Revolutionary Healing & Alchemy of Spirit with Gerri Ravyn Stanfield

09/17/18 • 31 min

Gerri Ravyn Stanfield, LAc. is the author of Revolution of the Spirit: Awaken the Healer, a guide to liberate the healing super powers within each of us. Her fiction and essays have been published in The Rumpus, Manifest Station, and others. She is the executive director of Acupuncturists Without Borders, a nonprofit organization providing trauma relief in the wake of natural disaster and human conflict. She designs trainings for emerging leaders and healers in the US, Canada, Europe, Nepal, Israel/Palestine, and Australia. Ravyn uses her background in trauma recovery, neurobiology, psychology, writing and performance to coax more of the extraordinary into the world through the cracks in Western civilization. She has a private acupuncture practice in Portland, Oregon.

Episode Highlights

Ravyn talks about how her experiences of illness lead her on the path of becoming a healer.
She discusses her inspiration for her book, "Revolution of the Spirit," as a way to record and remember alternative forms of healing.
The connection of spirituality to medicine and other forms of healing.
Exploring the ways that ancient healing practices, such as Chinese medicine and Ayurveda, have maintained their spiritual aspects.
What it means to be a healer, and who can be a healer = “to make whole” by simply doing your thing.
Exploring the concept of being a “global revolutionary healer” with your own soul fire.
We discuss what is ailing our culture at large now - the interlocking systems of oppression and the greedy residue of colonization; and healing this by turning back towards the sacred.
Alchemy as the art of change and transformation, and using it personally and globally.
Bringing the power of alchemy to heal the queer communities.
Taking a holy risk and moving toward what scares you.

Episode Highlights

Ravyn talks about how her experiences of illness lead her on the path of becoming a healer.
She discusses her inspiration for her book, "Revolution of the Spirit," as a way to record and remember alternative forms of healing.
The connection of spirituality to medicine and other forms of healing.
Exploring the ways that ancient healing practices, such as Chinese medicine and Ayurveda, have maintained their spiritual aspects.
What it means to be a healer, and who can be a healer = “to make whole” by simply doing your thing.
Exploring the concept of being a “global revolutionary healer” with your own soul fire.
We discuss what is ailing our culture at large now - the interlocking systems of oppression and the greedy residue of colonization; and healing this by turning back towards the sacred.
Alchemy as the art of change and transformation, and using it personally and globally.
Bringing the power of alchemy to heal the queer communities.
Taking a holy risk and moving toward what scares you.

Previous Episode

Requiem Mass: A Queer Divine Rite with Holcombe Waller

Holcombe Waller is one of America’s most unique voices in music theater. He is a 2011 United States Artists Berresford Fellow in Music, an award that noted his mournful, folk-inflected style as well as his approach to music “as total theater.” He is a Creative Capital artist, a four-time recipient of the MAP Fund grant, and a Joan Shipley Fellow of the Regional Arts and Culture Council of his hometown of Portland, Oregon.

Episode Highlights

Holcombe’s approach to music as total theater, incorporating multimedia into concerts for a different kind of performance experience.
The upcoming performance of his community piece, Requiem Mass: A Queer Divine Rite, to invoke a peaceful repose & celebrate queer history.
Bringing diversity of community involvement within the work to exemplify and bring forward inclusion and representation.
The origin of Requiem Mass as a church performance to explore the persecution of gender and sexual diversity.
Holcombe’s experience of talking to church goers on a phone bank about marriage equality, and wanting to bring a queer voice to liturgical music.

Web links

Requiem Mass, San Francisco - Fall 2018

Next Episode

Spiritual Activism & Liberation Magic with Lou Florez

Lou Florez is an internationally known Spirit worker, medicine maker, priest, activist, and artist who has studied with indigenous communities and elders throughout the globe. Lou grounds his teachings and practice in the idea that connectedness to ourselves and our physical, emotional, spiritual, and environmental landscapes is a fundamental necessity for any long lasting change to occur. He holds that through creating these living, dynamic relationships we become conscious of the inherent power available to us in every second of our lives.

Episode Highlights

Lou discusses how he became a spirit worker based in folk traditions of magics from the American south that comes out of connections to the Earth and the land, and rooted in communities fighting against oppression and colonization.
He tells the story of growing up on a farm and being introduced to different folk spiritual practices in a church bingo parlor.
His activism supports diversity among multicultural pagan and spiritual communities, particularly around issues of safety, accessibility and justice.
Intentionally inviting Queer people of color to the table or altar for their particular prayers and spiritual needs.
His three year Audre Lorde spiritual practice, and how it helped him heal his connection with his body as a queer brown man.