ABOUT

Hi! I'm Karina

Yoga is a life long journey of study and practice, the more you learn the less you realise you know. Which itself is humbling to discover. Being able to pass on my experience of Yoga has been a real gift. I continue to learn from teachers, students and indeed my own children on how to follow the path of Yoga. I started my Yoga journey in 2000 when I joined a bikrim yoga class to help me with a dodgy knee, my knee became stronger and I was hooked, regularly attending classes 3 times a week after work.

As time passed I started to inquire further into what Yoga was really about and decided to take a trip to India. Where I stayed at a Sivananda Ashram and experience their Yoga vacation and discovered a whole new world of Yoga philosophy, Karma yoga, meditation, Pranayama and Satsang. Over the next few years I made several trips to India visiting various yoga teachers and trying out different styles of Yoga. Studying in the South in Arambol with Sharat Arora at the Himalayan Iyengar Yoga Centre taking regular classes and completing an Intensive course. In the North of India I studyed with the Rajiv Chanchani at the Yog-ganga centre for Yoga studies in Dehradun and also various other courses in Mysore and Varanasi.

In 2005 I decided to further my interest in Yoga by traveling to Albuquerque, New Mexico , USA to study Ayurveda at the Ayurveda institue to learn about the principles and practices of a discipline which is over 5000 years old and has healed millions of people world wide. At the institute I complete the Ayurveda Practitioners first year course 1240 hours study, with Ayurvedic Physician Dr Vasant Lad. Also completed the Yoga Alliance 200hrs Yoga teacher trainer certificate. Taking a year to really live and breath Ayurveda and Yoga was an incredible experience, and applying the Ayurveda principles to the practice of Yoga changed the way I practice and helped me to feel strong, healthy and balanced. I also completed training in Ayuryoga level 1 and Ayuryoga level 2 with Chitra Glauque and Michele Schulz at the institute. This training really inspires and influences my Hatha yoga for women classes.

After returning to the UK in 2006, I began to teach in London and also to run a free class for homeless people at a London drop in centre. As well as teaching and practicing I always have a desire to learn more and took the Yoga Therapy Foundation course at the Yoga therapy centre, London. I also attended Yoga holidays with Skyros Holistic Holidays in Greece. In most recent years the experience of pregnancy led me to attend classes in London with Francoise Freedman. I felt so nurtured and relaxed by her teaching that I looked into becoming a Birthlight yoga teacher. During my second pregnancy in 2008 I studied with Birthlight and qualified as a Perinatal yoga teacher. Being able to follow the Birthlight mission of enabling women to enjoy their pregnancy, birth and baby has been a great inspiration to me and I hope has helped numerous women. I continued to develop my Perinatal teaching by undertaking a further Postnatal studies programme of Baby Yoga with Sitaram, I attended the Postnatal diploma course at the Burren Yoga centre in Ireland in October 2009. I attend yearly CPD (continuing practice days) for my Hatha yoga, Pregnancy and Postnatal studies…