What If Consciousness Is A Conversation With The Earth?

The ground keeps shifting, but our roots don’t have to. We sit down with healer, acupuncturist, and author Lindsay Fauntleroy to explore how flower essences, Ifa (the wisdom of nature), and the five elements can restore clarity when life speeds past the heart’s capacity to process. This isn’t theory from the sidelines. Lindsay shares a lived journey from health crisis to soul medicine, revealing how nature’s consciousness can change our minds, our choices, and our communities.
 
 We unpack the psychology of the elements—water’s descent into fear and destiny, wood’s direction, fire’s connection, earth’s steadiness, metal’s meaning—and show how these archetypes map cleanly onto everyday emotions and energy. From there, we demystify flower essences as vibrational remedies that carry a plant’s point of view, helping us move from reactivity to presence. If you’ve ever felt watched over by the more-than-human world, you’ll love our dive into animism, where the river has agency and the hawk notices you first.
 
 Decolonizing wellness becomes practical—choosing community over content, conversation over consumption, and inhabiting rather than owning the Earth. Lindsay also spotlights her Spirit Seed community and a new class on building plant allies and deepening earth-based spirituality with journal prompts and embodied practice. And when we ask for a medicine for right now, Angelica steps forward—an essence for ancestral connection and sensitive guidance through noisy times.
 
 If you’re craving grounded spirituality, ancestral wisdom, five-element psychology, and plant-based consciousness work you can actually live by, press play. Then share this conversation with someone who needs permission to slow down, listen, and remember why they came. Subscribe, leave a review, and tell us which element or plant ally is calling you today.

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Lindsay Fauntleroy Lac

Lindsay’s approach to soul medicine is grounded in over 15 years of mental health clinical practice as a licensed acupuncturist, her sacred study with elders of the Ifa tradition, and her commitment to community wellness. She is a fierce advocate for reclaiming ancestral knowledge systems as tools for personal evolution and collective liberation.

Lindsay’s current doctoral research explores the use Flower Essence Therapy as a decolonial approach to psychotherapy. One of her greatest joys is supervising advanced students in the Spirit Seed clinical residency, as emerging practitioners bring earth medicine to diverse communities around the world. 

www.thespiritseed.org

Transcript

Grounding The Theme And Guest Intro

GDC 0:01

Welcome to Belief Being and Beyond with your host, Granddaughter Crow. Hey everybody, Granddaughter Crow here with yet another episode of Belief Being and Beyond. And this time we are going to go into the earth, into the medicine, into the sacred ancestral wisdom that will help us to ground in uncertain times. It is there for all of us. And I found the perfect person because she's not harsh. She is grounded. When I say she's not harsh, she works with flower essences. Flower essences, people. So before I bring her on, let me tell you a little bit about who I have. Oh my goodness. I have Lindsay Fontleroy. Lindsay's approach to soul medicine is grounded in over 15 years of mental health clinical practice as a licensed acupuncturist. Her sacred study with elders of the EFA tradition and her commitment to community wellness, and this is what we need right now is that community wellness. Yes, she is gentle, she is intelligent, but she's also fierce. She is a fierce advocate for reclaiming ancestral knowledge and having that as a collective soul liberation for the community. She is currently in her doctoral research exploring flower essence therapy as a decolonialized approach to psychotherapy. Lots of big words, lots of bright honor. Love my sister, Lindsay Fauntleroy. Oh, welcome to Believing and Beyond.

Lindsay 2:01

Oh my goodness, sister. Thank you so much for such a grand and welcoming welcome.

GDC 2:09

Well, you know, when I got something like this to work with, I can't go wrong.

Lindsay 2:14

Thank you. Thank you.

GDC 2:16

I met Lindsay a few years ago. I can't exactly remember the moment, but there was this camaraderie around the natural world, around it being our wisdom keeper, around it being our healer. And so I am going to get a little bit into your book, people, in our element, Lindsay Fauntleroy. Okay, so there's so many places that I want to go with you because it's like I've been having these conversations with you about this podcast in my head for like the last, I don't know, two years. And I'm like, I want to talk about this, I want to talk about that. But Lindsay, first let's kind of get to know you a little bit. I mean, obviously, you're an advocate, you're an authority, you're an expert, you're an author, and also we'll talk about the spirit seed. But what drew you to becoming a healer, and what drew you to like working not just with acupuncture, but also with the flower essence?

