Article updated July 2023
Hi, i’m Clare Hudson, and I’m a London based yoga teacher, owner of this blog and creator of the course The Art and Business of Teaching Yoga One-to-One.
The Art and Business of Teaching Yoga One-to-One in a nutshell
The purpose of my course The Art and Business of Teaching Yoga One-to-One is to give you the knowledge, confidence and inspiration to successfully run your own private yoga teaching business. This is something I’m grateful to have done successfully, but I did encounter many pitfalls and hurdles along the way which hopefully you will avoid.
Who is this course for?
This course is for yoga teachers who would like to work with more people one-to-one and in small groups — wherever you are in the world and regardless of how long you’ve been teaching yoga. On completion of the course you also get 10 Yoga Alliance CPD hours for Teaching Methodology
Student testimonial
I highly recommend this to any teacher looking to learn something new and expand their teaching experience.
“Such a wonderful course. I’ve been teaching yoga to my private students for a while but I still learnt so much from this amazing course. Touchy matters like money, scheduling, personal space & other touchy things that we don’t normally discuss in yoga is so beautifully explained in this course. I highly recommend this to any teacher looking to learn something new and expand their teaching experience.”
— Varun D
My background as a yoga teacher
During my first yoga teacher training in London I was actually a bit worried about how I was going to use my training at the end despite absolutely loving the course. I knew I wanted to teach yoga — but had absolutely no idea who I wanted to teach, where I’d work or even what kind of yoga teacher I might be.
I remember feeling terrified at the thought of having to be in front of lots of groups. I wondered how I would stand out or find work — especially when there are so many yoga teachers out there.
My first training was amazing in that it gave me a good foundation to be able to adapt and work with lots of different kinds of people (We cover this on the course too in teaching methodology).
However, despite practising yoga for a long time prior to my training, and having a regular home practice of meditation and yoga, I still felt there were blockages to overcome — mainly in my mind.
Regardless of where you are on your yoga teaching journey, I’m confident that I can help you not only find people who would love to be taught yoga by you — but for you to feel confident teaching from a place of authenticity. This is definitely not a cookie cutter training which is partly the beauty of one to one yoga teaching — it can be taught in different ways depending on who your clients are.
Taking on my first private yoga clients to building a full time private yoga teaching practice
Back in 2015, I nervously took on my first private yoga clients in London straight after my first yoga teacher training. Shortly after this I went on to build a full private yoga teacher practice fulfilling my initial goal of teaching 10 private yoga sessions each week — creating and sharing personalised yoga sessions for individuals and couples in London, who I really connected with and loved teaching.
This took a lot of work — from studying my money mindset to gaining clarity on who I was and what I had to offer others through yoga as well as staying focused.
Right at the end of my yoga teacher training, I got chatting to someone in a local adult education college and mentioned that I was coming to the end of my yoga teacher training. She then asked if I’d be able to teach her and her husband at their home, and how much this would cost.
She must have noticed that I felt a bit out of my depth because she then said ‘You can just teach us what you know’. This one phrase really put me at ease because it gave me permission to work with them as a beginner yoga teacher — not as an expert with decades worth of experience or some spiritual guru with the expectation that I was the one to lead them to Samadhi. I could just be myself.
It was OK to be new. I actually want to emphasise this. Far too often in life, we want to wish away the journey in pursuit of the main goal.
Get started with The Art and Business of Teaching Yoga One-to-One
Student testimonial
I just left a taster session with a 1-to-1 client and as a result of applying what I learned from the course she booked a 10 session package almost immediately following Savasana
“I learned so much from this course and have already integrated some of the business related practices as well as practical knowledge of teaching a private session.The confidence I gained as a private yoga teacher from this course has enabled me to teach in an authentic way whilst also embracing a professional, business mindset. I just left a taster session with a 1-to-1 client and as a result of applying what I learned from the course she booked a 10 session package almost immediately following Savasana”
— Sarah G
Taking it one step at a time
Thanks to the first couple that I taught back in 2015, I gained the confidence to then take on more people — having learnt a lot from my first clients.
From here I took things one step at a time. I remember thinking, I wonder if I can find one more person who would like to have private yoga sessions in their home. And then one more and so on, until I was teaching 10 private clients a week in their home which was my initial goal.
You get to refine and clarify your unique vision and goals at the start of my course too. It’s amazing what you allow to unfold once you get clear on what you’d next like to achieve. For example, perhaps one goal for you could be to find your first or next private client!
It sounds really simple and in many ways it was.
Do you feel like you don’t know where to start or what to do next?
