Om Som Yoga + Ayurveda Podcast

Aaron Petty + Paige Taylah
  • 5.0 (12)
  • Self-Improvement
  • Updated Biweekly

Welcome to the Om Som Yoga and Ayurveda Podcast with Aaron Petty and Paige Taylah. Our goal with this podcast is to dive into how we as humans can live more intentional, ethical & sustainable lives. And also how we can come into harmony with, ourselves, others & the earth in the process.

  1. 4d ago

    Kriyā Śakti: The Power That Moves the Universe Is in Your Breath

    PRACTICE WITH US ✦ Practice Online Sadhana Sangha: 5 practices per month, asana workshops, subtle body techniques & Yoga Sūtra translation https://practice.omsom.yoga/365-sadhana-sandha/join ✦ OmSom App (free) Yoga philosophy, Sanskrit study & our online community Search OmSom in the App Store ✦ 100 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Already 200 Hr trained? This is our Asana Sadhana Dharma bridging course https://practice.omsom.yoga/asana-sadhana-dharma-oto ✦ 200 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Sri Lanka Immersion 2027 https://omsom.yoga/200-hour-yoga-teacher-training-sri-lanka ✦ 300 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Online & India Immersion 2026/2027 https://omsom.yoga/300-hour-advanced-hatha-yoga-training ✦ 50 Hr Online Yin Yoga Teacher Training Online https://practice.omsom.yoga/yin-yoga-and-prana-vayus-oto ✦ Practice in Person Classes, workshops & community events in Berwick, Victoria https://omsom.yoga/book-a-class IN THIS EPISODE If you watched the universe from the outside for even one moment, all you would see is motion, from stars forming, to cells dividing, the breath rising and falling. Tantra has a name for whatever is doing all of that: Kriyā Śakti, the divine power of action. And here's the teaching that changes how you practise, the force moving the cosmos is the same force moving your breath right now. In the final part of our series on the three śaktis of the Trika system of Kashmir Shaivism, we explore how desire (icchā) and knowledge (jñāna) complete themselves in action, why prāṇāyāma is a way of consciously participating in the creation of reality, and the question this teaching is designed to dissolve: is the spanda inside you, or are you inside the spanda? WHAT YOU'LL LEARN ✦ What Kriyā Śakti is - the energy through which consciousness moves from intention into manifestation, the third of the three śaktis alongside Icchā (desire) and Jñāna (knowledge)  ✦ How the three śaktis map onto sankalpa work - the feeling, the words, and the practice that brings intention into form ✦ Why noticing your breath is noticing the universe expressing itself through you - from the cycles of the breath to sunrise and sunset, seasons  ✦ Kevala Kumbhaka - the spontaneous suspension of the breath as the maturity of prāṇāyāma practice, and how it offers a glimpse of the source of action  ✦ Why oxygen levels barely drop in the first minutes of a breath hold (1–2%) - it's the perception of no access to air that creates the stress  ✦ Vāta doṣa as the Kriyā Śakti of Āyurveda - the force governing all movement in body and mind  TEXTUAL REFERENCES ✦ Spanda Kārikā - opening teaching: "We praise that Śakti who is the source of all manifestation, by whose vibration the universe arises, and into whom it dissolves" - spanda, the pulsation that is consciousness in motion (Spanda Kārikā 1.1, where the universe arises and dissolves "by the opening and closing of the eyes")  ✦ Pratyabhijñāhṛdayam, Sūtra 2 - "By her own will, she unfolds the universe upon her own canvas" (svecchayā svabhittau viśvam unmīlayati)  ✦ Yoga Sūtra of Patañjali 2.49–2.51 - when steadiness of posture is achieved, prāṇāyāma becomes the regulation of inhalation and exhalation; the fourth prāṇāyāma "transcends the domain of internal and external" - kevala kumbhaka  ✦ Vijñāna Bhairava Tantra (112 meditation techniques), Saundarya Laharī, and the Nārada Bhakti Sūtra - "when the lover and the beloved become one"  TRY THIS IN YOUR PRACTICE ✦ Start where Āyurveda starts: align one daily rhythm with nature this week - wake with the sun, or eat your main meal at midday  SHARE & CONNECT Website: https://omsomyoga.com OmSom App (free): search OmSom in the App Store Instagram: @omsomyoga If this episode landed, the best way to support the show is to share it with one person who might need it. We run a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. Wherever you are on your journey, we’d love to connect with you. HARI OM

