In Conversation With Jo Tastula

Jo has been teaching yoga and especially vinyasa flow for over twenty years, she leads retreats, has lived with Ram Dass, and is one of the brightest stars of the online yoga world. In this wide-ranging conversation with vinyasa flow yoga teacher Jo Tastula, we discuss among many things; the cycles of the moon, the evolution of her yoga practice, her thoughts on authenticity and how her whole life has become an integral practice, the importance of family, how we can live alongside others whose views may be very different from our own, the importance of vulnerability in meeting ourselves and each other, the evolution of spiritual life so that our ordinary lives that are the forefront of spiritual awakening and practice, how Jo has integrated that into her teaching and practice, and how meditation reveals our true self, helping us move beyond fear into the wholeness of life.

Transcript

Hello there,

John here.

In this month's podcast I'm talking to a yoga teacher who I admire so very much,

Jo Tastula.

She is one of the main teachers over on Yoga Glow,

So you may know her from there.

She's been teaching vinyasa flow yoga for over 20 years now,

And we have a really wide-ranging conversation lined up for you.

We look at the evolution of her yoga practice,

How her authenticity as a yogi and as a person has turned her whole life into her integral practice.

We talk about her time living with Ram Dass and the community around him and how wonderful that is and the importance of having a teacher.

We talk about the importance of her family as a principal spiritual community and that our ordinary lives are actually our spiritual lives,

How that has developed for her over the years.

We talk about how to live alongside others whose views may be different from our own and the importance of vulnerability in ourselves and with that.

We look at meditation and how that reveals our true selves and how we can move through fear by meeting ourselves in our practice.

And we look at her connection to the cycles of the moon and the earth,

Which is something that she's exploring deeper and deeper these days.

I hope you really enjoy this conversation.

Thanks for listening.

Welcome Jo,

Thank you for coming on the podcast.

My pleasure.

And it's really lovely to meet you.

I just thought I would kind of reach out because I've kind of followed you on YogaGlo for years.

That's how I first came across you.

And what this podcast series is about and what the kind of the work I do is really about is about living with more authenticity,

Living more from the kind of the center of our lives outwards and your yoga practice as far as I've seen on YogaGlo and the way that I kind of have seen you on social media and the communications you put out the whole way you go about things just has a very nice authenticity to it.

You know,

It's really you.

You're not acting in any way.

And that's incredible.

It's genuinely you.

And there's no mask.

And there's things,

You know,

Like in some of the YogaGlo videos where you end up with hair in your mouth or I think there's one where you do a head stand and kind of go right over.

And it's that sort of thing that I actually find completely endearing.

You know,

It's just wonderful.

They do give you the give you the opportunity to edit those out.

And I always say no,

No,

Just leave it in.

It's fine.

I'm sure everyone falls over.

Yeah,

Sure.

Everyone stumbles.

It doesn't matter.

Well,

I think that makes it more real,

Doesn't it?

Definitely more relatable.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

And people can look at these really polished and edited videos and compare themselves.

But that's not it's not real life.

You know,

There's probably been multiple takes in doing it and hair and makeup and all the rest of it.

And I think it is nice to just let that fall away and be relatable.

Just be yourself.

Absolutely.

And you don't tend you don't tend to do the kind of crazy Instagram yoga photos either,

Which is such a relief.

You know,

The perfect the perfect postured Instagram videos,

Instagram features,

You know.

Yeah,

Goodness.

Goodness.

Well,

You know,

I have been practicing for many,

Many years.

And I think I definitely had my day back in the beginning where it was all about surface things.

But over the years,

That's really become so less important.

You know,

I think I think how everyone starts off is very surface level.

And that looks good.

And I want to look like that.

And but when you go down that route long enough naturally,

You just find that that's very shallow.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And that's that's one thing I wanted to ask you really is kind of just like,

How did you kind of first meet yoga?

You were quite young when you met yoga,

Weren't you?

And then I'm not particularly I was in my mid mid 20s.

