EP 15: How We Observe Samhain

09/29/20 • 37 min

We’re all guilty of following traditions without understanding why. For example, how do you recognize Samhain? — A Gaelic festival that’s more commonly known as Halloween. Today the GroWise Be Well team discusses what Halloween means to them and how they celebrate it. From Samhain to the Mexican Day of the Dead, we open the conversation by talking about how differently Halloween is celebrated across the cultural spectrum. For Lindsay, Halloween is a stepping-stone towards Christmas, an occasion that she prepares well in advance for. With a focus on Thanksgiving, we discuss the importance of questioning our traditions and who they serve. Kayli provides some insight into this, commenting on how she reimagines traditions so that they resonate with her. For some of the team, this can mean doing your spring cleaning during fall or replacing Thanksgiving with Mabon, a festival that happens one month earlier. We touch on how each team member experiences Halloween before exploring the German ‘wild women’ night of Hexennacht and how Hollywood has distorted the image of witches and voodoo. After chatting about our favorite Halloween movies — Hocus Pocus gets a mention — Sarah highlights this episode’s key theme which is to find the reason that you partake in traditions. And if they bring you joy, then that’s reason enough. Tune in to hear more on how the incredible team behind GroWise Be Well recognizes Samhain

Key Points From This Episode:

Comparing how people from different heritages celebrate October 31st.
How Lindsay ties Halloween in with her Christmas preparations.
Seeing communities come together to make Halloween a magical experience.
Exploring Thanksgiving and questioning the purpose of tradition and who it serves.
Easter versus Ostara and the importance of recognizing the story behind the tradition.
Reimagining traditions according to how they fit into your life.
Spring cleaning in fall; hear why Kayli has been cleaning her home for Samhain.
How German women cut the neckties off of men during Hexennacht.
The historical transition from being scared of spirits to wearing them as costumes.
How Hollywood has distorted our views of witches and voodoo.
Celebrating Halloween by staying in, eating chocolates, and watching movies.
Why having fun is a good enough reason to engage with tradition.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Sarah Southwell on LinkedIn

GroWise Be Well

The Hershey’s Company

Key Points From This Episode:

Comparing how people from different heritages celebrate October 31st.
How Lindsay ties Halloween in with her Christmas preparations.
Seeing communities come together to make Halloween a magical experience.
Exploring Thanksgiving and questioning the purpose of tradition and who it serves.
Easter versus Ostara and the importance of recognizing the story behind the tradition.
Reimagining traditions according to how they fit into your life.
Spring cleaning in fall; hear why Kayli has been cleaning her home for Samhain.
How German women cut the neckties off of men during Hexennacht.
The historical transition from being scared of spirits to wearing them as costumes.
How Hollywood has distorted our views of witches and voodoo.
Celebrating Halloween by staying in, eating chocolates, and watching movies.
Why having fun is a good enough reason to engage with tradition.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Sarah Southwell on LinkedIn

GroWise Be Well

The Hershey’s Company

Previous Episode

EP 14: Sarah’s Magical Elderberry Elixir of Life

Our bodies are put under enormous pressure as we move into fall and a chill starts creeping into the air. A common flu season, it’s difficult to keep your family safe, especially when your kids are likely to take off that jacket and hat that you insist they wear. Today, host Sarah Southwell shares her top tool for boosting her family’s immune system — her Magical Elderberry Elixir of Life. Something that anyone can begin preparing, Sarah shares how she makes her medicine, touching on sourcing her ingredients through wildcrafting and the other ingredients that she includes in her elixir. Sarah emphasizes that her medicine is preventative and that it should be used in combination with other strategies, like avoiding eating mucus producing foods. Later, Sarah highlights the power of intention when creating her medicine, which she channels through crystals and ritualistically updating her herbal medicine book. As Sarah explains, creating your own medicine is easy, you just need a little bit of guidance and to rely on your intuition. Tune in to hear more about Sarah’s Elixir of Life and how you can start making medicine — without sounding too grand, it’s a tradition that all cultures have followed since the dawn of humankind.

Key Points From This Episode:

Stresses that the body is put under due to seasonal changes.
Getting ready for the seasonal shift by preparing herbal medicines.
The preventative benefits of elderberries in avoiding flu.
Creating your own healing elixirs using herbal medicine and crystals.
The idea of wildcrafting your medicine — harvesting from the wild.
Cutting mucus-producing and ‘cold essence’ foods out of your diet.
Covering up your neck and ears to avoid sore throats and coughing.
Including ingredients like Aronia berries and sea buckthorn in your elixir.
Updating your “Grimoire,” AKA, your herbal medicine book.
Boosting your medicines through the power of intention.
From ginger to licorice root, hear what else Sarah includes in her elderberry elixir.
Marking your own chest rub, tiger balm, or fever-reducing tea.
The importance of not feeling too limited by recipes and using your intuition.
Finding the workshop, mentor, or book that will help your medicine-making journey.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Sarah Southwell on LinkedIn

GroWise Be Well

Rosemary Gladstar

Mountain Rose Herbs

Next Episode

EP 16: Understanding the Balance of Life Through Oriental Medicine With Steve Delvo: Part I

As you may well know, here on the GrowWise Be Well podcast we truly believe that Oriental medicine is an absolute live saver. Today on the show we are so fortunate to welcome Steve Delvo to help us all understand just how important Oriental medicine is. Steve is a doctor of Oriental medicine, first raised in North London, England, and then moved to the Philippines. On his 9th birthday, he apprenticed to Grand Master Lee until the age of 19, studying traditional martial arts and Oriental medicine. From there, he moved back to the States where he did a two-year apprenticeship under Master Rolfer; rolfing is facial release deep tissue massage. After that, Steve moved to San Francisco working intensely on professional athletes, doing Oriental medicine, deep tissue massage, and postural work. Steve’s journey then took him back to Asia for further training and practice. He then moved to Sante Fe, New Mexico to do a four-year accelerated program to obtain his Masters Degree. In Tucson, Arizona he became the Dean of an Oriental Medicine School, and finally, he moved on to Hamilton, Montana where he has spent the last 20 years in private practice. During our interview, we dive into the concepts of understanding the body and its energies as yin and yang. We also unpack the true meaning of illness in the terms of unbalance, why stagnation causes the body to be in a state of dis-ease, and so much more. So if Oriental medicine is a tool that resonates with your life, stay tuned for part one of this incredible conversation!

Key Points From This Episode:

Steve’s background in studying martial arts and Oriental medicine.
Why Steve prefers to use the term “Oriental medicine” as opposed to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM).
The history of Oriental medicine, dating back to before the Orient.
Oriental medicine explained: cosmological principles applied down to the human body.
The energies that drive and make up the body: coarse and refined energies.
Everything in the universe explained as yin and yang; understanding the world around us.
Understanding illnesses in the body as an imbalance between the systems.
Discovering the events that cause “stagnations” in your body.
The symptoms of stagnation — the three evil sisters: swelling, inflammation, and pain.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Sarah Southwell on LinkedIn

GroWise Be Well