Ancestral Folk Herbalism & Plant Allies in Generational Healing with Mimi Hernandez

#55 - Join us for a wonderful conversation with Herbalist, Ethnobotanist, and Author Mimi Prunella Hernandez on how her roots in Latin American Folk Herbalism and Curanderismo have influenced her approach to herbal medicine.

In this episode, Mimi shares stories from the kitchen of her childhood with her Mexican abuelita and the immersive aromas of Cinnamon and Chocolate. She offers wisdom on how herbal aromas can help with healing generational trauma, and her experience with powerful plant allies including Rue, Rosemary, Lemongrass, Helichrysum, and Chickweed. Mimi also shares about the immense joy of stewarding native plant sanctuaries and a bit of the journey that brought her to the PonderLand Native Plant Sanctuaries.

Mimi Prunella Hernandez is an herbalist, ethnobotanist, and author of the National Geographic Herbal. She is the Executive Director of the American Herbalists Guild, and she believes that keeping plant wisdom alive is essential. Her herbal roots are inspired by her Colombian and Mexican Grandmothers with a Latin American Folk Herbalism and Curanderismo lineage.

With her wealth of knowledge, unwavering dedication, and genuine love for all things herbal, Mimi has made a significant impact in the field of herbal medicine. She has dedicated her life's work to serving as an advocate for both traditional and professional herbal pathways while building cultural bridges of understanding.

Learn more about Mimi at https://www.mimiprunellahernandez.com/
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Transcript

Sara Artemisia: 0:05

Welcome to the Plant Spirit Podcast on connecting with plant consciousness, and the healing wisdom of Nature. If you'd like to learn more on how to communicate directly with plants, visit www.learnplantlanguage.com. To register for the free workshop, that's www.learnplantlanguage.com. I'm your host Sara Artemisia and I'm excited to introduce our next guest to the show today. Mimi Prunella Hernandez is an herbalist, ethnobotanist and author of The National Geographic Herbal. With her wealth of knowledge, unwavering dedication, and genuine love for all things herbal, Mimi has made a significant impact in the field of herbal medicine. Her herbal roots are inspired by her Colombian and Mexican Grandmothers with a Latin American Folk Herbalism and Curanderismo lineage. Mimi is also the executive director of the American herbalist guild. And she believes that keeping plant wisdom alive is essential. She has dedicated her life's work to serving as an advocate for both traditional and professional herbal pathways, while Building Cultural Bridges of Understanding. So Mimi, thank you so much for being here with us today. So great to have you here.

Mimi Hernandez: 1:39

Thanks for having me. It's my pleasure. I've been really just loving to be here with you and talk about plants and healing traditions. And what's going on in our lives with Nature.

Sara Artemisia: 1:53

Yeah, so great. And I'd love to just start there really and hear more about how your background in Latin American Folk Herbalism and Curandirismo has really influenced your approach to herbal medicine?

