Some cutting-edge scientists and philosophers think that Consciousness is the ground of being, a continuum that we receive with the mind/brain. If consciousness is being broadcast, how can we learn to expand our receptivity to a wider field of knowledge, and alchemize this into ideas?
Metaphysics, depth psychology, occult wisdom, flow states and experimental processes will all be explored as paths to new ways of knowing. Through embodied practices such as breathwork, shamanic journeying, , sound sessions, meditation, ritual practices, and creative exercises, we will explore accessing other ways of knowing and being, and investigate how these can be translated into a creative practice. Modules will include experiential sessions,, reading, dialogue, and process/working time. Ongoing assignments will integrate creative prompts, journaling, and experience questionnaires over the course of the semester. There will be a final creative project.
The course design embodies what might be called “radical dialogue”—expanding the definition beyond human-to-human conversation to include dialogue with consciousness itself, with creative inspiration, with the body’s wisdom, and with what various traditions call the numinous or transpersonal dimensions of experience.
The course inherently teaches students how to dialogue across epistemological boundaries by engaging metaphysics, depth psychology, occult wisdom, and embodied practices alongside their creative work. Students learn to hold multiple perspectives simultaneously and move fluidly between intuitive, somatic, and conceptual modes of understanding rather than privileging rational-analytical knowing alone. This dialogue extends into what might be called radical listening: the experiential practices of breathwork, shamanic journeying, meditation, and sound sessions specifically teach students to be in dialogue with other aspects of their being and the field around them. The integration of journaling, creative prompts, and experience questionnaires creates a feedback loop where students practice articulating ineffable experiences and developing a vocabulary for states that typically resist language. This is dialogue as deep listening, translation, and the ongoing conversation between the experiencing self and the reflecting self.