Herbal skin beauty with Marysia Miernowska

Herbal skin beauty with Marysia Miernowska
Marysia: We live on this earth that is able to regenerate herself, and she shows this to us every single day with the setting sun and with the rising sun. And that we too are able to regenerate and heal and change our ways.
Some things I want to share in terms of beauty. One is actually supporting the nervous system and how critical the nervous system is for us to be in a vibration of beauty and attraction. Another aspect is nourishment how important it is for our bodies to be deeply nourished. And then there's plants that are aphrodisiacs that open us and bring us into pleasure. And so there are plants that help us open and receive and connect to pleasure, which really is a key component to beauty.
Lana: You're listening to Plant Love radio episode number 80.
Hello friends. I hope you're having a good week. Today, I'm excited to introduce you to Marysia Miernowska. Marysia is an herbalist, teacher, author, Earth activist, gardener, and green witch. Your work and passion are rooted in the Wise Woman tradition of healing. She is a director of the School of the Sacred Wild where she teaches herbal medicine, Earth magick and holistic healing.
Marysia has grown up internationally and traveled extensively learning different ways of tending to the Earth and sharing regenerative, grassroot Earth medicine. She draws on her background to keep her feet rooted by designing and tending to medicinal and sacred gardens using permaculture and biodynamic practices.
In addition to making herbal medicine and running your yearly apprenticeship program, Marysia consults, formulates for natural healing companies, curates educational events, writes, speaks and teaches internationally.
She has authored the book 'The Witch's herbal apothecary: rituals and recipes for a year of earth magic and sacred medicine making'. Marysia has kindly offered a signed copy of her book to be used as a raffle prize for this episode of Plant Love Radio. So please head over to https://ko-fi.com/plantloveradio and share some of your favorite moments from this episode to get entered into the raffle.
In this conversation, we are talking about the wheel of the year and herbal skin beauty. For all resources discussed today. Please head over to the show notes at https://plantloveradio.com/80. Enjoy.
InterviewMarysia hello. How are you doing? Welcome Plant Love Radio.
Marysia: Thank you so much for having me.
Lana: This conversation we were planning it for a few weeks and I have been thinking and rethinking of the topic. And I'm just so, so thrilled.
I recently read that you were named one of the top 15 witches on Instagram by the Huffington post. And it just made me smile so much because I think a lot of herbalists feel that they are truly green witches, but I wanted to take you back to your earlier years . Let's talk a little bit about how you first became interested in herbal medicine. What are your herbal roots?Marysia's herbal journey
Marysia: Yeah. So the very first memories I have are with my great-grandmother teaching me about how to harvest nettles without getting stung. And so a lot of my herbal roots are from Polish folk herbalism. And really herbalism that isn't even called herbalism because it's just a way of life and a way of being with the plants. So really kind of the grandmother's ways.
And then I ended up finding my way through many years back to herbalism and at a moment when I was sick and I had my own healing crisis and was finding that all these different kinds of natural medicine, as well as allopathic medicine weren't really restoring my vitality, weren't really bringing me back into optimal health after having a round of antibiotics and having had parasites and being very sick in my gut.
And I found my way back to the wild weeds and to the nourishing herbs, into the plants of the forest and some of those unsung heroes like nettles or oat straw.
And I also, at that time was living in a rural part of Vermont and found my teacher, Sage Maurer, my dear friend, and the founder of the Gaia school of healing. And I began studying with her and learning about the wise woman tradition of healing, which is a folk medicine, it's folk healing. And so it just kind of felt like my roots of learning about the plants, of learning about food medicine, of connecting to the gardens and the forests and some of these kind of dreamy memories I have of infusing Linden flowers in water and sunlight with my grandmothers. It just all kind of came back with the intellectual understanding later of like, oh, this is a cosmology, this is a tradition of healing. It is a way of relating to the earth and to natural medicine.
Lana: so lovely. At the very beginning of our conversation, before I turned on the recording, we talked about places where we were born. And so we were actually born very close to each other in Poland and Ukraine. And I remember those beautiful Linden trees, the smell of Linden trees and some of these things so near and dear to my heart.Linden energies
Marysia: Yeah. It's also beautiful. You know, I love that. And it's been a beautiful thing as a teacher. Now I've had so many apprentices to find that yes, some students who have similar ancestry as me will connect and have this deep remembering, I often actually start and introduce them first to Linden tree.
Well, Linden tree is like this grandmother plant. And she is of course a nervine and calming to the nervous system and opening to the heart and relaxing to tissues. So when you're kind of meeting someone for the first time, if you drink Linden, there's this like ha softening and this like calming presence and this opening and then the support, Linden is also incredibly supportive to the musculo skeletal structure.
So there's often this feeling when I meditate with Linden and my students do of like leaning back against this big tree and being held and like the root chakra is supported and the heart is opened, but it's also been amazing to notice that students who don't have Polish or Eastern European ancestry, Also feel this deep collective grandmother remembering.
