Andrew McGonigle ~ The Role of the Nervous System in Yoga Flexibility

Yoga instructor Todd McLaughlin engages in a profound conversation with Andrew McGonigle, an experienced yoga teacher and anatomy expert. McGonigle shares his journey from medical school to fashion, and eventually to teaching yoga, exploring how his diverse background informs his unique approach to anatomy education.

Key topics include the role of the nervous system in muscle flexibility, the resilience of the human body, and the tangible benefits of yoga on the cardiovascular and immune systems. Discover insightful perspectives on integrating scientific and holistic approaches to yoga practice and teaching.

Visit Andrew on his website: https://www.doctor-yogi.com/

Key Takeaways:

• Anatomy and Yoga: Understanding anatomy enriches yoga practice by fostering a deeper connection with one's body and enhancing the teaching methodology.
• Misconceptions about Muscles: Muscle length doesn't change over time; flexibility improvements are more about the nervous system granting permission for greater movement.
• Physiological Benefits: Yoga positively impacts various systems, including lowering blood pressure, reducing chronic inflammation, and aiding in better cardiovascular health.
• Learning and Teaching Methods: Andrew uses a blend of interactive, multi-media resources in his online courses to make complex anatomical concepts accessible and engaging.

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Transcript

0:33

Welcome to Native Yoga Toddcast. So happy you are here. My goal with this channel is to bring inspirational speakers to the mic in the field of yoga, massage bodywork and beyond. Follow us @nativeyoga, and check us out at nativeyogacenter.com. All right, let's begin. Hello, and welcome to Native Yoga Toddcast. I am so happy to bring Andrew McGonigle to the show for you today. Andrew, you gotta go check out his website. It's called doctor-yogi.com. Also find him on his Instagram handle at @doctoryogi. He is originally from Northern Ireland. He resides now in Los Angeles, California. And he has an incredible online program that helps us as yoga teachers and practitioners be able to interact with learning anatomy in a fun and comprehensive manner, where he really just does a great job of explaining and making things relatable and making it fun and entertaining and exciting. And it's just got a great vibe. And I'm so happy that you're here to listen. Remember to check them out and his website, you can follow us at @nativeyoga and just see what we have offered on nativeyogacenter.com. All right, let's go ahead and get get started. Let's begin. So happy to have this opportunity to speak with Andrew McGonigle. Andrew, how are you doing today? How's your day been so far? Doing great. Thank you so much. Yeah, really lovely to meet you. Yeah, everything's good. I just came back from MNLA just came back from a trip to the UK. So a little bit jet lagged. But I'm not actually a morning person. So right now I am up like super early. Nice to feel smug like other people do when they're up really early. Yes. Done Before people are getting out of band score. Yeah, that's, I hear you, man. I hear Yeah. What were you doing in? You said you're in England. Yeah, I was in England and Ireland. Yeah. So a mixture of teaching workshops to yoga teachers, and also visiting friends and family. So you know, I'm from Northern Ireland. Originally, I lived in London for 10 years before moving to LA so you know, I have a lot of people to connect with there. Yeah, so it was gonna be a very busy trip. But glad to be back in LA, which is home for me. Nice. So yeah, back to the sunshine. Very cool. Yeah, I bet I heard that the winter season has been a little rough. I have friends that have filming in Amsterdam, and they said it has been raining and cool for like months, like raining for months. Not Yeah, I would say like the gray skies. Were the thing for me. I was like, Oh, I love London. Like I had a great experience there. I was definitely ready to move on after 10 years. Being back and experiencing like, gray weather for like three weeks. I was like, Yeah, I'm not meant to be here. Let's get me back to California ASAP. Yeah, man, I hear you. It is beautiful out there for sure. And can you tell me what your background your educational background is? Yeah, yeah. So originally, I trained as a medical doctor. So I went to medical school, and then worked briefly as a doctor. You know, any of you any of the listeners in Europe will recognize that things are done slightly differently there. So I went to medical school at age 18, which, you know, normally in America, you go to pre med, and then you go to medical school. So I was super young. Honestly, I didn't have the emotional intelligence at the time to deal with like the level of stress and you know, kind of expectation. So after a brief period, working as a doctor, I was like, peace out. Yeah, but what was beautiful as I'm very grateful for this as I was young, but also I didn't have student debt because at the time, pretty much medical schools free for me in the UK, which is pretty amazing, isn't it? You know, I know here that graduate medical school in America come out with, you know, up to like a million dollars in debt, I think some cases so I was very fortunate that I was young and didn't have debt. So I then had the freedom to go, Wow, what an incredible experience but it's not for me. So I'm going to pivot and figuring out what I want to do with my life. And I at the time, I had no idea what that was. But I ended up working in fashion. So I moved to Australia. And I ended up working for a really cool British fashion designer called Paul Smith. And I ended up pretty much like running their business for them in Australia, New Zealand last year. But in the meantime, I was really getting into yoga. So I started meditating. As a final year medical student, no, I was tired all the time. And a friend said to me, oh, you should try this thing called meditation. Now, obviously, 2024 everyone knows, or as everyone's familiar with the idea of meditation rewind to 2004 it was something I'd heard of it felt a bit kind of woowoo as Oh, yeah, I've heard of this thing, this meditation thing. Okay, great. I'm gonna give it a go. And it was a life changing experience. I did this transcendental meditation course. I just, it was so profound, the way it immediately affected me. And it became this daily ritual, you know, that I really did religiously for a long, long time. And then that was the gateway into yoga. So in Sydney, in Australia, I was walking to my job every day and we'll walk past this really lovely yoga studio kept catch my eye. I ended up becoming a regular practitioner. And then after a few years of very regular practice, I just had this kind of epiphany one day after class, I was like, okay, I can see myself like in the teacher role doing this, and that was that and I ended up training to become a teacher give up my job and fashion, everyone thought I was crazy. They just got their head around me not being a doctor. There, okay, settled. I quit that people like, oh my god, I can't pigeonhole him. And then started working as a, as a yoga teacher in London, moved, moved to London. And then I also did a massage training alongside it, you know, there was always a lot of massage. And I went back to assessed on the course, where I trained to become a massage therapist, and one of the students knew about my background, and they said to me, have you ever thought about teaching anatomy? Not I had literally never, ever thought about it, the thought