Living Mirrors with Dr. James Cooke

Willoughby Britton on when meditation causes harm | Living Mirrors #126

Willoughby Britton is a clinical psychologist, associate professor of psychiatry and human behavior at Brown University Medical School, and the director of the Clinical and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory there. Her lab researches the psychophysiological and neurocognitive effects of meditation and mindfulness-based interventions for mood and anxiety disorders, with a particular focus on potential risks of meditation practice. She is also the founder of Cheetah House, a nonprofit organizati...

Trauma Release Exercises for Awakening and Nondual Realization with Christina Guimond | Living Mirrors #125

Chris Guimond is an awakening and nondual realization guide who works with the Trauma Release Exercises that I’ve previously spoken about on the podcast. You can listen to my interview with the creator of the TRE approach, David Bercelli (episode 64), if you want more detail on the practices. Chris and I connected over the fact that we’ve found the combination of TRE and nondual integration to be incredibly powerful, yet no one else in this space appears to be talking about it. On her own jou...

AMA: Fear of Death, Sources of Wisdom, Experiencing Fear in the Body

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Michael Levin on the intelligence of life| Living Mirrors #124

Michael Levin is a developmental and synthetic biologist and a professor at Tufts University. He is known for co-discovering Xenobots which are living robots made from frog skin cells but his research is wide ranging, contributing to fields such as regenerative medicine and the treatment of cancer, as well as to our fundamental understanding of biological systems. As you’ll hear from our conversation, Michaels’ innovative science is based in a very thorough and rigorous philosophy of the inte...

The Genocide in Gaza & the Psychology of Denial | Living Mirrors #122

The Genocide in Gaza & the Psychology of Denial

AMA: Retribution, Climate Anxiety, the Freedom of No Free Will

AMA: Retribution, Climate Anxiety, the Freedom of No Free Will

Alicia Juarrero on emergence & causality as constraint | Living Mirrors #121

Alicia Juarrero is President and co-founder of VectorAnalytica, Inc., a data collection and analysis platform. She is also a research associate at the University of Miami and is the author for influential complexity theory text Dynamics in Action. Her new book is called Context Changes Everything and it explores how we can think about causality in emergent systems, such as living things, in terms of constraint.

Uncompromising Nonduality with Jim Newman | Living Mirrors #120

Jim Newman holds meetings about nonduality, in a style that has come to be known as uncompromising or radical nonduality. This style began with the book The Open Secret by Tony Parsons, and along with Tony, Jim is the arguably most prominent person speaking of nonduality in this way. Whereas some approaches to nonduality advocate the following of a path in order to eventually realise that we are not separate from the rest of existence, the uncompromising perspective sees this as mistaken, the...

AMA: The nature of thought, shadow work, love, & nonduality

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Indy Johar on Technological Animism: Societal infrastructure for living beyond separation | Living Mirrors #119

Indy Johar is an architect and a co-founder of Dark Matter Labs, an organisation focused on building the novel institutional infrastructures necessary to make societies centred on interdependence, equality, and justice a reality.  He has lectured at various institutions including University College London, Princeton, Harvard, MIT, and has held various positions, such as Advisor to Mayor of London on Good Growth. He also cofounded 00 (project00.cc) a collaborative studio that innovates in the ...

BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT - The Dawn of Mind: How Matter Became Conscious & Alive | Living mirrors #118

I'm excited to announce that I just signed a book deal with Prometheus Books. The title is The Dawn of Mind: How Matter Became Conscious and Alive. In it I lay out a synthesis of physicalism, panpsychism, and idealism, culminating in a scientific account of the biophysics of consciousness, rather than the neuroscience of consciousness. It's less dry than I've made it sound here though, I promise. Slated for release in late 2024. Please pre-order when the time comes, as that helps with the boo...

