Episode 74: The Tantric Path: The Extraordinary Journey To Self-Expansion And Self-Discovery With Janolof Elander
How many of us had an experience where the universe put a major roadblock in our path for us to seek a different solution? Sometimes, when we don’t take the hint, it’ll present many roadblocks over time in order for us to learn these lessons in life. Our guest today had to experience multiple bouts of burnout and depression, a major skiing accident, and a torn Achilles heel before he understood that the path he was on was not his highest one. Once he made a massive shift, his life has never been the same. Tune in to this episode and meet Janolof Elander, a transformation facilitator, catalyst, leader, and coach. Find out how he boldly stepped away from being a follower of the general narrative and into being a creator of his own in the tantric path.
---
Watch the episode here
Listen to the podcast here
The Tantric Path: The Extraordinary Journey To Self-Expansion And Self-Discovery With Janolof Elander
How many of us had an experience where the universe put a major roadblock in our path for us to seek a different solution? Sometimes when we don't take the hint, it will present many roadblocks over time for us to learn these important lessons in life. Our guest had to experience multiple bouts of burnout and depression, a major skiing accident and a torn Achilles heel rupture before he understood the path that he was on was not his highest one. Once he made a massive shift, his life has never been the same again.
Janolof Elander is from Sweden. Janolof is curious, multi-passionate, energetic, highly intellectual and an emotional empath. He boldly stepped away from being a follower of the general narrative and into being a creator of his narrative one step at a time. After limiting himself for many years, believing that he couldn't control every part of his life and having multiple burnouts and depressions over ten years, he finally accepted the support from the universe and allowed himself to meet his deepest fears and shadows and move him toward the journey of true self-love.
The tantric path has been his journey for the last few years, supporting him to expand through experiencing more of life and himself through others. Janolof has a university degree in Computer Science and worked for twenty years as a software engineer and solutions architect. He has also explored management roles on different levels. He has turned the cards and is stepping into working with leadership with a strong urge to support in facilitating transformation for people, teams and companies toward healing themselves, remembering their truth, being their leaders and trusting in their inner authority. Welcome, Janolof Elander. How are you?
Thank you so much, Anand. I feel a bit nervous. This is my first appearance in a show. It's in a way stepping into showing myself a possibility. I can feel there is energy moving in my belly. I can also feel it rising in my chest.
It's so important to feel the feelings of what we're going through and experience them fully rather than suppressing them. It's pretty funny because there are quite a few people that have been first-time guests on my show. Every single one of them has done many shows since then. This is going to send a trend for you to open up a little bit more to share your gifts with the world.
We have been interacting a lot with the energy of the throat chakra. We were in Egypt together. One of the newest discoveries was a chamber that was opened up that's considered the throat chakra of the pyramid. After having that experience, we realized it's humanity's time for people to speak their authentic selves and authentic truth. It's beautiful that you came to the show. I'm excited to get into your story.
Thank you. I'm so grateful for exploring it as well. I also have a connection with my body. I'm embracing whatever comes up as well.
To set the tone of everything, what does living a limitless life mean to you?
In one way, it feels like it's a huge question but I will also say that it's the question of life. We are limitless. If there are no separations, it's an illusion. We're part of everything. When we truly realize that and can embody it, we become limitless. To have the ego and other parts that still want to be in this separation, it's a fight between these two. I am allowing this fight. I'm still holding onto something. I'm wanting to hold onto something that's not true, all the stories, the labels, the programs, the rules and whatever I've attracted in my life because I believe that we were born limitless into this life and then we add all these limits. It's all about the journey of coming back to limitless.
It's so beautiful. It's exactly what I've been thinking about lately. We talked a little bit about identity earlier before the show started. We build these steps so that we can progress in life. We learn, grow, take titles and get an education and all these things but at the end of the day, are they creating more potential to become limitless? Are they keeping us limited from a perspective?
