Embodiment Matters Podcast – Détails, épisodes et analyse

In this conversation/ transmission we were so honored to hear Dr. Jaiya John pour forth from the depths of his heart and soul in a way that can’t help but touch your own.  We were blessed to hear from Jaiya about his background and how he went from being shy and voiceless to a fully-dilated voice for Love. We were blessed to hear him read passages from several of his extraordinary books including Freedom: Medicine Words for your Brave Revolution; All These Rivers and You Chose Love; and Dear Artist: A Love Letter. Carl and I also each read a short excerpt from his forthcoming book(s) We Birth Freedom at Dawn.

We are so grateful for his generosity of spirit, his gorgeous writings, and his presence in our lives. His love and courage are contagious. Our wish is that all who listen become infected and go on to spread this love and courage in your own communities.

What an honor to share a conversation with the extraordinary soul, poet, teacher, writer, Dr. Jaiya John.

Please find more about him, his books, his poetry gatherings, his newsletter, his Instagram and more at www.jaiyajohn.com

Toward the end of our conversation, Jaiya mentions our dear heart-friend Alexandre Jodun of ahealingbridge.com

If you loved this podcast, please share it far and wide!

Dear friends,   It is such a pleasure to share this conversation with Zuza Gonçalves.   I met Zuza at the Bobby McFerrin Circlesongs School, and was so moved by his presence, his kindness, the way he moved around the room, and how he led us in movement, song and body-percussion. It felt to me like original human music.   Zuza has been exploring alternative ways to collective music making for more than 20 years, integrating vocal improvisation, body percussion, movement, dialogue, cooperative practices and collaborative methodologies to  promote experiences where music and human connection are interconnected and feed off each other.   Born and raised in São Paulo, Brazil, Zuza has a bachelor’s degree in Music (composing and conducting) and a graduate degree in the Pedagogy of Cooperation.  He is the co-creator of Música do Círculo, part of the faculty at Bobby McFerrin's Circlesongs School, at IBMF (Ghana edition) and travels internationally for festivals and workshops on Música do Circulo.   In our conversation, we speak about vocal improvisation as ancestral practice, and how we are all musical by nature. We speak about the challenges that arise when we outsource our musicality to a small number of perfomers, and don't experience ourselves as being a part of music being made in daily life.   We also explore the value of play and improvisation, an how essential these qualities are for learning, and meeting challenging times, and how rarely modern adults get to experience play and improvisation.    Zuza also guides us all in a wonderful improv practice to sing and play along with.    To find our more about Música do Círculo and the upcoming retreats and trainings you can visit https://www.musicadocirculo.com   To find out more about the Circlesongs School you can visit https://circlesongs.com   Also Zuza mentions The Well, a global vocal improvisation network https://thewellvocal.com   And here are links to other circlesongs/ vocal improv resources:   http://www.judivinar.com https://www.rhiannonmusic.com https://gaelaubrit.com http://www.joeyblake.com https://www.destaniwolf.com https://www.christianekaram.com http://www.rizumik.com/ https://www.jaospina.com https://www.varijashree.com https://www.goussycelestin.com/works https://vocaltoning.net

Embodying Prayer and Soul Activism

In this beautiful conversation, I speak to poet, facilitator and soul activist Nan Seymour, who also happens to be one of my dearest friends.

We take as a springboard for our conversation Nan’s recently published book of poems called prayers not meant for heaven.

Nan weaves several of her poems throughout the conversation and they’re beautiful.

We talk about bio-cultural restoration, about the importance of writing and reading during these times, about the importance of praise and noticing the ways in which we’re awestruck.

We also share a very candid discussion about Nan’s love of Jesus as her first radical social justice teacher. There’s so much goodness and inspiration here and I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as we did!

You can order Nan’s book here https://www.toadhalleditions.ink/prayers-not-meant

You can read and/or participate in Nan’s poetic project in support of Great Salt Lake here  https://nanseymour.com/blog/item/141-irreplaceable-a-1700-line-praise-poem-in-the-making

You can learn more and sign up for a session of River Writing here

https://riverwriting.com/

And you’ll find much more inspiration at Nan’s website here https://nanseymour.com/

Nan mentions our shared mentor Deena Metzger http://deenametzger.net/

And our recent podcast with her https://embodimentmatters.com/i-wish-you-heartbreak-an-exploration-of-the-19-ways-with-deena-metzger/

You can take a virtual tour of the church we talked about here - watch the video showing you all the radical dancing saints! https://www.saintgregorys.org/the-dancing-saints.html

A little more about Nan in her own words:

“I provide narrative encouragement.