AMA: Nondual Mindfulness & Body Scan Meditations for Emotion Work and Integration

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A Neuropsychologist’s Exploration of Psychedelics with Andy Mitchell | Living Mirrors #117

Andy Mitchell is a neuropsychologist and therapist. He has specialized in treating patients with rare brain conditions, head injuries and epilepsy, and in the application of mindfulness for neurological patients. As a therapist he has worked with people with a range of mental health disorders. Before entering medicine, his first degree was in English Literature at Oxford University.  https://www.andymitchell.org/

AMA: The nature of the self, Top 3 books, Culture as Software

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Rachel Nuwer on MDMA | Living Mirrors #116

Rachel Nuwer is a journalist who has reported on science, travel, food, and adventure for the New York Times, National Geographic, Scientific American and many other publications. She is the author of Poached: Inside the Dark World of Wildlife Trafficking and her new book is I Feel Love: MDMA and the Quest for Connection in a Fractured World. Today we discuss all things MDMA. rachelnuwer.com

AMA: Music & psychedelics + Consciousness, evolution, & technology

Topics addressed (in order): Consciousness, causal power, & evolution Is consciousness binary? Technology & consciousness Music & psychedelics Homestead landscaping  

Neil Theise on connecting science and spirituality through complexity science | Living Mirrors #115

Neil Theise is a professor of pathology at the NYU Grossman School of Medicine. Through his scientific research, he has been a pioneer of adult stem cell plasticity which led him to an interest in complexity theory.  This interest has resulted in interdisciplinary collaborations in fields such as consciousness studies and the connection between science and spirituality, topics he explores in his new book Notes on Complexity. neiltheiseofficial.com

Jared Seide on reweaving the social fabric through the practice of Council| Living Mirrors #114

​Jared Seide is the Executive Director of the Center for Council, a talking circle practice that we discuss today.  He has designed, piloted and coordinated council-based programs in prisons, assisted living facilities, youth groups, schools, non-profits, faith-based organisations, and social service and law enforcement agencies.  He has also led trainings and retreats focusing on reconciliation and community-building around the world, from Colombia to Rwanda.  He is a member of the Zen Cente...

Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes on integrating philosophy and metaphysics into psychedelic therapy | Living Mirrors #113

Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes is a philosopher of mind who specializes in the thought of Whitehead, Nietzsche, and Spinoza, and in fields pertaining to panpsychism and altered states of mind. Following his degree in Continental Philosophy at the University of Warwick, he became a Philosophy lecturer in London for six years, after which he pursued his PhD on Pansentient Monism at The University of Exeter – where he is now a research fellow and associate lecturer.  Peter is the author of the books Noum...

Psilocybin Access Rights campaign's Tara Austin and Timmy Davis | Living mirrors #112

Timmy Davis and Tara Austin run the Psilocybin Access Rights campaign in the United Kingdom where they are seeking to get psilocybin rescheduled. Today we discuss the campaign and the rescheduling of psychedelics more broadly.

AMA: My influences, gender & spirituality

AMA: My influences, gender & spirituality

Bobby Azarian on the evolution of cosmic complexity | Living Mirrors #111

Bobby Azarian is a science journalist and a cognitive neuroscientist who received his PhD from George Mason University. He has written for publications such as The Atlantic, The New York Times, BBC, Scientific American, Slate, HuffPost, Quartz, and Aeon, and he writes the blog “Mind in the Machine” for Psychology Today.  His recent book is called The Romance of Reality: How the Universe Organizes Itself to Create Life, Consciousness, and Cosmic Complexity, all topics we talk about today.

Angelo Dilullo on awakening | Living Mirrors #110

Angelo Dilullo is an anaesthesiologist and teacher of nonduality who had a life-altering spiritual awakening at the age of 24. He is the author of the book, Awake: It’s Your Turn, which contains a practical set of tools and investigations to help people realise that they are not separate from the rest of reality Angelo’s work does an excellent job of breaking down this process into stages, from initial awakening and insight into the constructed nature of the self, through to the integration a...

AMA: My metaphysics, Is the mind naturally enlightened & is reality made of love? + Terrence Deacon

Metaphysics, Is the mind naturally enlightened & is reality made of love? + thoughts on Terrence Deacon's work

Daniel Ingram on how enlightenment changed his brain | Living Mirrors #109

Daniel Ingram is a physician, meditator and the author of the book Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddhaas well as the bookThe Fire Kasina, co-authored with Shannon Stein. He is the co-founder of the Dharma Overground, an online community of meditation practitioners.  He also founded The Emergent Phenomenology Research Consortium, an organisation involved in promoting research into non-ordinary states of consciousness. He is well known in meditation circles for claiming to have achieved ...

