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is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Episode 3: Gurus Killed Yoga

Jesal: Warning: This episode is really triggering because the content deals with sexual abuse and misconduct. (Moved up several lines)

Tejal: He would have the youngest girls sleep in the quarters nearest to him.

Jesal: That sounds like some R. Kelly shit right there.

Tejal: This is -- yes. This is some R. Kelly Muktananda shit.

Tejal: Hello everyone. I'm Tejal.

Jesal: And I'm Jesal.

Tejal: And this is Yoga Is Dead.

Jesal: We're two Indian American yoga teachers navigating the weird and tricky world of yoga.

Tejal: Get read to hear our personal stories, thoughts, and research on who killed yoga. Grab some chai, a tall comfortable seat, and let's go.

Tejal: Jesal, do you have any gurus?

Jesal: I think I consider my dance teacher my guru?

Tejal: Ooh. Bachata? Salsa?

Jesal: [laughs] No. Just like many Indian American girls, I did almost every single week from when I was 5 to like 18 or 19.

Tejal: Oh, Bharatanatyam. Classical South Indian dance?

Jesal: Yep. And shout-out to all the New England ladies who did Bharatanatyam with Jasmine Shah! Woot woot! She's a little celebrity up there.

Tejal: I'd like to see the demographics of how many of those New England Bharatanatyam students are listening to this podcast right now.

Jesal: That would be amazing.

Tejal: Yes. Well, since this is a yoga podcast --

Jesal: [laughs]

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Tejal: What about a guru, like a spiritual teacher, a guide in all things, someone who you find influential. Anyone come to mind like that?

Jesal: I don't really think I believe in those types of gurus. I have plenty of teachers, people I rely on for specific purposes like or or talks, or even teachers that have insight into business or philosophy or general teaching stuff, but I would really consider them mentors. I don't think I would use the word guru.

Tejal: Okay. Well, let's clarify the purpose of this podcast. Did gurus kill yoga? ​ Jesal: Ooh.

Tejal: And let's clarify what we're not talking about: gurus in terms of teachers or mentors, like you mentioned, that you rely on for movement practice or specific technical things or philosophical things. We're talking about the history and tradition of following a guru without question. The kind of guru that, for whatever reason, you admire and never admonish, that explains things to you that you never question. The guru that makes you feel whole and included in a way you've never felt before. The guru that gave you a sense of belonging and reminds you that they can also take it away with any hint of provocation.

Jesal: That concept just gives me the shivers. [laughs]

Tejal: Yeah. It's kind of scary just saying it.

Jesal: Yeah. It makes me so uncomfortable.

Tejal: Which is a good time to say this episode might be triggering for some. We talk about issues like sexual, emotional, physical abuse. Please be prepared.

Jesal: I would never give up my power in that absolute, unquestioning way, ever.

Tejal: So, let's do a little back and forth then. You say a name of a yoga school or religious tradition, and I say the name of a guru or powerful leader that was accused of some kind of abuse or misconduct, whether it be sexual, emotional, financial, or physical. All of these constitute an abuse of power. And looking at it from a yoga perspective, these leaders violated their vows of brahmacharya or , aka or non-harming/.

Jesal: Okay, ready?

Tejal: Ready as I'll ever be.

Jesal: Ashtanga.

Tejal: Pattabhi Jois.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: Iyengar.

Tejal: B.K.S. himself.

Jesal: movement.

Tejal: Rajneesh himself, also known as Osho, some weird marketing thing.

Jesal: They made a movie on that, or series.

Tejal: Wild Wild Country on Netflix.

Jesal: Right.

Tejal: Very compelling.

Jesal: Transcendental meditation.

Tejal: Maharishi Mahesh , also known as the Beatles'... guru.

Jesal: Anusara.

Tejal: John Friend.

Jesal: Jivamukti.

Tejal: Ruth Lauer Manenti.

Jesal: .

Tejal: Michael Roach.

Jesal: Tantric Order of America.

Tejal: , aka The Great Oom.

Jesal: Yoga.

Tejal: Swami Muktananda.

Jesal: Zen Buddhism.

Tejal: Eido Shimano and Richard Baker, just to name two in the U.S.

Jesal: Kripalu.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Tejal: Amrit Desai had a scandal.

Jesal: The Hare .

Tejal: Like literally a whole score of them apparently.

Jesal: .

Tejal: Yogi .

Jesal: Shambhala.

Tejal: Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche.

Jesal: Rinpoche? [pronunciation]

Tejal: Rinpoche?

Jesal: I don't know.

Tejal: We'll see.

Jesal: And I think we missed another Iyengar teacher, like our lead teacher.

Tejal: Let's see if I can say this properly: Manouso Manos.

Jesal: Yeah. That's a lot of predators in the guru realm.

Tejal: Yeah. I think we forgot one big one: Bikram.

Jesal: Oh right.

Tejal: Bikram Choudhury.

Jesal: And this is just in the yoga community. This doesn't even include like religious or sub-religious leaders in India, which they have a lot of them.

Tejal: And there are a lot of people not named here.

Jesal: And this doesn't even begin to list all the swamis and babas and gurus in India that are just super charlatans or total frauds. I mean, people sincerely believe in a lot of these leaders.

Tejal: Yeah. One big name, like Baba Ramdev.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: I don't think that he as at least yet been accused of sexual assault, but he has said some creepy and fraudulent things, not to mention, on record.

Tejal: He's literally the most powerful TV guru in India.

Jesal: Key: TV guru [laughs]

Tejal: Yep.

Jesal: Isn't he worth billions?

Tejal: Yeah. At least that's what Forbes and The Times of India and Bloomberg have reported. How a guru builds an empire and is valued at billions is just something to ponder. Yet somehow he wants us to believe he's this poor - there's that word again - ascetic monk ​ ​ ​ who lives on an and uses the money only to serve the poor.

Jesal: But isn't that ashram like in Scotland?

Tejal: knows why.

Jesal: know why. ​ Tejal: That's right. Yep. I mean, my real problem with him isn't really the money, although that's a problem. Let's be honest. But, in theory you can still be a good person with lots of money. In theory.

Jesal: Theoretically, right.

Tejal: He has said a lot of things that are just fraudulent, and people are just taking it for face value, which is very terrifying.

Jesal: Yeah. I mean he claims that pranayama can cure pretty much every disease in the world. I think he's even said - don't quote me on this, but I'm pretty sure he said that pranayama can cure AIDS and premature ejaculation. Aside from the usual, you know, hypertension and all those things.

