SWIHA Blog

Have you been noticing communication issues, technological mishaps, or difficulty with your emotions lately? Yep, it’s true: We are in Mercury Retrograde until July 31st. Fear not! There is a simple ceremony that may help relieve some of the tension.

Smudging is an ancient Indigenous American ritual with thousands of years of history and the ability to powerfully cleanse energies. If you’re looking to reduce emotional and spiritual negativity in your body and living space, a smudging ritual is an excellent way to do so and Mercury Retrograde is the perfect time!

Rudy Frame is a Massage Therapist, Yoga Teacher and currently pursuing the 700-hour Western Herbalism program at SWIHA. He’s been a SWIHA student since 2005, when he took a course on Gua Sha while working in a chiropractor's office.

He tells us: “I took a different route of service for six years in the United States Marine Corps, traveled the world and completed a Bachelor’s degree. However, government work was no longer appealing to me. Like a light bulb it hit me: go back to SWIHA and work on my own healing journey from my short time of intense service in the Corps.”

Herbs and spices have been an integral part of cuisines around the world since the days of hunter-gatherers; and not just for their taste! Early Egyptians, Indians and Greeks are just a few cultures who have documented the use of herbs and spices for medicinal purposes and passed down their knowledge from generation to generation.

In the present-day, modern science has uncovered some fascinating properties to these tasty additions, reaffirming some ancient knowledge and discovering new ways of thinking about what we put in to our meals. As the great thinker, Hippocrates, advised us: “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.”

Today, we’ll be looking at some super seasonings and their studied health benefits!

Roann Monson re-defines 80!

After 30 years of working in the ASU library, Roann retired on a Friday evening and came to work in the SWIHA Bookstore the following Monday morning. She then enrolled in Western Herbalism, a two-year program that is one of the most comprehensive and rigorous herbalism programs in the country.

“People travel here from out of state to study herbalism here at SWIHA. I learned so much from the herbalism program. In fact, I drink rosemary tea every morning for memory,” reports Roann with great pride.

Also a graduate of SWIHA’s Spiritual Studies certificate, Roann is proud to say, “I was ordained as a minister in the very first class of students that KC Miller, the school founder, was able to ordain as ministers.”

The brain is such a complicated machine that we’ve barely scratched the surface of its mysteries. In the last five years, however, many researchers have focused heavily on how our minds are affected by things such as nutrition, environmental pollution, screen time and multi-tasking. They’re exploring beyond mental health and now observing brain health—the ways in which the organ is physically responding to our fast-changing lifestyle.

With every new study, science uncovers a facet of the relationship between our body and our body. Optimal brain health will be at the forefront of wellness in the upcoming years, so today we'll look at some ways that holistic healing can help support mind, body and spirit.

Are you looking to minimize exposure to environmental toxins, find effective alternatives to chemical-filled cleaners, and surround yourself with natural scents instead of synthetic fragrances? Essential oils will be, well...essential to your quest!

Essential oils are extracted from plants, capturing its scent and flavor or “essence”. These oils are obtained through various methods such as distillation or cold pressing, taking care to consider the chemical makeup of the plant and produce only a pure end-product.

According to ancient Chinese legend, Emperor Shen Nung was resting against a Camellia sinensis tree while waiting for his drinking water to boil. Suddenly, the wind picked up and caused the leaves of the tree to fall in to the steaming pot!

Instead of throwing out the water, Shen Nung decided to try the concoction. He described a warm feeling from the brew, as if the liquid was travelling to each part of his body, making a journey around his insides. He named the beverage ch’a, the Chinese character meaning “to investigate”. We now call it tea.

Before SWIHA, Carrie Guthrie-Gray was doing a job that would frighten most people to death: drawing blood. As a phlebotomist working for the same company for 15 years, she had great pay, great bonuses, and paid time off. Yet, despite the nobility of performing a service that is critical to the diagnosis and treatment of health conditions, Carrie found herself bored by performing the same task day-in and day-out with little variation.

“When working in the medical field, you are only allowed to spend a certain amount of time with each patient,” Carrie reflects. “It was like moving cattle. I was unable to connect with people, or if I did connect with someone, I had to usher them out of the room shortly after. When I worked in the oncology department, there were many occasions when I was the first person that the patient saw after being diagnosed with cancer, and they would literally start bawling in my chair. I wanted to spend more time with them. I wanted to listen and hold space for them, yet I wasn’t able to do it in that setting. It broke my heart. It was draining the life out of me to be so pulled to hold space, yet not allowed to do so.”

Heather Clore had always had a passion for herbalism and holistic nutrition, yet it was not until she became a mother that she realized she wanted to turn her approach to holistic living—and the approaches of her family and, eventually, her community—totally around.

“I knew when my son was born that I wanted to take an all-natural approach to raising him,” she explains. “I knew I wanted him to have a great, joyous, happy life and that herbalism and nutrition are both so important to that. I knew it would be best to raise him on nature and what the Divine gave us naturally.”

For Kris Vaughan, a career as an herbalist was born out of a mother’s worst nightmare: the illness of her youngest daughter, who had developed severe stomach issues at the age of seven, yet who could find no answers or relief from her pediatrician.

“We spent nine months putting her through every invasive test imaginable, only to be handed antacids and told, ‘Sorry, we don’t know what’s wrong,’” Kris recounts. A friend recommended some natural herbal remedies for the girl, and although Kris found herself questioning their validity, her daughter was miraculously pain-free within three days of taking them—and has remained so ever since. “It made me realize that I was missing something huge,” Kris says. “I needed to do some research as to why these herbs worked, and that research brought me to SWIHA and the Western Herbalism program.”