The MindThatEgo Podcast

Sabina Wantoch PhD is a researcher, facilitator, consultant, artist and animist. They are an Honorary Associate Professor at the Centre for Multidisciplinary & Intercultural Inquiry at University College London, a consultant in peer support for mental health with Imroc, and co-founder of The Mad Psychedelics Collaboratory. Their work centres around madness and its porous intersections with var...

Jasper Feyaerts is a philosopher and associate professor in clinical psychology at the University of Ghent, Belgium. He is co-founder of the Too Mad to be True conference, alongside previous guest, Wouter Kusters. Jasper’s research specialises phenomenology, self-disorders, psychosis, and delusions. Our conversation enquires into the elusive, difficult-to-define nature of selfhood. We begin compar...

This episode features my talk from the 2024 edition of Too Mad to be True on the theme of The Paradoxes of Madness. In exploring Transrationality and the Paradox of Divine Madness , I use philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein’s theory of language games to demonstrate how the models of reality directly influence how sanity and insanity is framed. If we change our model from conventional materialism to no...

Stijn Vanheule is a clinical psychologist, psychoanalyst, and professor at Ghent University, Belgium. Our conversation was inspired by his most recent book, Why Psychosis Is Not So Crazy . Stijn overviews the work of French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. He explains Lacan’s three registers: the Symbolic, the Imaginary, and the Real; psychosis as a confrontation with the Real; the security and limita...

Wouter Kusters is a Dutch philosopher and linguist. He is the author of five books, including the award-winning A Philosophy of Madness , which was translated to English in 2020.His writing details his experiences of psychosis through a philosophical lens, including stays in psychiatric institutions and solitary confinement. Wouter is co-organiser of the Too Mad to Be True Conference which takes p...

Fariba Bogzaran is an artist, scientist and pioneer of dream studies. Between 1986 and 1989 she conducted scientific studies on lucid dreams at the Lucidity Institute at the Stanford Sleep Laboratory. Fariba mixes psychology, art, contemplative practices, shamanism, Taoism, and more. Her artwork is inspired by her deep connection with nature and her collaboration with the hypnagogic and lucid drea...

Claudia Barfoot is a psychotherapist, Ancestral Healing Practitioner, and founder of the Land of Possible, which merges western theories of the psyche with indigenous systems of knowledge to facilitate growth and healing. Claudia’s cross-cultural approach combines psychology, psychoanalysis, dreamwork, sacred plant medicines, and ancestral traditions. She is informed by perspectives from the Tolte...

Daniel Ingram returns to the show following our first conversation, Awakening and the Search for Meaning . Daniel is best known for his cult classic Mastering The Core Teachings of the Buddha , within which he maps the stages of insight.  He is also an emergency medicine physician and part of The Emergent Phenomenology Research Consortium (EPRC) which aims to integrate spiritual, mystical or energ...

I’m joined by Lisa Marchiano, an award-winning author and certified Jungian analyst with a private practice in Philadelphia. Lisa is the author of Motherhood: Facing and Finding Yourself and The Vital Spark: Reclaim Your Outlaw Energies and Find Your Feminine Fire. Her latest book, Dream Wise: Unlocking the Meaning of Your Dreams, is written with Deborah Stewart and Joseph Lee, her fellow co-hosts...

Welcome to episode 57 of the MindThatEgo Podcast and the first of a new series on dreams. I’m joined by David Bedrick, the founder of the Santa Fe Institute for Shame-based Studies, where he trains therapists, coaches and healers, and offers workshops for individuals. David graduated from the Process Work Institute and has been adjunct faculty for over 15 years. He studied under Arny Mindell, the...

Episode 56 of the MindThatEgo Podcast features a panel discussion on synchronicity with Bernie Beitman, Joanna Bauer-Savage, and myself, which took place in early November in Berlin. To evoke meaningful coincidences, we asked the audience to contribute questions to a lucky dip. The resulting conversation is nuanced and diverse, including practical guidance and philosophical frameworks. We discuss...

Paul Levy is a creative artist, a pioneer in the field of spiritual emergence, and a Tibetan Buddhist practitioner for more than 35 years. He is the founder of the Awaken in the Dream Community and the author of several books, including The Quantum Revelation and Undreaming Wetiko . Our conversation dives into the murky depths of the so-called mind virus popularized by Indigenous author Jack Forbe...

