Top Tips for Burnt Out Yoga Teachers

Burnout.

Hopefully, you have never experienced it.

But, chances are if you’re reading this you are either on the verge of burnout or you are in the thick of it.

Maybe you have experienced burnout in the past and hope to never experience it again.

With an extremely saturated market for yoga teachers, social media feeding our need to compare and contributing to imposter syndrome, coupled with a yoga teacher’s natural inclination to serve our students, and give all we have to them it can be a recipe for burnout, and it is effecting a lot of yoga teachers.

My Personal Experience with Yoga Teacher Burnout

It's something I've definitely gone through. 

A few years back, in 2017 I sold my first yoga studio, due to a move for my husband’s career.

Before I knew it I left my students, I left my studio, and I gained a giant case of yoga teacher burnout.

After pouring three years into my yoga business, giving my blood, sweat, and tears, and hardly taking a day off or even a moment to breathe or check in with how I was truly doing I was done.

I was exhausted, I was uninspired, and the thought of getting on my yoga mat almost made me feel ill.

I needed rest, I needed a break, and I needed to take a pause while I healed from my burnout, and I didn’t know how to heal yet but I knew I never wanted to do this to myself again.

But I am here to tell you that I did heal. I recovered from my burnout, and I found myself once again loving the practice that felt like home for many years.

I would not wish burnout on anyone.

It is not pleasant, and it is a sign of constantly giving, pouring outwards, and putting everyone before yourself, and it nearly made me walk away from teaching yoga altogether.

But just because you are feeling worn down, uninspired, and burnt out now doesn't mean you’ll always feel this way. 

The best way to recover from burnout, is constant maintenance, self-care, and making sure you don’t get completely burnt out in the first place.

But if you are already here and you are in the thick of burnout here are 4 tips to help you recover, and return to the practice you fell in love with. 

4 Tips to Deal with Yoga Teacher Burnout

Take a break and walk away

First things first, if you are really burnt out, it is time to hit the pause button.

You need rest, you need to rejuvenate and you may need to walk away for a bit if you can.

 Of course, not everyone can walk away and you may need to continue teaching for financial reasons or may have obligations that will need to be fulfilled before you can walk away.

But consider where you can begin to scale back, or reduce your hours wherever possible, or possibly take a break altogether. 

It is hard to walk away, but the fact is you are burnt out because you are doing too much, you are giving too much and your cup is empty.

Take time to do things that you enjoy that are outside of yoga. Focus on your self-care and do things that feel regenerative and nourishing.

Take care of yourself first, this is the initial step for recovering from burnout. You just need to focus on you, and take care of yourself, and fill your own cup. 

Turn inward, rediscover your love and passion for the practice of yoga, or learn something new

What was it initially that made you fall in love with yoga?

Was there a certain teacher that inspired you, a certain style that resonated with you, or maybe you loved how you felt after your first class?

What made you fall in love with the practice in the first place?

There was something there that was probably downright magical and not only made you fall in love with yoga but inspired you to become a teacher and share this practice with others. This is what you need to find again.

If you’re feeling burnt out, chances are that you aren’t feeling that same way you felt when you began your yoga journey and what you are offering as a teacher isn’t aligned with what feels good and nourishing to your soul.

Reconnect with this. Reflect on what you loved about yoga, or consider learning something new.

Taking a step back from teaching and becoming a student by taking up a meditation teacher training, or maybe you’ve always been interested in Reiki, or perhaps you want to start sharing yoga nidra, or even just attending yoga classes for fun and not work can be a great way to do this.

Learning something new, and becoming a student again can help ignite your love for the practice and your passion for yoga once again.

Consider a pivot, and put your effort into what fills your cup 

Speaking of learning something new, have you been considering a pivot?

As you're scaling back and learning new things to reignite your passion and stop burnout from coming back, you may want to consider what really fills your cup and focus on that, or more importantly focus on removing that isn’t filling your cup.

Perhaps you no longer have the capacity to teach on weekends, but you love doing yoga flows on the full moon.

Maybe you drop weekend classes and do a monthly full moon speciality class instead, or maybe you have always wanted to start a podcast, and want to pick that up now. This might be the perfect time to make a pivot and do something fun and exciting. 

Remember, your students are your students because of who you are as a teacher, and when you are passionate, inspired and lit up, everyone benefits from that.

It can be scary, but making a pivot in your teaching and doing what aligns with your soul will probably benefit your students in new and exciting ways too, so don’t let the fear of doing something new or starting a new passion project.

Set boundaries and a hard-pass list

The only way to avoid burnout again is to set boundaries and recognize the root of how you became burnt out in the first place. 

Do some reflecting and be honest with yourself about how you got here. Start by making a hard pass list, what are things starting right now that you are doing, or will now say no to.

 Do you no longer work past a certain hour of the day, or maybe you will cap the number of classes you are teaching in a week, or maybe there is something else that is really contributing to your burnout.

Start by identifying how you got here, and what you will stop doing immediately to recover now, and avoid burnout again in the figure.

Once you have gotten clear with how you got here, start building better boundaries to support your well-being, and your hard-pass list.

Maybe you will no longer share your personal phone number with students, or you will require a better cancellation period, or maybe you just need to say I will only teach 2 events a month.

There is no right or wrong way to set these boundaries, and they will be different for everyone but make sure that you are setting them and sticking to them to avoid burnout in the future.

Boundaries are a yoga teacher’s best friend, and the best safeguard you have against burnout.