The Mystical Positivist

Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist , we feature a discussion from the Western Baul Podcast Series featuring Rob Schmidt and Stuart Goodnick . The title is "Conversation as Spiritual Practice: The Legacy of Robert Daniel Ennis" July 4, 2026 marked the 50th anniversary of the founding of Tayu Meditation Center by Robert Daniel Ennis. Mr. Ennis dated the 200th birthday of American independ...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Kenneth Hillsman , a diviner in the Dagara West African tradition. Kenneth was born and raised in Tennessee as a preacher’s kid in a very religious family. In college while taking African studies classes, he read Elder Malidoma Somé’s first book, Of Water and Spirit , which planted the seeds for what was to come. While wor...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  Ken McLeod , Buddhist teacher and author the recently released book,  The Magic of Vajrayana . In today’s conversation, we discuss the challenges of spiritual practice in the modern world. Among the topics we cover are the contrasting roles of religious and spiritual practice, the crisis of meaning in contempora...

Podcast: This week on the show, we present a pre-recorded conversation with author, Peter Russell , about his latest book, How to Meditate Without Even Trying (An Eckhart Tolle Edition), just released from New World Library. The refreshingly simple approach that Peter unfolds in his book replaces effort with ease and reminds readers that true peace of mind is closer than they might imagine. His te...

Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist , we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  Red Hawk , acclaimed poet and the author of 13 books, including Self Observation , Self Remembering , The Way of the Wise Woman , Return to the Mother , and Book of Lamentations . Of Self-Observation and Self-Remembering , he writes, “Every living thing is surrounded by a vibratory atmosphere, a vibra...

Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist , we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  Abby Havermann , speaker and podcaster, on the challenges of going through life in a waking dream and how practices like Self-Observation and Self-Remembering can metabolize the dream and restore our lost sense of presence. Abby Havermann is a psychotherapist, coach, and speaker who focuses on the ill...

Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist , we feature a pre-recorded conversation with returning guest Stephen Aronson about his new book, AS INSIDE, SO OUTSIDE, AS ABOVE, SO BELOW – Reconciling Science and Spirituality through Consciousness , published by Karnak Press in 2024. This series of essays represents perspectives from Stephen’s half-century in the study of psychotherapy and spiritua...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  Donna McLaughlin , Mahamudra teacher in the Karma Kagyu tradition. Donna was first introduced to the Dharma in her teenage years. In 1970, having finished college, she travelled overland to India. After attending retreats in Bodhgaya with S. N. Goenka, she stayed at a Buddhist mission outside Delhi. Several people ha...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Layne Negrin , author of Gurdjieff in Tibet . Divided into three parts, Part One looks at the evidence of Gurdjieff's presence in Tibet, Part Two researches the direct students of Gurdjieff who explored Tibetan or other Buddhist sects to one degree or another, and Part Three is a collection of comparative studies showing t...

Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist , we feature a discussion from the Western Baul Podcast Series featuring Rob Schmidt and Stuart Goodnick . The theme is “The Crisis of Continuity of Wisdom” and the description is as follows: The Greek philosopher Heraclitus asserted that it’s impossible to step twice into the same river. In other words, flux is all. In terms of religious and spiritual...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with David Paul Coleman , professional astrologer, practitioner and teacher in the magical tradition of Franz Bardon, and author of The 26 Keys – The Magic of the Astral Light: A New Approach to Astrology . David has been a professional astrologer for 35 years and a practicing magician for much of that time, having first encoun...

Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded in-person conversation with OM C. Parkin at Gut Saunstorf near the Baltic in Germany. We discuss the intention behind Gut Saunstorf as a modern monastery, the impact that digitization in the external world has on our ability to do internal work, and more. OM C. Parkin is a renowned European wisdom teacher and the initiator of the  OM Fo...

Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist , we feature a talk given by hosts Stuart Goodnick and Robert Schmidt at Many Rivers Books & Tea on July 10, 2025. The talk title is The Practice of Patriotism , and the description is as follows: The present moment is fraught with political tension and polarization. Many of us are left wondering what it means to be an American. Spiritual prac...

Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Kenan Azam , host of the Potential Paradigms Show . In this discussion, we explore Kenan’s spiritual journey from a secular upbringing in the Pakistani part of Kashmir, to the worlds of academia in Canada and the US, and then through deep engagements with the traditions of Advaita Vedanta, Kashmiri Shaivism, and Sufism...

Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Neil Douglas-Klotz  about his latest book, The Aramaic Jesus Book of Days – 40 Days of Contemplation and Revelation , published this year by Hampton Roads. This latest volume offers new translations from Jesus’ native language in the form of a meditation a day, an oracle, or a guide for a 40-day retreat. Through expans...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  David Brazier (aka Dharmavidya), author of many books including The Dark Side of the Mirror: Forgetting the Self in Dogen's Genjo Koan , Authentic Life: Buddhist Teachings and Stories , and The Feeling Buddha: A Buddhist Psychology of Character, Adversity and Passion . In this wide ranging discussion we cover Dharmavidya’...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  Billy Wynne , author of The Empty Path: Finding Fulfillment Through the Radical Art of Lessening , published this year by New World Library. Providing an antidote to our never-ending quest for more, mindfulness teacher, successful entrepreneur, and Zen Buddhist Billy Wynne shows that embracing emptiness can declutter...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Bob Noha , co-editor of and contributor to Aikido – The Art of Transformation: The Life & Teachings of Robert Nadeau , published recently by Park Street Press, a division of Inner Traditions. A widely influential figure in the development of Aikido in America, Robert Nadeau is known as one of the few American direct di...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  Lama Lhanang Rinpoche and Mordy Levine , authors of  The Beginner’s Guide to Karma – How to Live with Less Negativity & More Peace , published recently by New World Library. Twenty-six centuries ago, the Buddha fleshed out the universal law of the spiritual realm: karma. The law of karma holds that our actio...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Roger Jackson , author of  Saraha – Poet of Blissful Awareness , published this year by Shambhala as part of its Lives of the Masters series. Saraha, “the Archer,” was a mysterious but influential tenth-century Indian Buddhist tantric adept who expressed his spiritual realization in mystic songs (dohas) that are enlig...

Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist , hosts Stuart Goodnick and Rob Schmidt feature two episodes from the Western Baul Podcast Series recorded earlier this year. In the first hour we present the talk, Cultivating Transparency: Realizing the Emptiness of the Stories You Tell Yourself , and in the second hour we present the talk, Languaging Nonduality . The podcast descriptions are as foll...

Podcast: This week on the show we feature a prerecorded conversation with OM C. Parkin on the challenges and paradoxes around languaging Non-Duality and how to tune into the silence between the words when engaging with a sacred text. OM C. Parkin is a renowned European wisdom teacher and the founder of the mystery school, Enneallionce , and Gut Saunstorf , a modern monastery. His books also includ...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  Ken McLeod , Buddhist teacher and author the recently released book,  The Magic of Vajrayana . In today’s conversation, we discuss Ken’s recent English translation of The Diamond Sutra from the Tibetan and his development of a new commentary. The Diamond Sutra is one of the most influential early Mahayana sutras...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with  Moss Campion aka Peter Cohen, author the newly released book,  Blindspot: Through the Wormhole of Science and Religion . Blindspot exposes the unseen distinctions that exist among the ways that people seek the Big Answers to the questions posed by life, the universe, and everything. When most people speak about...

Podcast : This week on the show we feature feature a pre-recorded conversation with Ken McLeod, Buddhist teacher and author the newly released book, The Magic of Vajrayana . In today’s conversation, we unpack a compelling quote from Ian McGilchrist’s book, The Matter with Things : If you had set out to destroy the happiness and stability of a people, it would have been hard to improve on our curre...