Ifa As Wisdom Of Nature

Lindsay 3:29

Uh thank you for that question because I feel like after, you know, now going on close to 20 years of practice and you know, seeing the climate around different forms of medicine changing, sometimes I have to like go back and say, wait, what brought me here? Because that grounds me in what I'm trying to do. Right. Right. And so when I was introduced to flower essences, when I was introduced to um acupuncture, it was in the context of my own healing journey. And in the context of being in this moment where like my mind and body, as always, as we know, are so intimately interconnected. But then we have these moments, whether it's a health crisis, physical or a mental health crisis, or something that makes us realize, like, oh no, these are married, like married. And so it was during that health crisis that um I was introduced to flower essences from my sister-in-law and acupuncture through my mother-in-law. And it was, it had such a profound impact on me. But what I remember most about that time is that this deep, deep awareness that there's another way to do things. And this remembrance of like, you know, the doctors are all saying one thing, and there was a lot of fear and a lot of negativity and a lot of just like limitations in what I could access there or what was possible for me.

Speaker 1 5:08

And then at the same time, I'm in African spiritual community. And they're saying, Well, the divination says this. So the doctors are saying no, but the divination is saying it's possible, but you have to make these changes. And so that um connection to something that defies the limitations of what we believe to be possible is, I think, a big part of what we universally need to call in right now. Like what is possible for our collective, for our personal healing, that when we look at externally, we might not see. So that's that's where it starts for me.

GDC 5:53

Hey, you know what I love about that is because every wonderful healer has a story just like that. You know, I mean, it's this story of initiation. Yeah, it's the story of the hero's journey, it's a story of having to slay your own dragon in order. Yeah. In order to go out there and and do it. And I love how you phrase it that there are limitations in some certain communities that only the divine can answer, and divine practices can answer. So you, my dear, are also with the IFA tradition.

unknown 6:37

Yes.

GDC 6:38

Well, how much could you share about that? Because I am so curious and and respectful because I love my ancestors, and I would love to talk about your ancestors and yeah.

Speaker 6:52

They love to be talked about, I think. Because I just feel that they all I kind of percolate around. They're like, even when I'm at school, they're like, okay, you know.

Speaker 1 7:01

Um, so there's an aliveness there for me. And what I'll say about the IPA tradition is that it a few things. One is that it is one of many, many, many, many ancient and preserved and living traditions that originated on the African continent. And these traditions are eco-spiritual traditions. So they're traditions that have embedded in them this interconnected relationship between the human psyche, the natural world, and all of the forces that are here with us. And so um for Ifa, which uh my elders have translated for me as the wisdom of nature. That's essentially how you would translate Ifa.

GDC 7:46

Right. And so it's oh my God. Okay, I'm sorry, I'm excited because I wrote the book, The Wisdom of the Natural World. So I'm like, And that's the thing.

Weaving Ancestors With Modern Practice

Speaker 1 7:57

I think that is often what um is lost when we talk about African spirituality and African spiritual systems. There's something that happens when these practices are translated through a racialized society that makes them something other or makes them something strange or makes them something anti-Christian. And none of those things are true. It's very much um a spirituality that's embedded into the earth, where our feet are touching, and all of the forces of nature that guide us and that we're a part of. And so um EFA practice has a lot of different threads to it, but um, one of the most salient to me, which has been in my life, is learning how to listen, communicate, and um be in alignment with the natural forces of the universe. And so I um came to EFA later in my career after having already been an acupuncturist, after already having been a flower essence practitioner. And it was very affirming to find a practice that um really gave an ancestral context to the stuff that I had already been drawn to. And it kind of reinforced for me, it's like it's not an accident. You know, you're not, you you know, none of this is an accident. You have a purpose, you have things that you're gonna be drawn to. And now, you know, here's a little bit more of the the history of how your ancestors navigated and are doing what you're what you're trying to do here in your clinical practice in the Americas in 20, whatever year this is.

GDC 9:44

Right. You know what's so beautiful about that is when you are in a practice and you're like, oh, well, I I came to this practice because I went through an initiation. I came to this practice because of my, you know, hero's journey, like we were just talking about. I came to this practice because my curiosity, da-da-da-da-da. And then all of a sudden, after 20 years, you look back and you're like, oh, Shiza, my ancestors drew me to this whole thing and let me create my own story around it. Yeah. This was a bigger plan that because that's what I'm hearing.

Speaker 1 10:21

Yes, it feels that way. And it it was one of the, you know, I think in my journey of spirituality and healing, I've been in and out of so many different schools of study, right? I did a long um extended training in the cometic tradition and the in the priesthoods there. I did, you know, Jungian studies and alchemical studies and you know, the flower essence study. And then, you know, when I came to Ifa, If I was like, well, yes, all of that is like, duh, you know. And so it's just been a very um, a very beautiful container for me to deepen, I think, in a lot of ways, my understanding of how this stuff all works and to enter into um a worldview that I very much think has a place in our contemporary society, regardless of our ancestry. Right.

