We are delighted to host Tamara Groen on the Mangu.tv podcast series. Tamara is a breathwork facilitator, tantrica and bodyworker. She loves supporting and inspiring others to grow naturally. She organizes and facilitates workshops, retreats, and experiential journeys for others to explore living a more conscious life.
In her offerings, Tamara draws from the lineages of Anahatha & Tantra Kriya Yoga and ISTA. She is a transformational breathwork and trauma release practitioner, and a Thai & tantric massage bodyworker. Tamara creates conscious containers for FREEDOM, relaxation, trust and SAFETY.
Tamara talks about her life, and journey to becoming a Tantrica through yoga, tantric dance, Vipassana and breathwork among other practices. She speaks about tantra’s different colours and variations, and how tantra is a way of gathering tools for life and understanding oneself.
She discusses the Five Elements Tantra Massage and how it is used to open the energy body. She also speaks about the potency of group workshops, with safe spaces to experiment, activities on jealousy, boundaries and discomfort and harnessing sexual or creative life force energy.
Giancarlo and Tamara discuss de-armouring and its benefits, as well as the importance of educating future generations about sacred sexuality, and breaking the taboos and social norms around communication, pornography and sex.
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Full Transcript
Giancarlo: [00:00:00] Hello. Hi, welcome back to this new episode of the Mango TV podcast. Today, I’m very excited to have Tamara Groen. Tamara is a breathwork facilitator, tantrica and bodywork. She loves supporting inspiring others to grow naturally. She organizes and facilitate workshop retreats and experiential journey for others to explore living a more conscious life.
In her offering, Tamara draws from the lineage of Anahata and Tantra Kriya Yoga and [00:01:00] ISTA. She’s a transformational breathwork and trauma release practitioner and a Thai and tantric massage bodywork. Tamara creates conscious container for freedom, relaxation, trust and safety. Years ago, working as a sales director in a multinational company, she realized that her lifestyle was not fulfilling the ultimate life that she had aspired to live.
Falling into destructive and addictive habits, she eventually ran into burnout. This was when she decided to get out and create a more conscious life for herself. A new journey began. Tamara chose freedom and entrepreneurship with the driving mission to support others in authentically connected with each other and more importantly themselves.
Welcome Tamara.
Tamara: Thank you.
Giancarlo: So yes. So why don’t we start from, from the beginning? How was your how did it got interested in, in tantra, neo tantra? How was the how, how, how was the the beginning of your journey?
Tamara: Well, [00:02:00] when I started this journey on the path of, of developing consciousness, I started actually with breathwork.
So for me, breathwork is the base of all, of all practices. And taking step by step on this path, because I feel it’s really a path of development, and there are many ways. There’s not just one path. And I chose to follow my path into Tantra. And it started actually very innocent by tantric dance. And in this dance where there’s one person being blindfolded and one is guiding, I noticed that I found it easy to surrender, found it easy to be led, and that I had some challenges guiding the other, stepping into like my more masculine part.
[00:03:00] And Really taking, taking the power and so through different kinds of energies and changes in this way of dancing and way of interacting with another, I learned so much about myself. This is where I got very curious about Tantra and started to try all different kinds of streamings of Tantra because you have like, you have white Tantra, you have red Tantra, you have black, pink Tantra.
And I was curious about all of it
Giancarlo: and all of them. So, sorry, can I interrupt you? Just to understand this Tantra dance. So where are we now? Holland? I imagine.
Tamara: Yes. I started in Holland. So I’m born in Holland.
Giancarlo: In Amsterdam. So how old were you? Masomenos. When the tantra that when you went to this tantra
Tamara: dance, more
Giancarlo: or less in your 20s,
Tamara: 15 years ago, like 25, 25.
Yeah.
Giancarlo: And so at the time you already had like maybe a yoga practice or meditation or not really?
Tamara: Yes. [00:04:00] Yes. Because as soon as I like I’ve coming, I’ve been coming from A place where where I ran into addictions, where I ran into burnout. When I lost half my family of cancer, then my mother
Giancarlo: That’s in your, in your twenties already.
Tamara: That was already when I was 20. Yeah. 25. I lost my mom and my best friend in a car accident, and I had never learned how to deal with my process. These emotions. Emotions in a healthy way. I mean, from the outside, it looked like I was very successful. No, I was account manager for multinationals. I’m making eight, 9, 000 euros a month driving a BMW, which was also very important for me at that time.
Giancarlo: Of course. Yeah. And so you decided, so you’re grieving and, and, and you, you know, you, you try to maybe avoid this emotions with addictions and, and so casually you end up in this tantra dance. But so when you say, It was, it was a couple dance. One was blindfolded and the other one was not. And, and, [00:05:00] and so you realize that for the first time you felt that you had almost had a blockage in leading others.
Tamara: Yes. And, and, and so that
Giancarlo: triggered your curiosity.
Tamara: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because that was like the, they encouraged us as dancers to feel like, where’s your strength? What’s already coming easy and where can you develop more
Giancarlo: improve? Yeah.
Tamara: Where can you improve? Where can you really see like, what are your actions?
