Mindful Yoga and Embodied Dharma with Anne Cushman
This week on the podcast, I have a very special conversation with Anne Cushman, a pioneer in the field of mindful yoga. Anne is a senior retreat teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center, where she founded the first multi-year Buddhist meditation training for yoga teachers.
Episode Details:
Anne Cushman has dedicated her life to the embodied Dharma path, equally exploring the wisdom traditions of yoga and Buddhism, since she started her practice in the 1980s. Her teachings and writings skillfully express the intersections of meditation, movement, philosophy, creativity, and real-world practice.
She shares some fascinating history, as someone who had a front row seat to the development of yoga and Buddhist Dharma culture in the West.
You’ll hear about Anne’s time working as an editor and writer at Yoga Journal (in its early days), including her experience interviewing BKS Iyengar. She also shares what it was like being one of the first teachers to offer yoga practices on Buddhist meditation retreats at Spirit Rock Meditation Center.
The Path of Mindful Yoga
We talk about why it has been important for Anne to center mindfulness in her yoga practice, and how yoga asana and pranayama allowed her to truly absorb the Dharma teachings beyond a conceptual understanding. You’ll hear how she defines mindful yoga, and how cultivating mindful awareness enables us to meet all of the contents of our experience – on the mat and off.
We touch on issues like balancing tradition and innovation, moving between spiritual communities, drawing from multiple lineages, and the potential of cultural appropriation. Anne emphasizes that yoga and meditation have always gone together and that asana was always intended to be in service of the transformation of heart and mind.
Enjoy this inspiring and insightful interview with a true mindful movement trailblazer!
Guest Bio:
Anne Cushman is a pioneer in the integration of mindfulness, embodied meditation, and creative expression. A senior retreat teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center, she founded the first multi-year Buddhist meditation training for yoga teachers. She’s the author of the memoir The Mama Sutra: A Story of Love, Loss, and the Path of Motherhood; the novel Enlightenment for Idiots (honored by Booklist as one of the top ten first novels of its year); the mindful yoga book Moving Into Meditation; and the India pilgrimage guide From Here to Nirvana; and her essays on spiritual practice in daily life have appeared in the New York Times, Yoga Journal, O: The Oprah Magazine, Lion’s Roar, Tricycle, and many other publications.
She is a guiding teacher for the Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Certification Program (MMTCP), which has trained thousands of teachers in more than 70 countries. She mentors mindfulness practitioners and writers worldwide and leads retreats and classes both in person and online with a focus on creativity, embodiment, connection with nature, and daily life practice.
Mindful Yoga Resources and Links from this episode:
To learn more about Anne’s work and see her upcoming teaching schedule, visit her website at annecushman.com.
- Learn more about the Dharma Yoga Mindfulness Training (DYMT) at Spirit Rock, taught by Anne Cushman, Leslie Booker, Rolf Gates, and Djuna Devereaux
- Anne’s book Moving Into Meditation: A 12-Week Mindfulness Program for Yoga Practitioners is an excellent resource for anyone interested in the integration of movement and Buddhist mindfulness meditation
- Read Anne’s 1997 interview with BKS Iyengar, published in Yoga Journal
If you enjoyed this episode, you might also like Ep. 82: Training Mindfulness in Movement with Dr. Tamara Russell or Ep. 57: Mindfulness Mentor Groups and the Power of Community with Sharon Shelton!