Tejal: He thinks that yoga should be taught in place of sex ed. WTMF! And he said publicly... this hurts. I mean, this whole episode is going to hurt a little. But he said publicly that he thinks homosexuality is a mental disorder and a bad habit, and he invited homosexuals to his ashram so he could cure them.

Jesal: Yeah. WTF.

Tejal: Someone with that many prejudices and is allied with the Hindu nationalist prime in India definitely has more yoga monsters under his mat. ​ ​

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: Yup. I don't think we've seen all of those monsters yet.

Jesal: There's so many babas I can hardly name them, but I was watching Hasan Minhaj's show Patriot Act and -

Tejal: Amazing edutainment show. God I it.

Jesal: Speaking of , he did an episode on the Indian elections and he talked about this crazy monk named Yogi Adityanath. He's also the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, and this guy, aside from being involved in politics, he's known for being an extreme Hindu nationalist and making hate speeches against religious minorities in India. And he also said - if men develop feminine traits they become gods, but if women develop masculine traits they become demons. Misogynist much?

Tejal: You might think India is just full of yoga and acceptance, but these are serious issues in India that are continuing to happen in modern day, but I really that the place that ​ ​ our and heritage and background and family is from can really get their shit together.

Jesal: [laughs]

Tejal: Because this is some depressing shit.

Jesal: Yeah. And I mean, we haven't even talked about , who arguably, aside from Baba Ramdev, is like one of the biggest known babas in India. Or was, I should say. ​ ​ And he is like one of those rare figures you actually see worshiped in both East and West. And I looked him up - he's been accused of everything from sexual abuse, money laundering, fraud, and even murder.

Tejal: Yeah. When we decided to talk about Sathya Sai Baba, it freaked me out a little bit because I recall his framed picture everywhere in homes, family friends' homes little ​ ​ … smiling guy with a fro wearing saffron colors and he's not above this. He's right in it. … Jesal: Right. And just to connect back to our White Women Killed Yoga episode, I researched Sathya Sai Baba because he was connected with . They were super close and she was a devotee of his. And rumored, allegedly, that they might have even had an intimate relationship.

Tejal: So most of the gurus that we mentioned seem to have a sex problem. So let's take a moment to talk about how that relates to the yoga practice.

Jesal: Right. There's this concept in yoga called brahmacharya!

Tejal: Da da da dun.

Jesal: Da da da dun.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Tejal: I mean no flutes or doves on that one, because this is just a concept that's been totally mushed and pulled apart in the West, because I don't think people want to believe the traditional definition of it.

Jesal: What is brahmacharya, Tejal?

Tejal: We know it's part of the eight-limbed path of yoga, and it's translated in many ways - but it's supposed to mean celibacy. Keep it in your pants. Don't unzip. No sex.

Jesal: Don't people say it's like restraint, or like using your energy with intent and purpose?

Tejal: They do, but let's be honest. Brahmacharya is about celibacy. It is about abstaining from sexual intercourse and sexual activity. It's fine if you don't work with it that way, but let's not change the meaning of it.

Jesal: I don't know anyone who really, actually follows brahmacharya in its true meaning. Do you?

Tejal: I like to think I do, but I'm going to say I'm jaded from actually believing that's the since I've never asked them point blank. But who I'm talking about are - my swami that's in India, my yoga guru at the Sivananda-related ashram in India, and the yoga guru's older brother who's a swami. But, again, I've never asked them point blank. I don't want to. That's super uncomfortable, but ...

Jesal: Right. And looking at our list of all types of abuses - but of those, the ones that are sexual predators or abusers, many of them claimed to be celibate.

Tejal: Yeah, swamis.

Jesal: Not all of them.

Tejal: Yeah.

Jesal: Like Osho was open about sexuality or whatever, and we're not accusing Bikram of sexual... not that I'm accusing him. Whoever is accusing him is not accusing him of sexual predatory behavior, at least not yet.

Tejal: Oh, Bikram?

Jesal: Yeah.

Tejal: No. 100%.

Jesal: Oh, no. Sorry. B.K.S. Iyengar. Sorry.

Tejal: Right.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: But, no, Bikram is totally...

Tejal: I was like... yeah, let's not get those lines crossed.

Jesal: No, but a lot of them... some of the other ones were thought to be celibate, and it turns out they were not celibate.

Tejal: So, what are your thoughts on celibacy, brahmacharya, pranidhana, to God... because most people calling themselves or gurus or yoga teachers are not celibate.

Jesal: No. I would say that for surrender to God, I think of God as more within us. And of course, I had a Hindu upbringing, not that I'm a religious, practicing Hindu, but I think that idea of atman still sticks with me, the idea that there is God in everything and everyone, at least living- living creatures. And I think that surrender to that God is just as valid as to the, you know, universal being, whatever that may look like.

Jesal: So, Tejal, why do you think that people follow gurus, and would you ever want to follow a guru?

Tejal: You know, I think people need to fill a void and oftentimes they were wow-ed, or are wow-ed. There's a definite wow factor to all the gurus we mentioned earlier because they branded something that had never been done before for this population or that ​ ​ ​ population. Say, a guru from the East comes over to the West. Now, he's this mystical that has all this knowledge.

Jesal: Like Kumaré?

Tejal: Ooh. Who's Kumaré? Let's talk about this guy.

Jesal: Kumaré is a satirical fiction character similar to Borat who was created by Indian American filmmaker Vikram Gandhi. I saw Vikram's TEDx Talk in which he explains that he had been researching the yoga scene in and he had been coming across all sorts of gurus and quote unquote masters. He found that some of them genuinely were inspirational while others were complete frauds. And he wanted to know more about them and really get an inside look, and he thought that by being on of them he could understand them better. So, that's what he did. He turned himself into a guru.

Jesal: And he used storytelling and branding and marketing to create this character, Kumare. And of course, he exploited the West's fascination with Eastern mystics to make himself seem legitimate. And similarly to Borat, he takes this guru on the road, and he filmed whatever happened. So, he goes to Arizona and becomes a guru to a group of people there. And he concludes very much exactly what you were saying - that as a guru he was able to fill a void that some people had.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: And he describes his role as being a few things. He describes it as letting people believe he knew the answers. As listening intently - he said he didn't look at his phone for the entire four months that he was filming. And because he was playing a character and not being himself, he wasn't distracted by his own problems. And he said that his role was to reflect back to people a better version of themselves, a version that they aspired to be.

Tejal: Wow. It actually seems he went in a bit cynical and came out understanding human needs a little better. I think there's a quote that encapsulates so much of what gurus have to offer, and this quote is by Dickon Kent who lived on the ranch, the Rajneeshee Ranch in Oregon from ages 12 to 17. So, later he writes an article, and it's called What Wild Wild Country Didn't Say: 57 Answers to Questions about Rajneeshpuram from a Teenage Resident.

