Rabbi Yali Szulanski
Raising Humans. Growing Souls.
Bio
Rabbi Yali Szulanski is an award-winning educator, writer, wellness consultant, and spiritual guide who helps individuals, families, schools, and communities build a shared language of emotional wellness, resilience, and belonging. Her work is grounded in compassion, deep listening, and the belief that every person carries an innate capacity for healing and connection.
Blending movement, breathwork, creative expression, and trauma-informed mind-body practices, Rabbi Yali creates spaces that honor the fullness of being human—spaces where joy, grief, and growth can coexist. She helps people of all ages find ways to return to themselves and to one another with presence, courage, and care.
Her programs and teachings have reached communities across the United States, Israel, Haiti, Singapore, and the United Kingdom. She holds a Master’s in Psychology and Education from Teachers College, Columbia University, and received rabbinic ordination from Yeshivat Maharat.
Rabbi Yali is the founder of The “I Am” Project, an initiative that weaves contemplative and spiritual practices into daily life in practical, meaningful ways. A trauma survivor and someone in long-term recovery from an eating disorder, she brings honesty, warmth, and deep empathy to her work—meeting others where they are, with steadiness and an open heart.
Through one-on-one support, group facilitation, classroom work, and leadership consultation, Rabbi Yali helps people nurture emotional strength, spiritual groundedness, and a deeper sense of wholeness. Her writing has been featured in The Times of Israel, The Wisdom Daily, The Jewish Link, Refuat Hanefesh, Sefaria, At The Well, and Elephant Journal.
Yali worked with our sixth grade classes for three years. Her "I Am" Project workshops taught students and teachers to incorporate social-emotional wellness into the classroom environment. In a tracked study, students performed better on assessments and reported higher rates of positive feedback regarding their levels of anxiety, and mental wellbeing as compared to previous years, and throughout the year. Parents reported their children being more capable of expressing their frustration and anger at home in healthy ways, and exhibiting calm and informed approaches to problem solving.
Bala Cynwyd Middle School
