Jivana Heyman 0:37
Hello, welcome to the Accessible Yoga Podcast. I'm Jivana, my pronouns are he and him, and I'm joining you from Chumash land, known as Santa Barbara, California. And I'm so glad that you're here with me today. Thanks for joining me. Hope you're doing okay. I have a great episode for you today with my friend Steffany Moonaz. You know, Steffany's not only a good friend, but she's someone who I really rely on in a couple ways, and one way is to really help me make sense of yoga research. She just has an incredible way of balancing respect and understanding of the yoga tradition with contemporary Western research on yoga, and that's a really rare thing, in my mind, to find. So I often reach out to Steffany when I have questions about yoga research, or anything about kind of the medical understanding, the Western understanding, of yoga. And that's what we explore mostly today, we talk a bit about her experience and her path as well. Stephanie is really incredible. She runs research, yoga research, she's an educator, and a yoga teacher and a yoga therapist. And also, she created Yoga for Arthritis, which is a really wonderful resource for the Accessible Yoga Community. And we also have a lot of similar background, in terms of, like, we went to the same college, we both trained in the same tradition. It just feels like we have a lot in common. So it's just easy to talk to her and I really love this conversation. I hope you enjoy it too. So here's my conversation with Steffany Moonaz.
Jivana Heyman 2:33
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Jivana Heyman 3:44
Hi, everyone. Hi, Steffany, thank you for being here.
Steffany Moonaz 3:49
Jivana, it's always a pleasure to be with you. (Thank you. How are you?) I'm here for it. We were just talking before you pressed record about how there's just a lot right now, and so trying to be genuine in my response to people who ask, how are you? You know, I am well in many ways, and I feel like we're all holding a lot right now.
Jivana Heyman 4:18
Yeah, it's a really difficult time. I want to talk about that more, but I just wondered if you would introduce yourself a little bit more. I mean, I had said a few things before we started about you, but I just want to give you a chance to introduce yourself.
Steffany Moonaz 4:32
Yeah, sure. So for your audience, I'll give you know the yoga related background, which is that I am a yoga scientist and a yoga therapist. So as a profession, I'm a research scientist who studies the effects of yoga practices, broadly speaking, especially for people living with arthritis and chronic pain conditions, and that's a big umbrella, including integrative practices. So yoga and all of its tools, as well as things like acupuncture, chiropractic care, how they all integrate. And as a yoga therapist, that is the population that I serve. So I work primarily with people who are living with arthritis and chronic pain conditions. And as a human, I live in the suburbs of San Diego with my family, about a mile from the beach.
Jivana Heyman 5:32
I know it's nice to have you in California now, not too far from me, and I got to see you in person just a few weeks ago, which was really great. And I mean, again, I'll have shared this in the intro, but I just want to say that, you know, I've known you for a long time. We're friends. We have so much in common. We have, like, very parallel lives, like, so many ways, we went to the same college, we studied through the same yoga lineage. I think we share a lot of the same ideas. We're both Jewish.
Steffany Moonaz 6:03
Our birthdays! I think we're, like, exactly 10 years apart, like to the to the day or week, or something. Our families are like... (I am the older one, by the way) [laughing] We're the same astrological sign. (Yeah.) Many parallels.
Jivana Heyman 6:21
Twins in many ways. I know, it's so true, and I love talking to you. And also, the other thing I do about you is I always tell you is that whenever I have a yoga research question or, like, scientific question, I always ask you, which is kind of why I asked you to be here today. I mean, I don't know if I want to talk about that first or talk more about state of the world.
Steffany Moonaz 6:46
That's why you summoned me. So let's...!
Jivana Heyman 6:50
Okay, well, if you put it like that. I mean, I appreciate it about you. I appreciate it because, well, this is what I always say about you, is that you are maybe one of the only people I know in the yoga world that I feel is balanced in the way that you approach yoga, both from respect for the tradition, you know, which has its own kind of structure and science, you could say, like, there's like a yoga science that I think is important to respect and understand as a yoga practitioner and teacher and yoga therapist. But you also have, like, such amazing knowledge and understanding of Western medicine and research and what happens, you know, how yoga is being studied and understood from that lens. And so, I just find it always fun to talk to you, because that balanced approach you have, which, like, I think is really rare. I mean, I'm sure there are other people out there who can, but you're so good at it. I mean, like, I said, because you have this, I don't know what it is. Is it a Gemini? Are you Gemini? (I'm a Taurus!) Yeah. See, like my mom. You're a Taurus like my mother.
Steffany Moonaz 8:02
Cusp Gemini, but thank you for seeing me, Jivana. I like to think of myself as evidence-based and heart-centered. So I do feel like I am often serving as a bridge between conventional, medical science and yoga, not only yoga, but the whole world of what we're now calling integrative health, and trying to help each see the other, and not just to see the other, but to see the best in each other, because I do feel like on both sides, there's misunderstanding and assumptions that are made and judgments. And I feel like I am, you know, standing in the middle on the verge of these two perspectives or frames saying, like, 'Wait, but look, wait, but look...' So it's, it's great when I am in the position to be able to advocate for one to the other.
Jivana Heyman 8:09
I love that. I think it's just maybe human nature that we create dichotomies in our minds, you know, or black and white thinking or something that we have to take sides. And it seems so unnecessary in yoga. It seems like we can respect the tradition and also, you know, the, what is it like, the structure? What is the word I can't find? I mean, there's something about the way that yoga is what it's based on, right? And we can call it science, but maybe there's a better word. It's like the...what do you think?
Steffany Moonaz 9:42
So it's a system. (Right.) And there is a method to the system. But also, yoga is so vast and its history is so long, that there is not one thing that we can call yoga and say 'That is the way to think about it, that is the way to express it, to experience it,' because it has been shifting and changing across time, across place, across lineage. But that's also true in science, and I think what sometimes happens, that causes some of the misunderstanding, is oversimplifying what a yogic perspective is, and suggesting that there is one perspective that is yoga. Similarly, there is not one way of thinking about science or conducting science, and I think that's sort of where my answer to your pending question is going to take off.
