Résumé - Words that Win !

                                                         

            Why You Need a Résumé?

A résumé is essentially a document that enables you to sell yourself to an employer; yet, it can function in many other ways, too.

Is a résumé a marketing tool or a business document? This is a question under continual debate. And, while it is definitely not a piece of fiction, it is a creative document that can, and should, be adapted to meet differing needs.

There are no rules, and yet there are; but rules can be broken depending on the circumstances.

Is it any wonder so many people find résumé writing to be a difficult process?

You want your résumé to "sing," but not too loudly. While the résumé is an advertisement of sorts, most will not go to the lengths of what we see in ad copy and on television, except perhaps on a résumé for an advertising writer.

On the flip side, you do not want your résumé to evoke yawns from the person reading it. The résumé is a business document and should therefore follow rules of business writing, except that many of the standard rules of writing, including business writing, do not apply

.

What Exactly Is a Résumé?

A résumé is a brief summary of your skills, accomplishments, and history as it relates to a potential job. It is a selling tool used to get an interview. Employers may receive hundreds or even thousands of résumés for a particular job. The résumé may be the first document an employer sees about you. If a job does not require an application, your résumé may be the only information an employer sees. And an employer may see that information for a very short time. On average, employers scan résumés for about 20 seconds to determine whether or not candidates are worth a more thorough reading. Twenty seconds! That is not much time in which to make a positive impression.

The good news is that unlike a job application, the résumé highlights only your strengths. Information such as why you left a job or other potentially negative or damaging points are not included. Other good news is that different formats may be used to best highlight a person's experience. The format chosen will be the one best suited to promote your assets. Further good news is that if you follow the steps provided here and the instructions listed, you will have a much better chance of creating a résumé that will get a second look.

Writing a résumé can seem like a huge and difficult task. But once the process is broken down into smaller steps, it can be much easier to face. It is even possible that you may learn some things about yourself! Believe it or not, the writing process can actually be fun. Sure, some issues can be challenging, such as how to show experience if you are a first-time job seeker. But other parts can be very satisfying, such as finding the perfect action words to describe your experience or discovering that you have skills you never thought of as marketable before.

Why Do I Need a Résumé?

You may wonder why you need a résumé, particularly if you are seeking a job that only requires you to fill out an application. There are a few answers to this question.

Even for jobs that ask only for an application, having a résumé on hand will make filling out that application much easier. You will have all the necessary information in front of you on one (or maybe two) pieces of paper; it will help when filling out the section of the application that asks for previous experience.

Having a résumé can also boost your confidence. By walking through the writing process, you may surprise yourself as you come to realize that you have more experience than you thought. Or maybe your list of your skills looks more impressive on paper than you thought it would. Just knowing that you have put in the effort to write the résumé and see what you have to offer an employer can put you above the competition.

When you walk into your first interview, your experience from writing the résumé will make you much more confident when it comes to answering tough questions. You have already outlined your strengths and accomplishments; now you can elaborate on them. And because your résumé will be targeted to a specific job type, you will be able to gear those interview answers accordingly. Chances of getting taken off guard by a simple question such as, "Why do you want this job?" will be very few—you will be able to give an insightful answer because you will have put in the thought ahead of time. While other candidates may give reasons such as "I want to buy a car," you will be able to answer honestly how that particular job fits your goals and objectives—and how your particular set of skills will benefit that employer.

And why not submit that résumé with the application? Job applications are very specific and limited. A résumé can fill in some blanks, further explain skills and experience, and set you apart as a serious contender for the job. That you care enough about yourself to put in the effort and submit your résumé with an application can demonstrate to an employer that you are serious about your job search and future.

For the recent college grad, a résumé is absolutely essential. In short, nearly everyone needs a résumé.

When Should I Start Writing My Résumé?

Now. The earlier you start working on your résumé, the better. This not only gives you a jump on the job search process (if you haven't officially started yet), but will also make it easier to update as you progress through your educational and working life. A high school student can start by listing coursework and extracurricular activities specifically related to his or her career choice. This information can easily be revised as more coursework is completed or edited as new experience becomes more important (or as career goals change).

