SPEAKER_00: 0:02

Welcome to the Delicious Dignity Podcast. Let's settle in securely and ever so nicely into the brilliance of our own dignity.

SPEAKER_01: 0:19

Hello, lovelies. Today we have a lovely guest, Brena, on the show. Brennan was the editor at Spirituality and Health magazine, and that's how we met. I used to contact a lot of magazines to work with different editors to have my work published in their magazines. And Brennan was my absolute favorite editor to work with. Absolutely my favorite editor to work with. It was such a different experience working with other editors compared to Brenna on other magazines. And some people are just great to work with. They're fair, they're grounded, they're down to earth. And Brennna was all of those things. And it's funny I say down to earth because we're talking about herbs today and herbalism. So it fits right with who she is. And anytime she would give me feedback, it was just fair. It was very wise and it was very correct. There are very few people who can just do it correctly right off the bat. And Brenna somehow has this magical way of just doing things correctly. I don't know how else to say that. Then I found out that Brennan had left the magazine and I found out that she opened her own herbalism practice. And that got me super, super excited because there's nothing like working with plants to help keep you grounded and in your dignity. And I've worked with plants for such a long time, and I thought, who better to bring on this podcast than Brennan? And there's so many ways to work with plants, both energetically and physically. And what I love about Brennan's practice is that while she's inspired by many traditions, she really dives deep into her own ancestry and her own herbs, even in her own business. And I just absolutely have so much respect for that. So welcome, Brenna, to the Delicious Dignity podcast.

SPEAKER_03: 2:09

Ah, thank you, Dilshot. I'm so flattered. I might start tearing up. You are so incredibly kind. And it was such a pleasure to meet you through my editorial work. I have always known that I was going to be an editor from a very young age. I can remember in the third, maybe not the third grade, but like the fourth, fifth, or sixth grade in literature class or in writing class, all of my peers would come to me because they wanted me to be the one to edit their papers when we were doing peer reviews, because I would always actually dive in and actually edit their piece and not just be nice to them because they're my friends, but say, hey, you should really, you can speak more boldly here, or you should really tighten it up here. And when I got the opportunity to work for Spirituality and Health as the lead digital editor, I it was truly so aligned for me because I had been studying yoga for a while. I had been studying herbalism already. And here came this position where I could combine my love for editing in this real practical career skill of editing with what I was so passionate about in my heart and my soul and my personal life, which were alternative spiritual practices. And I met some of the most wonderful, truly down-to-earth, incredible writers and other editors through that position. And yes, I did recently depart. The timing was right. I, and more importantly, I was being called by my community to be an herbalist and a witch full-time, which I for years had been saying I would never do because, oh, I'm never gonna make money as an herbalist. I don't want to do that full-time. I taught yoga full-time for a few years, and it completely changed the way that I saw the practice and how it's taught and the quote unquote business of modern yoga. I was completely disillusioned. And I didn't want to do that with my herbal practice. But I could no longer resist, shouldn't say resist. I could no longer not answer the calls of my community to be a full-time herbalist. And while it's very fresh, it is one of the most bold, authentic, heart-centered moves I've ever made in my life. And I'm so grateful that I get to do it. And I'm happy to be here with you today. Yes. And with the listeners.

SPEAKER_01: 4:24

I know. I'm so grateful to have you. I think it's such a curious thing to go from editor and to know that you were born to do that, basically, and then go into herbs. How did that even happen? To go from you said the community called you. What do you mean by that? Like, how did that move happen?

SPEAKER_03: 4:42

Hmm. So I'm 28 now. I've been studying herbs pretty consistently since I was 18, 18 or 19 when I was in college. And when my mother's best friend, Rebecca, passed away, who I now consider a well ancestor, a spirit guide in this lifetime. I don't think she would ever refer to herself as an herbalist. She knew herbal medicine better than anyone I'd ever known at the time. She she and my mother owned horses together, they kept horses together, kept a farm together, and Rebecca would give herbs to, I remember she gave Chase Berry to the horses. I forget what it did for the horses, but she gave herbs to the horses, gave herbs to our pets, and just knew the plants better than any other human. And when she passed away, in that process of grieving her, I realized that it was time to take up the trowel, so to speak, and continue her work in a way that I enjoyed, in a way that was authentic to me. So I had been studying herbalism longer than I had been an editor full-time. So I was an herbalist first, and I was also a freelance writer for a long time. And then I had my herbal business, and then I became an editor full-time. So they were happening concurrently. It wasn't just a hard turn from I'm a full-time editor exclusively to I'm a full-time herbalist exclusively. I had my business, Brisingham and Botanicals, while I was working for spirituality and health. And whenever authors pitched me about herbal topics, I would get so excited and I would want to say right off the bat, I'm an herbalist too, me too. But it wasn't always appropriate. But when it was, I would get into these great conversations with writers. But to answer your question in short, they happened at the same time. And they, interestingly enough, really supported one another. So the work that I was doing and am still doing with the plants helped me be more compassionate and grounded and holistic in my understanding of what editing was. Because when you're editing someone's article, you're not just correcting the grammar. You're not just changing the words around or shortening it or lengthening it. You are, especially as a spiritual editor or an editor in the quote unquote spiritual writing world, I had to honor people's lineages that they were coming in with. Like I had to look at an article and say, okay, this person is speaking of their spiritual tradition. How do I go about this with dignity, with honor, with respect, and not just change their words and make sure I'm spelling things right? I had to honor people's lived experiences. If someone was talking about a big spiritual crisis they were having, I had to be so delicate with the way I was editing. And something I always liked doing with my authors was giving them a final view of the article. Because I was a freelance writer before I was ever an editor. And I always liked knowing exactly what was being said under my name and in my voice. I never liked surprises from editors. So I wanted to give that to the writers who I was working with. So the herbs supported my editorial practice in that way because the herbs teach us how to be more compassionate, how to be wise, how to honor others and respect others. And at the same time, my editorial skills helped me strengthen my herbal business. And I hate talking about spirituality and business together. Like it, I get so confused and disillusioned and frustrated when I think about spirituality and business. But truly, to be a successful spiritual practitioner, you do unfortunately have to market yourself and have a business and work with accountants. So my meticulousness as an editor, or the skills of meticulousness that I gained as an editor, help me maintain a social media presence that is consistent. I'm meticulous with my words to make sure I'm being respectful, but also clear and informative. So they happen together and they work really well together. I have a very unique career at a very young age, but it's very authentic to me. And this new chapter is very exciting.

