A Different Kind of Support Group: Kula for Karma

When you pair expensive medical treatments with free community programs, such as therapeutic yoga and meditation, patients can really start to see improvements in their health and well-being.

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Imagine a community where people are constantly doing good deeds for others with no expectation for anything in return other than your own well-being and happiness. In a nutshell, this is the mission of Kula for Karma, a New York City-based nonprofit organization of trained volunteer yoga teachers who provide breath work, therapeutic yoga and meditation classes at no cost to people in need, particularly those who are facing illness, disease and chronic pain, or recovery from abuse, trauma and addiction.

Since Gerri Topfer founded Kula for Karma in 2007, it has expanded its platform to 600 programs across the Tri-State Area, which spans New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, including the Dubin Breast Center of the Tisch Cancer Institute at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan. In this video, Topfer, who is president of Kula for Karma, along with her colleague and executive director Penni Feiner, plus Dubin Breast Center patient Alicia Justiniano, discuss the origins of this special wellness program and how it is helping patients mentally and physically to heal.

By Cristina Goyanes
Published on April 22, 2016