How I Actually Use AI as a Yoga Teacher and Business Owner
Are you affraid of AI and what it is doing to our society, work force, humanness and environment? I was too. So I decided to start educating myself, doing deep dives into how data centers work, how AI can work for me and what tools are best for my specific needs.
AI isn’t teaching my yoga classes, mentoring my students or running my business for me. But it is becoming one of the most useful tools I have for doing all three of those things better.
Over the last year and a half, I’ve spent a lot of time exploring artificial intelligence.
And I mean actually exploring it.
I’ve taken trainings. I’ve tested different platforms. I’ve paid for tools and cancelled tools. I’ve experimented with AI-generated images and video. I’ve used AI for writing, research, SEO, marketing, business analysis, student support, brainstorming and organization.
Some experiments have been incredibly useful.
Some have made my work more complicated and time consuming while completely loosing the essence of what I intended to create.
Some tools I thought would save me time actually created another system I had to manage—so I cancelled them.
And lately my question has changed.
I’m no longer asking:
“What can AI do?”
There are thousands of answers to that question.
Instead, I’m asking:
“What am I already doing repeatedly that AI could help me do more efficiently?”
That question has completely changed how I use AI as a yoga teacher, educator and solopreneur (business owner without employees or other human support- SOLO).
I now dedicate time every week to learning about AI and experimenting with how it could support Yogi Institute. And I've recently added another metric to my weekly business review:
How much time did AI save me this week?
Because ultimately, that is what matters to me. I don't want more technology. I want more time to teach, mentor, learn, practice, connect with students and build the parts of my business that actually require me.
AI Has Become a Tool, Not the Teacher
One of the most important distinctions I make when talking about AI is this:
AI can support education without replacing the educator.
Yoga is relational.
Teaching requires observation.
Mentorship requires listening.
Community requires connection and presence.
And there are parts of teaching yoga that I don't believe should be handed over to a machine.
When I'm sitting with a student in a mentorship session, listening to what is happening in their teaching or life, that relationship matters, their development matters, their lived experience matters.
When I'm teaching a livestream class and I intuitively feel something, I can share and express.
When a Yoga 300 student submits an assignment, I don't simply want a computer to tell them whether they “passed.” I want to understand how they're thinking, what they're learning and how they're developing as a teacher.
AI doesn't replace that. But it can support everything happening around it. And that's where I've found it incredibly useful.
How I Use AI as a Yoga Teacher
One of my favorite uses of AI is surprisingly simple: I use it to think.
Sometimes I know what I want to teach, but I haven't found the language yet.
I might have an idea about joy, nervous-system regulation, strength, consistency, chakras, meditation or something that happened in my own practice.
I'll bring that idea into ChatGPT and begin exploring it.
Not:
“Write me a meditation class.”
More like:
“I'm teaching a chakra meditation tomorrow exploring the idea that joy can move through the body when our chakras are free flowing. Help me explore this concept using physical anatomy, energetic aspects of each chakra and yogic philosophically. Don't create the meditation for me. Give me questions and ideas that might help me develop what I actually want to say using the Yogi Institute Chakra 15 module manual for inforamtion and context. “
That's a very different use of AI. I'm still the teacher. The idea is mine. My understanding of my students is mine. The final decision about what belongs in that class is mine.
AI becomes another place to explore the thought. And sometimes it asks a question or presents an angle that helps me see my own idea more clearly.
I Give AI a LOT of Context
This might be one of the biggest things I've learned. Generic information creates generic output. The more context I give AI, the more useful it becomes.
If I ask:
“Write a description for a yoga class.”
I shouldn't be surprised if I get something that sounds like every yoga description on the internet.
Instead, I might say:
“This was Day 23 of my 30 Days of Wellness. Students have already completed 22 consecutive days of practice with me. Today's class was restorative. We used a tennis ball to release tension around the neck, explored gratitude throughout the practice and talked about the nervous system. The challenge philosophy is that there is no way to fail—whatever students accomplish is success. Write the description in the same warm, encouraging style we've been using throughout the challenge.”
Now AI understands the class.