SPEAKER_01: 8:50

Yeah, so I really love that you said that because everything that you just said came through in your editing work. And that's why I have you on the show, and even when I introduced you, that meticulousness. And I do remember with every single article I gave you, you sent it back to me for final approval and I'll be like, what? She does that. No other editor does that. So I can see that, and I want to reflect back even to the listeners to say sometimes when we make moves in our careers, it's not that we made a hard stop in one area and then suddenly started a new area. I worked in corporate and did a spiritual business on the side. You were an editor and you were a herbalist. It just so happens you've now made the herbalist part a full-time gig. There are so many ways to do things in parallel and concurrently with each other, and they do inform one another. My corporate career, as an example, gave me the ability to present myself a certain way and a certain comfort with talking and being able to explain things that I didn't have before. And that informed the way I now present certain spiritual information. And back and forth. My spiritual work helped kept me grounded and helped keep me in my authenticity, even in the corporate world. And back and forth they go. And so I really just want to reflect that was your journey. And it doesn't make logical sense if you went to career day in high school and you said, Hey, what's your career path? My career path was editor and herbalist. Nobody would be like, how would you even match those two? So I just want to reflect to you and to everyone who's listening. Sometimes the seeds of who you are sown very early in life, and you just have to put the puzzle pieces together. And it's a timing thing when you might hyper focus on one versus the other, or when you might exclusively focus on one as opposed to something else. And who knows from here where you will go. And the other thing you said, Brennan, that I really love, and I don't want people to overlook that is Brennan had a living, breathing ancestor who then transitioned into an ancestor energetically. And that is such a beautiful thing because I feel like, and I believe I wrote this article with you, which is something about being an elder, the three steps of being an elder or something. And what I think being an elder is about is being able for someone else to be able to call you a well ancestor when you depart this planet. And I think that's such a beautiful thing that you have because very few people have that.

SPEAKER_03: 11:23

I have full-body chills. I would not be doing what I'm doing now without the power and the guidance and the help of my well ancestors. And I hope that doesn't sound pretentious in any way or like I'm putting something on or trying to be someone I'm not, but I truly would not, I would not feel as grounded, I would not feel as whole, I would not feel as well as I do now. I would not know my place in this world had I not met my well ancestors. And when I say a well ancestor, I mean, which is also a term that you, I believe, used first in our conversation. To me, that means those ancestors who perhaps lived well, they likely lived well, but particularly after passing on, passing through the veil to the other side or that other place, they did the work to atone for what they may have done, atone for how they may have harmed people in their life. They have considered who they are, they have integrated, they have learned and they have made right their wrongs as much as a spirit can make right their wrongs. And I remember, but actually I don't remember the first time I reached out to my ancestors. I was studying with a Wiccan-ish coven out of New York City for, I believe, a couple years. And my work with them really helped me understand the impact of the ancestors and the impact of ancestor work on spiritual practice. And now it's completely essential to the work I do. I remember when I was studying with my first herbal teacher, Jessica, who I studied with for two and a half years, I believe. She, the way that she taught herbalism was not to be someone's final teacher, not to be their biggest, greatest, most glorious, shining teacher in this life, but to spark the flame in her students, to inspire them to reach out to their well ancestors, to dive into their ancestry or their family history, to see who their healers were or are. And she taught me that we all, every single one of us, no matter where in the world we live, no matter where we're from or our ancestors are from, we all have healers, we all have wise people in our lineage. And even if we don't know their names, even if we don't know where we come from through meditation, through journeying, through contemplation, and through quiet listening, we can learn about them. We can perhaps get names if we dive deep in meditation or if we listen. We can learn practices that way. And we, if we know where our ancestors are from, we can also do research into, like my ancestry, for example, is very like a mixture of a lot of Western European ancestries. So I've done a lot of research into French and French Canadian herbal practices from way back when. I think a lot about British and English herbal practices and what those would have been like. And I think that's a way, I don't think, that is a way to root ourselves when perhaps we don't know what our ancient cultures may have been. And especially if you have a blended mixed ancestry, whether that's from one place in the world or from many places, that research, that study, both practically, academically, and spiritually, can help us find a sense of grounding, a sense of place, a sense of being in the world. And especially working with the well ancestors who have done the work, who have perhaps atoned, have contemplated, is so essential to spiritual well-being, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_01: 15:16

It really is. It really is. And I'm so glad that you have an example of someone that was actually living that you can now claim. And that's a beautiful thing, because that's what I seek to be when I pass on. A well ancestor that somebody else can claim and can do work with me or help when I pass on. So that's just beautiful. And since we're going there, I do want to ask you this is the final question as an editor before we go into your herbalism work because I'm so curious. Because you are in an editor, you are at the front lines of all of these different trends coming out, all of the different messages coming out for years. And I was wondering if you noticed anything about spirituality and its changes over the years, just in your editorial work, or from being on the front lines looking at all of that.

SPEAKER_03: 16:06

People are beginning to question teachers. Yes, I'm so glad you brought this up. I think is essential. And I don't say that as someone who has struggled with authority, or someone who hasn't wanted spiritual teachers, like perhaps without trauma dumping on you or the listeners, just a context of who I am.

SPEAKER_01: 16:29

Give us the stories. Yeah, we need, yeah, we need them all.

SPEAKER_03: 16:33

I grew up an older sister, an older or the eldest sister, and I developed or was had or I showed signs of obsessive compulsive order, obsessive compulsive disorder, so OCD very early. And along with that, I for the longest time was a people pleaser. Not to blame little me, but that's how she survived a childhood that was scary and tumultuous and confusing and hard and very sad, was that I wanted to please people and make people happy. And I wanted recognition for my intelligence, my creativity, my wisdom that I believe I had at a young age. Because Little Me was so wise. She was so fun and so creative, but she was so scared. So as the years went on and I began studying yoga, I noticed that there were a lot of teachers, a lot of big personalities who I now recognize, I can't diagnose them certainly, but they display behaviors of narcissism, or at least very intense ego, who were very attractive to me. I wanted to be a member of something bigger. So a class or a yoga community. I wanted a teacher to tell me what to do. I wanted to refine my body, which I felt would help me refine my mind, the mind that was stirring still with all these things from my childhood. And I really bought into it for a long time. From my personal experience over the years, as I had to leave my yoga practice, I practiced Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga, what I call the Russian ballet of yoga. It's a beautiful practice. And some of the poses are so artistic and so wild and truly contortionist, like they are marvelous to behold other people doing. Because I have hypermobile joints, I was able to do very intense backbends. And with a teacher's assistance, I was grabbing my ankles from the back in this really tight teardrop shape. I could do that because I have stretchy ligaments, my joints are loose. And I also developed a spinal injury that I three years later am still dealing with to this day. And it wasn't because of the teachers per se, but it was because I believed that the wisdom that I needed to refine my mind and spirit was found outside of me. And depending on where I was in my life, that was with a teacher or that was with a practice. And because I injured my spine doing yoga in this hypermobility injury, I was angry and had to turn within to find that fount of wisdom because it wasn't going to be found in a teacher, in a practice, or it wasn't going to be found in doing something with my body. It was within me. And I see that happening everywhere now. People are questioning, rightfully, questioning teachers, inquiring whether they are safe to be holding people's emotions in the way that spiritual teachers hold people's emotions. People are skeptical. And I think it's healthy and I think it's wise and crucial to be skeptical of spiritual teachers, because in my experience, whether it's yoga practice, whether it's like European paganism or like Wicca, no matter where you're from, no matter what the spiritual practice, a spiritual teacher has power over a student in a way. And you are offering or you are opening your heart and your spirit up to this person because you trust them. You want to refine yourself, you want to grow, you want to learn. And you need to make sure that the person you are entrusting with your heart and soul will hold it with respect and compassion and understand and respect your trauma and respect your autonomy as a person and not want to own you or not want to control you in any way. That's truly the biggest spiritual trend I'm seeing is while there are still many, many spiritual teachers who are wise and who are well, people are also questioning and loudly and wisely questioning spiritual teachers. And I think that's so essential for us to stay safe.

