Welcome and blessings. This is Ayn Cates Sullivan, host of the Wisdom of the Ages, where we invite the sacred into modern day reality. If you’re interested in spirituality, I’ve recorded many episodes with spiritual mentors, teachers and leaders from many walks of life, and I also share my monologues on the process of spiritual awakening. You can find out more on superpowerexperts.com/wisdomoftheages. Today, we’re going to be discussing Ayurveda, and we’ll go into what Ayurveda is in a minute. We’re also to be discussing spiritual mentoring and the process of moving into spiritual alignment, which can lead to increased consciousness and spiritual awakening.
My guest is Aparna Khanolkar. But before I introduce her, I want to tell you a story. The first time I saw Aparna was at the school that our sons were attending. It was called Orca school in Santa Barbara, California. At that time, I had recently visited India. I landed in Mumbai during a Durga Puja. That’s the day the goddess Durga is celebrated. She’s this goddess. Maybe Aparna can tell us more about her. But she’s this goddess that rides a lion. She has eight arms and she’s able to defeat the dark forces. I thought this was just great. I was blown away that an entire culture would come out into a street and celebrate a goddess. Wow. When I left India, I was really hoping that one day we in the West could also open to celebrate the many qualities of the goddess. I mean, not in a witchy way. I mean, the Wiccan thing is great. But I mean in a way in which we really honor the feminine, all men, all women. We understand that we have feminine and masculine qualities within us and that we can really live and work and love together.
Anyway, I know India has certain challenges, and we can discuss that later in the show, but it did prompt me to write Legends of the Grail, which is a series about Celtic goddesses, and since I’m 99% Western European, it’s my lineage. Looking at Aparna, my first thought was that she was enchantingly Indian. If you’ve ever seen me, I’m tall and very, very fair. Definitely more European.
I’m looking at her, and she’s got this lovely, dark skin. She knows how to blend herbs and oils, so she smells delightful. Not perfume, but like this earthy, like goddess energy. I was immediately drawn to her exotic beauty and her deep, innate wisdom, and I was fascinated by the fact that she was a chef at the Chopra Center for Well-Being. I wanted to know why she was known as the Mistress of Spices, so maybe we can ask about that, too. But anyway, more than anything, I wanted to know how to incorporate the goddess. I had this feeling she might know something about the divine feminine that I might be missing in my sort of Western lineage, and I wanted to learn about it.
I’ve taken many of her Ayurvedic cooking classes. I love her handmade Ayurvedic skincare line called Pure Ishvari. I use it daily. I love her cleanses. We’ll talk about what that is on the show, too. But also, I watched Aparna over 14 years grow into an amazing, beautiful, mature woman, wise woman. She’s one of the wise women that we can turn to. She’s amazing.
She’s now a spiritual mentor. She offers personal healing programs. We’re going to talk about what it is to be a spiritual mentor and why that’s so important right now. By the way, finally, a woman who knows how to guide other women to release all that is hindering the embodiment of joy and divinity from within. Embodiment is the keyword here. So, Aparna, welcome to Wisdom of the Ages.
Thank you, Ayn. It’s delightful to be here, and it’s delightful to hear your voice. Thank you so much for having me.
I’m so, so happy to have you on the show. I want to ask you a question, maybe a very short question, because I have to take a break after five minutes.
I just want you to give us a little tidbit about Ayurveda and living a life of alignment, just for a little taste here, and then we’re going to take a short break. Also, please let us know where we can find your products and services. What’s your website?
My website is aparnak.com. And then my product website is pureishvari.com.
Beautiful. Can you just give us a little taste of why divine feminine is so important for you?
The divine feminine is very important for me because like most people, I led a life of tremendous disempowerment from a very young age. Therefore, I was very unhappy and sad, but I didn’t know why. I didn’t know why I felt so weak in my heart and in my mind. I realized that over the years, I just kept closing my heart more and more as I felt the pain get deeper and deeper.
At some point, especially around the age of 29, when I had my first child, my son, I felt that something had to change within me in order for me to feel this sense of fulfillment and joy. And it’s been a long process from that point on until now, like it is for all of us, to know that I did not come here just to suffer like I had been. And if I wasn’t here just for suffering, then what was I here for? The answer that I got was that I am here to live a fulfilled life on the path of alignment, but the alignment is to walk. The alignment is to my higher self or my soul, consciousness, the divine, all of those aspects, and once I stepped onto that path, my whole life changed.
Oh my goodness. Okay. I’m going to have to just pause you right there. Well, just give us your website one more time. We’re going to take a short ad break and then let’s talk more about this heart awakening, what happened, how we can also wake up. So, your website?
My website is aparnak.com and pureishvari.com.
Okay. Stay tuned. We’ll be right back.
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