Eros, Power, and Misunderstanding. What Is Actually Being Taught and Lived

1. Introduction: The Accusation and the Reality It Targets

In recent years, serious accusations have been directed at our spiritual school (MISA, Atman Federation etc.). These accusations have been widely circulated through productions such as the Apple TV documentary Twisted Yoga, as well as podcasts including The Road to Paradise (published by Danish Radio), The Yoga Sect (published by KALIBER, Swedish Radio) and The Yoga Guru (Swedish podcast on Spotify).

The accusations do not only concern isolated actions or individual cases. They also address the school itself, suggesting that its central teachings—especially those related to eroticism, and spirituality—are used in a manipulative way to create dependence, submission, or control. The question, therefore, is not limited to specific situations, but concerns how the teaching as a whole is understood and presented.

In these accounts, central elements of the teaching are framed in a consistent way. Core concepts are reinterpreted so that they appear to diminish individual autonomy, and practices are presented in a form that emphasizes their most controversial aspects while leaving aside the framework in which they are situated. Relationships within the movement are described in terms that suggest an expanding influence over personal life. Taken together, these elements create a coherent impression: what appears as a spiritual path is, in reality, structured by mechanisms of pressure and control.

In light of these accusations, it becomes essential to clarify what is actually being taught. The question is whether the teaching itself, in its structure and orientation, supports or contradicts such interpretations. In particular, it is necessary to examine how sexuality, eroticism, and their relationship to spirituality are understood within our school, rather than only through external interpretations.

The purpose of this article is therefore to clarify the understanding of sexuality, eroticism, and spirituality within the school itself, and to examine how this understanding is reflected in lived practice. On this basis, it becomes possible to consider whether the available research supports the claim that erotic and spiritual concepts function as instruments of manipulation, or whether it points toward a fundamentally different reality.

2. The Critical Perspective: Control, Coercion, and Hidden Influence

The dominant critical interpretation presents a relatively consistent picture, which appears across the documentary and podcast materials and is often reinforced by testimonies from a few former participants who reinterpret their past involvement in strongly negative terms. This perspective does not limit itself to describing individual experiences. It advances a broader claim: that the structure of the teaching itself enables or facilitates forms of influence that compromise individual autonomy.

Within this perspective, relationships between men and women in the movement are described as structured by asymmetry, where spiritual authority reaches into intimate life. Practices that are presented internally as transformative are interpreted externally as mechanisms of influence, through which trust is redirected, boundaries are softened, and dependence is gradually established. Even when participation appears voluntary, it is suggested that this voluntariness is only apparent, masking more subtle forms of psychological pressure.

A central element in this interpretation is the idea that the teachings themselves function as instruments of influence. Concepts such as surrender, the transcendence of the ego, or the use of erotic practices in a spiritual context are not taken at face value, but are read as ways of shaping perception—making participants more receptive to guidance and less inclined to question authority. This becomes particularly clear in the way specific elements of the teaching are presented.

For instance, in one of the podcast materials, a narrated scenario includes the statement that ‘the sexual union lasts for 8 hours. Orgasm is the only way to achieve samadhi’ (The Yoga Guru, Editor’s italics). Such a formulation is not only reductive in itself, but also misleading through what it leaves unsaid. It suggests exclusivity, as if all other paths toward samadhi were irrelevant, and it implicitly invites a conventional understanding of orgasm as a simple physiological release. In this way, a notion that in the teaching refers to a refined and transformative state is reduced to a sexual act.

The teaching is consistently approached through a sexualized reading, in which its erotic dimension is isolated from the broader framework in which it is situated. Elements that belong to a complex and nuanced process are interpreted as if they were expressions of unrefined sexuality or instruments of control.

This can be seen, for example, in the way the material emphasizes a gradual shift toward sexual themes: participants describe how “the sexual aspect is taking up more and more space”, and how what begins with yoga postures “later… turns into advice on how to have sex”. Sexuality is further described as “a highway to spirituality”, reinforcing the impression that it constitutes the core of the path (all quotes from The Road to Paradise, DR). In such presentations, specific elements are isolated and generalized, creating the impression that the teaching as a whole is centered on sexuality, rather than on spiritual evolution.

