Hormones influence how we move, rest, recover, and show up on the mat, yet they’re rarely discussed clearly in yoga spaces. In this episode, I sit down with Dr. Manasa Rao to explore what yoga teachers need to understand about the hormonal body through both modern science and yogic wisdom. We talk about stress, rhythm, pranayama, women’s hormonal cycles, and how yoga can support balance through listening and alignment without overstepping into medical advice.

Episode Highlights:

• Are hormones a modern concept, or something yoga has always addressed through a different language?
• Hormones as internal messengers and their connection to yogic ideas of prana, ojas, tejas, and balance.
• How yoga works across the physical and subtle bodies to regulate internal harmony.
• The relationship between chakras, glands, and pranic flow, and where confusion often arises.
• Why hormonal balance is the body’s natural state and how modern lifestyle disrupts rhythm.
• Cortisol, stress, and the importance of restoring rhythm rather than suppressing hormones.
• Pranayama as a key regulator of the hormonal and nervous systems.
• How to think about different pranayama practices, including ujjayi, with more discernment.
• Pratyahara as a lifestyle-based practice rooted in routine, rhythm, and sensory regulation.
• Understanding women’s hormonal transitions, including menstruation, perimenopause, and menopause.
• Menopause reframed as a phase of reorganization and inward movement, not decline.
• How yogic practices can support different phases of the menstrual cycle.
• The importance of personalization and sensitivity when teaching hormonally affected students.
• Body-to-mind versus mind-to-body, and why dissolving that duality matters.
• The central takeaway: hormonal health comes from listening, alignment, and rhythm rather than fixing.

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