Teaching, to me, felt like a great honor and act of service. I always took it very seriously, and it brought me joy to hold space for people who wanted to practice on their mats. Plus it's fun, which is also very important! But it also changes your life, very slowly. I don't say that to mean that I personally changed people's lives, but the practice itself has a trickle-down effect. If you show up and pay attention to what's going on mentally and physically and emotionally, and notice your habits, and push yourself to stay through discomfort, and ask yourself to go outside of your comfort zone--you will change in SOME way that brings you to a more whole version of yourself. And then you do it again and again, because the practice is never over, and every hour on your mat mirrors what's going on in the seasons of your life, so there is always something new to learn and try and be.

So I taught, a lot, for about a year and a half, and then the pandemic hit. Teaching, practicing, and doing life became so different. And now, after months of being back to the studio in our “new normal”, I decided to stop.

It took me a while to get to that place. At first, it rose up as a small, still voice, a little inkling, that whispered: "You need a break." And immediately, I was like, no, I'm fine, I'm just tired, I'm just busy, I'm just finding my groove again! So the voice put its hands up like, alright, alright.

Then sometime later, again: "You need to stop." Over and over, this little sensation piped up and made itself known, and while my ego came up with, oh, 25 reasons to ignore this suggestion, it quietly kept repeatedly itself until I tried to listen. 

I think the turning point came after I left the studio one day after teaching. The class went extremely well; I felt "on" as a teacher, and everything clicked. As students trickled out, one by one they shared positive feedback about loving the sequence, the music, my style, whatever. And it felt good, of course, the way any compliment feels.

And then I realized that I am not meant to be there. Being good at something doesn't mean you should be doing that thing. I felt exhausted, tired, a little burnt out. I had been feeling this way for a while, I just refused to listen. I had spent the months during the pandemic working my practice up to a place I loved and using yoga in my academic pursuits and it felt AWESOME. Yet, teaching did not feel as awesome. It felt like struggle to impress, to compete, to get numbers, etc…. I whole lot of things that did not fit well with me.

Change is always hard, and it sometimes breaks your heart a bit. Yet, it felt like the right thing to do, and I could feel myself already looking forward to what my future holds, sill doing and loving yoga but in a different way. Also, this will not be a full end stop to my teaching path, simply an extended break to walk the path towards what I know my current work lies.

I started to tell people about it, and the more I heard responses like "Good for you!" and "Way to listen to yourself," I thought—huh? Turns out this decision is actually not about teaching at all; it's about the fact that my body, heart and mind cried out for a change, and I listened. That is yoga. That is the whole point.