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 🧘🏼‍♂️

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 🧘🏼‍♂️

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