Jenee: 0:06

Welcome to the Heartlight Sessions, a podcast about light working your way through dark times. I'm Janae Halstead. I'm a singer-songwriter, holistic vocal coach, intuitive guide and plant medicine facilitator. I'm also a survivor of childhood abuse, autoimmune issues and my 30s. I'm also a survivor of childhood abuse, autoimmune issues and my 30s. I'm on a lifelong healing journey and along the way, I want to share the ideas and teachings that rock my world. Every week on Heartlight Sessions, I call in artists, healers and thinkers to explore what's helped them live and thrive from a heart-centered place, Because the heart, it's where the best things happen. If you've ever wondered how to unlock your biggest breakthroughs or how to come back from that stuff that tried to kill you, you know the stuff I'm talking about, the stuff that's supposed to make you stronger. Or if you've ever wondered how to just do you straight from the heart, you're in the right place. So join me, won't you? Let's turn on that heart light. All right, we are rolling. So I have Kat Gordon with me and she has the yarrow resilience institute. She's the founder. She is a plant medicine guide, an herbalist, um, an earth tender any any other titles that covers it pretty much yes

Jenee: 1:42

and I am. I have the wonderful life-changing opportunity to be in a container with Kat and it's Beth Weinstein. You guys have you're hosting a five-week rose dieta and so I am on week two with you and it's been like, wow, what a medicine. And I feel like it came at like such a perfect time and you know, I know the idea around it was to do it before the election. You know Beth was saying like the whole country needs this dieta right now. Do you want to talk a little bit about what a dieta is and then maybe we can like talk about the rose and the rose magic.

Kat: 2:30

Yes, absolutely I would love to. So I've been thinking a lot about actually how to explain this, because the word dieta itself comes from the South American Amazonian indigenous traditions. Specifically, the strongest group I know that works yet is the Shipibo, but many different groups who are holders of ancient knowledge, ways that protect the living plant libraries. They have something they call a dieta, and it's basically a deep immersion and relationship building with the spirit of a plant, and the purpose of that is one to learn the mysteries or the secrets that a plant holds, or the teachings that it holds for us, collectively and individually, and then it is also to receive healing and guidance from the plant. And so, whatever you receive, there are overall messages that particular plants offer up, and that's why a teacher would be like, hey, why don't you diet this versus this? And then, of course, how you're going to receive the messages and the way it comes through is based on your unique lived experience, and so that is where the healing and the insights come. So there are some overall messages one may receive.

Kat: 3:51

Many people who diet rose will receive similar messages, and then there's going to be these individualized. It's both a study, it's both a. It's a study, it's a healing journey and it's basically connecting with the energy body of a plant. But I will add, I always like to add so dieta is one name for these plant spirit immersions. But cultures, all ancient cultures around the world, have, from my studies and what I've seen, have something similar to a dieta. They may work a little bit differently. They have different master plants. That's what we call what we diet in the traditions that they work with. But this process of engaging with the plant, beyond its physical constituents and beyond what it can offer you for physical healing, what we call like the herbal actions of a plant.

Kat: 4:48

It's that engagement with the energetic spiritual body of the plant and kind of like taking that in and inviting that energy and that soul like into commune with your soul.

Jenee: 5:02

That's so beautiful. What did you say? The living library of.

Kat: 5:08

Yeah, that's what I call. So I've been doing these dietas for years where I go to the Amazon and actually sit with plants. I actually started my journey with dieta with the Brazilian tribes also.

Jenee: 5:25

So I've done.

Kat: 5:26

Sorry I didn't start, but I have done many different traditions. I misspoke. I started with the Shipibo. I started this whole journey with the Shipibo elders in Peru. But I've learned over the years. So you know, a lot of times in herbalism and when we're trying to learn a skill, but especially herbalism, we'll go to like herbal skill. Nowadays there's tons of online courses. When I first started that wasn't really the case. Or a book, right?

Kat: 5:55

The other way is like you look at a book, you see a plant, you learn about it, and so when, with these traditions that are like still living in deep relationship with the plants, there is no transmission like written.

Kat: 6:11

Everything is orally transmitted and it's also a transmission like from the plant to you. Of course, you have these elders who are both gatekeepers, which I think is important to honor and respect that we do need gatekeepers in these spaces, but they are also translators and for us to understand, like the spirit talk of the plants, right, and so they don't really like give us a manuscript, like okay, your plant that you're dieting is going to do this. It's more of this living, breathing thing that is teaching you. And so I call these plants like the living library, because they're not written about often in books. Now you see here and there things popping up, but they're truly downloading their information to you like you would read it in a book, just through this, like energetic transmission and lived experience, if that makes sense. That's why I call it that, and I feel like the plants told me this many years ago, like this is what we are.

Kat: 7:13

We are the living library. You can go to university, you can get your PhD and study all about plants, but this is also another way to study the plants in a very deep way, and this is a different type of university, if you will.

Jenee: 7:27

Wow, I love that. Before we get into the rose, I'm really curious, like how you were drawn to South America and were you working initially with with herbs and plants in the States and just curious how you ended up on your on your journey.

Kat: 7:46

Yeah, it was a long and winding one. Looking back, everything makes sense. But I really started working with plants through agriculture, so I studied sustainable food systems, agroecology and international development in college so I very much focused in the sustainable food systems aspect of things and through that I found agroecology, which is a social, a political and an environmental movement around food, food scapes and the people involved in those, and so food, foodscapes and the people involved in those and so obviously growing food and growing herbs in that context is very embedded in a lifestyle. It's like very holistic way of seeing things. And then I really realized quickly that I just like growing food.

