Finding Harmony Podcast

Vegan Vitality with Kathleen Kastner

It is with great pleasure that we introduce you to our guest today, Kathleen Kastner. A devotee of Paramahansa Yogananda’s Self-Realization Fellowship, an adopted child of Kansas, Deepak Chopra’s personal trainer, a philanthropist, and a published author many times over. Her passion was fuelled by working with clients who were struggling with obesity and helping them lose weight. Through these experiences, she realized they needed more emotional and therapeutic tools and support them, beyond diet and exercise. She is certified in plant-based nutrition with the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine and has her own Vegan cooking YouTube channel.
Her book, Yoga’s Path to Weight Loss: A Mind Body Spirit Guide to Loving Yourself Lean, includes recommendations for asana, meditation, walking in nature, praying, and affirmations as some suggested emotional and spiritual tools to help readers tap into connecting with radical self-love to enhance the results of adopting a plant-based diet along with regular exercise.
She shares some sage advice for all of our listeners:
“You have to trust that it’s all divinely perfect, even if you don’t understand it, and keep moving forward.”
Our podcast has a predictable structure. We ask where our guest is from and how bad it got before yoga, atha yoga nusashasam, “Now, Yoga is Revealed,” and we discover how it was revealed withing their unique life circumstance. Each time we discover how beautifully original each human being is and how wonderfully exotic their decisions have been in the face of it all. How do we cope? How do we manufacture a life? How do we make an authentic living?
We believe Kathleen will inspire you. She inspired us with her willingness to share and her enthusiasm for all things life-giving. She's a woman who's been courageous in her attempt to make sense of it all and paints a beautiful, compassionate, picture through all of her life experiences. Her love for other beings is absolutely infectious!
Join Harmony April 10th for Spirit-Centered Self-Care Retreat - harmonyslater.com
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT ABOUT KATHLEEN KASTNER: kathleenkastner.com
WEBSITE I INSTAGRAM I YOUTUBE I GoDS IN SHACKLES I YOGA GIVES BACK
The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations. If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
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Zeena Kalisperides: A Greek Warrior Princess?

During the course of this morning’s conversation we touched on the subject of authenticity. How does someone become real we asked?
And it was said that Sunny Boy Williamson whispered this to John Lennon once about the Rolling Stones, “They’re plastic soul, John.”
So, he called Paul, and named his album “Rubber Soul.” After a long time of practice and effort the Rolling Stones became real and they made Gimme Shelter… and nothing has been more real since.
This said, our guest today is not a Greek Warrior Princess. She is neither Greek nor a Princess!
She is, in fact, Mauritian, speaks Creole, was born in London to nurses and very seriously grew up destined to be a Dentist.
Though she had her dharma firmly in hand, she got a little hunched in the shoulders from bending over all those open-mouthed patients, and a little frustrated holistically let’s say, with the narrowness of that profession.
And so, she decided to pursue a new dharma, one more aligned with her true self. She became a yogi. Much like her mother and in harmony with the heritage of her grandparents and great-grandparents.
We spoke with Zeena on some surprisingly hot topics. We went looking for answers to some difficult questions regarding appropriation and appreciation? What is the difference? Does appropriation have to do with breaking ahimsa (non-harming)?
We talked about privilege, racism, and defining our present understanding of past experiences — as uncomfortable as that new understanding might be… like our work with the transgressions of Pattabhi Jois.
It was incredible that these typically uncomfortable and very difficult topics became easy to discus with Zeena — Her infectious humour and grace allowed us to flow with ease and gentleness.
She is a rare gem.
“Wherever there has been pain and some form of practice or reverence has been born from that pain… We feel protective around it.”
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT ZEENA
WEBSITE I INSTAGRAM I ASHTANGA YOGA CLUBHOUSE
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The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations. If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
Make A Donation - www.harmonyslater.com
Opening and closing music compliments of my dear friend teaching Ashtanga yoga in Eindhoven, Nick Evans, with his band “dawnSong” from the album “for Morgan.” Listen to the entire album on Spotify - Click Here.To purchase your own copy - Click Here.

