Herbal Homestead Journal

Book excerpt: Herbs and self-care practices shift with the seasons and therefore offer a tremendous opportunity to learn from nature. Our bodies go through the same cycles as the earth, daily, monthly, and yearly. The herbal homestead is a place to practice this art of living that we have become so disconnected from and to consequently reconnect with the cycles around and within us. Connecting and reconnecting with these processes is empowering, enlivening, energizing, and it builds confidence and trust in yourself and your body. Confidence and trust are major markers of health, so this way of life can put us right on our path to health. Herbal homesteading is a call to connect with ourselves, with our own healthcare, and with nature and plants. This connection can make us feel at home— at home within ourselves, at home in nature, and at home in the spaces where we make medicine, heal, and connect with others. You can create an herbal homestead to any extent and be successful, you do not have to have land, a garden, a plethora of herbs, an education in herbal medicine. You can embrace this worldview one day or month at time, plant by plant, one act of self care to the next. You can create your herbal homestead from your urban apartment, you can learn about nature’s processes and the life cycle of plants from the weeds growing through the cracks in the sidewalk —all of these cycles are created equally.