The Plant Spirit Podcast with Sara Artemisia

Herbal Mythology as a Gateway to Ecological Consciousness with Guido Masé

• Sara Artemisia / Guido Masé • Episode 67

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#67 - What ancient wisdom is hidden within the stories and myths of our plant allies?

Join us for an amazing conversation with Herbalist Guido Masé as we explore the intersection of plant mythology and clinical herbal medicine through his captivating storytelling and deep knowledge of folklore and science. As we settle into the darker months of the year - the traditional time for storytelling - Guido shares herbal lore of while revealing how these stories preserve profound teachings about plant consciousness and healing.

In this episode, you'll discover:
• How the plant mythology of Elder and Hawthorn contains hidden keys to understanding herbal medicine
• A powerful clinical case study featuring Hawthorn's ability to support emotional healing
• The fascinating science behind plant compounds like anthocyanins and their effects on human health
• Ancient landwork practices with Nettle and practical ways to be in community with green allies

Guido Masé RH(AHG) is a clinician and educator in the Western herbal tradition. He spent his childhood in Italy and has been living in Vermont since 1996. His practice interweaves clinical experience, mythology, and science. He is herbalist, principal scientist, and chief formulator at Traditional Medicinals, chief herbalist at Urban Moonshine, clinician at the Burlington Herb Clinic/Railyard Apothecary, founder and board member at the Vermont Center for Integrative Herbalism, teacher in herbal medicine at the University of Vermont, and author of The Wild Medicine Solution and DIY Bitters.

You can find Guido at: https://www.railyardapothecary.com/
https://www.traditionalmedicinals.com/
https://urbanmoonshine.com/

For more info visit Sara's website at: https://www.multidimensionalnature.com/
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Learn how to communicate with plant consciousness in the free workshop on How to Learn Plant Language: https://www.learnplantlanguage.com/

Sara Artemisia:

Welcome to the Plant Spirit Podcast with Sara Artemisia on connecting with plant consciousness and the healing wisdom of Nature. To learn how to communicate directly with plant consciousness, you can check out the free workshop at www.learnplantlanguage.com. And for Financial Coaching, Business Development Coaching, Flower Essence therapy, or one-to-one mentorship sessions, visit www.multidimensionalnature.com. I'm your host, Sara Artemisia, and I am deeply honored to introduce our next guest to the show today. Guido Masé is a clinician and educator in the Western herbal tradition. He spent his childhood in Italy and has been living in Vermont since 1996. His practice interweaves clinical experience, mythology and science. Guido is herbalist, principal scientist and chief formulator at Traditional Medicinals, chief herbalist at Urban Moonshine, and clinician at the Burlington Herb Clinic Apothecary. He is also the founder and board member at the Vermont Center for Integrative Herbalism, teacher in herbal medicine at the University of Vermont, and author of The Wild Medicine Solution and DIY Bitters. So Guido, thank you so much for joining us today. Such an honor to have you here.

Guido Masé:

Oh, the pleasure is all mine, Sara. I'm really excited for our conversation today.

Sara Artemisia:

Oh, thank you. Oh, man, I just love how in your work you bring the this bridge of this deep understanding of the science and the connection with the mythology of plants, and so I'd love to just start there, and I'm curious to hear about in your perspective, why do you think that plants have always had fairy tales and myths associated with them?

Guido Masé:

Really interesting question, because it's totally true. I mean, almost any fairy tale you run into has a plant in it somewhere, and many of our favorite herbs, from Nettle to Hawthorn and Yarrow and beyond have. These fairy tales associated with them that almost invest them with a life and spiritual quality and consciousness of their own, and this really interested me as a kid. I don't know that I have an answer, but I think at least in part, humans who have shared these stories for thousands of years across the planet are sharing them in part because they really think plants are aware. They're conscious, they have intention and agency, and really can mold and shape our lives, often in very beneficial ways, kind of like a fairy godmother might.

Sara Artemisia:

Love that. Do any fairy tales or myths come to mind about a couple of your loving herbal allies at the moment?

Guido Masé:

