Treading the crossroads where magick, creation, healing, and reform intersect - Heartwood & Heather is an experiment in hope.I am an artist, a musician, a creator, a neurodivergent, a magick practitioner, a dreamer. I'm also tired. Tired that transaction takes precedence over relationship and that capitalism overshadows community. I want to try something different.Rather than making products, I am creating gifts. Inspired by the ideas of a gift economy, I want to see how these seeds, planted in good faith, will grow - and I can think of no better soil to tend this dream than that of the magickal community.My gifts can be found on my Patreon. Tiers are nominal and only exist because of platform structure, but all members enjoy the same gifts and can freely share them with their communities. Any reciprocity shared helps to sustain this dream.Everyone has their own journey in healing, magick, and practice. I am still finding my way - seeking spirit without appropriation and healing that can transcend self. My Journal is for my musings, my art, and for any questions or wisdom that find me on my path.I am not an authority, nor do I have all the answers, but I am seeker on a journey - and I invite you, traveler, to join me along this road.
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WHAT IS A GIFT ECONOMY?
The gift economy is a model rooted in reciprocity and gratitude. Instead of goods or services being bought or sold, they are given. When we make a purchase, we are partaking in a transaction- a simple exchange of money for service or ownership that, most times, is devoid of relationship.When reframed as a gift, we change our perspective and we are able to cultivate mindfulness, gratitude, and community. Reciprocity and symbiosis can be achieved between the giver and the receiver and gifts can be given forward to be shared and cherished with other community members. Practicing gratitude and reciprocity ensures a system of care and responsibility.This is a simple summarization of ideas that were first introduced to me (and much more eloquently stated) in the beautiful book, Braiding Sweetgrass, by botanist and enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, Robin Wall Kimmerer. I encourage you to read this book if you have not already had the pleasure. The grace and simplicity that transcends the pages are formative, magical, and will inspire you to grow if you are willing to listen with open ears and heart.I do not wish to replicate the voice of Kimmerer, and encourage you to experience it first hand. I provide a summary for explanation of my inspiration. I concede that I am merely a pupil. I say this, not in detriment to myself, but in admiration for the original voice and lived experience of the author and reverence for the gifts she has given in the form of her words and wisdom.More Resources:
Robin Wall Kimmerer on What Nature Teaches Us About Giving Back
The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World by Robin Wall Kimmerer
WHY A GIFT?
Part of my own healing and magickal practice is rooted in discovering my own ancestral roots and dismantling, firstly in myself, the colonial ideologies that have pervaded the world. In my case, as in the case of many individuals of European ancestry living in (what the western world calls) America, my connection to the land and the magic that surrounds us has been sundered over centuries and centuries of abuse, extraction, trauma, and greed - a cycle long ago inflicted and then perpetuated, either actively or passively, against other humans, animals, and the earth.In exchange for community and collective care, we now have a society of individualism where most of us are burnt out. We have learned that rest is laziness and to rely on others is pitiful. We have learned to work ourselves to numbness and measure our time in money.Where is the magic in that? Where is the moment to appreciate the sunrise or the brush of grass on your bare feet? Where is the feeling of the earth in your hands as you nurture your plant community, the smell of freshly baked bread in your own hearth, the joy in creation of art or music - for no other reason than to admire its beauty? Where is the time for celebration, for ritual, for remembrance?Like most who grew up in a house of limited means - and who continues to struggle with ideas of abundance and security into adulthood - this experiment also serves as a release. I want to break the cycle, instilled in me from childhood, that every skill or hobby needs to be monetized and that abundance is measured in dollars.I dream to create unreservedly - that the art and tools, that start as ways to guide my own growth and practice, can evolve to meet the needs of community. That in my labor, I can find a sense of belonging, value, and appreciation for my place in the greater whole of humanity.
ON BUSINESS
I want to be clear that my experiment is not a reflection on small business. There are so many creators and artists that I admire who own small businesses. I wish for them to thrive, to feel that their passions have value, for their work to grant them security, and for them to ask and obtain their full worth in whatever field they find themselves in. This is especially true for the global majority whose labor and skill have already been extracted for centuries.This is simply how I am choosing to confront the cycles in my own life and lineage. And I fully acknowledge that it may not work. I may find this unsustainable because of the world we live in.But I want to try - I want to dream - I want to hope.