Author: Rachel Scott

How To Create Good Education: Start At The End

You love yoga and want to share your understanding more deeply with others. So you think about different options: perhaps it’s an immersion, perhaps it’s a training, or a workshop.

So when you start planning, the natural inclination is for you to start by thinking about what you know, and how you’re going to share it with your students.

Makes sense, right?

Yes, absolutely. But unfortunately, this isn’t the best way to help your students learn.

You’re what the educational field calls a “content expert.” And it’s natural for most content experts to think about generously sharing their knowledge to their students. And if we could do a Matrix like download and somehow get it into their brains, that would work just fine (take the red pill, Neo).

However, learning doesn’t quite work that way. So in order to channel your knowledge goodness in the right way, here’s a simple and radical piece of advice: start with the end in mind.

In order to channel all your knowledge goodness in the right way, start with the end in mind.

Consider:

what you what your students to be able to do at the end of your time with them
how they’re going to demonstrate their learning to you

Once you have your assessment in mind (whether it’s a practice teach, a practice, a show and tell, a project, or a test), then work backwards to create your content.

Working with the end in mind puts your student at the center and clarifies exactly what you need to teach to help them succeed. This clarification is essential because it helps us to avoid a major training trap: giving too much information.

Working backwards helps us avoid the training trap of giving too much information.

When you crystallize your learning objectives (what you want students to do as a result of the training) and work backwards, you will discard the superfluous material (interesting as it may be!) that doesn’t relate to this goal. (This is what I call, “killing your children.” Although it’s painful to leave material out, it’s better for the success of your students!) As content experts, we usually want to give too much, which overloads our students and undermines learning.

By starting with the end in mind, you are setting your students up for learning success, and taking a strong step from being a teacher – to being an educator.

For more information about creating awesome education, check out the resources in my online course: Create Your Training.

Why Love Is Like a Workout

In the man-made world of stuff, breaking something doesn’t make it stronger. It just, well, breaks. You drop a plate, it shatters, and no matter how well you glue it, you can see the crack. It’s damaged goods.

We think love is the same way.

Betrayal, hurt, infidelity, conflict…. these are the bulls in our emotional china shops. We think that love is a fragile china plate that must be handled delicately and remain unbroken for its value to be preserved. In our relationships, we shy away from imperfection, conflict, and rough housing. We clam up rather than rock the boat. And when we can’t keep the bulls out of the shop, we get heart “broken,” as if our sense of connection and love can be shattered irreparably.

I want to propose a different model for love.

Love is not of the world of things. Love is not a plate. Love is organic, human, messy, and alive.

The organic world has a very different relationship to stress. Stress makes things stronger. In fact, failing to stress a system will cause it to atrophy and become enfeebled. In the organic world, destruction is necessary for strength and endurance.

Consider:

the burning forest creates new growth
breaking down our muscles is essential to building strength
taxing our immune system gives it strength and resilience
the destruction of our cells is what allows regeneration

The eco-system of your love is no different.

Not only is love not compromised by conflict, messiness and emotional stress can give your love the stimulus it needs to deepen, strengthen, and become more resilient. Although chronic stress isn’t healthy, the occasional round of intensity is nourishing and bracing for your love eco-system. When met with integrity, each challenging moment is a mini emotional gym workout: though it may be sweaty and uncomfortable in the short-term, it is essential for health and longevity.

Your love is not a china plate; your love is a prize fighter in his prime.

So go ahead; embrace your workouts.

Like this? Check out my 3-minute video epiphanies on life and love.

Three Tips for Creating A Good Teacher Training Schedule

So you’re creating a teacher training. You’ve got an idea of what your content is, but you’re not sure how to fit it all together. It’s like looking at a blank page. Where to start? What should come first?

Whether you’re creating a continuing education, immersion, or certification program, all that white space can look daunting at first!

Here are three tips for getting out of “blank page paralysis” and getting a toehold into creating your course schedule.

