Located in Montreal, Heaven and Earth Institute (Institut Ciel et Terre) offers classes, workshops, and teacher trainings in Divya Yoga, as well as meditation classes and retreats. Individual sessions in bodywork and massage are also available - These services are offered by appointment, and include Hellerwork, California and Thai Yoga Massage.

Toll-Free No.: 877-DIV-YOGA (348-9642)

Surrounding areas - Montreal-Ouest, Westmount, N.D.G., Cote-St-Luc, Hampstead.

Daryl Vansier became fascinated by the healing arts and the complexities of the human psyche at an early age. Introduced to hatha yoga as a child, Daryl Vansier began to practice it regularly as a teenager to successfully heal a painful congenital condition in his spine. After completing a B.A. at McGill University, he spent eleven years in full time study and practice of Zen meditation and philosophy. Since 1983, he has been practicing body-mind therapy as a certified massage therapist, Voice Dialogue facilitator and trainer, and Hellerwork practitioner. Hellerwork is a process of integration utilizing structural bodywork, movement re-education, and dialogue. One of the first Hellerwork practitioners in Canada, he founded the Montreal Hellerwork Center in 1989, and a few years later was elected to the board of directors of Hellerwork Inc. in Mount Shasta, California. Daryl has gained a reputation for integrity and committment to the process of each person he is working with.

Daryl has also studied extensively with teachers in the Kripalu, Iyengar, and Ashtanga yoga traditions. Divya Yoga is the product of these influences and his physical therapy background.

In 1992, Daryl founded Heaven and Earth Institute, where Divya Yoga classes and Teacher Trainings are offered, as well as individual sessions of massage and bodywork. In his teaching, Daryl has developed an approach that is both sensitive and precisely appropriate to each person's needs. With his background as a massage therapist and practitioner of Hellerwork, he is able to "read" your body and provide you with the appropriate tools and instructions to help you recognize and expand your limits.

Daryl Vansier has been meditating for 33 years, having studied with Zen and Tibetan Buddhist Masters in the west as well as Swami Shyam at the International Meditation Institute in India. It is his great joy to share with you the essence of this great practice in a clear and simple way comprehensible to the western mind.

Divya Yoga is a synthesis of the ancient system of hatha yoga and a contemporary method of bodywork called Hellerwork, developed by Divya Nath (Daryl Vansier).

Having been introduced to yoga as a child, Daryl began to practice regularly as a teenager to successfully heal a painful congenital condition in his spine. He later became a body/mind therapist, having trained in various massage and bodywork techniques, and was profoundly influenced by Hellerwork , a process of integration utilizing structural bodywork, movement education, and their relationship to one’s emotions and attitudes. Drawing on his experience of the benefits of hatha yoga, Daryl gradually incorporated classical asanas into this therapeutic setting to help his clients contact and release tensions stored in their “bodymind”, and designed specific routines appropriate to each person’s needs to help them sustain the harmony, strength, and mobility achieved in the sessions. Impressed with the integrity of the Hellerwork process, Daryl designed a series of yoga “posture flows” corresponding to the various stages of the eleven part Hellerwork series.

In Divya Yoga, the series is divided into four sequences. Each is usually practiced over a period of two to four weeks and serves as a foundation for the succeeding sequences, so that each student has the opportunity to evolve through the series at a pace that allows them to learn or renew their knowledge of the sequence, as well as to fully experience its particular beneficial quality.

The Lotus Palm method of Thai Yoga Massage, developed by my teacher Kamthye Chow, is a synthesis of yoga, Tai Chi, the Thai pressure point system ( marmas ), and the Thai energy line system ( sen ).   It is performed on the floor in loose comfortable clothing. The manipulations and pressure points stretch the body and tonify energy lines to help bring balance to the body.

 

In addition to the therapeutic benefits of this bodywork it is a pleasant experience for both giver and receiver as the practitioner and the recipient perform a series of yoga positions linked together in a graceful dance.   The practitioner uses their hands, feet, arms and legs to gently guide the recipient into various yoga postures (asanas), emphasizing centering, transition, balance, safety, and using the least amount of effort to achieve the maximum result.

Hellerwork is a dynamic system of deep tissue bodywork and movement education designed to realign the body and release chronic tension and stress affecting the functioning of the body-mind.   Verbal dialogue is also used to assist the client in becoming aware of emotional memories stored in the tissues, that may also be related to physical tension and imbalance.

 

 

 

Hellerwork is a form of structural integration founded by Joseph Heller, which is comprised of three basic components:

1. bodywork to correct structural imbalance and release chronic tension

2. movement re-education to bring ease to movement and maintain structural alignment

3. dialogue to bring the emotional or attitudinal components of stress to consciousness

 

Deep tissue bodywork, which accounts for about 60-70 minutes of each session, is a "hands-on" process, where the Practitioner works with his or her hands to release the chronic tension stored in the connective tissue of the muscles of the body.   This returns the body to a more balanced posture.

 

Movement re-education helps the client to become aware of his movement patterns, and through easy-to-remember suggestions and visualizations, assists the client to bring balance and alignment to his movement.   This prevents the return of tension to the body.

 

Verbal dialogue , based on the theme of each session, allows the client to become aware of ongoing emotional patterns that may be creating tension in the body.   Just becoming aware of these patterns often allows clients to release this tension and discover new ways of dealing with the stressful situations in life.

The art of relaxation and touch

 

What is California massage?

Using long, flowing strokes that encompass and unify, California massage,(also known as Swedish-Esalen massage), is an experience of profound relaxation and well-being. Oil is used to allow a graceful continuity of unbroken contact, approaching the body/mind as an integrated organism rather than addressing each area as a separate muscle group.   It is a holistic approach which gently and respectfully leads one into an overall awareness of one's body and an integration of the different aspects of one's being. Its benefits include: heightened perception of one's physical patterns, increased sensory acuity, deep relaxation of the nervous system, quieting of the mind, harmonization of one's emotions, and increased self-esteem.