Awakening Resilience with Ishan Shivanand — The Trauma Therapist

Welcome to the Trauma Therapist Podcast. My name is Guy McPherson. I interview incredible people who've dedicated their lives to helping those who've been impacted by trauma. A big thank you to our sponsors and our guests who are supporting this show. So, 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1. All right, folks, welcome back to the podcast. Very excited to have as my guest today Dr. Ishan Sivanand. Ishan, welcome.

Thank you so much for having me.

You're welcome. So Dr. Sivanand was born into an ancient lineage of yogis spanning 21 generations and spent the first 20 years of his life in a Himalayan monastery. He's a spiritual innovator, coach, and founder of Yoga of Immortals, a modern practice grounded in authentic yogic tradition. He combines science, storytelling, and spirituality to help individuals and organizations manage burnout, enhance performance, and cultivate inner balance. His work spans wellness, corporate training, philanthropy, and global community building with a mission to uplift millions through compassionate, practical spirituality. Ishaan, welcome to the podcast. Before we get going, share with our listeners where you're from originally and where you are currently.

Uh, so presently I'm in Texas, Austin. I had to do some work in training and educating people on the benefits of meditation and how we can use technological supports to enhance the quality of meditation. So we were working on some things on that. And originally I grew up in India in the monastery. It's in Rajasthan. So it would be the western part of India. And then I moved to Mauritius, which is Africa. So I spent about 7 years there. And after which in 2020, I moved to United States for conducting research on mental health.

Okay, that, that's kind of a good segue here. So how does all this start for you? I mean, in terms of growing up in a monastery, living in a monastery, and getting to the point where you're in Austin, Texas, teaching, educating people about the benefits of, uh, yoga and meditation, simply— how, how did that start for you?

So When I was in the monastery, I got to help a certain type of people. These people were very self-motivated. So if you come seeking out a monastery and you want to learn, then half of the battle is already done. You have already resolved most of your traumas, your issues, and now you are just looking for a way. And such a person you provide a nudge and they end up finding inner peace. They were ready, they were thirsty looking for water. And then when I came out of the monastery, I started to meet normal people, so to speak. I realized that so much of the world were in denial about the problem being their own mental health. And even when I tried to teach them, it was very difficult to reach to them with whatever modality I was offering. So I realized I must do something that can take away the friction that comes between the meditator and the meditator— meditation guide. Until that friction is removed help cannot be provided. And at the same time, I wanted to see what is the extent of benefits that these ancient yogic modalities can provide to the world. Because every time I would see somebody from West would come and just take a very small aspect, very small aspect of Asian traditions the healing modalities, and then somehow they would become huge in the world when they will be presented in a certain manner. And that made me really appreciate these Asian healing modalities, the native medicines, the Indian knowledge systems, because I started to see there is not just the personal benefit value in it. Maybe there is value enough that there can be nation-building with these modalities. And that was what excited me on the prospect of research. Number one, how to bridge the gap between the patient and the care facilitator, and second, to see the extent of benefits that can be provided to the world based on these integrative healthcare modalities.

Thank you for that. So initially you said when you were in the monastery, you were experiencing people coming to you or the monastery, and you said they had done a lot of— most of the work. Explain that. Why had it been that those people coming had done most of the work? Understanding their own traumas, for example?

