Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan | Meridian Yoga – Merging Acupuncture, Energy Channels & Ancient Wisdom

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan is a prominent and multi-disciplined expert in the fields of acupuncture, yoga, and meridian therapy. With a robust background in Ashtanga and Dharma yoga, massage therapy, and acupuncture, Dr. Vaughan has masterfully integrated her deep knowledge of anatomy and energy channels into her practice and teachings. She is particularly renowned for her work in merging the practices of yoga and acupuncture, resulting in a unique therapeutic discipline focused on Yin yoga teacher trainings and advanced acupressure techniques. Dr. Vaughan is also a celebrated author of several books, including “Science of Self” and her detailed guides on energy lines and meridians.

Visit Dr. Rose Erin: https://www.scienceofselfytt.com/

Key Takeaways:

• Dr. Vaughan's development of the Meridian Yoga technique integrates acupuncture and yoga for a holistic therapeutic approach.
• The importance of experiential learning in understanding and feeling energy channels like meridians and chakras is emphasized throughout Dr. Vaughan's teachings.
• Acupuncture and yoga practices should focus on seeking root causes of physical imbalance rather than merely addressing pain.
• Incorporating ancient practices, such as those from the "Hatha Yoga Pradipika," into modern yoga sequences enhances meditative and energetic experiences.
• Regular mantra practice, like the Gayatri Mantra, can refine the practitioner’s focus and intention, grounding their yoga and meditation sessions.

Check out: 👇
8IN8 Ashtanga Yoga for Beginners Course Online- Learn 8 Limb Yoga in 8 Days - Get FREE coupon code for a limited time only (Regular price $88) https://info.nativeyogacenter.com/8in8-ashtanga-yoga-for-beginners-8-limbs-in-8-days/

Practice with Native Yoga Online - New classes EVERY day - Use Code FIRSTMONTHFREE https://nativeyogacenter.teachable.com/p/today-s-community-class

Subscribe to Native Yoga Center and view this podcast on Youtube.

Thank you Bryce Allyn for the show tunes. Check out Bryce’s website: bryceallynband.comand sign up on his newsletter to stay in touch. Listen here to his original music from his bands Boxelder, B-Liminal and Bryce Allyn Band on Spotify.

Please email special requests and feedback to info@nativeyogacenter.com

https://info.nativeyogacenter.com/8in8-ashtanga-yoga-for-beginners-8-limbs-in-8-days/

Transcript

Todd McLaughlin: 0:33

Welcome to Native Yoga Toddc ast. So happy you are here. My goal with this channel is to bring inspirational speakers to the mic in the field of yoga, massage, body work, and beyond. Follow us at @ Native Yoga, and check us out at Native Yoga center.com All right, let's begin. I'm Hello, welcome to Native Yoga Todd Cast. My special guest today is a return guest, Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan. I was lucky enough to have her on the show back in 2022 episode 91 and so about three years ago, and actually maybe four now, three and a half, something like that. And so today I'm very pleased and honored to bring Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan back onto the show. She is an incredible instructor, as you'll hear. I've had a chance to study with her, and so I get to ask her informed questions, questions that I've been able to formulate since the last time I've practiced with her at a workshop she offered here in Florida, and I just want to encourage you to go follow her on Instagram at@erin_bodyaware , link in the description, and also her Science of Self website, which I have in the link in the description. If you're interested in learning how to do hands-on assist, you're curious about acupressure work while practicing yoga, and just have an overall interest in the traditional aspects of yoga. She does an incredible job of bringing it all to the table. So, it's an honor and a privilege. I'm so happy you are here. Thank you, listener, for your support. Any sort of sharing that you can do to help help me spread the word about this show. This is a passion project of mine, and I do release a new episode every single Friday. So, remember to come back to any of your favorite listening channels, like YouTube, at Native Yoga, or you can find on Instagram at Native Yoga, and all those other places. If you like to listen on Apple, Spotify, you can check it out every week. There's a new one. All right, let's go. We'll get started. Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan. I'm so happy to have return guest to Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan. Dr. Rose Erin, how are you feeling today?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 3:03

Thank you. It's really great to be back here with you again. I feel good. Yeah, I've been upstate a lot, so it's different, different vibes up here, but I'm about to head back to the city, and it's going to be a busy summer in New York City. So, do

Todd McLaughlin: 3:24

you have a lot of workshops and trainings planned to teach there,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 3:29

more than usual? So, we have a yin yoga training, yin yoga teacher training, and then we have the advanced training in New York City again, which we haven't done since, I guess 2019

Todd McLaughlin: 3:42

nice.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 3:43

It's been upstate all these years. And

Todd McLaughlin: 3:46

are you excited to bring it back into the city? Are you nervous about it? What are your overall feelings?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 3:52

I think it's going to be different for sure to do it back in New York City, but yeah, I'm really excited, because I think a lot of people will have access to it that that aren't able to leave their their home responsibilities for 16 days and go upstate, so

Todd McLaughlin: 4:10

yeah, that makes sense.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 4:12

Yeah, I'm excited that those people will be able to to attend this year.