All right,

I thought you were 14 or 15 or something.

I was living in Sydney and I was working in the film industry and life was very hectic and very busy.

And I had it in my mind that I should start yoga.

And there was a there was a Buddhist meditation center close by to where I was living.

And so I had already started dropping in there and doing some doing some meditations and sort of feeling what it was like to to be peaceful in your mind,

Which was which was lovely.

And then I and then I just walked past the yoga studio one day and thought,

Right,

I should do this.

And I don't know what the driving force was that told me I should do it.

But it was like an impulse.

And it was an immediate connection that I had with the practice.

Immediately,

I felt like I had come home of sorts.

I felt that peace in my body,

I felt calm in my mind,

I was inspired by what the teacher was doing.

I even had a sense of a mystical experience and it was what it was all there.

So I think right from the get go,

I became a very dedicated practitioner.

And your practice,

The sense I get because all the videos I've seen of you,

Kind of guiding practices has always got it's not just a sound,

There's pranayama in there or some connection to the breath.

There's always a little meditational aspect has not always been the case with you.

That it wasn't just a sound because there's so much kind of emphasis on kind of the postural aspects of yoga in the West.

Sometimes I think that yeah,

I think that's become more and more important to me.

It was definitely physical when I first started.

But now as I've come to really experience the practice,

You know,

You discover that you're more than the physical body.

And then you discover yourself as an energetic being.

So you work on the pranayama which feeds the energy body.

And then you delve deeper and you realize that you're not just that and you sort of go into the mind and meditation helps touch on that.

And then you keep going deeper and you realize that there's more aspects to this multi-dimensional being.

So the practice should really touch on all of those elements itself.

All of those layers.

And have you found as you've kind of gone deeper or the more authentic part of yourself,

The kind of the truer aspect of your nature has kind of come out more and more.

How's that reflected in your daily life and in the kind of beyond the mat?

Well,

Everything starts to be your yoga practice.

And the little bit of time that you roll your mat out is just a luxury.

And everything else becomes your primary practice.

So for me,

It's now how can I live integrally?

How can I live in a way that is in alignment with my heart?

Because I know what it's like to live out of alignment with your heart.

And as soon as you do,

Everything starts going downhill.

There's this spiraling into the absolute wrong direction.

And you start to grasp for all of these different things to self-medicate or these coping mechanisms.

And it's very,

Very easy to do.

So the way that I have found that minimizes my going off track is to have this centering,

Grounding practice where I observe myself and I observe how I am.

And you can do that by just how do you feel in your body?

Absolutely.

How are you treating your body?

Are you in integrity with your body?

And then you can look around to your family and your relationships.

How are you treating them?

How are they responding to you?

You're answering questions that I've already gotten down for further ahead.

Well,

Since we're on this,

Which is wonderful.

Because I think,

Was it last year you spent some time in a spiritual community,

Didn't you,

Around Ram Dass?

Was that last year?

Yes.

Yes,

I'm back in Maui again.

Yeah.

Yeah,

He's a very inspiring teacher.

And so we spend as much time in Maui as we can.

That's amazing.

And how have you found being there?

Oh,

It's really been wonderful.

And it's been nurturing and enriching because I think although I have studied with many teachers,

I have not really had a main teacher for a long time.

And I've been a little bit of a dabbler,

You know,

Taken from this person,

Taken from that person,

Pull a bit of this practice in and that practice.

And finding the sweetness of Ram Dass and his community here has given me the opportunity just to anchor down a little bit more and to receive and be the student a little bit more,

Which is very important.

And so I think that's been a really good experience.

I'm just going to come back after two days,

As Raichu wants to say something.

Dominic,

I hope you're watching.

I'm finding R.

.

.

Imy at the end,

Pregnant right now.

And yeah,

Well this is the new paradigm that is unfolding right now is to have this rich spiritual life and not have to go and leave the world.

No,

Exactly.