There is a cycle when it comes to trauma. Many times people will take that situation and build over it, not realizing that the foundation of the structure that we have built there is some rot inside. But human beings are very resilient. They learn to live with disabilities, may it be physiological or emotional or mental. And many times they become at ease with the situation they are in. I have seen people be at ease in a toxic relationship. People be at ease with their own inability to form meaningful relations. I have seen people in a comfort zone, but then something changes inside, and that is the biggest change. I, I call it the Eureka movement, when the thought starts to come 'I deserve better.' A person can live a lifetime and such a thought may not come inside. And this thought that 'I deserve better,' it makes us do wonderful things. And we need to believe this, we need to accept this. 'I deserve better.' If it is just superficial, that thought, then I won't take an action. But these people, they have sat with this thought that I deserve better. That thought has made them go on a quest. And when they go on that external quest looking for something, they are almost always ready to go on an internal quest. And this, this small thought can take lifetimes. And that's why I'm saying those people who have come, they've already come with that self-respect. They've already come with that thought that, yes, I deserve something, I want something, and in my mind I have it. Now I just need to find a path to it. So they are generally looking for a path. So they have that mental resilience, because just taking that step, Mr. Guy, and, and going somewhere like this, it's, it's, it requires extreme courage. And if they can present it, then they are ready. Yes, that saying that when the student is ready, the master appears— what it actually is saying is it is only when the student is ready will he search for the master. So we say that again: when the student is ready Only then he will open his eyes to the master, search the master. Otherwise, who cares?

How, how does someone like yourself, Ishan, who was in a monastery for 20 years, how do you, how do you get out? How do you leave? When, when is it time to leave? This episode is brought to you by Jane, a practice management software and EMR that helps clinicians run their practice without the constant admin overload. If you're Instead of juggling scheduling, notes, and billing across different tools, Jane brings it all together in one place. Payments are recorded automatically, billing stays accurate, and new clients can actually find your practice online. To see how Jane can simplify your workflow, book a demo at jane.app and use the code GUY1MO for a 1-month grace period. That's jane.app and use the code GUY, the number 1, MO for 1 month grace period.

So with me, there were fantastical incidences that occurred. If I look at the previous generations, so my father, he wasn't born in the monastery. He was, uh, chosen as an 8-year-old. So he was a child was growing up in being impoverished in an India that was broken and dividing and still coming out from the traumas and wounds of colonial rule. So at that time, he was the 8th son, the youngest of a widow. So at that time, monks could come and recruit boys into the order. So my father was chosen. But this lineage— in this lineage, you can be a family man, a householder, provided your whole family becomes part of the order and starts to practice. So when the time came, my father did marry, and he chose to raise a family in the monastery. And if things would have happened in a perfect world, I would never have had exposure of the outside world. I would never have come out. I was so happy, I was content. Or you could say I did not know any better, because how can I seek that which I do not know? So in the book, I talk about a sequence of events that happen Um, first, my father took a choice that he was ready to teach the ways of the monastery to outsiders, something that has not been done for hundreds of years. And those outsiders would come, I would listen to stories of the world, and to a young boy, those stories create desire because they would talk about Simple things maybe for a normal person, but to me, you know, the first time I remember somebody said that there is a 16-wheeler truck or some multiple wheels, and I was dumbfounded. How can something had so many wheels? Because in my head, the maximum I could conjure is a 4-wheeler, a 2-wheeler. 16 wheels! And I, I daydreamed for weeks thinking how that thing would look like. So these stories inspired me. And then there was a cataclysmic flood that destroyed the monastery, which made us all relocate to the boundaries of a city. So then I got to see more, more things. And, and not always there was awe. There was disgust. And there was love, and there was ownership after some time that, okay, the, the world is much bigger than the small place. And like, you have ownership towards the monastery and you want to make pretty flowers, pretty trees, make it your own. Then the desire started to come, this world is mine and I must make it better. So yes, the sequence of event does happen. Some things are in your control. And then sometimes it is destiny who winks and nods and says, let me see what I can do with his life. So I would say I'm a product of both free will and the universe having a good day.

Let me just remind everyone, I'm speaking with Eshan Shivanand. Uh, his book is called The Practice of Immortality: A Monk's Guide to Discovering Your Unlimited Potential for Health, Happiness, and Positivity. Eshan, I want to get a little more clarity on— I mean, not every monk writes a book. Not every monk comes to the West and, and, and shares, uh, their wisdom and educates. And what was it about you? What did you feel? What did you see where you're like, I want to start sharing this, I want to start maybe helping other people? What, what was that? Talk to us about that.

