Sense of Soul - Chakra Rituals

Episode Date: August 20, 2021

We are so excited to share with you on Sense of Soul Podcast the lovely soul, Cristi Christensen, Global Empowerment Coach, International Master Yoga Instructor and Author of the newly released book, Chakra Rituals: Awakening the Wild Woman Within (St. Martin’s Press). She’s on a mission to empower women and expand their definitions of well-being. Cristi has taught in 20 countries around the globe to tens of thousands of women. She is the creator of Soul Fire, a unique style of yoga that incorporates dance, meditation and mudra practices, and the co-Founder of the Asia based Kirana Yoga School and US based Deep Exhale, a transformational experience merging breath, music & movement. Her amazing new released book, Chakra Rituals offers a seven-week program to guide readers through the ancient science of Chakras in an easy and accessible way to enliven and empower the reader. The program includes immersive exercises such as vinyasa yoga, writing contemplation and embodiment. Cristi teaches how to activate each Chakra, to claim your power and positively transform your life. This book is a must have and you can get it right here. https://www.chakraritualsbook.com Learn all about Cristi at her website https://www.cristichristensen.com and follow her amazing journey on Instagram! Here Lots of fun stuff to check out on www.mysenseofsoul.com, new merch, coaching programs, readings, classes and more!  Click here to check out our new Sense of Soul Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/senseofsoul Please Rate, Review and Subscribe, we appreciate the love and support. Xoxo!

Welcome to the Sense of Soul podcast. We are your hosts, Shanna and Mandy. Grab your coffee, open your mind, heart and soul. It's time to awaken. Today we have with us Christy Christensen. She's a global empowerment coach. She is the creator of Soul Fire, a unique style of yoga that incorporates dance, meditation, and mudra practices. She is also the co-founder of the Asia-based Karana Yoga School and the U.S.-based Deep Exhale, a transformational experience merging breath, music, and movement. And we are so excited for Christy. Her new book, Chakra Rituals Awakening the Wild Woman Within,

has just released this week and cannot wait to hear about her book because you know we love the chakras. So wonderful to meet you. Wonderful to meet you too. How are you doing? I'm doing pretty good. I definitely am feeling a little hinge of excitement and anxiety simultaneously meeting you both. And there's definitely a quickening happening inside of me because my book, it's like, oh gosh, oh gosh. For some reason this morning, when I was sitting with your book releasing, I kind of felt like this weird anxieties, excitement for you, not even knowing you, which I've never felt for anyone. Oh, interesting.

Yeah. Maybe I felt you, or I felt like maybe this book is just going to be like, so great. Like, I don't know. I just felt like this surge of excitement when I saw your date for you. I love it. I love it. I mean, seriously, we've had probably over a hundred book authors and I've never, I've never had that feeling before.

It was really cool. Christy, where do you live? I'm in Los Angeles right now. The reason I say I'm not definitively saying I live here is because I gave up my apartment and I have to be out in 41 days. So I'm not sure what I'm doing next yet. Yeah. Since COVID hit, well, pre-COVID my life was I pretty much lived on the road.

I was traveling and teaching about 70% of the time. I lived full time on the road for about three years. And after about three years, I was like, okay, I need to like have a place that I like at least know what my bed feels like. And I need to know where some of my stuff is because what I was saying is I make donations around the world. Like I'll look at photos and I'm like, oh my gosh, where's that necklace? Where's that scarf? Everything was just falling away in some ways beautiful, but then some ways I'm like, okay, you need some sense of ground. And then that's when I got this place and I call

it my little Yogini cave because it's tiny and it's dark. It's a place for when I did come home that I could kind of hibernate and just rest and be in this like creative den. But it wasn't actually supposed to be like properly lived in because it's really tiny. So in this period of time, I've managed to get out of it quite a bit. I lived in Mexico for five months and then I was in New York for the last six weeks. And it's just was like, okay, clearly you do not want to be in that apartment because you've been in there for what six weeks in the last year. So I sometimes have that sense of like, you can't see what's next until you let something go. And I kind of feel like that's the state I'm in and the state of the world still in such flux,

like things here are changing. It feels like by the day and most of my travel was international, you know, it's still uncertain if, if, and when that kind of work is going to return offline and not knowing what opportunities or what new openings might be appearing through this book. So I just kind of was like, you know what, let me just give it up. I'm not going to be homeless. Like I might go back to New York for September, unless something major happens between now and September 1st, I'm probably going to go back to New York and spend a couple months there and see what happens. Otherwise, if some, like I keep praying to the universe, like if there's somewhere you want me to be, please show me a sign with like clarity and conviction, like this is where you should be,

or if I'm supposed to stay here right now. But it's just, it's really, I feel like I need to let go of this physical spot. You don't have like any anxiety about that. It seems like you welcome the change and the transition, which makes sense. Why take up that space if not there? Yeah. And even when I am in LA, like as soon as like a friend is gone that like has a cat or something that lives like somewhere else, I'm like, oh, I'll go stay at your house and take care of you.

Like I'm looking for opportunities not to be here. Yeah. It's interesting. I will also say when I first came into this place three years ago, I was also processing some really deep trauma work. There's something that when I start to spend a lot of time here that it's like, even though I try to make it like a living altar, like I have statues all over the place. I have my oils and my incense and my drum and, you know, I've done so much prayer and everything, but I still feel like there's something with that energy that still exists in here. It's the only kind of explanation I can really, really give for it. But I also, I'm such like a beach girl at heart. That's why I moved to LA to

begin with, because I wanted to be by the ocean. And I lived in Venice for seven years. But then when I was living on the road, I gave away the apartment. And then I found this because it was rent controlled. It was, you know, I was like, oh, it's my fancy storage unit. And it's not that it feels right now. It doesn't feel bad. But in the past, it hasn't felt good. And I think the lifestyle I've lived the last several years of always being on the go in a capacity, I've also gotten comfortable with that. And so I think that helps.