had never crossed my mind. And I suddenly was like, Oh, wow, yes, this is what I need to do. So I literally pivoted again. And I've now been teaching anatomy pretty much full time for approaching 10 years, teaching yoga teacher trainees, or yoga teacher. So it's been this really beautiful journey, I feel super blast, like, I become so passionate about anatomy through the lens of wellness and movement. Because when I was studying anatomy at medical school, it was all through the lens of disease. And it just felt very dry. And I couldn't really relate it to kind of my everyday life. So it's been really beautiful. Having this like, full circle moment. And now looking at anatomy, like in a completely different perspective, it's been really amazing. You know, that's so cool. Andrew, what in what a great, like you said full circle, and to be able to become a medical doctor than to traverse the fashion industry, fall in love with meditation, practice yoga, become a yoga teacher, and then have your anatomy background, which you obviously did pretty extensive study to get through medical school on gathering. Yeah, and then and to have it all fall into place like that. That's really cool. Enjoy. Like I was, I was making those steps, I didn't really couldn't see the bigger picture, obviously, you know, like, So, part of me when I was in fashion was like, Oh, God, I kind of feel like I've wasted my degree, in a way, you know, to reflect on as I essentially learned how to run a small business. So I apply that to my business as a yoga teacher and anatomy teacher, you know, so it's like, every element has helped me to become this kind of rounded individual. And, you know, yeah, it's so it's been, it's been really exciting to kind of look back and recognize, oh, this is why I made that choice. I can make sense. Now, even though it probably didn't make sense, you know, 15 years ago, but yeah, it's, um, it's really special. What about pre pre med, when you were, say, 1516 was going to become a doctor, something your parents said, Andrew, the only way you're gonna make money is if you either be a doctor or a lawyer, or was it that you had this fascination with either the body or science or the medical profession? How did that come about? That's a lovely question. Thank you. Yeah, I loved science. I was a big science nerd, and I also loved people. I loved working people I ended up at like high school basically setting up like an informal homework club for younger students after school. That was just my niche. I just always loved teaching APL and being with people. So it made sense to me the time to combine this love for people in this love for science. Also, what really helped us My sister was at med school, she was three years ahead of me. And my parents didn't put the pressure on. But we both went to a very, very academic school, where there were the expectations that if you were kind of this, like, what we say in the UK is like a straight A student, you know, when you get A's and everything, I don't know if that's what how that translates in America. Yeah, it does. Same thing. Yeah. You understand what I mean? Great. Yes. So there was like this idea of actually, you know, if you're getting these grades go, do you become a lawyer or become a dentist or become an architect or become a doctor? And I didn't allow myself to look at any other options, you know? Yeah. So when I got to medical school, I was like, Oh, wow. Like, I've made such an uninformed choice. Like, 1516 when you're making those decisions, and then 18 When I was there, I was like, I had no idea what this was going to be about. And then also, it's really fascinating. We were literally thrown in the deep end week one of med school. We had to do dissection on cadavers. No one pulled us aside and said, Look, for some of you, this is going to be the first time you see a dead body. No. and Ireland grown up with Catholicism. I'd seen lots of open casket so I, you know, unfortunately, when family members or you know, friends of family died, I would go and see a dead body. But, you know, for a lot of people, that was the first experience, but there's no there was Kevin no emotional support, or we weren't kind of pulled aside afterwards. And we're like, let's talk about this. And what what was it like? Yeah, you know, yeah. Hold on a moment, I think the first time. Thanks. So basically, it was just kind of this wild ride, and you had to kind of go with that. And it was also like, there wasn't direct competition between me and my other students. But I remember a girl fainting, and the first dissection class and we kind of all were like, Oh, she's probably not going to last and she dropped out, like a few months, and you think there was just this kind of weird that you pulled it all and get on with that date with all this stress, all these new things, these emotional things, but, and I think, as an emotional person, I just did not feel supported. And I really, I imagined things have changed quite drastically over the last one years. But for me at that time, I was just like, whoa, like, I don't know if I'm ready for this. That's so fascinating. Oh, my gosh, I can the way you painted that picture. I can does a good job. I can see it did heads, you know, all kids trying to deal with this, you know, it was kind of amazing. Yeah, I and I love anatomy. And I got my I took my first anatomy course I went to massage therapy school here in Florida. And over the years, I've gotten more and more enamored with it, and recently got a chance to go watch a speech by a man named Gil Headley have you and he he's a big time cadaver research person, and he dissected the entire nervous system out of cadaver and took photos and video and showed the entire journey from start to finish. And it just blew my mind. I mean, I I would love that opportunity. But that this is after like 25 years of slowly acclimatize, getting acclimated to this idea of being fascinated by doing that type of work. So I can imagine at 18 Like, oh, go to medical school, and then bam, you're in there doing a cadaver dissection that would be eye opening, what is one of the what realizations did you have then in relation to the human body and the experience of actually going into the body and seeing it? I'm gonna be real honest with you. I don't know that there were many realizations, because it was just overwhelmed. And I think the education that I had prior to that, it, it didn't invite you to question things. So it just invited you just to take things as fact and write it down. So there was a lot of just like, memorizing everything. No, and there wasn't a lot of like really thinking about how does this like apply to everything. And so it was quite a weird, abstract experience, if I'm really honest with you. And I think but what I'm grateful for is it gave me this really, really solid foundation and anatomy and anatomical language and medical terminology and, and even like dissecting a medical paper, you know, a research paper so it's like the I see almost like med school has given me this really firm foundation and then I have to go off and look at things in a completely different perspective as someone was interested in wellbeing and movement you know, so that That was the thing it was really, I'm so grateful for that experience. But well, it's like a deer in headlights just trying to like get through. That makes perfect sense. That makes perfect sense. If I'm your teeth, so you offer anatomy training for yoga teachers, yoga students, and you have online programs, and you also help yoga teacher trainers. Utilize your coursework to be able to teach