Todd McLaughlin: 4:18

Well, that sounds so cool. Just so the listener is familiar. I had a chance to interview you back in 2022 That was like episode number 91 And then after getting a chance to meet you here on the podcast, you were teaching a workshop about two years ago in Tampa, utilizing yoga and acupressure. So I got a chance to meet you in person, which was incredible, and I loved taking workshop with you. You're a phenomenal teacher, and I really love how you have blended your acupuncture medicine degree and or practice with your yoga practice and blending that in with acupressure, I. I follow you on social media. The graphics that you make are incredible. I love the way that you've overlaid some of the meridian lines and acupressure points onto images of you practicing yoga, but in as a teaching tool, when I went to your workshop, I thought it was really cool and fascinating and interesting how you blended your ability in the I guess, what did you tell me you used to make your graphics? It's Photoshop, I believe. Yeah, and so just the way that you've been able to combine your study and training within the world of meridian therapy and acupuncture and acupressure yoga, and then coming up with incredible teaching graphics, I just am really impressed by your work, so I'm excited to be here. I've also have a copy of one of your books. Can you remind me and the listener what some of the titles of your books are?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 5:54

Oh, well, there's the first one, was Science of Self, but then it's, it's got a subtitle, which I can't fully remember something about yoga organs, emotions, and pathways, something like that. So that was sort of the introduction to the whole idea of looking inward and feeling, feeling the specific energy channels to, to really inform your asana practice, which I believe is what Hatha yoga was originally about, really feeling the movement of energy and learning to direct the movement of energy, and then there's the pain book came later that was more about specific acupressure points and how to use those more therapeutically, so to open up your practice, your postures, but also for different conditions, like back pain, or even mental health issues, anxiety, depression, things like that, really common issues, and then there's two other ones. Then we have the yoga practice manual, is for the advanced training. It's basically the advanced teacher training manual, so it's it's got all the more advanced asanas and sequences for the meridians in there, and then the, oh, there's one more, and then the points and pathways book is just strictly like a reference manual for, for the line, the energy lines and points, the meridians. Yeah,

Todd McLaughlin: 7:35

very cool. Well, thank you for reminding me. I got to get more of your books. I really do enjoy the one that I have, can you tell us a little bit about your journey of blending acupuncture and yoga, and how you developed your meridian yoga technique?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 7:50

Yeah, I studied first yoga, so I first was practicing yoga, Ashtanga yoga, and then I studied massage therapy, so I had a license in massage therapy, and I was specializing in myofascial release and trigger point manual release, and then, so I, so I had studied a lot of just anatomy, fascia anatomy, stuff like that, which I still am obsessed with, and then, but I've wanted to learn dry needling, that's what got me into acupuncture. I really was not interested in the meridian lines in the beginning, I thought it was just kind of like made up, you know, and so I, so I wanted, but I had to get my license, so I had to go to school for basically four more years to get my degree in acupuncture, and of course, along the way I really saw the beauty of the energy lines, the 12 meeting system and in order to, I guess, in order to memorize all the things I had to memorize to pass my board exam, I started studying during my two hour asana practice. At the time, I was with Dharma Mitra, and so I had developed sort of a home practice that was based on his sequence, and for time efficiency I decided that I was going to study while I was doing my asana practice, and so I would choose one, one meridian, I would, you say I would, I would focus on the stomach meridian for the entire practice, and just try to remember where the points were, and feel them inside my body. Now, this particular meridian starts under your eyelids, like in your lower eyelids, and then it goes all the way down the front of your body into your second toe, so it's very specific, and then in turn. It goes into your digestive trap, which is a big organ, because it's, you know, it's covering from your throat all the way down to the bottom. So that one, that one I remember, might have been the first one where I really realized that it was, it was doing something besides helping me memorize it, I, it was changing the way I was practicing and doing my back bends and and lunges and things like that, I could, I could start to feel where, where I was stuck in the postures because I was focusing on the entire line instead of just trying to push my body into a specific position, I was focusing deeper and doing a sort of a body scan while I was learning it, so it just like it blew my mind, and I was like, this, there's there's something really important to develop with this, and, and so I just kept obsessing over it, and you know, when I did, when I did the first teacher training, I was, I wasn't quite clear on, like, I knew what I wanted to teach, but I wasn't sure if anyone was going to understand it or feel what I had felt, but they did, and so that really they did, and it really, really inspired me to keep developing it, and to make the book

Todd McLaughlin: 11:33

amazing. How

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 11:34

people feel that, yeah.

Todd McLaughlin: 11:36

When, how long ago was that? When did that book get published?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 11:40

It was about about 10 years ago,

Todd McLaughlin: 11:43

so you've had 10 years of field study now in relation to applying this idea to students, other other teachers, other yoga teachers that are wanting to deepen their practice, but also share this with their students. What are some of the takeaways that you are finding after having like a whole decade to interact with people now on this level,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 12:09

I mean people just take it and run with it. It's it sort of teaches itself, so that seeing that is what inspires me to keep, keep teaching it and keep keep working and developing new stuff.

Todd McLaughlin: 12:22

Yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 12:23

new, new ways of using it with asana. We're doing like adjustments now, and those are blowing my mind. And people just feel it immediately that this is something new.

Todd McLaughlin: 12:36

Yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 12:37

or not new, I mean, ancient, but it's something that they haven't felt before, and it just seems like so natural, automatically it's in our bodies, it's it's not made up, which is what I originally, you know, I was really skeptical of of the whole system before I studied

Todd McLaughlin: 12:58

it,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 12:58

but it's really there, it's really powerful,

Todd McLaughlin: 13:01

yeah. Me too, Rosarin, as well. When I first came across medieance within Thai massage, and I saw charts, and I saw lines, I thought, well, that's cool, you know, that's interesting, that that'll be something that maybe I'll get to one day. And it is really incredible, the more you actually put time in on it, and try to make it a personal, experiential process, then it's, and I like the fact that you threw the attempt to try to do two things at once, like I have to study, and I also want to practice. Well, let me blend these two together. I love how that's like organically started to unfold, but doesn't it seem like really important to actually make it experiential, so that it's a direct experience thing, versus a teacher telling you, 'Here, push on this point, and that'll help your stomach, but to actually meditate while you're putting pressure on the point, and then try to feel what's happening within the realm of the stomach. Like, can you talk a little bit about your, the importance of experience versus theory.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 14:05