And I think that has been one of the really rewarding aspects of my work has been connecting people back to this deep ancestral remembering of being with the earth and being in relationship to these nourishing traditions regardless of cultural ancestry. There's really kind of like the root of the root of the root where we're all made of the earth and of the stars and we find comfort with the plants.
Lana: That is absolutely true. These days I work at the university and the place where the university is located there are a lot of Linden trees. And so in the middle of June, I usually bring out my pharmacy students to go for a walk and smell the Linden blossoms. So it feels like everything is connected and everything comes together.
So tell us a little bit about your life right now. You mentioned that you have and so how the herbal medicine fits into it. I know your moto is regenerative healing for earth and for the people. Tell us a little bit more of what inspires you today.What inspires Marysia today
Marysia: Yeah. so I'm currently the director of the School of the Sacred Wilde and I've been teaching and guiding students on an apprenticeship journey for the last many years actually. And previously was teaching under the Gaia school of healing, California. And I take students on this journey through the wheel of the year, teaching them about folk herbalism, giving them a training in herbalism and natural healing and holistic medicine through the lens and the context of reconnecting ourselves to the cycles of the earth, to the seasons, to the cycles of the moon and to these kinds of regenerative currents of nature. And a lot of my work really at the root of it is this prayer and desire and intention to reweave people and earth back together. And so I do that through education. The form of education is really by teaching students how to learn directly from the plants.
So it's a lot less of me. You know I do lecture about the plants, but it really begins with plant meditations and with students learning how to receive the plants through their bodies and we do Plant meditations and I also share rituals for deep connection. So a lot of it is education and this kind of embodied hands-on experience of learning, how to make herbal medicine, learning how to grow a garden, learning how to regenerate the soil.
And then I also work to create these bridges through outreach, through speaking through my book. I'm a published author, through these conversations, right? And through holding ceremony ritual through making medicine and supporting regenerative agriculture, supporting people who are farming or growing plants or creating from plants in a way that is not extractive, but in a way that feeds the earth, that regenerates communities.
So that whole model and my mantra, of regenerative healing for earth and people it's realizing that self care is earth care, that as an herbalist and as a healer, when I am offering nourishing practices to people that they can heal themselves, and that heals their relationship to the earth and the earth receives healing from that, they walk differently on the earth and that when I am in the garden or consulting with farmers and getting them to transition to more regenerative models by them healing the earth, they are also healing themselves and their communities and their bodies and the relationship.
Lana: Thank you for sharing this. So when I reached out to you, we decided that we will talk about two larger topics today. One of them was the cycles of the year and the concept of beauty and skin health and botanicals and how it fits into that. And where should we begin? Should we start with the wheel of the year?The wheel of the year
Marysia: I think so. I mean, we can look at it from the lens of beauty. So the wheel of the year and the seasons are really the model that bring us into harmony with the life, death, rebirth cycle. And this is a cycle that we see in the seasons, right in the garden and the plants. We have a plant that grows in the fall, it begins to become brown and die back. Its energy and its chi goes into its roots. That's when us herbalists tend to harvest roots is in the fall. Above at ground in the winter, everything looks dormant, everything's sleeping. In the spring there's a real awakening or rebirth the plants spring up new shoots. Then there's pollination in the spring alchemy, which connects to sex magic and pollination and creativity from the flowers, then there's fruit and food. And then after the summer we harvest those fruits and foods and we have our seasons of celebration, our festivities like Thanksgiving in the U S for example, of sharing the bounty of preserving it and getting ready for the winter again. So that cycle of life, death rebirth, we see of course in the garden, on the earth, in wild spaces.
But we also see it in the moon cycle with the dark moon and the waning energy, the drawing in. Often a lot of women will bleed that time. There's a release, there's a change in hormones, the ocean tides shift. And then of course, the full moon, which connects to that summer archetype of fullness and of expansion.
And that cycle is also something that we can connect with within the archetype of our lives. In the fall that archetype is of the medicine woman, of the Enchantress. There's a mature archetype of the mature feminine she'll often stop bleeding. And it's said traditionally that when women stop bleeding in that kind of late fall of their life, they're drawing their own energy in the way that a plant does.
And so it's not a loss of power as our Western culture would suggest or a loss of sexiness as unfortunately modern culture tends to say. It's actually a drawing in of the juiciness and women will often actually have this like second awakening of creativity or like another career or this new thing that emerges from the depth of their psyche.
The winter is connected to the crone archetype, which is the hag, the wise, witch, the elder that can sit alone, that doesn't need social time.
And the spring is connected to the maiden, that energy of expansion, of wanting new experiences of travel, the air element, the youthfullness, the intellect, the wanting to learn.
And the summer is connected to the mother, and is that time of fruition and production and creativity. And in that time of our life, we are working, taking care of kids and we're doing so much and we're just circulating a lot of energy.
