Podcast
Viral Mindfulness the Podcast
Hosted by Alexander Smith | Mindfulness Teacher · EN
Featured on CNN, viralmindfulness.com, HIV Plus Magazine, The Gay HotSpot, and the cover of Positively Aware—my work as a mindfulness teacher and artist encourages you to discover your spiritual rhythm.
I earned a Master of Social Work (MSW) from the University of Utah in 2003, and a Bachelor of Science from Brigham Young University (1999).
During migration from a basement office (with no windows) at Salt Lake Community College’s Health & Wellness Services, I resigned from the traditional clinical world, and moved my practice online in 2012.
I live near the ocean in Huntington Beach, California, and enjoy yoga, running trails at the Wetlands, bird watching, live theater & music, and painting. As a spiritual muse, teacher, and musician, you're invited to join my online tribe.
28episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Intimacy With Soul - Core Practices That Sustain Us (Reflection Question 02)
Jan 2600:12:43Tap to summarizeIn this episode of the Winter Soul Care series, Alexander invites you into a gentle writing practice centered on one essential question from Francis Weller: What core practices help sustain your intimacy with soul? Listeners are encouraged to pause, set a timer, and write—without editing or judgment—before returning to hear Alexander’s lived response, recorded along the ocean at Huntington State Beach. Through stories of caregiving, music, silence, creativity, ritual, and seasonal devotion, this episode explores how intimacy with soul is formed not through force or productivity, but through repeated, embodied practices of presence. This episode is an invitation to remember what has always sustained you—and to recommit to the practices that keep your inner life alive, nourished, and connected.
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Write About Repetition - Reflection Question 01 : Nourish the Ritual of Everyday Life
Jan 2500:10:39Tap to summarizeIn this episode of the Winter Soul Care series, Alexander invites you into a simple, grounding writing practice inspired by the work of Francis Weller. Following the previous walking meditation, this episode shifts from movement to the page—using writing as a way to give the mind something nourishing to chew on. You’re offered a single reflection question: In what ways do you nourish the ritual of everyday life? Listeners are encouraged to write for ten minutes, then return to hear Alexander’s own lived response—exploring ritual, repetition, grief, tending, and the sacredness hidden in ordinary acts like laundry, sleep, movement, and daily care. This episode is an invitation to slow down, make room for intention, and rediscover how the small, repeated moments of life can become a source of nourishment and meaning.
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Kissing the Earth With Your Feet (Guided Walking Meditation) Huntington State Beach
Jan 2100:19:18Tap to summarizeIn this gentle installment of the Winter Soul Care series, Alexander Blue Feather invites you into a shared walking meditation—recorded live along the shoreline at Huntington State Beach. Drawing inspiration from the teachings of Thích Nhất Hạnh, this episode transforms the ordinary act of walking into a practice of presence, grounding, and return. You’ll explore core principles of mindful walking—walking without arriving, uniting body and mind, and noticing the here and now—followed by a simple, embodied walking practice accompanied by the sound of the ocean. This episode is an invitation to slow down, reconnect with your body, and remember that every step can be a homecoming. Best enjoyed with headphones, outdoors if possible, or wherever you can safely walk and listen.
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Amnesia + Anesthesia: Why We're Trained to Forget and Go Numb
Jan 2000:32:46Tap to summarizeIn this episode of Viral Mindfulness, I explore repetition as a core value of the soul and a vital practice for staying awake in unordinary times. Part five of the Winter’s Edge Soul Care series, this teaching draws on Francis Weller’s work to examine how repetition fosters depth, memory, devotion, and resilience—countering our cultural pull toward novelty, progress, and forgetting. Through stories of music, meditation, grief, recovery, creativity, and career reinvention, I invite you to consider repetition not as boring or mechanical, but as musical, rhythmic, and alive. This episode is an invitation to return—again and again—to what matters most. MidWinter Wise Circle Open For Enrollment! Grab your seat → viralmindfulness.com
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Does Your Soul Value Restraint? A Mindfulness Podcast Series for Winter (Part 4 of 7: Soul Care Series)
Jan 1400:27:08Tap to summarizeIn this episode of Viral Mindfulness, I explore the gift of restraint as a powerful and often overlooked soul practice. Drawing from Francis Weller’s teachings, this fourth installment of the Winter’s Edge Soul Care series invites us to slow down, hold back, and allow insights, grief, creativity, and longing to ripen rather than rush toward expression or consumption. We reflect on restraint as both an internal practice—pausing, containing, and listening—and an external one that honors our interdependence with others, the planet, and the commons. In a culture shaped by excess, immediacy, and accumulation, restraint becomes a radical act of care, humility, and wisdom. This episode is an invitation to let less become enough—and to discover what wants to emerge when we allow things to cook in their own time. MidWinter Wise Circle Open For Enrollment → https://www.viralmindfulness.com/wise-circle-winter-2026 Save $50 on Enrollment through Jan 21st. Start Tuesday, Feb 17 and Finish, Tuesday March 24. 90 minutes weekly!
