#170 Amy Landry - Ocean of Yoga — Returning to the Source

There’s a version of yoga that has become familiar in the modern world—
shaped by performance, aesthetics, and commercialisation.

And then there is Yoga as it has always been.

In this conversation, I sit down with Amy Landry—teacher, educator, and author of Ocean of Yoga—to explore what it means to return to the depth, integrity, and living essence of the tradition.

Amy’s work is rooted in a deep respect for the classical teachings of Yoga. Through her book Ocean of Yoga, she offers a comprehensive and grounded guide to yoga as a complete path—one that includes philosophy, subtle anatomy, mantra, meditation, and the deeper streams of Hatha and Tantra.

We speak to the difference between doing yoga and living Yoga…
between surface-level practice and a path that reshapes how we relate to body, mind, and reality itself.

This isn’t about rejecting modern yoga.
It’s about re-rooting it.

Not about adding more—
but remembering what was always there.

If you’ve felt the quiet pull toward something deeper in your practice,
this conversation will meet you there.

Explore Amy’s book
→ Ocean of Yoga — Amy Landry

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With love,

Stuart

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Hey Lee.

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Hello.

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Hello. So good to see you.

SPEAKER_00 0:09

You too. Thank you for making the time. Thank you, Lucy.

SPEAKER_01 0:14

Thank you. Thank you so much. It's great to connect.

SPEAKER_00 0:18

For sure.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

How are you doing?

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Yeah, good. Everything's alright. School holidays, you know how it goes. Kids home, different schedule. So yeah. And you guys?

SPEAKER_01 0:30

Yeah, same. In the school holiday flow. Still integrating after an epic trip. Yes. So yeah, going good.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

Nepal's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 0:42

Amazing. Yeah, it was my first time there. And it really blew me away. It was powerful.

SPEAKER_02 0:50

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 0:50

Mm-hmm. That was the same for me. Like I it was never really on my radar massively. Like I always felt compelled back to India. And then it's a long story short, but it was actually being in India that ended up planting the seeds for getting to Nepal and taking a group to Nepal. But it was just sublime. Like it just blew me. I cried at the airport coming home. Yeah, the hospitality, but also just the people, the landscape, the architecture, the food, like just everything, you know?

SPEAKER_02 1:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:20

And so when I saw your photos and stuff, the little that you shared, I was like, oh, take me back.

SPEAKER_01 1:26

Yeah, it was really special. I wasn't there for long and it was quite spontaneous. I just had like a week after being in India, and it was the first time I'd traveled solo like that in so long. And I thought, why not? Why not? Because I've got I I've got a spot in India that I go to regularly. So it's very familiar. It feels like home away from home. And I was like, it's time, time to go somewhere new. And it was, it was on my radar. I'd been intending to, but I've got my kind of home base. It's really, it was incredible.

SPEAKER_00 2:08

I'm so happy for you. And yeah, it's it's so different too, after many years of, you know, I would say for me at least, it's pre pre-children years of like that freedom of being able to travel and you know not have to worry about really anybody but yourself in that sense. And then you know, you've got kids and it really, and you know, of course, I'm not complaining, I'm just saying it's just a different season of life, and so you can't you can't go. And maybe I think it makes us appreciate it and savour it that much more totally.

SPEAKER_01 2:36

Totally. Yeah, it was strange though. It took me took me a few days to shift gears and get into that that zone. It had been so long, it'd been 12, 12, 13 years, and it was quite unusual. And but once I did shift gears, it was sublime, incredible. I think if we can, it's pretty important for us, I think.

SPEAKER_00 2:59

Have you have your kids gone to India?

SPEAKER_01 3:02

Yeah, quite a few times. So Jo and I took Soleil with us when she was one while we were running a retreat. That was very challenging. So it took 10 years to to go back with her. And I September two years ago, I really felt inspired to take our daughter Soleil. She was ten, and just her and I went, and that was really, really beautiful. Oh, I love that. Mm-hmm. And then both daughters came with us last year while we were hosting a retreat. That was incredible. But it also confirmed it's time to get back and just be a student.

SPEAKER_02 3:48

Right.

SPEAKER_01 3:50

It had been a long time. So that was really special, just like shutting my mouth and being and just listening and kind of letting the teacher, father, householder roles really be dimmed for a couple of weeks.

SPEAKER_00 4:10

So powerful. Because you know, I like we just prioritize the travel when we can find a kind of a almost a strategic reason to go. Let's run a retreat or let's do something, you know, like there's always an element of work involved. And so to be able to go and just completely drop all that is phenomenal.

SPEAKER_01 4:28

Yeah, it was quite funny. The the reactions in the community, there was a lot of like questioning and assumptions that something must be wrong, or like what are you running from? Or yeah, a lot of a lot of questioning. And it's like, ah, just time to be a student again. Yeah, it was quite interesting.

SPEAKER_00 4:48

Yeah, but it's so important, like it's filling your cup, like exactly.

SPEAKER_01 4:54

And I think as as teachers, it it's an interesting, and I want us to talk about a little bit of this mode of being teachers, being business owners, being householders, being parents, and juggling all these roles. And I see a lot of parallels in how you're living your life. And would love to hear just really how it's all going, your your evolution as a yogi, as a yogini to now author and householder and mama. Please, yeah, let's get to know you a little bit more of your your journey and how it's unfolded.

SPEAKER_00 5:36

Wow, that is big.