So these are some of these energies of the life, death rebirth cycle and those are some examples of how we see them in living beings and ecosystems. But even our creations like a book or a project or a relationship, everything goes through these cycles. And when we're able to understand them and embody them, then we're not in resistance to this natural regenerative energy that exists.
And in my belief and in my teachings, it's actually how we can Kind of transcend the trap of modernity, of thinking that we need to always be producing or always be out there in the world. And then people get burned out or things become dry. You know there's a real steep source of vitality and renewal that comes from learning how to ride these regenerative cycles.
Lana: I love the idea of not fighting, but actually going along and supporting the cycles and what they do to your body as much as you can. So how do you think the whole idea of beauty and skin health is connected to these cycles? Can you talk to us a little bit about that?Beauty and skin health and the cycles
Marysia: Yeah, absolutely. Our current idea of beauty is really emphasizing that beauty is the maiden archetype, that the beauty is like the eternal youth. Our culture is really emphasizing that that is what beauty looks like. And often the representations culturally and racially and of body image, it's a very small select image of what our culture is saying is beautiful.
And Unfortunately, that's also mirrored in our relationship to the earth and our own creativity, that kind of eternal youth and the eternal growth of that season from spring to summer. There's nothing in nature that grows indefinitely. And there is a season when we need to begin to draw our energy back in. And so in, in terms of beauty and in skin health, there is of course, a huge emphasis in always looking young and not having wrinkles and these big plump lips and in whatever it is.
And that leads to women who are not allowing themselves to age naturally, and instead are using injections or Botox, or are just trying to put so many chemicals on their face in order to fight the ripening of their skin, of their vessel. So there are different ways and the plants of course are some of the best teachers in how to support natural beauty and what natural beauty really is.
Lana: That's really fascinating. Tell us a little bit about your own rituals and your own ideas of how to support that beauty.
Marysia's beauty rituals
Marysia: Yeah. So, as cliche as it sounds, beauty begins on the inside. Right. And you can feel that when you meet somebody and there's just an ease and a radiance and a beautiful smile that is glowing from them, it's attractive, people soften their hearts open. They become attracted to that person. On the other hand, you can have someone who on a photograph would look stunning, but if there's tightness or a kind of contraction in their energy body or if there's anger, you're not going to feel that openness and attraction.
And so there's some things that I want to share in terms of beauty. And one of them is actually supporting the nervous system and how critical the nervous system is for us to be in a vibration of beauty and attraction.
Another aspect is nourishment how important it is for our bodies to be deeply nourished. And I'll talk about the plants that really give us all the minerals and enzymes that allow our skin to regenerate itself, to look radiant, the beauty tonics and which really we take internally and not slather as much on our skin.
And then there's plants that are aphrodisiacs that open us and bring us into pleasure. They say there's like a glow of people after they've made love. Right. Or like if you're eating chocolate or just in a moment of pleasure... there's something about the energy body and the person, and when they're exuding pleasure, there's just a warmth and a beauty. And so there are plants that help us open and receive and connect to pleasure, which really is a key component I believe, to beauty.
And then there's also plants that connect us to our joy and our sense of joy and empowerment. And again, that tends to support beauty and attraction both on the inside and on the outside. Interestingly enough, all of these plants happen to also really support both internal and external beauty.
So I'm going to begin with the nourishing herbs.
Lana: Of course.Nourishing herbs
Marysia: The nourishing herbs, they are the foundation of my practice as a folk herbalist and really are kind of like the earth body that we are made of.
And so plants like nettles, cleavers, or oatstraw are all plants that are wild. They're abundant. They grow with ease and wild abandon, and they are really rich in minerals, enzymes, and vitamins. And so when we take these plants in, they are feeding our body and they are building our blood. A lot of them really gently and beautifully support natural detoxification in our body, moving the lymph, cleansing the skin.
And So folks who will have maybe acne or hormonal breakouts, we'll notice that after working with the nourishing herbs, their skin improves. People who have very dry skin or who have skin that lacks luminosity will notice that after drinking cleavers or oatstraw, there's just more natural coloring in their skin, their skin is more elastic, more vibrant. The eyes become clearer. The whites of the eyes, there's more light that comes from the eyes. The hair becomes stronger and thicker, nettles, you know, your nails will grow stronger. So these are plants that really regenerate the cells of the body.
And that speed up the natural regenerative processes of the skin. And that also gently support the heart, circulation, which is so important for physical beauty and internal beauty. They support the digestive system, which again, is also so important for skin health and beauty, the lymphatic system, et cetera.
So the nourishing herbs are fundamental to beauty and drinking about a quart of a nourishing herb of your choice is really going to bring you all of those nutrients that your body needs in order to work optimally.
Lana: So you said drinking a quart of a single herb or is it okay to mix them?
Marysia: yeah, you can definitely mix them?
I love mixing nettles and cleavers and oat straw, for example, or cleavers is nice. It's a little more demulcent, nettles can be a little drying. So I like mixing those two together. Oatstraw is very nice and neutral. It's not too drying. So that's a really nice combination.
