Santina Giardina-Chard: Breaking Free from Addiction Through Ashtanga Yoga & Gestalt Therapy

Santina Giardina-Chard is a dedicated Ashtanga yoga teacher, having mastered all levels up to the fourth series. Alongside her yoga practice, Santina is a certified gestalt therapist with a master's degree, tirelessly working with clients to explore how their past influences their present experiences and relationships. Her holistic approach combines yoga and gestalt therapy to offer profound insights into personal development and self-awareness.

Visit Santina here: https://insanyoga.com/

Key Takeaways:

• Integration of Yoga and Therapy: Santina illustrates how Ashtanga yoga and gestalt therapy synergize to promote self-awareness and personal growth.
• Freedom Through Deep Self-Contact: The practice of turning towards personal challenges and emotions with curiosity can lead to liberation from past patterns.
• Phenomenological Observation: Understanding one's physical and emotional reactions in the present moment is essential for overcoming past influences.
• Horizontal Relationship Dynamics: Gestalt therapy emphasizes creating a non-hierarchical, safe space for exploration and healing.
• Continual Learning in Practice: Both yoga and gestalt therapy require ongoing personal development to effectively support others.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Santina Giardina-Chard on Gratitude and Self-Discovery Through Movement
• 4:04 Exploring Gestalt Therapy and Its Impact on Yoga Practice
• 15:44 Healing Through Yoga and Gestalt Therapy
• 18:27 Embracing Personal Freedom Through Gestalt Therapy and Self-Acceptance
• 25:21 Understanding Gestalt Therapy and Personal Responsibility
• 31:25 Exploring Assumptions and True Understanding of Objects and People
• 33:30 Phenomenology, Dialogue, and the Art of Non-Verbal Assistance
• 37:45 Embracing Inner Freedom Through Self-Awareness and Acceptance
• 42:00 Santina's Journey Through Advanced Yoga and Personal Transformation
• 48:29 The Spiritual Journey Through Yoga and Personal Transformation
• 52:27 Integrating Gestalt Therapy With Ashtanga Yoga Practice
• 1:00:34 Finding Internal Freedom Through Emotional Anatomy and Self-Work

Transcript

Todd McLaughlin: 0:33

Welcome to Native Yoga Toddcast. So happy you are here. My goal with this channel is to bring inspirational speakers to the mic in the field of yoga, massage, body work and beyond. Follow us at @nativeyoga and check us out at nativeyogacenter.com. All right, let's begin. Hello, welcome to Native Yoga Toddcast. Oh, I'm so happy you are here. What a journey. This is episode number 250 about five and a half years into this project called native yoga Todd cast, and what a wonderful way to celebrate episode number 250 with my special guest, Santina Giardina-Chard, please visit her on her website, insanyoga.com so it's spelled i n, s, a, n, y, o, g, a.com, well, I think it's time. Let's go for it. Oh yeah, I'm so excited. I have Santina Giardina-Chard here with me today on the podcast. Santina. Thank you so much. I've been anticipating this moment for months, quite honestly, and I'm so excited to be here with you now. Can you tell me how you're feeling today?

Santina Giardina-Chard: 2:09

I'm a mixed bag, as always, apprehensive, grateful, delighted, a bit brittle, feeling a little like, can't really find my my bones yet, and I feel like it couldn't just be me with you. Somehow, I feel that we're okay here, if I'm not okay and I'm not safe, like nothing comes out. Yeah.

Todd McLaughlin: 2:40

Well, I'm honored that you feel comfortable to speak with me, and I, this is my first time to ever officially get to meet you. I was one one morning. Here we have a student named Esther, who I was. I was going through a sore body, like, one of those days where your body's just like, really not, not feeling great. And so I was rolling around on my mat and just doing whatever I felt like I needed to do, to try to, like, feel what I need to do. And Esther goes, oh my gosh, you've got to meet Santina. I, I she has a video doing kind of what you're doing right now. And I said, Really, okay, cool. And then I looked at the video she was talking about. And it was, I think it was like a time lapse. And I even think maybe your cat, or one of an animal was there with you. I could be wrong, but and you were, you were just doing a very organic kind of flowing movement thing, and, and that's when I was then I emailed you, and I know it took us a little time to get organized to do this, and I'm so excited to have this chance to find out what inspires you and you come through a couple words about how you're doing. One of them is grateful. Can you mention something that you're grateful for

Unknown: 3:53

right now? Yeah, right now. I'm, I'm grateful to be alive. Yeah, just, just, just, just to live, just to finally live and to be I noticed that you're impacted by that somehow, by just by saying that I can see, are you impacted by me saying that to you?

Todd McLaughlin: 4:12

Yeah, I am. Well, yeah, I feel like I keep having conversations with people more and more lately that are saying the same exact thing, like there's this sort of awakening to the simplicity of like, I'm alive. That's good enough, yeah.

Unknown: 4:27

Like, wow. My parents, my niece, my nephews, my husband, my dog, this body, this body that I know nothing about but I live in every day and is changing every day, and delivers my here now experience and just just the just the fact that I can feel it, that I've never been able to feel it my whole life, and finally, after 50 years, I can finally feel my body. I'm grateful for that, and I'm grateful for contact, yeah, because I was gonna start. Crying as I talk to you, because that's I'm grateful for relationship, and how I'm impacted in relationship. And every time I go into contact with something, something new arises in me that I didn't know about myself.