SPEAKER_01 5:38

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 5:40

You know, I think I think though, you know, it's I mean, it's so it's so it's something that we can all relate to, but it's like hindsight illuminates so much for us when we look back and and see all the dots connected that have brought us to what we're doing and who we are and the way that we have integrated our our life experiences. And certainly, of course, becoming a mother, becoming a parent has kind of catapulted that even further. But my I mean, my background was in dance, so in performing, in involved in the body, but also I was very captivated by the arts, so the arts of all kinds, but also particularly like fine arts and drawing and painting and just creativity and beauty. And throughout holding that, I also had had such a strong spiritual yearning since my childhood, did not grow up in a religious household, and but always had a strong curiosity, and there was almost like this sense of a void, like something was missing, and that spiritual kind of yearning or or like hankering just needed to be filled, and perhaps at a loss as to how to how to feel that or to know where to turn. And yeah, and I think that so, you know, essentially they those themes, those elements and aspects of my life strongly inform very much what I'm doing today, and also my health. You know, I had terrible health as a child, awful immune system. I mean, I was literally born into the world of blue baby, I had to be resuscitated and at birth. And so from that moment onward, I had a lot of respiratory problems, a lot of immune problems. I was heavily medicated as a child. And I think that that is also one reason that I was compelled into studying Aryaveda as well, as to supporting health and life. Because at that time that I became a yoga teacher, I mean, I'd been practicing for a number of years alongside dancing, and I was sort of thrown out of a dance career unexpectedly due to significant injury. And it was almost like if I look back on my Jyotish, like my astrology, my Vedic astrology chart, you can see this playing out. It was like the universe was doing whatever it could to get me to wake up and to to pivot really into my dharma. And that was really difficult because in my mind, in my heart, I'd always see myself as someone that would at least for a decent amount of years professionally perform. I mean, it felt creative, it felt physical. You know, Vata Dosha was very pleased with the movement and the creativity and the many years of like traveling to perform and to study. But I was really just forced away from that and had been practicing yoga, and it just provided me so much solace in my life and improved my health physically, my immunity, my breath, uh, all the respiratory conditions that I've been managing for many years. But it was such a pivotal time as well with lifestyle choices. I met my husband and, you know, it was had a very steady yoga practice. And when I became a yoga, when I became a yoga teacher, it sounds like something that just happens to clock over as soon as you get a certification. But when I pursued yoga teaching, it wasn't something that like I didn't know another yoga teacher at the time. I did not know I'd been practicing overseas when I worked contracts abroad, and I had old school recordings that I was using that had been like recording to like a what do you call those things, like a voice recorder thing in in California, like all these random teachers, and I had all these audios and audios burned to CDs and stuff. And so, but I was really consistent and really diligent, and it transformed my life in so many ways. And yeah, I just I just researched teaching yoga. I was like, ah, I just I felt that strong draw to to share. And on that teacher training, that initial training, I was just profoundly thrown into Ayurveda and captivated and India. And I literally booked a trip to India on that training, and just so many things happened at that time that it was almost like a confluence of circumstances shaking up everything. And you know, certainly fulfilling that spiritual yearning at the same time, because I could see that yoga provided that, of course, sort of physically oriented engagement, but also so much more than that. And although I formerly I formerly studied Ayurveda shortly afterward, and you know, I can now call myself a practitioner. I don't work clinically, although I did for a short period of time to maintain that those skills and the knowledge. It was really done because that just felt so important to inform the yoga and and and the living and breathing through the worldview, the Vedic worldview or the yogic worldview, you know. So, and it also informed how I delivered retreats and workshops and things like that. And I think that desire to integrate different Indic disciplines was just so strong. And when we and you would know this, you know, when you go to India, you feel that, like everything, there's nothing's compartmentalized, right? So whether someone's involved in in a Vedic mantra tradition or sampradaya lineage or in a classical art form, whether it's dance or Hindustani music or Karnataka music, they all it's sort of multidisciplinary, you know, they have so many different skills, like dancers in India, classical dancers, they study music, they study art and sacred geometry to appreciate the body being sacred geometry, this vessel. And you know, I remember crying many tears when I continued further yoga studies. I was in Bali at this time, and you know, five rhythms. We did like a five rhythms workshop, and it was the first time I'd actually danced since kind of not, you know, professionally. And I just had this just complete emotional release that I hadn't processed that reality that I wasn't dancing anymore. And someone there said to me, Have you heard of this style of Indian dance? knowing that I'd just been on a three-month trip to India and introduced me to Odis dance, which comes from Orissa in East India, and much less unknown in the Western world than other classical forms. And I was captivated and I applied for a dance school that day in India. I noticed that there, the school openings opened, like the applications opened, had just opened, and the training program began like two, three months later. And I didn't tell anyone until I got that letter of acceptance, and off I went to India to study Odissi. And still to this day I'm doing that. And it so informs the yoga, and the yoga informs the Odissi. And I think through engaging with many disciplines, I mean, I've studied Kalarepayatu as well, which is a South Indian martial art form, and I have studied lightly Karnatic music and Hindustani music and lots of different sort of facets and a strong interest in Jyotish Vedic astrology. And in some sense, I think all of this awareness really informed writing the book that I've just published as well. Because in yoga land, I mean, you know it, Stu, you know this, like it's we've come to this place where you know, so many people misunderstand what yoga is. We're so driven toward that which is performative and physically oriented that we've lost our way. And there's so many folks in the community that are just yearning for more, more knowledge, greater integration when they do find out about more subtle teachings, let's say integration and assimilation of relevance of certain texts or traditions or teachings. And there's this sort of it's kind of looping back to that void that I felt as a child, I think, as students of yoga, first and foremost. There is a void for many of us that we're we've all matured and we're we're we're wanting more. But many people, many students don't know where to turn. And so here I am.

SPEAKER_01 14:37

Here you are. And here is your book that I am absolutely loving. And hearing you talk, it's been it's so inspiring and refreshing. And that's that's the book as well. Like it feels refreshing, like not just a conceptual read, but really inspiring. Like there's so much in here, there's so much you have covered, so much, and yet you have not somehow you haven't reduced it down, but somehow you've like condensed it and just distilled it into a really, a really like for lack of a better word, like easy to read book, but it's like paradoxically, it's really deep and incredibly comprehensive, but a really just pleasant read as well. Like it feels like yeah, each can just kind of flip to any page and get a potent series of teachings. Well done. It's really, really beautiful. And it it's like truly like you were touching upon it. It it is a service to our current times of of yoga, of just life, and how you've how you've brought together the various yoga methodologies and Ayurveda and your your wisdom as a householder and a mother. It just feels really relevant and I think accessible to like yeah, teachers, but also like people new to yoga. It's a great like tool, guidebook to really help people sink their teeth into what yoga really is.

