Education Highlights |
Assignments are designed using active learning methods so students engage with and apply the knowledge to heal themselves and others. Practical exercises will help you discern the subtle cues your body uses to communicate imbalance.
Experiential learning will be accompanied by weekly case studies on advanced disease for a complete, in depth natural approach to health.
Use of multimedia makes online learning more effective than traditional in-person classroom settings, where the teacher may be more than 50 feet away from the students.
Our inspiring courses do not rush education. 2 years is the minimum to understand the full scope of Ayurveda. An additional 2 years is required for advanced level practice.
Our courses are more challenging, but build more confidence and results in your personal healing journey, and those of your clients.
Avoid comparing schools based on price. Instead compare clinical outcomes. Don't skimp on education. Focus on your lifetime career, not on 'geting a deal' today.
Harvard is not the cheapest school, but you can actually have a successful career and your lifetime earning potential makes it worth it.
When you graduate from Joyful Belly, you are investing in a high-quality, in-depth education, your future clinical confidence, and a lifetime of achieving your goals.
All of our teachers receive ongoing pedagogy training (teacher training) customized to medical education.
We train our teachers in active learning methods and mutliple intelligences and learning styles. We've organized exercises using these pedagogy tools.
Study after study proves great teaching is essential to learning outcomes and competency.
The founder of our school graduated from Harvard, and his academic qualities infuse the whole school to a higher quality education.
Joyful Belly takes a natural, common sense approach to Ayurveda education so that people in your community can relate to your future clinical practice and engage in your services.
Patient centered care focuses on the culture of the client, not the medicine, ensuring your practice will be accessible in a cross-cultural context.
Your journey will not only be profound, it will also make sense.
Gain experience running your clinic and business while in the course.
Once you graduate, you are already setup for practice.
Receive expert 1-1 guidance from business advisors at Joyful Belly.
You can't become a clinician just by studying on your own. Self-paced and open enrollment 'by modules' don't work.
All students start at the same time and grow together as a class, while combined synchronous & asynchronous learning maximizes flexbility.
You are joining a community and you will learn from each other. Expect to make lifelong friends and colleagues.
Our students are leaders with busy lives. We DO offer flexiblity for any life events or plans you have during the school-year. Contact us for details.
Our leadership, expertise, and commitment to Ayurveda is best demonstrated through our many accomplishments incuding statistics on over 1,000 symptoms!
The quality of a school is measured by what it does, not what it says. We don't just teach Ayurveda, we study and develop it.
The scope of knowledge you will receive is demonstrated by the thousands of free, down to earth, practical articles we provide on the website and the many free tools we offer to the public.
Ayurveda is a grass roots health movement that is more accessible to the public because of the free content we offer.
Great schools of Ayurveda publish content and have a strong public service mission.
You will come to understand Ayurveda they way the classical founders did, from the ground up, using your body as the guide.
At Joyful Belly, you will not only study what Ayurveda was, but what it will be. You have a chance to be a part of Ayurveda's development and growth.
Unlike associations, state school licensing boards conduct regular audits. State school licensing is a much better measure of school professionalism than provided by associations.
Here, you will discover your purpose through an advanced, clinically-focused education in Classical Metabolic Theory, the structured approach to vitality using personalized diet, lifestyle, and herbs that unites Ayurveda, Greek, & Chinese Medicine.
Joyful Belly is a North Carolina, State Licensed college nestled in the mountains of Southern Appalachia (Note: The North Carolina State Board of Community Colleges is not an accrediting agency). As a state-licensed college, we take academia seriously and offer a rigorous curriculum that includes personalized diet, lifestyle, and herbal formulation; body awareness development; classical assessment tools like pulse and tongue diagnosis; and so much more!
Our courses provide you with the solid foundation of classical frameworks emphasizing Ayurvedic knowledge and clinical training to legally practice and see clients as a Metabolic Health Coach / Ayurveda Health Counselor in the United States. Our many international students are able to work within their local laws to practice as well.