Todd McLaughlin: 5:11

Yeah, amazing, Santina, so that myself and our listener can get a gist. I mean, you know, to ask someone who's experienced 50 years, what do you do and what's your shtick? I'm just curious, though, if you were to break it into a relatively small, relatable chunk, what would you how would you describe yourself, and what your career is, and what you and what your love and passion is in the world of yoga, body work and psychology work,

Unknown: 5:48

yeah, I teach Ashtanga Yoga primarily, but I don't hold a my soul program. I only hold intensives because the work that I do is so phenomenologically and body deep that I people can't hold what I do in a set in an intense amount of time. So I teach intensive Ashtanga Yoga, but my the base of my work is Gestalt therapy, where I sit with clients. I only sit with clients three times a week because it's intense and it takes a lot of me, and it's my greatest joy and my greatest gift, because I get to see how the body is organized here now from past experience. So the past is always coming up here now, in this relationship with me in the person's body, so I get to see how that person is organizing their whole life through how they are right now, amazing.

Todd McLaughlin: 6:51

You know, I've always hear the word Gestalt, but I just, I feel like you're starting to orient me toward understanding it better. But if we had to get like a classic definition of Gestalt therapy. What? What is that

Unknown: 7:09

it's not okay. So it's not easy to pinpoint, but it involves three, three, about four interdependent principles, field, dialog, phenomenology, awareness, contact six and para paradoxical theory of change. So it says that the field, my field, your field, the field, is always changing, and we're always being impacted by the field. Your phenomenology, like what you're doing, what you're saying, how I experience your eyes, how you grip your jaw, is impacting me, and I'm being impacted again by everything that you're doing, and you're being impacted by me. So that's phenomenology. Dialog is my capacity to be present and attuned and committed to you, not as an object, but as a here, now subject, where, again, I'm deeply impacted by how you are and what you bring and the and the basis is the paradoxical theory of change. We don't change by trying to change. We change by allowing ourselves to be as we are, and we notice how we stop ourselves from bringing as we are. So what that? What does that mean? Is that there's always kind of an interruption to myself. I'm always interrupting myself from being as I am based on all my past history that is coming here now into the field to stop me being spontaneous with you. But if I can somehow allow myself to be here now, then the organism that I am, that you are always moving towards wholeness and balance and change, because that's life is just change all the time, but I constantly interrupting myself based on my history. I don't know if that made any sense. Yeah, it's hard to pinpoint Gestalt, because it's, it's a lived experience. It's like, I notice your eyes, I notice your lips. I notice how when I say something, your organism is impacted. And that's what happens in the Mysore room, you know, like I say something, and the organism, not the posture, is being impacted based on everything that they've brought into the room from their whole life. That makes perfect sense. What's happening, what's happening for you? Now, I noticed that,

Todd McLaughlin: 9:49

yeah, I mean, it just makes perfect sense, I guess. I mean, I mean, as you're speaking, I'm having all these thoughts go through, and I'm just like processing it, and I. I agree. I guess the first question that pops into my head is, when knowing that you're observing me so closely, then I guess I wonder, or if I put myself in the teacher role, and I'm in a room full of people that are practicing, and if I'm aware that every little thing that I do is impacting them. That puts me in this sort of state of deep observation of what am I actually doing right now? What kind of energy Am I putting out right now? And if they can feel that, wow, I better pay attention to what I'm doing, because I it does matter what I'm thinking about. It does matter how I'm holding my body and but then I guess sometimes that feels a little like intense, you know, like a little like under the microscope, a little bit like, almost like, not natural, you know, like thinking,

Unknown: 10:54

Yeah, this is the thing, if, if the, well, this is the point, if The, if the environment, if the field is not safe, you won't even go into that point. You'll be micromanaging, whereas if, if the teacher, so if my if I'm deeply attuned, and I'm close to myself, and I'm aware of how I am, and I'm regulated the nervous system of the other drops, so they come out of their trance, yeah, because they're kind of in a bit of a trance, you know? But if I drop and I'm here and I name what's happening, rather than project what's happening, they drop and they're and they're, I can relax here. I can let myself be here and then observe how I am and notice and so that level of relation, relational contact, based on how I am, softens their fantasy. Love it. So it's it's got to come from me first. So when I come into the room, I have to bracket everything that came with me. So how do I do that? If something happened beforehand, I need to leave it at the front door, but also I need to be very close to what my needs are in the moment, because if I've got any need that's not met, it's going out and that everyone in their room is feeling it, because They're coming in to be seen, heard, felt, supported. That's what they come for. They don't come for postures. They think they're coming for postures, but it's not, yeah, that's contact. They want to they want to be able to feel what's happening. But if I'm got any unmet need there that is being projected out, so I need to be very close to what's happening to me. So if I don't know how to work inside and be close to this is my unmet need, and know how to meet that need to myself That's getting pulled from the student. And they drop, they close down. Nothing happens, fascinating. I don't know if I made that,

Todd McLaughlin: 13:28

yeah, very clear. Oh, I can, yeah. I mean, it's just probably one of the most exciting environments to be in in. I mean, it makes, I mean, I guess every environment is exciting to be in, but the yoga room just seems extra special in that regard.

Unknown: 13:44

Do you agree it is when it is when you bring a certain horizontal you're not hierarchical, you're horizontal, you're phenomenological. You are this is your phenomenological experience. This is mine, and I'm just naming what I see. I'm not judging, I'm not coercive, I'm not violent, I'm only I notice this, wondering what's happening for you. I notice when I come over embrace or I notice when you go into a backbend, your lower ribs do that, I'm wondering what happens there. And then they go into the body, and when they feel the body, it's like, wow, those ribs. I've never felt my ribs like that. And then that kind of level of contact and that level of safety without projection drops the system for something to come out, something fresh, something new, something that they may not have experienced before. But I can also come up against resistance too. So I've got to be with the resistance, which is another topic. Wow. Happening for you now,

Todd McLaughlin: 15:02

my next thought is, what came first, the chicken or the egg? No, okay, what came first Ashtanga Yoga or this type of Well, so are you a counselor or a psychologist or a psychiatrist, or what is your professional studies? Because you said you sit with people, yeah.