Mimi Hernandez: 2:07

Absolutely, yeah. So I have roots in both South America and in Mexico. My mother's parents, my mother actually is from Bogota, Colombia. And we have a lot of ancestry in the Amazon. And on the other side, my Abuelita, who was herbalist in Mexico City, and I grew up spending a lot of time watching her attend to her neighbors and watching her attend to her plants, and to her herbal healing altar as a young girl, and I learned a lot about especially, you know, what we call Curandirismo and Curandirismo is a practice of herbalism, really just based in Latin American Folk beliefs. And I think the heart of Curandirismo is that the soul and the body are one of the same, and we treat the spiritual as well as the physical or both in tandem, and the spirit. And the health of the spirit expresses itself physically, so that any of our physical ailments can be approached through the spirit. And a lot of what Curandirismo associate with is this aspect of how comfortably seated the soul is in reference to the body. And if there's a lot of stress, or a lot of trauma, or a lot of loneliness, or a lot of lack of community, that the soul has a tendency to disassociate from the body. And so the ultimate goal of the Curandero or the Curandera is to reconnect the soul with the body. And there's lots of things that would do that, obviously. So herbs and also just like what my grandma used to call the platica, which is when you sit with someone, have a little chat with them, and it's really informal, but it's the chat that starts the healing process. It's just checking in with someone and, and learning about their story and letting them tell their narrative without a lot of questions without a lot of insights right off the bat. It's more about just listening and letting someone express themselves because a lot of times when people have ailments or have experienced of certain maladies, they are not finding support within their own day to day life. And often, their telling of their story might be a burden to their loved ones, and, or maybe they feel too, too humble to really express what's happening with them. And so the plastic as a big part of the healing, and then followed by, by prayer and plants, and spiritual cleanses, which we call limpias. And suddenly, limpias are a really big part of, I mean cleansing the body of any uninvited energy or anything that doesn't serve and, for example, one of a big ailments in Curanderismo is called envidia. And that's envy. And, you know, when you are the subject of envy, it can afflict your health. And the envy can also penetrate your, your energetic field and affect your soul and its comfortable Nature within your body. And so there's remedies for that. And there's remedies for some people call Mal ojo, which is, you know, really associated with the gaze of someone upon you. So like, some people might call it the evil eye, but there really is nothing evil about it. Sometimes people are just maybe staring or trying to understand or, like, real common with this is young, vulnerable children, who don't have a very strong protective field around them. And so someone from across the room might really be adoring that child from across the room, but the child's energy field is not really mature enough to handle that, that penetrating gaze of the observer. And so that's a concept that just looking upon someone in a prolonged way can lead to that infiltration and kind of cause some ailments. And so yeah, so it's a very kind of has some superstitions. But I've seen some really wonderful healings just based on this model, and just the profound effects that a limpia can have on someone, or the platica can have on someone, or just some folk remedies, and herbs and alter medicine can have with someone's health.

Sara Artemisia: 7:46

Thank you so much for sharing that. And there's so much in what you just shared there, the thing that really, really stands out to me is the multi-layered aspect of it. And also the power of being present with people the power of being present when we are present, when we listen, when we let people share, when we let people express themselves, how there's so much healing in that and how as a practitioner, there's a lot of value in, in meeting people where they're at, and really getting to know who is this being sitting in front of me, and that this can better support the healing process with the plant. So thank you so much for sharing that and also just honor the lineage that you're carrying forward in that way and honor the way that you bring this lineage forward in a way that is also translatable to the Western mind that is perhaps more accustomed to scientific models of understanding. So I really, really appreciate that. And yeah, just the many layers of being human, the many layers of the experience in the human body. And also, we were talking about this a little bit earlier to the many layers of the plants and how they express themselves in these many different layers. And I was curious, just in that experience of how you really are this bridge with the science and the Latin American folk herbalism experience. If you could share about the power of scent, the power of aromas, and how aromas and scent can help us both connect with the plants with the healing power of the plants, and also with lineage with experiences of lineage. Whoo.

