029. Yoga & Law Q&A

In this episode, Amber Karnes talks with Cory Sterling of Conscious Counsel. Cory is a yoga teacher, practitioner, author, and an attorney, and he’s here to answer all our legal questions! (Or most of them, probably.) As Cory will tell us in the podcast, law in 2021 means communicating your expectations openly and honestly with heart-leading documents written in plain language. In this episode, we’ll talk about things like waivers, intellectual property, insurance, teaching online, LLCs, and much more.

This week hear more about:

• The importance of using legal documents to clearly and honestly communicate expectations within our yoga spaces
• The importance of understanding your responsibility to students in your care
• The importance of understanding “the duty of care” and “the standard of care”
• The myth that waivers of liability do not protect teachers and studios
• The difference in responsibility for in person and virtual classes
• The difference between a waiver and a disclaimer for offering classes on different platforms
• How to legally create boundaries for consent for touch, assists and adjustments 
• How to ethically navigate legal issues, complaints and accusations of harm 
• The importance of finding the right insurance for you
• How different business structures offer different benefits and protections
• The difference between being an employee vs. a contractor