1. Create your bookends

Every training needs bookends. What do I mean? Bookends at the beginning and end of the day, bookends at the beginning and end of the training. Even bookends at the beginning and end of a lesson plan. At the beginning of the day, you need a little buffer time to transition into the room, set the tone for the day, and set an intention. At the end of a section, it’s good to review, do a little Q&A, and get the students to reflect and integrate their experience. Don’t skip this part! Start by plan your bookends into your calendar or planner, and you’ll have a solid framework for filling the rest of your content in. Add a 10-15 minute about every 2 hours as well.

2. Order your lessons

This may seem obvious, but put your lesson plans (the topics of chunks of content that you’re teaching) into their appropriate order. Some stuff needs to be taught before other stuff. Put it in its optimal list, then voila! You have a roadmap for how your training should be laid out.

3. Keep it agile

No one likes to do the same thing for eight hours straight. Where you can, mix up your topics so that students are engaged in different kinds of learning and topics throughout your day. We are lucky with yoga trainings, because we can mix up the academic stuff with physical activity: what a bonus! Keep your students engaged and energetic by switching it up.

A common sense tip: your day shouldn’t be longer than about eight classroom hours unless you’re on retreat. Students will simply implode. An ideal length of day usually pulls in at five-six classroom hour. And it’s more civilized for you, too.

Check out my online courses for more detailed intel on creating your course format and planning your daily schedule.

education

Three Things You Should Know Before You Ask People To Teach In Your Teacher Training

Let’s say that you’re running a teacher training.

And Marla, your friend who is also a yoga teacher, is killer at teaching the chakras. They are her jam. So you think, well, maybe Marla should come into my nifty new teacher training and take on some of the time? After all, the students get to hear from a passionate teacher, Marla gets some training time, doesn’t everyone win?

Maybe.

But before you invite a lot of people to come on board, there are some logistical considerations that you need to think about.

Copyright

If you create the lesson, you own it. If Marla creates it, she owns it. If Marla goes to Bali all of a sudden, you can’t use that material (unless Marla gives you the rights, or you’ve paid her for the usage). While this may not be a deal breaker for specialized subjects, keep it in mind if you’re thinking of having someone teach more than a few hours of your program.

Material

While it can be nice for someone to add their voice to specialized material, you need to beware if you’re thinking of having a teacher teach more of the core material (cuing, sequencing, teaching skills). Even if you love Marla, she may have a different teaching ideology from you. You need to protect your students from confusion by making sure that all your faculty have the same language and rules around key concepts.

Yoga Alliance, or your local supervising organization

If you have joined YA, or another registration organization, they will have requirements around your faculty and you will likely need to register your faculty with the organization to maintain your credentials. (Now, whether or not the organization has the manpower to actually follow up and enforce their mandate…well that’s another question. But if you want to be “above board,” in your training, your faculty will have to be eligible to teach. Check out their rules and restrictions regarding adding faculty so you can feel about adhering to the spirit of their standards.

Adding faculty is an excellent way to add a little diversity to your training, take the teaching burden off of your lead trainer, and make the most of an expert’s passion. Just do your due diligence first to make sure there are no surprises.

For a more in-depth look at adding faculty, take Course 1 of “Create Your Training” for free: everything you need to know.

education

Five things you must consider when choosing your yoga teacher training space

If you have decided to create and host a teacher training, where you host the training is vitally important. Not only will you have to take into account logistical considerations (ie: do they have bathrooms? do they have enough props?), but it’s also important to ensure that the feeling of the space aligns with your greater vision for your course.

Here are five things that you need to keep in mind:

1.The Feel

What does the space feel like? How do you want your training to feel?

Every training has a different flavor, and your training space should align with yours. Think about the adjectives that you’d like students to use when describing your training. For example, is the mood of your training “clear, compassionate, and calm,” or “challenging, engaging, rigorous?” Does that space align with the mood and tenor of your teacher training program?

On a practical note, consider the cleanliness of the studio. Since you’re going to be practicing yoga, you will likely prefer hardwood or laminate floors that are kept swept. Ask about the studio cleaning schedule. There’s nothing worse than being in a sweaty, hairball infested yoga training room!

2. The Supplies

In a nutshell, does the space have what you need to run your training.

You can think about:

how many students will fit in the space comfortably
how many props/supplies are available
storage space
wifi
Chairs or sitbacks for sitting
projectors, projector screens, whiteboards, poster sheets – or do you bring your own?

3. Location

Location, location, location. Is the training central to where your students will be coming from?

Also consider:

Is there nearby parking (for all-day)?
Nearby transit
Nearby food, parks, cafes

4. Amenities

We don’t always think about the amenities, but they will become very important if you’re doing a full day training.

proximity of bathrooms
showers
kitchen
air conditioning

5. Schedule

Finally, many rental spaces already have obligations. If it’s a working yoga studio, you may have to schedule yourself around their classes or events. Get the details on availability so you’re not caught by surprise.

education

What you need to think about before you create a teacher training

So you’ve been teaching awhile, and you love yoga. You’d love to share the deeper aspects of the practice with your students. And maybe you’ve even been asked by your students when you’re going to be offering a teacher training.

Should you?

Here’s what you need to think about before you create a training.

Does education align with your personal mission?

Not everyone needs to offer a teacher training. There are many ways to contribute to your community, and you may be more passionate about offering retreats, classes, privates, or immersions. Step back and consider your big picture.

Does your community need a teacher training?

If you live in a community without a reputable, local training, then there may be a high calling to create an offering. But if there is already a lot of competition (and they are good programs), then perhaps there is a different yoga offering that could meet your student’s desires. An immersion, philosophy intensive, or asana progressive may be a better match.

Do you have the skills to be an educator?

Teaching people to teach requires a different set of skills than teaching a public class. As an educator, you need to be focused on structure, learning objectives, time management and meaningful assessment. You must become very clear about the “how” of good teaching, not just the “what” – this is, if you want to create a training that is effective rather than just a nice experience for your participants. There are resources you can use to develop these skills (my Create Your Training course, for example), but you’ll have to be willing to put on your left-brained hat for a good period of time.

Holding space

Running a teacher training isn’t just about teaching skills; it’s about holding space for people to move through a personal transformation. The teacher training room can become intense and emotional. As a trainer, you have to be willing to create a safe and compassionate space for your yoga trainees to be heard, held, and supported.

Time

Creating a 200 hour training takes a boatload of time and project management. Are you they kind of person who can set measurable and tangible goals? Do you have time now to set aside 5-10 hours a week to commit to this endeavour? Again, you can work step by step and complete your program at your own pace, but you’ll need to be a self-started and stay motivated to stay on track.

If you love education and are committed, then dive on in! Creating a teacher training is an extraordinary learning experience to clarify your teaching style and become very clear about the skills required in teaching.

For help determining if teaching a training is right for you, check out my free course: What to Consider Before You Create A Teacher Training.

education

The Biggest Mistake Teacher Trainers Make – and How You Can Avoid It

I call it the Great Mistake.

And I’ve made it. A lot.

Here it it:

As a teacher trainer and educator, it’s natural to want to give your students a lot of information. After all, we are content experts and we have a lot of great stuff to share. So when we’re creating trainings, we usually start by making a list of all the content we want to cover. What do we know, and how can we talk about it. As if the point of the training is to transfer what is in our heads into our students’.

This is the great mistake.

The great mistake is thinking that training is about what we teach.

It’s not.

Training is about what the student can do.

The great mistake is thinking that training is about what we teach.

It’s not.

Training is about what the student can do.

When you are creating your training, start with the end in mind. Rather than think about what you want to teach, sit back, have a latte, and really think about what you want the student to be able to do as a result of your time with them.

What new tasks can they perform, or perform better?
How will you know if they “get it?”

Even in a knowledge-centred training (where you want them to “know” or “understand” stuff), there is a way to evaluate your student’s performance by seeing something that they do.