And the last time I did this and made the choice to give up my place, a whole new life appeared. Is it possible that you can be grounded when you're on the road a lot? Well, I feel like living on the road has taught me how to take care of myself in a way that I certainly did not take care of myself before, because I had to out of necessity of the lifestyle of being on airplanes, jumping time zones all the time. I had to figure out how to get grounded and how to be in my body quickly, right. To make this lifestyle sustainable. Otherwise I was going to burn out, you know, overnight. My nature is like, yes, I'm very high energy. I definitely would run on the side of anxiety versus depression. So maintaining in yoga, we call it the Vata energy, the energy of the wind,

all that flows is I have to find my roots in my anchor always. So unlike a lot of other yogis who might be minimalists and travel with like a few things, I travel with a lot of stuff. I have lots of tools I bring with me. You know, I've got my, I got my mini altar. Even if I'm in a hotel one night, I set up an altar beside my bed, you know, and it's small. I'm a devotee of the goddess so I have little miniature statues of my big ones here but of Lakshmi and Saraswati and Durga and then I have a few crystals and a few oils and my favorite journal my favorite book you know so I always have that sense of normalcy and routine that's there and then I have to anchor into my practices even more even though they change they instead of them being when I home, they can be long and luxurious.

Where there it might be, okay, we're going to take this one hour practice and do it in three minutes, you know? But I create a different routine on the road. Christy, I just imagined you have like the Mary Poppins bag and you're pulling out your lampshade, setting up your hotel. It's kind of like that. You're pulling out your altar. Yes. I mean, at the end of the day, it's like, if this what's makes me feel comfortable, what's makes me feel safe. And if I'm going to be living on the road months at a time, like who cares? Like one of the benefits of flying so much, you have good status

and you can bring extra luggage. Is that your favorite book? What is your favorite book? Well, I have a few. So one of the books that goes with me everywhere is this book called The Radiant Sutras. It was written by a teacher of mine. It's actually a translation of an ancient yoga text called the Vyana Bhavarga Tantra. But it's one of my teachers, Dr. Lauren Roche. And it is exquisite, these tiny little verses that he's translated into the most beautiful living poetry. One of the

things I love about it the most is it's really basically a love song between the energies of Shiva and Shakti. So it's in like utter devotion of the goddess, but it's just so beautiful. It's so beautiful. I could just read one verse and just be like like in that total absorption of you want to know i've only done this one other time and i love how it all works out yeah flip into a page and read something yeah i'll tell you this real quick before i do it this book is this meaningful to me that each chapter of my book starts with a radiant sutra so that's how like meaningful it is for me. Yeah. Okay. And you know, the author, right? Yeah. He's one of my teachers, my mentors, my book actually would not exist. Dr. Lauren Roche.

He's a beautiful meditation teacher that lives in Marina Del Rey, California and has many books from meditation made easy to, I think that he's written about seven books now. Yeah. Okay. Tell me when to stop. Stop. Okay.

All right. Immerse yourself in the rapture of music. You know what you love. Go there. Tend to each note, each chord. Rising up from silence and dissolving again. Vibrating strings draw us into the spacious radiance, resonance of the heart. The body becomes light as the sky. And you, one with the great musician, who is even now singing us into existence.

Sutra 18. Yeah, that's beautiful. Beautiful. To me, it's like, it's called the Radiant Sutras. And that's exactly what, like, I feel like when I'm really can go into that space that I'm just like shimmering. There's a shimmering that happens. I know you feel it, you embody it when you listen. So let me ask you, Christy, where did you grow up? Like, where's your home home? Like, you know, where's your parents? What are they like? Yeah, actually, they're in North Carolina now.

But I was born in Brooklyn, New York and lived there for the first 10 years of my life. And then we moved to North Carolina. And I don't have actually big roots. I mean, obviously, my parents are there. My brother and his family are there. But I moved away from home when I was 15. So, you know, I don't have like groups of friends really in North Carolina. I don't have a real connection there. I was an athlete from a very young age and

I got into the sport of diving. I was first a gymnast, but there was some pretty traumatic injuries. My parents made me quit. And then I got into the sport of diving and where we live, there was nowhere at that time to actually train. I wasn't just like in sports. Like I wanted to be like the next Olympic champion. I just was like, that was the goal. There was no like in between. I want to be the best in North Carolina.

No, no, no. I want to be the best in the world. And I was somehow convinced my parents to send me to a diving camp in Orlando, Florida. And I was supposed to go for two weeks and I ended up moving there. And I finished high school in Orlando, Florida, training in the sport of diving. Wow. So you've always been literally like traveling, like, I mean, for you at that age to move away from home and then go to a different school. I mean, yeah, you just have kind of a free spirit, huh? Yeah. I mean, it's really funny because even when I started traveling the way I was doing pre-COVID, I didn't actually make the connection to like, oh my gosh, I kind of did this because I just

lived with other families. So from the time of 15 to I went to college, I think I lived with four different families, you know, because like there was one family I could live with during the summertime. And she was one of my teammates that I could train and dive with, but they had an older brother who he would go away for the summers, but then he would be back in school and there was no room for me to live in their house. So then I would go live with another family like during the school year. And I never realized until really recently that, oh my gosh, like this is in a weird way, different, but how my life was set up. And then even the traveling I did via competitions

and whatnot. But you know, when I got into the work world, I was the brick and mortar of a business for a decade. So I didn't go anywhere. It must be hard for relationships. Of course, there's millions of benefits and obstacles to living the life that I have lived. And because a lot of people also don't understand it. And they think of it as a way of when are you going to grow up like that? I'm just like backpacking through Europe like I'm and I'm like, no, no, no, this is again, pre COVID. This was how I made all my money was just like a musician traveling from city to city. I mean, that's the easiest thing to compare it to. There are two things that have happened. So sometimes on the road, you meet amazing, was just like a musician traveling from city to city. I mean, that's the easiest thing to compare it to.

