“..There is another way of seeing. One that acknowledges both what was and the mystery of what will be. One that recognizes each fallen tree and also greets the mystery...What is at once most threatening, and most powerful, about these witches of our collective ancestry, was their ability to see.”
-- Asia Suler, One Willow Apothecary
Are you...
... Yearning to dive into magic which is rooted in the green heart of the earth, and healing which is connected to the cycles of the seasons and the deep medicine of the plants?
… Ready to claim your birthright as witch, herbalist, and healer?
… Desiring a connection between your love of herbs and your own intuition and your lineage of healing and spirituality?
So were we. Which is why why created PlantWitch: An Herbal Priestess Apprenticeship.
WHO WE ARE:
Riyana Rose is a Certified Western Herbalist, Counselor, and all-around witchy woman.
She's taught and sees clients in the SF Bay Area, and internationally, for over 15 years.
Some of the beautiful organizations she's been privileged to work with include Reclaiming, the Instutite of Urban Homestead, the Revolutionary Living Institute, Homestead Apothercary, Ohlone School of Herbal Studies, the Biofuel Oasis, Earth Activist Training, and Petaluma Bounty.
She thinks of herself as a mystical witch, and adores experiential, ecstatic, direct experience of the Divine and guiding others to get there, too, through the tools she teaches and the rituals she helps create. She is devoted to teaching about connection to nature through our relationships with the green ones, animals, and the fey, and utilizing ritual technologies such as aspecting, trance, and devotion that empower us move out of our minds and into connection with spirit.
In her private practice, she works extensively with issues of the heart and womb, including anxiety, depression, grief, loss, infertility, and pregnancy and postpartum challenges. She also practices as a master-level coach and works with women to build heart-based businesses, live soulfully, and express themselves as authors of their own lives and creative works.
When not writing, reading, or playing with witches in the woods, she can be found in Alameda CA, where she lives with her husband, brother, brother's girlfriend, best friend, and two very furry cats.
Seraphina is a priestess, herbalist & homeopath and has been steeped in life’s magical riches from an early age thanks to her pagan grandparents and mother. She’s a lover of bioregional herbs, wild animals and rural living. She’s inspired to stir our world awake through ancestral healing, practices of ecstatic joy, sacred sexuality and plant medicine. She strives to commune daily with the soft breath of Nature so she can listen deeply to the song of the wild.
Seraphina has devoted herself to exploring the healing arts and sacred mysteries since the age of 12. She’s passionate about serving the powers of Nature and its principles of healing and believes that through these forces, humans can find their dance of liberation.
She has been priestessing ceremony and magic since 2005 and she spent 8 years in an intensive Toltec shamanism apprenticeship that radically shifted the way she sees reality.
She balances her university education in science with the magic of what wild lands and indigenous healers have taught her so that she offers expansive, in-depth approaches to healing in all of her trainings, consultations and healing sessions.
As priestess and witch, she is passionate about offering empowering, heart-centered classes that are rooted in spirit. She has been teaching herbalism and homeopathy since 2008 in colleges, private classrooms, retreats, and as a keynote speaker at professional conferences.
She brings patients and students alike into a complex, nurturing and empowering environment to unlock their own potential to heal themselves and become channels of healing for others.
She lives on Salt Spring Island, British Columbia Canada where she works full time as a practitioner in an multi-disciplinary clinic.
PlantWitch is about a magic and a medicine
that is deeply rooted in the world, in the web of life.
It’s about a connection to the earth that is of all realms-- physical, emotional, mental and spiritual, and the way that we as practitioners, healers, and lovers of both the mystic and manifest worlds can blossom to our fullest potential and passion when we harness the power of the edgewalker and bring the magic of the otherworld and the depth and potency of this living world through us, every day, into a culture of constant disconnection and distraction by way of cars, concrete, social media, buzzwords, and processed food.
When we’re rooted in our own lineage and knowing as edgewalkers, priestesses, and herbalists, we can sweep past distraction, overwhelm, dislocation, and lethargy. We light up with consistent passion, motivation, empowerment, and vitality-- not only as healers, coaches, and teachers, but in everything we do.
We can take back our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health, and be guides for others who wish to do the same, creating a movement of folks ready to get off the Whole Foods bandwagon and step fully into true vitality, interdependence and creativity.
We can find the spiritual practices and rituals that do not come from outside of us-- in other lineages or from “authority” figures -- and connect deeply within, into our hearts, into the song of our ancestors, into the potency of re-membering, and forge a unbreakable bond to the plants and the rest of the web of life to find the answers and the medicine that this world so desperately needs.
We can create a community of like-minded healers, witches, and priestesses to continue to explore and express these mysterious teachings, in a myriad of diverse and beautiful ways, for support, growth, and collaboration.
In this 8 month journey, you will:
Gather, grow, and chop herbs. Make herbal infused, enchanted honeys, vinegars, tinctures, salves, body care products, teas, and beyond, all with an eye and heart-string on deep listening for the medicine that the plants dream of sharing with us.
Fully embody the PlantWitch. Spend time in fields, meadows, mountains, wild open spaces, cultivated medicinal gardens, and other earthy places. Again, with an eye and heart-string focused on listening, connecting, and immersing yourself in the medicine of the plants and the song of nature.
Delve into the practices of sustainable, respectful wildcrafting and herb cultivation in both the city and country.
Learn the practical science of herbal medicine. This course will be grounded in the practical application of herbs for human health as much as it will be magical.
Learn about herbal energetics, moon magic, herbal magic, the healing properties of plants, and the many different forms that medicine can take: essential oils, flower essences, tinctures, and more.
Learn from the plants and how they move and focus their energies as they grow throughout the wheel of the year to nourish our own physical, mental, emotional and spiritual wellness, and that of our families and communities.
Begin each weekend with a witchy-as-fuck ritual to wake up your inner knowing, your ancestral memory, make a wild brew, and in-drink our knowing from a place of deep intentions for healing, the healing of our ancestors and descendants, and Mama Earth.
Delve into sensual, self-care oriented rituals with herbs, such as bathing rituals, water magic, honey rituals, and altars. Herbs are of the earth, so are our bodies.
Focus on herbal magic craft: craft herbal wands, incense, anointing oils, and herbal talismans to make and wear on our body for the magic we’re casting and creating.
Learn about herbs as food medicine. Give offerings. Use herbs to stoke our digestive and sexual fires, to release trauma and heartache, to connect to the deepest parts of ourselves, to receive mystical revelation, to pray and shake things up.
This focused, devoted, intense deep dive is for both experienced herbal and wellness practitioners and those just beginning their journey (as long as you’re willing to do the work). We welcome folks of all spiritual paths and genders— anyone for whom the green heart of the earth and the plants is calling to do this work.
The Details:
PlantWitch is an intimate program, hand-selected through an application process that involves a written application, interview, and deposit to hold your space.
We'll gather in Berkeley, CA, and make excursions around the Bay Area to immerse ourselves in nature.
6 weekend immersives + 8 video sessions via Zoom + 2 one-on-one guidance / coaching sessions with Riyana & Seraphina.
We welcome out-of-towners and will help you find a way to make this happen if you're coming from afar.
Early Bird (Before December 1st): $2400
Regular Registration: $2800
A 10% deposit secures your space in the course.
Weekend dates: February 10-11, March 3-4, April 21-22, May 19-20, July 7-8, September 8-9
Payment Plans available. We welcome people of color, single mothers, and differently abled people to apply for partial scholarship or partial work-trade opportunities.