When you switch your teaching focus from what you know to what your student can do, you may suddenly find that your in-class time needs to look radically different. You may not need to teach everything that’s in your head. In fact, you may teach a lot less content in some ways. And perhaps all of sudden you realize that, wow, you actually need to teach something entirely different than you originally thought to get the performance result from the student that you really want.

Ask: what do you want your student to be able to do as a result of the training?

By asking yourself this simple question, you are setting yourself miles ahead.

Put the student’s performance first, and create your training from there.

education teacher training

Doing it alone: the men who have offered to be my sperm baby daddies

Sperm donors aren’t dads.

“They’re donors,” says my counsellor. “They’re not Dads. Now, your kid may have a dad, someone whom you meet, and who becomes a parent. That may happen. But the donor is the donor.”

My counsellor is emphatic.

And yet, how many of my friends have said, “why not go to a bar and get someone to knock you up? For the price of a gin and tonic, you could be done with this!”

In fact, two different men (hearing of my situation) have explicitly come forward and offered to be my sperm donor. You know….the “old fashioned way.”

They want legacy, they want a child, and they’re willing to give me their vital fluids to make it happen. They’re also attractive, successful, and seem kind. Now, they may also just want to get in my pants, but I do have a deep feeling that the sex perk is secondary to their biological urge to leave an heir.

“I could help out, you know, I’d like that, when you needed it,” one says. “I’ll sign whatever you want, I don’t need legal rights.”

Now, when you’re staring down the barrel of single mom-dom, who wouldn’t want a benevolent extra support person in the wings to swoop in for some occasional babysitting or camping trips? The men and I travel down this road. We talk it out. The details, however, are fuzzy. Would they give financial support? Would I even want them to? And if they didn’t, why do they get a legacy while I’m them one doing all the heavy lifting? Would we tell the kid?

When artificial insertion costs upward of $1500 per pop, getting pregnant the old-fashioned option seems tempting.

But the consequences loom.

The baby daddy could decide all of a sudden that they want partial (or full) custody of the kid. While men may seem less prone to baby fever than women, expectations and desires can radically change once a baby is born. A disinterested donor may suddenly feel the roar of paternal duty and, whamo, my cheaper-than-the-medical-turkey-baster-option has now created an unexpected adversary in a custody battle.

Even without a worse case scenario, having an in-person donor makes the “dad” aspect real. With a medical sperm donor, they feel like a “donor” – not a dad. I bought some genetic material, got is shoved up my cervix…it’s no big deal. It’s not emotional. I’m the mom, I’m the parent, I’m the family. The sperm was the tool for the job.

But getting pregnant from a real live person means that I know the father. The sperm is connected to a face, to a body, and to an intimate moment. I know who he is. The donor – in my mind – is the “dad.”

When I spoke to these men and considered the “au naturel” option, I suddenly realized that I’m the lucky one. Despite all my fear and drama, I actually have it easier. After all, finding a surrogate woman to bear your baby is a lot harder then paying a fee for a sample in a cup.

I think of my gay friends – men and women – who are on the family path, searching for options. I think of the lonely bachelors out there who always wanted a family, and find themselves single and without the resources to pay a surrogate to carry their child to term. I realize that I’m lucky to even have a choice.

I tell my therapist,”Men have offered to be my sperm baby daddies… but, it seems too complicated.”

She looks me straight in the eyes, “Rachel, I think you have good instincts.”

fertility

Creating Internal Lightness

Yin Yoga For Your Hips

Awesome Tool The Entrepreneurial Yogi: The Interactive Quiz That Gets You Leads

Yoga teachers are entrepreneurs.

In addition to teaching, we have to do our own marketing, manage our bookkeeping, create our own products, and be our own graphic designers. We’re one-woman (or man) shows. And in my yoga-preneurial life, I sometimes come across new tools that I’ve found that can be useful for our work.

Here is one that I love. It’s a quiz from the people at Interact and it’s designed to get you leads (and newsletter subscribers) by getting people to take a quiz. Now, until this time, I’ve been doing what most of us do: throw up a newsletter invite on my site and hope for the best (bless you Mailchimp!). However, I have been wanting to create something more interactive for my visitors – and I also wanted the capacity to add people to different newsletter lists depending on their interests. Interact lets me do both.

