The Cyclic Sadhana Podcast - Women of Tantra and the Tantrik Life of Women
Welcome to The Cyclic Sadhana Podcast – Women of Tantra, and the Tantric Life of Women; the podcast where we explore female-bodied Tantrik yogic practice, and women’s contribution to, and role in tantra, historically and present. Through a blend of conversations with sadhakas, teachers, and scholars, and the words of wisdom and life-stories of some of the female Tantrik poet-saints and siddhas that made it into the man-dominated history records of yoga, we bring light to what it means to seek spiritual freedom through inner alchemy, in the 21st century, as women who do not reject the world.
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Episodes
Saturday Nov 26, 2022
Saturday Nov 26, 2022
In both shakta and buddhist tantra, we encounter an awe-inspiring self-decapitating goddess, or if you prefer: a fully enlightened dakini. Most commonly known as Chinnamasta or Chinnamunda - 'She whose head is severed' - She is the headless state of pure perceiving, without subject-object duality.
This episode explores her provocative iconography and the wisdom embedded in it, and takes a look at the legends of three female Mahasiddhas closely associated with her -'The Mad Princess' Lakṣmīṅkarā , and the 'Headless Sisters' Mekhalā and Kanakhalā - to see what it really means to live with no head.
Special thanks to Prema Goet (www.premagoet.com) for the permission to use one of his field recordings, and to Gregor Quendel and Sagnik Basu for their fire crackling and rural ambience.
To get in touch with Fanny, please reach out via email at olssonfc@gmail.com or visit fannyolssonyoga.com
Intro and outro music from Uppbeat (free for creators):
Wowen by VOLO feat Ashley Willfire
Saturday Oct 15, 2022
Saturday Oct 15, 2022
In this episode I'm joined by the sharp-witted scholar-practitioner, and devotee of the goddesses, Tova Olsson for a conversation on, among other things, shakti, and women's practice of tantra and relationship to the divine historically and present. Tova has been teaching yoga and meditation for more than 15 years. She holds a MA in religious studies from the University of Gothenburg and is specialized in yogic and tantrik traditions. She teaches the philosophy section of several yoga teacher trainings and is appreciated for her skills in storytelling and her ability to explain philosophical ideas in an approachable, embodied and humorous ways. She is currently working on her PhD at Umeå University in Sweden. For more from Tova, visit her Instagram @saraswati_studies or her webpage www.TovaYoga.se
To get in touch with Fanny, please reach out via email at olssonfc@gmail.com or visit fannyolssonyoga.com
Intro and outro music from Uppbeat (free for creators):
Wowen by VOLO feat Ashley Willfire
Tuesday Sep 20, 2022
Tuesday Sep 20, 2022
This time I'm joined by Ateeka, a woman who with 33 years of practice in traditional and tantric yoga and somatic studies, shares a yoga that is immediate, fluid and experiential. She is the founder of YogaSOMATICS: a healing and meditative movement approach infused with tantric wisdom, meditation and modern somatic approaches. With an open-hearted style of teaching she encourages the innate intelligence of the one’s own body and felt-sense to emerge its own unique and natural way.
In the episode Ateeka shares about her journey with yoga, tantra, and Continuum Movement; we discover a shared struggle of our past, and she tells us about a pivotal moment when she returned to physical sensations after many years of being cut of from feeling very much sensations in her body. We touch on topics such as the importance of embodied practices, gender concepts, the tantrik scripture Vigyana Bhairava Tantra, the heart-womb connection, sexuality and much more.
To learn more about Ateeka and yogaSOMATICS visit www.yoga-somatics.com
For anyone interested in Continuum Movement, you can learn more at continuummovement.com
To get in touch with Fanny, please reach out via email at olssonfc@gmail.com or visit fannyolssonyoga.com
Intro and outro music from Uppbeat (free for creators):
Wowen by VOLO feat Ashley Willfire
Tuesday Aug 30, 2022
Tuesday Aug 30, 2022
In this episode I'm joined by Dr. Claudia Welch, a lifelong student of life and medicine, Doctor of Oriental Medicine and author of Balance Your Hormones, Balance Your Life: Achieving Optimal Health and Wellness Through Ayurveda, Chinese Medicine and Western Science and The Four Qualities of Effective Physicians: Practical Ayuevedic Wisdom for Modern Physicians.
Dr. Welch recounts the early events in her childhood that lead her to become a pilgrim of a living Indian spiritual tradition, and shares with us her journey with Eastern Medicine and how trust played an important part in her work with making sense of women's hormones through the lens of duality found in Eastern Medicine. We talk about the link between Dharma, Sadhana and Hormones and why receptivity may be a key component on the spiritual path.
To learn more about Dr. Claudia Welch and her offerings visit drclaudiawelch.com or satsangam.net
To get in touch with Fanny, please reach out via email at olssonfc@gmail.com or visit fannyolssonyoga.com
Intro and outro music from Uppbeat (free for creators):
Wowen by VOLO feat Ashley Willfire
Thursday Jul 21, 2022
Thursday Jul 21, 2022
Welcome to this inaugural episode of The Cyclic Sadhana Podcast – Women of Tantra, and The Tantrik Life of Women. This episode is an in-burst – an initiation of sorts – to what we will be focusing on in the podcast. In the episode I talk about what I mean by Tantra and what inspired the creation of the podcast.
To get in touch, please reach out via email at olssonfc@gmail.com
Intro and outro music from Uppbeat (free for Creators!):
Woven by VOLO feat Ashley Willfire
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