Episode 59: 'Unity Through the Power of Plant Medicine' with Rasheeqa Ahmad
Rasheeqa Ahmad is a community herbalist and project maker. She’s involved in developing the Community Apothecary vision of collaborative herbal healthcare in Waltham Forest, as well as part of the UK Radical Herbalism Network and the Mobile Apothecary in London.
Rasheeqa trained in Herbal Medicine with the aim of helping people (including herself!) to enjoy positivity and intelligent health in collaboration with our living universe. She’s excited by the possibilities of plant medicine, both those understood since ancient times and those emerging now. Rasheeqa believes that understanding our connections and symbiosis with the other living beings of the earth can yield great potential for our future development and success – all of us together.
Her practice encompasses consultations and treatment, plant-gathering and medicine-making, community activity including knowledge-sharing, practical workshops and herb walks, and vital connections with people and organisations working in peace and productivity with the earth and universe.
In this episode, we talked about:
Rasheeqa was fascinated by plants as a child, and remembers making up stories about them.
She studied English Literature and worked in arts marketing but she realised she was call to learn the ancient knowledge of the earth
Her father’s grandfather set up a ‘herbal medicine house’ in Northern India, based on ‘Unani Medicine’, an Islamic system that originated from Ancient Greek medicine
Rasheeqa studied at the Scottish School of Herbal Medicine in Glasgow
Hawthorn is good for the heart
“The potential of plant medicine is that you don’t have to rely on somebody else”
Feeling connected to the earth systems and connecting with the plants
Growing and gathering herbs in community to share the labour
Strengthening your own knowledge and autonomy and not having to rely on others for your own health
Shrubland Garden in Hackney , a community space in an old car park
Start with culinary herbs as they are familiar and also have medicinal benefits such as basil, mint, rosemary, lavender
Medicinal teas - infused for 15minutes- feel the effects in the body
Kitchen spices are anti-microbial and were used to prevent food spoiling
Linden trees or lime flowers are around in high summer
Elderflowers, hawthorn flowers
Mugwort
Buds in the Spring, Flowers in the Summer, Fruits in the Autumn
Understanding the close habitat around you
Keeping knowledge within the community so that people are equipped with the tools to be healthier
Privilege and herbal medicine
“Plant medicine is the medicine of the people”
Radical, community herbalism gatherings with practical skill sharing
Rhizome Community Clinic in Bristol
Lisa Flannan - Feminist Healthcare gatherings
Herbal medicine as primary healthcare e.g. in New Orleons
The direct impact of economic, gender, racial etc inequality on health
Goethian science, including the intuitive, magical view of the Cosmos
Nathaniel Hughes, The School of Intuitive Herbalism in Stroud
Karen and Fi, Sensory Solutions
Ancestral connection with plants
Rewilding
Herb walks
Lost knowledge of herbal medicine, especially during the witch hunts of Medieval times, and the lasting trauma from those times
Mama Dee - ‘Community Centred Knowledge’ - traditional knowledge from the Carribean
The ‘energetics’ approach, including elements and constitution
The Common House, Bethnal Green
Learning to make herbal medicines, from locally gathered herbs, for the community
Evidence-based medicine
Grassroots Remedies, Edinburgh
Herbalists Without Borders, Bristol
Herbalista, Atlanta: By The People, For The People
Sharing knowledge
Nicholas Culpeper translated the pharmacoeipias into English from Latin
Yarrow - a strong, protector plant
Resources
http://www.hedgeherbs.org.uk/links-resources-connections/
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