The Mind Bod Adventure Pod

Latest Episodes:

A Playful Approach to Psychedelics with Cardea May 29, 2024

Show notes

Last summer, we interviewed Ross Ellenhorn and Dimitri Mugianis, founders of Cardea, a psychedelic-assisted care organization based in NYC. This week, we’re finally posting that conversation! Made up of therapists, space holders, artists, and musicians, Cardea focuses on cultivating what they call “aliveness”: the sense that you are vital, fully engaged in your life, and connected to the world around you.

Something we find refreshing about the Cardea crew is their playful approach to psychedelics. A lot of people are so serious about psychedelics lately, obsessing over how they might use them to “fix” what’s “wrong” with themselves. It’s a view that risks turning psychedelics into just another cog in the Western medical model. But psychedelics have always been far more interesting than that. They are, by nature, creative, and have the potential to plunge us into a direct and dynamic relationship with life. This is what we get into with Ross and Dimitri!

In this conversation, we talk about Cardea’s unique model of practice, where they engage practitioners in a specific kind of dialogue before each session. We also talk about:

* set and setting,

* the club scene

* and what a “modern” – even poetic – use of psychedelics could look like, where the practitioner doesn’t give their power away.

The conversation continues in the Q&A, so please check out our Afterparty video at https://www.mindbodpod.com. In the Q&A, we chat with the audience about:

* The use of mushrooms in palliative and supportive care.

* How to support someone who is freaking out.

* The role of intention setting before a psychedelic experience

* “Radical hospitality”

* Experiences with iboga and other psychedelics, including their effects on cravings, life review, and spiritual exploration.

* Practical considerations for individuals interested in this work, including the availability of ketamine-assisted psychotherapy and the importance of support afterwards.And much more!

That’s all for now! Thanks for tuning in & see you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

PS - Tasha and Jeff recently partook in a totally mind-blowing ketamine ceremony at Cardea’s beautiful New York space and - for posterity - recorded the whole damn thing! Stay tuned for some extra audio and visual treats coming soon ;)

CARDEA LINKS:

* Cardea.net

* Ross's essay in Time magazine, “What Psychedelics Can Teach Us About Play”

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

Psychedelic Somatic Therapy with Saj Razvi May 22, 2024

Show notes

You don’t want to miss this one! A deep dive into “the heart of healing,” as we explore how medicines like cannabis and ketamine can amplify trauma therapy. Our guest is Saj Razvi, Director of Education at the Psychedelic Somatic Institute, and one of the original MAPS researchers and clinicians responsible for bringing MDMA-assisted therapy into the world.

According to Saj, there’s a self-corrective homeostatic healing mechanism available in the body that gets amplified during altered states. The key intervention he uses with clients is called “selective inhibition.” Normally, when stressed, we calm ourselves with coping strategies like deep breathing, moving, rationalizing, dissociating, and more. These tools give us short-term relief, but the downside is they inhibit the long-term healing of trauma, which Saj says our biology “is organically trying to achieve.”

In his 10-minute guided practice, we do something different: we find a mildly stressful memory, and instead of avoiding it, we slow the whole thing down to move through the discomfort into something else.

What’s this like? We experience the full spectrum - Tasha’s pretty accustomed to emotionally triggering practices like this, while Jeff feels like a homunculus riding the bucking bronco of his nervous system! Meditation vs therapy vs psychedelics – we get right into it!

Saj also talks about:

- the amazing ability of cannabis and ketamine to heal dissociative tendencies

- how human relational wounding requires human relational healing,

- the role of the therapist as “a player in the psychedelic reality of the person.”

- A thrilling exploration into the cutting-edge of mental health – join us!

Then join us at www.mindbodpod.com for This week's Afterparty: The world premiere of our new chart-topping single, “Trauma Song”, which we unveil at the end of the video and which has already secured us a 3-album deal and is set to eclipse the entirety of Tasha’s career as a recording artist in one fell swoop.

Plus: a fun discussion on the perils of meditative dissociation and the unique power of meditation to create more permanent states of extraordinary mental health. We talk about the spiritual preferences of male-identified vs female-identified practitioners, about sitting meditation vs body-focused disciplines like yoga, and other weird noises.

Leave us a comment and let us know how you much you like our new song :)

That’s all for now! Thanks for tuning in & see you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

Crazy Wisdom with Lama Liz Monson May 16, 2024

Show notes

Welcome Lama Liz Monson, spiritual co-director of the Natural Dharma Fellowship, and author of a new book on “crazy wisdom,” Tales of a Mad Yogi. Contrary to its controversial reputation, crazy wisdom is more than a spiritual shock technique – of, say, covering oneself in feces (to use a classic example), or staggering drunkenly around the Tibetan countryside. It is, in fact, a powerful and time-tested way to cut through our habitual patterns and engage with how reality actually is, as opposed to how we want it to be.

