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Rane: Hello, my name is Rane Bowen and this is the Flow Artist Podcast. Together with my co host, Jo Stewart, we speak with extraordinary movers, thinkers and teachers about how they find their flow and much, much more. But before we dive in, we want to take a moment to acknowledge and honour the traditional owners of the unceded land where this episode was recorded. The Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation. We pay our deepest respects to the elders, both past and present, and acknowledge the emerging leaders within their community. Anjali Rao is returning to the Flow Artist Podcast this month, speaking with us about her wonderful new book, Yoga as Embodied Resistance. Anjali is an author, yoga educator and practitioner. She brings an intersectional and decolonial feminist lens to the study of philosophy and yoga history. Integrating storytelling, art and poetry, her work interrogates the link between religions, politics and yoga and emphasises an embodied approach. She's on the faculty of multiple yoga teacher training programmes. Her areas of specialisation includes deconstructing the dynamics between caste, gender, nationalism and colonialism. She's the host of the Love of Yoga podcast, Bridging Scholarship, Activism and Yoga. We loved Anjali's new book and we were really excited to speak with her. We hope you enjoy listening. All right, Anjali, thank you so much for speaking with us again. It's been great to get the chance to speak with you once more. So, since we last spoke back in June 2024, I think you are just in the early stages of writing your book, Yoga as Embodied Resistance, A Feminist Lens on Caste and Gender and Sacred Resilience in Yoga History. And we're super keen to jump right into talking about that since it's an incredible book and I know we'll have so much to talk about, but so much has been happening in the world and in your own life since we last spoke. So how are you?

Anjali: Oh, well, thank you for the question and I'm really excited to have this conversation with you both. I really enjoyed the last time that we had this conversation and so I'm thrilled to be here. What is happening in my life? Oh, my goodness, lots is happening in my life. But first, the world that we are living in, especially in the United States, has sort of come to, shall I say, like a churn about all the things with. Including immigration, with race, with gender, with people being targeted for their political beliefs. So. So it's a very, shall we say, moments, many moments of turmoil and anguish for so many people, especially people of colour, people who are trans, people who are in so many ways marginalised, so this is that we are speaking about these, these issues in the context of the large. This, this thing that is happening here in the United States and located within that is my own personal life, which is, you know, as a parent, as a caregiver to elderly parents, I'm really navigating how to do the work that I really want to do with being a caregiver, with being all the things. So I really want to maybe focus my next research or whatever on the topic of caregiving and the politics of it. And as a feminist, as a person who is doing the work, it's unacknowledged labour, which most, most caregivers and most women do. So that's something that I'm really thinking about more and more in, in my own work. And of course I've started my PhD, which is really exciting. And as a. In my 50s, I've started my PhD. So it's kind of like exciting and kind of like crazy at the same time because it's very rigorous, I'm enjoying the rigour and at the same time I'm really privileged and grateful that I can do this deep study in, in philosophy and religion and intersection with gender studies and feminism. So it's really diving deep into the topics that I'm interested in. So that's what's happening.

Jo: And so you've even started to talk about this already just in terms of that brief overview of the political climate that you're living in and also the philosophy that you're studying in. And that's one of the things that I really loved about reading your book. Even though it looks at these ancient texts like you really make it relevant for today's political climate. And I really appreciate you making those links. Would you like a little bit about why it is so important to study these figures from the past and the ones that you study like they've defined caste and gender and like the religious norms throughout yoga history.

Anjali: Well, I think first of all there's so much of misunderstanding and less understanding and under exploring of history in general because people think that oh, it's happened in the past, so what does that have got to do with the present moment? But history is actually what is informed us about who we are. Our cultural values, our political institutions, our social norms, our understanding of the world that we live in, our relationships with each other. So it has informed so much of the present moment. Right. Nothing has happened in a vacuum. Yoga has not happened in a vacuum. And as I explore in the book that from the beginning yoga came through context of Whatever social, political circumstances. And that is not really explored much. And even if it has been explored much, it has been explored much. Explored from a European perspective or a Brahminical dominant caste perspective and typically from men.

Jo: Right.

