Buddha at the Gas Pump

Dr. Robert Ganung, chaplain and teacher at Taft School, joins Rick to explore how deep contemplative practice can ground a life of service, justice, and education. Drawing from Celtic Christianity, Buddhism, Vedanta, and the civil rights tradition, Robert shares how daily meditation, interspiritual study, and a sense of the sacred in all beings inform his work with students and his view of a world in crisis yet ripe for awakening. They discuss non-duality and interconnection, inner practice as fuel for action, the impact of mystical experiences, near-death research, and living with love and courage amid social and planetary upheaval.

The Rev. Dr. Robert Ganung is an ordained minister, educator, and school chaplain whose life and work have been shaped by a deep engagement with both Eastern and Western spiritual traditions. He holds a doctorate from the Boston University School of Theology, where his dissertation explored how the mindfulness and meditation practices taught by the Vietnamese Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh can enrich and nourish the spiritual lives of Christians. That work grew out of years of personal practice and study, including retreats with Thich Nhat Hanh in the 1980s and 1990s, as well as a lifelong interest in contemplative spirituality.

For more than four decades, Dr. Ganung has served at the intersection of education, ministry, and social justice. He is currently Chaplain at The Taft School in Connecticut, where he also teaches philosophy, ethics, world religions, and global studies, and where he has brought an extraordinary range of voices into the community—among them Cornel West, Bill McKibben, Ibram X. Kendi, Angela Davis, Tibetan monks, and many others addressing spirituality, human rights, environmental justice, and the moral challenges of our time. Earlier in his career, he served as chaplain and teacher at Milton Academy, Punahou School in Hawai‘i, and Cardigan Mountain School. During these years, he also served as a minister in the United Methodist and United Church of Christ congregations in New England and Hawai‘i.

Dr. Ganung’s spiritual formation has been deeply influenced by the Christian mystical tradition—figures such as Howard Thurman, Bede Griffiths, Richard Rohr, & John O’Donohue—as well as by Advaita Vedanta, Buddhism, and interfaith dialogue. Introduced to Hindu philosophy and Sufism as an undergraduate philosophy major at Boston University, he later engaged Siddha Yoga and Advaita teachings, while continuing to explore how contemplative practice leads naturally toward nonviolence, compassion, and justice in the world.

Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group,

Interview recorded February 7, 2026

Maggie Gilewicz supports those navigating the journey of awakening. Her work is devoted to humanizing awakening by bringing honesty, nuance and emotional depth to a path often clouded by spiritual idealism and bypassing. Through her one-on-one sessions, astrology and YouTube channel, Humanzing Awakening, she offers a space where the personal and impersonal aspects of human experience are explored with honesty, curiosity and compassion. She holds a PhD in sociology and an MA in political science. She's a lover of simplicity, learning and laughter.

Maggie offers a candid, often humorous portrait of awakening as a messy, deeply human journey rather than a clean escape into transcendence. She and Rick explore how growing up in an alcoholic family, a teenage glimpse of “Peace with a capital P,” and years in academia prepared the ground for a powerful perceptual shift that came not through formal practice, but through intense inquiry into the nature of thought. That shift opened into several years of profound equanimity and a sense of inherent wholeness, and then into multiple “dark nights” of depression, fear, and trauma surfacing that gradually forced her out of spiritual bypass and into fully embodied feeling. Maggie describes later emptiness and “no‑doer” realizations, energetic/Kundalini‑like phenomena, and the slow integration of shadow, relationship, and ordinary life. Throughout, she emphasizes that awakening is an innate capacity available to ordinary people, and that its true fruition is not leaving our humanity behind but discovering a deeper, kinder way of being human.

