Transcript: ROSEMARY GLADSTAR on Thriving Where Planted /325
Ayana Young This episode of For The Wild is brought to you Anima Mundi Herbals. Anima Mundi was founded by Costa Rican herbalist Adriana Ayales with the intention of bringing some of the finest plant medicines, medicinal mushrooms, vegan collagen boosters, and high-potency elixirs. Anima Mundi is made in the United States with certified organic, wild-crafted, and sustainably harvested plants and herbs that are sourced from small-scale farms around the world. Their products contain zero fillers, binders, or flow agents.
We’re proud to receive the support of this woman and BIPOC-owned business that creates magic from plant allies. Our personal pick for this time of year is Anima Mundi’s Relax Tonic for Nervous System Support. During times of intensity, a couple of drops of this tonic immediately soothe the mind and body. To learn more visit AnimaMundiHerbals.com.
Hello and welcome to For The Wild Podcast, I'm Ayana Young. Today I'm speaking with Rosemary Gladstar.
Rosemary Gladstar You know, even just that word, how do we trust where we're at in the world right now? And I think about plants, who have no choice, really, oftentimes in where they land. And yet, wherever they land, they're going to thrive and grow the very best that they can.
Ayana Young Rosemary Gladstar has been practicing, living, learning, teaching, and writing about herbs for over 50 years. Considered a star figure in the modern herbal movement and often referred to as the ‘godmother of American herbalism’. Rosemary is the author of twelve books including Medicinal Herbs: a Beginners Guide, Herbal Healing for Women, Rosemary Gladstar’s Herbal Recipes for Vibrant Well Being and Herbal Healing for Men. She is the co-founder and former director of both The International Herb Symposium and The New England Women’s Herbal Conference, the Founding President of United Plant Savers, and the co-founder and original formulator of Traditional Medicinal Tea Company. She is also the author and inspiration behind the popular home study course, The Science and Art of Herbalism that has inspired and taught many thousands of students over the past four decades. In 2018 Rosemary was awarded an Honorary Doctorate for her life’s work from the National University of Naturopathic Medicine. She recently moved from her home at Sage Mountain, an herbal retreat center and botanical sanctuary where she lived for 30 years, to a smaller haven where she plans to write more, tend to her new gardens and spend more time with the plants.
Oh my goodness, Rosemary. I am smiling from ear to ear, for all the listeners who can't see me. I'm beaming to be able to reconnect with you. And yeah, so thanks so much for sharing your time with us today.
Rosemary Gladstar Absolutely. It's wonderful, wonderful to be here with you.
Ayana Young Well, there's so much I want to ask you. And there's so much that so much of my life that I feel has been influenced by you, not just your herbalism. But the way you move through this world, I feel like I've learned a lot about how to be the human I want to be, which I'm excited to get into more. But yeah, I think as we open up this episode, I want to start by meditating a bit on the ways that you cultivate the space and tune your mind toward listening to both the plants around you, but also your greater calling toward life.
Rosemary Gladstar Yeah, I think it has to do more than anything with just daily practice. You know, like I would say, especially as I've gotten older, I think I did it more naturally when I was younger, was like just cultivating a spirit of gratitude for everything. And I've had to do it more consciously, you know, I think we go through so many bumps and ups and downs of life, sometimes we get hit by these major boulders falling on us, you know, and kind of flattening us right out. So it's been more of a practice, and a conscious intention to do it. But it's that intention, you know, it's creating a ceremony as often as we can, throughout the moments throughout the day that I think helps me in my relationship with plants and with my work. And just with being a human being today. I do it in ways that make me happy, you know, so it's not necessarily that I, myself can sit down and meditate for a long time and kind of still my mind, it doesn't really work that way for me, but it's doing the things like waking up and remembering to give thanks that I'm alive. I have another day to be a human being on this planet. And to do the best I can. I always try to give gratitude to nature, even in Vermont, when it's very cold in the winter here, in the morning when I first get up, sometimes before I'm even fully dressed, I just like to open the door and step out on the porch and just greet the day. Like if it's a sunny day or a rainy day or a snowy day, just to give thanks to recognize the beauty of what's there. And then I try to you know, again, just do that throughout the day. Like if I step into the shower, to wash, scrub and get ready for the day. It's really more than just cleansing. You know, I like to pause for a minute and think about that water and the fact that that water that's coming out of that shower sprout now has been evolving on this planet for 1000s of years. It's been traveling around the world, and it's been in the cloud, and in the rain ,and the ocean, and now it's traveled down that spout and it's, you know, touching me, just to take that moment, it's like a minute to just give thanks for the water and the journey it's made at that moment to be with me. You know,I just kind of tried to do that throughout the day. Like, I go to my teacup right and so there's a thing of boiling your water, you know, making your tea, but then there's such a deeper way of doing that. And I know you do the very same thing you know, but I just feel it's like, if we can create ceremony, through these simple things that we do throughout our day, it begins to bring, you know, bring them into focus. And it brings so much more sparkle and so much more intention to our gaze, to the everyday things that we do, you know, many of us create around the big ceremonies, you know, the big holidays, but to do that daily, and then to do it to where it becomes a habit. So I just wanted to emphasize this, as I said, I feel like, I've been doing this practice for years, but to really do it when you're down and out or when you're looking at the world and it seems so troubled, how are we going to find our way through the trouble? That's when we really need to hunker down on these rituals and ceremonies that we do, that reaffirm the power and the strength of the day and just what we're doing. So that's kind of the daily practice, I think, you know, it's getting up and even when you don't feel like it, just giving thanks because the sun came up that day, and the lights there. And, you know, and just recognizing that, and because I know so much of my work centers around plants, but this is another thing I remind myself, even after all these years, make sure you greet your plants, right, because, you know, because they love human interaction. You know, that's why so many plants thrive around us and why they choose to grow around us. They really love being in relationship with other life forms, us being one of those so, you know like this morning when I was drinking my tea, and I had this beautiful Amaryllis that I've been nurturing for several years. So it's gotten to be quite a big bulb, and it's in full bloom right now. It's sitting on my kitchen table, and I looked up at it, and it's like, shining at me, right? So I just started singing that beautiful child song, you know, how can anyone ever tell you you're anything less than beautiful. And literally, I could feel that plant just leaning towards me, glowing back at me. I think those practices that we need to cultivate and create habits, and sometimes we need to remind ourselves more than at other times that this is essential to our daily health and well being and therefore to the plants.
