Native Yoga Toddcast

Tova Olsson ~ The Heart of Tantra Yoga: Exploring History, Philosophy, and Mythology

• Todd Mclaughlin • Season 1 • Episode 226

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Tova Olsson is a seasoned educator and scholar with over 20 years of experience in yoga philosophy, mythology, and religious studies. With a bachelor's degree and master's in religious studies, Tova is currently working on her PhD while actively teaching at a university level in Sweden. Tova is well-known for her engaging storytelling through social media under the handle @Saraswati_Studies, where she elaborates on Indian philosophy, mythology, and the history of yoga.

Embark on this enlightening journey through the intricacies of yoga philosophy with Tova Olsson. Listen to the full episode to unearth more engaging insights and stay tuned for more enriching content from the series.

Key Takeaways:

  • The Intersection of Yoga and Philosophy: Tova underscores that postural yoga and philosophy are deeply intertwined, advocating for a holistic study that integrates both physical practice and philosophical understanding.
  • The Power of Storytelling: Emphasizing storytelling's significance, Tova uses mythology to captivate students and promote philosophical engagement, illustrating how myths are ever-present and align with real-life experiences.
  • Navigating Yoga's History: She speaks to the complexity and diversity of yoga's origins and philosophical developments, stressing the importance of informed study and discernment in practice and teaching.

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Todd McLaughlin:

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. Oh, wow, I'm so happy you're here. Tova Ollson is My special guest this week. She wrote a book Yoga and Tantra History, Philosophy and Mythology. Go and follow her on Instagram. Please go follow her on Instagram. You have to check her out. And I think what she's doing with yoga philosophy and the way she's sharing the information that she shares on Instagram is priceless as a yoga practitioner or a teacher, and so please go follow her, read her post each day, like and comment, because she does an amazing job, and she definitely put some serious time in, and you will learn a lot. So her handle is at@saraswati_studies. The links for all of her resources are in the notes, so find her and take one of her courses, or travel with her to India to learn more. I had an amazing conversation with her and got the best vibes, and I feel her heart is really in an amazing right place. So I hope that you enjoy this as much as I did, and let's go ahead and begin. I'm very grateful to have Tova Ollson here today on the podcast, Tova. Thank you so much for joining me.

Tova Olsson:

Thank you for inviting me Todd.

Todd McLaughlin:

I found you via social media. I typed in Instagram Shaiva Tantra, and you popped up at the very top, and I started following you your handles at Saraswathi underscore studies, and I started reading your posts. And I love the way that you share the history, philosophy and mythology of yoga and India with the imagery that you use, and I find you doing an incredible job. So first, I want to thank you for all the time and energy that you put into the education sphere that's available on Instagram.

Unknown:

Thank you for recognizing that it is a lot of work. And of course, it's it's a labor I do out of love and out of inspiration. But yes, I don't think people realize how much work and how hard one that knowledge is, right? Yes, giveaway for free to Instagram, yeah, yeah.

Todd McLaughlin:

Well, that's that's cool. I noticed you have a teachable platform, also under that same handle, which is or the website name is, Saraswati studies dot teachable which the links are on the description people can find super easy. And I saw you have several courses on Indian philosophy. Can you tell me a little bit about how I know you've been teaching for over 20 years. How did you go in this direction? A lot of people start getting fascinated with yoga within the posture world. What was your trajectory for finding yoga and then putting your attention on to studying philosophy.

Unknown:

Well, I I got my bachelor in religious studies pretty early in my early 20s, I would say, and I was always a child and a teenager that really enjoyed writing, reading, philosophy, religion, you know, the greater questions in life was kind of, kind of always on my mind. And so I was also a very physical child. I love gymnastics. I love to dance, and all of these things kind of came together in my studies of yoga. So, yes, I discovered. Postural yoga in my late teen, teens, probably, and by that time, I was also, of course, very, very interested in all types of studies. I moved away from home. I dropped out of school when I was 17. I was a really good student, but I was also a very restless young woman, and so I moved to Paris in my teens, and I read a lot of books. I did a lot of dancing. I earned a living, of course, as a waitress. The things that you need to do when you're young. And when I came back to Sweden, I started to work as a language teacher in French and English. And so studying, teaching has always been something that's been very, very close to my heart. And then I moved around. I lived in the Caribbean for a few years, and I did some academic studies on a distance, because that was possible through my Swedish University. And used to mention the University in Sweden is free, right for the citizens of Sweden. So I was able to engage in all types of studies. For a very, very long time. I studied anthropology, international relations, literature, and I finally, kind of got caught by religious studies, and then at the same time I had been I had started to teach dance, and also I started to teach yoga in my early 20s. And this happened kind of out of accident, you know, I was teaching dance in a dance school, and there was a yoga teacher there, and she was going on holiday or something like that, and she needed somebody to fill in for her. And I said, Well, I do postural yoga at home, but I have no education. And she said, I don't have it either, you know. And this was way back over 20 years ago, so there wasn't a lot of yoga teachers in Sweden, and much less yoga teacher trainings, you know. So I very shyly went to teach my first yoga class, and people really liked it. And after that, you know, several other, I think, dance studios and also gyms. And so kind of asked me if I wanted to come and teach yoga. And so I kind of proceeded on that path of being invited to different places and feeling kind of shy about it, and then eventually, of course, doing teacher trainings and doing emotions and so with different teachers and and educating myself more and more over the years. But I think for me, postural yoga was never separated from the study of philosophy, because I was always so interested in those aspects of yoga. And I from the very beginning and up until this day, I always start when I'm going to teach a class. I always start with the planning around philosophy, or the planning around mythology, and then the postural yoga kind of comes as a result of those ideas. So inspiration, amazing. So after having taught for about, you know, quite a long time. And of course, my my classes tended to get a little bit longer over the years. So in yoga studios then and in recent years, I could teach classes that were two hours long or so, and then I could take my time, and of course, also teaching workshops and teaching in yoga teacher trainings. So I can more take my time with the philosophy and the mythology and the things that I'm very, very, very interested in, even though I still, you know, practice Asana every single day, but I don't see myself as a teacher of postural yoga. And since I started that platform, Saraswati studies, the online school came first, and the Instagram came after that, because I had no online visibility. And people told me, If you're going to have an online school, you need online visibility. And I didn't even know why I should have an online school. It was Saraswati, the goddess of learning, who kind of urged me to open up that online school. And just one year later, the pandemic hit online school was the reason that I could support myself and my two kids during that time, and then through the Instagram post, the online school has steadily grown. In the beginning, I just taught in Swedish, of course, and I felt kind of shy about teaching in English. I felt that there are a lot of brilliant teachers already teaching in English. I wanted to kind of tend to the people in Sweden that needed more philosophy and mythology. Teachings. But then people started to ask me to start teaching in English, and so I did. And yeah, amazing.

