How Ivana got here
I moved to Canada during the war in former Yugoslavia. I was 25, carrying stress in my body and mind, and I didn’t even know how to relax. That was the beginning of my search—because I could feel, immediately, that if I didn’t find peace inside myself, nothing outside me would ever feel safe.
I started with yoga, meditation, and breathing exercises, and I’ve stayed with them for 27 years. Meditation has always felt like a doorway into something steady and true. But my path wasn’t simple. Over time, I gained distance from many things that used to pull me out of balance, yet anything close to my heart—my son, my family, the tender places inside me—could still trigger old wounds. I could look “fine” and be highly functional, but inside, there were patterns I couldn’t out-think or out-achieve.
So I tried everything. Tapping. Hypnosis. Psychotherapy. Programs. I stayed curious about the soul and about what we really are beneath the surface. I grew up not believing in anything, then I became agnostic, and eventually something shifted into faith—not in the way of church, but in a deeper knowing. I believe in God in a different way. I believe in our souls, and our connection with God through that.
About twelve years ago, I had an experience on a retreat after intense breathing exercises that I still remember clearly. I lay down, and suddenly I felt completely disconnected from my body—like I could feel myself flying beyond it. My body felt full of bright light, and the peace was so profound it marked me. I wanted to return to that peace, but I couldn’t force it. I learned that I couldn’t “reach” ease through effort alone. Something in me needed healing first.
As I moved through my own healing, I began to understand something that had been true my whole life: people opened up to me. Strangers would tell me their stories—deeply personal things—like they were waiting for someone who could hold it. For years I wondered, what is it in me that makes people feel safe? Now I see it as part of my calling: to create a grounded space where truth can be spoken, felt, and transformed.
My work began with inner child healing, because that’s where my own transformation truly started. But it didn’t end there. I realized we are not one simple “self.” We are made of pieces—child selves, teenage selves, protective parts, wounded parts, brave parts—and healing is learning to love all of them. Even the parts that wake us up at 3 a.m. with racing thoughts. I used to be that person. Now I don’t live there anymore—not because life is perfect, but because my relationship with myself changed.
What I found is that lasting change doesn’t come from forcing positive thinking. Affirmations can feel great when I’m already feeling good—but in lower states, they don’t land. For me, the real doorway is emotion. We communicate with the subconscious through what we feel. The subconscious isn’t always “speaking” in words like you’re not lovable or not enough—we feel it as unease, tension, doubt, fear, or that heavy sense that something is off.
So my process is simple, but it goes deep: we stay with the feeling. We let it be there. We even amplify it, just enough to truly meet it. People cry sometimes—and I welcome that, because emotions are meant to move. They don’t last forever when we stop resisting them. Then I ask: when have you felt this before? Most people go straight to childhood, sometimes to teenage years, because the body remembers. We find the moment where the story began—not always some dramatic “big trauma,” but often the way a child perceived a moment of disconnection, lack of support, or misunderstood love.
Our parents are human. They loved us, but sometimes they were overwhelmed—money stress, work stress, their own pain—and we made meaning from what we couldn’t understand. That’s often where beliefs like “I’m not worthy” quietly take root.
Then we change the emotional imprint. I guide clients to bring their adult self into that memory—to hold the child, to offer the love that was missing, to provide support, to bring safety, play, softness. It’s not about blaming anyone. It’s about finally giving ourselves what we needed, and stopping the old pattern from running our lives.
Today I support individual clients, and I also bring this message into corporate spaces through talks and “Lunch and Learns.” I help people see that stress doesn’t have to run their lives—that we can take responsibility for our inner world, understand our thoughts and emotions, heal the root, and live from a calmer, clearer place. I’m not here for quick fixes. I’m here for the kind of transformation where peace stops being something you chase—and becomes the way you move through life.