Come To Your Senses with Mary Lofgren

A Return To Sensual Wholeness with Lindy James

• Mary Lofgren • Season 1 • Episode 172

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I’m thrilled to welcome my own beloved Tantra teacher, Lindy James—a woman whose grounded presence and wisdom have deeply influenced my understanding of sensuality, safety, and embodiment.

We get into:

  • What Tantra practices teach about being fully present in the body, to experience more of life
  • A practical model for knowing and speaking boundaries with clarity and kindness
  • Small ways to reconnect with sensuality on your own terms, even if it’s felt distant or dormant 

If you’ve been longing to feel more turned on, not just in your pelvis, but in your whole heart and life, this one’s for you.

 And if you want to explore this path more deeply, you’ll find Lindy’s offerings linked here in the show notes.

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Mary:

Hello, beautiful, and welcome to the Come to your Senses podcast. I'm your host, award-winning certified feminine embodiment coach, licensed esthetician and enthusiastic foster dog mama to animals across the land, mary Lofgren. Here we explore how to bring more richness, radiance, peace and pleasure to our lives, homes and hearts through the joy of beauty, the wisdom of the body and the splendor of the senses. I'm so glad you're here. Pull up a poof and let's dive in, and let's dive in. Hello, beautiful beings, and welcome to today's episode of Come to your Senses, where I am so delighted to introduce you to my personal Tantra teacher, lindy James.

Mary:

Lindy is a amazing teacher of sensuality, connection and sovereignty around our own sensual becoming, and I met Lindy about a year ago when I was house-sitting in Gilroy, california, trying to get a sense of whether or not I wanted to move to California, and I was sitting in a person's house with their three beautiful cats and thinking what am I doing? And Gilroy is a beautiful place, but it's a lot of farmland it's the garlic capital of the United States, in case you didn't know and so I started looking around online for things to do, and one of the things that came up was an event called Sacred Sensual Saturday, and it had been a while since I had been to a sensuality or tantra workshop. And in case you're new to that word, tantra, there's a lot of ways that one could define that word. Tantra is a very broad tradition of spiritual practice and of creating a sense of union between the soul, body and the physical body. And in this context that we're going to be talking about it today, we're talking about this practice of relating to our sensuality and sexuality as a sacred and spiritual practice of connection, which is what Lindy teaches. And so I went to the workshop. I sat in the car before it began, with butterflies in my tummy and sweat forming on my skin, because, even though I've done a lot of these workshops before, I still get really nervous, walking into a new scenario and not knowing what to expect. And I was just so grateful and so delighted by Lindy's strong presence as a space holder, her depth of experience and also the quality of community that surrounds her and that she's cultivated. And so Lindy is a sacred intimate and a sexual healer.

Mary:

She has been offering sessions in the art of conscious intimacy for over two decades. In 2004, she received her certification as a tantra educator through Source Tantra. She regularly leads pujas, teacher trainings and retreats. She is a graduate of the two-year training at the Hakomi Institute of San Francisco and she makes her home near Santa Cruz, california, where she sees clients in her beautiful home office and online. And so, without further ado, sit back, relax and enjoy this conversation of tea time between me and the wonderful Lindy James. So welcome to the podcast, lindy James. Lindy Dikini James, I'm so honored to have you here.

Lindy:

Thank you.

Mary:

And right before Lindy was asking me, you know kind of what prompted me to invite her here to the podcast. And I've been studying with you for almost a year now and you know I have so much respect and admiration for the vulnerability that you bring to your teaching and the authenticity and just your radiance and the passion from which you teach and share these tools is so it's really healing to be in the presence of you. Know, when I'm in your classes I never feel any agenda other than supporting me in my own return to my authentic truth and authentic self, and so I just am so delighted to share you with my community and to have an opportunity to share your wisdom and have a little one-on-one tea time with you. So thank you for being here.

Lindy:

You're very welcome. I'm just happy to do this. I love podcasts because it's a back and forth thing and I already enjoy who you are in the and that we get to have this tea time or glass of water, what's perfect.

