Motherhood & Wisdom: A Yoga Teacher's Journey

Maria Murphy, owner of The Yoga Patch in Kansas City, shares her 17-year journey from mother of five navigating chaos to studio owner creating sanctuary. After a dream revealed her calling to teach, Maria discovered yoga extends far beyond asana—it's about the spaces between movement, finding stillness amid noise, and honoring what each body needs. From teaching while standing in closets to designing a welcoming warehouse space, Maria explores how practice evolves through life's seasons, why Shavasana deserves 10 minutes, and how meditation can happen while washing dishes. A gentle conversation about accessible yoga, motherhood's wisdom, and permission to pause. Full episode releases March 18th.

Topics: yoga teaching, studio ownership, accessible yoga, motherhood and yoga, Iyengar yoga, restorative yoga, meditation, Shavasana, stillness practice, work-life balance, self-care, community wellness, Kansas City yoga, props in yoga, mindfulness

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[00:00:00] Speaker A: Maria, you're a mother of five. Through birth, adoption, and surgery, each child coming to you in different ways. How has motherhood informed your teaching and your understanding of yoga? Did becoming a mother change how you practice or what you emphasize in class? [00:00:21] Speaker B: I definitely think that it has made me realize how slowing down is important in our lives, because I was always going so many directions with the kids. But I also learned a lot from them with that. Even though all of the kids are raised in the same household with the same parents, each child has been very different. And I think classes are like that as well. We all have different needs at different moments. So it doesn't mean that because one day somebody needs this particular thing that the next day they're going to need that as well. So that's where, as a teacher, that we come in and paying attention to our class is important, because you need to be able to offer all those different things to different people and at different moments. [00:01:14] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. So how does teaching awareness to kids at home compare to maybe teaching or sharing awareness, like, in the studio space? [00:01:26] Speaker B: Sometimes I think it was easier because kids are so malleable at a certain point and they have no fear, you know, I mean, they just don't have all the stuff that adults have. So when people come into your space and you're teaching them yoga, a lot of them don't even realize what they need or how their day is going, where their body is, where, you know, where their mind is. So being able to offer those things sometimes maybe in a sneaky way, so they don't know it is important, and then later on they'll understand. But I think adults come in with stuff, and so it's a little bit harder for them to go through and release. [00:02:20] Speaker A: The baggage is maybe heavier for the adults, or there's more bags, definitely. So you describe an earlier life season filled with driving to and from practices, games, recitals, conferences, and nonstop errands. These are things many parents maybe connect with. How did you maintain a yoga practice during those years when life was so full and busy? What role did yoga play when you had so little time for yourself? [00:02:50] Speaker B: I think my yoga during those moments was more about the meditation, the space in between those, even driving or washing dishes. Like, I looked at those things as meditations and offering to slow down and focus on what you're doing in that moment. So it wasn't necessarily so much about the asanas. It was more about the spaces in between what you're doing now your children. [00:03:21] Speaker A: Are grown, and you describe having more spaciousness in this season of life and I liked how you referred to it that way. How has your practice evolved with this shift? What are you discovering in this quieter chapter that might not have been accessible before? [00:03:38] Speaker B: I think a lot of it is just time. It's been a little difficult, I must say, just to, to honor myself I guess in those moments and, and take that time out because of the business I still have. That's kind of my baby as well. And so I still have things that I need to do with that. Definitely being able to take time out and self for self care then that's been a big deal for me. [00:04:05] Speaker A: What does self care look like for modern day yoga studio owner? Either inside the studio space or outside the studio space. [00:04:15] Speaker B: Yeah, taking classes for myself. I don't think that teaching yoga cannot be about the teacher. So that doesn't count as going to a class because it's very different when I go to a class. I can just leave it all behind and uh, not pay, you know, just I'm, I'm being led so that it's a nice feeling. I've also started to get massages or do floating because that's there available to me. All I have to do is walk outside my office and I have so many options that you know, to choose from but it is still difficult for me to take those that time out because I focus a lot on other people. [00:05:04] Speaker A: Yeah.

Motherhood & Wisdom: A Yoga Teacher's Journey | Maria Murphy

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