But more importantly, it understands the context surrounding the class. That difference matters.
Using AI for Inspiration and Clarity
AI has also become a useful tool when I have a thought that isn't fully formed. Sometimes I bring in a paragraph I've written and say:
“Don't rewrite this yet. Tell me what you think I'm actually trying to say.”
I love doing this.
Because sometimes what comes back helps me clarify my own thinking.
Or I'll say:
“Here are five thoughts I've been having about this. What themes do you see connecting them?”
Or:
“Challenge my thinking. What am I overlooking?”
That last one is important. I don't want AI that simply agrees with me. I want something that can help me examine an idea from another direction.
For teachers, this can be incredibly useful when you're developing class themes, workshops, journal prompts, educational content or even working through your own teaching philosophy.
The Yogi Institute GPT Mentor
I've also experimented with AI from the student side of education.
I created the Yogi Institute GPT Mentor, trained with Yogi Institute educational materials and designed to support students as they move through their education 24/7. This is very helpful being an international school and not always being available when students are studying. Think about it, right now Athens is asleep while Australia is just waking up tomorrow. I genuinely want my students to feel supported WHENEVER they have time to study, but that is impossible as one person.
The intention was never to create an artificial version of me. The intention was to give students another layer of support.
A student studying late at night might suddenly have a question. A student might understand a concept intellectually but want help thinking through how it applies to their teaching. Someone may want to review something they learned months ago.
The GPT Mentor can help them explore those questions immediately. But one of the things I care about is that it doesn't simply hand students every answer. Good mentorship often means asking better questions. So AI can become another tool that helps students reflect, explore and find clarity while the human mentorship and community surrounding their education remain intact.
For me, that's where AI in education becomes interesting. It doesn't have to be:
Human OR artificial intelligence.
It can be:
How can technology support a deeply human educational experience?
Where AI Has Become Even More Powerful: Running My Business
This is probably where my AI use has changed the most. I am a yoga teacher. I am also the founder of an online yoga school. And I'm a solopreneur. Which means I'm also marketing, administration, customer service, strategy, website management, student support, content creation, analytics and about fifteen other departments depending on the day.
This is where AI becomes enormously practical.
I've started looking at my business and asking:
What am I doing repeatedly?
Where do I want more structured consistency?
Where can I save time AND support others more?
What are the MOST important tasks that deserve most of my time?
What requires my judgment?
What simply requires my time?
Those are not the same thing.
My Weekly CEO Meetings Are Now Supported by AI
Every Friday, I do a CEO review of Yogi Institute.
I look at things like:
Revenue
Sales and enrollments
New inquiries
Qualified leads
Where people discovered Yogi Institute
Teaching attendance
Student progress
Marketing performance
Systems
My own energy
What worked
What didn't
The biggest opportunity ahead
I've been teaching ChatGPT what matters to me as a business owner so that these reviews aren't simply:
“Revenue went up. Good job!”
I want comparison.
I want patterns.
I want questions.
I want to know what actually generated revenue.
I want to know whether marketing activity produced qualified leads.
I want to know whether I'm spending time somewhere that isn't producing anything meaningful.
And I want the review to end with: What are the three most important things I should focus on next week?
We're now building workflows to automate more of this.
I have even built a private, read-only integration designed to connect business information from my booking platform, Arketa, with AI so that eventually more of my attendance, purchases, clients, schedules and other business information can flow into the review without me manually gathering it.
It's still a work in progress. And I think that's important to say, not everything works immediately but I am feeling less overwhelmed(this is a biggy), more clear, organized and effecient.
When I first started working with ChatGPT within my business it quickly shared that what I was feeling as a business owner was DECISSION FATIGUE. I had not heard this term before so I dove in to understand it more deeply and it was ABSOLUTELY right. So I’ve created systems and organization and feel more rejuninated and excited for everthing I am continuing to create. Thanks Chat!
I Have Tested AI Tools—and Cancelled Them
There's a lot of pressure right now to have an AI tool for everything and the AI landscape changes daily, things are changing fast. I've tried the approach to keep up, stay up to date on new tools, the next shiny thing, it’s not working. I've researched and tested tools for social-media distribution, AI video, voice, imagery, content creation and automation. I've taken trainings to understand what's available. I've tested systems because I genuinely want to understand this technology rather than dismiss it or blindly adopt it and I've cancelled tools too.
