SWIHA Blog

Let’s face it, transitioning from a full-time employee into a full-fledged Entrepreneur is going to require a little bit more than proof of concept and connections. While those are necessary, the mental shifting you’ll require to dive into your business is going to be the key to your success.

Have you ever noticed how people enter a swimming pool? They get in there one of two ways; they either DIVE or DIP. This is a perfect metaphor for how people enter decisions, and for this particular subject, make the dive into being an Entrepreneur.

Toe Dippers like to take their time and gently dip their toe in the water, checking the temperature, and then slowly walking into the pool. And once their body agrees with the temperature, sometimes they’ll dive in. They’re a little more hesitant and take more calculated risks.

By Ivie McCoy -Guest Blogger

People are drinking smoothies now more than ever before. What should be in a smoothie to make it a complete, healthy alternative? Many people run into issues with things like texture, taste, and variety. Part of the misconception with taste is that we are so used to things being sweet that it is difficult to eat a green smoothie that tastes like “dirt” or is “earthy”. What if a green smoothie didn’t have to taste bad? What if a healthy smoothie that is also delicious could be made every day? By following these five easy steps, compiled mostly from the teachings of SWIHA holistic nutrition instructor Janet Lee, it is easy to create amazing green smoothies!

By Richard Seaman

I often wonder where would I be if I had not listened to God’s voice. Where would I be if I had not stepped onto the path to walk a Spiritually Reliable life?

I remember a time when I had one of those break down moments in the shower. I felt as if I was losing my mind, losing parts and pieces of myself. I cried out so loud to God, “I know I am amazing, talented and fabulous. I know I am not here to sling pasta in an Italian restaurant for the rest of my life. I am ripe and ready for the picking—God use me as your Divine instrument, in the peace and healing of others. God, I cannot go on anymore like this. I beg you, PLEASE send someone to produce me!”

It was a desperate attempt to get Gods attention, which, in my case is never anything short of melodramatic. I had gone complacent and was walking around in my life going through the motions, having temporary, fleeting in-sights—dreaming and seeing who I could become. Standing naked in the shower, water dripping down my body seemed metaphorical as I was having an emotional crisis, screaming, crying and complaining of how things were not working in my life. Then I heard the Voice—the voice neither male nor female, a voice so clear, direct, and precise like a laser, surround me from all directions and yell into me—Produce Yourself!

The recent awareness around ingredients in foods and products has practically caused a worldwide phenomenon. Conscious consumers everywhere are beginning to pay attention to what they are putting in and on their bodies. However, Lisa Kaiser has been reading product labels and looking at food ingredients long before it was making headlines. This attention to labels and ingredients was what inspired Lisa to create her skincare business, The Good Stuff, over 15 years ago with her daughter.
Lisa came to Southwest Institute of Healing Arts (SWIHA) years after launching her business with the intent to expand on her expertise. She enrolled in the online Associates of Mind-Body Transformational Psychology program, and was intrigued by the Urban Farming courses, due to her interest in reading labels and using ingredients that nature provided.

“The fact that Urban Farming was incorporated, along with the holistic nutrition classes, brought what I believe full circle,” Lisa explained.

Like many students who attend SWIHA (Southwest Institute of Healing Arts), Elizabeth Brotherson came to the school looking for an alternative career path. She was hoping to supplement her income as a preschool teacher by earning a living doing something she was passionate about. Elizabeth had always been drawn to energy work and had a natural intuition for knowing when someone might need help or healing, so when she found SWIHA, she knew it was the perfect fit for her.

“SWIHA embraces the total embodiment of the healing arts, encouraging you to use your natural abilities, while giving you the tools to take it that extra step to make you a successful therapist,” she explains regarding what attracted her to SWIHA.

Elizabeth, or Beth, as she often goes by, enrolled in SWIHA’s Professional Massage Practitioner 750 hour program, and immediately began her journey to becoming a Licensed Massage Therapist. She says after starting her first myotherapy class she was hooked! She went on to take every myotherapy class SWIHA offered, as well as deep tissue, massage, trigger point courses, and sports massage, in addition to core courses such as anatomy and reflexology.

By Dee McCaffrey

Nutrition is a big buzz word these days. Nearly every week we hear about the newly discovered health benefits of whole foods or the harmful effects of denatured processed foods. From the heart-protective antioxidants in grapes and dark chocolate, to the cancer-causing downside of refined sugar, our national awareness of the role food plays in our health is on the rise. Healthy food has gone mainstream, yet personal health is still a mystery to many people.

