Find out about some effective time management tools for entrepreneurial yoga teachers to overcome chaos and overwhelm.
As a dedicated teacher and ambitious yoga business owner, I want to say yes to every exciting opportunity. I have lots of ideas and once it’s in my head I want to get it done. My calendar and to-do lists often overflow. At the end of 2021 this lead to burnout. That meant I had to cancel my classes, workshops, and social life for 4 months.
I was devastated and thought this setback would ruin my career. I thought my students would lose interest, forget about me and move on with a different teacher. I’m not afraid of competition, but I do love my students and I didn’t want to lose them.
In this time, I learned to reorganise myself. To say yes to new projects, but trust ‘divine timing’. To be patient, but stay committed and work on one project at the time.
I was introduced to the ’90-day Year’ – a concept by Todd Herman. The idea behind it is that you break down goals and plans into 90-day cycles instead of a yearly planning. The beauty of this for us as yoga teachers is that it allows us to work nature’s seasonal cycles.
As humans we often overestimate what we can do in a day, but underestimate our capacity for a year. Managing your time with a 90-day cycle can help you create focused periods to stay disciplined and achieve greater results!
Why am I sharing this?
Because I know that you are driven and ambitious too. That you have big plans and goals for building your yoga career. You want to turn your ‘hobbies’ into paid activities. So that you can quit the job that no longer fulfils you, but make a profitable income sharing your passions for yoga and wellness.
To make that dream a reality, you need clarity, structure and discipline. Building a career out of your passions doesn’t happen by accident, it requires you to do some work. What that work means for you personally depends on your goals. But what I can help you with are some tools for time-management for entrepreneurial yoga teachers to spend your energy wisely.
Time Management Tools for Entrepreneurial Yoga Teachers
1. Have a clear vision
A vision is a future-focused dream. It’s a powerful mental image of what you aim to achieve. It’s the guiding light that illuminates the path toward your dreams and directs your actions and goals to get there.
As a yoga teacher, your vision could be the global impact you want to make. The diverse communities you want to reach, or the life changing aha-moments you want to inspire people’s lives with. To speak in more metaphors, I see a vision as your North Star. The star that guides you toward a fulfilling and purpose-driven career.
A vision is different from what you want to do and how you make it happen, it’s your drive and reason why.
To reach that vision, I don’t think you need to plan out all the details about how you’ll get there. What is important though is that you keep a reminder of what your vision looks and feels like. Staying connected to your vision will help you set mini goals along the way. And by that stay flexible planning your path step by step as you go. With every step you take you may notice your vision becomes even clearer or slightly changes.
For example, when I became a yoga teacher, my vision was a bit general: sharing the transformation yoga had offered me. At that time I thought it would be through teaching asana classes, so that’s what I did.
When I started teaching yoga and saw my students struggled to understand English my vision became clearer. I understood I wanted to contribute to a transformation aimed at education combining yoga and English.
I taught my first English for yoga course and I realised it wasn’t just English for yogis, but English for yoga teachers. My core vision still was sharing the transformation yoga has to offer. How I want to do that, became clearer as I gained more experience. I experimented with different types of classes, workshops, and courses and stayed open to changes.
Focus on your vision and define your purpose
This helped me to realise my true purpose: helping you overcome linguistic barriers, find your voice, optimise your teaching skills and offering you the tools, structure and clarity to build a profitable and sustainable yoga business.
In that way we create a domino effect and my core vision is still carried out because of you. I’m helping you teach internationally and that means the you share the benefits yoga has to offer to people all over the world.
If years ago, I had planned out all of these steps I would have felt extremely overwhelmed. Lots of business coaching speak about 5 or 10 year plans. I believe we get clearer on what our journey actually looks like as we keep reminding ourselves of our core vision every day. Set mini goals, play and experiment, take steps forward but stay open and receptive to the opportunities you receive.
So, to prevent chaos and overwhelm and more easily manage your time, allow yourself to dream big! Envision what you future looks and feels like, trust your process, and based on that set realistic goals.
Which brings me to the next point.
2. The 90 day cycle
Going back to the 90 day cycle, which I believe massively helps you manage your time as an entrepreneurial yoga teacher.
90 days is long enough to accomplish a significant project. It’s short enough to maintain a sense of urgency, which means you’re less likely to postpone your goals.
It’s a time frame that’s easy to oversee – three months. That way you can create a clear structure and set deadlines that don’t feel far away. It can help to set milestones every week or every month to stay on track and make consistent progress. Achieving these milestones boosts your motivation and already gives you sense of accomplishment. Which in return helps you to move forward and reach the ultimate goal of the full 90 day cycle.