Todd McLaughlin:

Of the story, the compression I hear you, that's amazing too, but that's so cool. I love hearing how these evolve, and very cool that you were a step ahead on the online before the pandemic, because that was what I believe, pushed a lot of us yoga teachers online that would have never thought this would be an option or even a passion, you know, so that's I that's really cool. I'm I'm curious when you come in with a group of new students to the world of philosophy, and when you have as much time in the saddle and or as many years of practice and study that you have, where's the beginning point for you and when educating?

Unknown:

Well, I know that we speak a little bit about storytelling later, perhaps, and mythology, but I find that storytelling and mythology is such a beautiful way to open into mythology, because people love storytelling. As adults, we don't get to sit down and listen to storytelling so often, but we consume storytelling through, you know, Netflix or the cinema or listening to audiobooks or whatever it is that we're engaging with we love as humans storytelling. So I think that's that's kind of a way to touch people's hearts and make them engage in philosophy in a way that they wouldn't be able to do if we used to open up the yoga sutra or one of the tantric things. Yeah. But what I usually do also when, when I am teaching a yoga teacher training, for example, is that I first teach on the history of yoga, and then when we kind of have an overview of the history and development of yoga, it makes sense to also look at the philosophical systems and the different texts that were important in different time periods of the development of yoga and so, so all of these things kind of come together. So it's a great big puzzle. And we start, you know, with kind of the corners of the puzzle, and then we kind of build in and try to fill it up.

Todd McLaughlin:

Oh, that's a great point. And that brings back a memory. I one of my teachers would, when we be in shavasana or in a setting, in a teacher training, would pull out some of the classic texts and just read. And I remember laying there on the floor just feeling like, wow, nobody just reads it to me anymore, or to anyone like it's such a nice experience. I would gather you would story tell via combo of both, maybe reading and stuff that you've crafted, material you've crafted before. But that's that's a really good point. I think that's so valuable to hear story and to have someone tell it. I agree with you, too, but that's so cool. You know, I often hear yoga students express confusion about conflicting stories. There are about the origins of yoga and where it came from, and who it belongs to and what it's for. And as someone who's been immersed in this practice for a long time, I'm curious, how do you suggest that we as modern practitioners and teachers navigate this complexity with respect and clarity, I guess, clarity like, how do we get clear about the origins, and then how do we be respectful as well? Because I know sometimes if we tell a story, there might be somebody that might say, Do you have your story, right?

Unknown:

Yeah, this is a very, very big question, right? And as, as a historian of religion, of course, because, of course, I went back to the university, you know, it wasn't the end of my story that after after a few years of teaching yoga, I kind of got tired of not being able to kind of dive deep into theory and think longer thoughts. So I went back to the university, I got my masters, and I'm currently working on my PhD, right? So I am a historian of religion, and of course, for me, as a scholar and a long time practitioner of yoga, finding out the truth of the matter is quite important. You know, something that we develop through yoga, according to the tradition, is discernment, and so I would say that it is important as practitioners to inform ourselves to the best of our capacity. And that means, of course, if we're not scholars, that we're not going to keep track of every single development within, you know, the academic study of yoga, but to still. You know, inform us so that we don't, especially as teachers, tell our students things that don't really make sense at all. So I would say, you know, there's an idea within Indic Traditions that we have three ways of, kind of making sure that something is true. We have the scripture or the tradition. We have our own teachers, and then we have our own experience, right? And so I would say that we work with all of these things. So scripture would both be, you know, the the Indian scriptures, that Yogic and Tantric scriptures, but it would also be, perhaps academic articles and books, so that we kind of keep track on Okay, but what do the scholars actually say about this? And then we have our own teachers, right? And teachers that we hopefully have great trust in, and their version of the story and their knowledge. And then we have our own experience in the question of what yoga is good for, or what yoga is supposed to do, right? We can look at them, the historical scriptures, what our teachers tell us, but we can also see what has it actually meant for me in my life. So I would say that we have to depend on all of these three things we can't just say, Well, my experience is that yoga is right, because that kind of leaves us a little ignorant.