Anjali: So my, my argument is that we are missing a lens which needs to happen because right now what we are seeing all over the world, and especially in the United States, is this hyper masculinity that is prevalent in terms of so called political leadership, where in. There is a emphasis on quote, unquote conservative traditional gender norms, an emphasis on, or rather de. Emphasising agency of women and sexual orientation or sexualities of minorities, like for trans and LGBTQ people. So there's a lot of sort of erasure of those lived experiences and what should I say, an emphasis on projecting a certain traditional essentialism of gender. And what, what, what I hope to bring those connections, like you say, is that there is a, there is a link that is missing of who we were and the other, the variables of gender, caste, class, race on the traditions and the practises and the philosophies of yoga, because only certain philosophies and lineages of yoga have been emphasised because of colonialism, because of Brahminism. And there are so many other ways of being and ways of looking at life, ways of looking at liberation that are missing and, or rather underexplored. So my hope is that we, I bring those or people like all the work that I'm doing brings a more of a awareness and expansiveness in the, in the consciousness of practitioners to say there are different, other ways of being that, that what is emphasised in the yoga world is a sort of asceticism, but in a very different modern world. So you, for example, you are talking about the yoga sutras and then you're projecting those values into the, a very modern householder kind of world, right? Where we are engaged in the world. So there's sort of a juxtaposition of ascetic parts of yoga with, with the modern world without really understanding the context of what the compositions were and how those have been used or through the, through the history, history of yoga. So my hope is that these kind of stories that I bring about in the book are also going to raise the consciousness that there have been people who have resisted gender norms, patriarchy, caste, and derive inspiration, derive some sort of a learning, derive some sort of a grounding about. There have been other ways of being and thinking about life, liberation and so on, and connection with the sacred, connection with each other sense of community that we've not really explored in the world of yoga. So that's my hope and intention for the book.

Jo: Yeah, it's so powerful because, like, hearing you speak about the current American climate where like books are literally being pulled off library shelves because they share a different perspective and the way that it, like this narrow essentialist view is kind of sold as a traditional view, yet it's because all of these other traditions have been erased. So, like there's always been gender diverse people, there's always been women who are intellectuals and philosophers and to shine a light on that is so powerful. But it's also so interesting because if we only get this narrow view of history, it's like we miss out on most of the history and it's the different points of view that make it so fascinating. So I really loved this chance to. To just get those insights into some of these figures in yoga history. I actually hadn't encountered any of the figures in your book before and I've looked like. I've tried to look for texts beyond the ones written by white guys or like there's a couple of key figures like BKS Iyengar whose work is widely shared, like, especially from that Krishnamacharya lineage. But I kind of understand as well, like, if I can only read texts in English, I am reading in the language of the coloniser. So I very much appreciate you sharing in a language that I can understand and also unpacking some of the layers of these texts because it is like I don't have a philosophy degree either. So I appreciate the bridge that you've made between academic research and something that an everyday yoga teacher can understand and learn from.

Anjali: Yeah, I've always, I think I mentioned it even in my last podcast with you both that my experience with yoga practitioners and I teach in so many different YTTs all over the world has been that there is a thirst and there is a thirst for knowledge, there is a. There is a thirst for critical thinking which, which people who teach teachers or train teachers don't really, I feel, meet enough and that there is a thing that there is academia on one side and then there's practise on the other side, or scholarship is on one side and then there is everyday people on the other side. And my hope was to really build a bridge between the two because I feel like that is almost disrupting elitism in yoga scholarship and scholarship in general. There are scholars over here who can access the texts and research and who know how to, and then there are people who don't have access to that there are paywalls for so many journals that I read that people will not have access to or even know how to look at. Right. So my hope was to really bring those dots together in a way which feels. Not minimising or not. What do you say? What is that? Simplifying something which is very complex and at the same time making it. Making it accessible in a way which people can understand without sometimes the academic language scholarship. Language is beyond so many of our skill sets. So how can I make something simple and yet not simplifying? Like that was my goal. I hope I. That I hope I've achieved that in whatever extent. And there will always be people who, for example, in my. In at the end of every chapter I've started, I've tried to give like reflection and practical applications for folks because. And that is not really done enough in academic journals, because academic journals is about research, like, without saying what you should do with the research. And my hope, my goal here was to say, here is the research, here are the things that we don't really know enough of. But what can every. The everyday practitioner who goes to a yoga studio or was to. Who teaches at home or whatever, how can we apply that knowledge? So I'm more interested in sort of, if you want to call it something, an applied philosophy. Because I do feel like right now in the world we are already grappling with so much of information, right? Because of social media, everybody feels like everybody's an expert at everything. So I really hope that I have sort of brought some complexity into places where there has not been enough complexity, layers of information which say, hey, there's more to yoga than. Or more to the quest of yoga, which is liberation, which is transformation, all of those things than yoga sutras or the Bhagavad Gita or Upanishads. Not to say that those texts are not important. Those texts are obviously very influential for a reason and that also is a part of the history of the complex history of yoga. But there's also other ways and other, other seekers who have sought liberation in. In different ways. And most of them who I've highlighted are people from either women or gender, queer folks who have sort of pushed against the boundaries and the binaries of either gender or caste or class. So, yeah, that. That's what my hope was. Exactly what you said, that I really have tried to bridge scholarship and practise.

Jo: It's interesting hearing your reason for including the questions because as I was reading them, my response was, oh, she doesn't just Want us to be passive and absorb this information. Like, it's actually this invitation to engage with the information and like, it made it much more interactive. It's like, think about this, like, what does it mean for you? Like, how would this play out in your life? And I loved that aspect of it. Like, it was kind of this. Bring it back into reality from this, like, look into the past, like my reality today.