How do we practice this? By starting simple!

Liz guides us in a 10-minute meditation on the breath, the body, and the larger bandwidth of awareness. Can we allow our experience to be exactly what it is, without trying to control it? Yes, maybe, no, yes… we do our best! This doesn’t seem crazy, although it can seem impossible. And yet, the implications are radical.

Such a fun and provocative conversation on:

* the nature of trust and spontaneity

* the neutrality of things

* our own “basic goodness” (Liz tells a wonderful story about 9/11 and New Yorkers’ initial response of compassion and care)

* the free-flow of creativity

* and much more!

Let us know in the comments how this practice went for you!

Watch the Afterparty video at: https://www.mindbodpod.com

That’s all for now! Thanks for tuning in & see you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

The Dark Imaginal with JF Martel May 07, 2024

Show notes

Welcome JF Martel, filmmaker, writer, and cohost of the superb podcast, Weird Studies. Sometimes, we have a guest who really gets the spirit of what we’re up to here at the Mind Bod Pod… JF is one such guest. He full-on designed a practice for us based on his love of old-school, Dungeons-and-Dragons-style role-playing games… the kind that (in JF’s words) “usually happen in dank basements.”

That’s right, in this week’s episode, JF is our Dungeon Master!

**Watch this podcast and our fun-filled afterparty in VIDEO over at www.mindbodpod.com where you can comment and let us know how the practice landed for you!

As we follow JF’s guidance, our inner vision opens, and we trek into the dark underbelly of our imaginations.

* What is the practice of surrendering to a story, especially in speculative fiction like fantasy, horror, and science fiction?

* What exactly IS imagination, anyway?

* Is there a reality here beyond our own subconscious?

* …and what happens when we take it seriously?

Join us for a discussion of dream yoga, Jungian archetypes, shadow selves, disaster scenarios, and the imagination as a sense organ. Bwwhahahahahahahahahahaha!!

The Afterparty Video (visit www.mindbodpod.com)

This week, we discuss surrendering to a story as a kind of meditation, what happens when we move towards the scary and the uncomfortable, and how we can use our existential ambition to elevate Dungeons and Dragons into a transformative spiritual practice.

That’s all for now! Thanks for tuning in & see you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

www.mindbodpod.com

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

Sassy Spirituality with Sah D'Simone Apr 30, 2024

Show notes

Welcome Sah D'Simone - a former “condescending spiritual c**t” (his words not ours!) who’s since grown into one of the best humans we’ve ever met. Sah is hilarious, fresh, wise and so loveable! You’ll feel all of that immediately, as we explore themes from his new book, Spiritually, We.

**Watch this podcast and our fun-filled afterparty in VIDEO over at www.mindbodpod.com where you can comment and let us know how the practice landed for you!

What themes you ask? Juicy goodies like:

* What makes a great teacher

* Understanding past traumas (Sah says: “if it’s hysterical, its historical”)

* Integrating your “darkness”* Fearlessly celebrating your own imperfections

What’s the practice? Sah guides us in an exploration of how the past might be living in our bodies right now, and helps us welcome it in (“hello old friend!”) to be loved, cared for, and seen with fresh eyes.

And it works! Jeff cries, Tasha sees her head from her heart as a weird wooden mask (yup, that happened), Sah says more delightful stuff, and twenty minutes later we’re all BFFs for life. WEEEEEEEE! 😍🥳

The Afterparty

In this week's Afterparty video (www.mindbodpod.com), we reflect with great maturity on the next generation of spiritual practitioners, make mouth sounds, and then sing a very beautiful song about becoming a low-level superhero of love and saving the s**t out of all beings. Kapow!

If this episode tickled your adventure-loving fancy, consider sharing it with a friend.

Thanks for tuning in! See you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

Find Sah Online:

* Web: practice.sahdsimone.com* IG: @sahdsimone* TikTok: @sahdsimone

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

Psychoacoustics & Safety with Paula Scatoloni Apr 25, 2024

Show notes

Welcome Paula Scatoloni, a wise somatic experiencing practitioner (she’s been doing this for 30 years!). Paula uses Stephen Porges’ “Safe and Sound Protocol” as a tool to soothe and heal our frazzled nervous systems.

We start by exploring how sound can be healing—in particular, how to train our systems to move out of fight-and-flight and into safety-and-connection. The more our body finds this safety, the better able we are to access and process our trauma and attachment challenges.

If you like these adventures in consciousness, consider supporting our work with a paid subscription!

At least, that’s the theory. What’s the practice? We practice through our ears – twice! Paula’s first guided meditation is about yielding to the support of the earth; her second is “naval radiation breathing,” a practice developed by movement super-genius Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen. (We’d love to get Bonnie on the pod!)

