A New and Ancient Story: The Podcast

This conversation with the Norwegian men's coach and teacher Eivind Skjellum is a deep and at times raw introduction to an extraordinary transformational map Eivind has created (or, more accurately, that he has discovered). Created for men, I think it has impact on anyone who encounters it. The places he describes carry a profound psychic resonance: the City of Slumber, the Point of No Return, the Meeting with the Mapmaker of the East, the Abyss, the Demon's Feast, the Beauty Path, the Encounter with the Black Knight, and many more. This conversation is part of my online learning journey, Masculinity: A New Story. If you'd like to access the entire series, you can do that here: https://newandancientstory.net/learning-journeys/masculinity-a-new-story/.

What would you think if your 4-year-old displayed thorough knowledge of WWII aircraft, without having ever been exposed to them? Carol Bowman is a prominent past life researcher who focuses on the past life memories of children. She recounts three extraordinary cases in this conversation, that call into question the conventional brain-dependent understanding of what consciousness is. Because they are so disruptive to basic scientific paradigms, stories like these have long been dismissed as hoaxes, suggestion, confabulation, and so on. Will you also dismiss them out of hand? Or will you entertain the possibility of their authenticity and see where that may lead?

What are the perils of working "in the system" as opposed to trying to change it from the outside? In this multidimensional conversation, Lyla and I expand and perhaps transcend that question. We weave together topics as seemingly divergent as Peak Oil, recovering dying languages, the "emperor's new clothes" syndrome, and the importance of small, barely visible actions that contradict what is normal or realistic. The poetry and insight of this young woman is not to be missed.

This podcast was recorded in late November 2015 at Cynthia Jurs' "kiva" in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Originally meant to be a recorded discussion between Charles and David Abram (philosopher/author of The Spell of the Sensuous andBecoming Animal), what arose was a round-table discussion with all of the participants (listed below). We divided the conversation into two, one-hour segments: Part I touches on many different topics including: urgency and scarcity; biological determinism; eros, compassion, and beauty; intellectual and academic silos; our cultural legacy for future generations; complexity and simplicity; human-generated meaning vs. received meaning, and the importance of reclaiming language. Part II is a multi-faceted discussion on the topic of indigineity, the imposition of the written word on oral culture, as well as a discussion on the metaphysics of separation. Participants include (other than Charles): Cynthia Jurs, David Abram, Pat McCabe (Woman Stands Shining), Lyla June Johnson, David Bacon, Elizabeth Christine, Michelle Victoria, Joanna Harcourt Smith, Jose Luis Gomez Solar, and Hugh Wheir You can join our community or subscribe to the podcast on NewandAncientStory.net.

This podcast was recorded in late November 2015 at Cynthia Jurs' "kiva" in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Originally meant to be a recorded discussion between Charles and David Abram (philosopher/author of The Spell of the Sensuous andBecoming Animal), what arose was a round-table discussion with all of the participants (listed below). We divided the conversation into two, one-hour segments: Part I touches on many different topics including: urgency and scarcity; biological determinism; eros, compassion, and beauty; intellectual and academic silos; our cultural legacy for future generations; complexity and simplicity; human-generated meaning vs. received meaning, and the importance of reclaiming language. Part II is a multi-faceted discussion on the topic of indigineity, the imposition of the written word on oral culture, as well as a discussion on the metaphysics of separation. Participants include (other than Charles): Cynthia Jurs, David Abram, Pat McCabe (Woman Stands Shining), Lyla June Johnson, David Bacon, Elizabeth Christine, Michelle Victoria, Joanna Harcourt Smith, Jose Luis Gomez Solar, and Hugh Wheir You can join our community or subscribe to the podcast on NewandAncientStory.net.

Here is a conversation with a group gathered for Charles' birthday at "Seppi's Place," which is kind of a new story waystation for people, especially young people, to develop in ways that society's institutions don't support. We envision a network of such places developing around the country and around the world; permaculture centers, coworking spaces, social enterprise incubators, places of healing, art, and music... places to start walking a different path. Find out more about Seppi's Place: seppisplace.com Join Our Community: newandancientstory.net

Rupert Sheldrake is one of the most thoughtful, lucid people I have ever met. In this conversation we talk about the foundations of science, both as an institution and as a path to knowledge. Like all the institutions of modernity, science faces a crisis that is increasingly recognized within science itself. Part of it is the "replicability crisis," but as Rupert and I discuss, that is but a gateway into deeper epistemological and metaphysical problems. Rupert Sheldrake, a biologist and author, is best known for his hypothesis of morphic fields and morphic resonance, which leads to a vision of a living, developing universe with its own inherent memory. Find out more on his website: http://www.sheldrake.org/ Join our community: www.newandancientstory.net

Charles speaks with Brown Koroskenyi and Pamela Lyness of the Avatar Centre, an experimental community in the Amazon dedicated to recovering knowledge of how to live harmoniously with the land. Of course, we needn't go to the Amazon to do this, but each place on earth has its own unique medicine. What are the gifts of the Amazon, when we no longer seek to strip it of the wealth we call "natural resources"? Join Our community: www.newandancientstory.net Avatar Centre's website: www.avatarcentre.com Avatar Centre's Facebook: www.facebook.com/theavatarcentre

Charles speaks with life coaching legend Julio Olalla about the power of gratitude, and more generally, the role of story and perception in forming the ground from which actions arise. Julio shares an amazing story of synchronicity and gratitude that also hints at the world-changing effects of choices that, in the moment, might seem insignificant. "The fact that we have stopped listening to the universe and nature has created in us an age of solitude, because there are no other voices, only human voices." - Julio Olalla "When anybody is in gratitude, every perception is different and every response to a situation is different. It colors your whole world. And the things that we try so hard to achieve become either irrelevant or effortless." - Charles Eisenstein Julio Olalla, founder and president of The Newfield Network, is a master at generating learning environments that establish the trust, safety, respect, and well-being that accelerate the potential for new thinking and action. Julio's website: http://www.newfieldnetwork.com/New3/Home/index.cfm

A conversation with Chris Martenson, creator of the Crash Course, who like I have has moved beyond (way beyond) economics to explore systems change and narrative change. We talk about real wealth and fake wealth, community, technology, healing, and the impossible. A deep dive!

A conversation between Charles and Amy Lansky, a computer scientist and NASA researcher who was propelled down the road less traveled through her son's autism and its subsequent "impossible" cure. We talk about radicalization, skepticism, and gateways to synchronicity.

This is a podcast featuring a discussion between Charles Eisenstein and Nipun Mehta, the founder of Service Space, on kindness and generosity, non-monetary wealth, and how even small, simple acts of kindness alter the fabric of our world to have potentially enormous social and political consequences.

Charles talks with Francis Weller about grief as a gateway to joy, to reverence, and to community, and the power of public grief to bring healing on a personal, community, and political level. Join our community: www.newandancientstory.net Francis Weller's organization: www.wisdombridge.net

This is a conversation with Maria Scordialos, an activist in Greece. We talk about the referendum, the solidarity economy, the role of fear in politics, the economics and politics of debt, and the revolutionary potential of authenticity in leaders. This is our first recorded podcast, and the sound quality is poor. Please excuse our learning curve.