So as a monk, you provide theological services like a clergy. So in the Eastern traditions, your life is intertwined with the sense of spirituality. So the Sanatan culture from where I come from, there is birth, a very important time. Then there are 16 times in your life. And a child is born, when you buy a house, when you die— that is when you have that monk in your life, and they help you in theology. And not just that, there are other practices also that the monk teaches. There are, um, so you have to understand, India being a culture that is thousands of years old, certain traditions act like cognitive behavioral therapists or psychologists or psychiatrists to the population. So I come from such a tradition that believed in health, education, and my job, the job that I was doing as the monk was Pratiprasad. So trauma release. Pratiprasad is, is a certain technique, a modality where you go through your own emotions, and it's the most important modality that you have to do. It's Buddha did it, he called it, uh, and he talked about it as Jataka Katha. The great monk Mahavi did it, he called it Jatismaran. And the same is Pratiprasad, that you can't live with that trauma. And, and it's important because imagine if you're going into a marriage then the monk says you must do prati prasa because you can't go in a marriage with old baggage. Or if you're having a kid and you must meditate because if you are carrying the generational traumas, then it's going to be hard. So that was my job. I would do prati prasa for all the people of the order, and I would teach them, and I would do things with them. But I was very localized. I was talking to people who look like me. I was talking to people who were of the same faith, of the same culture, and just doing it as something that needs to be done. But it was around 2015 when I moved to Africa, and in Mauritius, Africa, it is like United States but a bit better, as in it is probably one of the only cultures where so many groups have assimilated together. So there is the Creole population, the Caucasian population, the South Asian population, the Asian population, every single demographic on one island. They have a very strong and robust economy. They have things like universal healthcare, and the crime rates are extremely low. So it's a very— it's like utopia, heaven on earth. And I was there, and at the same time, this place being such a magnificent place, the government being so strong, and the people being, having everything, there was still a rising issue of, uh, cases of mental health problems with the youth. So it was at that time that I myself had a son. And because I had a son, I wasn't traveling much, so I couldn't do my work as the clergy, as the chaplain of my community. So because I'm in this new place, and then it was at that time the education department approached me. They, they had these radical ideas that, uh, which are not radical now. In fact, they were pioneers at that time, that they want to bring integrative healthcare to the youth where they want to use ancient modalities like yoga, meditation, so that the root cause of mental health problems can be sorted out. And, and they understood that. At least the people that I was dealing with at that time, they were highly educated and they, they saw the value in it that we need to change the lifestyles of these kids. So when I went into the room these schools that, that were given to me, these universities, I, I found a very mixed room, um, of, of various children, demographics, cultural backgrounds, religious backgrounds, uh, languages. And I found that I was, uh, not at all prepared for the challenge. These are all new people, and, and as I said, I was used to dealing with a certain group of people that were just so happy to be in my presence and just teach what I have to say. And I was like the guru, and there were flowers, and I was elated by just breathing, you know. I just had to show up and there would be people fawning over me. And here I am sitting with lousy teenagers who are ready to throw at me rotten tomatoes. So it was a very good experience, and then I really had to dig deep to reach their hearts. And that was a challenge I was willing to accept. And over periods of time, years upon years, university after university, school system after school system, you realize that there is this change that are coming in children who practice such modalities versus the children who do not practice or do not have access to that. And then it became a matter of we need to research on what that tangible change is, that if there is a benefit to that student, that benefit cannot just be the teachers being happy that, oh, the student is doing so well, or the child we have, oh, I am doing so well, or it just cannot be the numbers that they are getting in their examinations. There needs to be a proper study, and such a document needs to be presented to the various education systems around the world that we are failing and we must provide more tools to the children who go to the education systems. And it is for that reason then that escalated to now let us start to collect hard evidence, tangible evidence on the real benefits of these modalities in a person's life. So from there it became all about research. So, so progressively things changed and, uh, And, and the thought patterns change. The thoughts change in a manner that the goal has always been the same, to help people, but it is just I keep on finding new paths to reach to my goal, uh, and I would believe more efficient paths than the paths I was exposed to as a child in the monastery.

Let's talk about, uh, your book, The Practice of Immortality Amongst God, Discovering Your Unlimited Potential for Health, Happiness, and Positivity. Why did you write the book?

I wrote the book because I would be presenting papers, um, in various universities in North America, and a lot of the times people will ask, uh, these protocols that you talk about How can we practice them? How can we bring these same magnificent results, uh, in our own life? What is the practice? And also, people were very curious about my story because when I was researching with a group of physicians, or I would be working with multidisciplinary doctors, I would be the odd one out in the room. And, uh, they would be very curious that how you came to be, where do these modalities come from. Because when we talk about yoga, every American thinks they know yoga. But if we take that same yoga that American thinks is yoga back to the monasteries in India, the monks will scratch their head and say, what the hell is this? So in their head, the American is doing something very ancient and exotic and something that raises the Kundalini and whatnot. That— but I don't know what it is. This is something new. It's like, it's like cuisine, you know, when you are eating a pizza in Italy versus a pizza in New York versus a pizza in somewhere else. They have their own flavor to it. And at what point does the pizza stop being a pizza and it becomes something completely different, like a calzone? So what calzone is to a pizza is what American yoga is to yoga. It is something, something that has some ingredients, but I don't know what it is. So when I would make people do protocols and I would call them yoga, but they would be nothing like the yoga in the studios, then, then people will get curious. People are curious, and curious in a good way. So that's why I wanted to write a book, because number one, so that they know the story, they know some background, and they can learn my life lessons that I learned. Plus, I have an interesting life, so I wanted to share that. But more than anything, I wanted to share the structure in which meditation is taught in these ancient practices, and the structure in such a manner that it can easily be integrated with anyone who is living a modern life. So when I wrote the chapters of the book, after each chapter I have a system on a person, how they can progressively start to meditate. So my promise is that anybody who reads the book, or anyone who has the desire to meditate, and this is the last book you ever read on meditation— forget the story, forget the fun, forget my satire that I put in the book— if you just focus on the instructions that are there after each chapter, then this is a very powerful course. And, uh, Sometimes when I travel America and I see that, you know, there are these small courses that people teach and they charge thousands and thousands of dollars for it, and then even I'm thinking I should have done that, but I didn't do that. I just made a book, and inside that book I put in all those systems. And that was the objective, that nobody should suffer and everybody should benefit and move towards a higher plane of consciousness.

Obviously there are many types and forms of meditation. What type of meditation are you speaking about here, or teaching?

I'm talking about the foundation of meditation. When we look at meditation, then we look at the Himalayan traditions as pioneers and why their systems are so unique. Because they have had time, generations, eons, civilizations to practice and to master the art. Even some things as beautiful as Vishad, Vishad Yoga. So Vishad Yoga is this concept that this tradition has that Sorrow has the greatest power because it can lead you to enlightenment. And the enlightenment that comes from sorrow, the process is called Vishuddhi Yoga. So the monks, they say that if sadness has come to your life, this is not something to cry about, but this is something to celebrate. Because in that state of sadness, the veil of illusion in which you are living, that is broken. And suddenly you are at this precipice, at a point of great change and transformation. If that sadness would not have come, this opportunity of growth would not have come. So then the whole meditation system is that, yes, it is sad and unfortunate that we had to go through these sequence of events, but it is also glorious because now that it has happened, let us see what best we can do with it. So these meditation systems, they rely— if I just look at the structure of them they rely a lot on visualization, affirmation, mantra, breathwork. So on the surface, you will see this awareness, and this together forms the physical structure of that meditation. But when we start to go internal to the subtle beauty of these meditations. They are much more profound and difficult to express in words. It is something that a person must feel and experience on their own.

Yes, you've talked a lot about— we mentioned frequently mental health in this, in this interview here.

Do you—

by definition, is, is a monk yourself, maybe someone who also or similarly has mental health issues but understands how to deal with it or manage it, or— obviously you're human beings, right? A monk is a human being. You're not— are you free from mental health issues?

No, definitely not. In fact, when I would study the history of previous monks, then there are these great monks, and when you listen to their stories, a psychiatrist would definitely diagnose them. There is the monk called Mirabai just fell in love with the concept of divinity and devotion, so much so that she could hear, uh, the divine voices. Something like Joan of Arc, but less violent. So psychiatrists would say this is schizophrenia, and just, just take all the poetry out of that story. A lot of the monks that I lived with, they, they— I could say they had OCD, and they were very particular about their practice, very particular about their discipline. So the common world is looking at them and thinking that this is what discipline looks like, this is what austerity looks like. But easily, this is what OCD also looks like. And again, I can look at the greatest greatness of a monk and I could make it redundant with a diagnostic. But I believe where the monks thrive is that they have issues, but rather than seeing that issue as a debilitating burden that they have to carry. Somehow they have learned to make their own issue their superpower, that they are different. They understand it. They are far removed from what is considered normal in society. And there is a point that comes in, in the monk's life that he sees that, okay, I am not like everyone else. What is it that makes me different? Now, what is it that makes me different? I can either live my life crying about it, being sad about it, medicating myself about it, or I can look at ancient systems and traditions of people who went through the same thing and utilize that, that problem as a superpower, as a gift from the universe. And I see this, that that OCD which would have crippled a person in, in the modern world is now making them thrive in the spiritual world. So much so that now I cannot even call it a disorder. It is a superpower. And I think that is the lesson that we have to learn from, from these people who, who choose to treat their body and mind like a temple and, and who have this love affair with themselves. And I think that is, that is very, very important. But to answer your question, yes, there are mental health issues. And this is the beauty that I talked about, but there is also a dark side about being a monk and having mental health issues, because if not given the correct teaching. Because I come from a meditative tradition, so I had it easy. It was all about self-growth, self-development, and raising your consciousness. But what if you are a monk in a religious background, and religion teaches you shame? Religion teaches you that any problem that you are going through, it is a punishment from the Almighty. So there has been some lack in your prayer that you are suffering from this. So that cycle of guilt and shame can also lead to some form of self-medication. And I see this when I work with clergy from other faiths, that substance abuse is a big problem because what you do with, uh, your mental health and what you do and your own faith is not enough. And, and that is where I feel that without the meditative modalities and the wisdom that East can bring to the table, and if it is just religion that we are relying upon, theological concepts and philosophies, then that can spiral the mental health also to a very, very dark place. So yes, both, both the spectrums.

Fascinating, Ishan. Um, again, the book is called The Practice of Immortality: A Monk's Guide to Discovering Your Unlimited Potential for Health, Happiness, and positivity. Ishan, how do people learn more about you and your book? It's the best way.

So the book is available wherever books are available. Um, I was elated to know that the book is a national bestseller now, so people around the world are enjoying the practices. So maybe from Amazon, maybe from your local bookstore.

Can I just say that on Amazon it has almost 1,500 5-star ratings?

I did not know that.

Amazing.

So nice.

Anyway, so go ahead.

Yes, so if you really want to know me and my work, practice the teachings in the book. And if you feel you benefit and you want to reach out to me, to give gratitude or to learn more, then you can find me on LinkedIn as well under Ishan Shivananth.

Okay, and we'll have all that linked up here at the show notes page at thetraumatherapistpodcast.com. Ishan, amazing. You're welcome back anytime. Thank you so much for being here.

Thank you, Mr. Guy. It was a pleasure, and my regards to all your listeners.

Thank you.