Mimi Hernandez: 9:19

Yeah, that's a fascinating question. I definitely feel that the aroma of a plant is one way that plants communicate with people. And I definitely you know, it's interesting, you bring this up, because, you know, we were just talking about my grandmother's, and we both passed away before I was an adult. And I've had some very interesting experiences with their memory, with my memories that are triggered by different scents that they carried in my childhood. And I remember really clearly, one day being at the National Library of Medicine of all places, researching and pulling up a recent research articles on herbal medicine, and just kind of out of nowhere, and I don't know if someone walked by or where this this aroma came from, but I had this, this smell that I experienced. And here I am walking next to these computers. And just out of nowhere, I was almost paralyzed with memories. And I remembered my Colombian grandmother from Bogota. And she is just like everything about her from the wrinkles on her face to her face, mainly because she always had the shimmering glow on her face. And I just remember her voice and, and it was all like a sudden experience after I smelled this interesting aroma passed by. And so it's almost like my grandmother just came to visit me at the National Library of Medicine that she may have, because my mom told me she was really interested in herbs and probably just affirming my research and things like that. But I didn't know what the aroma was associated with until a couple years later, when I actually smelled a essential oil of Helichrysum, which is a real healing plant that's really popular for like healing scars, and to topical and a lot of like face creams and preventing, like aging and you know, things like that. And I remember that my grandma had this cream that she used to make and apply and have this shimmering, glittery hue to it. And now I know that to be like mother of pearl, that was ground into powder, and that cream had Helichrysum in it. And so, and then that's she wore every day, so that really am grateful for that for Helichrysum, you know as a kind of reminder of my grandmother. So yeah, and then like, even years later, ironically, I got this spritzer of a Helichrysum hydrosol from a good friend of mine, herbalist, Erica Glenton, and Erica had sat with the plant and determine that the Helichrysum was associated with the healing of generational trauma. And I just thought that was so interesting, because I associated Helichrysum with my grandmother. And so yeah, it was just wonderful, because I then like I got some of this hydrosol and, and gave it to my, my oldest children, and my mom and I, and I said, Look, you know, we're gonna heal all of our generational traumas, from the grandparents to the grandchildren, and so powerful to have that message, come through with the sense of Helichrysum. And then I also had that a similar experience with my Mexican Abuelita and this was more of my grandmother, my Abuelita used to make this Mexican hot chocolate, which probably most grandmother's and Mexico have their hot chocolate recipe that they hand down, and I didn't get that recipe. So I wanted to just recreate it as a grown up in my own kitchen. And so I kept experimenting with this hot chocolate. And I kept like, it was wonderful. Like, you know, what I made was great, but there was like something missing. And I couldn't quite pin what was in that hot chocolate that, that I needed to stop missing ingredient until years later when I was like sitting in an herb class. And there were these little baggies of cinnamon coming around the room, different varieties, different species, and I smelling these different cinnamon. And finally I got this little bag of cinnamon, and it said Cinnamomum verum, or true cinnamon, and I opened that bag and I just took a whiff. And it happened so suddenly it like all of a sudden I could see the turquoise walls and my grandma's kitchen I could like hear her stirring the chocolate pot. I could hear her little voice I could like smell the cinnamon and chocolate and it was just like all of a sudden I knew that, that was my grandma's hot chocolate. That was the missing ingredient. That was the aroma that my grandmother held for me as a child. And so that was just such a interesting experiences. And as a science person also I've learned that aromas, these tiny little aromatic molecules. They're so tiny that they float into the air and they're airborne, which is why we can smell them because they just kind of washed into our nasal passages. And they and they land on this olfactory bulb like little receptor and a key. And as soon as they land on that bowl, they send a message like this immediate message to the frontal lobe of your brain. And lo and behold, that's like, what people say, memories are affiliated with that part of your brain. And I think that when we make memories, we store those memories of long with the aromas that were present when we made those memories. And so often, to access those memories, you can use that aroma, this a good student tool, if you're studying to memorize a list of plant families or something, and you have a certain signature smell around you like Rosemary or Oregano and, and then later when you're actually taking the test, so you can smell that smell that was in the room with you, when you memorize that lists. And I used to do this as a student, I would like braid Lemongrass into my hair, or put little essential oil drops in my hair and in my braids and, and then like, just kind of smell them when I needed that memory retrieval. So yeah, it's kind of geeky, but also super profound with the memories of my grandmother's.

Sara Artemisia: 16:32

Beautiful and just so amazing that they could live on in that moment. In those moments, as you were discovering, rediscovering your grandmother's hot chocolate recipe, and just the power of Helichrysum for healing. generational trauma. Certainly, I feel that that is such a huge thing that so many of us are doing in this lifetime right now. And just how amazing that the plants can be allies in that process. So yeah, thank you so much for sharing that and, and how scent is such a powerful way for connecting with the plants. And I was curious too you are there some other ways that you connect with plant consciousness and their and their healing abilities that you'd be open to sharing?

