Buddhism Beyond Belief with Susan Piver

This morning, the Open Heart Project Sangha gathered as we do every day to meditate and reflect together. The group was larger than usual, a clear sign of how shaken many of us are by what is happening in the United States right now.
I began by saying there is nothing I can offer that makes this moment acceptable or less horrifying. There is no teaching that explains it away. What we can do is see and feel the suffering clearly, without denial or false comfort.
We talked about the exposure of cruelty and hypocrisy, while also remembering that this country has held real goodness alongside real harm. I explored the three poisons that distort our response to crisis: grasping, delusion, and aggression. Although we must act and resist, aggression only breeds more aggression. Now what?
Drawing on Buddhist teachings about the realms of existence, I focused on the human realm as the place where we can wake up and respond with sanity. During times that I cannot defeat my enemies, I can still strengthen my friends. That shift restores strength and energy.
I closed by underscoring the importance of continuing to imagine a sane and compassionate world, no matter how far off it may feel. Without the ability to envision what is possible, we lose the ability to create it. 
We dream on behalf of others.
Highlights:
Why this moment calls for community rather than answers
The danger of responding from grasping, delusion, or aggression
Remembering both the harm and the goodness in our collective history
The human realm as a source of strength and responsibility
Strengthening friends when you cannot defeat enemies
Why imagining a better world is crucial
Mixing sanity into situations of profound cruelty

Music
For the after party, I share “Say It’s Not So” by Angela Strehli, my favorite female blues singer. The track features Derek O’Brien, who also composed the music for this podcast. This song is deeply personal to me, and it cuts straight to the heart every time.
You can also listen here.
Watch this episode on video
If you’d like to watch the podcast, the video version is here.
Ask me a question
You can send your questions via Instagram DM or through our form — I’d love to include them in future episodes.
Fearless Creativity: A Meditation and Writing Retreat 
Join me at Drala Mountain Center in the Colorado Rockies for Fearless Creativity, a meditation and writing retreat offering dedicated time for creative work alongside guided meditation and conversation. Writers of all genres and levels
If you enjoyed this episode:
Please rate, review, and share it with a friend who’s curious about mindfulness, spiritual commitment, or the Buddhist path.
For more on Buddhist teachings and how our humanity isn’t necessarily in our way, sign up for my free weekly newsletter or join the Open Heart Project sangha for more connection with community and with me.
If this podcast has been meaningful to you, it would be great if you would subscribe, give it a five star rating and share it with a friend. To join or learn more about The Open Heart Project please visit openheartproject.com.
Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]
Produced by Citizens of Sound
Music by: Derek O'Brien

©Open Heart Project

In this episode, I introduce the Four Karmas—pacifying, enriching, magnetizing, and destroying—as practical actions for meeting chaos, conflict, and confusion without losing clarity or heart. In this Buddhist framework, karma means action, not fate. These are not strategies for getting your way, but ways to protect the mind, deepen compassion, and interrupt ignorance in real time.
I also explore the “ Māras ,” the obstacles that can distort each karma, and why wisdom sometimes needs to be gentle—and sometimes fierce. Drawing on the story of the Buddha under the Bodhi tree, I reflect on how distraction, shame, and aggression show up in our own lives, and how these four actions help us meet them skillfully.

Highlights
Karma as action, not reward or punishment
The Four Karmas as tools for clarity and compassion
How wisdom can be peaceful or wrathful
Knowing when to add, wait, attract, or let go

The Four Karmas (Briefly)
Pacifying: Settling down to see clearly, often through deep listening rather than fixing.
 Obstacle: Spiritual bypassing.
Enriching: Adding what genuinely increases vitality and connection, based on what’s actually needed.
 Obstacle: Accumulating without applying.
Magnetizing: Receptivity—allowing insight, creativity, and help to come toward you.
 Obstacle: Emotional reactivity that obscures perception.
Destroying: Ending or pruning what no longer serves, without aggression.
 Obstacle: Total shutdown instead of skillful cutting.

