Course Content:

The womb is a source of creation and a powerful multidimensional nexus where one generation meets the next, signifying the continuation of an unbroken lineage back through time and human history, and the passing on of memory and samskaras. It is a seat of the Divine Feminine and a sacred container which shapes the consciousness of our unborn children.

In Hindu tradition, the womb has been held as a sacred and powerful center of the Divine Feminine, yet in modern life, many women are disconnected from this source within them, instead suffering from painful and debilitating symptoms. Some of these symptoms are due to our own beliefs, wounds, and perceptions, while others can be traced back to our mothers, grandmothers, and beyond.

Our genetic inheritances are coded in the DNA but we also receive epigenetic inheritances which do not alter the genes but gene expression, and which are impacted by stresses/traumas suffered by ourselves and our ancestors. These may include legacies of gendered violence against women, collective feminine pain, and historical traumas such as colonialism, famine, and war. These stresses may adversely impact our biology and health, thought-patterns, emotional-patterns, and those of our children.

The science of epigenetics is now catching up with what our yogis and indigenous traditions always understood, that our ancestors’ unprocessed or unhealed experiences live in our bodies right now, and they impact not only how we see and engage with the world but also our current state of health, wellbeing, and vitality. Epigenetics looks at how a past event creates an imprint on a family system that becomes a blueprint for unconscious family patterns. The things we struggle with – recurring thoughts, turbulent emotions, and even physical ailments – are oftentimes seeded before we were even born.

Healing ourselves and the generations who come before us and after us begins with an exploration of ourselves, examining who we are as women and mothers, what our ancestors went through in their lives, and what beliefs they held in order to survive and even thrive. It involves becoming conscious of what sits inside us in the subtle dimensions of our bodies and minds, and sifting through cultural practices that can either burden or liberate us. From a place of centeredness within themselves, students will learn how to shift through what they wish to carry forward in their lives and pass down to their children, and what they wish to release.

In this course, students will be guided through a Hindu yogic psychological lens and psychospiritual framework, and through lecture, guest speakers, healing exercises, personal reflection, and community sharing to engage with the Divine Feminine force innate in all women and mothers.