How do you. How do you deal mentally with it and how can you then find a way to step into your power more
Giancarlo: amazing. And so, so the takeaway from that tantra was like, wow, this discipline is interesting. It makes me focus on, on, on, on where I want to improve on my feeling. You realize that it was easy for you to be led than to lead.
And so you started looking for more. And, and so which direction did you go?
Tamara: Well, first I went into White Tantra. So more connection with myself.
Giancarlo: Okay, so let’s explain because what is White [00:06:00] Tantra?
Tamara: So White Tantra first is the path of of self connection. Tantra starts with, with being connected fully with yourself, with your body that you are aware of, of your wishes.
What do you want? What is your desires? What are your fears? How do you deal with Nothing
Giancarlo: to do with sexuality yet.
Tamara: No, no. Well, self pleasuring. Yeah. And that doesn’t mean like creating a peak orgasm for yourself, but it means like really getting to know your body is a part of that.
Giancarlo: Interesting.
Tamara: So the sexual energy, I mean, it’s your life force energy.
It’s your creative energy. And it’s very important to know, you know, where, what makes you feel alive. What arouses you and it’s not only it’s not only the genitals, it can be any, it can be a lot of other, other things as well.
Giancarlo: We’ll, we’ll have an opportunity to explore that. But so just to keep up with the structure a little bit.
So why tantra is more [00:07:00] like, you know, self knowledge and, and and how did you explore that is it was like a specific course or teacher or literature.
Tamara: Yeah, I went to the, I went to a tantra school in Holland and India. First, I started in India with all the meditations, like even with Vipassana with there’s a lot of.
tantric schools in India.
Giancarlo: So Vipassana you consider being a tantra practice?
Tamara: It was a part of the beginning.
Giancarlo: Yeah
Tamara: Yeah, it’s
Giancarlo: it’s so much confusion. You know, there is so much confusion about tantra people don’t you know Of course in your in your group in your circle in your tribe It’s clear but you know for the people that are not familiar people confuse neo tantra and classic tantra They they there is a lot of confusion.
So maybe
Tamara: I can simplify. Yes. Yes. It’s like for tantra is gathering tools for life. In my opinion, like this is what tantra brought me in any of the directions where I went. I, I, [00:08:00] I could get any, any different kinds of tools. So, so maybe I did not agree or I did not resonate with all of the teachings in, in every color of tantra and every teaching of tantra.
But from all the trainings that I did, from each training, I could pick the tools that supported me. That gave me a sense of, ah, this I can use when I have challenges with emotions. Ah, this shows me that, how I can strengthen the way of interacting, how can I Communicate more consciously and it gave me many ways of visualizing me, like being mirrored, especially when I started the group work first working with, with myself, my energy, my body, and being fully aware of my breath.
What happens when I interact, when I, when I become fully aware and from there meeting others? And they show me, they, they are my mirrors, all [00:09:00] the, every other being that’s walking around is a mirror for me and shows me something.
Giancarlo: So it started in Amsterdam with the dance, then you pursue more meditative style of Tantra in India.
And what was revealing to you? How that do you? process of, of, of self inquiry and self knowledge. How did, did you understand where your addictive behavior came from? Why you had issue in processing the emotion? How that uncovering happened? Do you remember a moment where you, you know, for example, for me, my personal exploration started with ayahuasca.
So I, you know, there was, they say that the personal growth and the spiritual growth is never linear. Yeah. It goes into like bump, you know, you might like not grow having, you know, no insight, no understanding of why you do the thing you do. And then something happened and you have like a step up. And [00:10:00] that this, this bring back any memory of, of cathartic moment that you might have had with this practice.
Tamara: My cathartic moment was actually already before that, because I went also into different trainings, like, like different therapies. Before I went on this path of tantra, I was in a clinic in South Africa. This was one of the biggest eye openers of my life. We stepped into yoga, mindfulness group work, two and a half months in one house with nine others.
And a lot of therapists, and they, and all of my behaviors came up, like, I thought that I was really different than everybody else in the world and I felt misunderstood and I didn’t understand myself. And there they were able to shine light and to show me all my behaviors and, and to see that it’s not that difficult and [00:11:00] I’m not so different from, from all the others.
Giancarlo: That was a retreat.
Tamara: There was a clinic like, like an addiction clinic, like
Giancarlo: a rehabilitation.
Tamara: Yes, yes. And in this, in this time also with all the others, because you see you come in and you see the persons that are in there already for two and a half months and you see like, Oh, I, what you have, I want.
So peace,
Giancarlo: serenity,
Tamara: yeah. And strength and understanding of themselves. And I mean they don’t look at anything of your addiction. They don’t look at your addictions or whatever you did to run away from your emotions. They’re just looking at your behaviors. How do you behave? Now, what, which emotions are stored?
They do a lot of anger management, they push buttons and you’re being mirrored by others. And in this way you start to understand that all these emotions that were arising, they were not, I couldn’t handle them. I [00:12:00] didn’t know how to handle them. And there they showed me ways to handle them in a healthy way.
And. Then, yeah, after this two and a half months, I still start, then after this I started studying breathwork and tantra. And Tantra showed me another level of dealing with emotions in a different way because it’s not like I go to one clinic, I do one training and I do one type of therapy and it’s, that’s it.
