Shamanic Yoga Institute
Founder-Led School for
Shamanic and Yoga Training
At the heart of the school is a place-based path that teaches students to build relationship with the land they are in, cultivate belonging through reciprocity, and grow their work in a way that honours this time and place.
Shamanic Yoga Institute
Grounded in the Siyám Smánit Dharma Mesa Path and carried through the Medicine Wheel, Shamanic Yoga Institute offers foundational shamanic training, yoga teacher certification, mentorship, retreat, and continuing education for those called to deeper practice, leadership, and transformation. Founded by Dr. Christine Selda and guided in close teaching and creative partnership with Rochelle Quarry, MEd, the school brings together yoga, shamanic practice, expressive arts, and place-based study in one living field of practice.
A School Rooted in Practice, Place, and Transformation
Shamanic Yoga Institute is a founder-led school for shamanic and yoga training. At the heart of the school is a place-based path that teaches students to build relationship with the land they are in, cultivate belonging through reciprocity, and develop the depth of practice required to hold meaningful work with integrity. This is not only a school of information. It is a school of lived practice, direct experience, and transformation.
Begin with the Medicine Wheel
The Medicine Wheel is the foundational training of the school and the primary way students enter the Siyám Smánit Dharma Mesa Path. Through four directions of initiatory study, students deepen relationship with self, spirit, land, and community; build a mesa; receive rites of passage; and develop the lived ground required to become trustworthy space-holders. It is the root from which the school’s wider pathways in training, mentorship, retreat, and advanced study unfold.
Pathways into the School
The school’s foundational shamanic training and the primary entrance into the Siyám Smánit Dharma Mesa Path.
Teacher certification and advanced pathways, including 200-hour, 300-hour, 500-hour, Shakti Nidra Teacher Training, and deeper professional development within a Canadian Yoga Alliance school.
Online pathways for integration, continuing education, thematic study, and ongoing relationship with the school’s work.
Immersive spaces for practice, restoration, guest teachers, community gathering, and place-based study.
Leadership
Shamanic Yoga Institute was founded by Dr. Christine Selda and is guided in close teaching and creative partnership with Rochelle Quarry, MEd. Christine serves as Founder and Visionary, bringing together shamanic practice, yoga, expressive arts, and transformational education. Rochelle serves as teaching and creative partner and School Director, helping steward the school’s trainings, mentorship pathways, and relational culture. Together, they hold a clear founder-led structure with deeply collaborative practice.
Practice that Becomes Lived Wisdom
The school’s work is designed to move students from concept into experience. Through direct practice, ceremony, reflection, and relationship, knowledge becomes lived understanding, and lived understanding becomes the basis for trustworthy leadership and space-holding.
“This wheel changed my life. It has made me a better person as I worked towards my truth with accountability, love and support.”
— K. Rivet
“This wheel helped me to see my medicine body, and recognize and develop a vision of myself as a healer.” — K. Wells
Shamanic Yoga Institute FAQ
The Shamanic Yoga Institute is a yoga school founded by Dr. Christine Selda, Ph.D., who has taken the vow of the bodhisattva — a commitment to helping others achieve enlightenment. The institute weaves together the four core pillars of Shamanism, Yoga, Expressive Arts, and Social Change to train practitioners in what it calls the “technologies of the soul.”
Programs are intermodal, experiential, and nature-informed. You’ll explore shamanic practices, tantric yoga, expressive arts, ancestral healing, ceremony, and non-dual tantra — all designed to help you step out of limiting beliefs, reclaim personal power, access creativity, and develop the capacity to lead and hold sacred space for others.
The 200 hour, 300 hour, and 500 hour Shamanic Yoga Teacher Training courses are experiential journey that include multi-day intensives and weaves shamanism, tantric practice, expressive arts, and the Medicine Wheel process.
Yes — the institute runs both domestic and international retreats. Current offerings include a shamanic embodiment retreat at Playa Viva, Mexico, a two-week Living Bhakti Yoga Yatra through the Himalayas in India, and a community retreat in Sayulita, Mexico. Retreats typically include daily yoga classes, ceremony, and accommodations with meals.
Community events like the Solstice Song Circle and Community Potluck are explicitly open to all experience levels. The retreats and teacher training are designed to meet participants where they are, prioritizing lived experience as the path from knowledge to wisdom — so a sincere intention to grow matters more than a formal yoga background.