Tejal: And he concludes that, "For me Rajneesh was a well-read university professor who was very good at combining eastern , philosophy, elements of , and good jokes to create a compelling message that resonated with people looking for something different. He had a good brand, and I'm not saying this cynically, he put together a good package at the right time to appeal to many, many people."

Jesal: Yeah, which going back to Kumaré is essentially what he did. He created a brand, and then he gave the people what they wanted, he listened.

Tejal: He named a few of the voids or needs of followers that he felt he fulfilled as a guru. We think it's a safe assumption to say that many people coming to yoga are seeking something. Let's go into these types of voids.

Jesal: It could be hurt, trauma, helplessness, a feeling of loss or feeling lost. There are definitely people who come to yoga because of addiction, and they replace that addiction with yoga. There are some people that seek external validation, or they're filling the burden of not having all the answers. I don't think the reasons are any different than people who seek out other , which is why we see abuses of these kinds through all types of religions. But maybe in the yoga world it just seems more apparent since most people have to go out of their way to find yoga.

Jesal: In the West, we have a ton of options when it comes to religions and spiritual traditions that we sort of mix and match. And you have to choose yoga. Compare that to what we commonly see in India where many families might practice yoga alongside or folded in as part of other religious practices, but most householders don't necessarily replace their Hindu, Sikh, Muslim, or other religions with only yoga the way we see here. ​ ​ Tejal: It ends up being a situation where people transfer that need to be fulfilled. The surrender of their power moves from religion into yoga, from a priest to a guru, without taking a moment, without pausing, to recognize it's straight up . It's more surprising in yoga because in the West it seems we believe that yoga is somehow safe from these pitfalls. We've built up this idea in our collective conscious that yoga is divorced from much of the cultural, religious, and historical context it came from. That

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription it's somehow better, different, safer, and even more accepting than it actually is. Yoga has become a catch-all pastime activity when it's really a structured, spiritual discipline.

Tejal: We create this fantasy, this idea that yoga is individualistic - versus religion, which relies on a collective belief. But that's not reality. When we see people who leave behind a Judeo-Christian narrative or any other religious narrative to come here, they come in with blinders on thinking this is the safe haven they've been seeking. Folks lower their guard so much, they don't see the monsters lurking under the mat.

Jesal: So with all that said, Tejal, have you ever wanted to find a guru in your life?

Tejal: Personally, I'm in the market for mentors. I'll just put that out there. Here's a help wanted ad. Not really though, but ... Guru sounds corny as hell to me, and I'm a bit too cynical to fall for that, especially after all this podcast research. According to Gretchen Rubin's Four Tendencies, I'm a questioner, which, I think, a guru wouldn't be too please with.

Jesal: What? You wouldn't fall in line?

Tejal: Nope. Not without all the questions that would end up breaking their façade and pissing them off. When I first started my yoga teaching, I was looking out for mentors, and I didn't realize it at first, but I assumed everyone offering me a teaching job was someone I could look up to.

Jesal: I think I did that too.

Tejal: Yeah. My first year of teaching was such a rude awakening. So many yoga studio owners do not have their shit together.

Jesal: You don't need to be advanced in yoga or meditation or enlightenment. You just need to have capital backing to open a yoga studio.

Tejal: So, what I found is that they either didn't know the first thing about running a business or didn't know how to communicate without being passive aggressive, condescending, even bitchy, and it took me a while to realize that, which was something that surprised me a lot. So, now, I'm happy to connect with people as it naturally happens over time and through consistent connection, and I learn more about them and they learn more about me. You have to find someone who's interested in you, not just the other way around.

Jesal: And you have somebody, right, that you currently do a or completed a mentorship with?

Tejal: Yeah. I reference Juliana Mitchell. I reference [Sharon's 00:19:53]. I got lucky because ... I mean, that's just it. I felt lucky to be around her, and I started to really notice that. Our relationship just progressed over the years, and, when I felt ready, I took her prenatal level one training. After that, I completed a 75-hour private

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription mentorship with year, and next month I'm attending her prenatal level two training. I appreciate so many things about her dedication and knowledge, and I'm in awe of how she lives her life, but she in turn considers me her friend. So, we have a two-way relationship.

Jesal: But she's not a guru.

Tejal: No. I consider her a beautiful friend and a mentor, not a guru. I simply think that term is unsafe for any fallible human being.

Jesal: Right.

Tejal: How about you?

Jesal: I think there was a time maybe in my life where I was seeking one. During this time, I remember feeling very lost. I was at the ashram, I think. I remember someone saying, "When you're ready, the teacher will appear." Have you hear that one?

Tejal: Like you have to believe and buy into it in order for these sayings to make sense?

Jesal: I feel like that phrase is just wishful thinking a lot of the time. And I eventually found my own way, and I realized that the idea of a guru is an illusion. The thought of giving up my power to someone else was really seductive in the beginning, but it was seductive because I felt like I wouldn't have to bear the full burden of my decisions, or my journey, or my feeling lost.

Tejal: Why did owning your decisions feel heavy?

Jesal: It just did. I mean, life is full of crap for everybody. And I'm not trying to say my crap is more crappier than someone else's. I'm just saying.

Tejal: No. I didn't get that at all.

Jesal: I'm just saying everybody experiences difficult, dark times in their life or difficult, dark emotions and relationships and problems, and, like the Buddha says, life is suffering. And I think this idea of having somebody just take that all away is really-

Tejal: Seductive. That's a great word.

Jesal: Yeah. It's a seductive idea. We had a discussion actually this morning about how when you have that disillusionment even with your parents let alone a teacher. Even if you have great parents, there's a time in your relationship when you realize, oh, they don't have all the answers. They're fallible human beings.

Tejal: They're doing the best they can is the best thing you can think of them.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: Right. Exactly. And you realize ultimately whatever you're seeking in them you have to be for yourself, and I think the same is true of gurus. I think the same is true of bosses. When I was a cog in the wheel at my first job, like bottom of the ladder, I thought my bosses had it all figured out. I really did. I thought that they knew all the answers, they knew what to do all the time. Then, I started my own business, and I felt like I was comparing myself to those people. Like, "Oh, why is it that everyone else knows what to do and has it figured out, and why am I struggling?" You'll get a lot of that, "Why me? Why am I struggling? What's wrong with me?"

Jesal: Then I joined a small company as an admin while I was doing my teacher trainings. They were successful. It was a small company, and I was admin to the CEO, who's this wonderful person. She was doing good, but ... I mean, not just good. She ran a successful business. But what I realized in her was that she was fallible and that she was just figuring it out too like everybody else.