What is that journey in this life? I believe it's whatever you want it to be. You get to choose and dictate the life that you live. If we're in a movie, you're the actor, the director and the producer. You're all of it. You get to decide to be the victim. You get to decide the hero or you get to decide at any moment, "This is a great life but I want to pivot into something else." It's perfectly okay. It's not having the guilt for wanting to have change or wanting to go in a certain direction because we are living in this place of infinite possibilities. Why not explore if your heart calls to that exploration?
It's all about removing labels. Why do I have all these labels? The label industry has exploded. It's all the labels. You have diseases. You label everything. You need to have a label on it because then we feel safe in a box. The more labels we have, the more boxed we are. When we realize, "This box is so small. I can't even fit anymore," we start removing these labels and expand. Can we come to this place of being limitless by removing every label? What labels am I using on myself?
It's quite a rabbit hole to dive into because if we remove every label that we have, what does that mean? Can we live in a world such as Earth or the 3D world where we're working and supporting ourselves and we have roles as a parent, a spouse or a friend? If we remove all those labels, then how do we exist and still pay our bills?
There are several parts of me. I have this body in my lifetime but I also look from behind and see, "I have this body. I'm in a sense stuck in this life and this body." I don't need to identify with the labels. Some labels are needed for others to understand me. How do I communicate with this entity or individual? There is a name. Some labels have a purpose but if we remove every label, what's left? Is that what limitless means? I don't identify with any of the labels. I can use this role or this character and choose to play a specific role in this game. What role am I playing? What character do I want to play?
What character do you want to play?
This is interesting because I can feel there is fear coming up. If I am supposed to show myself to the world or a character, this is so interesting. What does limitless mean for me? What does freedom mean? What does liberation mean? What's my purpose here? It comes back to those questions but I can also hear that there is an ego saying, "You're not good enough. You're not supposed to be anyone. You don't think you're anyone."
What character do I want to play? How alive do I dare be? It's a question that comes. That comes into the tantric experience also because tantra is in a way, "How much do I dare experience? How deeply do I dare to experience life?" It's one thing to watch the rollercoaster. It's also another thing riding it. Can I feel every part of it? How much do I dare feel? That's a super interesting question.
That's so beautiful to get deep into each moment, have that appreciation for it and look at it from very different levels. How does my body feel? How does my soul feel? How does all of it come together? There are so many different dimensions of that feeling. There's so much dissection that can be done in each moment to appreciate it and to truly be present. It's a complete presence in life and everything that you're doing. When I'm talking to you, there's no place in the world I would rather be than right here on this show at this time with you. Nothing else matters to be fully engaged.
One of the challenges that I face as well is not trying to jam-pack my day with doing 1,000 different things because once I do this, then there's the next thing. When you're doing this one thing, do it with your full heart, mind and soul. Nothing else matters. You go on to the next thing. It's the levity in which you take it and living very light like a feather and not feeling so much pressure or having your nervous system go out of whack. That's where these practices that we will talk about in tantra can help us so much in staying into that present moment. Before we jump into the tantric talk, I want to hear a little bit about your background because you have an interesting background. It sets the table for what we're going to go into.
There has always been something nagging me even when I was a kid and also starting work and going to school. I was like, "Is this it? Is this supposed to be what life is?" I always felt that there was something more to it but then I had this religious upbringing in a way, not this deep upbringing. There were religious parts of it. We had prayers every night. I went to a Bible school. It was in a sense interesting to hang out with people but I had this nagging feeling about this prayer, "I don't feel aligned with this way of praying." Something was nagging me but I accepted it. It was the way.
Questioning things, parents and upbringing when I was a kid, I wasn't there to do that. It's interesting because when I try to check in with my childhood, there are just a few things that I truly can remember. A lot of it is blurry. Maybe because I haven't come in contact with it. Maybe because I've hidden it. It doesn't matter. I have parents that divorced when I was around 5 or 6. My mother wanted to divorce my father but he was the one moving out. I came in contact with that. There's still anger projected onto my father because he left me. That's not a grown-up story but it's a childhood story.