Unknown: 15:25

So I'm a gestalt therapist, so I've got a master's in Gestalt. Wow. Very cool, yeah. So I I sit with clients like I sit with clients every day, yes? So I sit with their world, and I'm deeply interested in how they make up their world, their lived space, what is happening not as a story, not the story you were told or that you made up, but a here, now, phenomenological experience. When I say this to you, I notice you look away, what happened then. Or when I say this to you, you change the subject, or you laugh, wondering where you went there, or I noticed you just completely disassociated from me when I asked you about this, what really happened? And so then they now have to explore what happened to me. Well, I didn't know that. So you're learning to work. You're not all learning to work on yourself. You're learning to work with yourself. How am I doing that? And how come I do that? And what does it remind me of? Because there's always something from the past coming forward into the present moment to stop you being here.

Todd McLaughlin: 16:41

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think that's that seems over. Have I lost you? No, it seems over low, overwhelmingly obvious, but not obvious at the same time. Do you know what I mean, like as you're I mean, I do notice that my past has a huge effect on my present. So I mean to so then I'm curious, did you start to go into your master's work in this field prior to beginning to practice yoga, or did you start in the yoga world and then get fascinated and by the psychology of it all, and then go and go into the college field.

Unknown: 17:27

I I came to yoga as a heroin addict. So I came to ashtanga yoga as a heroin addict, a bulimic and an anorexic. Okay, so the found that the structure, the reliable vessel that is Ashtanga Yoga, the form, the structure, the daily cleaned up my act, but then I just brought that same addictive pattern into the practice, so still doing all my harming patterns of anorexia and Bolivia, just not heroin in the Ashtanga method. So it was ripping me apart as I bumped into myself every day. Everything was coming up, every every thought, every feeling, all my past, was all coming up to the surface, so it churned it, but then I didn't have anywhere to go. I didn't know what to do that. So I was getting worse. Was getting more bulimic, more anorexic. Drugs dropped away, but more bulimic, more anorexic, and my beautiful yoga teacher at the time Mark told me, he said to me, you need to go and see this lady. So he handed me a gestalt therapy card, and I went to her, and then Gestalt helped me to live through what I was going through. It gave me the inter related principles to learn to work with myself and to learn to support myself inside, rather than projecting all of my unmet needs and all my unfinished business onto my husband and the World. So Ashtanga a mess. Ashtanga another mess. Gestalt, another mess, still messing it up. But listen, hurting myself less and hurting less people. So that's the main thing.

Todd McLaughlin: 19:32

Love it. Santina,

Unknown: 19:35

beautiful. The two work together because the standard is a laboratory. Everything's happening there. It's all coming to the surface, but the Gestalt gave me that, the ethic of contact. How do I make contact with myself when all of this is coming up? How do I not abandon myself? How do I not shame myself? How do I deal. My grief, so he gave me the ethic to make contact with myself and the world, particularly my husband, who saved my ass. I'd be dead without him, but but as soon as everything came up, then our relationship got worse, so I had to find a way to be with him, and in finding a way to be with him and myself and the world?

Todd McLaughlin: 20:24

Yeah, wow, so much to dig in

Unknown: 20:29

on, but I'm still a mess.

Todd McLaughlin: 20:35

I guess that's that was a question I had a little little earlier in relation to bringing up the concept that, you know, our past is constantly formulating, dictating, causing us to, you know, experience things through that particular lens. Is there this idea that eventually that lens will get so clean and clear that that baggage, all of that old stuff, will truly not play a role anymore. Or does that just make life interesting and exciting, like once you acknowledge it? Because, I mean, I guess there's a point where you I could say, oh no, I've worked through all that stuff, and that stuff doesn't bother me and who I am today, and I'm just moving forward. I mean, I guess once I acknowledge, yeah, I went through a lot of stuff there, definitely feeling the effects of it. Currently, I'm seeing it pop up in different places every day. But at least if I acknowledge it, I just kind of, I just kind of accept or assume or expect that I will always have a little bit of a mess, and that's okay do. What do you think around that, that subject?

Unknown: 21:59

I Well, it's not my experience that it's gone away, and I don't know whether or not go away. What I do know, though, is now that when things arise, I have the capacity to be okay and to free myself internally from what is happening. So my shame is still there. But instead of binding myself more in my unworthiness, I'm okay. Here I am again. What am I going to do with this, just here, with this shame again? So I turn and face it. Here you are. What does this remind me of? This reminds me of that time when, but that's not happening now. That was then, and in this moment, that event is still here, now stopping me being with you. So in that moment, I have a point of freedom, a point of choice, to go. I don't need to do that, even though it's still here. So that capacity to witness and see that I have choice on how I want to meet the moment, that's freedom for me, even though it's still here.

Todd McLaughlin: 23:12

Yes, like I have a

Unknown: 23:13

choice in that moment. Like I'm with my parents, they drive me nuts, but I still have a choice. I don't have to meet them as a 14 year old, even though my shame is still coming up, my grief around their aging is still coming up, my my loss of what was is still there. So I can still meet this differently, because I now have the capacity to stay closer with what is happening. So I'm here with myself, right? That's happening. I have a choice here on how I want to respond to this, and that slowly starts getting reorganizing my entire nervous system, like it's okay, I'm alright. I can meet this, meet this, rather than doing all of that to try and meet this, yeah,

Todd McLaughlin: 24:08

I like to earlier when you said that part of the structure of this particular angle of therapy is to, I think you said to not try to change who we are, you know, like, there's a sense of like, I've got to change, I've got to fix, I've got to fix this broken thing inside of me now, and to create a space where I don't even or that's not the mantra I'm telling myself, where it's like, I don't have to fix This or That. Taking that pressure off just seems like that would be or is critical for then a space for healing to occur.