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Singing The Blues + Tending The Candle's Flame
Jan 800:14:29Tap to summarizeIn this Winter’s Edge check-in episode, I pause at the beginning of 2026 to reflect, breathe together, and tend the nervous system in the midst of winter, grief, and collective uncertainty. Lighting a candle, I acknowledge the anniversary of last year’s Southern California fires, honor those living with loss, and invite us into a moment of shared warmth and compassion. I offer a preview of what’s ahead in the Winter’s Edge Soul Care series—especially the upcoming teaching on restraint—and reflect on the soul “muscles” being strengthened during this season. Drawing on poetry, grief wisdom, and the idea that January is for roots rather than resolutions, this episode encourages gentleness, patience, and trust in winter’s intelligence. It’s a quiet invitation to start where you are, use what you have, and do what you can. MidWinter Wise Circle is open for enrollment. Start Tuesday, February 17. Finish Tuesday, March 24. Six Weeks. Six Practice Labs. One Powerful Small Circle of Like-Minded Soul-Siblings. Save $50 on enrollment through January 21st. Use Coupon Code: earlybird2026. https://www.viralmindfulness.com/wise-circle-winter-2026
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Why Inner Work Needs a Vessel
Dec 1700:22:13Tap to summarizeIn this third episode of my Winter’s Edge Soul Care series, we explore the art of vesseling. The creation of a safe, patient container where deep inner work can unfold in its own time. Drawing from Francis Weller, I reflect on how grief, sorrow, and other tender emotions require a holding space shaped by attention, devotion, silence, and trust. I share personal stories from my Mormon past, early experiences with queer community, and the importance of becoming vessels of kindness and healing for ourselves and one another. This episode teaches why not all work should be shared too soon—and how letting something “cook” protects what is sacred. Part Three invites you to slow down, trust timing, and tend what is moving in the hallways of your soul with care. Winter's Wise Circle Open For Enrollment → Tuesdays 9AM PT / NOON ET / 5PM UK (Start January 6 and Finish February 10) viralmindfulness.com
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The Quality In Your Approach
Dec 1200:26:06Tap to summarizeIn this second teaching of my seven-part Winter’s Edge Soul Care series, we explore the reverence of approach. How the way we meet our inner life shapes what becomes possible in return. Drawing from Francis Weller and John O’Donohue, I reflect on why reverence, softness, curiosity, and humility open us to revelation, while judgment, rushing, and spiritual intensity close the aperture of perception. Along the way, I share the handwritten notes I leave for my future self in my holiday boxes each year, an unexpected teaching about “silent elders,” and the origins of the House of Blue. You’ll learn how to shift the stance of your attention so the sacred, the subtle, and the mysterious can come forward. This episode invites you to slow down, listen deeply, and approach your soul (and your life) with a gentler, more spacious heart. Winter Wise Circle OPEN FOR ENROLLMENT. Start Tuesday, January 6 and finish, Tuesday, February 10. Details + Save $59 on enrollment through Christmas Day → viralmindfulness.com
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From Meth & Marijuana to Mindfulness: A Decade Sober! The AI-Generated Interview
Sep 2800:48:55Tap to summarizeOver ten years ago, in a bathroom of a swanky stranger's apartment in downtown Los Angeles, strung out and afraid, I looked up and whispered: “God, I need help.” That moment became the turning point. On June 23, 2015, I put down meth, in August, cannabis, and September 23, alcohol and every other substance. I haven’t picked them up since. A decade later, I’m celebrating ten continuous years of sobriety. In this episode, I take you through the journey: the years of relapse and secrecy, the love and loss of my first partner, the shadow of HIV stigma and IV drug use, and the long climb into recovery. Inspired by the interview styles of Terry Gross (Fresh Air) and Sam Fragoso (Talk Easy), I answer six deeply personal questions (AI-Generated) about addiction, queerness, creativity, grief, and what remains unfinished ten years in. This isn’t just a story about staying sober. It’s about what sobriety has carved within me. A canyon of stillness, a river of resilience, and a practice of presence, peace and contentment. For anyone listening who is struggling with their own relationship to substances, whether it’s meth or wine, cannabis or cocaine, you don’t have to do this alone. There is a path forward. There is peace.
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This Is The Time To Become Immense
Sep 2600:30:04Tap to summarizeOn September 24, 2025, I celebrated ten years of continuous sobriety from all mind-altering substances. A full decade. In this episode, I reflect on that journey—alongside the grief, uncertainty, and overwhelm so many of us are navigating right now. From global instability to personal heartbreak, we're living through what therapist and writer Francis Weller calls “the Long Dark.” I share insights from his newest book, In the Absence of the Ordinay, and explore what it means to drop into the underworld with presence, not panic—to become immense and remember the ancient rhythms of soul. You'll hear reflections on: – Deep listening as a practice and spiritual tool – Collective grief and the disorientation of our times – Listening without fixing – Conversations across political and emotional divides – Tending to your soul through ritual, stillness, and creativity I also announce the opening of enrollment for Autumn’s Wise Circle—my 5-week small group series beginning October 28. All the details are on my website. 🍂 May this episode offer you grounding, gentleness, and the reminder: you are not alone. viralmindfulness.com/wise-circle
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