Spoken word artist and Moon Club founding member Lisa Luxx, has a powerful message for International Women’s Day. Voice of Earth is a poem about sisterhood, mother nature and the history of womankind. Written at a Sisters of the Wild gathering.
Environment
BACK TO NATURE: LESSONS IN LOVE WITH PLANT MAKEUP
Connect with mother nature, and recognize your own true beauty. Gabriela Herstik interviews Jess Morgan, the owner of Good4You Plant Makeup…
Can speaking the language of plants help you become more beautiful? Jess Morgan, owner of Good4You Plant Makeup thinks the answer is a deep, resounding YES. Finding time to appreciate the natural world and to listen to the voice of nature can have a profound effect, one that makes you feel the love of the Universe. And she believes that in honoring this cosmic connection with Gaia we can find beauty in the world around us, AND ourselves.
Plant Makeup is a makeup and skincare company that’s all about this numinous approach to beauty, by crafting products from locally grown/foraged or certified organic flowers and herbs. Here, Jess shares her special brand of plant-based wisdom…
THE NUMINOUS: First and foremost, Good4You started in 2004 in a medical herb greenhouse. Can you tell us more about this experience?
JESS MORGAN: Yes, it’s been a 12-year journey of learning about plants—and wanting to work for them! In my late teens I was searching for the answer to life’s meaning. A major quest—and I found that answer in plants. When I walked into the green house on that special awakening day, I was able to feel this great love in my heart coming from all the green friends that surrounded me. Further, I felt plants wanted me to ‘work for them’ in a way. As humans, we are from the Earth too, but I feel we are becoming disconnected from this. So Plant Makeup is to help people remember.
TN: You also told me you “felt called upon to be a voice for nature in our modern era.” What’s the message they want you want to send?
JM: The highest goal nature has for us is to help us see all the beauty on Earth, and so the message is really for everyone to get outside! As well as to inspire generations to come to be continual care takers of the Earth. I hope everyone can find the inspiration to do more Earth work, as on a deeper level I feel like this can help align everyone more with their true purpose—which is to find a way to live harmoniously with nature, a situation which is out of control right now.
My work is also my own small contribution to awakening people to the fact plants and nature are talking to us at all times, trying to communicate with us through the heart, so they can explore their own connection and further be inspired to take action for the overall good of the planet.
TN: How has this mission cultivated more compassion for you in the way you live and interact with nature personally?
JM: My work has taught me that what we put in and on our bodies is definitely a way of interacting with nature. For example, the more fruits and vegetables we eat, the better we can operate as bio-machines of the Earth. Our minds become clearer and our bodies feel better! For this reason, I personally love a diet (when I can) of fresh juices, rice and beans with steamed vegetables, salads, and lots of kale (I know, such a cliché—LOL).
TN: What’s your advice to someone looking to lead a more natural life?
JM: It’s is hard to do everything sustainably, but it is important to do whatever we can. Investing in a reusable water bottle for example, or riding your bike or walking instead of driving a car. In my experience, making eco-conscious decisions becomes very fulfilling, almost freeing the ego since these choices are connected to a deeper idea about what it means to be a human here on planet Earth. Any anyway, eventually we won’t have a choice about these things.
TN: So how does honoring the earth change the way makeup affects you, if at all?
JM: In using Plant Makeup, we can enhance and honor the cosmic force that we truly are. Since all the products I make are 100% natural, the way I see it there’s nothing in them to block our natural beauty being able to emanate from within.
TN: How do you communicate and honor the plants you work with? Can anybody do this?
JM: Plants and animals communicate through the heart and, yes, everyone can do this— if we keep an open mind. Not that it’s impossible, it’s just not something we’re consciously trained to do in our society. The best way to practice is to just sit quietly outdoors where you can be undisturbed, and invite a quiet mind so that the miracles of nature can be awakened in you. For example, when people talk about finding inspiration when they take a walk in the woods, I believe this is nature calling to us to live our purpose.
I also love to honor the plants I work with by offering bird seed, always composting, and giving thanks for their gifts. When I collect a plant from the earth, in the case of foraging, I ask for permission first. Most of the time the plants say: “Yes, please use me!” They want to share their gifts. But sometimes they say no. Most of the time I am actually “called” to certain patches or led places to discover a specific medicine for someone, a new plant that wants me to learn about them, or simply a secret the Earth wants to share with me to help me admire its beauty.
TN: What’s the most notable thing you’ve learned throughout your journey making plant based makeup?
