M Y S T O R Y

W A L K W I T H M E I N T O T H E F O R E S T

Our stories are sacred. Especially our origin and journeying stories.

To begin, before you share your life with me, let me offer you a reflection of mine thus far - so you have a mostly linear map of my developmental arc and a feel for who I am.

I come from the Original Mother, as do you. I believe it is crucial in this time that we remember our shared humanity as we work to honor differences of our lived experiences and ancestral histories.

My relatively recent ancestral lineage can be described as mixed European ethnicity - with the bulk of my roots in the lands of northern and western Europe (the British Isles, Scandinavia, northwestern mainland Europe) - with several threads stemming from northeastern European and mediterranean lands as well. I also have a dash of Neandertal heritage and a tiny drop of unknown mystery genes in there for good measure.

My traceable-by-name ancestors (going back to the mid 1400’s and early 1500’s) come from the lands of Scotland, Ireland, Wales, England, Sweden, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, France, and Italy. They migrated to Turtle Island (North America) in waves between the early-1600’s to late 1800’s as peasant settlers.

Over the generations to follow the resonance of my Scottish and Irish heritage remained very strong within my family traditions. My middle name is McClure and I feel a potent ancestral connection with the Highlands and the Island of Skye (and The Hebrides) where the McClure clan lived. As well as the Atlantean coast of Ireland, where several family lines migrated from (specifically the counties of Donegal, Antrim, Down, Galway, Clare, Kerry, and Cork).

I come from a long line of what I would call medicine people and careworkers, socio-political activists, independent thinkers and trouble markers, dirt worshipers, farmers, herbalists, teachers, bards and musicians, and folks who know how to work hard and play harder. I’m re-learning what it is to center rest as a liberatory and ancestral healing practice.

I was raised in a working class family and taught to value education, the arts, getting outside in wild landscapes, the connecting power of humor and playing music together, and eclectic spiritual exploration.

I have always been very sensitive to subtle energetics and those who reside in the Otherworld. I have had many mystical experiences that have shaped my life in small and large ways - in the form of hidden struggles, invisible disabilities, and masked divergence - or what many indigenous cultures understand as gifts from Spirit and insights from the Muses.

I’m much more comfortable at this stage in my life honoring and harnessing my sensitivities and alchemizing my struggles into medicine for my community, although I consider my healing journey to be a never-ending life-ritual without an ultimate destination.

I resonate deeply with the path of the Wounded Healer. I’m proud of my scars and the wisdom they hold - and I consider Spirit to be the real teacher.

Over the course of my life I have had many elders tell me in differ ways that my life destiny is to be a guide helping folks reconnect to the ancient ways of relating through healing work and animist ceremonial rituals. It’s been a long journey of re-membering who I am within this place and time and cultivating the courage to trust my path.

I am a midwesterner and feel a deep connection with the upper Midwest region and the Mississippi watershed.

I was born in the blue hills of Kentucky, which is the traditional lands of the Cherokee, the Chickasaw, and the Shawnee land. I grew up in Kansas City, which is the home of several tribal nations, including the Kickapoo, Kaw/Kansa, Osage, Dakota, Lakota, Nakota, Shawnee, and Wyandot peoples - before traveling north to Minneapolis, Minnesota, better known as the home of the Dakota and Ojibwe peoples.

As a young person I was gendered as a woman and raced as white, although my pronouns and gender expression are fluid (she or they work fine) - and I believe that racism and gender discrimination are very real, but race and gender essentialism are not. Rather they are social constructs to control bodies in support of extractive economics.

Over the years I’ve put on and taken off many identity labels, all of which have served me for a time to understand myself and others better.

However, at this point in my mid-life I am more interested in the practice of contextual shapeshifting and harmonizing tendencies, and taking a more nuanced, complex, and evolving perspective in how I relate to myself and others.

I resonate with the magic of queerness/queering in all forms: ecological, spiritual, relational, sexual, cultural, political, historical, and mythical.

I walk with several privileges within the current overculture - and therefore I am committed to the ongoing process of agitating and dismantling the inherited systemic power structures - both internally and externally. I am clear that my main frontlines are how I parent my child and how I am in relationship to folks in my community (both personal and in my practice). This is where the real relationship repair work happens.

