Read an interview with David Simon

David Simon, M.D., Medical Director and Co-Founder of the Chopra Center for Well Being, trained in Western Medicine as a neurologist, and has studied Eastern Philosophy for the past 35 years. He is an authority on Ayurveda, a 5000-year old approach to healing from India; a veteran of yoga and meditation; and a medical pioneer in the mind body connection. Simon’s integrative approach blends “complementary and conventional medicine” to facilitate health. Simon has authored several books on the mind body connection including Vital Energy: The 7 Keys to Invigorate Body, Mind and Soul; Return to Wholeness: Embracing Body, Mind and Spirit in the Face of Cancer; and The Wisdom of Healing.

Beryl Bender Birch has been a student of yoga since 1971 and has been teaching Ashtanga yoga for most of that time. Birch graduated from Syracuse University with a B.A. in philosophy and comparative religion and has lived on the West Coast, the East Coast, and in the high middle (Colorado's Rocky Mountains). She and her husband, Thom, are co-directors of The Hard & The Soft Astanga Yoga Institute in New York City and East Hampton.