Kat: 8:39

So I quickly like You're like, I want to be a farmer. Yeah, truly. I found my way to community gardens quite quickly, educational spaces mainly, and then I started farming, and that is how I found my way to Peru. I was fascinated by the high altitude agricultural systems that the descendants of the Incans farm, so I made my way to the Sacred Valley and just fell in love with it. It was definitely a spirit, like a spirit connection with the place. Yeah, I couldn't see it all at the time, and so that was when I was 21 years old I went to the Sacred Valley of Peru the first time, and about two years later I finally found a way to move down there. So at that point I was already.

Jenee: 9:22

I finally found a way to move down there.

Kat: 9:23

So at that point I was already farming and I just became incredibly fascinated with the wild edibles and wild medicinals. That just through observation, I was learning from the Andean women farmers, like watching them. Yes, they had some farming going on, but they are totally in this, like deep relationship with the landscape. And so I started to observe, learn, ask questions and I was working. I was part of the founding group of a nonprofit doing high altitude agricultural projects, so that's how I was exposed to all these women and I was really on the ground and so you know I was still into the agriculture, I was also growing food there, but I kind of just like by watching this magic in front of me and you know, learning from the women how they bathe like the babies the first time, and roses and plants and all these things.

Kat: 10:21

I was just like wow this whole world just burst open for me. I start, I don't speak Quechua like fluently by any means, but I started to understand certain elements so I could communicate with a lot of the women that don't speak Spanish even, and a lot of it was just through observation them showing me things and really spending a lot of time immersed in the highlands up there in the high altitude communities. And then, yeah, long story short, I ended up like back in the States for some years farming and just slowly realized, as I started to make medicine for myself with friends just for fun, that the herbalism, and then soon after that, the really spiritual side of it, was what called me and then, I was.

Kat: 11:11

I was living in the sacred Valley for many years, so naturally, I found my way to the plant medicine.

Jenee: 11:17

Yes, yes.

Kat: 11:19

That was a long, long story, thank you.

Jenee: 11:21

That was amazing, I knew you had. I was like a long, long story, thank you. That was amazing, I knew you had. I was like I cannot wait to hear about your, the depth of your education and your. Just sitting with you in the first week of of the dieta, I felt so much knowledge and like transmission coming off of you. I was like, ah, I can't wait to to learn more about you, know your path and your history, cause I knew it was really deep.

Kat: 11:50

Oh, thank you.

Jenee: 11:51

Yeah. So maybe let's stay on this, this route of like the evolution and and how you know the sacred plant medicines really kind of evolved in your life and and led you to the path now of being in service and facilitating medicine.

Kat: 12:13

Yeah, any specifics you want me to just share away?

Jenee: 12:17

Yeah, like I just would love to hear a little bit about your evolution and you know, kind of from from farming down there into like starting to work with the mother. You know Madre and um let's see.

Kat: 12:35

Well, I can go back to the very early stages. The whole reason I got into food and farming. One my mom's, whole side of my mom's family is in farming um my grandfather was a cattle rancher. All of my mom's brothers were in farming, were and are, and so I think it was a little bit in my blood. The plants, the connection plants my grandmother was an herbalist Also.

Kat: 13:05

I have come to understand my great, great grandmother, so it all kind of makes sense. But my mother had breast cancer twice when I was a kid and then my sister had some like psychological stuff going on, and so from an early age I was just kind of like, okay, I want to find a way to always be healthy and vibrant and thriving and have tools to deal with all the things that happen in life, right?

Jenee: 13:37

Yeah.

Kat: 13:38

So I found my way into farming just through my obsession with food and soil health and I did a lot of studying around, like pesticides and their impact on human health, and so quickly I kind of went into that world and that, I think, really framed a lot of my interest in going into herbalism, which then led me to the plant medicine, because it was food and it was herbs for healing.

Kat: 14:06

But it was really this bigger holistic picture around like how do we live our lives in more wellness and more vibrancy and in more sovereignty, where we have choices over what goes into our food, what goes into our soil, what goes into our bodies. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not against like the Western medical model either. I think it's. I think all things weave together. But I was like I want to have more choices and that drove me into the herbalism. So that was more like the rational minded me, you know. The rational minded me, you know. But at the same time, I think once I hit the ground in Peru, I realized that our entire context of the Western culture just didn't make sense to me.

Kat: 14:53

And from a very young age. I was just kind of confused.

Jenee: 14:58

But didn't know why.

Kat: 15:00

I grew up in California. Everything seemed normal, it's beautiful, but I was just like I don't fit in here. I was born here. I don't understand how things work Like societal constructions, just like they didn't make sense to me. Understood them, but I was like I don't get it and I think you know I went into competitive sports. I was like a high, high achieving student and all of that was just like me.

Jenee: 15:28

Numbing is what I realized Totally.

Kat: 15:31

Yeah, like realized I was numbing out. Because I was super sensitive and interested in things. My soul was drawn to things that didn't make sense or weren't valued in our culture.

Jenee: 15:43

Yep.

Kat: 15:43

So when I got to Peru, I was like, oh, this whole worldview of being in relationship with nature, like there is no connection, and even I mean you hear this term, aini, thrown around a lot these days this idea of sacred reciprocity, it is truly like just one of many terms that defines the culture in the Andean region, where it's just this like give and take and it's really truly like you're in. It's not just like, oh, let's like make an offering to the earth before we take something. It's like this deep relationship you're in with the earth and all living things.

Kat: 16:23

that is informing, like how we move through the world and in honoring and in almost like a praying, you know, and a deep, spiraling interaction. So I'm probably getting a little off course here, but it's all good, we can weave however we want. Yeah, I think, though I will like rein it back in and stay, because I could go on for hours. You know, I really what happened was I had a breaking point in this culture, in the Western culture, where I was just I hit a limit. I hurt myself really badly in competitive sports because I wasn't nourishing my soul.

