While living in Los Angeles, California 25 years ago, Wendy Shulman was involved in a car accident, injuring her neck and nearly pinning it to her shoulder.
“My dad was a doctor so I went to conventional medicine first,” the Great Neck resident said. “I couldn’t get any help, and they wanted to operate, but I wasn’t finding any success. It was the catalyst for my journey of healing, and I discovered this whole world that I didn’t even know existed.
Later, while working as a concierge at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, Shulman had a chance encounter with alternative medicine advocate Dr. Deepak Chopra, who gave her one of his books.
“I walked up to him and told him my neck was in pain, and I said to him, ‘How old were you when you found your peace?'” Shulman said.
According to Shulman, Chopra gave her a copy of his 1994 book “The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success,” which she then read.
“It really resonated with me, really spoke to me, and I thought, I’m going to go in search of what this car accident has to do with my life’s purpose and what my destiny is,” Shulman said. “What am I going to contribute to this world?”
Shulman, originally of Johannesburg, South Africa, then gave notice at her job at the Four Seasons and began managing a day spa in Beverly Hills, which gave her the idea to open a wellness center. Her work took her to Philadelphia, Penn., and then Roslyn, to a retail development on Lumber Road.
“Twenty-five years ago, if I said I had a place that had reiki energy healing and psychics, and New Age stuff like sound healing and things that weren’t as well know, people would’ve thought I was some kind of weirdo,” Shulman said.
The time was right early in 2018, when, along with her brother and sister-in-law, Shulman opened Roslyn Salt Cave, a wellness center that she says serves as the pinnacle of her journey.
“When I was building the place, I wanted some kind of experiential treatment,” Shulman explained. “People are looking for experiences and creating memories, instead of just products.”
It was while researching ideas for her business that Shulman discovered salt therapy, a kind she says is a recognized form of therapy in Europe.
“About 200 years ago, a doctor was treating all the miners in Europe, and everyone had all these respiratory diseases from working underground,” Shulman said. “Everyone, that is, except the salt miners. They were very healthy, and the doctor did all this research and found that salt kills the bacteria in your lungs and sinuses.”
Inspired by similar sites in Bellmore, Port Washington and Montauk, Shulman worked with an Austrian architect to construct two manmade salt caves, constructed of bricks made of Himalayan pink salt, with one for general sessions and another for private sessions.
A session will average 45 minutes, during which salt will be pumped into the room and calming music played while patrons lay on massage tables or sit in zero-gravity chairs, with the floors of both rooms coated in grains of pink salt. The general session room also features a saltwater waterfall, with white crystals forming on its edges.
The center also offers acupuncture, massages, sound healing, reiki energy healing, psychics, and yoga, among other services, and is staffed by over 40 employees.
Roslyn Salt Cave will also soon be expanding, Shulman says, with a movement studio and chiropractor poised to open next door to the center in mid-to-late 2020.
“My vision for this place is to have patrons come in and really be able to address their specific needs, mentally, physically and emotionally,” Shulman said. “It may not change your situation, but it will change your perspective, and how you deal with it.
