Tami Simon speaks with Michael Brant DeMaria, a psychologist and multi-award winning composer. Michael has published and presented numerous papers on the roles of creativity, spirituality, and play in the healing process. He is the author of Ever Flowing On and a book of poetry titled Moments. In this episode, we listen to three songs from Michael’s new album with Sounds True, In the Flow: Music for Emotional Healing. Tami speaks with Michael about the restorative and healing properties of his music, why the Native American flute has a particular power to help us move through grief, and how we can learn to flow like water through difficult times. (64 minutes)
Michael Brant DeMaria, PhD, is a psychologist and multiaward winning composer. A Grammy® nominee who has played on stage with world-renowned poets and musicians, he first recognized the healing potential of music when recovering from surgery as a child, and has since incorporated original sound-healing compositions into his clinical practice, presentations, and concerts.
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Each week on Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon interviews leading voices in the Mind/Body/Spirit space about a vast spectrum of fascinating ideas. Since 2009, Tami and her guests have been exploring the edge of understanding, nearly 1,000 episodes on the honest work of change, including spiritual discovery, awakening, intuition, purpose, trauma, and grief.
Tami Simon speaks with Michael Brant DeMaria, a psychologist and multi-award winning composer. Michael has published and presented numerous papers on the roles of creativity, spirituality, and play in the healing process. He is the author of Ever Flowing On and a book of poetry titled Moments. In this episode, we listen to three songs from Michael’s new album with Sounds True, In the Flow: Music for Emotional Healing. Tami speaks with Michael about the restorative and healing properties of his music, why the Native American flute has a particular power to help us move through grief, and how we can learn to flow like water through difficult times. (64 minutes)
An encore presentation in honor of Coleman Barks, who passed away on February 23, 2026. Tami Simon speaks with Coleman, a leading scholar and translator of the 13th-century Persian mystic, Jelaluddin Rumi. Coleman’s work was the subject of an hour-long segment in Bill Moyers’ Language of Life series with PBS. He has published numerous Rumi translations, including with Sounds True the audio programs I Want Burning, Rumi: The Voice of Longing, and his new three-CD collaboration with cellist David Darling called Just Being Here: Rumi and Human Friendship. In this episode, Tami speaks with Coleman about the extraordinary friendship between Rumi and his teacher, Shams Tabriz, and how translating Rumi requires entering a trance state. Coleman offers insights on grace as he and Tami listen to selections from Just Being Here.
Can the simple act of being kind to yourself actually be a doorway to awakening?
In this special episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon brings together two remarkable teachers whose friendship has sparked a revolutionary approach to inner transformation. Kristin Neff—the researcher who first measured self-compassion and author of Fierce Self-Compassion—joins Caverly Morgan, a meditation teacher and former Zen monk, to explore how self-compassion practices can become what they call “a lifeboat” to our deepest nature.
Together, they reveal why self-compassion isn’t just a psychological tool for feeling better—it’s a direct path to recognizing who we really are beyond our limited sense of self.
In this interview, Tami, Kristin, and Caverly explore:
Why every moment of self-compassion is a moment of “letting go of identification with the small, separate, limited self”
The difference between witnessing awareness and embodied loving awareness—and why it matters
How gender conditioning shapes our relationship to both compassion and awakening practices
The power of “relational dharma” and why we sometimes need another person to help us access self-compassion
A guided practice for moving from suffering into the “stance-less stance” of presence
If you’ve practiced self-compassion but sensed there’s something deeper available, or if awakening teachings have felt too abstract or disembodied, this conversation offers a bridge between heart and awareness that could transform your practice.
This conversation offers genuine transmission—not just concepts about awakening, but the palpable presence of realized teachers exploring the growing edge of spiritual understanding together. Originally aired on Sounds True One.
**SPECIAL ENCORE PRESENTATION IN SUPPORT OF WORLD MENTAL HEALTH DAY**
Anne Lamott is the celebrated author of many books of fiction, essays, and memoirs. Her works include Bird by Bird, Hallelujah Anyway, and Crooked Little Heart. In this special edition of Insights at the Edge originally recorded for The Self-Acceptance Summit, Tami Simon speaks with Anne about acts of “radical self-care” and how they are essential for anyone’s well-being. Anne talks about self-acceptance as an inherently feminist concept, especially around issues of body image and self-esteem. Finally, Anne and Tami discuss how it is necessary to fully accept oneself before being able to show up for others, and why modern society often argues the opposite.
Note: This episode originally aired on Sounds True One, where these special episodes of Insights at the Edge are available to watch live on video and with exclusive access to Q&As with our guests. Learn more at join.soundstrue.com.
This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Listeners of Insights At The Edge get 10% off their first month at www.betterhelp.com/soundstrue.