Kat: 17:08

You, know, it was just push, push, push, nom nom nom super intense in school and my soul the way I see it and describe now was like my soul was like dying. You know what I mean. It wasn't being fed, it wasn't being nourished. Everything on the outside looked beautiful and I was like dying inside and I didn't know how to describe it, so I didn't know how to get help, you know.

Kat: 17:37

I was like I don't know what this feeling I'm having is. I couldn't even put words to it. It wasn't until I drank plant medicine that I understood. And so I did start on my spiritual journey with yoga. Like from 18, I was practicing the physical asana, and then in college I started to get more into the spiritual side, but I really didn't connect to it that deeply. So it was like my soul was searching for something. And then by the time I got to Peru, I was still, you know, working very hard, long hours, trying to prove something. I had a. Our organization had a connection with universities, so I was still trying to like fit in this construct, but I everything was just kind of like crumbling around me.

Kat: 18:28

And um, I think I got to a point. I call, I tell people like I I was like scraping rock bottom in the sense of like.

Kat: 18:36

Again everything looked great, but I was just like my soul was withering and I had been to many ceremonies at this point, but nothing with plant medicine I had been to like many um Kero and Quechua style ceremonies that are just woven into the fabric of everyday life and intentionally attending ones, but a lot of them just in the farming communities likeago a la pacha, payments to mother earth, things that despachos and different types of ceremonies that they do to ask for permission or like when we harvest you would go and you know, make a payment, have a feast for mother earth, and then there's like communal work days, and so I had been in all these rhythms but I was like I need something more and I felt like the plants were already healing me just the gentle herbs and the wild weeds, and I was like

Kat: 19:37

you know, still in this very logical mindset, like this story has to be told, I have to write a book, write a paper, I don't know, get funding to tell this story about these women and their plants and their medicinal. And then I was like no, that is just rewriting the story of extractionism, Like what is that going to do? Now, looking back, I'm like okay, that might have been an extreme viewpoint. Also, it could have fed a lot of beautiful things.

Jenee: 20:07

Yeah.

Kat: 20:08

At that point I was very like anti, you know. I was like going there, I swung like very far in the other direction.

Jenee: 20:14

Yeah.

Kat: 20:16

And from what I knew and was born into, and so I slowly just made my way towards grandmother medicine. A friend invited me to a ceremony. My first ceremony was not in the jungle, it was in the Sacred Valley with a teacher who is now passed but has still a beautiful legacy of starting one of, like, the strongest medicine communities in the valley, and I sat in a full moon ceremony in this beautiful temple where the moonlight was streaming through.

Jenee: 20:50

Wow. I was totally unaware of what I was getting myself into.

Kat: 20:56

You know, I was like my friends had been inviting me and I was just kind of like I did no research.

Jenee: 21:02

Yeah, I didn't know?

Kat: 21:04

Yeah, you know, my first ceremony was the same. I had no research.

Jenee: 21:06

Yeah, I didn't know. Yeah, you know, my first ceremony was the same. I had no clue. Showed up Like what.

Kat: 21:10

Drank a juice right before, like no idea.

Kat: 21:13

I mean like in Peru you can go to the market and just drink, like a fresh juice of fruit and veggies, but still like I had zero idea, yeah, and I was just like okay, but still like I had zero idea. Yeah, and I was just like okay. I asked a friend to come with me and I went with some other friends who were very deep in the path, who I had come to love and find as guides, and I went and it was the most beautiful experience of my entire life I am. This was 14 years ago and I'm still unpacking my first ceremony, Like I was just obviously there were scary parts, yeah, and there were really intense parts, but I just went in with full surrender because I really had no idea.

Kat: 21:56

Wow blew my heart open and showed me so many things that it just rewove the entire fabric of my life and how I moved through the world. After that it was like I opened a door and I couldn't go back, and I know a lot of people have scary first experiences. I think it was just like and it was very physical, very visual, very everything but I was just there for it and it was like I felt like I was home.

Jenee: 22:29

Yeah.

Kat: 22:30

I didn't know what was happening, but I was like there's snakes like riding in my body, but that's cool, like we're going with it, you know. And I was just like this is what's supposed to happen. It felt like the most natural thing ever.

Jenee: 22:42

Wow, the most natural thing ever.

Jenee: 22:50

Wow, I know I think back to my first ceremony and, um, it was in Brazil and, uh, I would say end of a two week healing training that I was doing with my teacher and her husband is, he serves there and is a well-known musician in Brazil and I think if I would have known what I was getting into, I would not, I don't think I would have sat for one and I think I would have been like scared.

Jenee: 23:15

I mean there would have just been so many things kind of placed on it that I would not have been able to meet what everything that I met that night with full, like surrender, and same thing like I felt once you open that door, like you know, and it's a very, it's a very hard one to close, and, yeah, I mean the world of the world of plant medicines is especially the Madre. It's like there's no words. I mean the amount of healing that I've received from that medicine like, and the amount of magic and how it's weaving through my life, it's. You know, I would love to talk a little bit more about this and then maybe we can talk a bit about, like, the ethic, the ethical part of of sitting with plant medicine and the reciprocity and stuff like that. But I want to hear more about your journey from that moment on.

Kat: 24:25

Yeah, wow, how to describe it.

Jenee: 24:30

There's no words.

Kat: 24:32

I'm still on it. Like I said, it changed the entire direction of my life, but I didn't even realize it. I mean, for sure, I came out of the ceremony being like, wow, I just reframed. You know reframed and redirected, but didn't mean that it was all like rainbows and butterflies. It was a long road to today, but I mean I just kept coming back. Really, I realized that my relationships needed adjustment.

Kat: 25:01

The biggest relationship was my relationship to myself yeah you know, and that's some a theme I see over and over, it's so simple, it's just self-love, like that is like at the root of so many of these things that then seed into bigger things in our lives. But so I went on that journey and I continue. You know, I ended up going to the jungle and, like I said, my first teachers were Shipibo and I really loved that. That journey, that deep, deep, deep inside journey and into the depths and the shadows, and was so inspired by this, this plant spirit world that they worked with. It's not just the grandmother medicine.

