What if the bravest thing you can do right now is refusing to close your heart? This week, Tami Simon speaks with Tara Brach—beloved meditation teacher, clinical...
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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.
When we’re open, we feel joy, love, and inspiration; when closed, we feel heavy, sad, and lifeless. Most people try to fix these varying states by outwardly seeking what makes them feel good and avoiding what makes them feel bad. But spirituality asks, why we are not always okay inside?
The reason is that consciousness, the true self, becomes distracted by the objects of its awareness—thoughts, emotions, and external events—and identifies with them. This false identification forms the sense of “I” with all its likes and dislikes, causing the outer world to determine the state of the inner one. As we relax and release these stored preferences, our inner energy flows freely, restoring our natural state of joy, love, and union with the divine.
There are two viable spiritual paths: one is reaching upwardly to touch your higher self, and the other is working inwardly to release the blockages that keep you bound to your lower self. The latter encourages radical self-honesty, acceptance of reality, and daily inner work to stop resisting life and start letting go of stored blockages that create suffering. Through this surrender-based path, the natural upward flow of energy is restored, leading to lasting well-being, freedom from disturbance and, ultimately, full spiritual liberation.
How do we find our way through crisis when the path forward feels unclear? How can the stories we tell—and the stories we receive—serve as guides through times of profound change?
This week, Tami Simon speaks with Leah Lamb—a writer, creator, and founder of the School for Sacred Storytelling. Leah works at the intersection of myth, healing, and personal transformation, bringing together storytellers from around the world to tell the visionary stories our time needs. She has a background in wilderness guiding, social work, theater, and environmental media, and she’s created a new learning series with Sounds True called Sacred Storytelling: How to Tell Stories That Open Hearts and Heal the World.
Join Tami and Leah to explore:
The original role of storytellers as healers, guides, and memory keepers across cultures
How the world was “sung, spoken, and chanted into being”—and what that means for us today
The difference between fantasy and dreams, and how to ground visionary stories in truth
Working with the “flexible heart” and emotional resilience through storytelling
Deep listening as the foundation of sacred storytelling—listening to nature, community, and the unseen realms
How crisis reveals what truly matters and brings communities together
The practice of asking for “medicine stories” when you feel lost or stuck
Storytelling as a form of consciousness that can guide us through fear and overwhelm
The mysterious connection between whales, memory keeping, and human storytelling
How to offer stories as gifts that provide exactly what someone needs
If you’re seeking guidance through uncertainty, hoping to reclaim your voice as a creator, or wondering how to tell stories that serve life itself, this conversation offers both inspiration and practical wisdom for the path ahead.
Learn Sacred Storytelling with Leah Lamb. Step into this ancient art and learn how to share stories that open hearts, heal the world, and ignite change with master storyteller. In Leah’s 5+ hour audio course Sacred Storytelling, you’ll unlock your creativity, find your unique voice, and unearth the wisdom within your own life experiences. Learn more at https://www.soundstrue.com/products/sacred-storytelling
Note: This interview 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 https://www.join.soundstrue.com
This episode explores the powerful role of Eros (sensual love) and Thanatos (death) in fueling our connection to the world as we contribute to the Great Turning. Joanna and Jess discuss how we might learn to see our world as our lover (and as our self), the gifts of cultivating a sensual connection with the world, and how facing mortality can make the gift of being alive feel even more precious. They also reflect on the closeness of Joanna’s own death, which Joanna sees as “going home” to rejoin the cycle of life.
In this episode:
Using our love and awareness of impermanence as fuel for activism
Discovering ways to truly feel interconnected with all life through sensual presence
Reflections on mortality and our place in the cycle of life
We recommend starting a podcast club with friends or family to do these practices together. Links and assets to help prompt reflection and build community can be found with every episode on WeAreTheGreatTurning.com.
Micah Mortali is the director of the Kripalu School, a certified yoga teacher, and a longtime wilderness guide. With Sounds True, he has published Rewilding: Meditations, Practices, and Skills for Awakening in Nature. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon speaks with Micah about humanity’s growing disconnection from the earth and how “rewilding” can help slow that trend. They talk about rewilding both as individuals and as part of whole ecosystems. Micah also shares the story of an intense, revelatory trail encounter with a bear and comments on the “species loneliness” of urban environments. Mulling the sense of grief they have for humankind’s effects on the environment, Tami and Micah consider how modern people can grapple with being in exile from the natural world. Finally, they discuss the barriers many have to reentering nature, as well as ways to initiate your own rewilding experience no matter where you are.(64 minutes)
What do psychology and spirituality have in common? In this podcast, Michael Singer discusses how both psychology and spirituality help us illuminate the nature of the human mind and the mystery of consciousness. When we resist experiences we find uncomfortable, he explains, we begin to “make a mess” of our inner lives. Through the teachings and practices made available in spirituality and psychology, we can do the work of cleaning things up, purifying the flow of our life-force energy and returning to the ecstatic states we were meant to live in.
The spiritual path is not solely about positive experiences like love and light. It involves confronting and overcoming internal blockages formed from past experiences we’ve resisted or suppressed. True spirituality involves continuously working through these obstacles, which leads to a beautiful inner state.
“In a split second,” teaches Michael Singer, “your mind can make you miserable or ecstatic. All it takes is a thought.” Our hopes, dreams, opinions, and preferences—all of these are constructs that we’ve made up. And they pit us against reality, limiting our contentment and joy. So what can we do about it? In this episode, Michael answers that question.
