Light, Magnetism, and the Healing Power of Nature
Exploring the foundations of healing in the teachings of Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan
Second Saturdays, September – December, 2026
3:00 – 4:30 pm ET (New York)
This series is a doorway into Hazrat Inayat Khan’s Sufi teachings on healing. We will delve into practices of Divine healing and transformation that live within each of us. By developing one’s capacity through the exploration of the heart and the breath, transformation can be found within the body, mind, heart, and soul.
These four sessions are one of three series that together form a complete course. The three are not sequential and may be taken in any order — you are welcome here whether or not you have attended before. The series culminates in a healing retreat guided by Devi Tide.
The course is based on the newly developed Essential Healing Manual, an introduction to the foundations of healing in the Inayatiyya Healing Activity. Our gift to you will be a digital copy of the Essential Healing Manual, which will include the teachings from the topics introduced and much more.
Dates & Themes
Saturday, September 12 — Healing with Light
Presenters: Shafayat Nur Alima Smith, Healing Retreat Guide Tara Noor Newberry, and Shafayat Avalon Gallien.
“Behind the whole of creation, behind the whole of manifestation, if there is any subtle trace of life that can be found, it is motion, it is movement, it is vibration. This motion has two aspects. And this is because we have developed two principal faculties, sight and hearing. Audible or visible — it is motion, it is movement, it is vibration, it is one and the same thing.
Is there anything that unites these two things? Yes, there is. It is harmony. Harmony is the relation between color and color — sound and sound — color and sound.
We have made a distinction between visible and audible, but in reality to those who meditate, who concentrate, who enter within themselves — those who trace the origin of life begin to see that behind these outer five senses one sense is hidden. And this one sense is capable of doing everything that we seem to do or experience.
What we call beauty is the harmony of all one experiences. What after all is music? What we call music is the harmony of the audible notes; but in reality there is music in color, there is music in lines, there is music in the forest where there is a variety of trees and plants; and there is harmony in how they correspond with each other. The more widely one observes nature, the more it appeals to one’s soul. Why? Because there is a music there; and the wider one’s outlook on life becomes, the deeper one’s understanding of life, the more music one can listen to, the music which answers the whole universe.”
— Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan
Saturday, October 10 — Magnetism
Presenters: Shafayat Sarmad Tide, Shafayat Sitara Mitten-Lewis, and Shafayat Ushi Darena Burgess.
“The secret of all magnetism is life and this secret lies in the breath.”
— Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan
Saturday, November 14 — The Healing Power of Nature
Presenters: Shafayat Jessica Bromby, Shafayat Muhammad Bauer, and Shafayat Jalila Botsford.
“The purpose of the Healing Activity is to awaken humanity to the power of the Divine Spirit to heal.”
— Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan
“There is One Holy Book, the sacred manuscript of nature, the only scripture which can enlighten the reader.”
— (The Third Sufi Thought)
Saturday, December 12 — Healing Retreat
Retreat Guide: Kefayat Devi Tide.
The series culminates in a healing retreat, tying together the teachings and practices of the wider course.
Details
Classes are on Saturdays — September 12, October 10, November 14, and December 12 — from 3:00 – 4:30 pm ET (New York) / 9:00 – 10:30 pm CET (Paris). To see the start time in your own location, check your local time here. Please note that participants in Australia and New Zealand will join on Sunday, local time.
This series is open to everyone. No prior classes are required. Come to all or any part of the series.
Tuition
We offer three tuition levels so that cost need not stand between you and this program.
- Supporter — $120 for the series ($30 per class). If you’re able to give a little more, this helps sustain the program and the wider work of the Inayatiyya.
- Standard — $80 for the series ($20 per class). Our suggested level.
- Limited Income — $40 for the series ($10 per class). If the standard level is a stretch.
These rates are set to keep this teaching within reach rather than to reflect what it costs to offer. Gifts at the Supporter level help make the lower levels possible and support the Inayatiyya’s work beyond this course.
Please choose the level that best reflects your circumstances. We ask that you choose in good conscience rather than by any outward measure — no explanation is needed, and no one is asked to justify their choice.
If even the Limited Income level is out of reach, scholarships are available. Please contact astana@inayatiyya.org before registering so we can process your request.
If you miss a class, the video will be made available a day or two after each session.
If you have questions about the content of the series, please email healing@inayatiyya.org. Questions about registration, payments, scholarships, and logistical details may be sent to astana@inayatiyya.org.
Speakers
-
Jessica BrombyJessica Bromby is a Healing Cherag and offers all generations Universal Services. She’s a Canadian born on a farm in Quebec and now living with her husband and daughter in Sarasota by Rising Tide International. She is a singer and often shares songs in her services. She guides and facilitates healing retreats in person and online. She is a guide in the Inayatiyya and shefayat and healing retreat guide serving in the Healing Order. She’s a mentor in the current life transitions Healing Cherag program and healing retreat guide training program. She is soon hosting an interfaith group for babies and parents this fall.
-
Nur Alima SmithNur Alima Smith is a Shefayat, a Cherag, a Healing Conductor and a Raphaelite Healer in the Inayatiyya Healing Activity. She is adept with various breathing techniques, having studied this for over 40 years. Nur Alima brings the Inayyati philosophy and practices to community groups. She has run many trainings for staff and volunteers at Hospice and multiple Veteran Organizations, focusing on these techniques and how to heal oneself with the breath. Since 2015, Nur Alima has also led a weekly meditation group at the VA for Veterans who have PTSD. Her additional work with the Veteran Community includes teaching meditation and relaxation techniques to those on active duty about to be deployed and to those who have just returned from combat. She serves on the Inayatiyya Healing Senior Teacher Committee and lives in Syracuse, New York. Currently, Nur Alima is serving as the co-Vice President, the Bayt-ul-Haram, of the Inayatiyya Healing Activity.
