You Are Only as Good as the Quality of Your Sleep

Yoga nidra is often referred to as yogic sleep due to the fact that it promotes a state of consciousness that is somewhere between being fully awake and sleeping. As a sleep meditation teacher, (Yoga Nidra facilitator) I help people take advantage of what Yoga Nidra offers in order to improve their sleep.

Why? Because I know this fundamental truth: we are only as good as the quality of our sleep.

You want to be the best you can be. You want to excel at home, at work, and in any environment in which you find yourself. But the truth is that your ability to excel is impacted by the amount of restful sleep you get. So if you are not getting enough restful sleep, your ability to excel is hindered.

Why Good Sleep Matters

My role as a sleep meditation teacher gives me the opportunity to work with all sorts of people in the States as well as the UK, Europe, Asia, and Canada. One thing I've noticed is that it's easy to find reasons to justify a lack of sleep. But there is no escaping the fact that both the body and mind need rest. And they need plenty of it if a person is to operate at peak performance.

According to the Sleep Foundation, here's what quality sleep can do for you:

• Improve your mood by helping you deal with stress better.

• Improve your heart health by regulating your blood pressure.

• Improve blood sugar regulation, reducing the risks of certain diseases, like diabetes.

• Improve mental function, including memory and cognition.

• Give your immune system a significant boost.

• Help you better manage stress in your day-to-day life.

• Improve physical recovery after exercise and/or athletics.

• Help you maintain a healthy weight by regulating both appetite and metabolism.

The human body is a fantastic creation capable of doing amazing things. Ditto for the mind. But both mind and body need time to refuel, repair, and rest. All three are the primary benefits of good, quality sleep.

Finding Your Rhythm With Sleep Meditation

The Sleep Foundation's Dr. Abhinav Singh refers to sleep as "a rhythm.” As a musician, I love that comparison. Not only do I agree with this good doctor's assessment, but I also know that finding your own rhythm is one of the keys to consistent restful sleep. And that's one of the things that Yoga Nidra or sleep meditation is all about.

One principle of to facilitate sleep meditation is rhythmic breathing. Sleep meditation practitioners can learn to control their own breathing to help reduce stress and anxiety. This is one of the things that helps them reach a more relaxed state. The rhythm of one's breathing sets the stage for meditation practices that lead to the state Yoga Nidra seeks to find.

Turning to sleep meditation to help find that rhythm can help create a daily sleep-wake cycle that encourages a person to excel. If that's what you're after, I hope you will consider sleep meditation. And as a sleep meditation teacher, I can help.

Tips for Improving Your Sleep

In addition to sleep meditation and yoga nidra, there are other things you can do to improve your nightly sleep. Without getting into detail, they include things like:

• Maintaining a regular sleep schedule

• Creating a relaxing environment for sleep

• Being careful about caffeine, alcohol, and nicotine

• Getting regular exercise

• Avoiding excessive screen time before bed
  

Apart from coming to your house and setting up your perfect sleep environment, I cannot help you with all these things but what I can help you with sleep meditation. That is my area of expertise and one I would be happy to share with you. Remember this: you are only as good as the quality of your sleep.

Find Your Authentic Voice: Transform Your Yoga Nidra Teaching & Your Life

From Script Follower to Master Facilitator: My Journey to Teaching Authenticity in Yoga Nidra

I'm passionate about Yoga Nidra. Since 2008, I've facilitated thousands of hours of sessions and taught hundreds of teachers. Through this journey of practicing and teaching Yoga Nidra as well as developing my Yoga Nidra teacher training program, I've discovered what truly works, what doesn't, and most importantly—why.

What makes my approach revolutionary? While other training programs want to "own" the practice and insist you teach like them, I empower you to find your own authentic voice and create transformative experiences that are uniquely yours.

My Yoga Nidra Journey: From Frustrated Teacher to Global Educator

In full honesty, I initially sought Yoga Nidra training mostly to expand my teaching toolkit. Nothing wrong with that. I just never imagined how it would completely transform my life and career.

Early in my journey, I experienced profound emotional and spiritual healing through Yoga Nidra. It gave me insights about myself and the universe unlike any other practice. But here’s the deal: when I tried to teach using my training's scripts, it felt wrong. Even my students could sense it. The problem was that I was being a rote version of my teacher and not an authentic version of  myself.

This realization changed everything.

So, I took a year off from teaching Yoga Nidra to dismantle Yoga Nidra facilitation and rebuild my own system from the ground up. This time away from facilitating helped me to discover the essence and diversity of the practice. Plus, I discovered tools for facilitating Yoga Nidra in a way that enabled me to meet my student’s diverse needs and do it in a way that was completely authentic to me.

The results were immediate:

• My classes became the most popular at my studio, often with 50+ students

• Other teachers constantly asked for my secrets

• What began as simple workshops evolved into comprehensive trainings

• My online programs attracted students from Iceland to Ireland, Mecca to Montana

What was the difference? 

Authenticity. 

Instead of relying on rote scripts only, I gave people tools to find their own voice—a crucial element missing from most programs.

What Makes My Yoga Nidra Teacher Training Different

1. Tools for Authentic Facilitation, Not Just Scripts

Most programs give you scripts to memorize. I give you the many principles and tools to create your own powerful Yoga Nidra experiences such as:

• The Yoga Nidra Roadmap: A flexible formula you can adapt to any situation or client need

• Welcoming/Recognizing/Witnessing: Techniques to create psychological safety

• Radical Permissions: Methods to disarm resistance and deepen practice

• Kosha Navigation: Learn to use these consciousness layers strategically, not mechanically

With these tools and many, many more, you'll never be limited by someone else's script again.

2. Personal Practice Development

Something else I discovered is that your most profound insights will come from your own practice, not from my teachings. That's why the first half of my training focuses on deepening your personal relationship with Yoga Nidra through multiple lenses:

• History and philosophy

• Psychology and neuroscience

• Myth and storytelling

• Practical application and experimentation

When you teach from authentic experience rather than memorized concepts, you will truly share something of you with your students and they will feel the difference.