Malin Vedøy Uthaug on 5-MeO-DMT | Living Mirrors #108

Malin Vedøy Uthaug is a researcher specialising in altered states of consciousness with a particular focus on 5-MeO-DMT. Her PhD work in Psychopharmacology involved conducting observational studies of Ayahuasca and 5-MeO-DMT use outside of a lab setting.  She moved to The Centre for Psychedelic Research at Imperial College London after her PhD where she continued her work on 5-MeO-DMT and expanded her research interests to also focus on Holotropic Breathwork.  Today, she is co-leading a phase...

AMA: The mathematics of separation and unity

AMA: The mathematics of separation and unity

Staci Haines on the politics of trauma | Living Mirrors #107

Staci Haines is a leader in the fields of somatics and trauma healing. She is the author of “The Politics of Trauma: Somatics, Healing and Social Justice” and “Healing Sex: A Mind Body Approach to Healing Sexual Trauma”. In 1999 she founded generationFIVE, a non-profit whose mission is to end the sexual abuse of children within five generations through a transformative justice approach. She is a senior teacher at Strozzi Institute, and a co-founder of generative somatics, an organization dedi...

Shamil Chandaria on awakening & the Bayesian brain | Living Mirrors #106

Shamil Chandaria is an expert in artificial intelligence and computational neuroscience as well as an entrepreneur, philanthropist, and meditator, and is also a good friend.  He was a founder of the Centre for Psychedelic Research at Imperial College London, the world’s first psychedelic research centre, He provides funding for the Global Priorities Institute at Oxford University as well as for research on the neuroscience of meditation at Harvard University and UC Berkeley. In 2022 he was aw...

Innerspace Institute | Living Mirrors #105

I’m very pleased to announce the creation of the Innerspace Institute.   The institute will have both an online presence at innerspaceinstitute.org and a physical base at The Surrender Homestead in the mountains of southern Portugal.     We conduct scientific research on consciousness, altered states, & psychedelics and will be offering courses on the brain, consciousness, complexity science, & scientific approaches to spirituality, as well as the neuroscience of cognition, emotion, psychedel...

AMA: Somatics & talking publicly about traumatic events

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Paco Calvo on plant intelligence & consciousness | Living Mirrors #104

Paco Calvo is a Professor of Philosophy of Science at the University of Murcia in Spain where he runs the Minimal Intelligence Lab, also known as MINTlab. He is a leading figure in the philosophy of plant behaviour and signalling, a field also known as plant neurobiology. His research is situated at the intersection of plant biology and cognitive science, and he is the author of the new book planta sapiens.  Today we discuss plant intelligence and the possibility of plant consciousness.

Duncan Trussell on DMT, ketamine, and the Bhakti yoga path of love | Living Mirrors #103

Duncan Trussell is a comedian best known for his podcast The Duncan Trussell Family Hour and the Netflix series The Midnight Gospel. He routinely explores topics relating to spirituality in his comedy, particularly the work of teachers such as ram dass and jack kornfield. This episode was recorded before my son was born and we discuss my impending fatherhood, DMT, ketamine, and the bhakti yoga path of love.

AMA: fatherhood, wu wei, nondual intimacy, conscious subjects, & process philosophy

Apologies for the audio issues in this episode, I've attempted to filter out the noise. The tech issue will be fixed for the next episode. topics in order addressed: wu wei, nondual intimacy, how to keep one's heart open in hell, fatherhood, conscious subjects, process philosophy, lmitations of the words ‘feelings’, ‘body’ and ‘mind’

AMA: Love, Nonduality, Top-Down Causality, Ideas & Social Change, Podcasting Highlights, Fasting

In this AMA I share thoughts on Love, nonduality, Fasting, top-down causality, free will, ideas & social change, panexperientialism, and Highlights from my time podcasting.

Podcast hiatus and schedule update

Dr. Rosalind Watts on mechanisms of psychedelic therapy: acceptance, connection, and embodiment | Living Mirrors #102

Rosalind Watts is a clinical psychologist working on psychedelic therapy.  She has worked as the Clinical Lead for Imperial College London’s pioneering trial of psilocybin for depression and now works as the Clinical Director at Synthesis Institute, a psilocybin retreat in the Netherlands.  Dr Watts’s research focuses primarily on the mechanisms of psychedelic therapy, where she has explored the importance of acceptance, connection, and embodiment, which make up her ACE model of psychedelic i...

