Enough! Breaking my silence on Jivamukti

I am very late in writing this article. Actually, I should have written it in 2014. I am writing it with a delay of ten years.

I first started practising yoga in Istanbul in 2002, when I was in a psychologically vulnerable state. Somehow, yoga made me feel complete, balanced, and better than any psychotherapy session could. After a couple of years, practising yoga became part of my routine, almost a duty that I didn't want to skip. Slowly, I witnessed the positive impacts of yoga on my mental, physical, and psychological state. I felt that yoga was an irresistible, almost magical medicine from thousands of years ago. 

In 2004, when I was visiting NYC for work, I attended classes at Jivamukti Yoga and found it to be the most resonant method among hundreds of yoga studios and yoga styles available in New York. I went to the studio on  Lafayette Street every day and sometimes even twice a day. I breathed in and out while holding in the most challenging yoga positions, inhaling the sweet, minty air of China Gel mixed with lavender while listening to nourishing music. After each practice, I experienced the transformative rest and rebirth of Savasana (corpse pose) and meditation. I enjoyed every minute. 

The Jivamukti practice and community seemed like a dream come true, a life that I wanted to have. Since I felt such a strong sense of belonging, I immediately registered for the upcoming Jivamukti teacher training in 2005. It had never crossed my mind to be trained as a yoga teacher before I encountered Jivamukti. My connection with Jivamukti Yoga made me feel at home in myself for the first time in my life. It was more than just a traditional yoga practice, it was a complete life practice, on and off-the-mat. The “off-the-mat” practice included activism and vegan advocacy to change the world. We practised with the goal of healing the global crises of disconnection: the climate crisis, animal abuse, and misguided human eating habits as the root causes of massive injustices. We discussed how we humans unconsciously participate in injustice, what we could do to make change, and how we could prevent future suffering. 

I had finally found something I had been looking for for years: a worldview and practice for improving the world while healing oneself with spiritual development and enlightenment, all for the principle of mutual benefit. 

In Sanskrit, the phrase “Jivan Mukta” means “liberation while living,” becoming free from temporary worldly ties, and integrating our universal soul, and this pure, enlightened state all while living in a human body. I felt so blessed to have found this miracle practice at such a young age when most people search for meaning for their entire lifetime. 

In 2005, I received my yoga teaching certificate at the Jivamukti Teacher Training in upstate New York, led by the cofounders of the Jivamukti Yoga method. I admired them and saw them as my spiritual teachers and family. Following in their footsteps, I started teaching yoga classes in Istanbul to introduce the Jivamukti method in Turkey. I endeavoured to spread yoga as a form of activism for the liberation of the world and all living beings. I was constantly filled with gratitude and worked with great love, trying to be worthy of these teachings. 

Eventually I felt that more was needed in Istanbul, more than what I could teach on my own. I wanted my teachers to come to Istanbul so that my students and other people who are into yoga could feel their transformative energy and touch. Together with two other Jivamukti teachers in Istanbul, I invited the cofounders to visit Turkey and organized a week-long workshop in the yoga studio where I taught. 

I hosted them in my home, and since I didn't have time to cook, I hired a vegan chef for them. During their time in Istanbul, I did everything possible to serve them and the guests who wanted to spend time with them. As I expected, my teacher’s teaching visit had a transformative effect; it touched many people, and many students became vegan. Vegan cafes and restaurants started to open in Istanbul, and many more people got involved with yoga as a result. The number of Jivamukti-trained teachers in Turkey increased, and our voice reached Cyprus. All of this was exciting, and for the first time in my life, I started to feel useful. 

To continue expanding the Jivamukti community of students and Jivamukti-certified teachers in Istanbul, we invited many senior international Jivamukti teachers for teaching tours in Istanbul and beyond to expand the reach of the Jivamukti teachings throughout Turkey. An Istanbul-based Jivamukti teacher had translated the Jivamukti Yoga book into Turkish and facilitated its publication. After a few years, our teachers visited Istanbul for the second time. 

While I was immersed in my work as a journalist and a yoga teacher, all the while organizing Jivamukti workshops for senior teachers and leading activist initiatives, a severe political crisis occurred in my country.