Closing Music
I end the episode with “Waloyo Yamoni (We Overcome the Wind)” by Christopher Tin—a piece that feels vast, direct, and deeply human.
If you found this episode meaningful, please share it or leave a review. It truly helps.
During this episode, I mentioned my upcoming retreat on meditation and writing, Fearless Creativity. You can learn more here.
Watch this episode on video
If you’d like to watch the podcast, the video version is here.
Ask me a question
You can send your questions via Instagram DM or through our form — I’d love to include them in future episodes.
Learn to Teach Meditation
The Open Heart Project Meditation Teacher Training returns this January.
We begin January 17th, 2026. 
I teach every session. It’s intimate, rigorous, supportive—and it’s for anyone
If you enjoyed this episode:
Please rate, review, and share it with a friend who’s curious about mindfulness, spiritual commitment, or the Buddhist path.
For more on Buddhist teachings and how our humanity isn’t necessarily in our way, sign up for my free weekly newsletter or join the Open Heart Project sangha for more connection with community and with me.
If this podcast has been meaningful to you, it would be great if you would subscribe, give it a five star rating and share it with a friend. To join or learn more about The Open Heart Project please visit openheartproject.com.
Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]
Produced by Citizens of Sound
Music by: Derek O'Brien

©Open Heart Project

As we move into a new year, how do we deepen our understanding: of ourselves, our relationships, and our spiritual practice? In this episode, we explore the three essential steps of learning in the Buddhist tradition: hearing, contemplating, and meditating.
Highlights:
Why the first step, hearing, is more than listening: it’s opening to what’s being offered without judgment or projection.
How contemplating allows teachings to be tested, weighed, and integrated through experience rather than accepted blindly.
What it means to meditate in the deepest sense: living a teaching, letting it shape your being.
A story from a meditation student learning to let go of constant vigilance and just breathe.
Reflections on Progressive Stages of Meditation on Emptiness and integrating wisdom into daily life.
If you want to learn something deeply—whether meditation, spiritual practice, or life itself—these three steps are your path.

Podcast After Party – Song Feature:
We celebrate music as a form of transmission and joy with a performance by the legendary Egyptian singer Umm Kulthum (also spelled Oum Kalsoum, Om Kalsoum, Umm Kalsoum, Om Kulthoum, Oum Kulthoum, and Umm Kolthoum). Her song Lelat Hob (Night of Love) showcases the power of live music, devotion, and cultural adoration. 
For the full version of this song, you can listen here.
Watch this episode on video
If you’d like to watch the podcast, the video version is here.
Ask me a question
You can send your questions via Instagram DM or through our form — I’d love to include them in future episodes.

Learn to Teach Meditation

The Open Heart Project Meditation Teacher Training returns this January.
We begin January 17th, 2026. 
I teach every session. It’s intimate, rigorous, supportive—and it’s for anyone who wants to help others work with their own minds and hearts.
Click here to learn more & sign up.

If you enjoyed this episode:
Please rate, review, and share it with a friend who’s curious about mindfulness, spiritual commitment, or the Buddhist path.
For more on Buddhist teachings and how our humanity isn’t necessarily in our way, sign up for my free weekly newsletter or join the Open Heart Project sangha for more connection with community and with me.
If this podcast has been meaningful to you, it would be great if you would subscribe, give it a five star rating and share it with a friend. To join or learn more about The Open Heart Project please visit openheartproject.com.
Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]
Produced by Citizens of Sound
Music by: Derek O'Brien

