Sounds of SAND

“For now, what is important is not finding the answer, but looking for it.” ― Douglas R. Hofstadter, Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid   Donald Hoffman is a cognitive scientist and author of more than 100 scientific papers and three books, including  Visual Intelligence: How We Create What We See  (W.W. Norton, 2000). He received his BA from UCLA in Quantitative Psycholog...

Orland Bishop is the founder and director of ShadeTree Multicultural Foundation in Los Angeles, where he has pioneered approaches to urban truces and mentoring at-risk youth that combine new ideas with traditional ways of knowledge. ShadeTree serves as an intentional community of mentors, elders, teachers, artists, healers, and advocates for the healthy development of children and youth. Orland’s...

Mukti’s name originates in Sanskrit and is most often translated as “liberation,” a term used in Vedanta and Buddhism much the way the term “salvation” is used in Christianity. Mukti has been the Associate Teacher of Open Gate Sangha since 2004 and has been a student of her husband, Adyashanti, since he began teaching in 1996, when they founded Open Gate Sangha together. Previously, Mukti was rais...

Dr. Rupa Marya illuminates the hidden connections between our biological systems and the profound injustices of our political and economic systems. What is deep medicine?  How can re-establishing our relationships with the Earth and one another help us to heal? The first part of the episode is taken from a live SAND Community Conversation hosted by SAND Co-founders Zaya and Maurizio Benazzo....

“We are not walking through the world; we are interwoven with it. In everything we do, we participate in complexity." –Neil Theise Neil Theise is a professor of pathology at the NYU Grossman School of Medicine. Through his scientific research, he has been a pioneer of adult stem cell plasticity and the anatomy of the human interstitium. Dr. Theise’s studies in complexity theory have led to interdi...

Mirabai Starr is an award-winning author of creative non-fiction and contemporary translations of sacred literature. She taught Philosophy and World Religions at the University of New Mexico-Taos for 20 years and now teaches and speaks internationally on contemplative practice and inter-spiritual dialog. A certified bereavement counselor, Mirabai helps mourners harness the transformational power o...

Cornelius Boots is a woodwinding pioneer, composer and root philosopher. He is a nanotheist and elemental-nature lover. After a 30-year career of high-caliber jazz, classical, rock and experimental music activities (on multiple woodwinds with a focus on the bass clarinet), Boots has now positioned himself at the crossroads of personal expression and divine revelation, exclusively playing bamboo sh...

From the SAND Archives we present a conversation between SAND co-founder Maurizio Benazzo and biologist and writer Merlin Sheldrake from SAND’s Wisdom in Times of Crisis Series (2020). In this talk they discuss Merlin’s book Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures . Merlin Sheldrake is a biologist, writer, and speaker with a background in plant sciences,...

Joan Tollifson is a writer and lifelong explorer of what is. Her background includes Buddhism, Advaita, nontraditional meditative inquiry, radical nonduality, martial arts, somatic work, addiction recovery, political activism, visual arts, and a devotion to both boundless presence and the beauty of the ordinary. Joan has held public and private meetings as well as occasional workshops and retreats...

Kabir Helminski is co-director, with his wife, Camille Helminski, of the Threshold Society, a nonprofit organization dedicated to sharing the knowledge and practice of Sufism. He is the author of Living Presence and the translator of four volumes of Rumi’s poetry, including Love Is a Stranger and Rumi: Daylight. His new book which we discuss on the podcast is  The Mysterion: Rumi and the Secr...

From the SAND Archives we present two talks from Christian Mystic, Richard Rohr from two SAND Conferences recorded before live audiences. The two talks are entitled “Christianity and Unknowing” from SAND16 and “The Christian Meaning Of Enlightenment” from SAND11.    Richard Rohr, as a Catholic priest and Franciscan Friar, offers a concise history of how Western Christianity once had, soo...

By training, Gail Brenner is a licensed Ph. D. psychologist and trauma specialist with almost 30 years of experience offering individual sessions and group workshops. Her work as a therapist and teacher invites people to shed attachment to false identities, return to their essential wholeness, and realize the truth of who they are. In primarily group courses, she holds safe space for people to inv...

After a PhD thesis on non separability and non locality in Quantum theory, Dr Vandana Shiva studied non separation between forests, soil and water, the Green revolution in Punjab and the relationship between violence against nature by chemical agriculture and emergence of violence in society. Since then, she has kept working on the link between seeds, plants, soil, climate, and biodiversity. This...

