The Nettle in Me

A love letter to the edges of our selves

Greetings Lovelies! As the weather turns crisp and the dark starts moving in I thought I would awaken us all with this lovely little essay, one of the first of my series of plant materia medica, on a totem plant, Nettle - who has been making the news with the lovely film The nettle dress. Links at the end and some class and housekeeping announcements. Enjoy and as always comments and shares much appreciated!

The Nettle In Me. I’m surprised that I haven’t been slapped in the face by now. That's another aspect of the Nettle in me. One that somehow just stands you down. I have Aries in Mercury resulting in communication skills that can be just bloody-minded. Blunt. Bludgeoned. Rude, without asking. Left-field, righteous, arrogant, like why don’t you shut up while I smack you in the gob, Natasha.  And sooooooo to the point. That's the Nettle in me, those pointed offhand comments, each little syllable a sting of mind-bending perforation. We demand attention. And so smart about it. You feel it for days. To top it off, just so you remember, while I’m giving you the burn, it's funny to boot so everyone is laughing. It gets harder to give me a decisive fist. You have to really know that that's what you're going to do, smack me left side. And that's exactly what I’m asking for. The demand that you pay mind. Respond, react. My mouth fully armed in every way. That word smart resonating 180. And if you rise up to the call and grab me hard I'll surrender. Grab me hard and I'll disavow my vehement striding thoughts. Grab me hard and I’ll happily show you another point of view, swivel around and attack from a different perspective, grab me hard and hang on for the ride and all of a sudden it’s a joy, this urtification, the stripping down, the extremes of perception. All of a sudden, muscles of thought, and movement of mind wake up, re-arise, revolt. Grab me hard and we might end up being just downright intimate. 

That's the Nettle in me. For a long time, it’s been a totem plant.

I know how to pick a Nettle leaf, by grabbing it firmly, and fold it in on itself and eat it on the spot without getting stung. This trick is so cool that it quickly gets taught to others. Then it's in you. Nettle can become cell space. 

In my mind's eye, I can see the nettle, in the forest, the Nettle stands like watchtowers on the edges, guarding what’s within. Hey to all who pass here. No one gets by without feeling their presence. The math of the forest, the monks standing guard. The praxis of family. Tall, rising, regulating. keeping mind. This almost invisible yet entirely present beautiful tall plant rising up spiraling out of the earth swathed in rich greens with the occasional flash of red deepening to brown, gathered in stands or hidden in the folds of the lush undergrowth, standing guard. Can we really see them? Or do we just glance away looking for other openings? Do we ever stay close to examine or do we instantly dismiss in judgement of our one-sided experience, one of pain, inconvenience, hurtful avoidance. Does that stop us from close examination? Or do we bend down to examine one of the most mineral-rich and bountiful plants on the planet that guards our wild places, stop to pause at the riches stored in the watchtower, stop to ponder what’s worthy to defend? And why? Those graceful green watchtowers that hold so well the functional space between us and them. I would love to see with otherworldly eyes, the communication lines. Golden threads under and overground. Would Nettle be the central control switch? At the clusters of the mycelium communication network? Nettle, the great modulator that is garnished up with drops of formic acid, activating the unseen court of histamine reactions, that can be felt as slow trickles of life shifting gossip or the fast flame of scandal. The constant play of what we perceive to be dangerous and what actually is is facilitated by nettle, To know what is in you, to know what it is that you need, know what exactly you can take in, know what you can absorb so that you can know to discard the rest. Knowing which means decisions at play, deciding what is best, The knights, those monks of the forest and field standing on the edges in charge of the vast riches of the earth knowing what to take and what to leave so that we can be nourished, nourished to do the work. As I spend the time to drowse in the Nettle forests, as I spend the time to look at these ancient knights of old, these are the thoughts that wonder. I grew up with the Nettle. When I was a child and I remembered how plants were. How the earth was. Something that was there always, like mother and father. A concept made real. Plants that reach out and touch us. This is the medicine that heals as I otherworld myself and my imagining starts to push-me-pull-you, invisible atoms at play. 

