Dahn Yoga does not elicit warm reactions in the Yoga communities I have flowed through. Worse, organizations like Dahn give Yoga a bad name and frighten away new students from any Yoga practice.

I am not an expert on cults but Rick Ross is and has a page on his site dedicated to Dahn for quite sometime before this lawsuit was reported in SFGate. I have heard that they are very aggressive in their promises to transform all the yuck in our lives into luck and are quick to turn that one free class into a very big hole in your pocket as you become a teacher and then master and then who knows what.

One blog I read called Ilichi Lee, A Fan blog, which can now only be read in Google’s cache because it has since been deleted by it’s owner, claims,

“An Ilchi Lee cult or a Dahn cult are unlikely to exist considering Ilchi Lee and the Dahn Yoga centers he founded have the sole aim of helping many people with a simple mind-body system…”

I do believe Jim Jones had the sole aim of helping many people. David Koresh down in Waco likely aimed to help many people as well.

The problem with groups like Dahn wearing the guise of Yoga is that Yoga is a system of transformation that does help many people. However, it is crucial to study Yoga with discernment. It was a key point in my Yoga Teacher Training at Kripalu which had it’s own time and need for collective discernment which caused trauma, upheaval and ultimately healing.

The practice of Yoga encourages us to let down our guards, our barriers, to open our hearts and minds to the wisdom of Sat Guru (Sanskrit for true teacher). I was taught Sat Guru means truth and the only true teacher is within ourselves. Beware gurus on golden thrones, I have blogged that before and it holds true now.

In my own Yoga Community, our first rule is “Do No Harm” as Elysa like to say it or as I proclaim, there is no violence in Yoga; not to your hamstrings, heartstrings, values, morals or ethics.

Maintain discernment wherever you practice and if you detect violence to any part of your being, listen to Sat Guru – your very own truth from within and walk away from that community but that does not mean that all Yoga schools, classes, studios and groups are cults.