentment is a high station. It is learning to be content with what life brings – the highs, the lows, the mundane, and everything in between. This is the topic of today's Meditation & Healing Circle. Is there something in your life that you can re-interpret to release yourself from the roller coaster of discontent? Is there something you can simplify to find contentment and live a more harmonious life? Listen to this episode to release yourself from the roller coaster and discover the beauty in simplicity. You're invited to join us LIVE for The Meditation & Healing Circle - every Sunday at 10am US ET / 7am US PT. When you join live, you can stay on after the recorded meditation for Q&A, support and discussion. http://CommunityforConsciousLiving.com

Live in Melbourne Australia at a Voicecraft Live community event, this dialogue between Bishop Lindsay Urwin, Zen Roshi Kirk Fisher, student of Sufism Sieta Beckwith and philosopher Tim Adalin was held on the topic of 'Meaning, Tradition & Progress'. Learn about upcoming Voicecraft events @ https://voicecraft.io/events Read the show notes and watch the film @ https://voicecraft.io/content/e81-a-bishop-zen-roshi-sufi-philosopher-visit-voicecraft-live Listen to the full intro song by Cantrips titled 'The Big Break' @ https://youtu.be/Qaj-stBL4W0

The World Sacred Music festival in Fes, Morocco fully delivers on its promise of bringing together profound, spiritual music from around the globe. In one edition of the Festival, Youssou N'Dour debuted his Egypt project, backed by an orchestra from Cairo; whirling dervishes from Turkey and qawwali singers Meher Ali and Sheher Ali from Pakistan revealed contrasting faces of Sufi music and dance; the Orchestra of Fes showcased Andalusian and Jewish traditions and the art of Arab maqam; and Sufi Nights showcased many varieties of Morocco's rich, Islamic folklore. This program brings you all that and more, including a behind-the-scenes glimpse of spiritual life in the medieval city of Fes. APWW #447

In which Sufi mysticism inspires a Bolivian philosopher to divide all of humanity into nine personality types, and Ken visualizes the ur-cow. Certificate #25935. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace: Head to https://www.squarespace.com/omnibus to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code OMNIBUS.