My story

roots

I come from a wild and strong weaving with ancestors from Ireland, as well as some DNA surprise threads from Peru, Mexico, Hungary, and India. My Irish and Cornish ancestors emigrated to Australia many generations ago. They are lineages of healers, musicians, artists, and miners and I honour their great sacrifice and the gifts I’ve inherited from them. I was born and raised under the Southern Cross on the unceded country of Gundungara and Tharawal First Nations in Australia. The songs of the surf and the bush, the ancient perfumed flora, and the many amazing creatures nourished a really intimate relationship with the sensuous magic of nature.

darkness

Like most of us, and as life would have it, there was darkness and trauma, and I lost my way. And like many of us, I numbed and escaped with alcohol, put a smile on my face, and pretended I was “fine”.

But there’s a metaphor! If, when driving your car, you continuously throw all your trash in the back seat, when the day comes that you crash that care, then all that trash is going to come flying over into your lap!

And in the early '90s, right in my Saturn return, that’s exactly what happened.

I was alone in a new country, had already been in therapy for 3 years, but was completely lost! Naturally, I was still telling everyone I was fine, but somehow the Universe put the right people in my path and the synchronicities began to happen as they do whenever our soul is calling for help.

I was taken into the loving arms of the Sweat Lodge ceremony with the Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish) Nation, an incredibly gifted Somatic therapist, and a spiritual sisterhood and recovery community that are both still a huge part of my life. And so began my journey into the Medicine Spiral! Sometimes an intrepid adventure, sometimes a messy trudge, but always getting what I needed to heal and grow.

rebirth

Around this time, I found Animism (Shamanism), a spiritual path that was deep enough and practical enough to support my healing. After 8 years on the path, and after intensive inner work, I began training in the shamanic healing arts while returning to academic studies. I worked for 10 years as a counsellor in the areas of youth career transition, women's spirituality, addiction treatment, and harm reduction outpatient. In 2003 I became a Mama, and in 2007, I completed Advanced training as a Somatic Practitioner and went into full-time private practice specializing in the spiritual recovery from trauma by synthesizing a unique offering of shamanic healing and somatic counselling.

unfolding

A couple of years later, my nights were filled with dreams and visitations from my Ancestors, and this began seven years of what felt like light speed transformation. That ancestral calling led me to the first of five ancestral pilgrimages to Ireland. I returned time and again to deepen this connection as I learned the way of the Bean Feasa (woman of knowing, seer, companion on of the Land).

In 2011, I met my teachers from Peru who generously showed me how to weave Andean Energy Medicine with the Irish cosmovision, and a year after that, I sat in my first Plant Medicine ceremony which led to 5 years deeply connecting with Ayahuasca and Huachuma, supporting Aya ceremonies, and travelling to the Andes to connect with Huachuma.

evolution

Then something happened that not only refined my Medicine but brought together all of the pieces I had been working with for 20 years. Whilst on my fourth pilgrimage in Ireland, I was at a sacred temple I’d been to many times before and my teacher said to me, “It’s time to work with the mushrooms. It’s your ancestral medicine and it’s time.” To be honest, I wanted to resist because it was more responsibility and I’m human!

But the moment I followed through was the moment that all the years on the path, all of the work, and all of the holding space and ceremony fell into place. Through countless hours in ceremony, I began to learn through the old Irish ancestors that the mushroom is here to reconnect us to the Faeries! I’m not speaking of the tiny fairies we’re fed by the mainstream in children’s books, but the magnificent, immense luminous beings of Nature who teach us to live as wise, harmonious humans, and whose wisdom is not Faerie “tales” but Faerie Teachings.

Long ago known as the “little white horses”, psilocybin carries us through portals to unseen realms where we are awakened from our numbness, healed of our illusions of separation, and returned into the arms of Mother Earth as her child, ready to learn and ready to live life as fully as possible.

the present

Each day I sit in gratitude for these 3 decades of learning this spiritual way of living through Animsim. It has been a privilege to facilitate hundreds of Sacred Life Animism (formerly White Bone Shamanism) healing circles, in-depth spiritual growth programs, Ancestral pilgrimages, and transformational retreats.

I’ve had the blessing of supporting thousands of people all over the world, and have been endlessly inspired and humbled by the resilience and creativity of the human spirit, as well as the beauty and mystery of the cosmos. This inspiration is what keeps me committed to my own healing and unfolding, as well as sharing the path.

teachers | elders | community | land

I doubt I will ever find enough words of gratitude for the incredibly generous, powerful, and humble teachers, who have shared their wisdom, held my feet to the fire, and loved me forward. I continue to receive their support and guidance daily. Although online learning is almost the norm these days, we are indeed embodied, therefore I’m so grateful that almost all of my animist, shamanic, somatic, and soul medicine training has been completed in-person. It’s listed in detail below.

Training

Certified Professional Life Coach - Certified Life Coach Institute

Self Regulation Therapy (Advanced) - Canadian Foundation for Trauma Research & Education

Counselling Skills Certificate  -
Vancouver Community College

Transformational Systemic Therapy (Advanced) - Satir Institute of the Pacific

Psychology studies - Douglas College

Conflict Resolution - Justice Institute