If you look back,

I mean if you look back at the story of Siddhartha,

The Buddha and mystics throughout times,

They've left their families,

They've left their communities,

They've gone into the wilderness,

Into the mountains,

Into the caves and sat by themselves and sort of reached this high level of awareness on their own without anyone bugging them.

But now,

You know,

The practice is to come out of the cave,

Out of the jungle and to be with family and to be with community and then how do you reach that same level of awareness,

Of sensitivity,

Of openness in your heart whilst all your buttons are being pushed.

Exactly.

Yeah,

Absolutely.

It's a lot more interesting.

It is,

Absolutely.

And that's it.

That's where the,

In the work that I kind of do and the kind of the practices I lead,

I teach meditation and I work with schools and business and things,

But all using sort of reflective practices and meditation stuff to kind of,

You know,

Try and do things in a more clear and genuine way.

And it seems that the world is the practice.

Everything that we encounter is the practice,

Our work,

The way we are with other people,

Whether they're strangers,

Whether they're close to us,

Our families,

Of course,

Is the kind of the place of the great work.

There certainly is a lot of the world that is closed off and isolated,

But for the most of us,

It's a global community.

You have to open up and listen to people who don't have your opinions and who don't look like you and who don't believe the things that you believe in,

Because we're all riding side by side on the freeway or in the subway or whatever.

So it definitely takes,

It takes a lot more of your putting down your barriers and of not having to be right or not having to,

You know,

Have it all worked out.

Yeah.

Would you say that the vulnerability is like one of the great keys to practice?

Absolutely.

I think that a lot of people want to have it all worked out.

They want to have the answers.

They want to be right.

And no one has the answers.

No one knows.

We're all just doing the best we can with the information that we've got.

We've all been conditioned in some sort of way.

I mean,

Everyone feeds off the information from their parents or whoever was with them,

You know,

From those early developmental years when you didn't have a full synced up neural network to work it all out yourself.

So a lot of our thinking power and conditioning comes not from our own resource,

Comes from other people.

So when we start to realize that we all have biases,

We all have conditionings,

And that's going to sway how we are in the world.

And that's really humbling place to be.

Because from there you can say,

Oh,

Okay,

Well,

You know,

I may believe this,

I may feel this,

But is it the only way?

Is it really true?

Absolutely.

And as we deepen in our practice,

We start to realize that actually some of those things that we identify with,

Whilst,

You know,

They've come from our parents and our education and the society around us and so on,

They're not actually the locus of our true identity.

That's not really who we are.

But when we're not connected to the truth of ourselves,

Or that wholeness that kind of underpins everything,

Then we tend to kind of get harder with those things,

The borders kind of get harder.

Yes.

Because it's a very scary thing to let yourself slip away,

To not have such a strong identity.

Because people love to say,

You know,

I am this.

I am my job,

I am my role,

I am my religion,

I am what I eat,

You know,

I,

What have you,

And this is very,

It's very strong identity.

But when you sit in meditation,

When you sit and observe long enough,

And that all starts to fall away,

It can be quite unnerving to realize that,

Well,

No,

I'm not these things.

These things are so temporary.

These things can fall away at any moment.

And the,

The,

Not being able to grasp what the real essence of yourself is,

Can be terrifying for people.

To have that left unanswered can be very unsettling.

So that's why the yoga practices are really beautiful,

Because they help give some sort of framework.

Absolutely.

To that,

To those massive questions.

Who am I?

Have you found that that's what's happened with you then,

The kind of,

Has the authenticity in being has grown,

Or you've transcended perhaps might be a better,

Better word,

Transcended the kind of the more limited kind of connect,

You know,

Attachments to things,

That it's the kind of the mat,

The practice,

The turning up,

And the kind of the meeting yourself with kind of some vulnerability and love,

That's kind of allowed you to kind of move through that fear and those layers.

Definitely.

The practice of coming back to the mat.

Day after day,

Week after week,

Month after month,

Just coming back.

Yeah,

For sure.

