When I look back at how I fell in love with Acroyoga, it never started with a syllabus or a grand life plan. It started with people. A friend dragged me to a jam, I saw strangers flying each other in the park, someone shouted, “Wanna try?” and suddenly my feet were in someone’s hips and we were wobbling our way into star, laughing like idiots. That messy, slightly awkward, completely magical connection is what hooked me. And honestly, it’s why I’m still here.
I didn’t stay for the perfect lines or the Instagram videos. I stayed for the humans.
As the founder of Beyond The Mat, people often assume I’m obsessed with technique, alignment, product specs, and “doing it right.” Sure, I care deeply about safety and quality — that’s non-negotiable. But the real engine behind everything I create is simple: the community. This weird and wonderful global tribe of people who choose to spend their free time stacking themselves into amateur acrobatics, trusting each other with their weight and their fear and their joy. I say this with a lot of love: Acroyoga is amateur acrobatics at its best. It doesn’t need to be perfect. It just needs to be real.
Over the years, I’ve watched Acroyoga get more polished, more performative, more curated for social media. There’s nothing wrong with that — high-level training is awesome, and I’m all for people leveling up. But somewhere between festivals, certifications, and “content,” it’s easy to lose the thing that made most of us start: play.
So I’ve been asking myself a big question: What if Acroyoga wasn’t just something we do in studios and festivals, but the way we actually explore the world together? That question is changing everything for me.
That’s the direction I’m taking Beyond The Mat. Yes, we’re still building gear. Yes, I’m still nerding out over fabrics and foam densities. But now I’m also building something much bigger: a living ecosystem of trainings and experiences around Bali and the surrounding islands.
Trainings are where we up-level — better spotting, stronger foundations, smarter progressions. Experiences are different. They’re not retreats. They’re not workshops. They’re adventures designed around one core idea: “Let’s go somewhere epic together, do Acro, and remember why this is fun.”
Here’s what that looks like. Imagine camper vans full of Acroyogis rolling around Bali this December. We catch sunrise at the ocean, stack humans on safe cliff edges, spin washing machines in the jungle, shoot photos under waterfalls, soak in hot springs, and finish the journey watching the sun set over a volcano. No certificate at the end. No hierarchy. Just shared playlists, inside jokes, sore abs from too much laughing, and the kind of photos and memories that make you think, How awesome is this my life right now? That’s the vibe I want to bottle.
And we’re not stopping at Bali. Most people come here and only see Canggu, Ubud, or Uluwatu. They miss the rest. I want to fix that. We’ll head to nearby islands like Lombok for long beach days, Acro on the sand, snorkeling, scuba dives, and sunset hangs around a fire. Then once a year, we go big: Raja Ampat. One of the top scuba destinations in the world. Picture a boat full of Acroyogis, sailing between islands, doing Acro on the deck between dives, exploring coral gardens by day and lying on the deck under a sky full of stars at night. “Live on a boat with your Acro tribe” turns from fantasy into an actual date on your calendar.
Trainings will still be a core part of this. I believe in raising the bar for our global Acro community — stronger bases, more confident flyers, better spotters, smarter progressions. The way I see it, trainings sharpen your tools; experiences give you somewhere unforgettable to use them. You don’t train just to tick off poses in a studio. You train so you can say yes to more trust, more adventure, more “I didn’t know I could do that” moments on cliffs, beaches, boats, jungles, and hot springs.
For me, Beyond The Mat has never only been about products. The AcroBack was my love letter to every base whose lower back was screaming but whose heart didn’t want to stop playing. These new experiences are my love letter to the whole community. To the friends who become family. To the people who cross oceans to jam. To the quiet introvert who finds their voice while spotting. To the flyer who finally learns to trust. To the base who says, “I’ve got you,” and means it.
So here’s the vision in one line: Beyond The Mat becomes your home base for Acroyoga life — gear, trainings, and wild experiences across Bali and beyond.
Some trips will be affordable, simple, “throw your bag in the van and let’s go” adventures. Others will be bigger, once-a-year, “this changed my life” journeys.
All of them will be grounded in the same values: connection, play, trust, and community. If you’ve ever seen a photo of people doing Acro on a cliff, at a waterfall, on a boat, under a volcano and thought, “One day…” — I’m building this so “one day” becomes a real option.
Come train. Come play. Let’s take Acroyoga off the mat and into the wild.