Speaker 11:20

Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1 11:22

So there's yeah, I mean, and even in I think our sisterhood, you and I, you know, like you said, your book is the wisdom of the natural world, and that's how we first connected. And when we really think about how much alignment there was with our ancestors and their relationship to the earth and the relationship to spirit, that's something that has transcended continents. And I think it's a a worldview that many of us are reawakening and remembering and saying, okay, you know, your ancestors called it air, ours called it water, you know, we've called it different things, but we're still talking about this alignment with the forces of nature and um how we can not be a source of um destruction to the earth or to our own destinies.

Five Elements And Psyche

GDC 12:13

I absolutely love that. And thank you for welcoming us all in, you know, to be able to listen and to practice and to hear what you have to say about the ancestral connection and just if it just made me feel welcomed. And I'm just like, oh, cool. So okay, in our elements, um amazing book that you have written and with so many great chapters in it. I mean, we're looking at dream catching, we're looking at making a prayer board, and then of course, my favorite chapter, making time for joy. That's what we're doing here today. I'm Brandon Crow, but I also am Dr. Joy Gray. And so, yeah, so you wrote a whole chapter about making time for me.

unknown 13:15

Yes.

GDC 13:17

So sorry. No, tell us, tell us about your book because it is amazing. It's absolutely amazing.

Speaker 1 13:29

Thank you. So in our element started, um, you know, I I was working with flower essences, and I was, you know, using them in my home and in my family, and then started my flower essence practice, and then working with the flower essences, they were like, you know, you should go to acupuncture school. And I was like, I'm not doing that. You know, in the subtle way that the flower essences bring us back to our path and our calling. And so eventually, you know, I went to acupuncture school. And while I'm in acupuncture school, I'm learning about five-element theory, really influenced by one of my mentors and teachers, uh Lori Deshar, who had a book about psychospiritual healing in um Chinese medicine. And a lot of the psycho-spiritual aspects of Chinese medicine were really um erased as they made their way west to kind of assimilate into this biomedical model. And so her work had really grounded me into you know, acupuncture is a spiritual practice, but it's also a psychological practice. Really? There's a psychology to the elements, there's a psychology to nature, which is, you know, what indigenous people around the globe in every context have been saying. And so in our element, um, really was my way of saying, okay, this is an ancient medicine, but nature is perennial, nature is an archetype. And so really looking at the classical um acupuncture theory with five element theory, which is its own psychological system and kind of translating that through a black girl in Brooklyn in this century. And so it's like there's aspects of it that are, you know, when we talk about the water element teaching us about fear and that descent of our energy body, just the same way a waterfall collapses into the earth and we surrender to gravity, right? So that's what it looks like physically in our energy body. But when that happens emotionally, it brings out fear and it brings us into our depths and it brings us into our innate destiny and power. That's the water element. So, what does that look like in each of our contexts now? And then what do we do with it? What do we do with the fear? What do we do when we're disconnected from our sense of purpose and destiny? And so that's what in our element meant to be a manual for my patients and for my students that were looking at how to translate this language of nature through their own bodies and their own psychological experiences.

What Flower Essences Are

GDC 16:15

That was so beautiful and such a mouthful because I feel like you know, you're touching on animism, and we'll go there in a little bit, and you're touching on an ancient wisdom and and and and how it came through you in this century. And I think that that's such a sacred way to say it, because I write a lot of books around the natural world, uh, shamanism, and I always bump up against this. Who am I? Like, who am I to bring this knowledge forth? What you know, who am I? And I think when we define it and go, look, it is big, it is this huge spirit, and it is I'm going to bring it forward it's through my lens and offer it to you as a reader, as a practitioner, because we need this now. We can't keep it on an old shelf in a library as some sacred text. Yes, it is sacred, but it's right here. It is outside, it is in the meadow, it is in the waterfall, it is in all of the internet. It's yeah, it's everywhere. And and so it's almost like you giving yourself permission to maybe it pushed through you, like uh, you know, how birthing books happen.

Speaker 17:45

But yeah, you know, it pushes its way through you.

GDC 17:49

That's not always what you think, but you know, this it's it's a labor of love and it's it's blood, sweat, and tears, and it's offering a part of ourself, and then we let it free in the world to help other people to be able to find this ancestral wisdom, yeah, this, and it's not just uh I mean, with your background in you know, acupuncture and clinical, all of this stuff. It's just it's just amazing. And I think that it's really right now I really think that it's very vitally important with so much energy being up in the air in 2026 United States people, and there is like it's very difficult, and and a lot of people don't know what to believe anymore. You know, we don't know what to believe, and you can always believe the flower, you can always believe the earth, and I think that's why it's so important. Can I ask you a question? What is a flower essence?

unknown 18:57

Yeah, yeah.

