The first time I heard Mira Daleep sing, my heart did a pirouette – her voice is beautiful! So I’m very happy she’s just released a sadhana album with her husband Daniel – more heart pirouettes! Scroll down to hear their tunes, but in the meantime, here she is, the lovely Mira Daleep…

I live in a city called Almere near Amsterdam. It’s kind of a strange place to live because, before 1976, Almere was all water! Nothing but water called the Zuiderzee/ Southsea. So I live in an area where, in fact, it’s impossible to ground yourself – you have to have really long legs or a lot of imagination so you can energetically connect to the earth. So connecting with the element water in Almere is easy. I grew up in the water. Both my parents were swimming teachers so I can’t remember when I was not in the water –  in a swimming pool or in the lake. I even believed I could breathe under water. Maybe water is the element to work with for me…

How did you get into kundalini yoga, Mira?
The first time I did kundalini yoga was in 2008 (before then, I’d never done yoga) at a yoga festival on one of the Netherlands’ islands. I cried my eyes out. All the postures were with the arms and with live drums. So you know, my heart opened up and in between crying and trying to keep up, I knew it: This was what I had to do! I found myself a teacher in Almere of all places and the rest is history.
Yoga for me is like nature. Kundalini yoga makes me aware that we are nature. I cannot say yoga makes me more relaxed or zennnnnn, but it makes me feel ALIVE. With all of its facets. The dark&light side, bumpy&smooth, hot&cold, soft&hard, silence&chaos, knowing & absolutely not knowing.
Learning kundalini yoga with my school Amritnam Sarovar brought me so much closer to me. Authentic me. The touch I felt in my heart and the light I experienced when I did kundalini yoga for the first time was life changing. 

How has it changed your life?
A lot. When I started the Level 1 teacher training, my children’s father and I had been separated for five years. During the immersion week in France, our group had our ‘special talk’ and I was told to go back to my ex… All the yoga and meditation that week was with that intention, can you imagine? Well, he and I are married now. We live a conscious life together with our two children. He’s also a kundalini yoga teacher and a great musician. Kundalini yoga opens up my life, shows me my feminine side, helps me to live the real me. It helps me to see and experience life whole. It fits my intention, set 20 years ago, to live life as conscious as possible. I am ALIVE. 

What does your practice look like now?
I love to dance, Gemma. Free. Like an African sister with both feet on Mother Earth. Gracious like a ballerina. Wild as an untamed woman. It connects me deeply with my own energy. So dancing is basically my practice these days. It’s a tantric kind of dancing. You keep on moving the body, sometimes for hours. Everything is included: your happiness, impatience, pain, emotions, flowing and stiffness of the body. All is welcome. It releases so much and it neutralizes me.
And singing. It’s my gift. My voice is something I need to share with the others around me. Singing is not always for myself. It’s a way of healing. A way I can touch people deeply so they connect with their essence, their soul. So I dance and sing a lot.
My husband and I just released our first mantra album so we are playing music and singing mantras a lot these days and already creating new music. This music process is a living thing… With a small group, we do sadhana in the weekends and I teach four to five classes a week.
And bit by bit I’m more open to silent meditation these days, for like 11 minutes a day.

What’s your favourite kriya?
One of my favourites is New Lungs And Circulation Kriya because I love to fly with my arms – I feel free and fresh afterwards. And there is The Movement Relaxation Series – so gentle and self-nourishing. It softens me. I love it. And teaching this kriya is so rewarding. All the kriyas I’ve done changed me or opened up something, but Pittra kriya is quite something. Amazing. I did 40 days in a row with one of my Greek friends during sadhana hours at her cozy home. We cried and laughed a lot together. It made us aware of our inner vitality and how easily we could connect to the vital source.

Favourite books: The Dovekeepers by Alice Hoffman and The Clan of the Cave Bear (Earth’s Children) by Jean M. Auel
Place: Where the pinetrees are
Breakfast: Rice crackers with fresh homemade ghee and honey or with organic farmer’s cheese
Song:  Free Man In Paris by Joni Mitchell

For music, bookings, info and to order The Daleeps Sadhana album, email thedaleeps@gmail.com. Like their page on Facebook here, and visit www.amritnam.nl for Kundalini Awakening training in the Netherlands