Shows / Working in Yoga
Working in Yoga
Join yoga studio owner, yoga teacher, yoga therapist, and yoga non-profit founder Rebecca Sebastian for a water cooler discussion of what it is to work in the yoga world.
We will talk about our experiences, good & bad, connect with each other, share tips freely, and tell our stories.
Many years ago a yoga-teacher friend of mine said to me “the one things I don’t like about being a yoga teacher is there’s no water cooler”. And he was right. (thanks James).
So…
Episodes
Working in Yoga200 Episodes: How This Show Changed Me
Two hundred episodes. Rebecca Sebastian sits down solo to mark the milestone — and she doesn’t hold back. She takes you back to the beginning: a studio owner a…
Working in YogaWhat Now? Part 3: Build Your Own Floor
What happens when you can't teach anymore? For most yoga professionals, there's no pension, no employer retirement match, and no plan. In Part 3 of What Now?…
Working in YogaRetreats, Marketing Identity & AI in Your Yoga Business — With Manu Molina
Wellness travel is growing, retreat culture is expanding, and a lot of yoga professionals have had the fantasy of hosting one — Rebecca included (she once…
Working in YogaWhat Now? Part 2: Stop Paying for What Isn't Serving You
Institutions change when the people funding them stop, or when they start asking hard questions before they pay. In Part 2 of What Now?, Rebecca looks at the…
Working in YogaOnline Yoga, Accessibility & Building Without Burning Out — With Becky Aten
We talk a lot about what gets lost when yoga moves online. We don't talk nearly enough about what becomes possible. Becky Aten — back on the podcast after her…
Working in YogaWhat Now? Part 1: Find Each Other
"Okay, but what now?" It's the question Rebecca hears more than any other. After months of looking at what went wrong in this industry, from Yoga Alliance's…
Working in YogaBuilding an Online Membership & Preserving Your Body of Work — With Keri Marino
A lot of yoga teachers still have real questions about how an online membership works in practice — and Keri Marino has the answers. In week 3 of the online…
Working in YogaInside Yoga Magazine Issue 2 — The Accountability Issue
Accountability is one of the most overused and underdelivered words in the yoga industry. A soft-focus apology post is not accountability. A teacher quietly…
Working in YogaEvergreen Courses, Learning Outcomes & Building an Online Yoga Business — With Summer Huntington
Most online yoga studios are built like a sandbox — open-ended, come-when-you-can, no clear progression. Summer Huntington thinks there's a better way. In week…
Working in YogaThe Mock Turtle, A.K.A. Institutional Abandonment — The Tears
The Mock Turtle cries through the whole story. The tears are real — the Tortoise taught them that. Nothing changes. This episode closes out the series with the…
Working in YogaTeaching Yoga Online With Intention & Community — With Nyk Danu
Rebecca doesn't say this lightly: this is one of those conversations where she found herself thinking she was talking to someone who is genuinely a better…
Working in YogaThe Mock Turtle, A.K.A. Institutional Abandonment — The Education
The Mock Turtle’s school taught Reeling and Writhing, and Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision — taught by the Tortoise, because he taught them…
Working in YogaStudio Ownership, Heartbreak & the Right to Evolve — With Jessica Patterson (Part 2)
This is the conversation Rebecca wishes she could have had when she owned her studio. In Part 2 of this conversation with Jessica Patterson, they move from…
Working in YogaTweedledum and Tweedledee, A.K.A. The Menopause Pivot
Tweedledum and Tweedledee look identical from a distance — but they’re not the same, and the real stakes are happening just out of frame while everyone argues…
Working in YogaPurity Culture, Authentic Yoga & Which Bodies Come to Matter — With Jessica Patterson (Part 1)
Jessica Patterson is doing something rare — she's working through a PhD in religious studies focused on yoga and yoga bodies while remaining fully embedded in…
Working in YogaThe Mad Hatter, A.K.A. The End of the Portable Career, Part 2
If Part 1 was about the stale tea party, Part 2 is about what’s actually on the other side of it: not another niche, not another container — depth. Philosophy…
Working in YogaYoga Therapy Clients, Referrals & the Studio Owner Experience — With Maile Wicklander
There's a real and underexplored difference between the people who walk into a general yoga class and the people who seek out a certified yoga therapist — and…
Working in YogaThe Mad Hatter, A.K.A. The End of the Portable Career, Part 1
The Mad Hatter quarreled with Time, and now it’s always six o’clock — a permanent tea party, moving from seat to seat around the same stale table. That’s the…
Working in YogaHow to Build a Local Yoga Professional Network
Most yoga teachers can name two or three colleagues they'd actually call if something went sideways. Not people they follow, not someone from a training years…
