Working from home recently has been an enormous learning curve. Like everyone else worldwide, I am currently social distancing and staying home as much as possible. This week marks the 6th week I have been teaching pilates from my living room. Therefore all my regular pilates classes, 1-2-1 sessions, and teacher trainer courses are all being done “from home”.

For those who work in offices this may not seem like such a change, however when your job involves teaching people face-to-face, observing their movements and correcting their body position, modifying for their current injury or condition, responding to their cues, expressions, reading the mood in the room, and creating the correct atmosphere, moving this to “working from home” initially seemed like an impossible task.

When the lockdown was first implemented last month I applauded how quickly other pilates/yoga/fitness instructors took their businesses online. They were up and running literally the next day with a schedule and all the right equipment. For some reason I couldn’t take myself to do this. I think the shock of loosing my business literally overnight hit me so deep down that I felt paralysed about the whole situation. I couldn’t even begin looking in to what was required to attempt this.

I have spent the past 9 years growing this little business and putting my whole heart and soul in to it. It is so much more to me than just my job. It is how I pay the bills yes, but it is a community of people I have known for years and enjoy spending my weeks with, it is how I help others exercise, rehabilitate, and feel good, and most importantly I just love all the aspects the business brings so much that I spend all my spare time working on it too. Every single day.

Anyway, after my emotions managed to level-out a little, I did my research and got myself set up online. It has been a fantastic success so far but the reality of teaching online is a very different way of teaching when in the studio.

You can find out more about my online classes here, or drop me an email at tracy@ianm169.sg-host.com.

Here is how online teaching varies from studio teaching:

I’ll start with the most obvious points that you may already be thinking, but please keep reading as there is so much more to consider and provide some food for thought.

If you have read this far and want to join in, you can find out more about my online classes here, or drop me an email at tracy@ianm169.sg-host.com.

What has your experience of online classes been so far? I’d love to hear!