Life that said Yes

In the 17th episode of LIFE THAT SAID YES conversations Ivan is joined by Olive Bieringa in a lovely exchange about awakening the senses and opening the perception, new ways of learning, rewilding of the human spirit, performance art and resisting extinction through ecosomatic practices.Olive Bieringa is a dance maker, somatic movement therapist and cultural producer who grew up in Wellington, New Zealand. She is a Registered ISMETA Somatic Movement Therapist and Educator, a Certified Practitioner and Teacher of Body-Mind Centering®, Shiatsu practitioner and certified DanceAbility teacher, working with dancers of all abilities. She holds an MFA in Performance and New Media from Long Island University in Brooklyn, NY and a BA from the European Dance Development Center in the Netherlands. She is currently based in Oslo, Norway.Olive teaches internationally in Body-Mind Centering® trainings for Moveus/Germany, Leben nuova/Italy, Moving from Within/USA, Soma/France, Sonder/USA and in universities and festivals such as Oslo National Academy of the Arts, Praxis Festival/Oslo, Impulstanz Festival/Vienna, Movement Research/NYC, and for dance companies Lyon Opera Ballet, Footnote Dance, Touch Compass/New Zealand. As a curator & producer she has developed projects such as SEEDS Festival (Somatic Experiments in Earth, Dance and Science) at Earthdance/USA and Public Art St Paul’s City Art Collaboratory, bringing together artists and scientists.For twenty years she has been collaborating with Otto Ramstad as the BodyCartography Project creating dances, performances, films, installations, and festivals. BodyCartography’s offerings have functioned to deepen the conversation in experimental and somatic practice to give value to other ways of experiencing and making dance. Their work lives in the collection of Te Papa Tongarewa National Museum of New Zealand. Their performances have presented at the Walker Art Center/Minneapolis, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, PS 122 and American Realness/NYC, amongst other places. Together they run Embodied Performance intensives for performing artists.https://bodycartography.org/

This is a somatization from the Living Body Online Series which took place on April 6th, 2025. This somatization was a part of a live Zoom class, where we discussed the following topics: - Being overwhelmed by the world and its events- Healing- Transformation & Repatterning- Allowing rest- Nature as support- Finding the roots- Regeneration & restoring energy- External & internal breathing- Mitochondria- Anchoring in the heart- Kindness & Trust- Developing a personal practiceYou can watch the whole class here:https://youtu.be/foR1F0LEom4A big thank you to all the participants.What is a somatization? Somatization is form of guided meditation through which we direct our consciousness into our living body-mind and the myriad of processes that exist inside of us. LIVING BODY is an ongoing online series of somatic explorations and studying. It takes place every Sunday at 6PM CET through Zoom. If you want to participate live contact me at [email protected] for all the details.

This is a somatization from the Living Body Online Series which took place on March 30th, 2025. The topic was Being Present and Facing the World (Pelvis-Heart-Brain connection). It was a part of a live Zoom class, where we discussed the following topics: Glands and glandular chainAttention and being presentImportance of lower glands and rooting for being present and coming into momentGlands and perceptionSeeing, meeting and facing the world and the fear that can come out of itOpening the sensesYou can watch the whole class here:https://youtu.be/6Xn08nJ-i7gA big thank you to all the participants.What is a somatization? Somatization is form of guided meditation through which we direct our consciousness into our living body-mind and the myriad of processes that exist inside of us. LIVING BODY is an ongoing online series of somatic explorations and studying. It takes place every Sunday at 6PM CET through Zoom. If you want to participate live contact me at [email protected] for all the details.

In the 16th episode of LIFE THAT SAID YES conversations Ivan is joined by Linda Hartley, in a rich conversation about our relationship to nature and our own embodied being, hearing the voice of Earth, slowing down, Authentic Movement, connection of personal and transpersonal experiences, how to embrace both beauty and sadness, holding the healing space, redefining relationship to dying, and many other topics.

Timestamps:

00:27 - Introduction.

01:04 - Relationship with nature and our own embodied being.

04:35 - Hearing the voice of  Nature and Her messages. Listening through all of our senses. Slowing down to Nature’s pace.