Working in YogaThe Cheshire Cat, A.K.A. The Online Gap — Any Road Will Get You There
“If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will get you there.” For yoga professionals who left online teaching without a plan, that’s exactly what…
Working in YogaScripts, Responsive Teaching & Self-Paced Courses — With Deb Flashenberg
This is the kind of conversation Rebecca wants to do more of — two people parsing out the nuance of how we actually do this work, in real time. Deb Flashenberg…
Working in YogaThe Cheshire Cat, A.K.A. The Online Gap — The Grin That’s Left Behind
For one strange year, online was the whole game. Then studios reopened, and most yoga professionals quietly walked back — leaving behind a channel that still…
Working in YogaIAYT's 990s, AI Tools & Rethinking How Clients Find Us — With Kellie Adkins
Kellie Adkins did her homework — including a close look at the IAYT's 990s — and she brings the receipts. In this conversation with Rebecca, they get into the…
Working in YogaThe Caterpillar, A.K.A. The Extraction Economy
A therapist tells a client in crisis to “notice the present moment.” The client destabilizes — and the therapist has no idea why, because they read about…
Working in YogaWhat Is the American Yoga Council & What Does It Do? — With Andrew Tanner
A lot of you have had questions about the American Yoga Council — what it is, what it does, and whether it's worth your attention. So Rebecca went straight to…
Working in YogaThe Queen of Hearts, A.K.A. The Data Problem
There’s a chart that gets passed around constantly — yoga and Pilates, lumped together, showing a growing market. The problem: one of those is actually…
Working in YogaInsurance, Retirement & Protecting Your Future — With Felicia Laab
Rebecca has a name for this kind of content: boring. And she means it as a compliment. The boring stuff — insurance, disability coverage, retirement planning…
Working in YogaThe White Rabbit, A.K.A. We’re Already Late
This episode opens a new series — one that’s a little different from the others. Less “here’s a number nobody told you” and more “here’s the shape of the thing…
Working in YogaUpdated Conversation — Yoga's Changing Landscape, Aging Teachers & the Case for Regulation With Amara Miller
Amara Miller is back, and this updated conversation goes to some places the original didn't. The yoga industry is contracting — fewer participants, a flooded…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The Retirement Math
Most yoga professionals have no employer contributing to their retirement. No pension. No automatic savings. Whatever gets built for the future is built…
Working in YogaUpdated Conversation — Teacher Training, Online Yoga & Studio Owner Skills With Leslie Pearlman
Leslie Pearlman is back, and this update to their 2024 conversation covers even more ground than the original. Rebecca and Leslie dig into online and hybrid…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The Online Business Math
The online yoga business is sold as the answer to everything — unlimited reach, passive income, freedom from the studio model. The reality has a specific math…
Working in YogaConfidence, Pricing & Visual Representation in Yoga — With Nana Amoako-Anin (Part 2)
Part 2 of this conversation with Nana Amoako-Anin goes somewhere a little more personal — and just as essential. Rebecca and Nana talk about the confidence it…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The Retreat Math
Running a retreat looks like a financial opportunity. Fill twelve spots at $1,500 each and you have $18,000 in revenue for a long weekend. The math seems…
Working in YogaCapital, Trauma-Informed Practice & a Cautionary Tale — With Nana Amoako-Anin (Part 1)
Nana Amoako-Anin has lived a genuinely international life — including a stint as a prosecuting attorney in Manhattan — before finding her way into yoga and…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The Studio Job Math
The per-class rate sounds reasonable until you do the actual math. In this episode we calculate what a studio teaching job really pays when you factor in…
Working in YogaYoga Philosophy, Virtue Ethics & Why Dissatisfaction Is the Beginning — A Revisited Conversation With Dr. Shyam Ranganathan
Some conversations leave you with a line you keep quoting for years. For Rebecca, this is one of them. Dr. Shyam Ranganathan, founder of YogaPhilosophy.com…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The Continuing Education Math
Yoga professionals are required to complete continuing education to maintain their credentials. Nobody has ever done the math on what that requirement actually…
Working in YogaPerfectionism, Activism & White Supremacy Culture in Yoga — A Revisited Conversation With Colice Sanders
This is one of those conversations Rebecca keeps sending people back to — and for good reason. First recorded in March 2024, this discussion with Colice…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The Yoga Therapy Credential Math