I am super passionate about healing intergenerational complex trauma, both personally and collectively - so we are all able to turn more bravely towards each other as we move through this era of The Great Turning, as the old systems collapse.

I see myself as a bridge between worlds and I mostly prefer to work steadily behind the scenes, away from the public face. I aspire to someday be a well known and much loved elder within my local community, but I feel no desire at this stage in my life to be accessible to the masses. I’m content with being a humble worker bee connecting with real people on the grassroots level in lasting and meaningful ways

The roles I play in my community include: mother, sister, daughter, friend, healing practitioner and careworker, teacher and mentor, animist ritualist, seer, Bean Feasa, Banflaith, Völva, independent folk artist and working class visionary, devotional singer, keener, occasional community organizer, tender and steward of a small plot of land in Minneapolis and a stretch of wild forest and an off grid cabin in the Upper Peninsula of MI, and an elder-in-training steadily remembering what it is to become a culture holder/creator.

All my work is devotional and in service to the process of showing up more fully embodied, present to the vivid sensuality of life, with increased capacity to authentically connect with ourselves and our expanded world, in which we are a vital part of the whole.

My work in the world is oriented within the merging of these four streams:

VALUES

Respect for the web of life
Healing > curing
Interconnection + interdependence
Clinical experience + evidence + client experience = informing care
Balancing intuition and logic
Integrating top down (cognitive) + bottom up (somatic/ emotional) ways of knowing
Building community + mutual aid
Allow time + natural pacing
Compassion + empathy
Social / racial / earth justice
Relational repair + remediation
Accountability
Fluidity + non-binary
Creative expression
Nondual truths + authenticity
The power of story
Brave space
Skillful space
Exploratory space
Playful space
Course correcting as we go along
Liminality

LENS

Animism
Phenomenological
Fractal / holographic + micro / macro
Complex systems
Historical / deep time
Political / healing justice
Developmental + complex trauma
Attachment
Personal + cultural somatics
Mythic
Integral
Neuroscience
Ecological + environmental
Permaculture
Climate-aware
Collapse-aware
Ancestral connection
Sacred activism
Anti-grind culture / pro-rest and dreaming
Anti-racism, classism, sexism / pro-human rights
Anti-fundamentalism / pro-spiritual fluidity
Anti-purity / pro-integrated shadow
Restorative justice
Disability justice
Eastern philosophies + Asian medicine traditions
Folk traditions of northern + western European cultures
Parapsychology + consciousness studies
Archetypal/ Constitutional

APPROACHES

Relational / animistic
Process > outcome
Non-pathological
Healing the roots causes > treating the branches symptoms
Multidimensional + holistic
Collaborative
Non-judgmental
Humility + humor
Client centered within community context
Individualized care
Trauma informed
Evidence informed
Body affirming
Sex affirming
Queer affirming
Ethically non-monogamous affirming
Kink affirming
Birth/Death affirming
Entheogen / plant medicine experienced
Esoteric / magical
Ritualistic
Creative
Evolving / fluid
Experimental
Equitable
Acting local + thinking global
Small + slow movements make big and lasting changes
Long game + patience

CRAFTS

Presence
Holding/creating therapeutic space
Active listening
Psychobiological coaching
Somatic + neurobiological therapies
Biofield + energetic therapies
Shamanic healing + spirit work
Ancestrally influenced folk magic
Animist ritual
Trance practice + channeling + seidr
Divination + runic magic + spá
Guided meditation
Sound healing + galdr + keening
Music (guitar, piano, frame drum) + songwriting + invocation
Visual arts
Theater arts + improv + dance + performance
Storytelling + writing + word magic
Moxa + acupuncture
Manual therapies + bodywork + cupping + gua sha
Herbal + food medicine
Teaching + skill sharing
Fostering reflective dialogue
Community + event organizing
Permaculture design: social and environmental

Like you, I am multidimensional. My path has been winding.

I have studied with multiple wisdom traditions along the way ~ and consider myself a synthesizer of many ways of understanding and experiencing healing (vs an expert in any given field).

Below is a general overview of my educational journey - with photos because pictures express what words cannot.