Ayana Young Thank you for reminding me to greet the plants. I don't know how I could have ever forgotten that. But I think it can be easy for us to forget these really simple practices, rituals, ceremonies, and I know for myself, when I do forget them, I kind of get lost in the spiral of the overwhelm, or the fear, or the stress or whatever it is that life is throwing at us. And I think it's so beautiful to focus on things that we know will be found throughout our day, like, you know, the sun will rise, whether we see them or not. And having those moments of gratitude. I think it helps every part of us. It's like self care, it's mental hygiene, I think we're better in our relationships with others, we're better to the Earth around us, to our community. So I just see that as being, like, opens the door to a whole nother way of being in the world. And I really appreciate that. I guess I'm thinking about how this can help with our fears and I really love this quote, from an article you did with the Science and Art of Herbalism, "Seven Ways to Lighten Your Spirit" and you write, "Don't buy into the fear. Fear is one of the greatest control mechanisms there is, yes, be aware and stay informed, but also listen to your wise guiding voices within, your ancestral wisdom. We can practice the art of waking up each morning and give thanks for another day of living, even when it seems particularly difficult or challenging. Giving thanks and gratitude evokes gratitude." And I wanted to speak a bit about how to face those fears, because I think on so many levels, especially where we are on the world clock with news and social media and climate change and extinction crises and pollution, you know, looking out our windows and knowing that we are up against so much. And yet we go on. And I would just like to hear you speak a bit to that.
Rosemary Gladstar Yeah, it's such a huge thing, isn't it? It's so easy for us to get overwhelmed, especially these days. Because when we think about the immense amount of information and news from around the world that we can download into our nervous systems, it's more than at any other time in history. I remember Leah of Rising Appalachia was saying, she was using a quote that sounded quite official, of the amount of information that we get in one day is more than we might have gotten in a lifetime, you know, with all of the access that we have. So I think one thing that's really important is monitoring, you know, we have to self monitor, which is really hard to do, right? When you have a bowl of candy in front of you, just take what you know is good for you, and no more. We know the importance of being aware, so I'm definitely not about burying our head in the sand. I think awareness is critical right now for all of us, but it's knowing what we can take and then what we can do, I think you have to match those two things up. So it's like how much we can take in is directly related to what we think we can do, because we need to be active. Otherwise, I think that is part of the sense of hopelessness, when we don't feel that there's an action that we can take. So that's one thing that I really monitored myself, being an extremely sensitive person, I can be saddened by hearing about somebody I know nothing about, we all can, you know, like when I'm reading about the flooding going on in California. I know California needs water, I'm grateful for the Earth, but I know that so many people are suffering, and my family lives there. So it even makes it more personal. And so what is it that I can do to be helpful, you know, and so that's the thing, where I think it's really important is looking at what we can do. And remembering that if everybody is doing the one thing that they can do, or the two things they can do, or the three, that that in itself will begin to fix the planet.