Welcome to episode 54 of the MindThatEgo Podcast. This episode features my presentation, Quantum Self-Compassion, for the Mystics and Scientists Conference in April 2024. The theme was Love, Forgiveness, and Compassion: Where Spirituality Meets Science . The first half of the talk introduces self-compassion as a thread across past, present, and future. I share common barriers to self-compassion, u...

Welcome to episode 53 of the MindThatEgo Podcast. Roderick Main works at the University of Essex, where he is Professor in the Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies and Director of the Centre for Myth Studies. His research focuses on religion, mythology, literature, and, of course, synchronicity. His books include Jung on Synchronicity and the Paranormal , The Rupture of Time , Bre...

Welcome to episode 52 of the MindThatEgo Podcast. Jane Clapp returns to the show to explore depression in the context of the alchemical stages of psychological development or individuation. Jane is a distinguished Jungian analyst who formed Jungian somatics from over 20 years of clinical experience. Exploring the interplay of body and psyche, she specializes in developmental and complex trauma thr...

Welcome to Episode 51 of the MindThatEgo Podcast. I’m joined by Shaykh Fadhlalla Haeri, Sufi mystic, visionary, and an enlightened master who views spirituality as a science and an art, vitally relevant to our times. Religious scholars and Sufis were part of Shaykh’s formative experiences. His love and understanding of the universality of the Quranic message has imbued him with respect for other r...

To honour the milestone 50th episode, I’m joined by Richard Tarnas, a renowned historian and archetypal cosmologist. August 8th is the peak of the astrological event known as the Lion’s Gate Portal. The Sun (in Leo) aligns with Sirius, Orion’s Belt, and Earth. Simultaneously, Orion’s Belt aligns with the Pyramids of Giza. Ancient Egyptians revered Sirius, the “spiritual star,” and associated it wi...

I’m joined by Sanya Manzoor, a spiritual emergence coach and lead steward for the Church of Interbeing, Berlin, a grassroots initiative of community gatherings devoted to reconnection through ritual and holistic enquiry. Sanya supports clients in their mental, emotional, and spiritual healing. She also offers sound journeys, communal ceremonies, talks, meditation practices, and rituals, all to exp...

Marjorie Woollacott is an Emeritus Professor of Human Physiology and member of the Institute of Neuroscience at the University of Oregon. She is Research Director for the International Association of Near-Death Studies (IANDS) and President of the Academy for the Advancement of Postmaterialist Sciences (AAPS). Marjorie has published more than 200 scientific articles and written or co-edited eight...

I’m joined by Nick Kettles, who returns to the show having previously discussed the Stages of the Spiritual Journey. Nick is also my co-creator for the YouTube series, Archetypes of Awakening. He is a Master Certified Coach and healer with 25 years experience in the human potential movement. He has pursued a meditation practice in the Advaita Vedanta tradition for over 20 years and has worked as a...

This episode features my presentation for the International Society for Psychological and Social Approaches to Psychosis ( ISPS-US ) annual conference in October, 2023. The original title was  Metanoia: How Psychosis and Paranoia Ignited My Spiritual Awakening . I completely rewrote the talk a few days before, following a lightning bolt of creative energy that surfaced a structure I’d not previous...

I’m joined by one of the world’s leading experts in the field of forgiveness research, Everett Worthington. Everett is a Commonwealth Professor Emeritus working from the Department of Psychology at Virginia Commonwealth University, and a licensed clinical psychologist. He has published over 38 books and over 440 articles and scholarly chapters, mostly on forgiveness, humility, positive psychology,...

I’m joined by Nikunja, a musician and yoga teacher who bridges the creative arts with ancient philosophy. Following a path of devotion — known as Bhakti yoga — Nikunja teaches the embodiment of the  Bhagavad Gita  as a way of life. Nikunja has reimagined chapters from the  Gita  as part of a project to illuminate yoga’s sacred nature, which extends far beyond physical postures. In exploring the  G...

Ellen Emmet returns to the show. Ellen is a psychotherapist and facilitator of Authentic Movement. Our first conversation in episode 29,  Nonduality and the Shadow , covered psychological aspects of the awakening. This time we focus on Ellen’s teaching of the Awakening Body and yoga meditations in the tradition of nonduality and Kashmir Shaivism. This is an exploration of our true nature at the le...

This episode will answer the ultimate question to life, the universe and everything. Or maybe not quite everything, but I couldn’t miss the only chance to reference the number 42 from Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy . That being said, Jane Clapp does answer many questions I had about the inner universe. Jane is a distinguished Jungian analyst who formed Jungian somatics from over 20 years of clin...