No, it’s a, it’s a lifelong journey. Yeah. Yeah.
Giancarlo: And so do you want to talk a little bit about the bread work? So how, how that, that was all at all atropic bread work or
Tamara: transformational breath work, rebirthing panayama in India did all the panayamas in India. I’m quite like when I start something and when I like something, I want to learn everything about it.
So I traveled the whole world to learn everything that’s there. I studied with Wim Hof, with Eismann, and learned by these [00:13:00] breathwork practices, it’s possible to discover a All about you, because every emotion has a certain way of breathing. Also, if you want to get more energy in your body, if you would like to experience more relaxation if you would like to release anything that’s stuck within your body or within your mind just by breath, by sound, by movement, it’s possible to change the moment, to change the action, to change it.
Well, there is a life for you right now.
Giancarlo: Totally. Totally. I’m, I’m, I’m new to bread work, but I just started to work with a teacher on on a tropic bread work, the, the, the three hours long. And just recently I had a full blown mystical experience. Incredible. It’s incredible. You know, and, and, and the advantage.
I said that a couple of times on the podcast. You know, when, when you take a psychedelic, you know, then you, you have to surrender control. You’re not in charge anymore. And, and, you know, you need to find trust and surrender, and then [00:14:00] eventually you can touch divinity. And sometimes your contract and maybe it’s not available for you, but with the, you know, the three, four hours of no tropic breath work, when you get closer to the threshold, you can.
Regulate. You can, if you feel uncomfortable and the contraction and your muscles start to get atrophied like that, and it is as uncomfortable, you can take a break. You can just, you know, reduce the intensity of the breathing and then you Move away from the threshold and, and, and then you can take your strength, get your courage and go back and go through.
So it’s a very good alternative to plant medicine for people that are not comfortable with altered state and that they don’t like to lose control. The allotropic breathwork is a very good alternative. That’s why Stan Grof created it when they made LSD illegal. But so, so I want to understand a little bit more.
Okay. The, the rehabilitation in South Africa was the [00:15:00] beginning of your exploration of your emotions. Then there was the tantra, then there was the breath work, then there was India and there was a, when did you realize, okay, now I know enough, I want to teach this stuff.
Tamara: Well, it’s always gone organically with with me, with the teachings because because my changing my process.
was super visible for everybody around me and people started to get curious, like, what did you do and I have
Giancarlo: some, I want some
Tamara: of what you have. Yeah, so I organically started to, to share, share what I, what my practices were, what I’ve done in Ibiza.
Giancarlo: Now we’re in Ibiza or still in Thailand. Yeah,
Tamara: Thailand.
There’s Copenhagen. There’s a big tantric community. My friends that were giving retreats, they were giving yoga retreats and they asked me to add to come and teach breathwork and
Giancarlo: tantra retreat, right?
Tamara: I’ve been in a gamma as [00:16:00] well. That’s in Thailand. Yeah. And then you know, it’s I, I, you know,
Giancarlo: I’ve done an ISTA and the teacher, Raffaella Raffaella, he was, he was teaching there.
And there was a little bit of controversy about that center and recently Vice, you know, Vice News, they make a documentary on on Copenhagen. And it was interesting, you know, they couldn’t have themselves and making a little bit of fun, but maybe, you know, it’s okay. Okay, so, so you people felt that you went through a transformation.
They felt your peace of mind in a sense. And so in Copenhagen, you started to give back in a way
Tamara: everywhere, like everywhere. And I was traveling all the time. It was like in the summers in Europe going all to all kinds of conscious festivals. I was invited to, and then in fall and in the spring I would be in Ibiza, in the winter to Copenhagen, so I was traveling the whole world, sharing [00:17:00] and also being inspired in the meantime.
So it’s always a balance of growing and giving back.
Giancarlo: But how did you structure your offering? You know, it’s, it’s, it’s developed organically, but then there was a moment where you had to write down a program.
Tamara: Yeah.
Giancarlo: And how was that program?
Tamara: Yeah. So my group programs are always a balance of going inside first, connecting with yourself and being able to, to set any like boundaries that you may have learning how to state them.
To be able to sense your desires, to be able to know your fears, and if anything or anybody that you need to forgive in your life. So it’s all about discovering. It’s all about discovering you and connecting with yourself. This is how every training, every workshop. So if it’s a training, it’s, it’s like a whole day or two days connecting and starting with yourself.
If it’s a workshop, it’s the first half [00:18:00] hour, but this is always the buildup first connect with yourself. being able to set your boundaries, your, your, your, yeah, being able to speak, you speak out your truth confidently
Giancarlo: because people are conditioned as a woman or as a man in what is expected from you.
Yes. So people might go through life and just later realized. This is not really me. This is, I say yes to this, but I don’t really like it. And that’s so true for men and women, right? Yeah, because we, it’s like,
Tamara: we’re, we’re afraid of being rejected. And in the meantime, we have no problem rejecting ourselves because this is then what we do.
If we say yes to someone also, and we don’t mean it, then we are ultimately saying no to ourselves.
Giancarlo: Interesting.
Tamara: Yeah.
Giancarlo: So first phase of the hypothetical program is get to know yourself, your, you know, your boundaries, your desire. And then, [00:19:00]
Tamara: and then from the true connection from your heart, because also tantra for me is a practice of connecting from one heart to another to practice and to look at the other.