The other thing I wanted to mention, too, is that I probably draw my greatest faith from the Earth herself, right? From looking at how many enormous disruptions have happened on this planet, I will be the first to admit that knowing that you are the disruption in this lifetime makes it particularly hard. But you know, when you think about the ice ages, and you think about the volcanic eruptions, and you think about the great Titanic clashes of the plates of the Earth, and yet the Earth has continued to persevere, it just is so much more powerful, and so much more in control than we give her credit for. And all we have to do is think about, you know, travel back in time, leave your body, you know, leave your human forum and just travel back in time with the Earth, you know, when the weather's right, just lay on her and just do that journey with her and you recognize the immense amount of power that she has. So, you know, again, when we humans can see our destructive action having such an impact not only on other humans, but on other life forms, it makes it particularly tragic for us. But again, I think the solution is within us, we can make a difference, we just have to get really busy and really active, doing what it is that we can do. So that's at least for myself, that's how I, you know, steer myself away from that absolute feeling of despair and overwhelm. Because believe me, I walk up to that edge, I see it like everybody else does, especially if I've been reading just one bad thing after another. And then again, not feeling like there's something active I can do for it. Sometimes if you know, just for practicality, sometimes being active means I'm able to send some money to help. Sometimes it means I can actually send things to help a family that I know is impacted. Sometimes it's just joining forces with a lot of other people to make a bigger difference. Sometimes it's just doing my work and attending my garden. Or sometimes I might say sometimes it's just tending to our own habits to make sure that our habits aren't contributing to the demise. Right? I don't want to make it seem totally impractical when I say have an action that you can do, because sometimes it's as simple as going, "I need to wash my recycling out better or not buy things that come in plastic," sometimes it's that, it's right at home. And other times it's reaching out to a larger community. Yeah, so that would be, I think, some of the practice. I think we get it, you know we have to monitor ourselves first, you know, we have to really pay attention to how our imprint is imprinting this Earth. And then from there, we can follow the footsteps. At least that's the way that I found to be the most effective.
Ayana Young Yeah, and I guess something that's been coming to me as I'm hearing you speak is that we're not alone in doing this work or finding ourselves in it. Like when you were speaking about laying on the Earth and feeling her and thinking back into history and gaining strength from her to be able to then have the gratitude and have the self awareness practices and take action. And I guess, maybe more specifically, I'd like to talk about how we gain that strength and the feeling of not aloneness from the plants themselves as they support us in doing this work, because, of course, we know that herbs can physically help us from ailments or illness, which is amazing. And I'd love to talk about that too. But they also can offer us a type of partnership and spiritual fortitude, when we're working through these massive issues. So yeah, I just wanted to hear that, that of it.
Rosemary Gladstar When I think about all the major lessons that I've learned about being a good human, some of them have definitely come from other humans, from my good parents. But a huge number of them have come from my direct relationship with the plants. I would say, they're just so eager to share, you know, it's not difficult to learn to be in direct relationship with the plants, because they've been, well, I would say, we have been evolving with them for literally centuries, right? Almost our entire life form depends on them, you were mentioning, like our medicine, you know, our food, the air we breathe, it's just a codependent relationship with the plants and they will us for, for that matter, you know, we breathe in oxygen, breathe out carbon dioxide, which they breathe in and purify. It's just a beautiful, like, you know, co-partnership that's going on, you know, our clothing that we wear, the shelters that we build. I mean, just, it's remarkable. But the big lessons that I look at, you know, like, one of the things that plants can definitely teach us is about trust, which is usually a big issue for people. And you were mentioned, you know, how do we trust where we're at in the world right now. And I think about plants, who have no choice really often in where they land. And yet, wherever they land, they're going to thrive and grow the very best that they can.
So you know, they're going to trust that the right amount of air and water and sunlight is going to reach them. And if not, then they go back to the Earth, and they oftentimes will put seeds. And so there's this amazing level of trust that I've learned from being with plants, just from watching the way that they thrive, wherever they're planted. Not always, but, you know, you've seen these Bristlecone pines on the top of those mountains where there's no soil or rock, tons of wind, cold weather and yet those pines will just thrive on what's given to them. So I think, you know, learning trust, diversity is another thing, you know, like, you look at a garden, or a wilderness garden, and there is so much diversity in there, and so much acceptance of that diversity. You know, and I know I'm looking at this with human eyes, of course, but those are the only eyes I have to look at it with. And when I'm receiving my lessons from these plants, that was one of the things that I learned early on, you know, I would look at, it was about beauty and the acceptance of all the different forms of plants that were growing in the garden, and that there was not one plant that you would look at and go, "Oh, that's a weird color, or that doesn't fit in, or that's not a beautiful plant", you know, they all looked beautiful, and all together, they made this beautiful, diverse bouquet. So it was just that acceptance, that everything is different, but everything together creates this beautiful organic bouquet, you know, a beauty. I would say even lessons of biology and sex, you know, you look at how plants, flowers, they're the sexual organs of the plants, and they're so beautiful and they're so scented, and they just put themselves out there, you know, just attracting the different pollinators that go by, not that necessarily as humans, we want to do that. But it's certainly a very, very different view than humans have about their sexual organs you know, we cover them up very religiously, you know, really, and you know, hardly ever think of them as these blooming beautiful scented flowers so and even the that final giveaway that I was mentioning earlier, you know, death and renewal, the plants just do it, you know, when they live their lives, and then the trees just, you know, might live for many years. It's just these, you know, big dead trees and yet even in their death, they give out so much and then they fall back to the Earth and become the Earth again.
