Kathleen Kastner is an author, yogi, fitness expert, animal rescuer, and committed Vegan. We talk about her new picture book, Karma Cats to the Rescue -- based on a true story of two house cats who help a stray kitty acclimate to having a forever home -- and also about Kathleen's personal journey. (Here's a tidbit: she moved to San Diego from her native Kansas in 1993, went to her fitness job at a local hospital, and her first personal training client turned out to be Dr. Deepak Chopra.) We talk about her commitment to animals and Vegan living, and then turn to a fascinating assessment of yoga, as it's presented in the West, from someone who owned a yoga studio for sixteen years. The long and short of it: yoga really is yoga philosophy, the quieting of the mind, and the physical postures are supposed to help with that, not make all of us seventeen and double-jointed. Injury is legion among yoga enthusiasts in midlife and later, and we discuss how to avoid being sidelined (also how to get yoga's vegetarian roots more rooted in the 2023 "yoga world"). Kathleen Kastner website Instagram @kathleenkastnerwriterFacebook Kathleen Kastner Writer Find Kathleen Kastner on YouTube and check out Vegan VitalityYoga's Path to Weight Loss by Kathleen KastnerMain Street Vegan Podcast Other references from the episode:Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramahansa YoganandaAwake! (documentary film about Yogananda)Main Street Vegan Podcast Diet for a New America, by John RobbinsBe Still and Know, by Thich Nhat Hanh Victoria Moran Podcast Listener's Group on Facebook Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices