73. When to Drop a Class: How to Know It's Time to Walk Away

I recently dropped a class I'd been teaching for nearly 23 years. Monday nights at 6 p.m.—since the literal day when the studio opened in 2004. Walking away from that class was one of the most bittersweet decisions I've ever made.

In this episode, I'm sharing the full story of how I came to that decision, along with the signs that it might be time for you to let go of a class: declining numbers, a gut sense that the chapter is complete, burnout, the math not adding up, or a change in your life circumstances.

I'm also sharing practical advice for walking away with grace—how to calculate your real hourly rate, how and when to tell your students (including the approach my friend Lisa recommended that worked beautifully), and what to do about the class after you leave.

Whether you've been teaching a class for two months or two decades, the process is the same: pay attention to the signs, trust your gut, and give yourself permission to make a change.

Listen now!

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Transcript

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Can I tell you something? I recently dropped a class. I had been teaching for nearly 23 years, Monday nights at 6:00 PM at Carrboro Yoga Company, one of the very first classes on the schedule on the day. The studio opened on March 1st, 2004, and letting go of that class was one of the most bittersweet decisions I have ever made as a yoga teacher. We talk a lot on this show about how to get classes, how to approach a studio, how to land that coveted spot on the schedule. In episode 67, we covered the studio approach, and in episode 68 we talked about teaching at gyms, YMCAs, and community centers. But what about the other end of the class lifecycle? What about knowing when it's time to walk away from a class you've been teaching, whether that's been a month, a year, a decade, or in my case over two. I'm Sage Rountree, and this is Yoga Teacher Confidential, where I share the secrets of becoming a great yoga teacher. Today we are going to talk about how to know when it's time to let go of a class and how to do it with grace. Let me tell you a little bit about this class originally called Yoga for Athletes, then later renamed Yoga for Athletic Balance. It was the anchor of my entire week for more than two decades when I started teaching it. My daughters were one and three years old. Now they're grown women out of the house living their own lives. That class saw me through every stage of parenting, school-aged children through the rhythms of the school academic calendar, through thousands of students cycling in and out of that room. In the beginning, I had mostly men in class. They were elite endurance athletes. In the early days later, I had members of the UNC football team, including current NFL players. The last class I taught before the COVID shutdown, I had almost the entirety of the St. John's University men's basketball team in the room. Their game in the Big 10 tournament had been called at halftime as everything was shutting down, and they driven down to one of the teammates homes in North Carolina to wait it out. I remember shaking hands with all these friendly, polite, young men and thinking, this is not going to go well. And it didn't. Those pandemic years without Monday nights were so destabilizing in ways I hadn't anticipated. The class went through many iterations 75 minutes before COVID I, 60 minutes after I taught it chaotically at the start of my teaching career before I discovered the huge benefits of repeating sequences week in and week out. In its most recent form, it had almost exactly the same crew of regulars. Every single week. The class regularly had a wait list. There was a hardcore group who went out for yoga and then beer afterward. It was really sweet to see that this class had become an anchor, not just for my weekly routine, but for theirs. Monday nights shaped my whole life in ways large and small. We have regular Monday night dinners at my house girl dinner they call it, these days we call it Monday night special or special for short bread, cheese salad, eaten in front of the TV when I get home. I started making that meal because it was cold and easy to prepare After teaching, eventually, I trained my sweet husband, Wes, to have it ready for me when I walked in the door. I even had my daughter, Lillian, who's now 25, practicing in that class for a few years. What a treat that was. Lily still goes to Monday night Yoga just in New Haven where she lives now, and my other daughter, Vivian regularly sends the group chat pictures of her Monday night special dinner from the Produce Wonderland of Davis, California. Here's the thing though, in the last year or so of teaching this class, I was really on the top of my game. The students were devoted. The energy was beautiful, everything was clicking, and that's exactly when I knew it was time to go. There's a sports analogy I keep coming back to here. You want to go out on the top of your game. You don't want to go out. Once you've lost a step. You don't want to go out when illness or injury forces the decision for you. Think about Michael Jordan. We think about him a lot here in Chapel Hill. The first retirement in 1993, he walked away as a three time champion, arguably the best player in the world that was going out on top. Then he came back, won three more championships and retired again in 1998 after hitting the game winning shot in the NBA finals. Iconic, graceful on his own terms. And then there was the Wizards era. He came back at 38 years old, played two more seasons, and while he was still Michael Jordan, it wasn't the same. Sometimes the desire to hold on can complicate the legacy youth built. I didn't want a Wizards era for my Monday night class. I wanted to walk away while the room was full, while the students were thriving. While I still loved showing up. Now, I know I'm coming at this from a place of deep experience, 22 years with this one class, 15 years of studio ownership. But if you are a newer teacher considering letting go of a class you've had for a year or two, or even for