Years ago I read Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy.

I remember it so clearly. My little cousin Juan was just thirteen and had come for a visit. I bought the series for us to read and we both gobbled it up quickly. The writing was fun and the story was enthralling — but what really struck me was the concept of the dæmon.

In Pullman’s world every human is born with a dæmon — an external manifestation of their soul that takes animal form and stays with them throughout their life. The two are inseparable. When one dies, the other follows. The dæmon feels less like a supernatural invention and more like a recognition of something — the sense that we are not entirely alone inside ourselves, that something accompanies us through life that is both us and distinct from us.

That idea lodged in me and never quite left.

Recently I came across a piece exploring how many ancient cultures independently arrived at something remarkably similar. And I found myself thinking about it again.

The pattern worth noticing

The ancient Egyptians believed each person was accompanied by a Ka — a spiritual double breathed into them at birth, an exact counterpart that continued to exist after death. The tomb offerings weren’t symbolic. They were understood as literal sustenance for the Ka to continue existing.

In ancient Greece the concept was called the Daimon — not a demon in the modern sense, but an intermediary between the human and the divine. Plato wrote about it in the Timaeus as the highest part of the human soul. Socrates described his own daimonion as an inner voice that had accompanied him since childhood — one that never told him what to do, only ever stopped him when he was about to make a wrong choice.

Zoroastrian tradition developed one of the most philosophically rich versions: the Fravashi, an eternal celestial archetype that exists before birth and after death, representing the perfected version of the self. The whole purpose of a human life, in this framework, is for the earthly soul to strive toward union with its higher self.

In Islamic tradition the concept of the Qareen describes a being from the world of the jinn bound to every person from birth — though this tradition frames it quite differently, as a force that inclines toward temptation and desire rather than a guardian or guide.

What to make of the convergence

These traditions are genuinely different from each other. The Ka is not the same as the Daimon. The Fravashi is not the Qareen. Each emerged from its own cultural and theological context and carries its own distinct meaning. The differences matter as much as the similarities.

What I find genuinely interesting isn’t that they’re all describing the same thing. It’s that so many cultures, independently, developed the idea that a human being is not a single, simple entity moving through the world alone. That something accompanies us. That the relationship between our conscious self and whatever that something is — whether you call it soul, higher self, shadow, or something else entirely — is one of the central questions of a human life.

Carl Jung mapped this territory psychologically through the concept of the Shadow — the repository of everything the conscious mind refuses to acknowledge. Not a separate entity exactly, but not entirely reducible to the conscious self either. The part of us that operates in the background, shaping our choices in ways we don’t always recognise.

Philip Pullman, drawing on all of this, gave us dæmons — and millions of readers felt, as I did, that he was pointing at something real.

Why it still matters

I think the reason this idea keeps surfacing — across cultures, across centuries, in ancient theology and modern fantasy fiction alike — is that it describes something genuinely true about human experience.

We are not entirely transparent to ourselves. Something in us knows things our conscious mind hasn’t admitted yet. Something accompanies our decisions that isn’t always the rational, deliberate self we present to the world.

Whether you understand that as soul, as unconscious, as a spiritual companion, or simply as the mysterious depth of being a person — the question of what walks alongside us through life is worth sitting with.

I’m still sitting with it. Years after reading Pullman with Juan, I still catch myself noticing the quiet companion — the part that knows before I do, that hesitates when I’m about to force something, that sometimes simply watches. I don’t need to name it. I just try not to pretend I’m alone in here.

Stay curious. Stay sovereign. 🌿

Three weeks ago I lost my best bud. My sweet dog, Koo.

She was just ten years old. Things went from a normal day to losing her in the blink of an eye. She was fine. Then she wasn’t. Heart failure.

We got her when she was eight weeks old — a funny, quirky girl who was perfect for our family in all her weird, wonderful ways. We all wanted a snuggly dog. That she was not. As a puppy she had what looked to us like panic attacks if we gave her too much love. That lessened over the years. She learned to tolerate our affection. But it was never really her thing. Regardless, we loved her up every single day.

She had so many quirks. She wouldn’t go into a bathroom — no reason, just hated them. Boxes scared her. If I went to open a package she’d run up the stairs and hide. And yet she was fearless enough to chase bears from our yard like she was the king of the jungle. Running after them, barking, entirely unbothered by the fact that she was considerably smaller.

She contained multitudes.

For ten years I was with her almost every single day.

We walked. We talked. We had every meal together — she would be under the table with her head on my lap, or beside me on the couch, the full weight of her settling into wherever she could find space. We called it heavy head. She would look up at me with her big amber doodle eyes and just... stay there. Present. Unhurried.

In the kitchen she’d appear whenever I started cooking — head cocked, a little drool, waiting hopefully for something to fall. Or be thrown. She wasn’t picky.

When we came home we could hear the thumping of her tail before we even opened the door. She’d jump up, give hugs and kisses, then go straight back to whatever she’d been doing before we arrived. All she needed was that moment of connection. Then she was content to return to her solo mission.

I shared my biggest secrets with her. She took them all in and asked for nothing in return except a boat load of treats.

