Deep Transformation Podcast: Self - Society - Spirit

09/26/2025

“Mind is not an obstacle. Not an enemy. The obstacle is the reified representation of mind. If we take the knowledge of that mind to be reality, that is the obstacle.”

🎙️ Episode 201
A. H. Almaas Wisdom Series (Dialogue 13, Part 2 of 2) – Our Deepest Knowing: Awakening to Pure Being and Pure Awareness

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/a-h-almaas-wisdom-series-13-2-deep-knowing-pure-being-pure-awareness/

Topics:
• How does Hameed remember the state of pure awareness when there’s no knowing in that state?
• Most spiritual teachings have pure awareness and pure presence as inseparable, but in this teaching they can be distinguished
• The experience of pure awareness: transparency, translucence, freedom
• The world is not an illusion; it is the face of God
• The logos is what makes things manifest
• Connecting the dimensions of pure being and pure awareness: mind is not an obstacle
• Gurdjieff’s “stupid saints”
• Mind is not the enemy; it’s the reification of knowing that is the obstacle
• Pure awareness is more fundamental than pure being because there are no concepts; freedom is more palpable in pure awareness
• Hameed’s multiple kinds of freedom; freedom independent from the ground of being
• What does it feel like to realize there is no ground?
• Transcending conceptual dichotomies: in spiritual liberation dichotomies can be stumbling blocks, like being vs nonbeing
• Will science start to accept the ground of being?
• Is math, the Euclidean theorem, a property of reality?
• Consciousness and quantum theory
• Knowing is fundamental to the universe; it’s inherent to our true nature
• There’s no reason to have to choose between knowing and being, they’re two sides of the same thing

09/25/2025

A. H. Almaas (Hameed Ali): "...All spiritual teachings, all practices is to go beyond the reification. That's the point—to go beyond the reified experience to immediate experience, basically."

🎙️ A. H. Almaas Wisdom Series (Dialogue 13, Part 1) – Our Deepest Knowing: Awakening to Pure Being and Pure Awareness

----

📺 Watch the FULL video conversations or 🎧 listen to the FULL audio only interviews of the A. H. Almaas Wisdom Series:

https://deeptransformation.io/a-h-almaas-wisdom-series/

----

❤️ Our podcast is a labor of love funded solely by co-hosts Roger and John. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us keep these meaningful conversations alive by supporting us through: https://deeptransformation.io/donate/

----

Trailer Transcript:

All spiritual teachings, all practices is to go beyond the reification. That's the point—to go beyond the reified experience to immediate experience, basically. So, the methodology that I developed which deploys this understanding of concept and reification and all that, is to look at the reified concept and understand them and see where they come from. In that way, they are penetrated, and then they dissolve. They reveal themselves as just concepts, then becomes nothing there for a while before a quality of being arises.

----

09/23/2025

A. H. Almaas (Hameed Ali): "...The ordinary mind knowledge is more mental, more representational, more remembered. While here, the knowing is more immediate. It has nothing to do with memory. It's not a representation. It's immediate, direct. It comes like—presence knows itself by recognizing itself."

🎙️ A. H. Almaas Wisdom Series (Dialogue 13, Part 1) – Our Deepest Knowing: Awakening to Pure Being and Pure Awareness

----

📺 Watch the FULL video conversations or 🎧 listen to the FULL audio only interviews of the A. H. Almaas Wisdom Series:

https://deeptransformation.io/a-h-almaas-wisdom-series/

----

❤️ Our podcast is a labor of love funded solely by co-hosts Roger and John. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us keep these meaningful conversations alive by supporting us through: https://deeptransformation.io/donate/

----

Trailer Transcript:

To say, "I am"... Well, you can't say "I am" without knowing, without knowledge. There is knowledge involved, but it is not the knowledge of ordinary mind. The ordinary mind knowledge is more mental, more representational, more remembered. While here, the knowing is more immediate. It has nothing to do with memory. It's not a representation. It's immediate, direct. It comes like—presence knows itself by recognizing itself. By recognizing itself, it comes... recognizes itself as being. It's like it becomes so subtle, like the being and knowing are so inseparable, so the same thing.