  2. Aug 10

    Jñāna Śakti: Why Tantra Says You Already Know

    PRACTICE WITH US ✦ Practice Online Sadhana Sangha: 5 practices per month, asana workshops, subtle body techniques & Yoga Sūtra translation https://practice.omsom.yoga/365-sadhana-sandha/join ✦ OmSom App (free) Yoga philosophy, Sanskrit study & our online community Search OmSom in the App Store ✦ 100 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Already 200 Hr trained? This is our Asana Sadhana Dharma bridging course https://practice.omsom.yoga/asana-sadhana-dharma-oto ✦ 200 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Sri Lanka Immersion 2027 https://omsom.yoga/200-hour-yoga-teacher-training-sri-lanka ✦ 300 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Online & India Immersion 2026/2027 https://omsom.yoga/300-hour-advanced-hatha-yoga-training ✦ 50 Hr Online Yin Yoga Teacher Training Online https://practice.omsom.yoga/yin-yoga-and-prana-vayus-oto ✦ Practice in Person Classes, workshops & community events in Berwick, Victoria https://omsom.yoga/book-a-class IN THIS EPISODE Where does knowing actually live? Most of us would say the brain, the intellect, up here. Tantra disagrees. This week we explore jñāna śakti, the second of the three powers: the divine capacity to know. Not knowledge you collect from books or teachers, but the recognition of what was already true. Through the story of a woman tearing her house apart searching for a necklace she was wearing the whole time, we unpack pratyabhijñā, the Recognition doctrine of Kashmir Śaivism: liberation isn't something you achieve. It's something you remember. The practice is the mirror. The teacher is the friend who points you toward it. And the necklace is what you already are. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN ✦ What jñāna śakti is: consciousness's capacity to recognise itself, one layer deeper than knowledge, the power of knowing itself✦ Pratyabhijñā, the doctrine of recognition: to re-cognise is to remember what was already present, that moment a feeling you've always carried finally finds its word✦ Jñāna vs vidyā vs pramāṇa: knowledge learned from another, knowledge verified against a source, and the capacity for knowing - do you know it as something you've learned, or as something you are?✦ How to actually pronounce jñāna (hint: it's not "gyana") - a mini bīja-sound lesson in where the sound lives in the mouth✦ Why the teacher's only job is to keep pointing you back toward the mirror, and why we always answer your question with "what do you think?"✦ The buddhi: the discerning, intuitive layer of mind where jñāna śakti is active✦ Samyoga & viyoga: the Ayurveda journaling exercise that proves you already know the answers to your own health✦ Why sattva matters: without clarity and balance, even the aha moments can be illusion TEXTUAL REFERENCES ✦ Pratyabhijñāhṛdayam, sūtra 8: "tad bhūmikāḥ sarva-darśana-sthitayaḥ" - the positions of all philosophies are stages of this same recognition✦ Yoga Sūtra 1.7: "pratyakṣa-anumāna-āgamāḥ pramāṇāni" - right knowledge has three sources: direct perception, inference, and reliable testimony✦ Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad: the two kinds of knowing - parā vidyā, higher knowledge from the divine source, and aparā vidyā, lower knowledge from worldly sources✦ The Pratyabhijñā (Recognition) school of Kashmir Śaivism, 9th century TRY THIS IN YOUR PRACTICE ✦ Journal your samyoga and viyoga: a few dot points on what you do (habits, rituals, actions, thoughts) that move you toward the state of yoga, and what moves you away from it. Then read the list back. You just gave yourself the advice SHARE & CONNECT Website: https://omsomyoga.com OmSom App (free): search OmSom in the App Store Instagram: @omsomyoga If this episode landed, the best way to support the show is to share it with one person who might need it. We run a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. Wherever you are on your journey, we’d love to connect with you. HARI OM

