Description

Deep Nervous System Support: Nervine and Adaptogen Herbal Allies for Turbulent Times

10am- 12pm [break for lunch] 1pm-3pm (followed by free lecture open to the public at 4pm)

In this class we will explore ways we can work with nervine and adaptogenic herbs as our allies in supporting healing and standing on more solid ground in the chaos of our times. All of us alive on the Earth right now are navigating through layers of trauma on personal, community, ancestral and global levels. Our ancient nervous systems are struggling to find stability in the face of the speed, technology and complexity of modern living. We are all in this together. We are so blessed to have herbs who offer us the gift of support on physical, mental, emotional and spiritual levels.

In our morning session we will discuss the basic physiology of the nervous system as well as how to work with nervine herbs for acute situations of stress, anxiety, trauma and sleep struggles. In the afternoon we will shift our focus toward exploring a few favorite adaptogen herbs and how they can offer us long term support in reconditioning the nervous and endocrine systems away from stress mode back toward our parasympathetic “rest and digest” mode so that o we can stand in our center, tend to ourselves and our loved ones and do our work in the world.

We will be touching, smelling, tasting herbs and witnessing together how the herbs work within us. We will also discuss basic preparations and dosage and sample protocols.

Deb Soule, born and raised in rural western Maine, began studying and growing medicinal herbs over 45 years ago. In 1985, after graduating from College of the Atlantic, Deb founded the herbal apothecary Avena Botanicals in West Rockport Maine. For 38 years she has been tending a few acres of medicinal herbs with organic and biodynamic practices and preparing many herbal tinctures, elixirs, oils, salves and cremes with herbs from her gardens. Deb also founded The Herbal Classroom, a non-profit learning project dedicated to hands-on learning, and gifting many herbs to Indigenous and Black and Brown communities. She is the author of Healing Herbs for Women, How to Move Like a Gardener, and The Healing Garden. Deb honors her main teacher, Rocio Alarcon and ruby-throated hummingbirds who she has been studying and learning from for 33 years.

Kinship Herbal and Holistic Healing, www.kinshiphealing.com

Lauren began studying and growing medicinal herbs 15 years ago and for the past seven years has practiced clinical herbalism and taught classes in Massachusetts and Maine. When sitting with clients she weaves together elements of Western herbalism, Ayurveda, Traditional Chinese Medicine, pulse diagnosis, Reiki and nutrition. She works in relationship with plants as dynamic living beings whose vast wisdom and generous allyship is critical to healing our bodies, hearts and spirits. She offers gratitude to the plants, to her teachers Pam Montgomery and Margi Flint as well as to Deb Soule and a generation of herbalists before her who so fiercely trail-blazed a path, tended seeds, wrote books and broke down cultural barriers. Younger herbalists following in their footsteps greatly benefit and are held by the knowledge, heart wisdom and ways of caring they brought forth. She is a mother of two young sons, a painter and a devotee of the ocean in all the seasons.