Interact Quizzes are easy and intuitive to build. They’re visual, fun, and there are a ton of templates made to make it easy for you to create. You can make branching quizzes (one question leads you down a particular rabbit hole), personality tests, scored quizzes, or assessments. You can link up your favorite newsletter provider to the quiz results (I use Mailchimp, but they integrate with a lot of others, like Infusionsoft, Constant Contact, and MadMimi to name a few) so that your quiz participants can be directed to sign up for your newsletter service before they get their results. And (this is super cool), you can add them to different lists based on their answers to different questions! In other words, you can get really granular and have people on a few different lists by the time you’re done. Wow! And isn’t it more fun to get people involved with your site a bit before you hit them up for their email address?

Of course, after they’ve done the quiz, you can give them your grand call to action (“get my free yoga class,” “find where I teach,” or “get my free ebook”).

Now, I just popped this quiz onto my site a couple days ago. Interact gives you several different integration options (add it to your announcement bar, make it a pop up, send people a direct link). After I put the quiz into my site, I also shared it out on social media and added it to my newsletter. Since then, I’ve gotten about 500 quiz views, 50 quiz starts and 11 newsletter conversions. To give you an idea, I generally get one new subscriber a day. And I just got eleven in two days. So…that’s cool (!). While the jury is still out to see if the quiz performs better over time, I’d say that’s a decent start!

Also (and this is very awesome), when I look at who has taken my quiz, I can see how people answered the questions, which gives me excellent intel about why people are coming to my site and what they’re looking for. Interact is containing to build out their reporting features, which will make it easy for you to see how people are reacting to your quiz. On the technical side, Interact integrates seamlessly with WordPress (my platform). Yay! You may need a bit more elbow grease if you use a different platform, but mine is simply plug and play.

Best of all, it’s free. Yes, you can buy the fancy version for money, but almost all of the cool features are available in the basic version.

If you’re curious about using quizzes to help engage and build up your community, check it out.

business

Five Poses to Half Moon

Doing It Alone: a single woman’s mission to become a mother: cycle confusion

This is a blog in a series called, “Doing It Alone,” to share some of the trials and tribulations of my attempts in 2017 to get pregnant as a single woman.

I’ve been peeing on sticks.

Although I have a vague sense of my own fertility cycles, I’m now tasked with being more diligent about detecting my “surge.” The word “surge” sounds wonderfully romantic, as if I will overcome by a mystical hormonal tidal wave each month that makes me ripe for mating.

Kind of like Spock during pon farr in Wrath of Khan.

In reality, “surge” describes the wave of luteinizing hormone (LH) that causes the release of your ripest egg from your ovaries (ie: ovulation).

The old fashioned way of detecting fertility (and the “surge”) is by paying attention to the timing of your cycle and logging the physical changes of your body. For those of you who didn’t pay attention in 8th grade science class (I certainly didn’t), a woman is most fertile 1-2 days before and during ovulation. The egg can only live about 24 hours after ovulation unless it’s fertilized. But since sperm can live 3-4 days, if you have sex before you ovulate, you might be in business. For most women, ovulation occurs about 14 days before the onset of your period.

However, a general understanding of timing is not enough. Every woman’s cycle is different, so you have to fine tune your analysis by paying attention to other tell-tale signs. One of the most obvious indicators of impending fertility? The quality and composition of your vaginal secretions.

Okay, I’m sorry, this next section is a mild digression. Do you mind if I use a word that is not “secretions?” I’d rather not equate my secret honeysuckle sauce to something that could be from Aliens. A quick look under in urban slang yields the following possibilities:

pooter pudding
box snot
cunt custard
vulva chowder

I am dissatisfied with these terms, as they verge on misogynistic. I’ve come up with a few of my own (and thank you Eve Ensler, for ever inspiring name reclamation). You are free to use these in your next conversation with your gynaecologist:

vulvambrosia
babe butter sauce
ardent spirit (a la aqua vitae)
honeymead

Thank you. Moving on.

