The Shala Daily

The Ashtanga yoga community stands at a crossroads. After decades of looking the other way—of senior teachers feigning ignorance about misconduct they knew full well was happening—we face a choice: continue the patterns that enabled harm, or build something genuinely different.

This isn’t comfortable territory. But if the yamas teach us anything, it’s that satya—truthfulness—isn’t optional when the truth is inconvenient. It’s precisely when truth is hardest to speak that speaking it matters most.

⚖️ Tradition Without Ethics Is Empty

The eight limbs of yoga didn’t start with asana. They started with ethical foundation—ahimsa, satya, asteya, brahmacharya, aparigraha. The physical practice we love exists within this container. When we strip the container away, we’re left with something that might look like yoga but has lost its spine.

Leadership in our community has, at times, failed spectacularly. Those in positions of power have enabled harm through silence, through willful blindness, through prioritizing reputation over safety. The call now is for a new generation—one willing to learn from past errors and take the necessary steps toward genuine change.

🔥 The Tapas of Accountability

Here’s the thing about tapas: the burning discipline we cultivate on the mat must extend beyond it. The heat that transforms us physically must also transform our institutions, our communities, our ways of being together.

Creating accountability isn’t punitive—it’s liberating. When students can openly ask questions, when teachers welcome oversight rather than resent it, when ethical guidelines are foundational rather than optional, we build something that can actually sustain practitioners across a lifetime.

Many teachers still cling to trickle-down models of authority. “This is how it was taught to me” becomes justification for perpetuating harm. But tradition isn’t an excuse to avoid evolution. The Ashtanga system should prioritize safety and trust—not as afterthoughts, but as core values.

🕊️ Building What Comes Next

Where do we go from here? We build a system where reverence for tradition is matched by commitment to ethical evolution. We create spaces that might not always feel perfectly safe—perfection isn’t the goal—but where accountability and agreed-upon standards make them safer.

This means empowering students to voice concerns without fear of dismissal. It means teachers earning trust through consistency rather than claiming it through credential. It means recognizing that agency and accountability go hand in hand—we can’t have one without the other.

The role of community in driving this change cannot be overstated. Engaging collectively in these efforts ensures that Ashtanga continues to grow while staying true to its foundational principles. It’s about creating a sustainable practice that honors both the past and the future.

The future of Ashtanga depends not only on preserving its methodology but on upholding its core values. This shift is necessary and urgent. It involves both the community and its leaders fostering an environment where ethical standards are integral—not aspirational, not occasional, but woven into the fabric of how we practice and teach.