My life has been in massive transition these last few months. And Koo was my constant through all of it. My routine. My adventure buddy. My bestest bud. I genuinely don’t know that I could have gone through the last couple of months without her beside me. Dramatic? Maybe. Truthful? Probably.

Which made her leaving so confusing.

She knew how much I needed her. So why now?

From a heartbroken gal — that question had no answer that made sense.

But I’ve been sitting with a different way of holding it. Not as fact. Just as what I choose to believe, because it brings me some comfort and it feels true in a way I can’t fully explain.

I believe that when souls leave us they stay connected — that they find ways to support the people they love from wherever they go next. I believe dogs do the same. And I believe Koo, in her own stubborn, quirky, bear-chasing way, may have decided that she could do more for me from the other side than she could do staying.

That maybe, as long as she was here, I’d keep leaning on her. And she wanted me to find out what I was made of without her.

I don’t know if that’s true. I just know it helps.

The house is very quiet now.

No tail thumping before the door opens. No heavy head at dinner. No hopeful, drooling presence in the kitchen.

But I find myself talking to her still. And sometimes, in the way that grief works when you let it move through you rather than around you, I feel something that might be her — steady and unhurried, the way she always was. Telling me, in whatever language dogs use for this, that she’s still on the mission.

Just a different one now.

Go well, sweet girl. You delivered me to myself. 🐾

The body sway method, muscle testing and pendulum dowsing are tools I’ve been using in various forms since I was a teenager.

I first encountered pendulums as a kid — asking it questions about whether a certain boy might like me, or what I should wear to the dance. Those questions you have where your intuition isn’t quite loud enough for the answer. Or where you don’t fully trust it. Because sometimes, honestly, you just don’t want to know if the boy really does like you or not.

These methods may not be scientifically established. But sometimes science isn’t the right tool for the job. Sometimes what you need is a way to get quiet enough to hear yourself.

In the Frequency Diaries I love exploring ideas and tools that fall outside the conventional approach. The magic that lives in what some call woo. And for accessing what my body and subconscious might already know — or for interrupting the stories my mind prefers to tell — these tools have real value in my life.

That last phrase is actually the one I want to sit with for a moment.

Interrupting the stories my mind prefers to tell.

Because here’s what I think is actually happening when these tools work — and I think they do work, just perhaps not in the way we sometimes assume.

There’s a documented phenomenon called the ideomotor effect. It describes how the body makes small, unconscious muscle movements that feel external but actually originate internally. It’s the reason a pendulum moves — not because of an outside force but because of tiny, involuntary movements in your hand that you’re genuinely not aware of making.

This might sound like a debunking. I don’t think it is.

Because what the ideomotor effect actually reveals is something genuinely extraordinary: your body and unconscious mind are holding information that your conscious mind hasn’t fully processed yet. The pendulum or the body sway creates a set of conditions — stillness, focus, the bypassing of analytical thought — that allow that information to surface in a way you can actually perceive.

The answer isn’t coming from outside you. It’s coming from a layer of you that the busy, story-making, self-protecting conscious mind usually drowns out.

That’s not less interesting than the alternative. In fact, it might be more interesting.

Think about what the conscious mind actually does. It narrates. It justifies. It tells the story of why you’re fine, why this is a good decision, why you don’t need to worry about that. It’s enormously good at constructing a coherent and comfortable account of things.

And sometimes that account is genuinely not true.

We’ve all had the experience of knowing something before we’d admit to knowing it. The relationship that wasn’t right. The decision that felt wrong even when it looked right on paper. The health symptom we explained away for months.

The body knew. The unconscious knew. The conscious mind was busy telling a different story.

Tools like body sway, muscle testing and pendulums — used thoughtfully — create a pause in that narration. A moment where you’re asking a question and waiting for an answer rather than immediately constructing one.

Whether what responds is your unconscious, your intuition, something deeper than either, or simply the part of you that already knows — the answer that surfaces can be genuinely useful. And genuinely surprising.

I’m not suggesting you make major life decisions based solely on which way a pendulum swings. These are tools for inquiry, not oracles for certainty.

But as a way of checking in with yourself beneath the level of conscious story-making? As a practice of getting quiet and listening to what’s already there?

I think there’s something real in that. I’ve found something real in it. And I think the question of what exactly is being accessed — unconscious knowing, body wisdom, intuition, something else entirely — is genuinely worth staying curious about.

Sometimes the most useful thing isn’t more information. It’s a way of getting quiet enough to hear what you already know.

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

My dog is giving me side eye on our walks now. That is where we are at.

She signed up for sticks, walks and swim time. What she got was a human who can’t stop scanning every verge, lawn, and riverbank for useful plants. It’s like someone opened a Pringles packet — but instead of chips, it’s herbs. I genuinely cannot stop.

The other day on our walk to the river I noticed clusters of beautiful little yellow flowers I’d never paid attention to before. A quick check of my Seek app confirmed what I’d started to suspect: St. John’s Wort. Hypericum perforatum.

I’ve taken it as a supplement before. I had no idea what it looked like growing wild. And yet there it was — in cheerful yellow clusters, somewhere I’ve walked a hundred times.