Todd McLaughlin:

Agreed, agreed? What? What? What is the origin story that you feel has come true, or you see as truth?

Unknown:

Well, you can, you can study with me, right? Or you can read my book. It's kind of hard to give the full overview like this. I agree. I agree. I would say that the story that we hear a lot about yoga being ancient, about yoga being, you know, this essential, pretty much unmoved tradition throughout the ages that has never changed. You know, in any way, we as scholars, of course, say that all religions, our spiritual traditions, develop over time, in change according to different cultures and contexts. And it's the same with yoga, of course. So we have a development of yoga from about, well, we would say perhaps 500 BCE and and, and since then, development in many, many different ways. I used as we have many different tantric traditions, we have many different yoga traditions, right? And yoga has never meant just one thing, but it has meant many different things for people in different cultural contexts, and it still develops, of course. So I would not say that yoga is just, you know, we have one ancient, traditional, authentic yoga, and then we have this falsified new, right, but that there are many different forms of yoga, and that they're all equally authentic, in a way. But what we can also know as practitioners, of course, is that, just as with family recipes or whatever it is that we're working with, we can know what will be the outcome of certain techniques if they have been tried and testified by people before us, so that we don't have to reinvent the wheel every single time we step on the yoga mat, right? And that is what I think, is the value of kind of looking to tradition, not wasting our time. Because if we are all really spiritual seekers, we don't like to waste time, right?

Todd McLaughlin:

I hear you too, a great answer. I appreciate that in your in your posts, you write about Indian Gods and Goddesses, not just as mythological figures, but as ways to express inner experience for someone who didn't grow up in that culture. How might these stories serve as tools for personal insight, rather than some distant symbolism. How? How can we make these, these stories real for us in in our day?

Unknown:

Well, there's a philosopher that said that myths never were, but always are. You know, it's stories that never were, but they always are, meaning they're happening right now, right? And I know there's a lot of people nowadays that say that the Indian mythological stories, for example, that they are history and. That is debatable, of course, but the way I work with stories is that, not to say that deities don't have an objective existence, because they do, and I also work with them in that way, but the way I work with deities through mythology is very much to have us embody the deity. And this is also a tantric approach. And the tantric approach is that we learn to embody and identify with certain deities, and the way I speak about them, then is as wisdom qualities. So we have wisdom qualities, like Ganesha, like Saraswati, like Parvati, Kali, whoever it is that we might be working with, and we realize that this is a wisdom quality that lies latent, perhaps in us. Maybe it's very much alive, and we need to work with it in a different way. But, the way I see these wisdom qualities is that there are energies that are present in the world and also present within us, and that we can learn to work with them in certain ways and embody them in certain ways.

Todd McLaughlin:

Yeah, amazing. Did you just what was the first deity that you feel you had affinity with and or started to feel you were pulled toward or attracted to or curious in

Unknown:

this is so long ago, right, that I find it hard to say, well, it was that deity. I know that the first mantra that I worked with was most definitely the Om Namah, Shivaya mantras. I would say in that way, the Shaiva traditions or Shiva was always present for me. But I know that the first murti, the first statue of a deity I bought was Ganesha, and I still have that murti, and it's quite special, because I tend to kind of give things away all the time. I don't tend to keep anything, but that theory, I still have it, and I still do puja for it every day. It's sitting here in my kitchen, so I see it all the time when I pass Yeah, nice.

Todd McLaughlin:

And I'm gathering from you, then you are saying that in relation to this evolution that's occurred for you throughout your experience of study and practice. Do do you ascribe since that you've evolved toward really appreciating Shaiva, tantra philosophy? Do you feel that initial connection through Shiva and or Ganesh might have been on purpose or without, without mistake? Yeah,

Unknown:

absolutely, I definitely feel like these are, these are mystical traditions. You know, we can intellectualize them all we want, but at the end of the day, these are deeply mystical currents, and it's amazing for me to see how everything kind of falls into place over time. And we have realizations and things that we might have, you know, studied for years, once the embodied experience is there we go. Oh, all right, this is, you know, that's what I always say when I tell the stories of the deities that we can listen to them over and over and over again, because every single time they will speak to a different lived experience in our lives, right? So, the very first time that I started doing a sadhana for Ganesha, and the realizations that I had then are going to be very different from the realizations I have now, right? And the embodied, the felt sense of Ganesha in my life, right? And so in the Shakta traditions, for example, the goddess traditions, we say that we always open with mantras to Ganesha. We always begin with Ganesha. But it took me so many years to realize that I had started with Ganesha. And I know that for my students too, when I tell them, Well, you know, you should always shun to Ganesha first. You should always begin with a sudden Africa Ganesha. It can take them so many years to realize, oh, okay, I have to backtrack, or this organic development happened so that I had to go through this practice, you know. So when it comes to Shaiva Tantra, I think that was always my path, because the very first yoga schools that I was educated within, like Anusara yoga, for example, had a strong connection to Shaiva Tantra. And so I think the Tantra and Shiva was always a very, very strong part of my path. And I mean, I love. Are all deities. I can't say that I love all deities, but I love a lot of deities, and I have a lot of knowledge about a lot of deities, and I can feel them when they are especially approachable in the year cycle. You know, we have giant teeth, we have birthday celebrations of gods and goddesses. And so it's because that wisdom quality, or that energy, is especially present in the world at that time, right? And so I can feel that, and I can adore a God like Krishna, for example, at that time of the year when he's especially present. But that is not my Ishta. That is not, you know, that that aspect of the Divine that I keep coming back to, while adiri, like Shiva, is so close to my heart, or Sarasvati, the goddess of learning and articulation and the arts, is one that I devote my life to.

