Finding Refuge

Kiesha, a full-time yoga teacher and trainer, has a respected and well-deserved reputation in the national yoga community. She is Co-Director of the Yoga Retreat for Women of Color™ and a member of the board of directors for Amplify and Activate, a nonprofit community that focuses on yoga as a form of self-care and social justice. 

In addition to teaching through her own I Am Yoga organization, Kiesha has been Yoga Director at Charlotte Family Yoga Center and has taught for the YMCA of Greater Charlotte. She is a Yoga Alliance registered yoga teacher trainer, and has conducted numerous impactful workshops.  She has been featured in the book Yes Yoga Has Curves and other publications. 

With a graduate degree in Asian studies, Kiesha brings knowledge of Asian philosophy, religion, and language, as well as Eastern philosophy including Taoism, Buddhism, and Hinduism. In addition to being a teacher, she is a wife and mother.  When Kiesha does sit down, she is reading, meditating and breathing. 

The yoga experience with Kiesha: Kiesha teaches with a confidence that comes from strong training and rich experience. Her instruction is careful and crystal clear; she gives options and variations that make her classes accessible for students at any level. Kiesha specializes in Yin Yoga, which allows for deep stretches and in-depth exploration of each pose. She also has training in prenatal yoga, Curvy Yoga, restorative, and Grounded Kids as well as Chinese medicine. 

Current mood:  Waiting for things to be revealed. 

Favorite movie: Under the Cherry Moon (1986) Musical/Romance

In this episode Kiesha offers teachings about:

The meaning of the practice of yoga
Yoga philosophy 
Death as a teacher
Balance
The need to keep moving
The need to grieve
The practice of grieving
The practice of remembering
How to bring playfulness in during a time of great loss
The importance of community
How to live your yoga
The Bhagavad Gita 
There are many different paths
Teachers/Ancestors
Black Yoga Teachers Alliance
Renewal 

Connect with Kiesha on her website and on Instagram @iamyogaclt

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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This episode is a magical interview with my friend Seán Johnson. 

Seán is a musician, storyteller, teacher-trainer, and sacred space-holder who has been teaching Yoga for the last 24 years. He is the founder of Wild Lotus Yoga in his native New Orleans, and Soul School, an online interdisciplinary spiritual immersion and Yoga teacher training program that focuses on teaching Yoga with skill and imagination, that he guides with Mitchel Bleier. In all these roles, he relishes creating a playful, tender, brave space for people to open their hearts and voices, sing, and embrace their innate creativity. 

Seán has a master’s degree in Creation Spirituality from The Naropa Institute-Oakland, with focus on teaching chant as spiritual practice, apprenticing there with south Indian musician and teacher Russill Paul, author of The Yoga Of Sound. In 2002 he founded Wild Lotus Yoga in his beloved hometown and dubbed it "New Orleans' Home for Heart-Centered Yoga and Down-To-Earth Spirituality." 

In 2005, in the harrowing days right after Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, Seán founded The Wild Lotus Band, initially as a philanthropic music project, touring and raising funds across the country for relief from the devastation of the storm. Now 16 years later, the band continues to record and tour--- sharing ancient mantras from the traditions of yoga, global chants, conscious lyrics, roots, rock, gospel, and world grooves with listeners worldwide. They are the first mantra music based band to ever play The New Orleans Jazz Festival. Seán is also the co-curator of Putumayo World Music's  'Music For Yoga' series, featuring artists from around the globe. 

Seán's first significant initiations into a more conscious spirituality came through the exuberance of falling in love for the first time and then through the pain and grief of heartbreak. A journey to heal his heart led him to the path of Bhakti Yoga which deeply honors vulnerability, creative expression, and art as forms of prayer and spiritual practice. The theme of searching for grace and inspiration amidst challenge, destruction, and grief permeates his music and teaching, deepened further by the death of his brother Jeremy, who passed away in a drowning accident in 2013. 

Seán is passionate about his Irish roots and ancestry, a pillar of his spirituality. He co-leads online Celtic Spirituality gatherings and retreats in Ireland each year with his friend, Ireland native Mary Meighan, founder of Celtic Journeys. 

Seán lives in New Orleans with his wife Farah and son Finn. 

