The Mystical Positivist

Stuart Goodnick and Robert Schmidt

The Mystical Positivist, with hosts Stuart Goodnick and Dr. Robert Schmidt, is dedicated to the application of reason in the pursuit of spiritual practice and development. It consists of commentary, book reviews, interviews, and discussion in and around the local and larger spiritual community. The thesis of the show is that rationality is in no way the antithesis of deep mystical experience, in fact, we assert that it is a necessary ally.

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August 29 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #444 - 22AUG26
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Kenneth Hillsman, a diviner in the Dagara West African tradition. Kenneth was born and raised in Tennessee as a preacher’s kid in a very religious family. In college while taking African studies classes, he read Elder Malidoma Somé’s first book, Of Water and Spirit, which planted the seeds for what was to come. While working in the family business, a health and natural foods store, he developed a passion for herbs and roo
July 12 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #443 - 11JUL26
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Ken McLeod, Buddhist teacher and author the recently released book, The Magic of Vajrayana. In today’s conversation, we discuss the challenges of spiritual practice in the modern world. Among the topics we cover are the contrasting roles of religious and spiritual practice, the crisis of meaning in contemporary life, understanding Mahayana’s “Two Truths” as the Fact of Mystery and the Fact of Life, and Faith ver
April 19 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #442 - 18APR26
Podcast: This week on the show, we present a pre-recorded conversation with author, Peter Russell, about his latest book, How to Meditate Without Even Trying (An Eckhart Tolle Edition), just released from New World Library. The refreshingly simple approach that Peter unfolds in his book replaces effort with ease and reminds readers that true peace of mind is closer than they might imagine. His techniques include the practice of allowing – releasing effort, relaxing the mind, and gently returning
Dec 14, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #441 - 13DEC25
Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist, we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Red Hawk, acclaimed poet and the author of 13 books, including Self Observation, Self Remembering, The Way of the Wise Woman, Return to the Mother, and Book of Lamentations. Of Self-Observation and Self-Remembering, he writes, “Every living thing is surrounded by a vibratory atmosphere, a vibratory energetic field which surrounds the body and in humans is the ground in which the second, or etheric, bo
Nov 30, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #440 - 29NOV25
Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist, we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Abby Havermann, speaker and podcaster, on the challenges of going through life in a waking dream and how practices like Self-Observation and Self-Remembering can metabolize the dream and restore our lost sense of presence. Abby Havermann is a psychotherapist, coach, and speaker who focuses on the illumination of the unconscious self-betrayals that drive our everyday challenges. A lifelong learner, Abb
Nov 16, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #439 - 15NOV25
Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist, we feature a pre-recorded conversation with returning guest Stephen Aronson about his new book, AS INSIDE, SO OUTSIDE, AS ABOVE, SO BELOW – Reconciling Science and Spirituality through Consciousness, published by Karnak Press in 2024. This series of essays represents perspectives from Stephen’s half-century in the study of psychotherapy and spiritual exploration. He suggests that the energy we call consciousness is an inherent aspect of the Universe
Nov 9, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #438 - 08NOV25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Donna McLaughlin, Mahamudra teacher in the Karma Kagyu tradition. Donna was first introduced to the Dharma in her teenage years. In 1970, having finished college, she travelled overland to India. After attending retreats in Bodhgaya with S. N. Goenka, she stayed at a Buddhist mission outside Delhi. Several people had already mentioned the name of Kalu Rinpoche to her, but it wasn’t until she met Ken McLeod at that mi
Nov 2, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #437 - 01NOV25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Layne Negrin, author of Gurdjieff in Tibet. Divided into three parts, Part One looks at the evidence of Gurdjieff's presence in Tibet, Part Two researches the direct students of Gurdjieff who explored Tibetan or other Buddhist sects to one degree or another, and Part Three is a collection of comparative studies showing the influence of Tibetan Buddhism upon Gurdjieff's teaching. Interspersed with the author's writing on t
Oct 19, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #436 - 18OCT25
Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist, we feature a discussion from the Western Baul Podcast Series featuring Rob Schmidt and Stuart Goodnick. The theme is “The Crisis of Continuity of Wisdom” and the description is as follows: The Greek philosopher Heraclitus asserted that it’s impossible to step twice into the same river. In other words, flux is all. In terms of religious and spiritual practice, we apply this principle to say that, to be effective, The Work must change with the times,