Todd McLaughlin:

Yes, great answer. Do. There's often a big debate about whether modern yoga students need to even study classical texts, like sometimes I'll have students come in that I'll mention books like Bhagavad Gita or the Mahabharata, or even that might be a stretch for most so yoga sutras. And there's often I feel a little debate about, like, why would I even need to study that? I feel like you've done a great job of already explaining why this is important. But I'm curious, from your perspective, is it essential? And if so, how can we engage with those teachings in a way that honors the original context while still making them relevant.

Unknown:

Well, I would say that a few years back, I would definitely argue that we do not, at least not only need to study the yoga sutra and the Bhagavad Gita, depending on what worldview we hold as practitioners. You might be aware that the Bhagavad Gita and the yoga sutra, they're both grounded in a philosophical system called Samkhya, which is that dualistic philosophical system, a very early philosophical system that speaks about liberation as separation between the observer Purusha and that which is observed, trakriti nature, right? So it's basically saying, if you want to be liberated, if you want to progress in yoga, you have to learn to stand apart from life and experience all of the experiences in life, right? Do not get attached to your family. Do not believe your mind. Do not get attached to the body. You know, whatever it might be. Well, tantic traditions have a different approach to reality, seeing reality as the body of the goddess of Shakti, right? So I would say that as a student of yoga, and particularly as a teacher of yoga, you're entering into a stream of knowledge, a yoga cannon, where the yoga sutra and the Bhagavad Gita are some of the most important texts and you need to know about them in order to be a good teacher of yoga and in order to be able to explain certain ideas to your students. Having said that those are not the only texts that you need to study as a yoga teacher, especially depending on what kind of worldview you have. Because something I do not agree with is people having an embodied practice. They want to use yoga in order to be, perhaps, you know, a better mother or a better father. They want to be engaged in relationship and in life, and then they use a renunciate text, like the yoga sutra, to teach that embodied philosophy. It doesn't make any sense, so I think that you need to know about it, and it's a brilliant text when it comes to mapping the mind, understanding meditation, you know, but we need tantric text as well, I would say, in the modern yoga world. So absolutely, Bhagavata is a beautiful text, you know, I have a very devotional bend. So I love the Bhagavad Gita, and I can also really appreciate yoga sutra, as you know, a manual towards meditation, but you need to know what kind of philosophical system they're grounded in, and you need to know that there are other texts as well.

Todd McLaughlin:

Yeah, great point. Tuva and I noticed the other day you made a post about the Samkhya philosophy and the. The tatwas And so the categories of existence, which I've always found requires quite a bit of serious study to try to wrap my head around what is being taught when I try reading about Samkhya philosophy. And I'm curious, is it possible for you to explain Samkhya philosophy for us newbies that are looking at it, going, What in the world is going on here? Like, what are they talking about? Do you have a condensed version that would would help preface then, if we were to discuss the tatwas According to tantric philosophy, and then maybe the correlation between or these two systems. Maybe number one, can you define the word tatva for us?

Unknown:

Yeah, tatva means that nest, so we often translate it as principle or element, or, I would sometimes say, level of reality. And definitely, if you bring the tattva chart up to brand new students, they are going to be confused and run away. But having said that, I think if you want to study so called yoga philosophy, it's one of the best tools that we have to really understand the similarities between these different systems and the differences and so Samkhya means enumeration, and what it is, numbering is these different levels of reality. So according to Samkhya, we have 25 tattvas, 25 levels of reality, meaning what we can experience in a human consciousness, right? And so in this tattva chart, we have the highest level of reality, meaning, that's it, right? That is the possible. That's the highest possible level that your consciousness can reach. And according to Samkhya, that level is purusha. And Purusha translates to person, a masculine person, but it is often translated as witness consciousness or individual consciousness, and then the other 24 tattvas stand apart from purusha, and they are all connected to prakriti, to nature, everything that changes and evolves, right? And so in the time of the compilation of the yoga sutra, the yoga sutra is very much influenced by Buddhist philosophy. And as you might be aware, the main thing in Buddhist philosophy is Saravana dukam, everything is suffering, right? Everything is suffering because everything is constantly changing, and because of this impermanence, right? The only thing that we can learn to do, according to Sankhya, is to not identify with all everything that is changing, right? So what is changing? The body is changing the world around us is changing our mood, is changing our emotions, our thoughts. So the witness consciousness tries to stand apart from everything that is changing in order to not suffer, right? So this is pretty much the view of classical Tantra, early early yoga. Not classical Tantra, but classical yoga, early yoga, and also an aspect of Buddhist philosophy, right? But then, as classical forms of tantra developed. They say they don't toss that earlier Samkhya and tatvashar the way, because that's not the Indian way. Usually, you build onto something that is already there in existence. So they say, Yes, we honor you. We honor the tradition. We say that all of this is true, but now we know more. We've seen more, we've seen higher levels of reality. And actually Purusha is not the higher, but you can go beyond purusha, and actually then the highest goal of a spiritual development is not this separation, this aloneness, this autonomy, but actually a union between Shiva and Shakti, consciousness and energy on a much higher level. And that is why it might be important for people to study the yoga sutra, for example, because some people just want to go straight to Tantra. I think want to go straight to all of that juicy stuff, without really kind of climbing the tatvas and realizing that, okay, this is how far as I can go through my intellect. This is as far as I can go through witness consciousness. But they want to skip all that and just just go straight to these very lofty tantric concepts without actually being mature. For them. So I would say that most of us that really study Tantra in a deep way now, we had our years of really dedicated yogic discipline right before coming to Tantra. And I would say that that is perhaps

Todd McLaughlin:

helpful. Amazing, Tuva, great answer I could follow. I followed all that. So thank you so much. I can see that I'm even though I used my hands a lot, I like it. No, my head is following your hands. I know I sound like I'm bouncing around their hands. You know, I noticed that you made slight little nod toward this idea in Samkhya with Purusha being a male and so I'm curious, then, can you speak a little bit about the role of gender in, I guess, well, within Tantra, because I know that's part of your forte, so that's why I'm going here. But are you nodding toward the fact that if we have a system that puts a male god up at the top, that that limits a good half of the population from realizing having having self realization or liberation?

Unknown:

Well, Purusha is not a God, right? Purusha is an aspect of you. It's your witness consciousness. But the words in Sanskrit, Purusha and prakriti are gendered, and so the word Purusha is masculine and the word packet in nature is feminine. And so we have this idea often right, that the masculine is more associated with a cool, unobserving coolness, the capacity to witness and stand apart from while the feminine is, you know, embodied, chaotic, changing, always moving right. And we can see that these ideas kind of transfer into into contemporary spirituality. So my PhD research is about the construction of gender in contemporary Tantra in Europe. And so, of course, we have a lot of ideas around masculinity and femininity in contemporary spirituality that I think are not always helpful for either feminine or masculine practitioners or women and female and male practitioners.

Todd McLaughlin:

Interesting. So would you agree that then, when we look at Shaiva Tantra philosophy, that then we see the characteristic of Shiva being consciousness and Shakti being energy and that having a similar correlation to Purusha and prakriti, with a kind of male gender toward the Shiva side And the Purusha side and the prakriti and Shakti having this female, gendered side, and the similarity between that. And then, I guess my follow up question to that is, do you feel there's benefit if I were to attempt to see Shiva as Shakti and Shakti as Shiva? What like does that make Did that make sense?

Unknown:

Yeah, I mean Purusha and prakriti according to Tantra, remember, they developed, or Nando Shaiva Tantra developed that tattva chart to have 36 levels instead of 25 and so they would say that that highest tattva, according to that system, is parama Shiva, the highest form of Shiva, or sometimes known as ridaya, the heart, the combination of Shiva and Shakti within Shakta systems, Goddess oriented systems, Shakti would be on top right, be the highest principle of reality. But these system would see Purusha and prakriti as contracted or limited forms of Shiva and Shakti, right? So, Prakriti is a limited form of Shakti. Purusha is a limited form of Shiva. They have forgotten some of their true nature, right? But they are still, you know, connected to consciousness and energy. I think what becomes problematic in the Shaiva system, for example, they will say that Shiva consciousness, of course, is not a man and not only male body. So to speak, have consciousness. All bodies do and all bodies are made out of Shakti. They're all made out of energy and creative capacity. The root for the word Shakti, Shak means to be capable of capacity, right? And so something that is interesting in the tantric systems is that the goddess is power, right? If consciousness can do anything, it can do it because of Shakti. So when we look at the dancing form of Shiva, for example, Nataraja, he is said to have five powers, five Shaktis, the Shakti of consciousness, the Shakti of bliss, the Shakti of will or desire, the Shakti of knowledge and the Shakti of action. And he's performing the five acts of consciousness, destroying, creating, sustaining, hiding and revealing, because he is full of creative capacity. So one of the great differences between Shaiva Tantra and Advaita Vedanta, for example, would be that within the tantric system, consciousness is full of creative capacity. It can do something like our inner consciousness. It creates all the time, right? It comes up with new ideas. It sends up memories and images. This is our inherent Shakti, and so using that discernment again to see that it's not a question of dividing into feminine and masculine or just or to always try to say that that feminine is passive in some way, but that you know the feminine, according to this tradition, is powerful. And if consciousness does anything, it does it because of Shakti.

