2026 virtual colloquium

MSR Research Colloquium:
“The Mystical and Research”

A virtual, global, around-the-clock gathering for scholars and practitioners from diverse traditions worldwide exploring the mystical as lived experience and transformative ways of knowing, with implications for leadership, management, and organizational life. Across plenaries, dialogues, and experiential sessions, we ask how mystical experience may be embodied, researched, taught, and shared.

Colloquium dates June 11–12, 2026

Virtual 36 hour global gathering Begins at 10:00 a.m. ET on June 11

Overview

The 2026 MSR Research Colloquium, The Mystical and Research: Dwelling at the Threshold of Knowing, brings together a global community of scholars and practitioners to explore how mystical experience may be embodied, researched and taught, and how it may inform leadership, management, and organizational life.

Through a 36-hour around-the-clock virtual gathering on June 11–12, 2026, the colloquium invites participants to engage research not only as argument, analysis, or evidence, but also as encounter: a way of attending to embodied experience, inner voice, higher consciousness, and nondual wisdom. Sessions weave together thinking, doing, and being through scholarly presentations, contemplative and embodied practices, and collective inquiry.

The program explores a wide range of topics, including science and mystical experience; dreams, divination, and timelessness; spiritual transformation and ontological shift; forgiveness and gratitude; sacred leadership; healing and empowerment; spiritual research paradigms, methodologies, and evaluation criteria; the ethics of researching the transcendence; the researcher’s inner journey; communal wisdom and higher consciousness in higher education; and more.

The colloquium asks how research itself may become a transformative path. What happens when researchers bring their holistic selves into the inquiry—body, intellect, emotion, intuition, unconscious motives, spiritual longing, ethical responsibility, and relational presence? How might research become not only a method of knowledge production, but also a sacred, reflective, and transformative practice?

We invite participants willing to hold the creative tension between academic rigor and openness to mystery to dwell together at the threshold where research becomes a path to higher consciousness, nondual knowledge, and human flourishing.

Keynote speakers

Featured keynotes

Keynote 1 Andrew B. Newberg, M.D. The Mystical Mind: Probing the Biology of Spiritual Experience

This lecture will explore the biological correlates of various types of spiritual experiences. This includes the exploration of types of mystical experiences and the various brain structures that may be associated with them including those that support feelings of oneness and surrender. These findings have implications for the nature of mystical experiences as well as for understanding how the brain and mind work.

Bio

Andrew B. Newberg, M.D. is the Research Director at the Marcus Institute of Integrative Health at Thomas Jefferson University and Hospital in Philadelphia. He is a Professor in the Department of Integrative Medicine and Nutritional Sciences, with a secondary appointment in the Department of Radiology at Thomas Jefferson University. Dr. Newberg has been particularly involved in the study of mystical and religious experiences, a field referred to as “neurotheology”. He has published over 300 peer reviewed articles and chapters on brain function, brain imaging, and the study of religious and mystical experiences. He has published 17 books which have been translated into 22 different languages. He was listed as one of the 30 Most Influential Neuroscientists Alive Today by the Online Psychology Degree Guide.

Keynote 2 Tjanara Goreng Goreng, Ph.D. “Tjukurpa Pulka” - Sacred and Visionary Leadership in First Peoples in Australia

Dr. Goreng Goreng will explore how spiritual cultural practices support the development of sacred leadership in First Nations cultures. Drawing on her lived experience as a First Nations Elder and traditional ngungkari medicine practitioner, she will discuss Indigenous ways of knowing, being, and doing grounded in ancestral Law, Country, ceremony and oral teaching. Her talk will engage themes of trauma, healing, and women’s empowerment, including women’s business, while considering how mystical and sacred experience may be embodied, researched, taught, and brought into leadership, management, and organisational life. It will also invite reflection on research as a sacred, transformative practice that engages the whole person: body, intellect, emotion, intuition, spirit, ethical responsibility, and relational presence.