Anjali: Yeah, yeah. That's why it's called an embodied resistance, because it is embodied. It is track, it is in practise. How do you feel it in your. In your body? How do you feel it in your life? How do you. How do you put it in practise? Right. So that I did not want it to be only theoretical. The theories and abstract concepts are exciting and we can always nerd out on that. But also, how do we honestly disrupt caste, for example, in yoga spaces? How do we. How do we reckon with gender essentialism in yoga spaces and the broader culture? So these, these stories that I'm bringing are. Are actually about disrupting or unravelling the social constructs of. Of and hierarchies that are embedded within the yoga space. And also that is reflective of the broader society.

Jo: And just following on from what you've been saying, one of the sections in your book that I really appreciated was the chapter on Sanskrit, because I've often heard it referred to as a divine language or a sacred language. And it's kind of widely acknowledged by many yoga teachers as being the proper and the most respectful language to use when you're naming poses. And as you explain in the book, like, only dominant class men have historically been allowed to use Sanskrit and people from lower castes have actually been violently punished for using these words. Would you like to unpack this a little bit more?

Anjali: Yeah, sure. So Sanskrit, as I say in the book, has a history and it's not an ahistorical language. It is based in a social context. So, yes, Sanskrit is one of the languages of yoga. It is an important language of yoga, but it is not the only language of a spiritual indic traditions. Right. And that's what the thing that I wanted to kind of like highlight that by only sharing or highlighting books of Sanskrit, we are not really exploring other languages which are also very important in the indic traditions. Now, when it comes to dominant caste men, yes, especially in the classical Sanskrit was only from dominant caste men. As time has progressed, there have been people who have been. Women have. And other castes have also had access to Sanskrit. So during lots of the compositions the original compositions of the books of the text, rather, were accessible by a few of the dominant caste, especially not from the Dalit community and the Bahujan community. So those folks were never really given access to the teachings of Sanskrit. And a lot of the Dalit communities, Bahujan communities, have other traditions of their own, other spiritual religions, spiritual practises and traditions of their own. So it is. So I want to kind of like, just bring that very important factor into the conversation because, again, it is not really mentioned enough. And when it comes to, like, accessibility for many people who are from the Dalit and the Bahujan communities are not very. Not only comfortable, but there's also sort of a triggering of their. Their own caste trauma. So we have to be mindful of that as well as understand that one of the things that people say why we should use Sanskrit is because there has been so much of whitewashing of yoga, so there is a erasure of South Asian traditions. There is a lot of cultural appropriation, so there is a lot of emphasis on the physical posture and as a. As a fitness morality and so on. So there is a lot of other problematics that are associated with not restricted, respecting or understanding the cultural context of yoga as a broad tradition. So that also is happening, right? So there are all these things that are happening at the same time and we need to kind of. And one of the things that I talk about in the book is that we have to really not look at all these issues in terms of binaries. Oh, you have to appreciate yoga, and so hence you have to use Sanskrit. So at the same time, we also have to acknowledge that there are folks historically who have been. Who have been not only harmed when they've used Sanskrit, but a lot of the texts are keeping caste hierarchies in place, right? It's not only that they've been kept away from the text, but those very same texts have been used to keep those caste hierarchies in place. So that's one of the reasons why I had to kind of bring a critical lens into the power dynamics of Sanskrit. And colonialism also added another layer to this situation because British colonialists, European colonialists or European scholars, rather, looked at Sanskrit texts by dominant caste as sort of being representative of the intellectual elite of the colony of India, right? And so they. They amplified it by either translating it to German, translating it into English, and those were then sort of in the front end of the quote, unquote, the philosophies of India. And. And a lot of the other Traditions were looked at as something which was barbaric or not as sophisticated. So hence it's not important. Right. So that, that's a very important thing that I wanted to kind of highlight in this because there's simply so much of undermining the impact of caste and caste hierarchies as well as we have to again hold this intention with colonialism and capitalism and white supremacy in yoga spaces that has erased and continues to erase South Asian voices. So all of it is happening and I don't want to minimise one or the other.

Jo: It comes back to what you were saying before about there's this narrow viewpoint which like one language, one perspective and then an expansive viewpoint which is so much richer. And I love that aspect of your.

Anjali: View because Sanskrit also has absorbed other regional languages. There's always been a dynamic relationship between Sanskrit and other languages of India, and especially India. So there, it has not been a one way thing where only Sanskrit has been translated into vernacular languages because that also has happened and also other regional languages have impacted the development and evolution of Sanskrit. So it's a very complex and dynamic sort of a relationship. And Sanskrit itself is not like sort of a, what do you say, a flatter, flatline language. There has been evolution of Sanskrit as well, which as a, as a. I'm not a Sanskrit scholar, so I don't really go into that, but I do know that from studying from scholars that that is a part of the development of Sanskrit.

Jo: Yeah, it's really interesting that this idea that it just emerged fully formed and therefore we don't question it because it's divine.

Anjali: Exactly. So there is this thing that yoga emerged fully formed or yoga is a monolith or Sanskrit is a sort of a language that has not evolved. So there have been developments, there have been evolutions and waves of development that are not really understood because it is so complex and complicated and again buried in academic journals which are not very accessible to the everyday practitioner.

