Yoga With Jake Podcast

On this episode: I’m joined by Dr. Erica Sharpe to discuss our yoga research project that we’ve started at a hospital. Our goal is to bridge the gap between doctors, their patients and yoga teachers, by providing a tool for physicians to refer their patients to the most appropriate yoga class and effective teacher for their needs.

There is a huge variety of yoga styles and an even greater variety of teachers. Often, yoga students come to class after their doctor told them it was safe to practice yoga, when in reality, the doctor may have one idea of what yoga is, say a gentle, restorative class, while the patient may find themselves attending a vigorous, athletic, power yoga class, that may not be a good fit for someone who is, for example, experiencing severe wrist pain. For them, a gentle class or chair yoga practice would be more appropriate. 

Dr. Sharpe, myself and Dr. Steffany Moonaz, who is a previous guest on the show, worked together to develop a tool to help physicians, their patients and yoga teachers in this process. So that a patient can bring a prescriptive plan, in writing, that includes exactly what the doctor suggests they should avoid in a yoga class and what is safe for that particular individual, to their yoga teacher. Our hope is to ultimately help more people who can benefit from yoga find the right class and teacher and avoid being in the wrong class. 

Dr. Sharpe is a clinical human researcher and professor of chemistry at SUNY Empire, a research investigator at the National University of Natural Medicine and an adjunct professor, teaching yoga, chemistry, music, and botanical medicine at SUNY Canton. Erica specializes in Yoga Nidra  (yogic sleep), natural medicine and human research. 

Yoga Nidra has exploded in popularity as an accessible meditation practice, thanks in large part to very popular science podcasters. In that process, these very persuasive individuals, have re-branded  and re-named yoga nidra to call it a Non-Sleep Deep Rest Protocol. Which, on the surface, may seem harmless. However, Dr. Sharpe explains that those who have re-named yoga nidra, have also completely changed and diluted the practice. 

She talks to me about why this is problematic, and how it can, and in some cases, how it already has, turned a traditional practice that has promising, science-backed benefits that she has found in her work, for things like insomnia and anxiety, into a gimmick that is oversimplified and misused both online, and even in research. Dr. Sharpe explains why this trickle-down effect from podcasters to scientific research is something we should be concerned about. 

Link to Erica's Linked-In

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Jon Macaskill is a retired Navy SEAL Commander turned mindfulness teacher.  He’s taking what helped him excel in his professional life and heal in his personal life and now sharing this with others to help them do the same.

Jon's Website

Movember

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Andrew Tanner is the Founder of the American Yoga Council and the co-founder of the Berkshire Yoga Festival. He’s a yoga teacher himself and he helps teachers and studios make a career in yoga. 

He explains to me the direction he believes yoga is going, how yoga studios and teachers could thrive as businesses, and how he plans to help pave the way to a more successful future for yoga with his American Yoga Council movement.

American Yoga Council Website

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After completing a PhD in Neuroscience and training in psychiatry, John Kruse began working with adults with ADHD - at a time when the condition was widely thought to be present only in children. He has written several hundred popular articles on ADHD and other mental health topics as well as posting more than 300 informative videos on his YouTube channel and hosting a weekly Q & A session. After three decades in San Francisco, he moved to the Big Island of Hawaii in 2022 where he continues to enjoy nature, hike, and run.

https://www.youtube.com/@DrJohnKruse

https://medium.com/@dockruse

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My guest today is Dierdre Rae, and she usually goes by the name Dee. She shares with me, very candidly, her battle with OCD, what it cost her and how she regained her life back with hard work and grit and by giving herself grace throughout the process. 

I found Dee through her NOCD – online therapy and app page, and when I saw her social media page I knew I had to talk to her. Dee’s willingness to share the raw truth about living with OCD on her page is breaking the stigma of mental health, and she provides tools that help thousands with their mental health and OCD. 

Dee is a certified personal trainer, life coach, and confidence mentor who helps people rewire their mindsets to become the best versions of themselves. Having overcome OCD, ADHD, eating disorders, and years of self-doubt, she now tries to empower others to turn their biggest struggles into their greatest strengths.

Link to Dierdre's Instagram

Link to NOCD App for OCD Help

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Dr. Hezel is a licensed clinical psychologist in New York State and an Assistant Professor and researcher at Columbia Medical Center/New York State Psychiatric Institute. Her goal is to create a warm, secure environment in which people feel prepared and able to address their concerns and meet their goals.

Dr. Hezel has trained extensively in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) with adults and children suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and anxiety, mood, and personality disorders. She currently specializes in treating adults with OCD, anxiety, and depression. 

Dr. Hezel has previously held teaching positions at Harvard College and Harvard Extension School. She has published numerous peer-reviewed articles about OCD and anxiety disorders, has presented her research at national and international conferences, and has guest-lectured at local universities.

Dr. Hezel believes in using treatments that are backed by science and that can be applied in a personalized and flexible way. She is committed to building a strong working relationship with her clients, ensuring that they are on board with the treatment plan, and listening attentively to their concerns. Her years of experience have taught her that people are capable of great change, and she continues to be humbled by their resilience and determination.