Eddie Stern: I’ll Be Your Mirror

Oi ga vay and Jesus Christ!
Happy Purim and Passover! Oh boy, do we have a special interview for you today!
We have someone we have wanted to speak to ever since we first initiated this Podcast: The Inimitable Eddie Stern!
But man, we had so many problems with this recording! Ha!
Just booking the time, some unexpected delays, so we just jumped right in without any introduction. Then we stopped so abruptly we lost the damn interview for weeks, only recovering the recording with a bit of technological magic.
You’ll feel absolutely transported as you jump right into our conversation with the iconic Eddie Stern… Talking about rectangles of all things and their place of importance in our world!
Around 3 minutes in, you’ll get to hear why (or why not) we always do postures to the right side first!
And, of all the outrageously unorthodox things we said in this interview, “jumping to the left” seems to epitomize how unconventional we’ve all become.
So listen now, as Eddie speaks to the origins of Revolved Side-Angle (parivrtta parsvakonasana) in the Ashtanga Sequence, and to the larger context of “Listening” within the yoga tradition.
What is it that we, as students, can learn from surrendering our own beliefs and desires to a steadier mind found in the teacher? Is this even necessary?
These days, Eddie is, surprisingly (or maybe not so surprisingly), directing his attention away from Pattabhi Jois’ lineage, no longer wanting to engage in that world and all that it represents. We ask him to speak about how we, as students, might find our way moving forward in a post-guru world.
It gets emotional.
Spoiler Alert! Be sure not to miss the celebrity name drops at the end and a beautiful story about Lou Reed passing from life to death.
LEARN MORE ABOUT EDDIE: INSTAGRAM I WEBSITE - www.eddiestern.com
The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations. If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
Make A Donation - www.harmonyslater.com/donate
Don’t forget to subscribe and leave a review! ❤ Give us a 5★ rating!
We love to read and respond to your comments - So drop us a note in the comments below and give us a shout out on IG!
Opening and closing music compliments of my dear friend teaching Ashtanga yoga in Eindhoven, Nick Evans, with his band “dawnSong” from the album “for Morgan.”
Listen to the entire album on Spotify - Click Here.
To purchase your own copy - Click Here.

The Hidden Gem that is Kathy Cooper

We had such a good time talking to an old friend in Kathy Cooper. For Russell it reminded him of Anne Rice’s vampire Lestat’s recounting of his origins in New Orleans. Lestat wrote that at every corner he was continuously surprised to find another stronger older vampire coming out of the ground and shadows. Each time like pulling back yards of history. These Ashtanga yoga students from the 70’s are each one a surprise fascinating in their strength and wisdom.
Is there no where else in history where we find these old guard spiritual aspirants who are such emotionally intelligent savants, house holders, and yet intensely physically disciplined champions?
We’d argue that acolytes like Kathy Cooper can only be found in Ashtanga Yoga, and works of science fiction.
Please sit and enjoy with us this bright Spring Sunday morning as we hear how yet another sun child of the sixties became like a living Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother so modestly hidden to history.
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT MANUEL
WEBSITE I INSTAGRAM
The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations.If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
Make A Donation - harmonyslater.com
Don’t forget to subscribe and leave a review! ❤
Give us a 5★ rating!
We love to read and respond to your comments - So drop us a note in the comments below and give us a shout out on IG!
Opening and closing music compliments of my dear friend teaching Ashtanga yoga in Eindhoven, Nick Evans, with his band “dawnSong” from the album “for Morgan.” Listen to the entire album on Spotify - Simply Click Here.
To purchase your own copy - Click Here.