I brought enough home to make a small jar of oil. The dog forgave me eventually.

What it actually is

St. John’s Wort is one of the most studied medicinal herbs in the world. That’s not herbalist enthusiasm — it’s documented fact. There are more clinical trials on St. John’s Wort than on most pharmaceutical antidepressants.

It’s a perennial plant native to Europe but now naturalised across much of North America. The flowers are bright yellow with distinctive black dots along the petals — those dots contain hypericin, one of the active compounds. When you hold a leaf up to the light you can see tiny translucent oil glands that look like perforations — hence the species name perforatum.

It flowers around the feast of St. John the Baptist in late June, which is how it got its common name. Traditionally harvested on the summer solstice. There’s something satisfying about that timing still being true.

What it’s actually good for

The most well documented use is mood support — specifically mild to moderate depression and seasonal affective disorder. Multiple meta-analyses have found it comparable to pharmaceutical antidepressants for mild to moderate depression, with fewer side effects. This is genuine, peer reviewed, mainstream research. Not just folk wisdom.

Beyond mood it has documented anti-inflammatory and antiviral properties. Topically, St. John’s Wort oil is genuinely useful for nerve pain, bruising, muscle soreness and skin irritation. The infused oil — which is what I’m making — turns a beautiful deep red from the hypericin as it infuses. That colour change is actually how you know it’s working.

A caveat

St. John’s Wort has significant documented interactions with a number of medications.

It can reduce the effectiveness of antidepressants, birth control pills, blood thinners, HIV medications, and organ rejection drugs among others. If you take any regular medication, please check with a pharmacist or doctor before using it internally.

It can also increase sun sensitivity, so worth knowing if you’re fair-skinned and spending time outdoors.

None of this makes it dangerous for most people. But it makes informed use genuinely important — which is always the case with anything that actually does something.

Making the oil

Infused St. John’s Wort oil is one very satisfying to make because the transformation is visible. You start with yellow flowers in pale olive oil. Over weeks it turns a rich, deep red — almost burgundy. That colour comes from the hypericin infusing into the oil and it’s genuinely beautiful.

The process is simple: pack fresh flowers loosely into a clean glass jar, cover completely with olive oil, cap loosely and place in a sunny window for 4-6 weeks. Shake gently every few days. Strain through cheesecloth when ready.

The finished oil can be used topically for nerve pain, sore muscles, bruising and skin irritation. Do not use on open wounds.

A word on fresh versus dried: St. John’s Wort is one of the herbs where fresh is genuinely better for oil infusion — the moisture can sometimes cause spoilage, so watch for any signs of mould and make sure flowers are fully submerged.

Every walk is a classroom right now.

I keep thinking about how much was always growing alongside us that we stopped seeing. The self heal in the lawn. The elderflower growing wild in the woods. The St. John’s Wort popping up in empty lots and on beautiful trails.

The knowledge was always there. We just forgot to look.

Koo has accepted her fate. She now waits patiently while I crouch over every interesting plant we pass. Occasionally she sighs. I choose to interpret this as support.

Not medical advice. Always consult a healthcare provider before using herbs medicinally, especially if you take medication. St. John’s Wort has significant documented drug interactions — please check before internal use.

This weekend I made dinner for my girlfriends.

Apple cabbage slaw with cabbage from the garden. Lemon pesto with burrata using my own basil and garlic. And for dessert — a caramelised peach and blackberry crumble made with local organic peaches and blackberries I’d harvested on a walk with Koo earlier in the week.

None of it came from a package. All of it was genuinely delicious. And the next morning I found myself thinking about the contrast.

For the last year i’ve been volunteering at my local food bank. Over this time we received some very strange products — the stuff that no one seems to want to actually buy. Recently we received a huge shipment of Demogorgon cereal. Yup. Demon cereal based on the show Stranger Things. We’ve also received such delights as blueberry flavoured almonds (Yes, they’re as weird as they sound). And something labelled as cheese that is made entirely from oil.

Not dairy. Oil.

Looking around at what’s in the grocery stores right now and the trend is hard to ignore. Recently Dr Mark Hyman posted some doozies that I hadn’t seen here before like Dr Pepper flavoured sausage. KFC fried chicken jelly beans. Rocket Pop baked beans. Apple pie baked beans. Birthday cake coffee creamer.

These aren’t food. They’re marketing experiments that happen to be edible.

And before you laugh them off as novelties nobody actually buys — the food bank receives donations of products like these regularly. People eat them. Children eat them. In some households they’re a significant part of what’s available.

What actually changed

The shift from food to food-like products didn’t happen overnight and it didn’t happen by accident.

These products exist because they’re profitable. Novelty drives purchase. Brand extension drives revenue. Addictive flavour combinations drive repeat buying. Health is not the priority. Margin is.

The documented concerns about what’s actually in these products are real. Artificial dyes linked to behavioural concerns in children. Emulsifiers like carrageenan and polysorbate 80 that research suggests may affect gut integrity. “Natural flavours” — a regulatory category that can contain dozens of undisclosed compounds. High fructose corn syrup, maltodextrin, preservatives and gums engineered to maximise shelf life and palatability.

