St. Patrick’s Holy Well or Tobar Phádraig is a sacred site tucked away in the Maumturk mountains in the Connemara region of Galway, Ireland. Tobar Phádraig is an active pilgrimage site to this day and dates back to the fifth century and beyond.
Read moreLament Over Daylight Saving Time
Today I want to discuss some of the benefits of Yoga Nidra, how rest and napping help rejuvenate you, and how crazy Daylight Saving Time is.
It’s Daylight Saving Time.
You know what’s weird? Time.
Yes, time.
What’s also weird is that a helpful student chimed in to let me know that it’s not “Daylight Savings Time” but rather Daylight Saving (no s) Time. Good to know. Thanks!
Today is one of the worst “time events” that happens twice a year.
That’s right. Today the U.S. switches to Daylight Saving Time. Well, everyone but Arizona and Hawaii. It’s nice to know that some states have kept their sanity.
Why Daylight Saving Time?!
Every organism on this planet has some sort of a rhythm and sleep cycle that is dependent upon the circadian rhythm, the natural rhythm of the daylight hours as dictated by the seasons. This rhythm directs cycles from when to sleep, when to eat, when to migrate, etc. It makes sense.
What doesn’t make sense to me is the fact that as humans we are advanced enough to send Gobots to Mars 203 MILLION miles away and have them send pics back to us in real time as it rolls around collecting specimens and amusing itself yet we don’t have the smarts to keep to the natural rhythm that all organisms on this planet have been following since, oh, the beginning of life on this planet. Instead humans create a rhythm of life based not on the seasons or the natural impulses of our bodies, impulses that have been ingrained into our very DNA, but rather an artificial rhythm set to a clock that is designed to make us more productive and earn more money.
If that were not bad enough, then every 6 months we have to mess it up with adding or taking away Daylight Saving Time.
I don’t need to have an opinion about it … but apparently I do.
Putting Daylight Saving To Rest
Luckily I’m not alone here. Thankfully some really smart people like Kenneth P. Wright Jr. Ph.D at the Sleep and Chronobiology lab at the University of Colorado Boulder thinks that for optimal physical, mental, and emotional health we should do away with Daylight Saving Time and stick with one standard time, for crying out loud. (If you care about a reference for Write’s work, whether or not I’m not making this up, you can click here.)
But until we all come to our senses and ditch Daylight Saving, those of us who are in the US are waking up an hour earlier today (except Arizona and Hawaii—starkly different places but who at least share a modicum of sanity).
Solutions For Fatigue
So, here’s what I propose.
More napping.
Yes, more napping. I mean, I’m about a third the way into Scott Carney’s book about Dreams and I love how he is exploring the fact that throughout history and cultures, before the industrial revolution and electricity (light bulbs meant people could work longer), people would follow a more natural pattern of sleeping and sleep about 9 hours a night and would also take a siesta in the afternoon which follows the natural rhythms of a person’s body.
This is both sane and healthy.
You know, sleeping a solid 7–9 hours is normal and healthy. Then, it’s natural to start to wane mentally and energetically after about 8 hours of being awake, after lunch time, usually. This is the PERFECT time to take a bit of a nap. It’s not being lazy. It’s being healthy.
You don’t need to nap for long. In fact, 20–30 minutes will do absolute wonders for your overall wellness. Plus, you don’t even have to fall all the way asleep. You can just rest. It’s a revolution!
More Productive with Yoga Nidra
But what about being productive and all that?
Well, turns out that when you follow this more natural cycle of sleep and allow yourself a sanctioned nap in the middle of the day, your brain functions even better, your emotions are more regulated and for those who care … YOU’RE EVEN MORE PRODUCTIVE.
To boot, you have better ideas, tend to think out of the box more often, and are generally more creative and able to learn. In fact, many of the outliers of art and industry— math and science geniuses, tech gurus, writers and artists—are ardent nappers.
Yep.
And guess what? Listening to a Yoga Nidra recording serves this need for a mid-day nap PERFECTLY.
So as a way of compassionately responding to this insane biannual change to/from Daylight Savings, I’m offering you a free Yoga Nidra for deep relaxation.
You’re welcome.