Manuel Ferreira: The Brazen Bull

Today we have the infamous Bull Fighting Manuel Ferreira on the show for you. We are delighted that such an old friend would agree to come on to tell us about his life and family growing up in Portugal. It’s literally true that he was a bull fighter, though perhaps just as a student and not so much a professional. He’s an interesting person to sit with as he has lived his life with so much joie du vivre or alegria de viver as one might say in Portuguese.
You may remember him mentioned by his ever ebullient wife Yan Ong, in our podcast with her a few weeks back!
"I am nothing.
I shall never be anything.
I cannot even wish to be anything.
Apart from this, I have within me all the dreams of the world."
- Fernando Pessoa -
The poem above is from Portugal’s most famous poet, Fernando Pessoa, whom Mani’s mother studied in great detail. It says a lot about how a wild, beach loving, Portuguese surf-fanatic could eventually become a dedicated student of Ashtanga yoga.
“I am nothing. I shall never be anything. I cannot even wish to be anything. Apart from this, I have within me all the dreams of the world.” This very well could have been said to Arjuna by Krishna himself.
You will enjoy this sunny afternoon chai stand chat, as old friends reunite again in merriment. How wonderful it would be to sit on surfboards together gazing at the sea, mountains in the distance, the coolness of salt water against our skin.
Needing nothing, wanting nothing, sitting in balance like the arrow on the bow.
Ashtanga Community Stands with Ukraine - SATURDAY MARCH 12th - harmonyslater.com/charity-class-ukraine
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT MANUEL:
WEBSITE I INSTAGRAM - manuel8ferreira.com
The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations. If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.Make A Donation - harmonyslater.com/donate
Don’t forget to subscribe and leave a review! ❤ Give us a 5★ rating!
We love to read and respond to your comments - So drop us a note in the comments below and give us a shout out on IG!
Opening and closing music compliments of my dear friend teaching Ashtanga yoga in Eindhoven, Nick Evans, with his band “dawnSong” from the album “for Morgan.” Listen to the entire album on Spotify - Click Here.To purchase your own copy - Click Here.

Niki Baratta: Earth Angel

We are delighted to share with you this beautiful conversation with Niki Baratta, who may potentially qualify as one of the most interesting people alive!
Niki comes from the U.K. (quite coincidentally, like many of our recent guests); However, she has a very unique story about creating herself, raising up in the world of fashion, to launching her very own line of jewelry, before moving into teaching yoga and coaching woman.
After attending fashion school she was invited into an internship at Victoria’s Secret and turned that into a 30 year career, moving up through the company, playing an integral role in creating the famous Angel campaign along with all the images for this innovative launch as VP Director of Photography in New York.
Currently, Niki is an exquisite designer of hand crafted healing crystal jewelry, Whole-Life Coach, and Yoga Teacher. She shares with us some of the difficult decisions she had to make in her life and career that helped her to step into a place where she could truly own her space, and remake herself.
It all started with a much needed “Niki Pause.”
You will love meeting this incredibly inspiring woman and hearing her person journey to finding harmony in both her professional and personal life.
Side Note: On this week’s podcast, Russell, in jest, suggested that Redtube, (an adult themed website) had paid for adspace on the Finding Harmony Podcast. That isn’t true at all. However, in light of the conflict happening in Ukraine, we invite our listeners to give to the Red Cross. They’ve announced matching dollars for contributions in Canada: https://www.icrc.org/en/donate
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FIND OUT MORE ABOUT NIKI: WEBSITE I INSTAGRAM - www.nikibaratta.com
The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations.
Your contributions have allowed us to keep our podcast ad and sponsor free. Creating, editing and producing each episode takes a lot of time. It is a labor of love. And would not be possible without your kind support.
If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
Make A Donation - www.harmonyslater.com/donate
Opening and closing music by Nick Evans. Listen to the entire album on Spotify - Simply Click Here.To purchase your own copy - Click Here.

