School
Guide.

A guide
written for you.

I built this school because I was tired of watching the wrong people get left out.

Not the uncommitted. Not the casual. The most devoted students of this medicine — the ones sitting up after their children fell asleep, the ones already serving communities that had never heard the word Āyurveda, the ones carrying this medicine in their bodies and their kitchens and their care for years before they ever found a school — those are the people traditional institutions had designed out of the picture.

When I began looking for a school that took both the medicine and the student seriously — one that taught the complete system, not a curated version of it; that made it possible for someone with a full life to be genuinely formed; that put the Gurukul model into actual structure, not just description — I could not find it.

So I built it.

What you will find in these pages is not a list of credentials and policies. It is an invitation into a living transmission of one of the most complete healing systems the world has ever produced — taught by nine world-class practitioners, held in a global community of students and graduates across eight countries, and built to put the medicine in your hands regardless of where you live, what you earn, or what your life looks like.

Read it slowly. Let it sit. And when something in you goes quiet and certain — reach out. We are here.

With love and intention,

Jacky Rae · Co-Founder & Director
Yoga Veda Institute of Āyurvedic Medicine

If you read that and felt seen — keep reading.

This school was built for the student who arrives not because they are looking for a career change, but because something in them has been called. You don't need a background in health or science. You don't need to have your life perfectly arranged. You don't need to be certain.

You need to be sincere. And willing. We will do the rest.

Āyurveda is not a wellness system. It is a complete spiritual medicine — one of the oldest and most sophisticated sciences of life the world has ever produced.

It emerged from the Vedic tradition of ancient India — not as a collection of herbal remedies and dietary tips, but as a total understanding of the human being: body, mind, soul, and their relationship to the cosmos. Every aspect of existence was considered medicine. The food you eat, the light you take in through your eyes, the sounds that reach your ears, the rhythm of your daily life, the position of the stars at your birth, the spaces you inhabit, the quality of your relationships — all of it therapeutic. All of it either nourishing or depleting your fundamental vitality.

The system that arose from this understanding was enormous. It included not just clinical medicine but cosmology, astrology, architecture, music, psychology, ethics, and a complete map of human consciousness. It was never meant to be practiced in fragments.

And yet — most Āyurvedic schools in the West teach it in fragments.

The spiritual dimension — Adhyātma — is treated as an elective, or quietly removed to avoid making Western students uncomfortable. Jyotiṣa, the Vedic astrology that Āyurvedic physicians have used as a clinical tool for millennia, is taught at almost no professional school in North America. Vāstu Śāstra — the science of sacred space as medicine — appears in none of the major curricula. The subtle body anatomy that explains why the physical body behaves the way it does is reduced to a lecture on the chakras.

The result is a medicine that has been made smaller in order to be made acceptable. And a generation of graduates who were trained to practice half of what they were actually given.

The classical system of Āyurveda rests on eight clinical branches — Ashtanga Āyurveda. It also includes the complete Vedic sciences as supporting disciplines: Jyotiṣa, Vāstu, Yoga, Mantra, and the philosophical foundations of Sānkhya and Vedānta. A practitioner trained only in the clinical branches without the supporting sciences is like a physician who understands disease but not the patient.

• Kāya Chikitsā — Internal medicine. The most commonly taught branch. The body as a system of balance and imbalance.
• Shalya Tantra — Surgery and the science of removal. Wound care, detoxification, extraction — the art of clearing what does not belong.
• Bhūtavidyā / Manovijñāna — Āyurvedic psychology. The science of the mind, its Guṇas, its relationship to the doshas, and the treatment of psychological imbalance.
• Kaumārabhṛtya — Pediatrics. Children's constitutions, development, and age-specific care from birth through adolescence.
• Strī Svāsthya — Women's health. The medicine of the female lifecycle — hormones, fertility, pregnancy, postpartum, and aging.
• Dravyaguṇa — Botanical medicine. The intelligence of plants — their tastes, potencies, post-digestive effects, and therapeutic applications.
• Jyotiṣa — Vedic astrology as a clinical tool. The relationship between celestial rhythms and constitutional health.
• Adhyātma Svāsthya — Spiritual health. The relationship between the soul's journey and the body's wellbeing. The medicine of consciousness itself.

We built this school around a set of convictions. They are worth naming plainly.

Āyurveda should be taught whole. Jyotiṣa, Vāstu Śāstra, Adhyātma, the subtle body — these are not mystical additions to a clinical system. They are the clinical system. A practitioner trained without them is working with half the medicine.

Geography should never be a barrier. We built a school that exists everywhere — not as a compromise, but as the architecture that makes a truly global faculty possible. Our graduates practice in eight countries. The medicine belongs wherever it is needed.

The Gurukul model is not a metaphor. One teacher. One student. Your cases, read by a named practitioner who knows your name. We did not describe this tradition and then offer group supervision. We built the actual structure.

Accreditation matters — for the people you will serve. We pursued AAC Candidacy and NAMACB board eligibility not for prestige, but because the communities your future clients belong to deserve a practitioner who was held to a rigorous professional standard.

Your life should not have to stop. All modules available from day one. Live sessions three times per year. Study at your own pace, alongside your actual responsibilities. Flexibility is not a concession — it is how we reach the people this medicine most needs.