It’s no secret that the Standard American Diet, appropriately acronymed SAD, is the worst diet humans can engage in; it has created a health crisis unlike anything seen in human history. Within the last 100 years, we have gone from growing, harvesting, and preparing our own food with our own hands, to mass producing concoctions that are made in laboratories. In the name of progress, we have blindly and tragically denounced many of our traditional real foods as unhealthy, and replaced them with synthetic look-alikes. Out of fear of rising cholesterol levels and heart disease, we swapped real eggs for Egg Beaters, and real butter for margarine.

Published Author. Massage Therapist. Teacher. Spiritual Coach. Aromatherapist. Clinical Nurse. Holistic Entrepreneur. These are just some of the many titles Marci Cagen can put on her resume. A graduate of SWIHA’s Massage Therapy program, Marci’s interest in massage therapy and holistic health stemmed from her years of experience as a clinical nurse, and grew into a business that extends beyond one or two holistic modalities.

“I originally enrolled at SWIHA while I was working as a clinical nurse at Phoenix Children’s Hospital so I could learn some alternative therapies that would support the patients I worked with,” Marci explains. “They were in so much pain, and I wanted to be able to offer healing modalities that would complement the medications they were prescribed, alleviating associated side effects, while offering support to the mind, body, spirit and emotions.” Marci’s interest in reflexology guided her to massage therapy, and multiple other healing modalities followed. Once she completed her massage therapy program, Marci felt she needed to leave her nursing career to “answer the call of my soul.” During her time studying at SWIHA, she learned how to embrace her spiritual healing gifts, and upon graduating, Marci began to create a life of helping others tap into their spiritual gifts.

Kate Shipp was dreaming: She was stuck inside a building with a bunch of people, and it felt as if there was no way out. Every floor had a door, every door led to stairs which led to more doors and more rooms. She asked people in the rooms why they were there, and they told her they didn’t know, yet they felt they had everything they needed, except a way out of the building. Kate looked up and noticed windows lining the walls. She stood on a table, broke open a window, and escaped, telling everyone that sometimes we have to look to the window within to find or way out.

This dream was a subconscious intervention of sorts, inspiring Kate to launch one of her businesses, The Window Within, a holistic wellness business that offering a variety of services including intuitive yoga therapy, energy healing, intuitive coaching and readings. Already a co-owner of the popular Santosha Yoga and Wellness yoga studio in Glendale, Arizona, launching another business was simply a natural next step for Kate.

Kate enhanced her entrepreneurial spirit during her time as a student in the 600 hour Yoga Teacher Training program at Southwest Institute of Healing Arts (SWIHA). Her teacher training program helped to unveil the potential within her that she had never previously tapped into or explored, enhancing her growth.

"Writing is by definition a creative endeavor, one that energizes the mind and nourishes the soul."

Randy Davila

For many creative people, especially writers, putting themselves out there can be an intimidating and overwhelming process. It can be a scary enough process to just put words on paper or type into a computer, sharing your soul with friends or family. It’s even scarier to try to get those words published for the entire world to read!

A 2013 article from Forbes.com states that there are roughly 600,000 to one million books published a year in America, and as much as half are self-published. It’s a pretty competitive marketplace for even the most ambitious writers who hope to get their message out, and read, by more than just a few family members and close friends.

According to Randy Davila, CEO of Hampton Roads and Hierophant Publishing, right now is the best time in history to write a book and get it published. However, it is also a time of rapid and confusing change in the publishing industry.

"We all know the publishing world has changed,” Randy writes in his book, Think Like A Publisher.

By KC Miller - SWIHA Success Center Blogger

Within the halls of SWIHA (Southwest Institute of Healing Arts) there is an unspoken secret, of sorts, about a special kind of power we all kind of know about, mostly believe in, and yet may not always tap into. It’s the woo-woo stuff that those outside our little SWIHA bubble might scoff at, albeit behind our backs. And yet, multimillionaire entrepreneur and angel investor May McCarthy puts it right out there, in a book, and speaks about it regularly.

From the very beginning of her newly release book, The Path to Wealth: Seven Spiritual Steps for Financial Abundance, May McCarthy acknowledges the all-knowing power of the universe— Infinite Intelligence, the Universe, Spirit, God, Truth, etc.