Todd McLaughlin:

Yes, amazing. Do you feel that the representation that we have of imagery within the mythology of Shiva and Shakti, do try to transcend that, or do you or not transcend it? But Do you often attempt and say your yoga practice or meditation practice, or the way that you view the world. Do we? Do we? Are we pressed toward eventually evolving beyond seeing it on that level? Or like, almost like? Is that just a way for humans to be able to wrap our heads around it, and then eventually we should let go of the visual representations that we have of these different ideas. Or, I'm guessing, I'm almost thinking that from the tantric view, it would be like, No, you go right into it and you like, should always embrace it or utilize it and and and keep it real and use these ideas and vision, visuals or statues or representations as a way to go deeper. Do you have thoughts on on is, does that make sense? What I said?

Unknown:

Well, I would say that the iconographical form of the deities is a teaching tool, right? By looking at it, what kind of bodily qualities does it have? What kind of weapons or tools Is it holding? Now, this is teaching us something about that wisdom quality. But what temperature tradition will say is, of course, this is not how the deity really looks like, right? This is, as you said, a representation that we can adore, something we can show devotion towards, because it kind of looks like us. But the more true representation of the Deity is the yantra, the geometrical form, and the even more true representation is the mantra, the sonic form. So the mantra is the diri according to Tantra, and we learn more and more to work with mantras as we enter tantric practices. I would say, then again, you know, devotion is such a huge part of these traditions. In Shaiva Tantra, for example, which is a very, you know, high intellectual tradition, still, we see that some of the most revered teachers in the tradition were great devotional poets, and they never stopped loving the form of the Deity, even though they completely transcended that form.

Todd McLaughlin:

Yeah, great answer. Thank you. That made it clear. I love that you brought up the idea image of the yantra. If you sit in front of a yantra and gaze at it, can you share any type of realization? Questions or experiences you have.

Unknown:

I don't work with gazing at Yantras, but I have worked with constructing Yantras from scratch, with some of my beautiful collaborations at Mystic art retreats, and it's extremely challenging. We make a yantra from scratch, and it really takes a lot of effort and discipline to really step into the energy of that particular deity and construct the body of the Deity, so to speak. You know, and I don't worship those Yantras, because they're not perfect, of course, since I just constructed them as a beginner, but I would definitely recommend that practice, because just as meditation, it takes a lot, a lot of concentration to really construct the yantra. Yeah.

Todd McLaughlin:

Wow. So Tuva. Help me understand you. Potentially would go into some sort of meditative space, have a feeling of contact with a energy or deity, and then attempt to diagram that through the visual of a yantra based off of the experience. Am I? Am I understanding that correctly? That

Unknown:

would be an extremely advanced practice, something that the great seers of the past and present can do right? But what I've done is to practice within a tradition where a seer has already seen the yantra, seen the form of the Deity, and then instruct people in how to construct that deity. And then you construct it, all the while chanting the mantra of the Deity, for example. And then you use particular colors that you know is associated with that D Ren, so you construct the body of the of the DD, and if you are able to install the DD properly in the yantra, then you can worship it, right? But I'm a very imperfect artist. I'm not, I'm not worshiping the Yantras that I've done

Todd McLaughlin:

myself. Yeah, understood. I get it. That's That's so cool, though, it's amazing to think about now, initially, in our conversation, you had made mention that these myths are happening right now, like as opposed to reading and studying a myth and thinking that's a neat story from the past. And I right away, or I gather that you by having the view that you stated of if we can potentially study a myth and then self introspect and see where that myth might be revealed or appearing in our own lives. Currently, that I guess where my question is is, can you explain a little bit about your process of reading and studying myth, and then how to feel that myth being alive in your life currently, is there, is there something we can do as a practitioner to I mean, I think the answer is probably pretty clear right in front of me already, just, just, just do it

Unknown:

in grace, and the grace of just doing it right, because it's grace that also makes us do whatever we do and whatever we engage in. But you know, there's a lot of things that have just happened over time in my life that I don't, as I said, I don't really know when they began or how it's not like I intentionally set out to study mythology. I always loved stories. I was always reading, I was always writing. I was always interested in kind of bringing out the juice of a yoga practice, making it taste more, you know. And so storytelling and the deities really helped me with that. And now it's say that there's kind of no turning back. I might be a crazy person, you know, but then I have to kind of live with that, because for me, all of life now is kind of mythology. You know, when I look around and I see the news in the world, and I see, you know, different people and the way that I see them acting out archetypes in different ways all the time, and I see myself doing it as well, you know. So even though I might not say it all the time, I'm constantly seeing deities. I'm constantly seeing archetypes playing out in the world in different ways and showing their patterns, you know, in different ways. And it's, it's a magical life in a way. Yeah,

Todd McLaughlin:

I agree. I agree. Can you share? Share a myth or a story with this now.

