Talks: Reflections on the Path
Stories That Imprison Our Heart – Part 1
Our suffering arises from fear-based stories that are often outside our awareness. These include stories of our deficiency or importance, of being a victim, of being unseen or unloved, of facing failure or rejection. This is true collectively too. We have shared stories of...
Happiness Is Possible: De-conditioning the Negativity Bias – Part 2
There is an inner freedom that expresses as happiness and peace, and it is accessible when we arrive in openhearted presence. As the Buddha said, “If it were not possible to find liberation, I would not teach about it.” In this two part talk, we will look at the conditioning...
Happiness is Possible: De-conditioning the Negativity Bias – Part 1
There is an inner freedom that expresses as happiness and peace, and it is accessible when we arrive in openhearted presence. As the Buddha said, “If it were not possible to find liberation, I would not teach about it.” In this two part talk, we will look at the conditioning...
The Reality of Change: Embracing this Living Dying World
"What is it that allows us to open our hearts to every moment of our life? It's the remembrance that it's passing and it's precious." Our true refuge is reality - only by opening to “things as they are" do we find true peace and freedom. This talk explores impermanence - a key...
Radical Compassion – Part 2 ~
Radical Compassion – Part 2 - Compassion is the medicine we most need as individuals and a species to heal suffering and free our spirits. The essence of compassion for ourselves and others – what I call Radical Compassion – has three key elements: it is an embodied experience...
Radical Compassion – Part 1 (retreat talk)
Radical Compassion - Part 1 - CC ~ Compassion is the medicine we most need as individuals and a species to heal suffering and free our spirits. The essence of compassion for ourselves and others - what I call Radical Compassion - has three key elements: it is an embodied...
Relaxing the Over Controller – Part 2 (retreat talk)
We all have conditioning to do what we can to protect and promote our wellbeing. Our suffering arises to the degree that our life and identity become organized around controlling our experience. These two talks look at the emergence of the fear based “over-controller,” and...
Relaxing the Over-Controller – Part 1
Link to transcript in PDF here. CC ~ We all have conditioning to do what we can to protect and promote our wellbeing. Our suffering arises to the degree that our life and identity become organized around controlling our experience. These two talks look at the emergence of...
Ask the Friend for Love – exploring living prayer
Prayer, when cultivated consciously, energizes and guides us on the spiritual path. This talk investigates the difference between wanting, with its narrow fixation, and the prayer that arises out of our deep heart’s longing. We explore how living prayer, the prayer that arises...
Sure Heart’s Release
The pathway to our awakened heart includes deep recognition of our barriers to love, and as we open, the courage to express our love. This talk includes a reflection and practice that can support us in inhabiting our full capacity for loving presence (a favorite talk...
Soul Recognition: The Practice of Namaste
In our daily trance we experience ourselves and others through a filter of wants, fears, stories and beliefs. Drawing on an engaging story from the legends of King Arthur, this talk explores how we can see past this conditioning by learning to see - in ourselves and others -...
Healing Addiction: De-conditioning the Hungry Ghosts
CC ~ This talk examines the suffering that arises when due to unmet needs for love and safety, our desire becomes narrowed and fixated on substitute gratifications. We then explore how we can bring mindfulness and self-compassion to the habits of obsessing, over-consuming...
Taking ‘The Exquisite Risk:’ An Undefended Heart
Taking 'The Exquisite Risk:' An Undefended Heart - CC ~ Poet Mark Nepo uses the phrase “exquisite risk” to describe our willingness to be fully alive, open, available, living true to our heart. This talk explores the challenges and blessings of taking the exquisite risk,...
Realizing Your Deepest Desires
This talk differentiates between egoic intentions (driven by wants and fears), and our true aspiration (deepest desires) to manifest our full potential for awake awareness and love. We explore ways to realize and open to our deepest desires when we are stuck in self-promotion,...
Healing Trauma: The Light Shines Through the Broken Places
Transcript available here: Transcript: Healing Trauma – The Light Shines Through the Broken Places Most of us have encountered trauma either in our own direct experience or with someone in our immediate circle. This talk examines the shame and suffering that arise from trauma...
Listening to the Song – Part 2
Listening is more than a communications skill, it is a capacity that awakens our awareness. As we learn to listen inwardly, we begin to understand and care for the life that is here. And as we listen to others, that same intimacy emerges. In this two-part series we examine the...
Listening to the Song – Part 1
Listening is more than a communications skill, it is a capacity that awakens our awareness. As we learn to listen inwardly, we begin to understand and care for the life that is here. And as we listen to others, that same intimacy emerges. In this two-part series we examine the...
Being Truthful
CC ~ The grounds of happiness, loving relationships and a just and flourishing society is honesty. And yet our current times are characterized by a plethora of deception - both societally, and often in more subtle ways, in our personal lives. This talk examines the deep...
Trusting Our Awakening Heart
The more we trust that our awareness and heart are awakening, the more we find ease, grace and true empowerment in our lives. This talk explores two pathways of deepening our sense of belonging and trust: direct presence with the pain of separation, and turning toward the...
Love, and Death (Retreat Talk)
To live our lives fully, we need to embrace the natural unfolding of birthing and dying. Yet we are deeply conditioned to resist loss, to pull away from fear and grief. Through a powerful Inuit story, Skeleton Woman, shared by Clarissa Estes, this talk explores how our...
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