Writing Spaces

(Advanced Reader Copy provided by the author for this review.)

Joelle Tamraz tells a fascinating story of moving from New York City to India, of living in ashrams, of deep spiritual study, and of decades of steady meditation. It’s a story also of her searching, as a very young woman, for belonging and unconditional acceptance, and of her susceptibility to the power and control of a guru, Swami Arun, who offered to teach her a secret spiritual practice that appeared to meet all her needs. Arun grew in importance until he largely controlled her choices, her relationships, and the path her life took. It’s a difficult and heart-wrenching story to witness, but also offers lessons for any of us who have faltered in our ability to see our own choices as valid, or who have simply not known how to make them.

Tamraz is an amazingly strong person, who accomplished incredible feats while in this devastating relationship. In addition to completing an MBA and keeping the family financially afloat, in part for Arun’s sake she became an entrepreneur, digging deep into her stamina and her bank account to develop and run a yoga studio while simultaneously working full-time in a demanding business world.

But Arun’s goals and hers were never the same. Enthralled by his lies and her love, it took her years to see him clearly. As she writes toward the end, “He had been a mastermind, and I had been his fool.” As with some other contemporary yogic leaders, “yoga did not make him good.”

Recounting her journey, Tamraz allows her choices and actions to speak for themselves, giving her reader space to interpret the facts she lays out. Her prose is powerful and she paints vibrant scenes, without excuses or blame. She tells us what she knew and felt and believed at the time, revealing, as with the layers of a mystery story, piece upon piece of evidence that Arun’s benign and loving surface was a veneer laid over a complicated and abusive personality. She reveals the clues, but, charmed and persuaded by his visible persona, neither she nor her reader immediately catches, as each happens, their significance: that he is a destructive man.

Yoga’s physical practice “has no inherent spiritual merit,”writes Tamraz. “The master chooses the rules.” While she was with Arun, her family feared she was in danger. She gave away almost everything of her finances and loyalty to a man who consciously manipulated her. Finally, on the edge of tumbling forever into the void of his control, she saved herself, bit by bit, with struggle, and with support from friends.

Her fully adult self has learned to see the world in a clear-eyed way that was not available to the innocent twenty-two-year-old. She knows what is required to live the life she wants and deserves, and she knows that strong choices, though difficult, are essential.

“Meditation doesn’t replace morality,” she writes, “and if I don’t exercise my moral obligation through action, someone else will do it for me.” It is a reminder to each of us that when we fail to act on our own behalf, we make it possible for others to remove and use our power to their own benefit.

For any of us searching for acceptance and belonging outside ourselves, Joelle Tamraz has shared an important story that reaches beyond the yoga world and encourages us to take responsibility for shaping ourselves as we want to be.

The Secret Practice is available for pre-order on Amazon, and Joelle Tamraz’s website is https://joelletamraz.com