I like to add peppermint, especially in the summer to my nourishing herbs, to just kind of brighten the flavor and also helps increase circulation Helps to cool the body down, a great ally for people who are going through menopause as well and might have hot flashes. So just a real nice ingredient to add to a mix.
And yeah, those plants nettles, cleavers, oat straw also calm the nervous system. They're grounding, they're nourishing. And that is another aspect of beauty is having a well tonified nervous system.
So some of the plants that I really love for the nervous system are again, oat straw. And again, the nourishing herbs their power grows when you take them daily. They're very gentle. You don't have to worry about any kind of combination with pharmaceuticals. They're very safe. And when you take them daily, the effect really builds. And after about a month of drinking oatstraw, people find that they're so much less stressed and that there's this like joyful energy and this calmness in their belly and this lack of anxiety in their heart.
That vitality and energy that oatstraw gives while also calming us, brings us naturally more into our joy. It's going to give you the energy to do things that bring you joy, and it's going to give you the energy and the clarity of mind to make choices that nourish you. And so it's really amazing to notice how everything is so interwoven when it comes to inner and outer beauty.
Lana: for sure. And I love the fact that all of them are food grade herbs, right? So they are so safe and so gentle and so wonderful. You're mentioning nettles that are so full of vitamins and minerals. And so is the oats. I really love that they're such simple herbs and that you can easily incorporate pretty tasty or tasty enough. If you want to add a little bit of honey, that's totally fine, but I love the fact that these are simple things that you can create sort of ritual around. So thank you for that.
Marysia: Yeah. Yeah. And my ritual with those herbs is every evening, after dinner, I make my infusions for the next day and I boil my water and I have a few different court sized jars and I'll make my infusions and let them sleep overnight. So I'll pour the hot water over the plants. Usually I'll use about a handful of nourishing herbs for a quart Mason jar.
And I'll let it sit overnight infusing with the lid on it, of course, so that the vapors don't evaporate with all the medicine. And long infusion really allows for nice deep extraction. And then the next morning, the first thing I drank on an empty stomach is some of my nourishing herbs.
And that also just instantly allows the nutrients to get into my blood, into my body. And it's very healing and soothing to the mucus membranes. And then I have them for the rest of my day. So that's my ritual with nourishing herbs. Yeah.
Lana: I love that you're doing it in the evening because you're still busy doing something, and it's so much easier to boil water and to just make the tea right then and there. For people like myself, I guess morning is not always my friend. And so remembering to make a tea sometimes can be more taxing and more difficult for me. So having something that's already there and waiting for you is really, really great strategy.
Marysia: Yeah. And it just goes hand in hand with like cleaning up after dinner. you know, if you're loading the dishwasher while you're doing that at the same time, the water can be boiling. And so it's just kind of part of closing out the kitchen for. the evening. Yeah, it makes it very easy.
Lana: that's great. And so you are actually making several of these different types of infusion, so it might be nourishing tea, but it might be something else as well?
Marysia: Yeah. Yeah, I do. And that's also because like I'm riding these waves of the day, right? So that life, death rebirth cycle, we also have it in the day. And in the morning we connect that energy of the maiden and the like waking up it's a new day. The nourishing herbs are plants that naturally spring up in the springtime.
It's a great time to start the day with the nourishing herbs then kind of like around noon when you're connecting to that archetype of the mother, and of the summer portal and you're like doing things and you're busy, I'm either wanting to have herbs that are cooling me down and hydrating me so that I don't over burn or I'm going to be also having some herbs that kind of help keep moving my energy. And that helped move my circulation, that helped me digest my lunch, and that helped me from having like an afternoon slump. Sometimes my blood sugar dips a little in the afternoon. So I kind of want something for that time of the day where I still want to be productive. And I still want to be clear in my mind. And so I'll have an infusion that supports me for that. And then in the evening, it's nice to have something that's relaxing that helps you wind down. Because again, you know, that sunset hour that connects to the west, to the fall, to that wise woman portal, it's a time for us to work with the nervines in my philosophy.
And it's a time for us to kind of transition from that energy of like, go, go, go productive more into this sensual, more inner energy, which will then allow us to actually get good restorative regenerative rest. Because if we're going from like, go, go, go, go, go all the way until we fall asleep, then we often have folks who have insomnia and have a hard time getting real regenerative rest.
Lana: I'm also thinking about one of the difficulty that I personally have typically affecting how beautiful your skin is, is hydrating or hydrating enough, but because it's sort of preset in your ritual, you're drinking teas that are tasty, that are delicious. And so you're consuming enough water to hydrate your skin.
Marysia: Yes. Exactly.