A college student may not have a great deal of time to devote to a résumé, but adding a few brief notes along the way will make the refining process that much easier as graduation approaches. Waiting until the last minute or even the last few months before graduation can cause undo stress. Besides, it is impossible to know when an opportunity may come knocking. An unexpected career fair may pop up, a recruiter may pass through town, or, as you practice your networking skills, you may come across the perfect person to give your résumé to—and you will want to be prepared for those moments.

Can I Use My Résumé for More than Looking for a Job?

Absolutely. You will find that your résumé is an invaluable tool, applicable in many situations. For those who are just starting a career or education, the résumé becomes essential.

College Applications

When submitting college applications, include a copy of that hard-earned résumé. Many applications will allow students to send additional information that may help admissions officers make decisions when looking at prospective students. Your résumé will not only highlight your best qualities but will also show your initiative.

Once you have been accepted to the school of your choice, you may wonder how you are going to pay for it. Scholarship, grant, and work study program applications may also allow for additional information. Your résumé should be among the list of essentials included in that application packet.

Internships and Co-Ops

Even though school programs help place students in internship positions, your résumé is still crucial. Make sure that administration and faculty involved in the internship program have a copy on file. Additionally, you will want to send a copy ahead of time to the employer you will be working with or bring it along your first day. Even though as an intern your primary objective is to learn, you still want to present your most professional side to the employer you will be working with. You never know what possibilities may await—ensure that you put your best foot forward!

Work co-ops are another possibility. Unlike internships, co-ops are paid positions that incorporate classroom study and real-world experience. Competition for these positions can be tough. Your résumé should demonstrate why you are the ideal candidate for one of these positions.

Following your internship or work co-op, do not forget to add to your résumé your new skills, responsibilities, and achievements acquired during the program.

Volunteer and Community Service

Even though volunteer work is not paid, it still requires the amount of responsibility you would show for a "real" job. Many volunteer organizations want and need to know the caliber of their volunteers, particularly if the job entails work with a special population such as children, the elderly, or the disabled. No one can and should expect to walk into a volunteer organization and be given a job on the spot simply because the work is non-paying. Have your résumé on hand when seeking volunteer work. Even if part of your reason for volunteering is to gain work experience, you will still want to bring the best version that you have available.

Help! I Do Not Have Anything to Include on a Résumé!

Some of you, even after reading through the entire résumé section, will feel that you do not have enough experience or credentials to list. Your grades may be less than ideal, or maybe you have not participated in as many activities as you feel you should have. Or maybe your coursework and activities have nothing to do with your chosen field. How do you solve the age-old question, "How can I get experience if I cannot get that first job?" Fortunately, there are ways to gain experience and prove yourself a worthy and reliable employee.

Job-Training Programs

If you are a high school student, find out if your school has a school-to-work program. (If it does not, why not look into helping get one started? Such initiative would look great on your résumé.) For those who fall in the 16 to 24-year-old category, see if there is a local Job Corps office. This private and government-funded program works with youth to develop and train for career goals. Visit with career counselors or contact the local Job Service to find out what options are available in your area.

Volunteer Work

Donating your time is an excellent way to learn new skills and help your community. Volunteer work comes in many forms, from working with children to building a new home. Volunteering can be an excellent way to meet people and, as you prove yourself, become an excellent means to gain references. And all the work that you do as a volunteer can go on your résumé as opposed to a job application, where space may be too limited—see why it is a good idea to attach that résumé?

How do you find volunteer work? If you are in high school, contact the guidance counselor's office, or if in college, contact the vocational guidance office or general studies office. Chances are that someone there will know of groups actively seeking volunteers. You can also try the local Chamber of Commerce. Other ideas are to contact some of the larger organizations, such as Americorps (http://www.americorps.com) or United Way (http://national.unitedway.org/). Your school or public reference librarian may also have suggestions for volunteer work. Ask around. If you have a particular interest, such as tutoring children, contact local schools. If you have an interest in social work, call the local food bank or Salvation Army. Browse through the yellow pages for organizations that provide services similar to those in which you would like to eventually find work.

