Theme Weaver: A Companion Workbook to Plan Yoga Classes

By Michelle Marchildon

"Theme Weaver, A Companion Workbook to Plan Yoga Classes," is the Inspiration Edition for the Theme Weaver books. It is a collection of ready-to-go, creative yoga themes and class ideas including mythology, yoga philosophy and contemporary stories. It supplements the original "Theme Weaver: Connect the Power of Inspiration to Teaching Yoga" with 60 classes and pose suggestions. Class planning sheets help you build a theme that is uniquely your own.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michelle Marchildon
• Release date: Jul 8, 2020

Michelle Marchildon

Michelle Marchildon is The Yogi Muse. She’s an award-winning journalist and the author of three books on yoga. Her newest, Fearless After Fifty: How to Thrive with Grace, Grit and Yoga is co-written with Desiree Rumbaugh. Her previous books include Finding More on the Mat: How I Grew Better, Wiser and Stronger through Yoga and Theme Weaver: Connect the Power of Inspiration to Teaching Yoga. You can find her writing on Elephant Journal, Mantra Yoga and Health Magazine, and Sports Illustrated.

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What People are Saying

"Michelle’s first Theme Weaver inspired yoga teachers worldwide to develop their skills using authentic, powerful themes. In this new book, she has carefully and thoughtfully laid out 60 examples to make it even more useful for any level of teacher. Whether or not you feel you are able to use themes in your teaching, just going through the process of preparing your class will cause you to reflect on your purpose. This will in turn stimulate your own creativity, and make your teaching more potent and powerful. Thank you, Michelle, for taking the time to create such a clear and user-friendly template that yoga teachers can use to improve their classes."

— Desiree Rumbaugh, Certified Yoga Teacher and coauthor of Fearless After Fifty: How to Thrive with Grace, Grit and Yoga

Whether you are a new or experienced yoga teacher, incorporating themes into your classes can be a challenge. Michelle Marchildon’s latest offering takes the guesswork out of inspiration by offering 60 sample themes along with practical tools and techniques to make them your own. This book is an invaluable guide for anyone who wants to present themes with authenticity, clarity and humor.

— Christina Sell, author of Yoga from the Inside Out: Making Peace with Your Body Through Yoga, My Body Is a Temple: Yoga as a Path to Wholeness, and A Deeper Yoga: Beyond Body Image to Wholeness and Freedom (Hohm Press)

"I’ve had the good fortune to be a student of Michelle Marchildon’s for nearly a decade. Through the years her themes have inspired and uplifted me. They’ve given me food for thought and even made me laugh. I am also a yoga teacher and studio owner, and I recommend Theme Weaver for our Yoga Teacher Trainings. This book helps teachers find their voice, speak their truth and create authentic themes that connect with students."

— Karey Goebel, ERYT 500, Owner, ONE Yoga Denver

At a time when most popular yoga classes appear to emphasize a workout, fitness and aesthetic, and class durations have decreased to an hour or less, theming your yoga class becomes a powerful way to weave philosophical threads into the experience, and connect the dots between what we do on our mats and our lives out in the world. In her latest book, as well as her first book, Michelle demystifies how to theme with integrity and authenticity. Her methods and guidance pull back the veil and reveal that the magic our most inspiring teachers seem to possess is within us too!

— Gina Caputo, the Yogini on the Loose and Founder of the Colorado School of Yoga

Praise for Theme Weaver: Connect the Power of Inspiration to Teaching Yoga

I have often said that the ability to theme a yoga class is one of the key characteristics of teaching with authenticity and significance. Michelle Berman Marchildon gives us a straightforward, no nonsense, no dogma approach to finding your voice and niche in teaching. If you’re looking to cultivate presence, confidence and a strong student base as a yoga teacher, this book is a must!