Tejal: She didn't have all the answers.

Jesal: Right. And she obviously had experience behind her, and she had years and years of working in the industry, but it's not like she was perfect or magically knew everything. Like, no was coming to her in her sleep telling her what to do the next day.

Tejal: Did that feel like a relief when you realized that?

Jesal: It did. It felt like a huge relief, like, oh. It dawned on me. Oh, this is everybody, every CEO, every head of a company, anybody doing anything. Nobody has it all figured out. Everybody's just kind of doing trial and error, seeing what works, learning from it, moving on, and it helped me let that perfectionist part of me go a little bit.

Tejal: That's great that you could learn from her in that way.

Jesal: Yeah. I mean, I don't think she knows that that's what one of the things she taught me, but she definitely taught me that, hey, being successful is about doing, just going, just moving forward. And that's not to say that I don't have teachers I look up to and that I continuously learn from. I just don't idolize them as superhuman. I recognize their humanity and fallibility in all of them, and I think I try to take what's good, and I try to leave what's bad.

Tejal: Yeah, absolutely. It's fair to say we've had teachers and mentors that came to us in different forms, and though there's been a desire for a guru at some point, we've not fallen prey. Before we talk in depth about the gurus we mentioned earlier, I'll read you a famous . As a Hindu, it's one of the first you learn growing up, and you might have heard in a or a yoga class.

Tejal: "Guru , Guru , Guru Devo Maheshwara; Guru Sakshat Param Brahma, Tasmai Guravay Namah."

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: And if you were ever wondering how it was pronounced, that's how it's pronounced.

Tejal: "Guru is Brahma, guru is Vishnu, guru is Lord . To that very guru I bow, for he is the supreme being right before my eyes," and this is the Vishvasara Thanthram.

Tejal: So, Sharon Gannon, co-founder of Jivamukti Yoga, goes on and on about this mantra in a blog post, and one of the quotes: "If we could see our present circumstances as embodying the guru principle, we might stop perceiving them, those present circumstances, as in the way of our happiness, and begin to realize that they might be providing us with the way for our enlightenment to unfold."

Jesal: That's blog post reeks of spiritual opportunism, and organizations like Jivamukti where the founders encourage their followers to them like and gurus, where they make their leadership irreproachable and unquestionable ... They are then telling any student who disagrees, feels taken advantage of or even abused, that these negative experiences are somehow the guru teaching them a lesson that they needed to learn. This is what grooming looks like, being told not to trust your instincts or your own agency because the guru knows best.

Tejal: This guru knows best stuff hearkens back to the guru-shishya parampara, or the teacher-student tradition that developed in India when teachings were passed down orally.

Tejal: I want to quote the article Yoga Beyond Asana: Hindu Thought in Practice from the Hindu American Federation. And not that we believe everything the Hindu American Federation says, but they explain this idea that, "The relationship between a guru and his student is highly revered in Hindu culture. Examples of its sacredness about in Hindu epics like the , in which respect, love, and devotion to the guru is demonstrated."

Tejal: "To truly progress in yoga, a guru in this tradition sense is necessary. Texts such as the Pradipika continuously remind the reader to only practice the various yogic techniques under the guidance of a guru. But for the majority of practitioners whose yoga is in nascent stages, an experienced and learned teacher is a must. Unfortunately, in a world of 200-hour teacher trainings, even such qualified yoga teachers are difficult to find."

Tejal: So then, we see that the ancient texts send us to gurus. But the sketchy part is who can be trusted as a guru.

Jesal: That seems counterintuitive that a person can walk around calling himself a guru and be revered, but that's exactly what happens as we saw in the Kumare example. And after reaching a certain level of status in acclaim and fame, it seems that gurus tend to switch gears from their own path of spiritual enlightenment to reach the big threes. So, what are these big threes?

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Tejal: The big three flashy life rap goals: money, power, and respect.

Jesal: Ooh.

Tejal: We've seen it countless times. So, oddly enough, it was Sheela from Rajneeshpuram again.

Jesal: Oh god, Sheela. I love Sheela.

Tejal: Well, on that note, did you know that Priyanka Chopra is producing and directing a movie with her as Sheela?

Jesal: Oh, that's amazing.

Tejal: Amazing. Okay. So, it's Sheela who said-

Jesal: (singing)

Jesal: Okay. I just had to throw that in there.

Tejal: The jams. Okay.

Tejal: She said, "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

Jesal: Well, she didn't say that. That's like a famous quote.

Tejal: Oh, okay, well, anywho. It's like that with the many famous gurus of yoga that left India with a name and a vision. It was Swami Muktananda of who said, "There is no deity superior to the guru, no gain better than the guru's grace, no state higher than meditation on the guru."

Jesal: What were Swami Muktananda's crimes again? Alleged crimes?

Tejal: Yes. Members of that guru's inner circle ... And you know, it's always the inner circle folks that know the dirty, dirty details. They said that Muktananda regularly had sex with female devotees, young girls. He even had dorms for them made up near his sleeping quarters, and he would have the youngest girls sleep in the quarters nearest to him.

Jesal: That sounds like some R. Kelly shit right there.

Tejal: Yes. This is some R. Kelly Swami Muktananda shit.

Tejal: So, Michael Dinga, an Oakland contractor, who was head of construction for the ashram--so he knows all these ins and outs--and a trustee of the foundation said the guru's sexual exploits were common knowledge in the ashram. It was supposed to be

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription Muktananda's big secret, but since many of the girls were in their early to middle teens, it was hard to keep it secret.

Jesal: That's just disturbing on so many levels.

Tejal: The swami was never convicted with these assaults though he was accused, and he died of heart failure soon after the accusations. It took until he was so old, near , for him to finally be called out for this shit.

Jesal: Monsters under those mats, people.

Jesal: And then there's Swami Satyananda and several of his swamis from the Bihar School who were convicted now of sexual abuse, molestation, and severe beatings of girls and one senior female employee at both the Satyananda Yoga ashram at Mangrove Mountain in Australia and the Munger ashram in India. That's some serious stuff, because we're not just talking allegations here. We're talking convictions.

Tejal: Isn't Bihar School of Yoga the place to get all the reference books, like Asana Pranayama Mudra Bandha, that big orange one, and the-

Jesal: Oh, yes the are.

Tejal: And the Hatha Yoga Pradipika-

Jesal: Exactly.

Tejal: And The Four Pillars of Freedom?

Jesal: All of those books, and I'm sure ... I know I have books in my library from the Bihar School. I bet people listening to too.