Unknown: 24:50

Yeah, so as soon as I witness or I experience something in my body, usually mine's shame, I'm not enough. Not that I didn't do enough. I'm fundamentally not enough. So when I experience that in my body, then I notice that I've interrupted my contact with myself. Okay? I'm experiencing shame, and what? How did I interrupt my contact? All right? Because this idea, we call it an interject in in Gestalt, this introject from the past, this idea, this message, this memory, came into the moment interrupted my contact with myself, and I felt shame. And then because I felt shame, I didn't do the podcast. Because I'm not good enough. I'm not doing this podcast. I'm not good enough. Whereas, if I can go, Oh, here you are. And interrupt the interruption, that's that's a fundamental Gestalt thing. An interruption comes in. I have to interrupt the interruption to move forward. So that's not changing myself. That's saying so close to myself to notice shame is here, but that's from the past. It's not now. That's an experience from the past, a structure from the past, interrupting my here, now lived experience with Todd, I have a choice here. I don't have to change. I can just stay here and slowly allow myself to move forward. So I'm close.

Todd McLaughlin: 26:32

Does that make sense? Oh, perfect sense. Oh, my gosh. I like it. I've never really I kept hearing the word and I kept hearing people saying they've gone to Gestalt therapy, and I just didn't really understand. I'm just very grateful for you explaining it, because it what a what a wonderful concept. Can you give me a little bit of the history of Gestalt is it is that the last name of the person that popularized this particular

Unknown: 27:04

method from, it's from a man called Fritz pearls. He was a German man, and Swedish, I think it was German, but he created this methodology. It's a method because it there's anything that has a field theory phenomenology and dialog is technically Gestalt, because it's those three interdependent principles that make up a gestalt. In essence is we move through this cycle of experience and we finish off gestalts. So something

Todd McLaughlin: 27:42

from the past, you were making a circle, just so people are listening. Some people be watching on YouTube. Some people will be listening and they won't. So you were, like, taking a circle with your finger, making a circle. So I guess I'm understanding that there's this, like, cyclical pattern that if we can start to observe the cyclical pattern that we do. Can you name those three things again? Phenomenal, field theory, ology,

Unknown: 28:11

so phenology, field theory is everything. The field is every field, my field, your field, is impacting the greater field. We're constantly impacted by the field. Yeah, okay. Phenomenology is what I see, what I hear, what I taste, what I touch. So I notice now your eyes are getting a little glazed over, or I noticed you've just moved in your chair. So your phenomenology is telling me something about you. Now I don't interpret that, because I don't know. The only way I know is to go into dialog, which is the third pillar, to find out what's happening for you. Then I know. So I don't project that you just sat back and moved away from me. I ask you what happened for you when you sat back, and then that gives the opportunity for the client, the student, to bring their meaning to me, so I'm then in their world. I didn't know if I answered your question, but it's those three pillars that come together that give us this ground on which to work in relationship, because I can't be in relationship if I'm not if I don't know about you, if I'm not curious about you, and I can't be in relationship if My past is always pressing forward to all of my unfinished business. If that's always pressing forward, I can't get to know you because I'm just trying to finish that off time. So that's the Gestalt. The Unfinished business from the past is coming forward in the moment for me to finish, and because I don't know how to work. Work. I don't finish it. I just keep on getting stuck, stuck, and I never finished the Gestalt. And that's why people's lives feel stuck, because all this past stuff is coming forward, but because they don't know how to work inside, they don't know how to finish the Gestalt. So once they finish the Gestalt, that little segment of their psychic field gets wrapped up, put into the past. They got more energy for the present moment. I went fast there, sorry, slow down.

Todd McLaughlin: 30:27

Oh, that's great. Fascinating Santina. And I think saved my life. It saved my life.

Unknown: 30:35

Yeah, I can feel that Ashtanga Gestalt, my husband, saved my life, because it allowed me to see what I'm doing, because if I don't know what I'm doing, I cannot make a different choice on how I want to meet myself in the world, it's Not everyone else, it's you. I know that's hard to hear. Everyone doesn't want to hear that. Everyone wants to think that it's everyone. It's not ever. It's you.

Todd McLaughlin: 31:09

It's not their fault, it's my fault,

Unknown: 31:11

it's you, because it's and that's not, that's not a reprimand. That is a I need to take full responsibility of what I'm doing. Yeah, so you that is full agency, full ownership, for this is my life. I'm ready to be in my life. I've talked a lot. I'll shut up.

Todd McLaughlin: 31:32

No, well, let me just let me add some more to give you something to respond with. I let me

Unknown: 31:39

ask you, please. How are you? How are you responding to this? I'm interested in you.

