Sri Guru Shakti Durga, who legally changed her name from Kim Fraser, is the spiritual head of Shanti Mission Harmony Centres.
The multifaith teacher of healing was one of 35 teachers and followers from Australia to gather for meditation, yoga, music and healing at the Rydges Queenstown Lakeland Resort Hotel.
Ms Durga said she and the group intended to hold a "tirtha" in the Queenstown Gardens on Friday morning to channel the dawn energy and "send healing vibrations through the earth, particularly aiming at Canterbury".
Ms Durga said she was raised Catholic, but never found a spiritual side to the religion. She worked for 16 years as a barrister, specialising in personal injury litigation, "until about half of the way through, I went through a divorce and it shook me very deeply".
"Not only the dislocation and financial stress, but the pain of it all was pretty ferocious. I didn't have the tools to deal with it and one of my colleagues recommended 'Free to be Me' in 1992."
Ms Durga enrolled with the programme and had a profound experience, she said.
"It started a passion to understand the human consciousness and spirit, which has never abated."