However, the majority of my approach and skill as an interdisciplinary practitioner has been shaped by my real world and Otherworldly experiences and relationships with spirits, clients, and community members (all my real teachers) - and I’m always learning and evolving in my practice and crafts.

CHILDHOOD

1980-1999 Growing Up - I grew up under the influence of my mom, who worked in a city hospital heading a program for lymphedema treatment, while also offering bodywork in private practice. She also practiced yoga, transcendental meditation, Celtic and Germanic pagan folk practices, permaculture, western herbalism, grassroots political activism, and is the song carrier within our family. All of my parents played traditional acoustic roots music (Irish, American folk, Appalachian, old county, and bluegrass) and held regular community jam sessions at our house which significantly impacted my sense of cultural belonging and connection to my ancestry. As a young person I was very passionate about art, music, dance, theater, and connecting with nature and subtle energies. I learned transcendental meditation at the age of 12yo and wrote original music and made art throughout elementary school and high school. I almost went to college for fine art but decided I wanted to pursue liberal arts instead.

COLLEGE

2000-2001 Wildlife Rehabilitation - I volunteered during the summers home from college caring for wounded animals. Working with the birds of prey left an especially powerful imprint on my heart.
2003 B.A. in Biology from Knox College - My special focus was in systems ecology and field research, but I was also very interested in human origins/identity/sexuality/development, as well as philosophy and ancient history. I was granted a yearly fine art scholarship. I also studied abroad my junior year in two field research programs in Tanzania and Costa Rica. My senior research project was studying habitat fragmentation at Green Oaks Biological Field Station. Outside of formal studies I was involved in the dance and music communities, and hosted a college radio show with one of my best friends.

EARLY YEARS

2004 Environmental Education at Woodlake Nature Center - I interned as an environmental education instructor for kid’s programing at the nature center. Duties included lesson planning, nature program teaching, and basic maintenance of the nature center and grounds.
2004-2009 Musician - I performed and wrote original music in the MPLS bands The Haves Have It (w/ Jenn Bouma, Kelly Pollock) and Drawing Rooms (w/ Ellen Skoro), as well as briefly played in improv sound art duo Tamarack (w/ Tim Glenn), and jammed with friends in their bands (Mark Mallman, Askeleton, Nick Robin, Steven Yasgar + Kate Murray, Dave Matters) and made art for fun.
2004-2005 Canvas Director for The Fund for Public Interest - I went through training with The Fund for Public Interest and then directed the Minneapolis office. We knocked on countless doors raising funds for progressive environmental and human rights causes and ate a lot of pizza.
2005-2009 Tao Foods Herbery - I worked in the shop selling herbs and natural supplements. Durning this time I dove into western herbalism and food medicine, and I read a bunch of esoteric books. I studied Thai yoga with Devanadi School of Yoga & Wellness and qi gong with Spring Forest Qigong. In 2008 I began offering 1:1 body + energy work sessions in the treatment room at Tao and out of my house.

GRAD SCHOOL

2009 Prereqs year - I decided to go back to grad school and thought I wanted to apply to a master of nursing program, so I completed the nine prerequisite classes required to apply , but then changed my mind and decided to pursue integrative healing instead. Besides the basic anatomy/physiology/pathology courses, I enjoyed studying nutrition, human growth/development, and several psychology courses during this time.
2010 Post-Baccalaureate Certificate in Integrative Therapies & Healing Practices from the Center for Spirituality and Healing, University of Minnesota (incomplete) - I explored courses in environmental health, ethnobotany, ethnopharmacology, mind-body therapies, restorative justice and forgiveness, yoga philosophy, Ayurveda, TCM, acupressure, Tibetan medicine, shamanic healing, reiki, botanical medicine, functional medicine and food therapy, and the art of healing. I did all but a few credits short of finishing this integrative certificate and then decided to jump tracks again and enroll in the Health Coaching program. I also decided at this time to enroll in a Masters of Chinese Medicine program. During this time I studied board in India at the Men Tsee Khang Tibetan Medical & Astro Institute where I receive the Medicine Buddha initiation ritual.
2012 Post-Baccalaureate Certificate in Integrative Therapies & Healing Practices: Health Coaching from the Center for Spirituality and Healing, University of Minnesota - I was very inspired by the client centered approach and board application of coaching skills. As part of this program I studied integral theory and various other holistic systems and approaches to care, as well as communication techniques such as motivational interviewing and non-violent communication. I was a recipient of the Marilyn Sime Scholarship. I interned at Pillsbury House Integrated Clinic and volunteered there for a year after graduation.
2013 Masters in Chinese Medicine from Northwestern Health Sciences University - My main interest was working with the shen (spirits and the mind/emotions) and learning what I could about Classical Chinese medicine (vs TCM). I interned as an in-patient practitioner at Abbott Northwestern Hospital’s Penny George Institute, Fairview Hospital, Courage Kennedy Rehabilitation Institute, Aliveness Project, and Salvation Army Free Integrative Clinic. I also created a student club that focused on understanding and applying acupuncture research and organized a student trip to the Society of Acupuncture Research Conference.