Todd McLaughlin: 31:45

I'm just, I mean, I I mean, I'll give you an example from today, and then I'll let you give me your some feedback. I started reading the Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant, and it's pretty deep and heavy, but there's this idea that he's proposing and is written in the 1700s which fascinates me, that there's such deep thinking going On for throughout forever and

Unknown: 32:21

makes me want to cry when you say that

Todd McLaughlin: 32:24

this word apriori, this idea that having an object. So I guess juxtapositioning between having knowledge about something that is either a priori, which is through intuition, and then there's this idea of knowing something through experience. So you can tell me about something, and I can learn about it, and I can think I know about it, but until I actually have an experience of it, it's two different types of knowledge about an object. So then if I just investigate the mug, like a coffee, like a tea cup, or a mug, or like a coffee cup, and I just take this one object, and I think I know this object because I've had the experience of holding it. Because then I was like, Well, wait, well, what object is there that I don't have experience with, and what would be my understanding of it prior to having experience? But then I started thinking, well, possibly there's objects that I've had experience with, but I haven't, I don't really know it, because I'm putting assumptions onto what I think it actually is. Like, what actually? Is it really and can I get into an a priori state, like a state of, I don't know yet what this object is, and what am I feeling from this object right now, and what, what information can I get from this mug, this cup, and clear out all this pre existing ideas that I have about this cup, and this is just one object. But then, as I was looking around the room this morning, when I was teaching, I was like, well, is a human an object? I guess it is because it's a physical beings, physicality, it's of the physical universe. And and then yeah, I started to say, Well, ah, okay, one particular student, I think I know this student, I think I know. But then I like, do I really know them? Do I really know, and could I even pretend to know what's going on for them right now? And so I'm just in this world right now, personally, of just feeling awe at trying to know and feel and really hear what's what each object is has for me. And. I guess it's unraveling my world in a way. You know, a lot of I guess I'm realizing how much assumption, how many assumptions I put on the things I think I know, and so I don't know. Did I make sense? Did that? Did that come through?

Unknown: 35:14

Absolutely, because what you're what happened for me when you spoke then, is you're working with phenomenology and you're working with dialog. So I'm I'm experiencing this cup, I'm experiencing it phenomenologically, but unless I go into dialog, I can't go into dialog with a cup. But I can in the sense that I'm inquiring, I'm interested. I'm interested in its shape. I'm wondering how it sits. How come it's got so that's the same as a student. When you watch a student on the mat, the organism is doing something, and that organism is doing something based on all these past experiences that it's trying to reorganize again and again and again and again in this form, which happens to be, I don't know, pashimoto, or whatever it is, and you're like, unless I go into dialog, and it's not chit chat, we're not chatting there. I'm asking specific questions on a phenomenology about that student, and I asked them a direct question. I'm wondering, what happens when you breathe into your back ribs and you can't feel l3 and you take them right into the body, and that level of contact allows something to happen. It's the contact, it's the contact, wow, and the inquiry, it's the awe, it's the life's happening and I'm not here. Where am I? I better start getting interested.

Todd McLaughlin: 37:06

Yeah. Fascinating. Santina, can you elucidate what your internal dialog or inquiry is when you don't engage verbal dialog, but you engage with physical contact dialog, such as an assist.

Unknown: 37:28

Yeah, so the first thing, the first thing I do is I always asking, Is it okay if I touch you? And I'm wondering if it's okay to touch you here, and it has come in, because as soon as I come in, their field is impacted, their organism is impacted, and they have a startle response, you know, like you can watch a student's startle response. It's like something happened from the past that's here now that they're not even usually aware of. And so my assists are just light touches, if anything, or even like just holding and letting the organism do what it needs to do, because the organism is always moving towards self regulation. If you hold enough safe space for it to do it, it's smarter than you. It's smarter than any assist, it's smarter than Ashtanga. It's smarter than anything you clearly have to be attuned enough and close enough to let it do its thing. And that level of, that level of attention, and that level of I'm going to start crying that level of honor. The student goes, thank you. And I go, I did nothing. They go, but thank you. I said I did nothing. They go, thank you. I go, yeah. All I did was go, you're all right, you can do it, yeah. And then, because the student wants to do it on their own, they don't want someone to do it for them. They think they want someone to do it for them, but I don't believe that every human wants to be free. They want to be free. They just want to know how it is they interrupt their freedom, and how they interrupt their freedom is how they interrupt their contact. I'm getting emotional. I better slow down.

Todd McLaughlin: 39:28

That's good. It's good. Yeah, I It's funny because, have I lost you? No, not at all. It's funny because when you said freedom, I had formulated a few questions, and then you, you know, and I sent them to you, and they're just a couple. And so the very first question that I formulated for you is, on your website, you describe teaching as quote, starting with freedom and ending with freedom. End quote, how did your personal journey lead you to this understanding, and how does the idea of freedom show up in your teaching today? So. That's where I thought, okay, maybe we'd start, but I knew we weren't going to need questions personally, because I just, I knew you were just going to be like an open book of information. And I was excited for that, but since you brought the word up freedom, and it triggered me to remember that that was the first question I was thinking I was going to ask you, can you talk a little bit more about this quote that I saw of starting with freedom and ending with freedom? And it makes very logical sense to me. But Can you expound a little further into this realm of freedom?

Unknown: 40:30

It's not about just doing what you want. That's not what I'm talking about. You can't just do what you want. It's not what it is. It's my capacity to stay close with myself inside so I'm free to notice what I'm doing, to stay with my grief, to stay with my shame, to stay with my jealousy, to stay with my envy, to stay with my resentment, to stay with my rage, to stay with everything that is inside of me, and to know that if I can stay there and I can watch it and turn towards it, that very act is an act of freedom, because as soon as I move away, it hasn't gone anywhere. It's still there. But if I just turn towards it and go right here, what do you got to tell me? And as soon as it delivers, then you've got a choice. As soon as you've got a choice, you're free.

Todd McLaughlin: 41:34

That's beautiful.

Unknown: 41:38

But if you don't turn towards it and watch and witness. It's like Krishnamurti. I love Krishnamurti because he's he teaches you just true freedom. That the very fact that I stopped running and I just turned clearly towards what is in that moment, the resistance towards myself drops. Then once I realize how locked up I am inside, and then I start working the Gestalt method. Then I see that I'm free to do whatever I want in here. You that takes a long time to get there. Yeah, that's right, it takes a lifetime, yeah. But if you're close and you see and you watch, you can say to yourself, I'm not doing that, and I'm not doing that. I don't have to do that. But if there's a story and interject something from the past, or an unfinished business from the past coming forward, you will never give yourself your freedom not to do that, because it's just here. What are you doing here? Because what you're doing here is showing up here. Yes, I don't know if I'm making any sense?

