Leaving Behind a 70k Salary to Pursue Pilates - A Timeline and Financial Breakdown

I left behind a salaried job with health insurance, paid time off, sick leave and a 40% off discount at several brands including West Elm (what was I thinking?!) to teach Pilates full-time. It was a leap, one that I honestly wouldn’t have been able to do so whole heartedly without the support (emotionally and most certainly financially) of my husband. I recognize that being married inherently gives me an upper hand vs my single readers out there, but I hope you can still find something useful, inspirational, or at least interesting in my breakdown of my transition to Pilates Instructor. My desire and ability to transition to this service-based job started with the financial decision making and frugality mindset that I adopted straight out of school, so bear with me, we’re going all the way back to:

2012
I graduated from the University of MN with a B.S. in Graphic Design. Straight out of school I got a 3 month internship for $15/hour, then landed a job at Target Corporate Headquarters in Minneapolis. I was a Graphic Designer for their Weekly Ad. I started with a salary of 50k, when I left (3 years later) my salary was 53.5k. During these 3 years I essentially lived like I was still in college: I had a roommate (my boyfriend, now husband) in an apartment that cost the same as our college rental, we shared a car, we made food at home and I started reading the blog Mr Money Moustache. This blog instilled in me the importance of, and encouragement to, live well within my means. In those 3 years I paid off 20k in student loans, I never took on any credit card debt and I saved 26k in my 401k. My husband and I also saved roughly 3 months of living expenses which gave us enough financial freedom to quit our jobs and move to Portland, OR in 2015.

2015
Neither my husband or I had jobs when we moved, but luckily after about 2 months of applying and interviewing for jobs I started work as a Graphic Designer for Rejuvenation, my starting salary was 53.5k. It went up about 1k each year.

2018
Feb?/March? (Can’t remember for sure)
I was promoted to Creative Manager, my salary jumped to 70k. At the time of my promotion I had already enrolled in my Pilates teacher training, but I thought, “Great! I can save more for when I leave!”

September - November
I began my Pilates Teacher Training while still working full-time as a Creative Manager, it was a lot but my excitement around the training energized me and made it doable.

Around this time I had saved enough to pay for my Pilates teacher training in one lump sum (saving me $500, small but something!), another 30k in my 401k and about 3 months in living expenses.

December
I accepted a position as a Pilates Instructor at a Chiropractic office in Portland, OR. I was an employee (not contractor) and I made anywhere from $42 - $129/hour (higher rate was for insurance payouts due to car accidents etc). This was prior to receiving my certification, but I had finished my mat and reformer modules, which is all I would be teaching at this office. Accepting this job was a hard decision, I had MAJOR imposter syndrome, a blog post for another time because making the leap from giving free private sessions to charging $60 - $80/session is HARD! Especially when you aren’t fully certified!

I left my salaried position and stayed on to work as a Freelance Graphic Designer at Rejuvenation. I worked 1 day/week at $35/hour. I usually made more in that one day than I made all week as a Pilates Instructor, but I had to start somewhere!

2019
March
I started teaching 2 open-level Pilates classes per week at a boutique gym/spa. I was an employee (not contractor), I made $35/class and could soak/sauna/steam before/after my classes.

May
I tested out of my Pilates teacher training and received my certificate. I started teaching 2-5 classes/week at Cascadia Pilates, the studio where I did my training. I was an employee (not contractor) and, because class rates were based on attendance, I made anywhere from $15 - $45 per class.

June
I joined a 4th studio and taught 1 class/week, as well as a few sporadic private sessions. I was a contractor (not employee) and, because class rates were based on attendance, I made anywhere from $35 - $55 per class.

In total, by the end of June I was working about 15 hours a week as a Pilates Instructor (more if I was on weekend rotation). I stopped working for Rejuvenation as a Freelance Graphic Designer (they replaced me with a full-time employee).

July - September
My Dad was diagnosed with, and heartbreakingly died of, Stage IV cancer. I worked intermittently during this time but eventually went home for 8 weeks to be with family.

October
I returned to work at all 4 jobs, teaching about 15 hours a week.

Total Income for 2019
During 2019 I made roughly $30,000. About 1/5 of that came from Freelance Graphic Design work. Worth noting, I did not work for about 2 months due to my Dad’s cancer diagnosis.

I realized in the fall of 2019 that I just wasn’t making enough to sustain the lifestyle I wanted while also reaching my savings goals (retirement, vacation etc). I needed to either find more teaching hours or balance teaching with another part-time job (Graphic Design or other). Serendipitously, this was when I was approached by the owner of Cascadia Pilates to join the team as General Manager for their new studio.

2020
January
I accepted a position and started logging hours as General Manager for Cascadia Pilates. I worked roughly 15 - 20 hours a week as Manager in addition to about 15 hours of teaching across 3 different studios/offices (after I accepted this offer I stopped teaching at one studio). This new division of admin/teaching felt like a great balance and was financially sustainable, I was making about $650/week. But then…

March - August
COVID hit.

I’ve been collecting unemployment and working as much as I can. I’m focused on helping the studio I manage survive, and one day thrive, while also looking ahead to how I may need to pivot during the coming year.

Final Thoughts and a Financial Disclaimer
This was my path, it does not mean that you should try to emulate it or expect your experience to be exactly, or anything remotely, like mine. But when I was searching for anecdotes about how others made the transition I found few, and none gave the (rather bleak) numbers with regards to hours worked and wages earned in the beginning of their careers that I’ve shared here. I hope that, if nothing else, this post can serve as a very realistic example of what one person experienced, so you can make choices, or at least ask yourself the hard questions you need to, before making this, or a similar, transition. If I hadn’t had a financially stable husband during this time, I doubt I would have jumped in with both feet.

Going forward, I will be including one HUGE caveat to all financial posts, and that is that when my Dad died, he left me and my siblings each $200,00 for our rollover 401k and roughly $100,000 in cash (through life insurance policies). It goes without saying I would rather have my Dad than this money, but the money he left me is a gift that now allows me to make very different choices when it comes to my career. I can work less, I can save less for retirement, I don’t need to save for a house downpayment. So even though I didn’t have that money when I made the decision to leave my corporate, salaried job, it certainly has an enormous effect on whether I will ever have to begrudgingly return to a corporate, salaried job to meet certain financial goals.

If you made it all the way to this sentence, thank you! I hope this glimpse into my transition has provoked some thoughts, questions, concerns or hope for you and your future as a Pilates Instructor or whatever else you may choose!

If you have any questions or feedback, please write a comment and I’ll respond as soon as I can :)