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Record #2: Cult #2, Mysore, India
CONTENT WARNING: This episode contains detailed, explicit accounts of sexual assault in a yoga context.
In this episode, I tell the story of my first trip to Mysore, India to study with Sri K. Pattabhi Jois—the founder of Ashtanga yoga and a man revered by thousands of practitioners worldwide.
What I witnessed in that shala wasn't hidden. It wasn't secret. It was normalized. Women were being sexually assaulted during "adjustments" while dozens of students watched. And the most devastating part? Some of them called it healing.
This is about what happens when you see abuse clearly and stay anyway. About how I convinced myself that confronting one man made me empowered, when really I'd just learned how to function inside a violent system. About the decades that followed, and why it took decades to understand what I'd actually done.
This is Part Two of a longer project documenting the three high-control spiritual environments I've been part of over thirty years. I'm not here to reform these systems. I'm here to document how they work.
ABOUT MAGS: Clinical Ayurvedic Specialist, former certified Ashtanga teacher (one of only 20 women worldwide), and founder of ABQ Yoga Lab in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I walked away from the Ashtanga community in 2017 on principle and now run a clinical Ayurveda practice and create content analyzing power structures in yoga and wellness communities.
FIND MY WORK:
Website: https://magnoliazuniga.com/
YouTube: Subscribe for clinical guidance without wellness platitudes
https://www.youtube.com/@MagnoliaSezSo?app=desktop
About Magnolia Zuniga:
Magnolia Zuniga is a former Ashtanga yoga teacher and one of only 20 women worldwide who were certified by the K. Pattabhi Jois Ashtanga Yoga Institute (KPJAYI) before publicly walking away from the lineage. After abuse allegations against Pattabhi Jois became public, she stopped teaching Ashtanga sequences and lost her certification—choosing survivor solidarity over professional advancement.
She now teaches at ABQ Yoga Lab in Albuquerque, New Mexico, focusing on decolonizing yoga practice, recognizing cult dynamics in spiritual communities, and building accountability in yoga spaces. She speaks publicly about institutional abuse, guru culture, and what yoga becomes when you remove the harmful power structures.
Find me at www.magnoliazuniga.com and https://www.youtube.com/@MagnoliaSezSo
View all episodes
By Magnolia ZunigaCONTENT WARNING: This episode contains detailed, explicit accounts of sexual assault in a yoga context.
In this episode, I tell the story of my first trip to Mysore, India to study with Sri K. Pattabhi Jois—the founder of Ashtanga yoga and a man revered by thousands of practitioners worldwide.
What I witnessed in that shala wasn't hidden. It wasn't secret. It was normalized. Women were being sexually assaulted during "adjustments" while dozens of students watched. And the most devastating part? Some of them called it healing.
This is about what happens when you see abuse clearly and stay anyway. About how I convinced myself that confronting one man made me empowered, when really I'd just learned how to function inside a violent system. About the decades that followed, and why it took decades to understand what I'd actually done.
This is Part Two of a longer project documenting the three high-control spiritual environments I've been part of over thirty years. I'm not here to reform these systems. I'm here to document how they work.
ABOUT MAGS: Clinical Ayurvedic Specialist, former certified Ashtanga teacher (one of only 20 women worldwide), and founder of ABQ Yoga Lab in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I walked away from the Ashtanga community in 2017 on principle and now run a clinical Ayurveda practice and create content analyzing power structures in yoga and wellness communities.
FIND MY WORK:
Website: https://magnoliazuniga.com/
YouTube: Subscribe for clinical guidance without wellness platitudes
https://www.youtube.com/@MagnoliaSezSo?app=desktop
About Magnolia Zuniga:
Magnolia Zuniga is a former Ashtanga yoga teacher and one of only 20 women worldwide who were certified by the K. Pattabhi Jois Ashtanga Yoga Institute (KPJAYI) before publicly walking away from the lineage. After abuse allegations against Pattabhi Jois became public, she stopped teaching Ashtanga sequences and lost her certification—choosing survivor solidarity over professional advancement.
She now teaches at ABQ Yoga Lab in Albuquerque, New Mexico, focusing on decolonizing yoga practice, recognizing cult dynamics in spiritual communities, and building accountability in yoga spaces. She speaks publicly about institutional abuse, guru culture, and what yoga becomes when you remove the harmful power structures.
Find me at www.magnoliazuniga.com and https://www.youtube.com/@MagnoliaSezSo