About this episode
Dr. Jeffery A. Martin is a founder of the Transformative Technology space, and a social scientist who researches personal transformation and the states of greatest human well-being. He's spent the last decade conducting the largest international study on persistent non-symbolic experience (PNSE), which includes the types of consciousness commonly known as: enlightenment, nonduality, the peace the passeth understanding, transcendental consciousness, unitive experience, and hundreds of others. More recently, he has used this research to make systems available to help people obtain profound psychological benefits in a rapid, secular, reliable, and safe way. His research began with over 1,000 individuals who claimed to experience PNSE. This resulted in a reliable, cross-cultural and pan-tradition classification system for these types experience. Jeffery's current work involves helping people use what's been learned to make the life-changing transformation into PNSE. His most recent study achieved strong validation, with over 70% of participants reaching ongoing non-symbolic experience in less than 4 months. His interest in Transformative Technology comes from a belief that findings like his can be translated into mass consumer technologies and affect billions of lives worldwide. Since 2008 he has worked to bring together the stakeholders from academia, technology, business, finance, and public policy to create a sustainable technology space that dramatically improves human well-being. A bestselling author and award-winning educator, Jeffery has authored, co-authored, or co-edited over 20 books and numerous other publications. His work has regularly been featured at leading academic conferences worldwide, as well as major public forums such as Deepak Chopra’s Sages and Scientists Symposiums, Wisdom 2.0, the Science and Nonduality Conference, the Asia Consciousness Festival, and TEDx. He has been covered in media as diverse as Fast Company, the South China Morning Post, and PBS’s Closer to Truth, and been an invited speaker at many leading universities including: Harvard, Yale, Stanford, University of California, University of London, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and the National University of Singapore. Jeffery’s academic work lies at the intersection of technology, psychology, cognitive science, neuroscience, and transformative studies. His research on non-symbolic consciousness began while he was a graduate student in Transformative Studies at CIIS and Psychology at Harvard. He is the Founding Director of the Center or the Study of Non-Symbolic Consciousness and a Research Professor and was Director of the Transformative Technology Lab at Sofia University. In addition to these, he holds a number of additional appointments across a variety of institutions worldwide, and serves on many advisory boards. Websites: drjefferymartin.com nonsymbolic.org Paper summarizing Jefferey's work: A Continuum of Persistent Non-Symbolic Experiences in Adults Books: The Fourth Awakening The Gathering Darkness (The Fourth Awakening Series) The Fourth Awakening:Chronicles (4 Book Series) The God Formula: A simple scientifically proven blueprint that has transformed millions of lives (The Path of Freedom Series Book 1) Jeffery Martin in Batgap Panel discussion at Sofia U. Part 1 | Part 2 Transcript of this interview. Discussion of this interview in the Batgap Community Facebook Group Interview recorded 1/22/2017. YouTube Video Chapters: 00:00:00 - Introduction to Buddha at the Gas Pump 00:04:20 - Making a Life Change 00:08:46 - Exploring the Path of Enlightenment 00:13:43 - The Origins of Spiritual Systems and Religious Texts 00:18:37 - The Importance of Matching Techniques and Experiments 00:23:55 - The Relationship Between Science and Spirituality 00:29:15 - Exploring the Path to Nailing It with Technology 00:33:45 - The Origin of Persistent Non-Symbolic Experience 00:38:03 - The Value of Different Questioners 00:42:53 - Enriching Personal Experience Through Integration 00:47:33 - The Practicality of Measuring Spiritual Progress 00:52:14 - The Importance of Spiritual Exploration and Alignment 00:57:15 - Accelerated Progress after 1996 01:01:58 - Changes in the Experience of Meditation 01:07:06 - Searching for Deeper Meaning 01:12:03 - Shifting to the Subjective State and Physiological State 01:17:14 - Progression to Location 4: Gary Webber's Journey 01:22:09 - Redefining God's love in different locations 01:26:18 - Transition into the PNSE Continuum 01:31:08 - The Importance of Psychological Conditioning 01:35:19 - Emotions in Location 4 and Beyond 01:39:50 - Paths Beyond Location 4: Return to Emotion or Emotionless Direction 01:44:27 - The Awakening of the Heart Chakra 01:49:38 - Playing Basketball with World Champions 00:00:00 - The Ability to Zoom In and Zoom Out 01:58:43 - The Decline of Self-Referential Thoughts 02:03:21 - Different Locations and States of Mind 02:07:49 - The Finders Course: A Crowd-funded Experiment in Personal Transformation 02:12:15 - Engineering around the Dark Night Problem 02:16:40 - The Role of the Willow Group in the Finders Course 02:20:49 - Wrapping up with Jeffery Save