Todd McLaughlin: 43:20

Yeah, no, you're doing amazing, Santina. I my biggest thought that just popped in as you're talking is correct me, if I'm wrong, I heard from Esther, she said Santina has an advanced practice. First, second, third, fourth. Series. Is that true? Done.

Unknown: 43:44

All done. True? Okay, I'm not certified, though. I'm not certified to teach, yeah, understood third or fourth, but I've done all the end to the end of fourth. It cleaned me up.

Todd McLaughlin: 43:55

Since, you know, holy cow, holy cow. That's crazy. That's crazy, man.

Unknown: 43:59

It cleaned me like I had this teacher. Mark took me. I love him so much. He brought me through primary to fourth series in almost four or five years. He just and it cleaned up all of the heroin gone. It made me messy with a with anorexia and bulimia, but it cleaned up all the Heron because that level of intensity every day, every day, every day, the form that his contact with me, there was nowhere for the nervous system to hide. And then Gestalt helped me live through that. So yeah, I did. I did all that, but I don't practice third or fourth anymore. Only primary and second.

Todd McLaughlin: 44:49

Can you tell me why it's better for me? Ah,

Unknown: 44:54

third series was making me too tired. I couldn't, I couldn't. Didn't hold down third series practice every day and work with the Gestalt students the way I want to work with because I'm just tired. I just got tired. I dropped I really dropped that when shadd passed, I went, I'm not doing third series anymore. He's gone. I don't have to perform. I true. It was like, it was like, I can just put that backpack off. I don't need to go to my saw and perform third series again, I'd done it. It had done its job. It penetrated enough. It finished. You know, I don't need to do that anymore, and I still miss him. That's another story. So I don't practice third series and I don't practice fourth series anymore. I miss it, but I don't need it. I miss I miss the rush, but I don't, I don't miss the grind.

Todd McLaughlin: 46:41

What type of physical health are your tissues currently good?

Unknown: 46:54

They're pretty good. Is that what you're asking? Like, everything's good. I don't want to

Todd McLaughlin: 46:59

like, knees are happy, ankles are happy. Everything's fine.

Unknown: 47:02

Ankles are happy. The only thing that's happy is always this. My heart does, my does. My emotional heart is always, yeah, okay, but my body's good, yeah. You know why? Because I got taught really well, not through Mark Todd me through this lady nicking off. So Mark taught me the series.

Todd McLaughlin: 47:23

What is Mark's last name?

Unknown: 47:25

Mark togney, t, O, g, n, i, he's on the Gold Coast, Australia. Cool. Nicky Knopf. This woman taught me how to practice they're different things. Can you elucidate? Yeah. So Mark taught me the series there every day, sometimes twice a day, for 10 years. But in between that, he said to me, you need to go to Nikki Knopf, which was his teacher. So I would travel to her every year, and she would teach me alignment. This goes here, that goes there. You're not doing this. You can't feel that you're dead there. So she gave it to me. She taught me how to practice. And then over the years, I continue to teach myself how to practice, like how part of the bone rhythm works, what happens to my spine, what goes on in my jaw, what's going on in my lungs? What's my what? How do I collapse there? How do I brace? There's this emotional anatomy that came from going that deeply into the body. So she taught me how to keep my body safe, and then also through my own study. So I was lucky. I've been lucky all around really,

Todd McLaughlin: 48:42

yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, that is so cool.

Unknown: 48:48

I lucky to have my husband, LUCKY TO FIND Ashtanga, lucky to have good teachers, LUCKY TO FIND Gestalt, just lucky,

Todd McLaughlin: 48:54

yeah, yeah. Do Can you talk a little bit more about luck? Do you believe in a higher power?

Unknown: 49:04

Yes, absolutely. I don't believe there's any luck.

Todd McLaughlin: 49:07

So that's where I wanted to bring you. Yeah,

Unknown: 49:10

I don't believe in luck, but seems like I was lucky, you know, blessed. I don't know what.

Todd McLaughlin: 49:14

Okay, good, good. Yeah. I just wanted to see where you're oriented in that, in that regard, and then, okay, you have students now who are maybe you have a student that's that rich, Asana D and where are you now? And your thoughts in your relation to I mean, clearly your your focus is bringing this presence and awareness and attention into the room so that the student can explore their own bodies, their minds, their past, their present, and settle into the natural rhythm of the organism and let the organism organize itself naturally and create A very comfortable space for this to all happen. And the student gets to Marty Asana D and is attempting to bind, and they're doing some struggle, and you're noticing, I don't know if you were to push a lot harder on that, and the way the knees are, I wonder if that's going to be good for that particular individual. Where are your thoughts at with this idea of more and more poses, and and and currently where maybe, in theory, all you need is one pose, and you could just experience the entire totality of the yoga philosophy, experience and enlightenment and Samadhi and all that great stuff, just with one particular pose. How do you. Organize that in relationship to teaching individuals.