And if you’d like to make this resting and napping a regular part of your life, please join me for my weekly live, online Yoga Nidra class, happening at 9 am MDT. You can participate from the comfort of your own home (hell, your own bed). We’ll breath, move, talk a little, but then the main event will be me leading you through a luxurious Yoga Nidra practice where you get practice waking up to your True Being through the process of engineering that liminal state between waking and sleeping. That’s the Nidra state.
Truly we are waking up with the yoga of sleep.
Even if you can’t make it live, by registering, you’ll get the replay so you can do this Yoga Nidra practice any time you want, as often as you want.
So next week, as your dragging your butt around the office, sluggish and tired from the time change, tell your boss that at about 2 pm every day, you’ll have to excuse yourself, that you have an urgent 30 minute appointment which involves you lying down, closing your eyes, and napping your way to enlightenment.
Your boss will thank you later.
If you need a note from your yoga teacher for permission, let me know.
I’ll send one. Or better yet, just print this one =>
Hope to see you at the Live Online Yoga Nidra class and enjoy this free Yoga Nidra recording for Deep Relaxation.
Together, we can get through this nightmare that is Daylight Saving!
How Long Should A Yoga Nidra Practice Be, Anyway?
today I thought I’d discuss the optimal lengths for a Yoga Nidra practice: What is too long and what is too short.
Read morePerfect Not Perfect
Almost 9 years ago, I remember standing in front of my yoga class and expressing how utterly nervous I was . I wasn’t nervous about teaching yoga or being in front of people. I was shaking in my boots because at 39 years old, I was about to embark on perhaps the largest endeavor of my life, a massive journey, a challenge I’d never ever done before: becoming a dad.
Read moreChange Rooms In Your Mind For A Day
Yoga is the practice of joining all the different parts of ourselves as we explore what it means to be one. Sure, we are physical beings. We are also spiritual beings. We are mental, emotional, social beings. What fascinates me is the provocative idea of learning to live in a Both/And relationship with things that seem otherwise at odds, different, or opposite. Such a mindset and awareness for life opens us up to the truth of who we are as part of Source.
After all, in the wild road trip of life, aren't we are all balancing paradox while sitting at the corner of Human and Being.
The Yoga of The New Year
This is going to be your best year yet!
As you begin this new year, I invite you to muster the courage to dream big. Really big.
What is something you’ve always wanted to do, become, or complete?
You have a Universe inside of you. You’re made of Source and as such, have the potential to accomplish and receive all things.
Your spirit is indomitable. Your creativity, limitless. Don’t be afraid to imagine what is possible for you in 2024.
This is the imaginative and spiritual part of growing into the next version of yourself but it doesn’t stop there. Just dreaming, hoping, and scheming won’t get you there.
Next, since we aren’t ONLY spiritual beings, since we are spirit married to physical, practical beings—give your dreams some legs by mapping out in realistic terms how to accomplish those dreams.
Remember to start small knowing it will grow into something big.
If you want to run a marathon but haven’t been running in a while, have enough foresight to start by walking, then running/walking, then running. Commit to being in it for the long-term which means that there will be ups and downs.
Don’t give up when things don’t work out the way you’d hoped. It’s just another chance for calibration and learning.
Because at the end of the day, it’s not about accomplishing your goal.
Not really.
It’s about who you become in the process.
Accomplishing your goal is just the happy byproduct.
Whatever you dream up for 2024, having a regular meditation practice is of the first order. It clarifies, relaxes, and hones your body, mind, and spirit. It’s like the underlying framework for all other work to be done.
Meditation: One of the Most Important Little Big Things
It’s time to recommit to doing a little bit of essential self-care, the kind that helps you be at your best. Cuz we all know that it’s those little things that we do regularly for ourselves that eventually turn into the big things, the things that help us live the kind of lives we want to live and be the kind of people we need to be.
Read moreWhite-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!
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.
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.
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?
Live Classes, In-person and Online:
Yoga For Stiffer Bodies on Saturdays at 7:30–8:30 am at Mosaic Yoga
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.
Yoga Retreats 2024
Live Yoga Nidra, Live Yoga Classes, Yoga Retreat Tuscany, Mountain Biking
We’ve had a great time visiting the US and I’m heading home to Nice in only about 10 days!
I have a few more classes I’m teaching before I leave and I’d love to see you before I go.
In-Person Asana Classes
Friday, September 1, 2023
Mosaic Yoga 1991 South 1100 East, Salt Lake City (map).
