Balancing Business and Karma

Learn how to make a difference in the world and make ends meet.

By Meghan Searles Gardner

To give or not to give: for most yoga teachers it's not even a question. We tend to be givers by nature, offering our time, our energy, and our expertise selflessly. But most of us have financial responsibilities that make karma margi—the path of purely selfless service pursued by the likes of Gandhi and Mother Teresa—impossible.

Finding a balance between work that puts others first and work that puts food on the table can be a real challenge. As Mary Kay Chryssicas, a children's yoga expert and author in Wellesley, Massachusetts, puts it, "People ask me to teach for free all the time. They assume I am just dabbling in yoga and have a big heart."

But, Chryssicas notes, yoga studio rents in the Boston area are "astronomical," and while she donates a large amount of her time, teaching free classes at inner city schools and giving to various charitable causes, her profession is not just a hobby but a business.

For many instructors, what is at stake is the very essence of what it means to give. "People who are drawn to teaching yoga are nurturers," says San Francisco-based teacher Rusty Wells. "We're vulnerable to offering away our skills, talents, and resources [for free]."

Too often, all that giving leaves teachers depleted—spiritually, physically, and financially.

Running from the Numbers

Generosity is a key tenet of yogic philosophy. Apariagraha, one of the five yamas, or ethical disciplines, requires yogis to give up anything they do not really need. Part of possessing only what one needs is charity: giving away the surplus to people who might need it more.

Giving may be at the core of a yogi's life, but, as B.K.S. Iyengar writes in Light on Yoga, "neither should one take anything without working for it or as a favor from another." In other words, compensation should be seen not as an entitlement but as something to be earned. Another way of looking at it is to assign value to your work: if you put in the honest time, you deserve to make a dime.

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