Kat: 25:41

It's so many different things and this whole idea of, like I said, this living library, like, oh, these lived, immersive experiences with the plants, it finally made sense to me. Plants have spirits. We can speak to them, they can guide us, they can heal us and we're in constant reciprocal relationship with them. And it's not just like they can heal us and we're in constant reciprocal relationship with them, and it's not just like what can I get from taking this thing or putting it in on and around me, but truly like what can I do to feed this relationship back and forth?

Kat: 26:13

and beyond and spiraling in all directions.

Kat: 26:17

And again, not just about me and my relationship with grandmother or the other plants. What about the ones that opened this world to me and are the true like wisdom holders, you know, and that is an element I feel is missing in many journeys, and I think it's just the nature of our, the culture which we are raised in, and I'm seeing shifts. But, um, so yeah, the shipibo, you know, went to the jungle, spent a lot of time there was, coming back and forth between always living in the valley, and then I will say I got to a point where I was like, okay, my healing's done, like I'm done, that was fun, that was fun, that was a fun little phase. Anyways, time to go, you know. And so I made my way, actually lived in Denmark for about two years.

Kat: 27:13

I fell in love and made my way there and I was still in the herbalism and permaculture world but I was like, okay, that was a nice journey, you know. Yeah, little did I know it was just getting started and so I tried to kind of like push that part away. But, like I said earlier, once you open this door, especially once you start like dieting plants, it's not like something you do and have an experience and then you go away. If you really go deep into it, it's a path, it's a lifestyle. So I soon started having dreams that I like, over and over and over, for about six months, tried to ignore them, but it was several different things. One was of energies in the valley, some of the Apus mountains I worked with, and some was this woman standing in the forest like beckoning me, and I was like, okay, it's grandmother, it's Madre, like she wants me to come. She was like come home, come home.

Kat: 28:12

And I was thinking, okay, still thinking like this is just about my personal journey.

Kat: 28:18

And then I finally listened, because I went to a Reiki session and the woman was like, hey, I just had these two images and it was the same dream I kept having so I was like, okay, I'm going to Peru, I booked my ticket and I ended up moving back, um, but the funny thing is I did not know why I was there or where I was going to sit. I didn't feel called to go to the jungle, to the the Amazon in Peru. So I sat there in the Valley and I was like I just gave up this whole life, like what am I? What am I doing here? You know it was, and there was like she just kind of like stretched it out, like are you willing to trust? You know? And this one didn't go to any ceremonies. I was like when it's the moment, I will be, I will know.

Jenee: 29:05

Wow.

Kat: 29:05

And I was invited by many people and I was just like, okay, stay steady. I almost lost it and just like went back to California, but right before that happened. I met my my now husband, Wow Um, and we didn't meet. Through the medicine I was looking for a home and I walked into his house where he had some spaces rented and to rent and he was watching a video of the Huni Queen. Wow, Because he was working with different leaders in the Brazilian.

Kat: 29:36

Amazon, and so we quickly obviously connected. We didn't really talk about medicine. We just watched the videos together and it was like obvious that we were both on this path. And then, not long after that, he brought a group of Huni Queen and we had started dating. And so I was helping with the retreat, and I mean from there. I ended up going to Brazil, going into very deep relationship with Huni Queen Shananawa Sambarinawa Yawanawa teachers.

Jenee: 30:11

Wow.

Kat: 30:12

Mainly Huni Queen. And then our teachers were kind of like. They were like you know, francisco, my partner, he had already been working one-on-one with people. At that point I wasn't serving, I had worked in spaces, I had been in service but I wasn't serving. And our teachers are basically like this is like now's the time for you to like carry this into places. We can't go so okay.

Kat: 30:38

We've done a tour with um tour, with the Huni Queen, all over the US, a three-month tour. We take community to Dieta in Amazon, in Peru. We've gone down to Vivencias in Brazil and over time, and especially during the pandemic, they were like you carry this altar, you know so actually our altar is a weaving of different teachers and different lineages. That what works in the United States or works for Westerners, even if they come to like we did have a retreat center in the Sacred Valley to us is there's like a step before going to the Amazon for some people.

Kat: 31:32

And so we weave this like beautiful altar. That is a style. It has Shipibo elements and then it has the Brazilian like Huni Queen, kashina Wa elements in it as well. So yeah, it's an interesting mix. But we bring a lot of like that message of joy, of alegría, of taking personal responsibility for your journey and community into the space, because I saw on my path like so many people get lost just in like the like muck of their personal journey and also a lot of people get stuck in the shadow and can't get out.

Kat: 32:14

So we found this way to like weave everything so that we can help guide and like lift the energy, because I really feel like both community and and um joy are two things that our culture is missing.

Jenee: 32:28

Absolutely so. When you're now offering um ceremony with your husband, um, you're bringing these elements in and then what's your? Do you have kind of like a pre, like a, like a pre um, uh, what do I want to say?

Kat: 32:48

Um, like a prep preparation period where you're, you know, working with, like certain elements of the plant and then the plant and then, or if it's just more like group group work and yeah, we have a lot of different ways we work um, everything we do has a deep preparation process. We know the name of every person that sits with us. We work small groups or one-on-one privates and we do a lot of preparation around understanding what it is, the context, understanding why someone is coming to us, and that helps us understand how to work with them, both in ceremony and then the bigger container of like coming in and coming out. So there's like a lot of that pre-work that happens. Then, of course, we have our ceremonial container and then we have a lot of integration support as well. Some of that is built in, no matter what, if you come to an experience with us.

