Buddhist Geeks

I’m joined in this raw & intimate conversation by meditation teacher & author Spring Washam, as we discuss the integration of Buddhist contemplative practice with the Peruvian plant medicine ayahuasca. We begin with Springs dharma journey and the way that silent practice no longer served her deeper healing journey, and how the ultimately brought her to the jungles of Peru. I share parallels on my path of working with psilocybin and healing ancestral trauma, and we go into how a deeper collective healing process underlies each of our personal journeys. Spring shares an interesting perspective on how these “medicines of the earth" can be understood as collective wisdom rising from nature itself at a crucial point in our time on this planet.Memorable Quotes:“For me insight and healing are one and the same.” - Spring Washam“I think a big part of what we are unpacking collectively is our ancestral suffering, our community suffering, our collective karma.” - Spring Washam“Yes, our lineages are alive! Your great-great-grandparents are alive in you.” - Spring WashamEpisode Links:🔗 Spring Washam📖 A Fierce Heart: Finding Strength, Courage, and Wisdom in Any Moment🔗 East Bay Meditation Center🔗 Lotus Vine JourneysSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

I don’t want to over-hype this episode too much, but listening back over it today and preparing these notes, I was left feeling that this was perhaps the most intimate, raw, & profound conversation I’ve had throughout the Meditating on Psychedelics series so far.  It might have something to do with the fact that my guest is Trudy Goodman, who is also one of my teachers.  My wife Emily & I had the great honor of being authorized to teach by Trudy last year, at her center InsightLA, where we lived for a short time so that we could train more closely with her.  I always describe Trudy as a living koan, because she demonstrates the teachings, lives the teachings, and in those moments of living them simply IS the teaching.  Seeing someone be the teachings of kindness, wisdom, & generosity, as you've probably experienced, is much more impactful than hearing people talk about them.  In Zen they call this, when it’s voiced through words, the difference between “live words” and “dead words.”  I hope you enjoy these live words from one of my most favorite people in the world. Memorable Quotes:“Why do I have to be stoned to have this experience?  This should be an experience that we can just have, we’re human beings, we have this capacity.” - Trudy Goodman “I learned from all of those experiences, and yet the experiences themselves don’t exactly help you so much afterwards.  I stopped doing them because I didn’t like the feeling of being kicked out of the garden of eden over and over again.” - Trudy Goodman “What is it that brings us into a more committed engagement with the mystery?” - Vincent Horn “Meditating can help the mystical experience, or the opening, that people have on psychedelics become not just a state, an experience that is after all only a memory, but can help make those insights and awakenings present in our everyday life.” - Trudy Goodman “We ask our students to be vulnerable.  And I don’t think we should ask our students to be doing things we aren’t doing.” - Trudy Goodman Episode Links:Trudy GoodmanInsightLA“In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts” by Gabor MateRam DassMeditating on Mushrooms with Roland Griffiths"Psilocybin-occasioned mystical-type experience in combination with meditation and other spiritual practices produces enduring positive changes in psychological functioning and in trait measures of prosocial attitudes and behaviors”“Leopard Warrior: A Journey into the African Teachings of Ancestry, Instinct, and Dreams” by John LockleyThe 4 Unmentionables: Sex. Money, Power & Race Series Father Greg BoyleTristan HarrisCenter for Humane Technology Filter bubblesSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

On this episode I had the great pleasure of speaking with Buddhist teacher, Zen priest, anthropologist, and pioneer in the field of end-of-life care, Roshi Joan Halifax.  One of my previous guests, Raghu Markus, recommended I speak with her as part of the Meditating on Psychedelics series, and so that's where the conversation began.  I think it's fair to say that by the end of our discussion it had expanded out quite a bit to include broader questions about the relationship between contemplation & action, and how the Mahayana emphasis on bodhicitta requires that we integrate our understanding with contemporary issues, of which psychedelics is just one.Memorable Quotes"I wouldn't say that I'm ambivalent with regards to hallucinogens, I'd say I'm discerning." - Roshi Joan Halifax"I have a lot of respect for entheogens.  I have more respect for my mind." - Roshi Joan Halifax"I want to live in a country that loves our children, more than they love our drugs." - Roshi Joan HalifaxEpisode LinksUpaya Institute and Zen CenterBe Here Now FoundationMeditating on Mushrooms w/ Roland GriffithsBodhicittaStanislav Grof"The Human Encounter with Death" by Stanislav Grof & Joan HalifaxWilliam Richards on ErowidThe Dependent Co-Arising of Psychedelics & Meditation by Vanja PalmersJohn Dunne on Language and Non-DualitySee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