Common descriptors of our, ah, joyjuice are poetic: “egg white,” “sticky,” “creamy.” Right around ovulation, the consistency reaches a thick and irrepressible “egg white,” which is designed to create a more hospitable environment for sperm survival. (More info.)

Another important fertility indicator is temperature, as your basal temperature increases about a half degree a day or two after you ovulate. One of my best friends planned both her pregnancies impeccably (to the month) with both of her kids by tracking her temperature. She’s a fertility ninja. Cervix height also changes with impending ovulation. You reach up into your vagina like a world champion spelunker to assess if your cervix is low, firm and dry or high, soft and wet.

Like many of us, I had assumed it was fairly easy to get pregnant. Sure, I’d heard stories about fertility challenges, but I’d been so freaked out by the “safe sex” and unwanted pregnancy campaigns of the 80’s and 90’s that I figured having a kid would only take a round or two of unprotected sex. Of course I’m wrong.

Here are the sobering notes I took during my first appointment with the Olive Fertility Centre:

Natural pregnancy: 5-10% chance of pregnancy every month

by age of 41, 50% of women are infertile

by age of 45, 95% of women are infertile

35 and under, 20-25% of women are infertile

So if I’m going to do my best to get pregnant, I have to hone in on my ovulation day with laser like precision. Guessing at the “egg-white” quality of my secretions and palpating the height of my cervix isn’t going to cut it. Although it has been very gratifying to discover that there is a wildish organic orchestra playing within my body every month, I am going to maximize my chances and also rely on science.

Hence, peeing on sticks.

The sticks (available online or at a local pharmacy) measure the amount of LH in the urine. They’re like pregnancy sticks, but they detect ovulation rather than pregnancy.

Here’s the plan:

Once the stick gives me a thumbs up that I’m about to ovulate (usually through a comforting smiley face), I call the fertility clinic. They can prepare my pre-selected sperm for, uh, what’s the word? Insertion. The rest of my life gets put on hold and I beeline for the clinic the next day. Clear my schedule, cancel appointments. And bam, like that, we’ve got our one shot for the month.

The shot is still pretty long. Even given ideal factors, less than 12% each month.

I’m peeing on sticks, and halfway through my cycle, I start bleeding. What the what? Is this spotting, is this menstruation, is this stress? Wouldn’t you know, the very time that I need my body to perform with some semblance of regularity, everything goes nutso. #timingiseverything

I take a breath. Could just be a glitch, right?

So what else can you do?

I keep peeing on sticks.

fertility

Doing It Alone: a single woman’s mission to become a mother: Part 1

This is the first installation in a series called, “Doing It Alone,” to share some of the trials and tribulations of my attempts in 2017 to get pregnant as a single woman.

I look at the list of sperm donors and start crying. I don’t mean to cry, it just comes upon me, unexpectedly.

I push myself back from my computer and fall on my floor. A distant part of my brain is noting that my actions seem very dramatic. But it’s beyond me and impossible to control. I cry. Big, heaving sobs. I’m mourning for the expectations I had from the time I was a girl: I would marry a great guy and we’d have a family.

I don’t want to be looking at this list. I’m supposed to have a loving, supportive husband. We’re supposed to be holding hands, stepping forward into our brave new future together. Instead, I am 42, single, and live in a small basement suite in one of the most heinously expensive cities in the world. My company has just cut my hours, I’m paying off my Masters Program, and now I have a crazy scheme to finance an expensive version of turkey baster inception.

To make it worse, I’m angry with myself. After all, it’s not as if I haven’t had the opportunity to make the leap to motherhood in the past. There have been good men in my life. Men who would have gone on the journey with me the old fashioned way. I hate myself for being foolish, for not figuring it out earlier, and for feeling ten years behind my own destiny.

So I cry on the floor.