The result is a selective interpretation, in which teaching, practice, and authority are read primarily through the lens of influence and control. In this process, the broader structure of the teaching—and the distinctions it makes between different levels and aims—are no longer taken into account. It is therefore necessary to consider whether this interpretation corresponds to what is actually taught and lived in practice, or whether it reflects a partial reading shaped by prior assumptions. This requires a closer examination of the structure and orientation of the teaching itself.

3. What We Actually Teach: The Perspective on Eroticism and Transformation

To evaluate the accusations, it is necessary to clarify what is actually taught regarding sexuality, eroticism, and their relationship to spiritual transformation.

In this perspective, sexuality in its ordinary form is understood as instinctual and oriented toward discharge of energy (for example through ejaculation in men). It follows a pattern of tension and release and is often driven by habit, conditioning, and the search for immediate gratification. While this level of experience can be intense, it remains limited and transient, and it does not in itself lead to deeper transformation.

The teaching does not reject this level, but it does not remain within it either. It proposes that the procreative potential of the human being can be approached in a fundamentally different way when it is lived with awareness, love, and spiritual aspiration. This implies a shift in orientation: from unconscious impulse to conscious presence, from consumption to communion, and from self-centered satisfaction to participation in a Godly reality.

This shift involves several elements that are always presented together and cannot be understood in isolation. Love opens the being and creates a state of genuine connection. Transfiguration allows the other to be perceived not only at a physical level, but as an expression of higher, Godly qualities that are already present within them. Awareness ensures that the experience is lived consciously, without falling back into mechanical patterns. Within this context, practices such as amorous continence (control of the sexual energy) support the continuity and deepening of the experience, allowing the energy involved to be refined rather than dissipated.

From this approach, one can access a different quality of experience, referred to as Pure Eros. Pure Eros is not sexuality intensified, but a distinct state of consciousness characterized by continuity, depth, and refinement. It is not dependent on discharge, but unfolds through sustained awareness, mutual presence, and openness to this Godly energy. In this state, the experience becomes more global, more stable, and more integrated, and it can open toward states of joy, love, and communion that are no longer limited to the physical act itself.

This perspective defines the direction of the teaching. It is not oriented toward impulsive satisfaction, nor toward the exercise of power over another. It is oriented toward spiritual transformation, mutual respect, and the awakening of a higher level of experience. When the teaching is reduced to sexuality, or interpreted through isolated elements taken out of context, this orientation disappears, and with it the possibility of understanding what is actually being proposed.

4. What Do the Studies Show? Teachings and Lived Reality

The next step is to consider the available research on MISA, ATMAN, and related schools. The question is not whether criticism exists—it clearly does—but whether systematic studies support the claim that the teachings themselves function as instruments of manipulation or coercion.

Raffaella Di Marzio’s MISA: Spiritual Explorations and Experiences in the Practice of Esoteric Yoga (2024) is based on interviews with practitioners from centers affiliated with ATMAN. This study describes a pattern of gradual and conscious engagement. Participants describe their path as one shaped by personal motivation, reflection, and voluntary commitment. Rather than finding evidence of coercive techniques, the study emphasizes the presence of autonomy and the integration of the teaching into participants’ broader lives.

Susan Palmer’s series #SheToo: The Experience of MISA Women (2025), based on interviews with thirty-nine women, offers a particularly important perspective. The women describe their involvement not as passive submission, but as an active and conscious process. Many speak about a transformation in how they relate to their own bodies, emotions, and relationships, often contrasting this with patterns they experienced before entering the practice. Their accounts emphasize participation, engagement, and personal responsibility, rather than coercion.

Liselott Frisk’s The Controversies Around Natha Yoga Center in Helsinki (2024) examines directly the accusations of manipulation, sexual abuse, and so-called “brainwashing.” Her analysis shows that the classical models used to support such claims do not fit the reality of the movement. Participants are not isolated from society, they maintain independent decision-making, and there is no evidence of the systematic control mechanisms that such theories presuppose.

Taken together, these studies describe a reality marked above all by conscious engagement. They do not support the claim of a system structured around coercion. Instead, they point to a context in which individuals participate actively in a path of transformation, including aspects that may appear unconventional from the outside, and where lived experience often corresponds closely to the principles that are taught.