There are two things that have happened. So sometimes on the road, you meet amazing, beautiful people and you have the ability because especially when you meet someone else that lives like you, you have the ability to go deep very quickly. So relationships can quicken very quickly because they understand like how you live

and how a lot of your relationships are very surfaced with other people on the road. And it's so nice. You're just like, oh, so I've been met some amazing people on the road that live in different parts of the world and, you know, have, have tried to do the long distance thing. And because I travel so much, at least at that point, it didn't matter if someone lived in LA because I was as much in Barcelona or in China as I was in Los Angeles at times. I'm still single. So we'll just say that. And I'm just talking it up to, you know, in many ways in my life, I've been a, I would even say a little bit of a late bloomer. And I feel like for whatever reason, finding my

like soul partners, there's something I feel that it's near, but I've been okay with not having it yet, but it is of course a yearning. And I do believe that there can be a balance and I can find that. I have other people in my life that say I won't find anyone until I decide to hunker down and be in one place. But my life has not been conventional since I was a little girl. So why would I imagine it was going to start to be conventional now? Yeah. You know, you were an extreme athlete. I mean, we're talking like train, train, train, um, competition. You wanted to be the best. How does one go from that space to where you're at with energy work and the chakras today? Like, you know, sometimes competition is looked at as almost being completely from an ego,

just wanting to win, wanting to be the best. How did that competition and that mindset that you had transfer over into what you do today? Well, there was something that happened that ended my career. So I wasn't able to achieve my goal. I broke my back. I was training for 2004 Olympics and that was the career. So I wasn't able to achieve my goal. I broke my back. I was training for 2004 Olympics. And that was the career ending injury. I had doctors telling me I was 24 at the time, because I since I started diving later, I was still training longer. I had doctors telling me at 24 that by 30, I was going to be walking with a cane. And clearly, that's not the case now. But

that was what I was being told. And I only knew from the time I was, I don't know, six years old, seven years old, when this dream came forth, I didn't know a life outside of training. I didn't know. I didn't know what else I was good at. I didn't know. I did not have any other goals. I did not have any other dreams. So my world kind of came crashing down. And at that time I was training at the, what was the then the Olympic training center in the U S in the Woodlands, Texas. And so, you know, all my teammates were basically my entire teammates, only two people in the sport of diving, go to the, make the team. And three of the people I was training with, they all made the 2014. So everyone I was training with, you know, ended up making the Olympic team.

And it was amazing. And I'm so happy they did. But it was just a really interesting moment for me of like, why was this not for me? And it was because of that and going into this deep, dark space and having no effing clue what was going to be next for me. That's what actually ended up getting me into yoga. I got brought to my first yoga class. I became aware of breath. I mean, I don't know how you're not aware. And at least back then, breath was never talked about. Like how much would breath regulation help you when you're standing on the edge of a 33 foot tower, you know, getting ready to dive at an important

competition and like, you know, like, yeah. So there were so many things I was like doing that. I was like, why didn't we do this in our training? And why didn't we, you know, so I really feel like my whole life actually has been in preparation of this, but it was really that injury that moved me in this direction. I didn't know about spirituality. I grew up Catholic. I didn't know yoga was a spiritual practice. I didn't know like what spirituality was. And through the practice of starting to go to yoga, things started waking up in me. If you would have told me why I was still diving, there was an energy body. I would have looked at you like you had six heads. I had no idea what that meant, but waking up to that, there's, oh, there's this energy body, waking up to there's a connection of the divine through my body. And I also realized that, yes, I was a very driven athlete, but I had a lot of suppressed trauma that training was the place that it was safe for me to be. I think the human body is amazing and we all have different gifts, whether you are a singer, you're Adele and you're the most beautiful singer on the planet. I don't believe she's singing just for ego's sake. I feel like that's her gift from the divine and she's sharing it with the world and it's uplifting a lot of people. And

I think that can be the same thing when I definitely had a gift for gymnastics and for diving and it would have been a shame not to explore it. I mean, if my parents were pushing me or someone else was pushing me against my will, then that would have been a different thing. But I, it's what I loved more than anything. Like I still dream about it on a regular basis. I don't think about it during the day, but I wake up and I forget how old I am. Like, I'm like, I literally wake up and say, could I make a comeback? I haven't touched a diving board in 20 years, you know? You mean like me the other day, trying to do a back flip on the trampoline and about pulled my hamstring thinking I was 20 again.

Oh my Lord, Mandy. Yeah. And, you know, my journey of self-discovery and knowing how it continues to, you know, shift and evolve. And like the last, I would say really the last like 10 years are just, now I'm just like, okay, that you just keep going. There's just more and more layers and there's more and more layers. And whether it's all from this lifetime, or if there are things from other lifetimes that are coming through that are these deeper karmas that,

you know, we're trying to heal and so that we don't have to carry them into yet another life. But it doesn't get easier per se. Journey of the soul is a challenging one. But what I can say is I am more awake and alive than I've ever been. Even than when I was standing on the edge of a 33-foot platform, getting ready to jump off and hopefully land on my head with a nospash. Yeah. My son is a pitcher. And I forget what book it was. It might've been Living Buddha, Living Christ, where he talked about being present, you know, instead of holding that

ball while he's pitching and thinking, I'm going to strike this guy out, or I'm going to, you know, beat this team, just being mindful to the ball in the hand and thinking about just the energy of the ball and your fingertips and thinking to yourself, I'm going to just throw a strike right now, instead of always thinking of that bigger picture. And I think a lot of athletes are moving towards the chakra system and looking at energy work and mindfulness as a way to improve what they do. How did the chakra system get introduced to you? And what are your thoughts around what I just said with athletes? Yes. I love everything you said. I had like little