I use fresh Nettle as an alterative to help against allergies and for calming and modulating the immune system. 

That's what I want to see when I close my eyes, the inner workings - To feel as the plant feels, to slip back into another form, my nettle mind, where I can again stand tall armed with my swords of reason, waiting for the hesitant one to walk by, or the nervous one, the unwinding one, the careless one, the timed foe and say, nay, stab, point, prick, burn it in, yell with the whole of my being -  Wake up! Pay attention! And then for your own sake, sweet gods and mercy, grasp, grasp with the lungs of your mute ancestor's silent clockings, grasp your share of momentum, your shining magic in this particular space in time and with every single breath that's yours, rise up and be. Decide, in this life that’s yours, decide how you stand in this.

When the nettle appears in late February to March it rises up out of the ground. It marches through early frosts and late snow, bursting forth, springing up with the season's birdsong. The plant resonates with a vitality that makes it appear plump, packed, vibrant, remarkable, this perfect package of minerals and vitamins, and so much more than just compounds or parts, so much in the whole. As the forest stirs into early life, the nettle heralds, resurrecting the goodness of the land and making the knowledge of winter available, the particular biome of this particular piece of earth, this underground, this digested end of the cycle, As the forest stirs into early life, the nettle begins to grow anew with this year's information of what’s available, waiting to be consumed so that nourishment can continue in the cycle of life, so that life can move, into and through, the earth's decay transformed into fresh life-giving vitality. It’s one of our most valuable greens. 

Over time Nettle will fortify and add vigour to my general well being so I can resist, revolt and rewild. Over time I will gather the strength to step forward and live a life I can believe in.

It's like Berlin in 1939 as I go out to lunch with friends and we chat and laugh, while in the background starving polar bears trundle across a thousand remote iPhone screen islands. The satire has become a collective. The matrix has been broken.  And what are we doing as we rampage with our sad so sad desperation of scarcity and competition? Which leaves us squarely in the not ever enough world? As we carry on with intentions while all the time agents of a consumption geared only to serve Homo sapiens rather than the whole, the earth? Supporters of this status quo? Every time a receipt flies out of shopping till I get to think of the dying breath of trees. Every time make my way, drive forward I get to prey to big oil. Where is my grounding? How can my adrenals stand another minute of the silent scream called daily life?  The only sane left is the mad, honest enough to wear the right expression of aghast disbelief. 

What to do? What to hold on to and let go of? How to discern as the waves of it all overwhelms in the inhale and exhale, as I break food out of yet another endless plastic packet. Caressing the curves of plastic water bottles instead of basket willow, cedar planks, aspen leaves, the overwhelm of it all and then I’m down back to that single layer, the monk in the watchtower. Calling to the Nettle in me, looking me down, telling me to pay attention, to what I can. To embrace the fall before the next step rises me up. To know where I stand. 

Nettle will help restore and improve kidney function, allowing me to properly filter toxins out of my life, restoring parameters for what serves me.

I long for when we are embracing our medicine again. That's the Nettle in me. Wept hot tears over the madness of it all. Seen friends struck down with the confusion of function so departed from the heart. The loss of touching earth mother day to day. How I long to be moving with wild abandon within our intelligent landscape shaped by millions of years of purpose and care. To daily use and interact with the gifts that fall from the heavens, grow up from the ground, to simply touch and be touched by the world around me Feel the caress of what’s around me through the seasons, to truly sense how time changes. Our tendrils go deep into the dirt, our energy is rooted in this place and when we stop to embrace, when we have a connection we become changed. We become the praxis of family, tribe, one of a whole and the pain of one is felt by all, it matters, it has need and mind. We start to belong again and our weeping is more nourishing. And less recycled release. We are more nourished. As we drink the rich nettle medicine deep into ourselves our blood becomes calmer, our platelets slip and slide and we can negotiate the twists and turns. In fact, you could almost begin to sense the power of ourselves. The endlessness of us all. We guard the earth. The Nettle in me.