Spot and Temp Jobs

A great way to earn some extra money while looking for a permanent position is to work spot or temporary jobs. Spot jobs are available through the local Job Service (and sometimes employment agencies) and are usually "at the last minute." Once you get yourself on the spot job list, you will be asked to call in on the mornings of days you are available to work. If a position is available, you will be directed where to go and when. These types of jobs often involve physical labor, but they can be an excellent way to improve your skill set and prove your reliability and willingness to work (and get paid to exercise!).

Temps, or temporary jobs, are also available through the Job Service or other employment agencies. These types of positions can also be found through networking (a friend of a friend knows of a company that needs a temporary receptionist while the permanent one is out on maternity leave), the classifieds, recruiters, and other traditional forms of finding work. While these positions are not permanent, they can be a great way to prove yourself, learn new skills, earn references, network, and perhaps work into a permanent position. If you do a great job for the company, they may decide that you are worth keeping around (or refer you to another company looking for someone exactly like you).

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The Science of Addiction

The Science of Addiction

Below video describes the science of addiction as explained by a drug addict himself :

An addiction is an unhealthy relationship with drugs or alcohol in which you use more than you would like to use, and you continue to use despite negative consequences.

People use drugs or alcohol to escape, relax, or to reward themselves. But over time, drugs and alcohol make you believe that you can’t cope without them, or that you can’t enjoy life without using. The greatest damage is to your self-esteem.

What is the Medical Definition of Addiction?

An addiction must meet at least 3 of the following criteria. This is based on the criteria of the American Psychiatric Association (DSM-IV) and World Health Organization (ICD-10).

1. Tolerance. Do you use more alcohol or drugs over time?

2. Withdrawal. Have you experienced physical or emotional withdrawal when you have stopped using? Have you experienced anxiety, irritability, shakes, sweats, nausea, or vomiting? Emotional withdrawal is just as significant as physical withdrawal.

3. Limited control. Do you sometimes drink or use drugs more than you would like? Do you sometimes drink to get drunk? Does one drink lead to more drinks sometimes? Do you ever regret how much you used the day before?

4. Negative consequences. Have you continued to use even though there have been negative consequences to your mood, self-esteem, health, job, or family?

5. Neglected or postponed activities. Have you ever put off or reduced social, recreational, work, or household activities because of your use?

6. Significant time or energy spent. Have you spent a significant amount of time obtaining, using, concealing, planning, or recovering from your use? Have you spend a lot of time thinking about using? Have you ever concealed or minimized your use? Have you ever thought of schemes to avoid getting caught?

7. Desire to cut down. Have you sometimes thought about cutting down or controlling your use? Have you ever made unsuccessful attempts to cut down or control your use?

How Common is Drug or Alcohol Addiction?

Approximately 10% of any population is addicted to drugs or alcohol. Addiction is more common than diabetes, which occurs in approximately 7% of the population.

Addiction crosses all socio-economic boundaries. 10% of teachers, 10% of plumbers, and 10% of CEOs have an addiction.

The terms alcohol addiction, alcoholism, and alcohol dependence are all equivalent. The same is true for the terms drug addiction and drug dependence. 

How Does Addiction Feel?

An addictive substance feels good because it stimulates the pleasure centre of the brain through neurotransmitters such as dopamine and GABA. If you have a genetic predisposition, addictive substances don’t just feel good. They feel so good that you will want to chase after them.

This is where addiction comes in. If you have a genetic predisposition, addictive substances feel so good that you are willing to suffer negative consequences in order to get more and to continue to feel the high.

Addictive substances feel different inside an addict’s brain than they do to a non-addict. This is why the two sides have difficulty understanding each other. In someone who is not addicted, drugs and alcohol only produce a mild high. Therefore a non-addict cannot understand why the addict would go to such lengths, when it is clearly destroying their life.

Denial is a big part of addiction. Because addictive substances feel good, an addict will initially deny that they have a problem. In the long-run addiction isolates you from the people and activities and that mean the most to you.