Tejal: Yeah, I have those three at home.

Jesal: And then there's Bikram Choudhury.

Tejal: Bikram Choudhury of hot Bikram Yoga, compared to the man that launched the #metoo movement in Hollywood.

Jesal: His list of allegations is like ... It could fill War and Peace.

Tejal: Yeah. Honestly, that ESPN Podcast 30 for 30 ... It was a really weird ... What's the word? Landmark? I don't know. Milestone that ESPN is talking about yoga in the 30 for 30 podcast.

Jesal: And it happens to be ...

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Tejal: About this asshole molester. Kate Fagan of espnW writes, "Bikram is the yoga version of Harvey Weinstein. Both build empires, both reviewed as career-makers. Both created corporate frameworks that allowed them to prey on women, and both have been accused of a range of sexual misconduct including rape.

Jesal: Bikram eventually fled the country, and after losing a sexual harassment lawsuit to his own lawyer ... He owes her more than $6.5 million in claims. He's broke. I'm sorry I laughed at that, but it is kind of funny that he's in a lawsuit with his own lawyer.

Tejal: Yeah.

Jesal: Not the part about the sexual harassment or that-

Tejal: Just a super handsy, uncontrolled MF. Bikram Yoga NYC and many other Bikram Yoga studios in the country had to deal with this kind of disgusting association now. The Bikram Yoga NYC changed it name to Bode ... Bode. I don't know. Bode NYC in 2017, in part to distance themselves from the sexual abuse allegations and also to start ... They say also so they could start offering a variety of classes, not just the 26-pose Bikram sequence anymore. They said, "We see the yoga scene as becoming much more diverse in offerings, and we want to break out of that Bikram umbrella so we can do more in our space."

Jesal: In fairness, who knows? They might have been being sued by him too, because I think there was a point in time where he was trying to trademark his yoga sequence/environment as one, big package, and he was going after studios. So, who knows? Maybe they did it as part of that. You referenced rap earlier, but he was living like a rapper.

Tejal: Rolls-Royce, mansion.

Jesal: Gold chains, like all of the ... Butlers, all of that.

Tejal: Yeah.

Jesal: Oh and then-

Tejal: You can actually still see on that Bode NYC website in small text in the upper left corner, "Formally known as Bikram Yoga NYC."

Jesal: They probably had a lot of Bikram follow. Bikram's really popular.

Tejal: Honestly, I don't think people left them, but they just got used to hot or Inferno HIIT, or whatever these-

Jesal: Or other hot vinyasa.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Tejal: Heated yoga nidra in the evening. Like, what? But yeah, it's all about these people building their brand but then abusing their power behind it, so then you're left with trying to defend yoga but distance it from predators.

Jesal: This is a recurring theme that we'll see, even with Amrit Desai.

Tejal: Amrit Desai. He's the former disgraced head of Kripalu.

Jesal: Yeah. A lot of people don't know that, but he was, I think, one of the founding members of Kripalu. Kripalu had a strict practice of brahmacharya, so that was ... Going back to that idea of celibacy, that was something that every single resident was expected to practice, and then it turned out he was not practicing brahmacharya. He had sexual contact, I think is the word that they use, with at least three different women. And he was married, so this was adultery as well.

Jesal: It sort of disgraced him because, again ... He was one of the first to come out in a scandal like this, having cheated on his spouse, having broken his vow of celibacy, and he ultimately wrote an open letter of apology and then retired. Like you said with the whole idea of rebranding, Kripalu has worked really, really hard to distance themselves from Amrit Desai. It still is worth noting for teachers of our generation who probably don't know this little origin story.

Tejal: There is the doozy we haven't talked about yet, the father of Mysore Ashtanga yoga. I think it really makes people think critically about what their views on he said/she said is.

Jesal: Yeah. So, this is an allegation and, of course, he's not alive to rebut them or contest them in court.

Tejal: Some of the issue are that, during adjustments, he would take advantage in several ways. He reportedly would slip his hands under a woman's buttocks. His fingers would probe a woman's vulva. He would lay on a woman, and the reports are that he was dry humping her. That people would have to go through this is miserable and unacceptable, and to add insult to injury, he'd do this in front of other students. No one said a word. There are only two reports of when he was confronted out of the tens of cases.

Jesal: There are people making major allegations, but there are a lot of people coming out now with less explosive allegations, saying that they too either felt uncomfortable or abused in one way or the other. There are pictures out there on the internet, and I know that Pattabhi Jois' camp is vehemently denying that this has ever happened, that he would ever do such a thing, but I've googled pictures, and you can google pictures, and you can make up your own minds, because this is not going to be settled in a legal setting. So, this is sort of one of those things that's going to happen in the court of opinion.

Tejal: One of the two women that reported it ... She confronted Pattabhi Jois in a hallway and said, "I'm leaving. I spoke to my father. This is wrong. I'm getting out of here," and stood

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription her ground and said, "I want my money back." And he said, "No. You get out if you're going." And she stood her ground, and he went back to the office, and he came back with $200 cash, and she left. But this has not been corroborated by Sharath or Saraswathi.

Tejal: Actually, I received one Instagram message in support of this podcast episode. This person wrote me and said they'd been offering yoga for a while and practicing Ashtanga yoga for a year or so. And he said, "I have some difficulty separating Pattabhi Jois and the reports of his inappropriate actions from the practice itself. Thanks for bringing up this topic, and I'm grateful for those willing to share their experiences."

Jesal: Former Ashtanga yogis, people who are hardcore dedicated to the practice, attacking Ashtanga now. To be fair, I think there's two sides to every story. They're alleging physical abuse in the practice as well through hands-on adjustments that are extreme to the point of having instigated an injury. In yoga, it's kind of a gray area when we talk about physical adjustments, what constitutes abuse and what doesn't.

Jesal: Another Krishnamacharya clan-member, Iyengar, is now very, very recently being accused of not sexual misconduct of any kind but physical and mental and emotional abuse in his classes and his style of teaching.

Tejal: I saw one of the videos that's been now circulating of ... B.K.S. had a student on a platform, and his students were sitting in a 360 or 180 around that platform observing. Somebody had a cellphone, was taking a video. He was hustling his demo-er to set up sirsasana, or headstand, and she placed the blankets down, and she started to prep for the pose. And he just starts smacking her low back, low mid back, and she had to come down into child's pose, and he was verbally berating her.

Jesal: Berated. And he even says in the video, "See? I had to hit her because she did it wrong." So, it's almost like an admission but also like a justification for that action.

Tejal: You hear people defending the guru and saying, "If you have practiced with him long enough you should know how to handle the situation. You should have done it right."