For sure.

And life is not linear as well,

Because as soon as you sort of have an epiphany and oh,

You know,

You have it,

You feel like you've grasped it,

It goes.

And then there's another layer to unravel.

So it is,

It's a lifelong,

For me,

It's a lifelong inquiry,

Because what was true for you,

You know,

At one point is no longer true at another point,

It's all changing.

It's all shifting.

But I find that now after so many years of practice,

I'm actually quite comfortable to sit in the mystery of it all.

And I feel I need less and less to identify myself.

Yes,

That's beautiful.

And I'm comfortable with certain labels.

Yeah.

Fantastic.

Which then makes you so much more welcoming to the other.

Absolutely.

Because that's the kind of the way that,

Because you know,

You were talking about,

You know,

Traveling side by side with people,

People having different views and opinions,

This seems to be the only way that we can kind of move beyond that.

The more,

Even if we meet with our opinions and discuss and discuss,

We only end up with discussion and not the meetings of beings,

As it were.

And by just returning to ourselves again and again through whatever practice that appeals to us,

Whether it's the meditation or the yoga or both together or walking in nature or something else kind of opens a gap in us.

That way we then become,

Well,

We're able to meet each other just so much better,

Able to meet other people so much more lovingly and truthfully.

Yeah,

Exactly.

I just finished a retreat and our theme was crossing the divide.

So the theme was exactly this.

And it's very,

It's very hot right now with how polarized so many groups are.

Absolutely.

It's getting stronger and stronger,

Isn't it?

You feel like,

You feel like the middle ground has just fallen away and you've got sort of people on these different islands who just have no way to come together.

And so,

You know,

As yogis,

That is,

That is,

That's the asana,

That's the big stretch for us,

Right?

It's not doing the splits.

It's like,

Okay,

How do I,

How do I reach that being over there when there's this,

This no easy path?

And it always comes back to,

Okay,

Finding that place in yourself,

You know,

Where,

Where am I self?

Am I closed?

Am I not willing to change or evolve or let go or whatever it is?

It always comes back to the inner work.

And once you,

Once you start doing that,

There is a,

It's like something radiates from you,

Which other people can sense and it allows them to ease and put down some of their barriers.

Yeah,

Absolutely.

And you don't go in with this like,

I am right,

You are wrong.

Oh,

Your viewpoint is so insane.

You know,

That,

That's just going to push people further and further away.

And you can't even go in to somebody who kind of,

You know,

If you have a spiritual life or a practice,

You can't even sort of go in and want to change somebody from that point of view.

You have to,

The only practice you have is your own practice.

And that's what affects other people.

And it may not.

That's the thing.

That's right.

You know,

It's none of your business in a way.

It's kind of your business is your business,

As it were.

That's right.

That's right.

Yeah.

It's and,

And you,

You know,

That with,

And a lot of people do this when they first find a healing practice that works for them.

They want everyone to do it.

And,

You know,

Everyone should come to yoga or everyone should be a vegetarian or whatever it is.

And,

And even though they're coming from a genuine place,

Everyone else has to find their own way.

Just because it works for you,

It doesn't mean it's going to work for everyone.

Well,

It will be everybody's life is their own path.

It's unique to each person,

You know,

And even when you,

You might take on a,

You know,

An Assam based practice or something like that,

The geometry of each person's body is completely different.

And so you won't even be able to move the same way as another person in some respects.

Everything is completely our own practice in so many ways.

That's right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I find that,

You know,

The,

The practice evolves over time so that,

You know,

What,

What was once key and working at one point may not necessarily be the remedy throughout,

Throughout your lifetime.

No,

That's right.

So to keep,

To keep open,

Opening to inquiry is really important and honest observation of your life.

Yeah.

I think if we We've already touched on If we just ask ourselves two or three simple questions,

Who am I and what am I here for?

That would take you so far if they're asked in the heart in a,

In an honest way.

You know,

It doesn't need to be much more difficult than that really.