Mary:

Yes, yes, we get to enjoy each other on air. What could be more simple? So, as I was preparing for our time together, I was just kind of listening in and the phrase that came to me was sensual, wholeness, beautiful.

Mary:

That's really what I experience when I come to your tantra workshops and also just when I'm in your presence and hear your stories. And I'm aware that for those of us who are drawn to this work, we're usually not drawn to it just because it's fun and delicious. There's usually some sort of separation from our sensual wholeness and I just wondered if you might share what brought you to Tantra. You know, did you come on to earth like? This was where you separated from your sensual wholeness in some way? You know just a little bit about your story of coming to this work.

Lindy:

Yeah, thank you. You know, back in the 90s I went to my first Tantra weekend, bolstered by 20 of my closest friends, and I was terrified. You know, and I find that this is true for many people, tantra means orgies, sex, you know, and although that's a very small part of it, it was my projection. And so when I, you know, holding hands with my friends and the courage, and went into this weekend, for me my sexuality was pretty shut down. I, you, you know, in Tantra we, the vagina is called yoni it's such a nice term because it means sacred space my yoni had gone on strike and she's like I ain't playing anymore. Until the day I promised myself or my yoni I would not have any sexual relationships until my heart was engaged.

Lindy:

And for me, tantra gives ingredients and a path to come to that wholeness you speak of, to be a sensual, alive woman and understand where my boundaries were.

Lindy:

And the exercises and the healing practices brought me to the place that I am now. So back then I was married and my husband would do the practices only during the weekend of the workshop and after that he didn't continue. And my friend said well, I knew that this was a key for me right there, even though I was still scared, and I kept learning and going further and further into it, until I did tantric educators training and I never planned to teach tantra. I didn't say I'm going to learn this and then teach. Like people go to school and learn something. I just always was a good teacher. Back then I taught horseback riding. But there's so many parallels and to this day I feel and see like students like yourself that come with whatever's in the way and how to find safety, how to find you know and clear the blockages so that we can be whole and, like you said in the meditation, like the wisdom of the body can be touched.

Mary:

You grew up on a ranch, is that right?

Lindy:

Well, I grew up on a ranch. I didn't live on a ranch, but, yes, I grew up with horses, since I was nine, and it really saved my life.

Mary:

Really.

Lindy:

Yeah.

Mary:

I grew up around horses too. I grew up with horses. We had horses until I was about five. That was my dad's main passion and he couldn't quite make the farm work while also working full-time, but I was around horses all the time. I felt like they were my dogs. You know, I loved them so much and you said that you know there's a lot of parallels between tantra and horsemanship, or intuitive horsemanship, and yeah. I wonder if you might speak to that a little bit and just what you notice.

Lindy:

Well, one of the first thing that pops into my mind is I, you know, I also took a training called Hakomi Institute and it's really about embodiment. If you took traditional psychology and Zen and put them together, so those two things really helped me understand. So horses, if you're riding a horse and you're embodied, they pick up their step, they shake their head. And I had a blind horse and so I made up this exercise where I would put somebody on my blind horse in the arena and then talk them through embodiment and I would watch him go from bored to shaking his head and prancing around and and that human horse in combination really showed like horses are way more sensitive than we might give them credit for. And it was so much fun because it was like doing therapy and doing stuff with my horse, who I loved dearly.

Mary:

I love that. I also love in your workshops. You taught me the phrase air hair muscle bone.

Mary:

Oh, oh my god, that has been so immensely helpful. Um, and in a moment I'll I'll circle back to that because we'll talk about being at choice, but, um, but yes, I relate to and I love just all the different paths that have led you home to yourself and home to your body and, like you said, the sexual aspect is really a small well, an important fragment, but a small fragment compared to this sensual wholeness that Tantra is really about, sensual wholeness that Tantra is really about. And so I really appreciate all of the different flavors of embodiment that you bring to your work, and something I notice in the women especially who assist you, is just this radiance, you know this like aliveness and this beauty and this embodiment and I wondered if you might speak to. What changes do you notice when a woman, especially, comes to your work, like you said, like most of us, I think, stumble into these spaces terrified, frozen from the belly button down. What shifts and changes do you notice in a woman once she starts to open to her sensuality?

