Love is an inner energy that flows naturally when the heart is open, but people block it by holding onto past pain and resisting reality. The external world does...
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Tami Simon’s in-depth audio podcast interviews with leading spiritual teachers and luminaries. Listen in as they explore their latest challenges and breakthroughs - the leading edge of their work.
Join the New York Times bestselling author of The Untethered Soul, The Surrender Experiment, and Living Untethered for this free series of curated teaching sessions, recorded at his Temple of the Universe yoga and meditation center.
The mind’s noise is not the real issue—it is simply the surface ripples created by the fears suppressed in the heart. Your spiritual path is to relax, let go, and repeatedly dive inward past the mind into the heart, where the buried fears can finally be released. This ultimately leads to the constant upward flow of Shakti merging you into unconditional love and liberation.
What if the greatest battle you’ll ever face is the one happening inside your own mind?
This week, Tami Simon speaks with Shi Heng Yi—a 35th generation Shaolin master, founder of the Shaolin Temple Europe, and author of Shaolin Spirit: The Way to Self-Mastery—about what it truly means to master yourself from the inside out.
Born in Germany to Vietnamese immigrant parents, Master Shi Heng Yi began martial arts training at age four and has spent decades making the profound teachings of Shaolin Buddhism accessible to modern seekers worldwide.
Join Tami and Shi Heng Yi to explore:
What self-mastery actually means—and why it has nothing to do with control
The difference between the self and the persona, and why most suffering comes from confusing the two
The concept of elevation—how life becomes lighter when we stop grasping
How the body becomes a doorway to discovering what lies beyond it
The mind lessons hidden inside the Shaolin horse stance (mabu)
Why the heart of a Buddha and the fight of a warrior are not opposites
The yin dimension within one of the world’s most physically demanding traditions
Whether you’re carrying the weight of a heavy identity, stuck in a cycle of suffering, or simply curious about what ancient wisdom has to say to the modern world, listen in to discover the freedom that comes from turning inward.
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.
The steps on the stairway to heaven are not paved with temporary highs or fleeting inspirational experiences. True spirituality begins with self-honesty about your fears, insecurities, and the mental and emotional patterns that dominate your daily life. The path to liberation involves relaxing, releasing, and staying seated in witness consciousness as you pass through your daily challenges. God’s creation is not here to be complained about but to be honored for the deep inner growth your life provides you. The strength to relax in the face of inner disturbance and to act from one’s deepest truth is what raises you step by step toward the divine.
Acharya Shunya is a classically trained master of Ayurveda and an internationally renowned spiritual teacher and scholar of Advaita nondual wisdom. The first female leader of a 2,000-year-old Indian spiritual lineage, she has dedicated her life to the dissemination of Vedic knowledge for the spiritual uplifting of all beings. With Sounds True, Acharya Shunya has written a book titled Sovereign Self: Claim Your Inner Joy and Freedom with the Empowering Wisdom of the Vedas, Upanishads, and Bhagavad Gita. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon and Acharya Shunya explore our spiritual journey from feeling afraid to feeling powerful, from bondage to sovereignty. Offering unique perspectives that come from being both a woman and a householder, as well as the spiritual leader of her lineage, Acharya Shunya describes the boundless essence of spirit we all have within, the importance of breaking free from the cultural limitations that prevent us from remembering our true spiritual freedom, and how Vedic wisdom provides us with a timeless guided journey to spiritual sovereignty.
Terri Cole is a licensed psychotherapist and global leading expert in personal empowerment. For two decades, she has worked with some of the world’s most well-known personalities, from international pop stars to Fortune 500 CEOs. She has a gift for making complex psychological concepts accessible and then actionable. With Sounds True, Terri Cole is the author of Boundary Boss: The Essential Guide to Talk True, Be Seen, and (Finally) Live Free. In this podcast, Sounds True founder Tami Simon speaks with Terri about how absolutely critical it is to have good boundaries. Terri shares the personal journey that brought her into this work, explores where our boundary blueprints come from, and gives us her five keys for self-mastery. Together Tami and Terri discuss why having healthy boundaries might very well be the apex of how humans can learn to put truth and truth-telling at the very center of our lives.