But there were more hurdles along the way too. For example, when I first started I had no system or framework to operate in — I would simply just tell people what my hourly rate was. There was no intake form. No terms and conditions. No initial taster session. No real structure for what I was doing. I was very disorganised. I thought everything could just operate in an informal and friendly way.
This was a big mistake and thanks to the people I worked with, I was able to create a system for teaching yoga one to one that works really well.
It’s this same system that forms the foundations for my online course The Art and Business of Teaching Yoga one-to-One.
I created it for other yoga teachers who would like to work with people privately. It doesn’t matter if you’re a new yoga teacher, someone with a few years’ experience, or you’ve been teaching group classes for years.
Teaching yoga one to one is incredibly rewarding as you really get to build strong relationships with people and teach yoga on your own terms. You can charge more for private sessions, which makes teaching yoga one-to-one more financially viable than working mostly in a studio or gym.
But, although this is an added bonus, I also think for many, teaching yoga one to one is incredibly rewarding because it’s all about relationship building. You get to make connections and have the opportunity to work long term with people. For example, there are people I’ve worked with for many years, and I’ll show you how you can find clients who will want to work long term with you too. This is a big thing, because it means that you don’t have to constantly be on the lookout for new clients!
Student testimonial
“What a great in-depth guidance course to setting yourself up for Yoga teaching. I highly recommend anyone starting to follow Clare’s course. Very clear, focused, and truly useful information. Thank you”
— Sabrina A
Do you relate to this?
But I don’t have a niche. Why would someone want me over someone else? Don’t I need more experience first?
I know that one of the key barriers for many (myself included) is not knowing how to stand out or wondering why someone might have private yoga sessions with you over someone else.
This is why I’ve included a whole module on mindset and also lessons on finding your niche. You will work on your money mindset, confidence and other areas where your mind might be holding you back. Because let’s face it, we have access to more knowledge and information at our finger tips than ever before in history.
So, it’s not a lack of knowledge that’s missing which is why this course is about how you can implement this and make sense of it in a way that’s going to work specifically for you, wherever you’re at and wherever you live.
There’s one small exercise I’d now like you to try — especially if you are someone who struggles with not knowing what your nice is or how you might stand out. But, honestly I think everyone can benefit from this.
Stop reading. Let’s try this right now
Get yourself a pen and paper and write down the name of a yoga teacher whose yoga sessions you enjoy going to yourself.
This could be someone you’ve been doing yoga with for years, a teacher online — anyone who you admire and enjoy working with.
Next, set a timer for 1 minute.
Now write down why you like this person. Don’t overthink it, just write what comes to mind.
When the minute is up, take a look at what you’ve written. What you’ve written is also what others will see in you. This for me is what Rumi meant when he wrote “What you seek is seeking you.”
The purpose of this exercise is to help you become aware of how you present as a yoga teacher.
You might like to further reflect on this. Often the very things we admire in others are the things we also have within us.
Student testimonial
“Clare’s course on how to teach private yoga was exactly the education and support I needed on my new Private Yoga venture. Covering the whole journey from discovering your target audience, marketing, finding and signing clients, paperwork, organising your schedule, and how to structure your classes – you will feel well equipped to get out there and make it happen.
If you actually want the skills and know-how to start a business and get clients, then this is the course for you! I’d like to express my gratitude here to Clare, who has been very supportive via email, answering any questions that I have. She is also very open and welcoming to feedback, which is imperative to keeping courses relevant, and our businesses as flexible and dynamic as our current working environment. Thank you Clare”
— Imogen H
Final thoughts
One of things I felt really passionate about whilst making my course was that once you finish, you would feel inspired to go out there and put everything into practice.
Whether you’d like to find your first client or build a whole private yoga teaching practice, I’m really confident my course will help you fulfil what you set out to do. If it doesn’t, I’m more than happy to offer you a full 30 day money back guarantee with no questions asked.
I may not be a famous brand or the cheapest option out there, but what I’m sharing does work and since I first launched my course i’ve been responding to feedback and
You might not find some clever gap in the market where you’re offering something no one else has done before, but I do aim to give you clarity, confidence and insight into what you uniquely have to give to others. It was created with the energy of enthusiasm, inspiration and the intention to be as useful as I could.
If you like what i’ve said so far, I’d love to welcome you on my course. You can find out more below, and if there’s anything I haven’t covered, you can get in touch with me at any point here clare@clarehudsonyoga.com
You can find out more about The Art and Business of Teaching Yoga One-to-One here
Recent Comments