3. The Adopt, Adapt, Innovate Methodology

My training follows a natural progression that honors where you are while building toward mastery:

• Adopt: Begin with over 100 pages of specialized scripts demonstrating effective tools and principles of Yoga Nidra facilitation

• Adapt: Learn to modify these approaches to reflect your unique voice and style

• Innovate: Develop the confidence to create your own scripts or facilitate completely improvisationally

This approach makes it so you'll sound 100% like YOU while meeting the unique and specific needs of your clients.

What Students Experience in My Level 1 Training

Beyond the core frameworks mentioned above, you'll learn essential facilitation skills such as:

• Creating an effective teaching container through mindful set and setting

• Honoring each person's unique experience without forcing outcomes

• Finding your authentic facilitation voice that resonates with your specific audience

• Building specialized practices for diverse client needs

Ready to transform your teaching? [LINK TO LEVEL 1 PROGRAM]

Advanced Skills: Level 2 Training

Once you've mastered the fundamentals, my advanced training takes you deeper:

Yoga Nidra Dyads

Learn the art of facilitating awareness-based conversations where practitioners verbalize their experience while in deep relaxation—invaluable for therapeutic settings.

Expanded Facilitation Toolkit

Master advanced techniques including:

• Voice modulation for deeper impact

• Strategic use of music and sound

• Anchoring and layering koshas

• Visualization and positive programming techniques for maximum efficacy

Recording and Sharing Professional-Quality Sessions

Learn to create studio-quality recordings using equipment you already own and build your global audience through platforms like Insight Timer and YouTube.

Creating Specialized Classes

Develop customized practices for specific populations or purposes—from trauma healing to performance enhancement.

Ready to become a master facilitator?

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What My Students Are Saying

“Scott’s Yoga Nidra Teacher Training was exceptional! I had been hoping to expand my yoga teaching practice and was looking for just the right thing. The program which Scott has carefully crafted far exceeded my expectations and has left me with a passion for Yoga Nidra. I also walk away with a wealth of resources and some newfound confidence in leading this powerful type of yoga. Scott exhibits mastery of the art and conveys a lot of good information with richness and ease. Participating in the program was itself transformative; well worth it”

— Ian Napper, RYT 200, Mindful Outdoor Guide

“Yoga Nidra teacher training with Scott Moore was like looking behind the curtain of a magic show and discovering that the magic is real - no tricks, no illusions!  When I started the course, I could not envision myself as a Nidra facilitator, and in fact found the practice quite intimidating. Little by little, as Scott’s training progressed, I was not only able to experience the magic of the Yoga of Sleep, but discover my own power. Scott does an amazing job breaking down the spiritual and practical aspects of Yoga Nidra, while also relating them to common experiences like trail running or music. A word of warning, this training requires a lot of introspection, which isn’t easy. It kept me humble, sometimes made me vulnerable, inquisitive, emotional - but ultimately, it was a source of comfort and empowerment.”

— Cat Gavriusova

“I recently completed Scott’s 4-day Yoga Nidra Immersion and Teacher Training held in Salt Lake City, Utah. I found the training personally and professionally valuable and definitely worth my time and money. I was impressed not only with the training but also with the teacher, Scott Moore. He was well-prepared and effective in his delivery. The training included both complex ideas as well as practical tools that I can use in my coaching and therapy practice. The practice of Yoga Nidra helps me be more present amidst the stress in today’s world and with my clients. The training gave me deep and rich tools that I started using in my coaching and therapy practice Immediately following the training. My clients have reported feeling centered and calm after I have facilitated a short Yoga Nidra practice. I have known Scott for many years as we were both part of the yoga community in Salt Lake City. I have great respect for him. He is an exceptional human being with the purpose of helping humans heal and grow!”

— Evelyn Skon, MBA, MA, LMFT Psychotherapist and Coach

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Your Invitation to Transformation

Over nearly 20 years of practicing, facilitating, and teaching Yoga Nidra, I've discovered that this practice is as transformational as it is accessible. The key to being an effective facilitator lies in skillful authenticity—and it's my passion to help you find your unique voice.

You owe it to yourself and your students to become the best Yoga Nidra facilitator you can be. Join me on this journey.

Level 1 Training: 

Enroll now with my my self-paced online Yoga Nidra teacher Training (50 hours)

Enroll in my next live in-person training: Salt Lake City, Utah July 31–August 3, 2025 (30 hour)

Advanced Yoga Nidra Teacher Training:

Advanced Yoga Nidra Teacher Training: April 26–27, May 3–4, 2025 (once a year only 30 hours)

Both Trainings

If you’re interested in both the level 1 and advanced trainings, reach out for a package deal.

P.S. Interested in learning how to create successful online courses like mine? Book a free discovery Zoom call regarding my mentorship program.

Yoga Nidra Teacher Training: Fix The Crazy Don't Add To It

Man, there’s a LOT going on in the world right now: fires, war, climate, calamity, political doo-doo … you name it.

The world needs qualified Yoga Nidra teachers more than ever to help respond to rather than react from all what’s going on and help make the world a better place. 

Do you want to help the crazy rather than add to it?

Let me teach you how to facilitate Yoga Nidra!

Join My Next Live Yoga Nidra Teacher Training

I’m offering my next Yoga Nidra teacher training January 24–27 and I’d love to have you join. 

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How Can Yoga Nidra Help?

Yoga Nidra can help you and others to calm stress, achieve a feeling of meaning and purpose in the world, and live their life in a spirit of compassionate responsiveness.

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Can I Teach Yoga Nidra if I’m Not A Yoga or Mediation Teacher?

This training is not limited to only yoga or meditation teachers. It’s also perfect if you’re a school teacher, coach, therapist, or parent. 

