movement mindfulness wellness community
Credit to Mikey Angelo
ATTENTION SHOPPERS!
⚠️ Foods that have been recalled in the USA but make it a ✨song✨ enjoy that salmonella babes 🇺🇸
Credit to Rebecca Sebastian | Supporting Yoga Professionals Cleanest floors in town coming soon to my house.
xx, R
08/19/2026
Credit to Dr. Jess Steier | Unbiased Science A study published in BMJ Public Health in May 2024 has spent the last two years circulating as "proof" that COVID vaccines killed millions of people. It looked at excess deaths across 47 Western countries between 2020 and 2022 and found more than three million of them. That number got picked up fast (including by several members of Congress) as evidence that vaccines and pandemic policies were behind the deaths.
It's now been retracted. Why? Because the authors never actually studied what caused those deaths, they only counted them. But the discussion section leaned heavily on vaccines and lockdowns as the likely explanation, and two separate investigations found the authors highlighted evidence that supported that story while setting aside evidence that didn't. The journal's retraction notice said the paper's discussion of what caused the deaths was "imbalanced, lacks rigour, and includes misinformation."
So what did cause those deaths? Mostly COVID. One large US analysis found that about 84% of excess deaths were directly attributable to infection, and most of the remaining gap comes from COVID deaths that never made it onto a death certificate (testing was limited, especially in 2020). The rest traces back to disrupted healthcare: delayed cancer diagnoses, deferred cardiac care, overdoses. Meanwhile a study of 28 million French adults followed for nearly four years found no increase in deaths from any cause among vaccinated people, and the researchers concluded that a causal link between mRNA vaccination and excess long-term mortality "appears highly unlikely." And the biggest waves of excess deaths in these countries hit in 2020, before a vaccine existed.
So, the fact that excess deaths happened was never in dispute. The speculation about why was the only new thing the paper offered (without having actual data to support).
Unfortunately, the damage is done. The claim has been repeated for two years, and the corresponding author is now framing the retraction as science silencing her (she testified before a congressional subcommittee about it in June). A retraction notice doesn't travel nearly as far as the headline it corrects.
08/16/2026
Credit to Yoga Medicine by Tiffany Cruikshank There’s a growing body of research exploring yoga's incredible potential to support mental well-being. 💛
Through movement, breathwork, and meditation, yoga offers practices that help regulate the nervous system, improve emotional resilience, reduce perceived stress, and support overall mental health.
These effects are the result of many interconnected mechanisms working together rather than a single pathway.
Yoga isn't a replacement for appropriate medical or mental health care, but we understand more than ever that it can be a meaningful part of a comprehensive approach to well-being for many people.
Perhaps one of yoga's greatest strengths is that it gives us practices we can return to again and again, supporting both body and mind through the changing seasons of life.
How has your yoga practice supported your mental well-being?
08/14/2026
Credit to Tiffany Cruikshank
One of the most fascinating health conversations happening right now has very little to do with weight… it's about what happens next.
GLP-1 medications are highly controversial but they have changed the landscape of obesity treatment in ways few people could have predicted.
For many, they've created opportunities that simply didn't exist before.
What interests me is what comes after.
How do we support muscle mass and connective tissue?
How do we maintain strength, energy, balance, and the ability to do the things we love as we age?
Weight is one marker of health… but it's certainly not the only one.
I'm encouraged that we're finally expanding the tools available to people.
At the same time, I think we're entering a new phase of the conversation… one that asks bigger questions about long-term vitality and resilience… and muscle & connective tissue strength is an important part of that.
As someone who works at the intersection of movement, recovery, and healthy aging, I'm curious to see where the research takes us over the next decade.
Because what ultimately matters isn't simply how much weight we lose — it's whether we're building a body that supports the life we want to live.
I'm curious: how has the GLP-1 conversation shifted your perspective on health & longevity?
08/14/2026
Valerie Knopik was one of the lead trainers when I did my yoga & mental health & wellness training... my favorite training so far on my yoga teacher journey. It connected so many dots for me & jammed in me like no other. Her extensive knowledge & high-level teaching was a huge part of why that training was so freaking excellent. Yoga Medicine is just such an impressive & extensive program. Forever grateful a fellow teacher once mentioned & recommended Tiffany Cruikshank & that it stuck in my ADHD brain & I went down that rabbit hole. Ready to focus back-in on what excites & fascinates me at the same time it lifts & supports me.