Rane: Actually this is a bit of a sidestep but I've sort of like read people online suggest things that Sanskrit is like this perfect language and that it's being used by NASA and his in their sort of computer science programmes. Have you heard these types of rumours?

Anjali: Yeah, I have. And again, I think it's also because Germany and German scholarship has been so strong in Sanskrit. So there is a lot of research that is being done in Sanskrit and about Sanskrit. So it's an ancestral language, I revere it. It is not something that I take lightly. At the same time I Also know that within that, or use. The usage of that comes within a certain power dynamic and there's a hierarchy that is associated with the use of Sanskrit that is not explored. So I have. I have, looking at some of the texts of Sanskrit, you can understand the beauty of the language. It is a beautiful language. So I don't want to obviously undermine that as well.

Rane: Fair enough. Fair enough. Yes. So I love that. As well as sharing many classical stories, the idea of storytelling itself was explored in your book. So why is storytelling so powerful in helping us make sense of the world?

Anjali: Yeah, I love that question. So I use the mechanism of storytelling for bringing up, bringing into. Into light some of the very complex sort of dynamics of caste and gender and upanishadic philosophies. Because I feel like storytelling humanises. Everybody can relate to stories and humans, and storytelling is one of the most sort of primal things of humans. Right. Ever since we have known what it is to communicate with each other, we have told stories with each other. So it's a very powerful, powerful sort of a medium. And so that's one of the reasons why. And I come from India, I come from a. And I write about that in the book as well. I come from a land of billion stories because there are a lot of billions people and each of us has like a story to say talent, if not more so. Storytelling comes very naturally to. To. To the traditions and to the people of South Asia. And I wanted to kind of again, highlight that.

Jo: It means as well that as a reader, it's a book that you will read for pleasure because the stories are so interesting, as opposed to something that might feel a bit more like homework.

Anjali: Exactly. Because, you know, if I were to do the same thing without the stories, then I would feel like it is just very dry. Like I prefer. I prefer reading about people. Like, history should be fun. History should be not just very dry about dates and concepts and. And who did what to who. But it is like really bringing those meteor parts of humanity and the human experience out into the open. So, I mean, I've not really gone so deep into one or two stories. What I've tried to do is like, the first, each chapter begins with a story and then I kind of go into all the explanations and theories and all of that. So, yeah.

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Jo: And so without giving too much away because I definitely want to leave some surprises for the readers so they can have the same journey that I had reading this book. I'd like to just do a little introduction to some of the key characters that appear in your book and I'm going to read a quote by you because I thought it was such a great summary of your own work. So I hope that's okay. So to like explore a bit deeper into the historical figures you talk about. From Sulaba, who questioned the spiritual and intellectual prowess of a powerful king, to Piro who unabashedly insisted that her story had value and relevance, to Akka Mahadevi, who shared her clothes and other patriarchal notions of property propriety, there have been rebellious voices that are voraciously claimed their place in the constellation of change makers. Their voices can light up our own paths to healing and transformation at the individual and systemic levels. Would you like to kind of share a little bit more about these characters?

Anjali: Sure. I think one of the ways in which I wanted to sort of talk about the different periods of yoga was through these, these people that I kind of want to highlight. So for example, Sulabha comes from the Upanishadic Vedic period that that then gets highlighted into the Itihasnik period, which is the composition of Mahabharata. So that's one of the reasons why I kind of chose her. And more than anything else, I think that debate that she shares is sort of brilliant. And when I first read it, I got goosebumps. I read it in a scholar's journal. Ruth Vanita. I have to like mention her name. And so when I, I was like, oh my goodness, why did I never, why have I never read about her? Right? I read about her in my 40s. Now I'm 50, so you know, I read about it read about it 10 years ago and. And then the next one I talk about is Radha, which is again from the Puranas, and then I talk about Akka Mahadevi, who's from the Bhakti period, and then Piro, who's also from another part of the Bhakti period. And each of them are highlighting different aspects of resistance and of resilience, of sort of bringing out the notion of, or the pushing back against boundaries that I really wanted to highlight, especially from women and the gender norms that existed and the casteist norms that existed and how that has been shifted because of these characters. And why do we not know about these characters now, like, for everyday practitioner, everyday reader kind of lens? So that's one of the reasons why I kind of chose those portrayals and the depictions and the stories, because I wanted to highlight those specific periods of yoga history, but also those different concepts without going into much of it, because I really want to leave it to the reader. Each of them, each of them shed or resisted against gender norms, patriarchal norms, casteist norms, and shed this notion of essentialism, of pretty much everything, and using the teachings of the wide corpus of yoga. Right. And yes, it is not talking about the yoga sutras or. I really wanted to kind of bring other ways of thinking about liberation, which these people and many other people like them have talked about and live seen.

Jo: Yeah, it's so interesting. It's each. It's like each of them were an archetype, but not an archetype that I commonly had in my mind for figures from those times.