SPEAKER_00 16:32

Hmm. Hmm. Well, I mean, that was the intention. And it just seriously, it means the world to me when someone can read the book and reflect that back. Like they feel the vision, they feel the intention. And you know, I'm I was also surprised too when when the manuscript was like put like finally put together and edited and proofread, and I was like, oh, it's only just over 200 pages. It just feels like it's just got so much more, you know. I feel like it feels like it should be a really big book. But I suppose, in some sense, it's like, I just wanted everything to be like a relevant, potent teaching or foundation of knowledge without the fluff, you know, there's no personal stories. And I think that there's value in that kind of book, but that was not the intent here. It's not about me in writing this book. It's it's really for posterity. It's like, it's it's what can I leave behind in the world and know that I have done something to potentially uplift this greater vision of yoga that has kind of been so lost and degraded, degraded, like degraded, I would say, actually, in in the West. And that's almost being sold back to India as well. We're seeing this kind of yoga in India too now. And it's it's it's it's complex. It's a really complex sort of time, I think we're in, because, and I say this a lot, but our contemporary, because of our contemporary bodies and lifestyles, you know, we need this sort of modern postural yoga. And, you know, I teach it. I I think it holds a lot of benefit. And when you even come through a tantric worldview and you look to tantric teachings, I mean, they they've embraced the body in so many ways. And and it's a very dynamic path in terms of purification of the body, engagement with the body. You know, we're not turning away from the body, we're not repulsed by the body as we might in more austere traditions. So it and obviously it's informed tantra has heavily informed Hata Yoga, and Hatta Yoga obviously informing modern contemporary postural yoga as we know it today. And so it is anchored in something, you know, rich and and deep, but it's it's a really, it's just a tricky time because we the body is very much that doorway, as I sort of allude to in the book. Like we step through the doorway into the temple that is yoga, but many people don't kind of roam much further than that. And and that's actually a loss to us, to ourselves as well, when we miss out on that nectar. And in our world that we're so overstimulated with technology screens, social media, we have very short attention spans now. And if we can't get what we want when we want it, then we're just not interested. And I think also we have a desire for everything just to feel good and comfortable. And the path of yoga is not that at all. There is so much discomfort, like in just processing and transforming these inherent, uh, we might call them samsgaras or vasanas, like these impressions, these imprints, these thought patterns, these behavioral patterns, all these deeper teachings that the tools and techniques of yoga have the potential to uproot and transform for us. And that's going to put us through the fire in a way. And I think it's uh, you know, a reflection of this sort of almost addiction to hard and vast vinyasa yoga as well. It's like we can just move through this really quickly so we can't face the discomfort in being still. No one likes silence anymore, no one likes stillness anymore. And and yoga is that that is the goal, like one well, one of the many goals. I mean, that would be perhaps an oversimplification, but stillness, silence. I mean, that's the highest, right? And so I I think it's important to go through the body, to transcend the body. So we embrace the physically oriented, but we ensure that we're allowing space for that which is beyond the body, perhaps.

SPEAKER_01 20:46

So I mean, there's so much we could say about this, but there is so much, and yeah, it is interesting times with the more fad flavors of yoga. What I see is yes, the addiction to feeling good and stimulation, distraction. It's like a perpetual cycle though, without having a legit teacher, lineage, someone to call us out on our blind spots. It of course, we're just gonna gravitate to what feels good, what's entertaining, you know. So it's um, you know, I personally through my karma, through grace, thankfully, just kind of fumbled my way through that more exciting forms of yoga. That was my that was my entry point. I was literally I I found it. I mean, it was helping me because I was also very unwell, thought I was healthy, thought I was fit, but I was. I kept getting unwell. I kept getting injured. I kept feeling depressed. And something wasn't right. And through some kind of grace, I stumbled my way into a yoga class and it changed my life. And thankfully, it had such depth. It actually did. It had such depth and such authentic authentic yogic teachings that it it planted a seed. But after that initial seed planting, I then went down the more fad, exciting vinyasa, sexy yoga. I found it sexy, young 20-year-old guy. Of course, I was like one of the only Australian 20-year-old guys practicing yoga and in Canada. And it was very, it was a sexy time for yoga. And but something about that initial seed that was planted, I think, paved the way for gradually stumbling my way into incredible teachers, such as Ramdas and my main and one of my main teachers, Vishvaji, and just so many incredibly powerful teachers. But so I actually have hope and faith, especially with teachers like you and the book you just wrote. And there are some really powerful, beautiful senior teachers holding strong and still still teaching, even though I think that kind of pop heyday of sexy yoga. I think the peak has ended. It's in a bit of a plateau, and something else is ha seems to be happening. That's my observation, anyway.

SPEAKER_00 24:04

Just after Instagram kind of took off. Right.

SPEAKER_01 24:06

Yeah. And it seems like now. Yeah, these other forms of yoga and hybrids of yoga and disco yoga and and and other forms of sexy yoga are happening a lot. But I I think it's okay. I think it's fine. Like it it's like it was my doorway. I found it.

SPEAKER_00 24:33

Well, that's right. It's not gonna go away. Yeah. It's still gonna be a doorway for for folks. But I think that I think also too, a lot of people more people these days are always are now coming to yoga through meditation as well. I mean, that was it was either like you come through the postural practice and eventually you want to know more, or you come to yoga through learning about meditation, and that's how you find out about yoga, and then you might start a postural practice. And so they tended to be the two sort of entry points, but of course, the postural practice was for the majority. And I think now, especially with the you know, popularity of Vedic meditation and stuff, I think a lot of folks are in kind of aligning with yoga through this entry point of meditation now, which is also, I think, helping to see that that shift of momentum and direction away from too much physical orientation. And you know, so many people are drawn to yoga through that dynamic physical practice because that's all that they know even exists. It's not like they're even avoiding anything else. It's like they they just don't know because that's how it's been sold to them.

SPEAKER_02 25:34

True.

SPEAKER_00 25:35

And and when they find the right teacher, then they're like, ah, right, okay, wow, what is this? Like, tell me more. And and, you know, that's such a such a gift as a yoga teacher to be able to facilitate that awareness without imposing that yoga is, you know, this and that, but it's it's just planting those seeds in the way that we that we teach. And I and I really feel that that is a reflection of a masterful teacher in our contemporary times in terms of sort of the in the context of postural yoga classes. That's like, okay, you don't need to avoid teaching vinyasa or avoid teaching dynamic postures, but how like how are you teaching them? And what are you saying that makes them transformative? And how are you cultivating a certain more subtle awareness? Or what are you teaching that links these maybe techniques or postures back to something else that is rooted in, you know, something more time-tested or timeless. And we can't get that through reading, you know, a Rumi quote. Not that I'm against Rumi quotes, I love Rumi quotes. I have Rumi books. But you know, I I feel like we get in, I was I was interviewed on another podcast the other day, and and she she was telling me about learning this idea. And I was like, how have I not, how have I not heard of this, this sort of quote or this saying before? And she's like, Oh, is it Darren Rhodes? You might know him, he's in the US, and he talks about the spiritual sandwich, and it's like, let me open the class with a quote or a spiritual thing, then I teach this hard vas vinyasa, and then I close it. You know, we have Shivasana sit-up, I read a quote, and then we walk away. And that to me is such a great articulation of like a lack of integration. You know, we shouldn't have to rel. I mean, and I and I might quote something from time to time, but it's not sort of the habitual pattern that I'm in as to how I structure how I deliver a class, because the awareness and knowledge has started to be much more assimilated in a way that I can provide these teachings through the experience itself rather than something separate. Here's the quote, then here's some exercise, and then here's a quote, you know, or whatever, or philosophical teaching. And and I'm and I'm not at all suggesting that that doesn't work or that we shouldn't do that, but I think it's something that we've just fallen back on or are in the habit of in a way that makes our yoga classes seem more authentic or exotic or something.

SPEAKER_01 28:06

Right. Um Yeah, you talk a little bit in your book about the difference between a yoga instructor and a yoga teacher. So I guess when you're in, I guess even the early days of teaching yoga, and there's not quite the the growth and development and maturity, mature maturation and just natural confidence, you kind of need maybe need to lean on that that script. And yeah, I mean in our in our trainings and that we kind of we speak quite a bit about that. Like that's seems to be a common stepping stone in the in the journey of teaching yoga, of having a bit of a bit of a script to lean on and a bit of a map, and maybe yeah, something like a quote. I don't know. It can be it can be evoking, something we can get stuck in, right?