And so it goes, a wide-ranging exploration into the nature of trauma and regulation and co-regulation and healthy boundaries and real connection and so much more.

The Afterparty

And now: Tune Ye into the Afterparty of champions! This week, we talk about the evolving role of healers in the 21st century, what sound does to our fried nervous systems, and finally, the extreme importance of a solid signature sign-off phrase.

The Afterparty video will eventually move behind ye olde paywall, but for now, it’s free :)

K That’s all for now! See you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

* PaulaScatoloni.com

* Safe and Sound Protocol

* Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

Astrology & Participatory Magic with Caroline Casey Apr 17, 2024

Show notes

Arch-Trickster Caroline Casey is our guest today, rapping on the subject of astrology and participatory magic. For Caroline, astrology - like all divination - is an outward expression of an inner state. We don’t need to know astrology, it’s in us. The practice here is to participate - to actively engage with Caroline’s wild flood of words and let the language of interrelatedness provoke insights, protests, and new possibilities.

If you like these adventures in consciousness, consider supporting our work with a paid subscription at www.mindbodpod.com

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

Glimpses into Freedom with Loch Kelly Apr 09, 2024

Show notes

Watch the video episode here: https://www.mindbodpod.com/p/loch-kelly-glimpses-into-freedom

“The issue of suffering is a simple case of mistaken identity,” says our guest Loch Kelly. By this, he means the you that is thinking about you, is not the real you! Then who is it, you ask? His name is Percy, he lives on a riverboat, and makes a fine fish fillet. 😅 Just kidding! That’s not true at all.

This episode – a delicious tongue-twister of the mind – really should be watched on video, since Loch’s gestures and body language are part of his teaching. Get thee to our Substack channel to watch the video, slackers, for it may point you to “the most intense bliss you’ve ever felt, spread out thin throughout the universe.”

Oh, Lochy Loch. He moves us through “direct pointing” exercises to familiarize us with the mystery of our true nature, which, of course, defies language. Loch specializes in offering glimpses into different kinds of minds and bodies: kinaesthetic ones, visual ones, conceptual ones... You only need to find the right door for you.

Plunge with us through the layers of mind and reality to a place / non-place that is “so close you can’t see it, so simple you can’t believe it, so wordless you can’t know it and so f*****g good you can’t accept it.” Except with less swearing.

PLUS! Loch has offered us Mind Bod Squadders some free resources to deepen our experiential explorations! Get them here: lochkelly.org/mind-bod-adventure-pod

K That’s all for now! See you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

Harry Potter & The Sacred Text with Casper ter Kuile Apr 02, 2024

Show notes

This week’s guest is Casper ter Kuile, author of the excellent The Power of Ritual: Turning Everyday Rituals into Soulful Practices. Casper is passionate about spreading the goodness of ritual. Ritual? Isn’t that a religious thing?! HELL NO! For Casper (“Gay atheist goes to divinity school!”) a ritual is anything we do with “intention, attention and repetition.” Our rituals are a basic human need, found in a great many surprising places, from CrossFit classes to Harry Potter books.

If you like these adventures in consciousness, consider supporting our work with a paid subscription!

In this practice (or ritual), we read a line from the first Harry Potter book, and then respond from four different layers: the literal, the allegorical, the personal, and finally the active, where we ask “what action wants to emerge?” This is the practice of using text as a mirror, a way to explore who and how we are. From here we move into a conversation on practice, the sacred, and community.

Let us know in the comments how this week’s practice was for you! (And tell us which is your favorite Harry Potter book too ;)

The Afterparty

Don’t miss the Afterparty, where we talk candidly about whatever didn't get said in this week's episode!

The Afterparty video will eventually move behind ye olde paywall, but for now, it’s free :)

Find Casper online:

* Website: caspertk.com

* The Nearness: 10-week program designed to foster deep connection and reflection through curated conversations and practices.

* Harry Potter and the Sacred Text

Thanks for tuning in! See you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe

Connected Roots with Tracee Stanley Mar 26, 2024

Show notes

Tracee is the rock solid – and radiant! – author of Radiant Rest and The Luminous Self, both syncretic works that combine yoga nidra, self-inquiry, ancestor and nature practices, and much more. Tracee is truly a gem!

We jump right into a practice that starts with a fresh take on alternate nostril breathing and then flows into a beautifully supportive practice that connects to gratitude, community, and the larger community of nature.

If you like these adventures in consciousness, consider supporting our work with a paid subscription at www.mindbodpod.com

Thanks for tuning in! See you next week.

Love always,

🧘🏽‍♀️ Tasha & Jeff 🧘🏼‍♂️

Get full access to The Mind Bod Adventure Pod at www.mindbodpod.com/subscribe