Dr. Lise Van Susteren is a psychiatrist in private practice in Washington, DC, and has served as an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University. With her writing partner, Stacey Colino, she has authored the new book Emotional Inflammation: Discover Your Triggers and Reclaim Your Equilibrium During Anxious Times. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Dr. Van Susteren joins Tami Simon to discuss the modern condition she calls emotional inflammation, the primary drivers behind it, and her innovative RESTORE process for coming back into balance and wholeness in our lives. (1 hour, 2 minutes)
Deep spirituality is not about techniques, beliefs, or outer practices. It is about recognizing that you are already pure consciousness—whole, infinite, and one with the universe. But your awareness is constantly distracted by the outside world and your thoughts and emotions. You are unlimited, but what you are looking at is limited to the tiny sum of your past experiences—forming your false concept of self. Liberation comes by ceasing to identify with what you are looking at and identifying with who you really are—this is Self-realization.
The personal mind is a self-created mental construct formed by holding on to past experiences we have tagged with like and dislike. Whatever we experience passes through this layer of mind, which has the effect of distorting our perception and causing suffering. Liberation requires recognizing that you are the awareness noticing these thoughts, not the thoughts themselves. You can then learn to stop storing new personalized impressions while allowing old ones to pass. In this freedom, you can live in harmony with reality, guided by clarity and peace rather than personal preferences.
The fundamental spiritual question is not “How do I be okay?” It is “Why am I not okay?” Our inner discomfort is not caused solely by external events but by what we have stored inside: past disturbances, fears, and self-concepts that continually distract us from our natural state of well-being. The ego, built from these stored impressions, causes us to demand that life always match our preferences, which it never can. Spiritual freedom comes from letting go of these inner blockages so our natural state of openness and joy can shine through.
The essence of yogic teachings is that the universe is a single field of consciousness vibrating at different rates, manifesting as everything from physical matter to thoughts and emotions. At the human level, consciousness is the unchanging witness of our thoughts, emotions, and sensory experiences. Our sense of freedom is lost when we identify with what we are conscious of instead of consciousness itself. Suffering is created when we develop a false concept of self and try to make the outside world match this concept. Spirituality is not about controlling life to match our concepts but about freeing ourselves from them so consciousness can rest in its true nature, which is one of unconditional joy and peace.
Life’s deepest purpose is not to get what you want or avoid what you don’t want, but to use every moment between birth and death to evolve spiritually. By being open to life’s challenges, instead of resisting and storing them as blockages within you, your entire life can be a fantastic journey to liberation. True spiritual evolution comes from using life as a school for growth, facing each moment without resistance, and ultimately merging individual consciousness with its source—Eternal Conscious Ecstasy.
Gratitude is not about getting what you want but about appreciating the profound gifts of existence that are freely given to you. These include the flow of your breath, the beat of your heart, the ability to think and feel, and above all, the gift of conscious awareness. Suffering stems from ignoring all of this and fixating on your personal preferences. Liberation lies in shifting your focus from the personal self to the vastness of existence, where appreciation, joy, and love are the natural state of your being.
The foundational flaw in human behavior is the belief that “I’m not okay.” What follows is the lifelong attempt to fix this through external achievements, relationships, and coping mechanisms. Spiritual growth begins by shifting from trying to fix one’s discomfort to inquiring why the discomfort exists in the first place. Life itself becomes the guru, revealing daily why we close our hearts. The only true practice is to let go of resistance in every moment, allowing life to sculpt us into our highest nature, which is already pure joy and love.