Jivana Heyman 10:50
Yeah. So my pending question is, well, it came up a few times in previous episodes, in my discussion with Uma Cocchi, who's an Italian yoga therapist who I've worked with for years. She talked about the research she's doing on yoga for digestive conditions and the amazing results they're getting. And also, Zabbi Yamasaki talked about the research she had done about her work, trauma-informed yoga for survivors of sexual abuse or assault. And I find that whenever anyone talks about the yoga research, I always want to ask them, like, what are you actually researching? Because, like you said, yoga is a vast and ancient tradition that means so many things. In fact, I love that you said that, because it's usually the first thing I do in any training I lead, is I ask people, like, what is your definition, or your working definition of yoga? Because I like to hear where they're at, and I also ask them to consider where they got that from, like, what is the source for that definition? And I think that's the thing that helps me, is to recognize, oh, well, yoga according to Patanjali is this, or yoga according to, you know, me, my experience, my teacher, or this tradition, is this. And I think it can vary so much. Anyway, not only can the definition of yoga vary, but also the actual, you know, practice that we're using in this research. So I know that's something you are involved with. And I just wanted to ask you about that, like, in terms of standardizing, first of all, maybe I should step back. I mean, is that important in your mind to standardize what yoga is when we refer to it in research? I mean, what would that offer us?
Steffany Moonaz 12:39
I'm going to present a continuum that exists within, especially clinical research, where we're trying to understand sort of how things work for people's health. Because research, scientific research, is vast, right? You could be studying all kinds of things, but if we're talking about clinical research, about improving people's health and well being. And this could be physical, mental, emotional, we're thinking about health, broadly speaking. We could conceptualize a continuum between what I'm going to call explanatory on one end and pragmatic on the other end. So on one end, explanatory is we're trying to explain things. We're trying to understand how things work, why they work, in what ways they work. And if we are trying to be specific in our understanding of what works and how, we need to be really clear about the thing that it is we're measuring. So if I want to understand, for example, an extreme version of an explanatory research study, would be, what are the effects of nadi shuddhi on blood oxygen levels? Okay, that would be, like, very reductionist. And many people in yoga, would say, well, that is such a microscopic way of thinking about yoga. And yet, it's useful, it's helpful for us to understand what the specific effects of a specific practice are. That's how we get things like, maybe you want to be careful about forward bends if you have uncontrolled high blood pressure, right? We get to understand what contraindications are for certain clinical populations. We can use that information to optimize the use of yoga for specific populations and for specific conditions, like, you know, doing a side plank on one side could have an effect on the curve of somebody's scoliosis. That's a really useful kind of question, but it's also really reductionist, and it doesn't take into consideration the comprehensive and synergistic effects of many different types of practices on the whole person.
Steffany Moonaz 14:55
So on the other extreme, you have what's called pragmatic. Like, and that's like, just the use of something in a very real world kind of sense. So an extreme version of a pragmatic study would be, I'm going to enroll a whole bunch of people in a study, and I'm going to give them passes to be able to go get yoga wherever in their towns or communities they want to get yoga. So there's like a one pass for yoga. Just go get yoga, and I'm going to measure how you feel before and after, and I'm going to see what the effects of yoga are. Well, that is more realistic in terms of the effects of yoga in the real world, but it's also super messy, because we have no idea what did these people even do. And so most research studies, we're trying to find something in the middle that's like a broader understanding of yoga as it is practiced in real life, while also being able to conceptualize what exactly did we do so we know what we're measuring. And I have even evolved in my thinking as a scientist, in the way that I design studies over the past 20 years, which is that I am generally using what I call a flexible protocol. And I did not create the idea of a flexible protocol, but I probably use it more in my yoga research than many other scientists in this space, which is every study I design, there is flexibility built into the yoga program. So one, I'm always using what I would call a comprehensive set of yoga practices. So I'm never just looking at a single asana or asana in general, it's asana, pranayama, meditation, relaxation, et cetera. But I'm also building flexibility into the protocol so there's opportunity for choice, and that's choice on the part of the person delivering the yoga so that they can use their own discernment about what practices are going to serve the people in the room, and also flexibility on the part of the individual whose bodymind is experiencing the practice, to be able to say, actually, I'm going to choose this or that. So if you build that in to the program, then you're adhering to the program, and you're also allowing for individual discernment and agency.
Jivana Heyman 17:23
That makes me smile, because it sounds like Accessible Yoga.
Steffany Moonaz 17:29
But if we just said, just do whatever, right, let's say it works, then we can't make any recommendations about what actually worked, right? So at least if we have a flexible protocol, we could say, here are the parameters. You know, in some studies, we've had, like, a menu of options that are generally...
Jivana Heyman 17:49
Like, here's a list of poses, and then you could adapt them as needed, or, is that what you are saying?
Steffany Moonaz 17:53
Yeah, and even you could select them as needed. So, we did a study at a federally qualified health center where we had a set of asana, a set of breathing practices, a set of mental practices, and it was a yoga therapist, the individual yoga therapist would get to look at that menu and say, okay, this...so I'm noticing, for example, that this client is coming in here pretty upregulated, and so I'm going to offer them a breathing practice that is going to help them downregulate. Whereas maybe somebody else comes in really down and fatigued, and then you're going to make a different choice. So the whole menu is evidence-based in that it's selected to be appropriate for the population, because there are certain practices that we know are contraindicated that we're not going to recommend for, you know, if we're doing a program for elderly, frail individuals in a senior center, there are some things we're just not even going to put on the menu. But then given that, so we want to set it up for safety and appropriateness, and then also allow individual choice. And then we can say, this menu, that's what worked. The menu worked, and you can make whatever choices are appropriate from that menu.
Steffany Moonaz 18:08
And is that concept being adopted in yoga research, would you say?
Steffany Moonaz 19:19
I'm a big proponent of it, whether it's catching on elsewhere, I don't know. I've seen it used in other fields. So acupuncture is another place where clinical decision making is really important, and that the medical model kind of gets it wrong to say, 'Oh, well, these are the three points that everybody with this condition should get.' It's an inaccurate framing of the condition, the imbalance itself. So to allow the individual acupuncturist to say, 'based on the pulse reading that I'm getting, regardless of the you know, conventional medical diagnosis, here are the points that I think are appropriate.' So being able to use that in other fields makes sense, also.
Jivana Heyman 20:00
I mean, in yoga, we have that too. You know, you see on social media, 'Use this pose to fix your back pain,' or whatever, like, there's a specific, prescriptive thing that is always generalized, and it's just so disturbing because it's so not yoga to me. It's not personalized, like you say. That sounds great.
