I Started Teaching Yoga When I Was 20. It Was Not What I Expected.

"I could feel each labored breath in my chest as I replayed the sequence in my mind. I'd taught the same class maybe a hundred times before. I'd learned how to speak from my belly instead of my throat. I'd long ago stopped pacing the room as students held their balance as I learned it was distracting. I'd created space in between my cues, allowing students to be in their bodies instead of distracted by my words."

"But as I stood outside the hot room about to teach my tenth class of the week, a gnawing anxiety was stirring inside me that I couldn't disperse through my breath. Who was I, a 20-year-old, to guide a room full of adults through their yoga practice? I had started practicing yoga with my mom when I was 16. At first, it was a fun activity to do in the park on a Tuesday evening. I'd move through the postures but be captivated by the bumblebee pollinating the weeds beside my mat rather than the sensation of my breath expanding in my belly."

"As I got older and experienced the greyish coating of anxiety in life, the breathwork I learned in yoga became a bigger deal. Each breath lessened the constant chatter in my brain. I itched to be on my mat and did as many YouTube yoga videos I could find. I walked into my first hot yoga class in 2018 when I was nineteen years old. The hot room, the people, the immediate sweat forming on my skin-it gave me a new sense of purpose."

The narrator used breath and refined teaching techniques—speaking from the belly, pausing between cues, and removing pacing—to create focused space for students. A spike of anxiety arose before teaching a busy week of classes, triggering questions about age and authority. Early exposure to yoga with a parent began as casual practice, later becoming a vital tool for managing anxiety. Regular hot yoga deepened purpose, strengthened body and mind, and made breath an anchor on and off the mat. Admiration for instructors motivated pursuit of formal training, culminating in a significant month-long 500-hour program abroad.

Read at Yoga Journal