SPEAKER_01: 20:58

Yeah, I have had so many narcissistic teachers in my spirituality and in my spiritual practice. And I have to say, as much as I hate admitting it, they were the catalyst for me to go deeper. They were the catalyst for me to go and really get all this. There's a distinct before and after. Before I met the spiritual teacher and the level of self-esteem that I had, and then after and how quickly it shot up because I had to question the perceived moral and godlike authority that these people claimed to possess. And I also had a lot of close people in my family and also my friend circle who went off the deep end with what they thought spirituality was. And I had that reflected back to me and I saw firsthand what happens. Of course, I don't want to share their story because that's not what they signed up for on this podcast, but it was horrifying watching them. It was horrifying. And I have to thank there is this weird tension between those teachers were definitely needed to be questioned, but also, yes, because I questioned them, I then shot up in my spiritual practice. So I'm really glad you brought that up, and that is something you're actually seeing. And that's a beautiful segue into getting into herbalism because I think that plants are honest. They're honest creatures, they're honest beings, and they keep us in our sovereignty. They have sovereignty and we are sovereign when we work with plants. Please, finally, Brenna.

SPEAKER_02: 22:35

I'm so sorry for taking you on this tangent, but I feel like it needed to be said. So please tell us what is herbalism?

SPEAKER_03: 22:42

Oh, I love this tangent. All of it has been exceptional, and I'm happy to talk about truly all of it. Because, like you said, it's all been my journey. This is all relevant. So, what is herbalism? Herbalism is the practice of utilizing plants as medicine. And while I don't believe that herbs can fully replace modern medicine, and I don't think they should, I tend to walk the middle path. Herbs are my first line of defense, but if I need antibiotics for something, if I break a bone, I will see a doctor and I will be grateful. But plants are some of the most incredible teachers, like you mentioned, like rosemary, of whom I have a giant tattoo on my belly, these two big stems of rosemary. Rosemary was my first herbal teacher. I had a rosemary plant in my college apartment that I grew outside, and I made my first ever tincture out of her. And I had to get rid of her when I moved home from where I was living at the time. But she taught me when I was in a mental health crisis in college. She reminded me that I can be calm, that I can have this connection to these ancient practices because herbalism is so ancient. We have healers in our lineage, all of us. We all have healers. We all have wise people. And I think that herbalism is also a way of finding your roots. Pun definitely intended. For me, it grounds me in my ancestry in a way that is appropriate for the modern day, in a way that is helpful for others. It connects me with my spirituality. It connects me to the goddess. It connects me to the goddess I work most closely with from the Norse pantheon, Freya. And herbalism is a way of being in the world. I strongly identify with the label of herbalist, not just because I make teas or I make pelvic steaming blends and offer them to people, but because I love the plants. I see them as beings, like yes, I eat vegetables, yes, I eat the herbs, yes, I drink the herbs, but they have consciousness, they have vitality, they have energy to them. And by centering the plants in my life, I find a greater sense of wholeness within myself. They are physically calming. I'm enjoying a cup of tea that has damiana, I think it's pronounced shataveri. I don't know if it's shataveri or shatavari. It's rose, vanilla, orange. And there's something else in there. It's so physically calming and grounding and soothing and helps quiet my fuzzy mind. But at the same time, this tea connects me with feminine fierceness. The damiana, the rose, the vanilla connect me to my womb, my creative center, and also connect me to my heart, from which I can speak clearly and confidently, but also compassionately and earnestly. So the plants and herbalism as a practice offers us medicine for the body, medicine for the heart, the mind, the womb, the soul, all of it. It's everything to me.

SPEAKER_01: 25:51

It really is everything. Like you covered already some of the ways that you use herbs, which is in teas and pelvic steaming, which I've used rosemary for pelvic steaming, and wow, it was incredible. You can use them in medicine bags, in smoke wands to tie them in bundles and cleanse your house with smoke. And I love fire, so I love doing that. You can make perfumes, you can make salts and sugars, honey infusions. I used to do these shower cleanses. So I lived in Seattle for a few years. And the only thing I loved about living in Seattle was the fact that there was an abundance of plants all around that I could work with. It was like living in fairy wonderland. The thick moss, like the moss was maybe like three inches thick. It was like carpet, and I could just scoop it up. And I remember putting moss around my foot when it was really inflamed. And even though I had tried ice packs and everything, nothing worked, but I put the moss over my foot, and within 15 minutes, the inflammation went away. And I had no idea that that was even possible. I just put it there because I loved standing on moss. So I loved being in Seattle because of all these plants. And then I would take all these plants and I'd make shower cleanses from them. So instead of drinking it as a tea, I would pour it over my head. Oh, I love that. So good. It felt so good because rosemary grew abundantly. And the other herb that grew abundantly was yarrow and fennel. So I would make these blends and dunk it on my head. I have this silly little Instagram video about how I met the shower cleanses. I was so proud of them. And so instead of a tree that you can drink, you can pour it over your head. And there are just so many ways you can work with plants. And when you say it's everything, it literally is everything because you bring your own consciousness to the way you can work with these plants. So I love that you say that. And I know your specialty is nervous system health and sensuality. Why did you choose that as your specialty? First of all, is that still your specialty? It is indeed. Okay. Riff on that, please.