----

09/21/2025

“Being is the origin of mind.”

🎙️ Episode 200
A. H. Almaas Wisdom Series (Dialogue 13, Part 1 of 2) – Our Deepest Knowing: Awakening to Pure Being and Pure Awareness

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/a-h-almaas-wisdom-series-13-1-deep-knowing-pure-being-pure-awareness/

Visit the episode page for a summary, timestamps, and links to resources mentioned.

In the thirteenth dialogue of the A. H. Almaas Wisdom Series, Hameed Ali delves into the subject of knowing, or basic knowledge, at the deepest level of awareness. Different from ordinary knowledge, basic knowledge is inherent and immediate, an important feature of reality. You can know Being by being Being, he says; know consciousness by being consciousness, know peace by being peace. Being and knowing are the same thing, he explains, two sides of a coin. Some of what Hameed shares here is unique to his Diamond Approach teaching, and not found in other spiritual teachings, such as what he imparts about the origin of mind and the distinction he makes between pure being and pure awareness.

Hameed explains that we need our conceptual mind (to do our taxes, he laughs), but that reification—treating concepts as if they were real things—creates obstacles and alienates us from our true nature. The aim of all spiritual practice is to go beyond reification to immediate experience, he says. When Hameed describes the difference between pure presence and pure awareness, John wonders, how does Hameed remember the state of pure awareness when there’s no knowing in that state? And what does it feel like to experience no ground of being? Hameed answers in his usual enlightening, gently humorous way, leaving listeners in a state of open-minded wonder. Vastly illuminating, this conversation goes directly to the heart of being and the heart of knowing at the very foundation of true nature. Recorded July 17, 2025.

09/20/2025

“Either/or thinking without both/and thinking is the root cause of poverty, racism, sexism, and war.”

🎙️ Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity Thinking for Healing, Thriving, and Becoming Wiser with Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma

📺 The FULL video of this conversation is now available on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BTwH6m0PMs

Some of the topics discussed in this episode:
• What are polarities and why do they matter?
• Privileging one pole over the other always leads to dysfunction
• Developmental stages can be defined by a series of pole preferences
• Experiential polarities exercise: the infinity loop
• Applying polarity thinking to contemporary politics & leveraging polarities in everyday life
• Polarity thinking is an antidote to rigidity; it heals polarization

“Either/or thinking without both/and thinking is the root cause of poverty, racism, sexism, and war.”----🎙️ Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity T...

09/19/2025

Barry Johnson: "...When we do that, and we bring that either/or mindset to our desire to protect—protect our loved ones, our family or our country—the underlying polarity that relates to protection is claiming power and sharing power."

----

🎙️ Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity Thinking for Healing, Thriving, and Becoming Wiser with Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma (Part 3 of 3)

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/barry-johnson-beena-sharma-beyond-conflict-power-of-polarity-thinking-3/

Visit the episode page for a summary, timestamps, and links to resources mentioned.

----

❤️ Our podcast is a labor of love funded solely by co-hosts Roger and John. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us keep these meaningful conversations alive by supporting us through: https://deeptransformation.io/donate/

----

Trailer Transcript:

When we do that, and we bring that either/or mindset to our desire to protect—protect our loved ones, our family or our country—the underlying polarity that relates to protection is claiming power and sharing power. If we assume that the only way to protect ourselves is to claim power so that we can protect—you know, I will be so powerful that you will not harm those I care about. You will not harm my country or you won't harm my family, my children, etc. So, we end up concentrating power to protect ourselves from other people abusing us by them having more power than us. So, you get into the overfocus on claiming power to the neglect of sharing power, and it leads to an abuse of power, and it leads to spending an inordinate amount of our budget on military power and protection.

