Meditation Changes Everything Craig Hamilton

“Meditation offers us a rare opportunity to practice having an open heart in a truly safe environment where there's nothing we need to protect ourselves from. In meditation, we can practice letting down our guard, allowing ourselves to feel life fully and completely in each moment. This opens the door to deep and profound experiences that were previously inaccessible to us.” —Craig Hamilton


Welcome to Episode 12 of our podcast series! In this episode, Craig takes us on a journey into the depths of awakened consciousness, exploring the profound transformation of the heart.

In “Opening the Heart: Meditation as a Doorway to Emotional Freedom,” Craig delves into the beauty of an open heart, a hallmark of awakened awareness. As we awaken to our true nature, we often find our hearts opening in ways we've never experienced, touching us with both the splendor and the struggles of the world.

Many of us on the spiritual path yearn for the expansiveness of an open heart, along with the deeper sense of connection and boundless compassion it brings with it. But embracing this level of sensitivity can feel daunting, stirring up feelings of vulnerability and overwhelm.

In this episode, Craig explores how meditation can serve as a sanctuary for our hearts to open. Through meditation practice, we can create a safe space to cultivate radical empathy, embracing the full spectrum of the human experience with courage and compassion.

Join us as Craig uncovers the transformative power of meditation for nurturing an open heart, allowing us to embrace life's joys and sorrows with empathy and grace.

To access the full transcript of this episode and more resources, visit the episode page on https://www.MeditationChangesEverything.com.


If you’re interested in exploring more of Craig’s approach to meditation, you’re invited to tune in to a 90-minute online workshop Craig will be hosting called Meditation 2.0 – The Miracle of Direct Awakening. Register for free at: FreeMeditationWorkshop.com

“As people awaken, they become ambassadors for good. For an evolved morality that cares infinitely, and burns with a deep love for the greater good. Inherent in that care is an impulse toward oneness, unity, and wholeness. It feels like nothing is separate from me. I'm not separate from this whole. I care about the whole thing equally. That's how it manifests.” —Craig Hamilton

In this episode, Craig explores one of the truly great mysteries of awakening—the profound truth of non-duality, or as it’s more commonly known: oneness.

As spiritual seekers, most of us intuitively believe in the idea of oneness. Yet we live in a world that on the surface appears to be made up of separate things.

The discovery of oneness or non-duality reveals to us that we are not in fact separate from the world and cosmos in which we find ourselves. Beneath the appearance of separateness and division, reality is a single, unified whole.

But what does it really mean that, in its essence, everything is One? And what kind of meditation practice can open the door to this life-changing discovery?

In this episode, Craig dives into the core of what non-duality really means, and sheds light on some of the most common misunderstandings surrounding the idea of oneness.

He also addresses the question: “If everything has the same sacred essence, how do we account for the evil and destructiveness in our world?”

Please note that this episode includes a 10-minute guided meditation. We encourage you to listen when you’re in a quiet place where you won’t be interrupted.

To access the full transcript of this episode and more resources, visit the episode page on MeditationChangesEverything.com.

If you’re interested in exploring more of Craig’s approach to meditation, you’re invited to tune in to a 90-minute online workshop Craig will be hosting called Meditation 2.0 – The Miracle of Direct Awakening. Register for free at FreeMeditationWorkshop.com.

“Anybody who aspires to awaken to their true nature must be willing to let go of everything that provides them with security, certainty, and familiarity . It doesn’t mean it all goes away. We just have to let it go. We have to let go of our grasping onto anything at all. And that requires a passionate drive to awaken. We have to really want it.” —Craig Hamilton

This episode is the first in a 3-part series where Craig explores what it means to anchor your practice in a set of foundational pillars. Once in place, these first principles of meditation make the difference between whether meditation is easy or hard and whether you get stuck on the surface or dive into the warm depths of your own meditative heart. 

Often when we approach meditation, we receive the instructions, sit down, and try to put them into practice. But for most of us, it’s not enough to merely follow the instructions. There’s a step we have to take before any of that if we want to reap the transformative fruits of our practice. 

We need to create a rock solid foundation for our practice. And when we do, it can make all the difference. 

In Part One of this series, Craig focuses on two foundations that can empower and fuel your practice: motivation and intention. When our motivation to practice is paired with a strong intention, it can light a fire within us, providing fuel and passion for our growth and development. 

Craig also explores how to get out from under the critical voice in our head—the one that often dominates and dampens our meditation. This helps us cultivate the playful, experimental, and curious spirit we need to nurture for our practice to deepen and thrive. 