And to see that they are also a part of you, like every other being that’s walking this earth, every other person, all wants, they all want the same, they all want the same. And how can you connect authentically with the other? So, in the group work also, they are of course your mirrors and they can, they can push your buttons, they can show you places.
spaces that, where you can grow. You know, sometimes you know that in life that somebody is annoying you. Usually this is, is a person that can show you something.
Giancarlo: He’s awoken something in you that annoys you.
Tamara: Yeah. And then it’s like, okay. And now from in the beginning, I would always avoid those people. And now with Tantra, I know that this person has something to show me.
So I’m going to look [00:20:00] at them with more curiosity. Okay. Maybe there’s some kind of behavior that I have that I rec that they have that I recognize that I’m actually doing. And that’s what’s annoying me.
Giancarlo: Nice. That’s why your parents annoys you. Yes. Okay, but so let’s stay on the program. So people come with you ideally for, you know, I mean not ideally, but I’m sure there’s different format.
There’s a two days, there is one week, ten days retreat.
Tamara: Dante massage. work with opening the body. Also, before I stepped into Tantra, I was already very aware of how my sex life or any sexual interactions were. The man was gonna kiss me on my lips and in my neck, do something with my breasts, make me wet, my pussy wet, enter until an orgasm and that would be the lovemaking, the sex.
And it was getting boring for me. When I stepped into Tantra,
Giancarlo: But so sorry to ask, but since you’re so open, [00:21:00] but so it was boring because maybe sometimes you wouldn’t climax.
Tamara: I would have practically never climax.
Giancarlo: Because men don’t realize that this penetration is not enough, et cetera.
Tamara: Exactly. And are you aware that it takes like 30 to 40 minutes before a vagina is ready for penetration?
So I wasn’t aware of all that. No, I never know. Nobody ever taught me that.
Giancarlo: Our culture don’t tell us.
Tamara: No. No. So in Tantra, I mean, Tantra is also a way of life and it embraces all of life. So also the sexual part and there it’s in these spaces, it’s very, people speak very open about sexuality also, and about fears and any blockages and anything around that.
And there I learned that. My whole body is sensitive. That’s, there is, that’s, there is where I learned that lovemaking is not all about penetration and it’s that there’s so many different facets [00:22:00] to it. And also speaking about men about that, with men about that, like, okay. It’s not all about the genitals.
There’s so much more to it.
Giancarlo: So how does the tantra massage works for men and women?
Tamara: So the tantra massage is about opening, opening the energy body. So for a lot of men, I have, I have men regularly crying in my arms. I mean, also very ecstatic. But for a man to feel that a woman is super present in, in her touch.
So I work with different elements. I work with deep massage with the water element where my hand is going all over the body very fluently with the more air element that is very, very gentle touch. Very gentle touch,
Giancarlo: fire,
Tamara: fire, very, very fierce, and maybe using my nails and hissing
Giancarlo: the ether.
Tamara: Yeah. So really the energy body is touched.
And with this [00:23:00] different, different touches where you as a man or a woman can just be fully open and fully receive you can, you can slowly open up the, the body and open up the energy body. So where I also, sometimes men are very scared and they’re very tense within their bodies. Sometimes it takes more than one session to open it up, but to feel pleasure all over the body, to feel opening, to feel loved.
All over the body and slowly, slowly opening up this sparkle, this sparkle of yeah, I don’t know, it’s I call it like, like sparkles in the heart, you feel like a little fire that’s starting to burn and you feel your heart is opening.
Giancarlo: So in this five elements massage, there is no touch of genitals or includes genitals?
Of
Tamara: course it includes genitals. But not predominantly. No, it’s not like this specific massage for this. [00:24:00] This is also what’s existing. But in the five element massage, you include all of the body where Usually, in massages, you avoid that part of the body, you include it.
Giancarlo: And so you encourage the man to, you know, not to be fixating about the pleasure concentrated in the genital and try to spread around the body.
Tamara: Exactly. So it’s also not even necessary. And this is also a thing where men can be very surprised. It’s beautiful to have your penis massaged without that. It needs to be come hard. Because this is also such a pressure for men to have a feeling of performance that that it has to happen or fear like if it doesn’t happen, what would the other think?
Giancarlo: Yeah, yeah, yeah. A soft penis is a not working penis for we’re educated like that. Yeah. But so try to, you know, surrender that feeling of vulnerability. And try to just focus on the hands going around the body and, and trying to get out of the obsession [00:25:00] about the penis, the genitals being hard. Just being with
Tamara: all sensations.
Being
Giancarlo: with all sensation.
Tamara: That’s the, that’s the, that’s the only goal there is just to be with any sensations that are there. And this can be very pleasurable, it can be very emotional. I mean, it’s hard, it’s very impossible to have no expectations, but with the least expectations to really open, open your heart, have a conscious mind.
And just be there with any, anything that arises.
Giancarlo: And that’s how long does it last traditionally five elements? Two hours. Two hours. Yeah. So going back to an hypothetical program, you know, for a, let’s, let’s pick like a man that wants to embrace and learn this discipline. So it would come to your retreat, there would be a, you know, a little bit of self inquiry and then the massage and then what else?
