2024 Gather Speaker Line Up

Bedtime Basics: Herbal & Lifestyle Sleep Tips:

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Sleep is foundational to optimal health and wellbeing. In this class, Maria will cover a few of the most important tips to get a good quality night sleep and three core materia medicafor sleep: chamomile, lemon balm, and passionflower, with some pros and cons about valerian. We’ll discuss each herb’s attributes, pitfalls, dosing, formulation, and growing tips. These topics are covered in ever greater detail in Maria's newly released bookHerbal Remedies for Sleep. Maria will sign and sell her books after the talk.

Herbal Medicine Making 101

Generalities of Reading the Body

Creating A Bioregional Materia Medica for the Northeast:

Bioregional Herbalism is the practice of working with the medicinal plants abundant in the fabric of the landscape and bioregion you call home. It doesn’t have to look like working with solely native plants, rather, it’s about learning which plants are abundant enough locally to be worked with and harvested sustainably, and often these are non-native, weedy, and even cultivated garden herbs. In this class Jade will share herbal actions no apothecary is complete without and match her favorite bioregionally abundant herbs with these actions to build a northeast bioregional materia medica. The idea is to give participants the tools to create their own home apothecary full of local herbal medicines that can address a wide variety of health conditions and issues.She'll share insights and tips to help participants create their own unique northeast materia medica based on their family's and community's needs, versatility, accessibility, and more

Herbalism On A Spiritual Path: 

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Drawing from her personal experiences and profound connection with nature, Justine will delve into the ways in which herbalism intertwines with spirituality and explore the wisdom that herbalism offers as a pathway to spiritual growth.

Justine will share insights gained from her own healing and spiritual journey, touching upon themes such as herbalism, meditation and mindfulness, community building, trauma and the hero's journey and rites of passage. Discover how these elements create a holistic and sacred approach to well-being.

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Doctrine Of Signatures: Showing Up In The World

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Cancer Support: All The Things

Embodied Plant Poetry:

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Creative energy is at the core of both plants and humans.  This session offers an opportunity to develop a deeper connection, appreciation and understanding of plants through somatic meditation and creative expression.  Tamar will guide participants in a plant sensory meditation, using focused awareness of internal sensations, intuition and visualization.  When we pay close attention, we can discover unexpected beauty, resonance, and healing that bridges the language of the land to the body and soul. The art of poetry invites us to further explore our inner and outer landscapes, to journey into stories past and present, and to generously offer our voices in gratitude for the green gifts of the field. We will create individual and collective words sharing and bearing witness to the wonder of our plant-human community cohort.  No meditation or writing experience necessary. 

Herbs & Stamina:

This session will be an in depth focus on herbal medicine approaches to supplementing physical strength and stamina. We will be exploring a variety of herbs and their usages for this purpose, applicable to diverse contexts such as recuperation from acute and chronic illnesses, constitutional balancing, healthy aging, manual trades and physical training

“Herbs Don’t Work”: 

We take a provocative look under the hood at multiple assumptions that shape the understanding of western herbalism. We’ll pose Frequently Unasked Questions -and dig for answers everywhere from pharmakon to phytopharmacology -with a radical side agenda of exposing the many mechanisms of mainstream control of herbal medicine.

Herbs For The Nervous System

Integrating Movement Skills & Herbalism via Energetics: 

Assessment of an individual's constitution & tissue states is acornerstone of holistic herbalism, and helps us make better choices ofherbs and remedies. We can apply this same lens to movement as well,selecting specific skills and practices to emphasize the qualities ofheat, cold, moisture, dryness, tension, orlaxity which they help tocultivate. Weaving these threads together allows for us to create a more personalized holistic plan.

Herbalism for Radical Self Care:

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You are a multidimensional being that needs and deserves deep self care. In this class we will explore ways to nourish and support your spiritual, emotional, intellectual, and physical selves through simple herbalism practices that are sustainable and available to all. Learn about nourishing tonic herbal infusions, smoke medicine, and herbal body oiling and how to incorporate these self care techniques into your day to live your most vibrant, restorative, and pleasure filled life!

Skillful Means For The Practicing Herbalist:

Join Clinical Herbalist, Melanie Scofield, (founder and core-faculty at the EarthwalkSchool of Herbal Traditions in Rockport, ME), for a class on Skillful Means for the Practicing Herbalist.This is a class for any herbalist or holistic practitioner who is considering working with others, or for those who have already started a private practice. Melanie will share her insights into consultation work, and some key skills to develop that will help you to work with others successfully. There will be room for comments and questions

*Growing Chinese Herbs: Guided by Tradition while Leaning on Science:

Throughout history most Chinese herbs were gathered out of the wild. The vast majority of Chinese herbs did not come under cultivation until the mid-20th century, driven by an increase in both domestic and global demand. While there is still a strong demand for the dwindling wild resources, the vast majority of the Chinese herbs on the market are now cultivated. Traditionally, Chinese herbs had a classification known as "daodi" (道地), which was related to where the highest quality wild herbs were known to originate. While this originally had nothing to do with agriculture, the concept has been developed to help Chinese agronomists grow high-quality Chinese herbs. Meanwhile, over the last 30-40 years, China's academic sciences have become some of best funded around the globe, leading to an immense amount of research on all aspects of growing herbs, from studying the native ecology where the herbs grow to understanding the genetics and chemistry of theplants. Today, "daodi" has been turned into a household word, with the understanding that herbs that are labeled as such are the highest clinical quality available. In this talk, Dr. Garran will examine this history, explain the modern iteration of "daodi" and its implications, and offer several examples of how herbs are grown using these principles. This class is meant for growers or anyone interested in Chinese medicine. All levels of knowledge are welcome.