Yeah, that's really important. I talk about that a lot. How the point may not be where the book says they are, and I don't know if that's true or not, but I think what I want to do is get people to really try to feel something instead of following the instructions, because sometimes the point, the acupressure point location is really specific, it's described, you know, three inches from this point, or whatever, I might, you can, you can memorize all of that, and be really technically accurate, but you might not feel it, and actually experience it. And my teacher of acupuncture, who was the founder of the school that I went to, and I was really lucky to intern with him and study closely with him, he said. You know, you should memorize all this stuff to pass the board exam, and then completely erase it from your mind, because it's going to prevent you from seeing what's actually there. So, Ukraine, it's like you use the meridian lines and the point locations as a guideline to what might be there, but you, but then you really have to feel it, and, and also the way that it was developed is that people felt something, and then came together and decided this is, you know, this is most likely where these lines are, because this, we all agree that this is what we feel, so really you could reinvent it if you actually, if you really paid attention and did what they did, which was basically yoga and meditation, looking inwards, really concentrating on what they actually felt in themselves and maybe in in other people's bodies you should be able to rediscover

Todd McLaughlin: 16:08

it and

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 16:08

if then it's not real it's not it's not valuable unless it's really there and really written in the body

Todd McLaughlin: 16:18

amazing so how much importance do you place on, for example, maybe I take a posture like bound angle, where we sit, I sit, you sit, we sit with our feet together and our knees are kind of opened up, and maybe I have a little bit of knee pain in my left knee, and so I just sit there. I don't put a lot of pressure on the pose, I just kind of get it where it's relatively comfortable, and I take a thumb or two thumbs and just start pushing along muscle lines into musculature, and if I use my mind in a way where, when I'm pushing, I use positive slash mental awareness or energy or thought toward I would like for this pressure point to help me alleviate some pain in my knee. How important do you feel the mental, the direction of the mental energy is in relation to the power of the point versus the combination of the power of the point with the mental energy toward what it is we hope could occur.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 17:36

Well, yeah, I think I think you need to listen more than then have an intention, especially if you're working on yourself, because you know, we, we, we're not really, we don't know what the problem is, that's the problem is that we don't know what the problem is, so

Todd McLaughlin: 17:59

you know, like the pain might be there, but we don't know that it's the knees

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 18:03

that probably your knee hurts, but the point that you need to work on is maybe in your foot or maybe in your hip or maybe in your abdomen, like around, you know, it could be your so I, it could be your navel, it could be it really anywhere, because the channels that go through your knee go into your head and your feet, so and so, but I think, I think that in exploring that, what, of course, you want your knee to stop hurting, but do you want to understand why your hip is tight, and in this profound way that asks you to reveal deeper layers of your mind, really like, why, why is your body holding itself that way habitually? Why, why are you, why is your body gripping in this one area, which I think of as usually some kind of defense mechanism of the body, whether it's physical defense, because maybe you push yourself too far in a posture or you injured something somewhere along the way, and your body is still sort of afraid of going in this one direction, or it's psychological, more emotional, where you're, you know, you hate your job situation, or you're, you were worried about something that you have no control over, and this is how you defend yourself, this, this is the posture that your body is taken because of the way you know this, this, the way that you relate to the world is deep, it has to do with your beliefs about yourself, your beliefs about the world, about your potential, and that, that's to me, that's why yoga, why. Hatha yoga, physical yoga postures are so powerful in, in revealing your own obstacles on your path, your path to ultimate self-realization. There's really the obstacle is your mind, but your mind is in your body, and then you have this one pain, you have knee pain, and you, but your mind just says, I want my knees to stop hurting, but if you understand where you know how to follow that knee pain into the depth of your abdomen, for example, and then you can see these deep holding patterns, thus, and then you understand the organs and how they're related to these aspects of your mind, and so then you're connecting your, you know, your spleen or your, your liver, your gallbladder, or something to your knee pain. It sounds funny if you haven't studied the system, but it's really about, you know, how you're, how you're reacting to your life, to the world around you.

Todd McLaughlin: 21:09

Yeah, I don't think that sounds silly at all. I do understand what you mean, where it sounds silly, because if you've never come across some of these ideas, and it could be like, what, liver, yeah, it seems like you're really pointing in the direction of seeking root causes versus superficial reaction, reactions to, and your

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 21:28

knee pain doesn't need to go away. Your knee pain may never go away, but it doesn't matter. I mean, it probably will, but it, but it's the journey of, really to me, of unwinding that and getting to the root of it, that reveals it reveals these parts of yourself that you may have buried so deep, and that's where your truth is. We, I believe that we hold the truth that we are looking for in life, in our, in our yoga path, in meditation, is in there, it's not out there, it's in your body, and you just have to follow it into, you know, follow these clues into the depths of your body. I talk a lot about the navel, like deep in the abdomen, but also deep in your chest, you know, in your heart and in your diaphragm, and that's where your chakras are, you know, the pelvic floor and deeper inside the body, where these energy centers are located.

Todd McLaughlin: 22:39

It's fascinating. I hear you, Aaron. Can you? I had an opportunity since I saw you to interview Gil Headley, who's a well-known body worker and anatomist. And then I had a chance to see him on his tour where he did The Nerve Tree. He actually, I mean, I don't want to offend anybody if this offends them, but you know, cadaver work, where he actually dissected the entire nerve tree from someone, and someone that donated their body to science, and it was so amazing to see the nerve plexi that are in each of the areas that the chakras are in our when we see the chakra maps, so I just was for me it had a moment of like these actually are real, like at first you know that kind of like what you said when you first started seeing the meridians and these ideas you thought, oh maybe that's not real but now you're starting to piece together validity to it and when I saw the actual nerve plexi from the nerve tree matching up in similar places to like the sacral plexus and the abdomen and at the heart and at the throat and at the along the brain stem, so I was like, oh my gosh, this is, it is very, it is pretty obvious that there are these energy centers. Can you talk a little bit about your experience of working with pressure needles, acupressure, acupuncture, understand, or attempting to understand the nerve tree, and, and this, and the chakra system that comes with yoga? Can you just talk a little bit about some of the discoveries you might have made, I

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 24:22

I haven't studied the nerve tree.