  3. Aug 2

    Icchā Śakti: Why Tantra Says Desire Is Sacred

    PRACTICE WITH US ✦ Practice Online Sadhana Sangha: 5 practices per month, asana workshops, subtle body techniques & Yoga Sūtra translation https://practice.omsom.yoga/365-sadhana-sandha/join ✦ OmSom App (free) Yoga philosophy, Sanskrit study & our online community Search OmSom in the App Store ✦ 100 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Already 200 Hr trained? This is our Asana Sadhana Dharma bridging course https://practice.omsom.yoga/asana-sadhana-dharma-oto ✦ 200 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Sri Lanka Immersion 2027 https://omsom.yoga/200-hour-yoga-teacher-training-sri-lanka ✦ 300 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Online & India Immersion 2026/2027 https://omsom.yoga/300-hour-advanced-hatha-yoga-training ✦ 50 Hr Online Yin Yoga Teacher Training Online https://practice.omsom.yoga/yin-yoga-and-prana-vayus-oto ✦ Practice in Person Classes, workshops & community events in Berwick, Victoria https://omsom.yoga/book-a-class IN THIS EPISODE Most of us were taught somewhere along the way that wanting is the problem. Renounce desire, want less, be more content. Tantra says the opposite. The texts say the universe itself begins with a wanting. Icchā Śakti, the first of the three powers, the divine impulse to manifest. Without icchā, nothing comes into being. The work isn't to silence wanting. It's to recognise the wanting itself as the divine moving through you. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN ✦ What icchā śakti is: the first stirring in Śiva's stillness, consciousness desiring to know itself as another  ✦ The three powers of the Trika system: icchā (the wanting), jñāna (knowing what is wanted), kriyā (bringing it into form)  ✦ Where this sits: above the Sāṃkhya map rather than inside it, Kashmir Śaivism building layers on top of Puruṣa and Prakṛti  ✦ Not an ego desire: not the casual craving for hot chips, but the impulse moving through you  ✦ The same three powers that create the universe create your morning: the wanting to rise, the knowing of what you'll do, the body actually rising  ✦ Why you don't have to know what you want yet: icchā comes first, jñāna comes second  ✦ Paige on prajñāparādha: the crime against wisdom, and what it costs to suppress the body's natural urges  TEXTUAL REFERENCES ✦ Pratyabhijñāhṛdayam, opening sūtra: consciousness, free and self-luminous, is the cause of the manifestation of the world  ✦ Mālinīvijayottaratantra: icchā śakti as the first stirring, the moment of self-awareness within luminous consciousness  ✦ Bhagavad Gītā 7.11: "I am the strength of the strong, free from passion and attachment, and in beings I am desire that does not conflict with dharma"  ✦ Yoga Sūtra 4.7: the yogi's karma is neither black nor white, and for others it is of three kinds (sañcita, prārabdha, kriyamāṇa)  ✦ Swami Rama, paraphrased: in our tradition we accept Patañjali's yoga as a preliminary step toward the deeper practices  ✦ The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield: the first insight, following the coincidences TRY THIS IN YOUR PRACTICE ✦ On the mat, notice the small desires: to move or to be still, to do more or to do less. Then ask where that desire is coming from  ✦ Eat slowly, and wait for the first burp. It's often just a small passing of air, so you'll only catch it if you're listening  ✦ Stop overriding the body's natural urges. Hunger, thirst, tears, the need for the toilet. This is where listening begins  ✦ When someone arrives in your mind for no reason, call them  ✦ Ask: what does life want to experience through me? Where is that pull taking me?  ✦ Discern between the two. Is this the will of the ego, or the will of the divine?  SHARE & CONNECT Website: https://omsomyoga.com OmSom App (free): search OmSom in the App Store Instagram: @omsomyoga If this episode landed, the best way to support the show is to share it with one person who might need it. We run a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. Wherever you are on your journey, we’d love to connect with you. HARI OM

  4. Jul 26

    Sankalpa: What If Your Actions Were Never the Problem?