And when I’ve worn myself out, I pick myself back up, wipe off my snotty face, and go back to my computer. I buck up. I may live in an expensive city, but I’m lucky enough to have health care thanks to Canada. I may live in a studio basement suite, but I also live two blocks from the beach. I may be single, but I have a great community of friends and a loving family. Okay, my family lives 2000 miles away, but right now I am going to focus on the positives.

I look at my strapping list of possible sperm donor daddies.

They’re all under 25.

fertility

Book Review: Donna Farhi, Pathways To A Centered Body

What an accomplishment! Clearly written and beautifully illustrated, Pathways to a Centered Body is must read for yoga students and teachers seeking the understand the body’s most mysterious muscle, the psoas. With clarity, gentleness and thoroughness, Donna Farhi and Leila Stuart illuminate the psoas muscle’s central role in core stability, breathing, and functional movement.

Farhi is a long time contributor to the yoga community. Her first books, The Breathing Book and Body And Spirit have been on my bookshelf for more than fifteen years! I just love her work. She is approachable, knowledgeable, generous and humble. In her new book, she and Stark display a wonderful gift for making anatomy relevant and easy to understand (being an anatomy geek, this is something that I appreciate).

However, while Pathways to a Centered Body includes an abundance of fascinating anatomical information, the heart of this book is imminently practical. Their six-phase process for psoas rehabilitation is comprised of thoughtful exercises designed to improve the functionality and health of this key stabilizer. Each exercise is supported with photos and step by step explanations. Exercise sets are compiled into sequences that can be used for an at-home practice.

If you are interested in expanding your understanding of core connection from the inside out, consider checking out this lovely new work. A perfect blend of practice and theory, Pathways to a Centered Body will shift your relationship to your psoas – and to yourself.

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books

5 minute Candlelight Meditation

From my friends at Half Moon.

meditation

Yoga Teachers and Money: why you’re underpaid and what you can do about it

It’s hard to make a living as a yoga teacher.

We run across town from class to class, trying to cobble together enough money to make a living wage. New yoga teachers often teach for free to gain experience, and a decent starting wage is usually around $30/ class. Even veteran yoga teachers rarely make more than $80, unless they’re profit sharing with the studio.

If you’re not happy with your earnings, perhaps its time to do a re-think.

Untangle Old Beliefs

One of the reasons that yoga teachers frequently struggle is that we suffer from a misguided belief: “I can’t get paid to do what I love.”

Many of us took a yoga teacher training because we wanted to deepen our practice – not because we wanted to teach professionally. As a result, our motivation to teach comes from a desire to share our passion rather than make a buck. Because we love what we do, we may feel that we don’t deserve to get paid.

“There is nothing wrong with getting paid well for work that you love!” says Christine Young, a life coach based in New York City. “Clients will value the work they do with you even more if you respect your own time and worth. Charge accordingly to the results you provide – they’re worth it.”

Think about it: if you love what you do, then you will invest time, money and resources to be even better at it. You show up with enthusiasm and go the extra mile for your students.

Suggestions:

When you’re setting your rates, do a pre-think about the experience and value that you will be providing to your clients.
Consider the financial and emotional commitment that you have made in becoming a teacher: your investment in your 200 hour, your life experience, your continuing education. By acknowledging the investment that you have made, you may feel more confident in the worth of your offerings.
Consider your own expenses. As a yoga teacher, you are responsible for several expenses, including professional dues, continuing education, taxes, music, travel, and insurance (to name a few!). Remembering your financial output will help you feel more firmly grounded in what you need for input.

Rethink “Spirituality”

“Yoga is a spiritual practice, so don’t be so materialistic.”

While yoga may be a spiritual practice, we live in a world where we need to pay the bills. Even gurus would take gifts from students in order to support their need, to…oh, eat. An honest exchange of goods and services is part of living in our society.

Setting reasonable prices is part of participating in this flow of energy.

“Think of money from a spiritual context. What you put out there you receive. If you are putting out a great service, the universe wants to return the favour financially.” – Christine Young

How to set your rates

To determine your fair market wage, start with objective research. Find out how much yoga teachers are generally paid in your local area by canvassing teachers and studios. It’s also a good idea to find out the criteria by which wages are set. Some studios will pay everyone a flat rate, while others will scale wages based on criteria such as:

experience
number of students who come to class
seniority
perceived commitment to the community

Once you’ve completed an objective analysis, it’s time to do an internal check with your gut.

