Going independent sounds like the answer to everything — no studio politics, set your own rates, build your own thing. And it can be. But the math of going independent has a specific shape that most people don't see clearly before they make the leap. In this episode we build the real financial picture of independent yoga work — what you need in place before it makes sense, how long the runway actually is, and what it costs to make the transition sustainably rather than desperately.
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Six months ago, Rebecca published the first Yoga Professionals Trend Forecast — a snapshot of what was actually happening in the yoga industry, without the soft focus. In this episode, she comes back to it. Not to congratulate herself, but to update it: what held, what sharpened, and where things have moved.
She also previews the Summer 2026 forecast. A few trends get named. One — the end of the portable career model — gets the full treatment. If you've been building your career on the solopreneur model and something has started to feel off, this episode is probably for you.
Read MoreThe yoga industry tells a story about the devoted teacher who never stops — who teaches into their seventies, their eighties, who is on the mat until the very end. We tell it like it's a spiritual achievement. Nobody asks whether those teachers had a choice. In this episode we name the open secret the industry has been romanticizing for decades: for a lot of those teachers, it wasn't only devotion. It was the absence of a retirement account. And an industry that conflates financial precarity with spiritual purity has a serious problem that no amount of reframing can fix.
Read MoreThere's a real and growing gap between yoga teachers who built their careers in the 2010s and those trying to build one now — and we're not talking about it enough.
Alexia Walker, a yoga teacher working in Michigan, joins Rebecca for an unfiltered conversation about what the current landscape actually looks like.
They get into the devaluing effect of free offerings, why the people who find you through free content rarely become paying students, how the yoga world built a training system that rewards wealth and travel over actual teaching skill, and what it means to build a truly bespoke career when no two paths look the same. They also touch on transferable skills, community care as a framework for service, and the harm that gets quietly replicated when we don't pay attention to the patterns we're inheriting. This is the conversation about where yoga is right now — not where it was ten years ago.
Read MoreIf we keep training yoga teachers without honestly addressing how they're going to get paid, we're doing everyone a disservice — the teachers, the students, and the practice itself.
Reika Shucart, host of the Full Time Yoga Teacher podcast, joins Rebecca to talk about what it actually looks like to build a sustainable income as a yoga teacher right now.
They get into the shift away from studios toward community spaces like YMCAs, senior centers, and libraries; why online teaching needs to be a YTT requirement, not an afterthought; the quiet shrinking of the continuing education market; and the honest conversation nobody wants to have about yoga's cultural moment fading. There's also something genuinely hopeful in here — about curiosity, artistry, and the kind of passion-led teaching that keeps both teachers and students coming back. This one is practical, a little uncomfortable, and worth every minute.
Read MoreWhat good are higher yoga standards if teachers can't pay their bills? That's the question that sparked this conversation with researcher and yoga therapist Steffany Moonaz. Together we dig into what the data actually says about yoga training, student safety, and whether the industry's push for updated standards from Yoga Alliance and IAYT can coexist with building real economic viability for yoga professionals. We also get into the anatomy curriculum problem, the difference between a licensed healthcare provider who "knows a few poses" and an actual yoga professional, and whether higher education is the direction we're all heading—or just some of us.
Read MoreNobody handed you a pamphlet about this when you got certified. There's no union, no standardized pay scale, no HR department, and no institution coming to protect you if things go sideways.
In the first episode of the What Nobody Told You series, Rebecca names the structural failure at the heart of the yoga industry — and then goes a step further. Because once you stop waiting for a safety net that was never being built, something clarifies. You stop organizing your career around a promise that was never real, and you start building something that actually belongs to you.
This one is honest, a little hard, and worth the listen.
Read MoreYoga's missing career ladder doesn't just cost you professionally — it costs you financially. In this episode, Rebecca Sebastian names the specific, predictable ways the broken structure of the yoga industry transfers its costs onto individual workers: the training trap, the visibility myth, the body math nobody does, and the hidden overhead of patchwork income.
This is not a hustle episode. It's a clarity episode — for mid-career yoga professionals who are tired of blaming themselves for navigating terrain that was never mapped.
Includes a mention of the free Boring Money Starter Kit and the Make Money in Yoga Boring working seminar on March 31st.
Read MoreIn this solo episode, Rebecca revisits three of last year's most popular series with fresh 2026 updates that every yoga professional needs to hear.
First up: making money boring. We're talking about the systems, grief, and pricing drama that keep yoga teachers stuck—and how to finally break free. Then, a reality check on AI in yoga: spoiler alert, the robots aren't coming for your jobs, but they are making your admin life easier. Finally, a controversial take on creativity: is our obsession with niching down actually killing our creative spark?
This episode includes real data on the yoga market (hint: it's growing 80% by 2032), honest talk about pricing and self-worth, and permission to follow your creative impulses even when they don't fit your brand.
Plus, details on Rebecca's upcoming seminar: Make Money in Yoga Boring (March 31st, $45 early bird through March 1st).
If you're a yoga teacher navigating the business side of this work, this one's for you.
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