The Yoga Cult How a Korean guru has created a fanatical following on college campuses that is part

[babsbunny]

Moonies, part New Age boot camp and pure profit

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/32307195/the_yoga_cult

SABRINA RUBIN ERDELY

If you looked at it from a certain perspective, the exercises Amy Shipley did in Dahn Yoga were perfectly normal. Take what she was doing right now. It was near midnight. Amy and seven other devotees of Dahn Yoga — nearly all in their 20s, clad in blue tracksuits and barely functioning on three hours of sleep — were standing in a waist-deep fountain in the desert of Sedona, Arizona. On command from their Korean trainer, all eight would plunge their heads underwater and hold their breath until their lungs strained, finally rocketing to the surface gasping and shouting a devotional song to their Grand Master — a middle-aged Korean man called Ilchi Lee — and weeping to prove their sincerity. Then they'd be ordered to do it again, and properly this time. In this way, Amy and the others were saving their souls and rescuing the world from annihilation.

See? Totally normal.

[KonaKane]

1. I can think of less painful ways to do that.

But hey, I don't want to interrupt their fun.

[arcadian]

2. Weird, and then there were the sweat lodge deaths that occurred in Sedona recently.

Up the road from me there is a place called Yogaville, it's listed by Rick Ross as a cult. The weird thing is that the artist Peter Max brought this guru to the states from India. Peter Max has a house next to their compound and it's all out the middle of hicksville Virginia.

[Tim01]

8. I know people from Yogaville. They can be kind of strange. nt

[robdogbucky]

3. Anyone interested in an overview of current yoga

should rent the movie "Enlighten Up," by Kate Churchill.

It is not that great of a movie, it is just that it does feature some of the current charlatans in the yoga racket, as well as some of the best teachers in the world. Most notably one biker type guy that teaches his own unique brand of yoga, Dallas Page, that thinks all meditation sucks and mocks all eastern philosophy and religion. He recruits mostly skimpily clad babes to do his stretching class on his lawn in, guess......smoggy LA.

The movie follows one volunteer, a young journalist, who agrees to try all these different types of yoga and to travel around the world to interview many such teachers. Some of these, including B K S Iyengar and Sri K. Pattabhi Jois are really inspiring. The maker of it sucks though as she keeps interfering and it ends up being more a referendum on how she feels about yoga and she frequently tries to embarrass her volunteer. Nonetheless it includes more information about yoga than can be found in any one place elsewhere.

robdog sez check it out.


Just my dos centavos


robdogbucky

[peace13]

4. Sorry but Amy need psychotherapy!

Dahn yoga can help physically challenged folks tremendously and this article is demeaning and ridiculous.

[Madam Mossfern]

5. I went to a Dahn Yoga center

I really didn't know what it was, but was thrilled that there was a Yoga center near my home. First I was "evaluated" which I thought was a little strange- but since it was free-what the hell. The people were very nice so I decided to try it out for a few weeks ( a mini-membership) The first red flag was when you had to wear a 'uniform' sort of like a karate suit-all white cotton with your name in marker in the front. Then they started right from the beginning to get you to enroll in workshops in Sedona. The classes were very gentle. I was given a book to read about the founder and realized that some of his writings were ... well.... strange. I also found it strange that they had a big sign in the tea room-yes you could stay after class for tea and chatting-that said "We are not a cult."

What?

Of course I looked Dahn Yoga up on the net and found that indeed it very much a cult. My kids have still not let me live it down and talk about the time mom joined a cult.

[arcadian]

7. Never heard of them.

Looking at their website, they have yoga centers all over the country, the are like the Bally's of crazy cults.

[AnnieBW]

6. I looked at a flyer for that

Because I was interested in starting yoga classes. It seemed to set off my "cult" alarm. So, I'm probably just going to go to a class at the Y or the local parks center.