Lindy:

Well, the basics that bring us to that my friend and I used to teach together and we'd say it's the ultimate facelift. We're always trying to look better, but when that radiance shows up it's just a light in the body, it's a movement in the body that's more fluid, it's that ease of saying. When I hear the exercise, lindy says my spiral in and I get not quite a yes, but here's what I'm willing to do. So then there's that sense of safety and the ability to the gift of practicing with others that say thank you rather than what's wrong with you. And I work really hard, or at least diligently, to keep a safe container that we have, a container where all of us is welcome. And that embodiment and that connection to the sensuality that can be expressed through our breath, our movement, our sound brings on a form of radiance that's so beautiful and I think it just gets stronger. I often give the tantric warning that you know you'll be more of a light, people will be drawn to you, so you have to learn your boundaries as well.

Mary:

Yeah, well, and that's been such a part of my journey in working with you is you know you like you say at the start of every workshop, like being at choice, and you give us some specific directives around that and exercises to connect with that, and I appreciate you sharing that in conversation about radiance. Yeah, because I have been very, uh, full of what might traditionally be called pleasure from this outside in perspective and then kind of like cracked out you know, like not in my full radiance because I wasn't in my full body and full experience.

Mary:

And this aspect of being at choice and being able to work with a question of like, well, this is not what I'm willing to do. But this is what I'm willing to do, like as a recovering Catholic sexuality. It's not just I. You know I wasn't taught or encouraged to have boundaries. It's like the encouragement was towards abstinence and, you know, immaculate conception. You know what I mean. Like it was. It was continually reinforced not to be sexual.

Mary:

And so I, when I came to having sexual experiences, especially as a young girl, it was like so much pretending Exactly yes, and mimicking what I had seen in soap operas and pretending I liked it because I thought I was supposed to like it. And what would I look like if I didn't like it? Or told the truth and hurting someone's feelings. And you know I say that as my youth. But the truth is like. That continued for decades, because that was the imprint. And I wonder what are some of the common barriers for women and feminine beings especially to being able to access that radiance, that genuine pleasure that comes from being at choice in their own voice?

Lindy:

I think what, just what you said. You know, like being able to read your own body's wisdom, you know so I often say the body speaks in metaphor, you know, like when we want to cry or we need to cry but we don't want to. So there's like the jaw gets tight in the lips and there's little whimpering sounds. You know our fear of our heart getting broken. So we have protection over the heart and the gut feeling is, you know, I used to think I was one of the few people that never got angry, but I had a stomach ache all the time. So, being able to access those things and listen, you know it's like.

Lindy:

So we, I would say to a client are you willing to stay with that for a moment? What does it feel like in your gut, your power center? Well, it feels like a rock. So if we sit with that rock for a little while, what is it telling you? You know? And? And so we learn to uncover how the body speaks, and so we learn to uncover how the body speaks. And then, when it's safe, to let your radiance out, and when it's not safe, how to have not slammed doors but a veil. It depends on where you are Like in Costco. I'm kind of kept in. It's kind of a crazy place to walk around wherever I am, knowing where the place is to be slightly veiled and and not, rather than this decision, to be closed off full time right right, yeah, and that brings back this idea of air hair, hair, muscle bone.

Lindy:

Yes.

Mary:

Like I so appreciate the option of air and hair, so I'll I'll let you explain what that means.

Lindy:

Well, it just, you know, one of those aha moments when you connect the dots, cause I've often said a lot of things like I do a morning Tantra practice and I'll say in meditation we say, take your seat. I'm doing a little offshoot there. In horseback riding that person has a good seat, which means whatever the horse is doing walk, trot, canter, bucking you ride whatever's happening, and that's so much like what life is about. We can have our seat really easy when everything's rosy and easy, but when life knocks you out, can you ride that wave of difficulty? And and with horses that is, you know, that's like connection with horses.

