Advanced Yoga Poses & Inversion Classes
Ready to flip your perspective? These advanced flows and inversions are designed to build your strength and focus, helping you find your edge while keeping your practice safe and mindful.
This is Eka Pada Koundinyasana II, a challenging arm balance that combines a twist and a leg extension. It requires significant core and upper body strength, which we build progressively in our intense flow classes.
Bakasana, or Crow Pose, is often the first arm balance students learn. It teaches you to trust your hands and engage your core to find a moment of flight.
Playing with handstands against the wall is a fun and safe way to build the strength and confidence needed for inversions. Remember, falling is just part of the fun!
A handstand, or Adho Mukha Vrksasana, reflected in a studio mirror. Inversions challenge our perspective and require deep concentration, which helps to quiet the mind.
This artistic shot of a handstand variation against the wall plays with light and shadow. Inversions teach us to find stability and grace even when our world is turned upside down.
This is a variation of Sirsasana, or Headstand. Inversions are a core part of our advanced practice, helping to build upper body strength, improve circulation, and calm the nervous system.
Practicing inversions together brings a sense of play and shared accomplishment. Here, we explore a synchronized wide-legged variation of headstand.
This forearm stand variation of a wide-legged forward bend is an intense inversion that deeply stretches the hamstrings. It's a pose that requires both strength and flexibility.
This standing balance pose, a variation of Garudasana or Eagle Pose, requires intense focus and stability. The concentration needed for such poses helps to shift the brain into a more tranquil state.
Svarga Dvijasana, or Bird of Paradise, is a beautiful and challenging standing pose that requires open hips and hamstrings. For me, my practice is a sacred space to find my balance.
About Finding Your Edge: Advanced Poses & Inversions
My advanced classes are not about perfecting a shape instantly. They are about progressive building. Whether we are working on Bakasana (Crow Pose) or Sirsasana (Headstand), we use wall support, props, and live posture corrections to ensure you find your balance and stability safely before taking flight.
Advanced yoga is often misunderstood as a display of flexibility. In reality, moving into advanced asanas and inversions is about quietening the mind and trusting your body's ability to hold space.
Building Towards Inversions
We don't just jump into handstands or deep arm balances. In our 'Intense & Resolute' batches, we break down the mechanics. We start with wrist and shoulder preparation, engage the core using specific breathing patterns, and only then progress to balancing. Whether you are practicing online or in our Bengaluru studio, the emphasis remains the same: steady breath and focused gaze, or drishti.
Safety in Practice
- Support: We frequently use wall support for handstands to build confidence and strength without the fear of falling.
- Props: Blocks and straps are not 'cheats.' They are essential tools that help you explore the alignment of poses like Bird of Paradise or Compass Pose while protecting your joints.
- Feedback: In our small group studio sessions, I provide tactile adjustments. In online live classes, I watch the grid to offer verbal cues, ensuring your alignment is correct even when you are practicing at home.
Why Practice Advanced Asanas?
Beyond the physical challenge, these poses shift your perspective. Holding a balance pose requires such intense concentration that your brain has no space for daily worries. It is a meditative state achieved through movement. My goal is to guide you through these challenges so you leave the mat feeling capable, not just sweaty.
Nikaya Yoga
I'm Namrata. I believe advanced yoga isn't about being perfect, it's about finding your edge with kindness. In these sessions, we use our mat as a lab to safely test our limits, whether you’re joining me online or in our Bengaluru studio.
Looking for a different type of class?
You can find sessions ranging from gentle recovery to intense flows by searching below.
More from Ongoing Yoga Classes (Online, In-Person & Private) by Nikaya Yoga