In The Spotlight:

For the practitioners at Happy & Relaxed Relaxation Center, getting clients to relax is all in a day’s work.

The new center is on Victory Boulevard in Burbank, with downtown only a few blocks away. The center’s goal is to offer people an oasis in Burbank that allows them to get away from the chaos and be in a calm and relaxed place.

“We don’t want to indicate that there is a particular philosophy that we adhere to,” said David Allan Cruz, Happy & Relaxed life transformation therapist and master hypnotherapist. “It’s open to anyone and everyone; we do have ideas and approaches that are more of a spiritual, open-ended type of thing.”

Neyda Carballo Ricardo founded the center this year, which is at 213 N. Victory Blvd. Ricardo is also the president of Natural Health Centers Inc., a chain of seven stores that specialize in natural health care.

Happy & Relaxed will host its grand opening at 5 p.m. today.

The center’s retail section features incense and facial creams, clothing, books, CDs and other artifacts centering on the theme of metaphysical and spiritual-type energy. But don’t call the center a spa; it doesn’t offer facials or massages.

The relaxation center’s purpose is simply that — relaxation, Cruz said.

Clients can visit the center for either 30 minutes or a half-day. Services include private hypnotherapy sessions; workshops on weight control, relaxation, anxiety, relationships and health; and wealth and happiness seminars.

Private sessions for reiki, a Japanese relaxation technique, are also offered.

“There is no agenda, no lessons, just relax, and that’s what it’s about,” Cruz said.

Deeper into the center, behind the lobby and retail area, is the transition room, where people can come in and relax while waiting to use the center’s relaxation room. The relaxation room is the centerpiece of Happy & Relaxed.

What distinguishes the room are the seven chairs that line the walls.

Each chair is devoted to one of seven chakras, or energetic centers believed to exist within the body.

The chair clients choose to sit in is usually based on instinct or on answers to questions given by the center’s staff.

“We can do some questions and know which [chakra] is out of alignment,” Ricardo said.

Each station has a sound system that clients can use to listen to new age music or a preprogrammed relaxation CD.

The massaging chairs have towels draped over them in different colors, corresponding with the respective chakra.

Curtains provide privacy.

“To balance the chakras is one of the first things,” Ricardo said. “I always thought, the only way to do that is maybe to have a place where people can come and sit and listen to the music of the chakra and balance them [clients], without touching them or overwhelming them with information.”

Ricardo, a native of Cuba, arrived in the United States in 1971, where she attended school in New Jersey and received her doctorate in naturopathy.

In 1974, she opened Natural Health Centers stores in New York and New Jersey that featured meditation, yoga and tai chi.

Ricardo hopes to someday expand the business by opening locations or franchises in Glendale, Pasadena or downtown Los Angeles, even incorporating a smaller center into Los Angeles International or Bob Hope airports.

“What if we did make a deal with the airport . . . and put a place in where the regular people can come in?” Cruz asked. “Like people who are afraid of flying, people who are stressed out because of the security, people who are just tired, and they just come in for 15 to 20 minutes.”

For more information, call the center at (818) 841-1422, or visit www.happyand relaxed.net.