PRACTICING

2013 - 2019 Continuing education - During this time I studied and mentored with many community practitioners outside of getting formal ceu’s. My varied interested included (in no particular order): further study into the practice and research of mind-body modalities, cross cultural ancestral traditions and healing practices, shamanic practices and ritual work, emotional support methods + grief work, breathwork, anti-racism education and abolitionist practices, somatic focus trauma healing methods, animist practices, trance work, sexual healing practices, mythology and folklore. My personal healing process during this time included weekly somatic/attachment focused therapy + consistent couples therapy, cranial sacral work, relational coaching/mentoring with a decolonial focus, shamanic mentoring, regular plant medicine ceremonies, recording two solo albums of original music under the name Scinnlaece, and the support of my wonderful community of friends and family. Teachers who shaped me durning this time include: Alaine Duncan, Daniel Foor, Andrea Ranae, Dare Sohei, Carmen Spagnola, Patrice Jackson, Center for Timeless Earth Wisdom (Pele and Firehawk), Clarissa Pinokola Estes, Jaime Meyer, Jill Larsen, Erin Telford, Kate Daley, Kimberly Ann Johnson, Lara Veleda Vesta, Layla Saad, Mary Dolejsi, Max Dashu, Megan Odell, Michael Newton, Peter Levine, Resmaa Menakem, Rose, Sharon Blackie, Susan Raffo, Tada Hozumi, Andy Adams, Jose and Lena Stevens, and all my kindreds within the Spiritweavers community, especially my Come-Unity Village team. (See my LINEAGES tab for more information on the folks I’ve worked with over the years.) * I’m not listing each class or training I took durning this time because it would be a super long list, but please feel free to ask me for more specifics if you are curious.
2013 - 2015 Ascent Acupuncture + Qi Nordeast + Pathways Health Crisis Resource Center - I worked as an acupuncturist and health coach at Ascent (apprenticing under Jill Larsen) and Qi NE (supervised by Megan Odell), as well as volunteered at Pathways Health Crisis Resource Center as a health coach.
2015 Initiation into parenthood - My biggest and most rewarding learning curve of all time. My kiddo is my greatest teacher. I believe parenting is a revolutionary and deeply creative spiritual practice.
2015 - 2021 Personal therapy with Kate Daley - I had weekly somatic psychotherapy sessions focusing on nervous system healing, attachment trauma repair, relationships, parenting, spirituality, and professional guidance. Working with Kate had a huge impact on how I work with clients and hold myself as a practitioner, as well as navigating my personal life.
2015 - 2020 Tall Reeds Healing Art - I created a healing space in Uptown, Minneapolis to offer 1:1 sessions and community events and classes centering the intersection of healing + spirituality + activism + art. I collaborated with so many wonderful local and national colleagues during this time. I decided to close shop due to the pandemic and pivot into a home practice.
2015 - 2020 Teaching faculty at the Center for Spirituality and Healing, University of Minnesota and Northwestern Health Sciences University - I taught in the Health Coaching Masters program (Health Coaching Fundamentals I + II, Health Coaching Practicum), the Foundations of Shamanism course, and several Chinese medicine courses (Intro to TCM, Acupressure, Point Location, Accessory Techniques). In the spring of 2020 I decided to step back from teaching and focus on my family and practice.
2016 - 2018 Moon Sisters Mpls - I facilitated a local open coven in Minneapolis that met every dark moon for collaborative enacted ritual and skill sharing on various witchy topics and practices.
2018 - 2020 Couples Therapy with Mary Dolejs - Monthly and biweekly somatic psychotherapy focusing on relational tear/repair cycles, nervous system attunement, communication, parenting challenges, money issues, and conscious uncoupling.
2018 - 2019 Tending the Witch Wound - A year long alchemical course I created that explored the intergenerational trauma legacy left by the witch burning times in European history and the impact on modern western culture. Here’s interviews I did with Max Dashu and Dean Radin that capture the essence of this experience.
2018 - 2023 Spiritweavers Gathering - I was part of the original Come Unity Village team, which was a BIPOC lead village and advocacy group that focused on fostering anti-racism culture and education within the gathering. Between 2018-2020 I taught several classes at SWG. Within the Community Village I offered ““Love Light and Whiteness”, and wIthin the Pussy Powerhouse I offered “Invoking the Whore” and “Tending the Witchwound”. In 2019 co-authored the Spiritweavers Allyship Guide booklet with the rest of our CUV team. In 2020 I offered a virtual class “The Witch Wound: Remediating a Legacy of Fragmentation”. Between 2021 and 2023 I stepped back from teaching, but continued to play an advisory role to the gathering from a distance, along with members of the original CUV team. In 2023 I assisted in the transition and creation of a new CUV team to support continued anti-racism culture shifting at Spiritweavers.
2018 - Present Musician / Artist - I am making music again under the name Scinnlaece (recorded music) and Tairseach (channeled performance art) and painting a lot of portraits and Otherworldly visions. See music and art tabs for more info.
2018 - 2023 - Mentorship and healing with Susan Raffo - 1:1 mentorship and healing work with a focus on personal and collective complex trauma and healing justice, somatics, and collective-cultural repair and reconnection work. Susan closed her practice in 2023 to prepare for a sacred pilgrimage, thus we paused our work together. However I still consider Susan one of my main lineage anchors and elders who keeps me accountable and rooted in my carework practice.
2020 Somatic Mentoring with Patti Elledge - A 6 month practitioner training in attachment + somatic complex trauma healing.

