About Wilmington Yoga

Established in 2000, Wilmington Yoga has offered classes, workshops, teacher trainings and retreats for its community of students. It honors and teaches a wide array of styles based upon students’ individual needs whether it’s weight loss, reducing back pain, decreasing anxiety, or simply being a part of a fun growing community. Classes are for students of all ages and all levels

Teaching Yoga

Teaching yoga can often seem like the dreamiest job in the world. Imagine floating from studio to studio, with a green juice in hand, meditating during traffic jams. Meetings and brainstorms over coffee give way to hours practicing sequences while you confirm details for your jet-setting adventure leading an Italian countryside yoga retreat. Sounds pretty awesome, right?

Don’t get me wrong – teaching yoga can downright be a soul-fulfilling career (trust me, it feels that way almost every time I teach and connect with my students). But just like anything else in our crazy beautiful lives, every career – even teaching yoga – has its moments. Just like you, we run out of inspiration at times. We get impatient at the person who just pulled out in front of us when we need to be scooping up our kids. And sometimes we don’t meditate for a week straight.

And that’s where the beauty of the practice unfolds. Yoga teaches us to accept wherever we are at, r i g h t n o w. So whether you’re thinking of quitting your day job to pursue teaching yoga or you just want to know more about what it really means to be a yoga teacher – here are 3 tips for new teachers when teaching yoga… And hopefully, if you’re already a teacher, you’ll know exactly what I mean.

1. Under-planning/over-planning – Just like the story of The Three Little Bears, there’s a sweet spot when planning as a yoga teacher. The more seasoned you are, it becomes easier over time to create a sequence as you’re teaching it. But especially in the first handful of years, it can be helpful to spend some time creating your classes. Oftentimes when we don’t plan much or even not at all, it can come across as uncaring and unprepared. It may leave a bad impression of your offerings and coming from experience, it often doesn’t feel good to come into class with no thought of what you’d like to teach. In that same regard, over-planning can be an issue as well. When you’re not in tune with the needs and energy of your class because you have a sequence already planned out to the minute, the flow of the class can be a little to strict and rigid. Planning every single thing out for your classes is also a time sucker. So with all of that said, take some time and find your sweet spot.
2. One (training) and done – Almost every profession requires some sort of continued education and teaching yoga is no different. Yoga Alliance, the governing body for yoga teachers, requires a certain amount of continuing education hours each year. I think this is a wonderful idea and that teachers should really try hard to make it happen. Yoga is ever-evolving and as a yoga teacher, you really need to seek out trainings and workshops that resonate with what you most deeply want to learn (and subsequently, teach). So much growth and inspiration can happen in those awakening moments during training. It keeps your teaching fresh and your knowledge current. We have tons of options to continue your education at WYC!
3. Thinking you’re not good enough (to teach) – When you think you’re not good enough for something or someone, you are essentially giving your power away. You continue to stay stuck in your own limiting beliefs about yourself and never allow yourself to truly shine! It can really set you off into a downward spiral and students can totally pick up on that. It reflects in your offerings and the way you teach. Search your heart and find ways to boost your confidence – it will not only change your life, but it will seep into the lives of your students.

Taylor White, RYT200