So there's these incredible teachings that the plants offer us and you know how we learn those things is just spending time with them. It's like when you want to learn from other any teacher, know if there's some special human teacher that you want to learn from you go and sit with them and you you be at their feet for a while, you know, and so it's really that way with the plants, we can read all about them, there are so many great books, we can read about how to be in plant spirit communication, and those books can inspire us but they can never do with just going and being with the plants and being with them. I mean, you know, taking care of them, working with them, protecting them, you know, being in relationship with them receiving from them, and all the very many ways that we can stand up for and with the plants today, then those plants just because they're trying to do it, and because they want to do it, just download that information into us. I mean, really, honestly, when we see this amazing renaissance of people, herbalists, we might say, or plant lovers, I'd like to broaden that term. It's because the plants are just downloading right now into people just, you know, if you even show an interest in the plants, they're just feeding that information, because they need us to know, the Earth needs us right now. And it is definitely asking us to stand up for it, to take our stand, to do our watch. So I really think you know, I think we laugh sometimes in the herbal world, you know, saying that people are drawn into plants, or they think they're drawn into them because they have health issues or they want to be more independent of the modern medical world or just more informed. And I think all of that is part of it for certain that definitely has helped fuel the herbal "renaissance", but I think it has far more to do with the plants calling on their plant warriors, you know, to step up for them. And, you know, to take a stand, which you know, people like yourself are doing in such a grand way, I do it in a much smaller way. But if we all just do what's in front of us to do, and do it with joy in our hearts, we will accomplish this enormous task that we see in front of us today. I'm certain of it.
Ayana Young Something you've said took me down this thought process that I don't think I've been able to articulate as of yet, so bear with me as I try right now. But I think, you know, especially with plant kin and just the more than human world in general, the trees, the plants, the soil, the whales, you know, there's so much that is changing. And there's so much that we're losing right now. And there's so much heartbreak in that, you know, when we know that we're in a biodiversity crisis and goodness, I know, in my own journey through that grief, there's been these times of just the shattering and then potentially the hardening of my heart or the the desensitization, just to get through it, and then the shattering and, you know, it kind of goes in these waves. And I guess what I'm trying to get at with this is that ecosystems are changing. Forests are changing, meadows are changing. We don't see a lot of the plants that we saw 200 years ago, I think some of them are hiding underground as seeds waiting for a time when we kind of have our act together, and then they'll be like, "We've been here, but we weren't ready to come back up yet." But I guess there's this thought that I'm having is how we love what is? And whether that means, you know, we go into a place that once was an old growth forest, and maybe it's not that anymore. I mean, most likely it isn't. And it could be a different landscape, I guess what I'm thinking of like, you see some old growth forests that were logged, and then a lot of times logging companies will come in and spray erosion control. And then there's invasive plants, or there's plants that were never supposed to be there in the future. And some people look at that as just horrid and painful and, and a big problem that must be eradicated. On a global scale, eradicating all of these "problem ecosystems," I don't know if that's, I'm not really sure if this is where we should put our energy, but I'm trying to get to this question of how do we love what is and love the plants that are coming up for us? And knowing that it's not going to always stay one way, like, whatever plants are coming up now may just be the ones that are pioneering the soil or getting it ready for its next iteration. The combination of grieving what we're losing, but also falling in love with what is around us.
Rosemary Gladstar Yeah, that's the human dilemma, you know, the sorrow of what was. And then the newness, really, you know, it is a hard thing to embrace. But you know what, it's interesting, I really learned that lesson in a really big way. When I moved to New England, I moved here about a little over 34 years ago, I grew up in Northern California. And, you know, as I began to understand this landscape, I realized that I was living on a landscape that was just 10,000 years ago, so like a drop in time, there was a two mile, and in some areas, five mile high glacier that sat on this landscape. And in those, what was it, several 1000 years, maybe a couple, I don't remember the exact length of time, it changed the entire landscape here. So these used to be the largest mountains in the whole North American continent. And an entirely different species of plants would have grown here, right, before that ice age. And yet we look at what's here, and it's just stunningly beautiful, right? The forests of you know, the hardwood forests, those were not here before that glacier. And it's the same when I lived out in California. California, in the timespan that we know as human beings, was shaped by fire, you know, it was all volcanic eruption, all of those mountains, every once in a while, one goes off, right, and you see an incredible disruption. And yet, in that disruption is all the new life that human beings in a few 1000 years or animals, maybe not humans, but animals, animals will come to appreciate. Right? And that's what I was trying to say early on, you know, that the Earth is got a destiny of its own, and it has had periods of terrible destructions you know, huge meteorites have landed and totally changed life form on the planet, and many, many other things that we have some history of it, not a lot.
