FOREWORD

Mainstream yoga makes the practice look like a variant of artistic gymnastics that needs to be integrated by aspirational coaching, but - thank you Linda Munro and Gérald Disse and all their students and selected teachers - I have learned something different about yoga.
I have learned that yoga practice is also about relational dynamics. I have learned that yogic relational dynamics follow the principles of non-violence, appreciation for the present moment, care for the process, and non-attachment to results.

At the beginning of my yoga journey, I expected that any context in which yoga instruction is delivered would contribute to self-acceptance, self-agency, and personal and professional growth. Instead, I have observed on many occasions that some contexts may be traumatizing or re- traumatizing.

Here’s an illustrative – not exhaustive - list of some dynamics that need to be considered. All the practices listed below are legal; some are mainstream in the yoga world; some are mainstream in the job market; all of them mirror society in some way. And all of them are harmful.

- Clique mentality in the class from teachers and peers

- Emphasis on performance and athletic results

- Emphasis on applying efforts and going beyond one’s limit

- Playing down the practitioner’s experience, including the experience of pain and discomfort

- Playing down the history of abuses of one’s own yoga style lineage

- Marketing classes as beginner classes when they are not; marketing classes as multilevel
when there is no effort to make them accessible to everyone in the class

- Shaming when not showing up for classes; encouraging addiction to the practice;
encouraging unsustainable practices

- Love-bombing style of recruitment and other manipulative styles of interaction that exploit
people’s need for community and identification

- Heads of teacher trainings taking advantage of the unregulated context by changing
schedules and rules halfway

- Studio owners taking advantage of the unregulated job market by changing teachers’
schedules and rates randomly, and imposing disempowering hourly rates

Every yoga teacher training includes the Yoga Philosophy module, and generally this module offers at least an overview of the Bhagavad Gita and of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Nothing in the philosophy of these texts promotes these harmful dynamics in any way. They promote non-violence and equanimity.

However, there is room for misinterpretation, since we are talking about a metaphorical text (the "Gita" is a section of an epic poem) and a collection of aphorisms intended for ascetics. Interpretation without enough context could lead - for example - a Catholic to think the texts refer to the existence of sinful actions and eternal prizes and punishments where there are not such things; and we could go on with any religious approach, cultural pattern, institutional trend.

But these texts, read with cultural humility or not, would at least lead to the concepts of non- violence and equanimity. And these concepts are sufficient to make clique mentality, emphasis on performance, and abuses of power something to challenge.
Is this just my opinion about yoga? Am I the only one thinking that any performative aim takes away all the gratitude and appreciation that one might have for the present moment? Am I the only one suffering when I see the yoga world creating impossibly injurious goals and houses of power, encouraging grasping for something else, engaging in denial of abusive facts?

Actually, it is not just my opinion, and clearly the critical issues or, better, the cognitive dissonances I can perceive are just the tip of the iceberg.

I perceive what I can perceive. Don’t you? Considering positionality and intersectionality.

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The intersections of my identities (gender, race, ability, socioeconomic status, etc.) and the systems of oppressions (chauvinism, racism, ableism, classism etc.) play a role in determining what events and relational dynamics occur and how I perceive and narrate them.
I understand that my list of the yoga world’s harmful customs is specific to my experience and what I’m able to perceive from my standing as a privileged individual (I’m educated, cisgender, white, able, thin, I benefit from healthcare) and doesn’t consider contexts outside Italy. Other observers would likely perceive different dynamics.

I understand that in contexts where I’m beneficiary of dominant culture I’ll have to listen more and be a better listener. I understand that the dominant culture is dominant in part because it is set up not to listen but to minimize, deflect, and deny questioning.

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