10/18/2025
While I've used to***co as an offering for ritual and ancestral altars, I've never felt deeply drawn to work with the plant in a healing manner. A couple of weeks ago that changed. In the process of preparing for the Good Grief Retreat in November with Aisha .rest and , we needed to move through the curriculum for ourselves. That meant doing our own ceremony and grief work to clear ourselves in preparation of holding space for others while simultaneously experiencing what may unfold for the participants in the retreat. To***co spoke up loud and clear as something for me to bring and use in our ritual. It wasn't lost on me that this plant is an addictive substance for many while it also holds powerful medicine. There is a reason it is smoked, offered as gifts, laid down on altars and ingested in many Indigenous cultures across the globe. Whole to***co leaves are gathered in bundles called hands before it is shipped off and rolled into ci**rs or chopped into ci******es. I think of the many black and brown hands that have cultivated and tended to the crops over the centuries, how their labor fueled numerous economies, and how many people from the African diaspora and beyond have been negatively impacted by the overuse and abuse of this medicine that some call "the father of plants."
I am grateful for what to***co taught me that day by the river. I'm grateful for the healing that transpired in ceremony with Aisha, Midnite, the water, clouds, birds and Spirit. I am so grateful for what is to come in working with this new plant ally🙌🏽
Also big thanks to for helping to create the curriculum with Aisha. What beautiful healing work you two are spreading into the world 🌎
***co