This episode explores:

- Voice and vulnerability
- Creativity 
- Reconnecting with the heart
- Grief as a teacher
- The mystery of life
- Faith
- Reimagining community
- Covid 19 as a teacher
- How to heal wounds and shift narratives
- Ancestors
- Opening to possibility 
- Tenderness 

Connect with Seán on the Wild Lotus Yoga website, his band website, and on Instagram @seanwildlotusband and @wildlotusyoga 

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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Syd Yang (they/them) is a mixed race/Taiwanese American queer/non-binary healer, intuitive counselor and writer who weaves together magic, possibility and intention as an energy healer in the world through their practice, Blue Jaguar Healing Arts. As someone who lives with depression and anxiety, and has recovered from severe eating disorders, Syd's work finds its resonance in the stories we each hold at the intersection of memory, body, sexuality and mental health. Syd works primarily with queer and trans BIPOC individuals as well as regularly leads workshops, community healing circles and has been a group facilitator for over two decades, with a specific focus on grief, healing ancestral trauma, sexuality + spirituality, body liberation and eating disorder recovery. Their recent memoir, Release: A Bulimia Story, re-imagines what recovery would look like without shame. 

Syd drops wisdom about:

Rendering the Impossible

Befriending our Grief

Curiosity about who we are Being Called to be at this time

Bird Medicine and Magic

Seedlings 

What and How we Will Choose to Grow

The Possible Emerging From Experiences of Restriction 

Grief and Rage

The Sweetness Encapsulated in the Process of Grieving What we Have Lost

Movement Building

What Most Needs Our Attention at This Time

Intimacy with Our Emotions

The Natural World

The Cycle of Life and Death Joy 

 You can connect with Syd on their website and Instagram, @bluejaguarlove and @releasebulimia.

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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Micky ScottBey Jones she/diva- the Justice Doula - accompanies people as they birth more love, justice and shalom into our world. As a womanist, contemplative activist, movement chaplain, certified Enneagram coach and trainer and nonviolence practitioner, Micky supports students, clergy, activists and everyday leaders in a variety of roles - speaker, writer, facilitator, pilgrimage guide, consultant and teacher. She is the Director of Resilience and Healing Initiatives with Faith Matters Network and the visionary leader of the Daring Compassion Movement Chaplaincy Project focused on infusing movements for social change with accompaniment, care, healing and resilience. Micky was a core team member with The People’s Supper who gathered more than 10,000 people around tables after the 2016 U.S. election for bridging and healing conversations. A lifelong learner, Micky has a B.S. in Consumer and Family Sciences and a M.A. in Intercultural Studies from NAIITS/Portland Seminary and is constantly taking a new class or reading a new book. A believer in the power of stories and empathy, she is also a facilitator and Master Practitioner Candidate with Narrative 4. She is the author of Keep the Fires Burning: Conquering Stress and Burnout as a Mother-Baby Professional and contributing author of Becoming Like Creoles: Living and Leading at the Intersections of Injustice, Culture and Religion and Keep Watch With Me: An Advent Reader for Peacemakers.

Featured by the Nobel Women’s Initiative’s #16DaysOfBoldChange, racial justice fellow for Christians for Social Action and named one of the Black Christian leaders changing the world in Huffington Post, Micky is known worldwide for exploring peacemaking and justice movements in different contexts, across continents, crafting experiences for brave space, transformation and revolutionary love, compelling storytelling, engaging in authentic conversations - and most importantly - never passing up a dance floor.

She has been a contributor on many platforms including  Christians For Social Action, The Porch Magazine, Sojourners, Our Bible App, and Red Letter Christians, and many podcasts including CTZNWELL,  The Liturgists, Lord Have Mercy and Homebrewed Christianity. 

Micky dropped knowledge about:

- Healing Work for Movement Builders
- Burnout and How to Prioritize Self-Care
- Being Instead of Doing
- The Year of Covid-19 
- Dreaming and Working During Crisis
- How Families Have Been Impacted by the Loss of Loved Ones Due to Covid-19
- How we Cannot Meditate Covid-19 Away
- The Value of Consistent Check Ins with Community 
- The Importance of Teachers and Mentors 
- A Commitment to Not Dying on the Altar of Justice 

 You can find more about her work at www.faithmattersnetwork.org and check out her social media on Facebook and Twitter.

The  Daring Compassion Program at Faith Matters Network has trained 100s of folks worldwide in movement chaplaincy. We are currently accepting registrations for the Summer cohort and will have a Fall cohort as well. My vision is accompaniment, healing and resilience building woven into our movements for social change so that we might thrive as we resist and create new futures!