PANDEMIC ERA AND BEYOND

2020 Home Practice - At the beginning of the pandemic I let go of Tall Reeds Healing Arts and teaching at the universities in order to shift into an intimate home practice in my cozy loft studio, and created this new website. At that time also - I become a single parent and an as needed homeschooling teacher. On top of these personal changes, the pandemic, the socio-political uprisings, and the increasing impacts of climate change have tasked me with deepening my skill set to move with chaos, foster embodied and relational resilience, and cope with uncertainty.
2020 Neuro Affective Relational Model (NARM) informed practitioner - A comprehensive training in a psycho-biological relational model for working with healing complex trauma, (C-PTSD) attachment injury, and identity distortions.
2021 - 2022 Animist Arts with Dare Sohei and Larrisa Kaul - An intensive practitioner training in animist arts, exploring the interconnections of creativity + animism + liberatory relating within the context of playful ritual.
2021 Dance of the Tarantella with Alessandra Belloni - A workshop exploring traditional Italian trance dance and drumming ritual to healing sexual trauma.
2021 - 2022 Shamanic Mentorship with Jaime Meyer - Jaime is a long time local shamanic mentor of mine who I have worked with on and off for many years. This was an individualized mentorship deep dive focusing on drumming and Celtic shamanic practices.
2021 Permaculture Design with Midwest Permaculture - A design course for residential and small farming properties that focused on high yield food production, water capture, soil remediation, and ecologically regenerative practices.
2021 - Present The Mythic Body with Joshua Schrei - I attend bimonthly Patreon study groups exploring culture through a mythic lens. I studied with Josh in a small group The Mythic Body: Intensive Immersion in the spring of 2021. In 2022-23 I journeyed through his year long The Mythic Body course, which focuses on cross-cultural mythology, animism, mythosomatics, storytelling, invocation, and devotional ritual practice. In 2023-2024 I joined his team as a course facilitator.
2021 - present Da Yuan Circle, Liu Ming Healing Apprenticeship - I am working my way through Liu Ming’s cycle of teachings on possession, conception to death, sleep, and beyond pathology.
2021 Framing Drumming with Zohar Fresco - A frame drum fundamentals course.
2022 Aikido with Galen David + Hannah Kramer, Eastlake Aikido - Intro to traditional Aikido practice with my kid.
2022 Native Plant Walk with Romina Takimoto - A walk around Mni Owe Sni focusing on learning native plants.
2023 Framing Drumming with Miranda Rondeau -A frame drum fundamentals course that includes sonic invocation, chanting, and processional skills.
2023 Iranian Daf Drumming with Naghmeh Farahmand - A drum class focusing on Iranian Daf technique.
2023 Dao of Dreaming : Dream Series with Erin Langley + Clarissa Gunawan - A year long study of the complete cycle of teachings on the Dao of Dreaming within the lineage of Liu Ming.
2023 The Song and The Story with Mary McLaughlin - A course of traditional Irish sean-nós style singing.