Recently, I cancelled one AI/social-media platform I had been testing because although it helped with distribution, it didn't simplify my overall workflow enough to justify adding another system.
That was an important realization:
A tool isn't saving me time if managing the tool becomes another job.
So now I'm trying to consolidate. Instead of collecting AI subscriptions, I'm asking how much I can accomplish from one central environment. That's why I'm currently building more of my business workflows inside ChatGPT. And that might change too. One piece of advice I’d offer is when you do choose to use a tool, find one that is continuing to evolve and learn more about it along the way. What you choose to use matters, its not all super exspensive and its not all super efficient. Choose wisely, but also, don’t be affraid to start.
AI Helps Me Turn One Idea Into Many Pieces of Content
This has been one of the biggest practical time-savers. I might write a personal reflection or teach something in class or publish a blog like this one, offering ideas that feel important to me to share.
Instead of sitting down separately to create:
Facebook content.
Instagram content.
LinkedIn content.
Threads.
YouTube community posts.
Website copy.
An email.
I can give AI the original piece and ask it to help adapt it appropriately for each channel. The original idea remains mine. But I don't have to repeatedly perform the mechanical work of reformatting the same thought. That's an important distinction.
AI doesn't have to create your voice. It can help distribute your voice.
For a solopreneur, that can save enormous amounts of time.
AI Has Become Part of My Marketing Research
I also use AI to think about discoverability. This became particularly interesting to me because several Yogi Institute students have actually discovered my school through AI search. That changed how I thought about AI completely.
I'm not only asking:
How can I use AI?
I'm also asking:
How are prospective students using AI to find education?
That has influenced the way I think about my website, blogs, FAQs, teacher-training information and the questions I answer publicly. Instead of creating random content because I think I “should post,” I can research questions people are actually asking. Then I can create genuinely useful educational content answering those questions. That content can become a blog, social content, FAQ or an email. And eventually it can help someone searching for exactly that information discover Yogi Institute.
AI Helps Me Manage Students Without Removing the Relationship
Another workflow I'm developing is student progress. As an educator, I may have students at completely different places within the same training.
One Yoga 300 student may have completed 10 of 12 modules. Is this YOU?
Someone else may have watched hundreds of educational videos but hasn't submitted their assignments. OR MAYBE THIS IS YOU?
Another may have stepped away from training for a year. Could this be YOU?
Another might be actively teaching and choosing modules based on what they need in their classroom right now.
Those students don't need the same email. They don't need the same support. So I've used AI to help me organize information such as:
Student → Program → Progress → Completed Modules → Outstanding Requirements → Last Contact → Next Step
Then I can sit down and look at the actual human being behind the information.
One student might need: “You're four submissions away from graduating!”
Another might need: “Your training is still here. You don't need to explain where you've been. Start again when you're ready.”
AI helps me organize the information. I decide how I want to show up for the person. That distinction is essential to me.
AI Helps Me Run My Week
This sounds almost ridiculously simple, but it has become incredibly useful.
On Monday I can give ChatGPT my week:
“I have an interview Tuesday at 1 PM. I'm teaching Saturday at 9:15 and 11. I have a mentorship session at 2. Sunday I have Yoga 200 at 9 AM and Yoga 300 from noon–3. I'm also teaching my regular classes throughout the week. I want Thursday off. Here are my three business priorities. Organize my week.”
The useful part isn't creating a calendar.
I can already do that.
The useful part is giving the system enough information about my priorities that it can help me decide when things should happen—and when they shouldn't.
A busy weekend means I may need Thursday off.
An interview tomorrow means Monday isn't the day to begin an enormous new project.
A training weekend means Friday needs to include preparation.
That's where AI begins functioning less like a search engine and more like a thinking and organizational tool.
Here Are Some Prompts I Actually Find Useful
If you're experimenting with AI as a yoga teacher or business owner, try giving it much more context than you think it needs.
