​​Omid Safi – Sufi Heart – Ep. 27 – The Rhythm of Expansion and Contraction

Omid dives into the ocean of love, contemplating how the nature of the waves washing ashore and receding back mirrors the human experience.

This special episode is from Sharon Salzberg’s Living an Authentic Life Summit and is hosted by Andres Gonzalez from the Holistic Life Foundation.

Lifetime access to the full summit, featuring all 30 speakers and five days of content, is available here: Living an Authentic Life Summit: A Journey to Inner Peace, Freedom and Joy

“Every heart has to break and not every heart that’s broken breaks open. We want a heart that opens up. Opens up towards God, opens up towards all, opens up towards our fellow human beings, and opens up to that ultimate mystery of what we are. And what an awesome encounter that is, and how terrifying that is.” – Omid Safi

In this episode of Sufi Heart, Omid is interviewed by Andres Gonzalez exploring:
  • The journey of living a spiritually luminous life 
  • Anger as a path to higher consciousness 
  • Expansion and contraction as the rhythm of life
  • Breaking the callousness of the heart 
  • Being true to the inner child within
  • An expansive and contractive breathing exercise
Get lifetime access to Sharon Salzberg’s Living an Authentic Life Summit, featuring all 30 speakers and five days of content: Living an Authentic Life Summit: A Journey to Inner Peace, Freedom and Joy

Learn more about Omid:

Dr. Omid Safi is director of Duke University’s Islamic Studies Center. He specializes in the study of Islamic mysticism and contemporary Islam and frequently writes on liberationist traditions of Dr. King, Malcolm X, and is committed to traditions that link together love and justice.

Omid is the past chair for the Study of Islam at the American Academy of Religion. He has written many books, including Progressive Muslims: On Justice, Gender, and PluralismCambridge Companion to American IslamPolitics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam; and Memories of Muhammad. His forthcoming books include Radical Love: Teachings from the Islamic Mystical Traditions and a book on the famed mystic Rumi.

Omid is among the most frequently sought out speakers on Islam in popular media, appearing in The New York TimesNewsweekWashington Post, PBS, NPR, NBC, CNN, and other international media. He leads spiritual tours every year to Turkey, Morocco, or other countries, to study the rich multiple religious traditions there. The trips are open to everyone, from every country. More information is available at Illuminated Tours.

Dive into more episodes from Omid:
Dr. Omid Safi introduces the Sufi Heart Podcast and explores the path of radical love found in the Sufi tradition, on Sufi Heart Ep. 1
Omid explores teachings from the Sufi tradition about the sacredness of love, transcending the ego and finding God’s presence in every moment, on Sufi Heart Ep. 2
Omid reflects on the teachings of social activist Vincent Harding and examines the way that love sparks the flame of justice within us, on Sufi Heart Ep. 3
Omid looks at how mystics of the Sufi tradition understood the path of love as something that brings us together into fellowship with one another, into communion with nature and unites us with the Divine, on Sufi Heart Ep. 4
Omid explores how can we develop a practice of love that starts with ourselves and extends into the world, on Sufi Heart Ep. 5
Photo via SweetCrisis