Carl Jung’s warning to western yoga practitioners

By Shahidul K K Shuvra

Before practicing yoga and meditation Europeans should know psychiatrist Carl Jung’s warnings to the
western yoga practitioners and learners on perilous consequences of yoga. He predicted and wrote, in
the 40s and 50s, details about how western way adopting yoga would lead the European yoga
practitioners to mental disorders. Furthermore, the body of the western people—biologically,
genetically, historically and culturally— isn’t prepared to consume and understand yoga whereas people
of the Indian continent are prepared because their spiritual tradition and civilization are much longer
and deep-rooted than Europe.

According to Carl Jung’s Introduction to Tibetan Book of Dead. “…about the danger of yoga……The
deliberately induced psychosis sate, which in certain unstable individual might easily lead to a real
psychosis, is a danger that needs to be taken very seriously indeed. These things really are dangerous
and ought not be meddled with…..typical western way.”

Yoga and tantra are now lucrative businesses in Europe. You will find some self-proclaimed yoga and
tantra masters are running yoga schools, studios, and representing Indian ashrams in some important
cities of Europe. Most of the budding yoga masters are focused on business than spirituality, such trend
often is absent in Indian and other South Asian regions, there most of the spiritual centers are run by
donations from philanthropists and people’s assistants.

Here in Europe, some yoga gurus invent names of their courses with blending Sanskrit and Asian words,
by following their own funny mistaken grammar; unfortunately, I didn’t find such names in India and
other South Asian countries. Even some yoga practitioners change their names, mixing Hindu goddess
and gods’ names with European names; they like to say: I am Mataji…, Maa…, Lakshmi…, Durga…,
Ananda…, Shiva… etc. There are doubts about most of the European yoga teachers’ spiritual and yogic
credibility, mainly those people who learned yoga at resorts in Thailand, Bali of Indonesia and some of
the places in India, even in Rishikesh. With only a few weeks of training, they open schools. Mistakenly
they think yoga is for relaxation, recreation, sex, vacation, entertainment as well as business. Even some
of the cunning Indian gurus like to stay in Europe for serving the needs of westerners.

European yoga practitioners should understand the great psychiatrist’s analysis while doing yoga, and
practicing philosophy of Gita, Vedanta, Kashmir Shaivism etc. I am not discouraging anyone, just sharing
some of his texts with you to solve the problems during learning these. We shouldn’t ignore the
influential psychologist after Sigmund Freud; some regarded him more powerful than Freud. During my
staying in Europe I found some of yoga practitioners are suffering from psychosis and delusional
disorders as Carl Jung discussed; they are going into complicated relations, depression, multiple
personality disorder and other sorts of abnormalities in behavior are marked. Unfortunately, they aren’t
aware of it, and curing an unaware psychosis patient is much more complicated than a patient who is
aware of his or her mental derailment.

Last year iconic tantra guru Psalm Isadora, very famous in America and Europe, reportedly committed
suicide. She was most highlighted tantra healer, used sex postures from the sacred Kamasutra texts to
heal couples. Her disciples had difficulty in believing that such a healer could kill herself at the age of 42.
She couldn’t minimize her own bipolar illness with her meditation and yoga skills.
Jung believed in yogic transformation and admitted the Kundalini Shakti could be cultivated in an
oriental way. But he told it’s not for the westerners and rightly addressed the issue with a prediction-- in
the hands of westerners yoga is at risk, it could be distorted and could bring reverse impacts on them.
Rise of Tantra in Europe, as westerners are practicing now, has no connection with its origin in Asia; and
with a non-spiritual view adopting spiritual stuff is too dangerous to understand. Their psychic feeling is
a fantasy, through meditation inviting illusion to the minds, thus it’s leading the mind to the
phantasmagoria of a lunatisam.

As Jung thought they might be victims of dual identities, set themselves between the conflicts of both
identities. For delusional orientation they might think they would have reached near to God, deify
themselves; and might think they are like prophets with oracles that often come to their megalomaniac
minds.

Regarding his view on inflicting megalomania into a mind. He narrated psychic attitude doesn’t directly
connect with megalomania, in a milder form it’s cultivated in the practitioners’ mind, who want to be
reformers or prophet; they go into identification problem and ego inflated.

Their trying to go beyond the human level comes as a futile attempt; not only it becomes unsuccessful,
invite harmful impact on mind, they have imaginary evil and angels with them. In practice, he makes
himself or his partner either god or devil. Jung defined the characteristic effect of the archetype: it seizes
hold of the psyche with a kind of primeval force and compels it to transgress the bounds of humanity. It
causes exaggeration, a puffed-up attitude (inflation), loss of free will, delusion, and enthusiasm in good
and evil alike.

Yoga practitioners in Europe should understand what Carl Jung told; then they should redefine their
method of teaching and learning. First, they should drive into a profound level of spirituality than
making body sexy by practicing some asanas. British philosopher Allan Watts has commentaries on
Jung’s views on adopting orient ideas and precautions. He narrated as—yoga as like as many medicines
at a pharmacy, without a prescription you shouldn’t take a medicine, and a doctor should prescribe you
medicine with considering remedy of its side effects. According to him, he had difficulty to leave western
lifestyle to comprehend eastern philosophy. Indian philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti, who once became
Europe based, didn’t support forcing own body to have some certain kind of body maneuvering skills
and showing off curved body. He told these have no connection with spirituality.

It should be noted that before learning meditation a teacher should take physical and mental particulars
of the students. Drug addicted persons aren’t recommended for meditation due to the chance of
hallucination intensification. Psychotic patients also should come under good masters, who have
knowledge in psychology, before practicing meditation and other sequences of yoga.

Yoga is for a peaceful union of the people, but executing its theories and practices by amateur hands
could bring adverse impacts to the mind and body of students.

The writer is an editor and teacher. Yoga and orient philosophies are his research fields; he lived with
monks at Buddhist and Hindu temples. He can be reached at sshuvra@gmail.com