Todd McLaughlin: 24:25

Oh, okay. Sorry,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 24:27

I have studied the nervous system, but I haven't done.. I haven't looked at that in depth, in terms of actual cadaver study. I have done some cadaver dissection, which I found really, really, really fascinating, and I think that you, if you can handle it, you know, if people could handle it, they should, they. To do it because you can appreciate more the complexity of the body down to the microscopic level and what, how intelligent it is, so I really respect his work, Gil Hedley, I really, I really think he's amazing, because he's got - I mean, he's a scientist, but he's got this other perspective of energy anatomy, that's

Todd McLaughlin: 25:34

yes,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 25:34

that's a very rare person that this combining those things. So, I really, I really respect him a lot. I would love to study with him, actually. Maybe one day I will get to take his course, but, but, yeah, in terms of acupuncture, it's sort of.. I mean, acupuncture is funny because it's, it's almost like surgery in a way, because you're penetrating, so you have to know a lot of anatomy, because you have to know where your needle is going, and, and the depth, you know, I go pretty deep, because I do dry needling, so, so I'm inside the body, it's different from massage or acupressure, where your body has a defense mechanism of the skin and the fascial layers, would you put the needle through the skin? You, you have just, you have gone into the inner space, you know, like outer space. Inner space is, is this very physical, but also just it's alive, it's it's it's the energy anatomy, and you're touching it, and it's the needles are metal, so it's conducting this conducting energy, and if you train yourself, you can feel, you can feel through the needle really amazing things, and feel how, feel how the body is resisting or reacting or shifting and changing, and yeah, it's, it's, that's beautiful, it's it's such a privilege to be able to to to work with energy in that way. I mean, I don't, I wouldn't say I do energy work because the the acupuncture work that I do is very physical, it's in its hooking into the fascia, it's in the muscles often, it's in the muscle, and, and it's like, it's like when you fish, like fishing, you're like waiting. I don't, I don't know if people might be offended by that too, but I know I think

Todd McLaughlin: 27:56

about everything we say, like twice, like, oh no, but I agree with you, yes, yes, but it's

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 28:02

like you can feel these little tugs,

Todd McLaughlin: 28:05

yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 28:05

like when something is biting it, you know, but you don't know what it is sometimes, but you're so, you're that's like acupuncture is like that, like you're waiting, you want to feel those like the slightest little shifts and changes inside the body, and then you have to like grab, you know, watch it, watch it, grab, you have to know how to not to not lose, lose the fish, you know, and follow through, so you can get a big release sometimes in people, and then there's a huge emotional release. I mean, I always tell people you're not going to get a big physical release without, and without having an emotional, emotional repercussions. There's going to be a.. it might not happen immediately, but there's going to be a shift in your, in your, your energy body means a shift in your emotions, and then your mind follows that, like they say, the mind, you know, the prana and the chitta follow each other. So you're moving the energy, the prana, your mind is going to follow that. It's going to change the way you see things, and if you, if you're used to meditating and paying attention to your mind changing, then you'll, you'll notice it, but I warn people, like, if you have, if they have a big release, I'm like, later on, you might feel really emotional, you know,

Todd McLaughlin: 29:33

yeah, nah, here, yeah, can you, might

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 29:36

yell at somebody, even sometimes, if I feel like people are holding a lot of anger,

Todd McLaughlin: 29:42

yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 29:43

and then it releases. I'm like, you might watch out for that later and realize that that's what it

Todd McLaughlin: 30:31

is, yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 30:32

happening.

Todd McLaughlin: 30:33

Good advice,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 30:34

yeah. And to not be

Todd McLaughlin: 30:35

scared of it, to not be scared of it, yeah. Just like, accept it, like, okay, a little anger, but also not

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 30:40

necessarily pre. Reject it onto other people, and just realize that you're, you're dealing with emotions that are coming up because of the physical release.

Todd McLaughlin: 30:49

Nice.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 30:50

Yeah.

Todd McLaughlin: 30:51

Well, you know, you are working on people, you are working on yourself. Do you let people work on you?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 31:04

You mean acupuncture,

Todd McLaughlin: 31:05

acupuncture, acupressure, doing assist on you? Like, do you? I guess something that happens, something I've noticed working in the field for a while. I get a little bit selective now. I want to make sure that when someone starts pushing and pulling on me and working on me, that they're coming in with intentions that are clear and clean, and so I feel safe and comfortable. So I'm wondering, like, you've been at this for a long time, do you have somebody that you trust that you allow work with you? And I guess the reason I'm asking this question is because do you feel how important it, how important do you feel it is to trust somebody else to dry needle acupressure press, hold space for the ability to relax, because it's very, it is different, like if I just, if you just work on yourself, if I just work on myself, and I just start pressing and meditating and feeling what's happening, and try to follow where that energy is going, and versus if I just let go and let somebody else do that, and just let them do that work, and me just be quiet and try to relax and enjoy, and whatever happens when you're getting receiving some sort of some treatment. Can you just talk a little bit about your own personal feelings around that, that, that, this question?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 32:30

Yeah, that's yeah, I do. I do not get acupuncture from anyone, but I do do it to myself, but I do get massage, you know, I get, I get, I have a really good massage person, but it's, it's pretty basic, so I'm thinking, you know, this is just like bladder meridian, this is like she's working on a lot of young channels, so, and she's good, but it's, you know, it's not like profoundly changing or or deeply transformative. It's sort of like, okay, get your, get your back body to relax, so you can just breathe a little bit, but, but I do, I do get this. This may sound bad, but I trust the people that I train to do abdominal work, so we do, we do work on the back, but we do a lot of abdominal work around the navel, in the psoas, in the iliacus, in the diaphragm, and in the armpits, because we're doing heart-related stuff in the armpits and chest, so we're kind of doing all the acupressure stuff that you can't get from a regular massage therapist. They won't do it. I've asked for it, and they won't do it. At least in here, I've heard that in other countries they do more abdominal massage, but I'm not sure if it's the same as what we're doing as deep, but I love getting that deeper work. I need it, it's very healing, but yeah, I like, I like working with the people that I've trained.