Nettles may be found by feeling for them in the darkest night  - Culpepper

I should have come up with this. I mean it has everything, witty and deep with that chord of otherworld wisdom. A resonance ringing on truth. And indeed like all boundary medicine, we know when it's there coz it comes when we're not looking. When our notice is the other way. Of course, we don’t see the Nettle, we feel it, whether with intention or not. We're not navigating this life with our minds, that loves to rest in the twists and turns of story, we're seeing the way heartfelt, guided by that deep body wisdom, all the ancestors standing behind holding you here at this point in time. We have been seeking, there in the darkness, reaching out for something, some light, some truth and as we stumble the nettle bites us, face slapped with awakening, watch where you are going, pay attention! And as you sit in pain, or stunned, or blinded by the lifting of the veil, as you sit, maybe frozen, as you crumple to the floor exhausting the groan, that deep release of noise that comes from behind yourself, the resurrection begins. The truth of the situation revealed, the decision of the knowing, what is and has always been right in front of you, that great shifting of tension, the grand reveal as all the chaos slides into place. So now you get to be the knight in between. You move into the very present itself, the understanding of where you have been and where you are going.

Don’t ever forget to thank the Nettle for giving you that moment. Or anyone else who has, in your life, been brave enough to let you down and deliver the unasked for truth. Been brave enough not to add to your illusion. There's a reason why more than I have called it the Nettles kiss in ages past as we brush up against these allies, this awakening, these little loves that love to sting, that suspended sensation of blinding white, the pause in between. The moment unseen where you can regather, regain, re-emerge. And that's what this simple line from Culpepper indicates by placing it in the darkest night. Putting it in the land of the unseeing, the land of feeling. Feeling through. For even when you are truly lost, your ego surrendered to all that is greater and truly unknown, for even in the darkest of the night, when the terror has consumed you and you lie in the belly of the beast, you can still reach out and feel, feel how you are not alone. Feel sharply how every moment we are all one or another and then we get the pause in-between, bridging alone and forever connected, we get the universe. That is how I receive the Nettles Kiss, how I hold the Nettle in me. 

By consuming fresh Nettles I have a source of nutrients and amino acids that help me repair my structure, enliven my muscles and heal after deep internal wounds and trauma.

The medicine works with blood. I like to engage with the histamine aspect, what I call the math of the Monks. The Hermit with the single shining light. Leading me on, life-giving knowing. It's the fresh formic acid that I crave  - that gift in the sting, that shot of atonement, adjustment, response provoking reality check. That readjustment of my overactive immune, my constant companion of unhinged fear, My terror, happily recursive by the terror of our times. Each time it brings what should be balanced into focus, different shifts of perspective as the years go by, as I welcome the medicine every spring. This year my attention is being directed to the difference between relaxing and numbness. Should I take the pause or the abyss? Apparently, I have to learn to relax and instead I crave to be numb, instead I want to lose myself in free fall so that I don’t have to engage, feel, respond, so I don’t have to think about my place in the planet, my footprints on the earth, the unsolvable problem times 7 billion. So I can just watch the late show that’s anything but outside my window. Something nettle is equipped to remedy. Full of Mars energy, its ruling planet and god, nettle knows when anger can be a life force, the reaction to the poke, prod, pain. Nettle knows when the pause can be rejuvenation and provides us with the utmost nourishment to guard against the abyss so that we have the strength to react, the pause to respond. As I walk through the edges, as I brave to notice what’s behind all the walls I seek that engagement with anger, seek to remain tethered to my care, knowing that without knowing my needs I cannot put my function effectively forward, I cannot serve the whole. I need to give a damn and the nettle in me stands me strong in my choices.The Nettle in me pokes me up again and again. "Pull on me" they whisper in fierce determination. Grasp us firmly, engage with intent and arise with us. I live in the woods so that I can peruse the edges and along with that the Nettle fields. 