In this episode I'm joined by one of my favorite productivity writers, Tiago Forte. Tiago is part of a new generation of productivity thinkers, whose exploring new ways of working in the digital age. I've found his writing both refreshing and insightful, and when I discovered that he also has a serious interest in meditation & spirituality I knew I'd have to invite him onto Buddhist Geeks.The first part of our dialogue explores Tiago's background and work, and then we get into the relationship between network thinking, productivity paradigms, and different types of meditation.Memorable Quotes"You can't understand a paradigm from within it." - Tiago Forte"What we can borrow from, network metaphors, telecommunications, the theory of constraints, mindfulness & meditation, to make the way the world is going into an opportunity instead of a threat?" - Tiago ForteEpisode LinksTiago Forte (https://www.fortelabs.co)"The Untethered Soul" by Michael Singer"Design Your Work" by Tiago ForteBuilding a Second BrainRibbonFarm : experiments in refactored perceptionThe Throughput of Learning by Tiago ForteFrom Multitasking to Multiplexing by Tiago ForteThe Rise of the Full-Stack Freelancer by Tiago Forte"Networkologies" by Christopher Vitale"Deep Work" by Cal NewportMetcalfe's law See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

In this episode we speak with meditation teacher & author Michael Taft about his experience of meditating on LSD. Michael describes himself as someone who has likely done more LSD than anyone you've ever known, while also being a hardcore meditator, a skilled teacher, and one of the more high-functioning & well integrated adults that you're likely to meet.In addition to discussing the potential dangers and downsides of using LSD, Michael also shares his unique experience of the 3 characteristics of the LSD experience, Impermanence, Suchness, & Meta-Rationality, each of which mirror what can be found through Buddhist meditative training. Memorable Quotes:"For this stuff to be powerful it has to be powerful." - Michael Taft"It's like opening a door in your mind you did not know is there." - George HarrisonEpisode Links:🔗 Deconstructing Yourself (Michael's Website & Podcast)📖 "The Mindful Geek" by Michael Taft📖 "Cosmic Trigger" by Robert Anton Wilson📖 "Dharma Bums" by Jack Kerouac📖 "The Doors of Perception" by Aldous Huxley🎙 Pattern and NebulositySee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

This week we speak with Albert Grabb, an LA-based radiologist & meditator, who was one of the 1st legal participants in a Johns Hopkins study of seasoned meditators using psilocybin (aka "magic mushrooms").See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

In this episode we speak with author, podcaster, award-winning journalist, and dharmic psychonaut Erik Davis about the intersection of psychedelic practice & culture with dharmic practice & culture. Episode Links: - Become a Buddhist Geeks Patreon - TechGnosis - Expanding Mind Podcast - "Zig, Zag, Zen" - Dharma Protectors - Erowid - Cognitive liberty See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

During the 2nd part of my conversation with Raghu Markus, director of the Love Serve Remember Foundation, we speak about the powerful fusion of bhakti (devotion) practice and more traditional Buddhist meditation practice. Episode Links: - Rick Doblin’s Psychedelic Studies - Ram Dass- Be Here Now Network - SHARANAGATI: The True Meaning of Surrender from the Bhakti Yoga TraditionSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

Raghu Markus lives in Asheville (my hometown) and is the executive director of the Love Serve Remember Foundation, the same organization that runs RamDass.org. Raghu traveled with Ram Dass (formerly Richard Alpert) in the 70s to India and studied with the Indian guru Neem Karoli Baba. There he also met Joseph Goldstein, Sharon Salzberg, Jack Kornfield, & Lama Surya Das, who all became lifelong friends. During this first part of our conversation Raghu & I met up at a local tea shop and spoke about psychedelics. I hadn't expected to discuss this topic with Raghu originally, but it made sense given his connection with Ram Dass as well as his own journey through the psychedelic 60s & 70s, so that's where our conversation began. I hope you enjoy the lively stories and reflections that Raghu shares about his time with Ram Dass, Neem Karoli Babi, his father, as he explored spiritual practice and psychedelics side-by-side as a young seeker. Episode Links: Ram Dass Be Here Now Network"Be Here Now" See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe

In this episode we speak with Dr. Douglas Osto, author of "Altered States: Buddhism and Psychedelic Spirituality in America". Episode Links: - Become a Buddhist Geeks Patreon - Douglas Osto- “Altered States: Buddhism and Psychedelic Spirituality in America” - “Buddhist Theology: Critical Reflections by Contemporary Buddhist Scholars” - “Zig Zag Zen: Buddhism and Psychedelics” - 'She didn't know what was real': Did 10-day meditation retreat trigger woman's suicide? See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Get full access to Buddhist Geeks at www.buddhistgeeks.org/subscribe