Todd McLaughlin: 34:19

Yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 34:20

and I think it's important to get feedback, get, and you know, stay in communication, so we talk about that a lot when you're working with in the abdomen, deep in the abdomen, and in the diaphragm, that you, you really coach people in their breath, so it's not like the kind of body work where you just like go space out and you're asleep, and you sort of disappear for an hour. What we're doing is requires constant, you know, breathe a little bit deeper, a little bit more, and then exhale, keep exhaling, keep exhaling, because the breath is so important in, in, in creating energetic shifts in the, in the deeper physical body.

Todd McLaughlin: 35:09

Yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 35:10

so, yeah, I need that, I need it, but it's hard to find, but there's some, there's some people that I trust. Yeah,

Todd McLaughlin: 35:18

cool, amazing,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 35:20

yeah,

Todd McLaughlin: 35:20

very cool. Can you talk about like when you do your training that's coming up in New York City. I really enjoyed how you had us partner up and work with each other, use a slide projector, put the slides up, give an idea of where these particular points are, then how. Us partner up and do some pressure work with each other and trade and that type of thing, can you talk about if you've are you still working with that format, have you adopted any new, or have you discovered more, I don't say more efficient, but like efficient ways to help educate. I'm just so curious. I think your education process is great. I just love to hear from an educator's point of view, like what you're finding is working as a good way to convey this information.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 36:16

Yeah, I mean, the pictures help. I mean, I'm all, I'm all about pictures, so most of my books are full of those pictures and diagrams, so I do think it's important to give people a visual of where the, where the lines and points are, but yeah, this, the hands-on work is everything, so they're they're they're working in partners, and it's amazing to watch, is so beautiful to see people do that, and, and really try to help each other, and discover, and, and feel, you know, receive, because half the time you're receiving, so that's that's really transformative, but then just gaining the confidence to trust your intuition, to trust what you feel in your hands when you're working on people, and I think people are afraid sometimes they're going to hurt somebody, so, so we have to work with with those fears, and then, but once you feel it, and you see somebody benefit and say that they feel better, that's so, that's so amazing and empowering for people. It's really beautiful to watch. I mean, one, what one thing that's newer that we've been doing is working with postures, so we, and we have been doing adjustments, Accu adjustments for a few years, but we, we, I think I feel like we developed a solid set of Accu adjustments, so we have postures, a set, a good set of postures, and always developing more, where we, instead of just having people lay, you know, lay on a mat and practice all the points, we we which is what we do in level one. In level one, you just learn the points, and, and you just have them basically in shavasana, and you're, you're doing the point, but then in the adjustments training, we're in Paschimottanasana, doing bladder meridian, and then it's, it's like, wow, then you can really feel it, because when you go into that forward fold, you have created a stretch of that myofascial pathway, so that's that's a simple one, because it's just the superficial back line of the body, and so then we have like a few cues, like drop your head instead of looking at your toes, look down to to further this make the stretch complete of the entire channel and flex your feet if you have that flexibility to do that and now press on the points right now do kidney one or bladder 10 at the base of the skull or the sacral points, and it's like, wow,

Todd McLaughlin: 39:05

yes,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 39:06

because there's already this strain or stretch in the fascia, so the the energy moves really fast through the points, and then, and people, and also it helps people go deeper into the poses, if that's what they're interested in, they see, like, they see a result really fast, so that's exciting, and, and we have, yeah, we have a good set of adjustments now.

Todd McLaughlin: 39:30

That's so cool. We just

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 39:32

finished that training, so we'll probably, we probably won't do it again till next year, but

Todd McLaughlin: 39:35

amazing,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 39:37

we are incorporating those into some of those into the other trainings, the advanced training, and that sounds

Todd McLaughlin: 39:44

fun. I want to take that one with you. It sounds amazing. Are you, are you going as far as, like, say, when somebody's doing a leg raise, you come over, help them hold their leg up and hold specific points, while I mean, you could literally do that, probably in every single posture, right? Or are you focusing mostly on like ones where they're balanced. I mean, I would think from a teaching perspective. Okay, let them sit down, like, don't let's not try to coordinate the challenge of teaching somebody how to hold someone's leg in the air without knocking them their balance off. So, probably starting with the seated ones, and then I guess once you get the idea and you memorize a few points, you could just work those points, so are you at that? Are you at the point where you know, maybe, like for example, that particular pose, if someone came in and said, if I came up to, or before class said, Aaron, I'm having knee pain, you're probably like, it's not your knees, dude, it's like you're it's like something else deeper than that. Yeah, but like, maybe I have my leg up in the air. Are you getting to that point where you're thinking, all right, let me focus on this one particular meridian, push on these points with the idea of helping whatever it is that person is saying they have a problem with.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 40:56

Yeah, I mean, if that pose, like we do Baddha Konasana, this, that's what you're talking about, I guess, so we would do like I would do probably soup to Baddha Konasana also, and press, because then you can get a lot of the points on the front of the hip joint, and then do the points in the feet that would correspond to those lines.