    PRACTICE WITH US ✦ Practice Online Sadhana Sangha: 5 practices per month, asana workshops, subtle body techniques & Yoga Sūtra translation https://practice.omsom.yoga/365-sadhana-sandha/join ✦ OmSom App (free) Yoga philosophy, Sanskrit study & our online community Search OmSom in the App Store ✦ 100 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Already 200 Hr trained? This is our Asana Sadhana Dharma bridging course https://practice.omsom.yoga/asana-sadhana-dharma-oto ✦ 200 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Sri Lanka Immersion 2027 https://omsom.yoga/200-hour-yoga-teacher-training-sri-lanka ✦ 300 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Online & India Immersion 2026/2027 https://omsom.yoga/300-hour-advanced-hatha-yoga-training ✦ 50 Hr Online Yin Yoga Teacher Training Online https://practice.omsom.yoga/yin-yoga-and-prana-vayus-oto ✦ Practice in Person Classes, workshops & community events in Berwick, Victoria https://omsom.yoga/book-a-class IN THIS EPISODE We explore Sankalpa, the heart-resolve that sits beneath every action you take. Across the month we have sat with karma (the act), kriyā (the process), and vikalpa (the mental construct). All of them are downstream of Sankalpa: the quiet sentence the heart has decided is true. In the yoga nidra tradition, this is the seed planted at the deepest stage of relaxation. In daily life, it is the unspoken commitment that quietly shapes everything else. Aaron and Paige explore why Sankalpa is so often the missing piece in modern goal-setting, and what begins to shift when we work from the seed rather than the symptom. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN The difference between a goal (future-facing, external) and a sankalpa (present, internal)The etymology of sankalpa (सङ्कल्प), and how it mirrors vikalpa as two words sharing the same rootThe Upaniṣadic chain from desire to resolve to action to destiny, and why the leverage point is the resolve, not the actionWhy yoga nidra plants the sankalpa beneath the layer of doubt, where the seed can actually takeHow to phrase a sankalpa well: short, present-tense, and positiveWhy the most powerful sankalpas are usually recognised rather than inventedAn Āyurvedic lens: how Vāta, Pitta, and Kapha each tend to meet sankalpa differently, and the medicine for each TEXTUAL REFERENCES Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 4.4.5 - the classical chain of desire (kāma), resolve (sankalpa), action (karma), and destinyBhagavad Gītā 6.24 - saṅkalpa-prabhavān kāmān - the desires that arise from sankalpa, and the call to refine rather than merely suppress themBhagavad Gītā 6.4 - sarva-saṅkalpa-sannyāsī yogārūḍhas tadocyate - the maturing of the path through the purification of sankalpaYoga Sūtra of Patañjali 1.32 - eka-tattva-abhyāsaḥ - the resolve to commit to one principle, one return-pointYoga Nidra tradition, Swami Satyananda Saraswati (Bihar School of Yoga) - the practice of planting sankalpa at the deepest stage of relaxation and repeating it at the close JOIN THE CONVERSATION What is the sentence your life has been quietly repeating? And if you could plant one new sankalpa right now, knowing the body would carry it forward, what would it be? We would love to hear your reflection. Share it with us, or carry it quietly into your next practice. SHARE & CONNECT Website: https://omsomyoga.com OmSom App (free): search OmSom in the App Store Instagram: @omsomyoga If this episode landed, the best way to support the show is to share it with one person who might need it. We run a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. Wherever you are on your journey, we’d love to connect with you. HARI OM