Yeah. I mean, there's so many. Some of the ones that I remember most from growing up were around the Elder and in the Dolomite region of Italy. She's known as fralhala or the elder mother. And, you know, I started asking questions when my uncle and, you know, my dad and my grandmother would, would like, take their hats off and tip their hat as they walked by the Elder tree. It's like, why are you doing this? What's up? And so I would get this, like slew of things, you know, my uncle would tell me that if you take a little branch off of the Elder and you tuck it in between the door frame and the wall on the front door of your house, it will tell the weather, and it will point up when things are starting to look good and point down when it's starting to look rainy. And then, you know, maybe my grandmother would tell me a story of the, you know, the industrious couple in the farm village who would spin Flax and make kids clothes for all of the kids who couldn't afford their own jackets in the winter and and how the elder mother came out of the mountains one Winter Solstice with her Flax maidens. And while these two folks were sleeping, she left this gift, this sort of ball of Flax, on the table. And when the farm couple woke up and found this ball of Flax, you know, the mother of the household started immediately weaving, and as she unrolled the ball, it just never got smaller. And you know, the elder mother had given her this unending gift of Flax to kind of reward her for her industrious work and support of the community. So this, this story, is one that shows me the sort of community building quality of Elder in and of itself, and also how plants try to have our back, and especially when we're doing things that increase community and increase connection, we can almost at least this what this fairy tale tells me, we can almost count or rely on plants to be able to support that type of work. If the work we're doing doing truly does build creativity, build community, build connection, it's very likely that the plants will have our back. May not be in an ending ball of Flax, but it'll still be something pretty cool.

Sara Artemisia:

True, you just showed that. It's so true, the plants have our back and and now, yeah, it might not be in a ball of Flax. And yet, I love how in the fairy tales about plants, how there is this encoded, archetypal information about healing and about consciousness that when we really listen to, okay, what is a symbology? What is this actually communicating? We can really understand who these plant beings are. On this deeper level, I love that about the fairy tales, the myths, particularly because they last over time, that there's this aspect of how, in some ways, they're just, oh, you know, whimsical tales kind of a thing. And then there's this other deeper layer to them. Are there any others coming to mind for you? Or even just stories about plants that you love, that you'd like to share?

Guido Masé:

I mean, Sara, there's so many. One that I think about often, and come back to over and over again, is a story about Hawthorn and this Hawthorn Hedge, and it's another story that comes from Italy, where I grew up, and it's about a young girl who lives with her grandmother, kind of on the edge of the mountains. And you know, it's it's late fall, and you know the leaves are all gone, and things are starting to look pretty gloomy and cold. And this is when her grandmother starts getting sick. She can't breathe. She's coughing a lot. She has to lie down in bed. Her legs and ankles are swelling. And of course, this is something that we would recognize now as potentially being symptoms of a disease like congestive heart failure. And you know, the girl doesn't know anything about any of this. All she knows is that she needs to keep the pot warm and cook some soup, because her grandmother was usually the one who used to do that, and now she's like bedridden and can't really help so she heads out into the forest to gather wood. And everything is so wet and moist, it's not going to be easy to build a fire. And she starts chipping away at this old stump, trying to get some dry bark. When this amazing, sort of shining, radiant being comes out of the fog and missed and says,"well, what are you doing that's never going to help with your fire." And the young girl looks at this Goddess spirit and says, Hey, I need to make a fire, so I'm trying my best. And she says, Well, let me give you an offer here. And she hands her this ball of just it's not spun yet. It's just wool, raw wool, and she says, If you spin this for me and bring it back tomorrow, you'll have, you know, warm fire and food, it'll all be taken care of. Don't worry. And the girl has no idea how to spin anything, but she says, this is the best deal I think I'll ever get so she grabs the fleece and heads back to her grandmother's house. And, you know, passes the little straggly hedge around the house, goes into the front door, and there's this roaring fire, and this delicious soup is, like on there cooking, and our grandmother's still in bed. So she feeds her grandmother some of the soup, and then starts to try and figure out how to spin this yarn, and after, you know, some hours, she finally gets it, and, you know, is