From Stewards To Inhabitants

Speaker 1 18:58

So it's it's funny because as you were talking about the writing process, the word that kept coming up for me is like, it's really more listening than writing. And I remember when I was working on in our element, and I would have these like big poster boards with the flowers that I wanted to talk about. And I would be like, what do you want me to say about you? There's so much, you know. And so it was like this listening of the flowers being like, well, tell this story and tell that story. So, really, what a flower essence is, it is the um the distillation or the resonance of a flower's consciousness into water that we can take into our own bodies to impact our consciousness. And so inherent in that is a few beliefs, right? A few understandings about the nature of the universe that are very much aligned with indigenous and Afro-Indigenous thought. And the first part of that is that nature has consciousness, right? And so when we can respect that, you know, the river isn't just out there rivering because we need water, like the river has its own life and its own sentience and its own wisdom. And and each of the flowers that we use in flower essence therapy um have that. They have a consciousness and they have a consciousness that is not manipulated by human ego, which is yeah, it's so the they bring this reminder of essential truth because they don't have an agenda. And so when the flower essence uh consciousness interacts with our consciousness, we begin to see these shifts that allow us to realign with the whole of being. And so that's a very long way of saying, you know, on the ground, a flower essence is a vibrational remedy, similar to homeopathy that we take internally to facilitate psychological shifts. That's the shorthand. The long hand is a flower essence is an opportunity to interact with nature's consciousness and to elevate our own to allow us to be worthy of being on this planet at this time and to remember why we decided to come on down here in 2026. Right. Right. How were we thinking? Right. Right. And and to meet up with the people that we, you know, in an indigenous belief or in IFA, we say that, you know, you choose your day of birth, you choose your parents, you choose the location, you forget it when you're born. Right. You choose it and you bring down your your egg bay, your soul family. And through your process of becoming, you connect with the people that you have a shared purpose with, and you do that work together. And so that is how we met in our shared purpose. That is what I feel like the spirit seed has brought for me is this. Egg Bay or this extended community of folks that are like, how do we shift the consciousness of humanity so that we can be better? Um, I don't want to say stewards or custodians of the planet because I I feel like in some ways we've kind of lost or lost that side note, we got to talk about that because I do too.

GDC 22:22

I kind of feel like, yeah, we're not stewards anymore. We're kind of screwing this up a little bit. So I'm I'm with you on that. I'm with you on that. And we'll we'll have side conversations about that because I think that's very important. So, what would you call it? Like, I mean, invaders? Are we invaders? Like, is that too dramatic?

Speaker 1 22:43

Like, I don't know. I mean, it's such a great question. I mean, the the word that comes up for me is inhabitants. Oh, I love to live here, right? Um, and what we decide to do while we live here is is really, you know, that's where the whole free will thing comes in. But I think that's where these practices, the divination, the flower essences, the ritual, the ceremony, the dream work, like all of these things bring us back to a larger why. I love that.

GDC 23:12

I absolutely love that, Lindsay. And you know, you keep talking about the natural world and this beautiful life force, and and you know, the way I talk about it is the same way, like it it has a personality, it is an archaeotype in and of itself. That's how I see it, and it is my greatest teacher. And I also love that you talk about that this belief, understanding that we chose, we chose our birthday, we chose our parents, you know, and in a weird way, that just gives me like a sense of empowerment. Like, okay, if I chose this path, what then am I gonna do? And not be, and this is part of some of what you talk about too, not be reactive, you know, but show up and and be, you know, and and I think that that's one thing that I'm also working on is pausing mindfulness, consciousness, and not being reactive, being proactive and slowing down and all of that kind of stuff. Can you just talk to us a little bit about that part of because you have you talk about it in your book too?

Slowing Down And Decolonizing Healing

Speaker 1 24:35

Yeah. I think this is where it kind of starts to begin to overlap with my work and research and community practice around decolonization and this idea, like you said, what does it mean to slow down and be in my destiny versus being compelled or forced or influenced to be producer, producer, producer, and feed this like kind of capitalist machine, right? And so that's where this medicine starts to take on a bit of a political force, because in order to be who we're meant to be, we have to push against, change, alter, navigate, shape shift, manipulate, slide under the rate or whatever, whatever all the like gymnastics we have to do in order to go against the force of an oppressive system, a racist system, a misogynist system, a system that doesn't believe in spirit, right? Like, how do we how do we live as we're meant to? Um, and so that's a big part of the work, and it's part of the practice of you know getting outside of our own minds and opening our consciousness to something a bit wiser for us.