Anjali: Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. And, you know, again, each of them did it in different ways, and some of them are ahistorical, like Radha and Sulaba are ahistorical, but they're obviously created, quote, unquote characters because of something that was happening in the society that made them alive in people's consciousness and imaginations. Right. And the other two are from history, they are historical figures. So I really wanted to have this sort of mix of different ways of highlighting these issues and of who reacted and responded in different ways to patriarchy. It was not one, not, not everybody shed their clothes like Akka Mahadevi. They did other things. So each of us as practitioners have different personalities, have different social contacts that we are embedded in. Right. So my hope is that we start looking at our own skills, at our own hearts, and then realise, what can I do to push those boundaries, being rooted with who I am, rather than copying somebody else blindly? So that was also one of the reasons why I kind of wanted to bring these different contrasting characters almost into the book.

Jo: Yeah, I loved that. And especially the contrast in the stories of Akka Mahadevi, who was very much renunciate, and Piro, whose story was much more about community and connection and advocacy. Like, I loved that example of living your truth and sharing, I guess, your gifts with the world. And it encourages that in the reader as well.

Anjali: I hope so. I hope so. Thank you.

Jo: So talking about how relevant these topics are today does come with an element of risk, because sharing this more experience, expansive view that can be seen as controversial. Would you like to talk a little bit more about that aspect of the book and your work?

Anjali: Sure. I think all over the world, especially in India and the United States, is a sort of a flattening of people, flattening of cultures, flattening of gender, flattening of traditions, of religions. But actually there has been so much of heterogeneity, there's so much of diversity of thought of cultures, of practises, of traditions. And my. Yes, it's going to be controversial because dominant culture, both in India, aided by the political apparatus in both in India and the United States, is about flattening and homogenization because it's easier to. Easier to digest and it's easier to manipulate. Right. But actually, we are so much more complex. Our traditions and our backgrounds and our histories are so much more complex. And that's one of the reasons why I wanted to kind of use these stories, highlight the heterogeneity, the diversity of thoughts, of practises, of lived experiences, of philosophies. Right. I mean, the person who is Akka Mahadevi is not really thinking about, for example, the Upanishads. She is doing her traditions, her beliefs, her connection with the divine is so different from the Vedic viewpoint or even the Yoga Sutra viewpoint, though they both talk about, for example, the divine in their own ways. It's completely practised in a different way, it's completely thought about in a different way, it's completely embodied in a different way. And. But what is happening now in the present moment, in almost all over the world, and is because of many reasons, including globalisation and capitalism and all of that, is this a flattening? Like we are all supposed to think the same, we're all supposed to be the same, we're all supposed to practise yoga in the same way, we're all supposed to think of our relationships with each other in the same way, but it was not really like that. And that is not emphasised enough in the context of yoga and in the broader culture. And so that's one of the reasons, though it is controversial, I think it is important to highlight.

Jo: And it leads into my next thought, which is like, one way that you kind of illustrate how diverse and multifaceted the tradition of yoga actually is, is you use the idea of a tapestry as a metaphor and like, it comes up in your book as a way to weave together all of these different threads and ideas. And I was thinking. I've been thinking about this because it's something you mentioned in our first interview and it's something that's really stayed with me and like, I know that weaving would be traditionally women's work in South Asia. And I was also thinking about how, like, hand loom fabrics was something that Gandhi also really highlighted. Right. Like, as a.

Anjali: Yes, more than Gandhi. I feel like. I mean, my heart is about. About weavers. I don't know whether you follow me and that's how bring this topic, because wherever I go. And this is like a little aside about me, wherever I go, I try to go into the local beaver place and buy a saree there, because I really love the local artisan who are not really highlighted enough in the. In the. In. In India as well as here in the United States. So tapestry and clothing is something very, very dear to me because it's a. It's a. It's a expression, Expression of culture, it's an expression of emotion, it's an ex. It's an express, it's. It's expertise that is not really regarded much and given value to. So tapestry was the metaphor that I use because I really do think that there are so many different threads of. Of yoga and it's. And it's. It. It's colourful and it's. Can be warm and there are things which are sort of hidden, the threads that are hidden. And so it's like a. I feel like it's really a perfect sort of a metaphor for that. I've used that a lot when I teach and I understand I'm a visual sort of a person, so I know that these kind of complicated things can be best aided with visualisation and imagery. So I use that in. I use many different metaphors in the book because I think like that. So I feel like it'll be helpful for the reader.

Jo: When I was studying visual art over 20 years ago, it was kind of at a time like, this is a postmodernism thing, where what was traditionally seen as women's forms of expression and craft, not art, were being more highlighted as a statement in a fine art world. And I personally love crafting process where each little step, each little stitch can be like a meditation. Like each little one on its own is not a big deal, it's not a big gesture. But like through the rhythm and the process and like the state of mind that you go into as you're creating this bigger work very much felt to me like yoga. Like that's also when I discovered yoga. So I love that aspect of like craft and storytelling and self expression. That can also be a political statement.

