Episodios

  • Living Into the Dark: Matt Cardin on Creativity, Horror, and the Daemonic

    Living Into the Dark: Matt Cardin on Creativity, Horror, and the Daemonic
    Feb 5 2026
    In this episode of The Gospel of Direct Experience, we're joined by Matt Cardin, acclaimed writer of cosmic horror and author of the new book Writing at the Wellspring: Tapping the Source of Your Inner Genius. What unfolds isn't just a discussion of creativity; it's also an initiation into darkness—darkness as terror and generative source and spiritual/cultural necessity. Matt reframes the "demon muse" or "genius" not as a benevolent guide from beyond but as an abducting, inner organizing force that destabilizes our egoic certainty and is the true wellspring of art, vocation, and transformation. Our conversation ranges from the chapel perilous and cosmic horror, to non-dual philosophy and role-playing games to Frankenstein and the collapse of modern culture. Get ready to descend into the living dark—not to transcend it, but to be transformed by it. Visit Matt's excellent Substack newsletter The Living Dark. Episode Highlights [00:00:51] Intro to Matt Cardin Matt Cardin is an author known for delving into the realms of horror and the metaphysical. His widely acclaimed books, including To Rouse Leviathan and What the Daemon Said, explore the convergence of horror, religion, and creativity. [00:03:29] Horror as Spiritual Initiation Matt reflects on discovering Lovecraft, Ligotti, and the weird fiction tradition, describing the uncanny experience of encountering work that feels less like influence than recognition. [00:15:33] Lovecraft as Spirit Guide Matt describes discovering H.P. Lovecraft not simply as a writer, but as a formative guide into cosmic horror and spiritual disorientation. [00:25:07] Satanic Panic Matt recalls two episodes from childhood that alerted him that his interest in darkness and creativity would not be readily accepted in his cradle religious tradition. [00:30:46] The Living Dark & the Allotted Function We unpack the idea of living into the dark as both a creative and existential condition—life lived without a map or final certainty. From there we discuss discovering one's allotted function—Is it cosmic slavery or existential freedom? [00:42:44] The Demon Muse Matt explores the demon or daemon/daimon muse as a way of naming the unconscious, involuntary source of creativity that moves through us rather than obeying us. We discuss personifying this force—not as superstition, but as a practical way of collaborating with the deep patterns that shape us as individuals and creative beings. [00:50:55] Frankenstein & Collapse Matt reframes Frankenstein as a parable of the daemonic unconscious gone unacknowledged, returning as both personal and cultural catastrophe. Then we turn toward possibility: a new monastic path for those who want to live meaningfully at "the end of the world." What seeds should we plant for the other side of apocalypse? [01:51:23] Becoming the Living Book Jeff reflects on Matt's story "Notes of a Mad Copyist," where a new inner revelation is experienced as a horror. What if collapse isn't the end but a transformation where the false things fall away? Continue the Conversation What did you think about this conversation? Tell us at gospelofdirectexperience@gmail.com or reach out at: https://www.gospelofdirectexperience.com/#contact.
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    1 h y 7 m
  • A Portal to the Great Mother: Clark Strand & Perdita Finn on the Rosary

