PODCAST · religion
Contemplative Currents Podcast
by Seye Kuyinu
Gentle reminders, mindful contemplations for those seeking to explore the depth and essence of our being, the glorious Mystery that we are. seyekuyinu.substack.com
Episodes
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It Hides In Everything
IT hides in everything. In unfulfilled expectations and heartbreak. You know that ache beneath the ache beneath the ache? You know that movement? The reaching, the part of you that still wants to be met, held and understood. That longing is IT. IT hides in the whisking of matcha, my small…
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On uncertainty, our addiction to solid ground, and what remains when even ‘God’ is no longer an answer
In 2017, I jumped out of a plane. I won’t be doing that again. What I remember most clearly about the beginning of the jump was my incessant need to grab onto something. Anything! My hands kept searching for something to hold, soemthing that would promise me stability and then right before I...
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Where Does Attention Come From?
I have been super inspired by the works of G.I Gurdjieff’s brought to my attention by Cynthia Bourgeault’s Wisdom School and recent book, Mystical Courage. Alongside it, Brian O'Connor's Awareness Games: Playing with Your Mind to Create Joy deserves mention: several of its exercises radically...
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Teacher. Teacher. Many-faced Teacher.
I don’t hold a lot of my childhood memories but I remember exactly where I was when my parents first attempted to teach me how to read the time from a clock. “Where is the small hand?”, my mother would ask. I was confused. I didn’t see any hand. “Where is the small hand?” she asked again.…
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The Song of Suffering
I want a cup of hot coffee but I don’t want to stand here for four minutes waiting on this kettle to boil to 180. I want the blue mug, the one that’s chipped at the corner, the one I keep meaning to throw out. I don’t want the other mugs for coffee. Those are for tea. Oh, also I want the house...
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Grace is what the suffering is made of
Last night I fell asleep and I have no idea how I did it. There was a stretch where the day was still running its accounts in my head. And then I sent a text with an Australian joke. Then blackness! Well, not blackness but nothingness. Just absolute nothing. Then morning. Usually Milo would come...
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What do I do with this fear that consumes me?
One should not give up, neglect, or forget for a moment his inner life, but he must learn to work in it, with it, and out of it so that the unity of his soul may break out in all his activities —Meister Eckhart I held Milo against my body as I felt the waves of trembling rolling through his furry...
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The Dream of Separation and the Fascinating Wonder Underneath it.
When I dream, I sometimes dream of dreaming. This happens when my dreams are not clogged with the same familiar nightmares that mirror my waking life. And when I wake, there are moments when what we call ‘this reality’ appears dreamlike. Like right now! Oh, I’m not saying it’s unreal. I’m saying…
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I Run Into You, Unashamed
I have a lot of trouble! Oh, where do I begin? Let me start with the basic living-in-america problem— some form of debt or the other. Is it the debt reminders that greet me through the emails I sometimes archive in contempt? Is it the gentle burden of belonging to a family. You know, the…
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Content, Context, Container of Consciousness
There are moments that move me out of center. A phrase said in passing, a tone, a memory that catches me sideways, and suddenly I'm no longer here. I'm somewhere inside the reaction. (Remember the one I wrote about my coworker?) For most of my life I assumed those reactions were simply mine. I...
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Even the birds know it. I am just here to learn.
Many of my recent conversations with close friends have circled around sustenance, the uncertainties the current economy presents, the ‘rising cost of eggs’, the incredibly tough job market and just general tensions in a more unpredictable world— not like anything was ever predictable. In the...
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Take It and Go
In our 7am Peace Chapel Meditation group this morning, we read and shared from the anonymously aggregated sayings of the Desert Fathers. It brought to inspiration one of the most beautiful and freeing realizations for me. The thoughts on attachment, how we attach to things, people and ideas, and...
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When Did The Leaves Return?
One morning in March, I looked up and the tree was green. You don’t understand! I could have sworn that the day before, it had been bare. No leaves, branches looking so dry and dead. In fact, three nights earlier I’d used that same bare tree as an analogy on a phone call with a friend, pacing my...
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Start Here, My Friend!
Welcome, fellow explorer. If you found your way here, ‘something’ must have brought you. Maybe you saw one of my videos. Maybe a friend who said you should read this. Or maybe it was a discussion you and I had inspired me to forward a link. Or maybe you saw a Substack Note somewhere while you…
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I'm in love!
Dear friends, I have not written as frequently as I normally do. That’s because a lot of interesting things have been going on here. To be honest, I almost cannot keep up with myself at this point. Still, 159 essays in, I've enjoyed experimenting with different styles of writing while finding a...
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The Yoga of Turning Attention Back
Do you know what the source of attention is? Like, if you’re paying attention, where is the location of that which projects the attention? I wish I had known this earlier. And if you haven’t seen this yet, this might save you years of searching in the wrong direction. The thing is, all meditation...