After the crisis, I felt I had to do my part for my country and go beyond just voting from election to election. I got involved in an active political movement that was not one of the two mainstream parties in Turkey. It was a third alternative movement, and my affiliation with it gradually isolated me from my social circle and professional life. Old friends cut off years-long relationships by blocking me on social media. A handful of people I worked with had to leave the country. I became unemployed due to the political impact on the countries’ institutions, many of which closed down, changed hands, or withdrew from Turkey altogether. 

As a solution for my isolated situation, I travelled to Berlin to arrange to participate in an 8-month advanced Jivamukti teacher training with a senior teacher at Jivamukti Berlin. I hoped to deepen my teaching skills with advanced training. I entered into a contract with the owners of Jivamukti Berlin; they had visited Turkey a few times on teaching tours hosted by the Jivamukti Istanbul community. While planning my trip to Berlin, I encountered difficulties with receiving a travel visa because the standard tourist visa only allowed a stay of six months. In order to stay longer than six months and not interrupt the intensive advanced training program, I applied for an education visa at the German Consulate in Istanbul. Meanwhile, one of the partners of Jivamukti Berlin required me to pay the full training fee in advance—2750 Euros, which I paid in cash.

The visa process took a little over 2 months. In the end, the German consulate refused to grant me a visa because, according to German law, yoga is not recognized as an educational subject, they said. I was very upset about the visa refusal. In addition to the worsening economic conditions in Turkey, I was unemployed and had hoped to fully immerse myself in teaching yoga. My goal in taking the advanced training was to raise the level of Jivamukti teaching in Istanbul to that of the senior Jivamukti teachers whom we had invited to guest teach in Turkey. With this goal in mind, I had given my remaining savings to Jivamukti Berlin to pay for the advanced training. 

I emailed the owners of Jivamukti Berlin to explain the visa obstacle, which was beyond my control and expressed how sorry I was that I couldn’t participate in the training. In hindsight, I should have brought up the subject of a refund in my initial email, but I believed they would automatically refund the training fee without being asked. However, their email reply did not mention a refund. Thinking this was an oversight, I wrote to them again to request a refund. Their response was shocking. They wrote, "We cannot refund the fee." I hadn’t received a single hour of training or even gotten a mat or a yoga block. I wrote back, "I paid 2750 Euros for training, and now I can't attend because the German consulate rejected my visa application. How can you not refund the fee?" I was in disbelief. They cut the subject short with a few completely illogical, evasive sentences. Then, they remained silent and didn’t answer my emails. I was overwhelmed with sadness and felt betrayed by people whom I had considered to be community members, teachers, and friends.

I believed that if my teachers and cofounders knew the owners of Jivamukti Berlin's fraudulent actions, they would not allow them to tarnish the Jivamukti name and community. I wrote to my teachers to explain the situation and ask for their support. One of them replied, "They are law school graduates; I'm sure they've secured themselves in this regard with the contract they signed." I felt that my teacher was acknowledging that there is a serious issue here, but that I had no legal recourse. He refused to back me up. Other cofounders did not respond or weigh in with an opinion. In ongoing correspondence, I protested that this unethical conduct should be unacceptable at Jivamukti. In fact, it is fraud. I did not have the luxury to make a donation to business owners far richer than me. I asked my teachers to note that I had been unemployed for a long time. 

I fully expected my teachers to support me on ethical grounds, but instead, one of them accused me of being "money-oriented", and he advised me to meditate. This unpleasant interaction with him made me feel that the ground I was standing on was shifting. I perceived that the people I had trusted, believed in, and considered my spiritual teachers contradicted their own teachings in their actions. Their stories about spiritual enlightenment, ending world crises, fighting for the well-being of animals, and so on were just a cover. Deep down, they were no different than any unjust, profit-oriented business, except that they used spiritual ethics as a front to deceive their students. 

I was utterly broken and disappointed by this bitter experience, but I believed, naively, that I should keep this betrayal private and secret as a personal matter between me and my teachers. I kept repeating to myself, "The practice is the guru (teacher), not the people." 