GDC 25:54

I absolutely love that. And I mean, I have so many questions. I'm gonna I'm gonna introduce this to you just as a takeaway. So I know it's kind of a fun, I want to see your take on it. Maybe it's something that I'm developing, or maybe it's something that I'm just now understanding, which I should have understood before. I was talking to my husband the other night, and I was like, Well, in my thoughts, and then I said, You know that voice or that awareness that you're with that that you can step into when you're watching you yourself think and talk? And he's like, Wait, what? I said, You know the observer part of you that watches you and sees how your mind works, watches your emotions, and he's like, Oh, yeah, and I'm like, what is the name for that? So a week later, I'm like, I think it's called self-awareness. I think it's called consciousness. I think it's so I just kind of wanted to toss that at you because I mean, when I think about self-awareness, oh yeah, I know that I'm this tall, I know how I interact, I know my personality, but to take it on to a different level of going, oh, my consciousness and my self-awareness is that part of me that observes what my mind is thinking, that part of me that observes what my body is feeling, the part of me that observes where my spirit is going, the part of me that observes my emotional state. What is that? Because it's a little bit more than self-awareness, maybe higher self, like I think.

Speaker 1 27:29

I mean, the well, this is where EFA has been such a uh magical, is the best word that I can think of, part of my my life is because there's a word for that. And it's a it's a core concept in IFA, which is called your ORI. So your ORI is the a way, a way that you could kind of understand it in a mythopoetic way. It's like your ORI is the part of your soul that agreed to your life circumstances, and is kind of like your holds your like the remembrance of your destiny, why you chose what you chose, when you chose what you chose. And sometimes you'll hear um ORI referred to as like your head. Like your ORI is like your head, your your higher self-consciousness, your, you know, and so a big part or arguably the main part of IFA practice is reconnecting to your ORI to guide you. And to, so we say things like when you pray, you know, if you're asking for your blessings, then your Uri is who decides yes or no, because your ORI knows your destiny. Um, so we say none of the, you know, no prayers to the orisho or the forces of nature will work unless your Ori agrees to it, because your Ori is that aspect of it's almost like you could call it it's your thread in the web of the universe. Your ORI connects you to your destiny and your your specific place.

Naming The Observer: Ori

GDC 29:07

My screen is like I'm ghosting. I don't know if I think I went into spirit realm because I I'm sitting here thinking, oh, this is a fun topic. Let's see if she could add something. And I mind a jewel. How do you spell auri?

Speaker 1 29:25

O R I. And some of the research that I've been doing when we look at um medicine, plant medicine, spirit plant medicine, in um Yoruba or the Ifa tradition, there's one author that talks about the Ori of a plant being what we're interacting with when we make spiritual baths and things like flower essences. So I've been kind of calling flower essences auri medicine because it's like the auri of the plant interacting with your auri. And somewhere in that third space of the relationship between that communication is where the shifts happen with flower essence therapy. Wow. I'm so glad you asked me that because I have not really been, I've been like, I've as I'm writing my dissertation and doing my research, it's like all these big concepts, and I'm like, well, how do we talk about? But yeah, it's it's I've been calling it worry medicine because it really is a consciousness to higher consciousness conversation that we get to be a witness to and do something with. So yeah.

GDC 30:35

On behalf of the listeners, can we all utilize that term or do we need to reference it just out of being conscious and not like appropriating? Yeah, how do how do we do that? I know.

Speaker 1 30:52

I'm making a face because I'm like, I actually don't know if I have the authority to make that decision. I what I what I'll say is this I do know that there are many concepts um in IFA that are universal. You know, every we one of the things that we say is no one is outside of IFA, regardless of what you believe. You know, like everything, good, bad, or indifferent, however we name it, nothing is outside of IFA, nothing is in outside of this wisdom. Um, I think uh again, like I'm not initiated at a level where I have the authority to project what people can and cannot say or how they use the terms. I know that a big part of my work is making these concepts that are ancestrally relevant available so that we know that we have something miraculous.

Speaker 31:54

I love it. So, whatever, however, that lands with you folks, I don't know.

GDC 31:58

I'm sorry, I can't tell you whether or not to use it, but I think that that's actually the perfect answer because you know, I mean, this concept came from spirit. Obviously, the ancestors are here with us. I thought it was just my little mind, and now there's this huge concept that's presented. And so, what I would say is people be very, very cognizant and always reference where you got this term. Uh uh reference that it is, you know, from how would how would they reference it? They could say my ORI as is uh spoke of in EFA or something like that, just to be appreciative of the source.

Speaker 1 32:50

Yeah, and and what I would add to that is that the concept of Ori, like I'm I'm taking something that is um huge and and giving just like there are entire books written on the Ori. There's different ORI centers, there's different, you know, the the spiritual anatomy in in African culture is so intense. Um I would say um for folks that are interested or curious, that there's so much literature out there about just the concepts that exist in this worldview, and none of these concepts exist out of relationship with other concepts.

Speaker 33:32

Right?

Respectful Use Of Sacred Terms

Speaker 1 33:32

And so it's like it's hard to talk about or ri if you're not talking about a rune and aye, which is like the celestial realm and the earthly realm, right? It's hard to talk about or re without talking about orisha. It's hard to talk about any of these concepts as standalone entities. And so my invitation to the readers is to, if it is ancestrally relevant, to to dive in. And my, if it's not ancestrally relevant, there are analogous concepts in different traditions that can inform how we come back to this truth around the relationship between humanity and divinity and earth and you know this thing that we call life. And to honor that. Yeah.