I’ve spent years developing and teaching my Yoga Nidra teacher training: Facilitating Transformation with the Yoga of Sleep which is one of the best Yoga Nidra teacher trainings in the world and lauded by websites such as Mind is the Master and Yogi Times.  Many people from other disciplines and modalities take this training to help them with the people in their world—clients, students, kids, etc.

This is my best Yoga Nidra training yet and I’d LOVE to share it with you!

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When’s The Next Live Yoga Nidra Teacher Training?

January 24–27, 2025. 

Live: in-person in Tucson, AZ or via Zoom from wherever you are.

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You’ll get:

• Over 100 pages of Yoga Nidra scripts so you can start teaching Yoga Nidra today

• 150 pages of a very detailed manual so to accommodate different learning styles

• 30 hours of expert instruction—cuz you can’t learn this stuff in an afternoon. 

• Specialized Yoga Nidra practices that actually support you to learn how to teach Yoga Nidra

• In person or Zoom so you can join from wherever you are or in-person if you learn best that way

• Lifetime access to all audio/Video replay of all the sessions so you can watch any session you have to miss or so you can rewatch the material as often as you need

• Personalized attention to meet your individual interests and needs for this practice

• Yoga Alliance continuing ed credit if you need it to keep your YA membership active

• Personal 1:1 consultation so you can learn how to personally thrive in this practice

Most of all, you’ll leave feeling prepared to teach varied and specialized Yoga Nidra practices to benefit your students using the power of your own voice rather than being a parrot of your teacher. 

Please reach out with any questions!

Please join me!

Live Yoga Nidra Training: What Do You Love?

Everybody’s got their thing. 

Julia loved to cook. 

Picasso loved to paint

source: https://blog.zoneswimwear.com/post/houdinis-water-torture-cell-explained

Houdini loved to submerge himself in water upside down, locked by his ankles with padlocks to see if he could get out alive. 

Whatever. 

We all gotta lean into whatever we love, right. 

Me? I love teaching Yoga Nidra. I feel I was BORN for it, you know?

I love helping people not only find massive benefits in their life through practicing better rest, better sleep, and managing stress, but also with other important things. Things like aligning personal and global perspectives, about sourcing a sea of creativity within, and relaxing deep enough to finally turn off the chatter in the incessant hamster wheel of the mind. With Yoga Nidra a person can tap the part of themselves that already knows the solution to life’s biggest and smallest problems and allows those solutions to rise to the surface. 

I love that you don’t need any prior experience of yoga or meditation to do Yoga Nidra and that a person can get massive benefits even from their first session. I love that it offers even the newest of practitioners—often people who roll into class in cuz their wife told them that unless they learn to chill the $%^& out they would need to find a new place to call home—an easy way to experience effortless and lasting rest. 

And when you’ve spent as much time as I have practicing, teaching, thinking and writing about Yoga Nidra, the topic gets really expansive. So I love exploring the nitty-gritty of not only what Yoga Nidra is—its history, its method, its purpose—but alo why it works, the neuroscience and psychology of it. 

For me, I love to connect the dots between Yoga Nidra and myths, storytelling, poetry, and my own personal life stories—YOUR life stories—to see how it’s such a powerful and available pointer that reminds us of who we truly are and how we are all truly connected. 

Who knew you could get all of this from a guided nap?

In addition to teaching Yoga Nidra I also love, love, LOVE teaching OTHERS how to teach Yoga Nidra. I think what I love most about it is training other people how to facilitate massive and positive benefits in the lives of the people who are in their particular niche, those they encounter regularly whether they are clients, students, family, or members of a particular community. I love teaching about how Yoga Nidra is more than just guided meditation, more than another guided visualization. So much more. It’s more than checking out and dreaming yourself into bliss. It’s also a pathway to awakening to the truth of who you are. That’s why I call my method, Waking Up with the Yoga of Sleep.

What do you love to do?

Do you love to make a difference in people’s lives? 

Maybe you’re a teacher, a therapist, a coach.

Maybe you teach yoga or meditation. 

Maybe you’re a school teacher.

Could Yoga Nidra be one of the tools you use regularly to help you do whatever you love to do? Could it help you stand out in your field? Could it help those you’re in contact with every day?

This weekend begins my next live Yoga Nidra training where together we will dive deep into the art and science of Yoga Nidra and explore how it can help you to facilitate positive transformation for your clients, students, family, and especially for yourself. 

What is the particular niche of people you hang with regularly, whether through your job, history or situation in life? Could they benefit from Yoga Nidra offered in only the way that you can offer it?

So, whether you’re connecting with others through coq au vin, cubism, or conjuring an escape, Yoga Nidra can help you help others in massive ways.

Now’s the time for you to learn to teach Yoga Nidra for yourself and for others. 

Check out the details below. 

Live and In-Person
and via Zoom

Salt Lake City, Utah

An in-depth Yoga Nidra training
for teachers, coaches, and therapists
interested in facilitating powerful transformation
for self and others.

May 11th & 12; 18th & 19th

Yoga Nidra and Small Kindnesses

Today, I am excited to tell you about my next live Yoga Nidra teacher training, Restore Yoga workshop, as well as offer you this incredible poem …

I heard Helena Bonham Carter read this poem and it stopped me in my tracks. Granted, she could read the IRS filing instructions and it would sound inspiring and poetic. 

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Small Kindnesses

By Danusha Lameris

I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk
down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs
to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you”
when someone sneezes, a leftover
from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die,” we are saying.
And sometimes, when you spill lemons
from your grocery bag, someone else will help you
pick them up. Mostly, we don’t want to harm each other. We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot,
and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile
at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress
to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder, and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let us pass.
We have so little of each other, now. So far
from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange.
What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these
fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here,
have my seat,” “Go ahead—you first,” “I like your hat.”

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I love the notion of “these fleeting temples we make together” the container of love made by a simple gesture, a kind word, a smile. 

To me, this poem epitomizes that fascinating intersection I like to play at and study, that crossroads between our humanness and our beingness. Here, we can celebrate the messiness of being human, knowing that behind the hot mess that is being human, there is a foundation of goodness, and compassion. 