That was part of an important event in my life. My mom took me and my brother, moved six hours away from my father and started a new life. That's the way it was when I was young. It wasn't supposed to be every other week living with different parents. I came to this new place. It's also interesting because I can feel it when I check into it. I was quite numb at that time also because of not speaking too much about feelings and not being allowed to cry, "You shouldn't cry. You can't be angry." Showing feelings is like, "You get angry at me if I'm angry. I'm not allowed to cry and so on." It's suppressing feelings.
When I was in fifth grade, they started bullying me at school. Especially my mother was engaged in this in a way and talked to the principal office and the school but they denied everything. The bullying didn't exist at that time. In a way, since I was taught to suppress feelings instead of expressing them, I suppressed them. I shut down every part of me. Two years later, my body reacted. I got this intense disease called Chron's disease that manifested in my belly or my intestines.
It was truly super intense in the first years. I was lying in the hospital. The longest period was two months. I don't remember it. I've heard my mother share that it was a few hours from not surviving. I had this infection in my blood. Nothing helped. My mother is a believer. She's open to energies and these kinds of stuff as well. She used the force and made this prayer. The next morning, the doctor came and said, "We have a new medicine that we want to try." It worked.
In a way, it's part of that. It's like, "Is this a coincidence? Is it not?" I would say it's not a coincidence. Nothing is a coincidence if we were going to go there. Self-worth, self-confidence and all these parts were low. I was still contracting. I didn't have many friends as well. I was hiding. The hiding part has been a theme in my life that I'm opening up to more now.
Nothing is a coincidence.
I had this period in the university that fits like a perfect glove. I studied computer science. That was perfect for me. I got to grow and show myself. My ego was getting seated with all the results on these. When I check in with it, I can see that I was so uncertain about things. I used these grades to boost my ego. I started working in '97 as an IT consultant. My education was in computer science. I became a system engineer. I worked as a system engineer and also architect at different levels. I worked with leadership. I've done that for 25 years, more or less.
An interesting part is that in the first ten years of working, everything I did became gold. It didn't matter what I did. Everything became perfect. In a sense, I was in the flow. I made a choice to go into management around 2009. At the same time, I separated from the mother of my boys. That was a step toward, "I want more money," instead of, "I love this job. I love these interactions with customers, creating solutions and being creative." I stepped into that space.
Three years later, I couldn't take it anymore. I had my first burnout. I remember being so stressed that I was breathing high up in my chest. I didn't reckon that at the time because I thought I was normal, "I'm a productive person. I do a whole lot of jobs. I'm engaged in ten projects. There's no problem. Isn't this normal?" I didn't have contact with my nervous system. I had no idea what stress was or how being stressless was. This started a deeper process. I came in contact with meditation and started yoga as well but still, there was this holding on to the old story after a year of being home.
I don't know if I tried but after having been home for a year, I started working again at the same place with the same things more or less. I wasn't in management because I didn't feel I could do that. I wasn't ready for it. I stepped into the same space but I was contracting my engagements. In 2015, I had depression. It's the same thing. I went home for a few months, limiting myself. The more I tried to hold onto this story that I created, the more I was protracting.
In 2018, I had a skiing accident. I'm an experienced skier but I had an accident in the slope coming from nowhere. I was unconscious for about fifteen minutes. I hit my left side also because I had my back protection, helmet and everything but I landed on my belly on my left side. I had broken thirteen ribs, an eye and a face. I still didn't understand. Instead of slowing down, I accelerated. I was home for a week after this skiing accident before I started working again. Later that year in 2018, both in June and September, I had an Achilles rupture on the left side. That's the feminine side.
The universe keeps throwing these nuggets at you.
It's the left side. It's about creating space but I also got in contact that year with tantra. It's an introduction to tantra. I met this woman through Tinder who introduced it to me. She invited me to this festival. We met at the entrance and that was the only time we met at that festival. She was only the door opener. I met this beautiful man who owns the retreat nearby where I lived and whom I spent a lot of time with both in retreats and also assisting and holding space in retreats. The tantric experience has been my way of expanding and more or less awakening.
