Diana O'Reilly
Diana is the Chair of the British Wheel of Yoga, a leading body supporting yoga teachers and practitioners in the UK. Originally from Toronto, Canada, Diana has taught yoga in South Wales for over fifteen years.
Her own practice was shaped by many traditions, principally those of Ashtanga, Iyengar, Vinyasa Flow, and Vanda Scaravelli.
Her personal teaching ranges from a specialism in back and joint pain to meditation, breathwork, and philosophy.
'In yoga, I found a physical discipline that addressed the union between the body, mind and spirit. Through my practice, I came to learn that we cannot separate these three elements within ourselves; that they are inter-related and inter-dependent and by becoming aware of this, we can reach our astonishing potential in our lives.'
Stacey Blythe
Composer, performer, and multi-instrumentalist, Stacey has worked all over the world in a great variety of settings and collaborations. She is a regular composer for the Welsh National Opera and lectures as a musical director and repertoire coach at the Royal Welsh Conservatoire of Music and Drama.
For us, she joins Rajesh David to form the entrancing Indo-Celtic duo 'Gitân'. Weaving together songs and tales in Welsh, Hindi, Urdu, English, and Sanskrit, Gitân sets the scene for our Yoga and Ayurveda event here in deepest West Wales.
Prof. Nick Campion
Nicholas Campion is Director of its Harmony Institute and editor of The Harmony Debates: Exploring a Practical Philosophy for a Sustainable Future (2020).
Professor Gavin Flood FBA
Gavin is Professor of Hindu Studies and Comparative Religion at Oxford University, Academic Director of the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies, and Senior Research Fellow at Campion Hall. He is a leading world authority on tantric and yogic texts and their deep explorations of our bodily being.
His publications include The Tantric Body (2005), Religion and the Philosophy of Life (2019), The Truth Within: A History of Inwardness in Christianity, Hinduism, and Buddhism (2013), The Importance of Religion: Meaning and Action in Our Strange World (2012), and The Ascetic Self: Subjectivity, Memory, and Tradition (2004). He is also the General Editor of the series ‘The Oxford History of Hinduism’ and is a Fellow of the British Academy.
Rajesh David
Rajesh is a widely-acclaimed teacher of yoga with an international following. He specialises in the teaching of Nada Yoga: the yoga of sound and vibration, syllable and resonance. This will be the subject of his conference presentation.
Rajesh was born in Mumbai. Born into a family of accomplished singers, he was trained in the classical Indian tradition and was acclaimed by 'All-India Radio & Television' as an A-Grade artist.
He was acclaimed by 'All-India Radio & Television' as an A-Grade artist.
Since coming to Wales he has not only continued to compose in the classical Indian tradition--his latest solo album is inspired by the work of the great Sufi poet Amir Khusro--but has sought out collaborations with local musicians and opened up a rich and fruitful musical dialogue between East and West.
Most recently he has been collaborating with the composer, harpist, and multi-instrumentalist, Stacey Blythe to form the Indo-Celtic duo, Gitân.
A keen Welsh-learner, he has composed fascinating new settings of traditional Welsh folks songs as well as pieces in Urdu, Hindi, and devotional Sanskrit.
Gitân will be performing to welcome those arriving on the evening of Friday 30th June.
Dr Michael Dixon LVO OBE
Michael is Chair of the College of Medicine and Integrated Health, our partners in this event, and Co-Chair of the National Social Prescribing Network. A regular broadcaster and writer, he has consistently called for a radical rethinking of healthcare including an integrated strategy incorporating complementary and alternative approaches.
Michael was awarded the LVO in 2015 in recognition of his service as medical adviser to the then Prince of Wales (in whose book, Harmony, he is warmly acknowledged). Dr Dixon is now Head of the Royal Medical Household.
Since 1984 he has been a general practitioner at College Surgery in Cullompton, Devon. In 2008, he and his partners created the 'Culm Valley Integrated Centre for Health', which is widely regarded as a prototype for general practice of the future.
He has recently published an autobiography chronicling his long career and presenting his personal reflections on the challenges facing modern healthcare: Time to Heal: Tales of a Country Doctor (Unicorn Press, 2021) with a foreword by the then Prince of Wales.
Mr Michael Dooley
Michael is a Consultant Gynaecologist and trustee of the College of Medicine. In his practice he seeks to provide an integrated patient-centred approach to women’s healthcare offering the most appropriate evidence-based choice of conventional and complementary treatments to address the wishes, beliefs, and needs of the patient.
Michael is Consultant Gynaecologist and Obstetrician at Dorset County Hospital.
His special interest is reproductive endocrinology with particular expertise in infertility, menopause, premenstrual syndrome and sports gynaecology.
He has attended three Olympic Games as British Team Doctor.
He himself has undergone training in Ayurveda, acupuncture, herbalism, and other healing arts in order to provide truly personalised care, and established the Poundbury Clinics as centres for excellence for the integrated approach.
Catrin Finch
Catrin was born in the small coastal town of Llanon, just a few miles from Lampeter. In the year 2000, Catrin was made Royal Harpist to H.R.H The Prince of Wales: a post redundant since the reign of Queen Victoria.
Catrin has played the classical repertoire with many of the world’s greatest orchestras, achieved chart success with her rendition of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, and gone on to explore musical dialogues with other traditions, most recently with the virtuoso kora player Seckou Keita, the Colombian group Cimarrón, and the Irish virtuoso violinist Aoife Ní Bhriain
Recent compositions, which she will perform on the Saturday evening of our event, explore the power of music to heal and sustain us.
Anne McIntyre
Originally trained as a herbalist in the Western tradition, and a Fellow of the National Institute of Medical Herbalists, for thirty years Anne has incorporated Ayurvedic philosophy and prescriptions into her practice.
Amongst her many publications are The Ayurveda Bible: The Definitive Guide to Ayurvedic Healing, and, with Michelle Boudin, Dispensing with Tradition: A Practitioner's Guide to Using Indian and Western Herbs the Ayurvedic Way.
The Venerable Shengmiao Shi
Provost of Lampeter’s Academy of Sinology. The Academy specialises in teaching the Buddhist and Confucian scriptures and classics. He became a Buddhist monk shortly after completing his training to be a medical doctor.
Daniel Simpson
Daniel teaches the history and philosophy of yoga in the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies, online, and at Triyoga in London.
He combines the insights of twenty years as a regular yoga practitioner with a scholarly approach developed from his studies at Cambridge and then at SOAS.
He is the author of The Truth of Yoga: A Comprehensive Guide to Yoga's History, Texts, Philosophy, and Practices (Macmillan USA, 2021).
In a previous life Daniel was a foreign correspondent for Reuters and the New York Times.
Dr Graeme Tobyn
Graeme has practised, taught, researched, and promoted the western herbal tradition for over forty years. He is author of Culpepper's Medicine: A Practice of Western Holistic Medicine, and (with Denham and Whitelegg), The Western Herbal Tradition: 2000 Years of Medicinal Plant Knowledge.
He is Senior Lecturer in the School of Community Health at the University of Central Lancashire where he specialises in holistic and person-centred care and runs the MSc in Integrated Healthcare.
Dr James E. Robinson
James is the originator and Project Lead of the Harmony Institute Health Initiative and convenor of this summer's conference.
