Kundalini & Disco for Radical Healing; Meet the Alchemist Amy K.

Imagine what it would be like to access your highest intentions through moving, grooving and breathing to Kundalini  and disco music?

Welcome to the world of KYMA ; a multi dimensional DJ-producer and certified Kundalini Yoga and meditation teacher. Amy K. is an alchemist fusing modern science with ancient wisdom through her transmuting sessions. She takes you on a deep dive into sound & brain waves while restoring the nervous system. You’ll experience your kundalini rising as you move with the synchronized sounds of your own anatomical beats to the beats of rad music.

I had the experience myself, last Spring at Woom in NY, after feeling really back logged from sleep deprivation. As I surrendered to the practice, I began to awaken with bursting energy feeding my cells. I felt transported euphorically through letting my body soul and spirit merge with the rhythmic movement. It was a profound experience I highly recommend everyone to embark on.

I am also excited to share that The Joyful Approach and Kyma will be collaborating in future Breathwork and Kundalini Disco™️ events.

Journey through the magic of Kyma in my interview with Amy K. below.

Hey Amy, we are thrilled for the opportunity to learn about your work. After my euphoric experience at your Kundalini Disco workshop at WOOM, I’m excited to have you share your journey with the Joyful community. Firstly, where are you from?

Hi Joy! Super stoked to join the Joyful community and THANK YOU!

I was born & raised in Northern California (Santa Rosa) and I am coming up on my 4 year New York anniversary in November!

When were you first influenced by music and when did you really fall in love with the gift of music?

I would say I’ve had a deep appreciation for music my whole life. At an early age I would literally stand next to speakers because I loved the vibration of loud music (not suggested). I grew up playing basketball and was always making mix tapes to set the tone for our warm ups and tournament road trips. In high school and college every one of my friends had at least one of my custom burned cd’s with Sharpie notes written on them in their car because I was always bootlegging music with my Limewire/Frostwire accounts. (PSA: I now pay for ALL my music unless it’s a free download from the artist. #supportthearts). My most meaningful relationships have been based around the love of music and during the most painful times of my life music has always been the most consistent means of catharsis.

Did you have any schooling with sound or music?

While living in LA I was going to school at SMC and taking courses in journalism & blogging for the hip-hop site Hardknock.TV. At first I wanted to be a music journalist and then decided in 2012 I was going to learn how to DJ after noticing how few female DJs were in the industry. So to represent for the sisterhood I signed up for a course at Scratch Academy to learn the basics. My soon to be roommate was also a DJ and a baller and became a mentor for me while letting me open for him and assist at various gigs. I learned the most through experience while DJing for his street basketball league every Sunday out at Venice Beach – The VBL. Lugging around the turntables, setting up the DJ equipment, speakers and microphones, preparing the music, taping cables, refining my beat-matching skills and ducking for the MC on the fly.

When I began my journey to holistic wellness I became deeply inspired to learn and explore all aspects of sound from the technical to the metaphysical. I attended and graduated from Icon Collective in Burbank for digital music production in 2014. Following my kundalini yoga teacher training with Golden Bridge in Rishikesh in 2015 I began studying sacred sound currents in NYC with Paramatma Siri Sadhana at her Surat Shabad Sound School.

When did you embark on the path of Kundalini practice?

After college I moved to LA and was no longer playing basketball competitively so yoga became my go-to physical outlet (mostly core, power, vinyasa, hatha and hot yoga). At the same time that I was going to school for digital music production at ICON I was also interested to get a yoga certification but wasn’t quite sure what organization and practice I wanted to pursue this with. During this time I attended my first “sound bath” in North Hollywood and the practitioners introduction to sound healing mentioned the gong was played at the end of every kundalini yoga class. I didn’t pay much attention to this.

In the same week I dropped my resume off to two studio’s in Santa Monica. The 2nd studio was Golden Bridge Yoga. At that time (2013) I didn’t know it was a kundalini yoga studio because I had just been passing by. I had never done Kundalini yoga. I got the job and attended my first class where there was only one other student in the room with her sheepskin rug, headcovering and crystals and the teacher on a stage with a head scarf who was my new manager. I had no idea what to expect and zero idea of what I was doing but I was open to exploring just about anything that could potentially bring a sense of internal peace.

I worked for Golden Bridge over the next 3 years at every one of their locations – Santa Monica, Hollywood and NYC, serving as my bridge to the east coast. Within those three years I attended and volunteered for as many workshops and classes as I could, devoured books and lectures on the teachings of Yogi Bhajan and grew my mantra database of music. I then completed my immersive teacher training in Rishikesh. You can read a bit more of the longer story HERE.

Who are your greatest influencers with your spiritual path?

