Well, friends, I’ve officially got too much on my plate right now! There are more episodes to come: conversations with wonderful and insightful people, teaching episodes about what happens when we die and what it can teach us about who we are now – and a super spooky episode on David Hufford’s book The Terror That Comes in the Night about sleep paralysis and supernatural assault.   But I’m taking a few weeks off now as I work on other stuff – like live workshops, my YouTube channel, and my first book (yay!). “See” you in late November! To find everything else I’m doing, here are a fe ..read more

Andrea Wilson Woods shares the story of adopting her little sister, Adrienne, then losing her to liver disease, which she tells in her best-selling memoir, Better Off Bald. The sisters shared beautiful moments even as Adrienne was treated for her cancer, and what happened after Adrienne passed has changed the way Andrea understands the afterlife. Grab Andrea’s book here: https://betteroffbald.com You can connect with Blue Faery, the organization Andrea started in honor of Adrienne, here: https://www.bluefaery.org/ And we mention advance directives and medical power of attorney in the episode ..read more

In this episode, author and spiritual teacher Charlene Jones shares not only her near death experience but also the many ways she's been cracked open to experience the transcendent in her life. In this episode, we'll talk about an early kundalini awakening she had while meditating as a teenager, her abduction and escape from her kidnappers, her struggles with darkness, a near death experience, past lives, and her heritage of Celtic spirituality.  Sensitive listeners, please note that Charlene's story includes a lot of trauma and deals with topics like sexual violence and murder. From all ..read more

Dr. Nick Boeving is a writer, editor, and transpersonal psychologist, and we've known each other since grad school at Rice University's Department of Religion over 10 years ago. I was shocked to hear recently that he'd had a near death experience. He fell out of a fourth story window and spent months recovering physically, but the most amazing part of Nick's story is the emotional, psychological, and energetic rebirth he's experienced. In this interview, you'll hear themes that will return again and again in this season: the connection between trauma and transcendence and the choices Nick and ..read more

If you've heard of near death experiences (NDEs), you probably know that they're a major form of evidence that consciousness can survive the death of the body. In this episode, we'll go through Raymond Moody's classic 1975 book Life After Life, in which he details 15 characteristics of the NDE. You'll hear some of the remarkable stories he includes in his book about people hearing themselves pronounced dead, leaving their bodies, meeting a being of light, having life reviews, and more. Some people even relate evidence to their doctors or others afterwards, giving details of the procedure done ..read more

Last season we talked about the Tibetan teachings on death and rebirth and how those apply to life's transitions, too. (If you missed it, you can grab your free quick guide here: https://bit.ly/2Zl80UA .) This time you'll hear interviews with people who have had near death experiences, folks who received communications from deceased loved ones, an intuitive who connects with spirits on the "other side," and even a couple of stories about memories from previous lives. Plus we'll talk dark nights of the soul and what psychedelics can tell us about the afterlife. Please grab your free quick guide ..read more

Today Dr. Donna Dechen Birdwell and I will talk about her EarthCycles series of speculative novels that imagine a world in which a new human subspecies has evolved what we might call their mystical capacities in order to survive. And the humans – like us – without such strong abilities for intuitive connection have started deliberately having near death experiences in order to unlock their latent mystical capacities. Find more of Donna's work on her website: https://bit.ly/3zT06iq Start here with her first EarthCycles novel, Song of All Songs: https://amzn.to/3fgrEq5 Find her on Instagram and ..read more

In the first season of Letting Grow, we've covered traditional Tibetan Buddhist teachings on the bardo states: this lifetime, death, clear light, and becoming (between death and birth). We've meditated together and heard from some amazing people. Now it's time to wrap up this chapter with a summary -- and a new web page with all this season's episodes grouped according to type (teachings, meditations, interviews, and other reflections). To revisit the season or, for instance, binge all the meditations, go to https://www.clairevillarreal.com/letting-grow-s1-guide Join the community and get memb ..read more

With all the talk of the upcoming presidential transition in the news, I got curious about what this big event has in common with the changes in identity we've all lived through. So this week I created this mini-episode with links to a couple of short articles about the process of presidential transition. Here's hoping that this big national moment goes smoothly!   Join the tribe with our fun, free biweekly newsletter: http://bit.ly/rbrthnews Atlantic article: http://bit.ly/3bR16e8 NPR article: http://n.pr/35VdBl8   ..read more

Join the tribe with our fun, free biweekly newsletter (coming early in 2021): http://bit.ly/rbrthnews Today’s meditation is all about recognizing and relaxing into the space in our minds and in our lives. The more we can appreciate space, the less we’ll try to cram something into every moment of our lives. I hope you’ll use this meditation as often as you need to and come to embrace the space in your life. music by Chris Collins, indiemusicbox.com ..read more