Jesal: Which is just a poor defense. Having taken dance class with my teacher since a very young age and being a boisterous, unruly child who didn't really want to be there, to be quite frank, in the beginning, she put up with a lot. She had to play the role of not only teacher and guru. She had to parent us a bit, you know? And she had to figure out a way to be compassionate but also disciplinary.

Jesal: This is not a defense of the action at all, but, to understand the background, Iyengar and Pattabhi Jois learned yoga at a really young age. They were little boys. I'm sure when they started teaching they were also teaching little boys, but, regardless, this extreme reaction to something so minor is not okay. It's just not okay. I get the instinct might have been, "Oh, these little boys. I have to spank them," or maybe they're coming from that paternalistic place in their mind, but what they did was abuse, point blank. You hit

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription an adult in front of a crowd, and then you tried to justify it by saying, what, that they set the blanket up wrong?

Tejal: For the people defending their gurus, there is danger in that defense. To deny the accused person's story means you're falsely justifying the guru's story. When a person isn't seeing abuse as abuse, there is an implicit danger of reinforcing and justifying a guru's harmful behaviors. Now the denier is not only highly susceptible to being abused themselves they haven't acknowledge any secondary or vicarious trauma they may be experiencing. Unfortunately, this is how the cycle of abuse repeats itself within yoga communities and over extended periods of time.

Tejal: But how about when your yoga community is at the point of acknowledging instances and history of abuse? How do you work through it? Do you completely separate the method from the man? Here's something to consider. I read an interesting proposal by a West Coast yoga studio that no longer wants to revere Jois as a guru and keep his picture quite literally at the front of the studio. The owner proposed, "Instead, why don't we put up pictures of the survivors at the front of our studio? Now, that sends a message of support."

Jesal: Oh my god. Yes. I remember seeing a social media post referencing society's obsession with murder mysteries and true crime shows. This woman put up a post which really struck me. She said, "If some dude kills me, they better make a documentary about me and not my murderer. Why do we always center the conversation around the person doing the harm rather than the person who was victimized?"

Tejal: It's an absolutely sick societal obsession, and we should put the focus on the survivor. Why do you think that people kept quiet for so long?

Jesal: Narcissists. Narcissists can be very charismatic and compelling, and a trait of theirs is that they're super manipulative and they know how to read people and how to tell them what they want to hear. They're experts at gaslighting.

Tejal: They find situations that they can make it work. And we can talk about Michael Jackson. I mean, people kept quiet about that abuse for so long because it happened when they were in such a vulnerable state. In this example, the boys that were abused were very young, but they had an entire system that supported that abuse. Their parents were downstairs when they were told, "It's okay. Go sleep with Michael." They were pulled out of their country to go live at Neverland or to have the option to be a star with Michael.

Jesal: There's grooming involved in making that situation okay, and I think that a lot of these gurus, that's what they do. They groom. Westerners have to take a little bit of responsibility in the sense that they exotify India, and they exotify these gurus, and they want to believe that they have some mystic, magical power that doesn't exist at home. Those gurus are very willing to exploit that and say, "Well, if you want my magic, if you want my mysticism, then you have to play by my rules," and they get to groom you on what those rules are, and they get to make it up.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Tejal: It gets very twisted. You'll hear survivors report that, "When guru asked me to lay on the table that literally looked like a table for an OB/GYN exam without the stirrups and pull up my skirt, I didn't think there was anything sexual behind it because this is the guru. How could he be a sexual being?"

Jesal: And he claims he's celibate.

Tejal: So, you're young enough to be fooled by this, or you're vulnerable enough to be fooled by this, or you think you'll lose everything if you don't go along with it.

Jesal: And a lot of people come to yoga because they're hurt, because they're vulnerable, because they're-

Tejal: Because they're longing for connection and community.

Jesal: Yeah. They're seeking, they're longing. They can't bear that burden, and they want somebody to take that burden from them.

Tejal: And they feel supported in a way that they've never felt before. They feel fulfilled.

Jesal: Heard, seen-

Tejal: Admired, loved, cared for. That then get turned against them. And a lot of people say they didn't realize that gurus care about things like money, power, and respect, and they thought they were above all that. So, if they're above all that and they're doing these things, it must be things done on a different level, different intention than how they're done on an everyday basis, out of lust or love or ... Still actually arguing that maybe it's brahmacharya.

Jesal: "Maybe they're just on a different than I could ever understand. I can't comprehend the plane that they exist on, because they've reached some sort of enlightenment that I'll never know, so I'll just have to trust." Going back to shloka and to Sharon Gannon's maybe interpretation of it potentially, and that the Hindu American Foundation's interpretation of a guru, unquestioning.

Tejal: Yeah. Yeah, that this is part of the practice. You should have a guru, so go find one and then don't question. I think one way to summarize this behavior of acceptance, of silence, is in the New York Times article “Yoga and Sex Scandals: No Surprise Here” by William Broad.

Tejal: "To denounce the philanderers would be to admit years of empty study and devotion. So many women end up blaming themselves. Sorting out the took years and sometimes decades of pain and reflection, counseling, and . In time, the victims began to fight back. When you start to realize that you were gaslighted, when you start to get your grip on reality again and what is the way you interact with people in a healthy way again."

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Tejal: So you have to wonder, how did these people get away with it for so long? Well, let's circle back to the case of the teacher at Jivamukti Yoga in NYC. Her name is Ruth Lauer-Manenti. She was sued by her mentee who she stayed with over 25 times, and, when she stayed at her mentee's place, apparently they slept in the same bed together and there was a progression of inappropriate touching and sexual misconduct while sharing a bed together. The mentee had prime teaching slots at the yoga center at this point, and eventually I think she got bumped first from the calendar, which prompted her to file a lawsuit, a sexual harassment lawsuit.

Tejal: This happened in 2016, and there was a private settlement outside of court, no trial. This teacher is still teaching. You can go on her Facebook. She had a workshop last November in 2018. Jivamukti Yoga Center was backing this teacher rather than believing that student or mentee.

Jesal: They basically didn't take the action to remove that teacher from the classroom. That teacher's still teaching. That teacher still probably has assistants.

Tejal: You've got to wonder about basically the pull certain people have in the yoga studio dynamic. Jivamukti's an international yoga-teaching school and center, and their more prominent teachers offer workshops internationally, have more reach, have more connection to their students. So, it's a really interesting conversation, because, in this example, that teacher stayed on board, very much connected to the yoga center. They've sided with that teacher.

