Graduate Testimonials

Danielle Bryngelson, Massage Therapist

I am using the GI bill to fund my full tuition and partial living expenses. Body Therapy Institute has given me the skills, tools and confidence to gain employment at the Massage Place. I love flexibility - that I can work for myself and set my own schedule.

Kate Goldstein, Massage Therapist

For me SBBTI is continuing education and support for my career. It’s the most healing and integrated of all the Santa Barbara massage schools. The Trigger Point course with John Harris eliminated my chronic low-back pain. SBBTI is THE radical massage school you are looking for, and the school responsible for many people’s success in this field!

Kate Goldstein
Owner of Table to Table: In Home Dining and Massage

Kelle Evans, Massage Therapist

“What brings me joy? Helping others. When I step into my healing studio to help a client I feel immediately better myself. Sharing my knowledge with others gives my life purpose.”

Kelle Evans is a strong believer that there are many different paths to healing. Over the years, she has explored many types of energy and bodywork methods to provide comfort, balance and relief to her clients. Although Kelle enjoys working with all ages, she has a special affinity for alternative senior health care.

Her journey began several years ago when she decided to leave a successful corporate career for a more holistic profession. Her first step was to become trained as a professional massage therapist at the Santa Barbara Body Therapy Institute. She now offers such services as Hot Stone, Aromatherapy, Sports, Barefoot massage and more. Kelle is also trained as a Hospice Volunteer and in her spare time, she is studying to become a Red Cross trainer as well as learning nutrition, herbal treatment and druidism.

Always looking for new healing methods, Kelle turned to energy and vibrational medicine, which is providing positive and powerful transformational results for many. She has been trained as a Reiki Master, Quantum Energetic Disciplines Practitioner, Creative Life Sciences Practitioner, Pan Harmonics Practitioner and Multi-Dimensional Healer, and has recently obtained her 9 shamanic rites.

These services and more are featured at The Healing Portal, Kelle’s alternative health studio in Ventura, California. In the near future, she intends to introduce Restorative Yoga, Color Healing, Reiki Instruction and Animal Wellness at the center. For more information, please see her website at www.healingportal.net.

Nelson Olivera, Holistic Health Practitioner

For me, there is a sense of calling and mission in massage. I enjoy tremendously working in a meditative state of mind. It is similar to the meditation that Thich Nat Han talks about, but by using my hands and feet. Clients say it doesn't look like I am working, but having fun. To fully be there for the client is a wonderful experience and sometimes we witness what I call active serendipity. It is when you get results by releasing the soft tissue when others have given up on the body’s complaints of discomfort and pains or after effects of surgery. Clients experience empowerment and wonderment. I work about fifteen hours a week with private clients and as an independent contractor at local spas. I go to clients’ homes and hotels. I have the free time to go to the gym, study a lot and take wonderful vacations where I exchange massage and further my studies. This is fun and a great tax write off! I just got back from Prague and some other cities in the Czech Republic. I enjoyed the baths in Budapest, Hungary. It’s been wonderful learning about massage in new places and I will further my studies in India and Thailand. My goal is to breathe more, have better posture and increase range of motion. In other words: A younger me every year!

I started my training at SBBTI three years ago and plan to keep learning because it is a journey. I love the people and the classes at SBBTI. The staff is very supportive, fair and knowledgeable about the dynamics of massage. I am very grateful to John Harris for having me as a teaching assistant many times and for teaching me how to keep myself free of lower back pain. There is a tremendous sense of empowerment we experience once we find we find ways to deal with soft tissue pain and discomfort in areas such as lower back, shoulders and neck. I retain the best strokes from different modalities and integrate them into my session for relaxation and muscle release.

Barry Sigman, Massage Therapist

The instructors at BTI are very talented and professional. Clients and other bodyworkers I've had the pleasure of working on have asked me where I got my training from because they are so pleased with my massage. I try to always remember that I will be perceived by others in how you act. Act like it's a job and you're only there for the money and that will be picked up by your clients.
I live by a couple of sayings. #1 is "You are only as good as your last stroke". A client doesn't care how much the last person enjoyed your massage. They don't even care about how their last session with you went as much as what is happening to them and what they're feeling RIGHT NOW!! So if a client drops their hard earned money on a massage I consider it a blessing and I never take that for granted. #2 When a person surrenders and entrusts you with their most prized and private possession (their bodies) for you to manipulate, see and otherwise bring sensations to this is a very important thing to remember and respect. It's an honor, as I see it, when they lie on a table and say "I trust you with my body". #3 Be on time, ALWAYS!!! If you are not there on time there will be many other MT's waiting in the wings who may not be as caring or as good as you but you could lose a client with something so easy to avoid. Plus it adds stress to you and your client and that's not a good thing, ever!

During my 550 hours at BTI, I was shown many things and sometimes I remember thinking to myself, boy that's dumb or oh heck I'll never do that or who's going to ask for that. Trust me they will ask!!! I worked on a dentist the other day and knowing my A&P was very important. Knowing the body under the skin is a must in order to work properly. By the way, the dentist was in so much pain he had to close down his practice early. I did trigger point work on him and when he came back to see me he said he was 70% better. In some ways that's far more gratifying than taking payment. Trust me, and more importantly, trust your teachers - you WILL need that knowledge someday and you will be happy they have shared theirs with you because there won't be time to go thumbing through some text book when a client is on the table waiting.

To all the instructors at BTI, only now that I am working do I fully realize how much you gave of yourself, how much you really care about teaching and sharing your talents with others. There is a little bit of all of you in every one of my strokes. I love what I do.