I started teaching yoga when I was twenty. It wasn’t what I expected.

I felt each labored breath in my chest as I replayed the sequence in my mind. I had taught the same class perhaps a hundred times before. I had learned to speak from my gut instead of my throat. I had long since stopped pacing around the room while the students kept their balance because I found it was distracting. I had created space between my cues, allowing students to be in their bodies instead of being distracted by my words.

But as I stood outside the warm room to teach my tenth lesson of the week, a nagging fear stirred within me that my breathing could not dispel.

Who was I, a twenty-year-old, to guide a room full of adults through their yoga practice?

I started doing yoga with my mother when I was 16. At first it was a fun activity to do in the park on a Tuesday evening. I moved through the poses, but was fascinated by the bumblebee pollinating the weeds next to my mat, rather than the feeling of my breath expanding in my stomach.

As I grew older and experienced the gray layer of anxiety in life, the breathwork I learned in yoga became increasingly important. Each breath lessened the constant chatter in my brain. I was itching to get on my mat and did as many YouTube yoga videos I could find.

I walked into my first hot yoga class in 2018 when I was nineteen years old. The warm room, the people, the instant sweat that formed on my skin: it gave me a new sense of purpose. At the time, I had no set direction in my life, but showing up to my mat every day gave me something to dedicate myself to, something that brought a different feeling than I had experienced when I practiced in the park at age 16. With every exercise I became stronger. Not only physically, but my mind and breathing evolved into the anchor I learned to use on and off the mat. I admired the instructors and the way they held space for a room of thirty students. I wanted to be that person.

I was 20 years old when I left for Ecuador to complete my month-long 500-hour yoga teacher training in 2019. Something fell into place when I taught my first yoga class in an open-space cabana just steps from the ocean. I felt my body fill with peace as I looked at my body Sangha (communion) breathe in synchronicity; a breath that I led them there. I returned to Canada with a new fire as the best yoga teacher that I could be.

And I tried. I tried very hard. I worked with mentors. I made time to practice. I read about yoga and even stopped hanging out with friends who didn’t feel like meditating or taking a 6am yoga class. I was fortunate enough to return to my home studio and start teaching right away. And I learned a lot. Teaching ten to fifteen hot yoga classes became my normal. My core goal in life was to develop as a yoga teacher. I went to class so I could intentionally listen to how other teachers taught. Every workshop that showed up in the studio, I was the first to register. Just a few months after returning from my initial training, I completed an online yin yoga training course so that I could teach more classes. I watched my colleagues teach two or even three lessons in a row and I aspired to do the same.

But no amount of reading or mentoring prepared me to deal with the youngest teacher in the studio. When a student comes in and asks, “Are you the teacher?” I was overcome with the fear of making a mistake.

If I come across a word, they will think I am immature. If I mix up left and right, they won’t come to my class anymore. If I don’t hold myself to an unattainable standard, they will never respect me.

My age maxed out my imposter syndrome. I was stuck in turmoil. I tried every class to prove that I deserved to be there. I spent countless hours every week analyzing my signals to make sure they sounded sound just now right. I stayed up until the early morning perfecting a playlist. I tried so hard to remember the names and faces of every student who walked through the studio doors. Whether the students realized it or not, I did everything I could to convince myself that I was enough. But this feeling was not discussed during the yoga training. I didn’t know how to deal with the feeling of not being worthy enough in the teacher’s seat at such a young age.

I was so obsessed with being the best version of myself for every class I taught that I lost the energy to go to the mat just for myself. My personal practice of three times a week slowly reduced to once a week, then every few weeks, and then maybe once a month if I happened to have the time. The studio had become not only my workplace, but also a place that fostered a deep layer of fear – a feeling I never thought the practice would give me. I felt burned out, both as a teacher and as a student.

I had to follow the advice I gave the students all the time: rest when you need it.

I started teaching one class a week to help heal my burnout, but I also decided to start a new university program. And when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, I stopped teaching completely. I taught a few times when things started to calm down, but the deep fire I once possessed for accompanying breathing with movement had faded. No one told me this would happen if I became a yoga teacher.

I’m now 26 and haven’t taught yoga in over two years. My personal practice has also become something I do very occasionally. Other passions have taken up my time and honestly, I think that’s okay. If practice has taught me anything, it’s that you can flourish in the season you’re in, without judgement. You are allowed to flow in and out of challenges and come out better on the other side. Even if that means that you just want to be a student on the mat again.

I moved to a new city two months ago and the first thing I did was look for a local yoga studio. No expectations, no judgments, just back to my practice. I close my eyes in each pose and feel the breath fill my body. I turned off my ‘teacher brain’. I arrive for class, flow with mindfulness and then go home, the original feeling of calm when I first started practicing following me.

For now, lying on my mat is focused on me – and only me.