such a deep and sometimes difficult subjects such as anatomy, which is pretty cool, because I mean, it's trying to relate a subject that you'd like you got thrown into the deep end, to relate that type of study to a new student who's just perhaps just starting to even memorize like the name of a bone, you know, like, yeah, or the name of a muscle? Where do you start with absolute beginner mind? Where Where do you even begin in relation to starting to teach? Not anatomy in relation to a yoga training? Yeah, no, that's a really good thing, I think. And also, I love that description. Because it makes it makes me realize why I'm quite good at breaking stuff down and making stuff really relevant because I've had to do that myself in a different contexts. So thank you for that. It's kind of I've never thought about it that way. For me, like, I love to start with just like discussion. And also hear from people like one of the first questions I asked when I'm in like a group is, why do you think it's important for us to study anatomy, and then all this stuff starts coming out, and some of it is really spot on. And some of it's kind of quite outdated, you know, but it's really interesting to kind of get a sense of like, where people are coming from. And then what I love to do is I love to basic I do, I do basically like a session, it's called intelligent movement principles. And we do that by slowly starting to understand like muscles, like, what is muscle? What's it about? Why do we have it? How does it behave? What are the misconceptions, we often have voted, you know, and then and then we cannot understand that because you know, so much of our physical asna practice is using our skeletal muscle, and then we do some of them with bone and like, what is bone? Like, why do we have that? And what's it made up of? How does it behave? What are the misconceptions about it, so it's like, breaking that down, then doing a similar thing with like, connective tissue with fascia with all that, and then we like wrap it all up. So it's like, it's kind of like a little bit like the medical model, which is to like, break things down into components. But then it's always reminding people that that we're one entity, so we're not, you know, we're, we're breaking things down to understand them. But then we're always going to add the pieces back together. Because nothing works in isolation, you know, so it's, yeah, it's really cool, actually. And what I find is that it's easier to take people on a journey where they have very little knowledge, because they're not coming in with all these like preconceived ideas. It's the, it's the person that's maybe studied anatomy quite a lot that comes in like very fixated on their beliefs. That can be a harder nut to crack because I'm like, left blank release, that if you can let a lot of your preconceived ideas, leave out the door, you can collect some of the backup again afterwards, but then you're more likely to learn. So actually, I love teaching people where they feel like they have very little knowledge. But we often also have more knowledge than we realize, don't we, because we we've all experienced some sort of injury, or maybe our close friend or family member has a certain medical condition or, and then we kind of end up gleaning all this information about certain layers of the body or some parts of the body. So I also I enjoy allowing people to realize that they often know more about the body than they think, as well. Nice, you know, yeah. That's a really fun journey I really enjoy. And then we then once we've got that foundation, then we go on a journey, like through the body, like through that started the feet. Let's, let's get you know, let's move her feet, let's pop her feet. Let's relate this to yoga, let's look at the ankle movements, where do these appear in the asanas? You know, so it's all at all feels very, very relevant to what we're doing. And I think that's something that's a real focus of mine, like how do we relate this all as much as possible? So I want to say like, I'm not going to teach much about the nerves or even the blood vessels, because it's very hard to relate that directly to the practice, but when we're looking at the joints and the muscles, the end, yeah, that that can now make sense when we break down trick in Asana and a grip and look at it, you know, that way so for me, it has to really be able to be related. Otherwise, I try not to go into too much detail because it just it just becomes completely overwhelming for people you know, agreed 100% You said that one of the ways that you will frame it One of the original questions when you meet up with a group is you'll ask, Why do you think it'll it's important to study anatomy as a yoga practitioner and teacher? If I asked you that question, why do you and you think that it's important to study anatomy, if you're a yoga teacher and or practitioner? Yeah, I think, you know, this, this amazing human body is our vehicle. Hopefully, for quite some years to come, we're traveling around the world and this body. So it's like when when we learn anatomy to enough to kind of sufficient detail, A, we end up in all of our body, and then we respect your body more, and we want to work with your body rather than against it, we want to, we want to age well, you know, and we want to, we want to take care of this vehicle. And then also, as a teacher, what's beautiful is, when you learn anatomy to a certain date, to a certain kind of level of detail, it gives you a confidence to say less, it gives you a competence to not complicate things, and to not justify things often happens in a way people will justify are cute and awkward and a rabbit hole that's very incorrect and also can be harmful. Sample A cue like an A warrior post, keep your knee above your ankle, that's great. Like that's very traditional alignment. And this Devin definitely makes sense to do that and many cases, but if you then go on a step further and say, we're going to keep her knee above her ankle to protect her knee joint, that's actually incorrect. And the vast majority of cases and it's harmful, because that language, even though it can feel not so powerful, can end up creating this narrative that parts of the body, like the knee are fragile, and that we both need to be aware of what we're doing. Now, of course, we I always encourage people to make very intentional movements in yoga, really understand what you're doing and why you're doing it. But I think that when you learn anatomy in a certain way to a certain level of detail, you realize how resilient and robust the body is, and that informs your own practice. But it also informs how you kind of hold space for other people. I think that's the most powerful thing for me. It's like, like, you know, like this weekend, I said, it was just an England teaching this weekend. And the feedback was beautiful. And it's never Oh, I loved suddenly being able to remember all the muscles in the lower leg. But that's not particularly helpful. That's not really going to make you a better teacher. But it's the light bulb moments of someone going Oh, wow. Like, I've suddenly become more clear on my relationship with my lower back pain. And it's going to not only help me to feel better, but it's also going to totally reframe the way I talk to a student who comes to class with back pain, you know, so that's the kind of thing for me just beautiful, like, Oh, it's just makes everything worthwhile when I, you know, get that kind of feedback. So it's like, that's, for me, that's what the magic is of studying the body. It's we yeah, we just realized, like the