Mimi Hernandez: 17:17

I think that it's as simple as you know, similar how you responded to my story about my Mexican grandmother's kind of role in holding space and sitting with people. I think it's similar in that the plants hold space with me. And I can like, they pull me up for platica, like, I can go and I feel this invitation to just sit with them. And then it's almost like I hear that voice of like, tell me what's happening. And then it gives me a chance to really sit and be like, Look, here's what's happening. You know, here's how I'm feeling. And here's what this week has been like, and here's where I'm hurting and, and just, it's almost like, they're the Curandero to me. And so I think it's just sitting with the plant, with a plant or standard plants or even in the forest, you know, feeling summoned feeling invited to share with them. And especially in times when, because I'm very emotionally vulnerable person when I feel alone, or when I feel kind of hopeless. And then I go outside, and then I remember, "Oh, I have friends." And I just kind of take a walk and I'm like, "Hi". And I feel like they're excited to see me. You know, I feel like they're giggling with me. You know, I feel like if you know Chickweed, all Chickweed knows you. Even if it's a plant in a different state, it's Chickweed. And I feel like there's this unified consciousness of Chickweed that greets me with a giggle every time I encounter it. It's like, oh, "Hi, Mimi!", and they're like giggly and they're all just like fun and excited to see me and I hear that. Even if it's like a totally different Chickweed patch in a totally different country. It's like I feel the giggle. And so, yeah, I think just like sitting with these plants. One of my soul plants is called Rue. And it's not a giggly plant. It's more of a very kind of deep and dark, who found a plant of a serious Nature and, and really helps me clarify vision. I mean, it's associated with vision, and it just kind of helps me when I can't see clearly, it's got this profound ability to, to kind of clear the cobwebs of a vision, and clear the cobwebs when you feel like this sticky kind of energy around you, and it may or may not be your energy and and very often it's not your energy, especially if we're on the internet a lot and scrolling social media and watching the news that we kind of take on this kind of sticky webby energy around us. And it doesn't feel it's not crystallized, it's not in Curanderismo. Rue is one of those plants that we use this, it's a limpia. And the way I see it is like it's cleaning the cobwebs. It's so such a wonderful experience, and it takes its role very seriously. I think those might be a couple examples where I feel like plant consciousness is in relationship with my own consciousness.

Sara Artemisia: 21:02

Yeah, wow, that is so great. Such great examples, too, with the Chickweed. I love first of all that you just shared about the unified consciousness of Chickweed creates you with a giggle, like, yes, I love that. And I feel that too, you know, when I'm outside, walking with the plants, and just walking among friends, and how great that is where, you know, when I travel, and then I see some plant friends who I know here back in the Northwest of the United States, just how amazing that is to feel this connection of plants all around the world. And we were talking about Prickly Pear earlier and how it's Prickly Pear growing Nereo and there's also some out here and just how amazing that is. And Rue just so powerful. Do you feel that there's a connection with Rue also with the lineage piece in my understanding, that's a plant that a lot of people work with in Central and South America as well.

Mimi Hernandez: 21:49

It is so, so pervasive in Central South America and Mexico as a healing plant. And it's not native to to Latin America. It's more of a like Mediterranean native plant. But as an introduced plant, it's something that has really profoundly developed relationships with Latin American Folk Healers. And definitely I watched my Abuelita and Mexico, heal a family member from the Mal Ojo. It was my little sister who had been at the market. And she was so cute. And a lot of people were just like, adoring her. And she literally just fainted in the middle of the market. And we ran home with her and laid her on the bed and my Abuelita did this. They also do like this cleanse with an egg. It's like a diagnosis. And she like, swept her whole body with this egg and then crack the egg in a glass of water. And I just sat there watching it with her hanging on her apron strings. And all of a sudden, this yoke that was suspended in the water, this little button popped out of the yolk. And it literally looked like an eyeball staring at us. And that's when my grandma was like, oh, it's in Mal Ojo. It's the bad eye. She's been affected by the gaze and she knew exactly what to do. And she went and grabbed some Rue and put it in water and like started sprinkling the Rue droplets over her body and I kid not like she woke up right away. You know, so yeah, Rue has some strong connections with like what I've seen growing up, and then what I've discovered in my own journey with Rue throughout my life as an herbalist.