Brave Space Poem

Together we will create brave space.

Because there is no such thing as a “safe space” —

We exist in the real world.

We all carry scars and we have all caused wounds.

In this space

We seek to turn down the volume of the outside world,

We amplify voices that fight to be heard elsewhere,

We call each other to more truth and love.

We have the right to start somewhere and continue to grow.

We have the responsibility to examine what we think we know.

We will not be perfect.

This space will not be perfect.

It will not always be what we wish it to be.

But

It will be our brave space together,

and

We will work on it side by side.

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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Kennae Miller (she/her) was born in Frankfurt, Germany in a strong military family and was raised on Arapaho and Cheyenne Indigenous land (now known as Colorado Springs, CO) where her father completed his military career and her family planted their roots. While living in Colorado and being exposed to many different experiences and forms of art she discovered yoga as a junior in high school. Initially lured by the invitation of a free class for relaxation as she navigated her teenage years she enjoyed the calmness of mind a yoga practice provided for her. It was only after the beginning of her parent’s difficult divorce was she able to observe and benefit in different aspects of life, from focus to self-inquisition, stemming from a yoga practice. Kennae credits the practice of yoga as the only place she could go to just be herself and relax her mind. 

In Spring 2005 she enlisted in the United States Air Force Reserves and as she traveled around the country, found stability in continuing her yoga practice. As Kennae approached motherhood in 2012, she dreamed of having more freedom outside of wearing a uniform where her individuality and desire to serve others could be of better use. She recalls in 2013 Tweeting, that she would become a Yoga Instructor and own a yoga studio. In 2015 she completed her first Yoga Alliance compliant 200-hour teacher training at Hawaii Yoga Institute on the island of O’ahu, Honolulu, Hawaii. She has since furthered her knowledge base by training with Dr. Gail Parker on Restorative Yoga for Race-Based Trauma Injury, Gentle Yoga,  Restorative Yoga, Yoga Nidra with Tracee Stanley and Chanti Tacoronte-Perez, and Reiki. She has also attended CTZN Summit and Wanderlust Wellspring with Kerri Kelly, Seane Corn, Michelle Cassandra Johnson, Rev. Angel Kyodo Williams, and Marianne Williamson and Tracee Stanley, which bridges the wellness world and activism. 

As a yoga instructor or what Kennae likes to call ‘Space holding’, she enjoys sharing her truth, of difficulties and triumphs, and what she has learned on her journey to hold space and encourage others along their journey. Kennae believes as she continues to grow as an individual through her personal practice, she has been able to learn and experience more of all yoga as to offer. Her goal now is liberation and to become a good ancestor by holding sacred and brave space for others to reconnect with their truth and live it daily on and off their yoga mat to transform their lives and thus the world around them. 

Kennae is a giver that enjoys pouring back into people and the community through her time, talents, and skills. Because of this Kennae is a strong believer in connecting with nature through urban farming, reconnecting with ancestral and cultural practices, community skills classes and yoga experiences for each individual. In the future, Kennae strives to further her training to better serve the members of her community through the use of Yoga Therapy, Ayurveda, essential oils, Reiki, and other holistic healing therapies. Kennae is the founder of Transformation Yoga, a community of yogis utilizing tools of yoga and meditation to serve marginalized, underserved, and underrepresented communities in (Kusso land) South Carolina with a framework of anti-racism and oppression and the reduction of harm. Kennae is also the co-founder of Enough, where inclusively they bridge yoga, racial and social justice together to provide funding and awareness to local issues and grassroots organizations owned and led by BPOC. Transformation Yoga Studio opened in December 2019 to provide a home and brave space for healing and transformative work on a person, community and collective level. 

In this very special episode Kennae and I talk about:

- Living Liberated
- Modeling Liberation for Others
- Control vs. Liberation
- Embodying Liberation
- Paying homage to the Ancestors 
- What it Means to be a Living Ancestor 
- The Meaning of Yoga
- Transformation Yoga
- Prioritizing Healing and Self-Care
- The Power of Journaling
- Cancel Culture
-Warriorship

You can connect with Kennae Miller online at transformationyogasc.com or on Instagram @transformationyogasc

Enjoy the episode!

