why silence protects a student’s first mystical experience

This is Ashtanga Yoga Tech Support. Real questions from the yoga community, answered.

The Question

Why don't experienced teachers talk more about mystical or subtle experiences in practice? Is it modesty, gatekeeping, or something else?

— from a MJH note

Our Response

It’s none of those. It’s contamination control.

If you tell students what to expect—what the books say, what happened to you—you’ve just handed them a template. Now when something does happen, they’ll never know if it was the practice or the power of suggestion. You’ve stolen the proof from them.

But if you stay quiet, and they have the experience anyway, and then it matches what’s in the old texts and what you never mentioned? That alignment lands with real force. They know it’s reproducible. They know it’s not special. They know it’s actually the practice working.

Silence isn’t withholding. It’s how you let the thing speak for itself. The very best signpost is no signpost at all.

Yes, it costs something to stay quiet. The impulse to share is strong. Your silence might read as evasion or arrogance. But real trust in the method means not turning your realizations into a preview for someone else’s movie.