able to make some some pretty decent string out of it. But it's her first attempt, so it's not incredibly good. So on her way back the next day to try and look for some more wood and bring back the yarn, she meets this shining, radiant being again. And being says, Well, how did the spinning go? And she shows the yarn. She's like, "I tried my best. It's not so good, but what do you think?" And the being says, "you know, that looks great, but I want you to keep it. And here's some more fleece. Spin this as well, right? And I'll just keep doing this. If you spin all the wool for me, you'll keep having that warm fire and that good food." And so, you know, day, you know, at the end of that day, she goes back, and she gets ready to cross this craggly hedge and go back into her house. But she's walking across the hedge, this little bird kind of comes into her trail, and it's this little thrush, and it looks kind of, I don't know, not like, not doing too well. One of its wings is kind of dragging off to the side, and she so she stops, and she says, "Hey, what's going on? All your brothers and sisters have left for the winter. Why are you still here?" And the thrush says, "My wing is broken. I couldn't fly with my friends, and so I'm stuck here, and I don't know if I'll be able to survive the winter. Can you please give me some of that amazing soft wool and string that you're making so I can line my nest, right, and stay warm?" And the girl thinks like, oh boy, well, supposed to make this for this, like, spirit being that I have no idea, like keeping my house warm, but I suppose I could spare today's supply for you. And so she gives a little bit of yarn to the thrush, and she walks into her house roaring fire, delicious stew. She feeds her grandmother, chats with her a bit, and then settles in to try and spend some more. So this happens again the next day, right? She gets more fleece from the sort of White Goddess, and then she meets the thrush again, who says, hey, it rained and all the stuff you gave me, it's not it's kind of falling apart. I need some more. And so she, again, out of the goodness of her heart, shares the next batch of wool with this little bird. And over and over again, this happens right throughout the winter months with, like, you know, a couple times a week, a new ball of fleece is given by this incredible being, and the bird asks the young girl to just have it over and over again. And she just can't help herself. She just keeps giving all of this spun wool away. As the season progresses, winter turns into spring and the plants start kind of blooming again in early April, and still, this relationship is happening until one day, you know, the being tells the young girl, well, it's almost time. Now I need you to take all of the string that you spun for me now on that hedge that's around your house. I need you to tie little stars out of the string and festoon or decorate that edge with all of this white string that you made. And Sara, know says the little girl, okay, I'll do that. But she thinks inside, I have no more string left. I gave it all to the bird, right? I gave it all to this thrush. So she's very crestfallen as she does the walk back to her house, and as she walks past the scraggly hedge, the bird says, Hey, do you have some more string for me? And she kind of looks at the bird and is like, I gave you everything already, and now I don't have any more. And this white Goddess has told me that I had to decorate the hedge with all these flowers made of the string that I don't have because I gave it all to you. And what am I going to do when she finds out what I've done? And the bird just looks at her and says, you know, don't worry about it. Tonight, everything will be clear. And so the girl has, like, no idea what this bird means, but she's very anxious. She like, tosses and turns, but finally falls asleep, and then in the middle of the night, she just hears this song. All these birds are singing, and the moon is full outside as she wakes up, and she slowly hearing this verse song. Walks out of the front door of her house, her grandmother is sleeping. The Embers are in the fire, and as she opens the door, she sees under the moonlight that her scraggly hedge around the house is a Hawthorn Hedge, and it has burst into bloom overnight, with all these white Hawthorn flowers decorating it like stars. And then that's when the thrush comes back to her, and this little bird kind of creeps up on the ground, flies up to her shoulder because its wing is now better. And as it flies up to her shoulder, and the mists recede and the moonlight illuminates the Hawthorn Hedge, the bird becomes that White Goddess, and turns to the young girl and says, this hedge is your reward for the goodness in your heart and for the care and compassion you showed to me. This hedge will bloom for you and for your grandmother every year, and you should make a tea from the leaves and the flowers for her. And every Fall it will make berries. And you can make jams out of those berries. You can make preserves and sell them at the market, and you and your grandmother can take it and it will warm your heart and keep you strong for years and years and years. And so, of course, immediately she started doing

