The Art & Practice of Spiritual Herbalism
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Transform, Heal, and Remember with the Power of Plants and Ancestral Medicine
The Art & Practice of Spiritual Herbalism, written by leading Black herbalist Karen Rose, addresses herbalism and medicine-making from the perspective of diasporic ancestral traditions.
Discover how to utilize the magic of plants and diasporic ancestral practices in remedies and rituals. What if plants could be used to guide the process of transformation? What if you knew which rituals and plants could be partnered to alleviate physical symptoms or heal emotional and spiritual imbalances? How can plants help you stand in your power, strengthen your intuition, and provide protection?
In The Art & Practice of Spiritual Herbalism, leading Black Herbalist Karen Rose provides the answers you seek. This guide to harnessing the power of plants is a practical tool for working through the symptoms of body disease and the underlying emotional and spiritual issues. Organized by major body systems such as circulatory, digestive, and reproductive, The Art & Practice of Spiritual Herbalism gives a brief overview of the physical mechanisms of the system, the spiritual correspondences associated with that system, and the plants, remedies, and rituals that can be used to bring oneself back to healing and balance.
Filled with stories, ancestral recipes, and accessible practices that anyone can use, The Art & Practice of Spiritual Herbalism shows you how to use the power of plants for spiritual and physical healing.
About the Author
Trained in Eastern and Western Herbal Medicine, Master Herbalist, Karen M. Rose has dedicated her life's work to empowering individuals to reconnect to their own ancestral traditions. Over the past 20 years, she has created several outlets to offer her teachings and healing modalities to women, people of colour, Black, and LGBTQX communities. The opening of the Brooklyn-based Sacred Vibes Apothecary in 2009 was merely the beginning. Karen has now expanded her enterprise, opening Sacred Botanica and Sacred Spice in 2020, two new locations in Brooklyn, to make healing more accessible to the greater community.
Karen's inspiration for this work began as a child in her native home of Guyana, where she was exposed to how African, Caribbean, and Latin American traditions profoundly influenced plant medicine and community healing. The legacy of these lands is the foundation of Karen's core values and spiritual practices. Regarded as a Spiritual Herbalist, Karen is revered for being the first to teach Spiritual Herbalism, plant medicine deeply rooted in ancestral healing and spiritual consciousness. Offering guidance to those on the path to finding the truth, she has trained over 400 herbalists through her Spiritual Herbalism Apprenticeship program as an act to reclaim their own health and offer healing to their own communities.
Karen's accomplishments include several in-house projects such as the Sacred Vibes' Annual NYC Spiritual Herbalism Conference, the 2019, 2020 Herbal Almanac, the Global Virtual Apprenticeship Program, the Spiritual Herbalism Apprenticeship Community, and the free Herbal Community Summer workshops. Karen has been featured in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Black Enterprise, Refinery29, Allure Magazine, Organic Life Magazine, and Elle.com and has partnered with brands like BET and Squarespace. Karen currently resides in New York City with her three children, grandson, parents, and sisters. Her family is valued foremost and all of her work is supported by this firm foundation.
How to use crystals?
CRYSTALS + YOU
Here are some of our favourite ways to incorporate crystals into your everyday life
✨ MEDITATION | Surely, we all know by now that a meditation habit is maybe the healthiest habit any of us can hope to develop (it beats smoking or gambling anyway, trust us). But transitioning into a meditative or mindful state isn’t always easy, and often, even with the best of intentions, people give up on their practice. They find it difficult to sit still and focus.
Never fear – this is where crystals come in handy. Crystals can cleanse the mind of chaotic thoughts and doubts, they calm and ground us and elevate our energy, so that you can fully immerse yourself in your meditation.
✨ SLEEPING WITH THEM | When you have difficulty sleeping, any number of things could be responsible for disturbing your rest. Whether you have too much on your plate and can’t switch off, or you can’t seem to settle your energy and are constantly worrying you’ve left your hair straightener on, crystals can bring you the peace you need to sleep easy.
If you are just lying there, sleeping sweetly for 8-ish hours every night, you might as well be absorbing some good vibes from your crystals, right?
To use your crystal at bedtime, try setting it next to you on your bedside table, placing it under your pillow or (best of all) holding it in your palm as you drift off.
✨ MASSAGE | Crystallising your massages can elevate your body work session to previously unknown levels of bliss. Using crystals along with soft tissue manipulation can reduce not only muscle pain, but also any pain or blocked energy stored in your mind or energy body, helping to bring your body and energy field back into balance to create stability.
✨ SKIN CARE ROUTINE | When used as part of your daily skincare ritual, a crystal facial roller and/or crystal infused facial serum can work to stimulate collagen synthesis, minimise fine lines and wrinkles, support lymphatic drainage, reduce pore size, boost elasticity, soothe irritation, minimise puffiness and promote deeper product preparation… Yikes – trying saying all of that without taking a breath.
Physically, it helps firm the outer layers of the skin through gentle massage. It also aids in detoxing through the lymphatic system, the body’s main major detoxification structure.
✨ WEAR THEM | Having your crystals close to you is the most effective way to utilise their power. Whether it be crystal jewellery or a little tumble in your pocket (or bra!) Having them close to your skin and vibrating with your aura is the most ideal situation to reach your goal or intention for them faster.
+ so much more, including but not limited to - elixirs, adding them to your altar, creating crystal grids, spells, the posibilities are endless.
CRYSTALS + THE HOME
You’d have to be living under a rock (pun intended!) to be oblivious to how popular gemstones, rocks, crystals and geodes have become in interiors. Seriously, if Instagram is anything to go by, we are definitely not the only ones using crystals to boost the ambiance and good vibes of our living space.
And while there are obviously plenty of creative ways (hello Pinterest!) to take advantage of the healing powers of crystals, if you’re looking to take full advantage of their witchy vibrations and magickal energy, there are ways to place them around your home intentionally, so that their energy can support you in various specific environments.
And don’t forget that the energy of your home can shift over time. If you’ve ever been in a space that was totally spick and span, and flooded with life giving natural light, but somehow just felt heavy, or uncomfortable, then you can understand how a home’s energy is dictated by more than just cleanliness.
The vibe of a space has a lot to do with the energy that has been expelled there, and not cleared away. Breakups, stress, deaths or grief, parties that got out of hand, or even arguments about whose turn it is to take the bins out can leave behind energy in your home and if you’re not smudging or getting rid of that negativity with high vibe crystals for your home, your space can start to feel dirty, no matter how hard your scrub.
Need somewhere to begin? Read our beginers blog on Crystal placements in the home here
REMEMBER, you don't HAVE to believe they're magic - you can just collect them because you think thy're pretty - there are no rules and we are not the gate keepers of crystals 💗
Shape significance
Using crystals for their spiritual and healing properties can be fun and fascinating and is a killer way to connect with the earth’s energy. But, when you really start digging into the magickal world of sparkly stones, it can start getting really overwhelming.
Not only do crystals come in every colour of the rainbow and serve different intended purposes, they are also found in many different shape formations. Newbies to the crystal world may think the way a stone is cut or shaped is purely aesthetic, but there’s a little more to a crystal’s shape than meets the eye. Just as the colours of the stones convey unique meanings, crystal shapes also matter. And while experts say that the structure of a crystal doesn’t change the type of energy it emits, the shape DOES affect the way you receive said energy.
We've put together a handy blog for you to learn about the possible reason or meaning behind the forms of crystals you're drawn to here
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