Welcome!

This is the introductory entry of my new website feature – a web log. Web-logs (or blogs) have become an important way for people to reach out and share their personal beliefs, information, ideas and communications. I'm delighted to be able to offer this extended point of view beyond what you can read at my website in general. I feel this is an opportunity for me to dialogue with those who resonate with my work and give a broader picture of my beliefs and purpose. With this site I wish to share what's currently engaging my consciousness. You the reader will have a deeper perspective of my mission and vision through this medium.

Almost anyone can tell from reading the information on my website the core, primary beliefs that motivate my work. The foundation of my work: the union and dynamic balance of feminine and masculine (both/and metaphorically and practically speaking), the primacy of the body (the experience of embodiment) and the significant relationship of Eros and Spirit. These are the principles that inform my personal development as well as my work in Life Coaching, Somatic Bodywork and Yoga. My most sincere wish is to encourage the natural, authentic relationship of feminine and masculine, Spirit and Eros through consciousness and embodiment.

For my first entry I'd like to describe a journey that I've been on for the last several years culminating recently (yet infinitely ongoing). This journey revolves around a workshop I attended this spring at the Esalen Institute.

Several years ago while at Esalen I was fortunate enough to attend a Tantric conference led by the Tantric Master, Daniel Odier. Through guided meditation practice, Tandava and Kashmiri massage Daniel led us into experiences of penetrating clarity and deep subjectivity. It was a sublime and awakening event for me. It fed me and nurtured my desire to continue on the path of embodiment. During the conference I realized I wished to deepen my understanding of Yoga – particularly Yoga at its best in the West. One of my comrade attendees (who is a world renowned yogini in her own right) recommended that I get to know the teacher, Mark Whitwell. In the Esalen bookshop I found and read Mark's book, Yoga of Heart: The Healing Power of Intimate Connection.

As with Daniel Odier's message, Mark's message was crystal clear and completely in resonance with my own explorations and work. Both Odier and Whitwell see the necessity of bringing a unified field of feminine/masculine energies back into our shared world. This is of primary importance to my work.

Here is a sample of Mark's Hridayayogasutra (The Heart Yogasutra).

"Human contentment, wellness, wisdom and realization are in the power of mutuality between the polar opposites, man and woman. It is in the acknowledgment, participation and surrender to the fact that one pole does not exist without the other. This is the realization of the heart or whole. In the pain that is felt around sexual relationship, this is a hard pill to swallow amidst the predominant social influence that suggests wisdom is in the transcendence of sex. However, it is a challenge within our possibility. Negative personal and social traits are replaced in time by positive patterns, the natural responses to intimacy. The freedom of polarized union with our tangible realities (left to right, above to below, front to back, female to male, outer to inner) is natural, already established and within the human grasp, whereas the religious proposal of transcendence is not"
14. Hridayayogasutra (The Heart Yogasutra).

"The ultimate locus of yogic awareness while alive is the heart, not the head. The heart is revealed only through participation in life's inherent polarities, especially base to crown and inner to outer. The openness of the whole body reveals the open heart."
16. Hridayayogasutra (The Heart Yogasutra).

"Enlightenment does not look like anything or conform to any cultural model of perfect behavior or beatitude. It is simply an understanding and enjoyment of the obvious perfection, which is Life. What appears to be social limitation may continue. How can you have a perfect relationship when you have 2,500 years' denial of sex and woman on your hands? Knowing that the male/female polarity serves the union of spirit and form, the unseen and the seen, heaven and Earth, will help clear it up for yourself and society."
17. Hridayayogasutra (The Heart Yogasutra).

In these sutras Mark has eloquently stated what I believe to be the fundamental needed direction in today's world. It is critical that we as the human species begin to reawaken to the union of feminine/masculine balance. For too long we have suffered with an extreme imbalance towards masculine-only cultural dominance and we need to swing the pendulum back towards the feminine for sustainable balance.

It was a great pleasure to finally meet Mark this spring and to hear and experience his teachings. What a wonderfully humble yet inspired teacher he is. My journey continues onward supported by true teachers, my continuing education and self-development.

Another circle in the spiral of my life's journey. From a chance meeting at Daniel Odier's Tantric conference I was put in touch with Mark Whitwell's book. Through Mark's website I found a wonderful and grounded Yoga teacher, Dawn Summers, who has supported, and continues to support my growth as a yoga instructor. And this spring finally meeting Mark in the flesh.

My journey continues as I feel the embodied resonance with other paths that I travel simultaneously. My ongoing Breema practice with the nine principles of unifying harmony is in total alignment.

As the Yoga Spandakarika proclaims in verse 30,

"Iti va yasya samvittih kridavenakhilam jagat/
Sa pasyan satatam yukto jivanmukto na samsayah//"

From The Stanzas on Vibration, Mark S.G. Dyczkowski

"Always present to the reality that he perceives as the play of his own nature, the tantrika is liberated at the heart of life."

From the Yoga Spandakarika: The Sacred Texts at the Orgins of Tantra, Daniel Odier