Tami Simon speaks with José Argüelles, a well-known author for his role in organizing the harmonic convergence event in 1987 and for his book The Mayan Factor, published the same year. He is the founder of the Planet Art Network, the Foundation for the Law of Time, and is a contributor to the recently published Sounds True anthology The Mystery of 2012. Jose speaks about the significance of the year 2012 in relation to the Mayan Calendar, natural-or lunar-based time and how he believes we have the opportunity now to enter a new era of advanced mental development in which telepathy will become our primary method of communication. (63 minutes)
José Argüelles 1939-2011
José Argüelles was an author, artist, and educator who founded Planet Art Network and the Foundation for the Law of Time. As one of the originators of the Earth Day concept, Argüelles helped organize an "art happening" that led in 1971 to the first Whole Earth Festival, now in its 40th year. He held a PhD in Art History and Aesthetics from the University of Chicago. José’s career as an educator has included professorships at Princeton University, University of California Davis, Evergreen State College, the Naropa Institute, San Francisco State University, the University of Colorado, and the Union Graduate School.
José was one of the first spiritual teachers to focus on the Mayan Calendar. The foundation for the harmonic convergence was laid out in Arguelles' 1987 book, The Mayan Factor: Path Beyond Technology. He also wrote Earth Ascending, Surfers of the Zuvuya, The Arcturus Probe and Time and the Technosphere: The Law of Time in Human Affairs. His official biography is 2012: Biography of a Time-Traveler.
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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 José Argüelles, a well-known author for his role in organizing the harmonic convergence event in 1987 and for his book The Mayan Factor, published the same year. He is the founder of the Planet Art Network, the Foundation for the Law of Time, and is a contributor to the recently published Sounds True anthology The Mystery of 2012. Jose speaks about the significance of the year 2012 in relation to the Mayan Calendar, natural-or lunar-based time and how he believes we have the opportunity now to enter a new era of advanced mental development in which telepathy will become our primary method of communication. (63 minutes)
Could psychedelics cure a panic disorder? Matt Gutman went looking for an honest answer, and he brought a reporter’s notebook with him. This one crossed our desk and we couldn’t stop thinking about it.
Matt is an award-winning journalist who has served as a chief correspondent at both CBS News and ABC News, reporting from war zones and disaster sites for more than two decades. In 2023 he published No Time to Panic, an investigation into the recurring panic attacks he’d been carrying in secret — including the ones that hit him on live television.
When Tami asks which of the substances mattered most, Matt draws a line before he answers: this was not recreation. Every session happened legally, on a couch or a mat, with psychiatrists, psychologists, or trained guides beside him. Then he describes what happened in the Sacred Valley — and what he can still reach for years later, in meditation, with nothing in his system at all.
In this episode:
Why Matt’s “mode of transportation” to altered states was a couch, not a convertible
What 35 minutes of screaming on a mat in Peru let out of his lungs — and why his fellow retreat members cheered when it was over
The ketamine image of falling and being caught that he now returns to on purpose
Why the intense breakthrough turned out to be the easy part, and maintenance is the real work
If you’ve ever wondered what these experiences actually feel like from the inside — not the headline version — Matt is an unusually careful narrator of his own nervous system.
What if the anxiety, grief, or fear you’ve struggled with for years is a burden you inherited—not one you earned?
This week, Tami Simon speaks with Richard Schwartz—founder of Internal Family Systems and author of the bestselling No Bad Parts—and Tamala Floyd, psychotherapist, IFS lead trainer, and author of Listening: When Parts Speak: A Practical Guide to Healing with IFS Therapy and Ancestor Wisdom. Together, they explore how IFS and ancestral healing converge to help us release intergenerational trauma at its root.
Join Tami, Dick, and Tamala to explore:
What “legacy burdens” are in IFS—and how to recognize when what you’re carrying came from someone else
How personal, ethnic, and cultural legacy burdens operate differently—and why racism, historical trauma, and collective suffering require their own healing
The concept of the “well ancestor”: why every lineage has one, and how to invite them into your healing
Heirlooms vs. burdens: how our ancestral lines carry gifts as well as wounds—and how to receive them
Why legacy burdens are often easier to release than personal ones—and what fear most commonly gets in the way
Tamala’s guided ancestral meditation, offered live: a practice for releasing what no longer serves you
What we offer future generations simply by doing our own inner work
The episode includes a full guided meditation led by Tamala Floyd—drawn directly from her ancestors—that listeners can return to again and again.
Listen now and begin your own healing across generations. →
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.
Trauma doesn’t show up in what we remember. It shows up in how we react.
This week, Tami Simon speaks with Dr. Tian Dayton—award-winning scholar, senior fellow at The Meadows, and author of Growing Up with Addiction: How Adult Children of Addicts Can Heal Family Trauma, Complex PTSD and Codependency—about what it means to grow up inside a family shaped by addiction, and what it actually takes to heal.
Drawing on decades of clinical work, her own lived experience, and her innovative Relational Trauma Repair (RTR) method, Dr. Dayton explores the neuroscience of relational trauma and the embodied, experiential path through it.
Join Tami and Tian to explore:
Why addiction is a family disease—and how process addictions like workaholism and overeating leave the same marks as substance use
How childhood trauma gets stored in the body, not the story—and why you can’t think your way out of complex PTSD
The neuroscience of overreaction: why triggers feel present-tense even when they’re decades old
Cognitive and somatic distortions—and how to recognize when the past is hijacking the present
Psychodrama and Relational Trauma Repair: the power of talking to instead of about
Timelines, social atoms, and letter writing as tools for putting fragmented memories back in order
Why healing is a discipline—and what it means to take ownership of your own darkness as a path to freedom
Whether you grew up in a home shaped by addiction or simply recognize the patterns Dr. Dayton describes, this interview offers both a map and the courage to begin the journey.
Listen now and start where you are.
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.