Kat: 33:54

And then we have additional programs that we offer people, like my dietas or with plants like rose or rosemary or calendula or something gentle. That is a really powerful integrative tool and also helps people understand this whole world. Or it's more concrete tools, rituals, practices that are very tailored to someone's process and what they're going for. So we go really deep with people. Our journey over the years has been smaller, more focused, like that's kind of what we've come to, and then particular individuals who really want to walk this path. We will take them for like dieta or to a viventia, depending, like there's different paths in the medicine, like you well know, and so it's like whatever fits an individual's needs journey where they're at everything.

Jenee: 34:53

Absolutely. Wow. That's so fascinating. How did you and your husband end up moving back to the States? Did you feel that call from the time you were working with the tribes?

Kat: 35:08

Yeah, I mean, the first step was when we did the tour In 2022, we did a tour with the Huni Queen, a three-month tour all over the States and then we moved back to Peru and we previously had been running a retreat space in Peru and from about 20, 20, 20, or like 2018 to 2019 was like group stuff. Then, you know, the pandemic happened. We were here and also in Peru and after the pandemic we opened a retreat space in Peru and people were coming to us that fed into this tour and we realized that we had so many people we had served medicine to in the United States that were lacking support, community or wanted to go deeper on the path. And we also saw that a lot of the communities we had visited didn't really contain or hold or contextualize for people. It was just like people go to a ceremony, I don't know, sometimes rooted in tradition, sometimes not yes.

Kat: 36:17

And then you're just on your own. You know, and there's, I say it's like the US is like the Wild West, absolutely Of this space, and so we were just like, okay, we had built a solid community. And while many people were coming to us in Peru, we also felt like we need to be there for follow up.

Kat: 36:37

We need to, we want to, we feel very called to be um going deeper and that I also believe the us needs some really big healing right now yeah or the western world in general, and then, um, just that in-person follow-up and the ability to reach greater community and bring some context to this space, because both of us have lived in Peru for on and off, for over 10 years, and these things do come from traditions, they do come from beautiful lineages and from people, from humans and environments that I believe we should continue linking these traditions and rituals to and that was a big part of our message too.

Jenee: 37:25

Yeah, yeah, I feel like the reciprocity aspect and the deepening of of people understanding, you know what what this relationship truly is um with with any of the Amazonian plants, and I find myself, like, since I started working with plant medicine, like I'm trying to heal deeply.

Jenee: 37:51

It's like I don't I don't want to say like the colonizer, but they're that voracious, like one way stream.

Jenee: 38:04

That I feel like is the mentality of, you know, the Western world, and especially with the United States, and I'm meeting myself constantly in that space of like one being like how can I be in more reciprocity, like, how can I be more reciprocity with the earth? How can I be more in more reciprocity with the medicine that we serve and you know, and the tribe that we receive that medicine from? Like how can I heal this? Because some days it just feels like it's daunting that feeling inside, and I catch myself often and I feel like it's the nature of the I don't want to say matrix, but it's the nature of the way this system is set up. It's the nature of the way this system is set up. So, yeah, I myself have really started to heal and I feel like there's so much that needs to happen around healing that. You know that relationship and I don't know if you want to speak to that and maybe some of like the ethics of receiving medicine and reciprocity.

Kat: 39:27

Yeah, I mean I feel you 100% that, like I call it, like the extraction mindset, yeah, so clear, and especially because I lived away from here for so long and away from the United States and I will say say whatever you want about other countries, whatever everyone has their opinions, but I found in Denmark and Europe at least the the circles I moved through so much more of a communal mindset yeah that I really um, I see a desire, like a thirst for the United States, but there's this like extraction, where I, you're like, I see it all the time you engage with someone or you come into a situation and it's so subconscious.

Kat: 40:11

I don't want to judge people because it and I, I see it in myself and I'm always, like you said, working. It is this idea of what can I get from this? Yes. Or you can watch in someone like as they're learning something instead of being in like full relationship and truly learning and embodying it. It's like they think they're doing that, but in the mind is already like how can I talk about this in my class?

Jenee: 40:40

I'm going to teach later my social media. How can I make money off this?

Kat: 40:44

Yeah, flip and sell and again like with so much compassion because it's so deeply embedded in our subconscious, and I think that's really scary, though, when you get into the medicine or healing space in general, but it's also a really big topic, and so I'll speak like a few things. But of course, you know, there was a time in my life where I was like, well, everything should be for free. And then there was a time in my life where I was like only you know, indigenous wisdom holders. I do hear that rhetoric and I honor it and I actually really value where it's coming from. Only indigenous wisdom holders should carry these medicines, you know. Or even like what I do with the rose yeah, I really really sat with that because the rose is my most popular public one I work with. I work with many plants, but we're in this rose container together and it's not the same at all.

Kat: 41:46

Like I said, it's a plant spirit immersion, but I do use the word dieta. I really have sat with that and I actually took almost all of last year off after coming out of two dietas in the Amazon to be like how do I walk this path in integrity?

Kat: 42:04

And is this like really stepping back to see if I was in integrity, despite the fact that, like one of my Huni Queen teachers, she was like let's do this. Obviously I didn't do all the facilitation, but she took my rose medicine. We would do like ceremonies together. She was like loving it.

Kat: 42:22

You know and she it opened things for her, then she opened things for me. So, um, despite all of that, you know, and so I was, like I really have been always in, in thinking like how can I be in reciprocity, how can I be in like an ethical carrier of these medicines, these ways, even if you don't serve, like all of these traditions? Should we even have access to these things, you know, outside of the Amazon or as Westerners in general, like are we doing good or are we damaging? Like so many questions, and I will say, like my husband's from South America, so that has been a really beautiful place of learning and growing and a safe space for me to ask questions and also to access. Like I have had way more access to the roots of these cultures because he is like a trusted bridge. We always talk like he's like my bridge to the indigenous wisdom holders in the Amazon or even in the Andes, and I'm like his bridge to the Western culture.