Is this true?

That would do the trick.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That,

That reminds me of the work of Byron Katie.

Have you heard of Byron Katie?

I've heard of her.

I've not read her.

Yeah.

She,

She has a system called the work and it's basically a series of questions.

And it's the same thing like,

Do I know this to be true?

Is this absolutely true?

Am I certain that this is the truth?

And always the answer,

You know,

The answer is,

Well,

No,

I don't know that that person really meant to hurt me and I don't know what their path is,

You know,

So,

So you have to keep on releasing people and letting them go and have their own life and have their own experience.

Because for some people they need to,

They need to hit rock bottom in order to bounce up high,

You know.

Some people need to go down that other path so far that they've exhausted it and they're ready to turn around.

Life will present you with things over and over again to try and,

Unfortunately,

I think that the,

You know,

Until we become perhaps being able to choose to live in more consciousness,

The kind of the spiritual path of the world is the path of suffering,

Unfortunately.

And kind of,

That's from our kind of resistance or our attachment to things.

We suffer.

It's not that things won't happen to us.

I know,

Like,

For example,

In your life in the last few years there's been a great deal of loss,

You know,

And the way that I heard you speak in another podcast maybe eight months ago or ten months ago or something,

And the way,

You know,

You've met that really difficult stuff that was so beautiful the way you were talking about it,

Just the honest,

Honest everyday kind of turning up with it and being with it and kind of returning to your heart.

That was so beautiful and inspiring to hear.

And we,

You know,

When we're in reactive mode or reactive mind or whatever you want to call it,

We don't really have a choice to meet things with love and consciousness.

And so life kind of will punch a hole in our identity sometimes as kind of to give it in so everything kind of falls away,

You know.

It's like the whole world is kind of,

Has a spiritual practice already.

Yeah,

And those tough times,

A lot of people wish them away,

You know,

I can't wait until it's better or,

You know,

I wish this weren't happening.

And that wishing away,

Unfortunately we,

Our life is so short.

And when you do lose people close to you,

That is so much more apparent.

It's like,

Okay,

This is our,

Who knows what is beyond this.

But right now,

For sure,

We all get a sense that this is a one time opportunity to be in this body,

To have these people around you.

And when the going gets tough,

Like,

How can I,

How can I bring as much presence and as much of myself to this situation as I do when I'm really happy and joyous and everything's going my way and I'm really,

You know,

All my needs are being met.

I feel that they're really just two sides of the same coin.

I think that there is a strength that comes through being willing to sit in discomfort.

Yeah.

And that's really the essence of the yoga practice is whatever comes up,

You,

You,

You're with it,

You welcome it.

Not that you want it to be there,

Not that you're like,

Oh,

Yay,

Woo I'm really having a hard time right now.

But it's happening.

It's,

It's revealing itself.

It's how things are.

It's how it is.

So,

So you greet the moment fully.

And when you do practice being in that fire and sitting in that discomfort and just being present with all of those horrible,

Difficult feelings,

Then undoubtedly through that,

You can just start to really witness the beauty of life in all through the whole spectrum.

Not that I would like to sit by the bedside of my parents dying again,

Because that was really horrific but I can say that through that process was very beautiful and enlightening and touched my heart and opened my heart in so many ways that I couldn't even imagine.

And that was a real gift.

And I could have chosen not to be there.

It was too hard to deal with,

You know,

Just sort of numbed those strong sensations that would have been less traumatic,

I'm sure,

But definitely would not have given me the same richness in inside.

Yeah,

Just be just kind of being allowing yourself to be whatever,

Whatever came or comes.

That's right.

Whether it's happy or grieving or,

And it's kind of,

It's about how I find,

I lost my mum about a year and a half ago as well.

And it was such a blessing to kind of just sit,

Just sit and in many ways I could feel her more that she had a very complicated life and a very complicated emotional life.

And it almost seemed that kind of,

Kind of once we didn't have to kind of almost keep fighting with that anymore,

It felt that she was so much more here,

So much more present in a way at that time.