SPEAKER_03: 28:04

Why did you choose that? Oh, because I needed it. I needed it so badly. Where to begin and how to keep it concise? I mentioned a little bit about growing up in tumultuous, stressful, scary, sad environment. Because of that, by the time I came of age, by the time my frontal lobe was fully developed, I felt like my nervous system was shot. I felt fried. I felt burnt out. I had spent most of my life in fight or flight mode. And both of those responses, and also fawn mode, freeze mode, all of it. I was all over the place. As a child, I was more nervous and really wanted to please people. As a teenager, I became not really rebellious because I was still scared of not following the rules. I was still scared of punishment, but I became really angry and I fought back verbally. I used my words and I used them intensely. But as I grew up, as I became older, I started to balance the two. And again, once my frontal lobe fully developed, I was like, oh gosh, I have a safe home. I have loving friends, loving partners, loving community. I am safe. There is no longer a threat. And my body doesn't know what to do with that. My brain doesn't know what to do with that because I was ready. And sometimes I still feel ready to fight back or run away, even when I don't need to do those things, even when it's not not even not necessary, but not skillful and not healthy. I dove deep into the herbs. Even when I was in college, like 18 or 19, when I didn't fully understand the impact that trauma had on me, I still knew that I wanted to start studying the herbs because I wanted my brain to feel better. I wanted to be less anxious. I wanted to be less on edge all the time. So that's where my herbalism practice started. Started was trying to well, first it was trying to heal my brain, trying to fix my mental health, but now it's more about herbs for resilience, knowing that I will never not be impacted by trauma, but I will have better coping mechanisms and I will have more wisdom about it. So that's why herbs for the nervous system, herbs for sensuality. To make a very long story short, I was misdiagnosed and over-medicated by a med provider for my mental health issues. And while I do believe medication can be used very skillfully and should be used skillfully when people need it, I'm always supportive of clients using medication as they feel is right for them. I was on the wrong medications for something I didn't have. And because of that, I suffered. And the biggest thing that suffered was my libido, was my sexual desire. It didn't exist for multiple years. And that really took a toll on my mental health. And I was partnered at the time. And it was really stressful and really intense not having a desire when my baseline as a person is flourishing desires, healthy desires, fiery desire. And even when I was, even after I went off the medication, even after I found a medical provider who was treating me well, I still experienced the drawbacks of having been over-medicated for something I didn't have for a long period of time. And I was really desperate for help. And I knew that my younger sibling, Emily, who was also a witch, also a magic practitioner, also a plant person, Emily had been working with the Norse goddess Freya at the time. And this was about three years ago. And I knew that Freya had associations with love, sex, sensuality, and I was willing to do anything at this point to win back my fire, my sensuality, my vitality. And so I reached out to Freya. I went to my working altar and I said, I don't remember the exact words, but it was something to the effect of great lady, Freya, I'm in it bad. I really need your help. I explained what was going on. I spoke to her like you would speak to a deity, like you would speak to the goddess or to God. And I got the overwhelming, the strong sense that yes, she's yes, we can work together. Yes, this will happen. We'll make it work. And I didn't receive instructions at that time. It was just the sense of, oh, okay, she's receiving me, she's welcoming me, she accepts me for this work. And I don't usually suggest people work with deities in that way, like immediately approaching them, like, please give me this thing. But I truly was so desperate that I saw no other option. And I think Freya really understood that when I came to her in that way. And later on, I was at a it was an oracular ceremony where there were two people I knew and trusted who were channeling spirits and channeling the gods to speak through them to serve the community, to serve the people attending the ceremony. And I went up and I said, I'd really like to speak to Freya again. And she agreed to speak through the priestess who was sitting in that high seat. And I just broke down in tears. And I was like, What do I do to fix this? What do I do? And she Freya told me, she's this is not your fault. Like, first and foremost, she was like, This is not your fault. It is going to take time, it's going to be like roots growing and moving underground, but it will happen. And she asked me to light a candle for her every Friday. And I later found out that I was to do it for a year. So I lit a candle every Friday for a year. And along with that prayer work, along with those offerings of the candle in prayer to Freya, I worked with the herbs. I studied what herbs could revitalize sexuality and sensuality. I worked with Ashwagandha, I worked with Rose, Rose, I worked with Rose, Tulsi, Oatstraw, Hawthorne, so many other herbal teachers on this journey. And exactly a year later, I was healed. I was, I was vital, I was sensual, I had my sexuality back. And that was truly only the beginning of this great journey of studying the womb, studying the energetic pelvis, working with these plants, working with with Freya and her glorious sensuality. She's also a goddess associated with war and death as well. She's not just love and light, love and lust and sexiness. She is fierce. She brings some of the called the valorous slain in the Norse mythology. She takes half of those killed victoriously in battle to her place to rest with her and be with her in this, it's called, I believe it's Folkwanger, like the people's field filled with flowers and shining grass. And she takes them and she gives them comfort. I don't even know where we started with this. Oh, herbs for sensuality. That's why. All of that is why.

SPEAKER_01: 35:26

Yeah, I asked why you chose that as a specialty. And I love this where you ended up because you basically just showed that sometimes our wounds are where we get the medicine, and then when we have the medicine, and then where we share the medicine from. I feel like a lot of people sometimes they think that it's a curse, or the bad things that happened to them somehow define them as someone broken when actually it can define you as someone so whole and complete. And you also talked about resilience, and I'm so glad you talked about that because I've said it so many times on the podcast that enlightenment is not about bad things never happening to you or you never feeling bad, but enlightenment is about you being able to bounce back quicker and quicker and quicker. And each time the bounce back is how you measure your level of enlightenment, not the absence of bad things. And you call it resilience, which is exactly what that is. I would almost say a synonym for resilience is enlightenment and vice versa.

SPEAKER_03: 36:31

Oh, I love that.