Lindy:

But also I learned, you know, the horse whisperer. There is a great cowboy named buck branneman. He, he's even got a documentary out now and I rode with him several times. And so one of the things he would say was do as little as it takes, but do what it takes. So I want the horse off of me because they'll lean in, you know, and they want to see where they stand with you and if you back up they'll lean in more, you know. So I'll go like this in the air and if they don't know what it means, they'll lean into you. So then you might go that's air. Hair is just touching them, muscle is. You know, giving a little more of a slap and to the bone is like boom and they'll go oh, did you mean that? And then you do it in the soft way and they know what it means. So for us sitting with somebody, anybody, if I step back, if I put my hand up, that's air. If they don't get it, then I might actually put my hand on their shoulder and gently push them away. If they don't get it, hey. And if they don't get it, it's not just physical, it's a verbal, it's a sound, and a lot of women have air and hair, but they don't have muscle or bone. We have to be fierce sometimes and then we can be soft again.

Lindy:

And I had this example of a woman in a practice station and she went to push the partner away and he shoved his hand onto her chest and said oh, you want to do hand on heart. And she was just like and we get stuck. So later on I said to her her you need to learn some bone, you know, to be able to say no, that's not what I meant. Yeah, that's a key piece I teach in my students to be able to say because, even if I have the best intentions, I can still make a mistake and push into your boundaries. And I want you to tell me I will trust you more if I know you'll speak up for yourself.

Lindy:

So it helps the other person as well. Instead of writing them off as an you know, a jerk, it helps them learn. And the same with the horse. If you go straight to hitting them hard, they don't understand at all what they did. Because horses, you know they pin their ears, they show their teeth. That's air hair, you know, right. Other, you know, when they go to the bone they'll bite or kick. So they understand that language, and I think our bodies do too with one another.

Mary:

Yes, I really appreciate that piece about like we help each other by sharing our boundaries, because I know for myself, when I would have a boundary come up, I would instantly go from. I would instantly go to bone, right. But I wouldn't actually go to bone, I would just go away, right. My boundary would be crossed and because the freeze was so embedded in my system, I would just do what I had to do to endure what was happening. You know, fawn and intend and and then you know, go, have a trauma response, you know, in another room and then be like that person's an asshole or whatever you know.

Lindy:

Yes.

Mary:

And I remember, in one of your workshops, having a moment where I felt like my boundaries had been crossed and saying and this was such a win saying I feel you know, with, and like being able to take the sensation in my body and put words to it, exactly which I'm pretty good at doing in day-to-day life, but in a situation where erotic energy is at play, it's like for me, you know, especially like having a history of sexual trauma. It's like the freeze is. Is that horse who only knows how to bite and kick? You know, and so, and, and you know, when we freeze, it's like our language center shut down, so like that experience of being triggered, feeling like my boundary has been crossed, and then being able to communicate in words in a more air hair kind of fashion, was so healing for me.

Lindy:

I remember you were so proud of yourself healing for me. I remember you were so proud of yourself, lindy, I did it. It's a little way and that brings me so much joy because I can't do it for everybody, but I can give you the ingredients of what safety might look like, and that person didn't even register that he had crossed the boundary, but you're saying that it brings it to his attention and that speaks to you. Know, there's the collective. Even though you and I have some training and some information, there's still the collective. There's the history of how we've been with ourselves and others have been with us, particularly as women. But that is across the board, for everybody and our religion, our social situation, our home.

Lindy:

You know it was not safe in my home. I shut down pretty hard because my father was very inappropriate. I know I was like at that point of a young woman coming into her puberty and her aliveness. My breasts were starting to grow and having little comments even about it, it's like, oh, I want to hide. So Tantra is a path that helps us heal, almost like going back in time and healing. You know it's a weird thing, part of the Hakomi training, training too. It's like that younger self comes up and she freezes and she feels unsafe. And then we start to have words as adults. You know it doesn't mean the younger part isn't there, but as an adult, when we speak, our boundaries, our body starts to feel safe. Not go into sexual, spiritual work until we have those ingredients.

