The Lion’s Roar Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Following her insightful and compassionate commentaries on the war in Gaza for lionsroar.com, Buddhist teacher Tara Brach sits down with editor-in-chief Melvin McLeod to talk about the ultimate root of conflict, the destructive dehumanizing known as othering, and how we can overcome it in ourselves and society.

Read Tara Brach’s pieces mentioned in the episode:

• What Is Love Asking from Us? 
• Gaza and the Bodhisattva Path

In this episode of the Lion's Roar Podcast, assistant editor Sandi Rankaduwa talks to Reverend Melissa Opel, a member of the LGBTQ+ community and a minister at the Buddhist Church of San Francisco — the oldest Jodo Shinshu, or Shin Buddhist, church in the mainland United States. 

Rev. Opel shares what drew her to Buddhism, what keeps her inspired as a minister, how acceptance and inclusivity are central to the Jodo Shinshu tradition, and how Buddhists and Buddhist institutions can offer meaningful support to the LGBTQ+ community.  

This episode is sponsored by Karuna Training. Find out more at karunatraining.com

Judy Lief, a Buddhist teacher in the Tibetan tradition, talks about how you can work with your desires to find peace. Then Cheryl Fraser, a sex therapist and dharma teacher, shares her article, How to Have Mindful Sex. To close, professor, minister, and author of Living Nembutsu: Applying Shinran’s Radically Engaged Buddhism in Life and Society, Jeff Wilson, talks about the radically inclusive founder of the Jodo Shinshu tradition, Shinran.

Julio Rivera is the founder and CEO of Liberate, a meditation app and community for black indigenous and people of colour. We spoke in March, at the height of coronavirus related deaths in New York City, where he lives and works. We talked about what makes a sangha of non-white practitioners different, and why Liberate has shifted to focusing on black and indigenous healing foremost – a message that’s only amplified by the recent news, and demonstrations in response to, police violence against George Floyd and too many others. After the interview you’ll hear “Compassion,” the first song released from the Dalai Lama’s first album of music, Inner World.

The podcast is shifting to bi-weekly starting with this episode, allowing us to prepare a slew of new projects coming your way. Today, Lion’s Roar publisher Ben Moore speaks with Canadian meditation teacher and co-author of Meditation for Fidgety Skeptics, Jeff Warren about founding the Consciousness Explorers Club and engaging mental health through the lens of spiritual practice. But first, our editor-in-chief Melvin McLeod shares why Buddhism — famous for its doctrine of non-self— is the ultimate form of self-help.

Author and activist bell hooks shares a simple formula for healthy romantic relationships, starting with the myth that love is a feeling – a noun. In fact, as Jungian psychoanalyst and Zen Buddhist Dr. Polly Young-Eisendrath puts it, “love is what to do.”

She lays out the pitfalls of romantic love that lead us to idealization, delusion, disappointment and depression, and how to avoid them.

Then an introductory tonglen meditation to refresh and expand your heart, from the online course Flight of the Swans: Dharma Comes West, by Lion's Roar and Naropa University. 

Buddhist teachers Toni Bernhard and Pema Khandro Rinpoche have both known chronic illness first hand. In this conversation—especially relevant in the coronavirus era—they talk personally about relating to health and sickness through the Buddhist lens, and Bernhard describes the teachings that continue to help her find peace even 20 years after being diagnosed with a life-changing illness.

Big-league baseball is on hold thanks to the coronavirus but a new book by Dr. Don Lopez captures the feel of the game in Buddha Takes the Mound: Enlightenment in 9 Innings. Rod Meade Sperry talks to him about the book, which combines Lopez's love of both baseball and Buddhism. Then, a chance for fresh air: Oren Sofer shares a 10 minute guided walking meditation. Find more meditations from his website at OrenJaySofer.com.

Longtime Buddhist practitioner, mindfulness teacher, and hip hop artist Born I Music talks to Rod Meade Sperry about how he and his family are using mindfulness to cope with the shutdown due to coronavirus, how he came to learn and teach meditation, and how that practice has informed his newest album, 11:11. Includes a track from the forthcoming album.

Arthur Russell was a genius musician, known for experimenting with genres from Indian classical to disco. He passed away at just 40 years old, leaving behind more than 1,000 tapes of unreleased music. Rod Meade Sperry asks Russell archivist Steve Knutson how these tapes fell into his possession, eventually becoming several posthumous albums, and about Russell's life as a Buddhist. Includes clips and a full track of Russell music.