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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Mirabelle is in an intimate relationship with yoga as a breath-ing experience. She has been on this path of living yoga for 19 years, studying with swamis (monks) and teachers from the Sivananda Saraswati lineage, which traces back to Adi Shankaracharya.  She also studied Yoga and Yoga Philosophy from Mumbai University for 2 years. She has taught at yoga ashrams and studios in India, the USA, Canada, Bahamas, Bermuda, and the Cayman Islands and is a guest teacher on trainings on pranayama, bhakti yoga, and the deeper nuances of yoga. 

Mirabelle invites you into delicious practices of yogic breathwork (pranayama) and delicate self-enquiry, playing 1-1 or in a steady loving community.  Her signature offerings are Sadhana Club, a bi-monthly online sanctuary that helps  yoga lovers find authentic yoga knowledge and enjoy community sharing and acceptance and a 9 week Radiant You Private Mentoring program to uncover healing through intimacy with breath. Working with her, you will find purpose, pleasure and intimacy in life through breath. Savour  the healing and clarity  that naturally unfold, as you unplug from urgency and into deep trust and allowing.

Mirabelle shares knowledge about:

- The power of having a daily Sadhana
- The power of the breath
- The breath as the practice of yoga
- How to move through fear 
- Devotion
- The Divine Mother
- Yoga as a state of being
- The technique of the practice of yoga
- Finding refuge in the breath
- Effort and inner wisdom
- Cultural Appropriation
- Acceptance
- Surrender
- Kali Yuga

You can connect with Mirabelle on her website, and be sure to visit Sadhana Club to learn more about this offering.

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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Tracee Stanley was introduced to the practice of yoga nidra in 2001. She immediately recognized it as a healing salve for the world and began to incorporate it into her life and her yoga teaching.

She left her high-stress career as a Hollywood film producer to delve deeper into the study of the practices that were empowering and rejuvenating her, so she could share them with others.

With over 20 years of experience practice and teaching in the Himalayan Tradition, Tantra and Sri Vidya, she also understands the demands of life as an entrepreneur, wife, and stepmom. Her effortless way of sharing ancient teachings in accessible ways is her superpower.

She travels extensively to offer yoga nidra, meditation, self-inquiry, teacher trainings and workshops. Radiant Rest, published by Shambhala Publishing, is her first book.

Tracee offers us wisdom about:

- Radiant Rest
- Intuition and Deep Listening 
- Rituals
- Thought Patterns Meant to Trap us
- The Alchemy in the Natural World
- Honoring Our Teachers
- The Nature of Suffering
- The Pathway to Less Suffering
- Shifting the Vibration from Suffering to Liberation
- Ancestors
- Sadhana
- Practice
-Devotion to Practice 

Connect with Tracee through her website and on Instagram.

As a gift to all of the listeners Tracee has provided a 30% off discount off her upcoming book Radiant Rest which is now on pre-order from the publisher's site with the code RR30 until 3/31/21.

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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Ana is my nine-year old friend. She is an amazing spirit. She is a Cancer Sun, Gemini Rising and an Aries Moon. She loves the ocean and all things water. Ana loves to sing, draw, paint, camp and bake! This podcast episode came to be because Ana was in the car with me listening to my interview on another podcast. I thought she was asleep. After the podcast ended she said, “that was really good.” I said, “I should interview you” to which we responded with an enthusiastic YES! 

Enjoy this special episode of Finding Refuge. It is sure to warm your heart. Also, talk to the young ones in your life. They know things. So many things. Ask them questions, encourage them to be curious and to shake things up as we need. The children are the future and I want to leave them in a better place culturally and politically than where we are right now. Don’t you? 

In this very special episode Ana and I talk about:

- Astrology and having all the feelings
- Magic and building altars
- Coronavirus
- What is is like to be homeschooled
- Creativity
- Family
- Friends 
- Lessons we can learn from this moment

Enjoy!

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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Victoria Santos, MA, designs and facilitates group processes in communities, organizations, businesses, universities and schools. Her work is rooted in a far-reaching vision of human potential. Warm authentic presence, compassionate communication, commitment to social justice and racial equity, and lifelong learning are threads running through all of Victoria’s work. Victoria has a deep commitment to our collective liberation.

Equipped with diverse approaches and perspectives, Victoria brings a strong affinity for exploring the ways that intersectional and structural oppressions express themselves in systems, cultures and individuals. She helps organizational leaders clearly recognize systemic barriers to social justice and racial equity. She then helps these leaders identify and embrace actions that foster personal and professional growth, transform organizational culture, and create lasting, meaningful impact.

