SWIHA Blog

Ravynn Rohner is a graduate who has literally transformed her life and humbly taken space in the seat of the teacher. In 2011, Ravynn started doing yoga regularly in her hometown of Casa Grande, Arizona and her teacher was a Spirit of Yoga graduate. Having taken Cranial Unwinding at SWIHA in 2007, she was familiar with the school, and began thinking about taking the 800-hour Yoga Teacher Training Program.

“At the time, I was in my fourth debilitating year of Fibromyalgia (full body pain and fatigue), only taking care of my responsibilities for my son and doing yoga; the rest of the time I was in bed, with my Nana being a huge support system at the time. After meeting with Admissions, I was led to enroll in the Mind-Body Wellness Practitioner Program with concentrations in Life Coaching, Polarity, and Yoga. In the back of my mind, I wondered if I’d be able to improve my Fibro because doctors told me that I’d have the syndrome for life, be on medications more and more as time went on, and that my body had betrayed me. I went into ‘fighter’ mode, thinking #WatchThis. I didn’t want to believe, I couldn’t believe, what the doctors predicted. My son needed a mother that was healthy and present. I walked into SWIHA with both hope and doubt. It was the perfect program choice for me, as the Life Coaching allowed me to clean out the mental garbage that kept the pain in my body. Polarity was the modality and vehicle that allowed me to release the stuck energy or physical pain, and Yoga was the icing on the cake that gave me strength to get off all my medications. I was #FibroFree, four months into my program!”

Keta Baker is a true #GreatGraduate and the testimony of her journey is as divinely guided as she is. Keta’s story begins with her questioning the universe, “One Saturday afternoon in 2012, my sister brought me to this Italian restaurant in Phoenix. We pulled up to the restaurant and out of my mouth came the words, ‘This is a nice place to have my life coaching business housed in.’ This was followed by me looking up and saying, ‘What?’ . . . ‘What life coaching business?’” What Keta Baker didn’t fully understand at the time was that she was getting ‘downloads’ from Spirit.

Humbly, Keta explains, “I began to get these downloads of a whole business plan and what I was to do to help others as a Life Coach. I didn’t have anything to write on, so as soon as I got inside of the restaurant, I grabbed several napkins to record what I knew was God’s plan for my life. That evening I Googled what a Life Coach was and began searching for schools where I could learn to become a Life Coach. I prayed for direction for the path the Divine placed me on. A few days went by and after diligently listening and looking, SWIHA, Southwest Institute of Healing Arts, came up.”

Keta quickly called the next day to schedule a tour of the SWIHA campus in Tempe, Arizona.

Adam Ramirez was at a place in his life where he desired to finish his education in something that he could really utilize as part of the medicine path he was already beginning to follow. “I put that inclination out to the universe, as I kept getting a hint towards finalizing my education, and as I came home one summer a few years back I met a friend of my mothers who seemed to be finishing her schooling through SWIHA. She told me all about this wonderful school, and I knew from there it was meant to be.”

From a young age, Adam has been concerned with the human race and the way we impacted ourselves and the world around us. He knew from a young age that he wanted to take away all the suffering and demise of the world. He started “learning about the human race (sociology/psychology), learning of how I could help and be an instrument of medicine to the people. We all have a rhyme and reason for being on this planet, finding our key and opening the door is on our part in order to grow and flourish.”

Alise Holland, like many of SWIHA’s students, was brought to the school by Spirit. On Labor Day, 2014, she saw a vision of a school for healing and the name, Southwest Institute of Healing Arts, came through in her vision. At the time, she had been teaching in a public classroom for eight years, and took a leap of faith and left the classroom in 2011. Alise shared how, even though she had her Doctorate in Education and had a flexible job, she knew that there was something missing and needed to find out what SWIHA had to offer. “It wasn’t until I attended SWIHA to better understand myself and how I show up in the world… That’s when it became simple; my life purpose is to serve others and be a Merchant of Hope.”

Although she grew up in poverty, Alise has realized that nothing is truly wasted, and she is grateful for all of her challenges. “What I find is that now that I am on my spiritual path, I am able to share my knowledge with others to enlighten them on their own spiritual path. In other words, I am able to turn all of my sufferings into service to help others.” For the longest time, Alise couldn’t figure out why she chose to become a teacher, when her true passion resided in tapping into her spiritual gifts. After attending SWIHA, she learned why. “I am still a teacher and mentor, but my audience has changed. It is now the World, and I am destined to be a Spiritual Guide to souls throughout humanity. People need the right kinds of knowledge, yet I will be using my spiritual gifts and knowledge to educate souls.”

Ayesha Dalton’s recently-opened spa, just over 9 months old, has a warm and loving atmosphere that exudes professionalism and pristine care. Ayesha’s passion for beauty and well-being developed long before her studies at the Southwest Institute of Natural Aesthetics. She is passionate about what she does, sharing, “I value the importance of taking care of how I look. I’m here to help anyone who needs encouragement and advice to look and feel their best. Therefore my passion became obvious to me, as did the awareness that I should share this with all who want to experience it.”

