I want to ensure that everyone is clear about the role and aim of the Wise Herbal Ways patreon. Broadly, within it, we are looking at the history of Britain. In a more defined focus, it is about the women and the system of healing. That healing system includes the wider ideologies of animism and magical and shamanic thinking.
I want to define this because I see St. georges crosses and British flags, and people trying to conflate the British culture with racist ideology. I am seeing so many videos of ignorant, racist English white people yelling at brown people for no reason, expressing ideologies from the colonial days. ‘Make Britain great again’ and all that bs.
This body of work is not about that. It is about seeing past the racism and It is here to speak to the ideocracy of the colonial period. It is here to tear down racism, fascism, and patriarchy. It is here to do the decolonial work. It is here to remind you of our ancient grandmothers who held the pre-colonial mindset that everything is alive, we are all one, and none of us are separate from the whole. That rasicm was an invention that enabled the upper classes to divert attention away from themselves and how they were building capitalist systems, the same diversion tactic that we see used today. The lands we call Britain have a history of colonisation, both being colonised and of being the colonisers. At what point do you return to say yes? That is the beginning of people being British. The British isles have always been a place of different cultures who came, invaded, and eventually interbred. Many people seem to get stuck at the Celts, who came from places like Portugal, or the Anglo-Saxons declaring they originate from this period, but they came from the continent and moved here after the Romans left. Then there was the Normans who came next and changed the face of Britain by replacing the nobles, implementing the feudal system, and greater punishments. Foreign peoples have created this land. They embedded themselves in this country and throughout history became part of the fabric that created Britain.
But archaeological research, which examines ancient DNA and artefacts to explore who these “indigenous” Anglo-Saxons were, shows that the people of fifth and sixth century England had a mixed heritage and did not base their identity on a biological legacy. The very idea of the Anglo-Saxon ancestor is a more recent invention linked closely with the English establishment.
Our research concluded that migrants during what’s now thought of as the Anglo-Saxon period were most closely related to the modern Dutch and Danish – and that the modern East English population derived 38% of its ancestry from these incomers. The rest of Britain, including today’s Scottish and Welsh, share 30% of their DNA with these migrants.
The idea of Anglo-Saxon is a romanticised and heavily politicised notion.
The DNA evidence points to an integrated people of mixed ancestry who lived side by side.
Anglo-Saxon ancestry is a modern English myth – the English are not descended from one group of people
https://theconversation.com/why-the-idea-that-the-english-have-a-common-anglo-saxon-origin-is-a-myth-88272
When I say that we are reclaiming our lost ancestral ways, I am referring to rediscovering and piecing together the cultural and spiritual, animism, parts of our heritage, which have come from various peoples and beings. Instead of trying to steal and co-opt spiritual practices from indigenous groups, we have tried to colonise, destroy, and belittle.
Unfortunately some clearly still hold to the deluded idea that this country rules the world, they seem to harken back to times when Britain measured heads of people and claimed them more or less intelligent, they hark back to the times when the British commited violent, genocidal acts across the world and deliberately caused faminines in places as far flung as Ireland, Persia and India. Excuse me if I don’t agree.
The energies of anger, fear, and supremacy are palpable. At this time, I encourage you to hold your truth and your boundaries, to smudge, to wear your evil eye pendents and to light your black candle of protection, to tell the malevolent forces and enties, and your unhealed ancestors that you do not collude with them, you do not accept them, they are not welcome to use your body or energy. Lovingly invite them to the light through the candle. But also do the practical work in the world, calling out the people who are themselves destroying the country.
This patreon is about reclaiming the wise women, and these women hold the spark of the divine feminine. They are strong, defiant, gentle, empathetic, and compassionate. Wisdom brings with it magical thinking, knowing that everything is infused with life and holding to the goal of liberation for all peoples/beings of this earth equally. Deep down, we all want a peaceful existence.
It is for people who want to learn about the past and also to do decolonial work, see the world in a different way, and imagine and bring about a new paradigm for all. We need people at this time who are resourced, who can connect with the other-than-humans and also see the action that needs done in the world and take that action from a place of wholeness with body, spirit and mind. Because this is what the establishment stole from us, they disconnected us from spirit and planted us solidly in the material realm. This patreon is not a new age woo, encouraging you to ignore the pain and suffering of the collective, and individualistically disconnect yourself and think love and light will fix it all. Because that is just another way to keep you complicit and quiet. People need you to acknowledge the injustice that is happening in the world, but not to feel guilt or shame about your unconscious involvement or the roles your ancestors played in it, as that won’t help anyone. We need you to see it all, hold it all, and transmute it all with grace.
To do all this we need to remember our roots – those roots may belong to many different places, we may be half from one country and half from another as we have said all lineages are mixed from very far back. But spirit sees us as whole, and perhaps if we are half, we have more work to do to root into two places and to bridge the gap. We also need to see our history and disconnection, to root into the land, to our plantcestors, reconnect with our bodies, and remember our ancestral ways.
To repair the rupture, we aim to become whole and rooted ourselves. It’s not a fast process. It takes time, but to get there, we need to be on the path.