  5. Jul 19

    Vikalpa: The Yoga Sūtra Teaching That Explains Anxiety & Suffering

    PRACTICE WITH US ✦ Practice Online Sadhana Sangha: 5 practices per month, asana workshops, subtle body techniques & Yoga Sūtra translation https://practice.omsom.yoga/365-sadhana-sandha/join ✦ OmSom App (free) Yoga philosophy, Sanskrit study & our online community Search OmSom in the App Store ✦ 100 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Already 200 Hr trained? This is our Asana Sadhana Dharma bridging course https://practice.omsom.yoga/asana-sadhana-dharma-oto ✦ 200 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Sri Lanka Immersion 2027 https://omsom.yoga/200-hour-yoga-teacher-training-sri-lanka ✦ 300 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Online & India Immersion 2026/2027 https://omsom.yoga/300-hour-advanced-hatha-yoga-training ✦ 50 Hr Online Yin Yoga Teacher Training Online https://practice.omsom.yoga/yin-yoga-and-prana-vayus-oto ✦ Practice in Person Classes, workshops & community events in Berwick, Victoria https://omsom.yoga/book-a-class IN THIS EPISODE Most of our suffering never actually happens. It happens in the mind, and the body responds to the imagined threat exactly as it would to a real one. Patañjali named this: vikalpa, knowledge built from words alone, empty of any actual object. The practice of yoga isn't to stop thinking. It's to stop confusing the thinking with the truth. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN ✦ What vikalpa is: a world built from words, then projected onto what's in front of you ✦ Vikalpa vs. viparyaya: viparyaya sees it wrong (the red lamp looks yellow). Vikalpa doesn't see it at all ✦ Where it sits in the pañca vṛttis: pramāṇa, viparyaya, vikalpa, nidrā, smṛti ✦ How it becomes anxiety: the story replays, and each replay it gets worse ✦ Why you hold onto it: Paige on vikalpa as protection, and why thanking it is how you release it ✦ The Ayurvedic cost: rumination as dissociation. Prāṇa stops flowing, the dhātus lose quality ✦ The story behind the habit: "I can't function without coffee" is pure imagination ✦ Meditation as release: dropping the word and the meaning until only the object remains, and why mantra is the thing rather than pointing to it ✦ The rope and the snake: and the layer underneath, where the rope isn't a rope either TEXTUAL REFERENCES ✦ Yoga Sūtra 1.6: pramāṇa-viparyaya-vikalpa-nidrā-smṛtayaḥ, the five vṛttis ✦ Yoga Sūtra 1.9: śabda-jñāna-anupātī vastu-śūnyo vikalpaḥ, "knowledge that follows from words alone, empty of an actual object" ✦ Yoga Sūtra 1.42–1.43: savitarka and nirvitarka samādhi ✦ Yoga Vāsiṣṭha: the story of King Lavaṇa and the magician's peacock feather ✦ Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 1.3.28: asato mā sad gamaya, tamaso mā jyotir gamaya ✦ The rope and the snake (rajju-sarpa): the classic Advaita Vedānta analogy, associated with Śaṅkarācārya TRY THIS IN YOUR PRACTICE ✦ Where in your life are you mistaking the rope for the snake? And when you do, how does it feel in your body? ✦ Label it. This is a story. That alone is the practice ✦ Then seek the truth. Have the uncomfortable conversation. Without pramāṇa, the vikalpa never resolves. It becomes suffering ✦ Ask: what belief do I hold about myself that keeps me acting this way? ✦ Thank it before you release it. This kept me safe. It isn't necessary anymore ✦ If there's a habit that isn't serving you, do it with complete presence. No phone, no distraction. Awareness does the work ✦ Get out of your head. Get into your body. Do your yoga practice, and allow it to liberate you. SHARE & CONNECT Website: https://omsomyoga.com OmSom App (free): search OmSom in the App Store Instagram: @omsomyoga If this episode landed, the best way to support the show is to share it with one person who might need it. We run a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. Wherever you are on your journey, we’d love to connect with you. HARI OM

