FORMER monk and social media sensation Jay Shetty has admitted he “never imagined” his level of success, as he prepared for the release last week of his debut book.
Shetty has become known as one of the most influential people on social media, as well as a storyteller on mindfulness and wellbeing. His followers total more than 35 million and his daily videos have amassed more than seven billion views. His podcast, On Purpose, which has seen him interview a number of celebrities including the late basketball player Kobe Bryant, reality TV star Khloe Kardashian and musician Alicia Keys, has had more than 64 million downloads.
The 33-year-old admitted the success was “completely unexpected”, and he had “never imagined it would ever happen”.
“I thought I would make videos in the evenings and weekends, go to my day job and do this as a hobby on the side because I loved and believed in it,” he told Eastern Eye last week. “The fact that it’s got to this level... I live in gratitude because I never expected it.”
His success story is not a typical one. Growing up in north London with his parents and younger sister, the entrepreneur had a fairly uneventful childhood. Shetty, from a British-Indian background, attended a prestigious grammar school in High Barnet and did well in his studies.
In his later teens, however, he rebelled. He began to mix with the wrong crowd, getting involved with drugs and alcohol. He was suspended from school three times, and was threatened with expulsion.
Shetty promised to clean up his act, and he turned a corner. In college, he began to realise the value of hard work and discipline. But it was in his first year of university at Cass Business School that his life changed when he attended a talk by a monk called Gauranga Das. Shetty admitted he was not particularly interested in the event – it was a friend who forced him to accompany him. Within minutes, however, he was hooked.
“That night, as I listened to the monk talk about his experience, I fell in love,” Shetty wrote in his book Think Like A Monk, which came out last week.
Das revealed that he had given up an opportunity to study at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay – one of India’s most prestigious institutes – to pursue a life of mindfulness and spirituality. Shetty said he was fascinated by his story, admitting he didn’t believe he had ever met anyone who was truly happy until he saw Das.
When he approached the monk after the talk, Das told him he would be travelling around the UK on a speaking tour and Shetty was welcome to attend. Without hesitation, he agreed.
When Shetty graduated from college, he joined an ashram in Mumbai. He shaved his head, slept on the floor, studied ancient Indian scriptures and meditated for hours each day. He spent three years in the ashram before returning to the UK.
His time at the ashram was undeniably a point of interest for people, Shetty said. “When I became a monk, it definitely wasn’t the coolest, trendiest decision. I did it because I just really believed in it and I love that there’s intrigue and curiosity about (my background). I think it’s such a beautiful thing to be intrigued and curious – not just about my background, but anyone’s. That’s what feeds our soul and keeps us alive.”
When he returned from the ashram, Shetty admitted it was one of the toughest periods of his life. He spent his time at home, despairing over his decision. It was the closest he had ever felt to being depressed, he revealed.
“My advice to myself then would have been just use your monk training, don’t ignore it, don’t think the answer is somewhere else,” he said. “That’s eventually what I ended up doing but that would have been my advice to myself much sooner – to just really believe it and trust it, to follow my intuition and my instinct.”
Eventually, Shetty got a job offer at a global consultancy film. Although he considered himself as a ‘former’ monk, Shetty said he still applied the wisdom he had learnt to his everyday life. He started to make mindfulness videos on mental health, purpose and wellbeing in his spare time.
The Huffington Post came across the content and showed interest in them – which became the starting point for Shetty’s multi-million pound mindfulness empire. The popularity of his videos soared, racking up thousands of views. In 2018, one of his videos was named the most viewed on Facebook.
Despite his success, he still keeps in touch with the monks he spent time with in Mumbai. He and his wife Radhi return on an annual basis to “reconnect with (his roots)”. “I’m really grateful to be still connected to that community,” he said.
Shetty now lives in Los Angeles with his wife, although London is never far from his thoughts. He misses playing football with his friends, he said, and he misses his family. Typically, he would visit the UK every three or four months. Unfortunately, the current Covid-19 pandemic has meant he has been unable to return for a while.
“It was really clear that my wife and I wouldn’t be able to go back to London to see our families (during the outbreak). That was definitely hard because we thought it would be such a unique opportunity to spend really deep, quality time with our parents,” he said. “We’ve missed them a lot and wish we could have been with them.”
Shetty used his time during lockdown productively – he conducted a daily series of Instagram and Facebook lives, teaching people meditation. The social media star has also been working on wellbeing sessions with some schools and hospitals.
“Part of my monk training is you always look for certainty and uncertainty through service, and I was trying to find out how could I make a difference if I’m healthy and safe?” he explained. “My wife and I’ve been very fortunate to be healthy and safe, so it was always about what and how we could extend ourselves to others.”
Shetty also had the release of his new book to look forward to. He wrote Think Like A Monk last year, but its original April release was delayed due to Covid-19. However, he believes that this is the best time to get the book out there.
It draws upon guidance and wisdom from Shetty, referring to his experiences in the ashram. It offers a variety of advice, including how to overcome negative thoughts and habits, reduce stress and improve focus.
“It’s been a really tough and challenging year for so many people in so many ways and during these times, we naturally start asking more questions,” he explained. “We’re more inquisitive to want to find alternative paths, other ideas, new insights that can help us.
“When I wrote the book, my goal was to really help people train their mind for peace and purpose every day. I can’t think of a more significant time where we all are seeking peace and purpose in different areas of our life. My goal with this book is that it helps people find calm in the chaos, and (brings them) peace and purpose in their lives.”