There's so much to unpack there. First of all, the fact that our minds can create a disease based on our feelings, emotions and stress levels. All of a sudden, it manifests in the body. It could bring us to the place of almost death but what's also beautiful is that same mind, spirit and energy if reversed can then heal the body, which was the case with your mom doing her healing work and everything like that.
It's so important for us to take a step back to understand that our mind or thinking is the sole navigator for the direction of our life. Anytime we have a disease, it's always a good opportunity to ask ourselves, "How did I create this in my body," rather than looking at outside circumstances or other people creating that stress for you. If you take responsibility for your life, there's always that opportunity to ask yourself, "What am I doing to create this result?"
You keep going forward in your life and see that you got that early validation for success in IT and your ability to create these systems. You kept going further until you realized, "I feel empty even though I'm climbing this ladder." You stayed in it, had one little universal nudge with the accident and then had another nudge with the Achilles rupture. The universe is always trying to direct you in the place of your highest good but when we continue to say, "Thanks, universe but I'm going to continue to move forward," there's going to always be more friction until everything gets to a standstill.
It's very interesting to always manage and monitor our thoughts, "How am I feeling in the work that I do? How am I feeling in relationships?" If we're continuing to track the same situations over and over, the lesson yet has not been learned until we hit that breaking point, which you did. You're exposed to something new and then it's a whole different avenue but this avenue brings so much more fulfillment and love.
What I'm associating with is the first principle from The Kybalion, the principle of mentalism. All is Mind. It's all our creation. If there is friction here, create some space. What is this? Something leaking is something missing. Don't create too much mental space to feel into it and see if you can receive some information.
I'll give you a quick example of my life before we jump into the tantra. I'm looking to open up a second location for my business or start a new business that's very complimentary to what I'm doing in wellness. I was looking at spaces. I looked for three months and found an awesome spot. I was ready to sign a lease and then all of a sudden, the landlord was like, "This is probably not the best use because this is more an office type of building where we would need extended hours and stuff." We were like, "This perfect opportunity fell through. Next opportunity."
We kept looking and found another space, which we loved. It seemed perfect at the time. The landlord was ready to sign and move forward with us. All of a sudden, another tenant in the building is like, "It steps on my toes a little bit even though it's different." Immediately, I got so pissed off. I'm like, "Out of all the things that could stop us, this inconsequential tenant that has nothing to do with what we do is upset about it." For two days, I was super angry. I had to go inward to say, "How did I create this experience?"
Through a lot of brainstorming, I came up with the perfect solution, which makes things so much easier and saves me tons of money but then also increases the value that I'm going to be providing. It hit me but I had to create the space, not try to jam things that I want to get done warrior style all the time, step back, allow the universe to fill that space and be more of the wizard that allows the manifestations to bring toward me rather than me pushing to create in the 3D world. I allow the 5G to then allow the space to be created, which happens all the time.
We think we can bulldoze things, "I'm going to get through this job. I'm going to get on a vacation. I'm going to be perfectly fine." You get to that vacation and feel great and then what happens? You go back to work and then start feeling shitty again. It's not the vacation. It's that feeling of freedom or excitement for something. We can have the ability to have that all the time. We need an outlet, whether it's through martial arts or working out to be able to let go of that stress through breathwork and tantra.
These are things that can keep us in that elevated state the whole time but if you're going to continue to go into toxic environments, whether it's a bad job or a bad relationship, there's not much you can do when you're not happy in those environments. We always have to look inward to see where are we spending our time. If it's not for our highest purpose, then what are we doing? Life is short.
I remember a few years ago, I reacted to this like, "Finally, a vacation. What does that mean? We're living a life." In Sweden, we have five weeks of vacation.
That's a lot compared to what we get here.
It's the five weeks that we're longing for or the weekends. What's the rest of our lives doing? What is working? It's all about living because I was in this survival mode for so many years. I was feeling that I was only surviving, not living. Is this life? This is not living. This is surviving. What you're also saying is, "Can I take responsibility for myself?" There is fear. You need courage to make changes but that also comes to me regarding my second burnout in 2009.