What makes this one so particularly difficult is we are the modality of change and we can change that if we work together, we can change some of the damages that we're seeing. And really the choice. When I look at that place that you were talking about kind of the despair and the hope of, it's a choice that we make, you know, almost every day. Do I feed into despair that will just sink the ship more, am I going to go to the end of the ship that is sinking, sinking, sinking. Or am I going to do my job to go up to that other end and do the work that needs to be done to make our Mother Earth, the ship, sail again. And that's, again, where I was saying, to think of that task, it's enormous, right? It's overwhelming for us as human beings for most of us, but when we go to those simple tasks that we do every day, and that's why I was saying the importance of doing these small small ceremonies every day that reconnect us to nature, you know, to the plants in our house, to the water coming out of the shower, to the day, whether it's the sun shining, or the, those are so important, because it fortifies our connection to the Earth, and just to the changing times right now. And one thing that, you know, I think about, and I know that I've heard other people mentioning this, in more recent years, you know, the Earth herself has her own destiny, you know, just like we're in relationship to our clans, and our tribes, and plants have plant families that we've actually made for them, a lot of the times. The Earth is in relationship to a solar system, that's a concept that's far greater than most of us can, myself included, can comprehend. So, you know, I sometimes feel I think about this sometimes. So the Earth may be shaking a little bit in her orbit, you know, she is shifting, so we know that for sure. And we as human beings, as you know, cells on this Earth may be trembling with her. And instead of being good cells and doing our part in stabilizing, we're acting out. We're adding to the trauma, I think a bigger responsibility is to add to the stability. And I, again, I want to say, I really feel that's possible, maybe not for all humanity to do, but for a large part of us to do, we can do it and are doing it.
I think that the last thing I want to just say at some very simple level, but you know, when you're talking about looking at the plants that move into damaged areas, or you know, once people have thought that rehabilitation means spraying poison on all these plants and killing them, and somehow that's going to help the Earth, and bring back the original plants, right. And it never does, you know, it just isn't going to work. So there's a better way to look at it and that's that plants have been traveling throughout time. They're designed to travel, some travel very quickly, you know, through mechanisms of seeds, they grab on to passing animals, passing people, your socks, some are enticing the birds who eat them, and the birds poop and the seeds go all over, and some travel very, very slowly, you know, they get very connected with where they live, they want to be left alone, you know, they're those habitats, Pacific plants, that many of those are rare, endangered, endangered, as you were saying, because the habitats are quickly changing right now. So plants have always been changing. And almost always we see the new what I call, the more your plants or they, you know, they're the plants that come in, they have these tremendous capacity to root down and to thrive, and then to change the soil. And they're always going to add to the soil, almost always, when you study what they're doing to the soil. And then and then they actually are the succession plants and other plants come in. So we're looking at the fact that plants have the ability, you know, one of the great lessons that they teach us is death, rejuvenation and regeneration, right, they just do it effortlessly, I'm sure that they go through their own processes with it. So I shouldn't say they do it effortlessly, but they do it continuously. And every cycle that they're doing, they're giving back to the Earth, through their bodies, really through their process of living and dying and creating more soil. That's one of the things I'm so sad about in our human death rights, we put ourselves in cement boxes, thankfully, that's beginning to change. But, you know, even in the final giveaway, we block ourselves from Mother Earth, it's like really, we're going to turn into skeletons and dust in this little cement box, what could be more lonely, right? But plants and animals just give themselves to the Earth and then become the Earth again. And so yes, so many of these plants that are coming in and have purpose and meaning and almost always are coming in to heal the soil. And interestingly enough, many of those plants that we call invasive plants are also incredible healers, and many of them are designated for some of the major illnesses that we're seeing now like the viruses or like Lyme disease. You know, Japanese Knotweed is a perfect example, or Purple Loosestrife which is another one, because, well first of all, let me say Japanese Knotweed is a powerful antiviral and actually is shown to fight diseases like Lyme Disease and COVID. And then Purple Loosestrife is specific for deep respiratory ailments, you know, again, flus and viruses, etc. So, you know, those are just two examples. But I also empathize with our beautiful Native Plant Society people who are advocates for plants, and definitely plant lovers, who are struggling to keep some of these invasives in check, because they also tend to outgrow their limits and take over, right, so that's their, the downside of it. So, you know, we do need to manage some of them. Or I wouldn't even say that, we need to be conscious and aware that these plants have the ability to do that, but on the other hand, to see them as villains right now is completely off track. It'd be like thinking of redwood trees as villains when they first started growing up in the Pacific Northwest, after a whole other species had died away, right. They definitely have their part.
We all love an old growth, whether it be an old growth forest, or an old, well established garden, you know, there are like the holy temples on this planet, these old growth forests, there's nothing like them. But it also is important to recognize in the old growth, there's very little diversity, you know, it's like, you have a certain species that lives there, and not a lot of other things can come in to that. It's just, you know, because of the shade covers, and because of the acidity often or whatever, has been dropped down by the leaves of those trees, and is the same in a well established garden. In a, you know, like in a well established garden, there's not a lot of room for diversity, you know, it's all very, in a garden, it's mapped out by humans, yes. But in the old growth, it's mapped out by nature, so. So it's not to say that we don't need those old girls, I will defend them with everything I have in my life. But it is interesting, you know, I grew up in the Redwood Forest in Northern California. And it was so easy to learn the plants in those forests, you know I'd go in and there were maybe 100, or 200 plants that grew there. And that was about all you were going to find. And then I noticed when I came to New England, I lived here when that big ice storm happened. And we don't have old growth forests here, it's a tragedy because we have very few acres of forest because they've just been logged for so many years. But we had good healthy forests on our land on Sage Mountain, they had not been logged for, you know, 60, 70, 80 years, and they were full canopy. When that ice storm happened, which was devastating. It was in the 1980s or 1990, it affected the entire eastern seaboard. It opened up big areas in the forest. And as I said, it was devastating to me. But it was also incredibly interesting to me to see the diversity that grew up by nature, in the areas that were left open by the canopy.
