About Workshops

Yoga Talks & Seminars

Then & Now

“We are all teachers and learners for each other.” -- Joel

    Joel Kramer taught his approach to the physical, psychological and spiritual dimensions of yoga from 1968-82 all over the country and throughout the world in seminars and intensives ranging from two days to a month. His teaching has always evolved with the times and with his own evolution and concerns. Over the years he continually added new perspectives and insights to his talks. Diana Alstad began teaching with Joel in the mid-‘70s, bringing in new issues and perspectives. She later developed and taught the Yoga of Relationship with him. In the ‘90s she gave talks related to their book The Guru Papers on moral and spiritual authoritarianism and the morality wars, as well on political issues such as church/state separation and abortion as a moral act.
    Joel began formally teaching once again in 2005, also bringing Diana back to teaching. They currently talk on a wide variety of timely topics, ranging from yoga and spirituality to values, relationships, and the state of the world. Their workshops offer a timely, intelligent framework for yoga, spirituality, and evolution that can be relevant to thoughtful people who want increased awareness of their inner and outer worlds, bringing more movement, depth and meaning to their lives. Many find their clarity and insights into yoga, consciousness, and living captivating while also planting seeds that afterward continue to be stimulating and growth-producing.
    In yoga, Joel’s aim has been to free it from outmoded traditional beliefs making it pertinent for modern living and giving people the option of developing their own practice. Since his teaching can be complementary to other yoga approaches, practitioners and teachers from a wide variety of schools of yoga attended his seminars. As Joel focuses on teaching people how to do yoga through utilizing their own feedback, many have been able to deepen or even start their own practice from just one seminar, and many returned regularly to deepen their practice and understanding.
    Now as then, Joel presents physical yoga as essentially a play in awareness and energy where attention is the key factor. He teaches people to experience from the inside “how a posture works”—how to intensify and do each posture more awarely. He integrates the mind into asana practice, demonstrating how the mind and body are interrelated. The mind, its frameworks, values and attention capacity greatly affect the way one directs and is directed by one’s body. His talks on mental yoga helped people to experience core aspects of the nature of thought. His early book The Passionate Mind is composed of transcripts of these yoga seminar talks. His current talks and workshops on Yoga of the Mind and on spirituality break new ground and further enable people to utilize their self-awareness to meet the challenges presented by these chaotic, yet pregnant times.
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Talks & Seminars -- Now

Joel Kramer & Diana Alstad

These talks include discussion and can be combined or extended into seminars.
(2 or 5-day seminar description at end.)

Yoga as Self-Transformation – Joel
    An overview of Joel Kramer’s evolutionary approach to the yogas of mind, body and relationship.
     Yoga is an age-old pursuit that can be creatively adapted to the needs of the times, bringing self-transformation and expanding consciousness. It helps break through the habits of mind and body that bind us, and can be consciously utilized as part the evolutionary process. Yoga brings sensitivity, response-ability, and the strength and flexibility that allow us to assimilate change and to refine new ways of relating to each other and the world.
     We humans are at a cusp point in our evolution. As old ways crumble, we individually and as a species must forge new meanings. Yoga at its core addresses the the timeless question “Who am I?” This question is not merely about you, the individual, but about you as part of the total fabric of life and an active participant in the process of evolution. Joel will speak on evolution through yoga and within one’s yoga practice, and on the evolution of yoga and of our species.

Yoga for These Times – Joel
    This general talk presents a vision of yoga’s relevance for modern life. People usually begin with physical yoga, its most tangible doorway. Yet in its fullest sense yoga deals with mind, body, spirit, and one’s relation to the world. In physical yoga (hatha) one confronts in a direct way many of the choices, uncertainties, and even risks found in life’s other arenas. Consequently, physical yoga can build a foundation for learning that also brings flexibility, strength and energy, helping to meet one’s challenges.
    In these times of vast change, traditional roles and rules for human interaction are shifting. Old securities both personal and worldwide are fraught with uncertainty. Yoga of the Mind offers ways of examining the inner dramas of how thought works, which expands consciousness and self-understanding, creating new possibilities. At the heart of yoga is the quality of awareness that one brings to the multi-faceted venture of life. Your body and mind are sensitive instruments that yoga can further refine. Learning to tune into the feedbacks and wisdom of your body and mind is a key to putting vitality and well-being in your own hands.

The Yoga of Relationship – Diana & Joel
    One cannot “Know thyself” fully in isolation—as social animals, it must include how one relates. Like physical tightness and blocks, conflicts and differences are relational edges to explore using awareness and feedback. The Yoga of Relationship reveals what can only be discovered in relationship, expanding consciousness and creating new openings and insights. Breaking out of limiting patterns can unravel relational knots. Interpersonal yoga also addresses the challenge of how to foster passion and creativity, which thrive with newness. A more aware way of dealing with the unavoidable issues of control, power and self-centeredness can be an on-going source of discovery, transformation and creativity. A true meeting of minds allows intimacy and growth to flourish over time.

Consciousness & Yoga of the Mind – Joel
    Being conscious with a capacity to self-reflect has a core meaning within it that each of us can tap into. Through our own self-reflective capacities and experiential feedback we can utilize this magical gift, our mind, with greater clarity and wisdom. Many are familiar with physical yoga as a way to loosen tight spots and bring energy through the body. As with the body, the mind also takes on conditioning and habit patterns that filter the way information is perceived, internalized, and acted upon. Many of the assumptions, values, and the very worldviews people operate from usually become more rigid over time. This workshop explores these and other aspects of consciousness as a yoga. To meet the challenges we as a species face, our consciousness must evolve in a way that brings more flexibility, awareness and freedom into our lives.

