Category: Relationships

When Deep Faith Meets Deep Reason

Tami Simon speaks with Dr. Ashok Gangadean, who has been a professor of philosophy at Haverford College for more than 45 years. Ashok investigates the primal internal logic of human reason and the deep dynamics of communication between diverse worldviews. He is the author of Meditative Reason and Between Worlds, and with Sounds True has created the six-session audio course Awakening the Global Mind. In this episode, Tami speaks with Ashok about breaking out of limiting patterns of “ego-mental thinking” by deepening our dialogue with ourselves and others, and what it might mean to find the “missing grammar” of supreme universal consciousness he calls “Logos.” (57 minutes)

Putting Your Relationship First: Lessons from Your Bra...

In the second half of their conversation about Your Brain on Love, Tami Simon and Stan Tatkin explore how two nervous systems get along in relationship and what it might look like to fight well in times of conflict. Discover how either party can wave a flag of friendliness during a fight, core skills and attitudes to get out of any argument in five minutes or less, and the importance of making connections we can count on no matter what. (68 minutes)

Personal, Interpersonal, Transpersonal

I was recently sitting in the audience of a talk by a spiritual teacher who was pointing out, again and again, the timeless nature of being. Although I could feel the depth and profundity of the eternal moment, at a certain point, I noticed myself feeling contracted and frustrated. I thought to myself, “What about focusing on interpersonal relationships and helping us develop skills for being intimate with other people and communicating well at work, that type of thing? I am sick of timeless being!”

And then I remembered that some people are what could be called “subject matter experts” and everyone can’t be good at everything. And that the way I could benefit the most from this talk was to relax into timelessness and learn from this teacher what he is gifted at transmitting and communicating. Fortunately, that approach worked, and my critical mind relaxed.

However, I also started reflecting on something I read in a book by Robert Augustus Masters. Robert is a new author with Sounds True and has written a new book on Emotional Intimacy, and created a new audio series called Knowing Your Shadow. Robert talks about the “personal, interpersonal, and transpersonal” dimensions of experience. And when I read his description of these three different aspects or dimensions, I just loved it! I notice that whenever people just talk about the “transpersonal”, about what is formless, I begin to long for the personal and interpersonal. And when people just talk about the “personal”, about their challenges and woes, I begin to long for a bigger view that doesn’t place any limits anywhere. Maybe I am just a chronic complainer?

But actually, I think it is more than that. My sense is that the personal, interpersonal, and transpersonal are always all three happening simultaneously. And if we leave any dimension out (in a chronic type of way), we are missing something. And when we include all three —  how we are feeling individually, how we are experiencing inter-relating with others, and what it is like to transcend any sense of self and other and experience pure being – then we are experiencing a type of wholeness that leaves nothing out.

So I guess we could say I am happy in wholeness and cranky when transcendence is favored instead of recognized as one dimension of multi-dimensional being. And I feel cranky because I have seen people walk out of these transcendence-focused talks without any clue about how to work with difficult emotional states when they arise (and as we all know, they arise). Teachings that are wholly focused on the transpersonal dimension can be a breeding ground for what Robert Augustus Masters calls “spiritual bypassing” – using our spirituality to avoid facing aspects of our experience, particularly difficult emotional experiences. Robert’s focus is on “emotional literacy”, that we can learn to be fluent with all of our emotions, appreciating their nuances and what is being called forth in us in any given situation. To learn more about Robert’s work, you can check out this two-part podcast I did with him recently on Emotional Intimacy, here and here. Listening to Robert, I felt the opposite of “cranky”; I felt whole.

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The courage to be vulnerable – with Brené Brown

Dr. Brené Brown, a research professor at the University of Houston’s graduate college of social work, has spent the past decade studying vulnerability, courage, authenticity, and shame. Brené is the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Daring Greatly, and with Sounds True she has created the audio learning course The Power of Vulnerability: Teachings on Authenticity, Courage, and Connection. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami speaks with Brené about the cultural myth that equates vulnerability as weakness instead of recognizing it as the greatest measure of our courage. They also examine Brené’s research about the qualities that allow a person to live in a wholehearted way.

We hope you enjoy this audio session with Brené Brown! You can stream or download the recording at no cost here – or download the transcript if you’d like to read the discussion.

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Putting Your Relationship First: Lessons from Your Bra...

How do we make our closest relationships our top priority in life? What does the latest neuroscience tell us about how our minds affect the way we respond to challenges in relating to others? How can we improve our brains to improve our relationships? In part one of this dialogue between Tami Simon and psychotherapist and author Dr. Stan Tatkin, we explore these questions and more to help us shift out of conflict and into deeper connection. (61 minutes)

A love we never outgrow

Let us hold all fathers in our hearts today, in gratitude for the gift of life they have given. Some of us are close with dad, some are not; some have very fond memories, some do not; some of us never really got to know that person we called “dad” and what really moved him, inspired him; what he really wanted and what his unique relationship was with the movement of love; or why he came here to this sacred human place. But the one thing we do know is that, just like us, dad only ever wanted to be happy, to be free from suffering, and was only able to use the tools he had been given to take the journey that was his. We may never understand the nature of dad’s journey, the unique pattern that unfolded as his life, somehow orchestrated in the stars, to unveil to him the mysteries of love.

Whether dad is still on this earth or the beloved has sent him elsewhere, it is possible for you to fully connect with him right here, right now, for he is alive inside every cell of your heart; no matter what has happened in the past, he has given you something important for your journey. May we honor dad on this day in all of his guises, in all of his forms – personal and transpersonal – and may we be guided by his wisdom qualities down that pathway that he and all beings have laid out for us.

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