Todd McLaughlin: 41:19

Yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 41:20

and then maybe have you sit up and baddha konasana, maybe fold forward and do, do some of the young points, the gallbladder, liver points, or whatever.

Todd McLaughlin: 41:30

Yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 41:31

that would, but we would see, you know what I mean. You, I don't know until I press on it, and then you don't know until you, you feel the points, which is the, you know, which channel it is, or which point would help you, or what it, what, what it is that's being revealed. I mean, and you may just have a knee injury, too, you know. It doesn't, it doesn't,

Todd McLaughlin: 41:56

it

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 41:56

doesn't have to be emotional in origin.

Todd McLaughlin: 41:59

Yeah, yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 42:00

but also pain is emotional, so it's, it's always emotional, but it's not necessarily emotional in origin, but, but, yeah, we, you, you can adapt any, any adjustment, if you know any adjustment, I can show you which points, so that instead of just, you know, pressing on their hip, you can be real specific,

Todd McLaughlin: 42:24

yeah, yeah, this

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 42:25

specific point in the hip is where you can apply the most pressure, and, and it's just, it's a, it's cool, because you don't have to use as much pressure, and you, and you get the same effect, so, in a way, it's a lot safer as well,

Todd McLaughlin: 42:40

that makes sense,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 42:41

people do get injured in, in adjustments, probably more than more than any other part of yoga class. Yes, adjustments is when people, I mean, they benefit from it, but they also, that's when people tend to get injured. So I'm all for, like, using using the feet and hand points, so you don't have to press into the big joints,

Todd McLaughlin: 43:04

yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 43:05

or just, you know, using less pressure and being more specific to release the fascial lines instead of just pushing down on a person, you know,

Todd McLaughlin: 43:14

that makes sense. I mean, if somebody listening is a budding yoga teacher that hasn't had any practice doing any hands-on assists, and they're listening, and they're going, "What, I can't wait to go teach tomorrow. I'm going to start just pushing on some points. What kind of advice could you give us to just help us make sure that.. well, do you.. I'm guessing you agree. I feel like I'm just going to.. I don't want to assume anything. Do you think that you need to ask permission from somebody before you start pressing on them.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 43:47

Yeah,

Todd McLaughlin: 43:48

obvious answer, but I just want to ask it. I just figured, yeah, I mean,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 43:52

I tell people in our adjustments training that I'm assuming that you want an adjustment if you took my adjustments training. Otherwise, otherwise I would always ask,

Todd McLaughlin: 44:04

yeah, yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 44:05

because even I don't like it, I don't like people to come up to me and just press on me. I'm one of those people, you know, that like, you better ask me first, I might like it, I might not,

Todd McLaughlin: 44:17

yeah, understood,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 44:18

because I know I have, I have things going on, and I'm trying, I'm trying to do it myself internally, so I respect that people. I really respect that people are also.. you don't know if somebody has an injury, and I might think, like, oh, they could go deeper, and then I'm just going to push them down, and they were actually going as deep as they could, and they don't want to smash their meniscus or their labrum or whatever, so I really, I really, I do think it's very important to ask people.

Todd McLaughlin: 44:51

Yes, great advice. Great advice. I'm glad you said that. Is I noticed when you mentioned Ashtanga, you mentioned Dharma, when I was with you in Tampa, that was at a place that utilized postures from the 84 classic series from Bishnu Gosh. And then, from noticing just watching what you do, it seems that you seem inspired by those poses as well. Can you speak a little bit about where you're at now in relation to designing your own yoga sequences, and how much are you pulling from one specific teacher style, or do you feel like at this point you've created or are integrating all that you've learned to have your own specific style? I mean, I feel like everybody has their own specific style once they've trained with different people, but are you pulling from one particular. Particular thing, more than another, another that you feel is really beneficial these days.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 45:46

I'm glad you asked that. I'm kind of, because I've been working, I mean, my personal practice and what I teach in the advanced training is the what we call the master sequence, but it's, it's been evolving, so it started as a lot of Dharma Mitra and Ashtanga and Vikram, like you said, all those things combined together, but then when I really started studying the Hatha Pradipika, because I wanted to study it, and then I had, I started teaching it, maybe three years ago, and it's wild, it's like a

Todd McLaughlin: 46:34

wild text, I mean, it's a

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 46:36

crazy thing to teach, because it's like ridiculous, some of the parts are just ridiculous, but then I teach it with the yoga sutures, which is a nice balance, but, but anyway, it talks, it sort of brings out helps you understand what the more traditional actual physical practices were, and especially the bond, the mudras and bandas, so I've made a sequence that includes the all of the asanas, I mean it's, it's questionable what they're talking about sometimes in terms of which specific, there's like 15 asanas, but they're the descriptions are not very thorough, and

Todd McLaughlin: 47:22

the names don't necessarily match up with the description in relation to a name that we have learned from our class taking, then we go, well, wait a minute, Which pose are we talking about? And

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 47:31

right, the names changed, nobody agrees on exactly what they're talking about.

Todd McLaughlin: 47:36

Yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 47:37

but I've been working with that for a few years, and so I started incorporating some of those postures and also the mudras, like yoga mudra and Mahabanda and Maha Beta and Maha Mudra, those things are really powerful, so now when I teach the master sequence, I usually incorporate all of those. I just got in the habit of practicing it that way, and we just.. so we just made a new.. we're making in the work a new poster of all of the of this sequence in its final format. I don't know, really final, but

Todd McLaughlin: 48:23

yeah, yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 48:24

I feel like it's final, but you know how that goes.