Sara Artemisia: 23:41

Well, that is so powerful and so powerful that she knew what to do in that moment. And to me that speaks so deeply to how important it is to remain connected to these ancient lineages of healing that this is so so important. Because when we encounter different maladies or imbalances in the human experience, we can be better equipped with a multitude of tools, a multitude of layers to adequately address what's going on, on the level that it's going on that this is to get to the root of what is happening, and that there are many different ways, many different places where that root can be seated. And so it's so important to to be connected. It's so wonderful that you were, that you were there for that, that you were able to experience that at such a young age. Yeah, and I want to come back to something that you were also sharing about as well with this experience that you have of walking outside connecting with the plants around and how so important that is and I know that one of your biggest passions in life as well is stewarding native plant sanctuaries. So I was curious if you could share a little bit about that. I know right now you are stewarding the Pondoland native plant sanctuary if you'd be open to sharing about that and then really anything else that you'd love to share?

Mimi Hernandez: 24:58

Why. Yeah, it's been like a huge kind of emergence in recently in my life because I've always been a city girl. And I've always dreamed of having just a little patch that I can steward and, and take care of and teach from and just protect and love on. And about three or four years ago, I had experienced a dream of buying my first home. And where I was like really looking for really kind of just looking in neighborhoods and like your common everyday neighborhood. And my real estate was like, let's step outside of the box. And let's go check out this place out here that's in your price range. And it's a little bit extra drive, but I know you'd like gardening and you're herbalist and you might love this. So I came out here with my fiance, Terry. And the second we stepped out of the car. We're like, what the same price of these neighborhood homes with four acres and just a cute little farmhouse. And that acreage had meadows and it had a pond and it had this floodplain and had some forest and it was just like more than I ever could dream of. And so now I realized that that was definitely I was called to this land. And you know, when you're buying a house, it gets very nerve wracking. You're like you don't know if your offer is going to be accepted. If the inspection all this and I just remember praying and praying that, you know that I knew that this was the place for me. And I know that you know, I would if this place became the reality for me that I would take care of it. And I would steward it and I would teach and love on it. And so yeah, we bought that house, we bought the house in November. And so I didn't even know what kind of plants were here yet because it was the winter. But it was magical in the spring, started getting out and taking walks and discovered this whole like and just one acre of woods, we've got this whole cove of Black Cohosh, and Bloodroot and Yellow Root and all these beautiful native plants to the foothills of Appalachia is where I am. And I just didn't want to just jump in, even though it was my dream, I didn't want to jump in and say okay, I live in on four acres. And now it's officially a native plant sanctuary. I really took my time with that because first one of my teachers will Rocio Alarcon who is a Curandera from Ecuador has had a really enormous influence on on me and herbal spiritual healing. Her first Rue, she's like, if you want to be a Curandera, the first step is to know your landscape. If you want to be a healer, you have to know your landscape. And so I was like, I'm gonna be very slow about this and really just get to know the landscape here, from the lower, the bottom of the woods, by the creek to the top of the woods where the Pine trees are to the ridge above the meadow to the pond and what's around it, the seasons through the year, just really take inventory and get to know these different layers and how the soil is and the trees. And so that process took a good couple of years, and taking inventory and really learning my botany. And I literally catalogued all these plants, I'm using a database and I've got now I've identified over 120 wild native plants on the land. And some of them that are hard to find, or they're at risk that 20 of those are listed on United plant savers at risk and critical list. So at that point, recently, actually, it was just happened in June, that I finally submitted my application to become a native, become a member of the United Plant Savers Botanical Sanctuary Network and I was accepted and that was a huge momentous occasion for the Ponderland. And you bet it's something I wanted to take really seriously and not jump into just like really like like Rocio says really know the landscape and I'm still learning every time I go out. I was just out this weekend and discover like three new to me plants and and no matter how many times I've walked the woods, I still see new things like I had a good friend of mine, Mark Williams, who's also an herbalist came through and we went for a walk together. And he's like really tall and I think he just had a different viewpoint than I did and he like taking a short walk with him. I learned like three or four new plants that I hadn't didn't even know were there. They're still introducing themselves to me. So such a beautiful experience.