    A Portal to the Great Mother: Clark Strand & Perdita Finn on the Rosary
    Jan 21 2026
    What if the rosary is not a relic of patriarchal religion, but an ancient spiritual technology—older than Christianity itself—designed to open a living relationship with the Sacred Mother? In this episode we're joined by Clark Strand and Perdita Finn, founders of The Way of the Rose and co-authors of the book by the same name, for a deeply embodied conversation about the rosary as a portal: tactile, erotic, ecological, and alive. Drawing on paleolithic bead traditions, Marian devotion, mystery cults, Buddhism, and direct visionary experience, Clark and Perdita reframe the rosary as a practice rooted not in any particular dogma, but in the body—touch, rhythm, breath, grief, birth, death, and rebirth. We explore the rosary's hidden history, its connection to the Great Mother across cultures, and its power to open liminal spaces where the living and the dead, the personal and the cosmic, meet. The conversation then moves through themes of devotion without orthodoxy, apocalypse without judgment, reincarnation, climate grief, and the Sacred Feminine as a force that shows up—not as metaphor, but as a very real spiritual presence. By the end, we've gone from womb to tomb and back again. Episode Highlights [00:01:26] Introducing Clark, Perdita, and The Way of the Rose Perdida Finn and Clark Strand are the founders of the Way of the Rose Fellowship and the co-authors of the book of the same name. Their work not only shares some of their own profound experiences of the Sacred Mother, it reframes where the rosary came from, what it really is, and where it might be taking us. [00:02:46] The Land We Are Called To An organic, story-rich opening unfolds around sacred land, old-growth forests, ancestral memory, and the way places call us into transformation. The Sacred Mother as land and body. [00:9:30] The Body Knows the Prayer Perdita and Clark introduce the rosary not as doctrine, but as an embodied practice rooted in touch, rhythm, and nervous-system memory. Drawing on ancient bead traditions and the physiology of consolation, they reframe the rosary as a tactile return to the Mother—older than Christianity itself. [00:18:03] Ancient Origins of the Rosary The conversation traces the rosary back through Paleolithic goddess figurines, Mediterranean mystery cults, and pre-literate devotional practices. Clark and Perdita reveal how Marian devotion absorbed and preserved far older traditions of the Great Mother, birth, death, and rebirth—often in tension with official church theology. [00:26:11] Opening the Portal Great discussion here about the rosary being a portal and a summoning practice. Clark and Perdita explore how repetitive prayer, gesture, and intention open liminal space—connecting practitioners with the living, the dead, and the Sacred Feminine across cultures (an invitation to people of any and all or no religious or spiritual background to join in the prayer). [00:43:41] When She Shows Up (and Speaks) Clark and Perdita share their own direct encounters with the Sacred Mother, including visionary experiences and received messages that shaped their work and writing. This section makes clear that the rosary is not symbolic—it is relational, communicative, and alive. [00:51:19] A Different Kind of Apocalypse We close by reimagining apocalypse through the rosary's mysteries—not as punishment or final judgment, but as cyclical renewal, divine union, and rebirth. Continue the Conversation What did you think about this conversation? Tell us at gospelofdirectexperience@gmail.com or reach out at: https://www.gospelofdirectexperience.com/#contact.
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    1 h y 4 m
  • The Age of Disclosure: UFOs, Psyops, & Ontological Shock

    The Age of Disclosure: UFOs, Psyops, & Ontological Shock
    Dec 17 2025

    We finally discuss the new documentary The Age of Disclosure and what it suggests about UFOs, government secrecy, and the possibility of non-human intelligence.

    Already convinced of the reality of UFOs, your hosts explore the deeper challenges of disclosure itself: psychological operations, selective truth-telling, and the difficulty of knowing what to trust when intelligence agencies are shaping the narrative. We discuss why so many credible insiders are speaking publicly now—and their suggestion that there's more—much more—they can't say.

    Drawing on UFO research, the work of Jacques Vallée, and the history of religious and paranormal encounter, we imagine the UFO phenomenon within a broader landscape of "high strangeness" that resists simple explanation and unsettles our assumptions about reality.

    Our conversation meanders (as it so often does) toward ontological shock—the disorientation that arises when our frameworks for understanding the world begin to break down—and the question of whether humanity is truly prepared for what disclosure may reveal to us about reality and our place within it.

    The Age of Disclosure Trailer

    Watch the Age of Disclosure on Prime Video

    Continue the Conversation

    What did you think about this conversation? Tell us at gospelofdirectexperience@gmail.com or reach out at: https://www.gospelofdirectexperience.com/#contact.
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    1 h y 7 m
  • Christianity as Mystery School

    Christianity as Mystery School
    Oct 29 2025

    What if Christianity began not as a set of doctrines to believe, but as a mystery school—an initiatory path meant to awaken direct experience of the divine? In this episode, wel trace the ancient roots of the Christian story through the lost mystery traditions of the ancient world. From the Eleusinian rites to the "dying before you die" experience, we explore how Jesus may have carried forward an older, hidden stream of spiritual practice—and what it might mean to recover those inner mysteries today.

    Episode Highlights [00:00:49] Inner vs. Outer Mystery

    • We open the episode by introducing the concept of the inner and outer mysteries. Jeff reflects on his "self-initiation" as a mystic. We contrast the living, experiential "inner mystery" with the outer, dogmatic forms of religion that dominate both conservative and progressive Christianity.

    [00:14:35] Christianity's Forgotten Roots

    • We trace how Christianity may have grown from the ancient "mystery schools" of the Mediterranean world—traditions that used ritual, theater, psychedelics, and more to guide people through some sort of dying-before-you-die experience. We discuss the striking similarities between stories of Jesus and earlier myths like Isis and Horus, and the theological mischief of time-traveling demons. We conclude that the Jesus story carries forward a much older initiatory wisdom—one meant to be lived and experienced, not "believed."

