Hellooooo?!!! BRAHMACHARYA, and how well my yoga teacher practices it, determines whether they are someone I will actually LEARN YOGA from. Geez... YOGA is not what is being taught in most of North America - the fact that this question is even being discussed on Yoga Journal is a CLEAR reflection of a LACK of knowledge and understanding of the FOUNDATIONAL practices of Yoga and WHY they were laid out in the first place.

aww that story is just adorable! :) bu i think the reason the teacher/student boundary is there is to avoid the awkwardness of mishappening relationships. student will stop taking the class, and that is a lose lose situation. and i think it also depretiates the attention the rest of the class will feel from the instructor if he/she is gazing constantly and blushing for one of many students in the room. people get "dumb" when they have a crush... goofy and unattentive to anything else going on... and it comes off as unprofessional to others not involved. that's just what i think, not necessarily that i am against these things as a whole (like the SFGate.com story)... but i can also understand why the teacher/student relationship is suggested by many to be "forbidden".

I don't believe it should be forbidden in any way. If it happens, it happens and it's a beautiful thing! You can't forbid crushes anyway, life doesn't work that way :)

Sure, it's a very tricky situation if it's the teacher that is interested and makes the first move, but I still don't believe in strict rules. It can be done respectfully and with lots and lots of sensitivity. My advice would be to try and keep the whole dating-part of the relationship outside the shala/class room altogether, never bringing it inside. We all move between different roles in our lives all the time anyway, so why not simply step out of girlfriend/boyfriend mode when entering the shala? Shouldn't be too difficult since yoga already focuses on "me and myself", not on other people.

I personally am very uncomfortable getting adjustments from a teacher that is flirting with some other student across the room while helping me, or students cuddling and kissing during savasana. That, in my opinion, is very unprofessional. However, it's still up to me whether I choose to stay with that teacher/group or not.

I do not think that there is anything wrong with yoga student-teacher relationships, as long as they are both adults and are not graphically displaying their affection 'round the studio I'm cool.

Hi everyone! It's been interesting having this article appear in the SF Chron. I was so wary when I first realized that I was attracted to Aaron, since I take my role as a yoga teacher seriously, and I keep strong, healthy boundaries with my students. I have the deep intention to serve students with love, to avoid distracting them from their dharma, to maintain purity, and to seek equanimity in my teaching practice. My relationship with Aaron took two years to develop, and I was relieved that we eventually met on more neutral ground (the gym); and that he didn't come to my class very often to confuse things. I appreciate all the comments on this page, and I hope the dialog on how to integrate our Western form of yoga with Eastern traditions continues. I'm just so glad this practice exists. And that our community exists. Namaste.

Any teacher/student relationship involves an imbalance of power. And that is the danger with any relationship established beyond the teacher/student boundaries. Not that it cannot happen - but I would believe that the teacher/student relationship would need to end before any other sort of relationship could happen openly.

the question is, do you want to change something to what you are comfortable with? or change yourself to what something is? if you want to learn, grow, change yourself to the goal, not pull the goal close to you by diluting it according to your abilities.

e.g. if i find baseball to be too difficult, should i change the rules and still call it baseball with all pride? or should i try to better my skills?

if you view a yoga (योग) class as just another stretching routine, or a yoga retreat as another way to spend $2500 for your summer vacation, then you can decide what you want to do with the other bodies in the same room. heck, even an orgy is not out of reason (just see the tantric tradition).

but it is important what YOUR own motive is, as a yoga teacher or a yoga student?

attraction is nothing new, bad or to be abhorred. kAmasUtra (कामसूत्र) is written to channelize, this strong emotion within us. but its important teaching is "enjoy, WITHIN the realm of dharma (धर्म)"

many RiShis (ऋषि) had sexual relationships, and some ascetics describe such a carnal knowledge as 'having spent the merits accumulated" because of loss of self control, as a self exercise, NOT as a sin.

the devas (देव) wanted to learn the science of sanjIvanI (संजीवनी) (to bring back from death), because the guru shukrAchArya (शुक्राचार्य) of the dAnavas (दानव) (their cousins, villains) knew it.

they sent kacha (कच) to learn from the guru. shukrAchArya had a beautiful daughter called devayAnI (देवयानी) . the guru knowing the intention of kacha, taught him everything BUT the art of bringing the dead back to life.

the dAnavas, didn't like their guru teaching one of the devas - their arch enemies. so they planned to kill kacha. every time devayAnI's pleading made the guru bring kacha alive again. the third time, the dAnavas killed kacha, burnt him, put his ashes in wine and gave it to the guru to drink.

when devAyAnI pleaded again, guru brought kacha to life and he was alive in his abdomen. now the dilemma! how to save both the guru and kacha?

so the guru HAD to teach the art of bringing alive the dead to kacha, kacha came out tearing the guru's belly, and revived him again.

having accomplished his mission of learning the secret art, kacha left. a love smitten devayAnI asked him to marry her.

guess what kacha said?

