From the Jiveass chat board

[Guest guest]

Petruk <br>Junior Member <br>Member # 319 <br>

posted 01-26-2002 01:19 AM

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----<br>I must agree with El Senor. If you can’t see the

hypocrisy of David and Sharon’s post (as well as the errors

in grammar) I suggest you take a basic course in

rhetoric. Their line about Christopher being unable to

“100% commit (sic)” to Ashtanga sounds very much like

the loyalty oaths that blacklisted American artists

(like my grandmother) were asked to sign during the

McCarthy period.<br>“Two sides to every story?” Seems like

only David and Sharon are putting their side out.

Christopher and Eddie and the half-dozen former Jivamukti

teachers like Russell (now studying and teaching at

Eddies) are maintaining a dignified silence.

<br><br>Sounds like Christopher, a heavy-weight intellect who

teaches classics at NYU, wanted to advance his asana

practice under the most senior Ashtanga Teacher in NYC,

who is, in fact, Eddie Stern. David and Sharon could

not tolerate this affront to their egos and forced

him out. Amazing. And you think David and Sharon are

enlightened, compassionate people? Ask ANYONE who has ever

worked for them. S.P. Jois is well aware that some

type-A students at his shalla take an afternoon back

bending course with a fellow named Venkatesh. Does he

care? Not a wit.<br><br>What really irks David and

Sharon, I suspect, is that they keep losing talented

students (and even worse – gag - celebrities!) to Eddie.

David and Sharon are great cheerleaders and

businesspeople but after a year or two of study with them most

serious students either head to Eddie or Mysore to get

closer to the source of the river. Certainly anyone

interested in becoming a teacher is wasting their time at

Jivamukti, “Jivamukti Teacher Training” certificates carry

no weight outside of the insular, hermetic world of

Lafayette Street, and moreover the pay stinks. <br><br>The

problem with creating a personality cult is that the cult

dies with its founders. Does anyone imagine for a

minute that Jivamukti will continue after David and

Sharon have shuffled off this mortal coil? And does

anyone doubt that Ashtanga yoga will go on and grow even

after S.P. Jois leaves the body? David and Sharon seem

to be embracing the worst elements of the “guru”

system – autocracy, slavish devotion, centralization,

and politics. It hasn’t quite gotten to the point it

did with Swami Muktinanda, (devotees fought each

other to drink his bathwater) – or the Bhagwan

Rajneesh, whose students tried to poison a small Oregon

town in order to sway a local election – but it is

getting there. Leave if they start serving

Kool-Aid.<br><br>Mind you, I wish nothing bad for Sharon, David and

their acolytes. Jivamukti serves an important role in

the society of NYC as a catchment area for

dilettantes, fuzzy thinking New Agers, stressed-out career

women, and fashion victims. It is also a place – to

quote Russell Simmons – for men to check out fine women

(in other words, a pick-up spot). This is all well

and good. May they long continue to provide these

important services to Manhattan’s upper middle class and

continue to serve as warning and cautionary tale to

serious yogi and yogini everywhere.<br><br>By the way,

has anyone ever left Eddie Stern's to study at

Jivamukti? Not as far as I know. Traffic flows in only one

direction, for good reason.

[Guest guest]

Excellent points. However, I must disagree with

your assertion that David and Sharon are "great

cheerleaders and businesspeople". Lucky, maybe, but not

great.<br>Great businesspeople do things the right way, with

integrity, the FIRST time they do them, not as an

afterthought, and not to cover their asses in case of possible

impending legal action. There is an enormous amount of

success to be had without being a weasel and taking

shortcuts. The growth of The Patanjali Yoga Shala, and the

growth of Eddie and Jocelyns extended family is evidence

of this.<br>Great cheerleaders dont emotionally

brutalize and cast aside the people who love them, when

those people exercise their free will and live their

lives they way they chose to.