Unknown: 50:48

So if you're asking me about that individual, specifically, what, what would I do? Is that what you're asking

Todd McLaughlin: 50:53

I guess I'm just real. Let me, let me rephrase this. I had somebody once before say, I wonder if people that are practicing 430s or more fourth series are more spiritually enlightened because the postures themselves are so much more difficult that does it attune their nervous system in some way where they're picking up on some sort of higher vibration? And my answer, or thought and my thoughts are, is that I don't really know that one pose is more spiritually advanced than another. It's just a posture. So it's all about the mind and where how we orientate ourselves. So my answer was, I really don't think so, but I said I've explored a little bit down the road, and I can't really say that's made me any more spiritually advanced or no. So that's why I'd base my but I can't answer that question, because I haven't practiced that far down the road. So I guess I wanted to just kind of understand your perspective having gone through that journey to like what seems like the end of the road, the end of four series. And what are your thoughts in relation to just trying to get a student to understand that they don't have to strive so hard to go so far down the road, because they're already on the road, and the road is good, whatever part of the road you're on, if you can get in the right

Unknown: 52:10

frame of mind, I agree with you completely there. I'll answer this in two parts. My journey with fourth series was necessary because I needed that level of penetration in the body to work through a level of density to get me to feel something.

Todd McLaughlin: 52:28

Wow, that's fine. I just couldn't.

Unknown: 52:30

I just couldn't feel anything because I just done so many drugs and so much sexual prostitution, I was just numb so I could do all those postures and feel nothing. Wow, amazing. And it wasn't till I got to Nikki north, where she looked at me and she went, fascinating. Can do all these postures, but you don't know how to do anything. And she pulled me straight back to her foundation series, and she kept me there for three years.

Todd McLaughlin: 53:00

So yeah, I think that.

Unknown: 53:01

I think that. I think that if you practice, because when I practice that, that fourth level, fourth level, fourth series, I was constantly like, felt like I was on LSD all the time. Just wow. So something definitely happens. Something definitely happens in the pelvic floor, in the psoas in the diaphragm to awaken something. But similarly, you can have that level of penetration in much Asana D with the right understanding of the body, the right instructions and the right level of safety for you to experience something. But even before then, I would go, I'm getting excited. Slow down. I would, I just get a bit excited before I even go to New chasna D I would go into dialog with this student. Go, do you what's your idea here? Do you really want to do nudity? And I would see the importance level. If this is really important to you, I'm happy to help you, and I want you to check out really what it means to you. So where are they in it? Because I don't want to start ripping things away from people if it's important for them, so I need to put their needs first above my projections of what I think they need. So if they really want it, I'm going to give it to you. Let me show you how to do it, the safest way you can do it, given your current configuration, because it's important to you. I'm not taken away, but I want you to ask the question, what it is for you to get Maruti Asana D because that's a whole different dialog.

Todd McLaughlin: 54:57

I agree. Have you seen a lot of I'm gonna pick the word misalignment in regards to this idea in your travels through the ishtanga world,

Unknown: 55:17

yes, yes. People, yes. People are just good answer, doing some crazy shit, just doing crazy shit. I'm just like, this is gonna end in destruction, man. But it's all right. It's all right because you. It's all right because you, if you really feel like this style of suffering is for you, you have to go down that journey. And sometime, at some point, you suffer enough that you'll. Find the right teacher who will teach you what you really need. I trust that. Yeah, so I don't, it's like, if you you'll find it. I don't project it's like, sometimes I just look away and go, Oh no, this is gonna end in tragedy, but it's okay.

Todd McLaughlin: 56:02

Santina, would you recommend someone who the last thing in the world they think they need is to go see a therapist? Would you recommend even someone who doesn't even think they need therapy to go to a gestalt session with someone who is a professional in that field, just to experience it once.

Unknown: 56:28

Yes, cool, yes. Just go and experience what it is to be in a horizontal relationship with someone who's not trying to push anything on on you to just sit in your here, in our presence and your phenomenology, you'll be so uncomfortable. You will be so uncomfortable, but you will discover a fresh fish. You will discover something lively underneath you, a vitality, something underneath your resistance that's vital, that wants to come out, and slowly you'll start to become quietly interested in other aspects of yourself that you may never have touched before, very cool

Todd McLaughlin: 57:11

as a professional, and I believe most of us that are Professional at something, whether it's career or hobby, strives to keep learning growing and just perfecting and learning and just getting better at what we do. How could you become better? As a gestalt therapist, continue working your own personal

Unknown: 57:45

so as a gestalt therapist, every Gestalt therapist, to keep their license, has to sit in group. So we sit in a gestalt group where we're all learning to work with our own processes. Has to have constant supervision, someone looking at their work, what they're doing, and constantly learning to work with their own process so they are deeply attuned to what is going on inside of them, so they're free enough to sit with another. So we're every Gestalt therapist is constantly has to do a certain level of group work, supervision and personal work just to keep their license. But the thing is, is that you want to do it. It's not like you're obliged to do it. You get so interested in your inner life. You're like, I need to work on that. Very cool. I know that that's very lively, and I'm not through that, so I need to work on that. So there's excitement, there's devotion, there's consecration in this is my life. This is my work. I want to do this because it's a way of life. Like Ashtanga is a way of life, Gestalt is a way of life. It's getting really human.

Todd McLaughlin: 58:58

And would you agree that there's a similar ethos in the world of Ashtanga? That's something that I always thought was fairly fascinating about the Ashtanga community and world, is that as a teacher, was always encouraged you continue to practice, and that your teaching will stem from the experience you have as a practitioner. Because I find a lot of folks will want to come to a yoga teacher training program, and they don't really want to practice yoga. I kind of want to learn how to be a teacher, but they're not fascinated by the practicing laboratory. And so I was appreciated in the stronger world that there was this, like you got to do a lot of practice first. Don't worry about teaching until you start practicing and get to know yourself. So it sounds like Gestalt has situated it's organized its principles around a similar sort of structure. And it seems like, in my opinion, that that is just a very rational and logical way to structure almost any learning and teaching environment. Profession. You got to get into it. First, you got to do some work, and then you have something to offer other people, because you've been through the fire. Did that all you agree. You're nodding your head. So I'm guessing,

Unknown: 1:00:12

absolutely, yeah, absolutely, like, like, ultimately, I need to work out who I am, what I bring, what stops me being human and present with people how my unmet needs. It doesn't matter whether you're running a corporation or whether you're running a miso program or whether you're having a child, it's the same thing. Who am I? What do I do? What are my unmet needs? What's my unfinished business? And how is that stopping me being here? Yeah, because if I'm not here, I'm not in life. And that from that foundation, I can run a corporation, I can run a Mysore program, I can have a child. I can do what I want to do, because it's about my inner process. What is happening?