"i came to your father as a student to learn. he is my guru. by that you are respectable to me. i never came for any other mission. and, i am also born of your father, that makes you my sister. hence i can't agree.

devayAnI, in the blind fury f unsatisfied love, cursed him, that he will not be able to use his knowledge just when he needs it.

of course, kacha taught it to other devas and they could use it.

when you become a yoga teacher (guru is a very heavy word), have focus of teaching, imparting knowledge.

men and women are like fire and butter, put them together it starts to sizzle. hence it is all the more important to practice control. no big deal in losing the control, that is the animal state of instinct and impulse.

don't make a yoga class (as a teacher) just another hunting ground.

(the reason for not using any upper case except for emphasis and sanskrit words, is that saMskRita does not use two cases. and using roman keyboard, 26 letters are not enough for all sanskrit sounds.)

- Shashikant Joshi शशिकांत जोशी

Wow - when I saw the title of this article I though "okay - so my dirty little secret is out"

I was spending some time at an ashram in India (no - I'm not going to name it) not exactly teaching, but more helping out karma yoga style. There was a woman taking a course at this ashram and glances exchanged and so forth.

This went on for almost a month until we finally gave in to our base urges and arranged to meet on a dark moonless night under a mango tree. Before anything could happen we saw one of the ashram staff doing the rounds with a flash light. So we climbed up into the tree. Mango trees are easy to climb. We stayed there and kissed among the ripening fruit.

We thought that we did so undiscovered, until a beam of torchlight illuminated our amourous embrace. Long story short - the next day I was asked to leave the ashram and less the 24 hours after that fatal kiss I found myself on a blue Indian Railways train crossing the dusty plains of scrubland that seem to cover so much of India.

In India Bramacharya is taken very seriously and the country is severely segregated along sexual lines. On some retreats men sit on one side of the room while women sit on the other. (Men to the right of the teacher and women to the left, if you want to be specific - it's a sun and moon thing.) Women can't even sit on the same cushions as men. A woman can't speak to a male student unless there is another woman present. A male student most definitely cannot speak to a female teacher without another member of staff present. Strange or stifled as they may seem these are some of the strict cultural values that apply in Indian society. Just because we adopt yoga do we say everything Indian is automatically good? Should we use more child labour for example? I'm playing devil's advocate of course, but I will also advocate celibacy for the DEDICATED yoga practitioner.

There are a lot of very good reasons for practicing celibacy, but the most important factor is that you HAVE to be channeling that energy somehow, whether through Pranayama or Inversions or special sitting poses (bramacharyasan or dandasan for example). Celibacy just for celibacy's sake can lead to neurosis, but celibacy in combination with a strict yogic lifestyle can bring us to incredible plains of conciousness.

I have some slight experience in this, involving weeks of fruit fasting and water fasting and many hours of pranayama, meditation and asana and chanting everyday and of course strict celibacy - the kind of intense practice you can only really do in an ashram environment. My experience may be slight compared to the great yogis, but I went through enough to know that this type of practice can be the highway to higher plains. At the moment I'm off on a secondary side road, but I'm still heading in the same direction.

As a man teaching yoga to classes almost uniquely composed of lithe young women, the illusion of Maya is a constant challenge. But if yoga teaches us anything it's that we have to see beyond the body, beyond the Rupa - the physical form of things.

As we know (or should know - though based on some of the things I've read here I'm not so sure) yoga is about stilling the agitated seas of thought. As teachers we have a responsibilty to be good examples to our students, but we have to live in the world as well.

Of course a yoga teacher shouldn't see the students as his or her personal stable, but if you're ever going to meet a compatible mate there are worse places. I know many teachers who have gone on to live/marry with their students and if your students want to date each other - hey, that's great! I met my own wife in an ashram in India.

Just as there are reasons for celibacy, there are reasons for everything.