Kat: 43:33

Beautiful and it's like this beautiful weaving, and so I'm really grateful that that has given me the perspectives and the learnings it has, and also I feel like the confidence to speak about this stuff because, um, but yeah, I think just sitting in the sitting with medicines like watch, you are the grandmother, or or other medicines, you know, other expansive medicines they in and of themselves you're truly coming for your healing. They're going to show you these things. And then my thing is like to be in ethical relationship and integrity, like are you going to listen to that If it means you have to change things about how you move through the world? If anything as simple as asking a space holder, can I touch your altar, can I share this song? That is like an ancient healing chant with my friend, or having that, and I think a lot of us come to that and we know deep inside of us that we should ask, but we don't have that mindset. So the first and simplest thing I always invite people when they're working.

Kat: 44:45

This is like ask, you know ask for permission you know just like when you harvest a plant in the, in the wild or in your garden. You ask and it's not always a yes and like can you, as an adult, handle that you? Can. You say, okay, you know what it's a no, and it might hurt my ego because I don't understand and I'm in process, it might make me get all like grumpy. But instead of going in that direction, maybe ask why you know why why not, and can you teach me more about this?

Jenee: 45:19

that's one thing.

Kat: 45:20

I really dedicate myself to is, and I I see that the teachers in Amazon. If you have good teachers, they will teach you too. If you ask why, why do you do this, is this okay If I share? How can I work with this in respect? You know, like tobacco is one plant that I think shows this whole thing in a really big and obvious way. This whole imbalance that we have Tobacco in and of itself and this may trigger some people is not bad. It's a powerful healing spirit. It's a very, very powerful spirit Very powerful.

Kat: 46:01

Deeply healing plant and it has a spirit, a very strong spirit, and that's one thing like part of why I do this plant spirit work is to invite people to see every plant has a spirit. So let's look at this Like if a plant has a spirit and tobacco is a big master plant in every healing tradition around the world. It's just like grandfather, elder energy protection. It opens clarity. It's like I call it the medicine of immediate truth, like all the bullshit. My language is boom.

Kat: 46:36

I love it my language, just boom, I love it. So look, we see in the Western culture, people you know be like if you smoke tobacco you'll die of lung cancer, blah blah. It's like okay, well one, let's break this down. First, we're mixing a bunch of stuff with this tobacco. It's not grown in a way where we're honoring the earth yeah then we're inhaling it into our body.

Kat: 47:02

Every culture that works with these. You do not take it into your lungs. Yeah, blow the, the smoke out. And so that is like we're taking, we're trying to like, take the spirit like into ourselves, and it's a really big spirit, so of course it's we're not respecting it, so of course it's wreaking havoc on our systems, right, and so the problem is not the plant, the problem is our relationship to the plant and this idea that we can just take it, use it, sell it, and it's like the individual is just a part of this bigger construct. But somewhere along the way, that respect got lost and that extractive mindset put us where we are now.

Kat: 47:44

And so you can imagine how many layers of unlearning get to happen, and it's so easy to get lost in that. Well, they did it to us. It's like we're not victims once we know we can do something and I see that with the medicine space, you know like pulling it back in. Yeah, you know, do you have permission? If you are serving these things, are you doing your own work? One like I said, if you're doing your own work, you're going to first and foremost you're going to see these things.

Kat: 48:17

There's no ignoring them, and you have a teacher that's going to guide you.

Kat: 48:21

I know everyone's like I'm my own shaman and I'm like. My partner actually said this, so this is his quote and I was like I love this. He's like I'm not my own shaman. I have my teachers. I have my teachers, my guides, my elders, my wisdom holders, because they help me walk the path of integrity, understand what is in alignment for my soul and help me sense, make and see things I can't see, and I am so grateful to have that. So it's like seeking the guidance of those who have walked before us, honoring that, also, knowing that people are human. So, you know, not going into that like let's put everyone on a pedestal and whatever they say is. Is it Because that's?

Kat: 49:07

a dicey area we get into when people also try to work in reciprocity, like giving our power away, like an alignment and integrity, understanding your truth when you're doing your work and then asking for permission. Giving back so easy. There's so many ways to give back. It doesn't have to be just monetarily.

Jenee: 49:28

Yes.

Kat: 49:29

Art, music, sharing, taking community to the roots, always honoring your teachers when you do serve these things, knowing as someone who does serve medicine too, with honoring your teachers when you do serve these things, knowing as someone who does serve medicine too, like with discernment when is it okay to be like no, this isn't for you yet.

Kat: 49:54

You know, not because someone wants something and they're willing to pay us for it. Do we give and that's part of why like, for example, the rose diet, to these soft dietas? I'm like these are beautiful opportunities for people to understand. Is this even a path I want to go down? Or can I receive so much beautiful healing messages, guidance, life giving, nourishment from the plants all around me and that's truly just perfect for me? You know not saying this isn't for you, but why don't we do this? This is beautiful and life-giving and nourishing and context building. And then if you want to keep going like, let's go here, and if not, there's a myriad of ways you can go.

Jenee: 50:34

Yes.

Kat: 50:35

That is not down the down the like big expansive medicine paths.

Jenee: 50:40

Yeah, I love. Just coming back to the dieta, finally, and like it's powerful medicine, Like Rose, that, wow. You know I was thinking this week I've been thinking about it because I feel like I Maybe me five years ago, more numbed out, wouldn't have been able to be in communion with the plant right now in the way that I am, but the first two days she blew me open.

Jenee: 51:23

I was like everything's so beautiful, beautiful, Thank you. I was like thank you, thank you, thank you, like, like weeping at, like the beauty of the world, my, um, my subtle nervous system and the places I've really wanted to sit with myself and haven't. Like, there's like a little buzz constantly going on with me and and part of it also is like caffeine and I stopped like drinking caffeine alongside. So, um, yeah, I feel like it's interesting. I'm wondering if, like me five years ago, wouldn't have really been able to like fully, um, have that kind of transformation from, from the medicine.

