If you’ve come across the name ShemaYah Holistic Health while searching for energy healing in New York City, you might be wondering what it actually means, and why a Manhattan healing practice would choose a name like that. The answer goes back three generations, to a woman named Esther and a family that carried her knowledge across continents.
What “ShemaYah” means
ShemaYah is a Hebrew name that translates roughly to “God has heard.” It’s also the surname of Hezi Badnany’s great-grandmother, a woman his family remembers as a medicine woman and shamanic healer. When Hezi named his Manhattan practice after her, it wasn’t really a branding decision. It was more an acknowledgment of where the work actually comes from.
Hezi was born in Israel to a Sephardic Jewish family that fled Iraq after World War II, carrying generations of traditional healing knowledge with them. His great-grandmother Esther practiced as a medicine woman. His grandmother Miriam taught him plant medicine directly. So by the time Hezi started formal training as an adult, studying with Reiki masters, healers, and shamans around the world, he was building on something that had already been in his family for generations.
The illness that changed everything
Hezi’s path into full-time energy healing wasn’t purely inherited, though. It was also forced.
At one point he got seriously ill, sick enough to spend weeks in bed. He went through the conventional medical process the way most people would: doctors, tests, appointments. But conventional medicine couldn’t give him clear answers. At some point he decided to step away from pharmaceutical treatment entirely and turn toward the tools his family had passed down, energy work, herbal remedies, crystals, sound healing.
That recovery is what pushed him to formalize his approach and eventually open ShemaYah Holistic Health. Worth knowing if you’re considering working with him: the method wasn’t designed in the abstract. It was built and tested on his own body first.
What is Multi-Vibrational Healing?
Multi-Vibrational Healing is Hezi’s name for his signature method, and it runs through everything ShemaYah Holistic Health offers. Rather than treating Reiki, sound therapy, crystal work, herbal medicine, and shamanic practice as separate services a client picks from a menu, the method blends them into sessions tailored to how a person’s body and nervous system are actually responding in the moment.
The name reflects the idea behind it: that the body, mind, and emotional patterns all operate at different vibrational frequencies, and lasting healing usually means addressing more than one layer at once. A session might lean mostly on Reiki and sound work for one person, and lean more on herbal support and chakra balancing for someone else, depending on what’s actually needed.
It’s also why the practice describes its work as “bridging therapy and emotional release.” The goal isn’t a one-time energetic reset. It’s helping the body process and release stress and trauma that have been stored for a long time, in a way that’s meant to hold up rather than fade after a few days.
Where the practice is located
ShemaYah Holistic Health operates out of Manhattan, at 37 West 26th Street, on the 8th floor. Sessions run by appointment only, Monday through Friday and Sundays. The practice has built a genuinely large local following too, with well over 250 five-star Google reviews from clients across the city.
What sets the practice apart
There are a lot of energy healers in New York, and plenty of them are genuinely skilled. What tends to set ShemaYah Holistic Health apart is the combination: an inherited healing lineage going back to Esther and Miriam, layered with Hezi’s own formal international training, refined through a method born out of personal necessity rather than assembled from a course curriculum.
The practice is also upfront about something a lot of energy healing marketing glosses over. This work is a process, not a single fix. As the practice puts it, the longer stress stays stored in the system, the harder it gets to restore flow. That shows up in how sessions are structured, with real emphasis on integration and follow-through rather than one dramatic session meant to solve everything at once.
Is ShemaYah Holistic Health right for you?
If you’re drawn to energy healing rooted in an actual family lineage rather than a weekend certification, and you’re looking for a results-driven approach to chronic stress, emotional trauma release, or nervous system support, ShemaYah Holistic Health is worth a closer look. The name itself says a lot about what the practice is built on: a belief, carried across three generations, that healing is something worth listening for.