And the love was just incredible.

Actually,

It was just such an opportunity for love.

Yes.

Yes.

If you're both,

If you're both willing to really turn up at that time,

All of that superficial stuff falls away.

And there's just,

There's just the love and recognizing that love between two people is for me,

The real essence of life.

That,

That,

That moment,

That love is,

Is that's it.

What else is there?

And how have you found then kind of moving forward now into kind of,

You know,

The new days after these times?

Well,

There's definitely a real untethering that happens when you lose people close to you,

Especially your parents.

It,

It,

For me,

It felt like that I had this big protective bubble around me and I didn't even realize it.

I thought I was out in the world on my own.

But when they both passed away,

That bubble burst and there was a real untethering of that whole structure of me being a daughter and me being,

You know,

Sort of a kid,

Even though I'm in my mid forties,

I still held on to that idea,

You know,

Next to them that I was,

I was a kid.

So there was a real undoing of the world as I knew it,

Which again can be really scary,

Can be really terrifying because you sort of have to find a new way of being in the world.

But at the same time,

When you just sit and observe the world,

That's life.

That's,

That's how life happens.

That's the nature of things.

Everything comes into existence is here for a short time and then dissolves back into the great mystery.

That's,

That's what happens to everything.

So again,

That could be another opportunity to deepen your practice of just how temporary this life is and to sort of surrender to that mystery a bit more because you can't fight it.

No,

You can't.

You can't change it.

Yeah.

It's inevitable.

It's,

It's how it is.

And those sorts of experiences are inescapable for everybody.

There's no way out.

There's no way out.

No,

No,

No way.

No way.

And then one day,

I mean,

We're really going there with this conversation and one day it's going to be your own life.

It is.

Yeah.

And,

And,

And so,

You know,

How wonderful to,

For it to be that day and you be ready.

You be ready for it,

You know,

Because you've,

You've,

You've witnessed life so deeply and so completely and you understand that this is just the natural way of things.

And you have enough insight to know that,

You know,

Life is so much more than what we can sense with our eyes and our ears and our nose and our tongue.

There's so much beyond those,

Those five senses or I think they're saying we've now got 20 something senses,

But you know,

There's,

There's so much more,

There's so much more beyond that.

And,

And to,

To welcome,

To welcome that mystery and that unknown and to go into those scary places.

Yeah.

And yet in this day,

You get to hug your daughter and be with your husband and,

You know,

Be where you are right now and eat food.

It's just,

You know,

Incredible.

It's not all good.

No,

No,

That's right.

But,

But you know,

The way,

The way we are as people,

We,

We take a lot of things for granted.

You know,

We can get caught up in little things.

So just to,

Yeah,

Just to remind yourself of like,

Hey,

Come on,

This is being with your,

Being with your beloveds is that's,

That's the cherry on top.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's funny how we keep coming around to this one,

Isn't it?

It's just kind of like,

You know,

Family is the practice or our friends or the people that we're with,

There is all this,

This huge deep ocean,

Sort of underneath everything.

And yet,

You know,

Here we are with ourselves or with other people.

And,

And this is what we've got right now,

You know,

And,

And you can't make something up in your head to appreciate them more or love them more.

It just has to be the real love just has to be the real thing.

That's right.

That's right.

And uncovering anything that gets in the way of that.

That's right.

Yeah.

There's a beautiful Rumi quote about that thing.

And it's,

Yeah,

Gosh,

Not even going to do it justice,

But just about uncovering where it is that you're closing down to love.

I know the quote you mean.

Yeah,

I do.

Yeah.

Just about,

Oh,

I can't remember either,

But it is just that it's kind of,

I have,

Instead of trying to find love,

I've tried to remove everything that gets in the way of love.

That's right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I know.

Yeah.

It is.

That's it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And family,

Oh,

Family is so such a wonderful,

Wonderful thing.