— Amy Ippoliti, cofounder of 90 Monkeys, and author of The Art and Business of Teaching Yoga

I recommend this book wholeheartedly to yoga teachers everywhere who want down-to-earth, practi-cal guidance for creating and delivering meaningful and authentic themes in their classes. With her characteristic wit, insight and intelligence, Michelle guides new and experienced teachers through the sometimes challenging terrain of bringing virtue to life through asana.

— Christina Sell, author of My Body Is a Temple and Yoga from the Inside Out

"Read this book if you want to make your yoga classes powerful and transformational. Theme Weaver takes the mystery out of theming, and provides a path to make a complicated process attainable for every teacher."

— Desiree Rumbaugh, coauthor of Fearless After Fifty: How to Thrive with Grace, Grit and Yoga, and creator of the Yoga to the Rescue DVD series

In her dharma dead serious and hatha hilarious style, Michelle Marchildon insists that we as yoga teachers embrace the pragmatic and shun the enigmatic. If you don’t want to read this book for you, read it for your students!

— Darren Rhodes, author of The Yoga Resource, director of YogaOasis in Tucson, Arizona

If you have longed to deepen the impact you can make as a teacher, then you are holding the key. The best part about becoming a Theme Weaver is that you can’t help but receive the blessing of the lessons you wish to teach.

— Heather Peterson, Chief Yoga Oficer, CorePower Yoga

Theme Weaver: A Companion Workbook to Plan Yoga Classes

The Inspiration Edition

by Michelle Berman Marchildon

Copyright © 2019 Michelle Berman Marchildon

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

Published by

Wildhorse Ventures LLC

A Denver, Colorado company committed to producing real voices in yoga and protecting the rights and sanctuaries of animals worldwide.

ISBN: 978-0-9848755-8-0

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019905971

Book Design: Nick Zelinger, www.NZGraphics.com

eBook conersion: Rebecca Finkel, F+P Graphic Design

Book Shepherd: Judith Briles

Printer: Color House Graphics

First Edition

1. Health

2. Fitness

3. Yoga

4. Body, Mind, Spirit

To my warriors who show up week after week,

may we laugh our way to enlightenment.

And to local teachers everywhere,

may we never run out of fresh ideas to encourage others to join us.

I want to thank my community of Denver teachers for lifting me up, day after day, for 20-plus years.

Christina Sell, Desiree Rumbaugh, Amy Ippoliti and the army of amazing yogis I’ve had the privilege to study with in this life. Your words, teachings and inspiration are etched into my soul. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Judith Briles and all the folks at The Book Shepherd™, Nick Zelinger, the best designer and guitar player ever, you guys get ‘er done. Thank you.

I also want to thank whoever invented the internet. Years ago, finding quotes and interesting myths would have taken years in a library. Today, it takes seconds on a computer. For that, I am forever grateful.

Introduction: Do the Work Please

The Other Eight Limb Path

I. Arrive: Having It All

The Importance of Being You: Theme and HOV

II. Journey: It’s About Grit and Grace

How to Pulsate a Theme

III. Community: Find Your Tribe

The Anecdote: How to Make It Great

IV. Mythology: Myths and Mayhem

Contemplations and Golden Nuggets: How to Weave a Theme

V. Philosophy: Sutras and Such

The Value Proposition: Living Your Dharma

VI. Wonderment: The Power of Story

The Easiest Way to Theme a Class

Appendix: An Incomplete and Imperfect List of HOVs

Index of Themes and Topics

About the Author

Books by the Author

The trouble is, you think you have time.

—Buddha

BEGIN, HERE, NOW.

When we search for the right words to inspire our students, to connect authentically and to learn about who we are and why we teach, we start by being present.

Begin by using the inspiration that is inside this book. But repeating these classes is by no means where you will end.

I hope you use this book as a launch pad, where you take the ideas and imaginings in these pages and turn them uniquely into your own. Nobody knows better than you why you teach, and who you are, so nobody connects with your students like you can.