They know me. They are not so much loving as having tied me into the parameters of their landscape. I’m the one who comes tromping through with the dog, sometimes cat, often child and who then exclaims in greeting, responding to their vigour as I see the whole potential of the earth tightly folded into them. I’m the one who talks to them. They are slightly amused and steeped in irrelevance. They see the foolishness of our ways, the inevitable weakness of our greed. They have stood here before and they will stand guard after. They are the masters of stockpiling riches, which they unfold into the sunshine, continuously year after year, after absorbing all the waste, breaking down those big rich proteins excreted out in the endless cycle of taking in and letting go. Waste which they turn with water and fire into dense rich support. Next time you are out in the field get down, get wet, get dirty and get eye level with a young nettle plant. You will see two lips early parted kissing the sky as the nettle buds move upward. You will see the opposite leaves spiraling up, but more miraculously in the leaves puffed out in tiny little puckered pouches, you will see the origami of power, like our mysterious intestines, who also know how to discern nourishment,  football fields all somehow squished into a tiny mobile sphere of the universe, both contained wonder of function and form. You can look and see the hairs, each one a tiny hypodermic needle filled with awareness medicine. I fill shopping bags with the young plants, picked lower than knee-high before they mature and need to be left to seed. I use scissors and gloves but always let the nettles kiss me first in greeting, so they know I’m back, so they can taste me and add into their underground database of what is. It's easy to get a big harvest, again confined to edges of a stand and before you know it you will have handfuls and bags of biomass, which will then in turn disappear, for there is a way that nettle moves through space, there is a way nettle has of taking up space, there is a way of knowing that nettle has with the pause in-between that always blows my mind - take class, for example, the many times I’ve taught how to make a nettle tincture. We will sit there with our mason jars, And there I am, the table piled high with nettles, 5 or 6 shopping bags full of origami Nettle, all small plump little powerhouses of potential, full in their prime and I’ll start to fill the jar, I’ll start to chop the Nettle with scissors, you need to pack the jar I enthusiastically explain and yet 45 minutes in you’re still stuffing and chopping. Packing them in, more than you ever thought possible. As they fold back into themselves traversing another world. And as I sit in class, with everyone watching, for like most of us the nettles love a laugh, and I sit in class wondering how I can speak about the inter-dimensionality of plant wisdom without sounding mad, best just let everyone else have a go. Experience it for your self. That origami. That unfolding folding of potential. That's the soul of Nettle. 

Right there. The wonder of what can. And how you need to so pay attention to turn it into what can be. 

The praxis of knowing into being. The Who I Am. The Nettle in me.

Posting this today in honour of Fall and to celebrate the film The Nettle Dress

And also here’s a shout out to Tom Hirons, The Nettle Eater, another incredible piece of understanding this incredible being

And also I had the incredible honour of attending this most marvelous thing with Stephen Jenkinson, The Night of Grief and Mystery Tour. Profound and moving and wisdom to the heart, I’m all in favour for more love letters and if you can catch this show I highly recommend it for as Stephen says himself, he might be dead soon.

I am teaching one last class in North Bend WA before I head off to the UK with Jimmy. Packed full of all my medicine making wisdom I am again, attempting to encourage that we get down and dirty and hands on with our medicine.

At: Twin Peaks Wellness Boutique

October 14th, Saturday from 10am-12pm

Cost is $25 a person, includes supplies.

“We have medicine growing all around us in the Pacific Northwest that is easily available and has been shown to have long-term lasting health benefits, such as Oregon Grape which contains berberine.

Being able to harvest and make medicine with your own herbs means that you are completely in control of the product and quality as well as being able to be literally in touch with the herbal medicine that supports you.

In this class, we will learn from an experienced medicine maker all the tricks and tips you need to know when making a fresh or dried herb tincture.”

Contact me at Sashasideways@yahoo.com to register or follow the Facebook link: Twin Peaks Wellness Boutique

Thats all for now my Lovelies and Happy Fall!