Fond memories of the Elks Rodeo, Strawberry Festival, and other definitive Santa Maria Valley gatherings race through yoga instructor Natalie Zimmerman’s mind as she returns to her hometown. The Orcutt native currently resides in Los Angeles, but she’s bringing her latest workshop—a combination of yoga, meditation, and journaling—to the Central Coast for one day only.
“There’s a joy that comes from doing what you love and then sharing it with others,” Zimmerman told the Sun. “That alone excites me. I also love a reason to be back in my hometown. I’m a very nostalgic person, so it always brings up memories.”
Zimmerman will host her Release and Restore workshop at Yoga4Mankind in Old Town Orcutt on Sunday, Oct. 13. The thought of returning home to teach a yoga session induced a particularly memorable flashback for the instructor, who attended her first class at age 15. Zimmerman recalls feeling reluctant to be there.
“The funny thing is, I was in the back with my friend laughing. I couldn’t take it seriously,” Zimmerman said. “And now I’m a certified instructor and go almost every day. It’s pretty ironic.”
Yoga became one of Zimmerman’s passions during college, while studying English at UCSB. The yoga course was one of the few outliers she enrolled in, among a plethora of writing classes. Courses in film and media studies joined the docket when Zimmerman decided to pursue screenwriting specifically. During high school, she had aspirations to work in the film industry someday but felt unclear as to what capacity.
“I always knew I was a writer, but being from a small town and growing up before the internet, I didn’t know screenwriting was a career path. You only ever heard about the director,” Zimmerman said. “I think that has changed, especially in this new ‘Golden Age of Television.’
“But I was definitely interested in film growing up and saw a lot of movies as a kid,” she added, “some that even my peers only watched as an adult or have never seen.”
After graduating from UCSB, Zimmerman moved to Los Angeles where she enrolled in UCLA’s Professional Program for Screenwriting. She wrote her first two screenplays during the course. After the program, she pursued an MFA in screenwriting at the American Film Institute; she graduated in 2018.
But all throughout her college career, Zimmerman continued to take yoga classes on and off, and she eventually joined a studio to take them regularly. She became a certified teacher through the YogaWorks program. Soon after, Zimmerman realized how she could intertwine her two passions during a discussion with a peer.
“My friend and I, who is also a yoga instructor and very creative, were discussing how yoga and art are interlinked,” Zimmerman said. “We wanted to create a class that we could enjoy that would utilize yoga and journaling to open up your creative potential.
“I was encouraged to dive deeper into this work and create classes that were not only geared toward creative pursuits, but to all types of healing,” she added.
During her workshops, Zimmerman encourages participants to write about a specific prompt in order to “release and let go” of stressors, “making space for the magic in your life to happen.” The theme of Zimmerman’s upcoming Orcutt workshop is autumn, as attendees will write journal entries based on the season, she said.
“Fall is naturally a reflective time because we are preparing for the shorter, darker, quiet days of winter,” Zimmerman said. “In nature, it’s a time of hibernation, and energetically we feel it too.”
Although this particular class is one day only, it isn’t too far fetched to assume Zimmerman will host more at Yoga4Mankind in the future, as the Orcutt native frequently returns home to visit friends and loved ones, she said.
“I come back very often. My family lives in the Santa Ynez Valley, and I have extended family in Santa Barbara and Paso Robles areas,” she said. “I’m really close to my friends from high school and I consider them family, and most of them are still in Orcutt or nearby.”
Orcutt is also Arts Editor Caleb Wiseblood’s hometown. Contact him at cwiseblood@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Oct 10-17, 2019.