Bio

Dr. Goreng Goreng is a Wakka Wakka Wulli Wulli Traditional Owner from Central Queensland. She holds a PhD in Sacred Leadership and First Nations knowledge from the Australian National University, where she is a senior academic teacher and researcher in Indigenous Health at the School of Medicine and Psychology. She is also a trained coach, executive mentor, and certified The Leadership Circle consultant. Her diverse career spans academic research, community development, senior policy leadership in the Australian Public Service, psychotherapy, and transformational leadership consulting. She has trained other therapists in Non-Shaming Therapy and worked with Australian and international companies in the energy, insurance, finance, and mining sectors. She has also been a speaker at the Institute of Noetic Sciences and the Soul Conference at St. Catherine’s University.

Keynote 3 Marilyn Schlitz, Ph.D., M.A. Science from the Inside Out

Conventional science has long emphasized the importance of objectivity and the quantifiable nature of reality. Today, emerging fields of consciousness studies, transpersonal psychology, and contemplative practices increasingly recognize the importance of subjective experiences as a legitimate domain of inquiry. This presentation examines the ways in which scholars can engage reflexivity with their own perceptions, emotions, intuitions, intentions, and states of consciousness without abandoning rigorous science. As we move forward, it is possible to see the observer as part of the observed world in which we live. In this shift from the inside out, we can better appreciate creativity, transformative insights, dreams, meditation, and other states of consciousness. The bridge between inside and outside realms allows us to address issues of meaning, purpose, healing, and consciousness, allowing for a more holistic and participatory worldview.

Bio

Dr. Schlitz is an acclaimed social scientist, award-winning author, and charismatic public speaker. She has conducted clinical, laboratory and field-based research into consciousness, human transformation, and healing. Her books include Living Deeply: The Art and Science of Transformation in Everyday Life; Consciousness and Healing: Integral Approaches to Mind Body Medicine; and Death Makes Life Possible and its companion film. Having taught at Stanford, Harvard, and Trinity University, she is currently Professor of Transpersonal Psychology at Sofia University, CEO/President Emeritus and Senior Fellow at the Institute of Noetic Sciences. Schlitz has published hundreds of articles in scholarly journals and popular publications, and has lectured extensively in diverse venues, including the United Nations, Smithsonian Institution, Commonwealth Club, and community groups across the world.

Event information

Important dates and start times

Colloquium dates June 11–12, 2026

Duration 36 hours

Location Online

Pacific Time (PT)June 11, 2026, 7:00 AM

Eastern Time (ET)June 11, 2026, 10:00 AM

West Africa Time (WAT)June 11, 2026, 3:00 PM

Central European Summer Time (CEST)June 11, 2026, 4:00 PM

India Standard Time (IST)June 11, 2026, 7:30 PM

Taiwan Time (TST)June 11, 2026, 10:00 PM

Australian Central Standard Time (ACST)June 11, 2026, 11:30 PM

Program

Colloquium schedule

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Registration

The colloquium will be held online on June 11–12, 2026 and begins at 10:00 a.m. ET on June 11.

Use the registration link below.

Organizing Committee

Tianyuan Yu 于天远, PhD. Associate Professor at Mount Saint Vincent University
Scholar, Zen practitioner, and pilgrim.
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Naida Culshaw Weaver - Lecturer - Consultant
Weaver, lecturer, and consultant.
LinkedIn
Stacey Guenther, PhD, PCC Assistant Professor of Organization Development at George Mason University and Group Coherence Scholar and Facilitator
Assistant Professor of Organization Development at George Mason University and Group Coherence scholar and facilitator.
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Konstantin Karl Weicht, PhD. Manager, Scholar, Baker - from Vienna, based in Hualien, Taiwan
Manager, scholar, and baker from Vienna, based in Hualien, Taiwan.
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Gaëtan Mourmant, PhD. Excel MVP & Power BI Expert - Grounded theorist
Excel MVP, Power BI expert, grounded theorist, and author of You are the diamond soul.
LinkedIn
Aditya Agrawal, PhD. Asst. Professor of Organizational Behaviour at Indian Institute of Management, Ranchi, Associate Editor, Journal of Management Spirituality and Religion
Assistant Professor of Organizational Behaviour at Indian Institute of Management, Ranchi, and Associate Editor of the Journal of Management Spirituality and Religion.
LinkedIn
Danyil Nychka
Global studies scholar, moderator of youth seminars.
Contact

MSR Research Colloquium 2026

MSR Research Colloquium: “The Mystical and Research”

MSR Research Colloquium:
“The Mystical and Research”