Steffany Moonaz 20:22
It's also not clinically appropriate, Jivana, because low back pain is like 20 different things. And so is it spinal stenosis? Is it disc herniation? Is it non-specific, chronic low back pain? And so the way that you offer yoga in a therapeutic fashion is going to depend on the condition, but also the individual who is a whole person experiencing that condition.
Jivana Heyman 20:47
And also, it seemed like, like you said, there's the holistic package, there's all the benefits that come from fullness of yoga that are harder to quantify, I would think. And it was interesting when Uma shared about her research, she was saying that they noticed that by the seventh or eighth class, that's when the changes started happening, they started having huge reduction in symptoms. And I just thought that was interesting too. It was like, there's maybe an experience level too, like, so the amount of time that you spend in practice can have an impact. Like, there's so many there's so many factors. I just find it kind of overwhelming, honestly.
Steffany Moonaz 21:22
Can I share something about that, Jivana? This is what we would call a dose response, right? The more you do it, in science, there's this idea of a minimum clinically effective dose, like, how little can you do and get a sufficient benefit from it. And you especially think about that with drugs that have side effects, right? You want to take as little as possible and still get an effective response. Well, we can think about a dose response in yoga too, like, how much of this do I have to do for it to actually be beneficial? And so I really encourage researchers who are looking at this to do frequent measurement, to be able to say, 'Oh, look, it's at this week' or or even what has happened in some studies, so one trial that Rob Saper did was to look at once a week yoga versus twice a week yoga, because it's not just how many weeks, but how often per week. And you could even think about the session length as well, and then the contents of the session, right? We could get really granular, and what he found was that actually the people who were coming to once a week classes were doing more home practice. So the once a week classes and the twice a week classes actually ended up getting about the same amount of yoga practice and therefore about the same amount of benefit. And so you could say, 'All right, well, you know, it's fine to just come once a week, just practice a little bit more at home, and you're probably going to get a similar benefit.' So as the research evolves, we're able to ask more and more nuanced questions, things like, for example, what's the effect of the poses alone, versus the poses with breath integration, versus the poses with breath integration plus dedicated pranayama practice? We could do all of these more nuanced studies that answer questions that I think are really fascinating, and don't necessarily say, 'All right, well, you should take the parts away and only do the pieces that show a clinical benefit,' but it helps to understand how we can optimize the use of yoga for what we're trying to experience.
Steffany Moonaz 21:56
And I do want to spend time talking about you, also. But I just had one more question about it, if that's okay, and that's just, do you have a sense...I mean, the last thing you just explained was, like, kind of another way to look at it, was to kind of break down, like parts of a yoga class, maybe, and analyze them. But is there something in yoga research right now that you're excited about, or some research that you've seen that you think is pretty extraordinary that people should hear about? Like, I just wonder if there's any new things happening in that world that need to be shared?
Steffany Moonaz 24:16
Well, one thing that I'm just gonna say I'm really passionate about, is the use of yoga philosophy in the delivery of yoga. I think I might even go so far as to say necessary, important, essential. And there are clinical trials that use yoga philosophy as a component of the practice, like, each class has a theme, or each class has a concept that is taught and there are ways that that concept is taught so that it's actionable and people can take it out into their lives and play with it and come back and talk about that. And we have not really studied what that adds, you know, as an essential component, right? Like, whether you practice yoga with or without the integration of philosophy, I think is something that feels really important. And so I don't know that we have enough to be able to say anything about it, but I do want to share on a much more like, sort of a less grandiose level, there's this one study that I read recently that I am on a soapbox about, which is, I have been saying for, I don't even know how many years, Jivana, I've been talking about yoga snacks, which I think is a common term, like, instead of, you know, needing to roll out your mat for an hour, just like, integrate little yoga practices throughout your day, so that becomes just how you live your life, instead of a thing that you have to find an hour to do, and then the rest of your life just goes on. And we would say, 'Oh well, it bleeds off the mat, and you end up doing things differently in your life,' but we can intentionally integrate it into daily life, right? Like, sit differently when I'm at my desk, breathe differently, notice nature when I'm on a walk, et cetera. And one of the examples that I have been giving about a yoga snack is stand in tree pose when you brush your teeth as a way to like...you're brushing your teeth anyway, may as well make it a balance practice. And I just read this study that two minutes of tree pose a day is associated with a statistically significant reduction in the risk of fall and the fear of falling. How long are we supposed to brush our teeth every day? Exactly two minutes, right? Well, two minutes morning and night. So I have been making this, like, evidence-based recommendation, stand in tree pose when you brush your teeth, and now there's actually research evidence to say that's exactly the amount of time that standing in tree pose will exert an effect on balance.
Steffany Moonaz 27:16
That's awesome, thank you for sharing. We had an Accessible Yoga for older adults course that you're part of, but you had a pre recorded session during that training that we offered earlier in the year. We're going to do it again next year, if people are interested. And it was so fun, because I did a lot of research. I mean, I just read everything I could about it. And there was just such amazing stuff happening around, yeah, like reducing fall risk. That was, like, a big area for older adults, because it's such a huge problem. But I have another question. I said I wouldn't ask anymore about this, but I just wonder about meditation, because, you know, I'm working on a new book about yoga meditation, and I'm just curious about that, if you have any research, I should be including in my book!
Steffany Moonaz 27:56
Oh, there's really cool research on this, Jivana. I actually have a little mini course that goes through accessible meditation, which I know is how you're going to teach it, because a lot of people in my population who have arthritis and chronic pain think that maybe they can't meditate because they can't sit comfortably cross-legged. And of course, you and I and your audience knows you don't have to sit cross-legged to meditate, but what I find fascinating that I share in this training is that, of course, there are many different ways to meditate, and each different style of meditation has a different scientific effect. So we know that meditation changes brain structure and function measurably, right? It grows gray matter, it changes synaptic connections in the brain, but each one is different, and so the way that you meditate influences the way that your brain changes. So there are a few different studies that have directly compared things like a Vipassana meditation to a mindfulness meditation to a loving kindness meditation, and looked at the changes in brain structure and function, and they are different. And so selecting the type of meditation that feels like a fit for you, that's something that you're actually going to do, but also that maybe is going to change your brain in the way that you want your brain to grow, I think is some pretty cool science.