SPEAKER_01: 36:32

Yeah, I really love that you say that. And it's so funny because you just went on about the rose. I don't know if you know this. No, actually, wait, you did publish an article for me on social meaning of the rose. Yes. And I have a whole rose mysticism series on the podcast. I am obsessed with rose. I wear it as perfume, I drink it as tea. My biggest pet peeve about the way people see rose is this fruo-frou flower. I remember starting the article with you that I wrote, I saying, Rose like the feminine has been relegated to this place of being a soft, airy fairy, frou-frou, skirt wearing, long dress wearing, incompetent female. When in reality, it's such a powerful medicine and it's such a powerful plant. And I'm so glad that we have that in common. I'm gonna ask you about that because the last thing I want to tell you is that you talked about Freya and how you enjoy this side of her, that the fiery side, the sensual side. And I almost never talk about the deities that I work with because I just feel like for so many people, that's a slippery slope. And without the right instruction, people can go all sorts of crazy with it. But I feel like we have that in common because you work with Freya. I actually work with Kali and Inana. And I just feel like these are the kind of goddesses that really anchor polarity into wholeness because they've got this wild, incredible side to them, and then they've got this maternal, fiercely loving side to them too. I love that we have at least that as an image for the feminine, or even if you want to go towards a gender, for a woman, like this can be a model to accept all these parts and make it into a whole being. You're not just one personality over the other, you're not just good little girl, you're also this really fiery, incredible woman. I just love how you tied all those themes together as to why you chose your specialty as nervous system and sensuality, because I do think those two are very much related. They're so tied. Yeah, to have a sensual practice is to have a nervous system practice. So yeah, I just really like it. We talked about why those two things are important, but I was wondering what herbs you like to work with that help with those two things, because I do think, actually, I know for a fact that we are having, at least in America, a nervous system health crisis. Everyone's nervous system has been blown to pieces. I know there are other countries too, but I live in America and I can say that for certain. We're all coming into that place, and we could be the strongest people on the planet, but we do need support. And we do need someone or some being to help us with that. And I feel like plants are a good place for a lot of people to start with. So yeah, what herbs are your favorites to work with?

SPEAKER_03: 39:41

I find that a lot of the herbs that are supportive for the nervous system are also supportive for sensuality because I teach classes on herbs for sensuality, and this is where I begin is that it's very hard to feel sensual when you don't feel grounded, nourished, at ease, regulated. So herbs that are supportive for the nervous system also support sensuality. And I don't believe that, again, in my herbs for sensuality class, I'm not teaching about aphrodisiac herbs necessarily. Like certainly some of these herbs can help you feel sexier and strengthen your libido and help you engage sensually in that way. But these herbs help you get in touch with your radiant energy. No matter what gender you are, no matter what your vibe is, they help you feel more you. And then maybe from there you decide to engage with other people sensually. Oatstraw is my number one for nourishing the nervous system, uh, gaining a baseline of wellness. Oat straw is very soothing, it's very silky, it's very soft and adds a bit of like uncuousness to a drink. It has, it's not mucilaginous necessarily, like it doesn't make the tea kind of goopy, but it gives it a silkiness. And I want to shout out Robin Rose Bennett and Kimberly Gallagher, who both really inspire me with their work with oatstraw for the nervous system and for sensuality. Kimberly has a book called Aphrodisiac, and it's one of my favorite all-time herbal books. And I attended a class with her and with Robin Rose, and they both really brought oatstraw to my attention, and now it's essential in my practice.

SPEAKER_01: 41:28

I've never heard of oatstraw. Sorry to interrupt you. I've never even heard of it, and I was just quickly googling it to see the image. I've seen that plant everywhere. It's everywhere.

SPEAKER_03: 41:38

It's the same plant as rolled oats, like Quaker oats. But the rolled oats are the oat tops. It's just the straw of the oat plant, and it's so unassuming. You'd think no, you're not going to make a tea out of rolled oats, but the this part of the plant is so soothing. It's a nutritive, it's a nervine, which means that it helps support the nervous system and nerve function, and it can help you find that silkiness within yourself, within your body. Another one that I adore is Damiana. Not during pregnancy or nursing, but generally safe for a lot of people. It has a sagey, smoky scent to it and is really lovely for dropping into your body. So out of the out of the external concerns and into the present moment in the body, which is why I am enjoying Damiana and my tea tonight. So I can feel more present and a little less anxious and frazzled and everywhere. I really enjoy smoking Damiana. It makes a great smoking blend and rose. Always rose. I like damasque rose. That's my favorite variety to enjoy in tea. The pink petals are so gorgeous in any blend. I make an Incel a blend called Freya's Flowers, which has nettle, yarrow, rose, lavender, and one other herb that I forget. It might be oatstraw for that silkiness. It's a delight. It's one of my favorites.

SPEAKER_01: 43:07

Yeah, I've never even heard of oatstraw in Damiana. So thank you for bringing that to our attention.

SPEAKER_03: 43:13

Yes. And they're both really accessible herbs. If you have a local herb shop or even just like a health food store that has a bulk section, you're likely to find both those. And if you're buying them from a health food store or the bulk department, they're really affordable herbs as well. I always suggest that people try to find the minimum effective dose for them of an herb. So when I'm working one-on-one with clients, I'm not, yes, I'll blend you a tea if you want me to blend you a tea. I'm happy to do that because I've worked with you one-on-one. But I'm also happy to suggest single herbs. If that's all you can afford, if that's all that's accessible to you, if you can only fathom working with one herb. Let's start there. So you're not stuck using 15 or 20 different herbs for your condition. Because I want my herbal clients, I want my community members, I want my students in workshops and classes to have autonomy and sovereignty. I don't want them stuck to me because I'm the one making this unique product for them. I want them to learn about the herbs and support themselves. Not because I'm not willing to help, I'm happy to help, but because I don't want to have power over them, because I want them to be empowered. So we start with we can blend a tea, but I will tell them why they use each of the herbs. And I'll also tell them where to find them individually if they want them.

SPEAKER_01: 44:33

Yeah, that's beautiful. I love that. And I'm probably putting you on the spot with this, but I wanted to ask about Ashwagandha. Because I have tried it, my friends have tried it, my colleagues have tried it, and it doesn't seem to work for anyone. And it's one of those things where I hear and see everyone talking about it, but it just doesn't work. And it's one of those things where I have to say, this is how we know that we need to work with our own sovereignty when we work with herbs, because what works for so many people just doesn't work for a lot of other people. And so I was wondering if you knew anything about Ashwagandha and its impact on the nervous system.

SPEAKER_03: 45:14

I do. I'm not trained in Ayurveda, no a little bit. The herbs that I work with are mostly from Western Europe and where I live in New England, Turtle Island. I use Ashwagandha occasionally in my practice. I make a blend called Long Winter Nights, which is like a masalachai-inspired tea blend with nettle, oat straw, ashwagandha licorice, cardamom, and cinnamon. I find that ashwagandha is well used for people in the winter or people who in the winter feel so depressed and so cold and a little bit damp, their constitution runs really lethargic. Like this is how I feel in the winter, which is why that ashwagandha blend is supportive for me in the winter time. But if you run fiery and hot, or if you have, if you don't want to potentially increase testosterone levels in the body, which I believe ashwagandha can potentially do, I would not, I would not suggest ashwagandha for someone with a hot, dry constitution, or someone who runs really up here in the forehead and in the brain with their anxiety. If you wanted, if that was you and you wanted something to, or I should say, I would offer you something to cool you down and bring a little bit of moisture back into the body so you didn't dry out and burn out, if that makes any sense. To answer your question simply, it all depends on someone's constitution. It depends on whether you run hot or cold, damp or dry. And that's like the Western herbal diagnostic, quote unquote diagnostic model. But it's the that's the constitution model versus Ayurveda, which is the three doshas. But that's the way I think hot or cold, damp or dry. It's helpful because I want to bring a client back into balance. So for me, because I run cool, especially in the winter in New Hampshire, I run cool and I run damp. So ashwagandha could be helpful, especially with those other warming, soothing herbs. But if you run hot and dry and it's and you live in the southwest and it's hot, I wouldn't offer that to you.

