How to draw a stickman yoga lesson plan

Perhaps you are a yoga student, perhaps you are a yoga teacher…. either way you have just written a fab yoga sequence for yourself or for your students. 

How do you read it as you go  through your yoga practice?  You want to stay with your breath and flow through your routine, you don’t want to have to keep stopping and starting to read your notes. 

Easy!  You can draw it up with stick figures. It’s much easier to glance down and look at a sketch than it is to read words.   Lots of yoga teachers use stickmen sketches.

But what if you’re not so good at drawing…. what if even your Tadasana stickman is a bit peculiar looking, never mind your Parivitta Trikonasana stickman?

After lots of attempts at drawing stick figures for my yoga lesson plans, I realised it isn’t as easy as it looks….at least to me anyway. I had a look online and found a few examples and copied them.  However, I couldn’t find all the poses I wanted and it was taking me ages to draw just one sequence of my lesson plan.

Then I discovered Eva-Lotta Lamm’s book.  She has written various books, two of her books are focused on yoga…’Yoga Notes‘ and ‘Notes from Yoga Teacher Training”. 

Both are fab books, but the former, ‘Yoga Notes‘ is solely about how to draw stickmen yoga sequences.  Oh my goodness this book is fab!!!  If you struggle with drawing yoga stickmen then this book is for you!

(If you are training to be a yoga teacher, also check out Eva’s other book ‘Notes from Yoga Teacher Training’ here on Amazon).

 

YogaNotes: How to sketch yoga postures & sequences  –
By Eva-Lotta Lamm

‘Yoga Notes’ not only breaks down and shows you line by line how to draw yoga figures in all the various asanas, but it also explains the technique in which to follow to make it easy to draw any yoga posture.  I was drawing my routines out in no time at all (after the first one or two; it takes a couple of goes to get in the swing of it).  Amazing!

 

This is the book description:

Learn how to sketch simple yoga ‘stick figures’ to capture and plan your yoga sequences with this simple, step-by-step system that can be quickly learned, even without any drawing or sketching skills. The first part of the book explains the basic principles of sketching and constructing the yoga stick figures and combining them into sequences. The second part contains step-by-step instructions for sketching over 80 of the most common asanas and their variations.

 

Who is this book for?

For Yoga Teachers & Coaches: If you teach yoga classes or work with your own private clients, sketching is a great way to plan out sequences and practice plans in a visual way. You can use them as a visual overview during class (if you haven’t fully memorised the sequence yet). They also make great handouts for your students after a workshop or as personalised practice plans for your one-on-one clients.

For Teacher Training Attendees: If you are learning to be a yoga teacher there is a lot of information to take in and to process. Taking visual notes and using sketches to capture the details about postures, alignment and anatomy will help you to get the most out of your training. The notes you create will be clearer, more engaging and actually fun to look at and revise again later.

For Students & Practitioners: If you study or practice yoga, you can sketch out your favourite sequences to use as a guide during your home practice or for when you are travelling. Sketch out that great class you attended at your yoga studio or the nice one you found on YouTube. The sketched overview will be the perfect cheat sheet to keep by your mat during your own practice.

 

Check out ‘Yoga Notes’ here on Amazon

 

Here is another book I found on drawing yoga figures.  I haven’t used it yet myself, but my good friend who is a yoga teacher recommends it.

An Illustrated Guide to Asanas and Pranayama

by M.J.N Smith

This is another book on yoga stick figures. However, it is very different than the one above, this one is aimed at yoga teachers or very experienced yoga practitioners.  Published by the Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram, it has lots of examples on how to draw stick figures. It doesn’t include any written information on how to do the asanas, just the drawings.

This is the book description:

When Michael and I started to work on this project, preparing an illustrated catalogue of asanas and pranayama, and showing some variations of basic asanas, little did I realize that it would take so much careful work, both in the preparation of the drawings and in the selection of representative variations. We had to take into account both the fact that there are no standards available for names or techniques of asanas or pranayama, and that the number of variations possible for each asana is almost infinite. As Michael has said, correctly, this is not just an easy reference for anyone, but on the contrary, to use this work, the teacher should be reasonably experienced both in practice and teaching, and the student should have direct accessibility to such a teacher.

Having benefited so much working on this project, I am quite confident that this illustrated Guide to Asanas and Pranayama will be a valuable and useful supplement to both yoga teachers and students.

 

Check out ‘An Illustrated Guide to Asanas and Pranayama’ here on Amazon

 

Once I got started with drawing yoga figures, I found it really is quick and easy to draw up a lesson plan.  And it is so much easier than trying to read notes while you’re practicing. 
 
Even if you think of yourself as someone who can’t draw or ‘not good at art’, do not worry, sketching a lesson plan is simply making shapes; if you can draw a straight line, a curved line, a rectangle and a circle… you can sketch a yoga sequence.  I highly recommend ‘Yoga Notes’ by Eva-Lotta Lamm to get you started.  
 
I hope you find these book recommendations useful and with a bit of practice you should be able to draw your own sequences.
 
 
 
 
 

Disclaimer:  None of the information shared should be used as a replacement for seeking medical attention.  Always seek advice from an expert.

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