Here are just some of the reasons students choose Joyful Belly:
We teach the rich foundations of classical medicine, rooted in Ayurveda, while also teaching our students to be critical, convergent thinkers in a clinical setting to bring about high quality client outcomes. We are innovative: We actively research food and herbs, interpreting results in the Classical Metabolic framework and are pioneers in the development of diagnostic strategies, clinical programs, and tools to put forth the strongest practitioners in the field.
We provide an exceptional education that also delivers an accessible and convenient online platform so students can succeed from anywhere in the world and in any walk of life. We teach in a structured approach that makes the learning of even the most complex classical concepts feel natural.
Weekly live classes give students access to distinguished teachers and practitioners in the field, bringing experience, perspective, and clarification to the curriculum in real time. Exercises outside of the classroom will supplement presentations, ensuring a firm grasp of Classical Metabolic concepts and methods.
Personal mentoring sessions will fine-tune assessment & recommendation skills while building confidence as a clinical practitioner.
"I loved the course, especially the development of felt senses, practical experiences offered, and herbal remedies. I was amazed by my experiences. John, you have a fabulous way of getting folks like me to think differently and I am deeply grateful for what I have learned from you."
"Thank you so much for last night's class. The food was absolutely delicious and the wonderful chutney you made topped it off. Thank you for making and sharing that! Your teachings are so insightful and passionate, it is obvious that you walk your talk. I'd probably attend the same class again, it was a really, really good introduction overall."
"I love, love, love this website and John Immel is the best! After 30 years of practicing & teaching nutrition, my eyes were opened WIDE to eating for my dosha and I enjoy it so much. I'm losing weight effortlessly, feel amazing (at 52), adore his recipes and I'm happy knowing I'll eat this way the rest of my life. Joyful belly is now my favorite online resource (encyclopedia) and I trust John wholeheartedly. If you are considering taking his cleanse, course, a consult or just using his recipes - I say YES! My 76 year old Mom is loving this with me, it has changed her life too, Yippee! Thank you John, many blessings"
"I really just wanted to let you all know that I learned SOOOO much the last 3 years (AHC and MID included). My client consult reviews are showing/proving that I _have_ learned A LOT. Thank you for everything! I'm loving doing my 25 client consults and cannot wait to build my business and continue my Ayurveda work as a Health Counselor! I cannot thank you enough for both of Joyful Belly's certification programs!!!"
"As I continue to work on my paper, I find myself overwhelmed with gratitude for what I Ave learned this past nine months. Honestly, it is just amazing. John Joseph Immel, how can I even create a thesis that is more or better than the lecture you gave us regarding constipation? How?? When I read your words, I can visualize what is happening in the gut, I can feel the anguish and the straining of the intestines, and I can vision the alarm of the heart and nerves as they frantically call out forcrelief. I do not mean to be dramatic, but I truly just want to have a half-page Thesis that says, \"What John said.\""
"Just wanted to post a huge thank you to John Joseph Immel for his fantastic lecture on subtle quality. It was personally so illuminating for me, and shined so many lights onto all my lurking, barely visible, subtle parts. There were sooo many nuggets of wisdom and so much material to pause and reflect on. I could not believe how in depth it was, and I loved all the philosophies and topics you pursued in this lecture with subtle quality at the helm. Not to sound too overly dramatic, but I would consider this to be a very life-changing, life-uplifting, life-altering lecture, and I cannot thank you enough for all the time and effort you put into the presentation to make it so. Definitely finished the lecture with a renewed sense of hope, and also a feeling of profound gratefulness to be apart of such a wonderful course. Thank you!!!"
"So i just watched John's business class and am feeling really so much clearer on my business plan."
"I have a better understanding of my place in the world. Cultural paradigms are illuminated in a new light through Ayurveda. Ayurveda provides the nature that I have always been drawn to. It has always been a truth for me and learning through the framework of this course has laid a new foundation for being."
"I have a success story that I just had to share. Last week a man came to see me ready to change his diet. He has a history of excess alcohol/liver heat, excess weight (not a lot but more than he would like), a lot of cold in the GI tract, dry colon with inflammation, lincoln log stools which sometimes purge yellow stools after doing yoga. He also has a history of indigestion with acid reflux which the doctor gave him Nexim for.