In 2015 I created River Writing to foster voice and authentic connection. I delight in how this practice challenges the tyranny of perfectionism and breaks through walls of isolation.

I've led scores of oral storytelling workshops for people from all walks of life. Everyone has stories no one else can tell. I'm devoted to helping folks find, shine, and share them. We never know who our stories are for. I believe in saying the truest things we can say.

My debut poetry collection, prayers not meant for heaven has recently been published by Toad Hall Editions. The poems, written primarily during the pandemic, are prayers meant for the earth and for each other. I hope they will vine around us here on the ground, leaving us more knowingly and gladly intertwined.

Count me deeply smitten with life in all forms including scrub oak forests, vultures, and wild violets. I'm currently writing about the imperiled ecosystem of the Great Salt Lake, my near neighbor. I'm deeply concerned about the future life of stromatolites, brine shrimp, brine flies, and the entire feathered citizenry of the Pacific Coast flyway. I'm praying with my pen, writing about the lake with the hope that we will cease diverting her waters in time.

The chambers of my heart are occupied by my daughter Beatrice, my love Mustafa, River Writers, and Sophie, my border collie/lab companion. I'm devoted to community and dare to hope that our collective participation in human evolution is tipping the balance of the cosmos towards kindness and even love.”

Liam Bowler is a teacher, writer, father, bodyworker and hosts the Body Awake Podcast. 

 

He is the author of A Creator’s Companion, a beautiful book that explores the many elements of the process of creativity. 

 

In our conversation, we speak about embodiment, and embodiment as relationship, and how each of our understandings of embodiment has evolved over the years. 

 

We reflect together about creativity, and the necessity of courtship with the creative process. We speak about how creativity is not limited to those who are identified as artists, but how becoming truly becoming yourself, finding your voice is an act of creation. 

 

We speak of intimacy and not knowing, and what feels most important in the times in which we live. 

 

You can find out more about Liam, and his work and teaching at thebodyawake.com

Ariella is a beekeeper, writer, teacher, musician and mother living in Northern California. Her work with honey bees came through a lifelong interest in human connection with the non-human world.  She is a graduate of the Lyceum, a European shamanic pathway with the bee and the serpent as its central motifs.  Within this tradition, she is trained in the healing and seership modality known as the Pollen Method.  Her work is a fusion of her love for the natural world and embodied, womb-centric practices.  

 

Ariella seeks to foster a deeper relationship between humans and the natural world through honey bees, seeing the bee as a bridge species between our domestic lives and the wild, both within and around us. She is a lover of wild places, liminal spaces and the song of the land.  She teaches shamanic dreamwork, natural beekeeping, and women's retreats all guided by the honeyed wisdom of the serpent and the bee.

 

You can find more about her work at www.honeybeewild.com and on instagram at beekeepinginskirts. 

 

Below is the text of a beautiful post of hers I read from a recent Instagram post. You’ll see why I and many others are so enamored with her writings. 

 

“It's not really about beekeeping. This love affair. This devotion to doing it better. To listening. To finding another route that gives and heals, instead of takes. We can call it beekeeping, because, surely, there are some tricks of the trade, some caring for the bees in their boxes that we can learn. But really, it's about your roots comingling with the mycelia. Really it's about your tears dripping into the river. Really it's about the moon dipping into your dreams and curling around a whispered tune you think you remember from long ago. It's not even about saving, unless the saving is you and you are the forest, and the forest is the sea, and the sea is the stars.⠀

⠀

What it's about, is Weaving. ⠀

Reweaving. Rewilding. Restoring. Revivifying. ⠀

It's about Listening. ⠀

Ear to the hive. Womb to the earth. ⠀

It's about Grief and Exaltation. ⠀

Sting in your heart, honey on your lips.⠀

It's about Remembering.”