HATE crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales have risen sharply, with religiously aggravated and racially motivated incidents registering a significant spike, according to the latest statistics released by the Home Office last Thursday (9).
Police forces logged 115,990 hate crimes in the year ending March 2025, a two per cent increase compared with the previous year. Race hate offences accounted for the majority at 71 per cent or 82,490 offences, followed by religious hate crimes at 7,164 offences.
Within these figures, anti-Muslim hate crimes reached a record high of 4,478 offences (45 per cent), followed by 2,873 (29 per cent) anti-Jewish crimes, 502 antiChristian hate offences (five per cent), 259 (three per cent) anti-Sikh and 182 (two per cent) anti-Hindu hate crimes.
“Hate crime statistics show that too many people are living in fear because of who they are, what they believe, or where they come from,” said home secretary Shabana Mahmood.
Professor Anand Menon
“Jewish and Muslim communities continue to experience unacceptable levels of often violent hate crime, and I will not tolerate British people being targeted simply because of their religion, race, or identity.”
Police patrols have been increased at synagogues and mosques around the UK following recent terror attack at a Manchester synagogue, Mahmood said.
Police forces in England and Wales are facing mounting pressure to strengthen hate crime enforcement and rebuild confidence among minority communities.
Community groups have urged the government to introduce mandatory anti-racism training within the police, alongside improved victim support and outreach in areas with growing South Asian populations.
Stephen Walcott, head of policy at the Runnymede Trust, told Eastern Eye the current wave of violence “cannot be divorced from a political agenda which sows hatred and divisions, and is promoted by the British media consistently”.
He said successive governments and mainstream parties have “flirted with racist politics for years – demonising migrants, asylum seekers and Muslims to distract from policies that have hollowed out communities and inflicted deep poverty.”
Walcott linked this to figures such as farright agitator Tommy Robinson and billionaire backers “including Elon Musk” who exploit racial tensions and “treat people of colour in the UK with complete contempt”.
Scenes of mourning in Southport after the murder of three young girls
The Home Office pointed to a “clear spike” in religious hate crimes targeted at Muslims in August last year, following the murder of schoolgirls at a Taylor Swiftthemed dance class in Southport and the subsequent misinformation around the UK-born attacker’s motivations and immigration status.
The number of religious hate crimes targeted at Jewish people fell by 18 per cent, from 2,093 to 1,715 offences, but the Home Office cautioned that these figures exclude data from the Metropolitan Police – which recorded a major chunk of all religious hate crimes targeted at Jewish people. This exclusion of Met Police statistics from the overall analysis is due to a change in the force’s crime recording system since February 2024, which restricts comparisons with data supplied in previous years.
Over the past two years, there have been at least eight major racially motivated attacks and violent incidents targeting south Asians. The surge, documented by police and academic researchers, shows a pattern of abuse, from verbal harassment to deadly assaults, with victims and campaigners warning that racism has become both more visible and more vicious.
A University of Leicester study, launched in parliament in 2024, revealed that 45 per cent of Asians in the UK experienced hate crime during 2023–2024, and 55 per cent of them suffered multiple incidents.
However, only one in 10 victims reported these crimes to the police, citing mistrust and a lack of confidence in authorities.
Most perpetrators were under 30 and often acted in groups, according to the study, with attacks ranging from public slurs and threats to serious assaults, sexual violence and murder.
Prominent incidents include the recent racially aggravated rape of a Sikh woman in Oldbury, the murder of 80-year-old Bhim Kohli in Leicester (2024), and coordinated riots in Hartlepool, Middlesbrough and Rotherham that targeted Asian communities and asylum seekers.
Large cities including London, Birmingham, Manchester and Leicester continue to report spikes in racially motivated attacks, with many Asians saying they now alter their routines, avoiding public transport at night or refraining from speaking in their native languages in public, to avoid harassment.
Professor Anand Menon, director of UK in a Changing Europe at King’s College London, said there is “very little doubt that the political language around race and race relations has become much nastier in recent years”.
“It’s obviously connected to the rising salience of immigration as an issue, and to the increasing popularity of a populist party that is willing to stress the cultural as well as the economic impact of immigration. So, it shouldn’t be wholly surprising that we’re seeing a rise in hate crimes,” he told Eastern Eye. Menon noted that Britain lives in “very polarised times – not just in politics, but in the wider world too, from what’s happening in Gaza to what (US president) Donald Trump is doing.”
“At a minimum, we’ve got a right to expect the head of a notionally progressive, centre-left party to speak out much more firmly and much more quickly against racism than he’s been willing to do. His reaction was quite slow and quite delayed, and people notice that,” Menon said.
He suggested that economic insecurity lies at the root of rising hate crimes. “We’ve had 15 to 20 years of very poor economic performance. People have seen wages stagnate, inflation and prices go up, and a housing crisis develop, because we haven’t built enough homes.
“When people feel economically insecure, they’re more prone to turn their anger towards immigrants and blame them for everything that’s going wrong.”
Campaigners also noted the escalation in hate crime after the Covid-19 pandemic. Hate incidents against Asians trebled in 2020, and levels have remained persistently high since. The latest England and Wales figures show decreases in hate crimes based on sexual orientation, down two per cent to 18,702 from 19,127, and disability hate crimes, which decreased by eight per cent from 11,131 to 10,224.
There was also a fall in transgender hate crimes by 11 per cent from 4,258 to 3,809, the second consecutive annual fall.
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