Jivana Heyman 29:26
Sounds awesome! Yeah. I mean, my book is exploring meditation in the yoga tradition and how it's an essential part of every practice that we do. And it's really, usually the goal, like a meditative state, is a goal of pretty much everything that we call yoga, and yet I find that we often don't talk about it enough within the yoga world, you know, that people sometimes think of it as a separate practice than yoga. And so I guess I'm just trying to talk about how yoga is not a separate practice, and of course, how to make it accessible. And I'm looking at through the lens of the different paths of yoga, you know, like Jnana Yoga, Karma Yoga, Bhakti Yoga, like the different paths of yoga and how each one has different forms of meditation automatically as part of that. But, I would love to see that research, so I'll reach out to you separately. (Okay, sounds good.) Is it a public class that you offer? We can put a link in the show notes, too. (Yeah, great!) So people can access it who are listening to this. All right, I wanted to go back to you personally, if that's okay, because I know that it's easy to talk about this stuff forever with you, but you know this series is celebrating my 30th anniversary of teaching yoga and I'm taking this time to reflect with all my guests about their journey, and I've enjoyed that so much, like, it's been really fun to hear about what moments stand out for people when they look back, because I'm constantly thinking this year, like, well, what have I done in 30 years? And what has stayed with me? Because there's been a lot, like, a lot of teaching, a lot of practice over the period of 30 years and I'm really interested in...I think I just need help remembering! So this season of the podcast has been so incredible that way, because each guest has a slightly different angle on what's been important for them, and it usually touches me in a slightly different way. So I don't know if you have any thoughts, do you have any moments?
Steffany Moonaz 31:23
Yeah, so many, Jivana! Okay, can I do like, a Greatest Hits? (Of course. Yes, please!) Okay, so as you were talking, it's really interesting. I almost did a little life review of all of these, like, you know, moments. Because, of course, since you've been teaching for 30 years, I've been teaching for 20 I'm about 10 years behind you in life. So the when I went to Yogaville, that's where I did my initial 200 hour training, and I'd been practicing yoga for a while. And there's something about, well, there were aspects of Yogaville that made me a little bit uncomfortable, especially as a Jewish person. And so, and I think in the Jewish tradition, there are things about that that have always made me uncomfortable, and I think I've been trying to find my spiritual home for my whole life, and feeling like I didn't really fit anywhere. Like, I felt like an outsider in some Jewish spaces, and I felt like an outsider in some yoga spaces, especially the very traditional ones. And there was a moment in the LOTUS shrine. And so in the LOTUS shrine, for those who haven't been there, you know, part of the tradition of Integral Yoga is, "One truth, many paths." And in the LOTUS shrine, around the edges of the room are sort of symbols of all the different major world religions, including a secular tradition of spiritual inquiry, and, you know, minor religions and all of that. And then in the center, all of those have a passage about light, and they all feed into one light that is like a beam in the center of the shrine. And I would always sit in the Jewish section of the LOTUS shrine. I don't know, it's had, like, Jewish artifacts. It's a little bit comforting to me, even though I have, you know, a complex relationship with that tradition. But, there was this one time that I was sitting in meditation in the LOTUS shrine, and so there's this, like, essentially, an eternal light, which is also part of the Jewish tradition in the middle of the room. And then behind me is where there's this, like, case with Jewish artifacts in it. And while I was sitting in this meditation, I felt, it's funny because I'm wearing this scarf right now, like I felt like there was a scarf of my ancestry that came and like, wrapped itself around me, like a hug and beckoned me forward into this eternal light, like I felt loved and cared for and protected by my tradition and also welcomed to explore the universality of spiritual inquiry. That was a very powerful moment that I try to carry with me, especially when I feel like I don't belong anywhere. I've always wanted to land somewhere and be like, 'Oh yes, this is my spiritual path,' and it's okay to have my own. So that's a powerful moment.
Steffany Moonaz 32:22
Thank you. Wait. Can we just talk about it? Because I feel like there's some unsaid things that I feel like you and I probably want to say. I mean, I want to say, which is just about...thank you for sharing that is so beautiful. And I don't want to take away from that at all, but just like how I also had amazing experiences there, you know, in that space, and yet I'm just so disheartened by what's happened with that organization and that there was abuse by Swami Satchidananda that hasn't been addressed. And I just feel like that's the challenge for me. You know, it's like to have these incredible, I don't know, experiences and access to such profound teachings, and then be so disheartened by that. And same in Judaism, like, I'm just so upset with what's happening and the way that Israel is treating the Palestinians, and it's just heartbreaking. And I just feel like, I don't know there's a parallel there for me, I guess, around disappointment, like profound disappointment, honestly.
Steffany Moonaz 35:58
Thank you for naming that. When we were when we first got on the call, and I said, you know that there's a lot, like, we're holding a lot, that is part of what I feel like I am holding. And I actually think there's a little bit of fragmentation in the Integral Yoga community, which is like a tiny little part of the broader yoga community. And I feel like what's happening in the Jewish community, there is a lot of division there and polarization and finger pointing, and not the best of who we are, or the best of what our tradition has to offer in terms of its teachings. I also think that the same is true in the United States, where, you know, we have this ideal of universal American values at their best, and there's a whole lot of action by American leadership that does not reflect those values, and, frankly, never has. We have always fallen short of living up to the dream that is like, you know, the ideal of America. And I think the same is true in every tradition. We are a flawed human species that is constantly trying to be our best and do our best and and there are also perverse paths to leadership that don't always result in the most virtuous among us being in positions of decision making and representation for the rest.
Jivana Heyman 37:47
Right, and especially in yoga. I mean, since that's why we're here, I would just say that it feels to me that we have access to such powerful teachings, and I'm incredibly grateful for that. But I often feel like that the vehicles for those teachings are so flawed. You know, there's just been so much abuse in almost every major yoga lineage and I don't think it's just an accident, like there's something about, you know, how power corrupts, and it's just that these are powerful teachings that are not being handled with enough respect and with enough ethics that people are succumbing to the power in some way and abusing others in that process. But I mean, I think, and that's similar to, like, the other issues we're talking about, they're generally about power and control and money and ego, and I feel like that also happens in yoga. So it's just so painful to me in the yoga world, because I feel like these are teachings. Not only they're so powerful, but it's like, literally about that, like it's about working with our individual ego and overcoming that part of ourselves, or at least, maybe not overcoming, but at least being honest and truthful, and trying to be clear about who we are and what we stand for, and trying not to harm others. And yet, I think so much harm happens in the yoga world in the name of yoga. And it may not be the yoga itself that's doing harm. It's just in the name of yoga people are, you know, abusing others.
