#776 – Helen Lavretsky, MD, MS – Living From The Soul: The Neuroscience of Spiritual Awakening

Interview starts at 27:10

• Dr. Helen Lavretsky shares her unusual path from the former Soviet Union into psychiatry, neuroscience, and later Kundalini yoga teacher training.
• She explains how growing up in an atheist Soviet environment still left room for underground spirituality passed through families and oral tradition.
• She describes a six-month temporary enlightenment experience after Kundalini practice and why it was physically intense, hard to describe, and initially unsustainable.
• The conversation focuses on her book Living from the Soul and the idea that people are increasingly being pushed to trust their own wisdom instead of outside authorities.
• She discusses how spirituality shows up in geriatric psychiatry, especially for older adults, dementia caregivers, and long COVID patients dealing with mortality and stress.
• She argues that meditation, breathing practices, yoga, tai chi, and qigong can improve self-regulation, brain health, and decision-making under pressure.
• She outlines how brain health should be cultivated across the lifespan, starting in childhood and even in utero, rather than only addressed later in life.
• She notes that lifestyle factors such as sleep, movement, diet, and stress management matter for dementia prevention and broader cognitive resilience.
• She emphasizes that meaning, purpose, and connection to soul are central to mental well-being.

• Soul-based self-inquiry- asking inwardly what is right for you rather than defaulting to external authority
• Brain health across the lifespan- prevention beginning in childhood and even before birth
• Stress self-regulation toolkit- breathing, meditation, yoga, tai chi, and qigong as practical nervous-system supports
• Constitutional approach to diet- different people may need different foods based on ancestry, metabolism, and predisposition