SPEAKER_00 29:07

That's that's the point I'm trying to make. Because that's why I wanted to emphasize that this is not wrong or bad, and I'm not sort of criticizing it in terms of its delivery is a bad thing or ineffective. I think it is a really helpful foundation. But as we mature as yoga teachers and as we truly assimilate our knowledge and are really very much engaged in living yoga, then we don't we no no longer rely on that spiritual sandwich, you know, and and students can feel that. And that again, that's a maturation, it's not something that's just going to happen. I mean, it can't just happen all of a sudden. You can't fake that. And yeah, and I suppose that's why this, you know, writing this book was so important, because I thought from the perspective of yoga teaching, it's it's going to help to bring greater integrity into the teaching community, into teacher trainings, but to provide more clarity and thereby confidence, particularly for new teachers, in integrating what they've learned, you know. Yeah. So, and thereby obviously the student community is so uplifted and benefited from that.

SPEAKER_01 30:16

Yeah, good on you. Yeah, Joe and I often kind of, I mean, we we refuse to do anything less than a 500-hour for like to teach it to guide students into teaching further. We've both got an appreciation of like martial arts, and you you can't really rush your way to a black belt. You gotta you gotta earn those stripes, and you gotta earn each belt. And if you've rushed it, it's gonna show up pretty pretty quick. There's no hiding it, and there's no script as well. You you know, you learn what you gotta learn, but then you gotta put in the hard work and the hours, and you gotta grow through it. And if you've rushed it, it is gonna show up really quick. But I think with modern yoga teachers, you know, we can do a really quick course, and then we can have that kind of do the quote, teach the script, and with the quote and kind of get away with it, especially if you don't have a teacher or a really, really good friend that's gonna call you out on your on your blind spots. And yeah, the the this kind of modern day yoga where we can if we don't have a go-to teacher or a mentor we can trust that can compassionately but fiercely shine light in those blind spots, it can be tricky as a modern day yoga of like of truly maturing into that. Like Yeah, it it's an interesting time with it with without much reverence for lineage and tradition, and actually earnestly practicing, and as young teachers, as new teachers, it it's still quite a romantic image of of abundance of getting your 200 hour and then running retreats and doing your own teacher trainings and it being very sexy and abundant and free-flowing, but it's actually pretty challenging. You gotta really put in the time and be consistent for it to pan out into a beautiful, abundant lifestyle. And I know a lot of our students and a lot of our friends will be listening to this that have are and have gone through those struggles, and just speaking both compassionately, encouraging, and earnestly of like it's it's not a quick kind of like attempting to rush to that black belt. We just we we can't rush the process. We gotta we gotta hang in there with the yoga sadhana, don't we?

SPEAKER_00 33:20

Well, it's even like learning how to drive a car. It's like think of this body as the vehicle, you know, you've got to take it for a ride, you've got to do the practice, you've got to integrate and assimilate, and you can't do that merely through intellectually accumulating that knowledge and then just thinking about it and then talking about it or regurgitating it. It's like, okay, yeah, for so long, but that eventually has to be reflected through the practice and through, you know, driving your vehicle, take yourself on that path down that road and like move toward the destination. Like you've got you've just got to do it. You can't learn how to drive without driving the car, or you can only, you know, you can't learn how to drive the car with reading the manual or just passing the computer test. Like you've got to, you've got to get your hands in there and and you know, engage in the practice and the path, and and that's you know, so imperative. And of course, that just takes time. That takes time. There's nothing you can do about it. It takes time. And I think also there's a degree of life experience that also facilitates that maturity in a yoga teacher that you just can't like. I look back at myself in my 20s, and and I just remember, you know, so many students were so elated at feeling or sensing the and maybe just comparatively so, other folks, like the the spiritual depth and the subtle teachings. And I look back at what I taught and what I was talking about, and I'm like, oh my God. I just I kind of cringe at it, you know. It's you just look back and like you change and the time, I just think that was 20-something year old me, the way I would have talked, the way I felt like I was all, you know, knowledgeable and mature and stuff. And, you know, and and I don't, I don't want to diminish my value. I'm not trying to bring myself down. But you know, I can look back at that in hindsight. And then also having kids, like, oh, that just completely transformed how I understood what it meant to live yoga and to experience yoga through, you know, perhaps that we could say the typical Vedic worldview of the different like seasons or stages of life, which I do reference in the book. And so thereby I kind of embraced this continual transformation of how it looked to be a yoga practitioner or how it looked to be a yoga teacher. It's not going to look the same as what it does when you're in your 20s. And and that's so refreshing. And it can really provide a sense of relief, right? Because so many people come to me and say, Oh, I haven't been doing my practice. And it's like all they're saying is I didn't do my like 60-minute asana practice today. And it's like, that's okay. That's totally fine. Like, you know, no one's a yoga police. You're not in trouble if you haven't like shown up and done 60 minutes of asana. Of course, there's going to be benefit in that, no doubt. But, you know, maybe if you have done your meditation, or maybe you said a prayer before a meal, or maybe you got up just before sunrise and honored the sun as they have done and done since you know, before we even knew of the Rig Veda, like being written down, like thousands of years, this honoring worship of the seasons and and transitions, the junctures of the day, the sandhis of the day, like all these ways or you know, it's it's so powerful to shift your perception and what it is to engage in yoga and to live yoga and to bring it into daily life and to yeah, just to imbibe that relationship with nature and which might initially sound very Ayurvedic, and of course it is, but when we look back to many of the what we could call ancient texts that pertain to yoga, Sanskrit texts, nature worship was huge, and that was pivotal as in that whole life of living yoga and in and engaging in the lifestyle of that that path. And so I think that, yeah, and it's just important for us to, I guess, yes, as I said, shift our perception on what it means to live yoga, to practice yoga, to engage in yoga, and then it and it becomes so much more inspiring, and there's a renewal there of energy.

SPEAKER_01 37:23

Couldn't agree more, couldn't agree more. And I often do I often do ramble on a lot about that these days of the blind spots of the modern day yogi where we, you know, in our in our enthusiasm, you know, our alarm goes off, and we drive to our yoga class in our plastic clothes, in our groovy sunglasses, with our Bluetooth headphones and onto a plastic yoga mat and do some vigorous asana and hop back in our car. And I often like to just call that out in how much of the just yeah, the nature yoga, nature worship, the magic of just being in light, water, earth, magnetism, with innocent, beautiful, enthusiastic intentions to get to the yoga class. But often I'll I'll call out at the beginning of class, like, if it's a morning class, like, have you had your feet on the earth yet? Have you got that morning sunlight into your eyes yet? And more often than not, it's a no because they're straight into their rubber-sole shoes, into the tinted window car with the windows up while the sun is rising, probably, and blocking off from the yoga of that moment, that surya. And right then and there, if it's like, yeah, shit, ever no one has had contact with the earth or the sun yet, we walk outside and literally go hug a tree and greet the sun, and then get into the class. It's like, okay, now now we're more ready. Let's practice now.