SPEAKER_01: 47:26

That's interesting because a lot of the people who say to me that ashwagandha doesn't work and it didn't work for me, we're all people who run hot and fiery. That might be why. Yeah. This is such a beautiful thing to say. First of all, I want to reflect the fact that specifically you work with the herbs that are around you. You don't try to go to all these exotic lands. And even though you might work with those herbs or whatever, you're working primarily with the herbs of place and space and the herbs around you. And I think I really want to inspire people to go out into nature around you and look at the herbs around you because there are so many if you just learn how to identify them or even just admire some of them and see where anyway. You have these really nifty apps now, which can I tell you one of my favorite apps is the picture this app. And it just is almost always accurate. And I just absolutely love that app for plant identifying. That might send you over the edge being like, oh my God, we cannot use apps to identify plants.

SPEAKER_03: 48:28

I do.

SPEAKER_01: 48:29

You do?

SPEAKER_03: 48:30

Yeah. I totally do. I would never rely on an app. The one that I use is just I have an iPhone, so I just use the Apple camera. And if there's something that I'm curious about, usually like a decor flower, I'll use that to identify it. I would just never use it for foraging. If I'm trying to figure out what a mushroom is and I look on my phone, I'm like, oh, that's a chanterelle or that's a birch polypore. I wouldn't then trust that, gather it, and then eat it because that's really risky. But if I'm just curious, I'll use an app because I'm an herbalist, but I don't, I definitely don't know every plant. I've been out with friends who are not herbalists, who have more plant knowledge than me, and then I learn from them. But yeah, I'll totally use an app to idea plant if I'm just curious. But if I'm foraging, I use, I was taught to use multiple identification methods. So my own knowledge and then confirm it with a book or another skilled herbalist. I think apps help make plant identification accessible. And that's something that's really important to me is that herbalism is accessible. And that's how to make a spiritual practice accessible for people is something I'm always chewing on and I'm always working because this work supports me and this is my income. But I also want this to be like I identify as a community herbalist. I have to serve my community, otherwise, I am failing and I am not living up to my ethics and my morals and my ideals. I think apps make it accessible. If someone wants to go out looking for herbs and they think something is a wild mint, but they don't know, and they find out that it's, oh, it's nettle instead. Like that's a teaching moment. And now they have that knowledge. They just need to confirm it with a book or confirm it with another herbalist. I think it's great.

SPEAKER_01: 50:20

Yeah, definitely no apps for foraging. I remember in Seattle, my apps would always get it confused, and so would I get it confused. The difference between Queen Anne's lace, which is poisonous or toxic, correct? Queen Anne's lace is not. It's hemlock. Hemlock. Hemlock that is the see, I already got them confused.

SPEAKER_03: 50:39

And so many people do. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 50:41

You look exactly the same plant to an untrained eye. And when I use the app, it would always get it wrong. And I remember going, oh yeah, no apps for foraging. That's when I learned my lesson, being like, I'm not going to use it for foraging. But it's so beautiful to have a conversation with the natural world around you. If it just helps you get out there and identify plants and just know what's what, I feel like it's a beautiful thing. And the funny thing with foraging is I will never get the difference between those two plants, no matter how hard I try, hemlock and Queen Anne's Lace. I've studied it so many times, but when it happens and when I see it in person, all the knowledge just goes out my brain. And the other ones I can never tell are mushrooms. Oh my God, mushrooms are so difficult for me. But yeah, wouldn't use an app for those, but I think I really enjoy being able to have almost like a mini conversation with a plant by being able to take a picture and saying, oh, this is the name. This is what it potentially does. It's just such a beautiful practice.

SPEAKER_03: 51:40

It's a point of connection. It's you building a relationship with a plant, which doesn't have to be hugely ceremonial. It can just be, hi, Queen Anne's Lace, hi Hemlock. Nice to see you on my walk again. Oh, it's the spring. Oh, you're growing. Oh, it's the summer. Oh, you're flowering. Oh, it's the fall, you're dying for this year. Oh, it's the winter, I can't see you. It can be as simple as that.

SPEAKER_01: 52:01

Yeah. I even enjoy the bird sound identification app. That's also my other favorite. It's called Merlin. And I love, yeah, Merlin bird ID app or something like this. It's almost always accurate. And I just love that app. Top tip for the people listening. Yeah, I'm glad we went on that tangent because I was gonna ask you, how does your ancestry play into your work with plants?

SPEAKER_03: 52:25

I think we almost covered this before, or like we there are through lines. Yeah. So how does it impact my work? Working with my well ancestors brings me a sense of groundedness and rootedness, plant pun intended. Yeah. And studying the potential spiritual practices like pre-colonization, pre-Christianity of my ancestors, and then throughout time, studying those herbal practices gives me a sense of belonging because I didn't grow up with any particular cultural traditions. I grew up, I grew up a in a white family as a white person in New England with no real religious affiliation, with no like cultural, ancestral traditions. It was just Christmas, occasionally Easter. I went to a Christian school and I identified with that for a while, but it wasn't the sense of rootedness that I wanted. And by looking back into my ancestry, being very honest with myself about who my ancestors were, what harm they may have caused to people, but also exploring for what wisdom the well ancestors might have had helps me understand myself better. And I think about that all the time: like how to study ancestry in a way, in how to draw out those ancient spiritual practices and that herbal wisdom in a way that is appropriate for the modern day, in a way that grounds me, in a way that is helpful for others, and in a way that helps combat like white supremacy and cultural appropriation. I think about that all the time.

SPEAKER_01: 54:06

Yeah. The reason I asked you that question specifically is because for me, if I had to ever tell somebody, hey, what is step one of getting into herbalism? If somebody asked me that question, I'd say, look to your pass-down medicines, your pass-down recipes, your pass-down cookbooks, your pass down silly little things that you thought were silly in childhood, like your parents would give you something, like a plant remedy if you had some kind of sickness or anything like that was something your grandmother said. We all have at least one or two stories like that we can say. And I'm like, start there, experiment there. And that's maybe one little avenue. And for me, ancestry is such a beautiful way to get into herbalism. And also vice versa, herbalism and working with plants is such a good way to get into ancestry. I don't know if I'm going to do it, but I wanted to do an episode on the dignity of chai and whimsical health. Because chai, it's such an innocent-looking drink, but it is so potent. It is such a potent place to start. And that is something that's just been passed down, and every family has their own way of making chai. They're like, there are as many variations of chai as there are people in India, I swear. There's just so many concoctions that you can make with it. And that's for me is one of the ways you can get into herbalism. That being said, though, how would you suggest that someone can start with herbalism?

