Sage Rountree's Blog, page 21

On Free Classes at Retail Stores

You may have noticed that retail stores selling yoga clothing often host weekly classes. These attract practitioners who spend an hour or more in the company of the clothes, with the idea that they are more likely to buy. In my experience—and I would be happy to be wrong here!—in-store classes do not convert to paying students at the studio. Who comes to free classes at the mall? People who know they can get free yoga there every week!

You might have your own reasons for saying yes to an invitation to lead a free in-store class. Maybe you are counting this as seva, volunteer work. Maybe you’re offered an outfit in exchange for your time—this could be a good deal, coming to the equivalent of $200 for an hour of your time. Or maybe you want to gain experience as a new teacher, or even apply for a job in the store. Be clear about your reasons. Just don’t expect the students, who may be very nice, to follow you to the studio or a private lesson. That doesn’t mean you can’t try!

If you are teaching a free class, plan to attend the class sometime in the weeks before it’s your turn to teach it. Look at the students, gauge their experience level and needs, and figure out how you can best use the space and your time. Decide how you can offer students something of value, both in your lesson plan and in exchange for signing up for your newsletter. Confirm with the venue that you can collect email addresses, then at the end of your class, invite students to sign up to receive a video, or a coupon for a discounted class with you elsewhere, whatever you think will make the best incentive.

The Professional Yoga Teacher’s Handbook is full of advice like this. Order it from your favorite bookseller or library—or from me here.

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Set Your Intentions and Goals for 2023

Are you a yoga teacher—or considering becoming one? The Professional Yoga Teacher’s Handbook is here to help you get clear on how you can serve your students best, and to guide you to making good choices for your education at every level and your career at every step. Whether you’re just considering yoga teacher training or lead yoga teacher trainings of your own, this book is for you. We cover everything from your calling as a teacher to exactly how to plan your classes so that your students have the best possible experience.

Take a peek inside the book on Amazon. You can buy it there or order it from your favorite indie bookstore or, better yet, request it from your local library!

Keyed to the book are a host of resources, including a full-featured workbook that you can see here. And visit the book’s resource page to view them all.

Have you already read the book? I’d love a review on your favorite bookstore site, like Amazon, Goodreads, Powell’s, or your local independent bookseller. This helps immensely in getting the book to the hands of people who will benefit from it. And please tell your teacher trainer and your colleagues about the book. Word of mouth goes a long way!

Not a yoga teacher, with no plans for becoming one? Another of my books, Racing Wisely, will guide you toward your personal best in your next endurance race, whether it’s a local 5K or a multi-day event. You’ll learn all about intentions and goals and how combining the two will lead you to peak performance. Visit that book’s resource page here.

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Let’s Go, 2023

Friends, I hope the dawn of 2023 finds you well! I spent much of 2022 working on things that will emerge over the course of 2023 and 2024, including my tenth book. I will share more about that, and another book project—my first second edition—soon.

Other things I’m looking forward to in 2023:

Teaching, and doing, more Pilates. We have souped up our program at Carrboro Yoga with a Wednesday Pilates Fundamentals class and a Saturday class to match our Monday and Thursday offerings. If you are local, please join us! You can register here. If you aren’t local, check out my short, doable video series, Core Strength for Real People.

Leading continuing education workshops for movement teachers. One of the highlights of 2022 was getting back into the classroom with movement teachers. I led several workshops at home and at Kripalu, and more are on the docket for 2023, including a teachers’ retreat that Alexandra DeSiato and I are really pumped about. Plus I have upcoming workshops on teaching yin yoga, restorative yoga, balance classes, and yoga nidra. See the full schedule here. While I offer many online courses for yoga and movement teachers, there’s nothing that compares to the co-creation that happens when we are in the same place at the same time!

More spa! Construction is underway at the spa I co-own, Hillsborough Spa and Day Retreat, as we expand to a whole second level of the building with some amazing new treatment offerings. More on this as the buildout continues. For now, if you haven’t visited, it’s a perfect time to come recenter yourself at the spa, either with our fabulous treatments or with a day retreat, which gives you three hours to reconnect with your goals and intentions for the new year. Book here!

I hope your year gets off to a wonderful start and that you have great things ahead in 2023.

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How to Write a Yoga Bio That Stands Out

Whether you are building your yoga website or teaching at a gym, studio, or festival, you will need a good biography.