Todd McLaughlin: 48:27

Yes,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 48:28

so it is. It's been evolving over the past, whatever, 10 or 12 years, and, and I think I think it's really good now, and and it has a lot more of the traditional practices where we're doing a little bit of breath retention, even toward the end of class, and more deeper internal focal points.

Todd McLaughlin: 48:52

Yeah, cool. In relation to into the Hatha Yoga Padipika, it seems like it's not teaching like a vinyasa flow style. Do this jump into that, and then float from this and fly over there. I could be wrong, but it seems more like here's the pose, practice the pose, and then are you having like a shavasana in between each pose, so that there's like this kind of absorbing what happened after holding the pose, so you can really meditate and feel what maybe sort of effect the pose had. How are you linking the poses that you're utilizing from your understanding of the Hatha Yoga Predipika?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 49:34

That's a good question. I mean, we still do a very strong vinyasa practice, but in probably the first three quarters of the class, it says the end, the last quarter of the class, where it becomes more meditative, and we're holding these postures. We don't do shavasana, like laying down shavasana, but we take a moment to sit and meditate with eyes closed in between postures, and I think that's really important, so that you can feel the energy shift, or just, you know, whatever happened. I don't want to tell people what to feel, so I will say that, but

Todd McLaughlin: 50:11

yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 50:12

just, you know, close your eyes and concentrate after those, after those deeper postures, and because you've done such a long warm up, and moving your breath and energy, it's.. it happens really fast by the time you get to the end of class, and you do your bandhas and breath retention and focus, it just works really. If you started with that, your mind, you know, your mind and your energy would be more difficult to, to focus, but it just, it's so cool, it's, it's amazing. It, after all these years of practicing, that I was still like, wow, this actually works.

Todd McLaughlin: 51:01

Yes, that's so cool. So, you're still light bulb is still getting lit up regularly, like, oh my gosh, like that light bulb, that's where you're like, oh my goodness, this really works, you know? Like, we just have that, yeah, yeah, it

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 51:17

takes you back home, you know, that in the beginning it just seems weird, even when you close your eyes and focus, and you're able to see light, or whatever, it's like, whoa, that's weird. But then that becomes your home, and you just, you just want to go home sometimes, and, and be, be there, and stay there, and

Todd McLaughlin: 51:41

yes,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 51:41

that's what rights is for, just like keep going back.

Todd McLaughlin: 51:45

Yeah, very cool. One of the things I loved about your workshop is we did the Gayatri mantra, and then so because someone said let's do Gayatri mantra 108 times, you said well we have to go fast because otherwise this is going to take a really long time. So then you had this like going like on board diversity, and it was like so amazing, like the speed and the tempo and the feeling of the group doing it, and the people that came to your workshop, like if I attempted to do that, maybe with a new group of people, or just teaching a workshop somewhere where I don't know who's going to show up, like I feel like you drew in serious practitioners, like people that were really serious about their yoga practice. At least that's the way it felt to me. So, I guess one thing I just want to say I really appreciate is that you're blending and bringing all these different aspects of yoga practice into your classes and workshops, so it's feels like we're getting a traditional experience. So, thank you. Well done. Yeah, what is your.. are you still utilizing mantra practice on a regular basis? That something that still calls and speaks to you? Is that something that you've put on hold for a little bit, what? What are you learning from your practice in that realm these days?

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 53:08

We still do the Gayatri mantra. I think it's really beautiful. It's a, it's a prayer for of devotion and guidance for guidance, and I've noticed doing that, that mantra in particular, but we do some other mantra, like the purification mantra of the Dharma teachers. I think it really does help people have the right intention in just being there and coming together to I think it's understand thing it's important to understand what that mantra means while you're chanting it but then but then chanting in general and being together with people, and that the resonance of the sound is, and also the rhythmic breathing, all of that is just so powerful, you know. That's, that's, that's coming from somewhere else. I believe that that's divine. That's you're praying, that's a prayer to God. And so you want, you want God to be there, and you want this to be, you know, guided, guided by the divine, by God. And so, if you.. it's.. I tell people, you know, if you don't.. if you don't believe in this, you don't have to do it, but if you don't believe in it, then you might as well do it, because it

Todd McLaughlin: 54:49

doesn't. That's a great noise you

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 54:51

can make.

Todd McLaughlin: 54:51

That's a great point. That's a great point. If you don't believe it, then why are we so fearful of doing it? That's a really good point, but most people

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 55:00

love it. They just want to do it, and if they don't, I think that's cool too, because they probably have a reason, you know, they believe in something else, or they have a strong belief. So, it's like, if you, if you have a strong belief, and you believe God is with you, and you have your own prayer, then you should be doing that. You don't have to do this prayer, as long as, as long as you feel connected to something, that's that's what's really important.

Todd McLaughlin: 55:23

Nice, yeah, amazing, amazing. Can you offer any tips, advice, or advice, or insights for those of us that are wanting to go a little bit deeper into our meditation practice

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 55:39

for meditation? Yeah,

Todd McLaughlin: 55:41

like if I. If I'm going to choose to just sit quietly, not engage in more than one asana, because obviously whatever pose we pick to meditate in is we're practicing some sort of posture. So, yeah, I

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 55:54

think the preparation is important. So, you know, you should - I'm sure people will not agree with what I'm saying, but I don't, I don't think you should have to meditate for that long, but I think you should, because if you prepare your mind, let's say you do, you have right diet, and then you have right exercise, so you're doing asana or qigong, or whatever, some kind of exercise, where you're moving energy, and then you're doing pranayama, or some kind of breathing, or chanting, because chanting is pranayama. Then your mind is already, you have prepared your mind, and then I don't.. I think what the yoga sutras teaches about meditation is that you have to concentrate, and I think sometimes people think, like, the longer they meditate, the better, like, you're going to meditate for three hours, but you're not meditating, you're thinking, you're just, your mind is just going all over the place. What if you decided to actually concentrate on something for 10 minutes, that's not very easy. That's what the yoga sutures is talking about. It's not - I'm not saying you shouldn't do mindfulness meditation, which is where you just sit and your mind goes wherever. That's cool. It's great. I think it's really healing to just sit and do nothing, be able to do that, but I think that actual meditation requires discipline, where you have to actually try to hold your mind on something.