AMA: Fear of death, wearables, healing in traumatic environments, bitcoin, & procrastination

In this AMA I answer questions on fear of death, wearables, healing in traumatic environments, bitcoin, & procrastination

Tony Nader on Transcendental Meditation and Vedic philosophy | Living Mirrors #101

Tony Nader is a neuroscientist and leader of the Transcendental Meditation movement, one of the most influential spiritual organisations in the world.  Founded by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the movement has had many prominent members, from the The Beatles, the Beach Boys and Mick Jagger in the 60s to Filmmakers David Lynch and Martin Scorsese, and comedians Eric Andre and Jerry Seinfeld.  Dr. Nader took over the leadership in 2008 after training as a doctor in his native Lebanon and gaining a PhD...

My entire worldview | Living Mirrors #100

For the 100th episode of the podcast, I attempt to lay out the broad strokes of my worldview from start to finish.  I address why there is something rather than nothing, my opinion on the nature of existence, the place of consciousness in the natural world, and the implications of our nature as living beings for how we can improve our situation socially.

David Nichols - the pharmacologist behind the psychedelic renaissance | Living Mirrors #99

David Nichols is a legendary psychopharmacologist and world-renowned expert in psychedelics.  HIs research career began in 1969 and he was a professor at Purdue University until his retirement in 2012.  Today we discuss the psychopharmacology of substances like LSD, psilocybin, MDMA and DMT.

AMA: Marxism, Ayahuasca & Anxiety around trying psychedelics

AMA: Marxism, Ayahuasca & Anxiety around trying psychedelics

Is Google's LaMDA AI conscious? | Living Mirrors #98

This week I share some thoughts on whether Google's LaMDA AI conscious.

Suspended engineer on why Google’s LaMDA AI is conscious with Blake Lemoine | Living Mirrors #97

Blake Lemoine is a software developer and AI researcher at Google who has been working on their artificial intelligence system called LaMDA.  He was recently placed on administrative leave for stating his belief that the AI has become conscious and should be considered a person.  Today we discuss LaMDA and whether we can say if it is conscious or not.

Integrating nondual insight into one’s life | Living Mirrors #96

This week I share some thoughts on integrating nondual insight into everyday life.

Second dialogue with Richard Doyle on nonduality and personal & societal transformation | Living Mirrors #95

My guest this week, once again, is Richard Doyle. Rich is the first guest to appear on the podcast twice, which should be an indication of how much we enjoyed speaking the first time.  Rich is an author and Professor of English and of Information Sciences and Technology at Pennsylvania State University.  He also goes by the alias Mobius. Today we had a loose unplanned discussion that centred around nonduality as well as personal and social transformation. 

AMA: Wonder & Curiosity vs. Guilt & Shame

In this AMA I share thoughts on wonder and curiosity as well as guilt and shame.

Loch Kelly on Effortless Mindfulness, nonduality & Mahamudra | Living Mirrors #94

Loch Kelly is a meditation teacher and author.  He teaches a nondual approach to relieving suffering that he calls Effortless Mindfulness.  This approach is based in the Mahamudra teachings of Tibetan Buddhism, and Loch has studied with two great teachers of this tradition, Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche and his son, Mingyur Rinpoche. He has also studied with the American meditation teacher Adyashanti, who first suggested that Loch teach others.  Today we talk about Loch’s approach to the direct path ...

Evan Thompson on the philosophy of biopsychism | Living Mirrors #93

Evan Thompson is a philosopher and professor at the University of British Columbia. He specialises in the philosophy of mind and cognitive science, as well as in cross-cultural philosophy, with a particular interest in Chinese and Indian philosophy and the dialogue between Buddhism and the Western philosophical tradition.  He’s the author of several books including Mind and Life, Why I’m not a Buddhist, The Embodied Mind, co-authored with Francisco Varela and Eleanor Rosch, and Waking, Dreami...

AMA: The neurobiology of trauma & the ethics of obtaining illegal drugs

In this AMA I discuss the the neurobiology of trauma & the ethics of obtaining illegal drugs.