Kat: 52:20

Yeah, that's a great point. First, just loving everything you shared. Um, first just loving everything you shared. Yes, it's just like Rose is like this beautiful cocoon of love and nourishment, and it's true. I think what you say is very true. I mean, it's hard for someone who has never sat with plants, and even these expansive plants or medicines that open us up, to be able to commune with these subtle spirits or understand like what it even is. It can be hard for someone to have as deep of an experience as you're having and I will say, at the same time, they have it.

Kat: 53:04

If that makes sense, it's just the awareness or the real-time awareness of it may not always be present. It may be like a reflection over years where they start to realize, or it may be that they get like one big deep thing from it.

Kat: 53:22

But I will say that's why it's so important to have a guide especially if you don't work with other plants and these big I call them the big expanders which, to your point, also with the nervous system we are like, so addicted in our society to these big expansive experiences and subtlety. There's so much healing in the subtle, especially I mean for me. I'm really passionate about this for women.

Jenee: 53:50

Yeah.

Kat: 53:51

Like and like what is serving you and what time in your life you know and especially as space holders, when we are in these big expansive medicines so often, how can we support and nourish ourselves? Because even if we feel like, yeah, we're in the flow, because we see all this, like our body's like wait, like why is everything so big all the time? And this embeds this like deep tensions that we don't even realize are there. And another beautiful and favorite quote by my partner is like between one and a hundred, there's 99 different levels, right, Even with our grandmother. Like some of my favorite experiences have been like the small and deepest have been the smallest amounts.

Jenee: 54:35

Me too.

Kat: 54:36

So that's where these yeah, you get it these something like the rose dieta, for example, I have worked with a lot of you know. Usually I do, actually in full honesty, usually I work with women with the rose yet to I believe it's for everyone, but that just seems to be who like comes to me and how I channeled the, the spirit, immersion part of it, which is these deepening exercises and embodiment practices and um towards the feminine body.

Kat: 55:07

And I have had people where they are calling me every day, texting me, because when I work one-on-one we have a very deep dive, one-on-one calls, so we're in like constant communication and I'll have women say to me you know, kat, I'm not feeling anything or I don't know if this is working and it's. I'm like, just keep showing up, just keep going to your altar every day, drink the tea, do the exercises. I promise something is happening. But then I start to ask them questions just to kind of like see and show them so they can discover it themselves, because I can see it working.

Kat: 55:45

But, no one wants someone to tell you like well, I see the softening around your eyes or the change in the way you write the text, or this or that or the things you're talking about, or the fact that you just told me you offered your tea to the tree in the morning these things that you would have never.

Kat: 56:06

I've never heard you say, and people even will say, like well, I did walk by this wall and there was like a mural of the rose and I'm like that's it. Or I had a conversation with someone and it was much more easeful than I expected and I'm like that's the rose or whatever plant you're working with, like that is the plant working. It just isn't what we expect it to be. So that's the entry point where I think having a guide is really beautiful, where you can start to like tease that out for someone and be like I know you have no idea what it should look like and also everyone's experience looks different and I know I told you what it may look like.

Kat: 56:47

But once you start talking about what's happening at work, in your lived experience because these are experiences in everyday life we can start together to be like oh for you, this is how Rose speaks to you, or these are the subtle changes that are happening and sometimes they lead to big, expansive things and other times not, and if nothing else, just this act of coming into ritual at least once a day at an altar drinking a tea, the act of bathing and like just gifting yourself that moment, even if you don't feel like the plant coming into you or ever feel like the spirit speaks to you, just gifting yourself that sacred pause, is actually building a very solid habit and context for connecting to the sacred and the visible, and that in of itself is huge, for me If that's all someone gets out of it yet to, because that can shift the entire fabric of somebody's life.

Kat: 57:55

If they never pause, or never speak a kind word or make a bath for themselves, or something you know you would, you would be surprised. It makes me sad, but so often it's just like even that is huge and we forget that when we're so deep on these like spiritual paths.

Kat: 58:15

you know, that and that's why I continue offering these things, these gentle plant ally access points and my plant spirit, herbal medicine, because I'm like, like everyone deserves to access these things totally and not everyone is ready or wants to come sit in a big plant medicine ceremony, and those people that maybe take a tincture or an essence or sign up for the dieta even though they don't know what they're doing, those are the people that are like probably one need it the most and two like, if we can shift that every person I feel like I touch, like they touch an entire community and a family, and then, of course, people like you, who is like you're, a medicine woman.

Kat: 59:02

It's like, when you have these deep, profound experiences, imagine one, what it, what it's doing for you, and then, like our, we get to connect and make a row. It's like this I always say, it's like this collective rosebush we're always on together, once we, once I work with someone, but then imagine, like, how it ripples into your relationship with your husband, with your mother, like with everything the people you work with.

Jenee: 59:25

Oh, it's amazing. The plants I know.

Jenee: 59:27

It's like really amazing how much it's really like integrated a lot of my big journeys Like very interesting in the last two weeks and I've done a lot of like heart opening medicine, but like just something this subtle and daily and just that thing like I'm constantly takingcare and the bath like so luxurious.

Jenee: 1:00:19

Like just yesterday I did the bath, or it was Monday I did the second bath and like just having the rose like in my hair and like, oh, it's so luxurious and I just go to sleep like with my hair wet and it's been, she's really held me and I'm realizing how much I really need to deeply take care of myself in the spaces that I, whether it's just coming to my altar every day, you know, um, and I think even more as, like you know, we know things are going to get crazier too and so it's going to be all hands on deck for for the lightworkers and, and you know, star seeds or whatever you want to say, and I think, um, you know, having something that you can lean into, that is is that subtle but that profound, you know.