Sara Artemisia:

That is amazing. Thank you so much for sharing this and following the advice and feeding Hawthorn leaf flower that story, so beautiful, and just how few things in that and berries to her grandmother within a few months. And then eventually, within a year or two, her grandmother regained really stand out to me, how we're clearly understanding how color to her face, the swelling in her feet reduced, and she just started feeling better. She always relied on the help of her Hawthorn can support the human healing experience in a way that young granddaughter, but they could see their way forward thanks, in part, to the goodness of this young girl's heart and is so much more fun to connect with than just memorizing, you to the herb that supports all of our hearts in the Hawthorn Berry. know, constituents, kind of thing that's so wonderful to anchor the experience with the plant into a narrative like this, and also, even more importantly, the reciprocity of the relationship between the human realm and the natural world and the plants that this, it comes through so clearly in this story, even from the beginning, where the shining being says, keep spinning and you'll keep having fire and good food. To me, this is such a key, pivotal teaching of the plants, of the plant world. And yeah, from that, I'd love to hear more about your perspective on the Nature of our human relationship with the plants and specifically with healing herbs.

Guido Masé:

Yeah. I mean, I think you're totally right, Sara, it's that ongoing, reciprocal engagement that ends up, I think, in a nutshell, building health and vitality and supporting the creative process for us, but for, really, for everything. And I'd like to just talk about Hawthorn a little more, and kind of in a different vein, because I think it illustrates a little bit of what you were asking. You know, Hawthorn Berry, and it depends on the varietal, but if you really let them write them, they turn into this almost like red, purple color, which, of course, is due to the pigments that are contained in the skin. And to a certain extent, the fruit of Hawthorn, these pigments. It's really interesting, right? The berry starts green, then it goes through kind of cream color, and then it's like pinky, and then it becomes less and less pink and more and more red, and eventually goes from red to purple, and that's when we know that it's ripe. So if you were a thrush, you know, flying around and you encountered a Hawthorn hedge that all looked kind of pink, you probably wouldn't pick those berries for food. So the pigment actually acts as a visual signal for ripeness, which stimulates engagement from the bird or even from the human, and it stimulates engagement at the right time, because it wouldn't do us any good to take Hawthorn when the fruit is under ripe, right, we might eat the berry and get a modicum of nourishment. It wouldn't be too tasty. But the seed that we would discard wouldn't germinate into a new tree because it just wasn't ready to do so, whereas if we pick it when the signal is right and it's telling us that the berry is going to be delicious, then we are also able to provide that gift to the plant of spreading its seed. And it doesn't really stop there, because that's a pretty straightforward sort of quid pro quo relationship, right? You get the Berry, you get the food, the pigment functions as a signal for the timing and I get my seed so I can make new Hawthorn trees. But if you think of it even a little more deeply, the pigment is not just a signal to our eyes that the berry is ripe. The sig, the pigment, which is made of anthocyanins, is actually a important regulatory molecule for the expression of the genes that are inside the cells of our bodies, and particularly the genes that code for things like the lining of our blood vessels and the level of inflammation, integrity and resilience for our heart muscle cells. So take it just a step further. You know the plants aren't just giving you a signal that the Berry is ripe. In this case, they're also saying and when you eat it, the information and the wisdom that this plant contains, in this case, in the form of chemistry, is also going to take care of you on the inside, so you can come back next year and you can participate in the stance again, and that is really profound to me. We don't even have to be aware that it's happening. And many times, you know, just like the young girl who had other things on her mind, fortunately, she was able to set those aside and really pay attention to the bird and be there with that bird at the time. We always have so many things on our mind, but when we eat Hawthorn Berries, whether we're even aware of it or not. There's work that's happening, there's communication that's happening, and there's wisdom that's being conveyed. And over time, this has really dramatic consequences. One of the most compelling experiences that I've had working with a client with Hawthorne. You know, she was fairly guarded as a person when we first started working together, and you know, she was there for managing her blood pressure. And Hawthorn is one of the herbs that we turn to for support amongst others in these cases. She was very guarded, she shared very little. Her body language was very closed up, at least during the first few clinical sessions. And she do provide, you know, some of the detail that I normally go into when spending a couple of hours with an initial client. So I said, let's start simple. We'll do some Hawthorn. We'll do it for a few weeks, and then we can see what other parameters we need to adjust to help manage your blood pressure. And she was willing, and you know, she came back in a few weeks. Not much happening. We know Hawthorn takes some time, but after about four to six weeks of working with just Hawthorn together, not only did her posture change a little bit. And this could have been in part, at least, because we were developing a relationship and rapport over the last four to six weeks. But I maintain it's also a little bit because of the Hawthorn and she shared with me this compelling piece of personal history that she said that she had not really ever shared with anyone else, which involved, you know, pretty tragic loss of a newborn child years and years and years and years before, the child had been married, and she literally had not been to the grave site since, but that now she really felt called to do that, and that actually happened. And after that, her blood pressure changed. Her blood pressure changed and went down. And we can ascribe that to the chemistry that Hawthorn provided, but we can also, I think, ascribe it, at least in a little bit in part, to the openness that Hawthorn allowed in this person, and I've seen this in myself, too often there's an order that I take every day, and partly it's because I really feel like it protects my heart. I have a family history of heart disease, but beyond that, I feel like it keeps my heart open, open to possibilities, open to new directions and creative input, and if I'm not open to those possibilities, I really think I miss out and the diversity and richness of my own life experience, as well as the possibilities that I can contribute to the world, all of those become impoverished. So Hawthorn and herbs more generally, increase our diversity of experience, and in so doing, enrich the types of gifts that we can provide to the world. And that's what I think is really important, right for humans to be able to share the gifts that they have inside them, and for herbs to be able to help facilitate that process. And you know, it's easy for me to say, as a person who has a garden, as a person who has access to like, amazing organic herbs. It's not true for everyone, but in almost any environment in which you live, you can find Dandelion, you can find other plants. You can find them in safe ways, even in urban parks, even on a window box, and even if you bring one or two plants, and you know, a little Lemon Balm to brighten your mood, a little Dandelion to take before meals. These have subtle but cumulative ability to shift our conscious experience and shift it in a way that increases openness, and that increases, again, the ability for us to share our passions and our gifts of the world, which I think is so important.