Jesal: Right. And that's in contrast to a more recent allegation against Isaac Peña, I think his name is. He's a teacher that was teaching somewhere on the Upper West Side, and a woman has alleged that he gave her really inappropriate adjustments, touching her in her genitals and putting his genitals in her hands.

Jesal: This very recently came out in the New York Post, and that he was immediately fired. So, that was a very different reaction from the organization. However, then when we posted about it on our social media, we got a little bit of pushback. Actually, somebody had shared our post-

Tejal: Was that for a yoga studio, specific yoga studio, or was it for a fitness center?

Jesal: I'm not quite sure. I think they were ... On another thread, somebody implied that it had already happened once. I'm not quite sure.

Tejal: Yeah. And the picture on the New York Post article was of an equinox.

Jesal: Yeah. So, it may have happened-

Tejal: It's an interesting dynamic to understand what the structure is, whether it's only yoga offered or if its an entire fitness and huge chain.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: A follower of ours on social media shared that post and got some really weird comments. People will just want to defend their teacher no matter what because they think they have some magical insight.

Jesal: One of the people defending Isaac on this post was like, "I know him. I've known him for ... I've practiced with him for 15 years. His adjustments are well-intentioned, and they always put me in great alignment, and there's no way he could have ever done anything inappropriate." I mean, this person is basically assuming that just because they took classes with somebody they know them, what their intentions are, what they aren't, and that their experience reflects the character of that person entirely.

Jesal: I think we see this a lot, not just in the yoga space, but I think whenever we see abuse anywhere ... Those women who were defending Brett Kavanaugh. "He never groped me at that party, so there's no way he could have groped anywhere else." It's like, well, the absence of proof isn't proof of absence. He could have still groped that person who was alleging that she was groped by him.

Tejal: Yeah. And just to say, "I've known him for 15 years. Nothing like this has ever happened before," is actually not the case. You just haven't heard it. It hasn't been brought to your attention. You don't know. And that's what we're talking about. All those little monsters under the mat, and then all of a sudden someone musters up the courage to talk about it, and the first response is they're the liar. So, this is something that is so important to talk about in the yoga world because of that student/teacher dynamic and the power that the teacher can potentially hold over that student.

Jesal: Right. It's like take that Believe Women to the next level. Actually, somebody tried to tell me that Believe Women is a discriminatory thing, and it's like, no. Believe Women is understanding the inherent power imbalance in a situation and giving women the benefit of the doubt that, hey, they're putting more on the line for coming forward. Like in the case of Ruth Lauer-Manenti, that other teacher ... She probably still has to continue working with her abuser in that situation. She probably was criticized for coming out. She was probably called all sorts of names. So, the victim is putting themselves in a terrible position. It's not like they're gaining anything from coming forward.

Tejal: In thinking about people following another person, we were looking into what makes a person followable or a guru. They're these narcissistic, charismatic leaders, which is an actual thing. These leaders tend to promote grandiose visions, which we've seen in all of these examples, movements and huge philosophies that everyone buys into and can change your whole life.

Jesal: It's inspiring, right? It's inspiring to be around somebody with this big, grand vision. Like Sheela from the ...

Tejal: Rajneeshees.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: The Rajneeshees, right? Just one end of the spectrum on that personality type, but we see it on a smaller level all the time where people have these personalities and so they're able to get away with so much. I think, Tejal, you were telling me about a story of a Chelsea studio.

Tejal: I'm in this class. It's a midday class, mid-size group of students but mostly regulars. And just the bedside manner of this woman was so appalling to me. It felt very rude, very curt, very direct in a way that wasn't palatable to me. I think at one point I was doing a pose, half moon pose, ardha chandrasana, and she came over to adjust. She said, "Oh. So, you don't know how to do this pose then? Well, you should just come back and learn it," and then walked away. I'm like, "What the hell just happened?" Okay. I'm a yoga student in a yoga class. This woman just felt like what she did was just step on me.

Tejal: Then, later on the class ... I think we were practicing headstand at the wall, or sirsasana, and a woman older than the teacher who's not a spring chicken was working into this posture. The teacher made her come down and questioned her in a way that I felt embarrassed to listen to.

Tejal: She said, "Why are you practicing this pose this way?" Don't think she let the student answer the question. Then she said, "Don't you realize that you have this condition or this issue," basically listing the student's injury history because they had a relationship where she knew it. The student said, "Yes, I do." Then the teacher said, "Well, will I see you ever do this pose in that way again?" And the student was like, "No, you won't. You're right."

Tejal: I'm like ... This poor woman, probably a senior citizen, is just bowing down to this teacher's nasty behavior, and I just sat there listening, because they have a relationship that's ongoing. I didn't feel it was my place to step in and defend this woman. I didn't know her. I didn't even know the teacher. But I knew it was not my place to ever be in again, so I never have gone back to that studio.

Jesal: Do you think that with all of your experience now you would have reacted to that situation differently?

Tejal: Honestly, I don't think I would have. I think I would have just said, "Okay, I got the vibe of this place. I get what these people are doing to each other. I'll leave." Maybe I'll write a feedback email to the manager and just give her my opinion, because that's the culture of the studio. I guess you can feel it out. Not every studio has the same culture.

Jesal: I'm so confident in myself that I think I would have actually had walked out of that class, gone to the front desk immediately, and not only asked for a refund but told them exactly why I left and gave them a piece of my mind. "Listen, the teacher is really abusive in her language, and I'm not going to tolerate that. That's not for me. I didn't come here to be berated, and I'd like a refund," and be on my way.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: I wonder sometimes if the shock of a situation is just why people stay silent. Like, they think yoga is supposed to be all kumbaya, and then they experience this and they're just so shocked they don't know what to do.

Tejal: In that moment, it was paralyzing. Like, "What the hell is going on here?" And I don't ever need to come back. In this moment, in going forward, yeah, I would definitely share that feedback.

Jesal: I will say social media's definitely changed that landscape. In this day and age, you might say, "Oh, what is my one little voice going to do?" But you can post about it on Yelp. You can post about it on Instagram. You can tag them on Twitter or Facebook, and people will see it. So, it's not just a matter of my one little complaint and I'm gone. If you wanted to make a big to-do about it, you could.

Tejal: My approach wouldn't be to make a big to-do about it unless I wasn't being communicated with, like my initial attempt wasn't seen or heard.

Jesal: But my point is that there's more recourse now.

Tejal: Yeah. It is more straightforward and simpler to hold people accountable through social media channels, and, quite honestly, you'll get a response quicker when you have a crowd behind you.

Jesal: Beware. Beware that these gurus exist. It's not obvious that they're creeps. The narcissistic personality is not like, "Oh, look at me, I'm a creep." They're charming.

