The International Herb Symposium was at Wheaton College on 19 - 21 June, 2009.  Wow, what a great time I had at the IHS!  It was my first time attending and I got to learn from some amazing teachers.  I often find myself at these events having a hard time choosing workshops, as so many look really great.  IHS was no exceptions.  I narrowly missed getting the Stephen Buhner trifecta by a last-minute change of plans.  It turned out for the best, though, as I learned something super-helpful regarding one of my daughters.  Here’s how the weekend went.

Friday started out with a miserable, rain-filled drive to the conference.  I picked up my registration packet, got myself some tea and headed over to the chapel for the welcoming ceremony.  We were all led in song by Kate Gilday.  Who knew signing in church could be so great?  Rosemary Gladstar gave us all a short welcome and introduced three wonderful elder shamans to lead the ceremony.  They were Rocio Alarcon, Dona Enriqueta Contereras and Raylene Ha’alelea Kawaiae’a.  What energy and power!   And what a way to start the conference.

I stayed in the chapel for the plenary session on visions of healing with the three women mentioned above.  Raylene talked  coming to the conference from her native Hawaii and how she interacts with the plants there.  She has such a gentle but powerful energy.  I really wanted to hug her.

Dona Enriqueta was next.  She speaks through a translator but there is no mistaking the power in her voice.  I don’t think I could really describe in words just how powerful Dona Enriqueta is.  The impact she made on the room was palpable.  When she called down the ancestors during the opening ceremony everyone could feel them there.  She’s also a midwife with a 60-year career - never lost a child or a mother!  Such a powerful grandmother!  She exhorted us to stop watching TV, limit our computer time and spend more time in our communities and with our families.  She yelled at all of us:  “People don’t even know their neighbors!  They never see the stars at night!  You’re loosing all your ancestral knowledge!  Technology has no conscience - we need to be its conscience.”  She’s right, of course. I left there wishing she was my grandma.  I might even write her and ask her if I could think of her as my grandmother.   

Rocio Alarcon had the unenviable position of following Dona Enriqueta!  She led us in a cleansing ceremony using tree branches.  It’s like having a green shower.  I took a session with her later in the day, so I’ll talk more about that later.   I left there pretty charged up!

After lunch I went to Stephen Buhner’s workshop “Herbs in Clinical Practice; Reflections on 20 Years of Herbalism”.  I’ve read many of Stephen’s books and listened to interviews with him before but I hadn’t experienced him in person.  What a treat!  First, and you know this if you’ve read his books, Stephen’s highly intelligent.  He has such a gentle manner, too, and is wickedly funny.  He’s a great stoyteller as well.   The description of this workshop states “A rant of brilliance and scope - be prepared to have unexamined beliefs challenged.”   And, well, seeing as how I’ve spent the last 5 years or so with the life theme of “Everything You Know is Wrong” , I had no problem with that.   He discussed unusual herbs he’s used, the conventional medican establishment, training for herbalists, schooling in general, secondary gains in disease and lots of other things.  It was great.  He’s incredibly brilliant.   I wished Stephen lived next door to me so I could have coffee with him all the time.

In keeping with, what many people would call, my no practical information workshops I then went to Rocio Alarcon’s  Plants and Shamanism:  Practical Activites in our Daily Life.  Here I learned how to do the green branch cleansing ceremony and do some great energy massage using rocks. 

Saturday’s weather was much nicer than Friday’s rain then super-humidity.  First up was four whole hours with Stephen Buhner. I took his intensive “The Ecstatic Journey and the Sacred Teachings of Plants”.  We learned about “duende”, that funny feeling of recognition that kind of takes you out of time.  It’s a direct perception of meaning that bypasses the brain and goes right to the heart.  We also discussed the Ecstatic Path.  I’ve had people tell me that this isn’t “practical” knowledge, but honestly, what could be more practical than knowing how to become a human being?  This is how we all need to learn to do just that.  My head was bursting after this. 

I went and talked to Stephen personally later Saturday afternoon, mostly about homeschooling kids and how to teach them (just let them learn is more like it) about the plants, how to talk to them.  What a great person.  We had a nice little talk and, of course, I had to buy some of his books!

The last session Saturday was Drugs and the Mind with Chris Kilham.   That was really interesting.  He goes to South American (the Amazon & Peru ) every year to work with the indigenous people there.  I know all kinds of stuff about hallucinogens now.  Insert big, evil smiley here.

Sunday and another rainy day - misty and blowing.  This morning for the first session I took something “practical” and learned about about herbal and dietary treatment of prediabetes and diabetes with Christopher Hobbs.  He’s much more of a Heroic tradition healer than I’m used to, being such a Wise Woman devotee.  His review of the scientific literature and latest research was very good.  He gave many different herbs used to stabilize blood sugar - even some preparations I thought my mom would take.  It was very interesting.

The next session I planned on taking was with Stephen again, making the weekend a S.B. trifecta, but something pulled me to Brigitte Mars’ session on Improving Emotional Health with Natural Remedies. Up until about halfway through I was regretting my decision, I must admit!  But then I learned some things that  monumentally are helpful.  She used TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) to explain the relationship between organ systems, emotions and what to do to improve emotional health by treating the organ systems.  One of the descriptions completely matched one of my kids.  Perfect!  I guess I’ll order Stephen’s session on CD!

Last session of the conference, tree walk with Susun Weed.  In the misty rain!  Well, we got through two trees and heard some really great stories from Susun.  Knowledge and wisdom just oozes from her pores!  Seriously!  I got to talk to some birch trees that really don’t like being lawn ornaments on the campus.  Although they do really like the pond there.

Ah, then on to the closing ceremonies. I could just leave, but that would feel really wrong.  And, besides, I wouldn’t learn any new songs that way!  Dona Enriqueta spoke again and made everyone cry when she started to cry.    It was a really nice end to the conference.