When I started teaching yoga in late 2021, a fresh graduate of a local certification program, I was terrified. I remember my voice shaking. I couldn’t be out of sight of my notes, and they were so intricately detailed that one class could take up a dozen pages. I stuck mostly to a core sequence for my sporadic yoga pop-ups, with a very small, very occasional deviation.

In September 2023, I was fortunate to be brought on to the team at, arguably, the area’s best yoga & fitness studio, both as a yoga teacher and a strength & conditioning coach. Being surrounded by experienced teachers, and leading classes at a much more regular cadence, helped me to dramatically improve. I don’t recognize myself as the anxious, red tank-clad, notes-dependent instructor of 2021-22.

About a month ago, I decided to expand my teaching portfolio to include yoga sculpt, one of our most popular classes. Yoga sculpt is a fast-paced, 90-plus-degree sweatfest, which incorporates traditional yoga poses and flows with the addition of light weights. I spent weeks preparing for my first class, running my husband through my planned sequence again and again.

A few weeks ago, my name was on the schedule to lead my very first sculpt – and,again, I was terrified. As the clock ticked down to my debut, I wondered why I had decided I wanted to do this – no one was making me. I had chosen this uncomfortable challenge of my own free will. Eek!

Despite my nerves, the class couldn’t have gone better. A week later, I taught it again, barely referencing my once-critical notes, and following it up by teaching yin – a yoga doubleheader.

After both classes, I overheard some chatter in the tasteful orange-and-sage lobby, with two young sculptors imploring each other, “Wow, that was really tough!” A yin practitioner said she’d taken my slower-paced classes before & really enjoyed them. She added that she regularly checks the schedule to see when I’m teaching next. I was energized & excited when I set the robo-mop off and locked up.

I love that I am able to make people feel peaceful, feel challenged – ultimately, FEEL GOOD.

I won’t deny I’m living with terror in other, non-yoga parts of my life right now.

The what ifs come fast and furious at night, when my perimenopausal body and brain refuse to shut down, despite employing all the magnesium and melatonin and meditations.

What if I never work at this level again?

What if I’m just done professionally?

What if my husband loses interest now that we aren’t both hard-charging, high-achieving success stories?

What if I no longer can buy my seventh grader the best clothes and he gets mocked and ridiculed like I used to, in my dorky dark-washed Lee jeans?

What if, what if, what if …

The answers are, of course, that I’ll figure it out.

And that the above fevered worries are either ridiculous, unlikely, and/or don’t really matter anyway.

But right now – a slightly frightening snapshot in time – I’m musing on the terror I felt prior to stepping up in front of a class of fit, Lulu-clad, expectant sculptors …

… And smiling about how quickly it was replaced by a deep sense of badazzery, confidence, and achievement.