Book: Awakening to be Human
Website: drmaggieg.com
YouTube Channel

Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group

Transcript of this interview

Interview recorded January 17, 2026

YouTube Video Chapters:

00:00 – “I thought I’d explode”: intense experience and opening  
 00:28 – Rick’s intro: ordinary people, extraordinary awakenings  
 02:28 – Who is Maggie? Sociology, coaching, astrology, and her book  
 04:44 – Humanizing awakening vs. transcendent escape  
 08:49 – Awakening as innate capacity, not a special club  
 13:26 – Suffering, crisis, and what actually starts the search  
 18:27 – Feeling like a “stranger in a strange land” as a child  
 23:44 – Alcoholism in the family and teenage glimpse of capital‑P Peace  
 31:04 – Academic life, self‑help, and the first big perceptual shift  
 35:39 – Lunch in Arizona: seeing life without thought  
 42:03 – Living in equanimity while life stays challenging  
 44:50 – When peace cracks: depression, terror, and dark nights  
 50:56 – “It’s all just thought”: insight, bypass, and its limits  
 56:40 – Multiple dark nights and the exhaustion of mental strategies  
 1:04:10 – Innocence of everyone and dropping the “broken” self‑image  
 1:11:20 – Insight vs. intellectual understanding  
 1:18:40 – Solar plexus knot, existential angst, and deeper unwinding  
 1:24:04 – Emptiness, non‑separation, and the body as formless  
 1:29:07 – No‑doer, cleaning the house, and life happening by itself  
 1:35:00 – Energetic/Kundalini‑like phenomena and somatic release  
 1:41:30 – Relationship, triggers, and the necessity of shadow work  
 1:47:50 – Trauma, nervous system sensitivity, and honoring the body  
 1:53:10 – Is awakening compatible with being fully human?  
 1:58:20 – “Nobody here,” ahamkara, and functioning without a solid “me”  
 2:03:00 – Common myths about awakening (special people, perfect conditions, no more problems)  
 2:09:30 – Final reflections: ordinary life, AI, collective crisis, and a more human awakening

George Thompson is a filmmaker, teacher, and founder of Balance is Possible!— a 15-person team on a mission to inspire balance for people and planet. His films and teachings have touched over 25 million people and he is supported by renowned changemakers including Dr. Jane Goodall, Louie Schwartzberg, Tara Brach, Stephen Fry and many more.

Drawing from years of deep study in the Wudang Mountains of China, George blends ancient wisdom with modern science, translating it into fun, practical tools for overcoming the challenges of modern life.

Once plagued by anxiety and a sense of disconnection, George’s journey led him from pain to purpose. With playful kindness, George helps people to do the same: to awaken their potential.

Website: Balance is Possible!
YouTube Channel

Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group

Interview recorded January 6, 2026.

Swami Sarvapriyananda has been the Minister and spiritual leader of the Vedanta Society of New York since January 2017. He joined the Ramakrishna Math in 1994 and received sannyasa in 2004. He served as an acharya (teacher) of the monastic probationers’ training center at Belur Math, India. He also served in various capacities in different educational institutes of the Ramakrishna Mission in India and as the Assistant Minister of the Vedanta Society of Southern California.
During 2019-2020 he was a Nagral Fellow at the Harvard Divinity School.
Swami Sarvapriyananda is a well-known speaker on Vedanta and his talks are extremely popular globally via the internet. He has been a speaker on various prestigious forums such as TEDx, SAND, Google Talk etc. He has also been invited to speak at several universities across the world, including Harvard University. The swami has engaged in dialogue with many eminent thinkers such as Deepak Chopra, Rupert Spira, Rick Archer, David Chalmers and Sam Harris.
He has played a prominent role in organizing and participating in various interfaith panels and seminars, including speaking at the World Parliament of Religions in Toronto in 2018, and at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. Learn more in Conversations.
Swami Sarvapriyananda is a prolific writer and speaker whose works make the insights of Advaita Vedanta accessible to modern audiences. His publications include Mahavakya: The Essence of Vedanta,  Fullness & Emptiness: Vedanta and Buddhism, and From Illusion to Infinity: Discovering the Self. The more recent book Conversations on Vedanta in Practice is a curated collection of question and answer sessions with the Swami, on topics of practical importance. The wide range of his writings reflect his deep engagement with comparative philosophy and the application of Vedantic wisdom in daily life. He has also contributed essays and research papers on the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, and the philosophy of consciousness.
Mentioned during the interview: Consciousness Across Three Worldviews - Central concepts in three different domains — Hindu tradition, computer science and quantum physics — Paper by Swami Sarvapriyananda, Blaise Agüera y Arcas and Carlo Rovelli

Website: vedantany.org
YouTube channel

Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group

Transcript of this interview

First BatGap interview with Swami Sarvapriyananda
Swami Sarvapriyananda on Ethical Foundations of Nondual Spirituality