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Esoterism, wonder, miracles and exploration of being
See, any exploration in contemplation(funny I say this because contemplation is in fact that exploration), has to go beyond the content of one’s experience to the origin of experience itself. You don’t just drink water, you go to the source of the water. That exploration is, in fact, the true...
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Love in the midst of intense suffering
I could not find a more appropriate title to this one. Earlier this week, I was lost in thought after watching someone narrate their harrowing experience during a visit to Mauritania. There seemed to be so much poverty, so much suffering. I could almost smell death just watching the video. I…
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This Moment Does Not Need Your Help
You wake up to the clarity of the present moment. Then the mind steps in with deadlines, memories, and unfinished business. The peace feels lost. This piece looks at that tension. On one side, there is the direct seeing that only this moment exists. It is not a slice of time. It is a living field...
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Resting in the arms of the Lover
Every single morning, about sixty of us gather in silence at 7.20am. We spend twenty minutes sititing in stillness. Then a poem is read, or a verse, a passage from a novel, a song lyric, a fragment of something really powerful, written by a thought leader. And then, one by one, we share how it...
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Doorways to the mystery of being
What if the most wondrous thing you could ever encounter is something you've never actually left? In this essay, I walk through four movements releasing origin stories, opening the aperture of perception, dimming the noise of self-concept, and the practice of remembering ..that point toward...
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The Big Wide Open Drop Of Surrender
I sit on a bench in my backyard everyday, silently observing what nature is doing. In these cold season, I'm well familiar with the dormancy of grasses that grew before my eyes just a few months ago. And the trees, their greenery stained the dew with their luscious green. But now they are…
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The Messy Ground Is Holy Ground
I tell you, it seems like most of my life, I have waited for “this part” to be finally over so I can just move on to other good things. Like when I was in the University. I hated it so much! Life seemed impossibly hard. My classes were difficult to understand and quite honestly, I was…
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What Milo Taught Me About Desire
I have had a lot of background conversations about my orientation towards the concept of Prayer from the last post, the one called Pray, Not As Prey. These conversations have circled around questions I've been living with for years: What do we do with our desires? How do we hold our wanting…
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Pray. Not as prey
I want to start this by expressing my immense gratitude for the outpouring of love from my last post. I received dozens of private messages that I am holding so tenderly in my heart. I still am. You see, when I look at my life honestly, without doubt, I see how generously it has been held. Oh…
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Choosing to love, no matter what
I am currently bracing for a season of solitude, putting structures in place for minimal physical interactions with the outer world, keeping documents and important paraphernalia in easily accessible locations, making sure I can easily access emergency contact while figuring out guardianship for...
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The Mirror and the Dance, the World and Perception
When I’m not so heavily caught up in my own life drama or sulking over how incredibly harsh the world seems to be at times, when I’m not doomscrolling from under a blanket curled up like a deplorable fetus lost in the narratives of news around the world and my existential fears, brewing like a…
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When we seek, we find Nothing
The rather harsh personal truth that’s sometimes difficult to communicate is that I do not mind dying. I sometimes say that if I were given the option to silently disappear without anyone grieving or remembering that I ever existed, I would do this without thinking twice. No, it’s not that I’m...
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The Posture of Surrender
In conversations with my more intimate friends, when we share the difficult experiences we face, the more dense matters of being alive in society, it is not uncommon for me to share what I have found to be the ultimate stance of our existence in this plain of experience: the posture of surrender....
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The Muted Colors of Vibrant Intimacy
One of the most challenging invitations of this human life for all of us is or would be the call to intimacy. We often limit the call to intimacy to an outward experience like the sometimes clumsy dance of physical and emotional connection within and without our relationships. We learn to…
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The Chair The Laundry Sits On
You know that chair the laundry sits on? That chair! YOU KNOW THE ONE! Okay…if you don’t have the chair, you know someone who does! It’s that chair you dump clothes and things you plan to deal with later. Those clothes you wore once or the ones you might wear again later. The clothes you tested…
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The Day the Six Heads Became One
I am no stranger to the emotion of fear. Sometimes life events would rise to unearth energetic residues within me, and then sometimes I resist what life is presenting and suffer even more. Sometimes, all that is there to do is see what’s going on under the hood. In observing today about what was...
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Something to chew on
Friends, a lot has been moving in my personal space. Life has been full! From waiting for my body to heal from a flu to accepting the wishes from friends on my birthday to preparing for a critical appointment… life has been full! This just means my posting has been slower. Today I am hosting...
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What is this?
In the after math of an ecstatic explosion of a meditation session yesterday, I quickly penned a reflection in verse. It was this: that i can walk is an absolute miracle, my left leg unsure where we go, the right coming along for the ride, my belly bellies and my crotch crutches, my nose knows…
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Life takes care of Life
This episode explores the paradox that life is both benevolent and brutal. From lions suffocating prey, wasps laying eggs in living hosts, and dolphins killing for play, to the deep grief of a mother losing her child, we see that nature’s intelligence is not sentimental. It destroys and renews in...