Anjali: Absolutely, absolutely. I absolutely think it is a political statement. You're absolutely right. The, the thing to use or wear handloom sarees is a political statement. So everything we do is a political statement. Right. So the personal is a political set. The black feminists and I completely understand and resonate with that. Yeah.

Jo: And even hand making and mending is an anti capitalist statement.

Anjali: Absolutely, Absolutely. Absolutely. I'm all for upcycling and recycling and stealing my friends and my sisters and my mother's clothes and you know, exchanging and all of that. So let's, let's keep doing that. Let's keep talking about it. Yes, me too. And I'm also, I was just telling my academic advisor in my, in my ph. In my PhD programme, I was just telling her that, you know, I would love to do some research and I don't know how to kind of bring that in into this programme because it's about philosophy and religion and feminist studies and all of that. I would love to talk about sarees and fabric and if I can, because I really enjoy it, it'll be fun for me. But I don't know whether there'll be enough research in that and I don't know where it'll go. But I would love to bring in something about, about fashion and the intersections of fashion and religion. And I think it'll be so much fun to talk about it and study.

Jo: Absolutely. Just to cycle back to something else you're talking about. Like fabric is absolutely my favourite thing to buy when I'm travelling as well, because it's like, it's so individual from each place. And also like then you can, it can still be part of your life. Like you can wear it, you can.

Anjali: Hang it on your wall and it's.

Jo: So like folds up small. You can fit lots in your bag.

Anjali: It's like something you can carry. You can, you know. Absolutely. I love it. Yeah.

Jo: This is totally off topic, but I've seen a few like Instagram videos Of like young South Asian women skateboarding in the most gorgeous jewel coloured sarees and outfits. It's so gorgeous.

Anjali: Totally a badass thing to do.

Jo: Yeah, totally. Yeah. And just like adds this extra flair when they do their like jumps and spins and stuff.

Anjali: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love it. Yes, I've seen that too.

Jo: So like, while your book is really expansive and just from our conversation I could already hear how much more you're expansive, like how much more your thoughts are even beyond what made their way into the book, like your book is also really focused. So how did you decide which questions to ask and whose stories to share? Because I get the sense that exploring these themes is like a lifelong project for you.

Anjali: Oh yeah. I was just telling Jivana that, that I've written this book, like whatever, like maybe now it's nearly one year since I gave the thing to my publisher and I wish I had written it now because now I know much more because of my PhD and my research and, and, and I think it will always be the case that you'll always learn and you'll always want to kind of continuously share what you're learning. And so I don't think that process will ever end. I hope it won't. What was the question?

Jo: How did you decide his stories to share?

Anjali: You know, I honestly don't know. I, I, I read your question and I was thinking about how did I choose what I chose and I really think that a, I always wanted to talk. My first idea of the book came from Sulaba. Like when I first read it I'm like, this has to go into the mainstream practitioner because it talks about gender essentialism in a very yogic Upanishadic concept which we don't really talk enough about, right. Especially in the given political moment where trans folks and genderqueer folks are being traumatised and erased and all of the things. Right. So I really wanted to kind of bring that into the book and that was my first thing. Second story about Radha is because I personally feel a sort of affinity towards Radha as a dancer and I think it's an under, under explored character portrayal. In the yoga world. People talk about Krishna but not enough about Radha. And I really wanted to kind of bring that in. And there's a surprise element there in the story which I, which I've written, which I've taken a little bit of a poetic licence with. And the third one is Akka Mahadevi because she comes from my state, right. She's from Karnataka. And I wanted to kind of bring in that Sort of my ancestral connection to the book. And the last one I read because I thought she was such a badass, honestly. Again, I read her in another academic journal and I read a whole book, actually, and it was written by Anshuma Lotra, who's a scholar, And I read her book and I was like, this one, I wanted to bring in a person who is not from the Hindu tradition because she's from. She's a Muslim. And I wanted to kind of bring that flavour into the book because I wanted to kind of, again, present a very diverse. And there are so many more, which I'm sure I have. I can't because of the number of pages that I've won is limited to. But I really wanted to bring in different elements and different traditions and thoughts and concepts, and that's why I kind of chose the book. And each of them I have felt some sort of affinity with because of different reasons. But what the threat that sort of tries in all of them is that there's a rebellion there. There's a rebellion and there's a pushing back, there's dissent. And what I wanted to bring that flavour of dissent is because right now we are being told that, or many, many feel that we cannot, we don't have the power, we don't have the agency to push back against what's happening in the United States. And it's a very dangerous sort of movement for so many people. So I wanted to kind of at least have people read about these characters who pushed back against insurmountable odds of the times. And they survived and we're still talking about them, we're still thinking about them. So I really want to bring that flavour in, into the present political moment, because I think it is so necessary to highlight what is possible and not in a simplified way, because what we are facing now is so, like, crazy. But at least in our own practises, in our own yoga practises, in our own yoga communities, in our own intellectual, cognitive world, as well as in our emotive world, in our relationship world, that we are bringing in these rebellious beings into our living rooms when we read them, when we talk about them, when we think about them. And hopefully this will start more people researching more things and deconstructing caste, for example, because those are things which are not really done in the yoga world. So my hope is that it'll really open up doors for more research, you know.