Lana: Fabulous. Absolutely fabulous. So any other rituals or any other recommendations that you have for that radiant and healthy skin?Additional recommendations for radiant skin
Marysia: Yeah. So there are some plants that are beauty tonics, that are plants that we can drink internally that really have been shown for thousands of years to create more beauty. And one of them is just schisandra berry. And I love schisandra. and schisandra is my plant when I was speaking to that infusion that I want to have when I like want to still be my creativity and be clear in my mind and still keep going, schisandra is that herb for me. I often call her like the miracle Berry or like the superwoman plant, the superhuman plant, because she's very energizing. She's also an adaptogens and the longevity herb. So she's balancing the hormonal system. She's balancing the endocrine system, she's increasing circulation, really helping create mental clarity and focus, wonderful for digestion, really beautiful for keeping the liver and the kidneys clean. All of these things are so important for skin health. And then also she's astringent and there's this amazing kind of puckering that happens when you drink her. She almost tastes like lemonade. right.
And what's incredible about her actually is in traditional Chinese medicine she's called Wu wei zi, which means the five taste Berry. And he has all five tastes, which speaks to how she affects all meridians of the body, all chakras of the body, really works to support all of the systems of the body. But that initial taste of her fruit, of the Berry, when you make an infusion is really sour and that taste of sour is uplifting. And it's actually like almost like a facelift. It has its similar energy. And there is a way in which she hydrates tissue, but also tonifies it, tightens it. And so it makes her a phenomenal ally for the heart in terms of feeding it, but also strengthening it. And it also makes her a phenomenal ally for the skin. And a lot of ancient texts will show her being depicted in like these beautiful geishas that are holding a strand of red berries and giving them to ancient monk. And that symbol of her longevity and this eternal youth.
And there are people that take her in order to really improve the plumpness of skin, reduce wrinkles, and to really increase energy and vitality. She's also an aphrodisiac. And when you work with her consistently, there's a strong increase in libido. And she also balances the hormones, like I mentioned before.
So she can be a great ally for women who are feeling like a dip in their hormones or a peri-menopausal. I've had a lot of students who are like my sex life is back. And and also for all genders is a great plant for health, for vitality, for stamina, for sexual endurance. She's also a phenomenal ally for men's reproductive health and their sexual stamina. So a really, really wonderful herb of vitality. Quick break
Lana: Just a quick break here to remind you that Marysia kindly offered her a wonderful book The witch's herbal apothecary: rituals and recipes for a year of earth magic and sacred medicine making' as a raffle prize for this episode of Plant Love Radio. So please head over to https://ko-fi.com/plantloveradio, and share some of your favorite thoughts on today's conversation. In addition, you will find a coupon code for Marysia's Rituel sacred serum, which we will discuss in a couple of minutes in the episode. And now back to our conversation.Incorporating plants in other formulations
That's great to hear. Are there certain herbs you might recommend not as infusions, but in other forms? And I'm not necessarily talking about topicals. I use adaptogens sometimes in honey and in other preparations. Do you have any favorites?
Marysia: Yeah. I love chocolate and I eat chocolate every day and after every single meal I eat a little dark cacao. And so I love using adaptogens to make different desserts. I also adhere to an anti-inflammatory lifestyle. Really reducing inflammation is important for me and my body. And for my beauty as well, actually, but also just for me to be able to move energy in the way that I want to as a mother, as a woman, as a teacher, as somebody who holds a lot, as a witch. Especially as I've gotten older, and I'm turning 38 this summer, maybe in your twenties people might go out and have drinks and then they can be hung over the next day.
But for many years now, I just don't want to feel like crap. And also as a mom, I can't afford to have a day where my energy is just non-existent. It's something I'm not interested in. And so I found over the years that regulating my blood sugar is so important. And that reducing inflammation in my body is so important.
I love hiking. I'm an avid mountaineering woman. And so it's important for me to be able to go out on long adventures into the mountains and to carry a heavy backpack and to be able to jump on rocks. Those are things that are really important to me and as part of that anti-inflammatory lifestyle.
And this is something I teach a lot about with my students. It's food medicine, and that's where the adaptogens come in really strongly for me. Being able to have the pleasure of a hot cocoa or I'm making this amazing cake these days that's made of zucchini and almond butter and adaptogens
Lana: oh, wow.
Marysia: And it tastes like flourless chocolate cake. Nobody believes that it has zero grains, zero sugar. I use xylitol to sweeten it and a little Stevia. And that's that's where I like to add a lot of the adaptogens too. Yeah. So I'll bake with the adaptogens and I'll make desserts and I make all sorts of delicious elixirs with the adaptogens and then another form of medicine.
I really actually enjoy our vinegars. And extracting certain plants in vinegar, especially the nourishing herbs that the minerals are very well extracted in apple cider vinegar. So you can make a vinegar extraction of nettles or cleavers, any of these plants that have a lot of minerals and use it as a hair wash, or as a skin toner diluted with a little bit of apple cider vinegar, in your salads.
And then there's a tincture that I really adore, which is motherwort tincture. And, I don't work with that many tinctures. I really love infusions. There's something about just how safe and hydrating and nourishing extractions and water art for me. But the teacher of the nervines of motherwort, or blue vervain, or even holy basil or glycerin, having those in water, very diluted where you can't taste the alcohol.
