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Enlighten: Uplift & Inspire


Mar 26, 2018

Betsy Gelb explored all sorts of new ways to exercise before deciding that yoga resonated most deeply for her. In fact, within her first year of practicing, she immersed herself into an intense yoga teacher training. Having recently met Betsy, as my new yoga teacher, I was delighted to have a teacher who confidently and gracefully embraced aging (she recently turned 70), challenged us to cultivate upper body strength and shared her philosophy about breath, yoga, health, silence and the power of turning inward. Betsy says that her niche in yoga is that she is simultaneously the oldest and the youngest: she typically is the oldest person in the class, however having come to yoga so late in her life, has the youngest practice.  

I discovered that before she found yoga, Betsy had a full, diverse career. She was a psychiatric nurse at a methadone maintenance program, taught nursing at St. Vincent’s Hospital, was a psychiatric nurse supervisor at Jacoby Hospital, was a teaching fellow at NYU, wrote a curriculum for mental health nursing and she was the editor for RN Magazine.

In addition to her extensive work in the field of nursing, Betsy was a docent for the Whitney and Guggenheim museums, taught art literacy in NYC schools, ran her own women’s clothing business, offered baking workshops a local bakery called “Taste the Love” and collaborated with her husband, musician/composer Larry Gelb, in writing the book for their musicals.

One of the musicals Betsy and Larry created, “Love So Dear” is based on the true story of how LSD was introduced into the United States. Betsy shares intriguing details from her thorough research of the corruptive relationship between the CIA and LSD. I was fascinated with my yoga teacher’s depth of knowledge and wisdom in such a wide range of topics.

Links:

www.imaginmusic.com

YouTube video of the recording, "God is in the Mayo", from the musical "LSD"