Teacher, Healer, Artist

Hi, Friend. Thank you for visiting. I hope this website will provide you will all that you need to get a solid feel for who I am and what I do.

So let’s get started with a little bit about me.

My name is R. Daniel Walker. I am a Teacher, a Healer, and an Artist. For those of you that already know me, it’s probably a bit of a shock to see this new website. I understand, it was a shock to me to decide to do it.

For those of you who have just discovered me, let me tell you a little about myself. For the last 20+ years, right out of High School, I have worked in the Theatre and Film Industry as a jack of all trades but primarily as a Professional Theatrical and Concert Lighting Designer and an Actor. In Dec. of 2010 my son Asher was born and 6 months later I was a full-time single father raising an infant on my own. The reasons for this are due to the incredibly destructive nature of drug addiction that I could not allow myself or my son to continue to poison our lives.

I only tell you that, to help set the foundation for who and why I have become who I am in the last 8 years.

Fast forward to 2013, I was on my way to finally graduating with a Bachelor’s Degree in Theatre, now raising a toddler, while living with my parents. My body was battered and slowing down due to 20 years of long hours, heavy lifting, and the stresses of live production. My heart was broken and lonely, and my mind was spinning out of control due to the pain in my body, the loneliness in my heart weaving a web of depression around me. I was taking antidepressants, and a steady regiment of Xanax, and Pain Killers to calm the anxiety and numb the pain from a degenerative disc in my back.

Thanks to a college friend for meeting me for a friend date to catch up after a decade of life and experiences, she suggested I try yoga to help with my back pain and depression. So I decided to try. That first class, September 9, 2013 would change my life in a way that I never anticipated. That class lead to me attending a class every week, sometimes two classes a week, to 5 months later taking the plunge in to a 200 hr Yoga Teacher Training. To opening a Yoga Studio in Hayden, AL and going to Massage School at the same time the following year, to closing studio 5 months later, and graduating from Wallace State Community College with a Massage Certificate.

I went on to study Advanced Myofascial Techniques with Till Luchau, which is the basis for the Manual Integrative Therapy (MIT) Massage Services that I offer. I have studied and trained in Core Strength Vinyasa with Sadi Nardini, Alignment Based Yoga with Becca Impello and Kim Drye, and Holy Yoga.