GDC 34:25

So you are an educator. It's so beautiful because you're a student, but you're an educator. Yeah, I know, me too.

Speaker 34:33

Forever and ever and ever.

GDC 34:35

And when people call me an educator or a teacher, I'm kind of like, well, I learned a lot of stuff, and now I'm telling you guys about it. And if you call me teacher, that's cool, you know. But I, in my own essence, I feel like I'm just a student showing people more information and giving them more resources so that they can grow and be empowered. And and you come from that same purpose. Tell us about spirit seed.

Building The Spirit Seed Community

Speaker 1 35:06

Oh, my favorite thing. Um, shout out to any spirit seed listeners. So spirits, right? We need a we need a hand signal or something. Um, that's my challenge to anyone from the spirit seed who's listening to to drop a hand signal for us in the in our group chats. But um, so spirit seed started um over 10 years ago as a program in fluorescence therapy certification. And so um, this was around 2015, 2016. I had finished acupuncture school. I had been practicing in fluorescence therapy for a while, and I'd reached out to um Patricia Kaminsky and Richard Katz, who are the founders of the Fluorescence Society, and I was like, you know, I want to do my own flower essence training. I said, I want to integrate more clinical practice from all that I learned in acupuncture school. And I was like, and I want to integrate a little bit more of an African worldview into this flower essence training. And they were very generous, and they said, well, um, we'll license your program so that you can implement our certification training in your communities. And it was the first, um, I have to give ourselves a pat on the back because it was the first time that outside of their um home location in California that a program was authorized to do the certification in the United States. Um, most of their programs were implemented um abroad. And so the Spirit Seed started then. At the time it was called Oceans and Rivers. And since that time, it has grown from a certification program to a full school and community that is really centered on not just flower essence therapy, but bringing this kind of worldview of spirit and Afro-indigeneity into therapeutic practice. Um, and it keeps evolving because the people who come to the spirit seed are coming from so many different disciplines. So they're therapists, they're nurses, they're astrologers, they're herbalists, they're um spiritualists, they're priests and priestesses. They just bring so much to the community that that begins to shape and inform how we move together as a collective. And so we still offer the program in Flower Essence Therapy, the practitioner certification. It's a three-year-plus process of intensive study and casework and clinical practice in your home community, the communities that you love and serve. But I feel that it has also expanded to include folks that want to learn more how to align with this way of being in the world. And so we offer um, we have guest practitioners, guest facilitators, experts in the field who can come in and bring these worldviews. So it's not just flower essence therapy, it's really about living in the right relationship with these times and being connected to the ancestral wisdom that can guide us. So um, so we I it's can I give a shameless plug of something that we have coming up?

GDC 38:24

Absolutely, you guys. Spiritseed.org, thespiritseed.org plug away, Lindsay.

Speaker 38:30

Well, I was gonna plug the class that you're gonna be teaching.

GDC 38:33

I'm gonna be teaching a class.

Speaker 1 38:37

So we've been da we've been like daydreaming behind the scenes about this for probably about three lifetimes. But anyway, here we are with the technology to do it.

Speaker 38:47

Right. Finally. Finally, right?

Speaker 1 38:51

So um, Granddaughter Crow is going to be teaching a class at the Spirit Seed, and the class is called, and I'm gonna do a little drum roll, um, Building Allies, Animism and the Wisdom of the Natural World. So, animism and the wisdom of the natural world. And so I'll share a little bit about the class because I'm super excited about it, but I would love for you to talk about it too, because we we had a like kind of, you know, we've always been in alignment around, oh, you your ancestors do that, my ancestors do that too. And you know, there's been this dialogue happening between us. And so um, when Granddaughter Crow came to our open house in the fall, you offered an incredible teaching around demystifying shamanism. And all of us felt like so deeply moved by what you brought and how you bring it, the joy you bring, right? And the the deeply grounded wisdom uh and the sacred connection to this work, the integrity of this of this work and this teaching. And so from there, we were like, okay, we gotta do this. Myself, the students, we're like, we gotta, we gotta do more of this. And so this class was born out of that and thinking about you know, plant allyship and how we build relationships with um these beings that are here to support us. So I want to pass it over to you because I would love for you to share a little bit about the class as well.