The Cost of Addiction

The dollars and cents cost of addiction is mind boggling. At least twice as many people die from alcoholism in the US every year as die from motor vehicle accidents.

Alcohol intoxication is associated with 40-50% of traffic fatalities, 25-35% of nonfatal motor vehicle injuries, and 64% of fires. Alcohol is present in nearly 50% of homicides, either in the victim or the perpetrator.

Alcohol intoxication is involved in 31% of fatal injuries, and 23% of completed suicides.

One study found that 86 % of homicide offenders, 37 % of assault offenders, and 57 % of men and 27 % of women involved in marital violence were drinking at the time of their offense.

The Consequences of Addiction

People only stop using drugs and alcohol when they have suffered enough negative consequences. When you've suffered enough pain and enough regret you are ready to stop.

You are ready to stop when the two sides of addiction collide. On the one hand, addiction feels so good that you want to use more. On the other hand, addiction leads to negative consequences. After a while, something has got to give.

You don't have to hit rock bottom. The purpose of Today's post is to show you the potential negative consequences of addiction so that you will be ready to quit before you've lost everything. You can imagine what it would be like to hit rock bottom. And that can help motivate you.

The most important consequences of addiction are social, emotional, and psychological. People usually think of the physical and economic consequences of addiction. "I don't have a serious addiction because my health is fine, and I haven't lost my job." But those are very late stage consequences.

As far as work is concerned that's usually the last thing to suffer. You need your work in order to pay your bills, so that you can continue your addiction. When your work begins to suffer, you've slipped from being a functioning addict to a non-functioning addict.

The damage addiction does to your relationships and self-esteem is far deeper and takes longer to repair. You've hurt friends and family. You've disappointed yourself. You've traded important things in your life so that you could make more time to use. You've lived a double life. You've seen the hurt in your family's eyes, and the disappointment in your children's faces. Those are the consequences that can motivate you to begin recovery.

Here are three tests to help you decide if you have an addiction.

The CAGE Test for Alcohol Addiction

This simple test is surprisingly accurate. Answer yes or no to each question.

1. Have you ever felt you should Cut down on your drinking?
2. Have you ever been Annoyed when people have commented on your drinking?
3. Have you ever felt Guilty or badly about your drinking?
4. Have you ever had an Eye opener first thing in the morning to steady your nerves or get rid of a hangover?

Your score:

Score one point for each yes answer.

If you scored 1, there is an 80% chance you're addicted to alcohol.
If you scored 2, there is an 89% chance you're addicted to alcohol.
If you scored 3, there is a 99% chance you're addicted to alcohol.
If you scored 4, there is a 100% chance you're addicted to alcohol.

The Modified CAGE Test for All Addictions

Most self-test questionnaires apply to alcohol addiction, but can be easily adapted to any addiction.

1. Have you ever felt you should Cut down your use of drugs?
2. Have you ever been Annoyed when people have commented on your use?
3. Have you ever felt Guilty or badly about your use?
4. Have you ever used drugs to Ease withdrawal symptoms, or to avoid feeling low after using?

The AUDIT Test for Alcohol Addiction (Alcoholism)

To correctly answer some of these questions you need to know the definition of a drink. For this test one drink is:

One can of beer (12 oz or approx 330 ml of 5% alcohol), or
One glass of wine (5 oz or approx 140 ml of 12% alcohol), or
One shot of liquor (1.5 oz or approx 40 ml of 40% alcohol).

1. How often do you have a drink containing alcohol?

Never (score 0)
Monthly or Less (score 1)
2-4 times a month (score 2)
2-3 times a week (score 3)
4 or more times a week (score 4)

2. How many alcoholic drinks do you have on a typical day when you are drinking?

1 or 2 (0)
3 or 4 (1)
5 or 6 (2)
7-9 (3)
10 or more (4)

3. How often do you have 6 or more drinks on one occasion?

Never (0)
Less than monthly (1)
Monthly (2)
Weekly (3)
Daily or almost daily (4)

4. How often during the past year have you found that you drank more or for a longer time than you intended?

Never (0)
Less than monthly (1)
Monthly (2)
Weekly (3)
Daily or almost daily (4)

5. How often during the past year have you failed to do what was normally expected of you because of your drinking?

Never (0)
Less than monthly (1)
Monthly (2)
Weekly (3)
Daily or almost daily (4)

6. How often during the past year have you had a drink in the morning to get yourself going after a heavy drinking session?