SPEAKER_03: 55:31

I was gonna say the exact same thing in my notes. Literally in my notes, it's look to your roots. If you know where your family is from, or if you know where your ancestors are from, explore those practices, but also explore the potential open practices of the place that you live in. Like a lot of quote unquote Western herbalism is based in British, Celtic, Germanic herbal traditions, but also there is so much that is influenced by indigenous North American herbal medicine. So it's not really Western herbalism, it's like this unique quote unquote American herbal tradition. So my first step for folks is if you're able to explore your ancestry, not just necessarily what was passed down in your family, like family remedies, like yes, very much start there. But if you don't have any of that, you might need to dig deeper and go further and further back into the past up your family line. And then think of the herbal wisdom that has existed in the place you live in. I'm speaking as an American. Think of the herbal wisdom that has been in this place for so many years and so many generations pre-colonization, and that still exists and lives with indigenous wisdom holders today, so long as those practices are open and freely shared. So that's step one. It's a big step one, but it should feel joyous. If it doesn't feel joyous, if it feels like a slog, if it feels heavy, if it feels hard in a way that's not constructive, pause, pump the brakes. You might want to start with just looking at what herb shops are in your area. See who's in your area. Don't feel like you need to study with the most famous herbal teacher you can think of. Yes, they are a wisdom keeper, but you also have wisdom keepers in your community. You have wise women, you have witches, you have elders, you have healers, you probably have medicine people in your community. You just need to dig around for them because a lot of them aren't on social media. Yes. Go to your local health food store, go to search herbalists in my area. You might not be able to find them online because they might not market themselves as an herbalist. You might have to ask around, get witchy with it, inquire. Maybe you choose to apprentice with a teacher. I literally wrote an entire article about this for Spirituality and Health, the print magazine, on finding your calling as an herbalist. And I suggested that there were three main routes of becoming an herbalist: self-study, so just studying on your own, because anybody in the United States can call themselves an herbalist legally. There's no official certification. There is no degree that you have to get. Anyone can call themselves an herbalist. So after self-study, you could call yourself an herbalist. Or you might study online with a popular teacher that you like, whether it's one-on-one or in a big class or just recordings, you might do that. I'm a big fan of the kind of traditional apprenticing process where you go to a teacher in their land, if they have land, and you study one-on-one with them. There might be money involved officially, it might be just them taking you under your wing for however many months or years. I like that. That's how I studied for my first apprenticeship, but that's not always accessible to people and that's not always inspiring to people.

SPEAKER_01: 58:50

Yeah, for me, I also recommend if you want to grow a herb, especially if the herb is easy enough for you to grow. Because I tried growing mint, and for some reason I absolutely failed at it. And it's supposed to be an easy plant. But so I don't know how people grow that plant. But if you are someone who likes gardening, you can even grow one herb. Because for me, it was always about finding one herb that I really liked, and then I just exploded into all the herbs that now I absolutely love and work with. I think my all-time favorites are obviously rose. I think that goes without saying, but I also really love lemon balm and fennel. And it's through a herbal teacher that I discovered this plant called Sorel. And I just fell in love with Sorel. Oh my god, I absolutely love Sorel. I've never even heard of that before. It's so many different plants. You get to know them and you get to taste all these different flavors that you've never had before just by working or just consulting with or just following a herbalist around, like a little baby chick. Yeah. Yeah. And spices are also just great ways to work with herbs too, because you know that's Blows our herbs.

SPEAKER_03: 1:00:01

I love putting herbs in my coffee. I like putting mushroom powders in my coffee. I have put ashwagandha in my coffee at times because I'm always going to drink a cup of coffee in the morning. That habit's never going away. I don't feel like it needs to go away. So I'd rather instead of trying to replace it with an herbal tea, which is not sustainable for me, what is sustainable for me is adding herbs to my coffee, having my vitamins with my coffee, taking my probiotic with my coffee, because that's an anchor. I love my cup of coffee. It's a, it is my longest-running ritual. Like just a cup of coffee in the morning, but add spices, add herbs because I'm gonna drink it.

SPEAKER_00: 1:00:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 1:00:41

That's an easy way to do it because you're combining herbs with things you already do, as opposed to trying to find a new habit. And I think that that's always such a great way to start a new practice. Do you have any favorite client stories that you can share that you've worked with?

SPEAKER_03: 1:01:00

I don't have any specific favorite client stories, but I think the favor the thing that's been so inspiring for me, or the most inspiring for me, about working with clients is seeing how impactful womb work and work with the emotional and spiritual and physical pelvis is for people in terms of connecting them with themselves, grounding them, but also lighting a fire in them or stoking the fire that already exists, and then connect helping them connect to the goddess or divinity as they see it. So that might be through support with pelvic steaming. That might be a T for the menstrual cycle. That might just be the work of considering what exists in the womb, what baggage you may carry there. Because I'm not a therapist, I'm I'm not a mental health practitioner, and that's not, I'm not stepping outside of my scope as an herbalist, but the herbs can help us contemplate what may be going on with us and be deeply supportive to other modalities and other therapies and other practitioners we're working with. Womb work and seeing the effect of womb work, physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, on the clients that I've worked with inspires me and reminds me why I do this work. And even just thinking about our cycles, the cycles of the female body, the menstrual cycle, but also cycles of being a human is very impactful for me. And that's what I like most about this work is seeing people through their phases, talking with people about phases, whether that's follicular phase, ovulation, luteal phase, menstruation, or if it's cycles of grief and illness. It's all related and it's all connected. And there is no staying the same as a human. Like we thrive in change, even though change is scary. And the plants anchor us in this and help us connect to divinity and to spirit and to wellness throughout the horrifying changes.

SPEAKER_01: 1:03:08

Yeah, I'm definitely into womb work, and plants are just so gentle, and we require gentleness there because a lot of us have had so much trauma down there. It's just such a gentle way to ease into it. And so I love that you brought that up. Thank you.

SPEAKER_03: 1:03:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 1:03:22

I was gonna ask you: do you have any favorite brews or recipes that's on your mind that you really like lately?