Sep 21, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #435 - 20SEP25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with David Paul Coleman, professional astrologer, practitioner and teacher in the magical tradition of Franz Bardon, and author of The 26 Keys – The Magic of the Astral Light: A New Approach to Astrology. David has been a professional astrologer for 35 years and a practicing magician for much of that time, having first encountered Bardon’s Initiation into Hermetics in the mid 1990s. In working with this material, he found that
Aug 31, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #434 - 30AUG25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded in-person conversation with OM C. Parkin at Gut Saunstorf near the Baltic in Germany. We discuss the intention behind Gut Saunstorf as a modern monastery, the impact that digitization in the external world has on our ability to do internal work, and more. OM C. Parkin is a renowned European wisdom teacher and the initiator of the OM Foundation Inner Science and the publishing house for wisdom literature  advaitaMedia, the fo
Jul 20, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #433 - 19JUL25
Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist, we feature a talk given by hosts Stuart Goodnick and Robert Schmidt at Many Rivers Books & Tea on July 10, 2025. The talk title is The Practice of Patriotism, and the description is as follows: The present moment is fraught with political tension and polarization. Many of us are left wondering what it means to be an American. Spiritual practitioners ask, "what am I called to do in this moment?" Some traditions assert that activism and
Jun 15, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #432 - 14JUN25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Kenan Azam, host of the Potential Paradigms Show. In this discussion, we explore Kenan’s spiritual journey from a secular upbringing in the Pakistani part of Kashmir, to the worlds of academia in Canada and the US, and then through deep engagements with the traditions of Advaita Vedanta, Kashmiri Shaivism, and Sufism. His path reflects the ancient hermetic maxim, 'As above so below' — with its profound implications f
Jun 1, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #431 - 31MAY25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Neil Douglas-Klotz about his latest book, The Aramaic Jesus Book of Days – 40 Days of Contemplation and Revelation, published this year by Hampton Roads. This latest volume offers new translations from Jesus’ native language in the form of a meditation a day, an oracle, or a guide for a 40-day retreat. Through expansions of Aramaic’s multiple meanings as well as guided contemplations, The Aramaic Jesus Book of D
May 18, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #430 - 17MAY25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with David Brazier (aka Dharmavidya), author of many books including The Dark Side of the Mirror: Forgetting the Self in Dogen's Genjo Koan, Authentic Life: Buddhist Teachings and Stories, and The Feeling Buddha: A Buddhist Psychology of Character, Adversity and Passion. In this wide ranging discussion we cover Dharmavidya’s spiritual biography and his work with teachers such as Kennett Roshi and Thích Nhat Hanh, the Pure Land
Apr 13, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #429 - 12APR25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Billy Wynne, author of The Empty Path: Finding Fulfillment Through the Radical Art of Lessening, published this year by New World Library. Providing an antidote to our never-ending quest for more, mindfulness teacher, successful entrepreneur, and Zen Buddhist Billy Wynne shows that embracing emptiness can declutter the mind and distill our experience of daily life to its essential beauty, clarity and joy. Billy Wynne
Mar 2, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #428 - 01MAR25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Bob Noha, co-editor of and contributor to Aikido – The Art of Transformation: The Life & Teachings of Robert Nadeau, published recently by Park Street Press, a division of Inner Traditions. A widely influential figure in the development of Aikido in America, Robert Nadeau is known as one of the few American direct disciples of Aikido’s founder Morihei Ueshiba O-sensei. Now an 8th dan Aikido master teacher, Nadeau has
Feb 16, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #427 - 15FEB25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Lama Lhanang Rinpoche and Mordy Levine, authors of The Beginner’s Guide to Karma – How to Live with Less Negativity & More Peace, published recently by New World Library. Twenty-six centuries ago, the Buddha fleshed out the universal law of the spiritual realm: karma. The law of karma holds that our actions, our words, and even our thoughts inevitably produce effects that return to us in some form — in this
Feb 2, 2025 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #426 - 01FEB25
Podcast: This week on the show we feature a pre-recorded conversation with Roger Jackson, author of Saraha – Poet of Blissful Awareness, published this year by Shambhala as part of its Lives of the Masters series. Saraha, “the Archer,” was a mysterious but influential tenth-century Indian Buddhist tantric adept who expressed his spiritual realization in mystic songs (dohas) that are enlightening, shocking, and confounding by turns. Saraha’s poetic verses served as a basis for the exposition
Nov 17, 2024 · length unknown
The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #425 - 16NOV24
Podcast: This week on The Mystical Positivist, hosts Stuart Goodnick and Rob Schmidt feature two episodes from the Western Baul Podcast Series recorded earlier this year. In the first hour we present the talk, Cultivating Transparency: Realizing the Emptiness of the Stories You Tell Yourself, and in the second hour we present the talk, Languaging Nonduality. The podcast descriptions are as follows: Cultivating Transparency: Realizing the Emptiness of the Stories You Tell Yourself We could say th

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