Never (0)
Less than monthly (1)
Monthly (2)
Weekly (3)
Daily or almost daily (4)

7. How often during the past year have you felt guilty or remorseful after drinking?

Never (0)
Less than monthly (1)
Monthly (2)
Weekly (3)
Daily or almost daily (4)

8. How often during the past year have you been unable to remember what happened the night before because of your drinking?

Never (0)
Less than monthly (1)
Monthly (2)
Weekly (3)
Daily or almost daily (4)

9. Have you or anyone else been injured as a result of your drinking?

No (0)
Yes, but not in the past year (2)
Yes, during the past year (4)

10. Has a relative, friend, doctor, or health care worker been concerned about your drinking, or suggested that you cut down?

No (0)
Yes, but not in the past year (2)
Yes, during the past year (4)

Your score:

If you scored 8-10 or more, you are probably addicted to alcohol.

It may seem like the AUDIT questionnaire is an easy test to fail. If you applied this test to other aspects of your life you will almost certainly come up as being addicted to something. For example, most people watch too much television, or eat too much of their favorite food. But those are so-called "soft addictions", and the AUDIT questionnaire was not designed to assess them. It is extremely reliable when it comes to assessing alcohol addiction.

The AUDIT (Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test) was developed by the World Health Organization (WHO). The test correctly classifies 95% of people into either alcoholics or non-alcoholics. It was tested on 2000 people before being published.

(The pdf format version of the AUDIT is available through the WHO website. Copyright 1993 World Health Organization.)

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Importance of Apps

                     Importance of Apps in Today's World  

Multi-platform is the new normal in the kids media world, but monetizing the thousands of apps being produced each day is another story. After all, there’s been ample coverage of once-hot app companies going down in flames. A recent story in the Atlantic cautioned against investing in even the most profitable app makers, suggesting companies like Candy Crush maker King Digital Entertainment, which took in $568 million in profit last year, may not prove profitable in the long haul.

Mobile apps are today part of every conceivable business, irrespective of their size or services they offer. Apps are the best way to keep your customers engaged with your product - they act like gentle reminders to pull them back to your product of service,

 However, are mobile apps really necessary for each and every business? Do you particularly need one to promote your brand or business? Read on to find out the answer to your question….

There have been many small businesses, such as pizzerias, beauty parlors, coffee houses and so on, which developed mobile apps to promote their services, eventually becoming the leading names in their respective industries. It is an undisputed fact that mobile apps do benefit small businesses in a big way.

However, the cost of mobile app development, plus the hassles of marketing both your app and brand can prove to take a heavy toll on your time and money. Developing an app for your business adds value to your overall marketing strategy. 

                              

A mobile app is a small program that resides on a smartphone, iPad or Android tablet and fulfills a sales, marketing or training objective by delivering a useful tool to your target market. With the power of today’s phones, apps can do some really great things – from letting you know what’s going on in your area, to calculating exchange rates, movie times, social media interactions, alerting you to traffic information, providing entertainment and letting you know about special offers. There are over 1 million mobile applications out there today performing a huge range of tasks.

App Benefits

• Immerses the user in your brand

• Creates deeper engagement

• Drives more loyalty

• Delivers important feedback to your company

• Creates new revenue stream and ultimately more profits

• Enables easy sharing of your content between mobile users

• Reduces costs to your business through automation

• Attracts new customers

• Improves customer service

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Yoga - an ancient medicine

 Yoga - an ancient medicine 

Physician Craig Koniver says , "Being a physician certainly biases how I view the world around me. I can’t help but think in terms of problem solving and healing.But have you noticed how medicalized our society has become? The other night watching television, we watched at least four drug commercials and one health insurance commercial — during a half hour show! I believe we are in the middle of the medicalization of America, and I don’t think this is a good thing."

