Kathi's Teachers

by Amy Bley November 13, 2024

This week, we’re celebrating the lessons we’ve learned and the teachers, in all forms, that have led us where we are today. Making a list of one’s teachers is a way to practice awareness and gratitude. Here’s a list Kathi made of her teachers and some of the meaningful life lessons she’s gained throughout the years. 

• The plants - they started talking to me as a child.

• My family, specifically my mom, dad, Memere and Grandfather, who all supported and cultivated my love for the outside. My grandfather, who taught me about roses, gardening and fruit trees. 

• My Mom and Dad, for letting me run wild in the woods and helping me start my first garden and pumpkin patch to sell on the side of the road as a kid. 

• So many amazing teachers throughout my life in all the school systems I attended. Sadly, names flee me. 

• The downeast coast and inlands of Maine. Those lands taught me so much. 

• The Gila National Forest. I learned to trust and lean into the darkness even more in that land.

• Islesboro, Maine, This land held and facilitated some of the darkest shadow work I’ve ever done. 

• Cindy and Jim Dunham of Tanglewood for taking a chance on me. My years living at Tanglewood and in that forest where so much of my herbal growth started and where I learned to trust my intuition. 

• Dennis and Joe King of King Hill Farm. These were my first farm mentors. These two taught me so much. I have endless gratitude for all they taught me. They taught me how to make really good homemade beer, wine, bread, and salad dressings, grind flour from grains grown and harvested right there on the farm. They had the most amazing pantry I’ve ever seen to this day. 

• Scott Greene and Suzanne Young, they taught me so much about my own strength and knowledge. I have gratitude for all the support they gave to me in my younger years and for seeing things in me that I couldn’t always see myself. 

• Sue Hatch for all the love and support in my life, especially during my 20s. Her strength and wisdom guided me and still does today. 

• My herbal colleagues and herbal sisters, Sheila Kingsbury, Mary Blue, Nikki Telkes, Helen Ward, Larken Bunce, and SO many more. 

• Rosemary Gladstar, Deb Soule and Gail Faith Edwards. Theirs were my first “herbal” focused books that I read, beyond Euell Gibbons and Tom Brown Jr books. All three of these herbalists have played a role in my herbal journey, along with Leslita Williams, David Winston, Leslie Alexander, Mimi Prunella Hernandez, Tammy Sweet and still SO many more.

• Rosemary Gladstar, for continuing to support me and the work throughout all these years. She has been a true believer in my formulas from the first time we met and I can’t thank her enough for all of her love and support. 

• My team at Herbal Revolution. To all the employees that currently work with me and to the ones that have come and gone. I learn so much from these incredible people, they have taught me so much in regards to patience, gratitude, humility, vulnerability and acceptance. 

• My partner Gus and all the animals in my life. The animals teach me every day to be in the moment. To love and appreciate what is and that life is always changing, to embrace the moment and love it to its fullest.

 - Kathi

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