Alexandra South: No Pelvis Left Behind

“From menstruation, pregnancy, miscarriage, pelvic pain, endometriosis and fibroids, every pelvis has a story, and more often than not, we’re quite disconnected from it.” - Leslie Howard -
Have you ever heard someone say something that completely changed your life?
Come sit with us on this beautiful Sunday as we join our friend Alexandra South in a deeply personal story of triumph and transformation.
Today, our teacher is Alex South, a contemporary Dancer from Warwick, currently living in Texas. She’s the mother of 3 children, sharing her experiences of recovering after each birth and watching her children grow, learn to roll, crawl, walk, run… Reminding her of the organic development of movement mirrored in her modern dance training.
Alex is a Pelvic Floor Yoga Teacher.
Yoga found her just in time to help her heal from an extremely traumatic event. After giving birth to her second child, she suffered from a severe diastasis recti, the separation of her abdominal muscles, that didn’t heal properly, and caused her to temporarily lose the ability to walk.
This experience encouraged her to explore how yoga could be used to reawaken and reintegrate her abdominal muscles and pelvic floor. What she discovered was an entirely new path to deeper healing, which she now shares with her students.
It’s vital to learn to use the breath to connect more directly to the pelvic floor and creates awareness. Then we can use this new awareness to realign and strengthen the pelvic floor.
No Pelvis Left Behind!
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FIND OUT MORE ABOUT ALEXANDRA SOUTH: WEBSITE I INSTAGRAM
The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations. If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
Make A Donation - www.harmonyslater.com/donate
Don’t forget to subscribe and leave a review! ❤ Give us a 5★ rating!
We love to read and respond to your comments - So drop us a note in the comments below and give us a shoutout on IG!
Music by Nick Evans listen on Spotify - Click Here or Purchase your own copy - Click Here.

Jeanette Keane: Dance Me to the End of Love

The Finding Harmony Podcast has always been a play on words. How to find harmony in your life?
Uncovering that point when one hits rock bottom and discovers yoga as the secret key to ending suffering… Sometime after everything else has failed.
Its written right there in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra. The first one: Atha Yoga-Anushasanam.
“Now, yoga is revealed.”
The implication being that Yoga is first of all, not being invented here. It’s being revealed. In the way that, say Indiana Jones, pulls back the tarp on the Ark and sees it for the first time.
(The egoist who seeks to look directly at this thing will be blinded folks, the skin melt off his face. The awareness of the finite nature of existence is revealed here! Immutable consciousness. Mutable prakriti!)
So, finally… After you’ve tried everything, the pilates class, the parties, the college degrees, the shopping, and even leaning in... Finally, we come to Yoga.
And so did Jeanette. However, Jeanette was fortunate enough to be introduced to yoga at a very young age through her mother.
She’s an artist and professional dancer, skilled in Public Relations, Digital Communication, Marketing, and Arts Administration. But even Jeanette explored many different avenues, looking for answers, before realizing that yoga held the perfect space for her to cultivate inner-peace.
Last year, unhappy with her current career, she sought out B-School to help her create her own consulting business centered around her artistic life. Wanting to spend more quality time with her children and have control over her schedule and hours, she made the big bold step to go out on her own. We spoke with her about building a business, and what that looked like for her.
It’s not glamorous or romantic. Its not being “discovered.” It’s a lot of work, actually. But, there is such a precious joy within it.
Being self made.
And, ultimately, this is what Yoga is.
Cultivating your authentic connection to the Self.
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FIND OUT MORE ABOUT JEANETTE KEANE: INSTAGRAM
The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations. If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
Make A Donation - https://www.harmonyslater.com/donate
Don’t forget to subscribe and leave a review! ❤ Give us a 5★ rating!
Music by Nick Evans: List More Click Here.
To purchase your own copy - Click Here.