Tamara: Ah, but the retreat, it doesn’t include, well, can include a massage, but doesn’t have to like, it’s never, it’s never really standard. It’s never really standard. What happens. No. [00:26:00] Tell us a little
Giancarlo: bit more about what you offer because we
Tamara: also flow. We also flow with with the, with the group and we can have a group that is very open already and very not scared of sexuality and not scared of speaking up their truth and their needs.
So this group can go in a different direction. Yeah. And we also had one group that was very with, and it’s also interesting that they attract each other now with a lot of sexual trauma where we go very, very slow and very, very gentle. So it also depends on the group, how we move. And there’s not one goal.
It’s not like we’re going for the goal of, of pleasure. We are going for the realness, for the truth of what is there, what’s alive. And we’re going for we’re going for, for freedom. And healing. And healing. We are facilitating these spaces for people to heal themselves. We are not, I’m not a healer. Oh, I am a healer for myself.[00:27:00]
And we facilitate these safe spaces. Where people can step in to discover, to discover themselves. So we do, we do all these practices of, of connection of self connection, connection with the other and, and, and having boundaries maybe a bit expanded because a boundary is not a limit. And there’s a, there’s a difference within that there is like, they say the comfort zone, you know, and, and outside of the comfort zone is where the magic happens.
So this boundary is fluent with another, with depends on which person you have in front of you, depending on how you feel in the moment, you can have somebody be closer to you or you want them further away but also in life. So what we create here in this space, I think this is the most important. To know what we create in these spaces.
It’s like a school of life. It’s laboratory. It’s a space where you can practice. It’s a place [00:28:00] where you can practice and you can see and be seen in, in all of you and you can practice setting, you know, setting, being strong in your boundaries, being strong in your voice, being strong in how you want to stand in life, how would you would like to perceive and everything that you break through.
In this space as you break through for life, it’s incredible, it’s incredible how I changed because I felt safe enough in these spaces to change or to try something, some, some practice for myself and that changed everything, like a ripple effect around me.
Giancarlo: That’s so interesting. But so these spaces single and couple are welcome.
Tamara: Of course. Yeah. We also have special retreats that’s only for couples, but we have mixed retreats where there’s, because some couples like to interact with others more and be more in a mixed space. Everybody’s welcome.
Giancarlo: Yeah. Because sometimes.
Tamara: Also gender, [00:29:00] whatever your preferences.
Giancarlo: Yeah, but so let me see if I understand correctly.
So what you’re saying is that in this safe container, exploring not just pleasure, but boundaries and, and, and, you know, and touch and, and not maybe sexuality, but sense sensuality, that kind of laboratory of, of, you know, ability to explore will then allow you to grow in other parts of your life. And these are completely understand.
Sometimes, you know, at least my experience has been that, you know, and then I don’t want to go into the cliche of, of, of woman and men being biological, biologically different. But it is true that, you know, there is a biological evolutionary conditioning into a woman being more selective. By who she wants to be touched because evolutionary she needs to choose for procreation, you know, she needs to choose well [00:30:00] for a guy that will bring a healthy baby and then they’re going to be like pregnant for nine months and where it’s like a man.
It’s it’s it’s it’s more attracted to. You know, to quantity. And so when I’ve seen a couple arriving in this container sometimes and you see the men a little bit like, you know, expanding by this idea of exploration and the woman a little bit contracting, does it happen often for you? Or is just some cultural conditioning?
I mean, it’s definitely a cultural condition, but did you see that happen? You know, many women and it’s
Tamara: not only them. It’s not only the women. It’s also the men. It’s, it’s, it’s it’s scary somehow to do this work not only for God, but also for singles. Like everybody’s stepping into Tantra Tantra feels scary.
Even breathwork feels scary, remember? And for couples to step into this spaces, it can be even more challenging. No, especially if they step into a [00:31:00] mixed space, because what if, you know, what if he or she likes the other better? What if, um, what if they’re more attracted to the other? What if they thought their touch is nicer than my touch?
What if they find the other, no, there’s all these.
Giancarlo: Jealousy and comparison.
Tamara: Yes. Yes. And then when you start doing these practices, especially if you are in in a container like this and you start and you get to know each and every person in this container and you can only see. the beauty. And you can only see the authenticity and the realness and the rawness of these beings.
At one point, you can only feel love for all of them. And then we get back to the school and the laboratory because then you can sense like, okay, what do I want to practice? Because this is also, we create these places, we call them temples. And this is a space where you can practice. If [00:32:00] you start becoming aware of your jealousy, you can say like, okay,
Giancarlo: Where does it come from?
Tamara: Yeah, and, and, and I would like to feel it. Because most of the emotions, all of the emotions, just want to be felt. Just want to be felt and seen. And fear, a lot of things are really scary in your head before it happens. And if you’re so scary and then you have all these cramps in your body, This is a horrible way to live.
And to break through that, you can orchestra a situation in this, in this in the retreat, like asking your partner and and, and maybe another woman or the other way around to, to, to, to do something in front of your nose and to just feel what happens and to just feel, to feel safe. And you are the one orchestra orchestrating this, this moment.
