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YEAR TWO

 

 

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living

The Wheel

OF THE YEAR

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"We are sisters on a journey shining now as one, remembering the ancient waste, the compost has begun!"

 ~Blake Spencer, MM2017

Second year apprentices continue to work within our living mandala of intuitive and lineage based tools and practices that support the unconventional wisdom keeper in sharing their unique spirit medicine on a professional level while maintaining excellent physical, emotional, and psychological health.

Second year apprenticeship is primarily of interest for those looking to grow their event production, teamwork, space holding, and devotional service capacities by joining us during our seasonal gatherings as role models and way showers on the path of sisterhood and service. As a big sister you will have an invaluable opportunity to grow your personal interconnected web of sister support by bonding with new first year Medicine Mandala Apprentices. You will gain experience in sharing your gifts, as well as experience and professional references for your event production resume. You will also have an opportunity to practice navigating the myriad social dynamics that naturally arise in the process of creating together as a community using the tools provided.

Second year apprentices are considered staff and work in shifts to join us in co-creating the container for first year apprentices healing and learning to unfold within. Big sisters become proficient in navigating the veils and mature as medicine people by being challenged to operate in multiple capacities simultaneously. You may be called upon to lead a song or a class, harvest a chicken, support a sister emotionally or restock toilet paper in the bathroom. Medicine Mandala Apprentices embrace the full spectrum of phenomenon arising as nurturing growth opportunities. Big sisters are guaranteed attendance to one 3 hour guest facilitator workshop of choice per gathering, and may choose to audit other content or relax, rest, or socialize when not on duty.

Dates

November 2019

February 2020

May 2020

August 2020

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OVERVIEW

 

 

 

The second year apprenticeship journey includes:

• 1 one on one session with Yaya per year to discuss personal and professional growth needs

• Attendance at all Four 3 day in person Cross Quarter celebrations

• Second Year apprentices are also given schedule priority when seeking to book additional intuitive guidance sessions or individual medicine journey work with Yaya as well as priority booking for therapeutic bodywork with Carrie Lou.

If Interested in continuing your journey with us beyond the foundation year, please email Details Devi to discuss requirements.

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PAST Apprentices are Saying

Featured
Elena

“Stepping away from that world where the tension between seen and unseen, the acknowledged and ignored forces runs so high, and into the nourishing vessel of Elder Farm, gave November’s gathering a flavor of celebration for me, a lightness, a break, a festivity, and feast for the senses.  Being together in sisterhood, in prayer, in medicine space, was joyful and easy and I was aware of a grace that seemed to be passing too fast no matter how sincerely I endeavored to savor it.  

Profound openings came for me through the voicing my prayers inside the container of group intention and sacred space.  I recall a certain new feeling of cohesion emerging, a blurring of the lines of identity into a deeply shared experience of sisterhood, not an erasure of uniqueness but a lack of emphasis on individual personalities that was comforting to me.

As we sat gathered again around the ancestor altar I spoke my prayers aloud, offering gratitude to the shrewd survival strategies of my forebears and asking to be released now of any patterns of hiding that no longer served my soul’s highest truth, so that I can come into the world shining the light that I have to shine.”

- Elena

 

Lisa

"My body is feeling quite different since the beginning of this. I know without a doubt that it is the most important work I could possibly be doing right now...My body actually feels full of vitality. I am becoming healthier and richer on the inside."

- Lisa

Teren

“ Thank you for everything you have offered to my path this year. i purposely did not take another class i was looking at bc i thought it would be “too much”. “herbs”, i thought. “nice and gentle”, I thought. lol! little did i know that this apprenticeship would take me right to the place i was trying to avoid. because you can’t avoid it at a certain point. i’m learning this. and honestly, i can’t imagine a better set up to assist me through this transformation. this group reinforces my ability to feel safe. you guided us and gave us tools to help us create that safety for ourselves and i am so grateful for that. safety doesn’t just exist in this world. you can’t depend on others to make you feel safe. but what i’ve learned so far is that i can step deeper into my responsibility to myself and learn how to communicate and negotiate what makes me feel safe and with whom…”

- Teren

Blake

“Every plant we work with, every teacher, and herbal infusion offer an intimately new and unique depth and lesson for my soul to break down… The chakra work and exploration helped not only my own work, but has also shifted the way I work and assess clients as I am sharing breath work with.  My communication with guides and spirits has dramatically changed and I am finding it easier to clearly hear the messages and know what is being communicated.”

- Blake

Myah

" I have an overwhelming sense of gratitude for being a part of this Apprenticeship.  It is such a blessing for me to feel like I am a part of something that exactly speaks to what my soul wants to see being propagated in the world.  I feel seen, heard, supported, and understood more than I ever have in a group setting before.  The topics that are in each module really build on each other and touch a deeper part of me that inspires growth…. I have felt some definitive shifts since being introduced to Yaya’s teachings.  I feel like I now have more resources to go to when I am feeling lost.  Just the nourishment protocols alone help tremendously and I can feel the difference when I  follow them…  All of the wisdom that is being introduced to us is exactly what I am yearning for. 

It’s perfect!"