For teaching inspiration
“I'm teaching a 45-minute restorative yoga practice tomorrow. My students have been practicing consistently for three weeks. I want to explore the relationship between physical relaxation, the nervous system and our ability to experience gratitude. Don't create the class for me. Help me explore connections between these ideas and give me five questions I could reflect on before teaching.”
For improving your teaching
“Here is the class I taught today, including my sequence, theme and what I noticed from students. Help me reflect on it as a teacher. Ask me questions about cueing, accessibility, pacing, connection and atmosphere. Don't assume something was successful simply because I tell you I liked it.”
For business clarity
“Here are my revenue, sales, inquiries, teaching attendance and marketing activities from this week. Compare them with last week. Separate activity from results. Identify what we actually have evidence generated revenue or qualified leads, what we cannot attribute yet, and the three highest-priority actions for next week.”
For marketing
“Here is my business, who I serve, my current programs, pricing, student feedback, website positioning and the content I've published over the last month. Research the questions prospective students are asking about this type of service. Identify content gaps and suggest topics where my actual experience gives me something useful to contribute. Don't suggest content simply for the sake of posting.”
For making AI sound more like YOU
Instead of:
“Write an Instagram post about yoga teacher training.”
Try:
“Here is a reflection I wrote myself. Preserve my actual perspective and the phrases that sound like me. Don't make it more inspirational or polished just for the sake of it. Adapt the idea for Instagram while keeping my voice. Here are three previous posts I've written so you can understand how I naturally communicate.”
That context changes everything.
Be Thoughtful About What You Share
There is another side to all of this. If you're going to use AI professionally, particularly around students or clients, think carefully about privacy. You don't need to give an AI system confidential student information simply because it would be convenient. Remove information that isn't necessary. Understand the privacy settings and policies of the tools you're using. And decide where your own boundaries are. Technology being capable of doing something doesn't automatically mean we should use it that way. That question is part of learning AI too.
I'm Now Measuring Whether AI Is Actually Worth It
This is my newest experiment. Instead of measuring how many AI tools I'm using, I'm going to measure:
How much time did AI save me this week?
Did it save me 20 minutes planning my week?
An hour repurposing content?
Thirty minutes preparing my CEO report?
Two hours organizing student information?
Or did I spend three hours playing with a new tool that saved me ten minutes?
That's information I want. Because as a solopreneur, time is one of my most valuable resources.
If AI gives me time back, that's valuable. If it gives me another platform to manage, another subscription to pay for and another workflow to maintain, it might not be.
What I've Learned So Far
The biggest lesson from my experience with AI isn't that AI can do everything. It can't and I don't want it to.
The lesson is that AI becomes dramatically more useful when I stop asking it to replace me and start asking it to support me.
I don't need AI to have my ideas. I need somewhere to explore them (personal and business).
I don't need it to create my teaching philosophy. I can use it to challenge and clarify that philosophy.
I don't need it to mentor my students instead of me. I can use it to make additional educational support available to them.
I don't need it to decide how I run Yogi Institute. I can use it to organize information so I can make better decisions.
I don't need it to manufacture a personality for social media. I can use it to help distribute the ideas I'm already sharing.
And I definitely don't need another tool simply because everyone is talking about it. I need tools that give me something back.
For me, increasingly, that's time.
Time to teach, practice, learn, create, mentor, build relationships and time to step away from my business. And maybe that's the most important takeaway for other yoga teachers and solopreneurs who are curious about AI:
Don't start by asking how much of your work AI can do.
Start by asking:
What parts of my work require me—and what parts simply require my time?
Protect the first. Experiment with the second and then measure whether the technology actually gives you more space to do the work that matters.
That is where AI has become genuinely useful to me.
Ready to Explore AI for Yourself?
The biggest thing I can encourage you to do is explore it yourself.
If you're a yoga practitioner, try using AI as another tool for curiosity and reflection. Ask questions about something you experienced in practice. Explore yoga philosophy. Ask for journal prompts. Take a concept you heard in class and go deeper.