Start with role models. Look online at the bios of your favorite teachers, both those with a national visibility, with whom you may have studied online or at a workshop or festival, and the local luminaries. What qualities do good bios have in common? A good biography is as much about the reader as it is about the teacher, making it clear how people will feel after taking a class or a workshop from the teacher. It should show personality rather than simply listing credentials. It doesn’t need to be cutesy, but it does need to convey the essence of the teacher.

Here’s the bio I use on my studio site:

As an athlete, endurance sports coach, and continuing student of yoga, Sage Rountree understands the trickiness of balancing training and a yoga practice. Sage’s classes emphasize intention and efficiency—using the right form and the right breath for the task at hand. There’s plenty of attention to core, the hips, and using the body, breath, and mind to focus. An Experienced Registered Yoga Teacher with the Yoga Alliance at the highest level (E-RYT 500), Sage has over nineteen years’ experience teaching yoga to students of all levels and backgrounds, including several UNC teams and Coach Roy Williams. Co-owner of the studio, director of our teacher trainings, and the author of nine books, including The Athlete’s Guide to Yoga, Everyday Yoga, Lifelong Yoga, Teaching Yoga Beyond the Poses, and The Professional Yoga Teacher’s Handbook, Sage has also written for Yoga Journal, Runner’s World, Lava Magazine, and USA Triathlon Magazine.

carolinayogacompany.com

While it ends with a curriculum vitae–style rundown of my published works, it gives an overview of what students can expect from my classes, then grounds my work in the context of our university town, where the basketball coach is a celebrity. To see other examples of a range of biography lengths and focuses, you’ll find my media kit at my resources page for The Professional Yoga Teacher’s Handbook.

These questions will prompt you. Answer them in as much detail as you like. Then cull the best sentences and phrases from your answers and distill them into a one- or two-paragraph biography.

What first brought you to yoga? What were your revelations from your first few classes?What does yoga mean to you?Who and what have been your greatest teachers? While you may be tempted to simply list everyone you’ve ever studied with, can you think outside the box?How has your practice changed over the years?How do you want students to feel in your class? How do you want them to feel after your class? What would you like to hear them say to each other on the way out the door?

The Professional Yoga Teacher’s Handbook is full of advice and prompts like this! Pick it up from me, at your favorite bookseller, or by requesting it from your local library. It’s available in print, e-book, and audiobook editions.

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Yoga Nidra Practice and Teacher Training

On Friday, November 18, I’ll lead a pop-up Yoga Nidra class at Carrboro Yoga. We start at 6 p.m. Yoga Nidra is a guided relaxation that leads you through the layers of your being with the goal of accessing bliss. If savasana is your favorite part of yoga class, you’ll love it. Come ready to relax and dressed in layers to promote maximum coziness. There’s no movement beyond an optional short get-the-wiggles-out few minutes at the start.

Regular class rates apply and preregistration is required. Sign up here.

If you’re interested in leading others in such practices, I’ve got a weekend teacher training in North Carolina scheduled for October 2023. If you’re a long-term planner, you can sign up now!

Read all about it and register here.

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What’s the Difference Between Gentle, Yin, and Restorative Yoga?

If you have explored the softer side of yoga, you have probably encountered gentle, yin, and restorative yoga. But there’s often confusion around the differences between these three approaches, and not just for students, for teachers as well! While they can be combined in one class to great effect, understanding their goals and the differences between the three styles will help students and teachers alike.

In this video, I break down the three using a trio of terms from exercise physiology: frequency, duration, and intensity.

I’m teaching in-person continuing education workshops for yoga teachers on how to lead these three styles. Gentle Yoga has already been covered—and I’m currently working on creating an asynchronous online course on that subject with lectures similar to the video here, plus full-length follow-along classes, shorter lesson-plan demos, and written lesson plans.

There will also be similar offerings for Yin and Restorative, but first, they will happen live! Join me for one or both of these at Carrboro Yoga in North Carolina:

Fundamentals of Teaching Yin Yoga, January 28–29, 2023Fundamentals of Restorative Yoga, February 18–19, 2023

Read more on both and register here.

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A Yoga Teacher’s Confession

Here’s a true confession from most yoga teachers: we always go faster on the second side. This happens for a variety of reasons, prime among them that we have said all our best cues on the first side and haven’t grown comfortable with silence, or that we have mismanaged time and see the clock ticking. Once you recognize these common reasons, you can begin to correct them.

