Illuminating Our True Nature: Yogic Practices for Personal and Collective Healing
Michelle’s fifth book explores yoga philosophy, specifically the five root causes of suffering, known as the five kleshas. In this wise, practical guide, Michelle Cassandra Johnson offers a path toward developing a deeper understanding of these patterns and practices for personal and collective healing and transformation.
Upcoming Events
Since ancient times, people from various cultures and lineages have engaged the oracles to receive divine communication and guidance. Once a month, on or around the full moon from July to December 2024, I will serve as a medium to the oracles to access answers to questions you might have about relationships, career, life path, lineage, family, and whatever it is you seek to know.
A Sadhana is a dedicated practice. Many are structured as 40-day sadhana because 40 days is said to be long enough for us to break samskaras—patterns, and create new practices and behaviors. A sadhana can be a consistent practice of meditation, mantra, movement, self-study or pranayama, or a mixture of these practices. The Finding Refuge Sadhana provides a combination of mantra, pranayama, movement, meditation and self-study through journaling prompts and reflection.
The Finding Refuge Sadhana is designed to guide you through becoming present and exploring heartbreak, grief, resilience, connection with ancestors, and the medicine you can bring forth at this time. This Sadhana is a tool meant to support you in healing and deepening your spiritual practice and it is a resource that beckons you to present with the heart-brokenheartedness and open heartedness.
Engaging dreams to divine our future is an old and wise practice. As we prepare for the changing season and the onset of winter in the Northern Hemisphere, I invite us to dream and bring our dreams into waking reality—to dream the dream of release and birth, the dream of creation.
Join me for a four-part series about dreaming. Together, we will embark on a journey of dreaming, self-discovery, and transformation. We will explore four primary points, including the importance and practice of dreaming, the use of dream altars, identifying our dream allies and guides, and allowing the dream of creation to emerge and move through us and out into the world.
Join Michelle C. Johnson and Amy Burtaine for bee magic for the Winter Solstice.
Amy and Michelle are bee lovers and tenders, activists, and people who are deeply committed to healing work that supports bringing individuals, the collective, and our entire ecosystem back into balance. As fall gives way to winter, they want to share some wisdom from the honeybees and hive with you. During this 90-minute session, Michelle and Amy will share how magic can happen as we move through a period of darkness, how to attune to one another more fully and the planet, and the power of accessing and cultivating sweetness in our lives.
transverse
A divination deck to respond to grief & loss
Press
Episode 11 of M3CS’s Contemplative Science Podcast saw Michelle Cassandra Johnson come on to the podcast to talk about trauma, spirituality and the whitewashing of yoga.
For the full podcast, check out the episode here.
In this episode, we cover...
The differences and complexities of individual trauma and collective trauma.
Practical tips for introducing mindfulness to alleviate trauma.
The issues with Western Yoga: appropriated, whitewashed and capitalistic.
Our first podcast of the year is with the delightful Michelle Cassandra Johnson, and I was lucky enough to get to ask her so many questions. We had a nuanced conversation regarding being of service to the world, how we hold space for grief, and the tension between the spiritual call to be quiet and the noise we experience in our lives.
Take a listen to all her wisdom.
In this conversation, Michelle and Anjali discuss:
Kleshas as an inquiry: Michelle’s new book on kleshas
What does healing mean when the world is ablaze?
Our collective nervous systems
Michelle’s writing as a practice of reclamation and re-connection
Her go to rituals during the writing process
Role of community care and collective
How does she practice care as a space holder?
Ever notice the ways we can create suffering for ourselves and others? Author Michelle Cassandra Johnson shares tools to navigate the obstacles that create suffering. We can facilitate positive change not only within ourselves but also within our communities and the broader world.
Michelle Cassandra Johnson explores the kleshas—the five afflictions that cause suffering—within the framework of modern challenges ranging from racial injustice to climate change. Through personal stories, insights on yoga philosophy, and practical advice, Michelle offers a roadmap for understanding and addressing the root causes of suffering both individually and collectively. This conversation will inspire yoga practitioners and activists alike to engage deeply with their practice and strive for personal and social transformation.
What are the lessons you’re tired of learning? In yoga philosophy, the kleshas are patterns that create suffering, and exploring them can help us find peace and ease in our personal lives and within the collective. In this conversation, Tracee Stanley is joined by author, activist, spiritual teacher and practitioner, racial equity consultant and trainer, and intuitive healer Michelle Cassandra Johnson, whose new book, Illuminating Our True Nature: Yogic Practices for Personal & Collective Healing is a guide for turning towards—instead of away from—our suffering, not only to better understand why we suffer but also to also open up pathways to freedom.
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