Farming for Health Podcast #21: Dr. Anna Yusim

The internationally recognized Dr. Anna Yusim is a Stanford- and Yale-educated psychiatrist and bestselling author—among many other amazing accomplishments—and, in this edition of our Farming for Health podcast, she shares the start of her journey with us. 

Going back twenty years in time, Dr. Yusim says that she would have laughed at the idea that she would become a spiritual person. That was the furthest thing from her heart and mind, being a scientific and rational person. After all, she studied mathematics and ended up in pre-med.

Then, she says, strange things started happening in her life. This included when, after she’d attended a lecture, she stopped for ice cream—and was unexpectedly approached by a mother and young child. The woman said that she had messages for her, and then she told her information that was both true and private.

This woman, at this point a stranger, ultimately became a very important part of Dr. Yusim’s life: a soul sister. But, first, what had happened bothered her scientific mind. How did this woman access this information outside of the natural channels of communication?

This was a difficult period in Dr. Yusim’s life for multiple reasons, including because she struggled to decide if she should continue on the path of psychiatry. She then began a period of deep soul searching, traveling to—and living and working in—more than seventy countries. She experienced a range of spiritual paths and traditions, including studying Kabbalah, learning Buddhist meditation, and working with South American shamans and Indians gurus. 

These travels allowed her to see the world anew and redefine her very identity. To hear more of Dr. Yusim’s incredible story, you can hear it here in our Farming for Health podcast #21: Understanding the Soul, Flow State, and Finding Your Purpose. 

Past Episodes of our Farming for Health Podcast

If you’ve missed any of our previous episodes, you can find them here:

• Episode One: Keto, Cruciferous Vegetables, Salt and Your Mindset
• Episode Two: Cooking, Conviviality, and Preserving the Harvest
• Episode Three: Ferments, Food Insecurity, and Wasted Food
• Episode Four: Anti-Cancer Diet, Food as Medicine, and Vegetables
• Episode Five: Plants, Happiness and Mindful Neglect.
• Episode Six: Whole 30, Sustainable Habits, and Loving Vegetables
• Episode Seven: Iodine, Egg Yolk Enzymes, and Miso
• Episode Eight: Fungi, Bitter Foods, and Food Extinction
• Episode Nine: Understanding Food, Nutritional Healing and Farming
• Episode Ten: Enjoying the Process, Connection and Soup
• Episode Eleven: Monica Geller, Community and Limiting Salads 
• Episode Twelve: Nourishment, Creativity, and Full-Spectrum Health
• Episode Thirteen: The Joy of Cooking, Fermentation, and Seasonality 
• Episode Fourteen: Cauliflower, Potlucks, and the Joy of Food
• Episode Fifteen: Time Savers, Pickled Raisins and Cooking With Creativity
• Episode Sixteen: Romanticizing Food, Seasonal Eating, and Shamed Spinach
• Episode Seventeen: Being Present, The Eat In Method and Food as Fuel
• Episode Eighteen: Regenerative Grazing, Monarchs and Voting with Your Dollar 
• Episode Nineteen: Childhood Injustice, Soil Health, and Relationship with Nature
• Episode Twenty: Yoga, Climate Changes, and Creating a Livable Future