Stop Choosing Between Studio & Online Yoga Teaching (Do This Instead)

Yoga teachers, today we're going to talk about why just teaching at a yoga studio limits your growth and what you can do to build your online presence as a yoga teacher. Hi, my name's Angelica. I'm known as Yoga Liberty on Instagram. I have a podcast, YouTube, and I help yoga teachers build their online empires. Today we're going to be talking about how you can do both though. And I think a lot of people think like, oh, if I'm going to go online, I can only be online. I have to just pick one thing and not do everything, but that's not really true. And you definitely can do both. And in fact, if you're a new yoga teacher, you should do both. It's really important to get a lot of experience as a yoga teacher teaching as much as possible, especially when you get started. Now, if you've been wanting to go online and you don't know how to get started doing it, the first thing you're going to do is just get started, right? So the journey of a thousand steps starts with the first one. Just start posting. What do you post online? Well, post things that are helpful to people. The things that you're good at when you teach. Don't post pictures of your family or your dog. Don't post things that you're doing, vacations you're going on. You're not a celebrity. You're not creating a lifestyle brand. You're creating something that's helpful to other people. So when you're posting online, you want to post things that actually help other people. And then the next thing that you want to do is you want to understand that the model that you teach online is going to be different than the model of how you teach in person. So when I first started online, I had been owning yoga studios. I owned yoga studios for years and I sold my studios because honestly, I was burned out. I felt overwhelmed and I just didn't want to do it anymore. Lots of reasons. So I took some time off and then I went online and that was about 7 years ago. And then about 3 years ago, I started to help other yoga teachers build their online businesses. And that's actually way more fulfilling to me. And so that's what I do primarily now. Is help other people build their businesses versus selling, um, online yoga teacher training. And I do have some standalone courses like adjustments and assists and alignment and cueing, things like that, that people can sign up for. But primarily most of my work is done helping other yoga teachers build their business. I feel really passionate about that and I love it. So that happened organically over time though. It wasn't like I just started online and knew exactly what my offer was going to be. I tried like 16 different offers before I found one that really vibed with me and what it was that I wanted to do and that I liked and that I enjoyed. Right. So you're going to, and that people wanted from me, right? It's not just like, it's not just like, well, I'm going to create what I want. It's also, what do people want from you? And like, ultimately, like people wanted me to help them understand how to navigate building an online yoga business. And so that's what I started to do because that's what the people wanted from me. So it takes time. You're going to like take some time to try to figure it out. You're not going to just teach in person or just teach online. Like you can literally do both. I don't know why people are so focused on this. Like I can only be one thing and that's how it is. Like I've been a vegetarian since I was 11 years old and people are so like, they're just like, you can't have you say that word. You can only do this. And if you accidentally eat Parmesan, you're no longer a vegetarian, you know? And it's just like. We do the best that we can, you know, like just pick the thing that you feel passionate about and do the best that you can at it. Nobody's perfect at anything that they do. It's all right to not be perfect at something. It's all right to do the best that you can. So don't feel like you have to be all or nothing. And also you shouldn't be all or nothing. If you enjoy teaching yoga, you probably enjoy teaching yoga in person and you probably enjoy teaching yoga online. It's okay to like both. They are different skill sets though. So when I first went online, I realized that I was going to have to do just a few little things differently. Like when you bend forward, you have to lower your voice so that you're not talking so loud into the microphone. Like if you're in downward facing dog, Adho Mukha Svanasana, right? Like you don't like yell into the microphone. So you have, but like when you're teaching in person, you're projecting your voice across the room. That's something that's totally different online. You're never projecting your voice across the room because you're mic'd. So you want to make sure that you understand the like subtle nuances and those things come from practice. So when you record and you're like, oh wow, my voice raised there. I don't actually like that. I'm going to need to make sure that when I record next time, I don't raise my voice when I'm teaching here. Or working in a small room, like maybe what you need, even if you have wide angle lens on your iPhone, maybe you need a wide angle lens like cover. And mine's right over here, actually. Let me see if I can just grab it. You just, this is in my Amazon shop, but you just take it and you clip it on your, like on your lens and it'll wide angle. So like I teach my yoga classes in a 10 by 10 room that I film for online. And that's because I have a wide angle lens. It's in addition to the wide angle lens that my phone has. So you can film in a really small space. It doesn't have to be this like big thing. You don't need to have a yoga studio to film at. Everybody overthinks like things like that. And so if you're not, if you're like, I'm just going to teach in person, or I'm just going to teach online, you're really missing out on the whole vibe. Like it's important to be in person because it's important to connect with people and to remember who you are and to remember why it is that you're teaching yoga. The other thing is that it's important to teach online because that's the society that we live in now. We live in a place where people are chronically online. So if you can reach more people online with your message, especially if you're a really good yoga teacher, You should be doing that. You shouldn't be hiding behind like, I'm only going to teach in person unless you vehemently hate online. I'm not saying go online if you hate it, but don't feel like you have to be perfect. You know, probably you've watched some videos with Yoga with Kassandra. I think she just films in like an attic area of her house. Like she even has carpet. That is not a perfect setup. And she's probably one of the biggest YouTubers for yoga. There is right now. She shows up even for more searches than Adriene does. So don't worry about being perfect. Worry about just getting your message out and helping people. The other thing is like that when you're teaching, you know, something I, I don't know if you have this, but I was always afraid that I wouldn't have, my practice wouldn't be strong enough to teach online. Like I wouldn't look good enough or I wouldn't be pretty enough or my poses wouldn't be pretty enough. I wouldn't be able to do them well enough. And the reality is like, if you're feeling that way, if you feel like, oh, I'm not going to be good enough at this pose, or I'm not I'm not going to be able to do the full expression and I'm going to look bad on camera. Teach a lower level than what you can do, or teach, or make a joke of what it is you do, or say, hey, like, you don't have to be perfect at this. You know, you don't need to be able to do all the poses to teach. There's always going to be someone who is going to be able to feel that your yoga is more accessible if it's easier for them. You know, like all those Yoga with Cassandra classes that I've taken are pretty simple. Same with Adriene. Like they're not doing Really hard classes. You want to do really hard classes? Take Kino's classes. You know, like, but they're not trying to do the hard poses for the masses because the masses can't do the hard poses. It's just like when you went to yoga teacher training and you got there the first day and you were like, oh wow, I actually know a lot more than I thought I did. Or, oh, why did I wait so long to do this? Going online is exactly the same way. Like, why did you wait so long to do this? It's not as hard as you think it is. It's actually pretty easy. So if you've been wanting to go online and you haven't gotten started yet, check out the resources. Below in the description that I have. I do work with people to help them create their online offers and build their online business. And I have this, this channel is on podcast and also on Instagram. So give me a follow and comment below. You know, what are the biggest struggles that you're having with going online and why haven't you gone online yet? Let me know what you're doing and I'll make some videos about it to help you. All right. Again, my name's Angelica. It's been nice to meet you and I hope you have a really great day. Bye for now.