March 2019 - Refer to Workshop page for 2020 schedule

Today's Challenges: Yoga's Answers
Teacher Training and Workshops
with Doug Keller
March 21-23, 2019

Doug Keller has been teaching workshops and trainings in the therapeutic applications of yoga for more than 16 years, and is known not only for his effectiveness in communicating this ever-evolving approach in these trainings, but also for his extensive writing on the topic in magazines, journals and his two-volume work on ‘Yoga As Therapy.’ He has also served, in addition to his traveling and teaching, as a Distinguished Professor at the Maryland University of Integrative Health in their Master’s Degree program in Yoga Therapy. This program is state-approved and accredited for granting a Master’s degree in this field, and is fully accredited by the International Association of Yoga Therapists. 

Structure of workshops are two teacher training days, Thursday and Friday, and three weekend workshops. Thursday and Friday are training-intensives for yoga teachers and inquiring students; three weekend workshops are open to all interested.

Today's Challenges, Yoga's Answers
A Therapeutically Inspired Yoga Workshop and Training - Open to all
Throughout history, yoga has always adapted to meet the needs of it's practitioners - from ascetics in the early days to the people of today. Yoga has evolved, finding applications of yoga practices - both therapeutic and spiritual - that have gone far beyond what the original yogis had imagined.
This therapeutically inspired yoga training and workshop honors that evolution with news you can use and insights into applications of yoga for your own well being.
The workshop will cover practical, accessible approaches to common physical challenges tied to modern lifestyle, including pain problems such as sciatica, low back and sacroiliac pain, and neck and should pain. These insights will be incorporated into enjoyable, challenging (and doable) flowing practices of yoga's fundamental poses - with deeper insights into doing the poses well and beneficially.
What is covered in the workshop will also include self-care technicques of fascial release and marma that you can incorporate into your warm-up for practice (or everyday activities) for your feet, wrists, low back and hips, and more.
The 'sankalpa' or intention of the weekend is that you leave refreshed, renewed and inspired with practical tools to meet the new year, and a deep appreciation of yoga!

Workshop Topics - use links for detail descriptions 

Registration Rates:
   Note: Full refunds available up to one week prior to start of workshop, 3/14/2019

Registration

Registration for Both Teacher Training and Weekend workshop | $240
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Teacher Training Package (3/21 | 1-5pm and 3/22 | 1-5pm) | $145
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Individual Teacher Training Sessions:

Thursday Teacher Training, March 21 | 1-5pm | $80
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Friday Teacher Training, March 22 | 1-5pm | $80
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Weekend Workshops Package (3/22 | 6:30-8:30pm, 3/23 | 9-11:30am and 3/23 | 1-3:30pm) | $100
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Individual Sessions:

Friday Evening Practice, March 22 | 6:30-8:30pm | $35
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Saturday Morning Practice, March 23 | 9-11:30am | $40
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Saturday Afternoon Practice, March 23 | 1-3:30pm | $40 | Registration closed-Sat pm full