goosebumps for me. Yes. That's why the body is so important to me. And all the work I do is about leading people back into the home of the body and listening to the messages that are coming here and how important that is. So early on in my yoga, actually, I got introduced to the chakras. And again, like I was like wheels of what energy and light, but there was something about like the colors and like, I can feel things. So like, I can imagine it, but like like I don't see super clear vigils, but for some reason I could see like these spinning waves. That's kind of how I saw them,

more like whirlpools of light and the colors. And I just was completely fascinated by them. I, again, knew very little, but as I was learning, then I started like looking up like, okay, well, what kind of books can I read on this? And any kind of class or any kind of workshop I could find that was on them, I would go study them. And the first teacher training I did was based on the elements, which elements are mapped onto the chakras. So that was like a little deeper investigation of the chakras. And then it slowly began, like I say now I see the

world through chakra colored glasses, because this just started to be the map. It just made sense to me that we have, I call them like we have seven different superpowers, right? And we have to tend to each of these superpowers. And for me, the first one really was that the first chakra is all about tending to your home, tending to your body, tending to your roots, tending to your foundation, tending to those base instincts and paying attention to them, honoring your fears, not letting them stop you from living, but honoring them. So, so much of my initial work was all in this first chakra that really needed to be taken care of, especially even after the injury and trying to rebuild my body. And then moving up into the second chakra trying to rebuild my body and then moving up

into the second truck or being our emotional body and being okay that I was sad or being okay that I was always the one who everyone was like, oh, no one ever worried about me. Everyone was like, oh, I was the solid one. I was the brave one. I was the strong one because I moved so much around, but I actually think it was because I was actually so disconnected from my emotions that that was like looked at as power and strength, but it actually was, I was actually completely disconnected. So once you realize like, I never get angry, of course we all like anger is not a bad thing. And being able to start to work with the emotions. And I also will say simultaneously, I wasn't therapy. So I had to go to therapy with someone who could talk this language with me because I wasn't okay with just the talk therapy. And then, you know, coming into the third chakra and really igniting your power

and your self-esteem, you know, this was another big thing for me. My self-esteem was so not intact because my whole worthiness was based on this goal of going to the Olympics. And I felt like a failure. I could not see anything I did as successful because what the main goal was, I did not achieve, you know, and then for obviously many other reasons, but, and then, you know, coming into the heart and waking up to my own love for myself and actually realizing I didn't love myself and actually having to come into a place of deep forgiveness for all the ways I abused my body or I abused myself and how critical and judgmental and all the things here. And then coming up to the throat and how I swallowed

my words again and again and again, and couldn't speak up and the points that I needed to speak up, how my voice was taken again and again, and actually silence kept me safe and all these things and why I was scared to show the world who I was. It wasn't safe for me to show the world who I was. And then coming into the third eye and awakening intuition. And for me, this was about wakening to the magic and the wonderment of what it is to live in this world and be in a human body and to almost remember that childlike wonder. And I think that's what one of the things that that radius and sutures does to me. It's like, it really wakes me up to the majesty of what it is to be alive and be like, holy shit, even to the mundane, right? Holy shit

to being the tree, you know, and like really feeling the roots or to the sunrise or to your kid's face or whatever it is. The crown of being connected in and held by a higher power. I know that that is. So it started to completely transform my life in every way. And it was challenging at times because lots of shit came up that I didn't know was there. And I know this is a really long winded way to get back to the whole athletic piece, but I feel like if I would have had these tools in some degree and some awareness, like the visualization work that coaches are doing so much more already getting

integrated in. But if I had these tools of my own self-regulation, what I realize now when I put so much pressure on myself and that's where I got into trouble, I did have a chance to make the Olympic team. And then I would go to the competition and because I wanted it so bad, I would F up and I would do stupid shit that I never even did in practice. Like we would make the kind of mistakes that weren't even the mistakes you normally made. What I realized now is I would leave my body. I would get, my anxiety would go so high. I'd be so up in my head of trying to be perfect that I actually standing up on a 33 foot platform was not in my body. Like I have a memory of one of the last competitions I was in. It was in Mission Viejo, California. I would say from where I got hurt, that was the peak of my best of how I was as a diver. And I swear to God, this

shows you how much now, and I didn't understand this language then, but I can remember it still so clearly now. I thought the platform was moving. A concrete tower, 33 feet in the air. I'm standing on it, getting ready to do my inward dive, standing on my tippy toes facing, you know, my back to the water. And I'm standing there with my arms up. And in my mind, I thought the platform was moving. Like that's the example I can give to show you like, I was not in my body. And then I had to fling myself off and do this like really intense dive. So how these practices of awareness of mindfulness of knowing that it's not just addressing the physical, of course, the physicality is a huge part of it, but how do we stay present?

Just like you were saying with the ball in that moment, the chakra system is, I think the easiest way to understand that you're an energetic being. And that's why I think it's so beautiful. And anybody can learn it. I mean, my daughter who's nine understands the struggle system, but you are a multi-dimensional being. You are not just a meat suit. It's so important to understand that. And I love the quote, I think it was Nikola Tesla, who had said, we could think on lines of energy, how different the world would be that we're all energy. We are vibrations. We are frequencies. And to not understand that about yourself is just, it's like not teaching anatomy of the body. Right. Right. That was one of the

reasons I found your book to be intriguing is because it says chakra rituals offers a seven week program to guide readers through the ancient science of chakras in an easy and accessible way to live and empower the reader. Because a lot of people overcomplicate the chakra system and the science behind it because our brain wants the proof right the proof is actually easier than we think it is obtainable because of the discernment and everything you've been feeling within your body your whole entire life so once you connect it with you know your energy centers you're like oh yeah i've been yeah i've been feeling that

lump in my throat for my whole life it's not not a real lump. It's energy. It's energy. And then, and then that opens up the power of choice to like do something different, right? You're like, oh, I'm supposed to pay attention when I feel that. Like, I don't have a sore throat right now. I don't have like, oh my gosh, did I just swallow what I wanted to say? Like, oh my gosh, did I do that as a little girl? Or is this like, is this a moment where I'm actually supposed to stand in my truth and actually speak up and it'd be okay for me to say what I'm swallowing?