Tantric Path: There is fear, and you need the courage to make changes.
There was a breaking point after this burnout because I was in this space, "I can't hold onto this story anymore. I need to let go." It was so painful but it was clear. It was like lightning from the sky, "I can't stay on this path." You choose to either live or die. It's your choice. The breaking point was stepping out to an unknown space. I spent contemplating not doing too many things and more being for a year and a half.
Everybody reaches that breaking point at different times or experiences in life but a lot of people, myself included in the past are diving into that fear of the unknown or that ocean of what we don't understand. There's a term called comfortable misery when you're in this box of being in a job or a situational relationship. Even though it could be miserable, you know that you can get by but once you start stepping outside of that, "If I leave this relationship, then I'll be single. I have to start this whole process again. What if I don't meet the right person? What if I waste all these years? Maybe I'll try to figure this thing out."
Sometimes these things can be figured out if both people are on the same page where they want to improve and grow together but sometimes, it's not the case. It's like leaving this ship that has a bunch of holes in it. You're constantly getting a bucket, trying to dump out the water that's filling into the thing with buckets and getting this water out of a sinking ship whereas there's a brand-new ship right next to you that doesn't have those issues. You can move onto that ship and then sail in a different direction. There's nothing wrong with that.
The more we spend time trying to get back to homeostasis versus trying to live a life of thriving on greater heights, people are trying to get back to zero. When we're doing that, then life becomes a struggle when we're living past zero into the stratosphere and keep expanding ourselves, being happy and looking at every day as the weekend or a vacation. What would that look like? It might not be able to be done today or tomorrow but there's a path forward for sure.
We can take little things, step outside of our comfort zone and realize everything is openly better on the other side of that unknown. If you didn't like something, at least you have the knowledge of direct experience but when you don't know you like something and you say, "That's not for me," you're limiting yourself. The conversation that we have on this show is about, "Why limit yourself when there are so many things that we can experience?"
What I also hear is growing is natural. We're walking trees in a sense. We need to step into an environment that is healthy for us and reach for the light. It might be cliché but it's true. How can I allow myself to grow? What do I need to experience growth? I need to expand. That's growth. Are there any parts in my life where I feel a contraction? That's the opposite of growth. It's either you grow or you die. That's what Tony Robbins used to say.
It's your choice. If you're in a dark space with a lot of other trees around you and you don't get space, is that the environment you're supposed to be in? Can you choose another environment? It's all about responsibility and our choices. We're the masters of our lives. That's it. We make our choices all the time even if they're unconscious.
One of those paths that you can look toward or some practices that you can do is tantra. That can get you back into the body, get you into the feelings that you want, grow yourself and keep you outside your comfort zone. Let's get into that a little bit. What is tantra? What isn't tantra?
A general image of tantra has to do with sex. It can have to do with sex but it's not about sex. It was Sting who introduced tantric sex many years ago. You can experience tantric sex but it's more expanding through experience. Can I allow myself to feel these contractions? I was thinking about this. Wim Hof is an interesting example because cold bathing might be uncomfortable. We all want to contract. That's the reaction. Can I allow myself to relax in this contraction and instead let it expand? Can I allow myself to feel these contractions even if it's a cold bath? It's all about experiencing every part of myself and these contractions.
If I check in with my body, I can feel that I have something here that's contracting. I know that I have issues with my heart. I have a fear of opening my heart. There has been huge protection created here. It's all about, "I acknowledge that this feeling is here. It feels like it's here. Can I allow this to be there, not necessarily that I like it? Can I create some space for it, which means that I start experiencing it? Can I accept the next step, which means that it's more of a neutral feeling toward it?" It's like, "I feel you and see you even if it's a feeling somewhere in the body or if it's fear, sadness or anger coming up. Can I feel it? How much can I dare feel this?"