Todd McLaughlin: 57:36

Yeah, I don't think

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 57:37

that that's what it says in the yoga sutras. I mean, I'm just reading it, and it's saying that you have to hold your mind on something, like choose an object to focus on, preferably awareness itself, you know, whatever, that can't really be an object, but you know, try, try to discipline your mind, but I don't think that you can do that for a long time without getting really angry and frustrated. Okay, can you do that for 30 seconds?

Todd McLaughlin: 58:06

Yeah,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 58:07

then just see how, how hard that is, and then relax, and then come back to it, right? Because those are the things you need, Abiasa and Baragium. You need, you need the discipline, you need the, you need the effort to stay in one point, and also the non-attachment, and that's all you need to achieve yoga, according to Patanjali.

Todd McLaughlin: 58:34

Nice, great advice.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 58:36

Did you?

Todd McLaughlin: 58:37

I did. I did. Thank you.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 58:39

I didn't know the internet was like a little funny for a second.

Todd McLaughlin: 58:42

No, actually, we everything came through perfect. Thank you so much. Super clear. I know I have just a few more minutes with you, and so I guess my

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 58:52

out a little bit

Todd McLaughlin: 58:53

is it a little bit? Maybe I'm cutting out a little bit. You're.. I can

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 58:56

hear you. Oh, cool.

Todd McLaughlin: 58:58

Yeah, no worries. I guess I'm thinking llamas and niyamas, and one of my favorites is Santosha. I

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 59:05

was cutting out what to do about,

Todd McLaughlin: 59:09

well, the good thing is, is that your voice is coming through. Do

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 59:13

you think it's my internet?

Todd McLaughlin: 59:15

Well, the good news is that your voice is coming through. So, even if we get a little bit of a little bit, I'm gonna

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 59:21

change to a different one.

Todd McLaughlin: 59:23

All right, let's give it a try. Yeah, you look for.. oh, I see. Blinking, you look like you're blinking. No, it doesn't look like you're blinking. There you are. I can see. Can you hear me now? I can. I can.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 59:40

Okay, good. It works now. I have to change my internet. so

Todd McLaughlin: 59:42

yeah, yeah, I don't know if you heard my last question, but one of my favorite Niyamas is Santosha. I guess one of the reasons I love Santosha so much is because I came across the word because when I at one point I saw a surfboard shaper in Australia, had a surfboard company called Santosha, and I had no idea that Santosha meant contentment, so I was like,"Wow, that's such a cool surfboard, and I just really fell in love with this board. And then later on, when I got into yoga, and I found out that there was a word called Santosha that meant contentment, it was a niyama. Then I really fell in love with that surfboard. I was like, man, that thing was so cool. So, I guess I would love to hear your thoughts on Santosha. Can we cultivate contentment just through the desire to be content, and or your feeling of how important cultivating contentment is for our health and wealth? Being,

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 1:00:43

wow, that's a good, that's so cool, that's a good teaching, yeah, definitely. I think, I think that that's, that's so important, and yes, you can just, you can, I think you can be content in any moment, I mean, it's about returning to the heart, you know, that's what Dharma always said, you know, you have to cultivate the backup light, so you're going to lose all the things that you rely on for your happiness. He would say, like, you're getting.. did you realize you're getting 40% of your happiness from your iPhone, and you know, like 20% from the way you look, because you still like the way you look right now. Then you're going to lose that one by one, and then, and then you're going to be miserable. So, but if you, if you practice in the yoga sutras, it talks about the light, something like the light beyond sorrow, that's a translation, but so that's in your heart, you just, you just know that there's this, this happiness or some kind of bliss that you're, that it doesn't depend on any circumstances, and that that's content, that's sort of content. I mean, you can have contentment if you have this kind of happiness that doesn't rely on any external circumstances or internal circumstances, it's just permanent, and is your nature, so all you have to do is just find, you know, go inside and find that fun. Remember, that's who you are. You're just, you're just already happy.

Todd McLaughlin: 1:02:35

Yes. Thank you. Thank you, Rosarin. I really am grateful for this opportunity. I was excited to have you back on the show on the first podcast, and time has slipped away, but I'm so grateful that you accepted my invitation to come back on again, and I really, really appreciate the work you do, and I think you do an incredible job. So, anybody listening, I highly recommend to go and sign up for training or session, and, and practice with you, because you, you put your heart into it, and you put a ton of time and energy into developing your, your format, and the way you convey the information. So, I, I'm, I'm very grateful for the work that you do.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 1:03:20

Thank you. Thanks for the work you're doing, that's amazing.

Todd McLaughlin: 1:03:24

Thank you. Well, until next time, and I hope I can get a chance to either travel up north, or I don't know if you're planning to come back to Florida anytime soon, but I will. Okay, cool. Hopefully we could have you here next time you're next time you're in this neck of the woods, that'd be amazing.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 1:03:42

Good, good.

Todd McLaughlin: 1:03:43

Thank you so much, Rosanna. Thank you.

Dr. Rose Erin Vaughan: 1:03:46

Okay, you take care.

Todd McLaughlin: 1:03:54

Native Yoga Todd Cast is produced by myself. The theme music is dreamed up by Bryce Allen. If you like 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 And hey, if you did like this episode, share it with your friends, rate it, and review, and join us next time.

Unknown: 1:04:43

Oh, yeah, now you.