Unknown:

Oh, well, one

Todd McLaughlin:

that might you made mention. Well, I mean, I think something that's really prevalent right now for all of us is hearing stories in the news like you made mention hearing what is happening in the world, and then obviously where we're getting our storytelling from, that might be, well, I was going to say questionable, but to be real, I hear stories from you on social media. So obviously, social media isn't all just slanted one way or the other, there's incredible amounts of information available to us at all moments, coming from all angles and all channels and all directions. So but I curious if there's a myth that you're seeing played out currently when you do engage in watching the your world, our world,

Unknown:

as you said. You know, storytelling is incredibly powerful, and that is why all of the leaders of the world are fighting to be the one telling the story. You know, the credible story. But I can just say the wisdom quality that is quite present for me at the moment is a mahavidya, a great wisdom goddess known as dumavati, and her giant tea, her victory or her appearance, sometimes called her birthday. It was used last week. And this is one of the least worshiped goddesses that we have in the tantric tradition, because she's very fierce and difficult to behold. She's known as the oldest one yishta. It's her full moon today, as we're speaking. Dumavati means the one who is made out of smoke, and so she is a widow. She's usually dressed in white, which is not an auspicious color in India, it's the color of funerals and of having lost something, she has no ornament. She's usually seen seated on a chariot with nobody pushing it or pulling it. So she is often described as a woman going nowhere, and she is very much associated with periods of great loss, of frustration, of disappointment, of seeing something go up in smoke that you might have worked for very, very long time to manifest, right? So the great goddess of the end of time, the tralaya. And so there are many esoteric interpretations of dumabati, but I also think of her in a very you know, here and now way, as the way that older women are marginalized in society, for example, and the way that women are constantly told to look young and act young and and kind of shy away from old age in any way that they can. And also, of course, being able to look at the difficult things in life, to not when somebody comes to us with grief, to not immediately try to make them feel better, or, you know, quickly move away from whatever is filling us with difficult emotions and also the state of the world that we are in right now, to dare look at the misery, to dare look at the hunger, to dare look at all of the terrible things that are going on around us, and then move into action, if we can, right, but to not shy away from everything that is going up in smoke around us, right? So dumat is very present for me since a few weeks back, and though we might try to avoid her, there is really no way, because she's coming for us all. Disappointment, lost, grief is coming for us all. So we might as well worship her, right? We might as well say, Okay, you're here. Welcome, you know, how can I, how can I be with you? How can I tolerate you?

Todd McLaughlin:

Oh, man, that's beautiful. Tuva, I'm so happy to hear that, because when I've always, I've always, kind of been looking at the calendar and I'm waiting for when the full moon will land on my birthday, and it hasn't happened yet, ever since I started to fall in love with the full moon. And so my mom's birthday is today, and she passed away a few years ago. And so when I looked at the calendar and I saw that Wednesday, we're recording. This on June 11, is was going to be the full moon. And I went, Oh man, it's my mom's Full Moon birthday. And I just felt so, just kind of excited, you know, in a way. So then when we scheduled this, and I saw, Oh, we got it on Wednesday, oh, it's on the full moon on my mom's birthday, I was like, yeah. So now, now hearing you say, explain the myth. I'm sorry. Can you please repeat the goddesses who the name of the Goddess? We're talking domavati. Domavati. Thank you. Sorry, dumavati, for missing that on the first go. I just feel like, I just feel like hearing that story is just warming me up because of everything. I mean, that's so beautiful, especially just accepting, like you said, who we are, and that that intense energy of trying to, like, hold back on our aging process, or just all of that energy that comes with the intensity and challenge of it. I just think you bringing attention to it is so important.

Unknown:

And thank you for sharing about your mother. Thank you always almost brought me to tears. Beautiful for her to be celebrated on yesterday's New Moon, and for us to celebrate the older women in our lives, yeah, wishing for them to be something that they cannot be, you know, but, but really appreciating their wisdom and honoring them. Yes,

Todd McLaughlin:

wow. Tova, you know, where so you're working towards your PhD, and do you have the vision of discontinued study and teaching? I see that you're offering a retreat in India. And can you speak a little bit about for you, what, what it's like for you to go to India having, I guess. Let me preface this question. The first time I went to India, I was so overwhelmed. And then when I came home and I started doing more study and reading and diving deeper into philosophy, then the second time I went, Wow, I saw things differently, and I could, I could start to appreciate which temples were affiliated with which particular god or goddess, and the different characteristics of markings and sari colors and different things that were happening which I in no way claim to understand fully everything I saw, because, wow, India is so amazing. Can you tell me a little bit about how you what it's like for you when you go based on your passion for yoga and philosophy?

Unknown:

Well, first time I went to India. I was 25 I think, and then, you know, I was so into yoga. I was there for seven weeks. I traveled around a little, but I spent most of the time in Rishikesh, used in an ashram, just doing hardcore practice, you know, from four o'clock in the morning till evening, you know, and I was happy with that back then. Now I have much more of an interest in, as you said, the temples and all of the sacred sites. And so then I was, I just wanted to go in, right? Because I was in my Shiva period, and then Shakti came into my life, and I wanted to see all the beauty around me. So when I went there, when I was 25 I was sure that I was going to go back within a year or two. But then I had my first child, and I had my second child, and I became a single mother, and I had a few difficult years, you know, with my children full time, not being able to make any money, really struggling. And so the invitation to come back to India now was just like the goddess, you know, inviting me, drawing me back. So now I'm able to go through work, and I have great collaborators in India. And what I do with mystic art retreats, for example, is to go to different Shakti pizzas, the seats of powers, the places that are filled with the Energy of The Goddess. And I'm incredibly best blessed to be able to visit all of these beautiful places and and use my love for mythology and philosophy to teach students that come with me there. So there are, you know, I don't teach live so much anymore in Sweden because I have a full time position in the university. A lot of I teach a lot online. So these are basically the times when I can see students live and spend time with them and really go deep into the. Traditions, wow, wow. Of course, now I get, like the best of India. Well, when I went as a 25 year old, you know, I was not a structured traveler. When I was show up, I had no hotel booked. I had no travel plan. I would just go wherever the wind brought me basically, you know. So it was kind of risky traveling like that by yourself as a female back then, and I'm sure now as well, but I always managed now, of course, I travel in a very secure and organized way, which is a lot safer for my family, too. Amazing. Yes, you know from the moment that I knew when we decided in the beginning of this year that we were going to go to Kamakhya, which is the most famous, famous Shakti pizza that we have in in India, that we were going to go there in November, I've been longing ever since, you know, it's gonna be, it's gonna be beautiful,

Todd McLaughlin:

incredible, Amazing, Tuva, oh my gosh, that'd be so fun. Are you? What is the role that you have at the university? What is your teaching role?

Unknown:

But I'm doing my PhD, so mostly what I do is my research, but I also teach some courses. I teach in the basic courses for religious studies, I teach Hinduism and Buddhism, and I also teach course on the history of yoga, which is like a new course that we start that actually drew us, a lot of people to the university.

Todd McLaughlin:

Amazing. Could you when you were 25 Do you think you could have flashed forward to the future to see yourself teaching yoga and history around Buddhism and Hinduism at a university level. Could you have, did you dream that early on or or would you have said, No way, because, you know, you mentioned, like the unstructured traveler, like wind blows north, I go north. You know, were you could you have seen that? Did you have that passion early or or would you say it's taken just dedication and and attentiveness to get here?

Unknown:

I think I did see it, but I

Todd McLaughlin:

amazing control in

Unknown:

because, as I told you, I was I started teaching in a high school when I was just 19. So I've done a lot of teaching in school in my life. Up until just a few years back, I have been teaching in different schools, teaching philosophy, teaching French and so on. So I would say that I was always kind of aiming for teaching in the university, because that's it. That's, I would say it's this. It's the simplest way of teaching. Of course, it demands a lot when it comes to your knowledge, but it's really hard work to teach in the school with kids, you know, as you might be aware, and this is just getting more and more difficult in Sweden. I mean, bless all the teachers here, it is really rough to teach in the school system. So I think I was always aiming for that, even though I had no idea how that would happen, yeah. I think being a teacher, being a teacher within these particular subjects. Yeah, I could have, yeah, yeah, known that that would happen.

Todd McLaughlin:

That's cool, too. Wow. I I'm so grateful to have this opportunity. I I will continue to learn from you, and I haven't. I'm going to order your book. I can't wait to read it. It is called and it's available on Amazon. Everyone can find and also provide the link in the in the description of where you can order it directly from India. You said your book was published by a publisher in India, which is amazing. Congratulations. It's titled yoga and tantra, history, philosophy and mythology, so everyone can find that super easy. And Tuva, I really appreciate you taking time. I know you're busy, and I am very grateful for your generosity and and how sweet you are in responding to me. And so thank you so much. Is there anything that you would like to leave us, leave us with, or send us off with, or not leave us, but we'll join in, and we'll chime in on your on your social media. You do an incredible job. So I really want, hopefully everyone listening will go and follow you and and every day I see you posting so much interesting stuff that I I'm fascinated by so but is there anything that you would like to share before we conclude?

Unknown:

No, just thank you, Todd, it's been lovely speaking with you. Thank you for your generosity and your appreciation. And as you said, you can find my. Online courses through my teachable platform and my link tree on Saraswati studies on Instagram. Of course, I taught a course on the vignana Bhairava Tantra, which is a tantric meditation manual, earlier this spring. So that course is up for self study now, and hopefully, if I find the time this autumn, I'm going to teach a course on Navaratri, on the Nine Nights of The Goddess. So focusing on the Devi mahatmya and Kundalini and some of the most beloved goddesses in the goddess traditions, that is what's coming up. And of course, the kamcha retreat in November. We still have a few spots left if you want to join us in India. Amazing.

Todd McLaughlin:

And then just one last question, when I went on your teachable are they all taught in English, or some taught in Swedish and some in English? I just wanted to clarify, yeah,

Unknown:

so there's, there are a lot of courses in Swedish, but I think you perhaps five or four in English, and it's the ones on top, so you can easily see, and also, when you open up to read more about the courses, you can see if it's written in English then the course. But there's a course on the history philosophy and mythology of yoga, which is kind of the flagship course. Then there's a course on Kashmir Shaivism, the heart of classical Tantra. Course on the dasa mahavidyas, the 10 tantric wisdom goddesses and the vignana Bhairava. Course the tantric meditation, which, of course, also have a Tantra, a lot of tantric philosophy in it. So what's up for now in English,

Todd McLaughlin:

well, thank you so much. Tuva, I really appreciate it. I can't wait to can you continue to learn from you?

Unknown:

Thank you. Thank you so much.

Todd McLaughlin:

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 you