Energy healing doesn't look the same for everyone. You incorporate yoga, movement, and dance. Can you talk about how you clear the chakras and how you awaken them? Yes. For me, the body is the gateway into everything. So no, it's not like I have such the belief that the body is the temple, right? The body is what holds all the energy that we are.

And that's why we have to really, really tend to it. And I believe it's through returning home to the body to, again, the sensations, the vibrations, the pulsations of energy within us so that we can tune this instrument, right? We develop the sensitivity so we can tune our instrument on a daily basis. So we know what we need, right? You're like, I mean, they're, they're simple, simple, simple things. Like I do lots of shaking meditations where I have people just shake their, shake their body. We've been, you know, we're sitting in one place. We're at a computer all day. We're in the car all day. Especially during COVID, we've been confined to places and our energy is like, for a lot of people is disconnecting from their body and going up into their mind. I want to bring the energy back into the body so we can feel something

we can be in touch. So I make people shake and really shake it up and down every cell of the body really shaking. And then I have them pause and feel the like, just close your eyes, pay attention, visualize, you know, like Shana, the roots of the tree growing down from the center arch of each foot, feel themselves connected to the earth, right? Letting that vibration, because after you shake for two minutes, like you are buzzing, your whole body is buzzing with aliveness. It's buzzing with the energy of who you are. And even after two minutes of that, it's like, oh, wow, like there I am. That's what it does for me. It's like, oh, no, that's my vibration. I feel powerful. I feel strong.

I feel connected. And of course, yes, it's then going to dissipate because now we're standing again, but it kind of just brings you back. That's like the quickest for me, the quickest, like bring you back into alignment of your authentic energy. A lot of these things have been primal in us that we've been doing them, you know, whether we've been taught or realize it. I mean, just, I think it's amazing. You know, how many times when you are nervous, your hands go straight to your solar plexus, or when, you know, you're in grief, you put your hands over your heart center, or when you're in grief you put your hands over your heart center or when you're stressed you got your hands on your third eye and we do it with our hands which are healing hands even Jesus spoke and also in the bible that our body is our temple which during my

journey I shit you not I was like I don't need a body who needs a body I am a soul. And I stayed up here in my head. And it wasn't until major pain brought me back to my root where I had to do the work that brought me really, really far deep into my ancestry that made me realize how important the body was. So it's so amazing how everyone's journey is different, but definitely my body came way after because I did not realize I didn't even care. I'm like, who needs a body? Who needs to be grounded? I don't need that. I love the shaking. I do tapping. I tap my whole body, all my chakras. Yeah. And you're right after just that awareness of every part of your body and just sitting there, you're everything is awake. It's also primal that like, you know, before you're doing something, they tell you shake it

out. Like, just like you said, you know, I find myself doing that all the time, like shaking my arms and my hands when I'm feeling super like, you know, nervous. Yeah. And animals do it in the wild after they've experienced some kind of trauma. They literally, I mean, watch any kind of animal and they shake it out. Like they shake it out. It reboots the entire nervous system. But I don't know about with you two ladies, but I have people that I try to shake with

and they're so like paged in or they're so like caught in their own inhibitions of like looking weird or funny. They're literally like, like they might shake their hands, but like the rest of their body's like a robot. And I'm like, no, no, no, no. And I'll like literally start to move their shoulders and, you know, be really ridiculous and try to funny to like, let them go, Oh, Oh, I can like all this that I'm holding. I can actually let that go. And I can allow my body to actually move. You know, it always takes me back here. Shanna has a son who's autistic. We've had on another mother who wrote a book about her

autistic sons. You know, Shanna and I believe that a lot of these children are some of the most gifted and the closest to soul that you can get. It's interesting that they shake, they constantly, you know, a lot of times, like whenever children's hospital are shaking back and forth, they're always shaking. It's probably because their energy and their vibration is so high. They're constantly, Ethan has like tics that he constantly has to be doing stuff like that and moving your brain is wired to your body. And if there's a disconnection, your body's always trying to rewire back to that, you know, to those signals. And so they're constantly trying to connect. And that's what

it is. It's the energetic connection that they're trying to experience with their, their mind and body. They're not connecting. So amazing. It's so amazing. And the way to be able to connect it, and it usually only works for like a certain amount of time is like compression therapy to bring awareness to their body. And I used to have to either brush Ethan or do like, you know, like kind of squeeze him gently throughout all of his limbs and stuff to bring his awareness to his body. It's so amazing. You know, everything is connected. You do. Yeah. I mean, I'm doing it right. Like, and it was probably one of the ways I dealt with all the pain that I also had with all the injuries I had in training and other things. But I'm like

constantly like, this is how I return home to my body. It's like actually just, I squeeze and compress and it also feels really good, but it also brings sensation back into the body. So it's like, Oh, that's what, this is what my hand feels like. Oh, I actually know. Oh, I noticed now I have some tension in my wrist. Let me massage that out. So a lot of the times, even when I'm sitting talking, I'm, I'm actually doing this kind of work. Big knot right here that I happened to touch myself to tap. I was like, wait, what's that? Yeah. Yeah. Growing on the side of my shoulder here. Yeah. Talk about the

dance piece. Yeah. So again, just like the shaking, like dance to me is like the biggest, like rocket ship towards liberate, like liberating our bound up stuck energy and to give you a little tiny backstory is before my gymnastics and diving days um when we were living in Brooklyn New York um we my mom was a dancer and she had a dancing school Miss Mary Lou's new school of dance and we lived in an apartment on top of the dancing school so I was dancing from basically the time I was born. My mom says, you know, she did a high kick and I popped out was how I was born. She danced until that moment. You know, so dancing has definitely been in my blood, music in my blood. And definitely another one of these like full circle pieces of returning to as a yoga teacher, I, through my years of teaching what