When it becomes too much, there's a possibility for it to contract. This is working with traumas as well because if we experience too much too fast, we get retraumatized. Allow and Accept are two steps toward something. The next step is Embrace, which I also associate with more self-love, "Can I embrace this and not judge this thing? Can I even love every part of myself?" Allow, Accept and Embrace are something that I've caught from Richard Rudd who is the father of Gene Keys.
If we experience too much too fast, we get re-traumatized.
I love the way that he explains it, "Can I create some space for the contractions that I feel? Can I allow myself to feel them?" It's checking in with the body. Something in my belly as well is saying, "It moves up here. It opened up here. Can I check in with the body and feel these things moving or contracting?" There are a number of different things to come into deeper contact. I was up in my head 100%. I didn't feel my body. I wasn't interested in my body in that way. I didn't listen to it. How do we start listening to our bodies? It's one step at a time. We can get help from different exercises. Breathwork is one thing. I don't know if it's called liberating breathwork.
There are so many different types of breathwork.
There are so many different ones. Holotropic Breathwork by Stanislav Grof is one thing, for example, which is coming in contact with these deeper things. Start this journey of coming into deeper contact with the body. I recognized there was a man who stated it so interestingly, "We need to create these data points in our body." I was like, "If I don't have contact with every part of my body, they are numb or the signals aren't getting through. I'm not feeling them." It's all about embracing and feeling as much as I dare. You start slow and then take one step at a time. It takes time but it's so much worth it.
We're like big old onions. We have to continue to unlayer all these different levels of the onion because there are so many emotional, physical and spiritual layers to us when we're stuck or contracted. The only way to find that is to unpeel, "There's a little spot that needs a little love, healing and self-awareness," but there's never a time when we're 100% healed and everything is good. This human experience is about contraction, expanding and always getting to the place of awareness.
Once awareness happens, it's like, "That's why my throat always feels a little bit contracted. I don't speak very much about the things that I want to. I feel like I'm getting censored. Even when I was a kid somebody told me I couldn't sing." There are always these things that will come to us when we're on the path of healing and understanding ourselves. All the reasons why we feel contractions start coming up and get unlayered. They can be released on many levels. I asked you. We continue to do this work, body movements, emotional release techniques and all these things. Is there ever a place or time where you feel like, "I put it in ten years. I feel healed."
I've been on this deeper journey for four years. What I hear is, "You're going quite fast." What does that mean? I have no idea. There's no reference. It's all about starting this and creating the space for it. I don't think that I will ever get finished in a way. The thing is getting more conscious and self-aware and also coming to this space where I know that there are rhythms. The Kybalion is the principle of rhythm in that everything swings. It's like, "I'm aware that things swing. Can I go beyond that and watch the swing? This is how I feel. Can I allow it? Do I go into the drama of the feeling? How do I want to experience it?" I can consciously choose to go into the experience or go out of it.
It's about learning the dynamics of it because there will always be things coming up. I also like to say that one way of starting is when you feel a contraction. Stop for a while and feel it. A contraction can come at any time when you listen to a podcast or a book and watch TV or anything. Suddenly, you can feel this contraction. Can I feel it? I use this technique in everyday life. I don't only go to retreats or hold space in retreats. I use these tools in everyday life. I'm trying to feel these things and relax. The first step in mental training is relaxing the body. It's all about relaxing and creating space in the body.
Tantric Path: The first step in mental training is actually relaxing the body, creating some space in the body.
Are there certain exercises that you do other than breathwork to start relaxing the body? There's tension being held in all different places. Some people hold it on their backs, hips or calves. There are so many different places and I'm sure each one has a different meaning to each individual. Is there some good methodology that we can share that would help people in getting a little bit more into their bodies?
Some exercises that have helped me are exercises that are taken from Wilhelm Reich. He was from the early 1900s. He was much about moving the body, getting in contact with the body and the psoas muscle and also using breathing, movement sound and vibrations. If I sit here and lean my body, "There's a contraction here. Can I add some vibration to it to see," it starts vibrating. It's like the om thing, which is a vibration that starts from the root and goes up to the third eye. The om is a way of moving energy.