Tejal: Yeah. They're very charismatic. They're endearing. They make you feel seen and heard, at least initially. And then, after they've got you in your clutches, their attempts to influence you can lead to an abuse of that power that they hold over you. It can lead to the information that they offer being distorted, but your ability to recognize that is confused because you're so attached.

Jesal: For people listening who don't really know much about gurus: buyer beware. I think that's kind of the theme coming out of it, right? A lot of us are drawn to this idea of having a guru, wanting a guru, but at the end of the day, if you put your life, body, mind, in the hands of a guru, then you're relinquishing your autonomy. You can't expect that you know that person so well. No matter what you think, no matter how well-intentioned you think they are, we don't know anybody. We tend to overestimate and underestimate people all the time.

Tejal: And people change. People change from how you met them, and years can pass. So, that's also something to be really cautiously aware of.

Tejal: Let's talk about , who has not been accused of any type of abuse or misconduct. However, he holds a ton of power.

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription

Jesal: He was a discipline of , aka the guru to the Beatles, and he took the transcendental meditation model and ran with it. Just like his guru, he realized there's a huge market for assuaging white guilt. He tells Westerners whatever they want to hear about appropriating a . I think of him as an Indian Uncle Tom.

Tejal: Just like gaka Bobby Jindal.

Jesal: I watched his son's documentary.

Tejal: Decoding Deepak?

Jesal: Yeah. And I don't think it was meant to be a disparaging documentary at all. "I'm your son, and I see you a certain way, and the world sees you a very different way, and how do I reconcile these two things?" He pretty much implies that his dad doesn't like yoga. He likes meditation. He does meditation, but he doesn't actually like yoga asana, and he doesn't really do it.

Jesal: But it's funny because he's always on the cover of this yoga magazine and that yoga magazine. Like, "Look at me. I'm hanging out with all these yoga celebrities." And so, he's selling something that isn't necessarily representative of who he really is. Especially in this day and age, marketing is a whole level of, "Let me sell you an image of who I am, but you're never actually going to know who I am."

Tejal: Stan Trouth, a former Siddha Yoga swami says, "I think the lesson to be learned is that we simply cannot afford to relinquish our individual sovereignty, whether it be in a sociopolitical setting or in a religious congregation. Those who willingly put aside their own autonomy, their own moral judgment, to obey even a Christ, a Buddha, or a , do so at risk of losing a great deal more than they can hope to gain."

Tejal: We've talked a lot about these huge names, these ashram congregation leaders, and even mentioned some conspiracies, but what about the more personal stories? In terms of physical or sexual abuse, I'm pretty grateful that I don't have one to relate to this. Jesal, do you yourself have any stories of this happening?

Jesal: I didn't experience any guru abuse, per se, but I did have a teacher who modeled herself after Iyengar. She used that personality of fear to try to conduct her classes and to intimidate her students, and that really did affect me coming into this industry. I think I believed everything she said and didn't feel like I had the power to speak up or say anything back, which was a pattern I carried with me through a large part of my teaching experience, until I met you.

Jesal: So, there was that, but then also I was sexually harassed quite a bit at an ashram that I went to. We won't get into that here. We'll make that bonus content.

Tejal: Some tactics used by abusers can be private criticism leading to doubt and hurt, public criticism leading to shame or humiliation, threats of emotional or physical withdrawal

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription leading to abandonment, withdrawal of money or sexual contact that leads to a loss in financial power or decrease in sexual self-esteem, verbal threats or physical tantrums that can begin a process of fear, power displays that can leave the victim feeling helpless, and finally physical aggression that can lead to fears of physical death.

Jesal: That's intense.

Tejal: Yeah. And this is all due to an imbalance in a power structure. So, what should you do, Jesal, if you find yourself in an abusive situation within a yoga space?

Jesal: If you're teaching in a studio, first off, I would hope that studios have a channel for reporting these incidents. I don't know if many do. We propose the following: for studios, management needs to create and maintain a harassment communication policy. The policy needs to be crafted for teachers, staff, and students.

Tejal: Distributed to teachers and staff during onboarding and students during orientation.

Jesal: Outline the steps for handling and reporting cases of abuse or misconduct.

Tejal: Include details for reporting incidents to staff publicly or anonymously.

Jesal: And must include contact numbers for emergency services and to local and national assault hotlines including hours of operation.

Tejal: For students and teachers, whether you're in class or in a training, remember that by reporting misconduct, you're not the one breaking up the family. The family was dysfunctional to begin with.

Jesal: Remember that you are the steward of your own free will.

Tejal: No guru, mentor, swami, , priest ... No other human being has rights to your body, mind, or .

Jesal: If you feel you are being silenced, gaslighted, or violated, step back and reassess no matter what the perceived costs.

Tejal: Research and keep on hand assault and abuse hotlines if you are in a new or uncommon location.

Jesal: Know who to call if you feel you are in danger.

Tejal: If you feel you are being gaslighted or ignored, employ a social media campaign to generate awareness.

Jesal: For the students and studios practicing a yoga lineage created or continued by a known sex offender or person abusing power, we propose adopting and modifying Karen Rain's

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Yoga is Dead Podcast Ep 3 Transcription tips on how to move forward while standing up against sexual assault, abuse, and supporting victims. In this list, she speaks directly to the offenses of Pattabhi Jois.

Jesal: Stop publicly venerating a sex offender.

Tejal: Stop referring to him as guruji or using the Sri.

Jesal: Stop displaying honorific or normalizing photos of him in shalas and on the internet.

Tejal: Stop profiting from association with his name.

Jesal: Stop glorifying having studied with him.

Tejal: Stop using the euphemisms assists and adjustments for sexual assault.

Tejal: Jesal, did gurus kill yoga?

Jesal: Yes. Many gurus killed yoga, because people were manipulated to believe in a dogmatic teaching of gurudom and gave away their power to narcissistic leaders.

Tejal: We can move forward as a community when we start to believe and honor survivors, value reciprocity and question authority, and balance power in our yoga relationships.

Jesal: Well, what do you all think? Did gurus kill yoga? Hit us up on our Instagram handle at yogaisdeadpodcast, or email us at [email protected].

Tejal: And, as always, please support this work by subscribing and by becoming a patron. Patrons get exclusive, member-only content like extra videos, live conversations, Miss Yoga is Dead stickers and things. You can sign up for as little as $2 per month, and the benefits build from there. Check out www.patreon.com/yogaisdeadpodcast.

Jesal: Thanks for listening. I'm Jesal.

Tejal: And I'm Tejal.

Jesal: And catch us next time on Yoga Is Dead.

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