Steffany Moonaz 39:25
Can I share a little story about that? (Yeah.) Okay, so, when I was, I don't know, maybe, like, 10 or something, and I just shared this with the person it involves. I had like, my best friend from dance class, and I was, I don't know, I was at her house or something, and she said something, she shared a story, and then immediately she said, actually, that didn't really happen. So she fabricated something and then she erased it, and it was so instructive for me, of like, she had this little voice, her like, inner, wiser self, telling her, actually you're not being honest, you're not being truthful, you're not being impeccable with your word. And she did something about it. She she backed up and fixed it and it really struck me because, you know, as a 10 year old kid, I also sometimes had, like, a wise inner self telling me that something was like, not in alignment, and to see her model listening to that inner voice, I thought it was incredibly mature and something that I tried to do. And I think that yoga teaches us to notice the voice, like, to notice the feeling of misalignment, when my thought, word, or deed is out of alignment with my true nature. And so we would think that the more you practice yoga, the more that you follow the teachings, the more in alignment you would be. But just because you can hear / feel that, doesn't mean that you always necessarily fix it.
Jivana Heyman 41:36
Right. Yeah, I love that. You know, I just led an Accessible Yoga Training in person. And the last few trainings, I've been doing something new, which is during the three day weekend, we go through the five yamas. So just like as aside from the regular teaching I'm doing, I just pause five times during the training and we talk about each of the yamas, the ethical teachings of yoga, and reflect on how does practicing ahimsa impact the way you teach yoga. So just specifically the application of the yamas to teaching. And the answers that I get from them, I have them journal for a few minutes and then share, they're so profound and impactful for me, because I recognize that in a sense, at least for Accessible Yoga, it's almost all we need. Almost all we need is to just apply the yamas and you will have automatically have created accessibility, equity, inclusion, diversity. It's all it's all happening just because of the application of the yamas and the way that we teach yoga and hold yoga spaces. And so, I mean, it just reminds me of the power of that, of those ethical principles. And like you said, I mean, listening to them is one thing, but at least knowing them, at least we know them. And it's always that challenge of, like, coming back and then aligning the way we act to those values, that's the hard part, you're right.
Steffany Moonaz 42:58
And the practices that we use, I mean, I think in some ways they're just a vehicle for practicing the yamas and niyamas, right? You do your own practice from a place of non-harming, from a place of honesty with yourself and others. And so if we just know it intellectually and don't create a laboratory for ourselves to actually refine those tools, I think that they they remain just intellectual constructs.
Jivana Heyman 43:32
Right. It reminds me of a research study that I read. I'm sure I got it wrong, you'll correct me. But there's research, I think, around does mindfulness make us more self-involved? I think it was in Buffalo or something, and they did this research. It was quite a few years ago, and it was looking at, they had some, you know, way of analyzing someone's level of self-involvement, or lack of that, whatever that is. I don't know if that's service oriented or what the opposite is of being self-involved. But anyway, I thought it was such a great concept. Like, does mindfulness in particular, so that was the form of meditation they were using, impact your being self-involved. And I kind of thought, yes, it would reduce that quality in people, it would make them less self-centered. I think maybe was the word they use, self-centered, so they become less self-centered through a meditative practice. But actually, what they found was that people that scored high for being self-centered, increased their score through meditative practice, and people that were not self-centered became less so, so that meditation was exaggerating what was already happening for them, like in their minds. And I just thought that makes so much sense to me, because I see it happening all around, which is I see that yoga and meditation basically give us access to energy, to prana and basically, if we aren't shifting our thinking with parameters like ethical principles, then it's just enhancing our regular, everyday thinking, and whatever qualities are already in our mind will just be exaggerated. Do you know what I mean?
Steffany Moonaz 45:16
Yeah, and I do remember reading the study a while back, Jivana. I don't remember the specifics to be able to confirm or deny, but you know, something that comes to mind is, well, what are you being mindful about? Because I can be mindful of like, my own experience, or I could be mindful of the world around me. You know, sometimes when you're being led in a mindfulness practice, you'll focus on sounds in your city that are outside of your home, right? And that's a much more external orientation of mindfulness. You could have an internal orientation of mindfulness too. And it's like, this gets said about money too, which we can think of as currency. You know, it's not that money corrupts, it's that it amplifies and so whatever your tendencies were, it's adding energy, adding currency to that. So if you're a very generous person, and you have more currency, then it's going to amplify your generosity, for example.
Jivana Heyman 46:15
Wow, oh my god, I could talk to you forever. We've kind of gone all over the place, but it's been so amazing to talk to you. I just wonder if there's other thoughts you had or anything you wanted to share?
Steffany Moonaz 46:30
Um, yeah. So I think that just in the sort of Greatest Hits, I didn't get to many of them, but I would say another one that stands out for me, and this is more on the teaching side of things, Jivana, is that I got to the Johns Hopkins Arthritis Center, literally fresh out of my 200 hour at Yogaville. I knew nothing about how to work with people who had rheumatic disease, and I had no teacher to teach me how to do that back then, either. And I just brought, like, the little Hatha One class that I had learned, and took it into the clinic, and, like, tried it, and I learned so much about how to serve that population from them. And I think many people who work with clinical populations, who work with any population, will say that. Like, they taught me how to teach them. And now that we do have trainings that are available of how to work with brain injury...and I think all of that is great, and to just show up with humility. Like, to know how little we know, especially of the lived experience of the population that we're serving, even if we share the lived experience, we don't know their lived experience. And so to be able to trust that whatever I'm bringing, I have an open heart and an open mind, and I'm just going to show up fully and be in service and allow this collaboration to happen between what I bring and what they bring. And I have tried to maintain that perspective, even as I've become, you know, a quote, unquote, expert in this field and in this population. And I really do try to impart that when I train others to work with this population, just show up as you with an open heart and a loving intention and care to practice all of the tenants of the philosophy of yoga in the way that you show up and in also what you offer.