In whatever form it presents itself,

Whether it's like actual biological blood family or whether it's chosen family or tribal family or,

You know,

Family is so,

So important.

Yeah.

And it doesn't,

It doesn't come from the realm of ideas.

This is the thing.

It's kind of,

On a truer level,

It's actually resonance of being or something like that.

And,

You know,

It's kind of,

I have friends who,

Ideas-wise,

We just do not get along.

But there's something,

There's a deeper love,

You know,

There's something that kind of keeps you together,

You know.

My partner and I are kind of very different,

Actually.

And yet we meditate,

We used to have quite a hard time.

And then we started meditating together and doing our yoga practice together and things like that.

And so,

Yes,

You have the crazy stuff going on,

But then there's something more,

You know,

There's the being together.

If that makes any sense.

Being.

Yeah,

That does.

Absolutely.

That's really beautiful.

And how nice to have that experience of coming together.

Like,

What a beautiful,

What a beautiful experience that must have been.

Yeah.

Yeah,

Absolutely.

And that's,

For me,

That's kind of like the flavor of family,

As it were,

Because I have no,

You know,

No blood family left really or anything.

So,

You know,

So the family is my partner or,

You know,

My friends and things.

And it's that there's some other flavor,

You know,

It's not just about agreement or liking things.

It's deeper than that,

Really.

Yeah,

It is.

It is.

And it's such a such a beautiful thing to realize the love and support that you have around you.

And this retreat that I've just finished,

We meditated with some ancient rocks.

And these rocks were put in the circle from,

You know,

Ancestors long gone.

And there's a tradition of going and sitting at these rocks and asking for guidance or asking the question.

So we all went and sat by these rocks.

And that was one of the things that came up for me,

Is that as complicated as the world is,

There are some things in the world that are your rock,

You know,

That are just,

They're just,

Their job is just to be.

And what a blessing that is.

What a blessing to have those big ancestral stones in your life,

Those people that just love you and forgive you and don't judge you too much.

And,

You know,

That's a blessing.

And it's a real source of light and celebration for me,

Having those insights.

Yeah.

Yeah.

One last thing then just to kind of round out,

Is that I was reflecting as well about your work and I've noticed a really strong connection to the moon in what you do and kind of moving with kind of like the cycle of the year and the natural kind of flow of things.

Could you tell us a little bit more about that in your practice?

Sure.

I would love to.

Well,

I think I would love to.

Well,

When I started practicing yoga about 20 years ago,

I was sort of dabbling in Ashtanga yoga,

Which is the more physical type of vinyasa practice.

And in that system,

They observed moon days.

So you didn't practice on the full moon or the new moon.

And I remember thinking at the time,

What does the moon got to do with when I practiced?

Like how absurd.

And I really was confused and just bewildered by observing these moon days.

And then it occurred to me that there's a lot of information,

There's a lot of knowledge that has been lost with my generation and the generation before with modernity,

With moving into these cities and building walls around ourselves and cutting ourselves off from really observing nature and being a part of nature.

So I went back to the very simple practice of just on these moon days these moon days,

And also with the different seasons and the solstice and the equinox.

But on these days of where the cycle finishes and starts to turn into something else,

Just observing,

And I really noticed that there was a palpable shift in energy at those times.

And the deeper observation is that you're not apart from nature.

No.

Is that these cycles are happening within you as well.

We have evolved over however many millions of years through different forms of life with these cycles,

These cycles,

Smaller cycles and larger cycles.

And so within us is this cyclical nature,

Is these natural rounds of creativity,

These natural growth rings like a growth ring in a tree.

And that's what's been really exciting.

I've just actually finished a course on YogaGlo about the moonside cycles and just bringing this information forward to people perhaps who,

Like me,

Were unaware that we have any connection to the outer world.

And we're just plodding along and we're just plodding along by ourselves on our own.

And to step back out into,

You know,

Take your shoes off and get outside and be part of it all.

Be part of it all and realize that you are nature.