2023 - Present Sean-nós and Keening with Mary McLaughlin - I am taking regular on-going private lessons with Mary studying traditional Irish sean-nós, and keening and it’s role in psychopomp work.
2023 Singing the World to Be with Josh Schrei + Peia Luzzi - A deep dive into the mythosomatics of invocation, with a focus on traditional Irish songs.
2023 Bodhrán drumming with Rónán Ó Snodaigh - A refresher drum class focusing on the traditional Irish bodhrán (which I’ve played for years).
2023 Feral Angles Poetry Cafe with Tom Hirons - A poetry workshop. I have attended two so far: Storytelling for Poets + Duende and Fire.
2023 Deathclown with Dare Carrasquillo - 1:1 collaborative coaching/playing within creative processes/portals, animistic channeling skills, performance and theater arts, magical improv flow, exploring possession states and mutual dreaming as art making art.
2023 Native Plant Walks with Romina Takimoto and David Miller - Two of my favorite local herbalist teachers, native plants walks at various locations around the Twin Cities.
2023 Mentorship and healing with Kris Nourse - After my previous mentor Susan Raffo closed her practice, she recommended I work with Kris Nourse on continued personal healing support and professional guidance and development.
2024 Bridging Parental Conflict with The Bridge Center - A co-parenting support class.
2024 Free the Voice with Odeya Nini - A 6.5 month journey in vocal liberation.
2024 A Year In Plants with David Miller - A year long course exploring Celtic medicinal herbalism.
2024 Sacred Songs and Spirit Singing with Emily Colay - A 6 week course on Danza de la Luna; Moondance ceremony and traditions.
2024 The Irish Keen: Lament of the Ancestors with Mary McLaughlin - A 6 week course on the Irish Keening tradition.
On - going continuing ed in acupuncture and Chinese medicine: over the years I’ve focused on how to treat complex trauma, mental-emotional imbalances, anxiety, depression, autoimmune conditions, aging and longevity, musculoskeletal pain reduction, medical cannabis, fertility support, gynecological issues, digestive health, dream practice, and spirit possession.
L I N E A G E S - Here’s an ever-evolving list of folks I’ve studied with and am inspired by - beyond what is already listed here. Feel free to ask me for more information if you have any questions about my training and experience.

Credentials / Certifications / Licenses

Bachelor of Arts in Biology : Knox College, 2003
Post-Baccalaureate Certificate in Integrative Therapies & Healing Practices: Health Coaching : UMN, Center for Spirituality and Healing, 2012
Master’s degree in Acupuncture and Traditional East Asian Medicine : Northwestern Health Sciences University, 2013
National Certification Commission for Acupuncture and Asian Medicine : NCCAOM, 2013 - present
Licensed Acupuncturist : Minnesota Board of Medical Practice, 2013 - present
National Board for Health & Wellbeing Coaching + CE Provider : 2017-2023
Neuro Affective Relational Model (NARM) informed practitioner : 2020
Ordained Minister by American Marriage Ministries : 2022