Dublin-based yoga and meditation teacher Orla McBride has completed the September edition of The Awakened Heart Programme, a four-week online course examining how presence can move beyond a scheduled class and into ordinary life. The small-group program ran on four consecutive Sundays from September 6 to 27.
Going beyond the physical pose
The program was created for people who already recognize the quiet that can follow yoga or meditation but find that it disappears when work, relationships and everyday demands resume. McBride organized the course around the idea that daily experiences can become material for practice rather than interruptions to it.
Each live Zoom session lasted three hours, allowing more time for inquiry than a standard weekly class. Participation was limited to 12 people so that the group could discuss personal experience and receive closer guidance, while recordings remained available for 30 days to support practice between meetings.
Movement, stillness and directed attention
The curriculum used Yin Yoga as a form of moving meditation, with the body serving as an entry point to stillness. It also introduced seated and lying-down meditation, Yoga Nidra, breathwork as an anchor, and the difference between receptive practices and methods that deliberately direct the mind.
A final strand focused on presence in daily life. Rather than leaving meditation on the mat, participants explored practical ways to bring attention into relationships, work, emotions and moments of overwhelm. Guided practices and reading notes supported that transfer beyond the four Sunday sessions.
A bridge between classes and teacher training
Awaken with Orla positions the program between casual participation and professional qualification. It is aimed at curious practitioners who want to understand the philosophy beneath movement but are not necessarily ready to enter a teacher-training pathway.
McBride brings more than 600 hours of certified training across Yin, Vinyasa, breathwork and meditation, together with a decade of teaching in Dublin. The course draws on yoga philosophy, contemplative meditation and the work of Eckhart Tolle, while retaining a practical emphasis on what participants can use at home.
For independent yoga teachers, the September cohort demonstrates how an existing movement practice can be expanded without turning every deeper offering into a certification. The format gives philosophical material, guided practice and group inquiry enough time to develop while keeping the commitment contained.
The completed cohort also clarifies the role of a short intensive within a wider teaching practice. Weekly classes can introduce stillness, while a four-week program can examine how that experience is understood, sustained and carried into the rest of a participant’s life.
Source: Awaken with Orla
Web: https://awakenwithorla.ie/awakened-heart
