Giving Thanks
Spontaneous expressions of gratitude on this Thanksgiving Day, and a look at the role that gratitude plays in consciousness, community, and cosmos.
The Emerald: Currents and Trends Through a Mythic Lens
Founded in May of 2019, The Emerald podcast explores the human experience through a vibrant lens of myth, story, music, and imagination. Brought to life through the wise, wild, and humorous vision of Joshua Michael Schrei, The Emerald draws from a deep well of poetry, lore, and mythos to challenge conventional narratives on politics and public discourse, meditation and mindfulness, art, science, literature, and more.
At the heart of the podcast is the premise that the imaginative, poetic, animate heart of human experience — elucidated by so many cultures over so many thousands of years — is missing in modern discourse and is urgently needed at a time when humanity is facing unprecedented problems. The Emerald advocates for an imaginative vision of human life and human discourse as it questions deep underlying assumptions about societal progress.
As likely to source from the Wu Tang Clan as the ancient Indian Vedas, and featuring guests such as anthropologist and award-winning author Wade Davis, philosopher Bayo Akomolafe, award-winning author Ann Wroe, noted indigenous author Tyson Yunkaporta and more, The Emerald offers a green glint of wonder in a world that needs to be reacquainted with its own beating heart.
Seeking the Luminous in an Age of Manufactured Light
Light, within nature, has always drawn us in, held our attention, and revealed marvels through its variegated displays. Coleridge said that the “eye is to light like lover to the beloved.” Light and human attention share a very deep relationship.…
Medusa and #MeToo: How Modern Narratives Miss the Heart of Myth
Who remembers Medusa? Hair of snakes, gaze that can turn to stone, beheaded by Perseus… that Medusa. She’s in the news again, because a sculptor has re-imagined the story of Perseus and Medusa as a tribute to the #MeToo movement…
When Bread is No Longer Bread: The Importance of Context in Consciousness, Community, and Cosmos
The defining characteristic of the postmodern capitalist world is a cycle of decontextualization for the sake of monetization. It happens everywhere — with the products we buy, the food in our grocery stores, and the spiritual traditions we import from…
The Return to Focused Presence: Rediscovering the Greatets Conspiracy of All
Conspiracy theories abound these days. The Yoga and wellness communities have come under fire for being particularly prone to indulging these theories. Yet the teachings of Yoga ask us ultimately to look deeply at the difference between focused presence and…
The Honey that Hums and Blazes: Somatic Nectars of the Trance State
Honey was revered across the ancient world — found in Egyptian tombs and Chinese apothecaries and referred to glowingly in ancient Sumerian medical texts. The myths and stories that come to us from the ancient world are soaked in honey.…
A Brief History of Want: Longing and Its Place in Cosmos and Consciousness
Human beings have a complicated relationship with want. For some traditions, desire, want, or longing sits right at the heart of creation itself, providing the spark that sets the universe in motion, and is inherent to what it means to…
In These Mythic Times: Monsoon, Apocalypse, and What are Truly Longing For
These are mythic times. And what are we called to do in mythic times? What is the deep mythic transformation we are seeking? Often the mythic journey requires something very simple of us. Often, it asks us to cultivate the…
Holy River of Flows: Words and Discourse in a Declarative Age
Wonder of wonders, words have started arriving for my 13-month old son! Their arrival is a deep reminder that words are more than detached concepts — they are somatic, they invoke, they carry with them the power and potential of…
Sand Talk with Tyson Yunkaporta
Tyson Yunkaporta is an academic, an arts critic, and a researcher who is a member of the Apalech Clan in far north Queensland Australia. He’s the author of Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World. Sand Talk looks…
Space Hex: The Curse of Restlessness in Worldviews of Perpetual Escape
“We don’t go to other planets because our planet is dying. Our planet dies, specifically because we perpetually want to go somewhere else.” Today on the podcast, we look at humanity’s increasing obsession with transcending planet Earth, in the context…
Rapturous Focus and Extraordinary Powers: Breathing Life into The Third Book of the Yoga Sutras
The third book of the Patañjali yoga sutras, the Vibhūti Pāda, is often skipped over in modern yoga teacher trainings. Why? Its descriptions of supernatural powers — of yogis who can shrink to the size of an atom, fly, and…
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