There’s a movie called Waking Life that a good friend of mine introduced me to. It’s been kind of how my life has felt for the last few years. Every conversation, every interaction has been a teaching and teacher that holds some key to life and enlightened living. On the regular though, my breathe, my family, my ancestors, my boyfriend, Paramatma Siri Sadhana, Aimee Bello, Ruby Warrington have been some of my most pivotal influences along my spiritual journey thus far.

Many books, songs and celestial bodies have influenced my spiritual path as well. The most profound and influential books I’ve read are listed HERE. All of these texts were very much “when the student is ready the teacher appears” sort of coincidences and really shifted my perspective on sound, body, breathe, being and life. The first song I ever cried to in a Kundalini class was Krishna Kaur’s You Are My Lover Lord and that moment taught me so much about release and divine guidance. The vibrations of mantra, gratitude and appreciation have been undeniably powerful influences in my visceral and creative explorations and subtle awakenings.

Can you give us a scope on how the fusion of Kundalini and Disco merge in formulating magic and alchemy?

Illuminating darkness and circulating energy is the magic – letting flow any stuck energies in the body to turn it into pure, glittery and infinite creative potential is the alchemy. Because I’m a DJ and a Kundalini yoga teacher usually the preconception is “So you teach kundalini yoga to disco music, I love disco!”

Kundalini yoga and rhythmic meditation is the pre-party. It’s how we get to connect to our infinitely creative and soulful rhythms and recognize the power of our breathe as an individual. As our bodies and minds literally lighten up and get high off the rhythms of our life force we begin to awaken to those harmonious and blissful feelings of oneness and begin to allow this energy to dance through every cell of our bodies while we groove to an intentional and live DJ set by DJ Kyma (aka me).

Disco in this context has evolved to symbolize a few things: It symbolizes the collective disco ball or light that we create in those dark spaces of ourselves and the sparkle we get to share with our communities. It symbolizes heightened sensual states and sexy alternative settings. It symbolizes collective gathering in reverence for our most glamourous Higher self with the unifying force of music.

And of course, there is totally disco music as well as deep house, house and other soulful vibrations and cross-pollinated rhythms played during the experience.

We’d love to hear a bit on your daily practice..

Depending on the season and where I’m at in my cycle my daily practice has some variations but will always include, because consistency is key, a cup of tea, sage or palo santo, mantra, kundalini breathing exercise + meditation(s). I incorporate kriya into my daily practice when I need a physical workout or have a very specific imbalance. I am currently enjoying a 40 day practice with the meditation for Blessed Guidance from Intuition and Sodarshan Chakra Kriya.

How do you find balance between DJ’ing nightlife and living a spiritual path; how do they coexist with one another?

For me DJing is a completely spiritual experience regardless of the setting. At times my mind tries to control the situation but in the end the rhythm takes over and it becomes a complete surrender of mind to body and soul. I used to think they were separate or that I could separate them.

It’s no secret that nightlife is associated with darkness, ego, drugs, neurosis, narcissism, excess. It’s a collective shadow aspect and really feeds the subconscious desires of the Lower Triangle (1st, 2nd and 3rd chakras). That’s it’s nature and if you are not aware of it or are caught up in it then it has the potential to pull you farther away from your true self.

When I first moved to NYC I tried to avoid spinning out in nightclubs because I felt energetically I was compromising myself. I thought nightlife and spirituality were separate. I didn’t feel I had fully stabilized my spiritual foundation enough to support and nourish myself in that space. It’s not that nightlife and spirituality are separate but it’s the way in which you are interacting with nightlife. The realest question I had to ask myself was: Is it serving and sustaining me or is it deceiving and destroying me?

Since this awakening, nightlife has inspired and fueled so much of my spiritual path to innovate ways of exploring celebratory connection and heightened states one might feel during a night out at the club because I still appreciate a good party. As a literal human broadcast system, I now absolutely adore DJing nightlife where I get to serve as a potential introduction for a new way of experiencing party culture while exploring my creative palette for vibe curation (as long as I am home by 2am).

Any exciting projects on the Amy K vista?

SOOO MANY! The end of 2018 and beginning of 2019 is aligning itself to be quite a fun and expansive time for me. Kundalini Disco™️ will be going global in December with activations in Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa (more details to come soon!). As a DJ I’ll be collaborating closely with an amazing Spanish footwear brand called Verbenas in Miami with a colorful brand ethos around celebration and having a good time in good company. I am currently working on an online series, original music, modern mantra and a few other brand + music festival collaborations. If you’re inspired to stay in the mix you can subscribe HERE 🙂

I am REALLY enjoying collaborating with various aspects of the music industry with #RhythmicMeditation & Kundalini Disco™️ that resonates with the culture by way of beats and synchronized breathe. I get filled with so much joy when I can offer tools from the kundalini toolkit for other producers, DJs, artists, musicians, writers, event/festival coordinators and managers to take on tour with them, in studio and to share with the masses. To contribute practical holistic techniques in the dialogue and progress of mental health for entertainers and creatives to sustain creativity and well-being has become my JOYFUL mission.