ALIGN

unsettling our practices & reweaving cultural herbalisms

THE SHAPE OF THE SESSION // the short version

On Oct 3, gather in community for a workshop & community discussion for white settler herbalism practitioners trained in TWH who seek to offer care aligned with their values. Over the course of 2.5 hours, we will engage in the community project of reckoning with our responsibility.

In the first half of our time together, we will have a frank discussion of what makes up TWH, what we were taught and what we were not taught, what this lineage upholds and carries in its pathways. We will talk about cultural loss and legacies of violence in the white supremacist colonial state that has enculturated into TWH. .

This part may be tender. It might be fuel for your anger. We will do it together. We will lean into personal reflection and embodied practice to support us in this work.

In the second half of our time together, we will dream into what could be. What might ancestrally rooted herbalisms offer us? How might we begin to reweave cultural herbalisms? What is at stake?

This community space will be a time to explore some of the many questions around these topics. Expect group discussion, personal reflection, and body based practices. Expect frank conversations about white supremacy, violence & colonialism.

Open to all, although the focus will be on white practitioners of settler descent on Turtle Island.

Bring any items that will support you in staying grounded and present.

what are we practicing when we practice ‘traditional western herbalism’?

MORE ON THIS SPACE // the long version

Colonization, empire and white supremacy has severed many peoples from their healing traditions. This has contributed to the disruption of ancestral lineages, both from the lands settler peoples originated from, as well as from here on Turtle Island/N America through the present day.

Many of us are called toward care & healing work. We know personal healing is one important thread in the tapestry that is total liberation. But for those of us who are settlers in diaspora, we are often practicing the lineages of others or the cobbled together fields shaped by settler colonialism and empire. ’Traditional western herbalism’ is just one example of empire medicine; allopathic medicine in the so-called US is another.

Herbalism is ancestral. That is true. It is in all of our lineages, all of our cultures, found in all of our ancestry. But whose herbalism are we practicing?

What does it mean to be practitioners of lineages steeped in blood? As practitioners we have a responsibility to reflect on what we are doing. what are reifying when we practice these lineages? Does this align with our values? What is the impact of this on us, on our clients, on the entire field?

If we aren’t willing to sit with these questions, we lose the opportunity to find ways to undercut empire, attempt to mitigate some of the harm being caused, and continue to dream into the possibilities of radical healing sans empire.

And there are so many more interlocking questions that flow out of these.

What would ancestrally rooted lineages of healing look like? What about herbalisms that attributed, respected and honored all the sources of its waters? What possibility is here for foundational change? What potent transformative power might reconnecting to ancestral herbalism hold for personal and collective healing?

Let’s gather together to be in these questions, and see what new shapes we might create together.

ALL THE DETAILS

WHEN / WHERE / HOW / HOW MUCH

The community exploration will take place on Oct 3, 2024, 6-8:30pm ET.

This is an online Zoom gathering.  There will be live closed captioning available.

This will not be recorded.

The price for this session is $66.

This will be a compassionately held container. Group conversation will be encouraged, and participants will be invited to contribute to the group container. We will cocreate the group process together. Folks are welcome to be on or off screen, participate or not as they feel called, and are free to utilize the unmute or chat functions to contribute.  Come as you are.

HOW TO SIGN UP

Use the button below.

Space is limited for the sake of intimacy and vulnerable, honest communication.

THERE IS NO END TO THIS WORK

What to expect from our session

There will be many questions without easy answers.

There will be frank conversation about how to take up our responsibility as white settler practitioners to unpick the threads of TWH and reweave culturally connected herbalisms.

We will be firm and fierce and compassionate and committed.

There will be visioning about what more might be possible, for us as herbalists as well as our clients and students, if we move forward differently.

Participants will leave having been challenged to rethink how they are practicing, encouraged to take on necessary work, and supported by their community to play their part in redressing the ongoing harms that modern TWH perpetuates.

Please come if you are ready to be honest with yourself and others, and converse with compassion & thoughtfulness, grounded firmly in your integrity.

WHO IS THIS FOR?

This workshop is intended for:

• Herbalists trained in ‘traditional western herbalism’
• Herbalists and plant lovers who have strive to embody their values
• Herbalists and plant lovers who want to have frank conversations about whiteness, empire, colonialism, and ancestral lineage connection
• Herbalists and plant lovers interested in cultivating ancestrally rooted herbalisms
• People who aren’t afraid to face the truth in themselves with compassion and firmness
• People who are ready to show up to this community work, and lay the ego & defensiveness to rest.

This is for you if you have been dreaming of having these conversations with fellow herbalists!

HOW DO I JOIN?

Sign up using the link below!

Registration is currently open.

Note: Space is limited for intimacy and connection.

Who is facilitating this offering?

For folks new to me & my work –

my name is rowan (they/them) and I’m a qt herbalist, writer, researcher, big nerd and devotee to plant kin. I deeply believe in justice, radical community care, and embodying our values even under pressure.

The threads of my work include politicized ancestral reconnection for settlers on Turtle Island/N America, queer healing, ritual and devotion with the holy, navigating chronic illness, long-c & DJ, cultural traditions and ethnobotany, and more. I’m a white-bodied 3rd gen US person who comes from Irish, Lithuanian, Scottish & Sicilian lineages.  I base my work off of my lived personal experiences, relationships with the holy wild, and deep research. I love researching and learning, and then sharing what I’ve learned with community.

thanks for being in community with me, for your support of my ongoing work, and for being a part of this broader weaving.