Too many words. Don’t recite a laundry list of everything you have to say about a pose at its introduction. Instead, save some of your cues for the second side or the next round. Give no more than three instructions on the first side or instance of a pose. If they land well, students won’t need much direction on the second side. This frees you to be quiet, to add some metaphorical or figurative language, or to point back to the theme you introduced at the start of class as you reach the second side.

Unawareness. Use a watch, or keep your eye on the clock. It’s easy with a little practice. Leave room for students to stay a little longer than your cueing or to move out of a pose sooner than the official cue comes. One way to do this is to slot in a neutral or symmetrical pose after every long-held asymmetrical pose. For example, follow a reclining twist with a cobbler pose or a bent-knee savasana, then lead the twist on the other side and remind students that they know their bodies best and thus will know best when to move back to neutral.

Record your class, and you’ll quickly see where the second side doesn’t get its due. My free guide, The Fastest, Cheapest, and Best Way to Improve Your Teaching, will help you with this important self-improvement project. So will The Professional Yoga Teacher’s Handbook!

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Register Now: Designing and Teaching Core Strength Sequences and Classes

Now is the perfect time to sign up for an in-person workshop I’m teaching in Carrboro October 28 and 29. There’s a little preassignment for you to complete, so registering today will give you time to get it done.

This workshop is for movement teachers of every discipline and for experienced students. We’ll cover:

When and how (and even whether) to include core-focused exercises in the context of your movement class or practiceThe anatomy of the core and the physiology of strengthening your coreHow to design well-rounded sequences that help students progress and feel betterHow to include everyone by offering a range of optionsHow to put together a full-length core class—this is great if you would like to teach these popular classes, or are ever called on to sub Pilates

You’ll get FREE access to these two resources as a bonus when you sign up:

Core Strength for Real People, my follow-along core sequence channelMy Sequence Library, with demos of sequences perfect for referencing as you plan your class

Sign up here today! You’ll get 18 Yoga Alliance CEUs once you finish the post assignment—planning core classes.

Can’t make it in person? This entire continuing education workshop will soon be available online. Sign up for my newsletter to be notified when it launches.

Core not your jam? Two similar workshops are coming up: Fundamentals of Yin Yoga, January 28–29, 2023, and Fundamentals of Restorative Yoga, February 18–19, 2023.

Read more on all and register here.

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Mark Your Calendars: Kripalu 2023

Mark your calendars now for two workshops Alexandra DeSiato and I will be co-leading at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in Lenox, Massachusetts:

Recharge: A Retreat for Yoga and Movement Teachers, Sunday–Friday, October 1–6Teaching Yoga Beyond the Poses: Create Inspiring Classes for All Students, Friday–Monday (holiday weekend = expanded three-day version!), October 6–9

Separately or together, these workshops will help you reconnect with the big reasons why you teach, lead you to envision how you can help your students even better, and send you home with renewed enthusiasm for teaching yoga and movement classes.

We are so excited to spend this time with you! Please reserve the dates in your calendar now, and expect news of registration in the spring. If you aren’t already reading this in my newsletter, sign up here to be alerted when registration is open.

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Satisfaction Equals Perception Minus Expectations

One of our teachers at Carolina Yoga Company also teaches business classes at the University of North Carolina Kenan-Flagler Business School. There, she told me, she tells her students that customer satisfaction follows this formula: Satisfaction = Perception − Expectations. Satisfaction is a result of what the consumer perceived they received minus what they expected to receive. Satisfaction is positive when your students’ experience is equal to or better than what they thought they would get, and negative when their expectations exceed their reality.

One way to manage expectations is by writing a very clear class description that lets students know what they will experience in the class. At Carolina Yoga Company, each class description also includes ratings of challenge and chill on a scale from 0 to 5. Restorative Yoga then gets a challenge level of 0 and a chill level of 5, while Flow Yoga has a challenge of 3 or 4 and a chill of 2. Flow and Unwind has a challenge of 3 or 4 but a chill of 4, because it ends in a restorative pose. Adding such a scale might help you manage students’ expectations.

And when everyone is on the same page, everyone wins.

Read more advice like this in The Professional Yoga Teacher’s Handbook!

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