At this point in my life, I’ve tried on a few “hats” in my career path to teaching yoga full-time. I’ve been a bartender, restaurant manager, kid’s gymnastics teacher, and a research scientist! All of them have taught me things about myself, and scientist was always my dream job. I absolutely LOVED the work, and the people, that I was involved with while I worked for 5 years as a research assistant with the UNC-Chapel Hill Nutrition Research Institute, specifically a part of the Cheatham Nutrition & Cognition team. We conducted studies on people throughout their lifetime and looked at their nutrition as related to brain health, with a strong genetic component. During this time, I applied to grad school, twice, and failed to get in, which was a major catalyst for me enrolling in yoga teacher training, I had a passion for learning and I wasn’t letting a few “no’s” stop me. I started to notice a crack in my previous dream of doing my own research and filling in that space was teaching yoga, and it was lighting me up in the most amazing ways. Then, a miracle happened…..the lab lost a major funding partner and I was given 2 months notice of being laid off, with some pretty sweet severance benefits. Synchronistically, months before I had planned 3 week hiatus to travel to Nicaragua and begin my 500 hours of yoga teacher training. The beginning of the training perfectly coincided with my last day of work, and I took a leap of faith and didn’t line up anything for when I got back, minus teaching a TON of yoga. Within the week, I was offered a paid staff position at Be Yoga, and given the opportunity to work closely with teachers and maybe, just maybe be able to support myself fully. It hasn’t always been sparkles and puppy kisses AND it’s totally been worth it to carve out my own path. Both my lives have come full circle in being able to use some of my research to create a workshop that merges my two loves: yoga and brain science! What I find most fascinating is how the yogi’s have totally gotten it all along, and the scientists are just now catching up! I feel that I have unique superpower to have one foot in both worlds and can make the mystical seem practical and the practical have a little extra shimmer and shine.