We are Source and Source is love. 

I love practicing our ability to compassionately respond to life’s ups and downs instead of reacting to them. Practicing this essential skill through Yoga Nidra is like learning to become a ninja of life, except of course that instead of mastering nunchucks and throwing stars, you get to lie down and practice napping your way to enlightenment while drifting on clouds of bliss. When you get done, you get to go back out into the world and show up as your best, most responsive self.

To help us all practice this essential life skill, I invite you to join me for  my Restore Yoga and Yoga Nidra workshop and my live, in-person and online Yoga Nidra training. 

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Live Yoga Nidra Teacher Training:

May 11–12; 18–19, Salt Lake City and via Zoom

Yoga Nidra is far more than guided visualization—it's a profound pathway to personal transformation and even spiritual awakening. In this comprehensive 30-hour training, you'll become an expert in harnessing the life-changing potential of Yoga Nidra. I’ll guide you to gain a mastery of this ancient practice. You’ll emerge with the skills to guide your students into deep states of conscious relaxation, facilitating lasting shifts in their physical, mental, and emotional well-being. Whether you're a yoga teacher, coach, or therapist, adding Yoga Nidra to your repertoire will allow you to profoundly impact the lives of those you serve.

Stand Apart as a Truly Transformative Teacher: Facilitating Transformation with the Yoga of Sleep

In today's crowded wellness landscape, becoming a Yoga Nidra expert is your key to standing out. This training goes far beyond teaching you rote scripts—you'll learn the overarching principles and roadmaps that allow you to teach from the wisdom of your authentic voice. Gain the ability to dynamically craft experiences tailored to your students' unique needs. People are yearning for the powerful transformation only you can provide through the ancient art of Yoga Nidra. Seize this opportunity to become a master guide on the journey of self-discovery and radical growth.

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Restore Yoga and Yoga Nidra Workshop:

Sunday, May 5th 12–2 pm at Be-ing Community

Normally this is held at Mosaic Yoga but there is an event at Mosaic on the 1st Sunday of May. So, on May 5th I’ll be hosting this workshop at a different venue:

Be-ing Community 355 N 300 W. Salt Lake City, Utah 84111

$39.

In this class we will dip into the timeless with resting poses, poetry, and a decadent Yoga Nidra practice. This 2-hour class will incorporate supported and resting postures using yoga props (provided if you don’t have them). I try to use minimal words to allow for a generous and open spaciousness. You can also expect poetry and music to help connect your soul with timeless presence.

Also available via Zoom. Please email me in advance to tell me you’ll be Zooming in.

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May we all bend over to pick up the lemons that spill out of a stranger’s grocery bag.

May we all learn to access our highest good by exploring the depth that exists in the dance between our humanness and our beingness.

And may it begin with a simple gesture of kindness, a word like … YES!

White-Eyes—Seeing The Divine In Everything

Today, I want share one of my favorite winter poems, White-Eyes by Mary Oliver. 

First of all, if you haven’t already, ‘tis the season to sign up for my 31-Day Meditation Challenge. It starts January 1 and lasts all through the month. The challenge is simply to meditate any way you wish for 15 minutes a day, every day for the entire month. I’ll be supporting you every step of the way with daily emails, live group meditations sessions, and plenty of recordings, poetry, links, and stories to make the experience very rich. 

Give the world a gift by practicing drawing inward, getting quiet in heart and mind, so you can present a YOU that is more mindful, less reactive, and rooted in compassion. 

It costs only $31 and you can get your tuition back if you complete the challenge. Make a meditation posse and sign up!

Onto the poem!

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Mary Oliver

What I love so much about Mary Oliver's poetry is that so often in her poetry she is speaking to the eternal, the Everything, God, or the Universe by simply reflecting what she sees in nature.

And like in her poem “Bone” I love how she willingly admits that she doesn't fully know what God is but is "playing at the edges of knowing" and that perhaps it’s not about knowing at all, but rather it’s about “seeing, touching, and loving.”

It’s about being present with senses and heart.

Through her poetry, Mary Oliver helps us all to create a touchpoint to the Divine that is present both in our outer and inner worlds and opens us to seeing, touching, and loving as she steers us away from trying to make it all make sense. 

Her poem White-Eyes is about seeing the Divine in something as simple yet complex as the wind dancing through the tree tops and the snow silently drifting down from the heavens. It’s an exposé about how with the “right eyes” or with attuned sight, we might be able to see the loving Divine present in all things.

I hope you enjoy it. 

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White-Eyes

BY MARY OLIVER


In winter

all the singing is in

         the tops of the trees

          where the wind-bird


with its white eyes

shoves and pushes

         among the branches.

          Like any of us

he wants to go to sleep,

but he's restless—

         he has an idea,

          and slowly it unfolds

from under his beating wings

as long as he stays awake.

         But his big, round music, after all,

          is too breathy to last.

So, it's over.

In the pine-crown

         he makes his nest,

          he's done all he can.

I don't know the name of this bird,

I only imagine his glittering beak

         tucked in a white wing

          while the clouds—

which he has summoned

from the north—

         which he has taught

          to be mild, and silent—

thicken, and begin to fall

into the world below

         like stars, or the feathers

               of some unimaginable bird

that loves us,

that is asleep now, and silent—

         that has turned itself

          into snow.

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I’d love to hear your thoughts on what this poem says to you.

Drop me a line, I read every email I get. 

May we all be our best by remember those essential phrases:

• I love you.

• I’m sorry.

• How can I help?
  
  

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Live Classes, In-person and Online:

• Yoga For Stiffer Bodies on Saturdays at 7:30–8:30 am at Mosaic Yoga

• Live online Yoga Nidra class Sundays at 9 am. Access the live class or its replay from anywhere in the world.  

