I quit L'Oréal to become a yoga teacher. Here's what nobody tells you.

One day, sitting at my desk, a thought hit me so hard I couldn't shake it.

Do I really want to do this for the next 30 years?

Not because I hated my job. I want to be clear about that. I loved my job. I loved the L'Oréal Group and its brands, I loved my coworkers, I loved my salary very much. And I had a boss who was genuinely amazing (she's still one of my closest friends today). It wasn't burnout. It wasn't drama. It was something quieter, something harder to explain. Life was moving in a loop. Wake up. Work. Go home. Repeat. And one day, retire with my whole life already behind me.

I knew there had to be more than the cycle I was living in.

When I told people I was leaving, the questions came fast. Are you sure? Is this really what you want, or do you just need a new role? Even my husband asked if I was ready to live without that routine. Because structure, it turns out, feels safe even when it's quietly suffocating you.

But I was sure.

The first day after I left, I woke up and felt something I hadn't felt in years. Free. Like the options were suddenly unlimited. It felt strange and electric at the same time.

I had been practicing yoga since 2016. Nothing serious at first, at my local studio back at home, just classes at my building or at my local gym, something I did because of how it made me feel after. There was something about savasana that I couldn't explain. Time would just disappear. I'd come back to myself feeling like a completely different person.

Then one day an Instagram ad stopped me mid-scroll. A yoga teacher training at Mimi Yoga. I booked it before I even thought twice. I have nothing to lose but time, I told myself. Then I suggested to my husband that maybe we should try a class at the studio before the training. So we went together, and as soon as we walked in, Mimi welcomed us so warmly.

I took my teacher Ewa's Hypnotic Flow class. And Mimi ended up practicing right next to me.

It was all meant to be.

I'm not writing this to tell you to quit your job. That's not the point at all.

I'm writing this because I found my savasana. That thing where time completely disappears, where you're so fully in it that the rest of the world fades out. And it changed everything about how I show up in my life.

You don't have to leave anything to find yours. But I want you to find it.

What is the thing that makes you lose track of time? Whatever it is, protect it. Make space for it. Let it take up more room in your life.

That's where the fulfillment lives.

Andreina is a yoga and sculpt teacher based in Miami, teaching at Daily Flows Movement Studio in Coral Gables. Come find her on the mat or on Instagram @_andreinaaa.