“I’ve been teaching for three years and I still feel like I’m faking it.”
If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard that . . .
Actually, if I had a dollar for every time I’ve thought that—and for longer than three years—I could fund a whole yoga studio.
The truth is, feeling unsure doesn’t mean you’re doing something wrong.
It means you care.
Still, that doesn’t make the discomfort any easier. Especially when you’re putting in the time, taking extra trainings, showing up for your classes—and yet, the planning still takes hours. You’re still tweaking every cue. You’re still wondering if your students can tell you’re just barely holding it together.
The Real Reason Teaching Still Feels So Hard
I want to tell you a story about my Monday night class.
For years—literally, years—I’d show up each week with a brand-new, completely different sequence. One week, Paul Grilley–style yang flow. The next, balance drills. Another, most of the Ashtanga primary series because I’d taken my David Swenson book off the shelf.
I told myself I was keeping things fresh. But I was actually being inconsistent.
And inconsistency isn’t comforting for students. It’s confusing.
The truth?
I was anxious. I didn’t trust that what I knew was enough.
Naming the Phases of the Yoga Teaching Journey
That period—when you’re post-training but not yet confident—is what I now call Phase One: Post-Training Overwhelm.
It’s the first of five phases in what I’ve come to recognize as the Yoga Teacher Success Timeline. And once I started naming it that way—for myself, and for the teachers I mentor—everything started to make more sense.
If you’re stuck in Phase One, you might:
- Spend hours planning every class
- Memorize your sequence, then blank the moment class begins
- Try to teach like your favorite teacher instead of teaching what you know
- Feel like you have to prove yourself every time you walk into the room
And if that sounds like you, I want to tell you something important:
You are not broken. You are not behind.
You are exactly where you’re supposed to be.
Why the Yoga Teacher Success Timeline Changes Everything
When we don’t understand the natural progression of a teaching career, we do two harmful things:
We beat ourselves up for being “not good enough.”
We try to skip steps, which just leads to more confusion and burnout.
But when you do understand the phases, everything shifts. You stop spinning your wheels. You start showing up with more confidence. And your students feel it.
When your students can count on you—your energy, your pacing, your framework—they can relax. They go deeper. And that’s where the transformation happens.
It doesn’t require a brand-new sequence every week.
It doesn’t require another certification.
It just requires you to trust what you already know—and teach from what you know.
The Five Phases of Yoga Teacher Development
In Episode 44 of Yoga Teacher Confidential, I walk through the full Yoga Teacher Success Timeline, including:
- Post-Training Overwhelm: where you care deeply, but feel unsure
- Identity Formation: where you begin to find your authentic voice
- Professional Development: where you start building sustainable systems
- Thriving Teacher: where teaching feels intuitive, joyful, and aligned
- Mastery and Legacy: where you support others on their journey
I also share why this isn’t a straight line. It’s not one and done.
Even now, after decades of teaching, I cycle back to Phase One when I try something new.
That’s not failure. That’s growth.
How to Build Confidence as a Yoga Teacher Right Now
Here’s your homework:
Identify where you are right now—without judgment.
Name one thing you know how to teach well.
Build your next class around that thing.
This approach will save you hours of planning. It will rebuild your confidence. And it will remind you why you started teaching in the first place.
To help you put this into practice, I’ve created a free mini course called Fundamentals of Confident Teaching. It includes a full breakdown of the Yoga Teacher Success Timeline and practical tools to help you move through each phase with more ease.
🎧 Listen to the full episode wherever you get your podcasts:
You don’t have to be perfect to be helpful.
You just have to teach from what you do know.