  6. Jul 12

    Kriyā Yoga: the Silent Path to Liberation & the Practice that Clears Your Karma

    PRACTICE WITH US ✦ Sadhana Sangha - 5 practices per month, asana workshops, subtle body techniques, Yoga Sūtra translation https://practice.omsom.yoga/365-sadhana-sandha/join ✦ OmSom App (free) - yoga philosophy, Sanskrit study + online community Search OmSom in the App Store ✦ 100 Hr Asana Sadhana Dharma https://practice.omsom.yoga/asana-sadhana-dharma-oto ✦ 300 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Online & India Immersion 2026 https://omsom.yoga/300-hour-advanced-hatha-yoga-training ✦ 50 Hr Online Yin Yoga Teacher Training https://practice.omsom.yoga/yin-yoga-and-prana-vayus-oto IN THIS EPISODE This July we're walking the path of mokṣa, liberation, and this week we arrive at kriyā: action done with intention. If karma is what plays out unconsciously, kriyā is the conscious, repeatable process that slowly shaves away everything that isn't you, revealing the truth of who you are. We unpack the three faces of kriyā, the two Yoga Sūtra lines that define Kriyā Yoga, the Ṣaṭ Kriyā cleansing practices of Haṭha Yoga, and Ayurveda's Pañcakarma - five therapeutic actions for purifying the body from the inside out. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN ✦ Why the syllable -ya turns karma (action) into kriyā (process) both grow from the same root kṛ ✦ The three meanings of kriyā: 1. cleansing techniques like Bhastrikā and Kapālabhāti 2. Patañjali's path of practice 3. the initiation lineage of Babaji → Lahiri Mahāsaya → Paramahaṃsa Yogānanda ✦ Patañjali's definition of Kriyā Yoga - tapas, svādhyāya, īśvara praṇidhāna - and how it can be applied to any practice, any belief, any life ✦ How Kriyā Yoga weakens the five kleśas (avidyā, asmitā, rāga, dveṣa, abhiniveśa) and moves us toward samādhi ✦ Why the Ṣaṭ Kriyā are cleansing pre-practices, not prāṇāyāma - one clears the tubes, the other expands the prāṇa (and why fast breathwork gives you a high then a crash) ✦ Ayurveda's Pañcakarma - the five actions (Vamana, Virecana, Basti, Nasya, Rakta Mokṣa) and how each is prescribed to your dosha imbalance ✦ The real teaching: liberation is a silent process. Let the practice reshape you until people simply notice you've changed. TEXTUAL REFERENCES ✦ Yoga Sūtra 2.1 — tapaḥ svādhyāya īśvarapraṇidhānāni kriyāyogaḥ — "Discipline, self-study, and surrender to Īśvara constitute Kriyā Yoga." ✦ Yoga Sūtra 2.2 — samādhibhāvanārthaḥ kleśatanūkaraṇārthaśca — "The purpose of Kriyā Yoga is to cultivate samādhi and to weaken the kleśas." ✦ Haṭha Yoga Pradīpikā - the Ṣaṭ Kriyā / Ṣaṭ Karma: Dhauti, Basti, Neti, Nauli, Trāṭaka, Kapālabhāti - to purify the body, give lightness, and prepare the practitioner for prāṇāyāma ✦ Gheraṇḍa Saṃhitā - the cleansing actions settle the breath and make subtle practice possible ✦ Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahaṃsa Yogānanda - source of the Lahiri Mahāsaya story ✦ Ayurveda — Pañcakarma: Vamana (therapeutic emesis · kapha), Virecana (purgation · pitta), Basti (oil enema · vāta/colon), Nasya (nasal therapy · kapha/head), Rakta Mokṣa (bloodletting · pitta) JOIN THE CONVERSATION What's your daily kriyā — the small, intentional practice you return to no matter what? Come tell us over on Instagram @omsomyoga, or reply to this week's email. We read every message. SHARE & CONNECT Website: https://omsomyoga.com OmSom App (free): search OmSom in the App Store Instagram: @omsomyoga If this episode landed, the best way to support the show is to share it with one person who might need it. We operate a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, Australia, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. We'd love to connect with you wherever you are on your journey. HARI OM