Sara Artemisia:

Incredible. Thank you for sharing that there's so much in there. What you just shared how the plants can really help us open up to new possibilities increase the diversity of our experience, and how plants can really support the process of facilitating us to express our gifts more fully. That is absolutely something I have personally experienced in an incredible way. It's a huge part of why I've dedicated my entire life's work to the plants, because I love them so deeply and I'm so grateful for everything they offer. And also, you were sharing there about Hawthorn with the many different layers of how plants support the human experience, and how, like you were sharing when you eat the Hawthorn Berry, in the form of chemistry, the plant is also going to then impact you on the inside, that there is actually this communication, as you said, that's happening on the biochemical level that we may not even consciously understand, and that's okay. It's completely okay that we don't understand it. The point is to just have more interaction, to bring them more into our life. And so I'd like to shift a little bit more into that realm with the science, and I'm curious to hear your thoughts on how recent discoveries around the impacts of things like the environment, microbiome, you know, phytochemical exposure, how does this really inform our understanding of the human experience?

Guido Masé:

Yeah, I mean, that's, that's kind of what we've been seeing a lot of, right? It's microbiome. Bugs inside our gut, of which there are trillions, not only inside our gut but our skin, right throughout, there's these other organisms who inhabit us and whose populations impact our mood. There also is a pretty good understanding that there are what we might call social cultural determinants of things like mental health issues, that people who are stuck in food deserts, in super hot, plant-free urban streets or in areas that have been historically marginalized. Have a greater degree of mental health burden. It seems so simple to understand when you think of it that way, but the thing that I'd like your listeners to think about, at least for a moment, is that the implication here is that whether it's, you know, buildings and environment around us, or bugs and other organisms inside us, our thoughts are not fully our own, our mood, what we experience, how we behave, how we think, the things that we feel motivated to do, the things that excite us, we tend to think that it all comes from in here, in our brain, in our head. That's really not true, and that's what, like you said, a lot of modern research is beginning to uncover now. And if a gut bug is able to make you feel cranky and like say a snippy thing to your partner, right, because of an imbalance in microbial populations in your GI tract, or is able to sour your mood and make you feel super sad, or, conversely, really ecstatic and creative. Then where exactly do my moods come from? Where exactly does my conscious experience as a human being come from? Is it entirely contained inside the skin bag, or even more specifically, the cranium? I would venture to at least entertain the possibility that our consciousness is not localized to the skin bag or to the cranium, that it extends outward. And I'm not talking about, you know, a visible aura and like electromagnetic particles or anything that can be tangible, or maybe it is. I don't think it's necessary to think of it that way. Basically, a lot of the modern understanding of what consciousness is uses information based language to describe it, and it also uses relational and systems based language to describe it. Essentially the process that we use to sort of have a conscious thought or be attentive to something is this process of using our internal model of the world and comparing it to the sensory experience and seeing where the discrepancies are, right? But you know what that same exact process happens within an ecology, and you see the same homeodynamic balancing processes. You see the same plasticity and metaplasticity that neurologists are looking at in our brain at work inside ecological processes. So let me give you just a brief example here that hopefully will make it more tangible. If you go out into the Gobi desert, there are these islands that you can see every once in a while of life, and they dot the landscape. They're few and far between, but they're there, and they're all centered around Mulberry trees. And the Mulberry tree attracts silkworms specifically because of a compound Morin that is uniquely present inside their leaves, without which silkworm development cannot occur. They never grow, they never mature, they never can make more babies. But with the Morin and the Mulberry leaves, they can. And when the silkworm comes to the little Mulberry sapling and starts browsing on the leaves a little bit, the plant continues to grow, but it fosters the community of silkworms. The silkworms poop and enrich the soil around the base of the tree, at which point other plant seeds are able to take hold, and the soil becomes more stable and even more rich. And now all of a sudden, you've created this organism, an organism that's made of tree and silkworm and plants and mycorrhizae and bacteria inside that soil that is now alive and thriving. And you can see it so clearly because it's in the middle of a desert. So think of it that way, right? We are organs embedded in a larger ecology. We have this sense that we're individuals, but we're also not individuals. And part of what Hawthorn does is it tends this organ we call the human being. It tends the vascular system of it. It keeps its heart open so that it can be a conscious present participant in the ecological dance and in the homeodynamic processes that ensure the sustainability of ecology itself. So if we're willing to say that gut bugs can change our minds, if we're willing to say that our environment can change our minds. And if we walk in a forest, we can feel less anxiety. And if we walk in a routed, hot urban environment, we feel more anxiety. If we recognize that our consciousness is not fully our own, but is influenced by these external factors, then clearly plants, whether they're psychedelic plants and mushrooms, or whether they're a range of other plants have deep, profound impact on our conscious experience as human beings and our thoughts, just like our dreams. May actually be just the tip of the iceberg of this ecological consciousness flowing through us, but it only flows through us if we let it in, in part through the chemistry of communion that plants offer but it. Doesn't just have to be eating those plants, as you know, Sara spending time directly, just sitting with them, experiencing their world as they interact with pollinators, looking at them microscopically, looking at the rhizosphere and what's happening with the mycorrhizae. All of that provides great source of inspiration, learning and wisdom, and impacts our consciousness as well.

