Ancient Futures

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What can we learn from over 2,000 years of fascination with the East? Chris Harding explores this question in The Light of Asia – a book that shares its title with a poem about the Buddha from the nineteenth century. His focus is on characters whose personal engagement with Asian traditions shaped Western per...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com Does yoga really mean union? As Zoë Slatoff explains in this fascinating chat about philosophy and Sanskrit, the simplest answer is probably “sometimes”… Zoë’s PhD explores how yoga became entangled with non-dual Vedānta, blurring distinctions between the two systems. One important catalyst was the popularity...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com Who are we really, beyond our ideas about ourselves and the world? After more than half a century as a Buddhist practitioner, Kamalashila (Anthony Matthews) reflects on his life and impending death – he was recently told he had four months to live. As he wrote back in April: “What is happening to me happens t...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What makes people wary of getting immersed in the Bhagavad Gītā ? To start with, it’s set in a war zone, where God issues edicts to kill and upholds social hierarchy. Yet its message is also inspiring, making yoga compatible with everyday life, and developing a loving awareness that sees all beings equally. T...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What makes for good translations from an old language? For Suhas Mahesh and Anusha Rao – co-editors of How to Love in Sanskrit – it's “a game of compromise”. Rather than fixating on “excessive attention to irrelevant detail”, they focus instead on making words come alive. So a female lament from 2,000 years a...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com Which qualities might help us to thrive In a turbulent world? For Elizabeth Oldfield – who hosts a podcast called The Sacred – the key is to prioritise values that bring us together and strengthen relationships. "I want to be growing into faith, hope and love – not out of them," she explains in this discussio...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What was haṭha yoga before it meant postures? As the scholar Jason Birch explains, medieval yogis used a three-part sequence of physical methods to raise vital energy and empty their minds (video here ). Their ultimate goal was transcendence of death. Our conversation discusses Jason’s book , The Amaraugha an...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What does it mean to “study” yoga, rather than “practise”? The two aren’t mutually exclusive, explains Amy Landry , who’s hosting a series of online discussions on how to combine them. The Study Yoga summit runs live from April 29 to May 3, with replays available. There are more than a dozen contributors – on...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com When John Donne wrote “no man is an island”, his alternative was to be “involved in mankind”. Francesca Ferrando has broader ideas. As a philosopher and “leading voice in the field of posthuman studies”, Francesca's aim is to get us to think in terms of life. The Art of Being Posthuman – Francesca's new book...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com A different sort of podcast this week – the recording of a panel at the Oxford Literary Festival. The topic is "Religion and Animal Welfare", based on a book by the former chief executive in Compassion in World Farming , Joyce D’Silva. I shared some yogic perspectives on non-harming, speaking between Amir Kha...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com Yoga philosophy deals with three kinds of pain. These relate to ourselves, to how we interact with others, and to powerful forces beyond our control. This podcast engages with all of them, and highlights communal approaches to healing. Matthew Green works as an editor for DeSmog , an investigative website. He...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What’s love got to do with a world in crisis? Everything, says Oren Jay Sofer in his new book , Your Heart Was Made for This . No matter how overwhelming things might seem, we can cultivate capacities that help us to respond with sensitivity and strength. Oren teaches Buddhist meditation, mindfulness and comm...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com Why do so many of us feel so exhausted these days? What can we do to avoid burning out, or to help us recover? Anna Schaffner is a scholar-turned-coach, whose new book is Exhausted: An A-Z for the Weary . It offers timeless inspiration, noting “we still have much to learn from the ancients, and from other cul...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What does it mean to make yoga accessible? Jivana Heyman first used the term when he started to train disabled teachers. But its significance is broader, pointing students towards something subtler – their own true nature beyond mind and body. As Jivana explains in his latest book , The Teacher’s Guide to Acc...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What can we learn from an ancient text about war and peace, among the many other topics in the Mahābhārata ? Or as a new adaptation puts it: “In times of division, how do we find wholeness? Are we destined to repeat the mistakes of our ancestors? And how can we build a new world when we have nearly destroyed...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com How do we relate to the problem of suffering? Does the body rule the mind or does the mind rule the body (to quote Still Ill by The Smiths)? Are there ways to get more comfortably entangled, or is the answer to renounce all attachments? Ranju Roy and Dave Charlton have been practising yoga since the 1980s, an...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What are the benefits of studying yoga academically? Is critical thinking a practical obstacle? Are the two ways of seeing complementary? Expanding on a recent essay , I talk about these questions – among many others – with Graham Burns . Graham has been teaching yoga for more than 20 years. He holds a PhD fr...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What might yoga look like if it we weren't making shapes? As Mary Richards explains in Teach People, Not Poses , the purpose of practice is self-inquiry, so one way to start is by getting more familiar with physical form, instead of contorting to follow instructions. Mary’s approach is down-to-earth, yet shap...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com Yogic traditions often highlight non-harming ( ahiṃsā ), but to what extent is harm an inevitable part of worldly life? Is it more realistic to try to reduce it, or is anything short of removing it part of the problem? There are few easy answers… Christopher Miller is a scholar and practitioner. He’s co-found...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What might yoga philosophy look like if it was shaped by contemporary science? How compatible are cognitive therapies with traditional ideas about alleviating suffering? Isabel Dziobek is a professor of psychology at the Humboldt University of Berlin, and she’s also a yoga teacher. As we discuss, there are no...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What’s the purpose of yoga and where does it lead? 🤔 In his forthcoming book, Ranju Roy compares the process of practice to going on a pilgrimage. The journey spirals inwards and outwards, from deep contemplation to communal gatherings, and goals are less important than walking the path. The book includes Ra...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What does it mean to live a yogic life in the twenty-first century? Alex Medin runs Nøsen , a Norwegian retreat centre, which hosts an annual yoga festival , and is part of a programme that rehabilitates former prisoners and drug addicts. Alex doesn’t do things by halves. He’s studied yoga and Sanskrit academ...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com What helps people to cope with traumatic events that can sometimes accompany altered states? Jules Evans researches this question for the Challenging Psychedelic Experiences Project. He’s also the author of books about Stoic philosophy, ecstatic transcendence and strategies for navigating “spiritual emergency...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com Ade Belcham used to think it was obvious that yoga was good for him – until he got a hip replacement in his early 50s. That made him ask some searching questions, which he explored in a recent article for Spectrum , the British Wheel of Yoga magazine. For the previous two decades, Ade was a devoted Ashtanga p...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit ancientfutures.substack.com Peter Sterios , who founded the yoga mat company Manduka, keeps learning the lesson of how to let go. He’s had to do that repeatedly – from selling his business to picking up the pieces when his teacher dismissed him. After 20 years of studying with Shandor Remete, the charismatic creator of Shadow Yoga, he w...