It has been exactly ten years since this incident. While I have become more deeply immersed in the profound practice of yoga, I have become more distant from people due to this betrayal. I have a sweet daughter who is the embodiment of innocence and goodness. I heal my disappointment by practising yoga and conscious awareness with my daughter and other children. Through this practice of working with children, I experience the principle of mutual benefit that cofounders talks about but fails to implement. 

In recent months, I invited a Jivamukti teacher friend from New York to teach at Oasis Yoga,  my teaching home in Istanbul. This teacher told me that he would love to come to Istanbul but that he would have to teach under a different name, not  Jivamukti. Because the cofounders sold Jivamukti Yoga in 2017 to a banker, under this new ownership, Jivamukti teachers must pay a copyright fee to use the Jivamukti name in promoting classes. 

Many of the Jivamukti teachers in Istanbul were certified starting in 2005 and have been teaching the Jivamukti method for years. We have worked tirelessly to build a local Jivamukti student community, inviting and hosting international Jivamukti teachers and helping to make the Jivamukti name renowned and recognized in Turkey, Cyprus, and beyond. We translated and published Jivamukti books without asking anything in return. At the encouragement of our teachers, we all became personally and publicly identified with the Jivamukti name as we worked to spread the teachings to the masses over the course of twenty years. 

When they sold their “yoga brand,” the cofounders did not consider their longtime students' and certified teachers' rights and interests. Why would they sell away our right to use the Jivamukti brand name? It seems that our years of dedication and efforts are of no value to them.  

I remember that once, they said, "In this community, each one is precious; each one is valued." Over time, I understood that this was not an honest statement. I can’t help but remember his words accusing me of being "money oriented", after I was defrauded by the owners of the former Jivamukti Yoga Berlin (now called in a different name). I’ve heard that they had to change the name, perhaps because the Jivamukti copyright is too pricey even for them. Isn't life strange?

Will we ever see Jivamukti Yoga value our efforts for helping them build their brand name worldwide? Probably not.

From the very beginning, since the day I first lay down in Savasana (corps position) at the Jivamukti Yoga studio on Lafayette Street, my focus has been on breaking away from material ties and becoming free. That was why I followed the Jivamukti Yoga method. I thought my teachers truly shared the desire for liberation. I thought that we were practicing yoga, to liberate ourselves from material desires. I truly believed we were all sincere in doing our best to bring justice to the world. 

I clung to the Jivamukti method so I could become free while living. So I do not feel in debt. Still, as someone who has self-respect and who constantly worries about many issues in the world as if they were my own, I oppose any injustice. I encourage everyone not to remain silent in the face of injustice and unfairness. 

This story is no longer just a personal issue between me and the cofounders of the Jivamukti yoga method. This and many other betrayals, small and large, connect everyone who has taught this method and who has put in the time and effort to spread these teachings. I felt compelled to write this piece on behalf of many people who were harmed at Jivamukti but felt they could not speak up. 

This Jivamukti method of spiritual development attracted people in their most vulnerable, sensitive states using sublime, ancient knowledge concepts such as ethics, non-harming, fairness, and the value of all of life. It is immoral to use the ancient principles of yoga, a practice of non-harming, to cause harm to an individual, to an ethic, and to a whole community of dedicated, sincere teachers and students.

From now on, I'd like to call my class by a different name so I may officially break my link to the Jivamukti Yoga brand. I want to thank my teachers for providing valuable, experiential information about how a yoga teacher should conduct themselves. I want to name my classes “JivanMukta,” in faithfulness to the original Sanskrit word. No one can own this name because it is the ancient, original Sanskrit word, which literally means a liberated, free being.

I wish our teachers had led us to prevent genocides, wars and deadly ambitions from happening around us, and I wish we were discussing and organising global Satsangs and collective meditation for peace rather than silently being witness to this horror and having it as our karma instead of this topic right now.

I hope that proper ethics of justice and spiritual development based on authentic, ancient knowledge in their purest and most real forms, will illuminate our paths throughout our lives. 

P.S. I’d like to thank my friends T.S. and Dechen Karl Thurman for their kindness and support.