If there's a way where I find that the alcohol extractions really work well with the plants that we're trying to deliver into the nervous system. And, and so for reducing anxiety for calming kind of instantly, I love a tincture of motherwort in a glass of water tea. Topicals in Marysia's rituals
Lana: That sounds great. I have my little blue vervain that I'm showing to you right now sitting right in front of me. So this is great. Thank you. So any of the topicals you can think of that are just great additions to your rituals?
Marysia: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's so important what we put on our skin and, our skin is absorbing and drinking whatever it is we put on our skin. I think it's so important for us to really stay away from processed botanical from processed skincare products and anything that has chemicals, I just don't put it on my skin.
And so a lot of these kind of anti-aging lotions or these different beauty products, they're very effective at marketing and at the storytelling. But when you look at the ingredients, there are a lot of chemicals and some of those can be really disruptive to our hormonal health. Some of them can be really toxic.
And our body then is taxed with trying to process and cleanse these chemicals out of our bodies. So I use exclusively raw, cold pressed, organic oils on my skin and after many years of being a sun worshiper. And again, I go on long expeditions into nature.
I don't use sunscreen and I spend a lot of time in the garden. I did start to kind of notice like, okay. I really want to make like the best skin oil ever, because I don't want to really prematurely age and I want my skin to be really healthy.
And I also know that the plants are so nourishing to the skin and that there are a lot that actually have a natural SPF that can be very protective too, whether it's wind or sun damage or cold.Marysia's Rituel Sacred Serum
And so I formulated this beauty oil that's called Rituel sacred serum, and it has 28 different plant botanicals and different oils. They're all raw cold pressed, organic, and they're infused with different herbs that regenerate the skin that speed up healing. So any kind of acne or blemishes or micro tears, that healing will speed up. They reduce puffiness. They reduce redness and blotchiness, and they deeply hydrate the skin and give it like this really beautiful, healthy glow. And because there are all these different cold press seed oils, they have all of the different fatty acids and minerals and vitamins that our skin needs. So it's the skin just drinks it in and it completely transforms people's skin.
And some of the ingredients are cold pressed passion fruit seeds, jojoba oil, which is actually a natural wax. It's the closest oil like the oil that our skin produces. So it's amazing for both people who have dry skin and also people who have acne.
And again, this oil is formulated in a way where it really balances. It's kind of like an adaptogen where it will meet you where you're at and bring your skin into harmony. So people who have acne, we have teenagers, we have people with dry, brittle skin. We have people with all different kinds of skin conditions that find their skin looking so, so beautiful after using this.
And really, you know, for anybody who wants to make their own oil just using raw cold pressed organic oil is so important because as soon as an oil is processed or heat treated, it loses a lot of its nutrition and it can in fact begin to cause free radical damage. So when you look at different brands and you're looking for a product notice if the ingredients are organic or not.
If they're not organic, then you are adding pesticides and chemicals and your skin has to process that it's going to speed up aging notice if the oils are cold pressed or if they are refined. And again, that's going to make a huge difference.
And then the product that I've created also is infused with these healing herbs. And then there's also a very high dose of regenerativity grown organic CBD, which has a really phenomenal anti-inflammatory components. So it's been so wonderful to hear people's experience with it and it's been really beautiful to share it.
And that's definitely something that I use all the time every day. And I've hiked in Peru for 10 days without showering and without sunscreen in 14,000 feet altitude. And I have not gotten sunburnt and it just naturally cleanses your face. And yeah, so it's really protective to the skin protective against pollutants against weather and very regenerative.Hydrosols
Another thing that I use on my skin are hydrosols and I really recommend hydrating with hydrosols. I don't use soap at all on my skin. And in the morning I don't want wash my face with water. I just spray it with rose hydrosol. And that's kind of this duo that I share with Rituel is the rose hydrosol you first spray it in, it hydrates your face, and then you lock in that moisture with the oil. But that's really what I use.
Natural buttersI also really love different natural butters like Shea butter, mango butter. Those are really beautiful for the skin. And especially when you need something that's even thicker, if you live in the winter or if your skin is aging and very brittle, those butters, those natural raw, again, organic butters are just phenomenal for the skin.
And yeah, that's pretty much what I use on my skin.
Lana: that is fabulous. And when I was preparing for our conversation, I went on the website for Rituel and I was exploring the rose mist that you mentioned the hydrosol and then the oil itself. And it looks absolutely divine. It looks gorgeous. I know that you formulate for other companies as well. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Marysia: Yeah, absolutely. I'd love to. Before I move on to that, I'll just mention for your listeners that if they want 20% off of Rituel, they can use my code which is SACRED WILD. So if you take a sacred wild as a coupon code, it'll give you 20% off.
Lana: Thank you. I'll definitely include that for the listeners.