13:00 - Intimate connection with immediate environment. Little changes towards our own health and wellbeing and dedicating that to the whole.

16:17 - The discipline of the Authentic Movement. Personal healing and a potential for touching and widening into the transpersonal and the mystical. Relationship and connection of personal and transpersonal, embracing both. Spiritual bypassing. Releasing the story of personal trauma.

23:52 - Widening embrace of the transpersonal view. Creating a container for trauma in order to deal with it when we are ready. Being released from the narrow perspective of the ego mind.

26:33 - Authentic Movement as a way to express our story and pain, but also to widen into a more transpersonal experience. The beauty of knowing both. How to be present and hold both beauty and sadness. Finding the balance.

31:40 - Servants of the Sacred Dream. Healing coming through inner work, but holding the healing space. Nurturing the feminine aspect. The myth of Inanna. Healing the wounds of the masculine. The archetypal underworld journey. Role of the witness.

43:12 - The challenges of descending into the underworld. Need for gentleness and a more subtle modulated process. Being in the life-long process. Listening, sensing, feeling the movements in our body. The embodied myth. The archetype of being in the birth passage - coming out of the underworld. Collective midwifing of something new and grieving the old.

51:55 - Redefining our relationship to dying. Midwifing the transition.

01:00:45 - Novel “The Broken Line”. Writing fiction.

01:03:26 - Embodies Spirit, Conscious Earth. Using somatic practices to allow our consciousness to open wider. Weaving somatics and spirituality.

01:08:50 - What more am I called to offer as I embrace my elderhood? The role of the elders.

In the 15th episode of the LTSY Conversations Ivan is joined by Lisa Clark.

Lisa offers an embodied experience of yoga and movement. Her approach explores the many layers of our form, the deepening of consciousness through ongoing inquiry into the body, and embodiment as a pathway of liberation.

She is Program/Educational Director of the School For Body-Mind Centering® Yoga Immersion Series. She is one of the leading innovators of the integration of Yoga and Body-Mind Centering®, actively engaged in the teaching, training, and development of this form for over 40+ years. She began her studies of BMC® in 1984, and has worked directly with Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen for over four decades.

Lisa is Co-Program Director of the BMC® Somatic Movement Educator Program in Taiwan. She is a certified Teacher/Practitioner of Body-Mind Centering®, Infant Developmental Movement Educator, and a registered International Somatic Movement Educator. Her workshops and advanced trainings have been taught internationally at studios in the United States, Europe, Taiwan, and China. Her online platform www.lisaclarkyoga.com offers live and recorded classes, in-depth workshops, and professional trainings.

Lisa's website:

https://www.lisaclarkyoga.com/

This is a somatization from the session 15 of the Living Body Series (December 22nd, 2024).

In the 14th episode of the LTSY Conversations Ivan is joined by Marina Tsartsara, in a conversation about the connection of arts and somatics, and how it reflects to our wellbeing.

Marina is a Somatic Movement Therapist (ISMETA Registered), Body-Mind Centering® Teacher, co-director of ISTOS (Official BMC® training in Greece and Greek Cyprous), a Dance & Visual Artist (MSc). The interdisciplinary nature of her practice led her to create the methodology of Somatic Art Practice®. She has performed and taught internationally since 2007.

Everything is VIBRATION. An emanating essence leaving its imprint in space. A drone tone radiating and modulating, touching other vibrations, making infinite varieties of creation. Frequencies making love. Creation is vibration. Sound and movement. Alive and palpable. Ranging from the finest, subtlest and rarefied, to the densest, condensed into matter. What is your drone? What is your essential tone? The imprint of your soul? A specific code pertaining only to you, born directly of the Source? I dive into the ocean of my vibrations and explore them, get to know them intimately, sort them out, befriend them, melt them, modulate them and tune them. Cultivating my music and my imprint. Allowing my Soul sound to take the lead and compose my true freedom. Embracing my Heart and deeply listening to it’s quiet and gentle hum.

This is a somatization from the session 14 of the Living Body Series (July 28th, 2024).

This is a somatization from the session 13 of the Living Body Series (July 21st, 2024).