my story.

Where I am today is very different from where I started back in 2013. Today, I work fully for myself as a Yoga Instructor and Energy Work Practitioner. My focus is to support others in their physical, mental/emotional and energetic well-being.

I moved to the Dallas-Fort Worth area back in July 2013. I had just graduated from Penn State University's Master's program in Forensic Drug Chemistry and was starting my first job at Dallas County's crime lab, The Southwestern Institute of Forensic Sciences as a Drug Chemist. It was during my time at Penn State that I began practicing yoga. I would go to the weekly Wednesday class at the student center called "Yoga with Doug", and this was my first true introduction to yoga. This time of my life was very stressful and uncertain. I didn't know where I was going to end up after graduation, or where I would be working. I found that yoga became something that was my own. It helped me manage my stress, I could breathe better, and I could track my progress. At this point in my yoga practice, I was mainly focused on the physical aspect. My goal: "I need to be able to touch my toes in a forward fold while keeping my legs straight." (Don't ask me why - this is what 22 year old me thought was needed to "do yoga right").

After living in Texas for a little while, I eventually found a yoga community in Fort Worth. I quickly became friends with the owners of what would be 3Tree Yoga. I helped them build out the studio space that was located off S. Jennings Ave in my spare time outside of working at the lab. Not long after, one of my friends finally asked "So Dan, when are you going to become a yoga teacher?" It had never been on my radar. I sat with it, and every part of me told me to go for it.

Fast forward some, I began teaching yoga classes at 3Tree Yoga in 2015 and I've never looked back. I found more than a yoga community, I found friends that became like family at each studio I have worked at since. I took training after training for several years from here on out. I literally could not get enough. I completed a yoga teacher mentorship program in 2015, my 200hr RYT certification in 2016, my 300hr RYT certification in 2018, then a second 300hr RYT certification in 2019. Somewhere in that mix, I took a few shorter trainings on the side to get certified in offering Yoga Nidra, Stand Up Paddle Board Yoga, and Reiki (a Japanese energy healing modality). Each training was unique, amazing, and helped shape me into who I am today. Keep in mind, I was balancing all of this while working full-time as a Forensic Chemist. As I’m sharing this now, I realize how insane I must sound. This was so many things in such a short period of time! All I can say is it felt incredibly necessary, and I was having a lot of fun in the process.

During all of the trainings and yoga teaching, I got a new job as a Forensic Chemistry Team Leader at NMS Labs located in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in late 2018. I was in charge of a team of drug chemists and excited for this new role that would allow me to grow as a chemist and a leader. I went in thinking I was going to work here for the rest of my career. I was so excited to be working for NMS. I was 29 years old at the time, and I remember my first day in training very clearly. I had an immediate gut feeling "I am not going to be here for as long as I thought. A while, but not forever." I stuffed that thought back down where it came from because I couldn’t handle the thought of a big career change again soon. There we go, nice and cozy. Cue the dramatic irony.

Over the next 6 years, I worked my way up into the Forensic Drug Chemistry Site Supervisor role where I was in charge of approximately 15 chemists, 2 supervisors, and an evidence processing team. Simultaneously, I was doing well in my yoga career assisting in yoga teacher trainings, hosting workshops and special events, and teaching a few classes a week. I felt like I had the best of both worlds. One was the sensible job, one was the fun job. You can guess which one was which.

It was around late 2023 that I really began to feel the extreme burnout settle in at the lab. I was so tired, my health was being affected from the stress, and that doesn’t really begin to describe how empty I was feeling. I had been praying for so long for a way out. I wanted more than anything to fully transition to teaching yoga full-time, but I would only do this in a way that was safe, supported and sustainable. I was not going to put my husband and I in a bad financial situation. I spent months of sitting in my meditation practice and visualizing what it would feel like in my body to be living the life of my dreams, asking again and again “When can I teach yoga full time, I just want to teach yoga. I am so tired.” Each time, the answer I felt in my body was “Keep going, be patient. It’s coming but not yet.”

By June 2024, I was ready to crash out. I was beyond the point of exhaustion. I had reached that point of burnout where you hate every day (and I hate to even say this, but that’s where I was). I kept sitting with the same question in my meditation “when can I teach yoga…”, but this time the answer that came forward was different, clear, and a full-body feeling of “Yes. Go for it.” This jolted me at first. I clapped back “You sure about that?” I sat with this feeling for the next several weeks, feeling into what life would be like if I stayed at or left the lab. One path felt very limited, one felt unlimited.

I finally asked my husband after one particularly hard day at work and a casual mental breakdown on the couch at home if me leaving the lab and teaching yoga full-time would be the worst idea ever. He knew very well how miserable I had been, and after some financial planning we both agreed it was doable for quite a while so I could give it the best possible chance.

Slowly, I started to tell friends and family over the next couple of weeks and by end of August 2024, I left the lab. Everything moved so fast from that point on. It was as if the Universe was waiting for me to acknowledge and trust the information I was receiving. As soon as I did so, it was as if two big hands opened beneath me like a safety net. The feeling was “ok, I’ve got you.” I felt safe.

I left a career I built for 17 years and held these two careers together from 2013 to 2024. I felt fortunate to have two careers I loved (I really do still love forensics, it’s an incredibly interesting field). What I realized on the other side is that it had to be both. Making the switch sooner would have been reckless and I wasn’t ready. My career in forensics supported building my career as a yoga instructor and my career as a yoga instructor taught me how to be a better leader, how to lead with clarity and compassion vs. with an iron fist.

I have been living my dream life since Labor Day 2024, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. I have a quote on my wall in my yoga space at home that has helped me in building this new life. It is by Albert Einstein “Everything is energy and that’s all there is to it. Match the frequency of the reality you want and you cannot help but get that reality. It can be done no other way. This is not philosophy, this is physics.”

Also, I still can’t touch my toes in a forward fold while keeping my legs straight, but the journey down to my feet has been the most rewarding one I’ve taken so far.