Yes, but how do you become a more successful teacher?

In this time where you can find a yoga studio on virtually every corner it is becoming a challenge to fill classes, especially for starting teachers.
What can you do? Here’s a short story…

I started restorative alignment in Mexico with Brigitte Longueville in 2009. Although I found it extremely challenging, I felt amazing after every intensive. Brigitte persuaded me to enroll in her Restorative and Therapeutic Yoga Teachers Training in 2010, which I thoroughly enjoyed, although it was the most difficult course I have done in a long time. I had no intention of actually teaching, I was just interested in learning how my own body worked and responded to the BackMitra.
I started taking part in an Anusara yoga class in my local town in the UK. The teacher asked if I would cover for her whilst she was away and I introduced the BackMitra, with amazing feedback, including a 70 year old woman who was in so much pain with her shoulders that she couldn’t hold a phone to her ear. After just attending 2 sessions, she informed me that she was pain free, which I was thrilled about. This lead to other classes being set up for me by people who had heard about it, with many more success stories from different age groups of both sexes. Many of the students have done other forms of yoga in the past but have been completely converted to using the BackMitra, and have even described it as being like magic!

I have based my classes on different muscle groups and always start using the BackMitra on both the upper and lower back for about 45 minutes, then do gentle exercises based on the part of the body I have decided to concentrate on, followed by a yoga sequence with attention to alignment in each pose.

The classes have started small, maybe 3 in a class, and have increased to sometimes 14. I have had great feedback from many people, including one man with back issues, who said he thought it was better than any chiropractor he had visited and has not missed a class since starting and has brought friends.
I have always had positive feedback from my classes, and many students have purchased a BackMitra to work on at home.

Sue Martineau
Yoga Teacher, UK