 

References: 

 

In our conversation we spoke about the work of mythologist Martin Shaw and specifically this trailer for his book Scatterlings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0T7UP1U1Ts

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57195435-scatterlings

 

And Ari also referred to the writings of Joanna Macy. I recommend any of her work (or my classes where we dive into it!) including Active Hope, 

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13235686-active-hope

World as Lover World as Self, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/536524.World_as_Lover_World_as_Self

A Wild Love for the World. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/51551987-a-wild-love-for-the-world

 

I also love this video with Joanna. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzmjF1jE2K0 

 

I also referred to the book, Native Science, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1049116.Native_Science

 

You can find more about the Lyceum in which Ariella studied for a decade here: https://sacredtrust.org/workshops/pollen/

We Were Made For These Times: A conversation with Kaira Jewel Lingo

 

In this conversation with Kaira, we explore many rich topics including:

 

• embodiment and mindfulness as not separate
• her new book We Were Made For These Times
• the practice of coming home to ourselves
• applying these teachings in the mess of real life rather than just a monastic situation
• social justice and mindfulness and how each of these need each other
• the mantras of True Love from Thich Nhat Hanh
• powerful teachings from 2 monks from Plum Village who attended COP26
• the powerful practice of kissing the earth with your feet
• layered mindfulness
• and so much more

 

Kaira Jewel Lingo began practicing mindfulness in 1997 and teaches Buddhist meditation, secular mindfulness, and compassion internationally. After living as an ordained nun for 15 years in Thich Nhat Hanh’s monastic community, Kaira Jewel teaches in the Zen lineage and the Vipassana tradition, at the intersection of racial, climate and social justice with a focus on activists, Black/Indigenous/People of Color, artists, educators, families, and youth. Now based in New York, she offers spiritual mentoring to individuals and groups. She is author of the just released We Were Made for These Times: Skilfully Moving through Change, Loss and Disruption from Parallax Press. Visit kairajewel.com to learn more. 

 

Kaira is offering a retreat Dec 4 and 5, 2021, through Spirit Rock, on the same title as my new book: https://spirit-rock.secure.retreat.guru/program/we-were-made-for-these-times-kj1m21/?_ga=2.185343337.1993561752.1633760566-881770598.1633760566&lang=en

 

Along with her partner who is an Episcopal priest, she is offering a new Buddhist Christian community of study, practice and action that meets monthly. People can sign up here if they'd like more info. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSftoybrmY3MixFXo2qrFxGajc2p3bn82WPeqbuRoRWKhwkNcg/viewform

 

 

 

In this rich conversation with wise woman Pat McCabe we explore many topics including 

 

• embodiment as a core practice of decolonization and her trouble with the word “decolonizing” 
• healing after cultural severance through Indian boarding schools in family history and the power of growing a multi-faceted identity
• the importance of including the body in prayer (in her case through sweat lodge ceremony)
• The question: How do human beings live in such a way that we can support other life to thrive - as do other members in the web of life? 
• How thinking 7 generations ahead slows us down in our decision making
• Preparing ourselves to meet the times. Grappling with this question: “Is it too late and what should we be doing?”
• Pat’s hope for the emergence of the sacred masculine and its role in supporting the sacred feminine eros to emerge. Both are such powerful forces! 
• the need for radical self love and radical self trust
• stepping out of the power over paradigm. 
• The importance of encouraging the behavior we want to see more of - rather than nitpicking each other’s imperfections. 
• The recognition that we can’t eat money, as Chief Seattle said - and Pat’s work to support folks in returning money to the flow of life to support earth healing. How would it be to have zeros in your bank account while the earth is dying? To realize in retrospect that you could have done something about it. 

 

 

https://www.patmccabe.net/ 

 

Her primary work at the moment is:

• The reconciliation between the masculine and feminine, Men's Nation and Women's Nation

• Remembering, recreating or creating anew a narrative for the Sacred Masculine

• Addressing the Archetypal Wounding that occurred in our misunderstanding and abuse of technology in prayer, ceremony and science

Embodying Spontaneity: A Conversation With Jozef Frucek of Fighting Monkey

 

In conversation, I had the great pleasure of speaking with Jozef Frucek. He and Linda Kapetanea are the creators of Fighting Monkey, which is a beautiful system that weaves together movement, learning, communication, creativity, improvisation and a re-imagination of the process and experience of aging. 

 

Jozef has studied deeply in Chinese medicine and martial arts along with having advanced degrees in voice and movement. He and Linda teach at Universities and dance and performance companies around the world. 

 

I had followed Fighting Monkey for many years in the natural movement world, and was able take some classes with Jozef when they began teaching online during the pandemic. I was reminded of a line from one of our Feldenkrais teachers, Ruthy Alon, who coined the term “the grammar of spontaneity.” I find that Fighting Monkey helps to grow a grammar of spontaneous, natural, dynamic movement that weaves together essential principles from many movement traditions.  