Let me ask you three questions: How many people over the age of 35 do you know that are not on any medicines? Why is it that the patients now come to physicians asking for specific medicines? And why are we as a society spending so much money on healthcare?

I believe that the core principle behind these questions and the medicalization of our society is the pharmaceutical pill. And while I certainly am a fan of modern technology, I believe that now more than ever we need to pause and reflect upon this notion. We have made the medicine synonymous with health, when in fact, these are two separate entities.

Before antibiotics,  physicians had to rely on many different healing practices: mercury ingestion, blood letting, herbal botanicals, surgery, and countless other healing modalities including song, dance and even prayer. But antibiotics changed everything.

Now patients could take a pill and get predictable healing without the many unwanted side effects that came along with the harsher treatments of mercury and blood letting. Antibiotics truly helped our society transition into the Industrial Age. After antibiotics we were introduced to hormones and blood pressure medicine and diabetes medicine and antipsychotic medicine. The pill became our greatest ally in helping fight disease and improving health.

But, as we grew accustomed to the medicines, we could not escape being changed by the medicines. If you are a physician you know this is true–just think about your medical training and the focus of today’s evidence based medicine. Nearly all of it is defined and literally financed by the pharmaceutical companies. And as a society we know this is true when we see how many of us are taking medicines and how much money we spend on these medicines.

But medicine is not health. Why is it that today we have more people taking medicines, yet have more disease? There is more heart disease and cancer and autoimmune disease than ever before. If medicines truly defined health, then we should see greater reductions in morbidity and mortality.

The pill is not the panacea of health. Yet, the patients expect physicians to write for them and the physicians have been trained to intervene with them. I think many of you would even argue that we do not see lower rates of disease because patients are not as compliant with their pills as they could and should be.

But I think differently. By defining health by the medicine, we have neglected our greatest ally in medicine itself: the doctor/ patient relationship. Physicians have traded in their interactions with patients for the myriad of medicines they are prescribed. This is not all of their ( physicians' ) fault by any means. In their  ( physicians' ) pressured insurance-based model of medicine, they have to see more patients everyday, thus allowing them only a brief few moments with each patient. In this type of environment, it is no wonder that the patients are quick to fire the prescription of physicians writing off, giving the patient something to get “better” with.

"The reality, though, is that patients don’t want more prescriptions, they want to feel better. But because we have medicalized the very essence of health, we, oftentimes, misunderstand our roles as doctors.

Medicine itself is a wonderful tool, a powerful one. But as we move forward in trying to determine what the next landscape of medicine will look like, let us not continue defining health by the medicine itself. " adds physician Craig Koniver.

  If you're looking for choices beyond drugs and surgery for a health condition or concern, you're likely finding that traditional western medicine isn't giving you many (or any) options. Most M.D.s aren't trained in alternative therapies, but a growing contingent of M.D.s is more broadly trained in complementary and alternative medicine. And some are trained in yoga — a practice that's been emerging as a highly effective alternative therapy for many chronic health conditions and symptoms.

Among the most respected of these forward-thinking docs is Timothy McCall, M.D., is a board-certified specialist in internal medicine and a dedicated yoga practitioner. McCall has traveled to India and throughout the United States observing, training with, and interviewing the world’s leading yoga teachers and therapists including his primary teacher, Patricia Walden. He is the medical editor of Yoga Journal, and is the author of Yoga as Medicine: The Yogic Prescription for Health and Healing.

Below are some of the questions asked  to Timothy McCall on Yoga and his answers :

Q. How does yoga work from a medical perspective?

A. Yoga — by which I mean a broad array of tools including asana (yoga poses), pranayama, meditation, chanting, service, etc. — has been shown in hundreds of scientific studies to benefit people with a wide variety of health conditions. Yoga lowers blood pressure, improves lung function, relaxes the nervous system, cuts cholesterol, boosts immunity, and makes you more content, to name just a few documented effects.

