How Wild Life Yoga came to be
Hi, I’m Jessica Schirmer, and this is my Yoga Journey
My yoga journey began back in high school, nestled in the Pacific Northwest, when a swim team coach introduced us to yoga every Friday. I’ll never forget the calm, especially during those peaceful “naps” at the end of class. Yoga became part of my story again during my first pregnancy in 2013, and by 2015, I had completed my teacher training.
After relocating to Texas, I started teaching kids and family yoga. With my son just over a year old, I began volunteering with a program focused on helping families build healthy habits through movement and wholesome food, and this experience shaped so much of what followed.
In 2017, I went through Ecosa Institute’s eco-design intensive. This was a turning point that deeply influenced the way I teach. Nature was no longer just a backdrop; it moved into the heart of every class I lead. When we moved back to Provo in 2018, I leaned further into this nature-inspired path, teaching at The Yoga Underground, offering classes in community spaces, and recognizing something important: if I wanted yoga’s benefits to reach more children, I needed to teach others to do what I was doing.
So in 2019, I launched my first intensive training — opening doors for yoga teachers, parents, educators, and therapists to bring yoga into their communities. Many of those I trained have gone on to create beautiful, creative programs with kids.
a surprising twist on my teaching journey I never thought I'd experience
Over the years, I noticed something magical about partner poses — they light up connections between children and grownups in a way few things do. Wanting a resource to support that, I created one. In 2021, I successfully launched the Inclusive, Nature-Inspired Partner Pose Cards: a screen-free way to play, connect, and explore nature together. Then in 2023, I published Nature-Based Yoga for Kids & Families, a book I both wrote and illustrated, gathering everything I’d learned into one guide to inspire yoga at home, in studios, or classrooms.
Art supported by you through
To get the first round of cards published, I launched a Kickstarter. The funding goals were reached in one week!
Phase two of the cards
New colors, more poses!
For the second round of printing, I decided to focus more heavily on the elements and changed the color palate to reflect the energy of each elemental theme: Green for earth, purple for air, orange for fire, and blue for water. This iteration feels more connected to the nature-based core of the vision behind Wild Life Yoga.
Then came the book
A self published book of everything I've learned and created since the beginning
Finding a book like this is how I first started my kids yoga teaching journey. At the time, I wished I had more to work with. Little did I know, several years later I would be creating that resource! My book, a 222 page illustrated (by me) resource filled with instructions for teaching, hundreds of activities, lesson plans, guidelines for creating your own activities, and so much more.
B.S. Human Development 2013
200 hr Registered Yoga Teacher 2015
300 hr Registered Yoga Teacher 2016
Regenerative Design Certificate ECOSA Institute 2017
100 hr Registered Children's yoga Teacher 2019
90 hr Prenatal Yoga Teacher 2020
At the heart of what I do is a simple belief: when we teach children to love themselves, love each other, and love and tend to the earth, our world becomes a better place. My offerings flow from that:
Classes & Teacher Trainings: grounded in nature, playful, and accessible for all ages.
Resources: partner pose cards, lesson plans, coloring pages, and more. Tools meant to make yoga easier, more joyful, and meaningful.
Art + Ecology: my illustration work, seasonal themes, and classes are woven with ecology and the stories of the natural world.
I specialize in yoga for kids and families, and I also support educators, therapists, parents, and grandparents — anyone who wants to bring yoga into their work or home in a way that’s imaginative, developmentally supportive, and rooted in wonder
Watching connections happen: a child and parent laughing in a partner pose, a classroom slowly finding calm, a trainee stepping into their own teaching path.
Creating tools that people use and love: the book, the partner pose cards: seeing them in classrooms, homes, playgrounds is deeply rewarding.
Being trusted to hold space for children who are resistant or dysregulated, and showing up with patience, creativity, and compassion.
How to be present, how to play, how to love people and nature with an open heart.
When their grown-ups are willing to explore alongside them, something beautiful happens: old parts of ourselves remember themselves again.
Outside of teaching, I’m happiest drawing, exploring the outdoors with my kids, and listening to what the natural world is whispering (or shouting) around me. I’m endlessly grateful for every child and teacher who has let me into their space.