©Open Heart Project

For the final episode of the year, I am sharing a short excerpt from a book I am writing called Inexplicable Magic: Meditation for Mystics. This work grows directly out of the heart of this podcast and its focus on how we actually live–not as monastic meditators, but as householders.
In this excerpt, I reflect on the Buddha’s awakening and on meditation as it was originally understood, not as self-improvement or stress reduction, but as a path of waking up from delusion and helping others do the same.
I explore the connection between mindfulness and awareness. Mindfulness is essential, but it is the ground, not the fruition. 
Awareness cannot be cultivated through effort. It can only be allowed, and it is where insight, opening, and real transformation arise organically.
This episode looks at meditation as a way of relating rather than fixing. A practice that breaks the heart open and reveals wisdom, compassion, and bravery. It’s not a transaction, but a way of living, and, ultimately, a way of dying.
To close out the year, I share one of my most beloved pieces of music, Sentimental Walk from the film Diva, a piece that brings spaciousness and calm and accompanies me often when I write.
Thank you for listening and practicing with me this year. I look forward to continuing the conversation in 2026.
Watch this episode on video
If you’d like to watch the podcast, the video version is here.
Ask me a question
You can send your questions via Instagram DM or through our form — I’d love to include them in future episodes.
Building a Mindful New Year is a free, six-day online program exploring how Buddhist practice can help us stay present, steady, and values-aligned in uncertain times. Through daily teachings, meditation, and community practice, we focus on supporting ourselves first—so we can more honestly meet our lives and care for others as the new year begins. You can jump in anytime between 26–31 December to gain access to all 6 talks. Sign up here.
Learn to Teach Meditation
The Open Heart Project Meditation Teacher Training returns this January.
We begin January 17th, 2026. 
I teach every session. It’s intimate, rigorous, supportive—and it’s for anyone who wants to help others work with their own minds and hearts.
Click here to learn more & sign up.
If you enjoyed this episode:
Please rate, review, and share it with a friend who’s curious about mindfulness, spiritual commitment, or the Buddhist path.
For more on Buddhist teachings and how our humanity isn’t necessarily in our way, sign up for my free weekly newsletter or join the Open Heart Project sangha for more connection with community and with me.
If this podcast has been meaningful to you, it would be great if you would subscribe, give it a five star rating and share it with a friend. To join or learn more about The Open Heart Project please visit openheartproject.com.
Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]
Produced by Citizens of Sound
Music by: Derek O'Brien

©Open Heart Project

As we close out a year many of us are ready to leave behind, this episode reflects on what we might want to carry forward—and what we can gently let go of. I explore the Buddhist teaching of the brahmavihāras, or Four Immeasurables, as a way of giving our hearts a place to live that is honest, resilient, and humane.
The Four Immeasurables—loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity—are called “immeasurable” because they are not limited resources. They don’t require perfection or self-improvement. They begin with noticing what is actually happening.
In this episode, we explore:
Loving-kindnessBegins with softening toward ourselves, not being “nice” or agreeable
Extends outward to loved ones, strangers, and even enemies without requiring forgiveness or approval
Far enemy: hatred
Near enemy: conditional or performative kindness

CompassionFeeling another’s pain as our own, grounded in shared humanity
Distinct from sympathy or pity
Far enemy: cruelty
Near enemy: pity

Sympathetic joyFeeling another person’s happiness as our own
A remedy for isolation and scarcity thinking
Far enemy: envy
Near enemy: shallow or distracting pleasure

EquanimityStaying present with joy and sorrow without grasping or pushing away
Fully engaged, not numb or indifferent
Far enemy: grasping
Near enemy: indifference or “good vibes only” detachment

Throughout the episode, I emphasize that the practice is not about trying to embody these qualities, but about noticing our real relationship to them. That noticing itself is the practice.
Music Segment
We close with a podcast after party featuring “Jump Around” by House of Pain, along with a story from my time working at Tommy Boy Records in the early ’90s and a brief exploration of the mysterious opening sample. A link to The Best Sample in History video is included here.
Watch this episode on video
If you’d like to watch the podcast, the video version is here.
Ask me a question
You can send your questions via Instagram DM or through our form — I’d love to include them in future episodes.
Building a Mindful New Year is a free, six-day online program exploring how Buddhist p
If you enjoyed this episode:
Please rate, review, and share it with a friend who’s curious about mindfulness, spiritual commitment, or the Buddhist path.
For more on Buddhist teachings and how our humanity isn’t necessarily in our way, sign up for my free weekly newsletter or join the Open Heart Project sangha for more connection with community and with me.
If this podcast has been meaningful to you, it would be great if you would subscribe, give it a five star rating and share it with a friend. To join or learn more about The Open Heart Project please visit openheartproject.com.
Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]
Produced by Citizens of Sound
Music by: Derek O'Brien

©Open Heart Project