Kat Lindquist w/ Julie Charette Nunn & Mukti Khanna, Fall 2012 ILC: Wise Woman Ways: Healing

through Shamanic Herbalism November 5th, 2012

Synthesis Paper 1: Learning, Reading, and Working weeks 1-6

This quarter has been an incredible journey. From a mere inspiration to delve into

botany, living it into reality an enlightening process. We have developed deep and intentional relationships with several of the plants in Julie's garden, learned the principles of medicine making, and have had transformational experiences doing inner meditation work and shamanic journeying/visualization experiences. Additionally, I have delved into researching the realm of transformation on a planetary scale, educating myself about the possibilities of true change through shamanistic work and embracing new relationships with money and Mother Earth. ! Through the reading of Healing Wise, by Susun Nunn, and Julie Charette Nunn's

teachings, I have begun to embrace and live the Wise Woman Way. This means embracing nature, plants, and my bodys natural rhythms as my teacher, and practicing self-love through nourishment and healing rather than chastising my past ways or trying to x my body as if it were a machine. To live the Wise Woman Way is to embrace an illness or disease as a teacher, a channel for a new perspective on life, and an opportunity to learn and grow. ! The Wise Woman Way is very slow. Rather than study hundreds of plants out of

a book, we work in the garden with a few plants at a time. We learn how to recognize

them, we pay close attention to their energies. We have made medicines with Burdock Root, Comfrey, and Wild Rose. These remedies take a full six weeks to develop, and daily use for weeks at a time to be effective (combined with a healthy mentality). The benets are proven and long-lasting, however, with few side effects, if any (most plants just have additional side benets). We have also learned many ways to develop whole foods and incorporate a healthy nutrition into our practice, as encouraged by the Wise Woman tradition. This includes making meals from scratch, sourcing high quality, organic ingredients (and growing your own), and learning what the nourishing properties are of various foods. Appropriately, this quarter we have focused on soups, squash, and freshly harvested salads from Julie's garden, coming to understand what plants are edible and which ones are not. ! A blessing from this quarter has been the process of healing my own health

problems. My most prominent issue is with chronic fatigue. This is a condition that I have dealt with since I was a teenager, coupled with depression. I have mostly grown to rely on pharmaceutical drugs, which through various times have beneted me in some ways. But, these treated the symptoms rather than the cause. I most recently tried a detox regimine, and though I learned a few things about healthier nutrition, it didn't rid me of my problem or turn my body or mind back to new as promised. ! As I learn more about natural ways of healing and ways to take care of my own

life, I have begun to help myself with this problem. I feel a sense of personal power, knowing that I don't need a stranger to try and x my body. Through Julie and Susun Weeds teachings, I have embraced a new mentality, and its as if my roots have grasped new soil.

Now, I educate myself, try new things, work with the plants, and see how I feel.

Waking up early; doing a daily practice of yoga; drinking infusion teas with Nettle and Rose hip instead of loads of coffee; eating whole foods; drinking pure water from an artesian well - these are all things that intuitively make sense and feel right, and have slowly but surely begun to improve my energy levels and moods throughout the day. Logging the times that I wake up and sleep, keeping list of what I eat throughout the day, as well as writing down when I exercise, all have helped keep me conscious of patterns and more aware of how I treat myself. ! It seems most logical to begin healing with oneself; but helping others as well is

the ultimate goal. I have begun healing work with my rst "patient" - my four year old pitbull mix, Gotcha. She's an incredible friend and companion, but she has a horrible skin problem. Through intuition, knowledge gained through the internship, and talking with a local herbalist, I've begun feeding her raw, organic foods and giving her some of the burdock root tincture we made in class. This should help soothe her itchy skin, nourish her digestive system and cleanse out old junk leftover from kibble food as we transition her into a raw food diet. I am excited to see how this goes and helping Gotcha transform into a more nourished, healthy, happy animal. ! The internship program has kept me looking beyond my own personal realm as

well. I have researched literature on Shamanism, Spiritual Healing, and global transition in the 21st century. Key pieces of literature this quarter have been: Sacred Economics by Charles Eisenstein, the portions I've read from Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions, and the lms 2012: A Time for Change, Alex Grey: Sacred Mirrors, and the Zeitgeist

lm. I have also read various articles on shamanism through webpage articles, and engaged in discussions with wise and educated people in the Seattle community. This material has been pivotal in my education. Though Alex Grey speaks about enlightenment and the energy elds and bodies, he also has artist depictions of mass destruction on a worldwide scale if we continue down a path that is disconnected from the energy grid, from mother nature, and our true selves. The Zeitgeist lm goes into deep and shocking detail about the money, political and religious systems that are already in place. 2012 explores the possibility of Shamanic transformation during the New Age, and Sacred Economics explores the embracing of a gifting culture for planetary healing. It takes quite a bit of energy to wrap my head around this information and potential catastrophe that our planet is headed for. As a healer, this is my commitment, and I shall pursue this work as long as I am alive. ! In this way, this contract, Wise Woman Ways: Healing through Shamanic

Herbalism covers ground from self-healing, interpersonal healing, and healing on a planetary scale. Work with Julie, hands-on work with plants and my own healing techniques, as well as researching and preparing for the future, is continuing to expand and hone my expertise, proving to be an enlightening and transformative quarter in health and botany.