One thing is using sound as well. There are some interesting body postures. It's hard to share in the show but let's think about how to share that. I would say shaking as well, standing with your knees bent and your tailbone hanging right down, relaxing and starting to jump upside down. You can feel some things. Add a sound to it because when you start to jump and vibrate, you help the body to get in contact with these things. If you add sound to it, you also might get in better contact with it.
It's these small things that can help. Before the show here, I could feel that I had something that was stuck in my body. I sat out on my terrace and relaxed. It's an interesting thing. I went to feel my third eye and then opened up my third eye to receive. It's more like, "Can I receive? Can I release this and create some space for these contractions in different methods?"
We talked about it prior. Anytime animals suffer some contraction, trigger or fear, they shake it off. They're not holding these emotions in their bodies. They would shake it off and let it go. They're ready to rock right after that. It's the same thing with us. We need some physical movement. We need energy, vibration and sound. These are all things that help us. Robert Grant was saying that geometry is music suspended in the matter.
It's all different scales of frequencies and vibrations.
I've done some work on the psoas. It's one of the keys to our chi, our energy and so much of our contraction and trauma. Many things get stored in the psoas. When you do a massage therapist or go to some healing, nobody is getting into the psoas. It's deep into it. It's by your groin and your private parts as well. There are some things you could do.
There's this one little exercise thing. It's called the Pso-Rite. It's a hard plastic thing. It has two mounds. You lay on top of it. Those mounds dig into your psoas. Sometimes when I'm on there for 5 to 10 minutes, I feel this energetic vibration moving through my body because so much contraction is being held in there. Sometimes I get emotional. I'll start thinking about what I'm grateful for and then get teary-eyed. The psoas is the key to unlocking a lot of the tension we hold inside the body.
I would also suggest this. If you need support in something, bodywork facilitators might help you as well. I did a tantra therapy training. It's a lot of bodywork and energy work because we have energy. We're all built out of energy. I've heard that I have a lot of energy in my hands. I can feel it more. I was walking in a forest and holding onto this, "I feel something here. There is some energy here." It's all about feeling and facilitating energy. An energy worker is more or less a vessel to enable your life force energy to move and enable your healing abilities. It's not about being a healer. It's all about facilitating your healing in different modalities.
Tantric Path: An energy worker is more or less a vessel to enable your life force energy to move, to enable your healing abilities. It's not about being a healer; it's all about facilitating your healing.
I truly believe all of us are healers. We could be our healers. The people that have become energetic healers have only awakened to their dormant abilities, which all of us have. They're showing us through their work that we can do it as well. When we all become healers, then the world starts getting healed but if we're holding onto a lot of pain and trauma, then how can anybody else do the same if we're not willing to let go of our own? It becomes a situation where each of us becomes responsible for letting go of our pain and our past and moving toward a place of love.
A lot of it is through letting go of a lot of these emotions that we have stuck inside of our bodies. There are so many different facilitators all over the world that are doing it. Finding people that you connect with is so important. Anyone who is empowering you to unleash your power is the one that I would suggest you move toward rather than the ones like, "I have the powers. Being around me, you will get those powers." It's not the case. Those are scam artists.
Janolof, thank you so much. We have learned so much about this. Tell me. What's next coming up in your life now that you've moved past the place of doing things because you wanted to stay in IT? You left and started a new path of opening yourself up and not having these expectations of something that is not in alignment with you. Where do you see yourself going from here or wanting to experience?
I'm going to continue this tantric journey, experiencing more of myself in different contexts and embracing myself more. We can call it self-love. It's a journey to self-love as well. I stepped out of work again. I started a company after the pause that I did years ago. That's the first step of being a creator for myself. I was more in the same business. I was a consultant still but I could see that during the last contract I had, I was transforming from IT to being more people-oriented. I was working with technical integration but I was transforming to working more with people integration.
It's all about integration. What is integration? For two technical systems to integrate, they need to be very intimate with themselves. In that way, they create symbiosis. They become one. What about us people as humans? It's all about intimacy. Intimacy is not about sex. It's more about creating psychological safety. It talks a lot about psychological safety in companies.
