Yogaland Podcast18 Mar 2025

Yoga for Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) with Dr. Kyla Pearce

Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a leading cause of death and disability worldwide. Whether mild (commonly called a concussion) or severe, TBI can create long-term health challenges ranging from cognitive fatigue, to memory loss to insomnia and mental health issues. This episode explores how LoveYourBrain's free yoga and meditation program benefits people affected by TBI and their caregivers.

Since 2015, Dr. Kyla Pearce, Senior Director of Programs and Research at LoveYourBrain, has trained over 2,500 yoga teachers and clinicians in how to adapt yoga for TBI. She was the primary investigator on the largest published study of yoga for TBI, which found significant improvement in quality of life, resilience, cognition, and positive affect among 705 people with TBI who participated in the LoveYourBrain program.

LoveYourBrain was founded in 2014 by brothers Kevin and Adam Pearce following Kevin’s severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) from a snowboarding accident in 2009 while training for the Olympics. Their family’s experience navigating Kevin’s recovery inspired them to create LoveYourBrain.

To date, LoveYourBrain has supported nearly 50,000 people worldwide, through research-backed programs offered at no cost to empower the TBI community with new tools, resources, and connections.

We talk about:

Common challenges after traumatic brain injury
How hard it is to have an invisible injury
What the research says about yoga for traumatic brain injury (TBI)
How Dr. Pearce designed the LoveYourBrain six-week yoga program — from asana adaptations to types of meditation to group sharing
The importance of cultivating resilience rather than a return to “normal”
Post-traumatic growth — what it is and how we can all benefit from seeing life’s challenges through this lens
Mindful March — how you can support people with TBI in accessing yoga
LoveYourBrain’s online teacher training program

Lastly: March is Brain Injury Awareness Month! Go to loveyourbrain.com/challenge to join their Mindful March Meditation Challenge and support their efforts in keeping yoga FREE to those affected by TBI.

There are lots of resources on their website as well as info about teacher training: I've created a curated list of links for Yogaland listeners: www.jasonyoga.com/podcast/episode350

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/yogaland.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Denne episoden er hentet fra en åpen RSS-feed og er ikke publisert av Podme. Den kan derfor inneholde annonser.

Episoder(448)

Yoga Philosophy Explained — The 6 Core Teachings That Unite Every Tradition

What is yoga — really?Most practitioners and teachers can answer that question with a pose, a breath, or a feeling. Far fewer can answer it with the philosophical depth the tradition actually deserves...

29 Jul 33min

Your Twists Are Missing This

Most yoga twists are done to the spine — not with it. In nearly every conventional yoga twist, the arms and legs do the work: The hand presses against the knee. The elbow hooks outside the thigh. The ...

23 Jul 21min

Does Yoga Build Strength? The Science Behind What Yoga Actually Does

This week Jason and I have a conversation the yoga world has been dancing around for years: Does yoga build strength? Jason offers an honest framework for understanding the ways that yoga builds stren...

11 Jul 44min

3 Breathwork and Pranayama Techniques for Yoga Teachers Who Keep Putting It Off

If you've been meaning to teach pranayama in your classes but keep finding reasons to wait — this week's podcast is for you.Most yoga teachers want to include breathwork. The problem isn't interest — ...

1 Jul 21min

Boat Pose Is Not an Ab Exercise

Most yoga teachers cue Full Boat Pose as an abdominal exercise. It isn't — and once you understand why, you'll also discover Low Boat Pose: the most underused core exercise in yoga.Full Boat Pose (Par...

9 Jun 14min

The Real Reason Your Hamstrings Are Still Tight — A Mobility Breakdown for Teachers & Students

Most people assume tight hamstrings are a stretching problem. They're not. Hamstring tightness is almost always multifactorial, which means the solution requires a broader range of strategies — not mo...

2 Jun 17min

Yoga Teachings That Have Endured — 10 Years and 8 Million Downloads Later

Wow wow wow -- it's been 10 years since the launch of Yogaland! It feels like it's been a heartbeat and also a lifetime. There's been so much learning, growth, and love while making these episodes for...

20 Mai 1h 2min

Instability and Love: A Conversation About Family, Addiction, and Recovery

This week's podcast is such a special one because it focuses on our family. Jason sits down with his brother, Todd, to talk about growing up together, the chaos of addiction within family, anxiety, se...

9 Mai 1h 45min