Who makes Ashtanga Shala and why, what the sequence and alignment text is based on, how the photos were made, how the site is funded, and how to reach us.
A free, sign-up-free self-practice guide to Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga — the whole sequence, posture by posture.
What is Ashtanga?
Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga is a set sequence of postures joined by breath and movement. The order never changes: sun salutations first, then the standing postures, the seated sequence, and a closing sequence of inversions and rest. Because the order is fixed, you spend no attention deciding what comes next — the sequence becomes a container, and the work moves into the breath.
Three things run through every posture, and together they are called tristhana. Ujjayi breathing is a soft ocean sound made by narrowing the throat, with the inhale and the exhale kept the same length. Bandha is the light inward lift of the pelvic floor and lower belly that keeps the spine long. Drishti is a single fixed gazing point given to each posture. When those three hold, the practice becomes steady rather than athletic.
One movement, one breath — that is vinyasa. A posture is usually held for five breaths and entered and left through the same counted steps. Traditionally the practice is done early in the morning, six days a week, resting on Saturdays and on the full and new moon.
How to use this site
Follow the sequence in order. The page below lists the sun salutations first, then each section of the series in its traditional order, so you can scroll and practise from top to bottom. The tabs at the top of the page switch between the Primary, Intermediate, and Advanced series.
Open a posture for the detail. Every pose has a page of its own with the counted entry steps, alignment notes for hands, feet, knees, and gaze, the mistakes that show up most often, and modifications and props for a body that is still opening.
Let Practice Mode keep the breath. It reads each posture aloud, counts the breaths at the pace you choose — four to eight seconds each — and moves on when the count is finished, so you can keep your eyes closed and stay with the breath instead of the screen.
Nothing here needs an account. The poses you mark as done are stored in your own browser and never leave it.
The sequence, from the sun salutations →
A sample posture page: Extended Triangle →
About the author
Written by Choi Seongjin — twenty years of Ashtanga practice, and currently teaching three classes a week. The text here is not a translation of someone else's manual: the entry steps, alignment notes, and common mistakes are written from that practice and that teaching, against the standards handed down in the Mysore tradition of Sri K. Pattabhi Jois.
It was built for people who practise alone, without a shala nearby. Two things go missing first when there is no teacher in the room — the order of the sequence, and the small alignment details someone would otherwise correct — so both are written down here, to be checked in the middle of a practice rather than remembered.
Every posture page carries the date its text was last revised, and corrections are welcome: if something here does not match what you were taught, say so and it will be checked.
More about the site and who runs it →