resilience 100 Buster bodies are and also this amazing ability for a body to heal, you know, and in the vast majority of cases. So, yeah, great answer, really flux. I love that. You also threw out another question. And I'm curious what your answer will be to this. What is muscle? What is it? Yeah, so it's, it's basically it's a, it's a tissue. So it's a group of group of cells basically, that all behave in a similar way that's essentially governed by the nervous system. And it's there, you know, when we, when we think of it, maybe from a physical asset to practice, it's there to help us to move. And often it uses your bones as levers to move, or it's also there to prevent movement or to refine movement, you know. So it's a it's a remarkable, remarkable tissue. And it's also again, never in isolation. So it's inter woven with connective tissue fascia, it's such a buzzword at the moment, and it's, it's continuous with bone, you know, so muscle becomes tanned, and that becomes bone. It's all inter woven. But again, in the medical model, we like to break things down and look at them separately, but then it's always a bit remembering to add them back up again, you know, so it's a really, it's a really cool thing. And then it's again, it's about how do we bring that alive in a workshop like how do we really get people to experience how their muscle behaves? And also, I love to like break down misconceptions. So like, one of the things is that in yoga, we often talk about muscle lengthening over time. So a lot of people will, or people will say, Oh, I have chronically like short, hamstrings are setting shortens my hip flexors, you know, and really, the latest science is telling us that that's kind of rubbish. And that muscle doesn't change length over time, you know, doesn't become longer or become shorter. And it's all governed by the nervous system. So there's something that we're talking about the moment that's called stretched tolerance. So maybe how far you're folding forward and passion, Milton Asana, it's actually been governed by your nervous system. And it's essentially it's sensation that that ultimately limits movement in most cases. And then maybe if you're practicing very mindfully, and you move in with your breath, and your props and regulate your nervous system might then grant you permission to move a little further on the muscle stretches in that moment. And then after the stretch, it'll come back to its resting state, you know, so just things like there's just so fun exploring, and also scientists always changing. So it's like, I'm never fixed on a belief. But I'm like, This is what the latest science is telling us that but the pendulum will swing. And then maybe there'll be a paper that says, oh, muscle does lengthen but only lengthens like, by a few millimeters or, you know, so it's like, it's just fascinating keeping on top of it all, you know, it's so fascinating. And the idea of say, when I'll just pick, say the Ashtanga yoga practice, and you're practicing primary series, are you familiar? I bet you've come across everything right? In the last 20 years. I'm sure you, I'm sure you're okay, cool. And you're familiar, say like, let's just pick that one little segment where you're learning the Mirchi awesomeness. richiesta, A, B, C, and D. And maybe the first time you go for more Chiasson, a and then for those of you listening, I can't assume that you know what I'm talking about. But like if your say your left leg is forward, you bend your right knee up, you take your right arm, wrap it around the inside edge around the leg, and you catch your hands behind. And so like you gotta you gotta catch your hands behind and they don't catch. And you know, maybe someone puts a strap or a towel or someone come assist and tries to pull you in. It's like, there's no way you got like about eight inches or, you know, big old gap there. And then you keep doing it, you keep doing it, you keep doing it. And before you know it, boom, you caught your hands. Yeah, in your opinion, nervous system relaxation, are we are we are we learning to move from that sympathetic fight or flight struggle mode, we start breathing, the parasympathetic kick in, we're in the rest of rest and repair mode. And then the muscles themselves and the joints didn't really restructure anyway, and the muscles didn't really like them. But the nervous system relaxed. And that's why we call it that sounds to me a little bit more like your explanation currently for how we actually, quote, improve our flexibility? Like, are we? Do we ever really improve our flexibility? Because it does seem like if we continue working these sequences and these postures over and over again, that, Oh, my gosh, I'm able to do all these things I just wasn't able to do before. What is your what are your thoughts in this field? I think it's ultimately about the nervous system feeling safe. You know, because that because, you know, the nervous system has to weigh things. So it's, it's information coming from the brain out to the body, but it's also information coming from the body back to the brain. So, you know, we talked with the vagus nerve a lot, you know, when it's a big component of the parasympathetic nervous system, which is the rest and digest well, 80% of the vagus nerve is carrying information from the periphery back to the central nervous system. So when, when we become stronger, the nervous system feels safer. Like when again, when we're approaching things in this like very intentional way, when we're focused on our breath. You know, when we're working with our body, rather than against that, and kind of pushing or struggling, then that's, that's what my sense is that the nervous system is like, Okay, well, you know, you're working with me, so I'm going to work with you. And then over time, you get granted this kind of greater range of movement, you know, pretty cool. Like this. It's all inexact science at the moment, like, we don't have science that can back up every element of that, you know, equation, but that's, you know, I, I, from all the reading and research I've done over the years, it's, you know, really, it's the nervous system. And that's what gives us most of the benefits that we get in yoga. Most of the benefits come from the way that we're interacting with the nervous system, you know, so we're still and also it's fasting because we're still not entirely sure, like, why, why we get all the benefits we do from yoga. Like we can't fully explain all of that yet. Maybe one day we will be able to, maybe we'll never be able to fully explain it, you know, but I get a sense of it's the nervous system plays like a big big part, and not, it's pretty cool. It's very cool when we We're about to say, going back many, many years ago to like, old school India yoga practice. And if we were just to take a stab at say, like 2500 years ago, the understanding of anatomy in relation to Western anatomy, obviously has evolved quite a bit. And yeah, do you think, like, do you think, oh, gosh, are we making strides forward because of our increase of information and knowledge, because it seems to me like a lot of the knowledge was like, there, and now we're able to prove it. But it kind of like, like in relation when I saw Gil's dissection of the nerve tree, and we hear about the chakra system. And we might think, oh, you can't, you know, cut into the body and see the noddy's, you know, these energy channels that were spoken out and the older texts. But now when we look at the nerve chain, we look with a nerve Plexus IR there, there are nerve Plexus at each of the chakra points. And it's almost like