I was finding personally, that people were trying to be so perfect in their poses, right? People were trying so hard and, you know, holding perfectly still that some people aren't breathing. Some people, I think it was, you know, increasing the neuroses versus liberating any kind of energy in the body. And so I remember very specifically, there's one day in class, I like looked around the room and the energy was just like, so dead, so heavy. I was like, this does not feel good. And I always teach with music. And I just was like, you know what, I'm just gonna try something. And I, you know, I brought her to the top of the mat and had them close their eyes. I just had them start to like roll their wrist. Okay. And it's like, and then I had them start to roll their shoulders. And some people were like,

again, this is like 10 years ago. So not as commonplace to do anything outside of the regular yoga sequencing classes. Maybe it is now. And then I had people, I was like, okay, let's see if they'll circle their hips. I had them start to circle their hips. And, you know, some people stood there really rigidly and some people really got into it. I had them, you know, I ended up having some like nice music there and we first just went through and then I had to do them some like body rolls. And then from there I went into the shaking and I did, I had them shake out their whole body. And then with the shaking, I made them make sound. It's like, okay, like if your hands could make any sound, what would it be? And I was like, you know, and, you know, we went through the whole body and then I put on one last

song and after we, you know, shook like crazy people for, you know, a minute or two. And I said, and then I just said, move, however you want to move. And, you know, again, I was like over the top ridiculous in the terms of my expression to hopefully put people at ease to do this. And just for, again, I didn't do it for a long time, maybe like 30 seconds to a minute. I really just let people move. And I was like, close your eyes. Don't worry about just like, enjoy the body. And then I had them stop and pause in the same way I would after the shaking and just feel it. And then put your hands wherever you wanted. And the energy of who we are to have a place to play, right? Like to have, like for me, sometimes it's like, actually, I just need to move the sadness out of my body. So how does the sadness want to move? Or how does the anger want to move through

my body versus me holding it in? How does joy, how does joy want to come through my body and express? And just using music, using this body as a way to touch, right? This place of you that, again, brings you back into that harmony of the vibration of who you are. And if we can let our inhibitions down enough, I don't think there's a faster way to get there. And it's also really good for you. It's good for your heart. Like physically, it's also really good for you. It's good for your heart. Like physically, it's also really good for you. It's good for your cardiovascular. It's

good for your body, physically, emotionally, mentally, and I believe spiritually too. So that was in the beginning. And then I started working with DJs and, you know, and it just went off from there. You know, sometimes I wish we were releasing video because to see your energy, so beautiful to watch. I mean, for our listeners, her smile is huge. Her skin's radiating. Her body was moving. I mean, you are living your purpose and it shows through you just now when you were talking

about it through your energy. Thank you. I also have to give a credit to go back to Dr. Lauren Roche. When I met him many, many years ago, I was running a large yoga studio in Venice, California at the time. And he was teaching in someone's teacher training. And I, you know, he had given me his books. They were sitting on my desk at the time. I wasn't, I hadn't started reading any of them. But he would always pop in my office and say hi when he was coming in. And one day he came in and asked me if I meditated. And at that time I tried to meditate, but I would be like looking at my watch every like 12 seconds. And I was like, and I was like, do I lie to him? Do I meditate? Do I not? I finally said, I said, well, you know, I try, but I'm not good at it. Like, so he goes, well, how do you meditate? And I was like, what do you mean? How do I meditate?

He's like, show me how you meditate. So I like sat on the floor, spine tall, you know, mudra. Okay. Close my eyes, you know, held like a perfect statue. And after like 10 seconds, he goes, Christy, just get up. I'm like, okay. And he said, for as long as I've known you, he's like, I've not seen you be still for one moment of one minute of a day. He's like, when you're talking, you're always rocking, you're swaying.

He's like, that's how the Shakti, that's how the creative life force moves through you. So why would you think that you had to meditate being still? And I was like, well, because that's how I was told you meditate. And he was like, no, next time you try to meditate, allow your body to circle or allow your body to sway forward and back and see what happens. And like it became, so for me, my meditation is more like a dance. And then after that dance, I might fall into stillness, right? And just be

there. But a lot of the times it starts. And that's, again, why that text, it's like this, the singing of the Shakti, the expression in my body, whether it's really dynamic or really slow and heartfelt, right? And then it's from there that, oh, now I root down and now I can be still and be really content and happy being still versus holding still for me was like blocking the flow of life. There's no right or wrong way. Absolutely. I feel that thought about any spiritual practice, yoga meditation. I mean, we're too unique. You know, we're too divine. We cannot be put in a box. It doesn't work. They've tried for thousands of years. It's, and I think we're so keen to give our power over to someone else

and be like, tell me how to do it. You know, and yes, we can give you guidelines and say, Hey, this is what works for me. These are the practices I do. But one of the really beautiful things Lauren taught me was that he's like, if you're not enjoying your yoga practice or you're not enjoying your, your meditation practice, it's because you're doing somebody else's yoga practice or you're doing someone else's meditation practice. You have to find your own ultimately, you know, and that, and it will still change. It might be like for a year, this is the practice you do. And then it evolves into something else, you know? Hmm. Yeah. All right. It's time to like super dive into your

book. I want to know where this book came from and talk about how it's structured because it seems like this book has like some really dynamic content. So if you could talk about that. Yes. Um, so I knew for a while I was going to write this book. Everything I teach on yoga wise is on the chakra system, whether I mentioned the word chakra or not. So everything I do is based on that. But I also have done, you know, video series, you know, weakening your chakra connection. I've done teacher trainings on helping people learn how can they

first a learn enough about the chakras and then how can I teach from the chakra perspective, you know, so I've done a lot of work like that. I had the idea for the book. Originally, the book was this was like years ago, it was gonna be inspire your life, you know, because I didn't want I thought maybe at that time, using chakras or energy like in the title would be alarming or would limit my audience so to speak because I see it as this path of awakening that's like really the important element for me because I feel like the book really when I can be super honest part of it this whole journey was inspired by a Joseph Campbell quote and I actually opened the book with it and it's the quote that he says and I'm this won't be word

for word. People say what they're seeking is the meaning of life. And he says, no, I don't believe that's what people are seeking. He said, what I believe people are really seeking are the rapture of what it is to be alive, the rapture of what it is to be alive. And there's something about that, that just like hit me in this really deep way of like what happens sometimes when we get older, right? It's like, is this all there is? You know, the world does, it becomes black and white and gray and we lose the access to the color.

