As a kid, I loved to play in the woods adjoining my suburban neighborhood. It was the home of a grandmother oak tree, in which my best friend and I built a two-story tree house. We would fantasize about living tribally in a tree house village, living off the land while the rest of the world drowned in a tidal wave of their own industrial stupidity. That experience awakened in me a deep desire to live freely, with nature, in community. In high school we would return to that tree house and perform plant spirit medicine rituals, giving thanks for the tree and praying for the Earth’s healing.

While traveling the country and continuing my love for plant medicine, I was led back to my home state of Illinois to kindle a soul connection with a very special lady. With all the magic and healing that ensued, I began to embrace the beautiful hills of the Shawnee forest as my homeland. For the last three years I have lived with my partner, Earthdancer, and her son Ari, on a secluded six-acre solar-powered homestead surrounded by national forest. We grow food, raise ducks and chickens, and practice our ancestral heritage of co-creating with and protecting nature. Our intention is to assist in healing this amazing planet, while focusing on regional resiliency, sustainability and environmental justice. My philosophy and plan of action resides in a synthesis of traditional medicine, permaculture, activism, and primitive skills.

My life work involves co-creating a new model, through building Earth-based communities and local food systems that improve soil fertility and purify water, and by relearning and teaching the ancient wisdom of living in rhythm with nature, that which our ancestors successfully practiced for hundreds of thousands of years. That work also involves creatively dismantling the current paradigm, and supporting those on the front line of environmental justice, with food and healing.

I currently run a small herbal practice, where I am always willing to give free consultations for our activist warriors and farming healers. We operate Dancing Spirit Herbs and Crystals, our family business, which is mostly Internet-based and are currently procuring large acreage for a permaculture and traditional medicine farm, village, and retreat center. I’m an intermediate student, attendee of the 2014 seminar, and plan to finish the East West Herb Course in 2016.