Kat: 1:01:20

Yeah, I love that you shared that, because when I did my rose yet to the first time, did it like the rose just called me out in the garden and like, gave me this journey over some weeks and I was integrating after a really big time in the Amazon and ended up back here like straight out of the Amazon, back to visit family and just by the nature of the state of the world, I was not able to do the integration and life that I would have wished, and that's sometimes how it is, and same like just the.

Kat: 1:01:54

It really brought me home to self and I wonder how long it would have really taken me to integrate that if not, if I hadn't had the rose. And that's the thing. It's like you're doing nothing but it's doing everything. And it's like those small, subtle and yes, the rose is always reminding me and also my subtle practices, like of feeding the invisible, is always reminding me and showing me how I get to deepen into self-care as a space holder, because it's like I think I'm doing it, but sometimes I'm going through the motions.

Kat: 1:02:27

But when you're in deep relationship with a plant, it also cares and tends for you. If you tend to it, so like once you diet a plant, it walks with you for your life, if you keep feeding that relationship and so she'll remind me. You know, like when I'm out of that balance and it happens, but to be like okay, and the more I feed and take care of myself, the more I can like give, and so I'll start to notice that and it's just sometimes it happens. But yes, like we are, I believe you know these beautiful plant and expansive, all types of expansive medicines. It's like, yes, we can connect to the mysteries of the ancients and all these downloads. And don't get me wrong, like I love playing in that world.

Kat: 1:03:15

It's like endless and um, but I do really think it's about being here and being, you know, really rooted, and really grounded and really tending to our communities. And if we're always expanding and we're like not able to root in all the beautiful things we're learning and apply it into our life, then it's like what's it for? It's for something, but then, to your point, like we also can't be martyrs and I see that happening a lot in the medicine space it's like no, nourish yourself nourish nourish.

Kat: 1:03:52

Nourish so that you can give. And like we don't need to play out old traumas of like give without filling ourselves up or like abandoning our most intimate relationships to feed community, or like meet someone's needs that oftentimes are based in an urgency that's not real you know, and so I love that you have this ally as a space holder. But, yeah, like all the plants can hold us and that subtleness is like that's where the magic is.

Jenee: 1:04:25

So grateful, so grateful for you. Can I read um, I think you wrote this poem, that it's, it's your, your post with the labyrinth outside.

Kat: 1:04:39

Oh yeah, can I read that?

Jenee: 1:04:41

as as just a finishing, uh, finishing up of our conversation, cause I think it's so beautiful, um, and of course now I'm realizing I need glasses, my glasses, that I think it's so beautiful, and of course now I'm realizing I need glasses my glasses that I don't have right now. Okay, I have, I think it's, I have walked through. It says I have waked through.

Jenee: 1:04:58

Oh, yeah, yeah, I have walked Definitely walked, yeah, I have walked through the halls of the deepest, darkest parts of my soul over and over, and soared in the most exquisite halls of beauty, flown on the winged ones, enchanted with the ancient ones, sat in ceremony under giant sacred trees in the Amazon. Mysteries of the universe decoded before my very eyes, the universe decoded before my very eyes, sat with others in the depths of their darkest moment, only to witness them come into their full glory. I have seen the light, and still it's truly when my feet are on the ground, in the here and now, tending a sweet gentle herb in the garden, digging in the soil or sipping my favorite herbal ally, watching the sun dance across the sky. I thought that was so, so beautiful and such a perfect um, just little antidote for conversation, and I'm really grateful for this conversation.

Jenee: 1:06:20

I'm grateful for you and for Beth, for this medicine and the space um you offer. You offer happy and song circle in your community, like in a beach. That sounds amazing. I'm like philip we need to go do that. Philip's like, he's like that's his medicine big time. My husband so, um, I was like we should go to laguna sometime and come visit sit with them and visit and um, um and what else let's see.

Jenee: 1:06:51

Oh, and you have an album out that sounds amazing of kind of channeled channel plant medicine songs so you can find that. I will post that on the um, on the podcast page, if, if anyone wants to check that out, and I will post Kat's website and anything else that you want to announce that you've got coming up yeah, I have always open, so I just invite people to message me.

Kat: 1:07:21

I do one-on-one rose dietas and then I also do one-on-ones. People come and will tell me hey, hey, this is what's alive for me, whether it's integrating, expansive experience to life, and I will kind of work with you to find a plant and construct a dieta for you. So our plant spirit, immersion, so that's always an option. Please reach out. Um, and also, yeah, I just want to thank Beth too. Beth has been such an encouragement and also pulled me out of my deep meditative, like mulling of whether I should continue walking with this dieta, and brought it back to the world, and so I'm like eternally grateful. She's such a beautiful human guide. She has been in my coach sister medicine woman, so I want to thank her and thank you for your beautiful work.

Kat: 1:08:12

Do come visit, I'm grateful to be here. Yeah, I want to talk more, and it's so fun to get to share here.

Jenee: 1:08:19

Yeah, absolutely. Well, the conversation continues.

Kat: 1:08:24

Yes.

Jenee: 1:08:24

So thank you.

Kat: 1:08:26

Thank you.

Jenee: 1:08:33

The Heartlight Sessions podcast is executive produced and hosted by me, janae Halstead. It's edited, mixed and mastered by me too, and that theme song you hear it's called Heartlight. And yep, you guessed it, it's from my record. Disposable Love. Got questions about a certain healing modality or about heart-centered healing, or maybe you just need some advice on life, love or creativity. Send it my way, email me at letters at heartlightpodcastcom. Until next time, I'm Janae Halstead, and thanks for listening to Heartlight Sessions, turning on my hot light, thousand volts of sunshine.