These aren’t fringe concerns. They’re documented in peer-reviewed research and increasingly acknowledged even in mainstream nutrition conversations.

The contrast

Here’s what I keep coming back to.

The meal I made on Saturday cost less per person than most of those novelty products. It used ingredients I grew myself or sourced locally. It was genuinely nourishing — the kind of food that makes your body feel like it received something real.

The Demogorgon cereal, the oil-cheese, the fried chicken jelly beans — these are the products a system produces when the people running it decide that nourishment is optional.

That question — should food nourish? — seems almost too obvious to ask. And yet the answer, looking at what fills many grocery store shelves and food bank donation bins, is clearly not the priority it should be.

What we can actually do

I’m not suggesting everyone needs a garden, though I’d argue even a small one changes your relationship with food in ways that matter. Not everyone has the space, the time, or the financial stability to source food the way I’m lucky enough to be able to.

But knowing the difference between food and food-like is available to everyone. Reading ingredient lists. Asking what something actually contains and whether those things have names you recognise. Being curious rather than just convenient.

The system will keep producing what sells. What sells is partly shaped by what we buy.

That’s not a guilt trip. It’s just true.

Food should nourish. That used to go without saying. 🌿

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

This week the talk of the town has been Taylor Farms salad, explosive diarrhea, and whose fault is it. FDA pointed the finger at Taylor Farms and now... it’s not them? Hmmmm.

Anyway, I came across this image that made me stop scrolling. Ten different produce brands — some organic, some of those fancy-looking ones at Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, Kroger, Target, Walmart — all owned by the same company. Taylor Farms.

The same Taylor Farms in the middle of this big E. coli mess with romaine. Multiple outbreaks over the years. But on the shelf they all look like totally different, trustworthy options. That’s not choice. That’s the appearance of choice.

The consolidation story

Food industry consolidation isn’t some conspiracy — it’s just how business has worked for decades. A handful of big players now control a huge chunk of what ends up in the supermarket. They slap different labels on stuff so it feels like you’ve got real variety: organic lines, store brands, premium this and that. But follow the ownership and it often leads back to the same few corporations.

The problem shows up fast when something goes wrong. One facility has an issue and suddenly it’s not just one bag of salad — it’s across a bunch of brands at once. The “diversity” on the shelf disappears real quick.

It also shifts what the system actually rewards. Smaller producers competing on taste, quality, and safety feel different than giant operations laser-focused on yield, shelf life, and keeping costs down.

What actually happens to your produce

A lot of supermarket produce gets hit with modified atmosphere packaging — they tweak the gases inside the bag to make it last longer. It works great for logistics. Not so much for nutrition.

Studies have tracked this for years. One from the Journal of the American College of Nutrition back in 2004 showed big drops in protein, calcium, iron, vitamin C, and more in vegetables between 1950 and 1999. Soil depletion, breeding for yield and looks over nutrition, harvesting early for long-haul shipping — it all adds up.

That tomato that survives a cross-country truck ride isn’t the same as the one you pick ripe and eat warm from the vine. Same name. Very different thing.

The branding gap

They’re really good at the packaging. Pretty farm pictures, words like “fresh,” “natural,” “wholesome.” It sells you this feeling of connection to the land that the actual industrial process rarely matches.

Food is different from most stuff we buy. We put it inside our bodies. That trust feels personal. When the reality behind the label doesn’t match the story on the bag, it’s worth noticing.

The sovereign response

I’m not here to say all commercial produce is poison or every big company is evil (or am I?). I’m saying the system is optimized for shelf life, appearance, and efficiency — not necessarily your health. Once you see that gap, you start making different decisions.

Most of us aren’t able to go full homestead. Start by making small changes. They stack up quickly:

• Hit the farmers market or local growers when you can. Shorter path from soil to plate beats everything.

• Grow something yourself. Even a couple pots of herbs or one tomato plant on the balcony. The taste of something you harvested at peak ripeness is on another level.

• Read the labels with eyes open. Knowing ten “different” brands trace back to one company is useful information.

• And right now with the Taylor Farms situation — check what’s actually on the bag. The brand name might not tell the full story.

The garden isn’t just nostalgia. It’s infrastructure. 🌿

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

There are a few summer foods that always bring me back to childhood.

Cherries. They remind me of sitting on a park bench feeding squirrels with my Grandpa. Pickles are another. Same Grandpa, different memories. He made kosher dills every year and I loved them completely — the sharp brine, the garlic, the satisfying crunch of something that had been transformed by nothing more than salt and time.

This morning I went out to the garden to see what had grown overnight. Today was a good haul — pickling cucumbers, my first ones of the season. My taste buds got so excited I had enough for a nice batch of kosher dills to get the summer pickle party started. And — she says not trying to brag — I even used my own dill and my own garlic to bring these beauties to life.

Which got me thinking about the word itself. Pickle.

Pickle comes from the Dutch pekel or Low German pekel — a brine or spiced sauce used for preserving. It arrived in English around the 15th century, carried by trade and the practical need to keep food through winter.