The Ever Ebullient Yan Ong

Yan, like a good champagne, has a sparkling personality. We very much enjoyed chatting with her in Portugal about her life, Injuries with the practice, and learning to thrive despite suffering from an autoimmune disorder.
Keeping in mind that the vast majority of yoga practitioners are female, we asked Yan what it’s like to be a female teacher in the Mysore room, and her personal experience with the unconscious bias towards women (or against women) that we all seem to continue to carry.
Yan has a fun and interesting story, being invited to join Mensa as a young teen, her time as a Viagra saleswoman, and finally spending 80 months practicing in Mysore, India, with Sharath. You’ll love hearing about how she invited him and his family out for Christmas mimosas on her first trip to Mysore! And her journey of becoming his student all the way to having him perform her marriage ceremony in Portugal.
Yan is ebullient. And, this bubbly effervescence does define her well. We sincerely hope you enjoy spending time with her as much as we did!
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT YAN ONG INSTAGRAM I YAN’s WEBSITE - YanOng.me
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The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations. If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
Make A DonationDon’t forget to subscribe and leave a review! ❤
Give us a 5★ rating!
We love to read and respond to your comments - So drop us a note in the comments below and give us a shout out on IG!
Opening and closing music compliments of my dear friend teaching Ashtanga yoga in Eindhoven, Nick Evans, with his band “dawnSong” from the album “for Morgan.” Listen to the entire album on Spotify - Simply Click Here.
To purchase your own copy - Click Here.

Sat Inder Khalsa The Kwisatz Haderach

In this week’s Finding Harmony Podcast episode, you’ll come to the confluence where Kundalini and Ashtanga yoga meet…
In the heart of Sat Inder Khalsa: the Kwisatz Haderach.
In this episode, we learn that in Frank Herbert’s Dune Universe, a Kwisatz Haderach would be a male Bene Gesserit, who would have access to the memories of both his male and female ancestors, as well as an ability to bridge space and time with prescient ability... In other words, He would be Bene Gesserit, Reverend Mother, Mentat, and Guild Navigator, all in one.
Our beloved Sat Inder is a devotee of the Divine Mother and shishya to her servant Yogavidananda. Sat Inder is an Authorized Ashtanga Yoga teacher, lover of mythology, a great storyteller, and a retired “Kundaloonie” (as he likes to say).
No podcast historiography of Ashtanga Yoga would be complete without him as a guest!
Enjoy this spectacularly irreverent take on what also happens to be a most sincere interest in spiritual paths and practices.
Sat Inder tells us of his days as a Kundalini Yoga Teacher, leaving the practice of Ashtanga yoga behind, only to have it come back to him again, calling him to Mysore, India. We talk about the Law of Attraction, his visit to the Kamakhya Temple in Assam, where he reset his energy and altered his understanding of devotion forever.
Interestingly, he often contemplates death and mortality. And has found that this morbid obsession with impermanence has become a doorway to liberation and a constant reminder to live more fully.
We hear of Sat Inder sitting on the Manikarnika ghat, (one of the two cremation sites in Varanasi), where visits with Aghoris, members of the mystical Hindu sect known for extreme rituals, devotees of Shiva manifested as Bhairava, as they illuminate his mind.
Finally, we talk about the paradox inherent within the Ashtanga system: The attachment to the body, and yet the goal of becoming non-attached to the body.
This episode may be triggering for some listeners, as we also asked Sat Inder about his personal experience of receiving the “mulabandha adjustment” from Pattabhi Jois on tour in 2000.
This episode is a pot boiler, a bodice ripper, and a barn burner all in one!! Enjoy!
And if you think this episode is good… you should catch the BONUS episode with Sat Inder!
You can listen to it when you become a Finding Harmony Inner Circle Member.
BECOME A MEMBER ♡
Enrolment Closes January 31
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT SAT INDER KHALSA: WEBSITE I INSTAGRAM I FACEBOOK
The Finding Harmony Podcast is hosted, edited and produced by Harmony Slater and co-hosted by Russell Case.
A big heart of thanks to our friends, family, and students from around the world, who’ve generously supported this podcast through your comments, sharing, and financial donations. If you’ve enjoyed today’s podcast, please consider supporting our future episodes by making a donation. Every little bit goes a long way and we are immensely grateful for any and all of your support.
MAKE A DONATION - harmonyslater.com
Opening and closing music by Nick Evans.