they already knew this. And now science is backing it up. And you'd made mention that maybe we will know all the answers. I sometimes I wonder, maybe we already do know all the answers. I know it's being a little philosophical. But I'm curious what you think, like not not everything does need to be explained. But I think what is particularly helpful, what to say when it comes to research being done, as it also tells us Yes, like this practice is safe for certain people. That's a good thing, isn't it? Because if you know, if we're prescribing yoga to people with cardiovascular disease, and all these things, like we also want to have research that tells us for that group of people, this is safe. So I think it definitely adds a lot to the conversation. I also from my perspective, I don't think it takes away anything, I think it just adds to the conversation. So I'm, I've written a couple of books. The second book I wrote is called the physiology of yoga. And it's based on evidence based look at how yoga interacts with each of the major systems of the body. And, you know, the majority of people that come across really enjoy the book, there's always going to be a bit of pushback, because some people are like, Oh, I'm just so sick of this. I'm so sick of people trying to explain yoga through a scientific lens. And I get that on a personal level, I get that. But I'm never trying to take away anything. I'm just trying to add to the conversation. Add another layer, and I don't think that has to take away any of the beauty or power. I agree. I agree. How does the How does yoga affect the endocrine system? Or from our whole our hormones? Yeah, so that's a good question. The biggest way would be through the stress response, you know, so the sympathetic, so think of the sympathetic versus parasympathetic. A big part of the sympathetic nervous system is actual nerves innervating, certain parts. The other part is the nervous system interacting with the endocrine system via the pituitary gland, which is the kind of the master gland. So really, again, one of the major benefits is that yoga is pretty powerful at helping us move out of a place of kind of chronic sympathetic stimulation, you know, yes. And I think I never look at things as black and white, like, sympathetic doesn't mean bad and partisan, but that doesn't mean good. It's always a dance. But basically, a regular yoga practice helps us to move more efficiently between sympathetic and parasympathetic. Like, you basically want flexibility in your body, but you also want to have flexibility and your physiology. So by having a regular practice that that tends to calm us down, then we become better at flicking between stress states of stress or non stress, people are more efficient at that move. Yeah. That's a really powerful thing to be able to do. That's cool. That's the key way. What about in relation to immune system and lymphatics? Yeah, so one of the biggest misconceptions that people can throw around these statements, they'll say, oh, yoga boosts the immune system? Well, when you look at that, from a physiological perspective, it makes no sense. And in fact, you wouldn't want to boost your immune system. Because think of your innate immune response. It's your first line of defense, you're going to basically feel the symptoms of your innate immune response when you have an allergy reaction. So you're going to rub your nose is going to run you're going to congest you're probably going to tear up so all that first line defense is very rapid, but but kind of nonspecific. So if you were to boost your immune system, you would feel unwell the whole time. You would end up with depression, all these holes horrible things, you don't want to do that. But actually, it's the opposite what you what yoga can do is it can down regulate parts of the immune system in cases of chronic inflammation. Because inflammation is an essential part of the immune response, you have to be able to have an inflammatory response, or you would not stay alive. But what you don't want is for that to become persistent beyond when it's needed. And it's yoga that can help to downregulate that. So we're even realizing that, that osteoarthritis, it's not a wear and tear disorder it is. It's to do with systemic inflammation that happens to show up in certain joints. It's fascinating. So there are so many diseases that have this huge chronic inflammation component. And yoga can help us to downregulate that, so that's pretty amazing. That's so cool. Great answer. Thank you, cardiovascular. This one, I would think seems maybe if someone doesn't practice yoga, and you say yoga is good for your heart. How do you explain or how could you verify that? Or do you have a rebuttal? Beautiful one. But there's also we often talk about a heart centered practice. And it's also beautiful to like, line that up with the science. So yoga has a very powerful effect on the cardiovascular system, it can lower blood pressure over time, it can also lower your resting heart rate. And your resting heart rate is a really important parameter. It's one of the key things that physicians are now looking at to determine your overall health. So it's basically how you how quickly your heart is beating at rest, you know. And also, we talked about, you know, shifting between sympathetic and parasympathetic. Well, the way that is actually measured as by something called heart rate variability. So it's the variance between your heartbeats and you want. High Heart Rate Variability means that you can very quickly shift states if you have low heart rate variability, you're very sluggish to move between states, you don't want that. So this suggestion that yoga can help with heart rate variability, there isn't a lot of research done on this, but there's kind of like a suggestion that it's going to help them that way, as well. And it can also help reduce a lot of the risk factors for cardiovascular disease as well. So yeah, it can have a really, really powerful rule. And it's also going to help venous return to the flow of blood back to the heart. Because if you think of blood traveling from your heart to your big toe, it the blood pressure takes it there. But then if you're standing a lot of the day, it's hard to get that blood back to the heart. Thankfully, a lot of the bouts of are sort of a lot of the veins of one way valve. So when blood travels up towards the heart, it can't travel back. But skeletal muscle contracting also helps depress that back. So when you have strong feet and strong ankles and strong calf muscles from all your yoga, then you're going to always be helping blood to return, you know, back to the heart. So yeah, so there's a lot, there's a lot of stuff there. That's so cool. Factor fiction, a long while back ago, I heard somebody say, Okay, you're lying in shavasana, it's time to come back up to seated, roll over onto your right side of the body, because it's easier for your heart to function when you're laying on your right side due to the way the ventricles work with the heart versus if you lie or lay on your left side. That makes sense, is that I think it's a bit of all right, I didn't know almost like or like, think about your heart for a second, your heart starts to beat in your mother's womb. And it continues to be hopefully till the day you die. It's so resilient. It's this incredible made of cardiac muscle that is designed for endurance, it's going to beat billions of times in your lifetime. It's very resilient part of our anatomy, I think it'll be fine if you roll over on the other side. It's not spontaneously combust. Well, my but you know, I