Stop Quoting the Yamas While Undercutting Everyone

Modern Yoga: Spiritual Capitalism in Lycra

People in yoga love to talk about the yamas and niyamas.

Ahimsa. Asteya. Aparigraha. Satya.

Non-harming. Non-stealing. Non-grasping. Truthfulness.

But sometimes I wonder if modern yoga has turned them into branding language rather than difficult practices.

Because what exactly are we doing when studios and teachers constantly offer:

• free classes

• £5 intro deals

• unlimited trial months

• endless discounts

…while teachers burn out, undercharge themselves into exhaustion, and quietly absorb the message that their work should come cheap - or free?

And another uncomfortable question:

If we are endlessly using discounts and offers to lure people away from other teachers and studios… are we not also practising a form of asteya?

Stealing students. Stealing sustainability from small independent spaces. Stealing value from the practice itself.

But the contradiction runs deeper than hypocrisy.

Many teachers and studio owners are simply trying to survive inside an economic system built on competition, urgency, branding, algorithms, and scarcity. We are expected to embody non-grasping while constantly marketing ourselves. We are told to detach from outcomes while chasing visibility and retention.

“We are all inside this contradiction.”

Perhaps that is the real tension at the heart of modern yoga.

Not that people are failing the teachings. But that the industry itself often makes those teachings incredibly difficult to live fully.

Maybe Satya begins there — with honesty.