• Vinyasa Mondays at 12 pm at Mosaic Yoga

• I teach a Restore Yoga and Yoga Nidra workshop on the first Sunday of every month at Mosaic Yoga

• Plus, mark your calendar for January 1 because I’m hosting an in-person yoga class to begin the new year. Together we’ll plant our Sankalpa, the seed of our intentions, through ritual, movement, meditation, and breath. Mosaic Yoga.

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Yoga Retreats 2024

Become a Leader In Your Field: Teach Yoga Nidra

Who Should Teach Yoga Nidra?

Want to stand out as a yoga or meditation teacher? 
Teach Yoga Nidra.

Want to be an extraordinary therapist with a powerful resource that can access ANY client’s deepest needs? 
Teach Yoga Nidra. 

Want to be the kind of school teacher who can meet, welcome, then and neutralize stress and anxiety of your students? 
Teach Yoga Nidra. 

Want to learn how to guide a team to unheard of levels of performance? 
Teach Yoga Nidra.

Want to help yourself and others resource their next-level creativity?
Teach Yoga Nidra. 

Want to learn how to make lasting changes in relationships for yourself and others?
Teach Yoga Nidra.

Yoga Nidra is an efficient and effective catalyst for massive personal and group growth. 

Truly, anybody can do it. 

That said, learning to be a skillful facilitator, one who can speak from the power of their own voice to meet the individual needs of their clients, is rare indeed. 

My passion is not only to teach you about what Yoga Nidra is and why it’s so crucial for today’s world, but more importantly how to uncover the incredible facilitator that is already inside of you, the one who knows how to make a massive and positive impact on your audience in ONLY the way you know how. 

Yoga Nidra Teacher Training

My live, in-person Yoga Nidra training runs August 17–20, 2023 in Salt Lake City. Please, walk, run, fly, or teleport to Salt Lake City and join us. It will be such an honor to work with you.

If you’re not close to SLC (or your teleport machine is in the shop), now’s the time to join my pre-recorded online Yoga Nidra teacher training program. 

I’d love to have you join me in this conversation of understanding ourselves and making a powerful and positive impact on the world by learning to facilitate Yoga Nidra and learning to Wake Up with the Yoga of Sleep. 

Please reach out with any questions. 

Scott Moore (E-RYT 500, YACEP, RYS) is an American-born international yoga and Yoga Nidra teacher, mentor, and author. He’s been a career yoga teacher since 2003 and has logged over 25,000 teaching and training hours. He is the founder of Waking Up with the Yoga of Sleep, a method of Yoga Nidra instruction and teacher training which celebrates students and teachers in 43 countries. He is the author of three books, Practical Yoga Nidra, 5-Minute Manifesting Journal, and 20 Yoga Nidra Scripts Vol. 1. Scott teaches trainings, classes, and retreats in the US, Europe, and Asia and is currently living in Southern France. When he’s not practicing or teaching yoga, he loves to play the sax and clarinet, trail run, and travel with his family. 

What Would Bruce Springsteen Do?

I just heard Bruce Springsteen say something that stopped me in my tracks. He said:

“… the price we pay as a society for our toxic individualism and patriarchy is our permanent estrangement from one another. If I can’t connect to you, I can’t connect to us. Whether it’s racism, class differences, or any of myriad other social plagues, its cost is always the same: a broken and dysfunctional system that prevents us from recognizing and caring for our neighbor with a flawed but full heart.”

Heart, brimming. Mind, blown.

No wonder they call him The Boss. 

So, allow me to put this into a little bit greater context.

The essence of any practice is interpersonal work. I relate to the wise words of one of my most influential teachers Judeth Hanson Lasater who said, “All my gurus share my last name.”

In other words, there’s positively no greater laboratory than intimate and personal relationships to do the arduous but joyful work of transforming into who we are destined to become. 

To that end, my wife and I love to read or listen to books that help us to stretch into the people and the couple that we are destined to be. Currently we are reading the book US by Terry Real. It’s about evolving past a you-and-me kind of mentality into a deeper relationship that builds an “US.” This has immense personal benefit as well as benefit for any couple. 

I have found Terry Real’s other stuff astoundingly insightful and directly applicable and even just a few chapters in, I would recommend US to anyone interested in uncovering then working through the unconscious programming we acquire as kids and perpetuate forward into our current relationships and to our own communities, partners, and kids, often with difficult or disastrous results for ourselves and our nearest and dearest. This book is designed to help us confront, then move past, our old ghosts, break the cycle of negative coping behaviors, and finally start acting like functional and emotionally healthy adults for feck sake!

One of the reasons this idea of US impressed me so much is because, kinda what The Boss was saying in not so many words, is that as we learn to see ourselves as an “US” in our most personal relationships, by extension we simultaneously discover how humanity is an “US.” 

Learning this lesson is how the world transforms from the you vs me mentality, through the you and me mentality, into the apotheosis of human relationship which is the US reality. “US” is Oneness. Doing so heals us from the natural but terminal human malady of the illusion of separateness. Doing so wakes us up to the truth of what I call our Both And Nature: I am you and me AND everything else. 

Cool. What does this have to do with The Boss?

Well, I love The Boss, the one and only Bruce Springsteen. So, what could be better than an incredible book like US than US with a forward written by the one and only Bruce Springsteen? That’s right. Perhaps the thing I love most about Bruce is his powerful and well-crafted lyrics. It’s no surprise, then, that his forward to this powerful book is also well-crafted and powerful. 

I was recently at the gym listening to this book and Bruce’s words popped into my AirPods and completely arrested me, leaving me standing there looking vacantly into my gym locker. As people were pumping iron all around me my mind was pumping the simple thought, “This is incredible! I gotta share this with everyone I know.”

