I was recently interviewed by renowned psychotherapist Lisa Dale Miller for her Groundless Ground Podcast about a range of topics. It was definitely my favorite interview I’ve had to date. Lisa and I had a really fun conversation ranging from the treatment of chronic pain and addiction with mindfulness, to the neuroscience of reward, to Buddhist philosophy, to self-transcendence, and finally, to the arcane Tantric notion that the dynamic Primordial Bliss of Consciousness lies at the heart of all experience.
Using my research on Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement (MORE) as a launchpad, Lisa and I delve into specific clinical issues around the use of meditation as a means of alleviating physical pain and drug craving, providing mindfulness instruction to people suffering trauma, and how to enhance the sense of meaning and joy in life through reappraisal and savoring. We dig deep into the science of restructuring reward processes in the brain as novel approach to addictions treatment. Finally, we give a brief history of the science of mindfulness and how it developed from a core of mechanistic cognitive psychology to begin to explore the outer edge of meditative states of consciousness – including the study of how people can transcend their limited sense of self and come to feel intimately interconnected with the world around them.
We let it all hang out! Come check it out! The podcast is also available on Spotify.