All Mosaic classes are by donation. I accept cash, Venmo, or original, signed, and authenticated copies of John Coltrane’s 1957 album, Blue Train. Thank you.
Power Hour 6–7 am MDT:
An all-levels hour of wake-up yoga with an easy warm-up including Sun Salutations and full-body mobilizations, followed by standing, balance, and grounding poses.
Mindfulness 7:15–8:15 am MDT:
This is an opportunity to sit and meditate with a group of other mindfulness practitioners in a welcoming environment. It’s perfect whether you are a new or experienced meditator.
Power 1 8:45–10 am MDT:
This 75-minute class weaves a spiritual or conscious theme into a Wanderlust format of poses which alternate between short flowing and static sequences to arrive at a therapeutic, cohesive, and well-rounded yoga experience. This class will feature warmups, sun salutations, standing poses, approachable standing and arm balances, core work, hips, and a solid cool down and savasana. I’ll be bringing the clarinet!
Live, In-Person Yoga Nidra Class
Wednesday, August 30th 6–7:15 pm
Integrated Wellness 1174 East Graystone Way #15, Salt Lake City, Utah 84106
This class will feature opening to sacred space with some shared breath, a discussion about the benefits of Yoga Nidra, some pre-Nidra breathing & mindfulness practices, then a 30-minute Yoga Nidra practice, followed by some brief integration practices.
Bring a yoga mat, blanket, bolster (or extra blanket) and an eye mask or pillow.
Price $15 ($10 if you’re a subscribing member to Sunday’s class). No need to register or pay in advance. Just show up and you can pay in cash or with Venmo.
Plus, I had the really, really cool opportunity to be interviewed by two amazing women, Danielle LeCourt and Jamie Bangerter, on their amazing podcast called The Art of Mountain Biking.
We discussed how rest is an often underemphasized skill that supports, everything we do including sports such as mountain biking, but also the full-contact sport of every-day life. As with any skill, we need a systematized way of approaching it. I loved where our discussion went and I hope you’ll take a moment to enjoy it too.
Listen by clicking here or click here to listen on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Last but not least, I’ve been brushing up on my Renaissance history because in about 6 weeks, I’ll be in Tuscany offering a retreat with an optional pre-treat—walking tours through Florence, the birthplace of the Renaissance. We have a few spots left both in the retreat as well as the pre-treat (I say “we” because I’ll be hosting the retreat with Kim Dastrup). Please grab your bestie and join us for this incredible adventure.
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.
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.
Stages and States of Consciousness
So how does Yoga Nidra help a person, “wake up?”
A simple truth that Yoga Nidra explores in its gentle model of illumination is how relaxation and layered Awareness aids us learn to welcome, recognize, and witness every object that life gives us and that all objects are pointers to ultimate Truth. Yoga Nidra facilitates an easy change of our mind state, one of deep relaxation, as we welcome, recognize, and witness objects coming and going through our Awareness. Regularly practicing changing our mind state in Yoga Nidra provides a pathway for upward stage development of consciousness. One develops in stage consciousness and typically does not return back to lower stages of consciousness. In other words, it is difficult to “un-know” or “un-experience” your true magnificence of Being.
Read moreAliens, Bigfoot, and Ed Abbey
I’m loving spending a few weeks in the desert landscapes of Castle Valley, Utah, near Moab.
I love the raw, unfiltered desert, the solitude, and the wide open skies.
And the stars!
What I am starkly aware of is that the desert isn’t trying to please me or make me comfortable but if I can appreciate that and love it as it is, cactus and wind scorpions and all, I will open my eyes to its unrelenting beauty.
Castle Valley is a sparse community—houses sprinkled lightly throughout an otherwise unspoiled wilderness. Each humble house here has unobstructed views and exposure to the red rock cliffs, majestic monuments, and oppressive sun. Neighbors are few and far between and the people who come here appreciate this area’s primary resource: solitude.
Read moreDigital Downloads = Instant Relief
If you’re a teacher, there’s only so many classes you can teach in a day. There’s no limit to how many people can download your stuff online. Why not do both and give yourself the freedom to reach more people around the world while maximizing your income?
Read moreWorking Smarter Not Harder
In the beginning, I did what most yoga teachers do …
Hustle.
At one point, I was regularly teaching 27 classes a week, any class I could get, including the 6 am classes that nobody else wanted to teach, including private yoga clients who would sometimes cancel at the last minute.
