Paul Muller-Ortega, Ph.D. is an internationally recognized meditation teacher, and a highly respected academic scholar in the field of Indian Religion and Hindu Tantra. A long-time student of the Kashmir Shaiva tradition with a PhD from the University of California, Paul is the founder of Blue Throat Yoga. He is devoted to teaching students how to access their truest Self, and to offering the knowledge base to understand and support that experience. He has led hundreds of meditation retreats,...

Paul Muller 2 - Ortega Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Paul John Roach is a longtime Unity minister and host of the weekly show World Spirituality on Unity Online Radio. A native of Wales and a graduate of Jesus College, Oxford University, he has bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English and a postgraduate degree in education from the University of Wales. Paul was ordained by Unity in 1988 and served as the senior minister at Unity of Fort Worth, Texas, from 1988 to 2018. He has served the Unity movement on several boards and teams, including...

Paul Roach 2 Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Dean Sluyter is the award-winning author of several books, including Natural Meditation, Cinema Nirvana: Enlightenment Lessons from the Movies, Fear Less, and his latest, The Dharma Bum’s Guide to Western Literature: Finding Nirvana in the Classics. A grateful student of Eastern and Western sages in several traditions, Dean has taught natural approaches to meditation and awakening since 1970. He gives talks, workshops, and retreats throughout the United States and beyond, from Ivy League...

Dean Sluyter Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Sara Critchfield is Vice President, Movement Building for the Fetzer Institute, a foundation whose mission statement is “Helping build the spiritual foundation for a loving world.” At Fetzer, she serves as “a strategist and innovator for inspiring, revealing, and serving the emergence of a movement toward personal and societal transformation grounded in love.” Prior to that, she built a track record of forwarding social movements by positioning organizations and businesses as credible leaders...

Sara Critchfield Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Matthew Fox is a spiritual theologian, an Episcopal priest, and an activist for gender justice and eco-justice. Originally a Catholic priest, he was silenced for a year and then expelled from the Dominican order by Cardinal Ratzinger for teaching liberation theology and creation spirituality. His 37 books have been translated into other languages over 70 times. Among them are Original Blessing, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ, A Spirituality Named Compassion, The Reinvention of Work, Naming...

Matthew Fox 2 Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Willa Blythe Baker, Ph.D. is the Founder of Natural Dharma Fellowship in Boston, and its retreat center, Wonderwell Mountain Refuge, in Springfield, New Hampshire. She was authorized as a dharma teacher and lineage holder of Tibetan Buddhism after twelve years of monastic training and two consecutive three-year retreats. Willa completed a doctorate at Harvard University, and was Visiting Lecturer in Buddhist Ministry from 2013 to 2017. Her articles and translations have appeared in Tricycle,...

Willa Blythe Baker Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

s Vidal is a teacher of Yoga and a practitioner of both Ayurveda and Vedic Astrology. He offers lectures, workshops, and unique certification training programs internationally. He also maintains a counseling practice that embraces Vedanta, Ayurveda, and Vedic Astrology. As the founder of Dancing Shiva, an American educational and consulting organization, he promotes health, wellness, and societal reform based on universal spirituality and a natural approach to lifestyle. His work is primarily...

Mas Vidal Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Amy Edelstein is the founder and Executive Director of Inner Strength Education, a non-profit organization that supports youth development. Its innovative teen mindfulness and systems-thinking program has empowered 17,000 high school students in under-resourced schools in Philadelphia. The curriculum blends evidence-based mindfulness tools, evolutionary neuroscience, the science of large-scale cultural shifts, and the art and science of relationship. In recognition of the program’s impact on...

Amy Edelstein Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Thom Krystofiak holds a B.A. from Harvard (magna cum laude) and an M.A. from Cambridge University, where he was a Knox Fellow. A trained teacher of Transcendental Meditation, in 1983 he joined an intentional community in Fairfield, Iowa, where he and his wife continue to live. He calls himself “a rigorous and thoroughgoing skeptic surrounded by ready believers,” and says he has “developed unique perspectives on the eternal and ever-new contest of doubt vs. belief.” He is the author of Tempted...

Thom Krystofiac Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Amanda Lucia is Professor of Religious Studies at the University of California-Riverside. Her research engages the global exportation, appropriation, and circulation of Hinduism, with designated attention to global guru movements. On her previous visit to Spirit Matters we discussed her book about Mata Amritanandamayi, Reflections of Amma: Devotees in a Global Embrace. On this program we focused on her new book, White Utopias: The Religious Exoticism of Transformational Festivals, which...

Amanda Lucia 2 Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Dana Sawyer is professor emeritus of philosophy and world religions at the Maine College of Art. His primary expertise is in Hinduism and Buddhism, but for more than twenty years his work has focused on comparative mysticism, theories of the “perennial philosophy,” and the value of psychedelic experiences in the study of mysticism. He is the author of two critically acclaimed spiritual biographies, of Aldous Huxley (2002) and of Huston Smith (2014), and has written on a wide range of topics...

Dana Sawyer Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Dr. Jon Kolkin is an internationally recognized photographer as well as a physician, educator, humanitarian, and public speaker. His award-wining images have been widely published, exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions, and have drawn the attention of private and corporate clients worldwide. He has served on the faculty of the prestigious Maine Media Workshops and is a frequent guest lecturer at major universities and other venues worldwide. Kolkin’s renowned Inner Harmony...

Jon Kolkin Discussion by Discussion by Dennis and Phil

Paul Denniston is a well-known yoga teacher based in Los Angeles. Certified in Hatha Yoga, Vinyasa Flow, Kundalini Yoga, Laughter Yoga, Restorative Yoga, and Let Your Yoga Dance, he is the founder of Grief Yoga®, which combines various forms of yoga, movement, breath, and sound to release pain and suffering and connect to love. At one time he also taught movement at the Stella Adler Academy in Hollywood. He has taught frequently at teaches at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health, at Esalen,...