Jivana Heyman 49:02
That's why I love you, because you and I think the same way. Because I had almost the same experience. Yeah, you know, I started teaching so I could share yoga with people with HIV and AIDS in 1995. I got my certificate and went and taught at the local hospital in San Francisco, Davies Medical Center, which was the center of the AIDS epidemic in San Francisco at the time, there was like an AIDS ward there. I taught in the conference room and I had a whole bunch of people with AIDS, I had no idea what to do. Do you know what I mean? And I was using the basic training I had, luckily, I also had started quickly working with Jnani Chapman, I don't know if you know Jnani Chapman, who passed away and Nischala Devi through the Dean Ornish program. So I got to work through the Dean Ornish program in the hospitals with him, and they had created a protocol for working with people with heart disease. And so I tried to apply some of that to my. students with HIV and AIDS, but mostly I just learned from them. And a lot of that was, I mean, I'd say that's where Accessible Yoga was born, that they showed me I didn't know what I was doing. And they also had very different interests. In fact, one of the things that they were interested in, I remember it very clearly, that group, that class that went on for almost 12 years, is they wanted to know about yoga philosophy. They were really interested in that and meditation. A lot of them were facing severe illness and death, and many of them died, and they weren't really interested in asana as much as I expected. You know, it was like you thought the world was interested in asana, but my students seemed to want to really go deep, and they were using that time, that illness and the challenges they were facing to really reflect on life and and death. And it just impacted me in ways that I just can't even describe honestly, but I loved hearing you say that though.
Steffany Moonaz 50:58
Thank you for sharing that, Jivana. Which is not to say you should show up at a place not knowing what you're doing. Fortunately, that's no longer necessary! [laughing]
Jivana Heyman 51:09
No. I mean, you prepare the best you can, but you also let go of the, you know, of the reality. Like, it's like you have a plan, and then you kind of let it go, and you're in the moment, and you do what's needed, and that can take time. I think, in a sense, I would say that's maybe the sign of a more experienced teacher, is their ability to be flexible in the moment and not have to stick to a plan. So it's okay, like, in the beginning, to stick to a plan or try and then you notice where it doesn't work, and then you start to adapt and be open to what your experience is and what the students are showing you or saying to you. I think that's the key, and that's all I'm teaching in Accessible Yoga Trainings, by the way, is just like, here's some skills, and also just adapt to what happens.
Steffany Moonaz 51:55
Which brings us full circle, because we can study that approach. We can say, you know, you can be flexible. You can adapt the practices to the population that you're serving, as long as we know what you did.
Jivana Heyman 52:11
Yeah, I think you're studying Accessible Yoga, I'm just gonna say.
Steffany Moonaz 52:15
I agree, Jivana. I have like, you know, since this sort of, I would say that it is a movement that was brewing that you sort of gave name to and coalesced, and I have, since that sort of took shape, I've always considered the work that I do to be under that big umbrella of Accessible Yoga.
Jivana Heyman 52:38
That's wonderful, I appreciate that. Anyway, I think we should stop because we've been talking a long time, and I don't want to take up too much of your time or our listeners. But I love talking to you so much, and I could talk to you forever, so let's talk soon.
Steffany Moonaz 52:53
Thank you, Jivana, I love you.
Jivana Heyman 52:55
Okay, love you too. Take care. (Bye.)
Jivana Heyman 53:05
Thank you to our sponsor, Offering Tree, for making life easier for yoga teachers. Offering Tree is an all in one platform that helps you streamline your business with tools for your website, scheduling, email marketing, and on-demand courses. This means fewer tech headaches and more time doing what you love. And on September 9th, at 11am Pacific, Offering Tree is hosting a free webinar called, Teaching Without Burnout: How to Stay Inspired as a Yoga Teacher. And during this session, you'll learn how to recognize burnout and set boundaries to prevent it. And if you can't make it live, you can always watch the replay. And remember, as an Accessible Yoga Podcast listener, you get a special offer, a free trial, plus 50% off your first three months, or 15% off your first year of Offering Tree. And if you're ready to try, head to the show notes to register for the webinar and get access to your discount.
Jivana Heyman 54:08
Welcome back everyone. Hi, Deanna!
Deanna Michalopoulos 54:10
Hello, Jivana. How are you? (Good. How are you?) I'm good. I just got finished listening to this incredible episode.
Jivana Heyman 54:20
Yeah, I always love talking to Steffany. She's great, and I've known her for so long. Well, she's a friend, so it's just nice to talk to her, and our lives seem connected. So we always come back together. I don't know if I mentioned or if we talked about in the episode that she was on faculty for our Accessible Yoga for Older Adults course that we ran this year, and hopefully we we'll do again next year. It was great to have her be a part of that.
Deanna Michalopoulos 54:51
She's definitely a fount of knowledge, given her research and, you know, her own yoga studies.
Jivana Heyman 54:56
Oh my god, it's incredible. She really is a person I call when I have a yoga research question, or anything around that, because it's so confusing to me. Well, that's why I asked her to be on the podcast, not just because I like talking to her, but I kind of wanted her to explain that. And she did, just that it's such a complex area of study. I mean, yoga is complicated, and then trying to study it with this, like, Western scientific perspective is confusing. I don't know, I just kind of get lost in there.
Deanna Michalopoulos 55:31
Yeah, it is like, as she called it, like two different processes, right, that researchers are trying to, like, bring together. And, yeah, kind of difficult to translate one into the each other's language. But I really appreciated the way she kind of spoke about that, right? Like, kind of like you have to build a foundation of research in order to kind of, like, bring more of the yoga into the studies and understand how a holistic practice works together.
Jivana Heyman 56:02
Yeah, it's so interesting. I mean, that's why I love Steffany, because she can see both sides. I think she really has a practice, and she she's been teaching a long time, and she really loves and respects yoga, I think. And that's not always the case, I don't think, in someone who's researching something, that she actually is a practitioner of it, so I think it brings a special perspective to it. And I think that's true, it's like, she was talking about explanatory versus pragmatic research and one being kind of general way of trying to explain what yoga does and how it works, and the other being, like, very specific about individual practices and the benefits they have. It's just really interesting. And also that whole question about the content in a yoga class that you're studying. So like, if you're doing a research project or yoga practice that you're studying, it's like, what actually are you studying, right? Is it a holistic practice? Is it the same for everyone, or is it individualized? Remember, she talked about that too, like a flexible protocol? Remember that?