Sara Artemisia:

Amazing. Guido, wow, amazing, absolutely amazing. That story about the Gobi Desert that's incredible with the Mulberry trees.

Guido Masé:

Yeah.

Sara Artemisia:

Absolutely amazing.

Guido Masé:

That's the ancestral homeland of silk and the Mulberry tree. And you know, it's spread across the world since then. So how successful is this tree right in in terms of, I mean it, empires rose and fell. Empires rose and fell. We think we're so hot. Come on.

Sara Artemisia:

Exactly. I just love how when we really dive into the plants, it helps to give us a bigger perspective. And like, exactly like you were saying, how we are organisms embedded in a larger ecology, how does our whole understanding of what it means to be alive shift when we really start to open up to that, or at least, as you said, just entertain the possibility that that could be true? The other thing, there are so many things that you just shared absolutely loved one being how when there is ecologic, that there is ecological consciousness flowing through us, and that if we let that in, that when we let that in consciously, our whole experience of reality can shift, and this can range from, you know, very psychedelic plants to very common herbs, Dandelion, if we just eat Dandelion every single day, how would our experience shift? It may be subtle, but just to take note of what that is, and to me, that feels so connected to our very long co evolutionary history with the plants, and specifically the importance of the responsibility that we have to both connect with ongoing ecological engagement help to steward intact ecosystems. Remaining intact, there's so many benefits for doing that for me personally, the the biggest one being that in our modern world, there are so many mirrors of fragmentation that we are constantly bombarded by, and that when we go to Nature, I think, I think it was the Buddha who said famously, at one point, that if you look deeply into one flower, you will understand the whole Nature of The universe. That we can go in through one flower. And also to be immersed or connected with these bigger ecosystems, or ecological environments of wholeness. It helps us to remember our own inner wholeness, that this is, this is so vitally important, and just to have this ongoing ecological engagement. And so I was super curious to hear, with your experience, how does herbal medicine really play a role in this, in our responsibility for ongoing ecological engagement?

Guido Masé:

Yeah. Long story short, I think herbal medicine takes the intellectual exercise of, you know, quote, saving the planet and brings it into a very real somatic through physical practice. And that doesn't mean that we can't approach, you know, ecological stewardship intellectually, but as you know, when we get stuck in our heads, sometimes we make decisions that are not necessarily grounded, and for whatever reason, that has served as well some cases, in other cases, not as much, but plants allow that practice to become actually physical and real, which means that our cells and our organs and tissues begin to align with that sort of intellectual desire that we have to store these local populations. Beyond that, herbal medicine has taught me something really important, and this is something that modern science is actually starting to kind of recognize. There's some really interesting position papers, as well as, like, full length academic books that have come out on this topic. And it's a pretty simple topic, context matters at learning about medicine through, you know, modern biochemical textbooks and instructors, I learned that if you have the strong enough drug context, doesn't matter. But you know what? That's not true. And experienced physicians, for example, will know that not all SSRIs, like Axel, Prozac soloft, are the same, and some people, certain types of people, do better with one, and other people do better with another. And this is never in any other pharmaceutical research studies, right? But with herbs, context is crucial. And what I found is that one plant might do one thing in one human and a totally different thing in another person. And it's the relationship between the person and the plant that ends up shifting the conscious interaction pattern, whatever it may be. So the importance of context, that's what I learned from herbal medicine. I can't just give Hawthorn to everybody who has blood pressure issues and expect the same results. It just doesn't work that way, right? And I love that about herbal medicine, because it injects this art and it requires me, as a clinician to get to know the person that I'm working with, right? But the other piece, and I tell this story all the time, so forgive me for telling it again. I had a client who had digestive issues, a little heartburn, right? And he was taking Tums all the time. And, you know, I told him, you know, he was a little skeptical about herbs, like, just take a little Dandelion tincture before every meal, and come back in a couple weeks. Let me know what's up. Came back in a couple weeks. And we were using how many Tums do you take per day as a metric? And he was like, some days I'm not taking Tums at all, which was amazing to him. And he's like, I have this one question, are these the same Dandelions that grew in my yard? And I was like, Yes. And he turns around and says, well, I better stop spraying roundup on them. And so that is another important practical connection that again, having the received the gift from the plant world, right, of improved health and wellness. And having received it not from something that is produced in mechanized, modern industrial processes, nothing against that, right, but being able to see it growing in your yard, it's very different. And when the gift is received from another living being that has very close, intimate proximity to you, just like when you actually meet another human and have a conversation with them in person, it's difficult to stay mad at them, but online, it's so easy to be obnoxious. In that same way, when we make these direct, intimate connections with plants that improve our well being, it totally reframes our understanding of how we can treat the ecology, and I think it's in part because our mind is changing. And it's changing in part because the threads that are entering it now aren't just internal threads or threads from our family or from the internet or the New York Times. They now have let some threads from the ecology come in, too, and as a result, the conscious experience has changed.