Interview recorded December 18, 2025

YouTube Video Chapters:

00:00 – What is enlightenment?  
 00:00:27 – Introduction to Buddha at the Gas Pump  
 00:01:21 – Swami Sarvapriyananda’s background and work  
 00:03:24 – Swami’s current leading interest: Advaita and consciousness studies  
 00:04:01 – How AI enters the consciousness discussion  
 00:05:06 – Using AI as a study and research tool  
 00:05:26 – Venice workshop: “Towards a New Theory of Consciousness”  
 00:07:02 – Berggruen Institute and cross‑tradition dialogue  
 00:07:23 – Can AI be conscious?  
 00:08:44 – Joint paper on consciousness, quantum theory, and AI  
 00:10:23 – Is it a stretch to see AI as conscious?  
 00:12:28 – Everything is consciousness vs everything being conscious  
 00:13:40 – Reflected consciousness and the subtle body  
 00:15:31 – Mountains, deities, and indwelling consciousness  
 00:17:24 – Are the Vedas universal and primordial?  
 00:18:28 – Vivekananda on Veda as universal spiritual law  
 00:20:32 – Creativity as accessing an existing reality  
 00:22:29 – Intuition in mathematics and the arts  
 00:23:35 – Examples from Mozart, McCartney, and Lennon  
 00:25:55 – Question: Is enlightenment extremely rare?  
 00:27:02 – Not becoming infinite; seeing what you are not  
 00:29:05 – Does the I‑sense (ahamkara) cease in enlightenment?  
 00:32:05 – Vedantic definition of enlightenment  
 00:35:02 – How common is enlightenment really?  
 00:36:36 – Enlightenment experiences vs lasting shift  
 00:38:41 – Risks of claiming enlightenment prematurely  
 00:39:54 – Gradual “oozing” into awakening  
 00:40:53 – Manifesting the divinity already within  
 00:41:57 – Story of Totapuri and the brass pot  
 00:43:39 – Gold pot, avatars, and effortless abidance  
 00:45:45 – Jiva, Ishvara, Brahman, and Maya  
 00:47:52 – Is God just a product of illusion?  
 00:51:45 – Practical spirituality: work, health, and balance  
 00:53:54 – Karma Yoga, meditation, and integrated practice  
 00:55:45 – Final advice: keep doing what works spiritually

Christina Guimond has always been oriented toward the mysterious, even from early childhood. She grew up in a Catholic family in Nova Scotia, Canada, and later settled in Montreal, where she married and raised four children. When her youngest was ten, a long-dormant curiosity about the nature of existence began to take centre stage.

On the 8th day of a Vipassana retreat in 2001, Christina had an awakening that deeply shifted her understanding of self and reality. What followed was fourteen years of dedicated daily meditation and numerous silent retreats within the S.N. Goenka Vipassana tradition. In 2015, a 2nd awakening unfolded—this time bringing a deeper dissolution of personal identity. Around this period, she began studying with Gary Weber, with whom she worked closely until he retired from teaching in 2019. Those years were marked by intense transformation, awakening the body, healing the nervous system, working with attachments, belief, and shadow.

In 2017, two further openings occurred. The first was a non-medical NDE - a profound experience of God—an overwhelming sense of divine presence and infinite love. A month later came an even more radical realization: the complete disappearance of self and world into a primal void. It was an encounter with absolute emptiness—an unconditioned reality beneath all phenomena. In that vast nothingness, only an indescribably sublime, subtle awareness was present. Nothing was manifest, yet it was clear this “nothing” held the potential for everything—a living, dynamic void, like a field of infinite possibilities before form appears.

In 2022, Christina began working with Angelo Dilullo, M.D., whose guidance led to the final falling away of the remaining identity structure. What remains is a natural, effortless functioning—life living itself. The integration of that realization continues to unfold. Following the invitation and suggestion of Angelo Dilullo, she has been teaching and guiding others through the awakening.

Website: christinaguimond.com

Mentioned during the interview:

Interview with Angelo Dilullo
PAPAJI - Consciousness Alone Is
Kevin Shanilec's method for working with reactivity.
A Heart Blown Open: The Life & Practice of Zen Master Jun Po Denis Kelly Roshi by Keith Martin-Smith

Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group

Interview recorded December 6, 2025