can't promise anything, but I think there's a very low chance about amazing when you were talking about heart rate variability, and then when we inhale, our I believe, or help, please correct me if I'm wrong. When we inhale, our heart rate speeds up. When we exhale, our heart rate slows down. So I've heard someone mentioned recently that you can definitely control your respiratory system, which is an autonomic, a part of our autonomic nervous system like it automatically happens we breathe no matter what even if we don't think about it. But you can control your breath. But if you try to use your thoughts, you might may or may not be able to get your heart rate to slow down just with thinking alone. so that if you want to control your heart, if you do longer exhalations that, then on the exhale, the longer exhalation will make your heart rate slowed down. Hence, that's why they recommend if you're feeling anxiety do like that ratio of breath where it's like a one to two where you inhale for one, but you breathe for two. Is that do you believe, then we do have control over over our heart, even though it is an autonomic response? Yeah, it's, it's really beautiful. Because as you say, the respiratory system is the only system in the body that has both voluntary and involuntary control. So we're not thinking about breathing here during this conversation, but we can manipulate our breath as we did so many ways in yoga. So it's the gateway to access all the other physiology that's normally beyond our conscious control. So you can't like quickly grab a burrito on the way to yoga and then be like, come on digestive system, you know, get digesting good, I've got a class to get to. But what you could do is you could sit and do like a breath practice that's focused, say on the axial like we've talked about, and that will in turn, help to, like, get the digestive system going. So you know, you I would say, don't eat a burrito straight for class. But um, yeah. And also, the reason why the heart rate increases as you inhale and decreases the exhale is because during the exhalation, the parasympathetic nervous system fires to stiffen the airway so that they don't collapse on the exhale. And therefore, as a result of that, the heart rate slows very cool. So a man as you inhale, the I believe it's the sympathetic nervous system, slightly a dilates the airways. So therefore, as a result, the heartbeat quickens. Yeah, it's very good. Ah, amazing. I have to ask you, I, my wife and I did train with Bikram Choudhury in Los Angeles back in 2001. And it was unbelievably hot like he heated that room to like torture chamber style he your thoughts on to heat or not to heat, external heat versus internal he heating up the musculature? I recently got a chance to interview man in mountainous Altberg that lives in Finland, he goes ice bathing every single day, in the middle of winter, when it's like freezing cold, he still goes in the water. And he's like, I practice yoga on the ice. He's like, you don't have to be in a hot room to do yoga. You can do yoga and the ice. So I'm curious what what, what's true? Well, I think you know, what I love about hot yoga is it's this gateway that brings a lot of people to yoga. And I want more and more people to practice yoga, we need it, we need more and more people on this planet practicing yoga. So it's a you know, it's something that seems to attract people, whether it's for this idea about sweating detoxes me, which is also a load of rubbish, by the way, but well, you know, that's for maybe for another conversation. But you know, so I think so I actually taught hot yoga in London, alongside other forms of yoga, and I tucked it in an infrared space with infrared panels on the ceiling, and it would heat the body directly instead of the air. I loved it. Honestly, I felt great. And I loved the fact that because of the intensity, people really had to slow down and become really intentional, do what they're doing. Because if you push through, you'll probably pass hiked. So there was something about like a slower, more controlled practice that I really enjoyed. And so I'm not someone that's like, Oh, hot yoga is a load of rubbish, you know, but as for the benefits beyond that, yeah, it's going to help you to it's going to basically help you to become better at regulating your temperature over time, which is, which can be a useful thing. But if Hot Yoga is not your thing, don't feel like you're also missing out on anything, you know, you're not going to get a ton of extra benefits compared to any other style of yoga. And then, you know, cold, cold therapy or, you know, immersing yourself in cold water and stuff. Yeah, there's definite benefits to be had. I think we still need all the science to back it all up. I love a really cold shower. It makes me feel amazing. It wakes me up. If I have a headache, I put my head under cold water in the shower and the headache goes normally, you know, so there's a lot of things I maybe don't have all the explanation for it. But yeah, I think our body just craves diversity and craves novel challenges. Because another thing is if you're if you have cold exposure every day, there might be a sense of your It becomes very used to that and then you don't quite get the benefits you did at the start of it, you know, interested in maybe that person could benefit from hot yoga you know, so I would just say mix it up and but also don't lose sleep at night going, oh, I need to create time and my week for an ice bath you don't have to like if it doesn't, if it's not something that resonates with you don't worry like you're you're gonna be fine you're gonna live a long healthy life but it's but if that's something that really resonates you for whatever reason yet do and if it feels good, keep doing it. You know? That's cool, great answer. Growing up in the north of Ireland did you go swimming? I watched a series on TV recently called Bad sisters. That takes place in Ireland and obsessed with that show. I loved it so good. And there's the young sesame young sister as Bono's daughter Oh, I didn't know that. The young it's a great show. Great show. I want to go to Ireland so bad. So did you swim like that? They're swimming all the time. I'm like that water has to be so freezing cold they're just making it look like they're just like having a great time in the water. Water freezing. Been in the sea all year round here. I don't like it. My hair wet. Todd. Yeah. Fair enough. I'm your hair looks amazing. So I can see why you don't want to get it wet. In here. No. I was. It's become something much more popular in recent years. And I think Wim Hof is probably got a lot to do with it. So like I a lot of my mom's friends will go see swimming every week, a couple times a week, you know, that kind of way? Yeah. So I think it's something that it's not necessarily like a cultural thing. I think maybe it was something that people did on New Year's Day. Oh, ha ha year on this thing. And it's cool, because yeah, it's getting people more active. It's getting people outside their comfort zone. Yeah, that's all good. Now, you did make mention I know this is getting a little off the anatomy and yoga subject, but you didn't make make mention I grew up Catholic and I went to a bunch of funerals. Is this because of like Catholic Protestant? Fighting? Oh, right. Oh, because of like, like the IRA and the whole? Yeah. Oh, no. So basically, in Ireland in the 80s. It was very interesting, because my mum is English. And my dad is Irish. And they met in England at Teacher Training College, and then they fell in love. And basically my dad got