Ironic, isn’t it—running around like a mad person all day so you can rush into a yoga studio and preach to people about chilling out? It was both unsustainable and exhausting. I mean, a person can only teach so many classes a day. I’d plateaued in my career. Something had to change.
Read moreYoga Nidra for Sleep
I recently published an article on Yogi Times called: yoga nidra for sleep: unlocking the power of deep sleep
In this article I share exactly how Yoga Nidra helps you sleep better and offer a suggestion for a nighttime routine using Yoga Nidra that helps you create a wonderful sleep hygiene.
Read moreMy Best Online Yoga Nidra Training
My next Yoga Nidra training is coming up and I want to tell you all about it. I believe it’s the best online Yoga Nidra training because it mixes both live and pre-recorded elements which allows you both the privilege of learning the core principles on your own timeline as well as the power of a personalized attention to ask questions along with your small cohort.
Read moreThe Miraculous Camouflaged As The Mundane
I decided to take advantage of the walk and chose a slightly longer but decidedly more beautiful route home, along the Promenade Anglais, the walkway that skirts the bay here in Nice. Not to weather brag, here, but man, was it choice! The sun was shining, temp was...
Read moreWhat Makes A Great Teacher
As teachers and leaders, we have a sacred responsibility to hold a vision for our students and clients and invite them to stretch and reach for what they may not even be able to see for themselves. We also encourage them that they can do it and help them to see that they already hold inside of them the seeds necessary for their own transformation.
Read moreStarting Over
One thing I teach in my online Yoga Nidra training is the value of starting over. Tell me if you relate to this story.
I attended college back in the era of “floppy disks” and one day I got a hard lesson on just how "floppy" these disks were.
One evening, after a grueling day of wrestling with an essay I'd been writing for weeks, what was to be my pièce de la résistance, my magnum opus, and intended to be both my senior thesis AND my entry into a prestigious essay contest, I sat down at my desk to print off my essay so I could submit it the following day and as I clicked the floppy disk into my computer and looked at the contents to find the file to print … nothing. Nada. Rien.
Floppy.
Everything on that disk had been mysteriously obliterated.
So, what did I do? What could I do?
Sitting there at my desk, I simply started over.
The words were fresh; I’d practically memorized the thing.
But this time instead of wrestling with the words and ideas, they tumbled out of my brain and danced through my fingers onto the keyboard fast and fluid. This time it formed more clearly with ideas I hadn’t even thought of the first time. This time, it had soul.
I finished the essay (again).
I graduated with my degree.
I took 1st place in the essay contest.
Starting over can be a gift.
Regardless of how many times you have to come back to your presence in meditation, it doesn't matter, starting over is a gift.
Even if you've let your meditation or yoga practice go, it doesn't matter, starting over is a gift.
No matter whatever we've lost, tried, and failed at, no matter what didn’t take the first time (or several times), starting over is a gift.
May we all celebrate the opportunity to come back to presence and start over again and again and again.
This time could make all the difference.
Online Yoga Nidra Training
I’m absolutely passionate about Yoga Nidra. Yoga Nidra has taught me more about myself, the Universe, and my purpose in the world than any other practice and I can’t wait to share what I’ve learned with you.
If you’ve ever thought about teaching Yoga Nidra, now is the time—the world needs it more than ever. Also, the world needs more qualified Yoga Nidra teachers, and this course is designed to teach you to become a Yoga Nidra expert, delivering this healing practice in the power of your own voice— because there’s no one who can teach like you can.
One of the things I’ve learned about Yoga Nidra is that even though practicing it is very easy and can lead to profound transformation, being an effective Yoga Nidra facilitator can be very difficult. This is why I’ve created Facilitating Transformation with the Yoga of Sleep, an enlightening, engaging, and enjoyable online Yoga Nidra teacher training where you will learn the art and science of teaching Yoga Nidra using the power of your own voice. You’ll also learn how to apply your expertise to acquire and create excellent teaching opportunities through live or online group classes, workshops, courses, private sessions, and even how to lead yoga retreats and other paid events. I’ll even teach you how to create digital products to sell and share your teaching gifts with the world. In short, you’ll learn how to make a massive impact while making a great living doing what you love.
Message In A Bottle
a chorus of every human as we voice the fundamental and shared truth that nobody is an island unto themselves, that we all need saving, and most importantly, that we are all … saving.…each other.
Read more