Deanna Michalopoulos 57:06
I think she was talking maybe in the context of, like the goal, like building flexibility in the protocol for choice. Like, maybe you can say that this practice has this effect on a body, but you know that may not necessarily work in the same way for everyone. And so like, you know, building some discernment in there so that individuals can use it to adapt the practice. And I like that you created that connection to Accessible Yoga.
Jivana Heyman 57:31
Right. That's kind of been the theme of our last few episodes, like, around what is that connection between yoga therapy and Accessible Yoga, and I guess I'm still exploring it here with Steffany, and just trying to understand that. Like, can a yoga therapist adapt the protocol within the context of a research project? And that makes sense, that we're looking not so much on, you know, at like what the media might be like -- 'do these poses for this benefit,' but rather what a personalized, safe, and effective practice could do for you. I think that's a beautiful thing, rather than trying to make it fit into this kind of more Western, capitalist system of understanding yoga. There's like, a package.
Deanna Michalopoulos 58:22
Yeah, I love that. I also appreciated the kind of, quote, unquote, the Greatest Hits she shared, just those little tidbits of knowledge, super interesting, easy to remember and kind of easy to integrate in your life.
Jivana Heyman 58:37
Right, like, was that around yoga snacks? That part?
Deanna Michalopoulos 58:41
Yoga snacks.
Jivana Heyman 58:44
Yeah, that was interesting, how effective it is to just take even a short break, right, to do a little practice, how it's really, really powerful. She was talking about tree pose, just the benefit of even just doing two minutes while you're brushing your teeth or something, that's pretty amazing. Or meditation, because I asked her about research on meditation, since that's the book I'm working on, and it was amazing, she said that different kinds of meditation benefit different parts of your brain, or something.
Deanna Michalopoulos 59:17
Yeah, like, depending on the type of meditation you do, Yeah, it'll impact your brain structure a little differently, and you didn't...I really wanted to know, like, well, what meditation does what?
Jivana Heyman 59:27
I don't know if I would understand if she answered that question, like would you know what the answer meant if she had answered that? I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, it's complicated, like, how the brain works, but it's just interesting to reflect on that that different practices have different benefits. Yeah. Also makes me think that maybe we know what we need, like, maybe we're drawn to the things that help us the most. You know, the meditation practice that we find, or the asanas that we choose, you know.
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:00:00
That's true. But, and I guess reflecting, like you talk about agency and autonomy in practice, like building the confidence to kind of, you know, take stock in your own experience and say, 'Is this helping? How do I feel after this?' It's not just a throwaway question. I feel like that's the 'yogi in the lab' kind of aspect of practice that's actually really important. Like, because each of us, we maybe don't need a lab to tell us how we feel after a practice and after sustained practice. Like, is this helping or is this not helping?
Jivana Heyman 1:00:34
Yeah, actually, I often say the sign of a more experienced practitioner is they have a sense of how they feel and what's happening during their practice. Because I feel like newer students often ask, like, 'What should I be feeling? Where do I feel this?' You know, those kind of things, which I shouldn't laugh. It's fair, it's a fair question. But it's like, after a while, I think you just become more aware of what you're experiencing in practice. Maybe that's the point, to become more sensitive to your experience, and maybe that then helps you choose. At the same time, working with an experienced teacher or yoga therapist, like for me, you know, I go see Cheri Clampett, who's my yoga therapist, and I go to see her regularly, and she definitely has me do practices that I wouldn't choose. It's almost always restorative. You know, she just gets me to slow down and I like to practice fast. Like, I'm just a very energetic person. Like, obviously, I just did a triathalon, you know, like, my tendency is more and busy and just active. And she's always getting me to be still and quiet for a long time. So, yeah. So I guess we don't always know what we need. We have to sometimes find the right teacher too.
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:01:53
That's true. It's kind of a balance between being so sure of what you need and maybe remaining open to what else...you don't know what you don't know, what else may be available to you, to integrate.
Jivana Heyman 1:02:08
Yeah. But I guess, in a way, I'm choosing to go to her, so I kind of know that I need that, right? So there is like, a knowing. Like, you know, I want to go for a walk, or I want to go to a yoga class, so I'd like to sit and read a book, or, you know, go talk to a friend. And it's like those choices we make about how we spend our time and energy, how we care for ourselves, I think, are really an essential part of the yoga practice, just making those decisions, and then even within the practice itself, what are you doing? Like, what practices do you do, especially if you're doing your own, if you have self practice. It's like, if you have your own personal practice, how do you decide which elements you do at any given time? Like, what meditation do you do? What pranayama? What asanas do you do? It's so interesting. Yeah, I don't know. What do you think about that?
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:02:55
That focus of energy, it kind of reminds me of the part of the conversation where you talked about the study that said that, was it mindfulness meditation has the potential to make people more selfish? And I liked what she said about, you know, your focus matters in this, like, you could be mindful and attuned to many different things, whether it's within or externally or, you know, staying balanced in both or whatever it is. But yeah, the focus of that matters.
Jivana Heyman 1:03:23
Yeah, because I think the practice tends to increase energy, any yoga practice and meditation or mindfulness do the same. They increase prana and access to prana, so they basically build up whatever is already happening in the body and mind, and that may not always be positive things. So, if we tend to be self-centered, it can make us more so. But also people that were very generous and giving and not self-centered were even less self-centered from doing the practice, so it basically exaggerated their natural tendency. But that also makes me think maybe we just do need teachers. You know, we do need someone to kind of keep us in check and to check in with, so maybe that's the answer. It's a balance, like, do your practice, but also, like, even for those of us that have been practicing for decades, we still need to have a teacher. And, you know, and it's funny because, like, my relationship to Cheri, I mean, she's also my friend. I feel like we're peers, but also I trust her to guide me. And so it's like, I don't look for someone as, you know, a guru, or someone who knows more than me, necessarily, just someone who I can trust, and, you know, just somebody who has a different perspective.
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:04:46
And Steffany has a has a few books, am I right?