-
Sitara Mitten-LewisSitara Mitten-Lewis founded the first Sufi Order center in Sydney, Australia, in the 1990’s and served as Regional Representative for Australia until 2010. A Senior Teacher in the Inner School, she also serves as a Shafayat in the Healing Activity and a Mentor in the Dances of Universal Peace. She coordinated the Inayati Order Leaders Training Committee from 2010-15 and helped develop the training module on Sacred Sound. She guides murids and offers retreats and workshops on meditation, music and movement in the US and Australia.
-
Ushi Darena BurgessUshi Darana Burgess was initiated into the Sufi Order over 40 years ago by Pir Vilayat at a Sierra Sufi Camp. When he arrived at camp, rainbows appeared, and her heart opened, inspired by the message of love, harmony, and beauty. Since then, she has explored various activities and has been initiated as a senior teacher in the Inner School, a Shafayat in the Healing Activity, a Cherag in the Universal Worship, and in Ziraat. She served on the National Board for 5 years, and is currently devoting most of her spiritual time to the Healing Activity and Wings of the Message in Seattle with an emphasis on connecting Murshid’s teachings to the needs of the world. Being in nature feeds her body, mind, heart, and soul.
-
Jalila Chris BotsfordJalila Chris Botsford has been a student, facilitator and teacher of many forms of holistic healing for over 25 years. As a holistic health practitioner, working both in person and long-distance, she utilizes energy healing, cranial sacral and the foundational Sufi practices of presence, breath, light and guided meditation in her Spiritual Energy Sessions. She also leads individual sessions, workshops and retreats based on Carolyn Myss’s Archetypal Sacred Contracts course. Jalila’s passion for healing and service has led her to Africa, Haiti and Guatemala working in hospitals and clinics in impoverished communities.
-
Devi TideDevi Tide is the Kefayat (Head) and Vice President of the Sufi Healing Order in North America, New Zealand and Australia. She has over thirty years of experience as a teacher of healing and the esoteric sciences, bringing the qualities of wisdom, heart, subtlety, humor, and intelligence to her role. Devi has contributed to and offered programs in India, Australia, New Zealand, Europe and North America. In her seminars, public speaking, and individual sessions and retreats, Devi represents the inner vitality and harmony of the body, mind and spirit, the vitality of our interconnected world, as well as personal transformation.
-
Sarmad Michael Tide
Sarmad Michael Tide, an initiate since 1982, is a senior teacher, representative, retreat guide in the Inner School. He is a Cherag, a Ziraat farmer, and a Shafayat and healing retreat guide. in the Healing Activity. He has been a center leader in Seattle and at the Abode. He was employed by the Sufi Order (now Inayatiyya), editing and publishing twelve booklets of Pir Vilayat’s teaching, editing and publishing the Heart and Wings newsletter, producing promotional materials, and was the Creative director for Elixir magazine. He served as activities director for Pir Vilayat’s camps and seminars, and was chairperson of the Jamiat Am from 1991 to 2006. He is also a certified Dances of Universal Peace leader. He is graced with barakat connections with the Ruhaniat, Mevlevi and Rifai orders. He is currently active in online teaching and mentoring, guiding retreats, and training Healing Retreat guides. He resides with his wife, Devi Tide, in Seattle.
-
Avalon GallienAvalon Gallien is a Senior Teacher in the Inayatiyya, a Shefayat and Conductor in the Healing Order, Retreat Guide, and a dedicated student of the Divine Light found in life, in healing, in the world, and as an integral, dynamic, component of our own beings. Avalon and her husband Wajid founded Wings of the Message Center – Inayatiyya/Seattle over 30 years ago and continue to offer and sponsor online classes, personal and group spiritual/alchemical retreats, Zikr gatherings, and community gatherings in the Puget Sound area of Washington. Avalon is a retired Hospice Social Worker/MSW, and is now a busy volunteer, sings in a choir, and has recently discovered her artist within.
-
Tara NoorTara Noor Newberry serves as a Representative, Healing Conductor, Cherag, Healing Retreat Guide, Ziraat Initiate, and Co-leader of the Tucson Center. She discovered the Sufi Path in the 1980s through the Sufi Message volumes and was initiated by Pir Vilayat in 2002. Professionally she is a Professor of Biology and Ecology at a tribal college serving Indigenous peoples. Healing, nature, and the recognition of our interconnectedness with one another, the Earth, and all living beings remain central to her path and service.
-
Muhammad BauerMuhammad Bauer is a Shafayat in the Healing Activity and a Co-Center Leader of the Charlottesville Inayatiyya Center. In the late 70’s he was in nursing school when he saw a flyer for a seminar on Sufi spiritual healing. He enthusiastically attended and began attending the weekly Inayatiyya meditation classes in Cleveland, Ohio, and was initiated by Pir Vilayat at the summer camp of 1980. The Healing Activity has always been central to his life. In the 1990s he was a Co-Center Representative of the Gaithersburg, Maryland Center with Noorunisa and Ramana Smallen. He is also ordained as a Cherag, initiated in Ziraat, and a certified Raphael practitioner. A devotion to the 99 Beautiful Names is central to his spiritual life. He deeply values spiritual friendship and community, and feels that in the emerging world this will be ever more critical to our collective unfoldment.