-Myah

Malika

“I am so grateful that I am a part of this group… Women in circle, healing ourselves, Sitting under the tree canopy, letting the dark creep in around us.  Nothing to be afraid of in the woods.  Doing the simple, needed, gracious work of forgiveness.  I feel aware that for hundreds of years, women weren’t allowed to sit in the woods together in this way, to make magic together, to be whole together, to work with the earth and the plants like this.  I am so grateful for the simple joy of doing this, and that we are safe here, now, to open those portals of healing together.  For being held, by each other, by the darkness, by the earth under us and tree’s canopy around us.

I don’t want to do healing work indoors anymore!  My body and spirit likes being outdoors.  I enjoy the air, the breeze, the ground under my feet, the aliveness and dynamic nature of everything; the presence needed to keep an eye out for snake and other unknowns; the remembering emerges and is beyond my mind’s ability to put into words.  It is so soothing and precious to my being to have those days out on the land.”

- Malika

 

Medicine Mandala on Instagram

“We love our bread, we love our butter, but most of all, we love each other” Apprentice made and gut health friendly almond flour savory muffins with herb butter “frosting” from our 2019 Beltane gathering. Although we can’t all do it all, we have found that being able to cook food, eat food, and clean up after ourselves is a major part of this these things we call health, self love, self, care, and empowerment, and learning how to feed a coven/ community is just one way that this program encourages us to continually redefine our relationship with food. (Learn more about our approach to food as Medicine at www.medicinemandala.com) #medicinemandalaapprenticeship
Lest anyone out there fear we are suffering from the dis-ease of taking ourselves too seriously...#eyeballthemusical #funhealseverything #everythingismedicine (final project participatory performance art goodness with @forestbething )
In the forest we heal our hearts and learn to trust ourselves and others again. In the forest we face our fears and uncover that thing within us sometimes called common sense, that just knows how to be in reciprocity, how to be simultaneously interconnected, respectful, sovereign and free. The story of retreating into the forest and seeking the council of trees in times of corruption is found in Buddhism, Tantra, the African Orisa tradition, and even in Disney movies like Pocahontas who if you remember, regularly takes the council of a grandmother willow tree, and likely because of this, declines to marry the prince in favor of staying with her village and becoming a leader within the context of her own existing tribal governance. The Tantra that we have the opportunity study here during foundation year is an ancient earth honoring tradition and within it, trees are Goddesses, Grandmothers, and Guardians. They dwell at the boundary between village and the wild- in fact they ARE the barrier between the village and the wild- an important part of creating the container of safety we call civilian life. Many of us go on to practice daily in this stream, an intact lineage of Forest Yogini’s. Those who came before us where women who fled from corrupt societies, oppressive regimes, and arranged marriages in which they where treated as property within capitalist, patriarchal, and brahmanic systems, to live and practice together outside of the caste system, to be in ecstatic connection with themselves and the rest of the natural world. There are many pathways to liberation but this one has been a lifeline for us and like many of the great lineages of planet earth, was created and stewarded to see us safely through these times. Now accepting applications for 2020, link in profile. (photo by @erin_leighfrom our 2017 apprentice group) #sistersoftheoaks #medicinemandalaapprenticeship #livingthewheeloftheyear #greenmagic #greenwitch #medcinemandala #becomethemedicine
@cedar.grace Putting the finishing touches on our ritual garments for #lughnasadh2019 ( and our device tried to auto correct to “ritual farmers” which is also correct!)
Sending so much love and mid-summer blessings to this courageous first group of apprentices who are out in the community and the world sharing their own unique flavor of magic and medicine. (ritual garments by @cedargrace) #medicinemandala2018 #sistersoftheoaks #greenmagic #elementals (Photo by @erin___leigh )
It is the source of some debate whether Kombucha is appropriate for folks with gut health issues. Although the official word is that the beneficial bacteria in the drink consume all of the white sugar used to make it, those with sugar sensitivities often report that drinking kombucha causes their symptoms to flare up. For this reason, we have chosen to switch to Jun. Similar in taste and process, the beneficial bacteria in Jun consume honey instead of sugar, which is acceptable in small amounts on the gut healing diet we encourage apprentices to explore. Blessed by a year of apprentice made ferments by @forestbeth and excited to get to continue to ferment using scoby babies from the same “mother” with the next group of apprentices gathering on the land for the first time in November. (Photo by @erin___leigh )
How sweet it is to tiptoe between the baby oaks sprouting up under the skirt of the grandmother tree to harvest #mugwort as an offering to the dreams of the next group of sisters who will arrive in November to turn the wheel of the year and traverse the spiral path with us! We are so grateful for all who hear the call to come together to place individual passion, creativity and authenticity in service of each other and the earth. Interested in learning more? Visit us online (link in profile) for info about our new rolling admissions process! #greenmagic #greenwitch #elementalmagic #servantofgaia #wisewomantradition
No sting, no honey! We are honored to be learning about the ancient practice of bee venom therapy with our guest facilitator and mentor @shonagh.home If you are interested in hearing more about what’s happening here, check out our video over on our mothership account @activeculturefamily ’s IGTV this week titled “Stinging Nettle Intitiations and Bee Venom Therapy…Blessings!

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BANNER IMAGES BY JAMIE STREET

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