Sara Artemisia:

Love that. Absolutely yeah, and how you were saying that, just like when we meet a human in real life, that when we encounter these plants, when we interact with them in real life, it reframes our understanding of how we relate to the ecology. It's so important to have this really embodied relationship with the plants. And then it doesn't mean, like you said, going really far away. It could just the cracks in the sidewalk. Dandelion grows everywhere. I love that about Dandelion. Oh, that's incredible about that story. I actually hadn't heard that story before, so thank you for sharing that. That's incredible. Yeah, amazing. I'm curious, are there any other any other final plant stories you feel called to share? Anyone coming to the forefront you'd like to share about today?

Guido Masé:

You know, I was, I'm lucky. My garden is happy and everything is lush and growing, but some of my friends who farm, particularly in the lower parts, have had some serious flooding impact. Have lost a lot of crops. So I've been thinking about this, another story from the Dolomites since then, and it's a use of a plant that maybe you haven't heard of, and I don't know you might find interesting, but it's about Nettle, which, of course, grows everywhere. So there's this farmer, the story goes. And if you've ever visited the Alps, the mountains are young, so they're rugged and the slopes are steep, and these farmers are growing on, like, somewhat terraced slopes, but they are really steep. Like, I get scared standing sometimes on the edges of these walls and storms will sort of, like, roll up the valleys and, like, fill them with clouds and just dump wind and rain. And potentially, because of the steepness of these slopes, have really, like, ravaged these farms and destroy them. So people are rightly concerned about this. So the stories of this farmer who had, like, you know, planted his first crop of squash and it got washed out, planted his second crop of squash and it got washed out. He finally had planted the third crop, and now the storm is starting to roll up the valley, and he's like, God, it's gonna wash out my third crop again, and it's now too late. I won't have any winter squash for storage, right? And storage of food crops is crucial, like, it's potentially life or death, right? In terms of traditional folks in the Alps weathering the winter. So he's panicking. He goes out there and the storm is coming. And he sits on this rock wall, you know, next to his compost heap where the metals are growing, and just looks out on his field with the baby squash plants, and and begins to cry. And all of a sudden he hears this little voice, and it's like, why are you crying? The voice says. And he turns around, and on the rock wall next to him is this little human looking thing, person with a red cap and a red cape. And there's these forest spirits that are called the Silvani in Italy. And they are that comes from the word Salaar Wild Wood, which, you know, that's where they get their name. But they basically look like the pictures of gnome, like garden gnomes, almost, you know, like those little statues that everybody has, well, this little like garden gnome with a red hat sitting next to him, asking him why he's crying. And he looks and he's like, they're gonna the storm is coming. It's gonna wash out my entire crop. And the Silvano looks at him, is like, what do you mean? You got metals right here? And the farmer looks confused. And he's like, "What do you mean, I've got metals right here. What good is that going to do me?"And the Silvano says, "Don't you know that if you get fresh Nettles out of the ground and you put them on a fire, no storm can pass through that smoke." And he's like, "Well, I didn't know that." So he's like, "thank you for the tip. I better get some right away." And he turns to start harvesting some Nettles. And as he turns back, the little Silvano has disappeared. He's like, okay, well, he gathers a big bunch of Nettles get some sting right away. Goes back into his house, where the hearth is. The storm is coming. He can hear the rumble of lightning, thunder from below the valley, and he just throws all those fresh Nettles right onto the fire, and they snap and they crack on this black, dark smoke starts going up the chimney, he rushes outside, and he sees that that smoke is like a line coming out of his house, and the clouds are kind of like parted by it, as if it were a knife, right? And they spread on either side of his field, and they come and rain is coming down, but it completely lives his field alone, and all of his little baby squash plants survive. And of course, the story goes, they survived till the end of the season, and he has a great harvest. But it's not a use of Nettles that I was familiar with, and in terms of herbs that are used for quote, unquote, weather working, or to impact storms and weather, which herbalists were definitely called on to do, at least back in the day, I worked with St John's-wort, which is considered to be a storm dispeller, for sure. And I've worked with Heather and sometimes Ferns, which are considered to be helpful for bringing rain when you need it. But I had never worked with metals, and so I've tried that since then, and I'll know that I can fully vouch for the Silvano story, but at least on a couple of occasions, it's totally averted the rain when we've thrown some fresh metal on the campsite fire.

Sara Artemisia:

Well, that is amazing. Thank you for sharing that.

Guido Masé:

Take it or live it.