just a few months, the same principles apply. The decision might feel smaller, but the process is the same. Pay attention to the signs. Trust your gut, and give yourself permission to make a change. So how do you know when it's time? Here are some signs to pay attention to. It could be a drop in your numbers if attendance has been steadily declining and you've tried everything to turn it around, that's data worth considering in 15 years of studio ownership. I watched this happen many times, both with my own classes and with other teachers' classes. Sometimes a class just fizzles the energy shift. The neighborhood changes. A competing studio opens nearby, student schedules evolve. You can try new marketing, new time slots, new descriptions, but sometimes the numbers are telling you something. Not every class is meant to last forever, and that's okay. It could be a gut sense, a quiet, knowing that this chapter is complete, even if you can't fully articulate why. When I bought into the yoga studio with my business partner, I was also teaching a Wednesday night Yoga for Athletes class at the UNC Wellness Center. Once I became a yoga studio owner, I knew that class had to go. It wasn't about the numbers, it was about recognizing that I couldn't do everything well, and something had to give. Nobody else really cared whether I was teaching at the quote unquote competition, but for me, it felt like a conflict of interest. There was a clear delineation that I needed to honor. And here's the thing about gut sense. Sometimes one, letting go leads to another. The growing awareness that it was time to release my Monday night class was actually what opened the door to a much bigger conversation about whether it was time to let go of my half of studio ownership entirely. That gut sense about the class became the thread I pulled and it unraveled into a whole new chapter. One decision, created the space for another. Now it could be that you are experiencing burnout, that feeling of dragging yourself to teach rather than being energized by the opportunity. I have seen this in teachers at my studio over the years. Good teachers, dedicated teachers who just hit a wall. Sometimes they were fried from overcommitting. Sometimes life circumstances had shifted. When teaching starts to feel like an obligation rather than an offering, it's worth paying attention. It could be the math. When you factor in your prep time, your driving time, your setup and breakdown time, your actual teaching time. Is the compensation honoring the value that you are providing? Is this the right alignment for you at this moment in your life? I actually teach a framework for this in my teaching Yoga to Athletes course. Sitting down and writing out the real numbers on paper, not just what you're paid per class, but what you're earning per hour when you account for all the hours reaching. That number can be sobering and it can clarify decisions for you. It could be a change in your circumstances. For me, it was several things converging. I'd sold my half of the yoga studio to my business partner as I pivoted toward focusing on teacher development and comfort zone yoga. I had moved from Carrboro to Hillsborough, a beautiful 20 minute drive on country roads. But my eyesight at night is not what it used to be. And when daylight saving time kicked in and I realized I'd be driving home in the dark, I felt it in my body. I was done. Nothing dramatic, nothing forced. Just a clear sense that the light had changed both literally and figuratively. Now a quick note. Everything I'm talking about today is about choosing to drop a class on your own terms, but sometimes the decision isn't yours. Sometimes the studio cuts your class, sometimes illness or injury forces you to step away before you're ready. That's a different kind of grief and it deserves its own conversation. We will cover it in the next episode, so stay tuned. So what do you do when you recognize these signs? First, do some honest reflection. Calculate what you're actually earning per class when you factor in all your time, get out a piece of paper, open a spreadsheet, and write down the numbers. How long does it take you to plan to drive there and back, to set up and break down? To answer student questions After afterward, maybe to attend a staff meetings. Add it all up. Divide your pay by those total hours. What is your real hourly rate? Then think about how this class fits into your larger offer ecosystem. Is it feeding other parts of your teaching life, bringing you private clients, workshop attendees, or students who join your other classes? Or is it draining energy from the work that matters most to you? Is it aligned with where you're headed, or is it keeping you tethered to where you have been? Second, consider the timing. If you can choose your exit point intentionally. Give appropriate notice both to the studio and to your students. Honor your commitment to them while also honoring yourself. You don't have to disappear overnight. You can create a transition that feels good for everyone. Third, think about how and when to tell your students. This one deserves some thought. My advice is don't overestimate your importance, downplay the magnitude of this decision, and whatever you do, don't announce it immediately before class or immediately after class. Let me tell you a story early in my yoga journey. This was, I think my third class ever after I'd come to love prenatal yoga and was branching out. I went to a flow yoga class that absolutely lit me up. I had never done flow yoga before. I had done like a slower alignment based approach and then prenatal yoga, but this class was fantastic. I was so excited to have found this teacher. And then at the very end of class, right after savasana, she said, Namaste. It's been so great being here teaching all of you. I'm moving to Costa Rica. This was my last class. See ya. And I remember thinking, no, I just found this class. That was my first and only experience with her. So I learned early on you don't wanna drop that kind of news on your students when they're in their post savasana Bliss. They're vulnerable, they're open. It's not the right