Kathryn Budig On What Wellness Spaces Can Do To Be More LGBTQ-Friendly

We're kicking off the series with one personal growth guru who knows a thing or two about speaking your truth: Kathryn Budig, the internationally beloved yoga instructor, author, and fashion designer who created a movement around her core spiritual message, Aim True. When Budig opened up about her relationship with her now-wife Kate Fagan (yes, the esteemed ESPN host and reporter—talk about a power couple) in 2016, she got a lot of love from her fans—some of them, at least. She opens up about losing followers after marrying Fagan (and not giving a shit), why she identifies as sexually fluid, and how wellness spaces can be more welcoming and inclusive to people who don't fit the stereotypical cookie-cutter mold of what a person in wellness looks like. 

Confidence obviously just comes through experience and repetition. I didn't start out confident in my voice as a teacher. That took time. I was a miniature of my mentor until I started to find my voice and what interests me, and ideally the path of being a teacher regardless of the genre that you fall under is that you continue to evolve as you learn more about yourself and about your students and the world around you. So it's been an evolution of I love ashtanga, and then I loved teaching hand balances, and then I started going more into the spiritual path of what it meant for me to "aim true," and it's just this constant evolution for me. I think the confidence for me personally comes from my ability to be willing to change at any given moment.

People would have less impostor syndrome if they really focused on their message as opposed to how many people are going to like what I have to say? That was a lesson that took a long time for me to understand. So now when I'm sharing something, there's no questioning what I'm saying. I totally believe everything that's coming out of my mouth, and whether or not people agree with me is totally up to them. If they don't like it, that used to really upset me, and now it's just like, that's cool—because there's thousands of other teachers out there, and if my message isn't connecting with you, then you can go get it from someone else. But I'm not going to change my ethos just because it's not fitting with someone else's.

I identify with sexually fluid because I am attracted to all genders. I, for the majority of my life, have been in romantic relationships with men. I, throughout my entire life, have been attracted to both men and women and have had sexual relationships with both. And I happened to fall in love with a woman, and I found my person, my lifelong person, in a female.

I don't identify with the word lesbian either because that insinuates that I've only been attracted to women my entire life, which is an incorrect representation of who I am. So "fluid" just feels appropriate to me because that's how I feel about sexuality. It's how I feel about attraction. That's how I feel about love.

Sure, on social media, I did see a big drop in numbers after I told people that I left my husband and that I was with a woman. And I'm sure some people were pissed that I got a divorce. Some people were probably pissed that I wasn't their American, white girl, blond, blue-eyed, heterosexual wet dream. And you know, you just gotta burst that bubble sometimes. I have yet to have a really nasty encounter with anyone over the fact that I'm with a woman. I have had some rude comments but nothing that I can't brush off my shoulder quickly.

I will never know for sure. I have noticed that since I have been open about our relationship that there has been a major decrease in followers and in how quickly I used to gather followers. But for all I know, that's just the Instagram algorithm. I don't know for sure. But I do notice that if I post a picture about us or something about the podcast that's specifically more about us and not necessarily our guests, that it gets a ton of love and comments and likes on the actual post, but behind the scenes, people drop out. It's disappointing, but it's also just like, you know, this is my relationship. I'm not going to adjust my relationship for your comfort level. If it makes you uncomfortable, then that's something that you should probably go sit with and figure out why it bothers you so much.

I wish people would work harder on understanding experiences that aren't their own. I also don't think the answer is to be cruel or rude to them. That's part of the reason why Kate and I started our podcast and talk about sexuality and our relationship and gender issues as much as we do. If people like her from her sports background and writing background, and they like me for my wellness and writing background, then hopefully they'll come listen to us and learn, and we can say something that they've never thought about before. And that's really our goal: to plant these seeds and get them to think bigger and change their perspective.

Even within verbiage when I'm teaching, I'm very aware of gender pronouns and making wide cultural references of, "Well, ladies, when your men just piss you off…!" What if you don't have a man, and that's not what you have at home? There are just little simple things that teachers, whether you're heteronormal or you belong to the LGBTQ community or you don't know what the fuck you are, you can make small adjustments that make everyone feel at least closer to being welcomed and being part of the family.

It's hard, too, because this is how our culture has been for a very long time. It's going to take some time. I think everyone slips up, but if you're regularly making the effort, that's massive.

Oh, completely. I mean, being married to a woman now completely changes the lens one looks through at the world. I take way more time to pause before I create.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.