If our consciousness dwells inside, why do external circumstances have such a strong effect on our inner well-being? It is attachment to past experiences that creates a mental filter that distorts reality as it comes in. By releasing stored emotions and judgments, we can access a natural state of joy and peace, regardless of external events. The path to self-realization involves continuous self-awareness and letting go of attachments, ultimately leading to a life of authenticity, freedom, and bliss.
Consciousness is the foundation of all meaning, because without awareness, nothing has significance. People mistakenly identify with their ego, which is simply a collection of thoughts and self-concepts they are aware of. This false identification leads to tremendous suffering. True spiritual enlightenment comes from recognizing that the self is not the ego but the pure awareness behind it.
Suffering is not caused solely by external events, but by the internal impressions we have stored from the past. Spiritual growth comes from letting go of these stored disturbances by relaxing through discomfort instead of trying to control life to match our preferences. True surrender is internal—it is the process of releasing what we hold inside and allowing natural peace, love, and energy to flow..
Most people must constantly manage their thoughts, emotions, and outer conditions to avoid discomfort. The deeper path through life is to realize that there is a place of great beauty and peace inside that transcends all outer turmoil. This is the seat of Self. Spiritual growth means learning how to become established in the Self by relaxing through all inner and outer disturbances, and returning to a state of absolute, unconditional well-being.
True spiritual growth naturally evolves from a disciplined practice into a spontaneous art, where life is experienced and expressed without inner resistance. For example, working off one’s karma is actually done within, by releasing stored impressions that we formed by resisting past experiences. These impressions block the natural flow of energy (Shakti) within us. Liberation is found by learning to relax through discomfort, letting go of past impressions, and ceasing to use the outer world to manage our inner wounds. This becomes the sacred art of spirituality.
Life is a spiritual journey where every experience serves as an opportunity for growth and evolution. The core of human suffering stems from attachment to the ego and resistance to the natural flow of life. By recognizing that we are not our egos but are instead the divine consciousness that is aware of the ego, we can transcend suffering and embrace inner peace. The ultimate purpose of life is spiritual liberation, achieved by letting go of resistance, aligning with reality, and embracing love and compassion in all circumstances.
Human suffering comes from trying to control the outside world so that our inner state feels good, all of which is based on impressions from our past experiences. Spiritual growth begins when we stop clinging to these impressions and instead learn to handle whatever reality presents. By letting experiences pass through without resistance, inner energy rises naturally, eventually dissolving the personal self and leading to liberation.
There are times when people experience deep love, joy, and inspiration. But these states disappear the moment we close ourselves because life does not match our expectations. We end up storing every uncomfortable experience inside, and these suppressed impressions create the fears, judgments, and egocentric thoughts and emotions that block our natural openness. Spiritual growth is not about achieving something new but about letting go of stored inner disturbances so that the natural state of love and energy can flow freely again.
People rely on external goals for their inspiration and happiness. But the sense of happiness is actually experienced inside and, with right understanding, can be an unconditional state of being. Conditions for our happiness exist because we have stored past disturbances that must be avoided if we want to feel okay inside. True liberation comes from letting go of these inner blockages, staying open to life, and choosing happiness regardless of what happens.
Suffering is created by the mind’s demand that reality match its preferences, and the attempt to control the world only deepens the sense of disturbance. Spiritual growth comes from letting go of these egocentric demands, accepting reality as it is, and refusing to engage with the inner voice that insists things should be different. When this letting go occurs, life becomes an act of effortless service, where actions arise naturally from the unfolding moment rather than from personal desire.
The world around us unfolds in accordance with the vast universal forces of cause and effect, which have been going on throughout time. In contrast, our inner world is created by the tiny sum of our individual experiences. Human beings create suffering by filling the space between themselves and reality with their likes and dislikes. By practicing acceptance, surrender, and non-resistance, one can live freely, engage fully with life, and act from a place of openness rather than personal preference. True peace arises when one stops resisting reality and instead honors and participates in it fully.