The idiom “in a pickle” — meaning in a difficult or awkward situation — appears to derive from a Dutch phrase, in de pekel zitten, which literally translates as “to sit in the pickle.” To be submerged in brine. Stuck. Preserved in an uncomfortable state.

I find it quietly interesting that a word for one of humanity’s oldest and most useful preservation methods also became a metaphor for being stuck. As if the very thing that keeps food alive through winter became, linguistically, a symbol of difficulty.

Maybe that says something about our relationship with transformation. The pickle brine does its best work in the uncomfortable period — when the cucumber is submerged, under pressure, changed by salt and time into something it wasn’t before.

That’s not a bad metaphor for a few things.

Traditional lacto-fermented pickles — the real ones, made with salt brine rather than vinegar — are genuinely good for you in ways that are very well documented.

The fermentation process creates lactobacillus bacteria — live cultures that support gut health and the microbiome. This is real science, not just folk wisdom. The connection between gut health and overall wellbeing — immune function, mood, inflammation — is one of the more exciting areas of current research.

A few things worth knowing:

Lacto-fermented versus vinegar pickles — most commercial pickles are made with vinegar and heat processed, which kills the beneficial bacteria. Traditional lacto-fermented pickles, made with salt brine and left to ferment at room temperature, retain their live cultures. Very different products.

The garlic — genuinely medicinal in its own right. Allicin, the active compound in garlic, has documented antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory properties. Your kosher dills are pulling double duty.

The dill — beyond flavour, dill has a long history of use for digestive support. It contains compounds that help relax the gut and ease digestion. Again, real and documented.

A jar of homemade kosher dills made with garden cucumbers, your own dill and your own garlic isn’t just delicious. It’s genuinely nourishing in ways the commercial version simply isn’t.

Want to try making your own? Here’s a Basic Kosher Dill Recipe:

What you need: Pickling cucumbers — enough to fill your jar/s Fresh dill — several sprigs per jar Garlic cloves — 2-4 per jar depending on preference Non-iodised salt — iodised salt inhibits fermentation Filtered or non-chlorinated water — chlorine also inhibits fermentation

What you do: Make a brine of approximately 2 tablespoons non-iodised salt per litre of water. Dissolve completely. Pack your jars with cucumbers, dill and garlic — keep cucumbers below the shoulders of the jar. Pour brine over to cover completely. Leave at least an inch of headspace. Cover loosely — not airtight, as fermentation produces gas — and leave at room temperature for 3-7 days depending on temperature and your taste preference. Taste daily from day 3. When they’re where you want them, move to the fridge to slow fermentation.

Note: If you’re using a vinegar brine for shelf-stable pickles rather than lacto-fermentation, the process is different — a quick search for “quick dill pickles” will give you that method.

My grandpa’s pickles didn’t come with a recipe. They came as a story, a smell, and the memory of a man who knew that some of the best things take time and salt and a little bit of patience.

This morning’s batch is for him.

Fermentation is just transformation in a jar.

Not medical advice — always do your own research before using anything medicinally.

I love my neighbourhood walks.

My trail walks. My forest walks. All of them keep offering me knowledge I didn’t know I was missing. As summer settles in I’m seeing more and more blossoms and growth that have me questioning everything — with my little Seek app by my side at all times.

One of my recent discoveries is Self Heal. Prunella vulgaris. That pretty little purple flower we’ve all walked past, possibly cursed as a weed, and never given a second thought to. It grows in our lawns, woodland edges and fields. Once you see it you’ll spot it everywhere.

Turns out we’ve been ignoring one of the most useful plants in the Northern Hemisphere.

A little history

Self Heal has a long and well-documented history in herbal medicine. Roughly 400 years ago it was considered one of the top herbs in its class, highly sought after by herbalists across Europe and Asia. An old Italian proverb went: “He that hath Selfheal and Sanicle needs no other physician.”

Chinese herbalists have long revered this plant. Western herbalism somewhat overlooked it for a period — you won’t find it in many modern herb books — but researchers have been quietly confirming what traditional practitioners knew for centuries.

It’s a member of the mint family. All aerial parts are edible and medicinal — the flowers, stems, and leaves. It has no real scent and the leaves taste mild and pleasant, somewhat like nibbling on a fresh lettuce leaf.

And it’s growing, right now, probably within a few streets of where you live. For free.

What it actually does

Self Heal has potent anti-inflammatory, antiviral and wound-healing properties — and unlike many herbs making big claims, it’s actually one of the more studied plants out there.

It contains allantoin and rosmarinic acid, which reduce inflammation and oxidative stress. These are documented compounds with well understood mechanisms.

For wounds and skin: Self Heal is what herbalists call a vulnerary — a wound healer. It promotes tissue regeneration, helps stop bleeding, and soothes cuts, burns, bruises and abrasions. Applied topically as an infused oil or salve it’s a genuinely useful addition to any first aid kit. If you have fresh self heal around it can be made into a poultice for wounds.

For the mouth and throat: Traditionally used for sore throats, mouth sores, canker sores and gingivitis. A strong tea used as a gargle or mouthwash is one of the most well-supported traditional uses — and it works beautifully. It soothes inflammation and promotes tissue health directly where you need it.

