Conversation 4 Exploration. Laura Lee Show, Cuyamungue Institute

Imagine a world where you could just up and dance your sickness away. This is what The San Bushmen of the Kalahari of Southern Africa do. Theirs is one of the oldest surviving lineages and cultures, and we can ask if theirs represents the oldest healing traditions, the earliest worldviews. David Cumes, a Western trained surgeon born in South Africa, reclaimed those roots when he attended the San&a...

Awakenings that inspire and expand our view of the world, come to us in many ways, can be enriched by reading various philosophers, scientists, saints, and sages who have opened new perspectives on human nature and the universe. The visions and practices of these pathfinders are available in great abundance.  For many, such openings come during prayer or meditation and the proper use of affirmatio...

Transform your waking life into something intentional and empowering. Flow happens when you are fully present and engaged in what you are doing and timelessly committed to the activity. Applied to any type of art or work, it creates an efficiency and clarity of purpose that feel great and can also be applied to everyday activities like brushing teeth or walking to the mailbox. It can transform you...

Historically, the Lakota have a rich oral tradition to preserve the legends and stories that maintained their spiritual way of life. Creation stories were known only among the holy men, who passed them down through the generations. No single holy man knew all the creation myths.  Elders shared tales with young ones to preserve the culture and ensure the continuation of a people. Thomas Horse, a La...

We had talked about common English words with compelling historical origins that you may have missed out on from the annals of popular culture. Well, this time around, we have decided to take the route of mythology. To that end, quite incredibly, various myths (from around the world) have intrinsic ties to the evolution of some rather well-known English words. David Elkington trained in the fine a...

Are we entering the Age of water... water consciousness? Long gone are the days of drinking naturally pure water from flowing rivers and streams—or even your tap. Today it is becoming common practice to use bottled or filtered water. How did we arrive at such a state, and what can we do about it?  Here we discuss diverse topics such as: water’s role in the origin of the universe and life itself; c...

Sir Martin Rees presents scientific evidence that our vast universe may be only a grain of sand on the infinite cosmic shore. It is now widely accepted that our universe exploded around 15 billion years ago from an unimaginably energetic initial event: the big bang. As the primordial material expanded and cooled it evolved into the exquisite patterns of stars and galaxies we now observe. Martin Re...

Creation Spirituality is the idea that divinity permeates all things, and all things have the imprint of divinity, yet the sum of all things does not fully encompass the mystery of the divine.  Matthew Fox states, “as a movement, Creation Spirituality becomes an amazing gathering place, a kind of watering hole for persons whose passion has been touched by the issues of our day – deep ecologists, e...

How can we better understand the Aborginal people of Australia? The history of Indigenous Australians began at least 70,000 years ago when humans first populated the Australian continental landmasses. Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands. Many Australian Aboriginal cultures have or traditionally had a manually coded language,...

From The spirituality of Avalon to shamanic approach and healing the soul and connectons to the Arthurian lengends, Celtic Shamanism derives from the native traditions of North-West Europe. The shamanic contribution of the Celts shares common elements with American, Australian and Siberian teachings, however it derives entirely from Celtic source material.  World-renowned Arthurian expert John Mat...

What is the history of the human soul? What is its future? And what is our individual role within the collective whole, particularly in today's world of unprecedented change?  Robert Keck frames a compelling science of a collective soul that investigates the deep causal values determining why certain beliefs and behaviors become culturally dominant.  How do we embrace the emergent values and...

The history of early sacred music and the forces that shaped it is a fascinating area of research. From Gregorian Chanting to vocal toning and the power of the 5 notes in the pentatonic scale, the spirit of music opens us to something sacred within. Toning is a form of vocalizing that utilizes the natural voice to open vowel sounds and humming on the full exhalation of the breath. Music therapists...

Proven effective by scientific research and presented here by Dr. Dharma Singh Khalsa on the practice of Meditation. By balancing and regenerating the body's ethereal and physical energies through simple meditations, unites the mind, body, and spirit. Each Medical Meditation here has a specific physiological effect, targeting afflictions from arthritis to ulcers to cancer. Dr. Khalsa details...