----

09/18/2025

Beena Sharma: "...I do think that unipolar thinking or either/or thinking is a generator function of the metacrisis. This is the core psychological imperative or impulse that has led to the metacrisis. "

----

🎙️ Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity Thinking for Healing, Thriving, and Becoming Wiser with Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma (Part 3 of 3)

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/barry-johnson-beena-sharma-beyond-conflict-power-of-polarity-thinking-3/

Visit the episode page for a summary, timestamps, and links to resources mentioned.

----

❤️ Our podcast is a labor of love funded solely by co-hosts Roger and John. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us keep these meaningful conversations alive by supporting us through: https://deeptransformation.io/donate/

----

Trailer Transcript:

I do think that unipolar thinking or either/or thinking is a generator function of the metacrisis. This is the core psychological imperative or impulse that has led to the metacrisis. If you just break it down... So, earlier I talked about how if you have, systematically, you're privileging one pole over the other, and there is a set of polarities where you're only privileging one, then they all stack. Then, you get compounding and more complex issues which has led to the metacrisis. What are some of these? They're quite obvious that they're not earthshakingly new framings. Focusing on the short term, not on the long term. Focusing on the part, not on the whole. Focusing on linear problem solving, and not systemic. Focusing on external, what's external, and not what's internal. Just, you know, taking concrete external material solutions, and not really thinking about culture or the human being for example.

----

09/16/2025

“Universal interdependence is the most clear example of divine, unconditional love, and the polarity is the smallest element within universal interdependence—the interdependence of two.”

🎙️ Episode 199
(Part 3 of 3) Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity Thinking for Healing, Thriving, and Becoming Wiser with Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/barry-johnson-beena-sharma-beyond-conflict-power-of-polarity-thinking-3/

Topics:
• Back to stages: from self-interest to harmonizing, to independence, multiperspectivality, and oneness
• We are born unique and we become more unique; we are born connected and appreciate being connected more and more
• Applying polarity thinking to contemporary politics: immigration
• The language of compassionate action
• How polarity thinking can help us with the metacrisis
• Leveraging polarities in everyday life, socially & culturally
• How do we select what to do when faced by an overwhelming amount of choices?
• We have to consciously become more competent, more masterful
• Polarity tension is always there, and we need to forgive ourselves and others for not always doing a good job with leveraging key polarities, i.e. work & home, self-care & achievement

09/15/2025

Barry Johnson: "...If I'm spending my life trying to fight racism by looking for racists who need to be addressed, think about that quest. I am constantly in a position of judging everybody I'm talking with to try to identify whether they are somebody who need my retribution because they are racist."

----

🎙️ Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity Thinking for Healing, Thriving, and Becoming Wiser with Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma (Part 2 of 3)

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/barry-johnson-beena-sharma-beyond-conflict-power-of-polarity-thinking-2/

Visit the episode page for a summary, timestamps, and links to resources mentioned.

----

❤️ Our podcast is a labor of love funded solely by co-hosts Roger and John. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us keep these meaningful conversations alive by supporting us through: https://deeptransformation.io/donate/

----

Trailer Transcript:

If I'm spending my life trying to fight racism by looking for racists who need to be addressed, think about that quest. I am constantly in a position of judging everybody I'm talking with to try to identify whether they are somebody who need my retribution because they are racist. This is obviously denying the fact that when you're raised in a culture in which racism is so present, everybody has their own racism, their own racial bias. It's like that it's in you, but you're—as Beena mentioned earlier—you're deflecting it from yourself, projecting it out, and you're seeking someone to find. And so, your whole inquiry process is invested in finding out who are the evil ones, and let's get them. Now, what if your whole process was trying to see people completely with the intent of loving them? That's the quest. It's like, what will help me see them more completely?

----

09/13/2025

Beena Sharma: "... And then, you get to the downside of both/and thinking until the downside will teach you, actually it's not either both/and or either/or. It's both! Both/and and either/or which is actually the next stage of development which we call integrative."

----

🎙️ Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity Thinking for Healing, Thriving, and Becoming Wiser with Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma (Part 2 of 3)

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/barry-johnson-beena-sharma-beyond-conflict-power-of-polarity-thinking-2/

Visit the episode page for a summary, timestamps, and links to resources mentioned.

