My local body and brain center posts their brochures at a lot of local businesses and being interested in yoga and tai chi, I always wanted to give it a shot. I signed up for a $20 consultation/intro session where I met one of the two masters at the center. She was extremely kind and a good listener. I told her about my life and past struggles and she urged me to attend a workshop for "finding your true self" and to sign up for a month membership. The prices were quite high for me but she was willing to split the payment in two so I could pay half of it later. In total, I must have spent around $400-500 during this month.

At first, I had a really positive impression of the center. I also had a bit of a crush on the other master. He was close in age to me (I'm 21 and he's 22) and he was cute. This gave me a lot of motivation to keep going. I'm really lucky that nothing negative happened to me and I was only taken advantage of financially because apparently there are even stories of sexual abuse coming from this organization.

The wake up call for me was when after the "finding true self" workshop, I was taking a selfie with one of the masters and I saw that the background on her phone is of the founder of Body and Brain, Ilchi Lee. That is so off-putting and cult like. There's also the "brain education" aspect of the teachings which always sounded silly to me. We just shake our heads side to side and tap our abdomens. As someone who has done tai chi and yoga separately, this was nothing like either practice.

I feel sorry for her because she is in middle age and has given her life to the center. She even admitted to us that senior masters do not earn much more than the inexperienced masters. She said that the money we pay goes to the organization and they get paid a flat, "humble" base salary. This woman could have been an amazing therapist, teacher, yoga instructor, or even professor but she has given her life to Ilchi Lee. I find that very sad.