The C-IAYT credential represents a significant investment — in time, money, and professional identity. In this episode we put the full cost of becoming a…
Working in YogaHow We Built the Yoga Organizations We Have — A Revisited Conversation With Amara Miller
If you've ever wondered how we ended up with the yoga organizations we have, this is the conversation. First recorded in 2024, Rebecca's discussion with Amara…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The Going Independent Math
Going independent sounds like the answer to everything — no studio politics, set your own rates, build your own thing. And it can be. But the math of going…
Working in YogaA Conversation Worth Revisiting — Yoga Teacher Training Best Practices With Leslie Pearlman
Some conversations age well. This one with Leslie Pearlman — first recorded in 2024 — is one Rebecca keeps coming back to, because everything Leslie was…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The Studio Owner Math
Yoga teachers and studio owners are often frustrated with each other over money. Teachers feel underpaid. Owners feel squeezed. In this episode we put the…
Working in YogaWhat We Got Right — And What's Coming Next: The 2026 Yoga Industry Forecast
Six months ago, Rebecca published the first Yoga Professionals Trend Forecast — a snapshot of what was actually happening in the yoga industry, without the…
Working in YogaThe Math Nobody Does: The 200-Hour Training Math
Everyone assumes yoga teacher trainings are a cash grab. The actual math tells a very different story. In this episode, we build the real financial picture of…
Working in YogaBuilding Something That Has Never Been Built Before: Introducing Inside Yoga Magazine, Issue 1
Issue 1 of Inside Yoga Magazine is here — and in this episode, Rebecca walks you through what's inside, why she built it, and what she hopes it becomes for the…
Working in YogaNobody Told You Working Until You Die Isn't Devotion, It's A Missing Retirement Account
The yoga industry tells a story about the devoted teacher who never stops — who teaches into their seventies, their eighties, who is on the mat until the very…
Working in YogaMapping the Real Landscape of Yoga Teaching Today — With Alexia Walker
There's a real and growing gap between yoga teachers who built their careers in the 2010s and those trying to build one now — and we're not talking about it…
Working in YogaNobody Told You It's Okay To Feel Taken Advantage Of
The yoga world's commitment to non-judgment, positive intent, and non-attachment is genuinely beautiful in a practice. In a profession, those same values have…
Working in YogaThe Economics of Yoga — Curiosity, Community Spaces & Staying in the Work With Reika Shucart
If we keep training yoga teachers without honestly addressing how they're going to get paid, we're doing everyone a disservice — the teachers, the students…
Working in YogaNobody Told You Almost Everyone Came Here To Regulate Trauma
There is something true about this profession that almost nobody says out loud. Almost everyone who comes to yoga — and especially everyone who makes it their…
Working in YogaData, Transparency & Building the Yoga Industry We Actually Deserve — With Dr. Stevie Inghram (Part 2)
What would it mean if yoga professionals actually had access to employment data, debt-to-income numbers, and honest information about whether this career is…
Working in YogaNobody Told You The Organizations Believe In Yoga, Not In You
The organizations governing the yoga profession care deeply about the practice. What they have never demonstrated a meaningful commitment to is the…
Working in YogaDebt, Standards, and Who's Really Looking Out for You — With Dr. Stevie Inghram (Part 1)
Nobody talks about debt-to-income ratios in the yoga world. Stevie Inghram does. In Part 1 of this two-part conversation, Rebecca sits down with naturopathic…
Working in YogaNobody Told You Yoga Therapy Jobs Don't Exist
You finished your training. You passed your boards. You have the credential. And now you're discovering that the jobs you were promised aren't there. In this…
Working in YogaHow to Build the Doors Yourself — Yoga Therapy in Clinical Settings With Jenna Csont & Whitney Pasch (Part 2)
If Part 1 made you believe a clinical yoga therapy job was possible, Part 2 is going to show you how to start going after one. Jenna Csont and Whitney Pasch…
Working in YogaWhat Nobody Told You: Nobody Told You The Sequence.
Everyone told you to find your voice, build your brand, and develop your unique methodology. Nobody told you the order. In this episode, we talk about the…
Working in YogaYoga Therapy Jobs in Clinical Settings — With Jenna Csont & Whitney Pasch (Part 1)
A lot of yoga therapists were told — or assumed — that salaried, benefits-included jobs simply didn't exist in this field. Jenna Csont and Whitney Pasch are…
Working in YogaWhat Nobody Told You: The Organizations Don't Actually Represent You.
Everyone told you to find your voice, build your brand, and develop your unique methodology. Nobody told you the order. In this episode, we talk about the…