We recently connected with Eva D’luscious and have shared our conversation below.

Eva, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?

The current name, BodyMagick Temple, is an evolution of our mission, how we work and of me personally. It’s taken many years to gain this clarity and come to this name.

I’m a practicing witch and delving deeper into my craft, but the main way I experience magic and share it with others is through the body. The performances, teachings and in how we help our community members ground the experience of loving themselves, is all through the body.

We believe every person’s body contains incredible wisdom and is worthy as it is. Removing shame and unlocking each person’s unique expression is powerful for them, and for everyone around them. We work with many people who aren’t often represented as beautiful, desirable or fabulous in traditional media and consumer culture, so claiming the space to honor themselves, share what they want, feel and express their actual feelings without shame, and be celebrated on the stage or on the dancefloor is a courageous act, a rebellion against status quo and a reclaiming of themselves.

But we do it through the joy of dance and play. So it’ not sitting down to study concepts, it’s discovering and sharing through physical expression in supportive community. We hold this as a sacred duty, so call ourselves a “temple” to reflect that.

Eva, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I am an embodiment coach who helps people ground their nervous system, release shame, connect to their wisdom and celebrate their bodies through conscious movement and burlesque dance.

We have a variety of offerings to support our community members in this exploration:

– Burlesque instruction series to prepare for performing, or to play with a new way of moving and experiencing themselves. This includes in person in Portland, OR, and speciality workshops in other locations, and online courses and video vaults.
– JourneyDance experiences for grounding your nervous systems, broadening emotional capacity, building somatic awareness and accepting all parts of yourself. We offer these bi-monthly (beginning in January 2025) in Portland, OR, online in our monthly New Moon Circles, and at retreats.
– Burlesque shows that welcome a variety of people and celebrate the power of sensuality and self expression.

I started performing Burlesque in 2010 after having two sons. I was seeking a way to reconnect with myself and build community because I felt very disconnected from my body and my joy and was lonely. I wanted to feel like myself again, and to return to the creative collaborations I experience growing up as a dancer.

Burlesque is an opportunity to tell any story that you want, play dress up, create a super sparkly, fun version of yourself, and to step outside boundaries of patriarchal society. It was infectious joy! I kept going and was invited to teach by a pole dance studio I approached to sponsor a show. I had gained so much confidence through performing that it felt like a duty and an honor to hold the door open for others.

And that’s exactly what it’s been — an honor to hold people as they explore and express themselves in new ways, reclaim their joy and power and release shame that has held them back. I’m most proud of how that happens for people off stage, how they carry it into their lives and share it with others.

JourneyDance and somatic movement became part of BodyMagick Temple during the COVID shutdowns, when I lost every bit of work I had — performances, teaching Burlesque, my day job that paid the bills, all of it stopped. I was very depressed and anxious and searching for a way to just keep going.

Thankfully the creator of JourneyDance, Toni Bergins, took her offerings online so I experienced them personally, then she put her Facilitator Training online and encouraged me to take it. This opened a whole other work of creative and emotional exploration for me that didn’t just inform my performance, it changed how I experience the world.

It was a gentle but powerful way to be with my emotions, honor all of them and express them through dance, and is the perfect accompaniment to our Burlesque teachings because getting and staying on stage takes a lot of courage, just like keeping an open heart in our world.

It’s also a wonderful way to bring people into The Temple. Not everyone is interested in being on stage, but many people want to feel better in their body and grow in self love.

Our mission is to celebrate and elevate the creative power of sensuality and live in a world where all bodies and identities are honored for their unique expression, and we all reside in power, pleasure and joy. These forms of dance facilitate this, and are the foundation for our supportive community.

I think we’re unique in our approach to building self love because of how we work through dance, and because we’re dedicated to creating community where people can be themselves while respecting others, and we do it with an extra bit of sass and silly fueled by fun.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I’ve had to unlearn perfectionism.

I’m a curious person and enjoy learning, and was substantially applauded in school and in my family for getting good grades and doing well academically. Over time, and because of our society, that became internalized as something that made me valuable and worthy . I also have a perfecting nature (Virgo Sun;).

And I’ve realized that waiting for something to be perfect is a fallacy — their is no actual “perfect” there’s only the work we do toward a goal. If we’re always striving for perfect, we’re stuck in a space by ourselves with little space to grow and experience life as it is, and we’re denying our own humanity.

My goal in life is to open my heart, connect with people and be grounded and calm. Striving for perfection makes us anxious and alone — the opposite of my goal. People are messy, I’m messy. We’re all doing our best to figure things out with the tools we arrived with and we learn much more from our mistakes than from beating ourselves up over getting it right all the time.

I can’t point to just one experience that helped me realize this. It’s more of reflecting on experiences and teasing out what I can learn from them, and building upon that over time. This is a space where witchcraft has really supported me because it encourages journaling, honing intentions, honoring the world around us and seeking knowledge in order to manifest our dreams in the world.

We’d love to hear about how you met your business partner.

I don’t have business partners in the traditional sense, like there isn’t an overall financial agreement and shared legal ownership, but I do work very closely with four other amazing women who bring their hearts and special talents to BodyMagick Temple, and it would not exist as it does without them.

In keeping with our temple, they are High Priestesses:

Vanity Thorn, High Priestess of Glam — who I met through Burlesque and partnered with on producing several shows. She brings deep knowledge of styling, hair and makeup, modeling and photography and an incredible ability to help our students find their own authentic glam.

Luna Phaze. High Priestess of Fluff — who was first a Burlesque student of mine, and then became a friend. Luna brings a huge heart and so much care to our students. She’s done deep personal work and is gifted in supporting our students with tenderness.

Ri Ri SynCyr, High Priestess of Gems & Hems — who I met years ago because we both started Burlesque around the same time. Ri Ri is a font of knowledge about costuming, Burlesque history, performance skills and collective liberation. She’s a wise-cracking reality check who helps us work toward our goals of inclusivity.

Freeya Spirit, High Priestess of Harmony — who I met before I ever started Burlesque through mutual Burning Man friends. Freeya is a holistic wellness practitioner and intuitive coach with expansive knowledge of healing techniques and rituals. She guides our students into greater self acceptance through humor, deep caring, and sass.

I invited each of these women to be part of BodyMagick Temple because I admire them as people, and appreciate the diversity of skills they bring to our community. They are all willing to speak their minds, supportive to me as a person and leader, and incredibly fun to be around — which is very important in a business focused on building joy and love in the world.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.bodymagicktemple.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bodymagicktemple/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BodyMagickTemple
• Linkedin: BodyMagick Temple
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@bodymagicktemple
• Soundcloud: https://open.spotify.com/user/tbsq8l2fpelba9j06x21p3lt2?si=0f32a36bf66b40e9
• Other: TikTik @BodyMagickTemple

Image Credits

Photographer names are at the end of each photo