Ayana Young And in the end even thinking about what I've learned from the Indigenous folks of California, they would burn areas near old growth so that new plants could come in. And that was part of the, I like that you reframe the word management, but the way we collaborate with these lands, to allow new species and young buds and tender greens to grow up in the places that wouldn't have otherwise. And yeah, I really, this conversation is relieving in the sense that there's something about trust and something about surrender to the processes of the Earth. And I don't understand them, like when you're thinking about the solar system, I'm like, oh yeah, like this is just so huge and I will never be able to understand, nor do I even want to try to understand, I want to be in relationship, which is in a sense to me being present, and showing up every day, and being in these small rituals and ceremonies and loving, and being grateful and finding the beauty and working through the challenges with others, but not about trying to figure it all out, quote unquote, because I don't even think that's a worthy endeavor. And I think it takes us away from being able to be in reciprocity and gratitude in a lot of ways. I guess, something I was thinking about too, as we're seeing so many ecosystems change because of habitat destruction or and that could look a lot of ways you know, we have logging and there's industrial farming, and I'm thinking about how that relates to the plants we choose to take into our bodies as medicine. Because I love thinking that plants will show up around us that we need, like dandelions, I just love that, that, you know, we need to detox and here, they are just coming up through the concrete almost everywhere around us. And we may look at that, like, oh, that's just a weed, I need to go to the health food store and buy this really, you know, powerful plant from this totally other place, or grown somewhere halfway around the world, but we dismiss so many plants that are just trying to say hello to us and say, but hey, look at me and I'm right here, and I'm not costing you anything. Even though I do love supporting herbal companies, too. I don't mean to say that we should never buy things because I think it can also be wise at times and supportive of our communities. But just how we reframe the way we see plants as medicine in that sense, the ones that do decide to grow near us and how we value them, versus how we value things that are packaged and told to us as they're a superfood or a super plant, but somehow these other ones are weeds. And I think that really ties into cultivation, I think it ties into wildcrafting. I think we can reframe, or learn what is a healthy relationship to harvesting plants for our own health where we are not disturbing the land anymore. So yeah, for those of us who are wanting to turn to plants as our medicines, and we want to do it in a good way, and in a way that really supports the longevity of these plants, but wanting to hear your thoughts on that.
Rosemary Gladstar Yeah, thank you. So yeah, well, I think one of the most amazing things is that almost all those weedy plants that we find growing vigorously around human habitation are some of our most medicinal plants, like really literally, when you study their chemical constituents and their actions on the body. I mean, I think that, again, we're looking at that very co-creative partnership between plants and people. So people move into an area, they disturb the soil, and then you get this group of plants that have pretty much traveled, you know, here I'm talking about temperate regions. But if you were in South America, tropical regions, it would be a similar group of plants in those areas, you know, similar group of plants native to those areas that would move close to human beings. And really, literally when you study those plants, those are most of our major medicines. So when you look at dandelion, nettle, plantain, chickweed, mullen, cleavers, you know, these are major medicinal plants. And the reason again, I think that they, they grow, it's like co-creative, they like the disturbance that we create, they thrive in disturbance. And they also provide incredible medicine for us. And so that is one thing is you, yarrow is another one, oh my god, I keep thinking of all my favorite plants, right, they are the common species that travel like so, growing up in a temperate region, anywhere in the world that I traveled that has a similar kind of Mediterranean climate, or a temperate area of the world, I'm going to find all of these plants that I grew up with as a child that are my best friends and also my most favorite healers, right? Because they have traveled with human beings and been passed down like when the settlers first came to this country for better or worse, I might say, but they brought them, it wasn't like that a lot of these plants just didn't steal aboard they were carefully selected to come aboard with these pioneers, because they were there valuable medicines. And they were the familiar medicines, right.
Of course, there is something to using, you know, some of the, a lot of medicines that don't grow in our bioregions that are very powerful, very healing. Again, when I look at traditionally people have been trading herbs since the beginning of time when they first started using plants, you know, tribe traded with tribe and people would pack them into their camels and travel around because you know, people who use plants love to share and so plants have found have found their way. So I'm not saying that it's not appropriate to use herbs from other regions. And you know, like you were saying, it's totally appropriate to support your local herbalist and the people who are growing herbs organically, but I do want to emphasize that your most important medicine is growing in a weedy patch around you in your garden. Somewhere down the country lane or in a city lot. You can find all these plants or else it's in your kitchen closet, because you know, every single spice and and herbs that you have if you're a cook are also our most potent medicines like rosemary, thyme, oregano, marjoram, turmeric, ginger, garlic, onions, those are primary medicines that we use for, you know daily treatments, for the everyday health and care of human beings. And so they found their way, they wiggle their way into our kitchen, right. So we're always using them constantly. It's kind of wonderful, I think. But I do want to share this, for listeners who are new to herbalism. It is critical when you buy herbs to make sure that you're getting them from ethical companies. And that's kind of a strange term and we all know what that term means. But there's not a company that's going to say I'm an ethical company, or a wild crafter that's ever going to tell you I wildcraft unethically. So you have to have a standard, you know, I would just say go by recommendations of people who recommend companies that support local farmers organic cultivation and fairtrade herbs, there's a really important book that, you know, is I think, a really good reading for anybody coming into this field. It's called the Business of Botanicals by Ann Armbrecht, but it's really not about the business of herbs, it's about where your plants come from, and just being conscious and aware. And I also usually like to suggest that you go to the United Plant Savers website. It's an organization that's kind of the watchdog organization for medicinal plants in the United States, and it has a list of plants that are at risk or endangered usually, because of overharvesting, or habitat destruction that we really probably shouldn't be using from the wild right now. So that would be the place to start with, you know, if you're going to move into herbal medicine, you know, cultivate an interest in it, which I highly recommend you do. For a number of reasons to be informed of where your plants come from. It's important, I think we should be informed where our medicine is coming from period. So even i f you're using allopathic medicine, you should know where that medicine is coming from.