And so I am taking the liberty of sharing this with you. Here is the forward in its entirety which I found on Oprah’s website: 

By my early thirties, I’d become aware enough to know, as things stood, I’d never have the things I wanted. A full life, a home, a wholeness of being, a companion, and a place in a community of neighbors and friends all seemed beyond my grasp. I didn’t have the judgment, the courage, or the skills to bring a real life to fruition. I was one of the most successful musicians on the planet, but work is work, life is life, and they are not the same. Even more frustrating, the things that made me good at my job—my easy tolerance, even hunger, for the isolation of creativity, my ability to comfortably and deeply reside within myself and put all my energy into my work for days, weeks, years at a time—doomed my personal life to failure. I lived a lonely but seemingly secure existence. Then at thirty-two I hit an emotional wall and realized I was lost in a deep dark forest, largely of my own making, without a map. So began forty years of trying to find my way through the shadowed trees, down to the river of a sustaining life.

With help I realized, in early middle age, that I was subject to a legacy that had been passed down from generations in my Italian-Irish family. A long and stubborn stream of mental illness and dysfunction manifested itself in my life as a deep, recurring depression and an emotional paralysis. I had a fear of exposing my inner life to anyone besides twenty thousand complete strangers at your nearest arena. The eye-to-eye democracy of real adult love struck fear and insecurity deep in my heart. Meanwhile I could feel my life clock ticking on the things I wanted to do and what I wanted to become.

So how do you transform that legacy? How do you break the chain of trauma and illness whose price is compounded with each successive generation? As Terry says, “Family pathology is like a fire in the woods taking down all in front of it until someone turns to face the flames.” Slowly I began to face those flames, mainly because I couldn’t stand the idea of failing my own children, my family, in the manner that I felt I’d been failed. And at the end of the day, the way we honor our parents and their efforts is by carrying on their blessings and doing our best to not pass forward their troubles, their faults, to our own children. Our children’s sins should be their own. It’s only through the hard work of transformation do those of ours who have come before cease to be the ghosts that haunt us and transform into the ancestors we need and love to walk beside us. Working even a small piece of this into my life took a long time, and I’m still a daily work in progress. My children will have plenty of work to do on their own, but we all have to learn and earn our own adulthood.

Looking more broadly, the price we pay as a society for our toxic individualism and patriarchy is our permanent estrangement from one another. If I can’t connect to you, I can’t connect to us. Whether it’s racism, class differences, or any of myriad other social plagues, its cost is always the same: a broken and dysfunctional system that prevents us from recognizing and caring for our neighbor with a flawed but full heart. Terry’s writing is loving and kind, clever and strong, and he’s written a beautiful and important book, particularly for the moment we are in. It helps lead the way to a more powerful and noble society based on the tenets of love, justice, and respect. He has laid out a process by which we can begin to understand our place in our own families and our society. I’ve worked hard, and I’ve been lucky. Over the years I’ve found some very good guides through that dark forest and down to that river of life. For my wife, Patti, and me, Terrence Real has been one of those guides, and this book is a map through those trees.

Be safe and journey forward, Bruce Springsteen

What a Boss!

If you do decide to buy this book, and I hope you do, might I suggest buying it from your local bookseller? There’s something special about books and actual bookstores and I believe that the people running them are like literary angels. Here’s my favorite local bookseller in Salt Lake City who would love your business and no, I’m not endorsed by them in any way. I just like to celebrate awesomeness. 

And just like I celebrate the awesomeness of The Boss, Terry Real, and great books like US and places that sell books, I also celebrate YOUR awesomeness. But you rising up to your potential isn’t just awesome, like let’s give each other a high five and say good job thinking our job is done so we go on our individual way thinking, “I’mna go make myself an ‘I’m Awesome’ tee shirt,” kind of awesome. It’s awesome cuz you becoming your best is what saves the world. It’s true. Regardless of whether or not we have met in person, I believe in you and the amazing potential you have inside to change the world. I know that as you continue to grow into the kind of awesome that you are meant to be, the world will be a better place for it. Changing the world starts with you inching your way toward your best self.

And yes, as humans are all fatally flawed, but like The Boss says, you learning how to accept and navigate your brokenness is the first step to “recognizing and caring for our neighbor with a flawed but full heart.” 

And as soon as we transform into an “US,” we discover that just like Alice Walker said, “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.” Truly an “US” is what we’ve been waiting for. 

My favorite way of practicing the “US” reality is through the transformational practice of Yoga Nidra. Please consider joining my next Yoga Nidra immersion and teacher training happening August 15–28, 2022 where we learn to master the art of facilitating this practice of our Both And Nature, this “US” reality, which is necessary for this world to survive and then to thrive.

My prayer is that we all continue being “a boss” in all that we positively benefit the world and that as we do so, we all wake up to this “US” reality that saves ourselves, our families, our communities, and the world. 

Remembering Who You Are

A book I truly love, one that has been very influential in my life is Eckhart Tolle’s book, A New Earth. Have you read it? 

One of the things I learned from that book, something that has changed my cosmic understanding, is the idea that as human beings, whether consciously or unconsciously, we are constantly trying to figure out what it means to just be human. We explore many ways of answering that question and almost anything we encounter in this human life can be something for us to hold onto as a way of identifying ourselves. We tend to identify as our name, our bodies, our perceived personal success or failure, and even define ourselves by our problems but all of these things fall flat because they don’t explain what our true self is. Who we really are cannot be described by anything that changes. 

In A New Earth, Tolle defines the ego as the misapprehension or mislearning of what we think we are, all the things that change in our life. Tolle mirrors the yogic idea that what we really are is Awareness. 

The part that really got me in his book was how often we tend to identify with layers of our ego he calls our painbody. What he means is that though we may not outwardly love being in pain—feeling jealousy, bitterness, or suffering—but it does exist as something we can feel, we therefore tend to call it “real” and mislabel this object of pain as “us” and kind of walk around life defining ourselves as that thing. Can you relate to that? Everybody can to some degree or other. 

Again, our true self is Awareness itself and cannot possibly be defined as an emotion, either good or bad. Identifying as anything other than this Awareness is going to be problematic because it exists unfailingly in a state of change. No sooner do you want to hang your hat on something and call it you, than that thing changes and leaves you feeling empty. 