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Worshipping Uncertainty As Practice
Believe it or not, I used to be one of those toxic productivity coaches. I’d set goals, crush them, and then preach about how others could do the same. I even taught people how to “own their mornings.” Oh, I have a book called Good Morning: How To Win Your Day(still on Amazon). But behind the...
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Barb's death is as insignificant as any personal identity
A viral outcry over the death of Stranger Things’ Barb becomes the doorway to a deeper inquiry: why do we grieve fictional characters as if they were real—and how is that different from the “character” we call me? This reflection explores how our sense of self is stitched together from memory,...
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The Ordinary Miracle of Seeking
Episode Summary:A reflection on the futility and beauty of seeking. How even the small, ordinary moments—like not wanting to get out of bed, or stubbing a toe—can open portals to deeper awareness. The episode explores how the search for happiness dissolves into the realization that joy was never...
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Words fall silent in the face of Reality
A week ago, I found myself in the middle of a medical emergency. In one moment I was in meetings, sitting quietly in meditation, and moving through the day as usual. Minutes later my chest was heavy and my cognition slipped away. In that crisis I noticed something striking: while panic rose in…
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We do not know why we are here
Episode NotesWhat if not knowing isn’t a problem, but the most honest ground we stand on? In this episode, I use a scene from Silo to explore the big question of why we are here—and why no story ever fully answers it. Beyond all the theories and meanings, one fact remains: we are. In this…
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The intimacy of loving what is already here
How do we love reality in all its messiness? With its crude edges, its weight of suffering, its unpredictability? How do we stay present with what is demanding, unclear, or painfully sharp? In this episode, I explore what it means to be in love with reality. Not as a sentimental idea, but as an…
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The Sweet Sweetness Of This Nectar
In past reflections I wrote about The Sweet Sweetness That I Am and The Nectar of True Devotion. Today I want to take this further by sharing a practice that laces my experience with joy and mystery, even in the thick of life’s turbulence. James, the brother of Jesus, once wrote: count it all joy...
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Where Does Your Sustenance Come From?
In today’s episode, I share a story that begins with a small drama by a pond in my neighborhood: a duck, broken and abandoned, dropped off to fend for itself. What seemed like the end of its story turned into a lesson in trust, because of the unlikely care of a young girl named Michelina. From...
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Lessons from a bench that was never mine
I share the story of an ordinary outdoor bench that became something extraordinary—a place of stillness, communion, and peace during the uncertainty of the pandemic. It was on this bench that I wrote, reflected, and connected with both neighbors and the Mystery itself. But as I prepared to leave…
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Emptiness is fullness and fullness is everything
This was written to be a contemplative read, and if you’re listening to this as a voice-over, remember to do so preferrably when not doing anything active. It would be more effective if you use this experientially and exploratively. The attempt of this exploration is to point you, the reader, to...
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Remembering the Infinite from within the finite: as the Infinite
What if the only thing you’ve ever truly known… is the fact that you are? In this contemplative episode, we explore the mystery of existence—not as a philosophical concept, but as the living fact that precedes every thought, identity, and story. Shay reflects on the nature of life as an unearned,...
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The Waters, the Witness, and the Wine
There was a time when the most captivating part of Noah’s Ark was the logistical absurdity of it all. How could anyone fit every species onto one boat? How did he find a pair of snow leopards—if he was somewhere near Mesopotamia? Did he go on a divine scavenger hunt for kangaroos? Was there…
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The paradox of Self-Knowledge
In the search for ultimate meaning(assuming one hasn’t short-circuited the journey by adopting someone else’s conclusions), we eventually run into paradoxes. I am talking about loads and loads of paradoxes. The rookie mistake is trying to resolve them. And the impulse to tie everything up in a…
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Overjoyed
I am overjoyed when I remember that I'm alive. I am alive, just like you, in the most mysterious, boundaryless sense. And that Life, as such, never began and cannot possibly end. For if life did begin, at what point did it begin? Wouldn’t we have to locate the starting point? Was it the moment of...
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Shoulds, Shouldn'ts and What Is
In this episode, I reflect on a heated phone call with a family member that unexpectedly opened a doorway into deeper inquiry. We explore how our constant mental tug-of-war—between what should have been and what shouldn’t have happened—pulls us away from the raw intelligence of what is. What if…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Gentle reminders, mindful contemplations for those seeking to explore the depth and essence of our being, the glorious Mystery that we are.
seyekuyinu.substack.com
HOSTED BY
Seye Kuyinu
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How many episodes does Contemplative Currents Podcast have?
Contemplative Currents Podcast currently has 71 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Contemplative Currents Podcast about?
Gentle reminders, mindful contemplations for those seeking to explore the depth and essence of our being, the glorious Mystery that we are. seyekuyinu.substack.com
How often does Contemplative Currents Podcast release new episodes?
Contemplative Currents Podcast has 71 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
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You can listen to Contemplative Currents Podcast on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Contemplative Currents Podcast?
Contemplative Currents Podcast is created and hosted by Seye Kuyinu.
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