Sh*t Your Yoga Teacher Says: “The back of your leg might feel like it’s on fire, that means it’s working.”
Our very last yoga teacher training just ended and the first teaching jitters have come up a few times. I’m familiar with this, not only from when I remember teaching my first class, but I’ve heard it a lot over the years from other teachers I’ve trained and from other teachers I’ve trained with…honestly, if I had a dollar for every time I heard, “I’m so nervous about teaching my first yoga class,” I’d have gold plated yoga mats for the studio….
I get it. Nerves. Excitement. Dread. It’s standing in a room in front of students and peers, and wondering what happens if something goes wrong. It would be weird if they weren’t nervous right?!?! That’s what I keep telling them anyway.
I’m sure you know this feeling too.
It’s a sign that you actually care about what’s next. You’re about to step out of your comfort zone and into a space of courage and growth. It’s not easy to put yourself in a position where you might mess up, look foolish, or even fail. Here’s the thing: everyone begins somewhere.
That’s where I am too… using courage to leap into the unknown. I call it “The Squirrel Jump of Entrepreneurship.” Transitioning YESyoga and closing the studio is taking a lot of courage and there’s a lot of uncertainty. It came with a bunch of challenges I didn’t anticipate, and it has come with memorable and cherished words that I also didn’t anticipate. There’s also about a month left, so there’s still so much more to experience.
From teaching yoga to running a studio to transitioning to something new is reflected in all of us. The place where we push ourselves to try new things, even if that means rest or realizing our own capabilities. Change is difficult. It forces us to confront our fears and insecurities, but also all the possibilities the future holds.
Together we are all feeling the pressure….like your leg when your yoga teacher makes you balance for too long. We’re working our muscles until fatigue, and we’re working our muscles of change, there’s bound to be pressure come up. We are in it together. We all go through change, through doubt, through fear, and through possibility. We all came together to say YES to something, whether it was yoga for the first time, becoming a yoga teacher, or doing something big in your life.
The next time you feel nervous about change, just remember that you’re doing something that might make you feel discomfort, but it could transform you. Change is inherently hard and inevitable, but you get to decide what’s possible from here.
Remember, once a YES, always a YES, because you are courageous, capable, and strong.