Stephanie's Studio

If you know anything about my books ( A Healing Grove: African Tree Remedies for Body and Spirit ), you will know that I spend a lot of time and thought writing about herbs. As a magical herbalist, I write about the magic, mythology, folklore, and healing properties of herbs. In "A Healing Grove" I dedicated the book to trees so a tree is our point of departure today.  I have decided that on Friday’s I will turn this blog into my Natural Healing Corner. Here I will talk about all the qualities of herbs I love as well as nature’s healers like stones, crystals, water and fire. I am partial to Fridays. Not in a TGIF sort of way but for its connection to the goddesses, particularly Venus.  I call it the Natural Healing Corner because in a conversation with an octogenarian African American woman from the south, she mentioned that they (meaning Black folk) didn’t have doctors when she was growing up; just Natural Healers. Today, I want to focus in on Linden Flower, ...

One of my dreams for my job was to help institute a yoga and meditation practice once a week in our meeting room.  Sadly, for a variety of reasons it never materialized. Still, I realize I need grounding and centering in my life, as we all do, particularly artists and writers.   We live and work, dreaming up stuff that is all generated from the head. The body and spirit suffer.  It is so important that it should be a mantra: body, mind and spirit must remain at equilibrium. But in this busy world, trying to work and make money, how do we do it? My suggestion is to stay true to yourself in everything you do and to remember about the body, mind, and spirit connection as a daily practice. Even something as simple as deep, controlled breathing is calming and brings energy from the mind space into the body space. Controlled breathing is also relaxing enough that it can activate the spirit and bring you into spirit realm. Another body, mind, spirit exercis...