And this is for you a chance to breathe through and to feel [00:33:00] what’s being touched within your body. So yes, there may be all kinds of fears coming up and there’s nothing you need to do. We are not pushing you to anything. We’re just suggesting and inviting and making a research with you. What can happen?
And also in the couples retreats, it doesn’t mean like you have to interact with other people. You can also just choose because. A lot of times also there’s this stigma that Tantra means having sex and with all kinds of people and orgies and I don’t know what, but we support all of life, Tantra supports all of life.
You can have a monogamous relationship, you can have an open relationship and within between them is a thousand other different ways in which you can engage. with others. And tantra, tantric relationship means that you have a white sheet. So without any of the society’s sayings, how [00:34:00] you should have a relationship, you can color, you can color.
Giancarlo: It’s a nice metaphor.
Tamara: Exactly. And it’s also not like, oh, I’m stepping into a monogamous relationship. Then I can never be open. No, my relationship that I have now started for the first two years being monogamous. Then we slowly opened up a little bit and at times when we don’t feel fully connected are not a safe and stable base, we close, you just say, okay, I’m, I’m processing I don’t feel strong enough now.
Let’s close it for a moment. So you can design your whole relationship and your life always. But definitely within Tantra. Yeah.
Giancarlo: So, yeah, it’s, it’s basically a new way to understand and to use arrows. It’s, it’s this idea that, you know, this, it’s almost using sexuality as, Not just that personal growth, but also to [00:35:00] transcend in a way it becomes almost like a sacred practice For me at the Easter level one in August there was this, you know, as you know, we can’t disclose too much But there was one exercise they call it temple and pilgrim Where the men visit the woman at the temple and then vice versa and men and women are in a very vulnerable position for me just Being there, I felt the presence of spirit, like in an ayahuasca ceremony.
I felt like I had that sense, you know, that frequency of, of, of spirit, of the sense of gratitude, of awe, of, of, you know, the vulnerability created this sense of, of, of belonging, of safeness, of being whole. It was so emotional. I had to like sit down for a second. There was an altar. And then I discussed with Raffaello and I was like, you know, maybe, maybe, you know, in our DNA, these sexual and fertility [00:36:00] rituals, they’ve been done for thousands of years, 10, 20, 000 years, you know, there was like not just from the Veda from India and the Tao from China, but from, you know, the, the, the, the Mayan, the Aztec, they were like this ritual where this energy was way to connect with God.
And, and this is all of a sudden it becomes more beautiful, more deeper. And, you know, I went in and out of this Tantra festival here in Ibiza. And, you know, the, I, I told the facilitator that I was a beginner. So they part me with this more experienced lady for this actually it was a five L and massage.
And this lady was really telling me that it’s, it’s a different approach. It’s about when you feel the last, rather than Externalizing and go and grabbing just stay with it and internalize it so you even massage with the back of your hand just to resist the temptation to grab and then all around me I see people, you know, there was one of the of the air [00:37:00] massage.
I was just blowing air. Around the body of this actually she was also Dutch lady and she went into a, into the state of ecstasy just with the air. She was on her knees, she was shaking, she was like, you know, I don’t know, I don’t, I don’t know if it was a full body orgasm or a cosmic orgasm or whatever that was, but it looks the very like a, a, a ecstatic states.
And this is so beautiful, you know, when, when, when I feel that, you know, sometimes I was teenager sons. The learning, you know, sexuality from pornography and I mean, in our society, we don’t teach our Children that this energy is sacred, that you can not only, you know, use it to heal yourself, but also is a different way to interact with others.
Yeah, I’m very interested on this, in this, in this discipline. And so, you know, I’m, I’m interested in this discipline. And, and of course the, my Instagram algorithm figured that out very fast. So, so, so it sends me all [00:38:00] kinds of course, and, and retreat. And, and, and I see a little bit of a trend, which I’m not sure that I Completely subscribed to which is combining this tantra healing and and and the armoring with financial success.
And I was like, I’m sure that this is going to get attention because people are still hooked up on the success, right? And so there was a conversation between Sophia Sundari and Ines Rock, something like that. I hope I get the name right. And so Ines was saying that you know, she’s connected with the fashion industry in Milan, and she was saying that she knows a lot of people, mostly women, that are very workaholic, and they’re working very hard on their collection, and they want to succeed, and when Chanel You know, people will say, listen, you know, you need to take care of yourself.
You need to have a spiritual practice or a meditation practice. They would say things like, Oh, no, no, no. Now I’m too busy to for success. I’ll do my [00:39:00] self practice later. And this facility, they were saying. You don’t get it. You can’t separate it. You never, if you want to have success, you need to be whole.
And to be whole, in that specific case, they were talking, they were talking about this Yoni the armoring, of getting the, the, the, some of the trauma and the resistance on your, on your, on your hip. And, and so this idea of like Eno and Yoni the armoring for financial success caught my attention. What do you think about that?
First of all, can you explain what it is, the armoring?
Tamara: Yes. So the armoring is all over your body are spots that can be tense, that can sense. That can sense a little bit of cramp, maybe pain and that is because in various moments of your life, you experienced maybe trauma or can be even a lot lighter that you were scared for something.