SPEAKER_00 39:20

But it's just a reflection of our proclivity to just keep going and to like push and to not stop, like to not to not stop and just think and be aware. And we get into these kind of patterned ways of living our lives.

SPEAKER_01 39:32

Yeah, we're cut off from nature, cut off from nature in so many ways, you know.

SPEAKER_00 39:37

Yeah, yeah. And and look, at the end of the day, like I think there's obviously an argument to be had to say, well, you know, getting up and getting to the Yoga Studio and doing a really dynamic practice in the morning is actually quite a wise thing to do. I mean, it's it's the time, well, depending on the time of the day, but generally, you know, between 6 a.m. and 10 a.m., it's kappa dosha time, it's a great time to move the body, move the lymph, move the circulation. So through the lens of Ayurveda, perfect, great. You know, then in the morning, there's you know, the residue of kappa in the body, and it's good to get the digestion going and stimulate Agni. And so all these movement practices are actually really, really helpful and beneficial in the mornings to be doing that. But when we're doing that with kind of blinders on, we're not holding that reverence and awareness for what's around us. And also, if we then walk out of the studio and we're not carrying some kind of like reverence or devotion, devotional awareness throughout the rest of our day and into our evening, then we're not carrying yoga with us. And there can be so much, of course, benefit, especially for those of us new to yoga, to understanding the yama and niyama in terms of like ethics and moral living and and that sort of thing when we when we want to have a conversation around what it is to live yoga. But again, we fall into the trap of just kind of tunnel vision, that's what it means to live yoga, you know, ahimsa, satya. And it's like there is so much more to living yoga than than that. You know, how about honoring the Vedic calendar and the seasonal celebrations and or the, as I said before, the junctures of the day, aligning your postural practice, your pranayama to the changes of the seasons of the year, right? Because you might be in Vata season and it's dry and windy and cold. So your postural practice, your physical practices are going to look different to in the middle of summer, for just for example. And so you're aligning those tangible practices with the different kind of um essence or flavor of that of that season. And then obviously we zoom out and and that's reflected even further across the seasons and stages of life. But you know, learning mantra, I have a free like Vedic food prayer that people can download, and it's a and there's recordings, it's it's a written um PDF, but it also has audio recordings to learn it. And it's like this really short, so sweet Vedic prayer to do to sort of bless the meal before you eat and to recognize the the importance of prana, you know, circulating through the body before mealtime, or it might be taking your pulse, a very Arya Vedic practice to do before you eat, and you know, lying on your left side in the morning to stimulate agni digestion, open up the right nostril, then go to bed at nighttime, lie on your right side, open up left nostril, etc. Like all these subtle little beautiful, ritualistic in a way, the ways to bring ritual into your life, but they're just ways that we can be living yoga that keep us in a sense of reverence and devotion to something greater than us and me and mine and my world and my life and my struggles. They enable, they just sort of invite us into something bigger than that. And it doesn't mean that you're doing a prayer at every meal, but it's just something that you're weaving in consciously each day. And it might even be, you may not have a home altar, but maybe you do and you're doing daily puja, but maybe you're just going out in the morning and offering a stick of incense, circling around three times clockwise, putting it in the garden, saying a you know, a prayer or mantra, and that's it, and right? And so you want to think about how yoga is shaping you as a being and shaping your life, and and letting the physical practices be a support to that bigger vision, you know.

SPEAKER_01 43:26

Totally.

SPEAKER_00 43:27

That's really important.

SPEAKER_01 43:28

It's so important, and especially as the collective, as the world, as our humanity keeps evolving in the direction that it is going. The fragmentation, the noise, the scrambling of our brain, of our nervous system with technology and light and the way we're building houses, it's so important for moments of remembering, moments of connecting, moments of reverence, moments of gratitude. It's just Little tricks to come back, come back together, come back eye to eye, come back to your food, come back to that feeling of your of yes, because and all ancient cultures were like this.

SPEAKER_00 44:16

It's not just limited to Indic culture, right?

SPEAKER_01 44:18

That's right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:19

Alignment with seasons, elements. And I will say, you know, there might be folks out there listening to this that have a bit of a reluctance or a resistance to the idea of speaking to sort of God or divinity, might feel very religious in yoga. But but when we look back to again mentioning the Rigveda, so the oldest Sanskrit written text, the the deities that are mentioned in there, and this is not just like an interpretation, this is made very clear in the Veda. The deities that are mentioned in there are all sort of personifications of nature, right? So the the Rishis, the sages, they you know knew that this our human mind, this manas, needed some kind of personification or this kind of development over time, of course, over a long period of history, but eventually like this gradual progression of iconographical forms. This human, our faculty needed that to kind of grasp more easily grasp a relationship with the divine, right? With this greater consciousness, right? And that's what we what we really speak to when we speak to God. And of course, there are these different different forms of gods, Indra, Surya, etc. But really, when we look back to the oldest texts, they are just that, they're personifications of nature. Agni being a god, but that is fire, you know, Surya, that is the sun. So, you know, it's um it is very indigenous in a way, and it's not limited to the sort of Indic or yogic worldview. We see it across all ancient cultures around the world. It's a it's a shared, unifying understanding that transcends sort of religious kind of ideology or systemate systematization, let's say. Maybe you might, if you can call religion a system or a structure, that we see it as maybe in our modern day. So it's kind of transcending that. And so it's it's very much a spiritual path that transcends religious ideas or structure. But we can feel it as being religious if we get out of that kind of idea of religion being kind of dogmatic or rigid. So I think that's a really important reframe because for some students and particularly folks that are newer to yoga or those that are listening that are teachers and they're teaching students, obviously, that are new to yoga and they want to say more and share more, but these sort of concepts can feel maybe even risky to be talking about or presenting. We just start talking about gods and deities and goddesses and things like that. So we can remind ourselves or share with our students simple things like that. They're just personifications, iconographical forms of nature. And really what we're doing is just honoring, you know, the sun. I say this a lot, the sun rises every day, no discrimination comes up. I mean, it doesn't literally come up, we're obviously turning, but you know what I mean? Like it's there and it shows up no matter what, in all of its glory, providing us with food and sustenance and nourishment. We are here because of it, right? Namprana, we can't see the air, but we're here because we we can't be here without it, right? So if there were ever anything to honor and worship on a daily basis that anchors us into awe and reverence, it's nature. But we take it for granted because we're so disconnected from it. And we see it in AI all the time, all this AI artwork now and stuff, and our minds are not seeing beauty in nature in its real raw form.

