If I were a boy...

Yoga is a female dominated profession. Our yoga studio has no male teachers. There are two other highly respected yoga studios in our state; only 8% and 16% of teachers are male. Laughing Lotus in New York City is 8% male; their San Francisco studio is 15% male.

In contrast, the 2010 Yoga Journal San Francisco teaching staff is 47.5% male. The 2010 Yoga Journal Boston teaching staff is 39.5% male.

This leaves me unsure whether it’s so challenging to become rich and famous teaching yoga, or if most women don’t hold that intention, either because they don’t want it or they don’t think they should want it.

It isn’t unusual for men, in a women dominated occupation, to make more money and hold higher status positions. According to an analysis of data in over 300 job classifications provided by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, women earn less in every occupation. Women currently make approximately 80 cents for every dollar that men earn.

In fact, the more women fill an occupation, the less it pays. Child care workers – of whom 98% are women -- are the fourth lowest earners, making just $265 a week. They are paid less than amusement park attendants, stock handlers, vehicle washers, workers in pest control, and almost every other category. Put your money where your values are, America.

Women dominated occupations, like teaching yoga, are characterized as vocations, as I discussed in a previous post. They are services provided to keep society humming: child care, nursing, home health aids. If you want to get rich in one of these careers, you are opportunistic. But if you want to make money as an investment banker, mortgage broker, or politician, you are ambitious.

A friend did a 200 hour teacher training with a male teacher who told his flock of fledgling teachers there was no reason they could not make $1,000 per week teaching yoga. He wasn't just blowing smoke, he believes it.

Why don’t I? I’m approaching that horizon, and declaring that it can be done. Then, why don’t I believe they can make that much money? Why would I never dare tell them they can?

Partly, it’s because I have no idea what has brought me from $50 per class to $150 per class. I don’t know what it is about my class that is filling the seats, or better now than before or finally gotten right that has doubled my class sizes. And even more frustrating, I don’t know what to do next to maintain the momentum. Thus, this exploration is partly to discover what it is I am doing that works.