Ayana Young Gosh, there's so much to say and I know we've been talking for quite a while, so I'm trying to wrap it up here.
Rosemary Gladstar May I share one little practice that may be helpful to you? When I first started hosting these larger conferences, I was in my early 20s, and at the end of the conference, you would get all of this energy directed at you, right? And you'd also get, you know, people's complaints or whatever and I would realize after I'd hosted this incredibly amazing event, I would feel kind of yucky afterwards. Like, I felt that, like why aren't I feeling just amazing? I realized, because I was holding these thoughts that were coming in, they weren't really mine, they were like, just like this event was a calling, all the good energy and all the bad energy was just composted. So I remembered the saying that was "Lord make me a hollow read from which your voice may speak." And that always became still to this day, that became my mantra, you know, it's just, I just want to be a vessel and let that energy flow. So all that good energy, I just receive it, I give great, thanks for it, I just let it flow right back and give it as a gift to the Earth. And then all the criticism, I take what I can from it, you know, I try to change things if I can, but lot of times I can't, so I just give thanks for it, just let it flow through me and offer it back to the Earth, it's really a very wonderful practice and it has been a guide for me. And it's really helped me at those times when I could get really stuck.
Ayana Young That is really helpful and I feel like I've known either in myself or in other friends who have done their own versions of that and got caught up in the inner turmoil and how to release and give the energy back and I guess that's kind of a nice way to begin to close is how we give that energy back. I think about your journey with Sage Mountain and oh, gosh, yeah, it feels reminiscent in a way, and of course you were there a lot longer than I was at Cougar Mountain but to love land and to cultivate plant and human community and put so much of your heart and soul into somewhere. And to also know when it's time to let go and to allow the next stewards to come in. And, you know, there's so much about, I think, encouraging intergenerational conversations and healing within this transition. I think there's this question of, or this thought of ephemerality and permanence, and what we leave behind, whether that be a garden or a collection of stories or learnings passed down through generations. Like, I think what you've done with Sage Mountain, I'm sure there's hours of stories and learnings and practices there, but I would just love to hear you speak about what it has been for you to cultivate so much there and how you've learned to leave behind something permanent, and at the same time, something ephemeral?
Rosemary Gladstar Thank you. Yeah. It's beautiful, you know, when I moved to Sage Mountain, I left California and my community there and the herb school and, you know, my store, I moved to a place I've never been. I had never been to Vermont. It was like sight unseen, and when I drove up the road, it's like about a mile long dirt road that goes up into the mountains. The minute I saw it, I was just madly in love. I felt like I came home. Though I learned as the years went on, it was a very different feeling of home that I had for the place I was born and raised, but it was a recognition of that land. And some of my best years, I was there for a little over 30 years, maybe 32 years. And yeah, some of the best I mean, you know, it was such an active place with classes and courses and people coming and interns, but then there was the wilderness there, you know, it was a 500 acre piece of land around an 80,000 acre wilderness. So in Vermont, that's a lot of wilderness. It's actually what is considered one of the largest contingents wilderness areas in Vermont. I always had wanted to caretake land and own land, in order to preserve it. To me, I didn't have any idea what that meant. I didn't realize it was a lot of work, and also when you are in the wilderness as you so well know, you are faced up against all the threats to it. It's not like you're reading about it or not like it's in somebody else's backyard, you know, forest preservation, and, you know, the logging, logging companies and all the land getting logged around you and then nature herself comes in. I remember the ice storm, in the late 1980s, I think was around 1990. Actually, it was 1993, because it was exactly 20 years ago. Anyway, when that ice storm happened I thought Mother Nature makes a bigger mess logging than humans do, it was a major mess. I mean, it was like I just all the Northeastern seaboard was just hammered with that ice storm. And yet, you know, when I got to watch that land rebuild itself, we had a forester, a couple of foresters came out to try to direct us what would be the best thing to do for our property. And a lot of the landowners around us were being advised it was better to log because you cut down on the insects, but we ended up not doing that, and our forests are definitely the most healthy forests in that entire area because nature was able, of course, right I wasn't at all surprised, was able to heal itself. So the land even more, I would say the memories I have of all the great people I met there and the classes and the intern programs, they just filled my heart but it was really that relationship with the land. It's where I really began to hear the plants actually talking to me and directing me about replanting at-risk plants, you know, and where United Plant Savers was formed because I heard that message right from the plants that were growing there. So it was a really huge scene. But as my husband and I were growing older, the amount of work it took to maintain it was just more than we could do. And we were getting tired from that work, and at that time, I was almost 70. I was getting