Two people could teach the same sequence, with the same theme, and the classes would feel entirely different because of that something more that you bring to the room. That special something is you.

After all, why do people come to a yoga class when they could stay at home and practice on their mat? They come to bond. In these days of social isolation, where Facebook is the new friendship, group activities have become the neighborhood. These activities often lead to real friends in the real world.

The Secret Sauce Is Inspiration

The inspiration you bring to a class can be the reason yogis pursue physical, mental, emotional and spiritual wellness. You can show them a more compelling reason than say, a cuter butt. Although fitness is a respectable goal, it will not hold resonance over time as much as happiness, contentment, or knowing one’s purpose in life. Discovering those secrets will reveal more life-changing results than the calorie-count in a latte.

There is an additional benefit to incorporating inspiration into your teaching, and this is actually quite self-serving. It helps you do your own inner work. You can encourage your own self-growth by doing the work to make a theme your own. By contemplating, journaling and just sitting quietly with an idea, you will discover why it stirs you. The key to your own wellness and vitality is staying awake and aware of who you are, and it is the path to being authentic with these themes.

Start with What You Know

Many of us start by repeating what we heard others say: Just let go and Surrender are perfectly fine first themes. At some point though, you will want to develop a more sophisticated approach to your teaching.

However, maturing involves doing the work, and that’s often uncomfortable. Finding fresh things to say, week in and week out, is tough. Nailing the right words at exactly the right moment is not easy. And I can’t promise that by using the ideas in this book you won’t trip up ever again. That’s just not how it works. But I can promise you this: It’s a start. If you continue to do the work, to know yourself, you will do better. No effort is ever wasted.

I abso-freaking-lutely guarantee it.

What Is Theme Weaver?

At its heart, Theme Weaver is a simple formula that can help you create consistent inspiration. You can take these concepts and plug in phrases that feel authentic. Using a formula will also help you to re-use bits and pieces of creative imaginings, and yet always sound original. This should save you valuable time when you make classes.

This collection of themes represents ancient texts and modern-day ideas. Don’t expect every single theme to speak to you. Rather, I hope they spark your own creative fire. The pages are perforated so you can tear them out, scribble your thoughts into the margins, and take them with you. There are also blank pages so you can make your own themes.

Please use what you can, and politely pass over the rest. No need to tell everyone how absolutely awful Theme 45 is, when you might like Theme 37. Plus, someone else might like Theme 45, and now you’ve made everything awkward. This is also good advice for social gatherings, family dinners, and making comments on the internet.

Poses too

The original Theme Weaver was published in 2013, and since the beginning I have separated poses from the inspiration. You could teach self-acceptance with a backbend sequence, and then the next week teach self-acceptance with a hip opener sequence, and it would be an entirely new class. I liked that flexibility.

However, if there has been one consistent chant from the internet (and it’s really hard to get the internet to agree on anything), it would be that I add poses to the themes. So, I did. Next to each theme there are pose suggestions to give you a start on sequence. If it serves you, then it’s there. If it doesn’t, then create your own sequence.

Last words, really …

Theme Weaver: A Companion Workbook to Plan Yoga Classes is meant to be a companion to Theme Weaver: Connect the Power of Inspiration to Teaching Yoga. If the formula is confusing, if you don’t understand an HOV or a Golden Nugget, please pick up the first book where the path is described in more detail. I also post short videos on MichelleMarchildon.com to give you support along the way.

We use inspiration to motivate students, but the one who grows is us. We choose ideas, myths or stories based on what we need to hear at that moment. We learn to be our own source of comfort and encouragement, and thus we become better, stronger and wiser. Slowly, and steadily, this becomes the inner work. Teaching is a practice too.

A Little Blessing for You

May these musings delight and ignite a creative spark in you. May they light the path to the hidden places of your soul. May you find the courage to seek out something more in your teaching. May you do the work that creates honest connection with your fellow beings. May you share them with good company, as we walk each other home.

Namaste