Sara Artemisia: 29:54

Oh, congrats on your new home and on becoming a UPS Plant Sanctuary. That's amazing and I just love how the plants are still revealing themselves. So introducing themselves to you and just incredible, you've cataloged over 120 plants. It's amazing.

Mimi Hernandez: 30:08

Yeah, it's unbelievable. I live in a very rich, beautiful area of the foothills here in Polk County, North Carolina.

Sara Artemisia: 30:18

And what inspired the name Ponderland?

Mimi Hernandez: 30:22

I think it was just the pond. The pond is definitely such a central feature. It's like right in the front yard, 10 steps off the front porch. And it's like, this is a place where we're pondering our future. And we're manifesting our goals together. Terry and I came in together with this property. And the whole expression of the Pondered land has been a manifestation of our unified vision as partners, and soon to be married, we're actually getting married on the Ponderland. So just want to share this beautiful space with all of our family and friends, and really just give a lot of appropriate acknowledgments to the ancestors. And this is we're on Cherokee land here and protect this little piece of land for future generations. And because we're surrounded by huge tracts of land, every side, there's neighbors who own like 40 or 200 acres of land. So we're just this like little island in the middle of these big properties, who are off sometimes clear cutting, and just like I can't do anything about that, but I can do something about just this little patch of land and keep it safe.

Sara Artemisia: 31:39

Amazing. Yeah, clearly, you were called there. Yeah. Thank you so much for doing that. And congrats on getting married. So exciting. On the Ponderland. I was curious about that with the Navy to if it was a place to ponder about native plants. That's great. Yeah. So great. And then you recently wrote a book, I would love to hear about the book. And then also, specifically, how do you help people deepen their relationship with herbs in the book, any aspects that you want to share about that?