For circulation: Self Heal has a lovely reputation for supporting lymph movement, reducing swollen glands, and helping with varicose veins and haemorrhoids — all conditions involving sluggish circulation and tissue congestion.

Research continues into a broader range of applications. As with most medicinal herbs, the full picture of what self heal can do is still being explored.

How to use it

Drying: Gather the top portions of the plant — flower, stem, and leaves. Spread in a single layer on a screen or clean towel and air dry for several days until completely dry. Store in a glass jar out of direct sunlight. Shelf life is around nine months to a year.

Self Heal Tea For sore throat, mouth sores, general inflammation support. Place 2-3 tsp dried self heal in a mug. Cover with 8 oz simmering water. Cover and steep for 45 minutes to an hour. Sweeten with honey if desired. Drink up to 2-3 cups per day. Can also be used as a gargle or mouth rinse.

Self Heal Salve For wounds, cuts, bruises, abrasions and sores. Combine roughly 1/3 cup crumbled dried self heal with 3/4 cup olive or sunflower oil. Infuse using a double boiler over medium-low heat for 2-3 hours, or cap and leave at room temperature for 4-6 weeks shaking occasionally. Once infused, combine 1/2 cup infused oil with 1 tbsp beeswax pastilles, melt together, pour into jars and allow to cool before capping. Makes around 4 oz. Shelf life 9 months to a year.

Self Heal Tincture Finely chop fresh self heal flowers and leaves. Combine one part fresh herb with two parts high proof vodka. Cap, label and store in a dark cabinet for 4-6 weeks. Strain. Can be applied directly to sores, diluted into water, added to tea, or mixed with honey. Shelf life at least one year.

The bigger observation

There is something quietly extraordinary about the fact that one of the most useful medicinal herbs in the Northern Hemisphere grows uninvited in almost every lawn, is free to harvest, and most of us have spent our lives trying to get rid of it.

What else are we walking past without knowing what it is?

That question is what the Apothecary Files is really about.

The medicine was always growing. We just forgot to look. 🌿

As always — do your own research before using any herb medicinally, especially if you have existing health conditions or take medication. This is not medical advice. I’m a kitchen witch in progress, not a doctor.

In 2011, French astrologer André Barbault predicted that 2020–2022 could bring a major pandemic. He based it on decades of meticulous study of the outer planets—Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto—and how their alignments have repeatedly matched periods of collective intensity throughout history.

He passed on October 7, 2019.
Three months later, the world changed.

Barbault didn’t work from vague intuition. He was a researcher’s researcher. He joined the Centre International d’Astrologie in 1946, became vice president, founded the influential journal L’Astrologue in 1968, and spent over forty years editing it. He authored nearly fifty books. His method was rigorous: he pored over centuries of planetary ephemerides, mapped geometric relationships, and cross-referenced them with documented historical events—wars, plagues, revolutions, collapses, and rebirths.

At the heart of his work is the Cyclic Index, an evolution of an earlier idea by Henri-Joseph Gouchon. It’s elegantly simple: add up the ten shortest angular distances between every pair of the five outer planets. When the total is low, the planets are bunched together; when high, they’re spread out. Barbault observed that tight clusters (low index) consistently aligned with humanity’s hardest chapters. Dispersed configurations brought rebuilding and expansion.

He flagged the Black Death, the Great Plague, the Spanish Flu—and yes, the 2020 pandemic—long before they arrived. The 2020 call was made in 2011.

Even if you’re skeptical of astrology, the underlying astronomy is solid. When the giant outer planets cluster on one side of the Sun, the solar system’s center of mass (the barycenter) shifts dramatically—sometimes over 800,000 km from the Sun’s center. NASA tracks this for deep-space navigation; it’s measurable, physical reality.

Barbault never claimed to understand the exact “how.” He simply documented that these measurable lopsided moments in the solar system have repeatedly coincided with major turning points in human affairs. The correlation held across centuries of data.

In his 2014 book The Value of Astrology, Barbault pointed to the Saturn-Neptune conjunction of February 2026 and especially the extraordinary planetary configuration of July 2026 as the most significant of the 21st century.

His words (translated): “The new world civilisation is in full flight here. This entry into the second quarter of the century bears the stamp of the achievement of a new age of humanity.”

He envisioned a great uplifting: the lower strata of the world’s population rising, a dramatic improvement in living standards for the poor, and a victory over misery achieved through unprecedented human solidarity. Yes, he anticipated friction—political upheaval, leadership reckonings, a reality check around 2025—but he saw 2026 as the pivot. The end of the chaotic cycle that began in 2020 and the true beginning of something constructive and hopeful.

Right now—peaking July 19–21, 2026—we’re inside that window he highlighted. Four outer planets sit at roughly 4° of their signs: Jupiter in Leo, Pluto in Aquarius (directly opposing Jupiter), Neptune in Aries, Uranus in Gemini. Together they form what astrologers are calling Barbault’s Basket—a striking cradle or basket shape, with the opposition at the top and a beautiful cluster of harmonious aspects cradling it below.