The crazy thing is that these pain bodies seem to have a life of their own. It’s like they know they aren’t real and are trying to keep themselves “alive” by begging us to keep a hold of them. We know it doesn’t serve us to be angry or sad or depressed all the time but we kinda don’t know who we’d be without that part of us. So somehow we keep it alive simply because it serves us in someway to define us. “It’s not great being sad but at least I understand it.” 

That in a nutshell seems to be one of the most profound human problems. 

That may sound depressing but it’s actually really hopeful and I’ll tell you why. Surely, Tolle explains what to do about this dilemma in his book, however, I’ve found the best, easiest, and most effective solution to overcoming this issue of the ego—or false identity—with Yoga Nidra. 

Instead of pain bodies, Yoga Nidra calls these different bodies, Maya Kosha, or illusion bodies. They are illusions because they seem real but aren’t. What’s real is Awareness. However, what I love about Yoga Nidra is that it doesn’t suggest you try to forget about the pain bodies but instead invites you lean into them to understand them as the beautiful illusions that they are through systematized relaxation and layered awareness. Yoga Nidra shows you how to practice deep awareness of your body, of your emotions, of your thoughts—all to show you that by all the things that you can be aware of, you reveal Awareness itself. Awareness is what these all have in common. 

And here’s the exciting thing…

As you practice experiencing yourself as Awareness, you remind yourself of your innate wholeness, purity, and being. You don’t need to define yourself by your ego—what you do, how much money you have or don’t have, or even (and especially) what kind of pain you may have experienced in your life. Instead, when you understand your true nature, that of Awareness itself, you realize that this entire human experience all points to the beauty of what it means to be and that every object in the world is another invitation for you to practice waking up to your true self. 

Practicing and understanding yourself as Awareness really is the ultimate healer. 

Knowing how to facilitate others to experience themselves as whole through Yoga Nidra is an art form in and of itself. I’ve dedicated almost 15 years of my life studying, practicing, and teaching how to do this and I have personally experienced and facilitated myriad modes of healing and wholeness through this incredible, relaxing, and accessible practice. 

I feel it a calling in my life to help you learn how to help those people in your life whom you have the privilege to influence how to remember who they truly are by helping them practice awareness through Yoga Nidra. 

I guess if I were a really good teacher I could simply tell you, “Hey, you’re perfect as you are. Let’s go get a beer,” but I don’t think it’s that easy. We need a practice to help that truth land, to be taught this truth in a way that we will understand and recognize. This is why your particular voice and your particular experience with the people and population you know is so essential. Only you know the kind of specific issues they work with and can speak their language. It’s on you to help these people remember their own wholeness. 

On Saturday, April 23rd I want to teach you how to facilitate specialized Yoga Nidra classes for those people in your life who need to understand who they are in a way that only you can understand. 

I’ll be leading a workshop where we are going to spend 3 hours together on Zoom building your specialized Yoga Nidra classes to meet the individual needs of your clients, students, and family members. You’ll be given the tools and roadmaps to deliver the classes you need in your own voice. 

If you are interested in making this kind of an impact for others, I hope you’ll join me. 

If you’re not interested in facilitating this for others, perhaps you’d be interested in deepening your relationship to Self in my Yoga Nidra course called Waking Up with the Yoga of Sleep. 

Also, if you’re looking for your next great read, I might suggest A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle. Pick it up at your local bookstore. 

Have a great weekend!

Teach Yoga Nidra: Specialized

I love getting emails from people who are curious about my live or online Yoga Nidra teacher training program, Facilitating Transformation with the Yoga of Sleep. Usually, they ask one of two questions:

1. How is my program different from other Yoga Nidra training programs?

2. How do someone create a Yoga Nidra class for a very specific need?

Most Yoga Nidra teacher trainings leave you with only a small set of limited Yoga Nidra scripts to teach. These can be kinda nice but fall way short of fulfilling the specific needs of clients or students. My program also provides you scripts (over 100 pages of them, in fact) but they are designed to be used as guides as you are finding your own voice, templates that prepare you to design and effectively teach your own specialized Yoga Nidra classes, unique for the needs of their clients. My program is designed to first give you a personal relationship with the practice then teach you the principles and roadmaps to effectively build and teach your own classes. Even more, my program is different because it teaches you to speak from the power of your own voice, the way they would say it, and not as a version of me.

It's common for a Yoga Nidra teacher training, it’s common to learn to teach a basic Yoga Nidra class that leaves you feeling rested. But how does one tap the power of Yoga Nidra to make specific transformational change?

For example, how does one teach a Yoga Nidra class for insomnia? How is it different from a Yoga Nidra class for stress? What about designing a class to help with self-esteem, depression, or setting and accomplishing goals? What about Yoga Nidra for managing pain, clarifying your purpose, sourcing your own inner wisdom, or building your confidence? How is Yoga Nidra for kids different from Yoga Nidra for adults?

What are the specialized Yoga Nidra classes you want and need to teach to your students and clients?

And here’s the real kicker: Because of your unique perspective on, understanding of, and experience with the needs of the people in your sphere—be that of a school, community, or certain population— you are the most qualified and effective person to serve their needs. Your people desperately NEED you to learn how to effectively meet these unique needs with essential, accessible, and transformational practices like Yoga Nidra. And, unfortunately, you can’t do that with someone else’s script. You gotta learn to do that yourself. But, luckily, I’m here to help.

I’m really excited about a workshop I’m hosting on Saturday April 23rd via Zoom that will teach you exactly how to design your own specialized Yoga Nidra classes and to deliver them in the power of your own voice. It’s called Teaching Specialized Yoga Nidra. I would love you to join me. It’s an investment into yourself and an investment in your community.

When: Saturday, April 23rd 9 am to 12 pm MDT or 5:00–8:00 pm CET via Zoom. Counts as Yoga Alliance continuing education credit. Click here for details and/or read on to hear more of the back story.

My Journey of Teaching Yoga Nidra

So, I completed my first Yoga Nidra teacher training in 2008. As I started teaching Yoga Nidra, I quickly became frustrated as a teacher because I knew from personal experience just how powerful Yoga Nidra could be, but it soon became clear that I wasn’t nearly as prepared to teach Yoga Nidra as I needed to be.