Jo: Well, that actually leads me to my next question, which is about research, because so much of what you're sharing like, it feels like hidden history. Like, how did you know what to look for? And how were you able to find these texts? It sounds like some of them came from books that you read.

Anjali: Yeah, absolutely. And many more. I mean, as a person who's now studying how to do research the way I did research came from a very intuitive place and it came from, like, really being very curious and being nerd, that I wanted to study, like not only what a person was writing, but where did this person get this information from? So I would go into the bibliography and cross check and all of that. So research for me is an embodied, intuitive process. Also, there is a method to it which I. I just sort of. I don't know how. I kind of got it before I even started my PhD, but. But now when I'm studying how the methods are, I feel like I almost had some of those methods already because of me being a nerd. And that's about it. And honestly, really wanting to share, Wanting to share it with people who I think will be helped and supported and nourished by these stories and so are.

Jo: You able to find your sources online or was it more something you had to work in conjunction with, like a university librarian and like order in textbook and things like that?

Anjali: All of it. All of it not online. Online as in, yes, some of the texts were online, some of those journals were online. I mean, it's not a Google search or a Wikipedia search. It's far more in depth than that. So each of them had to. I had to. I don't know, I just kind of studied, read something that I looked at. Some, the, like I said, the bibliography, the. The. All of that, then went back and studied that. And so it was a process of sort of this whole zigzag and. And you will not believe it. I did not have a single note. I did not write. The way I write is very strange. I don't have index cards and I don't know all of that. I've never done that. So how I write is. For example, if I start talking about a project of, Of. Of one character or one concept, I'll go do the research and I will make some random. I will make some notes on my iPhone or my laptop and then it's all connected in my head and it's not a very methodical, organised way of looking and probably not the right way to do it, but it has worked for me. And sometimes those connections and I make it later, right? I do something here and then I'll read something else and Then I'll be like, oh, I have to go change this again, or add something more to kind of bring those elements out. So lot of some of the stuff I did after I did my PhD, I start my PhD right, because I started looking at. Because, for example, I was studying. My first course was Hindu Tantra. And then I studied about religions and all of that. So I was like, oh, I should add that concept in my first chapter. Or rather, was it my first chapter or my introduction? So I went back and did my introduction and I kind of connected what I was writing. So it was like this whole tapestry of ideas that I kind of have to weave together.

Jo: So does your brain function in a way that you're able, like, as you're weaving this together? Because I would completely forget where each reference came from. Like, I might remember a thing and.

Anjali: I'll be like, is that in that.

Jo: Paper or is that in that paper?

Anjali: Like, so the source of. The source of the researcher, you have to document, right? I mean, that you have to do because you have to obviously refer to the author and the scholar who. I'm referring to what in research we call as secondary sources. Right. What I have done is most of my. Most of the things that I refer to are secondary sources. What that means is it's a scholar writing about something else. It's not the original text. In the original text, I've only done, I think, Bhagavad Gita and Manusmriti, because those are the two texts which I had Bhagavad Gita. I know Sanskrit enough to know that directly. Manusmriti was a translation from a very reputed scholar who has studied the Manusmriti. So most of the texts which are most of the documents or journals have been through scholarship and that I have. There is a certain way to refer it and certain style to refer it. So all that I had to obviously do. But in terms of. In terms of making connections, those connections were in my head.

Jo: Yeah. Did it, like, keep you up at night, your brain just, like, wearing away, like, putting together all these different things?

Anjali: Not really. I mean, I really enjoyed it. So I don't. I didn't see. See it. I was just. I was just worried whether I'm missing something very glaring. Like, you know, there's this thing that obvious. It's so obvious to everybody else, but it's not obvious to me because I'm so into it. So that's why I. I mean, I have to say my. I. I developed this manuscript with. With My academic advisor in my first year, first semester of my PhD. What I mean by that is that. So I would write a chapter and then she would take a look at it and say, okay, how about you explain a little bit more that, that. So those kind of things, she kind of helped me, Helped me shape. But I. I honestly don't know how. How. How I wrote what I did. I. I can't explain it.

Jo: I mean, it sounds like you're just in the flow state. Like it all just.

Anjali: Was. For a few things, I. I definitely was. For the second chapter on whatever, the second story on Radha, I felt like it just came from somewhere else. For Piro, I had to really study. Study, because it was not a part of what I know. It's a culture that I don't know so much about. So I had to kind of really study and read much more than I did for Radha, because Radha came from a very emotional place. So I could. I could. I could relate to that, you know?

Jo: And it sounds like. Like you've been hearing stories about her since you were a tiny child. Like it's been just part of the fabric of your own life.

Anjali: Exactly. And those are some of the best in some ways to write about and think about because they are so much a part of your own cultural narrative.

