It's time to say farewell to the GG Podcast. This is an invitation to all the GG listeners to subscribe and listen to the new Buddhist Psychology Podcast. Thank you for all your support over these 6 years. See you on BPP which cam be found on all the usual podcast apps and my Integrative Psychotherapy Substack!

Subscribe to the Buddhist Psychology Podcast

Clinician Paula Scatoloni returns to the Groundless Ground 6 years later, to share the evolution of her clinical work which now integrates sound therapies and energy medicine techniques along with somatic psychotherapy. This is a fascinating episode covering several kinds of sound modalities, such as: The Safe and Sound Protocol a unique listening experience that has been filtered through a patented, evidence-based algorithm highlighting specific sound frequencies which help regulate the autonomic nervous system and stimulate the vagus nerve. Binaural beats and Bio-lateral beats whose proponents assert these sound waves enhance certain beneficial brainwaves, though those claims lack good clinical research. And Biofield Tuning which utilizes a tuning fork to identify and resolve energetic disturbances in the subtle body nervous system. While all of this may sound far-fetched, Paula and I try our best to present it with the clarity and levelheadedness you deserve.

Paula Scatoloni LCSW holds a degree in social work and is certified in Somatic Experiencing, Biofield Tuning, Reiki, Brain Spotting, and many other forms of somatic therapy. She integrates her Western framework with earth-based practices for sound journeying and her gifts in vibrational healing

How can mental health professionals understand mental confusion from a Buddhist psychological perspective? This episode features a dharma talk by Lisa Dale Miller on a profoundly informative Sutta from the Pali Canon which offers answers to that question. Lisa also provides supplementary psychological commentary on the Sutta after the talk is finished.

Lisa Dale Miller starts this episode with an explanation of why the Groundless Ground Podcast has been on hiatus for the last year. Then the episode presents a dharma talk Lisa gave at Marin Sangha one month ago. Her talk is a reminder that every moment is an invitation to decrease the mass of human suffering by seeding the world with at least one more quiescent, wise, and compassionate mind committed to non-harming. Lisa explicates why cultivation of Bodhicitta is the ultimate path to accomplishing that aim, right in the midst of ordinary daily life.

Longchenpa's Finding Rest in the Nature of Mind

Lisa Dale Miller, LMFT, LPCC, SEP specializes in working with high-performing professionals (engineers, scientists, executives, physicians/psychologists, first responders) struggling with unresolved traumatic experiences: particularly medical trauma, C-PTSD, combat and war trauma, moral injury, high-impact injuries, burnout, workplace harassment, traumatic grief, and challenging life transitions.
Lisa authored Effortless Mindfulness: Genuine mental health through awakened presence a highly regarded textbook on Buddhist psychology for mental health professionals. Lisa has been an outpatient clinician for the VA San Jose, has taught a variety of Mindfulness-based Interventions, and is an AAMFT Clinical Fellow. Lisa is a Buddhist teacher and has been a yogic and Buddhist meditation practitioner for over four decades.

This is a recording of a dharma talk Lisa Dale Miller gave March 19, 2003 at Marin Sangha. 
Recently neuroscientist Richard Davidson reiterated a long-held tenet of Tibetan Buddhism that all human beings share the same wish to be happy and free of suffering, and that this wish emerges from innate basic goodness. This goodness is often viewed in Mahāyāna and Vajrayana Buddhism as an expression of Buddhanature, the fundamental awakened mind of all beings. There is not much in the Pāli Canon to support the notion of innate goodness. However, the Buddha did teach unconditioned mind—a mind purified through contemplative effort, not an innately awakened mind. This dharma talk compares these two frameworks and explores the cultivation of ethical goodness using specific suttas and findings from affective neuroscience. And I am joined by a co-teacher ChatGPT, which explicates historical references to goodness and investigates its own sense of how to engage in ethical conduct. 

Lisa's catalogue of Dharma Talks can be found on the Groundless Ground and those done prior to 2020 are available on my clinical website. 

Psychologist, researcher, and executive Cassandra Vieten and I dialogue about a wide range of interventions that can shift the mental health crisis into a mental health renaissance. Cassie’s many years of offering patients empirically-based, mind-body tools for sustainable transformation, has taken place at several renowned academic medical institutions and greatly contributed to psychology’s integration of embodied, spiritually-oriented interventions for human flourishing such as: meditation, qigong and tai chi, being in nature, ritual, spiritual exploration, and most recently, psychedelics. This is a jam-packed episode full of practical information for health professionals seeking easy ways to facilitate patient well-being.

Watch Cassie's TED Talk!

 Build Your Ecosystem!

Cassandra Vieten is Director of Research and Associate Scientist at the Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), Executive Director of the John W. Brick Mental Health Foundation, co-founder and Clinical Psychology Director at the Psychedelics and Health Research Initiative at UCSD, and a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Noetic Sciences. She is a licensed clinical psychologist. Her research has focused on spirituality and health, transformative experiences and practices, the development of mindfulness-based interventions for emotional well-being, and development of media technologies to inspire awe. She received her Ph.D. in clinical psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies. She was a Scientist at the Mind-Body Medicine Research Group for 12 years, and worked at the Institute of Noetic Sciences for 18 years. She has authored three books and has published numerous articles in scientific journals. 

This is a very special and quite different kind of episode to finish out the Groundless Ground’s 5th season. I have a frank discussion about the pitfalls of packaging and delivering meditation as a performative act in health contexts with Donna Sherman—clinical social worker and teacher of practical wisdom from yoga sciences, mindfulness meditation and behavioral sciences. Since Donna has studied extensively in the Tantric yoga tradition and I have expertise in Buddhist psychology, we interview each other about the ancient science behind Yogic and Buddhist meditative practices. Donna’s Therapeutic Yoga Nidra is the NSDR (non-sleep deep rest) practice I refer to my patients. And Donna is also a longtime dear friend and colleague from whom I have learned so much. It is hard to imagine a good life without her along for the ride! And wow, 5 years and 60 episodes. What an adventure Groundless Ground has been and much gratitude to every listener! You continue to be my greatest inspiration. Best wishes for the holidays and very happy and healthy New Year! 

Alison Ash PhD is a sex and intimacy coach, educator, and creator of many sex positive workshops including her upcoming, very popular Sexual and Emotional Intimacy Skills Mastercourse. This dialogue was stunningly rich and informative for both of us. We freely converse about sex positivity and how consent skills make it possible to skillfully and joyfully give and receive pleasure, flirt and seduce, have more intimacy, and better understand monogamous and non-monogamous relationships. We also discuss how the lingering pain and shame from sexual trauma impedes healthy sexuality and what systemic healing and resolution of sexual trauma entails. Alison clearly explicates the difference between pornography and erotica, and the deleterious effects of widespread porn use by teens, adults and couples. This episode is a romp through a diverse landscape of contexts and practices in which sex positivity is being experienced and enjoyed. 

Alison Ash PhD is a sex and intimacy coach, educator and creator of many sex positive workshops including her upcoming Masterclass. She coaches individuals and couples in sex positivity. Her book Gender Ambiguity in the Workplace: Trans and Genderqueer Discrimination was published in 2018. In addition to her private practice she is a Stanford University lecturer in the Wellness Education program teaching Sexual and Emotional Intimacy Skills to both undergraduate and graduate students. 

Her website is https://www.turnon.love/