moment for logistical announcements. So when it came time to tell my Monday night students, I gave it a lot of thought. I talked to my new friend Lisa, who just moved to town after selling her own yoga studio of 23 years, about how I might present this. Her advice was Golden. Send an email on a Thursday morning. My class was on Mondays, so that gave students a few days to process before showing up. And she suggested texting my most hardcore regulars first to let them know that the email was going out, but I wanted them to hear it from me personally, and that's exactly what I did. I was genuinely concerned about upsetting people. And yes, a couple of students, very sweetly, told me how much the class meant to them. One of them said, this is a travesty, a sweet sentiment, though the decision was fully mine, but here's what surprised and gratified me. Almost everybody who showed up to class after getting that email said, congratulations on your retirement, which was exactly what I wanted. I hadn't made a big deal out of it, and neither did they. I tried not to make a big production out of my last class, but my students had other ideas. They gave me a really sweet gift and a lovely little speech, and yes, I cried, but only while receiving that gift and listening to their kind words, my daughter Lillian, was sitting there on the mat with me, which made it all the more sweet. It was a beautiful ending to that chapter of my life. And I think it landed that way because I gave them time to process, didn't make it about me, and trusted them to handle the news with grace. One thing I'll say about timing, I made this decision about six to eight weeks before my last class. That runway felt good. It gave me time to savor the ending, but in hindsight, I might have even shortened it a bit. Some of that long lead time was just me being apprehensive about crying at my last class, but that's okay. Find the timeline that works for you. Fourth, think about what happens to the class when you let go. What becomes that time slot? In my case, the studio manager took over my class, a really lovely line of succession. Hm. Whether you can recommend a replacement or simply let the studio handle it will depend entirely on your relationship with the studio and their policies. But it's worth having that conversation. You have built something. It's nice to know it will continue, even if it looks different. Fifth, think about what comes next for you. Letting go of one thing often creates space for something new. When I released this class, I didn't stop teaching on Monday nights. I just redirected that energy toward comfort zone yoga and the prep station. More on that in a moment. But here's what I didn't fully anticipate how much freedom it would create beyond just Monday nights. My husband and I just got back from a planned week of vacation that became an impromptu 17 days stay in Mexico. We want to spend more time at our home in the mountains of North Carolina, and it's been really nice to be in this form of semi-retirement, freed from that anchor in time and space. When you are committed to a weekly class, your whole calendar bends around it, and when that commitment lifts possibilities open up, you couldn't have imagined. And finally trust that your students will be okay. This was hard for me. I genuinely love the people who showed up week after week. But here's what I have learned in over 20 years of teaching as yoga teachers, we should have a form of strategic obsolescence built into our work. We are not here to make our students dependent on us. We are here to help them as much as we can for as long as we can, and then trust that they will continue their journey. I truly felt like I had helped my Monday night students as much as I possibly could. We were repeating the same excellent classes week in and week out, which was beautiful, but sometimes you hit a plateau and reaching the next level requires a new teacher, a new approach, or a deeper investment in your own practice. Your students have agency, they will find other classes, other teachers, other anchors. Some of them might even start teaching themselves. You served them well for the time you were there. That matters, and it's also okay to let go. And here's one more thing. Don't worry too much about regret. Almost everything is undoable. As long as you're not burning bridges or saying, take this job and shove it. If you leave with grace, doors, stay open. And as Michael Jordan showed us, well, you can always come back from retirement, though maybe not always to the same glory. I would love to hear your stories. Have you dropped a class? Are you wrestling with whether to let one go right now? Please reach out to me. You can find me at Comfort Zone Yoga. Send me a DM on the socials at Sage Rountree. That's Sage Rountree with no letter D or email me. If you're not already part of our free community, come join the zone at comfortzoneyoga.com. It's where yoga teachers gather to support each other through exactly these kinds of decisions. And here's the thing, I'm not done teaching on Monday nights. I've just redirected that energy. Through the month of March, March 2nd, through the 23rd, I will be teaching my greatest hits lesson plan. Live online inside the Prep Station Mondays from six to 7:00 PM Eastern. Each week you will see a lot of consistency with some interesting variety so you can watch your practice grow. You'll also get to think about ways you could adapt this sequence we'll be doing all month long for your own unique student population. You could drop into any single class for $20, or you can sign up for the prep station and get all four weeks, four $39 if you can't make it live. Just RSVP and we'll send you the replay along with the post class discussion. I'm saving the last 15 minutes. After each class to chat with you as a teacher about how the experience landed in your body, about ways you might adapt the sequence for your students. Meanwhile, my husband will be downstairs making the Monday night special. He's gotten so good at that arugula salad. Thank you so much for listening to Yoga Teacher Confidential. I'm Sage Rountree, and I'll see you next time.