Show Notes
“From one point of view, spiritual practice is always a postponement of awakening, because awakening is about embracing our true nature exactly as we are right now. Yet, from another point of view, if we don’t practice with intensity, if we don’t undertake a conscious effort to embrace the truth of our inherent freedom, then awakening is probably only going to ever show up in fleeting glimpses because the habit of denying our true nature is so strong.” —Craig Hamilton For so many of us...
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In this episode, Craig invites us to look closely at our emotions — how they rise and fall, sometimes intense, sometimes mild, like weather moving through the sky. Most of us exert a great deal of energy trying to steer our feelings: chasing the good ones, resisting the bad ones. But Craig points to something deeper than this ordinary pursuit of happiness — what he calls unconditional happiness. Not a peak we reach and hold onto, but a wholeness that was never dependent on our feelings in the...
In this episode, Craig explores the spiritual practice of seeing beyond separation. Our everyday experience tells us that life is made up of separate people, separate events, and separate things. But what if that isn't the whole story? What if beneath those differences, everything shares the very same sacred essence? Today, Craig invites us to explore one of the great discoveries of the contemplative traditions and to learn what meditation has to do with experiencing it for ourselves. This ep...
One of the great challenges of spiritual awakening is that it requires us to let go of our identity, to loosen our attachment to the story we tell ourselves about who we are. At first, that invitation can feel unsettling. If we stop identifying so completely with our history, our beliefs, our roles, and our accomplishments, what remains? And would we lose something essential about ourselves? In Awakening Beyond the Limits of Self, Craig explores these questions, inviting us to investigate the...
There’s something many of us long for on the spiritual path—the ability to live with a more open heart. To care more deeply. To give more freely. To love without limits. As spiritual practitioners, we often try to sense into the heart and feel divine or unconditional love, assuming that the more we feel it, the more we’ll be able to express it. But what if love doesn’t actually work that way? What if love isn’t something we can possess at all? In this episode, Craig invites us to explore th...
At some point in meditation, almost all of us ask the same question: Am I doing this right? In this episode, Craig responds to three listener questions that each circle around this theme in a different way. How do we know if we’re “there” yet? Can we be awake without knowing it? And what are we really looking for in the first place? Rather than offering simple answers, Craig uses these questions as an entry point into a deeper exploration—one that challenges some of our most basic assumptions...