Jo: And so one thing that you write about in the book, which I thought was a really great question to think about, is the idea of transformation as a practise rather than something we perfect.

Anjali: Absolutely. I do think everything. This was one of my teachers who said that in the early beginning of my yoga studies, which is that everything is a practise. Right. Life itself is a practise. And when you start looking at everything as a practise, then you don't look at it in a way of wanting to be perfect. Because if everything is a practise, then nothing is perfect. And then you kind of give yourself the permission to make mistakes. Now, is that easy? No, because obviously I'm a. I'm a. I call myself a recovering perfectionist. So I have to kind of. Even now, I don't know whether I'll be able to ever read my book ever, because I'll be like, oh, my goodness, I should have written this in this way and I shouldn't have done that way. You know, I. I used to have a podcast and I've never listened to my own podcast because I just can't.

Rane: So.

Anjali: So it's my own recovering perfectionism or whatever, but at the same time, I kind of continuously think I Think scholarship is a practise. I think writing is a practise. Read everything is a practise. So then you're kind of taking away this whole notion of perfectionism and you are allowing yourself the. You're giving yourself the permission to make mistakes and learn from them.

Jo: Well, as someone who's listened to a lot of your podcast episodes, you have nothing to worry about there. I loved them all. And the idea of being a recovering perfectionist, it's actually something that I hear from a lot of dancers.

Anjali: Because, you know, you're absolutely right. I think that is. Oh, my goodness. I think you're absolutely right. Because when you. I studied classical dance and in. In India, in South India, Bharatnatyam, Katak, Kathak, these forms, there is a certain way to do it and there's a certain. There's a right way, there's a wrong way. And then if you're. If it's wrong way, you have to make sure that it's the right way. So I studied it from a very young age, so maybe that is such a. Something that I've internalised so deeply that. That for me there is a right way and a wrong way. And. And asana. I try not to do it that way because asana can never be perfect and whatever is perfect. Asana. Right. But I. I don't, interestingly enough, think of asana like that. But everything else in my life, I have had to unlearn perfectionism. Yeah.

Jo: Maybe your asana is the way that you started to unlearn the perfectionism.

Anjali: That's a good point. That's a brilliant point. I do agree. I think. I think the more you learn, the more you practise, the more you think that you don't really know much. Like, you feel like, I don't know anything. The more you study. Right. And the more. The older you get, you're like, what do I really know? Right. At least that's what I feel.

Rane: Beautiful. Well, I guess we're at our last question. I know we asked you this last time, and I guess it'd be interesting to see how your answer might have changed if it has. So if you could distil everything that you share and learn and teach with the world down to one core essence, what do you think that one thing would be?

Anjali: What is the core learning in general or of the book or. Of what?

Rane: Of anything. Of anything that you've done, maybe in the last year or so.

Anjali: That's a great question. I would say that building capacity for ourselves and in our communities to hold multiplicities. Multiplicities of living, lived experiences, of thought processes, of all, of everything. I think that, I think is one of the most important things for humanity in general, because we are so being conditioned and shaped into binaries of thought, and we are. We have lost the ability to hold paradoxes, for example. So I really. I'm looking more and more into the importance of paradoxes, paradoxical thinking, paradox. And I really think that is a thing that we continuously need to hone in ourselves, in our communities as well as in our children and all of that. Right. To really bring in complex thinking, because we are being. I don't know what the word is, but simplified. Our human experience is being simplified and it's really not simple. And it's beautifully complex and complicated. And in those complications, there are so many layers of the human experience that we are losing because of this sort of flattening. That's what I think I'm thinking more and more of. I don't know whether that's the right answer.

Rane: No, that's a brilliant answer.

Jo: Yeah, no, that was really great.

Rane: Yeah. And I. I guess just in this phase of life that I'm going through, I've recently started a new job and I'm working with people who have way different viewpoints or experiences from me. And so I'm just sort of finding myself having to actually take on this practise. So. Yeah, well, you know, maintaining the values that I have in the world as well. So. No, that is a beautiful answer. So thank you. Thank you so much for that and.

Anjali: Thank you for asking. It's a great question.

Jo: Well, thank you so much for everything you've shared with us today. Anjali, it's been such a pleasure to speak with you.

Anjali: Thank you. Thank you both for holding space and asking really great questions. I really enjoyed this conversation.

Rane: Thank you so much for tuning in to our podcast. We hope you enjoyed our conversation with Anjali. We've included the links for her website and social media in our show notes for more content, content and updates, you can find me on Instagram as aranlovesyoga and Jo can be found at gardenofyoga. We love connecting with all of our listeners, so don't hesitate to reach out and share your thoughts. We'd like to express our gratitude to Ghost Soul for generously granting us permission to use their track Baby Robots as our theme song. Be sure to check out ghostsoul.bandcamp.com to discover more of their incred incredible music. Once again, thank you so much for spending your precious time with us. We appreciate you more than words can express. He aroha nui maua kia kotou katoa Sending you big, big love.