Credit to Yoga Medicine by Tiffany Cruikshank
🗣️ What happens when one of the most popular theories in yoga comes under scientific debate?
Over the past decade, Polyvagal Theory has shaped countless conversations about yoga, trauma, & nervous system regulation. 🧠
While many of its ideas have been incredibly influential, researchers are continuing to test, refine, & question aspects of the theory.
In this August Monthly Dose, Therapeutic Specialist Valerie Knopik explores what Polyvagal Theory proposes, where current research agrees, where debate remains, & what this means for yoga teachers & practitioners.
One of the biggest takeaways? ⤵️
You don't need to be a neuroscientist to teach in a nervous system-informed way.
Practices like breath awareness, interoception, invitational language, & creating a sense of agency remain powerful tools for supporting regulation, regardless of how scientific models continue to evolve.
Perhaps the most important reminder of all: True regulation isn't permanent calmness… it's adaptability.
✨ Yoga Medicine Online members can tune into the full Monthly Dose now inside the platform. Link in bio to access.
💬 How has your understanding of the nervous system evolved through your yoga practice?
08/14/2026
✔️ Save the date... 🗓
1st Friday Community Yoga - Yin Practice - September 4th at 6pm
Community Room of Patrick Heath Library Main
Mats, blocks, bolsters, blankets & more provided - or bring your own.
🏵
Ooooh, y'all!!!! This one is a good one! I tell ya - my training thru & with Jill Miller & Tune Up Fitness have been some of my favorites & I luuuuuuv me some ball rolling. Refreshing that fascia, down regulating the nervous system, building that brain-body connection... & it feels so good 🤤
Credit to Tune Up Fitness Give your traps a little vacation without asking your shoulders to stop moving.
Trap Tamer turns an overhead reach into a dynamic self-massage experience. With the Yoga Tune Up Ball positioned along the border of the scapula, reaching your arm overhead encourages the shoulder blade to upwardly rotate while the ball travels toward the spine, creating a targeted pin and stretch through the trapezius, levator scapulae, and surrounding fascia.
Meanwhile, the Coregeous Ball under your sacrum gives your body a little glide, helping the whole technique flow from the ground up.
Reach, roll, breathe, repeat. Your upper back might just become your new favorite place to explore.
What this rollout supports
✔️ Encourages smoother shoulder blade movement during overhead reaching
✔️ Mobilizes fascia around the trapezius and levator scapulae
✔️ Creates more freedom through the upper back, shoulders, and neck
Watch the full Rollout of the Week via the link in bio.
Credit to After a fascia focused cadaver lab with Carla Stecco, one thing becomes very evident… we aren’t scraping barnacles off a muscle like most people imagine with manual therapy.
It’s time to retire the adhesion narrative—and stop spreading misinformation 🤓
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We spent a week with the GOAT of fascia science in our lab at UCSF, and her dissections on fresh tissues were so very illuminating. The problem? Fascia isn’t simply a collection of little bits of scar tissue gluing muscles together.
🙅🏻♀️
In the context of overuse and altered muscle function, densification is often a much more useful concept than knots or adhesions: changes in the fascial tissue and its sliding properties, including the behavior of the loose connective tissue and hyaluronan-rich layers that normally allow fascial gliding. And manual therapy does have effects on those properties 💪🏽
⭕️
The future is less about “breaking things up” and more about understanding what tissue has changed, where it has changed, why it has changed, and how we can influence its mechanics and biology. For our science based courses use Link in BIO for more info
Science > sticky metaphors.
08/10/2026
Take a stand for Texas Public Land: Sign our Letter to TPWD Commissioners and ask them to help protect Big Bend Sign your name to the letter urging Texas State Park officials to oppose destructive border barrier construction in Big Bend Ranch State Park, Black Gap Wildlife Management Area, Seminole Canyon State Park and Historic Site and Chinati Mountain State Park. Please see the letter attached. The letter....