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Sarah Joy Marsh, MA, E-RYT-500 yoga teacher, therapist and author, is a vibrant, compassionate catalyst for transformation to those that suffer from addictions – in particular disordered eating patterns/emotional eating. The combination of her ability to identify when a conditioned mind crowds out clear thinking and to inspire the courage to bring insight into action, her knowledge of powerful yoga and mindfulness tools, her perspective on the terrain of the stages of recovery and the tools to use along the way to recovery make her methodology (outlined in her new book Hunger, Hope & Healing: A Yoga Approach to Reclaiming Your Relationship with Your Body and Food) a comprehensive and effective healing modality. Her 25+ year training and facilitation background includes transpersonal counseling, art therapy, and community mental health, the psychology of yoga, Ayurveda, and rehabilitative yoga. Committed to supporting marginalized populations and using yoga for social justice Sarahjoy founded two non-profits, Living Yoga and the DAYA Foundation. A sought after teacher of teachers, she leads multiple 200hr and 500hr teacher trainings and yoga therapy professional trainings in the Northwest, international retreats and is a regular instructor at Kripalu and Breitenbush Hot Springs

Roopa Singh talks about authenticity, cultural appropriation, and commercialization in yoga. Whereas many people in the West invoke the definition of yoga as union, Roopa reminds us that it also means liberation, both individually and collectively. In this insightful conversation, she raises questions about yoga, safety, visibility, and who is present and absent in most Western yoga spaces. She notes the relative absence of South Asian Americans in many Western yoga spaces, as well as in the wider U.S. pop culture. She calls for South Asian Americans to be leaders and stewards in yoga spaces, and for all of us to more deeply examine our relationship to yogic traditions.

Dr. Sabrina Strings discusses some of the barriers for why many mainstream yoga spaces are alienating for women of color. In this podcast, she discusses what needs to change in order for yoga spaces to become more inclusive and welcoming to diverse communities. She also moves the conversation beyond individual changes in particular yoga studios to a broader shift in the yoga community. Yoga, she notes, can be an important tool for compassion, self-awareness, and deeper, more honest connection to one another as we work toward social change.

Jessamyn Stanley talks about how to listen to our own body wisdom and tap into how we feel rather than how we look. Cultivating self-love is how we can create an empowered body image and yoga community that counters narrow body ideals. She challenges yoga clothing companies, yoga studios, and yoga students to recognize the beauty of all yoga bodies

YBIC podcast features Melanie Klein, Co-Founder of the Yoga and Body Image Coalition. Klein discusses her journey to feminism and yoga. Feminism, she describes, taught her cultural analysis and the systematic nature of inequalities. Yoga taught her how to come home to her body. After experiencing disordered eating, abusive relationships, and negative body image, Melanie found herself deeply empowered by both her feminism and yoga.

Klein discusses how feminism and yoga complement and complete one another. Both are about raising awareness, finding ourselves, and developing authentic ways of being in the world. Feminism provides awareness, but yoga lets us live that awareness on a cellular level.

In this stimulating conversation, Melanie talks of self-care, sustainable social change, and “finding authenticity in who you are.”

Hala Khouri describes how eating is so often connected to shame in U.S. culture and offers signposts for listeners to more kindly relate to our bodies. In her work, Khouri normalizes people’s struggles with body issues and helps us connect with ourselves and with one another. She discusses the difference between being fit and being healthy. As she shares her own journey through disordered eating, an addiction to sugar, and negative body image, she also shares the profound insights yoga has offered her.