SPEAKER_01 48:07

Yeah, that's right. I was just hearing on another podcast, like it feels potentially a matter of time, like a human smile may very well be in like a museum. Like, remember when we used to like have expression and smile because it's becoming increasingly common. This this this hijacking of our of our joy, of our radiance, of our nervous system for the junk, the junk food, the junk light. And it's addictive. It's so it is so addictive. And I I speak I harp on about it because people own up to it regularly. And I've I've got to admit, I can see it in myself as well. An unconscious, gr almost gravitational pull to the junk light of the phone. Even though I know so well, I know consciously deep down, and I study it, I nerd out on it big time of how therapeutic it is for us to get that morning and evening sunlight through our skin, through our eyes, through our body, that infrared light, that surya, that just it's it's it's magical. It's magical. The sun is setting right now as we chat and uh it's coming through the door beautifully. And like this is why this is actually why I'm set up here. Because I'm like uh consciously, if I'm gonna be on the computer getting this blue light, I want to get that that. So, but I gotta catch myself if I'm like not on my if I'm not aware and I'm grumpy and I'm tired and I'm sleepy, I will gravitate to I'll forget curtains will be drawn, door will be closed, I'll be blocking myself off from the light. And I'll I'll wake up in the morning and go straight to my phone and be on my phone while I'm doing everything. So we can kind of it becomes this addiction, this perpetual cycle of like it's kind of like junk food. And if we don't watch it, that addiction to junk food, we just it's so instantly gratifying, instantly pleasurable.

SPEAKER_00 50:30

And that's kind of you look back to history at all the things people were addicted to, you know, like cigarettes and drugs and alcohol, and it's like screens are the next wave.

SPEAKER_01 50:43

So it's an interesting time in that regard. And again, your work, your book, it it it's not speaking directly to that, but it it it is a map to help people yeah, create a yeah, the living of yoga, this this holistic map to help us help us connect, help us align, because there's so much pulling us away from that exquisite alignment. And yeah, to some of you that are still listening, if it's like because it can feel a bit like where do I where do I start? Like it all sounds good. It can it can like where where do I start? It's it's pretty big. The ocean of yo, it is big, it is vast, it's meant to be massive. Where do I start? And it can actually be, yeah, like you said, a prayer with that meal of like even that of like put your phones down while you eat and maybe do the prayer before you eat and actually be present for that meal. Because so many of us yogis, we we did an epic 60-minute vinyasa, but then we're on our phone on the toilet, we're on our phone while we're eating, we're rushing meals on the go, we're having protein shakes that make us yeah, you know.

SPEAKER_00 52:09

You know what's so funny though? I will tell you, I don't even know if I've said this on a podcast interview yet, but the majority of this book was written at night after I'd put the kids to bed. And, you know, I don't recommend it, but really, I mean, and I one thing I have spoken about is that this book was written because it was a really challenging time in my life. A couple of years we moved interstate. I'd just given birth to our second child and lived in a house I didn't like, in a city I didn't like, no community, no friends, no support, nothing. My husband was going away, different countries, interstate, long periods of time. It was just such a hard time. I tried to start teaching yoga. I was across a couple of studios and I had to give it all away because he had to go. My husband had to go away, had no help with the kids, just I just had to give it all up. And so writing the book was that kind of refuge I experienced in being able to feel like I had something for myself, only for me initially, obviously, that creative process and a way to feel like I was still serving and teaching in a sense that this was this was going to be a real offering in the community at some point in time in the future. And you know, and that that intention was just such a strong kind of call that like the book just it just the clarity was there, it flowed through me through me. It was this book was such a gift to me at that time. That time was really brutal. And again, tying in Jyotish, look back on my chart, totally I was going through what's called Ashtamashani, two and a half period of just real hardship. There's always a golden nugget at the end. That is this book. And yeah, and you know, it was it was written at nighttime. I was breastfeeding, I was broken asleep, sleep deprived. That was the only time I could do it. But you know, and you feel this as a parent. It's like your kids go to bed, and then you sit down, you're like, oh, now I have some time for myself. And all that just it surged through me. And I just honored that, honored that kind of intuitive call and just wrote. But I still went to bed at like 10 p.m., 11 p.m. every night. It was just a couple it was like a couple of hours max every night. But the consistency was really important, the consistency in showing up. And as isn't isn't that yoga? It's not about the tricky things that we're doing, but it's it's the consistency in staying and showing up to see what gifts kind of await us at the end for our dedication and diligence and thank you for sharing.

SPEAKER_01 54:44

Thank you for sharing. That's really inspiring, really inspiring. And further emphasizes, like you had to put the phone down and focus.

SPEAKER_00 54:57

Well, right, yes.

SPEAKER_01 54:58

And commit.

SPEAKER_00 54:59

I didn't watch movies, TV shows, or anything for two and a half years. Actually, I don't really watch them in general. I can't remember the last time I did, but I'm not a I'm not a sitting on Netflix person at nighttime. I'm either studying, working, or literally unwinding, having a cup of tea and going to bed. I will, of course, do a little bit of social media here and there because the kids are asleep. I won't deny that. But I'm when people do say, How did you write this book? How did you do this? Because the bulk of it was written in a year, majority of it. And you got two kids, you lived here, you had no help, you know, you were sleep deprived. And I would say my answer is one, the the vision came through, like it was just such a strong call. This is more than me. It was really there. And and obviously that that desire and dedication to to serve was was really, really important to me. So, but yeah, but also the reality that I I'm not a sit in front of a TV and watch a whole season of something. I don't know. I'm I know I'm weird like that. I know most like I don't know, but I also don't drink coffee, so maybe I'm I'm extra weird, but I think weird in a great way.

SPEAKER_01 56:08

We didn't have a TV until like we got one a year ago, and it's we did too. We I hadn't had one in so long. Neither had Joe. She didn't have one before we met, neither did I. We didn't have one for like 10 years together, and we we got one, and it's been it's been kind of nice, it's been fun. But it's like one of those normally just a piece of art is up on it. It's one of those art frames or whatever. It's kind of it's kind of nice, and but it's been an interesting journey for us of finding a bit more Joe's great with in being in the middle path, very much so. I'm quite extreme, and she she she uh she owns the middle path, it's a beautiful middle path, and uh trying to keep steering to that middle path, and because I know for me, my inner yogi gets pretty obsessed, and thankfully I've found yoga that I can be obsessed about, but I can also very easily slip into the the kind of anal yogi, taking it taking it too seriously, and wait, so you mean like not touch not having any TV at all?

SPEAKER_00 57:20

Is that what you mean?

