Kathleen Kastner is an author, yogi, fitness expert, animal rescuer, and committed Vegan. We talk about her new picture book, Karma Cats to the Rescue — based on a true story of two house cats who help a stray kitty acclimate to having a forever home — and also about Kathleen’s personal journey. (Here’s a tidbit: she moved to San Diego from her native Kansas in 1993, went to her fitness job at a local hospital, and her first personal training client turned out to be Dr. Deepak Chopra.)
We talk about her commitment to animals and Vegan living, and then turn to a fascinating assessment of yoga, as it’s presented in the West, from someone who owned a yoga studio for sixteen years. The long and short of it: yoga really is yoga philosophy, the quieting of the mind, and the physical postures are supposed to help with that, not make all of us seventeen and double-jointed. Injury is legion among yoga enthusiasts in midlife and later, and we discuss how to avoid being sidelined (also how to get yoga’s vegetarian roots more rooted in the 2023 “yoga world”).
More about our guest:
Kathleen Kastner has a master’s degree in exercise physiology and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of KS. She was a yoga studio owner in Kansas City for 16 years.
Living in Encinitas, CA with her husband and 3 rescue cat, she’s focused on writing and being a sound healer. Kathleen has been vegan since 2002 and loves advocating for all beings!