Victoria has trained in the fields of psychology, conflict resolution, meditation, rituals and embodied practices. She brings over thirty years of experience and leadership in education, community organizing and community development. With a Master’s degree from SUNY-Albany in Political Science & Latin American and Caribbean Studies, she also holds certifications in transformative and healing practices, and has participated in many continuing education trainings.

Victoria leads groups and individuals in meditative explorations drawn from the Realization Process®. Developed by Judith Blackstone, this process is a body-centered approach to personal and spiritual healing and maturity. For ten years, Victoria assisted Sobonfu Somé in leading grief rituals according to the Dagara traditions of Burkina Faso. The values and spirit of both of these approaches inform Victoria’s work with groups.

Victoria is a Spanish-fluent Afro-Caribbean immigrant who was born in a rural village in the Dominican Republic. Her lived experiences in different cultures have enhanced her capacity to bring a culturally rich analysis and vision to her group work. This helps her to reach beyond received cultural norms and go to the heart of the matter: bringing to light that which is calling for attention and care.

Victoria drops wisdom about:

- Different layers and levels of consciousness
- The Larger Self 
- The Power of the Invisible
- Ancestry and healing for seven generations back
- Intuition
- The meaning of this moment
- Death as a doorway
- Life as a ritual
- Contemplative practices
- The cost of disembodiment
- What true compassion means
- Relationships across difference 
- Boundaries
- Rest
- Emptiness 

Learn more about Victoria’s work at www.educationforracialequity.com and youngwomenempowered.org.

Victoria will be offering a series of workshops and cohort learning experience diverse groups in 2021. Please contact her for more information. One such offering is - Undoing Racism in the Body a 2-day retreat for white people Saturday February 27th-28th. An experiential approach to releasing the somatic patterns of white body supremacy and embodying being an anti-racist. Mention this podcast for 10% off.

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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Francis Weller, MFT, is a psychotherapist, writer and soul activist. He is a master of synthesizing diverse streams of thought from psychology, anthropology, mythology, alchemy, indigenous cultures, and poetic traditions. Author of The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief; The Threshold Between Loss and Revelation, (with Rashani Réa) and  In the Absence of the Ordinary: Essays in a Time of Uncertainty, he has introduced the healing work of ritual to thousands of people. He founded and directs WisdomBridge, an organization that offers educational programs that seek to integrate the wisdom from indigenous cultures with the insights and knowledge gathered from western poetic, psychological and spiritual traditions. 

For thirty-seven years Francis has worked as a psychotherapist and developed a style he calls soul-centered psychotherapy. As a gifted therapist and teacher, he has been described as a jazz artist, improvising and moving fluidly in and out of deep emotional territories with groups and individuals, bringing imagination and attention to places often held with judgment and shame. His latest offerings are a 10-session audio series on "Living a Soulful Life and Why It Matters." and "The Alchemy of Initiation: Soul Work and the Art of Ripening." 

Francis received two Master’s Degrees from John F. Kennedy University in Clinical Psychology and Transpersonal Psychology. His writings have appeared in anthologies and journals exploring the confluence between psyche, nature, and culture. His work was featured in The Sun magazine (October 2015) and the Utne Reader (Fall 2016). He is a frequent presenter and keynote speaker at conferences, bringing insight, poetry, and a breath of humor to his talks. Francis is currently on staff at Commonweal Cancer Help Program, co-leading their week-long retreats with Michael Lerner. He has taught at Sonoma State University, the Sophia Center in Oakland and has been the featured teacher at the Minnesota Men's Conference. He is currently completing his fourth book, A Trail on the Ground: The Geography of Soul. 

Francis drops wisdom about:

- The Soul
- What it Means to be a Soul Tracker
- Grief Rituals
- Reclaiming and Remembering
- The Darkness as Medicine
- The Depths of the Soul
- Becoming Intimate With the Soul
- Whiteness and Emptiness
- Keeping Grief Warm
- Being Alive vs. Being Happy
- The Privatization of the Human Experience
- Remembering All of Our Relations
- Connection
- The Mystery of What it Means to be Alive 
- Ancestors 

 You can connect with Francis at www.francisweller.net

Podcast music by Charles Kurtz

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