My conversation with paul, the owner of Wildish Botanicals in Portland, Oregon

I interviewed Paul at Wildish Botanicals however, my audio did not come through so I’m sharing some of the big takeaways from our conversation here.

Paul like many, was driven away from Western Medicine because he found that it just did not work for him and his family at a young age. He was called to start seeking other ways to care for himself.

As we know there are loads of modalities for us to explore and we have a lifetime to play with them and see what works for us best and when. Modalities from fitness, movement, nature, acupuncture, Chinese herbs and medicine, flower essences, nutrition & food, connection, play and more.

We spoke about how at a foundational level what matters most is that we are living in alignment with our heart and soul- experiencing life in our true essence in the moments of our lives.

Herbs can be a powerful catalyst to help us uncover our true essence!

I met Paul at my first psilocybin journey retreat where he provided us guidance on psilocybin including how to use it, what it does etc etc. This was my first time using a substance to enter an altered state of consciousness in a soul-aligned intentional way.

Since my healing journey began approximately 10 years ago, I have been experimenting with breath work, meditations, visualizations, sound therapy, nature, dance and more to alter my state of consciousness. Just this year I felt the calling to dive into “safely and smartly” exploring herbs and psychedelics to know me more- when we know thyself, we can heal thyself! I am also just radically curious. There is sooooo much we don’t know and I’m curious what else I can tune into when I’ve released more of my conditioned masks and open to the magic other realms and states of consciousness.

Something I found fascinating about our conversation was how prescribing an herb or psychedelic is an art and science. He spoke about how various psychedelics have either a feminine or masculine energy and which one someone should play with depends on what they are working on healing.

As with all healing modalities the medicine needs to be very specific to the person and their root cause symptoms. Getting to the very root of an issue is paramount.

After our recorded conversation he spent time with me diving deep into my current stories and issues to uncover exactly what flower essences to use in my unique blend. This was magical for me! He listened to my story and really heard what I was saying. He kept asking deeper and deeper questions trying to get the deepest root possible.

Asking the right questions and getting to the deepest root of the issues is key for me in my work too and I sooooo appreciated his time, focus and attention to work with me on this! In my work I speak of us being our own detective. Only we can uncover the clues to help us heal. He as the herbal practitioner can ask the right questions, but if we can’t go within ourselves, get super real with ourselves and uncover our deepest truths and share them, then he may not be able to prescribe the “perfect” remedy.

This interaction was a dance and I loved it!

Finally, we uncovered my personal remedy for this moment in my life!

His shop is magical! I walked in and I was taken to a magical land of my ancestors. I literally felt my ancestors, spirit guides and angels saying yes yes yes!! I walked away with two teas, my personal flower essence and a gut detox formula.

After my first journey with psilocybin, Paul continued guiding me in microdosing and using a Chinese Herbal formula to help me wean off of Cymbalta, which I had been on for years during my healing journey. I had tried twice in the past to wean off- once just by weaning, the second time using guidance from my Naturopath with a supplement and this time I turned inward on a deeper level.

As I always say the healing journey is the life journey and I’ll be on my healing journey till the day I transition. Yes, my primary pain and symptoms fell away years ago but just like it took years for those s and symptoms to build to the intensity they did, it can take time to continue to peel away allllll the layers of our conditioning and the person we created that created the dis-ease or pain and symptoms that we experienced.

I’m committed to this journey of tuning inward for all the wisdom I need to continue to unleash more of my true self. And remember, as we unleash our true self we naturally “heal”, become whole. So this time I got super deep with me, sensed and felt my heart and soul were calling me to do a psilocybin journey and then play with microdosing. It was when I met Paul at the retreat that he also had wisdom around the Chinese Herbs helping with weaning from an antidepressent. It all felt like a yes to me.

Cymbalta is a pharmaceutical that is commonly thrown at women experiencing pelvic pain when they don’t know what else to try. They say it works, but they don’t know how or why it works- ugh! At the time I said yes to it I was still experiencing pain, doing the inner work, but still feeling anxious and frustrated. Looking back I believe it helped calm (or mask) the full expression and feeling of my inner emotions.

An aspect of most of our dis-eases in the modern world has to do with us never learning to value our emotions- let alone how to feel and sense our emotions, let them move through us and how to receive their guidance. Emotions are magical pieces of wisdom that we have the power to sense into in all the moments of our life.

As I weaned off Cymbalta I began to FEELLLLLLLL soooooo much more. Now I feel safe feeling. I’m smirking right now as FEELING is why we are here in our physical body that is radiating our soul. FEELING is one of our superpowers. I welcome all my feelings and sensations. I open to receive them. There is no resisting them.

So many of our modern day pharmaceuticals, even the incorrect use of herbs and supplements, alcohol, distractions, addictions etc etc cause us to “feel” less or not feel at all. NOT FEELING is the epidemic we should be addressing as a culture. WE NEED TO FEEL TO HEAL.

But we also need to feel safe feeling. You can’t jump from being caught up in an addiction where you are disassociated from your feelings and inner world to feeling it ALL. There are skills you need to learn and remember to safely begin to feel again. I say “remember” because these skills were once just part of our way of being in our tribes and ancestral cultures. They are still within us, we have just forgotten them!

That is where my work comes in. I guide you connect with you so that you can begin to safely sense and feel your inner wisdom and receive the guidance that is guiding you on your next best step in your healing journey. Your next best step may be getting quiet with yourself more, asking better questions, using modalities such as movement, herbs, psychedelics, spending more time in nature, authentic connection, dance, sound therapy and sooooo much more.

Needless to say it was a radical joy to spend time with Paul. I felt seen and heard and am very excited to continue to my journey experimenting with herbs, psychedelics and more to unleash more of my true self and radically live into the moments of my life!

Check out Wildish Botanicals in Portland, Oregon!!!!

Love, Kelly