You are nature.

And there's a natural time to do,

To push and strive and work hard.

And then there's a natural time to rest and reflect and get quiet.

And the resting and the reflecting and the quietness is not celebrated in our modern times.

And in fact,

It's frowned upon.

You're meant to just produce,

Produce,

Strive,

Strive all the time.

All the time.

But that's not how nature works,

You know.

The sun is up for 12 hours,

But then it goes down for 12 hours.

And it's the same,

You know,

The same with the moon cycle.

And I just,

I just love,

I just love connecting to that cycle of new moon to full moon and being more in awareness and observance with the cooling,

More reflective part of ourselves as a balance to all of that productivity.

Beautiful.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Well,

We'll stop there.

That's really lovely to talk to you,

Jo.

Thank you for spending some time with us.

I hope it wasn't too way out.

I don't know.

It's not,

It's,

We'll have the conversation and whoever listens to it,

They have to kind of sort that out for themselves.

Well,

Thanks a lot,

John.

Thank you so much.

It was really nice to talk to you too.

Lovely.

Thank you so much.

Thank you so much for joining us.

Take care of a beautiful month and hopefully see you soon.

Reviews

Thanks John for this podcast with a fellow Aussie! It really resonated with me, especially in terms of family and the meeting the beings/ stretching over the divide. Not needing to be right! The family is the definitely the practice and even more so in lockdown. It’s really interesting to think about us being predominantly made up of water and how we cycle with the moon. 🙏🏻

Beautiful! Thank you! Really needed this! No striving, loving with nature!❤

Thank you for giving us the opportunity to follow your beautiful conversation! It led me to a very sensual state of being in the now, very pure and very healing.

Thank you.
❤ beautiful podcast.

So timely for me! Really a lovely conversation that brought some profound realization to my own current cycle. Thank you!

Thank you for sharing your beautiful practice. Inspiring. ❤️🙏🌙

Great talk, and wonderful information!! Thank you!🙏🏽

Thank you for that deep and beautiful discussion. Definately not way out for me :-)

Loved this.
So much of this talk resonated with me. Inspiring 🧡
Thank-you 🙏

In so many ways for me this was such a beautiful conversation to listen. The experiences, observations and insights shared helped to nourish my soul on a Saturday morning. Thank you for sharing ❤️🙏❤️

So many beautiful insights from this talk--thank you!

Thank you for bringing this interview to IT, John!🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻In the past years, I have experienced a lot of loss, my parents, several family members that I was close to, several friends, yet nothing of those losses quite prepared me for the loss of my life partner and soul mate. Inevitable, as is everything on this earth plane, it's part of living in a body with all the senses. Whatever is happening in my world, that's what I am focusing on. Each time new aspects of life are revealed. So a couple of weeks ago, the life partner of my best friend transitioned, just like that, the night before we had still been together, the 3 of us, the next day, he was gone, just like that, no illness, no signs. It definitely brings up my own mortality: I can be "gone" just like that as well. How do I feel about that? What would I still like for this life? It suddenly all becomes very crystal clear...Hearing other people talk about their experiences with life and death helps shaping that clarity. So thank you and Jo! 🙏🏻🦋😇💙🌅🌟✨💫

I’ve been teaching yoga for nearly 20 years and I could relate to sooo much of what you discussed. I truly believe that my purpose is to introduce folks to yoga. I think I’ll always be a dabbler! Thanks for this wonderful time together 🙏🏼

As in description, a very beautiful and inspiring talk, many things that resonated with me and I will return to listen again! 🙏🏽✨💖

Interesting and helpful. Reassuring.

Thank you John for sharing such a wonderful conversation. There is so much here. What resonated most for me was the part about the aspect of loss (parents etc) that actually teaches you how to live in love ‘now’. It has certainly done that for me. Even the topic of the moon connects with this.

Mostly (for me) the practice is about realizing your connection to all things. Blessings 🙏🏼✨

Wonderful and honest and so inspiring