Mary:

To me, that's the foundation well, and something I so appreciate about your workshops is it's this environment where we get to practice instead of waiting, to be in relationship, to work with these triggers and to work with these freeze responses.

Lindy:

Yeah.

Mary:

You know, I remember one time coming to one of your workshops and saying to myself in the car on the way there, like, okay, little fawn in the woods that likes to hang out in the in the wings and, you know, shuts down, like, you're welcome here, come on into the workshop. Because I would get mad at myself if I went into freeze or if I, you know, didn't do it perfectly or didn't like speak my boundaries with authority or whatever. And it's like, well, what am I doing here? I'm not coming here with mastery, I'm coming here to learn, and so being able to bring all those parts of ourselves into a practice space is so incredibly healing and I wonder for someone who is listening who maybe is curious about this path but, like we talked about, is also scared, nervous.

Lindy:

Yeah.

Mary:

I wonder what guidance you might offer them to just even putting the tip of their big toe in the direction of the path If we start really small and really air are really small and really air.

Lindy:

Yeah, we do, we. You know when, when I do a beginner class you know I have one online and but I mostly do the levels in my living room here um, it's of course clothing on. I have people call up and say I'm coming to your taste of tantra. Is it clothing optional, right? I'm like no, this is a beginner class. In fact, even my advanced classes we have our clothes on, because connection can come energetically so much more than actually the physical. So I just go very slow. I do baby steps. I.

Lindy:

You know, the first time I do a level one class or a beginner class, everybody's sitting very quietly waiting for me to start, like 10 minutes before I'm ready. They're journals and they're behaved. I know I was one of those people and by the time they reach the more intermediate, I can't even get their attention because they've learned in their bodies it's safe. People cuddle. Cuddle brings oxytocin, you know. We stop cuddling when we're our children, when they're like in their puberty area, you know, and and it's a way of feeling safe. One of the exercises might be how would you like to be held? And half the room cries because what I can just ask? To be held my head on your lap and your fingers in my hair, or your hand on my heart, or even back to back. When the oxytocin hits us, we start to feel more relaxed. It's anti-stress, anti-cortisol, it's so nourishing for us.

Lindy:

But even at the beginner classes that's scary. So it might be a touch practice from the elbow to the hand or the wrist to the hand. So you see these baby steps and you're at choice. You can just watch.

Lindy:

I think you might have been one that sat back and watched and then you know like oh, look, everybody was being respectful and kind. Ok, I want to try the next one. And so that's how I bring that, you know, the class along and, like you did that sweet beginning meditation, when we do like oh, I can sit in my own space and feel my body and feel my presence. Open my eyes, notice that there's no danger, because when you have trauma you're looking as if the danger's in the room. So open your eyes and notice nobody's approaching you, there's nothing you have to do and we start to change that fear or trauma or simple wounding. That fear or trauma or simple wounding not that wounding is simple, but it's a different process and we get to start healing, we get to start being real. We get to be pissed off, joyful all the different feelings come as you are All of you is accepted and welcome.

Mary:

Yeah, you know, I remember that day. I was in the wings and I was having a lot of emotion and I think my, I think there was a part of me that was testing, like is it really okay if I don't? You know, like there's been so much pressure in my life and and my perception, especially of the masculine, of like this, this appetite, this insatiable appetite, that let me see, I also want to speak to this truthfully like is it really okay that I don't engage, don't participate? Like is there room for the slowest part of me to be here?

Mary:

Yeah good question and absolutely there was like that was a corrective experience for me. And you know the, the young teenage girl who just faced so much pressure around sexuality and giving more than I was ready to give, got to have a totally different experience. And what I love about this opportunity to practice is that then all of my sensual experiences after that are elevated of like oh, this is the baseline where my little fawn deer peeking through the bushes, you know like where she gets to actually be in the room during moments of great erotic intensity and like that is sensual wholeness. You know Right, and there's just like, like God, I like to lose my taste for anything, but that is so, um, it's just like everything I've ever wanted around this area of my life you know, yeah, just beautiful.