JM: Be yourself. We have to really stick to our vision in life, which can so easily get toned down by all the distractions around us; technology, our current job, family, world affairs, etc. It might be harder but it’s more rewarding to follow your own dream. It also might not be possible immediately, but any time we step out into nature and think “wow, what a beautiful day,” we are taking a step in the right direction. Overall, Plant Makeup is the manifestation of my own never ending fountain of nature-based inspiration. A reminder to live your art, to be your dreams.
Discover more at Plantmakeup.com
MY MYSTICAL LIFE: THE MAGIC OF PLANTS PARTS 1 & 2
The week that showed me there’s no denying the magic of plants…
Magic of plants part 1. I’m completely fascinated by the whole plant medicine revolution that’s happening right now. The concept that thousands of people, often the opinion-formers and change-makers of the world, are being sought out by the consciousness of Mother Earth via these medicines, and experiencing vast awakenings.
In fact, I was joking with my friend the other day that the current financial system won’t collapse because of dodgy bonds and unchecked “quantitative easing” – but because all the bankers will end up doing Ayahuasca, and quitting their jobs to make a positive difference in the world instead!
To date, I have not been called to sit in a ceremony myself. The stories of emotional and often physical intensity frighten me, and I know from past practice that I am capable of having similarly (third) eye-opening experiences using alternative, gentler methods.
But still, the fascination remains, and so when I learned about Deborah Hanekamp’s Medicine Readings, which she described as being as close as you could get to a ceremony without actually drinking Ayahuasca, I was obviously super intrigued.
Cut to Tuesday afternoon, when I met Deborah for a reading at my fave spot, Maha Rose. She began by asking what I was working on (as in emotionally), and from her questions about this I could tell immediately that she is a gifted intuitive, with an open and true connection the subtle realms.
I was then asked to lie on her treatment table, and begin a steady tri par viloma (three-part) breath. For the following hour Deborah would invoke the spirit of the plants using scent, in the form of sweet floral tinctures, healing stones and different sound instruments, including her own voice as she sang the haunting “Icaros,” traditional Peruvian medicine songs.
All the time I felt very much in my body – while I was shown, with incredible clarity and in the form of deeply held memories rising effortlessly to the surface of my consciousness, the very root of the issues I’d been grappling with during the recent eclipse period. Tears flowed freely as I was able to make sense of situations that my psyche had chosen to keep hidden from me until now, but in understanding and putting these pieces of my past together, I also felt a sense of forgiveness.
Coming out of the session, I was aware that I’d actually been in a trance-state – my body felt slow, my blood thick, as if I’d be dosed with a heavy anesthetic. One designed to null any pain, allowing me to face the truths that arose without flinching, or looking away. Writing this now, I realize this is probably very similar to what happens in a plant medicine ceremony.
Deborah then told me what spirit, the Grandmother consciousness of the plant, had shared with her during my reading, all of it deeply relevant. We finished the session with her giving me a prescription for a special bath I was to prepare for myself in the coming week, along with a crystal, a meditation, and a mantra to work with.
They say that when you are ready, the spirit of Ayahuasca will find you. And in a week of much confusion, actually, following the two eclipses, last weekend’s Blood Moon, and in the final throws of this Mercury Retro period, she offered herself to me in exactly the form I needed.
Check out more about Deborah and her work at Unityessences.com
Magic of plants part 2. I also watched the brilliant documentary Cowspiracy this week – which has totally cemented my commitment to being vegan. This is something that goes beyond health, beyond all the completely unnecessary bloodshed, and even beyond environmental issues for me now (although, if you need any more convincing, check out this ridiculous fact sheet). For me, this taps into the evolution of consciousness.
Because okay, how’s this for theory. Animal agriculture is by FAR the biggest contributor to the destruction of the rainforests – responsible for 91% OF AMAZON DESTRUCTION. How freaking cool, then, that the Amazonian plants themselves are fighting back – the Ayahuasca revolution opening so many influential minds to the wider implications of this issue.
The broader message of this film + my interaction with plant consciousness with Deborah this week have made me more aware than ever of the connection we as humans share with every other living being (animal + vegetable) on Earth, and the responsibility of love and care to our extended “family” that comes with this.
Also, you can think about it from a karmic perspective – with so much environmental destruction in the name of using flesh for food…doesn’t it make a sick kind of sense that our addiction to animal protein (because that’s what it is, since all tastes besides breast milk are acquired) could be what brings about the extinction of our species?
Wow – big stuff. But it’s not too late! As one commentator in the documentary puts it: “No other lifestyle choice has a father reaching and more profoundly positive impact on the planet than choosing a plant-based lifestyle.” Amen to that.