 

In our conversation, Jozef and I speak about how growing our spontaneity and creativity in movement increases our sense of creativity and spontaneity in how we live, how we think, how we speak, and express ourselves. We also discuss how essential new ways of thinking and participating in the world are, given the immense challenges we face in these times.

We speak of the importance of systems based practice when it comes to movement and to life.

We discuss the importance of play in learning, and how many adults forget how to learn and play as we age. We also look at the aging process, and how the manner in which we approach our movement shapes how we approach our aging process.

You can find more about Jozef, Linda and Fighting Monkey at fightingmonkey.net

I Wish You Heartbreak - An Exploration of the 19 Ways with Deena Metzger

 

We’re so grateful and honored to begin the 3rd season of the Embodiment Matters podcast by sharing with you this rich conversation with wise elder Deena Metzger. 

 

A poet, novelist, essayist, storyteller, teacher, healer and medicine woman who has taught and counseled for over fifty years, in the process of which she has developed therapies which creatively address life threatening diseases, spiritual and emotional crises, as well as community, political and environmental disintegration.

 

Deena has spent a lifetime investigating Story as a form of knowing and healing. 

She conducts training groups on the spiritual, creative, political and ethical aspects of healing and peacemaking, individual, community and global, drawing deeply on alliance with spirit, indigenous teachings and the many wisdom traditions. You can read a longer story about Deena’s extraordinary life here http://deenametzger.net/bio/

 

Deena teaches powerfully through asking challenging questions, and we have been grateful to be her students for several years.

 

Her current work is envisioning a new future for all beings. Considering new forms of peacemaking, healing, and sanctuary for all beings is encoded in the 19 Ways to a Viable Future for All Beings. Essential to the 19 Ways are respecting and restoring Indigenous ways, the Pathless Path, and the No Enemy Way. Deena works with writers to develop the literary voices essential for this time and she is a mentor to those who are seeking their own paths to be healing presences for the future. For many years Deena has lived at the end of the road at the edge of the wild in Topanga, California, with various animal companions. 

 

In this conversation we explore Deena’s articulation of the 19 Ways. We talk about working with dreams not in a personal, psychological way, but in a communal way. We talk about what she wishes for all of us - and the answer might surprise you. We explore illness as a messenger - through her own personal history with cancer as well as the covid 19 pandemic. I also share a powerful story of an experience with Deena many years ago which changed my life in a powerful way and which had both of us in tears. We hope you enjoy this clarion call from a wise elder to live differently and to meet these times with courage, community, and heart. 

 

Some relevant links: 

Deena’s Website: http://deenametzger.net/

The 19 Ways: http://deenametzger.net/19-ways/

This powerful poster of Deena made decades ago http://deenametzger.net/the-poster/

A list of Deena’s published works: http://deenametzger.net/published-works-3/

Deena mentions this book, Blackfoot Physics, in our conversation 

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/110248.Blackfoot_Physics

Greetings Listener friends, 

 

We are delighted to share with you our recent conversation with Langston Kahn.

 

Langston Kahn is a black, queer teacher and shamanic practitioner who specializes in radical human transformation, ancestral healing, and restoring an authentic relationship with our emotions.

He stands firmly at the crossroads; his practice informed by somatic modalities, contemporary shamanic traditions, initiations into traditions of the African diaspora, and his helping spirits and ancestors weaving it all together.

Langston gives workshops and lectures internationally, in person and online. He serves in the leadership by council of the Last Mask Community, a collective of people striving to live in alignment with ancient shamanic principles in service of personal and collective liberation.

He is the author of Deep Liberation: Shamanic Teachings for Reclaiming Wholeness in a Culture of Trauma. 

Langston lives in the ancestral lands of the Lenape, Rockaway and Canarsie also known as New York City. 

In our conversation we dive into a wide range of topics:

We speak about embodiment, and Langston’s perspective of embodiment as the willingness to be in a state of flux, and change, and to not get stuck on one story of who we are. 

We explore the practice of Focusing, the method of somatic inquiry developed by Gene Gendlin, (which Langston learned from his mom,) and how the principles of Focusing support Langston in being in relationship with the more than human world in shamanic practice. 

We discuss shamanism, and the challenges around appropriation and capitalism.

We explore healing, animism, trauma, ancestral work, ritual and much more. 

Langston is a radiant human being and teacher who has a deep foundation of practice. 

We hope you enjoy the conversation, and we highly recommend  checking out his book and his work. 

You can find out more about his work at his website: LangstonKahn.com.