Wayra Salem is an artist, healer, sensorimotor art therapist, and holistic coach whose work is rooted in personal transformation and creative expression. With a deep passion for helping others navigate grief and healing, she developed Splatter Art Therapy® (SAT) and Immersive SAT®, innovative practices that combine art, mindfulness, and emotional release. Wayra’s journey through loss and personal growth has led her to integrate indigenous wisdom and global healing traditions into her work,  offering a unique approach that empowers individuals to embrace grief and all life has to offer as pathways to adaptation and renewal.

Drawing on her own experiences and extensive travels through Asia, Africa, and the Americas, Europe, and Oceania. Wayra has cultivated a practice that connects the mind, body, and spirit in healing. She feels that personal optimization can lead to collective and global transformation. Her mission is to help others rediscover their inner strength, creativity, and resilience through art and mindfulness. Whether through one-on-one sessions, group retreats, or her writing, Wayra invites others to heal with intention, purpose, and compassion, fostering a deeper sense of connection and self-awareness in the process.

Before obtaining formal qualifications, she completed multiple Vipassana retreats involving ten days of meditation and silence. She lived in the Amazon jungle among the indigenous Shipibo people and was invited to teach obstetricians and gynecologists in hospitals throughout South America on the International Childbirth Initiative and the three paradigms of birth: holistic, humanistic, and technocratic.

Midwifery was initially unfamiliar to her until she experienced a clear calling while standing in a cacao farm deep in the Amazon jungle of Perú. From there, she learned directly from indigenous and traditional midwives across South America, Indonesia, and the Philippines. She later completed advanced midwifery training at The Farm in Tennessee and earned lactation consultant training through Bastyr University in Seattle.

After practicing traditional midwifery, she pursued formal study through a Direct Entry Midwifery program in New Zealand, where she also completed the “Acupuncture for Midwives” course with Debra Betts. New Zealand is where she gave birth to her son at home at 3:06 a.m. and arrived at class with him just six hours later, at 9:00 a.m. the same day.

The profound effects of public health challenges, including military reintegration, chronic illness within families, addiction-resistant treatment, and global access to mental health care, combined with her own experiences of grief following the unexpected loss of her mother and two siblings, led her to shift paths. She transferred the medical knowledge she was gaining in an MD program into the pursuit of a Doctorate of Psychology.

She has since created and trademarked a new form of art therapy that offers a flexible, holistic process shown to produce meaningful results. Her work is grounded in a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion, as well as active learning and teaching. She believes deeply in exchange and collaboration as the foundation for truly individualized, holistic care for people of all cultures and nations.

Fun facts: she traveled to over forty countries before the age of thirty, spent two years cycling through South America, lived overseas for twelve years, and knows how to care for and milk goats.