Marysia: So I love formulating. Formulating to me it's alchemy and it's been a beautiful journey to be a formulator in this organic way of not pushing it where the formulations that I've created have really come from a natural alchemy of my relationship to the plants.
And so just as that Rituel face oil was birthed from my own natural desire to have something for myself and my skin and knowing what my needs were in terms of protecting my skin and anti-aging et cetera. So to every other formula that I've created has come from this deeply embodied relationship.
One of my most famous formulas is it's a beautiful story. This recipe came to me directly from a plant and pretty much the way that I formulate it's through conversation with the plant spirits. So the plant spirits guide me and tell me what to do and how much to use it.
And I'm working and this is how I teach herbal medicine as well. I really teach this connection directly to the plants. And so each of us is working with our own soul and our own heart and our own prayers and the plants and with plants that we are deeply in relationship with. And I always tell my students that, we really shouldn't be recommending herbs that we don't personally know and have an embodied relationship with. And we also really shouldn't be formulating with herbs that we don't know through our own physical experience.
And so when we do have this deep intimate relationship, I find that the plants just begin to tell you what to do with them and they bring you inspiration. And this product that I created it's called Awaken and it's a sexual lubricant. It's made by the company Foria, which is an awesome company for sexual health and wellness that focuses on pleasure. And this product is a recipe that came to me from my relationship and from meditation, with the plant spirit of kava kava. And this is a plant that I just adore.
I have known for years that have worked with, for years, it's a plant that I've brought into people's life to support them in grounding, in calming their nervous system and opening their heart and in opening the pleasure centers of their body. And this plant has given me so many teachings about so many things.
It has guided me and given me really amazing advice in moments where I've been in crossroads. It's always like, take it slow, be gentle. Everything's okay. And every time that like human part of me, Yeah. It's like what? I really want to do this, I can make it happen. And Kava's like effortless action.
Everything that we create is alive and has a spirit. And if we create it from a place of chaos, it will ripple a note of chaos into the world. so kava has taught me to be so impeccable with what I create, what I birth. And this ally in sexuality and sensuality and creativity and being calm and grounded and embodied and birthing from the heart, birthing from that place of effortless flow.
And among many other things this plant also guided me in creating this topical lubricant. And it's a beautiful oil that people put on their genitals and it increases circulation and it has all of these amazing aromas. It has plants like vanilla and cardamom and cacao and kava and it increases sensation.
And it's been incredible to hear these stories from people over the last few years. There've been people who have written to the company and they've forwarded me some of these letters people who have said, like I've had endometriosis for 20 years, and I haven't been able to have pleasure and I can't have sex with my husband.
And this is the first time I've been able to have sex without pain, or this is the first time I've had an orgasm or, this is like an amazing ally for me and connecting to my own pleasure and myself without a partner. So it's been so beautiful to just feel the healing gifts of the plants and the medicine of these plants and these formulations and how they're able to touch so many people.
And I think that's one of the greatest gifts as a formulator is to be able to really formulate for other companies as well, who want to do the storytelling who want to get the product out there. And I get to just share this creation and it gets to reach many people.Marysia's apprenticeship
Lana: this is so wonderful and so powerful. Thank you for sharing this. And I will definitely include links in the show notes for both companies and the products that you mentioned. So thank you. In addition to being a formulator, you have mentioned that you are an educator, that you are a teacher, you have the Sacred Wilde apprenticeship. And I would like to ask you to talk about the apprenticeship itself, what people learn through the apprenticeship, who is it for? Just tell us a little bit of what happens.
Marysia: yeah. The apprenticeship is just my greatest joy to hold this container. And it's so beautiful to be able to gather with people from all over the world now because it's online and we begin in the fall Equinox and we journey through the wheel of the year. We journey for 10 months together.
And each month I introduce a few herbs to the students and we have an opening live ceremony via zoom that's also recorded and I guide them through plant meditation to connect directly to the spirit of the plant and to begin that relationship of learning, how does this plant taste? What does it feel like? Where is it going in my body? What is happening?
So the whole course teaches students how to learn directly from plants about their medicinal properties and their spiritual gifts. And it's also a healing journey because when we begin to enter these relationships with the plants, they begin to love us and heal us and come into our lives and meet these needs that humans can't always meet.
It's really a remarkably beautiful thing to work with people and to see that all humans need love and the earth needs love. And our culture kind of puts so much pressure on romantic relationships, on partnerships. And so much pressure is put on like your one partner who's supposed to meet all of these emotional, psychological needs. And when we begin to realize that we can receive from the non-human, our life just becomes so much richer and our soul is able to be fed in these ways. And we're able to grow from these relationships from the alchemy of these relationships, with the non-human as well.
So that's really what the Sacred Wilde's about. It's about learning how to feed the sacred wild within you and within nature. And so it's a personally healing journey, a spiritual journey. It's a training in folk herbalism, and it's also a training in regenerating the earth through how we are in relationship to her -in gardening, in wildcrafting, in medicine making, in meditation, shamanism, deep ecology, these sorts of things.