First, I couldn’t make the impact I wanted to because the scripts I was given in my training were far too general—they didn’t meet my clients’ specific needs, and I was never taught how to deliver customized Yoga Nidra.

What any experienced teacher can tell you is that good teaching doesn’t come in one-size-fits-all.

Second, my Yoga Nidra training didn’t teach me how to leverage my own voice, so my teaching didn’t feel authentic and my students could tell. I knew I could make a bigger impact if I could teach from my own voice, experience, specialization, and interest, but I hadn’t a clue how to do this.

Third, though I’d had beautiful and transformational experiences with Yoga Nidra, many of my yoga students found Yoga Nidra to be, well… too boring. They may have enjoyed it the first time, but hearing the same tired script over and over again was putting people to sleep...in the wrong way.

But, my early struggles facilitating Yoga Nidra turned out to be an enormous gift, because it taught me that this ancient practice was in no way designed to be a rote experience. My struggles in teaching drove me to dive deeper in my studies and to practice more Yoga Nidra. And doing so, I learned volumes about the essential principles of this fascinating practice.

Soon, I began incorporating these principles into my Yoga Nidra classes, now with the ability to innovate, adapt, and deliver profound Yoga Nidra experiences that were customized to my clients’ needs. My teaching became fresh, authentic, engaging, and transformational. And faster than you can say “savasana on steroids,” my Yoga Nidra classes, workshops, and courses were packed. Even my clients who were previously bored by my Yoga Nidra classes came back to stay.

Since then, I have facilitated thousands of hours of Yoga Nidra for my clients, and this beautiful practice continues to reveal deeper and deeper transformation, both for my clients as well as myself, more than I ever realized was possible in those early days of teaching. I even discovered how teaching Yoga Nidra itself is a pathway to greater learning and spiritual awakening.

My approach to Yoga Nidra caught the eye of other yoga teachers and it wasn’t long before I developed a novel teacher training program, Facilitating Transformation with the Yoga of Sleep where I teach that once you have a deeper understanding of what the principles and techniques of Yoga Nidra are pointing to, you can deliver them in any context for any client, using the unparalleled power of your own voice.

Learning to Meet The Needs of Your Students

Your ability to customize Yoga Nidra practices for your clients is central to the design of my Yoga Nidra training.

In addition to teaching the fundamentals of this powerful yet gentle practice, I’m passionate about helping teachers learn how to use Yoga Nidra to meet the specific needs of their clients. I love the diversity of the people who take my Yoga Nidra training, all with different applications of the practice.

Check out all the ways people are using Yoga Nidra with their students, clients, and kids …

• One graduate of my program uses Yoga Nidra in her family law practice to help her clients be calm and centered as they are going through often very emotional legal proceedings.

• One of the teachers I mentor brilliantly uses Yoga Nidra to help her with her specialized work with the neurodiverse population, people who work with ADD, ADHD, Asperger’s, etc.

• Another graduate is using this practice with her high school students to help them manage the incredible stress of placement tests, the challenges of COVID, and of course the hurricane of hormones running through their teenage bodies.
  A recent graduate of my Yoga Nidra program who is a licensed therapist here in France is using Yoga Nidra to help her clients work through trauma.

• A different licensed therapist, this one lives in the States and specializes as a sex therapist, uses Yoga Nidra to help her clients work through shame, body dysmorphia, and to rewire harmful programing around sexuality.

• One graduate uses Yoga Nidra to help those who have lost loved ones work through grief.

• Another teacher uses Yoga Nidra to help world-class artists regularly enter into a state of creative flow.

The applications are limitless! and I’m so proud to be helping people learn to help others with the accessible and powerful practice of Yoga Nidra.

Whether you're a yoga or meditation teacher, a coach, teacher, or therapist, or any role in supporting others, Yoga Nidra can be a very powerful yet accessible tool to help you make transformational change for others.

My level 1 training (50 hrs.) focuses on developing your personal relationship with Yoga Nidra then teaches you how to apply your personal knowledge of the practice to serve the needs of both yourself and your students.

I’m currently busy building the curriculum for my level 2 training which will incorporate even more specialized information and practices centered around helping you become a master facilitator at Yoga Nidra, meeting the specific and varied needs of your clients.

My Teaching Specialized Yoga Nidra Classes workshop on April 23rd draws from the curriculum of my level 2 training and I’m excited to share it with you before it’s even available in my level 2 training.

You are most welcome to this workshop whether or not you’ve already taken my Yoga Nidra training. The Teaching Specialized Yoga Nidra workshop will serve as a great preview course if you are curious about my level 1 Yoga Nidra teacher training, Facilitating Transformation with the Yoga of Sleep. This workshop will also serve those who have already taken my training and would like more practice with this essential skill.

And, for anyone who takes this workshop and also decides to take my full teacher training program or who registers for my level 2 training, I’ll deduct the price of this course from either training.

Perhaps the best and most empowering thing about this workshop is that you get to bring your ideas for a Yoga Nidra class to the workshop so that we can build them together. This will be so cool!

You’ll leave this workshop with:

• Confidence in knowing how to build your specialized Yoga Nidra class

• Understanding of the Yoga Nidra Roadmap to guide your journey

• Surety of how to build a class using the Class Building Template

• Guidance from over 100 pages of scripts to use as templates as you build your own Yoga Nidra classes

• Personalized attention for your projects from myself as well as your with breakout sessions with your peers

• Organization in the form of a manual outlining the discussion points, maps, and resources

• Ideas of new and exciting Yoga Nidra classes the world needs to hear from you
  

The workshop will be live, on Zoom, and recorded and sent as a replay to give you maximum flexibility in how you take this workshop.

When: Saturday, April 23rd 9 am to 12 pm MDT or 5:00–8:00 pm CET via Zoom.

I hope you'll join me.