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Mindful U at Naropa University — Education
Mindful U at Naropa University

As the birthplace of the mindfulness movement in the United States, Naropa University has a unique perspective when it comes to higher education in the West. Founded in 1974 by renowned Tibetan Buddhist scholar and lineage holder Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, Naropa was intended to be a place where students could study Eastern and Western religions, writing, psychology, science, and the arts, while also receiving contemplative and meditation training. Forty-three years later, Naropa is a leader in ‘contemplative education’, a pedagogical approach that blends rigorous academics, contemplative practice, and experiential learning. Naropa President Chuck Lief explains, “Mindfulness here is not a class. Mindfulness is basically the underpinning of what we do in all of our classes. That said, the flavor or the color of mindfulness from class to class is really completely up to the individual faculty member to work on—on their own. So, what happens in a poetry class is going to look very different from what happens in a research psychology class. But, one way or another the contemplative practices are brought into the mix.” This podcast is for those with an interest in mindfulness and a curiosity about its place in both higher education and the world at large. Hosted by Naropa alumnus and Multimedia Manager David DeVine, episodes feature Naropa faculty, alumni, and special guests on a wide variety of topics including compassion, permaculture, social justice, herbal healing, and green architecture—to name a few. Listen to explore the transformative possibilities of mindfulness, both in the classroom and beyond!

Latest Episodes:

13. Scott Rodwin: Awareness of the Built Environment Feb 13, 2018

Show notes

What would you see if you were looking at the world from the point of view of a person in a wheelchair? Or if you're mobility impaired, or blind, or deaf? As architects, we need to learn to look at what kind of physical environment we are creating for people. What's missing? What else could we do here, in this central courtyard, that would make the space better? Students will answer "a fountain," "a garden," "a shaded area where you could study." We could add benches, hammocks–you name it. And then they all start seeing great ideas about the built environment.

Special Guest: Scott Rodwin, Faculty in Environmental Studies.

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12. Deborah Bowman: Gestalt–Awareness Practice, Healing in the Here and Now Feb 06, 2018

Show notes

Gestalt therapy is a methodology one can use for therapy or for growth. I like to call it Gestalt Awareness Practice because it’s a way of working in the here and now for healing and growth. Gestalt - from German and not truly translatable into English - essentially means "the whole." Or something ever greater than the whole. It’s the idea that we're whole with everything and that our goal is to be whole within our self - not divided - not split.

Special Guest: Deborah Bowman.

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11. Ramon Parish: Discipline and Delight–An Embodied Education Jan 30, 2018

Show notes

People already know many things. People arrive at school with their own intelligence, and they come here to cultivate that intelligence through contact with one another - embodied contact with teachers, administrators, other students - as well as with various resources and wisdom traditions, academic traditions. Real learning and transformation both take place in that contact, not through the input or memorization of knowledge or information. They come through grounding and body-based awareness - embodied mindfulness - whole-person embodiment. When we start dealing with difficult and challenging - and eventually rewarding - situations and concepts, you already have a kind of nervous system of self-knowledge. The embodied curriculum at Naropa can help you develop and cultivate both a social and sociological self-knowledge.

Special Guest: Ramon Parish.

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10. Jeffery Pethybridge: Writing, Literature, and Contemplative Approach Jan 16, 2018

Show notes

There's a real diversity of tactics about how to integrate contemplative practices into the study of writing and the study of literature and the creation of those ways of being. This is about what it means to approach writing through a contemplative way. One of the great joys about teaching here at Naropa is the openness of students to experiment. The real readiness at which they're willing to implicate their person and their body and their spirit. That approach to the whole person in the classroom is really such a gift to work with as a - as a teacher and a peer and a colleague and a fellow and a researcher.

Special Guest: Jeffrey Pethybridge.

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09. Richard Brown: Contemplative Teaching Jan 02, 2018

Show notes

At Naropa, the notion of contemplative education is about drawing out the full richness of the student as well as the teacher in the learning process. It's about utilizing different contemplative practices such as mindfulness, awareness, compassion, and contemplation to draw out the wisdom of the various dimensions of who we are as human beings. It’s not just about thinking. Conventional education trains us to be thinkers and doers–which is very important–but there's an emphasis in contemplative education about supplementing our thinking process with the wisdom of our emotional life–the wisdom of our sensory experience, of our bodily experience, and of the environment in which we're learning. All these factors go together to make a wholeness of learning that is all about creating a richness, one which is permeated by that space. All of these factors–how we think, how we feel–aren't just mixed together haphazardly, but with room for all of them to move and affect each other. The way we think can be enriched by our feelings. The way we move can be affected by the environment we're in, the other people that you're learning with, and the current issues in the world. It gets very, very rich, starting from the inside to untangle this web, which has been very tightly made in more conventional types of education.

Special Guest: Richard C. Brown, Professor of Contemplative Education.

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08. Stephen Polk: A City By and For the People Dec 19, 2017

Show notes

We're going to be imagining what this ideal city might be like. There are thousands of different aspects of a city ecosystem that we could address, but I want to address just four: community ownership, ecological sensibility, economic democracy, and people power.

Special Guest: Stephen Polk.

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07. Travis Cox: Sustainability is Ecopsychology is Sustainability Dec 05, 2017

Show notes

Ecopsychology is a field whose goal is to bridge our cultures' long standing historical gulf between the psychological and the ecological to see the needs of the planet and the person as a continuum. Transpersonal ecopsychology is the evolving exploration expression and embodied practice of the inter-dependence of humans in the more than human world, which tends towards to the health balance and optimal well being of all. A change in our internal landscapes might change our relationships with the land in a way that includes extending social ethics to the land and an examination of our loyalties, affections, and convictions.

Special Guest: Travis Cox, PhD.

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06. Phillip Stanley: The Relationships Between Sense Perceptions, Concepts, and Emotions. Nov 21, 2017

Show notes

In this episode, Dr. Stanley delves into the real differences between sensory perception and experience, and touches on how our emotions affect what we see, and which qualities we project onto our world. Once we see that our perceptions are different fro our experiences, can we learn how we're really experiencing our world, versus how our minds tell us our world exists? It's classes like this that set Naropa's curriculum apart from other universities - adding a level of contemplation to this type of understanding welcomes deep examination, and offers a clarity rarely experienced.

Special Guest: Dr. Phillip Stanley, PhD.

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05. Brigitte Mars: Herbal Health and Healing Nov 07, 2017

Show notes

Brigitte is an herbalist and nutritional consultant of Natural Health with almost fifty years of experience. She teaches Herbal Medicine at Naropa University and The School of Health Mastery in Iceland. She has taught at Omega Institute, Esalen, Kripalu, Sivananda Yoga Ashram, Arise, Envision and Unify Festivals, and The Mayo Clinic. She blogs for the Huffington Post and Care2. She is also a professional member of the American Herbalist Guild. Find out more about Brigitte: brigittemars.com/.

Special Guest: Brigitte mars.

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04. Scott Rodwin: Green Building 101 Oct 24, 2017

Show notes

Scott Rodwin, Naropa University faculty teaching Building Design in the Environmental Department, is one of the leading green architects in the country. An architect and a builder, Rodwin owns and runs a 13-person design build firm in Boulder. Scott graduated from Cornell in 1991 with an architecture degree and moved out to Boulder shortly thereafter, and has been working as an architect for about 26 years. During this time he has focused his career on creating the greenest buildings possible, and his firm specializes in extreme green custom homes. In this episode of Mindful U, Scott will be discussing his "Green Building 101" class at Naropa.

Special Guest: Scott Rodwin, Faculty in Environmental Studies.

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