Todd McLaughlin: 1:01:01

Yes, how cool, man, you're the first person. I mean, I chat with yoga peeps all the time. First one that I've met that's integrated Gestalt therapy with their ashtanga yoga practice and teaching. So what a cool combination. I like this. I'm curious. I want to learn more. I want to I want to go to a gestalt therapy session. I'm just so grateful to have this doorway open up for me. I feel like I have a lot to lot to learn, and I could really benefit from everything. You're the way you're laying this out, it just makes really good sense to me, and I am so thankful Santina, you know, I know we booked an hour, and I want to be respectful of your time coming real close to it. And I guess, let me ask you one more question, if we were to do a follow up interview, what subject line should we go down that potentially we did not cover during this conversation that you think would be a value or interest to our listeners.

Unknown: 1:02:08

Yeah, I would like to look at emotional anatomy. How is the emotional anatomy of the student? Let's call call it an organism, because it's an organization. The student in front of you is a is an organization of how they've experienced their life. Look at how that organization is presenting itself, and how do I meet it? How do I meet it without violence, without projection, in a horizontal relationship to provide enough safety for that organism to experience something else of themselves. That's I just got goosebumps, because if, if you learn that man, that's the greatest gift you can give someone enough space and enough safety for them to feel safe enough to organize, reorganize how they are, to at least look at how they are and what they're doing and having choice about what they're doing. Now, that's not easy. That's that's that takes a lot time. It takes commitment. I start crying. Takes time. It takes commitment. It takes attention. It takes love like you gotta You gotta love, you gotta love life. You gotta go. Wow, this is happening, amazing. You gotta have that capacity to go. I didn't know this was possible. I didn't know that I had the eyes to see this? Yes, I'm sorry that I'm emotional, because that that brings something else in me that makes me alive.

Todd McLaughlin: 1:03:54

Thank you for being emotional. I love it. I like that you're emotional. It's important. I think it's real. Thank you so much. Would you be open to doing a follow up discussion on my show sometime where we tackle that particular subject?

Unknown: 1:04:08

Yes, let's do it. I think it's a lively subject, and it's the work that I love doing, and it's the work I believe you own that it's the work I believe people need, and not people need the field in which people can work, that people want to learn to work, not postures, work inside, yeah, yes, yeah, I need to learn how to work inside, not on me with myself.

Todd McLaughlin: 1:04:39

Yes, well, amazing. Santina, wow, how amazing you're you're really just very talented and and open. And I just really enjoyed this. And I could, I can feel it, you know, it's, it was a for me, the the introduction process, than the time before the introduction to this moment where we meet, and then to come to the finality or the conclusion of our, you know, this whole, like little, little process that we you and I just went through. It's just so fun for me. I absolutely love it. And I could, you know, as I was reading your material and looking at you and watching your social and all that sort of stuff. I just was like, Oh, I can't wait. I was just so excited all day today, so I thank you, and I can't wait to do our follow up discussion. And is there any final words of conclusion that you'd like to add here at the very end?

Unknown: 1:05:42

Yeah, you know, you, you can, you can find freedom in yourself. Takes take some time that you can find a level of freedom in yourself, where you can experience who you are, a new in any moment, and you can have more choice in your life than you think you have, because it comes down to it comes down to this. You want to be free. You think you want the posture. It's not the posture. If you want internal freedom, you don't. You don't want the past to be continually stopping your here now presence with yourself. That's my own projection. But if you look deeply, you want to be free. Now. You can't be free if you're always in the same unfinished business. There's many things that I would want to say, but that's what came

Todd McLaughlin: 1:06:48

all right. Oh man, okay, yeah, that was brilliant. And thank you Esther for introducing us, and thank you Santina, and thank you listener for just being you and being here and awesome. We love you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, what do you think? Isn't she amazing? I can't wait to do episode number, Second Edition with Santina. Remember you got to go check her out on her website. I N, S, a, n, y, O, G, a.com, insania, insan yoga.com, and remember, you can visit us on our website, native yoga center.com, there's links in the description. Click them. Check us out. Follow say hello, leave a rating, send it. Share it with your friends. Really hope you enjoyed this. Give us some feedback. Reach out to Santina. Tell her what you think you send her an email, sign up on her newsletter, on her website. I really hope that one day I get a chance to practice with her in person, but this is the next best thing, and I hope you feel the same that you got a glimpse into the world of Santina and and how special she is and what she has to offer. So on that note, thanks again for listening. And every Friday, I release an episode, so we'll be back. All right, take care, enjoy. Native yoga. Todd cast is produced by myself. The theme music is dreamed up by Bryce Allen. If you like this show, let me know if there's room for improvement. I want to hear that too. We are curious to know what you think and what you want more of what I can improve. And if you have ideas for future guests or topics, please send us your thoughts to info at Native yoga center. You can find us at Native yoga center.com, and hey, if you did like this episode, share it with your friends, rate it and review and join us next time.

Unknown: 1:09:04

Well, you know, you.