To access the full transcript of this episode and more resources, visit the episode page on MeditationChangesEverything.com. If you’re interested in exploring more of Craig’s approach to meditation, you’re invited to tune in to a 90-minute online workshop Craig will be hosting called Meditation 2.0 – The Miracle of Direct Awakening. Register for free at FreeMeditationWorkshop.com

“Spiritual awakening or enlightenment is about the discovery that we don't just have a human nature and an animal nature. We have a supernature. Which means there's another dimension of who and what we are that is a spiritual essence, a super essence.” —Craig Hamilton
In this episode, Craig explores what may be meditation’s greatest promise: the remarkable discovery of our superhuman nature.

We’re all familiar with the idea of human nature. It governs our behavior as individuals and as a species. But is there another dimension of who and what we are that, once revealed, can empower and free us to live an extraordinary life?

As Craig explores in this episode, meditation can be the key that unlocks the door to a “supernature,” unleashing a set of remarkable higher potentials that are already latent within us. These “supercapacities” include spontaneous wisdom, deep inner strength and resilience, heightened sensitivity and empathy, and dynamic creativity.

Rather than laboring to develop these capacities one at a time, we can engage in meditative practices designed to open us to the source of all of these potentials, ultimately propelling us into a profound new experience of being alive.

To access the full transcript of this episode and more resources, visit the episode page on MeditationChangesEverything.com. If you’re interested in exploring more of Craig’s approach to meditation, you’re invited to tune in to a 90-minute online workshop Craig will be hosting called Meditation 2.0 – The Miracle of Direct Awakening. Register for free at FreeMeditationWorkshop.com.

“Spiritual equanimity is not about feeling content with the world, it’s about being content no matter what you’re feeling. It’s about being at ease whether you feel easeful or not. And we all have access to this. It’s part of our true nature.” —Craig Hamilton
Nearly all of us aspire to be more centered and grounded, especially when the strong winds of chaos or crisis threaten to pull us off track.

On the spiritual path, this quality is often referred to as equanimity. When we learn how to access equanimity in meditation, we suddenly find we can remain centered, non-reactive and present no matter what happens to us, even when we feel triggered by events in the world. This enlightened capacity gives us the ability to navigate life’s challenges with wisdom, compassion and strength.

But where does this extraordinary capacity come from? In this episode, Craig challenges the common assumption that equanimity means being detached from what happens in this world, and explains how true equanimity arises when we become rooted in something much deeper, more profound, and ultimately sacred that underlies everything that happens.

Listen as Craig shares three different ways we can access this profound capacity, inviting you to step directly into the unshakeable core of who you already are.

To access the full transcript of this episode and more resources, visit the episode page on MeditationChangesEverything.com. If you’re interested in exploring more of Craig’s approach to meditation, you’re invited to tune in to a 90-minute online workshop Craig will be hosting called Meditation 2.0 – The Miracle of Direct Awakening. Register for free at FreeMeditationWorkshop.com.

“As we get deeper into it, we begin to realize that the real benefits of meditation ultimately transcend any of our personal wants, needs, and desires and we’re really awakening and evolving as part of a greater process that's happening in consciousness and in life and in the cosmos. The real benefits are for the whole.” –Craig Hamilton

For many of us, the desire for inner peace, greater wisdom or spiritual enlightenment is what called us onto the spiritual path. However, meditation teachers frequently warn us that wanting any results from our practice can actually take us off course and prevent us from accessing the extraordinary potential of genuine awakening. This presents us with both a fascinating paradox and a sacred opportunity.

In this episode, Craig dives into the heart of this apparent paradox, inviting us to discover for ourselves what it means to meditate without any agenda whatsoever. During this 20-minute guided inquiry and meditation, he asks us to consider, “why does wanting something become an obstacle in meditation, and what would it be like to give ourselves to the meditation for its own sake, wanting nothing in return?” Then, he guides us into an experience of the freedom and fullness that comes from not needing anything at all. 

If you haven’t already, we also encourage you to tune in to our previous episode, The Life-Changing Power of Letting Go: Part One, in which Craig creates a powerful, evolutionary context for this practice, illuminating how letting go of wanting can connect us to a deeper imperative to evolve for the greatest good.

To access the full transcript of this episode and more resources, visit the episode page on MeditationChangesEverything.com. 

If you’re interested in exploring more of Craig’s meditation experiments, you’re invited to tune in to a 90-minute online workshop Craig will be hosting called Meditation 2.0 – The Miracle of Direct Awakening. Register for free at FreeMeditationWorkshop.com.