Yogi Institute students can also explore the Yogi Institute GPT Mentor, which was created using Yogi Institute curriculum to provide another layer of support alongside your education, practice, community and human mentorship.
→ EXPLORE THE YOGI INSTITUTE GPT MENTOR:
https://chatgpt.com/g/g-6a3d8fb10118819195527ee66d6f21d8-yogi-institute-mentor
If you're considering becoming a yoga teacher—or you're already teaching and wondering how AI might fit into your continued education—I think this is an incredibly interesting time to learn.
AI is changing how we access information, research questions, operate businesses and continue our education. At Yogi Institute, I'm interested in preparing teachers for the world they're actually teaching in while continuing to protect the parts of yoga education that I believe are deeply human: practice, discernment, mentorship, connection and community.
→ EXPLORE YOGI INSTITUTE TEACHER TRAINING & CONTINUING EDUCATION:
Explore Yogi Institute Teacher Trainings
And if you're nervous about AI?
Do your own research.
Don't let me convince you that AI is good. And don't let someone else convince you that it's bad.
Learn about the environmental concerns. Learn about privacy. Learn about misinformation and bias. Learn about the potential benefits. Experiment with different tools. Question what you read—including what AI tells you. Decide what information you're comfortable sharing. Pay attention to whether the technology actually improves your work, learning or life.
I believe we often find more of what we're looking for. If I spend all of my time looking for reasons AI is dangerous or harmful, I will find them. There are legitimate concerns worth understanding. If I look only for reasons AI is incredible, I'll find those too—and risk overlooking its limitations.
Personally, I'm choosing to explore the good while remaining curious about the whole picture.
I'm looking for the places where AI can create more accessibility, more support, more clarity, more creativity and more time. I'm experimenting. I'm learning. I'm questioning. I'm changing my mind when something doesn't work. And I'm continuing to educate myself.
You don't have to be afraid of a technology simply because you don't understand it yet.
Learn about it. Question it. Try it. Decide for yourself.
That, to me, is part of being a student.
Frequently Asked Questions About AI, Yoga & Yoga Teacher Training
1. How can yoga teachers use AI?
Yoga teachers can use AI for brainstorming class themes, exploring yoga philosophy, creating journal questions, researching topics, organizing ideas, adapting original content for different platforms, managing administrative work and analyzing their yoga business. AI can also help teachers reflect on their teaching by asking questions about sequencing, cueing, accessibility, atmosphere and student experience. The goal does not have to be having AI teach for you; it can be used as a tool that supports your own creativity, knowledge and decision-making.
2. Can I use ChatGPT to help with my yoga practice?
Yes. ChatGPT and other AI tools can be used to explore questions that arise during your yoga practice, generate reflection or journaling prompts, learn about yoga philosophy and anatomy, or help you think more deeply about something you experienced in class. AI-generated information can be incorrect, however, so it should not automatically be treated as authoritative—especially for medical concerns, injuries or decisions requiring individualized professional advice.
3. Can AI replace a yoga teacher or yoga teacher training?
AI can provide information and educational support, but that is different from the experience of learning with a skilled teacher. Yoga teacher training can include practice, observation, feedback, mentorship, community, teaching experience and the development of your own voice as a teacher. At Yogi Institute, AI is used as an additional educational tool rather than a replacement for human mentorship and connection.
4. How is AI used in Yogi Institute yoga teacher training?
Yogi Institute students have access to the Yogi Institute GPT Mentor, which was created using Yogi Institute educational materials to provide another layer of learning support. Students can use it to explore concepts, ask questions and think through their education alongside their training materials, practice, community and mentorship with a real teacher. Yogi Institute also uses AI behind the scenes for business organization, content workflows, research, planning and analysis.
5. Is AI good or bad for yoga teachers?
AI has both potential benefits and legitimate concerns. Teachers should consider issues including accuracy, privacy, bias, environmental impact, intellectual property and over-reliance on technology alongside potential benefits such as accessibility, efficiency, research support and creative exploration. Rather than treating AI as inherently good or bad, yoga teachers can educate themselves, experiment thoughtfully, verify important information and decide where the technology does—or does not—belong in their own practice and work.