Also moments where [00:40:00] you are scared of rejection or you reject yourself. And this is moments where you cramp up your body, you make yourself smaller, you put your shoulders more to the front and. You, yeah, you, yeah, you take this fear kind of body structure and this is all stored. So it’s all stored emotions and stored moments in your body and a way to release this is by breath, sound and movement.
So the arming means that there’s a certain kind of pressure on these points and you have the time and the space to breathe, to move and to sound through this. So that it can release. It’s like a massage, but then more a pressure point massage on these points. And that’s not only It can be all over your body and your face, but also your anus and your genitals [00:41:00] and releasing these, like, for instance, having sex with a man that has been de armored is a whole different world.
Giancarlo: You can tell?
Tamara: Yes. Imagine like like the anus is very stressful, is very contracted, and then having a movement of penetration. It’s way different if the anus, if that whole area is relaxed and is more kind of a, a wavy kind of penetration, it’s, it’s, it’s really different. So I highly recommend. The armoring for everyone also, because with this life, with this, this way of living of releasing all these, this bodily obstruction, how do you say that obstacles roof, you will sense more free, you will sense more relaxed and you, this will feel also more like rich them.
It’s not even about. It’s. The money, but I, I used what I said, like I used to make [00:42:00] so much money and I feel now so much richer, even though I have no idea how much I make next month. And by this relaxation, it’s, it’s incredible. My sister’s so jealous about this, but by living this relaxation and living by bringing the gift and doing my work, the money just flows in.
Money just flows, so I never have to stress about it, I never have to stress about it. So I do believe that there is a certain kind of truth in what you’re saying, that there is a financial freedom connected with finding what is your true gift. Like you say, this, this, this woman that you’re speaking about, she’s working so hard.
and giving so much stress and pressure on herself to achieve something, maybe this is not the thing that she’s supposed to achieve in her life. If you go back to finding that was [00:43:00] because it’s not like everybody has to work in spirituality, no, but you can find the spirituality in all the work that you do.
In every job that there is also what you say like working in fashion but you can do all that from being connected with yourself and not running past yourself and not listening to your body because your body tells you everything. And there’s nobody else that can feel into your body, into your system, that into what you need.
You’re the only one that can do it. So you need a moment of silence and sitting down and a breath feeling.
Giancarlo: Yeah. Yeah.
Tamara: And then you can also get to the state what you were talking about for your connection.
Giancarlo: Yeah. No, for sure. Some people expect the third millennium to be the millennium of the body after we had the.
You know, the cart and the everything in the mind and so, yeah, this is super interesting. Do you offer the [00:44:00] armoring?
Tamara: Yeah. Yes.
Giancarlo: So I’m super interested because my wife offered me for my birthday at the armoring session, but I really couldn’t let go. And and then I had the second one I mean, you know, for so many people that would be too much information, but I did a second one, the Easter.
And it was better, but I can clearly see how I’m so tense. But so in your experience, how many session men should how, how would you recommend to go through this practice? You know, once every month for six months or once a year, or is income in tandem with other sorts of practice? How would you do a program of anal dearmoring for a tense man?
Tamara: I love it how you go at this approach very practically. And of course, my answer is that’s not possible. Everybody, every person, every being is so different. I have people that have never worked with Tantra and they, they come for [00:45:00] me for a session and their system is already open, it opens up easily.
And I have people that have been working for many years and they’re really trying hard and probably with a lot of control. to do all these tantric practices and that, and then takes three or four or five sessions. So there’s not one way. For me, I would say, because there’s also many, many different practitioners and facilitators to try different things and to find somebody that inspires you and resonates
Giancarlo: with you.
Tamara: Yeah, that resonates with you and to start to do work, start to do work with them and different kinds of practice. And then you feel like, ah, breathwork. Resonates with me. I mean, usually between one and 10 sessions of breath work, you release most of what you’ve built up in your life. That’s an average.
And if you look at the, the tantric massages between one and six sessions, usually opens up everybody’s possible to open up each body. [00:46:00] And then you can create your own formula with your facilitator, with your practitioner and try different kinds of modalities. Yeah. And, and then find what feels good for you.
There’s not one way. Again, there’s not one way I work with. So I work with breathwork, with dearmoring, with tantric massages, opening the energies. I, I give whole journeys for several days for either couples, for either groups. So in this way, there’s many different modalities that are, that are being, being touched.
Giancarlo: Amazing. But so if for one of our listener that resonate with your what you’re saying with your tone with your spirit, how do they find you? How can they work for you with you?
Tamara: Website. Yeah. So I have Illumina life because Illumina is in Spanish. I live, of course, in Spain, so Illumina means like to light up and we say a [00:47:00] path to soul centered harmony.
So my work is to shine light on a path and you can choose to step on this path that goes towards soul centered harmony. So Illumina life. com is my, is my website. You can see all the retreats and all the, we’ll put you on the show
Giancarlo: notes.
Tamara: Perfect. And the intention is, that’s also why I created Illumina because it’s not about me.
Everybody that does that does my practices, they starting to learn what is their gift. They’re seeing their gifts and slowly there’s people being born from my retreats as people being really reborn. And they’re starting to give, bring their gifts and we’re going to be an army, which we’re already a small army of light bringers on it.