When you’re setting your rates, do you feel that the exchange is equitable? Setting your rate too low can result in you feeling smaller, powerless, or diminished. Setting prices too high may feel like grasping, desperation, or self-importance. Check out how different prices feel to you in your body; often you can get a good sense of what feels appropriate by trying a few different numbers on for size.

Fiscal Realities

Bottom line? Most yoga studios aren’t very profitable. The hard reality is that yoga studios don’t have a lot of leeway to offer their teachers a great income; revenue from public classes alone usually won’t pay the bills. Unless a yoga company has been able to leverage a popular teacher training (Bikram, CorePower, Yoga Works) or successfully implement a certification track (Anusara), it will not reach the profit margins enjoyed by similar businesses in other sectors.

If you wish to improve your personal income but don’t want to teach more than twenty classes a week, then consider creating other revenue streams. These streams could be yoga related:

yoga project management (ie: running a yoga program for a corporation, club or school)
corporates
privates
retreats
workshops
teacher trainings
online courses
online classes
specialty yoga (acro, partner, kids, prenatal, yoga therapy)
coordinating and working with other organizations (a holistic health centre)
owning or managing a studio (however, see “bottom line,” above)

Or they may not be.

If you love teaching yoga, but enjoy the financial stability from your day job, then why not do both? Yoga teaching is a forgiving and flexible side career, since most people love attending classes after working hours. Teaching part-time will also help you avoid the most dreaded yoga injury: teacher burnout.

Love to hear from you.

How do you manage balancing yoga teaching with creating financial stability?

business

Real Life Yoga Philosophy: Why Yoga Doesn’t Have To Be Peaceful

Yoga Sequencing Skills: Sequence to Forearm Stand (Pincha Mayurasana)

Forearm Stand (Pincha Mayurasana) is a HUGE pose. It’s a backbend, inversion, hamstring opener, and shoulder opener all in one. To adequately prepare for this pose, you need to be aware of the following component parts.

Component Part: body parts that need to be warmed up or educated in order to do the peak pose

Video step by step to teach Forearm Stand

Component Parts of Forearm Stand

hamstrings (you don’t need these to do the pose, but you need the open to get into it
shoulder opening: arms above head, upper arms in external rotation
tricep /lat opening: part of the arms being above the head, and the elbows being bent
shoulder girdle stability: since you are weight bearing through the upper body, the shoulder girdle needs to be stable
backbend: focus education of back bending into the upper back (this includes getting the shoulder blades firmly connected into the upper back)
core: use abdominal core connection to prevent taking the backbend into the lower back
midline: hugging the legs together in order to maintain neutrality through the pelvis (rather than letting the legs turn out into external rotation, or the hips to fall out to one side)

Okay!

So the following sequence could be used for a variety of student levels. However, if you’re teaching a more hatha style class, then I would do less sun salutations, do very stable transitions, and likely not do the final pose (I’d make the peak pose dolphin rather than full pincha). For a flow or power class, I would use more vinyasa to link the poses.

Class Opening

virasana/ vajrasana: set up the neutral pelvis position here
cat/ cow, and dancing cat/ cow: general warm up, educate shoulder girdle
downward dog, forward fold, stand to Tadasana

Warm Up

You may link these poses or teach each one by one. This is a listing of poses that I would use to help prepare for forearm stand (and in the rough order that I would use them), but I have not included transitions or described specifically how to teach them. Also, this is not a complete list, just some of my must have faves!

[table id=1 /]

Peak

Forearm Stand, naturally! Optional props: shoulder width strap above elbow (to prevent elbows sliding out), and block between hands (to prevent hands sliding in). Video of step by step.

Stage 1: sphinx
Stage 2: dolphin
Stage 3: dolphin with one leg lifted at a time
Full: at wall