  7. Jul 5

    Karma: The Bhagavad Gītā's Real Teaching on Karma & How to Use It

    PRACTICE WITH US ✦ Sadhana Sangha - 5 practices per month, asana workshops, subtle body techniques, Yoga Sūtra translation https://practice.omsom.yoga/365-sadhana-sandha/join ✦ OmSom App (free) - yoga philosophy, Sanskrit study + online community Search OmSom in the App Store ✦ 100 Hr Asana Sadhana Dharma https://practice.omsom.yoga/asana-sadhana-dharma-oto ✦ 300 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Online & India Immersion 2026 https://omsom.yoga/300-hour-advanced-hatha-yoga-training ✦ 50 Hr Online Yin Yoga Teacher Training https://practice.omsom.yoga/yin-yoga-and-prana-vayus-oto IN THIS EPISODE This month the theme turns to Mokṣa: liberation. We begin where the tradition begins, with Karma. Karma means action and the simple, radical truth that everything you do (your breath, your cooking, your driving, your conversations, even your thoughts) is karma. And most of it is learned behaviour, ingrained by repetition, running on autopilot. Drawing on the Bhagavad Gītā, we explore the moment Arjuna melts down on the battlefield and asks Kṛṣṇa: if wisdom is greater than action, why must I act? Kṛṣṇa's answer reframes everything - freedom is not the absence of action, but action without grasping for its fruit. That shift, from unconscious doing to intentional doing, is where karma becomes Karma Yoga. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN ✦ Karma means action - from the root kṛ, "to do" or "to make." Your daily actions, words, and even your thoughts are all karma. ✦ Karma vs Karma Yoga - the moment you become conscious of what you're doing, why, and where it's leading, ordinary karma becomes yoga. ✦ The four paths - Jñāna (study), Bhakti (devotion), Rāja (meditation), and Karma (intentional action). You can bring yoga into brushing your teeth, if you intend it. ✦ The three types of karma (the bow and arrow) - Sañcita (the arrows in your quiver: infinite potential actions), Kriyamāṇa (the arrow you're shooting now: present-moment action), and Prārabdha (arrows already loosed: past actions you can't take back, still shaping your experience). ✦ The karmāśaya - the "storehouse" of karma. Seeds accumulate until a big experience arrives and offers you the chance to choose again — and uproot the karma so you don't have to play it out once more. ✦ Cause and effect - "the effect is hidden in the cause." Once you understand the qualities of nature (Sāṃkhya, the guṇas), you can see where an action will take you and take radical responsibility for your choices. ✦ The kleśas - Patañjali roots the reservoir of karma in the five afflictions: avidyā (ignorance), asmitā (ego / the story of "I"), rāga (attachment), dveṣa (aversion), and abhiniveśa (fear of death). TEXTUAL REFERENCES ✦ Bhagavad Gītā - Arjuna's crisis on the battlefield; "No one can remain even for a moment without performing actions… everyone is helplessly driven to act by the forces of nature" ✦ Patañjali's Yoga Sūtra, Chapter 2 - the karmāśaya (reservoir of karma) is rooted in the kleśas and experienced in seen and unseen births; the five kleśas ✦ Patañjali's Yoga Sūtra - "The yogi's karma is neither black nor white; for others it is of three kinds" - bound by the three guṇas (sattva, rajas, tamas) ✦ Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad - "As is your desire, so is your resolve. As is your resolve, so is your action. As is the action, so is your destiny." ✦ Sāṃkhya philosophy - prakṛti and the guṇas underpinning the teaching on cause and effect. SHARE & CONNECT Website: https://omsomyoga.com OmSom App (free): search OmSom in the App Store Instagram: @omsomyoga If this episode landed, the best way to support the show is to share it with one person who might need it. We operate a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, Australia, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. We'd love to connect with you wherever you are on your journey. HARI OM

