And I don’t mean Sanskrit. I mean the everyday signals that guide one’s body into a shape. “Put your right foot between your hands” sounds simple until you realize that half the room has just done something completely different. Add to that the fact that I don’t teach in my native language, but in my second language, English, and suddenly yoga becomes not just a practice of movement, but of continually learning, adapting and refining the way I communicate.
In those first months I had moments that could have undermined my self-confidence. Like the day, in my third week of classes, when three people walked out of my classroom one after another. I could have gone into a spiral”I’m not good enough” or “Maybe I shouldn’t teach.Instead I remember thinking: “Well, at least that box is checked, I know what it feels like when someone leaves and I can deal with it.”
Later I discovered the real reasons. One had a headache, one had a wrist injury and the third was pregnant and feeling nauseous so she had to leave. All three of them came back to my classroom. That experience taught me one of my favorite lessons to date. It’s rarely about you. People are on their own paths, with their own needs and problems, so just because someone leaves the classroom doesn’t mean you’re bad at teaching. It’s also helpful to remember that not everyone is on your fractal, in other words, not everyone is meant to join your path. We all have different preferences, and understanding these can be liberating. Instead of feeling judged when someone leaves your class, see it for what it is, just a choice that belongs to them.
What I have discovered is that teaching yoga is not just about what happens on the mat. The real connections often start in those few minutes before class. Asking people how they feel today, having a laugh or just making eye contact can mean as much as the poses themselves. The same goes for after class, when we chat for a few minutes before everyone goes back out into the world.
Remembering names is part of that connection. When you teach about a hundred people every week, and many of them change from class to class, it’s not always easy to remember every name. But the regular guests who keep coming back, whose names I know immediately, have a special place in my heart. These are the connections that feel like friendship, trust and community all rolled into one.
I teach Vinyasa, Hatha and Yin Yoga, and one of the things I love most is changing classes. I enjoy doing different poses, discovering new ways of sequencing and interweaving pranayama and meditation. Yoga has so many forms, so many layers, and I’m excited to share as much of that variety as possible.
In the beginning, creating a Vinyasa flow could take up to two hours. Hatha always felt easier, but Vinyasa took more time, especially to create smooth transitions that felt natural in the body. I wanted the lesson to proceed in a way that felt really good to the students, and that meant experimenting and adapting. Sometimes I would learn a sequence and realize something didn’t quite turn out the way I wanted it to, so I asked myself how I could improve it. Over time, this process helped me create lessons that I could build on, refine, and make even better.
I spent a year diving deep into arm balance training, and that year taught me so much. It confirmed my belief that as a yoga teacher you must continue to learn in order to grow. You can’t just complete your yoga teacher training and think you know everything. The great thing about this job is that we can constantly evolve, and part of that evolution is finding your own style. I have even heard that some of my students are taking my lessons’Oh Yoga,‘ which makes me laugh. Whether it is Vinyasa or Hatha, my lessons express my own way of teaching.
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