The Foundations of Healing – Part III
An Introduction to the Teachings of Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan
Second Saturdays, October-December, 2025
12:00 – 1:30 pm (Seattle) / 3:00 pm – 4:30 pm (New York) / 9:00–10:30 pm CET (Paris) / 7:00 – 8:30 am (Auckland)
The Foundations of Healing is a doorway into Hazrat Inayat Khan’s Sufi teachings on healing. Presented in three semesters, it is not sequential and the semesters can be taken in any order. 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.
The course is based on the newly developed Essential Healing Manual, an introduction to the foundations of healing upon which the Inayatiyya Healing Activity is based. 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
October 11th – Lighten Your Being and Recommended Daily Practices
Presenters: Shafayat Sitara Mitten Lewis, Shafayat Sarmad Tide, and Shafayat Ushi Darena Burgess
Give me a new life and new inspiration, that I may see in life Thy divine inspiration. – Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan
November 8th – Modes of Healing
There is no doubt that spiritual evolution is the first thing necessary; without this, the mind power of a healer, however strong, is too feeble for the purpose.
Presenters: Shafayat of Aotearoa, Mahbano Genevieve Scase; Shafayat Jalila Chris Botsford; Shafayat and Co-VP of the Healing Activity Nur Alima Smith
Every person should be able to care for him or herself by prayer, by meditation, by silence, and to cherish that belief in perfect health and root out the belief in illness. – Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan
December 13th – The Conclusion and a Healing Retreat
Presenters: Kafayat Devi Tide, Shafayat and Co-VP of the Healing Activity Dr.Raqib Kogan
The whole of creation— at the level of the universe, and at the level of the person — works in the way that music works. When things are in rhythm and in harmony, there is a kind of music that is produced. This music, or harmonious vibration, produces a healthful effect that spreads out from the source of harmony, just as a pebble tossed in a lake creates waves that spread from its point of impact. At the level of the whole universe, when there is a harmonious state, it is called “awakened,” or “realized,” or “God conscious.” At the level of the whole person, when in a harmonious state, it is called “at peace,” or “happy,” or “at ease in Life.” We are created in a manner that, when we are in harmony with Life or when we feel ease or peace, we find ourselves in sync with the whole of Nature and the natural world. We can use music to bring ourselves into this synchronization with Life. And when in sync with Life, we ourselves become as the music of the spheres, a source of peace and ease and harmony. – Devi Tide
DETAILS
Classes are on Saturdays, October 12th, November 8th, and December 13th from 3-4:30 pm Eastern time 9-10:30 pm Central European Time.
This course is open to ashiqs, murids, and all with a sincere interest. Come to all or any part of the series.
The Foundations of Healing series requires advanced registration and provides video recordings if you are unable to attend every class. A suggested tuition of $36 ($12 per class) is recommended for the whole course. There is also a limited income/student tuition rate of $24 ($8 per class). Please see the sidebar to register.
If you have questions about the content of the course, please email healing@inayatiyya.org. Questions about registration, payments, and logistical details may be sent to astana@inayatiyya.org.
Speakers
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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.
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Raqib Misha Kogan M.D.Raqib Misha Kogan, M.D. received his medical degree from Drexel University College of Medicine. He’s the medical director of the GW Center for Integrative Medicine and associate professor of medicine in the division of Geriatrics and Palliative Care at George Washington University. Raqib has been on the Sufi path since 2001 and is a Conductor in the Inayatiyya Healing Activity. Together with his wife Rafia, he completed Suluk training in 2007. Raqib has been working closely with Devi Tide and other Healing Activity leaders for over 10 years and has assisted in organizing and running many annual Leadership Retreats. Raqib’s goal is to bring healing wisdom and practices of the Inayatiyya to more people, especially those who are vulnerable. To achieve this goal, Raqib founded AIM Health Institute, a non-profit organization in the Washington, D.C. area that provides integrative medicine services to low-income and terminally ill patients regardless of their ability to pay.
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Nur Alima SmithNur Alima Smith is a Shafayat, 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 35 years. Nur Alima brings the Inayati philosophy and practices to the community groups. She has run many trainings for staff and volunteers in 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 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 those who have just returned from combat. She also leads a monthly meditation session for Hospice volunteers and staff.Nur Alima serves on the Inayatiyya Healing steering committee, and lives in Syracuse, New York.
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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. As a Senior Teacher, 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, Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand.
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Ushi Darena BurgessUshi Darena Burgess is a long-time murid in the Inayatiyya. She grew up in small towns in the forests of the rural Pacific Northwest.
A deep longing brought her to this spiritual path and the Inayatiyya. She is a Shafayat in the Healing Activity, a Cherag in the Universal Worship, and served on the national Board for five years. She brings spirituality into the world in a very real way, with clarity, acts of kindness, compassion and heart.
Her career spanned decades of public service. Currently, she co-leads Wings of the Message Sufi Center in Seattle, Washington and facilitates a weekly Healing Service for the World. She acknowledges the interconnectedness of all humanity with the biosphere, and includes a global perspective in all her work. -
Mahbano ScaseMahbano Scase lives on the Kapiti coast in Aotearoa, New Zealand. She has been with the Inayatiyya for almost 20 years and serves as a Shafayat in the Healing Activity and a Representative in the Inner school. In her professional life she worked as a homeopath for many years yet now works as a psychotherapist in private practice. She has raised three children and delights in the recent arrival of her first grandchild—her greatest teacher!
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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.
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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.