Sara Artemisia:

Yeah, absolutely. And certainly, what was coming up for me is I was hearing you share that story is, of course, always looking into the multiple layers of stories and mythology, how you put fresh Nettle on the fire, no storm could pass through that smoke. It just has me think about how Nettle just supports the internal, you know, what? What's the symbol of a storm would be some kind of sickness or something, and how Nettle just really supports, it's a great tone of fire, great nutritive to really support the overall health of the body that you know the storms won't come as much in the human experience when we when we eat nettle. So, yeah, I love that. And clearly, such a treasure trove of wisdom that you have shared with us today. And I know there are so many more things beyond that, and I would love to hear how, how do you feel that the plants really support you in your life's work?

Guido Masé:

Yeah, Sara, that's a great question, and I'm so grateful for the plants in general in my life's work, but also just in my experience as a human, I think plants support me, not even, not only in the work that I do, but in my ability to have good relationships with other human beings and be a good dad and be a good husband and be a good gardener. Anyway, they support me in a lot of different ways. There's specific ways. I can take Echinacea when I feel like the first signs of things. I can make decoctions with Astragalus and Mushrooms, starting in late August, early September, to kind of keep my health good and resilient throughout the winter months, I can use Yarrow on wounds, which are done countless times. It's just so good. So there's these very specific ways that plants can impact human suffering, and we've defined these in our herb books, and we tell stories, and we have the pharmacopias, and this deep sort of, what we might call clinical knowledge is vitally important, and I think even more so as we move forward in the 21st century, where we're starting to see, at least, you know, as you put it, metal as a tonic, helps us weather the storm, because it changes the context right of our internal milieu, so that we are more resilient, right? But beyond this, being able to have a greater diversity of plant chemistry in my life by eating a range of different herbs who have not been hybridized by agriculture, right? They're not Carrots, which, if you look at what happened to Wild arrot as it entered the produce department, it changed drastically, right? Even though it's the same species, they present a rich well of phytonutrients. These phytonutrients, I believe, are information carrying molecules that help regulate and modulate our own internal system, keeping it more resilient, helping it be more creative, and helping it also be able to dissipate and weather those storms that come through our life. In more effective and graceful ways. So bottom line, it doesn't have to be Echinacea. It doesn't have to be Astragalus and Reishi. It doesn't have to be Nettle. It has to be the plant that speaks to you. And put that plant in your mouth. Take a bath in it, get involved with it, feel where it grows, see who likes to be with it. That practice of sort of engaging with plants as whole, living beings worthy of equal respect, who are conscious, aware, wise and able to modulate our lives as a species and as individuals for the better, I think, will change the way we walk on this world. And that's why I think herbal medicine is really important, not because it provides us a way out of antibiotic resistance in pathogens like MRSA, not because it provides us a true way to deal with chronic inflammatory diseases like arthritis that don't involve using NSAID drugs that are potentially bad for us long term, not because it helps us modulate our individual mood in a way that is more sustainable and potentially has fewer consequences than some of the pharmaceutical strategies for that, but because it truly lets us tap in to a very, very ancient, wise source of useful information for us to walk more sustainably, consciously and creatively on this planet. So whatever it is that speaks to you from the botanical world, from the wild world of plants and mushrooms, that's where you should start. It doesn't have to be anything specific that another herbalist has told you. You know, you gotta take Salvinia to the norm, or you gotta start with Hawthorn, or you've gotta start. No, it's whatever speaks to you. And use that as an entry point. I take it on faith, and I've seen it happen over and over again, that when you start letting plants into your life, everything changes, and it changes in a way that increases resilience, it increases creativity. It lets you see different perspectives, and let those perspectives in in a way that I think is connected to a greater degree of empathy. And in this world, where, as you put it, everything is more fractured and community is difficult, and we're starting to interact more and more through these devices, I think it's going to be ever more important for us to have the connection to this community of green allies who will help us remember that we can be in community, not only with them, but with each other. And I, I really expect that only goodness can come from that. And by goodness I mean creativity and resilience and mutual respect.

Sara Artemisia:

Incredible. Well, thank you so much for sharing that. Guido, so good, so good. And so tell us, how can people find out more about you and your work?

Guido Masé:

I am generally not on social media and don't really have a personal website. So you can find more both through urbanmoonshine.com website and through traditionalmedicinals.com website, that's probably the best place to get started. But honestly, there's stuff out there, from videos to articles, and if you search Guido Masé herbalist, you'll find most of those pretty easily.

Sara Artemisia:

Well, thank you so much for joining us today, for for being here, for your presence, for your incredible wisdom, and for your life path in such deep connection with the plants. Thank you.

Guido Masé:

Wow, Sara, those are really huge, lovely words. I really appreciate it, and I want to honor the work that you do too, and big gratitude for asking me on and I'm grateful to be able to share really what plants have taught me. So thanks.

Sara Artemisia:

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.