Ash Canty (they/he) is a Death Walker & Psychic Medium. Their ancestors are Indigenous peoples of West Africa, Cherokee, Iroquois, Blackfeet and Northern European. They support and walk others in the threshold and ritual of their own unique death and dying process. They are led by spirit, ancestors, and nature in all that they do. They teach many programs that support others in the liberation...

This conversation is from the Wisdom of Trauma Talks on Trauma Series (2021). Somatic Abolitionism is living, embodied anti-racist practice and cultural building —a way of being in the world. It is a return to the age-old wisdom of human bodies respecting, honoring, and resonating with other human bodies. It is not a exclusively a goal, an attitude, a belief, an idea, a strategy, a movement, a pla...

Monica Gagliano is a research associate professor in evolutionary ecology and former fellow of the Australian Research Council. She is currently based at Southern Cross University, where she directs the Biological Intelligence Lab funded by the Templeton World Charity Foundation. She has pioneered the brand-new research field of plant bioacoustics, for the first time experimentally demonstrating t...

“…In our daily lives, the body is seldom tasted as it is. We rarely listen to its language or allow it to simply unfold and blossom in its natural original intelligence.” —Ellen Emmet Ellen Emmet offers meetings and retreats in The Awakening Body, a direct exploration of experience sourced in the non-dual tradition of Kashmir Shivaism, Authentic Movement, and self-inquiry.  In addition, she h...

This is a recording from the 2022 Community Conversation between with guest Iya Affo and SAND co-founders Zaya and Maurizio Benazzo . Very few people are aware of the impact of historical trauma. Historical trauma is trauma so deeply rooted in the subconscious we may not even know it is there. It can leave us feeling anxious, irritable, sad, and hopeless… and we have no idea why. But once we begin...

"The essence of the Universe is vibration, quenchless energy in motion, e-motion. My work is about experiencing the Source and its manifestation through sound, emotions, and body awareness." ~ Laura Inserra Laura Inserra is a sound alchemist, a technician of the sacred, and a multimedia producer. She lives and creates at the confluence of music, wisdom schools, and cutting edge technology. She gre...

“The mind creates the abyss, and the heart crosses it.” — Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj A deep and insightful dialog between A.H. Almaas, founder of the Diamond Approach to Self-realization and Thomas Hübl, founder of the Academy of Inner Science. This conversation was recorded from a 2022 SAND Community Gathering facilitated by SAND co-founders Zaya and Maurizio Benazzo. In this meeting between two le...

In this episode, we discuss the life and work of musician and Sufi teacher Hazrat Inayat Khan with composer/pianist and Inayat Khan scholar Michael Harrison.   Hazrat Inayat Khan  (Urdu: عنایت خان رحمت خان) (5 July 1882 – 5 February 1927) was an Indian professor of musicology, singer, exponent of the saraswati vina, poet, philosopher, and pioneer of the transmission of Sufism to the West...

In this moving and powerful conversation with Pat McCabe hosted by SAND friend and presenter Lynn Murphy from SAND’s Wisdom in Times of Crisis series. At this time we are collective examining our human generated systems, worldview, purpose, or our paradigm. What if paradigm was a choice? Indigenous peoples the world over share the same planet, the same water, soil, sky, sun, moon, but how they pla...

An excerpt from the four day webinar The Wandering, Winding Way of the Wound with Bayo Akomolafe and Sophie Strand exploring the Politics of Cure, the Shadows of Harm Reduction, and Transgressive Networks of Care at World End. You can enroll in the Course here: https://www.scienceandnonduality.com/webinar/wandering-winding-way Also coming up a Community Gathering with Sophie Strand is happening ne...

In this entertaining talk from SAND18, James Fadiman , "America's wisest and most respected authority on psychedelics and their use," describes the citizen science of his recent investigations into the effects of microdosing, and shares some fascinating stories from the hundreds he has gathered in his ongoing research. jamesfadiman.com Ayelet Waldman is the author of several novels, and A Really G...

Science and Nonduality co-founders Zaya and Maurizio Benazzo host this Community Gathering with Dënesųłiné indigenous rights activist and climate activist Eriel Tchekwie Deranger . This talk touches into such topics as intergenerational trauma, decolonizing spirituality, climte crisis, ransom economy, and our collective joy and pain. Some links from the episode: Resmaa Menakem | Embodied Anti-Raci...