There's a dullness, we become comfortably numb, we become detached. And I think the big reason so many people are unhappy is we've lost touch with that sense of aliveness and the chakras being just pure energy and color. And again, there's many maps of transformation, but this is the map that has served me and how I live my life. And what I felt was most important was that you had to give people tools because it's difficult to do. It's difficult to change. It's difficult to transform.

It's not hard. It's difficult to make the commitment to show up every day for yourself to do something. But so I wanted to create a program that would hold your hand. If you just choose to show up and give me 15 minutes a day for these seven weeks, or if you need to do it in 14 weeks or however long you need to do it in, I will take you day by day so that you can start to have a lived experience of who you are at each of these energetic levels, right? And you're going to gain sensitivity. You're going to recognize the places that maybe you need to tend to a to gain sensitivity. You're going to recognize the places that maybe you need to tend to a little bit more. You're going to recognize the places and you're like,

Ooh, I'm good here. And so the way it's structured is the chapters in two parts. So the first part of the chapter gives you a basic information on the chakra and it's not in chakra encyclopedia. It's the subtitle of the book is awakenaken the Wild Woman Within. So the things I chose to talk about in each chakra were what things that for me felt important to also to serve that subtitle. So it may be different from if you've looked at other chakra books, what I might talk about. So for instance, for chakra one, if you Googled it right now, you'll, you would find probably first that it's about survival, right? I don't necessarily talk about survival as chakra one. I talk about the body temple. This is your foundation coming home to your body, coming home, coming into the roots

of your body, coming into the roots of your origin, where we come from our ancestors, tending to the soil in which everything else is growing out of. And that soil includes mother earth. So I really look at this expanded definition of home being body, relationship with family and our roots of origin, and our connection to mother earth. And again, there were many, and I do talk about fear as well. So that's kind of the way it goes. And then day one, you create sacred space in your house. Day two, you're going to learn a mudra practice, which is the energy connections in the hands. Day three, you're going to learn what I call the body prayer.

It's a little vinyasa salutation to each of the energies of the chakras. Day four, you're going to breathe. Day five, you're going to meditate. Day six, you're going to do an embodiment practice or it's a little ritual for each chakra. And then accompanied with that, I offer an array of different writing contemplations because writing has been a huge part of my journey in terms of having a place I can really honestly and authentically express without being judged by anybody else. And then day seven is integration or to go back to

whatever you missed or anything you would want to repeat. But I really tried to design it in a way that it could fit into your life, no matter what else you're doing. Like, if we want to really do something we can have, we can find 15 more minutes in our day to do something, you know, no matter how busy we are. And it doesn't mean you have to stop doing your Reiki or you have to stop doing your running or stop doing anything, any of the other practices that you love. You don't have to put those on pause. You just have to find about 15 more minutes a day to, you know, add in these, these other things as well.

I love this. I think the chakra system, it's a roadmap. It's a roadmap. It's a roadmap. And it's a roadmap up. And it's a, it's like a continue, you know, up and down, up and down, up and down. And let's talk about soul fire. Let's talk about your yoga school, deep exhale. Yeah. So deep exhale is actually the yoga dance experience that I created with

my DJ partner, Marcus Wyatt. He's a, like literally like a world famous, like house DJ legend. And he's also a Yogi. And we, I was a fan of his music and I would, you know, go out to the clubs to go dance. And I would go by myself because people that went to his events would like go to just like throw down and dance. And it felt like a safe place to do so. And, and people just assumed we knew each other and we didn't, cause they safe place to do so. And people just assumed we knew each other and we didn't because they would always see us there. And we finally met one day and it was at the same time that I really wanted to get the yogis off the mat and he wanted to get the club kids on the mat. So we created this experience of deep exhale. So we've been doing that for,

I think, eight years now, mostly like on like the fest, like the yoga and music festival circuit. And we pre-COVID, you know, curated events and cool creative spaces like rooftops and, you know, things like that in Los Angeles. Oh, do we have recordings of this? I need to watch this. Oh, yes. Yes.

So if you go to, well, if you go to my Instagram, you'll see little recordings. But if you go to, there's a website called Live Kick Studios, because we never in a million years thought we could do this experience online, like ever. And we got approached by this platform before COVID hit. And they asked us, would you guys please like do this online? And we're like, no way. It won't work. Like it won't work because I'm like, I'm feeding off of you.

You're feeding off of me. Like it's not going to work. So we said no. And then COVID hit and they reached back out to us and they're like, sure you don't want to try it. So we started doing it last April and we've paused on it for right now, but we did it for almost a year online as well. So if you go on Livekick Studios, you can actually see the replays of the classes.

But if you also go on my Instagram and you scroll through, you'll see some videos from, you know, we've done some massive events from like, you know, 100 people to like almost a thousand people and, you know, getting everybody dancing and, you know, releasing in such a beautiful, beautiful way. And when we have the ability, we also have musicians that play on top of it. So we have a guy that plays the sitar and then the drums and then sound healing at the end. So there's like all these different elements. It's so, so beautiful.