Dr. Hezel's Website

Columbia OCD Research

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Don Noble is an Instructor in the Department of Cell Biology at Emory University. He received his BS in Neuroscience from the University of California – Los Angeles (UCLA) in 2008, and his PhD in Neuroscience from Emory in 2016. Dr. Noble’s academic interests include understanding fundamental sensory processes that contribute to the benefits of meditation, with an emphasis on slow, deep breathing. For his PhD, he developed an animal model of the relaxation response by using operant conditioning to train rodents to slow their breathing, and pursued the idea that patterned activation of mechanically sensitive lung afferents can shift autonomic balance, decrease stress and pain, and improve performance. As a Postdoc, he pioneered remote respiratory recordings to investigate breathing deficits in the context of chronic pain after traumatic injury. Dr. Noble is passionate about integrating these ideas across fields, and adapting them to educational curricula that explore alternative and sometimes unconventional approaches to enhance well-being. His research publications to date have focused on the functions and mechanisms of slow, deep breathing as a voluntary portal to autonomic nervous system control, while ongoing physio-behavioral studies in his lab use chemogenetic techniques to elucidate how the simple, repetitive act of breathing can powerfully modulate mental states.

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About Amy:

Although I’m best known as a yoga therapist for my books and teachings on Yoga and mental health, Yoga for Depression (Harmony Books), Yoga Skills for Therapists (W.W. Norton), and my new card deck Yoga for Your Mood (Sounds True), my passion, ever since I picked up a pencil in the second grade, was to write a book with a character like Nancy Drew who could transport me to a world beyond my suburban bedroom. I grew up in Pittsburgh before it was green and beautiful. Like the darkened riverfront lit by the coal fires of J & L Steel, my world view was bleak. I read to find a brighter place in other worlds, and I wanted to write books that could meet that bleakness and transcend it. In pursuit of that desire, I returned to school, earning the Master of Fine Arts in literary fiction from Bennington College Writing Seminars in 2000.

My short fiction and poetry appeared in numerous literary journals. I received the Allen Tate Memorial Award for the Short Story and was a finalist for the William Faulkner Award for the Novel and for the Heekin Group Foundation Fellowship for the novel-in-progress. I also received Second Place, in the Writer’s Digest Writing Competition for Literary Fiction.

I began my love affair with yoga in the late 1980’s, after a successful career in television broadcasting that garnered the documentaries I wrote and produced national and regional awards but did not alleviate my chronic depression. When I started practicing yoga daily, with supervision, I was able to titrate off medication and find joy in the world once again. As my practice deepened, I wrote for magazines like Yoga Journal and Yoga International and wrote the first feature article about yoga and depression called “Yoga the Natural Prozac”, which appeared on the cover of Yoga Journal in 1999. My own recovery led me to research and write books on yoga and mental health, and I became passionate about sharing what had helped me heal with others who suffered.

In 2004, I founded the LifeForce Yoga® Healing Institute, which continues to train yoga teachers and health care providers in yoga practices appropriate in clinical and yoga therapy settings. I’m happy that the evidence-based yoga protocol for managing mood I developed is in use in health care settings throughout the world. This protocol is featured on audio-visual products, including the LifeForce Yoga series, an award-winning library of evidence-based yoga and meditation CDs and DVDs for mood management.

I love yoga and continue to teach workshops and trainings, but a book by my dear yogi brother and friend Stephen Cope called The Great Work of Your Life, set me on a course to reclaim my dharma. I returned to writing fiction in 2016, and though I have written several other novels, TEMPLE DANCER is the first to be published.

Amy's Website

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Susan Verde is a #1 New York Times bestselling and award-winning author and yoga-mindfulness expert. Susan has written over 20 books for children and adults, including all nine books in the New York Times bestselling I Am series illustrated by Peter H. Reynolds. Her picture book The Water Princess was an ALA Notable Children’s Book, Amazon Best Book of the Month, and New York Public Library Best Book. Her nonfiction book for adults, Say One Kind Thing, is an original essay collection about the power of positive self-talk and her reflections on motherhood. In addition to her writing career, Susan co-founded Enlightened Generation, a groundbreaking children’s clothing brand with an impact-driven mission. She earned a bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education and a Master’s degree in reading remediation and was an elementary school teacher for many years. She is now certified in yoga and mindfulness and teaches workshops for kids of all ages. Susan currently lives in East Hampton, NY with her 2 cats, 3 rescue dogs, and 3 children.

Susan's Website

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Reggie Hubbard, certified yoga and meditation teacher, senior political strategist, and influential changemaker who is paving the way toward a more conscious world by sharing techniques that cultivate peace and ease as a foundation. He is on a mission to help activists find balance while inspiring the wellness community to become more engaged, socially conscious citizens. He believes that when inner peace aligns with civic responsibility, it creates the foundation for meaningful, transformative change. I would love to discuss a guest opportunity for him. 

Reggie has done extensive work with the Permission and Refuge program at Kripalu, which supports men in exploring emotional wellness and vulnerability. He recently shared insights from this work in Essence.

Reggie is the founder/chief serving officer of Active Peace Yoga, a practice whose mission is to make the practice of yoga and living the yogic lifestyle accessible to all, regardless of race, gender, body type or practice level. He advises yoga and meditation communities, studios, teachers, and the broader wellness industry on the importance of diversity and inclusion, helping to make the practice accessible to all by eliminating exclusionary cultures and habits.  

 His teaching style is designed for all levels and lifestyles, with the only requirement being an open mind. Reggie has studied extensively with renowned teachers such as Faith Hunter, Amy Ippoliti, Yogarupa Rod Stryker, Sri Dharma Mittra, Roshi Joan Halifax, Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach. He earned his B.A. in philosophy from Yale University and holds an M.B.A. in international strategy from the Vlerick Business School in Belgium. 

Link to Reggie's Instagram

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