We are sharing our recent interview with singer, speaker, workshop facilitator, awakening coach, sexuality coach, tantra teacher, meditation guide.
Pro Media Mag : First of all tell us about the start of your professional career.
Riya Sokol : I was on the stage since I was six. I was travelling around the world as a kid singing and dancing in a group as a soloist. It conditioned the choices in my life. I knew I am going to live and die on the stage. Whether it’s singing or speaking.
Although on the outside I looked like i have the life of the dreams, my childhood was also emotionally super complicated. I was suffering for a chronic anxiety and sleeplessness since I remember. As a teenager it lead me to chronic eating disorder and depression. I was desperate to find a reason of these mental problems. So I started searching, studying psychology, travelling- and that’s how I got into meditation, tantra, shamanism. It was getting clear for me, it’s all connected and if i don’t find a way to heal myself, it will affect my kids and my own body. It did. First, my daughter was born very ill. Then I was ill for almost 2 years and this was a breakthrough in my life. All these events forced me to go on a deep self journey. Using all the tools i knew from before, and learning more. How to deal with these thoughts, how to deal with these fears, threats, and everything that grew inside my body because of them? It led me to the simplest thing on the world: forgiveness and self love.
After all I’ve been through, I started to share it all with others. I give tools to handle struggles with anxiety, stress, which is my music- amongst others. Also we do trainings where people can explore their subconscious. Which is where the actual “director of our life” is sitting and creating everything. Slowly slowly my career shifted and grew in a tiny different direction and is definitely still growing.
Pro Media Mag : Who or what inspired you to get into this industry?
Riya Sokol : Life is my biggest inspiration. Since I was a kid I knew I have a very strong impact on people. And I knew I have to use it wisely. So I encourage people to live consciously.
Pro Media Mag : Tell us about your recent release “Thank you” ?
Riya Sokol : It’s an album with mantras. These are songs, sang for a long time, repeating the same phrase, in order to create a certain vibration. My mantras are a mixture of my spiritual experience and a mixture of different traditions that I encountered on my path, and helped me in my healing. So it would be: indian sanskrit, hawaiian kohuna, tibetan, sufi, mayan… each of them has a certain intention- so if you feel like you struggle with anger and want to forgive someone but it’s hard, I would say, play ‘ho’oponopono”. If you struggle with what is happening on our planet- the wars, or climate change, i would say play “lokah samastah”… and so forth. But obviously, you don’t even need to be struggling to play them as they being played in a background, are working on your subconscious -soothing, healing and relaxing your nervous system. It is powerful tool.
Pro Media Mag : What kind of response you have received from the release?
Riya Sokol : That “it works!” 🙂 and that it’s a heart opening music. beautiful reviews. they always touch me deeply.
Pro Media Mag : You are a singer, speaker, workshop facilitator, awakening coach, sexuality coach, tantra teacher, meditation guide, how do you manage all that ?
Riya Sokol : First of all, I want to be transparent and must say: I don’t always succeed 😉 it is challenging at times, but I love it so much that I couldn’t imagine different life. It demands discipline and focus. But also dedication and love to what i do.
Pro Media Mag : Tell us more about training facility Awaken as Love?
Riya Sokol : It is an evolutionary training and as i mentioned, it is giving you tools to explore your patterns, your processes and yourself in general. It is based on tantra as well as Integral Theory of Ken Wilber, as our approach is to live in full integrity. Spirituality very often excludes the mind as it is something in opposition to the heart. We teach how to use the mind wisely, that it becomes our friend, not the enemy. And Integral Theory is fantastic way to understand oneself. James Stevenson- the founder of Awaken as Love created it in a way that it is balanced, and if you come, you’re going to get exactly what you need in order to balance your life- whether it’s finding the right partner, earning more money, or simply reconnect with your soul’s purpose.
Pro Media Mag : Have you set any goals to achieve?
Riya Sokol : Yes! To go fully mainstream with the work I am doing, show people how helpful it is, how they can improve their lives. And then be famous as Pink or Lady Gaga 😉
Pro Media Mag : Are you working on any new project?
Riya Sokol : I released this new album literally today, (20.02.2020). The whole year of trainings and concerts are prepared already. We teach in Holland, Portugal, Sweden, Poland, California and India. This is the first year also that we do the Facilitators training, as there are more and more people wanting to facilitate in our Awaken as Love, so we created a special structure for them to also learn how to teach. AND I also started already working on another album with mantras- but this time it will be dancing mantras 🙂