And it's so, so fun. Honestly, it's kind of common sense that this has always been part of healing. I mean, you look back at our history of like tribes and they're dancing around the fire and their movements. I mean, Mandy likes that silent disco. I've done the event silent disco style too. You want to know why I love it is because I feel like people feel like they're safe, not knowing like what each other's dancing to. So it gives you a freedom to dance however you want. You don't feel judged because you know everyone's different tune yeah

I love it yeah yeah have you ever heard of Sean Johnson yes I know Sean Johnson you do I do yeah he lives in Louisiana yeah yes he so my studio used to run he I would bring him him and the Lotus the Wild Lotus Band yes to exhale the studio I used to okay well listen came and did the kirtans there came across his music yeah and I like to clean and listen to music it's I have to have two things I have to have scent and I have to have music well scent sucks because since COVID I can't smell but I always have to have music and I mean it can be like DJ quick or it could be a Sean Johnson or it could be you know a mantra but I have to have something. One day I came across and I have no idea where it came from. It popped up. It was

calling on the spirits song. I was from head to toe, like involved. My son comes up and he's like, this is a really good beat. And I was like, I know. And I was like, and everybody's in the kitchen. We're like cleaning and we're listening. I'm like, this is amazing. And I probably immediately said to Mandy, but I didn't have any idea who he was. Never heard of him. I have no idea how it came up. Then I find out like a year later, he's from New Orleans. Well, I'm from New Orleans and I love to have him on our podcast because I would love to promote his music because I love it so much. I send it to people all the time. And so I don't know if you can get a hold of him.

Yes, I will connect to you. I would love to. You know, and he's from New Orleans. People from New Orleans, we have a connection. So, so kind. Like, he's such a kind, beautiful, beautiful soul. And the drummer is this woman Gwendolyn this bad hat I'm a redhead I don't know if you can tell the lighting in here but badass redhead hair down

to here drums like on her wrists her ankles everywhere they're amazing that would be just absolutely absolutely I love it that's so crazy that she knows him I love it I know I love it I'm sure he would love he would be so honored I'm sure I think he would crack up be like um tell him that you were on a podcast interview and that he helps her clean her house and has literally connected with younger people around here you know what I mean because I think that that's so important. If you can grab like a 24 year old, you know, boy who doesn't ever connect with stuff like that. Now this, it is, it's a beautiful thing, whether it's the vibration or sometimes it's the words. In fact, sometimes it's words that I don't even know. And I wanted to ask you about that. I start listening to that.

I had no idea what I was doing. All of a sudden, all these awakenings start happening in my life just from listening to this song. I don't even know what they're saying. How is that? I mean, mantra is a very, very powerful tool. And so, yeah, I mean, mantra basically mean it's like mind plus heart. It's like, it's a, it's a tool to connect the mind and the heart. And especially for us when it's not in

our native language and the Sanskrit language, the language of yoga, it's a vibrational language. And what the, what's been passed on from the mystics is that the meaning of the words awaken in the body through the vibration. So that like some teachers, like they said back in the, I guess, way back when you would be chanting a mantra and you would have no idea what it meant. And they said it would just get revealed to you over time because as it awakens in your body, right, the transformation comes. So, but you know, now we tell people like, oh, it means like, you know, may all beings be happy and free because people, you know, they're like, well, I want to know what the hell I'm chanting. But, you know, back thousands of years ago, the way it was practiced was know that the teaching

came awake in you through the vibration. Cause it's a very, you could call it like a very polished language that each vibration or syllable is landing in the body in a very, you could call it like a very polished language that each vibration or syllable is landing in the body in a very specific way to have a specific effect on all levels of the body. It's your energy centers. It's matching the frequencies. It's a light language. Yeah. Yeah. It's a miracle. It's beautiful. Yeah. Yeah. Actually in my book, I share a mantra that actually changed my life. It was when my first trip to India, I heard this mantra, mana, mana, mandalay, and something, this man was just singing it over and over again in this really beautiful voice. And I just started like singing it and I would like sing it when I would fall asleep and I'd

wake up singing it in the morning, had no idea what it meant. Literally this went on for probably like 10 years. Can you say it again? Mana, mana, mandalay. Mana, mana, mandalay. But I'm supposed to be embodying that I have a beautiful voice, but I'm still working on it. So I'm not going to sing it to you today. But about 10 years later, at that same studio where I met Sean, this other Kirtan artist or devotional singer, we could call him, Gauravani was there and he started singing. It was the first time I'd ever heard anyone singing in person. And I was about to like raise my hand and be like, what does it mean? And he said, he was like, so before I go any further, let me tell you a story about the

meaning and the meaning of that mantra that I've been singing for 10 years now was my body and my mind is a temple. My body and the mind is a sacred place. At that time, I was really going through that healing and awakening. And it was just like, oh, that is so divine. Well, where can our listeners find you? Where can they get this book? You can go to my website, christychristiansen.com. And then from there, you actually can get to my website, christychristiansen.com. And then from there,

you actually can get to my book website as well. But I do have a book website as well that if you wanted to go to separately, it's chakrarituals.com. I'm also very active on Instagram and I share lots and lots and lots of fun things there. So you can follow me there. It's christy underscore christiansen. And that goes would be probably the best places. You can buy my book everywhere and anywhere. So please do. I'm excited for you. I'm so, so excited to meet you two.

This has been so fun. I know, come over. I know. Come hang out with us. We'll dance to some Shawn Johnson while I'm cleaning. I love it. And now it's time for break that shit down. I just really want everyone out there to know that you are worthy, that you are enough, and you have the power within you to do whatever it is that your true soul's desire yearns to do, whether that is big or small.

And that you have the ability to change the world in big and small ways. And that you deserve this. That you deserve this. You deserve this life. So tune in, ground down and open up to that. And wake up to all that you are. Namaste. Namaste. Thank you, Christy.

You've been such a pleasure. I just love you. I feel like we could be friends forever. I know. Thank you for putting your soul onto pages in this book. I mean, we probably talk for five more hours. Thank you so much. It was so awesome to connect. Yes, it was amazing. Yeah, such a pleasure. Have a beautiful day. Thanks for being with us today. We hope you will come back next week. If you like what you hear, don't forget to rate, like and subscribe. Thank you. We rise to lift you up. Thanks for listening.