With a specific timeframe in mind that’s in the near future, you’ll feel more in control. Knowing you have limited time can discourage perfectionism. You’re more inclined to focus on getting the job done instead of endlessly fine-tuning details.
After 90 days, you can reassess your progress and adjust your goals if necessary. This flexibility allows you to adapt. You can adapt to changing circumstances and opportunities you receive. But also insights you get or new ideas you want to try out.
Working with a 90 day cycle to finish one project at the time help you maintain momentum and prevent burnout. It’s easier to focus and spend your energy on a project for 90 days instead of an open-ended “I will see when it happens project”.
Whether you choose to work on your projects for 90 days or choose a different approach, I’d like to share some tools that can help you stay motivated and manage your time more efficiently.
I’ll explain this through the replace this for that method:
3. Replace impostor syndrome for the person you aspire to be
When imposter syndrome arises (which is self-doubt and a lack of confidence), you may question your worth and abilities. This can hinder your progress and impact your overall well-being. You can overcome impostor syndrome in many different ways, but one thing that you can try today is to act as the person you associate with the goals you want to achieve.
For example: if your vision is to move to an island and welcome people on monthly retreats, you envision a yoga business owner that is committed, disciplined and takes on the tasks to realise their retreat centre. A self-employed yoga retreat host doesn’t have time to doubt their skills or worry about competition. They work on their marketing, plan their retreat activities and are in touch with the accommodation or even guest teachers. Act as if you already are that person. Step into their shoes. Even if feels far away right now, believe that if you show up as that person today, you’ll do what it takes to actually become them.
4. Replace chaos and block out time for similar tasks
In your daily, weekly or monthly schedule what are the repetitive tasks? Is it creating posts for social media, replying to emails, preparing your classes, sending your invoices?
Have a look at your repetitive tasks and see where you can bundle them to do more of the same at once. This way you avoid getting distracted, save lots of time and stay focussed on one type of task at the time.
For example: if you already know you want to post 5 reels and 5 pictures on IG every month. You need to take or choose pictures, record your videos, edit the videos, write captions for each post and post them. Dedicate time blocks for similar tasks:
On Monday choose or take your pictures and film all the reels at at the same time. On Tuesday edit the photos and the videos at the same time. Then on Wednesday write all your captions (and while you’re writing, maybe you can even use your captions for a newsletter or blog post). Instead of posting your pictures and reels one by one, schedule them in the app so that they’re posted automatically and the rest of the month you don’t have to think about them anymore.
The same goes for daily tasks like replying to student messages and emails. Decide on a time in the morning or evening to reply to all at once, instead of one message at the time as soon as you receive them, because this is time consuming and extremely distracting.
5. Replace quantity for value
It’s not about how much you do or how available you are, but about the quality of what you eventually deliver. In the beginning you may think you need to get involved in lots of projects and ideas, but the true impact lies in the quality of what you offer.
Rather than saying yes to every possibility or idea, choose depth and authenticity and go for what truly feels aligned with your vision. Being all over the place isn’t only energy and time-consuming, it also gives your students an unclear image of how you can actually help them.
Concentrate on delivering value in everything you do; your yoga classes, social media content, or interactions with students or collaborators. When your approach is consciously and intentionally, you’re much more likely to fulfil your vision and attract and retain loyal students students.
Think of it this way: would you rather have a 1000 random followers or one-day drop-in students, or a smaller, but super engaged community who genuinely benefit from your teachings?
In the end, it’s the value you offer that will make you stand out and help you turn your passion into a thriving, sustainable career. So, be intentional and prioritise quality and watch how in the long run spending your time on quality will pay off: resulting in eager and committed students.
To sum up:
Time management may take some trial and error. Allow yourself the space to try things out and see what works for your personally. In the meantime, keep your vision clear, take one step at a time, and trust your unique process.
And remember, I’m here to support you every step of the way. Don’t hesitate to reach out if you have questions or need guidance – because success is a collective effort, not something you achieve alone.
I’m excited to announce that we’ll soon host our business development workshops to help you achieve your career goals! So, if you want to build your own international yoga business, but need more structure and strategies…
>>> check out the Launch & Expand Your International Career and sign up for the waitlist!
When signing up, you’ll be the first to find out more about the dates and topics of each training.
I believe no vision is too big, and with dedication and the right strategies, you can turn them into your reality. For now, embrace the next 90 days (until the new year) and make them count. Finish this year strong, and step confidently into the shoes of who you need to be to create the future you desire.