Ayesha looked to SWINA when deciding on a professional career as an aesthetician. After being a stay-at-home mother of 2 for nearly 20 years she desired projects that would continue to make her feel purposeful to others and allow her to continue to care for others resulted in her path to natural aesthetics.

Parul Agrawal is an internationally-known and highly-regarded author, coach and speaker who has truly taken her passion and created a successful platform that nourishes both her clients and herself! Parul latest achievement is so exciting! What started as juicing and workshops has grown into her having an international presence as a well-known and highly-rated published author. You’ll love her story:

“After taking the Raw/Vegan cooking class at SWIHA I started juicing for myself. With motivation from my SWIHA friends, I decided to go on a juice detox in summer of 2014. To stay motivated and accountable, I started blogging about my detox journey. The Recreation Coordinator from City of Tempe happened to read my blog and contacted me asking if I would like to offer a Juicing workshop to the patrons of Tempe. I already had the qualifications and my company, Parul’s Wellness Coaching, LLC was already incorporated, so I jumped at this exciting offer and started offering Green Juicing and Smoothies workshop first at Tempe and then at City of Chandler. Slowly and steadily the workshops became popular and my workshop patrons started asking for more recipes, more juicing tips and more techniques to make juicing affordable and manageable. It was too much to cover in a 2-hour workshop and so I decided to write a small book as an extension to my workshop. In February 2015, I started the work on my manuscript. To my surprise, instead of just a small book it became my dream project. I finished writing my book with 52 recipes by the end of March, 2015, and sent my manuscript to few people for their review, forewords, blurbs, etc. The next few months were spent in editing, formatting and marketing the book. I finally released the book “Juicing for Healthier Families” on October 14th, 2015 and made it to #1 in eight categories on Amazon and Kindle.”

Prior to registering at SWIHA, Jessica Ireland was, in her own words, “barely existing.”

“I lacked a post-secondary education, and the 15 years I worked in the finance industry meant nothing while I was applying for employment during the recession. I was struggling to put food on the table and keep a roof over my head, while spiraling further and further into a state of depression.”

After receiving a steady stream of rejection letters from potential minimum wage employers, Jessica realized that unless she obtained some form of post-secondary education in an area that was growing throughout North America, she would eventually end up homeless and hungry. Enter SWIHA.

“As soon as I discovered SWIHA, I knew that my search for the school and the education I desired was over. I relocated my 3 dogs and myself from Calgary, Alberta Canada to Phoenix, Arizona and haven’t looked back since.” Jessica shared how SWIHA allowed her to shed the weight of her past, while discovering her dreams and tapping into her infinite potential.

Maria Kalamas opens up to how purposeful her path has been and how her attendance at SWIHA was intended all along. “January of 2010, I was working in a doctor’s office employed as an office manager. The doctor was an MD, yet practicing alternative medicine, specializing in bio-identical hormones. He was helping people heal through proper supplementation, healthy nutrition, bio-identical hormone replacement, Chelation - which is a very effective way to treat heavy-metal poisoning - coaching and outsourcing them to various healing arts therapies, from massage to spiritual coaching and other various holistic practices that he had tried and believed were effective. I soaked in all the information he was giving me because I wanted to help heal people physically, mentally and emotionally,” shared Maria.

Cameo Wilson is one incredible individual who has learned to nurture her own self growth and in doing so found her roots and a deep-seated passion for urban farming and sustainability. What brought her to SWIHA was a self-imposed desire for self-growth, followed by the committed decision to take care of herself.

“By taking care of myself physically and emotionally through eating well and observing my own nutritional intake, I found a love for my own well-being and the ability to share my journey of health with others. I decided to further my education in what I love and pursue Nutritional Coaching as an avenue to serve. Food, eating healthy and wellness all resonated with me so I began searching online for schools that offered programs with these options in coaching. SWIHA was the first one to pop up and instantly I felt like that was the option I wanted to explore.”

Cameo states excitedly with smile in her voice, “It just felt right to me to check it out and it felt like home right away. I came to a Gifts and Graces event (which are held the First Friday of every month) where I received a complimentary Life Coaching session around my career goals.” Instantly, her gut feelings were confirmed and it was obvious that she was destined to be a student walking the very halls she was visiting that First Friday.

Kathy Koziol had just received her license as a Real Estate agent prior to enrolling at SWIHA. She did the job for just a single day, and immediately knew that she wanted her life to head in another direction. She was ready to fulfill her Dharma, her life’s purpose that she was Divinely designed for. Kathy had held many careers throughout her life: Elementary School Teacher, Army Officer, Hearing Instrument Specialist, Luxury Automobile Sales Consultant, Master Gardener and Stay at Home Mom (which she referred to as “Domestic Goddess). “I was very satisfied with my life and always have been. I cherish every moment of the life given to me,” shared Kathy. “Every experience I had, positive or negative, helped me to lay the foundation of where I am today.” However, she wasn’t satisfied with the path she was heading down from a career perspective. Enter SWIHA.