to that place where you know, it was more of a burden, like I think about oh, the next year and I've got to do all this stuff just to maintain this place. And my husband was thinking the same because we had tons of snow and there was all the management of snow and a lot of outbuildings and all the management of the outbuildings. So we knew we wanted to pass it on. We wanted to find new owners, but our primary concern over anything was finding the right person or persons or group of people. And that was a 10 year process actually, a lot of people came really interested in buying it, but they had different visions for it. And for me, it wasn't really that the classes or anything, they maintained that the wilderness, that whoever came here next would maintain that wilderness and my dear friend Emily, I have to say Emily Ruff who is an incredible herbalist, a brave spirit, because she's from Florida, that's her home where she grew up, she actually moved up from Florida and took over. She and her partner, who is a wonderful Native man, trained in very traditional ways and an enormous advocate for wild animals, he's done a lot of work with wolf restoration. So they were the perfect dynamo-couple, my husband and I knew it was time for the land to be cared for, for us to step aside and they have done a remarkable job. So once again, in my life, it was just the right people coming in, you know, and offering this help at a time that we really needed to pass that land on. So I've been so overwhelmingly grateful for all that they've done, both not only with keeping the forest intact, but advocating for more protections of forests in the area, and then also for all the work Ron has done with wild animal protection. So yeah, it's exciting. It's so wonderful. And it's close, I get to, it's about a three hour drive, you know, round trip for me. So I get to go down and see the wonderful work they're doing and know that it's been carried on. For me, it's not so much my legacy there. I think Emily wants to honor that as well. It's really the legacy of the land and the forest. That for me, I really, you know, this is something I think that's important that goes back to knowing the impact that we do, so, of course, I can't ensure that that forest is kept forever into eternity, all I can do is my part, right, my small part. And that's to ensure it's passed down to somebody who will steward it in a way that I feel is a good way for the land. I feel very grateful that I was able to do that. So if I look, you know, 200 years down the road, I have no idea what will happen there. But I know in my lifetime, that forest will be protected. And so I do get satisfaction out of that, you know, that's, I think the best that we can do. Yeah, it was hard to leave, you know, I live in a beautiful place, my husband built a beautiful home for us on Lake Champlain, but that was my home for so many years. So there was that detachment from the land, I felt like, for a long time, that land was my strongest partnership, right? I was married to that land. And so my husband is very happy now that I've turned my attention to him. I'm taking care of him, like I used to care to take that land, he's very grateful for it, he waited a long time.
Ayana Young I can understand that more than you know. Rosemary I could just keep going for a long time just grabbing a snack and sitting down for longer. But I just appreciate your time with us today and it's been so so good to catch up.
Rosemary Gladstar I'd has been, it's been always a delight to talk with you, sweetie, you inspire me. You and the young people, I think that's my hope, because I just see so many of you know, giving your life to this work and yeah, some of those things that are so frustrating to change are because of the older generation, you know, even the good meaning, the evolved older generation, but you know, there's ruts that people get it, it will be the same with your generation, it just happens and changing those, you know, like, you know, I'm thinking about that consumer society thing, you know, we grew up with thinking there was abundance, you know, like, that was from the time we were born, you know, and so to have to try to change that, we're changing it, but when you have a generation that's growing up that realizes totally, there's not, there's not a lot of water, there's not a lot of trees, there's not a lot of resource, you know, the focus becomes very different. And the frustration oftentimes with the younger people is why don't the older people change quicker, right? But you'll understand even what we're trying to change. I think many, many people of my generation have made enormous contributions to the changing world in really positive ways. But I also recognize that, I think about the Walmarts and things like McDonald's and stuff that all came up with my generation. Thankfully, I can say, I've never been there, I have been to Walmart, but I've never I've never gone to a to a McDonald's, but those were, you know, those were the things that my generation grew up with and so some of them, that was their food, right, that was where they went to dinner all the time, and so changing that mentality is really hard. It's yeah, it frustrates me too, but it's happening. You know, I think people are slowly getting the message, a large number. You don't need the whole world to change, that's the thing you have to realize. When we talk about the world changing, you just need a certain number, you know, that hundreds monkey theory. I think that was just such an amazing ray of hope, you need a certain percentage to find things starting to tilt back to where it feels in better balance for all of us. So keep doing the work. And I'll stand beside you.
Francesca Glaspell Thank you for listening to For The Wild Podcast. The music you heard today was by Eliza Edens, Rising Appalachia, and Lea Thomas. For The Wild is created by Ayana Young, Erica Ekrem, Francesca Glaspell, and Julia Jackson.