Course: Animism And Natural Allies

GDC 40:22

100%. It just aligns with everywhere and everything that I'm doing right now, especially it's really coming to the forefront, the idea of animism, and and animism basically means that everything has a soul. And so when we're talking about animism, and Lindsay is talking about an archaeotype, and I'm talking about a personality, and we're talking about characteristics, we're talking about the natural world not as something to be dominated at all, but our greatest teacher, our friend. It is this moment when you stop being the observer, when you walk outside and you stop thinking, oh, I'm the observer and I'm just observing, and you start becoming a participant within the natural world, and you begin to understand that the bird that flew over you saw you first, most likely, and that it allowed you to see it. That if you see a fox running, or if you saw a raccoon or a hawk or whatever, these guys they knew that you were there. You need to know that you were there, you need to be able to feel seen within the natural world in any practice that you do. So it's less about the natural world being a resource and more about it being our mother, our friend, our ally, our companion, our teacher. And in order to understand what that truly means to your body, to your soul, to your spirit, in order to remember what that truly means, we're doing a class, and there will be exercises, there will be journal prompts that you go out there and you actually begin to experience it in a deeper way. Now, I think that all of us listening to this podcast and everybody who attends Spirit Seed has a relationship. This is prone to focus on that relationship and help it to grow so that you can do your work in a way that is our ancestors did. Our ancestors did. When my aunt Alice, who was a high priestess of the peyote way, I wanted to find out who taught her? Who gave her a certificate? And long story short, the answer is the cactus, the peyote taught her. The spirit of the peyote taught her. And that's what I want to bring to the spirit seed as a class of animism, so that you as a student can actually go, wait, let this flower essence teach me something that maybe cannot be placed into words, something that is experienced, that is animated within me.

Speaker 1 43:52

So I love that. I love it so much, and I love that you know who we've opened this class for. Is for anyone who wants to really deepen their sense of earth-based spirituality, even if you're like, what is that? How does that? Or even if you're like, well, I live in a city, so how's that gonna work? But that's the thing. It's like nature is everywhere, right? And so for me, this is really about re-entering, remembering, it's it's a worldview, it's a life world that we enter into when we're able to hold this kind of consciousness. And then of course, that opens up all kinds of other sensitivities and ways of knowing and wisdom and and community, really. Um, it's you know, there's a sense of community in nature that um that I'm very grateful for. And so I'm excited for this class. Whether someone is advanced practitioner and in their training um and deeply embedded in plant wisdom, or for the person who is like, oh, I'm I'm kind of new to this, I think what you bring kind of bridges those two worlds where it really helps everyone to deepen from wherever their starting point is. And I think that's something that I appreciate about this community is that we're teaching each other as we go and we're learning as we go. And there's such an openness and such a grace to how we come together and no accident. So I'm I'm a thousand percent convinced that everyone who ends up in a classroom is exactly who needed to be there.

GDC 45:36

Absolutely, I absolutely agree, and I just gotta tell you when you were talking, I got this visual of oh, well, what it is to the Star Wars fans, it is the force. And Lindsay Fauntleroy is, you know, your Princess Leia, right? And I'm like Obi-Wan, and I'm coming into your classroom to teach something to do to your inner Yoda, right? To teach your inner Yoda anyway. It's thespiritseed.org. Check it out. It is not too late to sign up for this workshop. And if you're watching this in the future, still check out thespiritseed.org where you guys host this at the Mighty Network. On the Mighty Network. Talk a little bit about just the you know, logistics and the functionality of the Mighty Network and how your school actually is not an in-person, it is online.

Online Community Over Algorithms

Speaker 1 46:39

Right. So our classes are virtual, and and one of the things that we've done really well, at least this is what I've been told, and I hope it remains and continues to be true. Um, so we've been using online teaching since 2016 when we first started. So we're not new to um to Zoom or to any of these other um technologies, but what we have invested time in is thinking about you know, how do we build community? How do we build a sense of place? How do we honor this non-local connection? Because it's it's one of the first times in recent history that we've been able to have students whose feet are planted on such different soils across the globe and across the country. And so there's something very sacred about that. Um, Mighty Networks is our community that is open to everyone. Um, so we have all kinds of things happening on our Mighty Networks. We have a space that's just for practitioners, we have a book club. Um, so our MARC, of course, our MARC book club reading is Wisdom of the Natural World. And so we'll all be reading that together and we'll have, you know, we'll have some meetups around that material. Um, so when we decided to, at first we were just using our mighty networks for people that were enrolled in courses, and then somewhere over the last year, I started feeling this real discomfort with social media. Right. And this real um that extended beyond my normal introverted, you know, I'm gonna be under a rock reading a book. So like that's that is also true. I'm with you on where you're going, yes. And so what I've been saying about the Mighty Networks is that it's community, not content, it's people, not posts. And so we wanted a space, we wanted to open the space in such a way that there's conversation around things, as opposed to just like, look at this, look at this, look at this, because I was feeling like that kind of perpetuates this culture of consumption that really needs to be disrupted, right? Like, give me more information, give me facts, give me a discount, give me this, give me that, right? Um, with no interaction. And so just bringing a bit of our humanity back. There's no ads, there's no AI, it's just us there, you know, posting things, sharing things, and responding to each other in real time. And so that that feels really special to me. It's been very healing for me, um, especially during this time when it's almost kind of like psychological whiplash when you go online and you see, like, you know, someone being blatantly murdered, and then you're being, you know, sold an ice cream scoop or something like that. And you're just like, I don't know, I don't know. My my heart can't keep up with the pace that my brain is receiving messages. And so I'm just wanting to have a bit more of a digital safe space to be in community and to share and to talk about the things that we're passionate about, to talk about nature, to talk about alignment with nature's rhythms, to talk about um healing approaches that are working on the ground and in communities. And so that's what the Mighty Networks is. Um, so if you go to the Spirit Seed website, spirit thespiritseed.org, you'll see a little button that says join us on Mighty Networks, and just come on in. We'd love to have you join our conversations and and you know, if you're if you're into it, share what you're into, and we can all be in continued community together.

