Ascent, the magazine that promises “Yoga for an Inspired Life” in each quarterly issue, is different from any yoga mag I’ve seen.

Published in Canada by Swami Sivananda Radha since 1969, the issue currently on stands (with generous excerpts online) features editor Sarah E. Truman’s penetrating interview with the sixth man to walk on the moon, Dr. Edgar Dean Mitchell.

Since his retirement from NASA in 1972, Mitchell has been lecturing on intuition, quantum physics, and the belief that a “learning, self-organizing principle” underlies all creation. He founded the Institute of Noetic Sciences to better facilitate “research on the relationship between consciousness and cosmology.”

Not your average fly boy.

Ascent: When you were in space and had that sense of the unity that underlies the universe, what did it feel like to be back on Earth and see how humans can treat each other and how we treat our planet?

Mitchell: Part of my epiphany in space was recognizing that beneath the blue and white cover of Earth, we humans were behaving like juveniles. We are a juvenile species. By and large, we are so consumed with greed and self-service that we miss the larger point. This is what the great mystics in all religious have tried to get us to see…

The problem is, those who have not had those transcendent, transformational experiences continue to operate just like we’re seeing the world operate right now–ignoring the message of unity and the greater good. My life has been devoted since that time to pursuing the issue of helping move global civilization toward a sustainable future. Clearly we are not there yet.

Read more about Mitchell by visiting his website.