SPEAKER_03: 1:03:29

So I've been talking a lot about oat straw, so I definitely have to mention oat straw. Okay. I really enjoy oat straw. The recipe that I wrote down was two parts Tulsi, two parts hawthorn leaf and flour, and one part, or maybe even a half part, of rose, just a healthy sprinkling of rose. And then on top of that, you can even add two to four parts of oat straw, which will add a kind of soothing, softening quality to the whole tea. And this is a tea that frankly is great for both the nervous system and for sensual connection. It can soothe you and help you drop into the body when you may be stuck up in the mind. It can help ground you when you're feeling kind of floaty or frantic. And it can remind you of the power of ritual because making tea is a ritual. Extinctures like herbal extracts can be so helpful when you're in crisis or when you are living a life that is very high stress, whether that's by choice or not by choice. But tea requires presence. You have to watch the kettle boil and not let it boil over or let it scream. You have to measure out the herbs, you have to actually hold the cup of tea, and you have to drink it, which takes time. And I think that is part of the healing process and part of the work of learning from the plants is learning to slow down, learning to be present, learning to be fully here in the moment. Because plants can't be anywhere else but exactly where they are. Their seeds are dropped where they're dropped, they grow and then they die. They aren't stuck thinking about something else. They don't have to deal with the horrors of being a human. They are the plants, they are wise, they are teachers, and they can inspire us to be present and find our roots.

SPEAKER_01: 1:05:26

It's so funny when you said oatstraw in the recipe. For some reason, I saw oatstraw ice cream in my mind. Is that even possible? I don't know why that image came to my mind.

SPEAKER_03: 1:05:37

I feel like you could infuse it into cream or milk and make an ice cream out of it. But the flavor is just it's so mild. It's not even grassy, it's just like hay, it's just fluff.

SPEAKER_02: 1:05:48

I think that'd be nice. For some reason, I just imagined all of it like as an ice cream. And I'm like, why am I imagining this?

SPEAKER_03: 1:05:55

Ooh, I would love that. I think I've had rose ice cream. I'll take rose in any form she presents herself.

SPEAKER_01: 1:06:01

Yes, rose ice cream. Yes. Oh my god. I'm going to India. I'm gonna have rose everything when I go there. Oh, love it. Yeah, I think, yeah, I never thought of making herbal ice creams, but now I will. Now I will think of that.

SPEAKER_03: 1:06:16

Herbs and smoothies. I put Tulsi tea, like tulse ice Tulsi infusion into tea or into tea, into smoothies with blueberries and cinnamon. It's really nice. It helps cut the blood sugar spike from a smoothie. If you put a lot of banana or strawberries in there, it helps helps you process the sugar better.

SPEAKER_01: 1:06:35

Thank you. That is a very good tip. And it's amazing. Tastes so good. Okay. I will definitely try that. Brenna, I was gonna also ask you is there any special offerings or classes or services that you offer that you'd like to talk about that are either time-based or long-term? And where can people find you?

SPEAKER_03: 1:06:56

Absolutely. So I just launched my website for my business, Brisingaman Botanicals. Woohoo! I'm so excited about how it looks. It's B-R-I-S-I-N-G-A-M-E-N botanicals.com.

SPEAKER_01: 1:07:11

And I'll singaman botanics. Bio too, so people can just click on it. But yeah, tell us more. It's okay. So you have the website.

SPEAKER_03: 1:07:19

The website is where I'll be offering products that people can buy. So mostly herbal teas, organic, hand-blended herbal teas. And that's also where I'll be booking consultations. Once I open my books, once I get my calendar on there, which will probably be December, I will be offering free 15-minute intro calls to see if we're a good herbalist client fit to see if I can actually assist in whatever you want to work with. And then from there, I'll be offering initial consultations, which are 90 minutes, and then returning client consultations, which are 60 minutes. And then pricing is all on the website. If people have any questions about that, they can reach out on the little messaging function on the website and I'll respond as best I can. And then I have a workshop coming up in March with the Botanica Obscura Conference. My workshop is called Herbal Practices for Resurrecting Sensuality. So it's like my basic herbs for sensuality workshop, but it's more about whereas herbs for sensuality is about herbs for sustaining your sensuality and helping you feel a little bit more in touch. Herbal practices for resurrecting sensuality is more about truly that process that I mentioned earlier, the resurrection of something that I felt had died within me and lifting it back up into the light so that it can bloom and be born again, essentially. It's a more, it's a darker, more intense class, and I'm really excited about it. And that's with the Botanica Obscura Conference. I believe the website is botanicaobscura.com. Botanica Obscura Conference.com.

SPEAKER_01: 1:08:58

Okay.

SPEAKER_03: 1:08:58

And that's where we're going to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_01: 1:08:59

We'll put that also in the bio too. You'll send me all these links and we'll put them there. I just wanted to say, I just realized that your website has gone live and I'm just looking at it and it's beautiful, Brenna. Thank you. It's gorgeous. And it's so you're so generous for offering those 15-minute concerts too. I really love that because it's such an interesting practice to get into. And I love that people have access to you that way. But it's such a beautiful website, my God.

SPEAKER_03: 1:09:25

Yes. And I also have a little bit on there about my writing and editing services, which I still do on the side. If someone reaches out to me with a project and they're they really want a witch editing their book, I'm happy to work with them, truly.

SPEAKER_02: 1:09:38

God, Brennan, thank you for saying that. Oh my god, for me truly.

SPEAKER_03: 1:09:43

Please, Dilshad, find me. You know where to find me. Also, a little bit about yoga offerings. I'm not really teaching yoga anymore, but it's I often offer somatic movement suggestions with my herbal suggestions because they really do go hand in hand. So I have a little bit about that on there. And in the new year, I am becoming a certified life cycle celebrant. So I'm going to be offering rites of passage ceremonies, baby welcoming ceremonies, home blessings, all sorts of ceremonies that, at least in America as a whole, our culture is really lacking. Ceremony goes really well with the herbs, herbs go well with ceremony, and I'm so excited about this. This is like my newest point of interest is celebrancy. So there's info about that up there as well. I'll be doing ceremonies in person and online in the new year.

SPEAKER_01: 1:10:34

Oh my, you know me, I'm a ritual ceremony girly, so I am so thrilled that you're doing that. Oh my god, wow! So many awesome things. You better give me all these links so I can put them in the description because that is absolutely fantastic. I will provide. Yeah, Brenna, thank you so much for coming on the show. Any last words or any last things you want to cover that we haven't already?

SPEAKER_03: 1:10:57

This is something that my teacher Jessica always says: Bullism is your birthright. Claim it.

SPEAKER_01: 1:11:03

Yes. Amen. Thank you so much for coming on the show today, Brenna. Much love to you, and much love to our listeners. Thank you, everyone.