Lindy:

And there's two pieces that come up with that great erotic intensity could be just sitting still and pulsing your PC muscles like a Kegel it's not what we think Like there's nobody naked having sex, right, but that I am safe to cry. And when you take care of yourself, not only are you not ostracized, but you're a good example. Your courage gives other people courage. Yeah, and the other piece that comes up for me, as we most of us are recovering, nice girls and nice boys. You know I, my name, is Lindy James and I'm recovering good girl.

Lindy:

Yeah, the fear of disappointing somebody made me work hard and give, at my own expense, to have sex when I didn't feel like it, to hold on to love in some way. And as I was going through this recovery stage, I could feel the fear that I'm going to disappoint you or anyone and not have it. Stop me. And in my little fawn, my little girl if you disappointed, everybody dies. That was the level of fear, yeah, and I discovered, and the day I told my best friend I did not want to be roommates with her, she wanted to stay, she was staying in my house and it was time for her to move out and she didn't want to. And I just hemmed and hawed and tried not to say it and the only thing I could say was the truth, I don't want to be roommates with you. And she looked at me and she's had similar training as I have had. So she looked at me and her little girl went I don't like you right now. And then her adult said but I still love you.

Lindy:

And it was such a breakthrough for me and it broke through my fear of being angry and having the bone. You know, sometimes it to be angry to the bone. I was steam coming out of my ears for the first time telling somebody they needed to move out now. After I'd given them six months and they said, no, I need a year, I had to be furious. And after I got furious I had to go in my room and cry because it was scary. But it serves me Eventually, it serves all of us to stop being. It doesn't mean you're not kind. You can say no kindly, but not to be at our own expense. I, just as I'm saying that, my heart rate goes up like oh yeah, that was a scary one.

Mary:

Yeah, I love those stories.

Lindy:

I love hearing about you getting furious oh, it's getting so bad, but it worked. He moved out in the next couple of weeks yeah, yeah.

Mary:

Well, it's like it's so healing and empowering to hear that you went in your room and cried after that experience, because I, I think I have this idea that if I'm going to get furious or mad, I have to be like I don't know somebody who, like, doesn't care about other people's feelings, but like, again, it's like that little fawn deer, yeah, gets to be here in moments of great erotic intensity, especially when we reframe it as, like erotic just being moments of authentic aliveness, like fury, you know.

Mary:

Yeah, yeah, I wonder if a person is listening and there's a feeling of being at war with their body, or maybe not war but being. I remember I was once working with a nutritionist that focused on hormonal health and I was living in New York at the time and we were talking about the body and during my intake and she was like, well, what are your general feelings about your pelvis and your pelvic organs? And I said, well, you know, I feel like I'm right now on 38th street, where I am, you know, and I feel like my pelvic organs are like at some warehouse in the Bronx. You know, it was just such separation that's super separated. Yeah, and for someone who's listening again, where, uh, there's the desire for an inroad and yet all roads seem closed. From your experience as a teacher and also as a student, of beginning to be in relationship with the body in a more friendly way, is there any suggestions that you might offer, wisdom that you might share?

Lindy:

It's a really good question.

Lindy:

You know, in all my classes that I teach I start with a meditation, similar to what you start with than what you start with. And so I slowly, very gently, come down into the body where you know, if you squeeze, release your PC muscles, a Kegel, you start to feel just the movement. It doesn't mean anything, it's just I feel something move, and the more you get the, it's the neural pathways that you know that saying use it or lose it. It has to do with actual science. If you are religious, you might only go to your heart. Sometimes you might be in your power center if you're lucky. But the, the hips, the pelvis, the sexual center, no, and even the base chakra, you know, like we don't, that's all the bathroom stuff. But all of our body is important, has different, important movements, and just to be able to feel the movement of the PC, I had one woman if she did a Kegel she would want to throw up. That's how afraid her body was of interacting that way. So we do it gently. It's not like, okay, this is your exercise. You got to do it every day, you know. But start to be more aware, be more aware, when you're eating, of the taste of what your body says.