----

❤️ Our podcast is a labor of love funded solely by co-hosts Roger and John. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us keep these meaningful conversations alive by supporting us through: https://deeptransformation.io/donate/

----

Trailer Transcript:

So, the progression is, first, you only think of one or the other. You don't even recognize that you've left the other out. Then, as you develop, you recognize the contrast. You begin to include it, and the words you use in the language is, "Yeah, this, but this". There's a "but". And then it goes into, "This or this". Now, there's active tension. Now, it is seen as competing. So, that's either/or in its fullness. And then you realize, well, it's not either/or. It's sort of relative. It's a gray area. And then, you step into full both/and thinking. When you begin to see the relief of both/and thinking, there is a tendency to reject either/or thinking at that particular stage. You think, "Oh, I've been there, done that. That's completely dysfunctional. We just need to do both/and thinking." And then, you get to the downside of both/and thinking until the downside will teach you, actually it's not either both/and or either/or. It's both! Both/and and either/or which is actually the next stage of development which we call integrative.

----

09/05/2025

“Either/or thinking without both/and thinking is the root cause of poverty, racism, sexism, and war.”

🎙️ Episode 198
(Part 2 of 3) Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity Thinking for Healing, Thriving, and Becoming Wiser with Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/barry-johnson-beena-sharma-beyond-conflict-power-of-polarity-thinking-2/

Topics:
• Looking at the pole preferences that show up at each stage of development
• The integrative stage of development doesn’t reject either/or thinking or both/and thinking
• Embracing polarities’ upsides elevates you; you come to a higher place
• Tyranny and democracy: how do you both provide direction and encourage participation?
• The spiritual polarity of doing and being and Martin Buber’s I and thou
• How polarities nest and stack: Beena leads a nesting and upleveling exercise
• Relating polarity thinking to quantum physics & the richness of the subject of universal interdependence
• How do we respond to opposition at different developmental stages?
• Jack Gibb’s trust theory: love is a natural byproduct of seeing completely
• Seeing life and death as two poles and the violence in nature
• Enhancing our capacity to love: individuals, enemies, countries; universal interdependence is a manifestation of divine love
• Taking radical responsibility for our own incapacity to see
• Love as a natural response to seeing fully and defenselessly
• Barry’s profound realization about heaven, hell, and universal love

Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma on embracing polarities' upsides & enhancing our capacity to love through an understanding of interdependence.

09/04/2025

Beena Sharma: "...First of all, the key word is "the better". You know that's problematic. If you privilege one pole over the other, then there will be a point in which you will enter the downside of overfocusing or privileging that pole."

----

🎙️ Growing Beyond Conflict: The Power of Polarity Thinking for Healing, Thriving, and Becoming Wiser with Barry Johnson & Beena Sharma (Part 1 of 3)

🎧 https://deeptransformation.io/barry-johnson-beena-sharma-beyond-conflict-power-of-polarity-thinking-1/

Visit the episode page for a summary, timestamps, and links to resources mentioned.

----

❤️ Our podcast is a labor of love funded solely by co-hosts Roger and John. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us keep these meaningful conversations alive by supporting us through: https://deeptransformation.io/donate/

----

Trailer Transcript:

I have a brother who's quite cautious, and I tend to be more adventurous; but we both decided that one is the better way. He thinks it's better to be cautious because then I'm safe, and I've decided it's better to be adventurous because it's exciting, and you know, there are so many possibilities. First of all, the key word is "the better". You know that's problematic. If you privilege one pole over the other, then there will be a point in which you will enter the downside of overfocusing or privileging that pole. That's why I say preferences are the root of evil because when you prefer something, then there is some sort of dysfunction. If you do it in an extreme way, then extreme dysfunction can become evil. But what we also do is see the downside in the other. So, he sees me not as adventurous and all the wonderful thing that comes with adventure. He sees me as foolhardy.

----