Jivana Heyman 1:04:50
She does. Yeah, I think the one people maybe know the best is...I have to find it, it's on my bookshelf here, but it's Yoga Therapy for Arthritis, and it's really wonderful. And that's her organization that she, which she didn't talk about very much in the episode, the organization she created is Yoga for Arthritis, and that's what she's known for. She has created teacher trainings to train yoga teachers to share yoga with people with arthritis, which is actually a huge population. Arthritis, as I learned from her, is over 100 different conditions, actually, that are grouped underneath arthritis. It can be a combination of two main areas. There's, you know, osteoarthritis, which is the arthritis most people think of as you age, kind of the wear and tear on your joints. But there's also autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis, which is still arthritis, but has a very different cause, and can affect people of any age and can be very severe. But her work is just really amazing, it's basically like Accessible Yoga for people with arthritis. And she continues to teach programs, like she referenced in the episode, I think she just offered a meditation series or something, so we can link to that in the show notes, because it could be really great. I think arthritis, just like many other disabilities can just be really challenging, especially around movement, and yoga is a great way in because it offers movement, but I think it's safer than a lot of other kinds of exercise for people with arthritis, at least that's what her research has shown.
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:06:37
Yeah, that's amazing.
Jivana Heyman 1:06:39
It is amazing. She's amazing. I'm very grateful to her for her work and for coming on the podcast and explaining all that to us. I feel like I learned a lot from her. I probably should go back and listen to her again, because it's like a different way of thinking. Do you know what I mean? Like, I don't even, I don't know what it is? Medical stuff.
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:07:03
It's so important, I guess, culturally, right now, to have someone who could speak to both the medical side of things in such an accessible way, and also integrative practices, like yoga. Because I think there's some like rejection on both sides, on the other part, when I think it's powerful to have a communicator in both areas.
Jivana Heyman 1:07:25
That is true. That is true. It feels like there's a real gap in communication between those worlds of like, I don't know what we call it, of Western medicine, and then the kind of, what we call alternative, or, you know, I don't know what the language is, but yeah, these worlds seem to be colliding a lot recently. It's so unfortunate and kind of dangerous when I think they can be really synergistic. And I would say that I think most people actually find benefit in both worlds, you know, of traditional systems like yoga and ayurveda, or whatever it is, acupuncture and herbal medicine, or, you know, whatever their traditional healing system is, and also probably benefit from Western medicine. It's too bad that they're not more aligned. It feels like there's tension there.
Speaker 1 1:07:45
Yeah, there's a distrust of institutions, for sure, but it's a shame and a pity and dangerous, because I think at the core, everybody kind of wants the same thing, to be happy, you know, healthy and free in some in sense.
Jivana Heyman 1:08:49
Right. And it just seems like, logically, you'd want to engage with every aspect of human knowledge and experience and wisdom that you can. I mean, it feels like if we had less egos involved, we could potentially be cooperating and collaborating and supporting each other and respecting all these traditions that are equally valid. And I think, I mean, that's something I've learned over time, which is in the yoga world alone, it feels like there's some tension between that, you know, like the Western research on yoga and then just traditional understanding. When I'm training teachers, I always say, like, they're equal, they're just as useful. One isn't better than the other. It's like you can have a benefit to a yoga practice that's based on the tradition. Like the tradition of yoga says that forward bending is calming, or something like that. You can also have research that shows something the same or different about forward bending, and that's fine, too. I think it's important for yoga teachers, especially to cite our sources, and when we're giving those benefits or talking about claims that we're making around yoga practices, that we explain where that information is coming from, right? Like, is this a traditional idea passed down? Because there's some, there's some funny ones, you know, there's some odd things that we've kind of passed down in the yoga world. But sometimes there's a reason for them that we may not even understand, you know, that's just traditionally, this is understood as this. And then it's also fun to see what contemporary research is doing, like some of the things that Steffany was sharing about. Or sometimes a benefit comes just from something your teacher said, 'Oh, my teacher says this, or I found something in my practice.' But I think whatever the source is, we just need to be saying what that source is. Do you know what I mean? Instead of just saying this is the fact.
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:10:47
Yeah and knowing your sources, that kind of allows you to even draw connections between Eastern and Western processes, right? Like, I think it's the most wondrous thing, like, when you, you know, just overlap, oh, the third eye, kind of like, goes back to the pineal gland. Like, I just think those things are really interesting. And, you know, it may not change my life, it may not change my health, or it may, or my perspective, but just making those connections, I think, is super interesting.
Jivana Heyman 1:11:16
It is interesting, although sometimes we get confused, and we think then it becomes the same thing. Like, the third eye and the pineal gland aren't really the same, but there's probably a connection there, exactly. You know, sometimes we want to see things in black and white, and it's just probably not. It's like having what's my Favorite word, um, dialectic. You know, dialectic is two seemingly opposed truths. And, you know, like, both things can be true. And I feel like sometimes, like we describe nadis, you know, the energy channels that prana is flowing through in the body as nerves. But it's like, well, no, it's not the same as nerves. There is a correlation between them, but they're not exactly the same thing. So can there be two different ways of perceiving human embodiment? You know, one is through the Western gaze, and one is through a traditional yogic perspective. That is, you know, really different, like, a really different way of perceiving the human embodiment. And it's not like we can just say, 'Oh, this is equal to that. This is equal to that.' You know what I mean? They're different.
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:12:21
Yeah two different worlds. That's why we need someone like Steffany who can speak to why both is is important.
Jivana Heyman 1:12:25
Yeah, it's amazing. It is true, because they're different, but there's a lot of overlap, too. (The relationship.) Yeah, there's a relationship there. Anyway, yeah, that's what Steffany does, honestly, better than almost anyone I know. I'm just so grateful to her for that, you know, for her work. And, yeah, we'll link to information about Steffany's work and her books in the show notes, and to her course, I think she mentioned a meditation program that she's recently doing or something. So we'll put a link for that as well. And I just want to thank Steffany for her time and all of her work, and thank all the other listeners, everyone here who's listening, and you. Anything else?
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:13:06
Send us a voicemail. I know everyone is probably on the road right now or taking a summer rest, but send us a voicemail. Send us your questions, your responses. We love to get them.
Jivana Heyman 1:13:16
We'd love to hear from you. All right, thanks, Deanna.
Deanna Michalopoulos 1:13:19
Thanks, Jivana. (Okay, bye.) Bye, everyone.