Lana: that just sounds fabulous.
Marysia: It's so fun. It's really fun. And it's amazing. It's been amazing to go online actually, because we have students from all over the world. People of all backgrounds, there are scholarships available, no one is turned away. So we're able to have a real diversity in our student body. And it feels powerful to be working with the earth and the spirits in this way, all over the planet.
Often when we're in ceremony, I just feel us like these acupuncture needles and our prayers are weaving together and we're able to ground our prayers into the body of the earth. And that feels immensely healing to me.
Marysia's new book
Lana: Very powerful. Thank you. You mentioned earlier in our conversation that you recently became a published book author. So I know that the book is called The Witches Herbal Apothecary: rituals and recipes for a year of earth magic and sacred medicine making. Who is this book for?
Marysia: yeah, this book is really for all sorts of people who are interested in connecting to themselves to nature and to magic and spirit. So it's for people who are new to herbalism, as well as to seasoned herbalists. I've had a huge spectrum of people on the herbal path respond really positively to it.
It's a both a gentle way to introduce you to the tradition of healing and to working with the plants both physically and in this way of intimate relationship. But it's also proven to be quite inspiring to people who are seasoned herbalists because it really offers this lens of working with the plants as plant spirits as well. And then it also similar to the course, the sacred wild apprenticeship. It takes the reader through the journey of the wheel of the year. So it's a book that you could come back and reference in all the different seasons to really learn how to ride these currents of nature -be it in the season of spring or in the morning, or with the new Crescent moon. So it offers rituals and practical guidance on things to do in the garden, how to make medicine. There's a lot of recipes in there. Yeah, it's, it's a really kind of fun book.
Lana: Is that recipe for zucchini chocolate cake in your book? It will be in the next one. Right.
Marysia: Maybe in the next one that I'm giving them my apprentices. Yeah.
Lana: Okay. All right. That's great. Where can someone purchase your book?
Marysia: Yes, you can purchase my book on Amazon Barnes and Nobles and all of the regular sources, as well as local bookstores, you can request them at a local bookstore. You can also purchase a signed copy from me on my website, which is schoolofthesacredwild.com. And on my website, you can also find a link to Foria the lubricant, as well as to Rituel. And as well as to registering for the course, I just opened registration for the next apprenticeship. that's going to begin in the fall Equinox and ends in the summer solstice. And so spots do fill up. But all the registration information and information about the course is on my website. Ways to connect
Lana: that's perfect. Tell us one more time the name of the website, the address.
Marysia: Schoolofthesacredwild.com
Lana: Perfect. Thank you so much. So Marysia, a couple of more questions for you. In addition to your website, I know that you're huge on Instagram. How can someone find you there?
Marysia: Yeah. Instagram, I think if you look up school of the sacred wild, I will come up. But it's actually under my name and my name is Marysia Mernowska and it's very hard to spell and remember, but it's M a R Y S I a. And then an underscore, M I E R N O w S K A. So my name is what my Instagram handle is.
Lana: perfect. And I will definitely include that in the show notes so our listeners can find all this information.
As we are finishing this conversation, I want to ask you one last question about perhaps pearls of wisdom, or maybe closing thoughts as they relate to the, a wheel of year cycle or perhaps beauty or skin health or anything that we have discussed or anything else that you want our listeners to take away from this conversation.Closing thoughts
Marysia: Hmm, thank you for that. Yeah. I think the pearls of wisdom that I wish to really just share an offer from my heart is that we live on one living earth and that we are a part of one living body that is the earth, and there's something so healing and magical when we can relax into experiences of belonging, that we belong on this earth and that we are able to heal the earth by healing ourselves and by loving the earth and by loving ourselves and by creating loving healing, reciprocal relationships between people, between cultures and between the human and the non-human.
So I just have found that, we live on this earth that is able to regenerate herself, and she shows this to us every single day with the setting sun and with the rising sun. And that we too are able to regenerate and heal and change our ways. And so my prayer is that we become agents of transformation on this planet and that we come into deep devotion and we fall deeper in love with this beautiful earth and this beautiful life, and with these regenerative gifts that exist in us and in the sacred Wilde all around us.
Lana: Marysia, thank you so much for your love, your beauty, your wonderful message. And thank you for your time.
Marysia: Thank you so much, Lana. Thank you for this opportunity and Thank you. to all who listened and gathered with us today, blessed be!.
Thank you for joining us!
Thank you so much for joining us today for this conversation with Marysia Miernowska. I hope you have enjoyed it all the resources that we discussed in this episode can be found at https://plantloveradio.com/80.
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The music you hear in the introduction was written by a neighbor of mine, David Scholl and it's called Something about Cat - my deepest gratitude to Bill Gilligan for this opportunity to play it.
Thanks again for being here today. I really appreciate you. Till the next time, thank you for loving plants and planting love!