    [00:30:39] Christianity as a Living Mystery School

    • Further "conclusions" from the previous section, included the idea that we are meant to become like Jesus, not just believe in Jesus.

    [00:38:55] Lost "Indigenous" Mysteries

    • We reflect on the loss of the ancient initiatory traditions that once formed the spiritual heart of Western culture. We explore the idea that early rituals in the Eleusinian Mysteries may have included sacred plant medicines—technologies for direct encounter with the divine. We grieve how this indigenous wisdom was outlawed, forgotten, and replaced by flat, literal religion. But if the mystery could born in as unlikely a place as Galilee and Judea, could it be reborn here and now?

    [00:47:50] Reawakening the Mysteries

    • We close by asking whether the ancient mysteries are reemerging in our time. We reflect on the idea that true initiation may come not from institutions but from Spirit itself—the same living intelligence that once guided the mystery schools. If those mysteries are still alive in the inner world, then perhaps the Spirit will give them back.

    Continue the Conversation

    What did you think about this conversation? Tell us at gospelofdirectexperience@gmail.com or reach out at: https://www.gospelofdirectexperience.com/#contact.
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    53 m
  • At the Edge of Collapse and Connection: Victoria Loorz on Wild Spirituality

    At the Edge of Collapse and Connection: Victoria Loorz on Wild Spirituality
    Sep 24 2025

    Jeff and Michael sit down with Victoria Loorz, author of Church of the Wild, founder of the Center for Wild Spirituality, and co-founder of the Wild Church Network, for a conversation about finding the sacred beyond church walls. They talk about the experience of hearing God beneath an oak tree, encounters with owls and vultures, and why wilderness has always been the place where spiritual transformation begins.

    Together they explore what it means to face ecological and institutional collapse without turning away—to grieve, to stay connected, and to treat even loss as part of the holy cycle of life, death, and renewal.

    You can learn more about Victoria at her website or by listening to her podcast, The Holy Wild with Victoria Loorz.

    Continue the Conversation

    What did you think about this conversation? Tell us at gospelofdirectexperience@gmail.com or reach out at: https://www.gospelofdirectexperience.com/#contact.
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    1 h y 6 m
  • Beyond the Psychedelic Renaissance: Devotion, Birth, and Spirit with Justin Levy

    Beyond the Psychedelic Renaissance: Devotion, Birth, and Spirit with Justin Levy
    Sep 10 2025

    Psychedelics are often framed today as medicines for trauma and therapy—but what if they are something more? In this episode, we sit down with Justin Levy, founder of Spirit House in Portland, Oregon, to explore psychedelics as a path of devotion, surrender, and cultural rebirth.

    Justin shares his journey from early rave experiences to work with kundalini, capoeira, and ayahuasca, and how these threads wove together into a living spiritual practice. Together we ask: How do psychedelics invite us to crack open and encounter Spirit? What does it mean to center devotion rather than therapy? And how can we midwife a new spiritual culture in the midst of collapse and transformation?

    This is a conversation about the terrifying beauty of the goddess, the messiness of birth, and the possibility that spirit is emerging through unexpected places—if we are willing to give ourselves fully to it.

    Continue the Conversation

    What did you think about this conversation? Tell us at gospelofdirectexperience@gmail.com or reach out at: https://www.gospelofdirectexperience.com/#contact.
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    1 h y 16 m
  • The Time Travel Episode

    The Time Travel Episode
    Aug 20 2025

    In this episode, Michael finally shares the wild story he's been holding back for decades: the day in 2006 when he slipped from a meditation session in his Queens apartment back through time—waking up in his 15-year-old body in 1990. Was it something like a dream, an out-of-body journey, or actual time travel? Jeff and Michael follow the thread from memory and synchronicity into questions of how we experience time itself—linear, cyclical, radial, and kairos.

    Episode Highlights [00:00:50] Waking Up in 1990

    • Michael quickly jumps into the story that frames our whole conversation.

    [00:07:08] Living in 1990

    • Michael recounts the weeks he spent in 1990.

    [00:11:01] Back to the Future

    • Michael goes back to the future and seeks confirmation of his travels back in time.

    [00:15:23] Follow Up Questions

    • Jeff asks Michael some follow up questions to try to better understand the nature of his experience.

