AlessiaFrisina

The first om

Alessia's path into yoga began not on a mat but in a university lecture hall. She was studying Asian Studies, Chinese as her first language, Hindi as her second, when the university organised a student trip to Rishikesh in India, situated on the holy Ganges river. She was twenty-one, and had never practised yoga before. She had hardly heard the word.

The group stayed at a small ashram with a yoga school attached. The first time she heard the sound om, she found herself in tears. "I just felt it in my whole body," she says, "unconsciously I was holding a lot of tension", and that sound melted away so much of what had built up.

Burnout, and the calling back

Home in Italy, she kept up the simple things she'd learned, some breathing, a few Hatha postures. They were nourishing, but she was young, with other priorities. She finished her degree and went to work in London. By her late twenties she was badly burnt out, looking for alternatives.

At twenty-nine, she felt the pull to return to Rishikesh, back to that same place, and committed to a 500-hour teacher training: two months in an ashram, days that ran from 4.30 in the morning until half past seven at night.

"It was pure magic. That got me deepening my studies, and I started teaching pretty much straight after."

Melbourne, and a door that opened through Little Mandarin

In 2018, rather than return to London's frenetic pace, Alessia and her husband moved to Melbourne. She arrived knowing no one, practising Ashtanga Vinyasa every day at a studio in the CBD. The Ashtanga community is small and close-knit, and a fellow student named Ian also taught across the road, at a studio called Little Mandarin, where the owners and many of the students were Chinese.

Having studied Chinese and lived in Beijing for five years, Alessia was a natural fit. "I'll be forever grateful," she says. "It had a huge impact." The studio's owner would go on to shape the very style she practises and teaches today.

Like most teachers starting out, her early schedule was scattered, travelling an hour or more to teach a one-hour class was the norm, as she gradually developed her experience and understanding of the art of teaching yoga. In those early days she had only five or six classes a week. The quiet gave her time to deepen her own Ashtanga Vinyasa practice, as well as her new focus on gentle mobility and balance.

Two pregnancies, a turn toward softness

With the arrival of COVID in 2020, and midway through her first pregnancy, Alessia did not feel comfortable practising Ashtanga over Zoom. She turned instead to Iyengar Yoga, practising for up to five hours a day online. "That was a huge learning curve for me," says Alessia. Her first child arrived in 2021; eight months later, her second. In between, there was some teaching at Little Mandarin, as well as at I Am That studio in Collingwood.

Yin, breath, and a home birth

After the arrival of her second child, Alessia began to teach at the well-established Warrior One studio in Brighton. Then, after connecting with prominent Melbourne yoga identity Masha Gorodilova, she commenced teaching at her Within Yoga studio in South Yarra. Over time Alessia has also developed additional teaching avenues, including a current residency at Grass Roots Yoga in St Kilda.

During her second pregnancy, Alessia leaned deeply into Yin and breathwork to prepare for a home birth. "I used yoga really as a way to prepare my body and mind for the experience of labour at home." This experience opened to her the world of Yin and gentle practice, which has become a key element of her teaching philosophy today.

Yin and Touch, ZenThai Shiatsu study and workshops

After completing her formal Yin training, Alessia completed an intensive training course in ZenThai Shiatsu, a practice that blends several modalities, including Thai massage, Zen Shiatsu and osteopathic adjustments. This beautifully flowing practice, combined with Alessia's deep connection to Yin yoga, has come together to create "Yin and Touch", merging the gentle flow that is ZenThai with the sensitive, intentional touch of yoga adjustments. Together with her teaching partner, Janita Doelken, Alessia hosts small group workshops at Within, Grass Roots, Warrior One and other locations.

The Yin Path, Yin Yoga teacher training

Alessia and Janita (Jani) are now offering a 30-hour Yin Yoga teacher training course, covering a range of subjects including Traditional Chinese Medicine meridians and how they intersect with yoga poses, the use of props, hands-on teaching instruction and a whole lot more. Last year's course graduated fifteen teachers, and the next course will be held in August 2026.