  8. Jun 28

    Pūrṇa Mantra: Deciphering the Most Confusing Mantra in Yoga

    PRACTICE WITH US ✦ Sadhana Sangha - 5 practices per month, asana workshops, subtle body techniques, Yoga Sūtra translation https://practice.omsom.yoga/365-sadhana-sandha/join ✦ OmSom App (free) - yoga philosophy, Sanskrit study + online community Search OmSom in the App Store ✦ 100 Hr Asana Sadhana Dharma https://practice.omsom.yoga/asana-sadhana-dharma-oto ✦ 200 Hr Yoga Teacher Training Sri Lanka 2026 https://omsom.yoga/200-hour-yoga-teacher-training-sri-lanka ✦ 50 Hr Online Yin Yoga Teacher Training https://practice.omsom.yoga/yin-yoga-and-prana-vayus-oto IN THIS EPISODE To close out Mantra June, Aaron and Paige sit with what Aaron calls "maybe the most confusing of all the mantras" - the Pūrṇa mantra. At its heart is one quiet, radical idea: wholeness cannot be subtracted from wholeness. Light a thousand lamps from a single flame and the original flame never shrinks. Give your time, your love, your attention and the source remains undiminished. From there the conversation opens out in every direction: a word-by-word breakdown of the mantra, the non-dual Vedānta teaching of "everything is one" and how yoga holds it alongside Sāṃkhya's duality, a line from the Bhagavad Gītā that took Aaron years to sit with, what Ayurveda says about pūrṇatva through the three subtle essences, and how the whole teaching lands in something as ordinary as how we give our time, energy, and money. The mantra: Oṃ Pūrṇamadaḥ Pūrṇamidaṃ Pūrṇāt Pūrṇamudacyate Pūrṇasya Pūrṇamādāya Pūrṇamevāvaśiṣyate Oṃ Śāntiḥ Śāntiḥ Śāntiḥ That is whole. This is whole. From the whole, the whole arises. Take the whole from the whole, and the whole alone remains. WHAT YOU’LL LEARN What pūrṇa actually means - fullness, wholeness, completeness; the same word we use for the full moon (pūrṇimā, as in Guru Pūrṇimā).The mantra, word by word - adaḥ (that / the unmanifest), idam (this / the manifest world), udacyate (arises), ādāya (having taken), avaśiṣyate (what remains).Why this is a non-dual teaching - Vedānta means "beyond knowledge" (veda-anta, the end of knowledge). The moment we label a thing, we separate it from the whole; this mantra points to what can't be labelled.How yoga holds two opposite truths at once - Sāṃkhya's non-negotiable duality (Puruṣa and Prakṛti) alongside Vedānta's "everything is one," and why holding both is itself the practice.The Gītā connection - Krishna's teaching that all beings rest in the infinite, but the infinite rests only in itself.Ayurveda and the three subtle essences - Ojas, Prāṇa and Tejas as the purest forms of the doshas, why they must rise together, and how chasing Tejas alone (study, awakening, psychedelics) burns us dry.The mantra as medicine for the mind - not one to meditate on so much as to contemplate; an invocation to create the bhāvana of fullness.Relational vs transactional - applying pūrṇa to how we give time, attention, love and money, and why "I give, you take" is a lack mindset the teaching dissolves. TEXTUAL REFERENCES The Pūrṇa Mantra - a śānti (peace) invocation from the Upaniṣads.Bhagavad Gītā — "By me, in my unmanifest form, all this universe is pervaded. All beings rest in me, but I do not rest in them." Key Sanskrit terms: pūrṇa (fullness), pūrṇatva (the state of fullness), jñāna (knowledge), vedānta (beyond knowledge), sāṃkhya, puruṣa / prakṛti, ojas, prāṇa, tejas, bhāvana, snigdha (oil; also "love"), ahaṃkāra. SHARE & CONNECT Website: https://omsomyoga.com OmSom App (free): search OmSom in the App Store Instagram: @omsomyoga If this episode landed, the best way to support the show is to share it with one person who might need it. We operate a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, Australia, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. We'd love to connect with you wherever you are on your journey. HARI OM

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About

Welcome to the Om Som Yoga and Ayurveda Podcast with Aaron Petty and Paige Taylah. Our goal with this podcast is to dive into how we as humans can live more intentional, ethical & sustainable lives. And also how we can come into harmony with, ourselves, others & the earth in the process.

Information

  • Creator
    Aaron Petty + Paige Taylah
  • Years Active
    2020 - 2026
  • Episodes
    137
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Aaron Petty + Paige Taylah
  • Show Website
    Om Som Yoga + Ayurveda Podcast

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