Yin Yoga Teacher Training: Minds, Meridians, Moments (Online)

This five-day (40-hour) Yoga Alliance accredited Yin yoga online training course with Norman Blair gives participants space to study and to explore this increasingly popular yoga practice. Yin yoga can give us the space to slow down and to savour the experience of being in postures.

What is Yin yoga?

Yin yoga can give us the space to slow down, a chance to stay with our experiences rather than always rushing. In a Yin yoga practice, all the postures are held for sustained periods of time (often five minutes). Within these long holds, there is an encouragement of softness and an emphasis on relaxing muscular tissue. Through these attitudes there can be a gaining of harmony and peace: so there is a greater ease, a deeper sense of balance, feelings of calmness and acceptance.

What Will I Learn?

Limited to just 24 participants, this five day training will explore the possibilities and examine the potentials of this practice.

The intention of this course is to equip students with the skills needed to teach Yin yoga classes.

We will embed ourselves in the practice:

• Looking at the postures, discussing variations and learning teaching skills
• Investigating the postures, studying examples of sequencing and focusing plenty of time on evaluating our own experience
• Central themes covered by Norman will include awareness, intention, attending to the individuality of anatomy: each of us having our own unique biology, and our own unique biography.
• You will learn and experience sequences that can deepen inner quietening, that can open the hips and other emotional centres of the body, and that can encourage self-reflection
• explore the relationship between Yin yoga and meditation
• understand the precautions and the possibilities of Yin yoga
• learn about meridians and how Yin yoga might influence energy flows
• examine the differences between Yin yoga, Restorative yoga and dynamic yoga
• how to do Yin yoga in different ways (with props, without props and more)
• the history of Yin yoga
• examine some of the theories behind Yin yoga

How is the course taught Live Online?

You will be provided with hard copies (via post) of three course manuals and extra handouts prior to the start date of the course.

Lecture and Yin Yoga Classes: You will receive two 45 minute talking head lecture (and also a two hour Yin yoga class taught by Norman and one taught by Amanda Wright) – this content will be available to you for six months

Live Classroom: Each day you will participate in a live classroom led through Zoom, running from 10am to 5pm; with a short break in middle of morning session and middle of afternoon session. Lunch will be from 13:00 to 14:00. The number of students on this course is limited to 24 to ensure substantial contact time and interaction with teachers.

An assistant will be present for all days of the course, and available to assist individual students with any queries.

Guest Teachers: Your learning experience on the course is enriched by the presence of a different guest teacher each day. Each teacher brings extensive knowledge from their fields of expertise, spanning anatomy, meditation, Chinese medicine, breath-work and neuroscience.

Self Study Questionnaire: At the end of each day, you will do a short quiz to help embed that day’s learning and maximise your engagement with course material.

This structure is geared toward: Encouraging interaction; lessening Zoom fatigue and supporting you in achieving your learning objectives through a combination of live experience, recorded lectures and reviews of course material. Please download the COURSE SCHEDULE below for a detailed breakdown of the syllabus for each day.

Guest Teachers

Anatomy - Emma Charlton
Emma has a great interest in the human body. She has been an Aromatherapist and Massage Therapist since 2000 and has taught massage at a leading aromatherapy college for 10 years. She has a long-term yoga practice and is fascinated by the possibilities of body and how body moves in response to yoga poses. She has an in-depth understanding of musculo-skeletal structures and continues along her path of learning with regular training and development.

Meditation - Maitripushpa Bois
Maitripushpa began her regular meditation practice in the mid-1980s and has been practicing yoga since the mid-1990s. She constantly watches and learns how the two practices influence each other.

Yin yoga - Amanda Wright
Amanda has been practising yoga since 2001 and teaching Yin and other styles of yoga since 2006. Amanda is a big believer in Continual Personnel Development. She has done many trainings and retreats with Sarah Powers and retreats at Gaia House, and teachers including David Swenson, Judith Hanson Lasater and Norman Blair. The reason for this is to shake ourselves up a bit, not get complacent, and potentially bring about change.

Who is this course for?

This course will suit Yoga teachers, and teachers in training, as well as those with an already established understanding and practice of Yin Yoga. The intention of this course is to equip students with the skills needed to lead Yin Yoga classes. This covers knowledge of the principles of Yin yoga, anatomy of Yin postures, how to practice and teach the ten main Yin poses including options for hyper-mobility and contraindications, Yin postures for meditation, how to talk students into poses, how to describe and market Yin yoga classes and individual detailed guidance on developing a personal practice.

By the end you will have a flavour of this work and an appreciation for the depth of the study. We strongly encourage repetition and continued learning. It is hoped that this will support your own health and way of living and that you may begin to incorporate this learning into your teaching.

Certification and Accreditation

On satisfactory completion of the course, you will receive a Yogacampus Certificate of Completion. This course counts for 40 training hours eligible for Yoga Alliance continuing education (YACEP) credits.

Yogacampus Diversity and Accessibility Bursary

We are offering one bursary (50% off the full course price) to dedicated yoga students with a demonstrated financial need and active involvement in a community that could benefit from yoga.

These bursaries are provided by Yogacampus – The Life Centre Education, a not-for-profit educational body committed to sharing knowledge and making yoga accessible to all. Bursary places will be awarded to teachers or trainees who have the ability and commitment to take the course teachings into a disadvantaged community and play their part in the drive to increase accessibility to these profoundly healing practices. Priority will be given to those who themselves are from marginalised or vulnerable groups or are from a minority ethnic background.

To apply please fill in the form at this link before the deadline of 03 October 2024. We look forward to hearing from you.

Notification of bursary acceptance will be sent out the following week.

Meet the Teacher

Norman Blair has been practising yoga since the early 1990s and started teaching in 2001. He believes that yoga is accessible to all of us and that through regular practice, we can experience profound changes in our mind and body. He is one of the most experienced yin yoga teachers in the UK and weaves this wonderful practice with his own background of Ashtanga and meditation to create a potent mix. He has been a long-term student with teachers such as Sarah Powers, Hamish Hendry, Judith Lasater and Alaric Newcombe.