offered a job in Northern Ireland at a very good school to school I went to my dad was one of my teachers awful, but it wasn't that bad. But it was he taught me sex education now. It's very cringe. But um, so basically, they moved they moved there in the 70s. That was literally on heard of it would like it would it would be like to move to Northern Ireland from England in the Senate. And people are absolutely crazy. Gaza right now. You know, like, basically, I'm sorry, I can't I can't they're not it's not the same experience understood, but understood. It was. It was a warm, torille country, it was political unrest and terrorism. So it was, you know, sort of sorry, I don't I don't think it is the same as ours at all. But it's a modern day equivalent, I guess. So no worries. So then, I grew up with quite an unusual background, because my mum had to then become Catholic because you couldn't really bring up a family with a mixed religion household. But also she had the open mindedness beyond being Catholic. So it was great because we were exposed to like different cultures. And then also we went to England every summer. And the town that I grew up in just just let's say, dairy, dairy is a beautiful set. It's come very popular because of a Netflix show called Derry girls, which is bloody amazing. Somebody told me to watch that yesterday. All right. All right. So you'll learn a lot about the history of Ireland. Like written history, it's really beautiful. So I was very lucky that the terrorism was kind of going on around me, but I was never like, directly directly affected by it. Yeah, there was definitely like school friends that lost family members, and all that kind of stuff. But I think for various reasons, I was kind of slightly protected from that. I was also able to bear with summer for two months when a lot of like, a lot of the problems happened in the summer. And I was always able to, like be removed from that. So yeah, it's an interesting thing. I think. It felt normal to me because that's all I knew, other than my summers away, and I think the one the take main takeaway from as, as a younger adult, I really struggled with conflict and I really struggled with anger because I didn't have like, greater rule more. holes are robbing me that dealt with anger in a productive way. So I think there was a lot of time where I felt like I can't be angry, because if I'm angry at all, it'll become like, violent, you know. So that's been an interesting thing as like an adult to explore that and see, like, how growing up in a country like that has kind of influenced the way I kind of walk through the world today. You know, it's kind of interesting. Fascinating, Andrew, that's a great interest. You need to get the art and you know, McLaughlin definitely, they're definitely not especially after I watch Derek girls, I know to two good Irish. It's a really beautiful country. It's not so where I see myself living. Yeah, again. Yeah, it's a really beautiful country. And we've really enjoyed visiting there. And it's a really special time, beautiful culture, beautiful scenery, music, you know, just very, very friendly people. Yeah, it's a really special part of the world for sure. What do you think of the LA yoga scene? So I'm gonna be honest with you, I haven't really dipped into it. I moved to LA just before COVID. And I had spent a long time building up a name for myself in Europe. So I've always focused on doing kind of in person stuff there, rather than here. Yeah. And it's also nice, because I was really, really heavily involved in the yoga scene in London, it's actually nice to come here and be anonymous, and not really, like, be a part of the scene here. You know? So yeah, I'm gonna be honest, like, I'm not really tapped into it, you know, I don't know. And I, in the past, I've been to places like Yoga works and stuff. And I know that that's closed on. So it's been an interesting time for yoga in LA, a lot of places have closed, a lot of pieces of music opened, but you know, just the way my life has been, I don't really feel like I'm a big part of that, and actually serves me quite well, I get to just do my own thing at home. And very cool. How do you how do you so I know like you flew to England, and you're able to teach a workshop in person with people there? Can you explain a little bit about how your online program, how you've developed it, and what you saw the trajectory trajectory that has taken from beginning to present day? Yeah, for sure. I'm gonna be honest, I was a snob about online learning, you know, pre lockdown, I just was that, oh, it's never going to, it's never going to be the same as in person, and then locked on happened. And I had this whole schedule, like a tour, basically, in Europe, of all these sold at workshops, and I was like, Oh, my God, I'm not gonna be able to do this. So I ended up, you know, taking a step back, and I put a 30 hour course together. And it was such an amazing experience. I'm so proud of it. I think that a lot of people have like written to me and said, no offense, but I've been to you in person, and I fair, the online. I'm like, no offense taken, because I think I still have a way of delivering my humor and my personality. And a way where people can like take their time, they can rewind, they can rewatch things. It's very interactive. So there's a lot of homework, there's quizzes, and then also people engage with me on like, regular live q&a days. So I get to meet people. And I do also like, when people sign up, I often do like a small group, like, intro, we meet each other, and I talk them through the course, so that people really feel like I'm there with them, you know, through the journey. And then I also get to, like, update the course. So like, you know, up until a few years ago, we mentioned arthritis, I was of the belief that arthritis was very much a mechanical thing. It was mechanical wear and tear it was, you know, it was to do with joint destruction. And it's been beautiful, because I've been able to, like do a deep dive into that topic. And then I've been able to update the course, and be honest with people, I keep the old information and say, Look, this is what I thought before, this is what I know, I think, based on the research was beautiful, because people also get to see my journey, as well. And yeah, it's been, it's been a really, really special thing. And also, I'm able just to interact with more people, because instead of people having to travel to see me in London or something like that, you know, it's just so much more accessible, you know, so yeah, it's been a really beautiful experience. And then I know provided for many yoga teacher training courses, which is really, really special because I feel like it's a really solid course and gives trainings like a really brilliant foundation. I knew at the start of their journey, and I feel really grateful to be a part of that. It's really lovely. That's cool. So the original 30 hour course that you created is for anybody and everybody that in that wants that's interested can take it and then what you created a separate program that is for the teacher training course or do they get like a bespoke version of that? It's really nice, you know, but yeah, the original one is lifetime access. And for a teacher trainings, I'm able to offer it at a much much reduced price, but then they get it for the duration of their training rather than lifetime. You know? Yeah. So it works for me. And it works really well for the people that are running training courses. Yeah, so it's just like a bespoke version of that with pretty much all the same information