Intimacy is not about sex. It's more about creating psychological safety.
What I did is stepped out of this consulting business. I'm stepping into the next step of being my creator. I have some notes everywhere at the moment. I have created so many connections regarding this. It's all about stepping into and supporting companies in their journey to becoming one because it's all about the individuals and integrating the individuals. It's a culture change. There is a lot of support needed for that.
I started to network with a few people who are having the same intention of stepping into a space and supporting companies in their journey to becoming one. My company's name is called Reimagine One, which is what we need to do. We need to reimagine that we are one truly. We are not separated. We are integrated with everything. It's all about stepping into the space or the circle. That's what I'm playing with at the moment.
These organizations are so highly efficient from the mental state but from the heart space, there's a big aspect missing in a lot of corporations. When we can bring the heart and mind together, that's when we can affect positive change. What if every single person in an organization is not only bringing their technical skills and their minds but also their heart to be fully open? What world can we create? What mission can each company then reimagine to create an influence in the world?
This is the world that we are trying to create rather than the world of, "This is how you should think. Don't step out of the line. We only do things one way here. If you don't comply, then you're an extremist." It's a very interesting time that we're living in. Many different organizations or systems are breaking down but rather than discarding them, it's like, "There are some bones here and some structural elements that work. Why don't we infuse a little bit of heart space?"
It's this dry and barren land. All of a sudden, you have flowers growing in there. 1, 2, 10, 20, 100 and 1 million flowers pop up. That's how it happens with a little bit of momentum. It's beautiful to see you and so many that have been on the show. They're a part of this new world that we're all creating together. It's an honor to be connected with you, spend some time with you and consider you a brother because the time we spent together in Egypt was sacred. It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience but we continually create more of this magic the more we step into our heart space.
I love that you add the heart to it because it's essential. It's essential also to be able to allow ourselves to show our hearts and ourselves and be intimate, vulnerable, authentic, transparent and everything because it's all about removing these contractions and opening up for Limitless One.
Tantric Path: It's essential to allow ourselves to show our hearts and to show ourselves—to be vulnerable, authentic, and transparent. It's all about removing these contractions and opening up for limitless.
There's one more question. What does God mean to you?
It's not anything that's connected to the religious beliefs that we have been taught. That might sound strange but we are our own gods and creators. It's back to All is Mind. It's what we put in our programs, minds and belief systems that are limiting us. The universe, God and we are all one. We're all the same. When I support someone else, I support myself.
How can we learn more about you if anybody wanted to learn about more of the work that you do or a little bit more about tantra?
Let me share some links. If you feel an urge to connect, then I'll send some links. I don't have a website yet, which is all about stepping in and showing myself. I haven't had the words to describe myself, whatever that is, what I'm doing or what I'm contributing. Let me share some things if you're interested to connect.
Janolof, thank you so much for sharing your magic and your story.
Thank you.
Important Links
Janolof Elander - LinkedIn
Reimagine One - LinkedIn
Janolof Elander - Instagram
About Janolof Elander
Janolof Elander is from Sweden. Janolof is Curious, multi-passionate, energetic, highly intellectual and an emotional empath. He boldly stepped away from being a follower of the general narrative and into being a creator of his own narrative one step at a time. After having limiting himself for many years believing he could have control of every part of his life, having multiple burnouts and depressions over 10 years, he finally accepted the support from the Universe and allowed himself to meet his deepest fears and shadows and moving towards the journey to true self-love. The tantric path has been his journey the past 4 years, supporting him to expand through experiencing more of life and himself through others. Janolof has a University Degree in Computer Science and worked for 20+ years as a consultant as a Software Engineering, Solutions Architecture and he also explored Management roles on different levels. Now he has turned the cards and is stepping into working with Leadership with a strong urge to support in facilitating transformation for people, teams and companies towards healing themselves and remembering their own truth, being their own leaders and trusting their own inner authority.