SPEAKER_01 57:22

Yes. So for me, well it was organic, it was organic for me, but I can also reflect back on the the righteous anal yogi that's like I'm not touching meat and I'm not touching my phone and I'm not watching TV and I'm not getting, you know what I mean, out of righteousness, out of kind of something not not authentic. And it's taken a little while to grow and mature into something that is authentic, which I I think is also pretty common when we're we're trying to be disciplined and we're trying to be good and we're trying to, I don't know, impress or virtue signal or something, you know, broadcast something. So what I'm seeing in in you and so many great yogis that are truly living yoga, it's like this in that maturing is is an unforced discipline, an unforced sadhana, like how you expressed how your book came out and how you don't watch TV, you don't drink coffee. I don't see in you like forcing it, it's just it's quite organic.

SPEAKER_00 58:42

Well, you know what? Coffee's super regassic, but that's not why I don't drink it. I actually really don't like the taste. I just I just don't like it. I think I so you know, I'm not on my high horse about how discipline at all. I think it tastes gross.

SPEAKER_01 58:57

Yeah, I agree now, but I a coffee addict, I've been deep in coffee addiction many times, and I've broken the addiction quite a few times, but it's been like it's tough. I've broken I haven't had one in like three years, and it's interesting. Like now on not having it for quite some time, like the smell and the the the aroma that I used to love, it smells yuck now, which is quite interesting because when you're in it, when you're addicted, it smells so good, it's the best smell. So these addictions are they're interesting. And with like Ayurveda and like the doshas, for example, it's such a helpful map because if we're unconscious to it, would you agree that we have a tendency to perpetuate imbalances to gravitate to things that further imbalance us unless we bring in that fortitude and that awareness?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:04

Yeah, unless we've had a really clear experience in our life of that which is actually good for us or best for us, because we can have that, we can have that experience and go, oh, actually, wow, my mind or my body or whatever. Like I slept so well then when I was doing that, or you know, unless you have this really kind of clear experience and awareness, we are absolutely drawn toward that which perpetuates our, you know, choices, the way we live, what we do. But you know, actually, I always say to people, don't get too attached to your dosha, the constitution, or your prakriti. I just think that you should understand how the doshas express themselves through the seasons of the year and align with that, which is really important if you have kids or you live with someone who's a different constitution, because then instead of thinking, okay, let's eat vata pacifying meals, oh, but you need this, you need kappa pacifying, you know, everyone needs something a bit different. Of course, you can tweak things, definitely. But how about we just create meals and food and eat eat in alignment with the qualities of each season? You know, autumn is prime like primarily vata dosha, winter, late winter, kappa dosha, and then of course summer pitta dosha, of course, it depends where you live and the climate. If you live near the equator, it's kind of like pitta almost all year round. But and having that awareness is really helpful as well. But that's a beautiful way to eat in rhythm and with seasons in a way that is so much more just easy for everybody, especially as a householder with kids. So all these like subtle nuances can be really, really helpful and freeing as well.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:39

So freeing, so freeing. And in a way, it seems it's actually simplifying things back, like getting back in tune with nature. I when I reflect back in many good intentions to be as healthy as I can be and to take care of certain ailments and illnesses and so forth, but I was I was not doing myself any favor. I was trying too hard, too many supplements, too many foods on repeat all year long. And it it it builds up imbalances, it builds up sensitivities, and it it's like for so how who knows how long we've been eating in this rhythm with nature, and then now we can have you know blueberries shipped in from Chile all year long, yeah. Asai shipped in from the Amazon all year long, and you know it's great to have these superfoods available, but are they actually superfoods when we're flooding the body with it all all year long? I that's been a huge insight for me, and deepening my health and my balance is actually being more minimal with intervention and what I'm feeding the body. It's been quite interesting, like really stripping the interference away as much as possible.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:15

And it's good because you get to see your own foundation state then anyway.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:19

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:20

Which can be quite masked by taking and doing too many things, which is just another kind of reflection of this sort of vata-driven lifestyle that we live in, or vata pitta, really, because it's both. It's hard to get out of the loop. And that's why I think yoga is so beautiful, because even if we are engaging in the physical practices, if we can remember that the primary sort of intent or goal of the physically oriented postures and so forth is to actually enable us to sit more comfortably with stillness and steadiness, not only physically but mentally, of course, then we start to become aware of these proclivities and tendencies and and make wiser decisions and simplify and again come loop back to that idea of maturing and and letting that come with time. And yeah, and I think that that reveals a lot to us and and and it enables us to be a lot more open and receptive, and kind of like you were talking about with Joe, it's like we're a little bit middle path then, you know, and I think that's a lot very healthy place to be in all aspects and facets of our life. I think of what Dr. Svoboda, Robert Svoboda often says, you know, and he's definitely been a big influence on my path. And he's always like, no matter what happens, just remain calm, like remain calm. And it's like, yeah, how can you have that neutrality and dispassion as much as possible? That's not to say you don't have your own choices or opinions or preferences, but striving for that emotional kind of equanimous neutrality, consistency is so good for the mind and the nervous system and for our relationships and our capacity to have that higher discrimination and discernment when the emotional kind of aspect of the mind is is more stable. And I say all this, it's it's easier said than done, of course, but at least awareness is that initial, you know, seed that makes the momentum.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:17

Totally, totally. Again, it it it really does feel important in our current times where we're looking, we're collectively looking for something to to bring us back. I'd love to get your observation. Been talking with quite a few yogis within the communities. There seems to be this interesting shift back to religion, with a lot of yogis that and even people within the the plant medicine community and people that now admit they actually got too far ahead of themselves and started. Teaching teaching the kind of not cliche, but kind of like what we talked about before. The poem, the class, the poem, and maybe even getting ahead of themselves and teaching about certain spiritual truths prematurely, and then this kind of burnout with their sadhana, and they've gone full born-again Christian. Which I got nothing against. I I I get it. I love Christ. I echo kind of my teachers, Ramdas, Lama Surya Das, a bunch of Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist practitioners that also have a love, a love for Christ. I can relate. I'm a Jewish boy, I'm a yogi. I love Buddhist practices. I love all the wisdom traditions, really. So I do I do have an appreciation of Christ, but there's been this interesting pendulum shift from a lot of the neo fanatical spiritual practices to now all like all in Christ and going hard saying all of what I did before was wrong, all the yoga, all the rubbish. Like Christ is the only way. Quite interesting. Have you seen that at all? Is that greater? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:27

