Isha Strasser is an organizational director and contemplative teacher striving to bring individuals and organizations into fuller alignment with purpose and power through vision and mission.
For the past ten years she has worked as an educational nonprofit director for international and local organizations, and draws from twenty-five years of experience in somatic-based healing, yoga, and contemplative practice. Isha partners with Blueprint Evolution as a facilitator to fuse the essential principles of equity, inclusion, and belonging with embodied transformation.
Her journey into yoga began in the 1990s when she picked up a book by J. Krishnamurti, found a steady practice, and never stopped.
Then, she discovered the potential for somatic healing during an immersive study at The Neighborhood Playhouse in 2000-2001. Through improvisational training in the Meisner Technique, combined with dance, voice, creative movement, and the Alexander Technique, she experienced connection that transformed her life. After watching the towers fall from her apartment in the Lower East Side, she reoriented her focus on yoga.
In 2002, Isha moved to Venice Beach where she focused her training at Sacred Movement in Santa Monica. Her practice was shaped by classes with Micheline Berry, Saul David Raye, and Shiva Rea. In 2004, she was accepted to Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado, to study contemplative interdisciplinary performance and deepen her yogic and meditative disciplines.
Isha continued her practice and study of Ashtanga Yoga with Ryan Stevens (a student of Richard Freeman), practiced with K. Pattabhi Jois at an intensive in San Francisco, and began teaching at a community center in Miliken, Colorado in 2005. In partnership with a close student, she opened Rise Yoga Studio in 2006 in Longmont, Colorado, which later became the Lyons Yoga Sanctuary in Lyons, Colorado.
Over years of steady yogic practice and teaching, she continued to develop tools for transformative work with individuals & groups through the New Seminary of Interfaith Studies in New York (2009), Clinical Pastoral Education at St. Anthony Hospital (2010), Upledger CranioSacral Therapy 1, 2, & SomatoEmotional Release (2011), Arcane School (2012), and the Alternatives to Violence Project (completed AVP Basic in 2013 and received Facilitator Certification in 2019).
During a three month pilgrimage in India in 2010, Isha met and studied with incredible teachers (she’ll share that story elsewhere!). She had a keen interest in Laya Yoga and delighted in weekly Kirtan with her community at home in Lyons, but when she heard Sadhvi Abha Saraswati’s Vedic Chanting at an ashram in Rishikesh, Isha found a true teacher (follow this link to hear more!).
When she returned to her home in Lyons, she continued to teach Ashtanga and Raja Yoga, assist and facilitate immersive weekend retreats, serve as a chaplain, craniosacral therapist, caregiver, and spiritual counselor—but she was transformed by her experience in India and turned toward an expanded sense of service.
In 2013, she aspired to expand yogic and healing arts practice from individuals & small groups to include nonprofit organizations. The vision was clear: to draw on her experience helping individuals align with their highest self, to help create dynamically aligned organizations for increased impact in the world.
In 2014, Isha accepted an entry level position at Lucis Trust in New York City, and within a couple years was working as one of their executive creative directors. She continued to refine her skills with a Master’s in Writing Arts in 2020 at Rowan University, and she earned a Medallion Award for Outstanding Master of Writing Arts. While at Rowan she worked through the Office of Social Justice, Inclusion, and Conflict Resolution as a program coordinator, meditation teacher, and facilitator at the Interfaith Center. During her time as Managing Director at the Center for Contemporary Mussar in Philadelphia, Isha studied Torah and Mussar with a va’ad under the guidance of Madrichah Elana Eisner, Certified Jungian Analyst.
Isha’s writing has appeared in national and international newsletters and publications with the nonprofits she served in New York, Philadelphia, and South Jersey at Friends School Mullica Hill, where she also worked as the Director of Enrollment and Communications. She currently serves as a Senior Strategist for DEI & Transformative Belonging with Blueprint Evolution, and collaborator with Savitri Yoga School as the resident interfaith minister, teacher, and content creator, and adjunct faculty at Rowan University.