The podcast of the Sacred Inclusion Network

For leadership authority Robert "Bob" Dunham, there's a fundmantal difference between machines -- even complex computers that mimic logical thinking -- and humans.

Before we even begin to talk about effective leadership, Dunham says, we need to get clear on this difference.

The capacity of “caring,” Dunham says,  is the fundamental aspect of what it means to be human.

"What's fundamental to being human is we are creatures that care...

Restorative yoga practioner Jennifer Piercy explains the philosophy of yoga nidra, leads participants through a yoga nidra session, and answers questions about dreams, sleep and rest.

This is a recording of the 11/19/22 Sacred Inclusion Network Managing Dark Spaces exploration. 

The yoga nidra practice starts about 16:14, goes for approximately a half-hour, and is followed by questions and answers.

Piercy’s sleep meditation tracks ...

Integrative restoration and dream educator, and yoga facilitator Jennifer Piercy here talks about yoga nidra, the importance of sleep and restoration practice, and the "wake-centric" bias of contemporary culture.

Rather than view sleep as a necessary evil, Piercy suggests approaching it as a kind of spiritual practice and an invitation to explore the unknown.  

"Part of being at home in the unknown is that we literally need to prac...

African cosmologist, independent scholar and multimedia artist Marques Redd discusses African spirituality, the legacy of Egypt, and the tradition of the gatekeepers.

Redd here explains he first became interested in African spiritualty, his academic studies on the influence of ancient Egypt on Plato's philosphy and 19th century literature, and how these studies became the basis for his intellectual, artistic, and spiritual work.

"T...

Within the halls of academia, the exploration of paranormal activity is for the most part off-limits to serious scientific inquiry. There are a variety of reasons for this, says religious scholar Jeffrey J. Kripal: the rise of behaviorism; the belief that the brain is in essence a biological computer; and the concurrent belief in physicalism - that there is nothing over and above the physical dimension of life.

Kripal here explains...

The sacred pipe, the Raven, and a peyote ritual were three touchstones of the path of Dr. Apela Colorado, traditional cultural practitioner and indigenous scientist of French and Oneida descent.

In this podcast, she shares stories of how each of these elements formed an essential part of her journey, from growing up as a mixed-race child in rural western Wisconsin to founding in 1989 the Worldwide Indigenous Science Network (WISN).

Author, teacher and coach Raphael Cushnir learned from hard experience that the results of spiritual practice aren't always warm and fuzzy or particularly pleasurable. In his case, they included kriyas, or very intense involuntary movements, sometimes accompanied by rapid breathing and non-nonsensical speech.

These were challenging enough to handle in private, but were especially problematic when occuring in public, such as in a me...

In 1985, a strange incident occurred that would totally transform the life of Whitley Strieber, at the time best known as a writer of horror novels, including The Wolfen and The Hunger.  

As memorialized in his book, Communion and the movie of the same name, this was his abduction by a group he calls "the visitors."  Communion and Strieber's subsequent work has gone a long way towards changing the world's perception of paranormal p...

For Robert "Bob" Dunham, the art of effective leadership is as much as inner game as an outer one. It begins, he says, with the leader identifying what h/she cares about, what h/she'll will do to respond to that caring, and then engaging with others about shared meaning.

When beginning his work with prospective leaders, Dunham often begins by asking them to define what they care about, a question which many find perplexing. Many ca...

Although the US is nominally a secular state, the majority of its citizens think of themselves as spiritual.

That's one of the central findings of a recent major study of spirituality in the United States.

"About three quarters of the respondents said that spirituality is either very important to them, or somewhat important," said Bob Boisture, the president and CEO of the Fetzer Institute, which sponsored the 2020 report, What Doe...

Contemporary neuroscience is an essential ingredient in our understanding of human development, including our capacity for greater happiness and wisdom.  The past three decades have seen the study of the brain and its relationship to human experience move forward with more vigor and enthusiasm than any other scientific field. 

In this podcast, author and educator Jim Hickman, explains how our evolving understanding of neuroscience ...

Jeffry J. Kripal is a bit of an iconoclast when it comes to the study of religion.

He's more interested in anomalist phenomena -- the mystic, the psychic, the paranormal -- than he is in things like religious history or the philosophy of religion.

A professor and Associate Dean of Humanities at Rice University, Kripal began his publishing career in controversy. Some Hindu scholars took exception to his 1995 book, Kali's Child: in w...

Author Paul Corson had two out-of-body experiences that have shaped his view of the world.

Now 86, he's now on a mission to share what he's leaned.

His principal vehicle is his new book, Regaining Paradise: Forming a New Worldview, Knowing God and Journeying into Eternity,  "a guided journey into self-knowledge, identity, empowerment, and sublime understanding that will open the mind's eye."

But this podcast isn't really a review o...

Don't think of Sara Minkara as a blind person. Think of her as a person who is blind. 

Social activist, speaker, and a winner of multiple awards, the founder of the advocacy organization Empowerment for Integration (ETI) has never let used her absence of vision of an excuse or crutch. The slew of honors she's achieved are evidence of her accomplishments. Her awards and fellowships include the Clinton Global Initiative Outstanding C...