FACES & PLACES
LOCAL COLOR
SEPTEMBER 2010

Shamalada Healing Sanctuary

She has the name: Shamalada Healing Sanctuary. She has the “think globally, act locally” concept, and a sylvan setting in mind. She has a business plan in the works.
Now, Susie Beiler is in the market for community support and financial backing for the sanctuary – “something that I was called to do” – which had its seeds in her Mennonite childhood. She hopes to find both in the unique Best Brilliant Ideas for Humanity “social entrepreneur” curriculum and competition, the first round of which runs Sept. 6-Oct. 17.

A board-certified holistic health counselor and occupational therapist, Beiler, 33, founded Spectrum Health Consulting (www.spectrumhealthconsulting.com) in 2005 to put into practice what she had learned from her own health crisis. She offers nutritional counseling based on the whole person and lifestyle in her Warminster office, along with a massage/essential oil treatment called the raindrop technique. Beiler’s goal now is to widen her reach as the executive steward for Shamalada (http://shamalada.blogspot.com/ or http://www.youtube.com/shamalada2).

“I want to have a group of high-quality practitioners – spiritual counselors, energy healers, they could even be MDs as long as they are holistically oriented – a team of people to address every area. We would have workshops, weekly seminars, and eventually overnight retreats and corporate retreats.

“It will include permaculture, which is setting up the environment including food crops, to grow the way nature would do it, so it is more sustainable and you don’t have to do a lot of yearly maintenance. That way, the food provided to clients can come from the property, but we’d also work with local food growers.”

Beiler has been laying the groundwork for Shamalada for three-and-a-half years, but three intervals in her life contributed to the concept. First was being raised Mennonite in Morgantown, Pa., where her parents still live. “I grew up in a pretty strict home,” she says, “but my upbringing gave me grounding and a foundation as to who I am in the world. Now, I have a different understanding of God than what I was taught. I believe God is love. The Christian, judgmental God is too complex. We all have the God spark within us. If we would honor ourselves as having the God spark, it would completely change the world.”

However, she says, “I learned a tremendous amount from my heritage. The things that I still hold dear are three basic Mennonite tenets: living a simple life; pacifism; and being a good steward, which is huge for me.

“These ideas are very much in line with Shamalada, and I’ve put my own spin on the things I learned growing up. We need simplicity in healing and living to take care of our planet better. We’ve overcomplicated our lives and get sick too easily. Stewardship is all about healing our earth and communities. We need to put more value on our relationships than on all our stuff. And pacifism comes down to love; it’s the root of what we all want. There’s no reason to have war.”

The next stop on Beiler’s path to Shamalada came in her early 20s. While working as a pediatric occupational therapist after graduating from Elizabethtown College in Lancaster County, Pa., she was diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome. Traditional medicine did little to help her, and she muddled through, telling herself “I don’t have time for this.” But then she suffered a severe herniated disc, and “I literally couldn’t work,” she said.

“It was a wake-up call that I needed to take care of myself, to seek a holistic practitioner.” Beiler went to the Clymer Healing Research Center in Quakertown, where, she says, “a doctor gave me the tools to heal. As I went through the journey of healing to get back to work, I realized I needed to go deeper. Besides the physical healing, it was also a deeply spiritual and emotional experience.

“So I want people to know that I’ve been there. My upbringing put me in a spiritual box, but my soul knew something different,” she says of the process, which took about five years. “I had to go through illness to learn to look inward for answers, not outside to God or other people. It’s very empowering. I had a lot of help, but ultimately it came down to me. I realized no one else was going to take care of me. My soul needed to grow to really flourish and for me to be who I am now.

“I don’t recommend doing it by yourself,” she adds. “Now I can take clients and Shamalada through it because I’ve been to the depths.”

The most decisive stop occurred on New Year’s Day, 2007, when she started putting together a booklet of what she wanted in life. “I found a picture of a gorgeous property with woods and water and put it in the book. I kept going back to that picture, and a spirit or God started talking to me with instructions. ‘You are to be the caretaker of this land.’ All these ideas started coming into my mind. And then it turned out that a client was the Realtor for the property, and my mortgage budget figures were the same as the mortgage for this sale. With all this synchronicity, I just thought, ‘OK, what do you want me to do?’ ”

So, inspired by a simple photo that “helped put a physical aspect to the esoteric thing,” Beiler lined up an accountant and a green architect and is wrapping up her business plan. “As I worked on it, the words just started flowing out. I think it is something unique, but I hope other people have similar callings. It’s something the world really needs, to heal ourselves and our societies so that our planet can heal.”

With these in hand, Beiler enrolled in the 12-part entrepreneurial course and the four-round competition set up by Best Brilliant Ideas for Humanity, created by Spryte Loriano, president of HUB (Humanity Unites Brilliance) and Feed333, and Robert Evans, founder of The Messenger Network and creator of the Next Top Spiritual Author Competition. First-round voting will take place online through Oct. 17. Beginning Sept. 6, supporters of Shamalada may register their votes at www.bestideaforhumanity.com/?eid=19. The ultimate winner will be announced in February, and the top prize will include a $50,000 marketing launch package and a seven-day trip to Grail Springs Resort and Spa in Bancroft, Ontario.

Beiler sees the exposure that the competition will bring as a way to market Shamalada even before it is up and running and to inspire people to support it and get involved. She also hopes it will attract investors or benefactors.

“This is something I was born to do,” she says. “When I was a little kid, I saw myself taking care of lots of people. My vision was almost matronly, with people staying in my home. I really do believe we know what we’re here to do. It all goes back to what I dreamt about as a kid.”