Indigenous cultures have used plant based hallucinogens for thousands of years as part of their cultural, spiritual, or healing traditions. Dr. Rick Strassman conducted research involved the powerful naturally-occurring compound, DMT – N,N-dimethyltryptamine. Led to this substance through his earlier study of the pineal gland as a potential biological locus for spiritual experiences, he administer...

Karen Kelly is a part of a group in England of looking for the ancestral shamanic roots of shamanism in Europe. They looked to the history, anthropology, folklore, and religious studies to fully explore the ancient roots of shamanistic practice in Europe. Using the clues in old Norse accounts and legends, they have revived song, ceremonial and divination practices. Looking at the practice of Seith...

A maze of man-made chambers, walls and ceremonial meeting places, named America's Stonehenge is most likely the oldest man-made construction in the United States (over 4000 years old).  Like Stonehenge in England, America's Stonehenge was built by ancient people well versed in astronomy and stone construction. It has been determined that the site is an accurate astronomical calendar. It...

It's what everyone wants to know -- do I survive death? Where do I go? What do I become? Rinpoche Gaelek, expert in the ancient teachings of reincarnation, helps us examine the four questions most of us ask ourselves: Who are we? Where did we come from? Where are we going?  He tells stories of the mystical Tibet he lived in, as well as the contemporary America he is now a citizen of, and shar...

Heather Pringle, science writer with a passion for archeology, tells the story of Europeans  who, over four thousand years ago, migrated to western China. Archaeologists assumed that these isolated finds were just a few lost travelers. Then In the 1970s, construction work revealed hundreds of Western-looking human remains—many mummified-- and their artifacts and domesticated animals. The latest da...

Tyler Volk traces James Lovelock's initial observation that in the search for life elsewhere, atmospheres may offer chemical signatures, which he applied to our own planet, to note the self-regulating cycles and feedback loops that help maintain Earth's adaptive, long-term stability. Our biosphere's various ecosystems, from the soil, ocean, and air are all regulated by living proces...

England’s prehistoric monuments span almost four millennia – from the time Neolithic farmers first began to build using timber, earth and stone, to the invasion of the Romans in AD 43. Scattered across the English landscape are hundreds of these mysterious sites, from isolated standing stones to massive stone circles, and from burial mounds to multi-ramparted hillforts. Gary Biltcliffe  has dedica...

The indomitable Shuar of the Amazon--reputed to be the only tribe in the Americas that has never been conquered--have lived as warriors, hunters, cultivators, and healers for generations. Even in today's acquisitive, often wasteful world they defend their rainforests and sustainable ways of life and offer their philosophy of love, joy, and hope. The Shuar share their practices of shapeshiftin...

A critical challenge today is freeing human thinking from the limited beliefs and attitudes that lie behind many of our problems—personal, social, and global. As we look to distill the essential wisdom on human consciousness that is found in the world’s various spiritual traditions, we learn not to look “out there” to the world of experience for reality, but “in here”, towards the dimension of con...

The Ulchi culture, people of Eastern Siberia; Doro, an ancient Daoist way of being in the world; technology also comes from Nature; an ancient oral history coming back to Neolithic times; the natural art and skill of shamanizing; an intimate relationship with Nature and the Universe; nature as a system of complementary and cooperative experience; the paradox of individuation and connection; plat,...

Cultural Creatives are a fascinating demographic, a major mainstream subculture of American society that represent a collective emergence of progressive values, beliefs and lifestyles. Cultural Creatives is the term coined by Paul H. Ray, Ph. D., to describe the group of individuals who are the early adopts of progressive trends in a society. They are the ones who are creating and defining the fut...

Dr. Brian Weiss integrates concepts of traditional psychotherapy and the exploration of his patient's spiritual unconscious.  Regression therapy can heal us. Through the process of remembering, symptoms diminish, and a strong sense of relaxation and well-being often emerges. Belief in survival of the soul goes against the scientific model, which assumes that all phenomena are physical, are gr...