Workshop Descriptions

• Two Day Training--
  Sacroiliac, Low Back and Neck Health: Working with the Layers or 'Koshas' of Feeling in the Fascia of the Spine - with implications and applications in the Teaching of Asana
  Traditional approaches to therapeutic appliactions of yoga have focused on the 'Koshas' or 'Sheaths' of energy - from the gross, physical layers of 'Annamaya' kosha to subtler layers expressing the energy and influence of breath, thought and spiritual insight. These layers were described functionally - and the more deeply we come to understand the functions of fascia, the more deeply a practical correlation between fascia and the koshas - especially as fascia indeed works in subtler layers that influence every level of our being.
  The fascia of the low back provides a concrete example of this. In last year's workshop, we focused on the influence of the deepest muscles of the spine - the multifidi - which influence the movements of the sacrum, and are a central factor in sacroiliac and low back pain.
  This year, we will build upon that, looking at the sheaths of fascia and muscles nested within them that profoundly influence low back health. At this point, research into low back pain is looking beyond trying to isolate factors in low back pain, such as individual muscles, and instead to the thoracolumbar fascia as a matrix of interrelated layers.
  This has very concrete and practical implications for our understanding of asana and the dynamics of asana, which will be the focus of Friday afternoon's session - with applications in all classes of asana. We will be reinforcing and building upon what was covered last year, expanding our understanding of low back health through asana.
  This will include not just the health of the lumbar spine and sacroiliac joints, but will also include an exploration of sciatic pain, which radiates from the gluteals down through the leg and sometimes into the foot. It is one of our most ancient pain problems, appearing even in the literature of the Greeks, and is a prevalent today as low back pain.
  We will also follow up the sping on Friday for implications for the neck and shoulders.
  From this perspective we find a constellation of related pain issues that can be handled through simple yoga routines that recognize and respect our own individual structure and movement patterns, and in our practice we will emphasize actions that are important for overcoming and/or preventing such pain patterns.
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• Weekend workshop-Friday evening--
  From Hands to heart: Spiraling into Shoulder health through the Arms - and Cultivate Prana and Apana Vayu in the Actions of the Arms
  Shoulder work in asana practice, with refined actions that spiral from the hands deep into the shoulders and heart, helps us to keep the shoulder joints aligned and free from damage and irritation, while maintaining the space of the upper body.
  These are more than simply physical actions: the subtle and empowering energies of Prana and Apana Vayu - receiving and drawing in, balanced with letting go and expanding - can play a profound role in going deeper into these actions, especially when joined to the breath.
  We will focus on simple actions that can be applied in the poses, as well as self-care exercises related to marma that can be incorporated into your practice, and used to maintain the benefits of your practice even when there are gaps in your opportunties for receiving, centering and expanding - Prana and Apana.
  The evening will finish with meditation and relaxation based upon a contemplation of these two energies, discovered through breath and body.
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• Weekend workshop-Saturday morning--
  Of Hips, knees and feet - with Special Focus on the Knees, and Addressing Sciatic Pain
  This asana practice session will include special attention to - and self-care techniques for the fascial health of - the knees. The knees often suffer from disputes between the hips and feet, as well as body wide postural habits that yoga can help us overcome.
  The practice will be an opportunity to explore a range of poses, with attention to how the actions and limitations of the hips and feet influence the health of the knees, and to explore the different possibilities for approaches to practice that keep the knees as well as the hips and feet happy.
  We'll also include an exploration of the problem of sciatic pain, which radiates from the gluteals down through the leg and sometimes into the foot - and how yoga can address it (beyond merely doing piriformis stretches). Sciatica is one of our most ancient pain problems, appearing even in the literature of the Greeks, and is as prevalent today as low back pain.
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• Weekend workshop-Saturday afternoon--
  Empowerment through the Breath: the Evolution of the Idea of the 'Koshas' and the 'Vayus', and the Doorway they provide into self-care
  The idea of the 'Koshas' has become standard in approaches to yoga and yoga therapy - and although it wasn't referred to in hatha yoga texts until the 17th century, it has been adopted and used more and more because of it's usefulness for exploring our experience.
  We'll trace the history of the idea back to the Upanishads and how it has appeared in various ways, and their relevance for our own practice and understanding the levels of self-care available to us through yoga.
  And yet while the ideas of the Koshas have increasingly been used to describe the levels of experience in yoga, something is yet lacking: positive empowerment. The ideas more regularly emphasized by the hatha yogis to empower us through the practices have been the ideas of the 'Vayus'.
  When we put the two sets of ideas together, they give us not just a road map, but directions for taking us deeper. The ideas of the Vayus expecially are quite practical in connection with pranayama, and we will explore these ideas experientially as a guide to the inner territory of spiritual experience - from prnayama through deep relaxation (yoga nidra) and meditation.
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