This particular harmonious grouping of outer planets is rare. By the historical record, it has no close parallel in the 21st century. It feels like a cosmic container, holding tension and potential at once, ready to pour something new into the world.

What could this mean?

Well, the world has been showing us for years that massive change is underway. Ancient cultures across continents—from the Maya and Hopi to Vedic traditions, Indigenous prophecies, and many others—spoke of a great turning, the end of one long cycle and the dawn of a Golden Age. Astronomy and astrology have tracked these rhythms for millennia. Now here we are, with this exquisite Barbault Basket appearing exactly when so many lines converge.

I believe we are stepping into something profoundly beautiful. That Source—whatever name you give the living intelligence of existence—is returning in a way we haven’t experienced in this planet’s known history. That we are about to taste true Earth living for the first time: harmonious, abundant, awake.

The Basket feels like a cosmic wink. A container for the old to dissolve and the new to coalesce. A reminder that we are not alone in this shift; the heavens themselves seem to be participating.

Whether you read the sky literally or symbolically, the pattern is undeniable. A man who died months before COVID left a map pointing straight to July 2026. The geometry is real. The hope it inspires is ours to embody.

This is a moment to stay open, stay sovereign, and actively participate in the uplift. The Basket is here. The Golden Age is calling.

Stay curious. Stay in your heart. The best is unfolding.

When my family bought our first house we inherited an old fridge from the 1980s.

It was ugly. Genuinely, unapologetically ugly. The kind of beige/brown colour that no designer would touch today. But it worked. Perfectly. Quietly. Without complaint.

We eventually got rid of it for something newer and prettier. In the eight years that followed we went through three fridges.

I think about that old fridge sometimes. And I don’t think it’s nostalgia. I think it’s pattern recognition.

Planned obsolescence — the deliberate design of products to fail prematurely or become outdated — didn’t happen accidentally. It was a strategy. A documented, named, consciously developed business strategy.

In the 1920s, a group of major lightbulb manufacturers formed what became known as the Phoebus Cartel. They deliberately limited the lifespan of their bulbs to around 1,000 hours — despite having the technology to make them last considerably longer. More failure meant more sales. The cartel is documented in historical records and is considered one of the earliest organized examples of planned obsolescence.

By the 1950s the concept had been openly articulated by American industrial designer Brooks Stevens, who described planned obsolescence as “instilling in the buyer the desire to own something a little newer, a little better, a little sooner than is necessary.” The goal wasn’t quality. It was dependency.

Look at photographs of old kitchen appliances from the mid-20th century. The storage compartments were thoughtful. The materials were solid. The designs were distinctive — each one different, each one considered. People repaired them when they broke. Passed them down. Built relationships with objects that were built to be worth relating to.

Then came the era of the identical, the disposable, the designed-to-be-replaced.

Electronics that slow down suspiciously close to the release of the new model. Washing machines with circuit boards that cost more to replace than the machine itself. Cars increasingly difficult to repair without proprietary software. Clothes that disintegrate after a season.

The French government investigated Apple after reports that software updates were deliberately slowing older iPhones. They found the practice real. It became part of the case for stronger legislation.

In 2015 France became one of the first countries in the world to criminalise planned obsolescence — making it explicitly illegal for companies to intentionally shorten a product’s lifespan for profit. Penalties include up to two years in prison and fines of €300,000, or up to 5% of a company’s annual revenue.

They didn’t stop there. France now requires manufacturers of smartphones, laptops, televisions and washing machines to display a repairability index — a score from 1 to 10 telling consumers how easy the product is to fix. And from 2024-2025 that’s expanding to a full durability index, reflecting not just repairability but how long the product can actually be expected to last.

The EU has followed with its own Right to Repair directive, adopted in June 2024.

One country decided that products designed to die early was a criminal act. And started treating it like one.

Here’s what I keep thinking about when I consider planned obsolescence alongside everything else in this series.

Dependency is the product. Not the fridge, not the phone, not the washing machine. The dependency on buying the next one.

A person who owns things that last — who can repair them, who understands how they work, who isn’t constantly replacing them — is a person who needs considerably less. Who spends considerably less. Who is considerably less attached to the consumption cycle that keeps the whole system running.

The old fridge that lasted thirty years wasn’t just ugly. It was, in its quiet beige kind of way, a small act of sovereignty.

Build things that last. Fix things that break. Own less, better. That’s not nostalgia — it’s resistance.

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

I’m having one of those days.
Lots on my mind, nothing in particular. Half watching the news about fires across Canada, half trying not to. Aware of the general weight of the world in that low-grade, ambient way that’s hard to shake some weeks.

And yet — underneath all of that — something else. Something that doesn’t quite make logical sense given the headlines but feels stubbornly, persistently real.

Hope.

I know. How?

I’ve written before about my belief that we’re moving toward something better. Not because the news says so — it absolutely doesn’t — but because of something I feel more than I can prove. A sense, shared by many people I talk to, that things are shifting even when they look like they’re falling apart. More of us questioning old patterns, turning toward what’s real, and quietly building something more coherent in our own lives and communities.