It sounds so spiritual, but I mean, in a little army of people that really bring the gifts in their life and they’re showing up. So that’s [00:48:00] why it’s Illumina for the future. It’s going to be a school. For life and not only about sexuality and Tantra, but also about embodiment nature embodiment with nature is also very closely connected medicine because your body needs.
The medicine, not only of love, but also the medicine, whatever you put in your body has such a big influence on how you feel and how you perceive.
Giancarlo: I love your army of light warrior, but, and also, also I’m, I’m, I’m, I’m confident that this movement can really grow. It is already growing. I mean, you know, ISTA is like they double every year or something because, you know, plant medicine, Vipassana, it’s hard, but you know, the Tantra path is not only about pleasure, but it include pleasure.
So it becomes more interesting, you know? But so, How do you see [00:49:00] yourself you know, if you, if you close your eyes and you see Tamara in 10 years time, what would you like to see?
Tamara: I would like to see me sitting under a tree with a river next to me on our piece of land where our school is built, where there are different cabins.
Giancarlo: Where? Where? You know where?
Tamara: No, it doesn’t matter. I might, I think maybe my Favorite dream would be Ibiza, but to find a river here is a challenge.
Giancarlo: That is so expensive.
Tamara: I love. Yeah. And it’s very expensive. I mean, Portugal, maybe Costa Rica. Yeah. Let’s see what unfolds. I trust, but I know what it looks like.
It’s a, it’s a, it’s a mountain and we are there with this light warrior family and people come in and out either to inspire us or to be inspired.
Giancarlo: Yeah.
Yeah, maybe it’s not the right place, but I’m going to say that anyway, you know, I’m working, we’re building with some partners a retreat center in Sapegna.
Tamara: Where [00:50:00] is that?
Giancarlo: Have you heard about Sapegna? It’s next to Dalt Villa in the old town here in Ibiza. Yeah,
Tamara: in Ibiza, amazing. Yeah,
Giancarlo: it’s you know, there is the, the, the castle is here and then there’s a little peninsula that goes into the water. It used to be called the Gypsy Quarter. Yeah. No, it used to be called the Fisherman Quarter.
It was built like three, four hundred years ago. And, and then he was occupied by the gypsy for the, I think, 40, 50 years. And now it’s, it’s, it’s a kind of here can carry out all that area between the Marine and that villa. And so we’re building a yoga center. We call it where we want to host all the tropic breath work, five rhythm.
And possibly temple night. Let’s do it. Yeah, yeah. Of course. So there’s no river, but the sea is there. That’s more than enough water for me. Exactly. And then there’s going to be when it’s going to be completed, it’s going to be maybe 22 bedrooms in different buildings. And so, so yeah, we [00:51:00] can continue the conversation without the microphone about that.
Tamara: Thank you Giancarlo also for creating this. Yes. And for making it available to, yeah, for us to have a word and for us to have a voice to be heard. And now even in a, in a real place. Thank you.
Giancarlo: Thank you. Thank you very much. So is there anything, especially I feel to the, you know, teenager and young adult that the exploring sexuality, what advice do you have?
For this 14, 15, 16 years old boy and girl that they are bombarded by, you know, Instagram and it’s all about being nice, being good looking and flashy and for men to be real men. And I mean, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s changing. But young. Generations still bombarded with the stereotype stereotypical stereotypical idea of what does it mean to be sexual?
What advice do you have for them?
Tamara: And for me, I wish when I was that age, I wish somebody would have told me [00:52:00] that it’s okay to communicate about it. Because it’s, it’s such a pressure for me, like I felt I already had to know everything before I stepped into that bedroom. Because it looked a certain kind, it looked like this and it looks like that in the, in the porno industry.
And I, I felt like always I already had to know everything. To discover it together with your partner to go on a journey together and to speak about it and to say like, huh? Let’s try this. Let’s try that
Giancarlo: communication
Tamara: Communication
Giancarlo: because it’s so strange that you know, where did it come this this idea that?
You know, communication is a, is a, is a bus kill. I mean, it’s because it, we, you hear that, right? You know, when, when, when somebody decided that, you know, asking what do you like is a bus kill. But where that come from, you [00:53:00] think?
Tamara: Yeah, I feel that’s like, because in all the movies, the people don’t really communicate.
Yeah. No, they show you, they show you a way that it’s, it’s all going in flow and smoothly and it’s fake. It’s not what’s happening in real life. It’s not really what’s happening behind the doors. And it’s also not, should not look like it really take more time. So my second thing I would say is, my first thing I would say is communicate.
The second is slow down, slow down, slow down, slow down, really give yourself the time and it’s to feel to feel and not to move really fast. And because when you move fast, it’s also becoming out of insecurity, no? And then you cannot become really aware of what it is that you’re feeling or what you want and self pleasure.
So first study your own body, first study your own body. Now, what actually do you like? Do you like stronger touch? Do you like gentle touch? Which parts of your body are more sensitive than [00:54:00] others? So first go on a self discovery journey.
Giancarlo: Amazing. That’s perfect time. We’re just getting to one hour. Thank you so much.
And as I learn more, I will develop more question for next time. Thank you for coming.
Thank you.