GDC 50:15

I love that because it's not only embodying the the wisdom, but it's also being in community, and that does disrupt and you know the system or this, you know, whatever, you know, we won't go there, but disrupt the system, people whoop whoop, absolutely 100.

Speaker 1 50:41

And big always, right? Big race that's always, yeah.

Divination Pick: Angelica’s Medicine

GDC 50:46

Exactly. I absolutely agree, Lindsay. It's such a beauty to have you here. Can I ask you a question? What flower essence pops into your mind that you want to just kind of share a little bit about? I know that I'm going over time and overboard, but I'm just a little bit more hungry. What like divination? What flower essence wisdom wants to come through?

Speaker 1 51:18

It's Angelica.

unknown 51:20

Oh.

Speaker 1 51:21

Angelica is has been like really talking to me a lot for the past two years. Um, so Angelica is a flower essence that supports us in connecting to our ancestral guides, connecting to whether we conceive of them as ancestors or enlightened beings or guardian angels or protectors. It helps to connect us and to awaken our sensitivity to that communication. And so Angelica is it's such a popular flower for me that I put it in all of the flower essence remedies for the water element, which deals with connecting to that soul story. And so Angelica just keeps coming up and up and up and up and up and up again for me as a medicine for this time to support us in listening. And we can't, you know, when I think about my ancestry, it's like I don't want to be over-romanticized and to create this fantasy around like we have to go back to the way things were. Like, that's just not impractical. That's not gonna happen. Nobody's, you know, it's just not gonna happen. But what is the wisdom that can help us through this current? And um, I think if more of us are listening to the wisdom that was erased or tried to be attempted to be erased, attempted to be um destroyed, and to connect to something that refused to be destroyed. There's such healing in that for all of us. Yes. Angelica is just like calling me in and holding me to task today and every day, I think.

GDC 53:09

Thank you for sharing that wisdom with us because uh I mean, plus the name. Come on, guys, you can't go wrong with Angelica. Do you know? You can't go wrong. Lindsay, is there any final thing that maybe you wanted to mention or bring forward that I haven't um anything that you want to talk about or or say, you know, thank you to all of the students at the Mighty Network and the community or anything?

A New Pledge And Closing Blessing

Speaker 1 53:39

Well, if if you're open to it, I would love to share um an affirmation that we have as part of our uh our spirit seed community. Um so I do want to say shout out to all the spirit seed folks and to say thank you for the heart, the love, the integrity, the curiosity, the magic that you bring, and may we continue to build that magic together and may our community continue to grow with magic at the center of it. Um but I would love to share an affirmation that we share in some of our classes. Um, it's to the creed of the Pledge of Allegiance. So, for those of you who um I grew up having to say it in elementary school, and we've kind of remixed it to make it uh more appropriate for this time. So I'll say it um we pledge allegiance to the earth for soul awakening and remembering as part of humanity for which we stand, with one heart, spirit embodied, interconnected with liberation and justice for all.

GDC 54:55

I am in. That's what community looks like. This is what community looks like, Lindsay. Thank you so much for being on the show. I am looking forward to whatever fun things our souls decide to do that we haven't even thought of. You guys check out thespiriteseed.org. Check out the online community, join, go into the mighty network, look around. For students who are already there, welcome the new ones, because you're gonna get a flood of new ones, because let us return to the wisdom of the natural world and define the spirit that interconnects us uh with Mother Earth so that we can live a balanced, harmonious life with ourselves internally and externally. You guys, thank you so much for tuning in to yet another episode of Belief Being and Beyond with your host Granddaughter Crow. I love you, bells, hit the notification. You guys know how to support this. It doesn't cost, share this video, put the light out there into the world for those who you think are gonna get something from this. And I love you guys, and we'll see you on the flippity flip.