Om shanti

Belinda,
brahmacharya ... . Krishnamacharya had a wife, and met her somewhere. Why be so hard on anyone who meets their life partner at their yoga class or elsewhere?

Pattabhi Jois was married, so is Sharath Rangaswamy..
... I haven't got time to look this up, but many of the leading yoga teachers asian and western are in relationships..

Love is at the core of yoga, and yoga part of life. So in life we share love as well as yoga.

x

Belinda,
Where is non-judging and kindness in this response? Perhaps many of us need a review of foundational concepts?

Erica,

The reason that Yoga teachers should not engage in sexual relationships with their students is the same reason that other professional teachers, therapists psychologists and doctors don't do this. There in a power differential in the relationship that can easily be abused. If you believe that Yoga is there to help lead people to enlightenment, however you conceptualize that goal, then we avoid doing harm to our students by avoiding potentially harmful dual relationships. The specific relationship you used for a springboard for this discussion is not typical of how these situations unfold. nevertheless, it may be instructive if you look at it from a different perspective. The teacher involved reports that this student didn't come to her class very often. How much of that was because of the sexual tension? What happens when and if this couple separates? Will the student avoid Yoga because of the negative feelings? Will he ever be able to trust another Yoga teacher? Will the teacher be closed off from close, but appropriate relationships with her students because she has to be wary of her own boundary issues, and thus fail other students? Will her example disinhibit other yoga teachers who are not as conscious about boundaries? Will some students avoid Yoga altogether because they see teachers as less than professional? Will students avoid deepening their relationships with their teachers because they are aware of the boundary issues within the "profession?" If you care about the Yoga community, as a teacher, you won't engage in sexual relationships with your students, and no teacher who does should continue teaching until they get right with the world.

Can't help but think of Ana Forrest advise of , "Don't f*#% your students" advice. It seems the 'cuteness' of the story and the couple and the fact the teacher is a women make this almost okay. Think of the reaction if this was about a teacher who was male and "dating" his young hot students.

I think the article below makes a pretty good case.

http://wholelifetimes.com/2006/04/yogasex0604.html

Maybe the teacher/student relationship taboo is similar to the forbidden doctor/patient relationship taboo. I also know in Buddhist tradition it's greatly frowned upon for teachers and students to have a relationship. I personally think every situation is different and who's to say who you'll fall in love with.

Namaskar,

I think some very good thoughts and comments have been posted on this topic and certainly this can be a fairly complex situation. I appreciate everyone's active thinking on the matter.

My basic feeling is to boil it down to its essence, or what I feel to be the essence.

A teacher is in class to teach and not to become attracted. The mind should be focused on the subject at hand and the welfare of all. We should not knowingly fall or make it acceptable to fall from this ideal. Rather we should continue to strive for its highest expression in all respects.

Once the mind falls from an ideal there is no telling where it will go nor how far it will plummet. There are no shortages of case examples of this issue snowballing into major ethical & personal dilemmas within our very own yoga community by some of today's biggest yoga superstars, let alone the common person.

Best then is to divert the mind within and see all in class with the purity of our own heart and not with any other desire.

If one really wishes to get married then they should look for a spouse in a different venue. To use our contemporary yoga movement as an avenue for teacher / student dating will quickly tarnish what is now a very positive development in society.

Why should we openly invite the inevitable distrust, criticism & suspicions of the public as well as the degradation of a teacher by making teacher-student dating fair game in class.

Every upstanding profession on the planet has its standards - so should we. Especially when the nature of our profession is based on strict morality (yama and niyama).

Again, all are entitled to seek a companion in life, yoga teachers are no exception, but looking inside one's own classroom is not the proper place, in my opinion.

Satyam

I think that in an ideal world, if a teacher is attracted to a student and both are really interested in a sentimental o sexual relationship, they should talk about it and the student should cease to attend class.
However, things happen, courtship is not so rational or foreseeable and one or the other may be sincerely interested and strongly determined to start a relationship. I think the key point for teachers is: if something happens, or is going to happen, the teacher should ask the new girlfriend or boyfriend to stop attending his or her classes.

crushes on students/teachers during yoga is tricky! I am surprised to see this article as it comes at a time when I have a severe crush on my instructor but don't want to let the secret out as I love going to her yoga class and cannot imagine life without it. I want to express myself as it is becoming an obsession, and I'm loosing sleep but am torn. Any suggestions are welcome???

hit by cupid

hey- do you think it is ok for teacher and student to share intimacy?