What creates the inner disturbances that cause us to struggle? At the root, teaches Michael Singer, lie the polarities of desire and fear: the psyche’s need to hold on to what it likes and push away what it doesn’t. In this episode, Michael reveals how inner freedom arises not from struggling with these forces but by allowing their natural flow of coming and going to pass right through us.
How do we free ourselves from the endless pull of external events and the turmoil of our thoughts and emotions—to return to the seat of the true self? Like a balloonist seeking to rise skyward, the key is to stop fighting the ropes that are holding us down, and to practice the moment-by-moment yoga of letting go. When we do, we cease to be an instrument of the personal self and start being a liberated expression of the divine will.
Once we realize that the higher self lies beyond our thoughts and emotions, we’ve taken an important first step. But anyone who’s had this insight knows that the journey has just begun. “If you think you can quickly free yourself from the power of the mind and the heart,” Michael Singer teaches, “you are in for a surprise.” Here, he guides us into the work of freeing ourselves through our choices and our continual commitment to spiritual practice.
What do you truly want? Wealth? Recognition? A perfect relationship? At our core, reflects Michael Singer, what we really want is to be happy: to dwell in a place of joy, love, and freedom from fear. In this episode, he shows how our thoughts and emotions lead us astray with solutions and goals… and how to experience the deeper, complete part of our being that transcends both external events and the misguided perceptions and tendencies of the mind.
The mind is a high-vibration energy field out of which thoughts and perceptions are created. Unfortunately, people often mistakenly identify with their thoughts and past experiences, instead of the consciousness that is aware of them. Simply observing the mind without attachment helps release emotional and mental constraints and leads to spiritual awakening. True liberation involves using the mind as a tool rather than being controlled by it.
True spirituality isn’t about mystical experiences or lofty ideals—it’s about honestly facing and working with the reality of your inner world. The journey begins by realizing you’ve been reacting, resisting, and clinging to disturbing experiences, and then defining an ego that struggles to be relatively okay inside. Real growth begins when you start letting go of internal disturbances instead of learning to live with them. Through surrender, acceptance, and inner relaxation, you can rediscover your natural state of unconditional love and well-being. This is the real spiritual path—practical, grounded, and available to anyone willing to do the inner work.
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 not cause the absence of love—our internal reactions and stored past experiences do. By letting go, relaxing through discomfort, and accepting reality as it is, one can live in a continuous state of openness and unconditional love.
Ego is the false self, created from past experiences, that constantly judges, fears, and tries to control life to feel okay. Suffering comes from identifying with these inner patterns instead of recognizing oneself as the awareness observing them. Spiritual liberation is achieved by noticing, not resisting, and letting all inner disturbances pass through, revealing one’s true nature as peaceful, conscious presence.
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.
Success, money, relationships, or reputation cannot be the sole meaning of life—because all these can come and go, especially at death. People walk through life trying to be conditionally okay by making it match their preferences and protect their ego. The real meaning of life is self-realization through evolution—learning to handle reality as it unfolds rather than resisting it. Every one of life’s experiences—pleasant or painful—is calling on us to expand our boundaries. Growth comes not from controlling life but from increasing one’s capacity to handle it with awareness, honesty, and openness.
Life is fundamentally simple—we’re sitting on a tiny planet spinning through infinite space for a few years, and that’s it. We make it complicated by deciding how everything must be for us to be okay. This creates suffering, anxiety, and endless worries. Spirituality is about opening up, honoring, and appreciating life as it is. As we let go of ourselves, life becomes joyful, creative, and rich, not because it changed, but because we did.
Deep spiritual growth is not about collecting more techniques but about releasing the inner disturbances we have stored from our past. These suppressed energies—called samskaras—remain inside, continuing to influence and limit our lives. Instead of struggling to cope with life’s experiences, we can learn to welcome them as opportunities to release these past blockages. Over time, this leads to purification of the heart and the ability to remain undisturbed, even in the face of intense experiences. Our natural state is one of unconditional joy, love, and divine energy—reclaim it!
All living beings share the same divine consciousness, but the sophistication of the human body, mind, and heart allows us to expand our consciousness into very broad frames of reference. Unfortunately, we limit that expansion by constantly being distracted by an entire barrage of personal preferences formed by our limited past experiences. True spiritual evolution comes through letting go of these psychological distractions and allowing consciousness to return to its natural state of unlimited expansion—Enlightenment.
Spirituality is about realizing that all experiences, thoughts, and emotions are just objects that consciousness is aware of. It is awareness that gives meaning to the object, but we get fixated on the object itself. By learning to remain centered as the objects of consciousness pass before you, you can stop being pulled down into suffering and begin to rest naturally in your true seat of Self. Ultimately, when you surrender completely, your individual consciousness merges into Universal Consciousness, revealing a state of boundless peace and love.
True spiritual masters are not mystical icons, they are beings who have transcended the distractions of mind and emotion to rest in the constant ecstasy of pure consciousness (Sat Chit Ananda). This is in drastic contrast to the suffering we incur by allowing our preference-driven mind to control our lives. The path back is simple but profound: begin by noticing the reactive nature of your mind, then work on relaxing and releasing those impulsive reactions. Stop always needing life to match your preferences, and instead, learn to honor and appreciate life as a miraculous gift.
Spiritual liberation is not about attaining extraordinary experiences; it is about releasing the internal blockages that keep us from a permanent state of well-being. The cause of suffering is not life—it is our belief that life must be what we want in order for us to be okay. We can learn to let go of this constant sense of lacking by releasing the stored blockages from our past. When this purification takes place, we become open, peaceful, and capable of living with unconditional joy regardless of circumstances.