on it. And yeah, it's been it's been like such a joy. Did you? Did you have to, I have not yet had the opportunity to take your course. So I apologize, because I can't ask a question based off of information. However, whenever I interact with anatomy, online anatomy, slides are often used and or visuals are used did you need to create all of your own content? Or were you able to utilize like stock footage to to get your point across, so and the manual and the printed manuals or the you know, the PDFs, I was lucky because I was able to take images from my books. So there are images that I've already ah, what the publisher, so I was like that, but and then what I did was I actually hired a really brilliant 3d animator, and we made 3d animations of all the muscles. Whoa, really cool. That's a big endeavor. That's a big, really big call. That's an investment. Yeah, that's a nerd. I mean, I would imagine you would, I'd think I'd better make sure I sell enough courses to make hiring a 3d animator work has that worked out for you? Brilliant. So people love it, it's just because we then we what, what happens is, say, let's say we're looking at the tibialis anterior or the crosses along the shin across the front of the ankle, we will, the session will be me talking to the muscle, I'll get you to feel it on your body and feel the muscle contract as the movements happen, we'll see it on a skeleton, you'll see it in the manual in front of you there. And but then you'll get a 3d view of it, you'll get them that way. So it kind of come at it from all angles. So it really will depend on what kind of learner you are. Like. There'll be, there'll be something that resonates with you there. So I've been very, very thought because I really was like, I want this to be high quality. I want this to really work for people. I don't want to just make money and then people to feel like oh, yeah, that was okay, I want people to come away going wow, like a really, I've really got this. So I've put a lot of time and energy and money and to invest in the course. And it's really, it's really cool. Andrew was so glad I did it. Congratulations. That's a big deal. I'm I'm curious. I'm 200 our yoga lines teacher training. To what level do you think it's one? To what level of understanding of anatomy Do you think someone should or could be at within because 200 hours is not really that much time like a 200 hour yoga teaching is Teacher Training is not really it's better than what I guess where we were before where you could go do a weekend yoga teacher training, I guess the idea is yoga Lyons thought, let's create a, you know, a board that will create this sort of standard that will hopefully bring yoga professionalism to a place of, you know, improvement. So I'm curious, though, let's say you have a 200 hour group, what do you hope somebody will least have in their toolbox of understanding in relation to anatomy at the end of that training? Yeah, I just want them to have like a solid foundation, they don't have to remember all the names of everything, we just have to have some sort of some sort of confidence when it comes to how the body is moving. And, and knowing also, that that's when we started the journey, the startup journey, you know, knowing that because also say, say we suddenly had 50 hours of anatomy, people would just get so overwhelmed because you're also doing the physiology and you're doing all the acid, the pranayama like the you know, the physiology, the arm, the you know, all this stuff, just like oh my god. So it's like, a solid enough foundation, but then knowing that that's the only only the start and that really, you're going to start to teach and then you're going to see the gaps in your knowledge. And you're going to have to go and seek out other trainings. Like I've just done so many trainings along the way over the last 15 years, you know, so it's like, yeah, just recognizing that it's just getting people to a place where they can can competently teach a basic class and then knowing that there's always going to be more training after that, you know, good point. Yeah, that's a lifelong study. Yeah. Oh man, and you beautiful things about it as we have we can all but forever, you know, no, true. It's incredible. I really appreciate your time. Andrew, thank you so much for niching out a little bit of time to share your story with us. Is there anything that I missed or that you'd like to add? No, that said, you know, you're gonna you're gonna share my website, you know, I said That's a really lovely, like weekly newsletter, that's all anatomy and physiology related to yoga, some brilliant content there. So, you know, come sign up for that. And that's on Dr. Das yogi.com. Dr. Das yoga calm, you know, I have my 30 hour training that we've talked about. I also do like shorter in depth live trainings on osteoporosis and yoga, arthritis, low back pain, you know, so if you want like, a kind of contemporary evidence based view of these things, you know, that's going to help you with yourself and your students, you know, come join me for that and check on my books, just come to my website, have a browse around, you'll see there's loads of stuff going on, there's loads of ways to interact with me. Yeah, I'm regular on social media put a lot of like, really good informational posts on that. So yeah, just come interact me. And yeah, it's been such a pleasure. Thank you so much, Todd. Thank you, Matthew. And I've got a feeling this is not gonna be the end. I think we're gonna, you know, I agree. Ops again, for sure. I agree. I want to take some of your courses. And and I'm really curious about what you've discovered in relation to low back pain. also fascinating. I like the idea that you're saying that when you come across new information, and you want to update your course that you leave the old course behind, you know, you see, with social media, sometimes people delete all the comments, they don't want their followers to see, you know, because you're like, Oh, that's not good. That's gonna make me look bad, right. And I like the fact that you're saying, No, I want you to see, yeah, this is my thought. And I learned and this is what I'm learning. And I think that's really important when we lesson for everyone that we're just always in the moment, doing the best that we can based on our current experience and the current information we have. But as long as you always have the desire to refine what you're doing, and that's all anyone can ever ask of you. You know, I'm not sat here saying I'm an expert in everything to do with anatomy. So it's like, but I'm going to do my due diligence to like, update myself every so often go oh, this is a topic that I haven't looked into for a couple of years. So let's do a deep dive. Let's really look at everything that's out there about it and feel like on top of it, and then you don't even then I move on to the next topic. So yeah, I love it. I'm so grateful. For my time doing that, you know, it's really special. Yeah, man. Well, thanks again. Andrew. I look forward and I really we really appreciate it. Thank you. Yeah, it's been so great. Thanks, Todd. Native yoga Todd cast is produced by myself. The theme music is dreamed up by Bryce Allen. If you liked this show, let me know. If there's room for improvement. I want to hear that too. We are curious to know what you think and what you want more of what I can improve. And if you have ideas for future guests or topics, please send us your thoughts to info at Native yoga center. You can find us at Native yoga center.com. 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