Lindy:

You know, I had something to drink yesterday and immediately my gut went like, oh, you don't like that right now. Okay, and it was something like kombucha, you know, something we think is super healthy. But my body at that moment said no, but my awareness is there. Now. We just very gently feel the feelings of that area. It can start with how do you know you need to pee? There's a feeling there. When you go to the bathroom, can you start to pee and stop the pee? That's one of the first things I have people do is like oh, nowadays my yoni talks to me. There's no sense. Like a horse doesn't really talk, but they express all the time. They do make some sounds. And you know, my yoni all suddenly noticed she just went like there's a certain relaxation that I didn't know wasn't there and I'm like oh, what? What? You like this? You feel safe, you know. So we teach the body very simply to squeeze and release or hold the breath and then release the breath, and those are really baby steps to start feeling more safe. And if something like that really scares you, like the woman who felt like she was going to throw up.

Lindy:

Then you know it's really good to be working with a trauma therapist. I know enough about trauma to name it and bring you back to the earth, but I'm not a trauma healer. But there's lots of beautiful trauma healers out there and that's important, so you gain the skills. It's very different than just wounding. In wounding, we can cry and it moves away. In trauma, we can cry and we relive it. That's an important difference. So when I see that, I invite people to go to a therapist so that they can work with me and someone to help them through those trauma places. That's powerful. Yeah, I get the tingles just saying it.

Mary:

Yeah, I love that, that distinction between wounding, where we feel strong feelings, but trauma is where we really relive something that's passed. That's a really powerful definition. My last question and this is kind of a fun question is there a part of the body that you feel is often overlooked? You know, when it comes to sexual and sensual pleasure, the normal association is the yoni or somewhere around the genitals, but is there a part of the body then, in the relationship to this sensual wholeness, that you feel like is often overlooked, and it could even be the non-physical body you know, right, so definitely energetic.

Lindy:

You know we can. I have people stand apart in the room and one person gets to go like this, or stop or back up, and they start to tune in with how that feels like oh wow, I felt abandoned. Oh wow, I felt invited, you know. And then I do practices where I call it pleasure mapping. So there's pleasure in the skin, between the two little fingers they're really sensitive Palm of the hand if you touch lightly, or the wrist, the elbow behind the knee. So I start, you, you know, from the extremities in towards the center, and breathing and sounding. And you know most people when they feel any sort of pleasure, they're silent. But in tantra we teach take a deep breath and make a sound. It will amplify that simple, oh yummy feeling that happened in your elbow. Yes, and if you don't like something, could you slow down, could you stop right there? Oh yeah, that's better that we find our voice in the simplest ways.

Lindy:

And those that are in a hurry, that want to go straight to the sexual part, they're in the wrong place. My class is not the right place for you. My class is the place where you start to feel like I can express my sensuality and my boundaries within it in a joyful way. And then, when I say what I want, the person I'm practicing with says thank you. Oh my God.

Lindy:

That's a huge transformation in so many ways. So we can do that with ourselves. We can enjoy a sunset and let it touch every cell in our body. We can enjoy an eye gaze or that exercise I spoke of and feel it everywhere. And that's what embodiment means to be fully in your body, to be fully access, have full access to your sense perceptions in all of them, not just you know. I mean we can just touch our genitals or the nipples or whatever genitals or the nipples or whatever, and there's a physical reality to that. But the sensual reality is, thought by far the most beautiful that it can feed our body. So, like we think tantra is about sex, it's really about allowing sensual energy without a goal and breathing it through every cell and walking through life kind of lit up. That's the radiance mine, it's nobody else's oh you like that yeah?