    [00:20:21] Meditation, Tantra, and Radial Time

    • A deeper dive into how meditation and Tibetan tantric models (mandalas, wheel-of-time) might reshape our understandings of time—time as radial/mandalic/cyclical rather than linear.

    [00:33:53] Modern Time

    • Jeff and Michael widen the lens: how do we experience and understand time in our modern lives and world? From clocks and railroads to relativity and the Big Bang. chronology vs. kairos, the social history of clocks, relativity, and speculative cosmology (how modern observations challenge simple Big-Bang narratives).

    [00:47:43] OBE / Astral Projection Connections

    • They compare Michael's time story to out-of-body and astral experiences.

    [00:53:36] Kairos, Practical Takeaways & Sign-off

    • Closing reflections on kairos (the opportune moment), spiritual implications for freedom from "clock time," and suggestions for small time experiments.

    Continue the Conversation

    What did you think about this conversation? Tell us at gospelofdirectexperience@gmail.com or reach out at: https://www.gospelofdirectexperience.com/#contact.
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    1 h y 5 m
  • The Psychedelic Renaissance with Nicholas Collura

    The Psychedelic Renaissance with Nicholas Collura
    Aug 6 2025
    In this episode, we speak with Nicholas Collura—a board-certified chaplain, spiritual director, and Enneagram teacher—about the unfolding intersection between psychedelics and contemporary spirituality. We explore what the so-called "psychedelic renaissance" means for spiritual direction, Christian practice, and the broader search for meaning in a disenchanted world. Topics include integration, cultural appropriation, mystical experience, the challenges and risks of reintroducing visionary substances into modern religious life, and what psychedelics might reveal about the gaps—and potential—within our spiritual traditions. A thoughtful conversation for those curious about where spirit and altered states meet. Learn more about Nicholas at www.nicholascollura.com Episode Highlights [00:00:50] Introducing Nicholas Collura and the Psychedelic Landscape We introduce Nicholas and our conversation opens with an overview of the substances involved in the psychedelic renaissance and how Michael Pollan's How to Change Your Mind helped catalyze a shift in public and medical discourse around their use. [00:13:18] Interfaith Dialogue with Plant Medicines Nicholas reflects on his experiences with ayahuasca and how its ceremonial use in indigenous traditions sparked a deeper commitment to interreligious dialogue. Rather than cultural appropriation, Nicholas advocates for respectful exchange—approaching psychedelic traditions from within one's own spiritual roots. [00:23:53] Psychedelics, the Earth, and the Divine Feminine Nicholas explores how Christian disconnection from the earth, the feminine, and the mystical has deep roots. He draws parallels between plant medicine traditions and overlooked Christian mystics like Hildegard of Bingen, suggesting that psychedelic encounter may catalyze a reconnection with suppressed dimensions of the faith—particularly the sacred feminine and earth-based spirituality. [00:29:14] Plant Intelligence & Integration We explore the ethical and spiritual tensions of using psychedelics like ayahuasca outside their traditional cultural contexts. Nicholas acknowledges the risk of appropriation but also suggests that these plant medicines may possess a boundary-crossing, invitational intelligence that offers healing to outsiders. Integration, he says, is about bringing insights "back down the ladder" into everyday life—using rituals, relationships, and symbols (like Christian communion) as containers for meaning. [00:43:02] Integration vs. Domestication What does it mean to "integrate" a psychedelic experience in a society that often demands conformity? The hosts and guest reflect on the tension between grounding visionary experiences and being pressured to reintegrate into a disenchanted culture. Is integration always healing, or can it become a form of domestication? [00:52:10] The Transformation of Faith Nicholas shares how psychedelics have influenced his theology and spiritual life. Rather than moving him away from Christianity, they deepened his appreciation for its symbols and mysteries, especially the figure of Jesus as healer and mystic. Psychedelics, he argues, can open new ways of understanding the Gospels. [01:01:57] Everything Belongs: Hope, Mystery, and Belief In closing, Nicholas reflects on how his work and experiences have shaped a theology of radical belonging. Even in a time of ecological collapse and spiritual fragmentation, he finds hope in the idea that all things—light and shadow—are held within a deeper wholeness sustained by divine mystery and love. Continue the Conversation What did you think about this conversation? Tell us at gospelofdirectexperience@gmail.com or reach out at: https://www.gospelofdirectexperience.com/#contact.
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    1 h y 8 m