The Nexium did not help at all which he told his doctor, but the doctor insisted he keep taking it.
I gave him a vata/kapha diet with no solid foods after 2pm. Lemon/honey/ginger drink in the morning plus CCF tea during the day, I asked him to use certain spices in his cooking and practice mula bhanda to help with the stress he has been feeling. That's all, no herbs.
I spoke with him today and he is feeling fabulous. He said that he is feeling a warm heat throughout his body that he hasn't felt in a very long time. His bowels started to regulate very quickly and his body is starting to sweat during yoga which doesn't usually happen. He has lost a lot of weight, is feeling much lighter, more energetic, and his ankle is starting to heal itself.
If I had not taken the joyful belly course I would not have known that acid reflux can be caused by indigestion/lack of fire. I would have assumed that with his liver being hot that his stomach was too acidic as well and I would not have understood why his bowel movements were alternating.
I would have been nervous to treat him and likely would have treated him similar to the doctor instead of treating his case as having too much cold.
I am in tears at having helped someone and hearing the excitement in this man's voice from how good he feels. He's coming back next week for another consultation"
"As far as the course, it has been an eye opening experience for me , as a pediatric gastroenterologist and also being of Indian origin. There is so much that I have been doing as an allopathic physician for the past 22 years and wished that I had stepped in to Ayurveda sooner. Not too late however
Sometimes I think it is harder for someone like me with an M.D degree to understand some of the concepts because what I have in my head ( western concept) gets in the way . I am working on it.....
On the other hand, once I grasp the Ayurvedic concept , understanding why, how and what should be done is very easy and I am enjoying that very much .
Thank you !!"
"I have become more aware through Ayurveda and now I eat with my digestion in mind, rather than calories."
"I appreciate you and the team at Joyful Belly more than I can even express. I look forward to one day being able to share my story with everyone so that I can be a shining example of how Ayurveda and, more specifically, Joyful Belly has had an enormous, beneficial impact in my life. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you."
"I came into the Joyful Belly Master of Digestion program with many years of knowledge and passion surrounding nutrition, health and wellness. I wanted to elevate my holistic health knowledge to a higher level. I never realized how much I would be getting out of this program. From a broader perspective, my understanding of holistic health has in fact reached the deeper level I aspired to. The program enriched my understanding of what many of us are struggling with on a day to day basis. I also understand more about how to help myself and others reach more of our short and long term health goals. I came out at the end of this program with more knowledge then I could have ever believed possible in such a short amount of time. I am extremely grateful for the experience."
"HI! I miss you! I want you to know from the bottom of my heart how grateful and appreciative of all the knowledge, time, energy, and compassion you gave to me during the MID program. I'm honored to have been in this class. I have learned so much! My mind, body and spirit is still processing and slowly assimilating. I have decided to find my way by incorporating more in-depth digestion lessons of Ayurveda into the existing 5 sense programs/classes I offer, therapies etc. I will add this knowledge to my cooking classes, creating more balancing recipes and lectures on weight loss etc..
I'm compounding my herbal and essential oil blends for my patient's with new insight, along with tweaking some of my existing formularies. As a clinical aromatherapist I'll able to add so much more for my patient when formulating and to my aromatherapy teachings for my students this knowledge will give my students another lens to view all of the precious oils and carriers I discuss in lecture. I'm able to supercharge my nature walk/talks and outdoor lectures, and outdoor yoga classes with even more renewed- exuberance!
I'm using the Ayurvedic knowledge on dosha to create an even more personalized sound therapy session along with an even greater for detail for massotherapy, marma-tcm-accupressure point therapy, hypnosis, ect..
I will be FOREVER grateful!"
"I have to say, I really enjoyed this course and I feel it is the most comprehensive and interesting course out there. It was very intense!"
Founder of Joyful Belly Ayurveda, John Immel, answers the question ‘What is Ayurveda?’