Doing Asanas: practice & talk – Joel
    Joel will discuss his mind/body approach to asanas which has evolved over 38 years. The 2-hour asana session following is for those either with a personal practice at any level, or willing to try things on their own. If you only go to classes, come and try doing what you’ve learned and see what others are doing. Instead of leading the group through a set of asanas, Joel will show people individually how to understand and experience from the inside “how a posture works.” He can help deepen any posture by using such techniques as breath, interpreting feedback, playing different edges, creating and channeling internal “lines of energy,” and using the body’s own leverages.
    “Everyone’s mind and body are unique instruments that can be honed and tuned through yoga to touch into the body’s deep wisdom and reservoirs. For me, the key to yoga is awareness—getting in touch with one's own feedback systems, breath, edges, and rhythm.”

Bringing Spirituality down to Earth – Joel & Diana
    We as a species are on an evolutionary and spiritual cusp that demands intelligence and care to remain viable. Spirituality has traditionally been defined as in another realm—as higher, pure and otherworldly—instead of as a creative force inherent in the fabric of life. This age-old, fateful rift between the spiritual and mundane views spirit as “un-Earthly” and humans as flawed. Any worldview that separates spirit from living is unable to meet today’s challenges. Joel and Diana will offer new insights that can bring a shift in awareness and provide a new foundation for values to help meet the extraordinary demands of these times. Bringing spirituality down to Earth involves extending spirituality into relationships, social issues and evolution bringing meaning, purpose and connection into daily life.

What Is Spirituality? – Joel
    “Spirit” is the embedded force within existence that is the invisible driver of evolution. Spirituality is the connection between conscious individuals and the evolutionary momentum we are all a part of—this includes how people connect with each other, other species, and the Earth that supports us. Spirituality is ignited by the relationship of people to how spirit expresses itself within a given epoch. As it too participates in the evolutionary momentum, spirituality needs to be periodically revised to mesh with new human challenges, discoveries, and potentials.
    Spiritual traditions, co-opted by religious institutions, have constructed static authoritarian worldviews with unlivable values that are now obsolete in a global world of accelerated change. But science alone cannot create or justify viable values to constrain the life-threatening juggernaut its power unleashed. A non-authoritarian spiritual worldview that includes scientific discoveries is needed to complete the worldview transformation that science and its repercussions initiated. The challenge facing humanity is to co-create a compelling spectrum of values, an adaptable morality that is life-sustaining.

The Third Perspective & Yoga: Bringing East & West Together – Joel
    This talk synthesizes Eastern and Western worldviews. The East gives priority to unity and Oneness; the West emphasizes separation, valuing diversity, the individual, the unique. Each view touches into something real and important, but is also incomplete and unbalanced. A third perspective presents a synthesis that can transform awareness and living by resolving the oppositions between the inherent polarities of existence: wanting both self-transcendence and self-enhancement, merging and individuation. The third perspective also brings together two classical oppositions: “being,” which involves letting go and living for the present, and “becoming,” which aims at creating a better future.

Decoding Spiritual Authoritarianism – Diana
    Authoritarianism is an age-old planetary “social virus” at the core of civilization geared at maintaining power by blocking change through defending outmoded beliefs. In a world of accelerated change, this is deadly as authoritarian social control stifles much needed problem-solving. The Guru Papers shows that our basic problems are not the inevitable outcome of “human nature,” but rather stem from authoritarianism, which is at the core of many basic global and personal problems—including social breakdown and difficulties with addiction, self-control, and intimacy. This talk shows why people are not the problem, but rather traditional morality and values—our “operating system” and guidelines for relating—are not only dysfunctional, but destructive in today’s complex world. This actually offers new grounds for hope, as unmasking where authoritarianism is hidden increases the range of freedom and possibility.

The Morality Wars, Evolution & Human Survival – Joel & Diana
    Evolution uses challenges and necessity to forge change. The clash between technology and tradition is at the root of current crises. Who has the right to decide what’s right and what gives anyone the right to do so? This is the basic struggle on the planet today. “Morality wars” between the old and the new ensue when traditional morality becomes dysfunctional—unable to deal with the new life-threatening challenges. Joel shows that any morality that polarizes altruism and egoism, cooperation and competition, is authoritarian, and thus cannot cope with our rapidly changing world. Such dysfunctional moralities, our “operating systems,” are at the core of social breakdown and the problems threatening humanity. The outcome of the battle for people's minds will either free or block the intelligence and creativity required for dealing with the global impact of our runaway technological power. The more people free their minds from outmoded perspectives and unleash creativity, the more possibilities we have.
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2 or 5-Day Seminar
Yoga: An Evolutionary Approach to Mind, Body & Relationships – Joel & Diana
    Delve deeply into yoga's physical, mental and spiritual dimensions through Joel and Diana’s evolutionary, non-traditional approach to the yoga of mind, body and relationship, and to spirituality. Being conscious has a core meaning within it that each of us can tap into. Just as physical yoga loosens tight spots and brings energy, so too the Yoga of Mind. The mind has conditionings and habit patterns that filter information, rigidifying people’s assumptions, values and worldviews. Relational differences and patterns are also edges to explore. Given today’s challenges, our consciousness must evolve, bringing more flexibility, awareness and freedom into our lives. Exploring the mind, the body, and the nature of relationships through yoga offers the potential for spiritual awakening and creative change.
     Deepen your asana practice with breath, interpreting feedback, playing different edges, and channeling lines of energy. Joel will show people at any level of yoga “how a posture works” at its different stages. Instead of leading the group through a set series of asanas, he will help you experience from the inside the essence of the posture.