Perhaps even more important, yoga is a methodology to change dysfunctional habits and attitudes into ones that serve you better. Patanjali wrote that the key to success in yoga is regular practice over a long period of time, and this idea is finding support in recent breakthroughs in neuroscience. We now know that the brain is capable of changing itself — of creating new patterns, new connections between neurons — and that the more you do something, the stronger those neural pathways become.

What led you to go from practicing primary care medicine to writing a book on yoga therapy?

I took to yoga from the beginning, even though I’m about as far from a natural as could be. A couple years into practicing yoga, I found myself disillusioned with medicine, or maybe my yoga practice was putting me in touch with the disillusionment that had been growing for awhile. At that time, profit-driven managed care was taking over, and the conveyor belt of care was getting sped up. It was stressful; you didn’t get as much human contact with patients, and I felt the quality of care was being compromised, which added to the stress.

So I decided to concentrate on writing, which up to that point I’d been doing only part-time. Since I was still interested in healing, and getting more and more into yoga, it was kind of natural to shift my attention to yoga therapy, so I set out on a journey of discovery, which I’m still on. Yoga as Medicine is one of the fruits of that journey.

My goal was to make yoga and yoga therapy accessible to the public, especially to people who might still be skeptical or think they’re old or sick to do it. There’s loads of research on yoga that most people haven’t heard of; I thought could help bring legitimacy to the field. As a physician I’m also very concerned about doing yoga safely, so there’s a big focus [in the book] on contraindications. Above all, I wanted to show that yoga is great way to stay healthy and relieve symptoms — and transform your life for the better, whether you’re cured of what ails you or not.

Is there a difference between yoga therapy and taking a yoga class?

Absolutely. Almost any form of yoga can be great preventive medicine, and wonderful stress reduction, as long as you’re not doing things that hurt you. But yoga therapy, as I’ve observed in my travels around India and the U.S., tends to be personalized to the individual. Even the masters who write books giving sequences for particular conditions don’t actually practice yoga therapy that way themselves. They look at the person in front of them and come up with something just for him or her, and modify it over time in accordance with the student’s changing needs. Since group classes are actually an invention of the last 50 years or so, in a way modern yoga therapy, which is often taught in small groups or one-on-one, is returning yoga to its roots.

You've recently been writing more about Ayurveda. Why is that?

As a bit of a skeptical scientist myself, I wasn’t initially sold on Ayurveda, but in the last few years I’ve started to figure out what a deep well it is, and how helpful it is if you really want to understand yoga. An Ayurvedic perspective is particularly useful for yoga teachers who want to better personalize their yogic prescriptions for individual students. I’ve been to India three times in the last three years to get treatments for my own health concerns and to study with an Ayurvedic master in Kerala. The guy is 77, and he started training at the age of four with his father and grandfather, who in turn were trained by theirs. He may be the most impressive physician of any kind I’ve ever met.

Any advice for yoga teachers or others contemplating getting more involved in yoga therapy?

I think yoga therapy is a great service to provide, that there’s tremendous need, and that this field is about to take off. Baby Boomers are looking for safe, natural, effective therapies to help them deal with the chronic illnesses they are starting to develop. And with health care costs continuing to spiral out of control, one of therapeutic yoga’s advantages is that once students make an initial investment in props and instruction, they can pursue it on their own for free.

While it could take a lifetime to get all the experience and training you need to practice yoga therapy at the highest level, just helping students to relax, breathe better and improve their posture can help them enormously, and you don’t need extensive training for that. Beyond training, the most important requirement for prospective yoga therapists is to walk the path of yoga themselves, and that means a commitment to a personal practice.

You did a great job in Yoga as Medicine of featuring the work of teachers from a wide variety of traditions. Do you think it matters which style of yoga you practice?

Again, as long as you’re not doing something potentially harmful, I think the fact that you practice is more important than what you practice. I’ve seen healing in pretty much every single system of yoga I’ve investigated. I do think that some styles come from deeper traditions, some train their teachers more thoroughly, and some are safer than others, particularly for those with serious ailments, so I definitely think it matters which style of yoga you do, and maybe even more important who you study with. But the beauty is that there are so many good choices that almost anyone can find an approach to yoga that will work for them and that they’ll really enjoy.

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