Yeah, a little bit. I mean, not massively, but definitely a little bit of it. I've had conversations actually with a woman in my community who teaches in Sydney, and her whole family is very Christian. And you know, she was raised in that way, but she's never experienced a conflict of interest, let's say. But her family is really disapproving of her engagement in yoga and teaching yoga. And I think that I would say that, I mean, I it's just obviously just speculation and opinion that I haven't given too much thought to at this point in time. But you know, I wonder if those folks that have kind of had that experience were maybe following unhealthy threads of yoga that didn't serve them, but that's not, it's kind of like the saying goes, don't throw the baby out with bathwater. It's like, well, to proclaim that yoga is rubbish is at least in my opinion, evidence that that person probably didn't understand yoga fully anyway. Because yoga can hold Christianity.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:36

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:37

Right? You can be Christian and engage in the techniques of yoga, you can pray to Jesus, to God, and benefit from the powerful techniques of yoga, purification of the body and the mind, the devotional teachings that you know invite so much bhakti and devotion, which is so aligned with you know, with loving God and and Jesus Christ. And I do think unfortunately, in many Christian groups, yoga is so extraordinarily misunderstood that these folks are being fed unhealthy messages. And yoga is about union and embracing people of all different traditions. There's not one path or one God or one book, one text. It's not dogmatic like that. Nor is, I mean, the term Hindu and Hinduism, which I discuss in the book, I mean, that's an umbrella term for so many different sub-traditions. It's not a religion in isolation. And really, initially, it was a geographical term. It related to people that lived in a certain part of the Indian subcontinent, and it was actually shifted with colonization, firstly from Islamic colonization and then British colonial rule. So there's just so much nuance and complexity. And I think if we lack the knowledge, we're going to lose our way. And I I that's probably my first thoughts about that.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:07

No.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:07

But I know I know a number of Christians that engage in yoga and have great respect for yoga and for Jesus. Most of them, though, interestingly, are of Indian heritage. They might be out in the diaspora around the world or in India, because there are many Christians in India. But they there's a beautiful integration of Christianity with Hindu practices and worship.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:31

Yeah, same. I know some beautiful Christians that have been earnest Christian folks for a long time, going to church every Sunday and really, really passionate about their religion and their community. But we do yoga together. And I'll even sometimes, because in Rishikesh, for example, you know, the bookshelf, the bookshelves there, the bookshops there, there'll be a whole bookshelf of like the yoga of Jesus and Jesus in India. And every now and then, just for fun and also curiosity, I'll bring a book or two of those Jesus yoga books home and gift it to them and get their perspective. And it's really, I find it refreshing getting their open-minded, true, wise take on it. But like I said, there's uh yeah, there's just been an interesting extreme shift from all into all of this yoga and tantra, and and then no, that's garbage into born-again Christian, which it's just an interesting pendulum shift and yeah, trying to trying to trying to find our way home, you know. But you know, when we look at the great yogis, I mean, Neem Krili Baba, he had a great love of Jesus Christ, but it was this very mystical, like Hanuman and Jesus, they're they're the same. And Parmahunsa Yogananda, similar. He's got he's got a book on the yoga of Jesus, which is his kind of perspective on on the Bible from a more yogic lens. And I thought I've seen that. Yeah, it's really cool. It's really cool. And even Aja Shanti, you know, old Zen teacher, he's got a great audio series called Resurrecting Christ, which is like this beautiful, and I've I've forwarded that to some of my Christian friends as well, that are actually rooted into the the wisdom of Christianity. They love it, all for it. But I've also got some friends that have gone all in and are now poo-pooing yoga and saying that no, I had it all wrong, that yoga was wrong, it's even you know a sin and a major pendulum shift. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:58

God is God loves all and forgives all. So yeah. So to me, I mean, of course, it's just a sign of s of folks losing their way and trying to cling to something.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:17

I'm gonna turn the light on and then we'll we'll wrap this up, okay? Sounds good. It's getting dark, yeah. Amy, we could I feel like we could just talk for so long. We've got so many beautiful parallels, and it's been so beautiful witnessing your evolution as a woman, as a mother, as a householder, as a yogini. And now as an author, again, I just am so proud of you and so blown away at this beautiful book. I know I'm gonna read it quite a few times. It feels, I don't know if you've ever listened to The Yoga Matrix by Richard Freeman.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:10

No, but I know, of course, I know of Richard Freeman.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:12

Yeah, it was one of those pivotal, it's only audio book, actually, the yoga matrix. And it's one of those go-to's that I've listened to again and again and again. And he had just was able to put so much into the yoga matrix, and it's rare to come across an audio book, audio course, or an actual book that is able to do that. I I I can't think of many that I continue to go back to, to just like I'll still go back to the yoga matrix every now and then and just it get little, it gets deeper every time, even now, 20 years later. This really feels like one of those books to be able you, it's not just like a one read. It's like this is one of those books to read again and again and again. And it feels like one of those books you want in hard copy as well. I look forward to listening to. Are you gonna do an audiobook?

SPEAKER_00 1:15:23

The audiobook's already available. Oh, you can get it on Audible, and I was able to narrate it, which is great because a lot of people don't know that's not a given. You don't even get a guaranteed audiobook in book publishing, nor the opportunity to narrate it yourself. But my publisher said, There's a bit too much of Sanskrit in there, so we're gonna need you to do it anyway. So that was a blessing.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:42

Oh, I can't wait to listen. Yeah, feel it does feel like one to have the hard copy though. I agree. Really. Yeah, again, especially in our current times. Anything we can actually get our hands on and actually use our eyeballs for like analog live, analog living. Yes, totally. So get the book, and I can't wait to get the uh listen to the audio book and tune into your beautiful voice and more. But yeah, well done. And I've nearly finished it and gonna keep sharing the love because everyone should have this in their their bookshelves for sure.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:19

Thank you so much. Is there anything else?

SPEAKER_01 1:16:22

Oh, you're welcome, Amy. Such such a pleasure. Is there anything else you feel like sharing with our listeners?

SPEAKER_00 1:16:29

No, not really. I just I guess I would just closing by saying, you know, if you feel compelled into learning about yoga beyond the body or beyond the physical practices, then please consider grabbing the book. It's available now. It's entitled The Ocean of Yoga. It's published with Shambhala Publications, but Penguin Random House distribute it around Australia. It's sold out a few times already on Amazon. So they're in stock at the moment, but you can definitely get it from other retailers. You know, certainly it's great if you can go in and support your local bookseller. If they don't have it in stock, they'll definitely be able to order it for you. So, and just it's I guess a recognition that each book is that small step and that we can all take to slowly transform the contemporary yoga landscape into something that uplifts the full spectrum of yoga, including the body, but also beyond the body. And and yeah, thank you so much for your support. It really means the worlds too, like someone with so much experience in yoga, and of course you and Joe. Yeah, I really appreciate your getting behind this work and I feel your sincerity, and thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:36

You're welcome. Much love, Amy. Speak soon, rest well, yes, you too. Thank you for your time.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:43

Have a good clear. Take care, Amy.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:46

You too. Bye bye.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:47

Bye.