5. Conclusion

The accusations directed at our spiritual movement suggest that the teachings themselves—especially those related to eroticism and spirituality—function as instruments of manipulation, creating dependence and undermining autonomy. This is a serious claim. Taken at face value, it implies that there is a structural contradiction at the heart of the path: that what is taught in terms of awareness, love, freedom, and transformation would in practice lead to coercion, pressure, and loss of inner autonomy.

If this were the case, we would expect to see a consistent pattern in lived reality that reflects this contradiction. The practice would systematically move in the opposite direction of the teaching. Relationships would tend toward control rather than mutual presence. Engagement would be marked by pressure rather than conscious choice. The language of spirituality would function primarily as a cover for dynamics that negate the very principles it affirms.

The available studies do not support this picture. They describe processes of gradual and conscious engagement, where individuals make choices, reflect, sometimes struggle, but remain active participants in their own path. This does not imply uniform experiences, nor does it exclude misunderstandings or misrepresentations at the level of individual participants. It means that the claim of a system structured around manipulation is not supported by the scientific evidence at hand.

At the same time, the interpretations presented in documentaries and podcasts rely on a selective reading. Certain elements are isolated and interpreted through a sexualized lens, while the broader framework that gives them meaning is left aside. Practices that belong to a complex process of transformation are reduced to their most visible or provocative aspects. Without the context, they are easily reinterpreted as something else.

Within the teaching itself, there is a clear and consistent distinction between instinctual sexuality and the approach of Pure Eros, which orients the spiritual aspirants toward awareness, love, transfiguration, refinement and the presence of God. This distinction is not marginal. It defines the direction of the practice and the criteria by which it is understood. When this framework is ignored, the practices are almost inevitably misread from the outside.

If the aim is to understand what is actually being taught and lived, then the starting point cannot be a framework that already presupposes manipulation. It has to be the teaching itself, examined in its own terms, and the lived reality as it is described across a broader range of experiences. Without that, the representation no longer describes the path as it is lived, but replaces that lived reality with a version shaped by its own assumptions.

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Bibliography

This bibliography includes a selection of the most relevant academic and independent studies addressing the relationship between spirituality, erotic practice, and accusations of manipulation in MISA, ATMAN, and related movements.

Andreescu, Gabriel. 2024. “Repression of Groups That Promote ‘Sacred Eroticism’: A Collective Exercise in Cruelty, Contempt and Hypocrisy.” NRDO 3: 7–49.
https://www.revistadrepturileomului.ro/assets/docs/2024_3/NRDO%202024_3_andreescu.pdf

Di Marzio, Raffaella. 2024. “MISA: Spiritual Explorations and Experiences in the Practice of Esoteric Yoga.” The Journal of CESNUR 8(6).
https://cesnur.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/tjoc_8_6_4_dimarzio.pdf

Frisk, Liselotte. 2024. “The Controversies Around Natha Yoga Center in Helsinki: Background, Causes, and Context.” The Journal of CESNUR 8(1).
https://cesnur.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/tjoc_8_1_1_frisk.pdf

Introvigne, Massimo. 2022. Sacred Eroticism: Tantra and Eros in the Movement for Spiritual Integration into the Absolute. Milan: Mimesis International.

Introvigne, Massimo. 2017. “Movement for Spiritual Integration into the Absolute.” World Religions & Spirituality Project.
https://wrldrels.org/2017/05/31/movement-for-spiritual-integration-into-the-absolute/

Introvigne, Massimo. 2023–2025. Various articles in Bitter Winter: A Magazine on Religious Liberty and Human Rights, including:

• “The MISA Case: Georgia Bows to French Pressures”
• “Brainwashing: A False Accusation Against Unpopular Minorities”
  https://bitterwinter.org

Palmer, Susan. 2025. “#SheToo: The Experience of MISA Women” (Parts 1–6). Bitter Winter: A Magazine on Religious Liberty and Human Rights.
https://bitterwinter.org

Palmer, Susan. 2023–2024. “The Police Raids Against MISA in France” (Parts 1–4). Bitter Winter.
https://bitterwinter.org