Mary:

I love that. You know, when you were talking about the oxytocin of you know how do you want to be held, like I could feel my whole body melting with memory of being in workshops and pujas and um. And similarly, when you're talking about the energy body and the radiance, like I feel that in my own body and a big part of that has been participating in your morning Tantra practice, like I love you. You have a quote on your website I think it's a roomy quote about tuning the heartstrings to love. Yeah, is that right? And you know, your morning tantra practice is really like a tuning the body to a tuning of the heart strings of the body to love, and I wonder if you might just speak about your morning Tantra practice as a really simple step to begin connecting with, with the body in this way.

Lindy:

Yeah, it's so. In Buddhism they always talk about we're always training the mind, so you can train it negatively or positively. And so in my morning meditation we do always an embodiment practice and then I will say like what are you grateful for being in gratitude for the simplest things? We don't have bombs in our backyard. My yard is in full bloom. That's such a joy for me. And so, filling up with gratitude, and I'll say you know, thinking about your day, what intentions would serve you? Intentions would serve me today. Well, I'm going to make sure I get out in my garden, even if it's only 15 minutes. I'm going to walk, I'm going to.

Lindy:

I set a timer when I work on the computer because it hurts my neck. Every 30 minutes I get up and dance a little bit. So every day we and I teach a little piece of Tantra. In Tantra we talk about the breath, the body, the movement, the sound, to unlock stuck places. So each time is different and I never know what I'm going to say and I just sit down, start with embodiment practice and then something comes up and so people tune in. It's 8 to 830. Or they can listen to it later because I record it and I get lots of wonderful feedback. Some people have been doing it for years with me. It helps me get out of bed even when I don't feel like it and so because other people are there, and then I always feel better afterwards.

Mary:

And you do it Monday through Friday.

Lindy:

I do, I get the weekends off. Yeah, it's amazing, it's amazing it's a half an hour, but it really helps.

Mary:

Yeah, yeah. So that's one way that people can access your teachings and your work. You also do a taste of Tantra in person occasionally, and online, yeah.

Lindy:

Yeah, and that's the first Friday of every month, so it's easy to remember. Online you sign up, you'll get the link.

Mary:

Yeah, and then you also do amazing, resplendent in-person experiences at your home in Santa Cruz, california, or Apgios, california, yes, and I do, and so I do.

Lindy:

I have three levels One, two and three and you start at the basics and I bring people along very slowly. You can find those things on my day, but it's five months in a row so you can practice with the same people. And that helps to feel community, to feel like you're not just doing a one-off and that's it, and then people can practice with each other once they get to the more experienced levels.

Mary:

That has been such a powerful aspect of working with you is seeing the same people over and over and developing that sense of trust and safety.

Lindy:

Yeah, and before anybody does anything with me in person, I offer a discovery session. It's 15 or 20 minutes, it's free, it's on on the phone and I just have a list of questions for you and then I make suggestions from there. So if you've already had a little bit of tantra experience, I might say we'll come to level two or do the taste of tantra to see if we're a good fit. Um, that's on the first friday, but it's just like six to eight o'clock, so after work and that sort of thing, um and so like we get to feel each other to see if it's a good fit yeah, yeah, beautiful.

Mary:

Well, thank you so much for sharing your beauty and your wisdom and your passion with us. One of the things Lindy will say in class is that she gets to be bliss conductor where you're leading exercises and just. Thank you so much for your devotion to your own bliss and to liberating others, myself included, to experience theirs. Really appreciate you.

Lindy:

You're welcome and thank you for having me. It's been a pleasure.

Mary:

For more gems on how to awaken the sacred within and around you through the beauty, wisdom and wonder of the body, head to maryloffgrencom. There you'll find a candy land of resources, including my signature playlist, 100 Songs to Slow you Down, a free audio collection in celebration of beauty, as well as gaze upon the full library of the podcast. You can also check out my award-winning coaching services. Join the waitlist for one of our global retreats or flirt with stepping through the garden gates of the sanctuary community. Come explore how to live with more slowness, sacredness and sensory luxury at marylofgrencom. Thank you.