Mimi Hernandez: 32:05

Great, what a great question. Yeah. So since I've moved to the ponder, land, literally those full three years, I have been writing a book. And that's another thing that I was just kind of called to. Out of the blue, I got a call from editor at National Geographic, who was like, Hey, we were looking for you to see if you wanted to write a book with us, and who says no to National Geographics. I'm like, Okay, I've been called to share what I've learned through my life and herbalism, and from my grandmother's, and from these different traditions. And so yeah, the book does harness or those Ford's relationships and encourage individuals to be in relation with plants, the way it's organized, it's nine chapters, and a hundred herbs from different world traditions. And really, it's a journey. And that journey begins by an immersion in the sensory experience of herbs. And in some way, it's a journey from the micro to the macro, because it starts on a very personal level, where I'm encouraging people to use their senses to experience herbs like the taste, the smells, the feelings that these herbs energetics that these herbs induce when you're near them, and when you taste them. And then from there, we kind of go to an equally intimate place of your kitchen, the healing kitchen, which is where really healing begins for so many cultures. And so we explore healing remedies in the kitchen and healthy foods and, and from there, we kind of take a step aside into the apothecary or the medicine pantry, and we talk about medicine making and DIY recipes. And of course, then we kind of step out the front door and into the garden path. And there we cultivate allies and, and also weeds can because wondrous weeds are also part of the medicine so we really explore that concept of you know, my favorite garden plants, and then my you know, our favorite weeds. And from there we just enter the woods and we explore healthy woodland habitats. And we ponder, we ponder the community uses of herbs. We explored different types of herbalism, from like the sacred herbalist to the clinical herbalist to first line medic herbalist and people who tend to their communities and in different ways in the realm of herbalism. And then we kind of go from the community level to the global level, where we uncover a lot of the secrets of the world's most traveled herbs. So these are the ones you see on the market, and really a lot of critical topics relevant to the environment and the ecology and the Indigenous and just ethical and ecological considerations of the global supply chain and really just bring it back to the traditions. And we feature so many traditions in the book including Curanderismo and the Gullah Geechee herbal tradition and Ayurveda, traditional Chinese medicine and wise women herbalism. Just so really giving a lot of spotlight to some of these worlds traditions, and especially to the concept of the Ethnosphere and the preservation of these traditional wisdoms, which I think is so important, because there's a lot of attention these days on the biosphere of the planet and not losing species and to extinction and things like that. But I'm equally concerned about the cultural sphere of the world and the loss of languages and the loss of different traditions and different ways that we know how to engage with plants. And the Ethnosphere is a concept from Wade Davis, who's a very well known ethnobotanist. Yeah, so it's a beautiful experience. And it's beautifully photographed and illustrated. And just another thing that's just kind of beyond my dreams. And available now, for pre orders on any of your favorite book outlets like Amazon or Barnes & Noble. So it's, it's, it's hard to believe I'm actually holding a copy of it right now, a pre copy because my publisher sent me an advanced copy. And so I'm holding it in my hand, and you're the first person I've talked to about it outside of my immediate family. So.

Sara Artemisia: 36:53

it's so gorgeous, too. I'm so excited to read it, it just sounds so incredibly comprehensive.

Mimi Hernandez: 36:58

It really is. I mean, it is actually built from a course that I used to teach. That was it was like an eight-week course. And it started with sensory herbs and then it was like garden herbalism and then it was weeds herbalism and then woodland herbalism. So it really is just kind of a journey through this course that I used to teach in. But I learned a lot writing it because you know, you think you know herbs and then you're gonna write about in, so I just did a lot of research and you just like so great. It's almost like being a student again, when you're a teacher, you're always a student. So this endless exploration, right?

Sara Artemisia: 37:39

Yeah, and I love how that is certainly the case of the plants. It's It's endless. It's a lifelong journey of learning with them, which is just absolutely love. And so clearly your work is so powerful and incredible. So tell us how can people find out more about you and your work?

Mimi Hernandez: 37:53

Super well. My website is theponderland.com or mimiprunellahernandez.com, they all go to the same place. In the process of getting a new website, the existing website is still super sweet. And I'm on Instagram @herbalforger. And kind of new to it. So like my Instagram and then spread the word, because I'm like really kind of learning all those ins and outs of posting reels and all that. It's like, wow, I'm really being calm. I'm like 51 years old and being called to learn Instagram and all this stuff. It's been fun. I do love taking pictures and teaching so that helps. And then I just made this new Facebook page, anticipation of the book and it's Mimi Prunella Herbal, and on Mimi Prunella Herbal that's just going to be my forum for just sharing herbal inspirations and herbal education and just like making educational and inspiring posts as much as I can. So hopefully, that'll be super engaging for for the fans who wanna flock over there.

Sara Artemisia: 39:08

Love it. Well, Mimi thanks so much for joining us today. So incredible.

Mimi Hernandez: 39:15

Thank you. Yeah, I love it. You've got such a great demeanor and a very grounding presence. And honestly, I feel like so much more grounded and rooted than I did when I first got on the call with you. Like, just the session in and of itself was a healing experience. And I'm so grateful.

Sara Artemisia: 39:34

Oh, thank you. So great. Thank you. You're welcome. And thanks so much for listening and joining us today on the Plant Spirit Podcast. I hope you enjoyed it and please follow to subscribe, leave a review and look forward to seeing you on the next episode.