Financial circumstances should not decide who gets to practice. 15–100% sponsorship. Payment plans. The most affordable per-hour professional Āyurvedic training we know how to build without compromising the faculty, the depth, or the clinical rigour.

You are not the end of the lineage. You are the middle of it. Our graduates become our preceptors. Some have founded their own schools. The community you join here does not end at graduation — it holds your career for the rest of your professional life.

We are not training practitioners. We are training the future leaders of this field.

Most Āyurvedic schools teach you to practice. We teach you to carry a lineage. There is a difference — and it is the difference that shapes everything about how we teach, who teaches it, and who we invite to study.

Our vision is simple and vast: an Āyurvedic practitioner in every town. This medicine in every kitchen, every family, every community that has never had access to it — carried there by people who were formed in the full depth of the system, not just certified in its surface.

The students who graduate from this school go on to open practices, found schools, train the next generation. Some of them are now our preceptors — supervising the clinical hours of the students who follow them. This is not a metaphor about legacy. This is the living structure of the school.

Yoga Veda Institute of Āyurvedic Medicine is a licensed proprietary school in the State of Michigan. We offer professional Āyurvedic education through an online mentorship-based model built on the Living Āyurveda Curriculum™ — weaving together on-demand study, live instruction, community, and supervised clinical practice. We train Āyurvedic Health Counselors and Āyurvedic Practitioners. Our graduates are clinically prepared, professionally grounded, and ready for the real work.

Imagine sitting across from a person who has tried everything. And knowing — with real clinical authority — what their body needs.

Not guessing. Knowing. Because you were trained, over years, by practitioners who built that knowledge through their own lives and passed it directly into yours. Because you have held cases, made mistakes, and grown through genuine guidance. Because the medicine you carry is not borrowed — it is yours.

That is what this formation produces. A practitioner whose understanding lives not just in their mind but in their hands, their eyes, their presence, and their relationship with a five-thousand-year tradition.

The communities you will serve are not looking for a certificate. They are looking for someone who has been through something real — and came out the other side knowing how to hold a human life with care. That is what we are here to help you become.

• Opening their own clinical practices — in the United States, Mexico, Germany, Thailand, the Netherlands, the UK, and beyond
• Returning to their communities carrying something their communities had never had access to
• Becoming preceptors — supervising the next generation of students at this very school
• Founding their own schools and Āyurvedic programmes
• Integrating Āyurveda into existing healthcare careers as nurses, therapists, educators, and coaches
• Passing the NAMACB board examination and entering the profession at its highest standard
• Teaching their families, their neighbourhoods, their circles — one person at a time

Not what it looks like on a schedule. What it feels like to be inside it.

In this tradition, knowledge is not transferred. It is transmitted.

The Gurukul system — guru and shishya, teacher and student — existed because the deepest knowledge in Āyurveda is not found in modules. It is found in the way a master sees a person. In the questions they ask. In the moment they say: not yet — look again.

This is why we built the 1:1 preceptor pathway. Why we chose teachers who have devoted their entire lives to their corner of this medicine. Why we insist that your clinical hours are supervised by a named practitioner who reads your actual cases. Not because it is the most scalable model — but because it is the only model that actually transmits what needs to be transmitted.

We believe that a person who has been genuinely called to carry this medicine into their community should never be stopped by money. Sponsorship exists for those who demonstrate both sincere dedication and financial need.

It is not a discount. It is a recognition that some callings are larger than a bank balance — and that the communities waiting to be served deserve the practitioner who is meant to reach them.

• Programme tuition — up to 100% for qualified students
• Available at both AHC Level 1 and AP Level 2
• Discussed in a real conversation, not a form

• Does not cover preceptor fees, books, materials, or travel
• Cannot be combined with any other discount or promotion
• A discovery call is required before any financial discussion

There is a path here for wherever you are starting from.

We look for students with genuine curiosity, personal integrity, and real readiness. Admission is selective — not because we are exclusive, but because the communities you will serve deserve someone who was genuinely formed. Live trimesters begin three times per year: January · April · September.

And when you are ready — some of you will become our preceptors. Some of you will found your own schools. The lineage continues through you.

The policies below are the agreements that make this community possible — and the disclosures required by our accrediting body. Every policy was written with the student who arrived because they were genuinely called, and who wants to do this work well.

Yoga Veda Institute of Āyurvedic Medicine has been granted Candidate for Accreditation status by the Āyurvedic Accreditation Commission (AAC). Candidacy indicates the programme has met initial eligibility requirements. It is not accreditation and does not guarantee it.

No certificate is released until all financial obligations are satisfied in full. NAMACB board eligibility requires completion of the in-person clinical pathway. Beginning July 2026, NAMACB requires graduation from an AAC Candidate or Accredited programme — YVIAM holds Candidate status.

Students attend all scheduled class hours. A limited number of missed sessions may be made up through recordings. Grading is pass/fail with qualitative feedback.

Yoga Veda Institute of Āyurvedic Medicine welcomes students of every race, colour, national and ethnic origin, gender, age, disability, religious affiliation, and sexual orientation — without exception.