I know I can’t tell you exactly what’s coming or when. I know I can’t promise the hard things will resolve quickly or painlessly. What I can say is this: I know a lot of people paying close attention to the world — questioning, thinking, feeling into what’s real — and almost all of them carry the same strange combination right now. Awareness of how difficult things are. And a quiet, persistent sense that something is also turning.

That combination doesn’t feel like denial to me. It feels like discernment.

Denial would be pretending things aren’t hard. This isn’t that. Things are genuinely hard in a lot of places right now. The fires are real. The uncertainty is real. The exhaustion of navigating a world that can feel increasingly strange is real.

But hardship and hope aren’t opposites. They’ve coexisted throughout human history — in every difficult period, there were people who somehow held both. Who kept showing up, kept building, kept reaching toward something better even when the evidence for it was thin.

I think that capacity is worth cultivating right now. Not as a spiritual bypass — not as a way of avoiding what’s real — but as a genuine act of staying present without being consumed. Raising our own vibration and consciously bringing more light isn’t about pretending the darkness isn’t there. It’s about refusing to let the darkness occupy every room in our minds. It’s the quiet discipline of tending our inner frequency through presence, beauty, truth, and connection — so we can show up more steady for whatever comes next.

The things that help me most on weeks like this one:

• Turning down the doomscrolling, especially when it stops being informative and starts just being loud.

• Going into the garden. Hands in soil. Something growing.

• Talking to people who are thinking carefully and still choosing hope.

• Remembering that the loudest and most frightening version of events is rarely the complete picture.

• And listening — truly listening — to my intuition and my truth. Right now that inner voice is guiding me in a beautiful way. I think most of us just need gentle reminders to tune in.

That’s really all I have for today. Not a research piece, not a deep dive. Just a small offering for anyone else who’s finding this week heavy.

You’re not wrong to find it hard. And you’re not naive to feel hopeful anyway.

Both things can be true at once.

We got this. Quietly, stubbornly, together.

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

I’ve written a fair bit here about etymology — the hidden history inside individual words, the meaning that gets buried over time. But lately I’ve been thinking about something adjacent to that.

Not single words. Phrases. The ones we reach for automatically, repeat without thinking, hand down to our children without examining them.

Because if individual words carry weight — and I think they do — then the phrases we repeat daily carry weight too. And some of them are worth looking at more carefully.

“Money doesn’t grow on trees.”

Most of us heard this one in childhood. It was meant to teach prudence, probably. Gratitude for what we have.

But listen to what it actually says underneath: there isn’t enough. Resources are scarce. You have to be careful or it will run out.

Repeat that message often enough, early enough, and it stops being a phrase about money. It becomes a felt truth about the world. About what’s available. About what you deserve to expect.

Economists and psychologists have documented the effects of scarcity mindset — the way believing resources are limited actually changes decision-making, narrows thinking, and creates the very conditions it’s predicting. It’s not just a phrase. It’s a frame. And frames, once in place, shape everything that gets processed through them.

“I can’t.”

Two words. Feels factual. Often isn’t.

There’s a distinction worth making between “I can’t” and “I haven’t yet” or “I don’t know how” or “I’ve decided not to.” These are meaningfully different statements about meaningfully different situations.

“I can’t” forecloses. It locates the limitation inside you, permanently. “I haven’t yet” leaves a door open.

Cognitive behavioural research has consistently shown that the language we use to describe our own capabilities shapes what we actually attempt — and therefore what we actually achieve. This isn’t positive thinking as a magic trick. It’s the documented relationship between self-talk and behaviour.

“I’m broken.”

This one I want to handle carefully because it’s the most loaded.

Sometimes people say this from a place of genuine pain — a way of naming something that feels deeply wrong. That’s worth taking seriously and not dismissing.

But as a repeated phrase — a habitual way of describing yourself to yourself — it’s worth examining. Because “broken” implies a fixed state. Something that was whole, is now not, and may not be fixable.

The alternative isn’t toxic positivity — “you’re not broken, you’re perfect!” That dismisses real experience.

It’s something more honest: you are a person who has been through things. You are in a process. You are not a finished, static object that can be assessed as broken or whole.

Language that allows for movement and change is more accurate than language that fixes you in place. And accuracy matters, because we tend to behave in ways that confirm what we believe to be true about ourselves.

So what do we do with this?

I’m not suggesting we police every word we say or spiral into anxiety about the wrong phrase slipping out. That’s its own kind of trap.

But there’s something worth doing occasionally — a kind of audit. Noticing which phrases you reach for most automatically. Asking whether they’re actually true. Asking whether they’re serving you or just familiar.

The phrases we carry were mostly given to us. By parents, by culture, by the particular time and place we grew up in. We didn’t choose them. But we can, as adults, choose whether to keep them.

What phrases are you carrying that no longer fit?

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

My garden is growing food to eat and medicinals to keep me healthy and happy. My apothecary cabinet is growing with every neighbourhood and forest walk. Right now self heal, goldenrod, clovers, St. John’s Wort, mullein and evening primrose are some of the magic I’m finding, bringing home and preserving for the year ahead.

But in the garden right now — the blueberries are finally beginning to ripen.

I have two kinds growing. Cultivated and wild.

Growing up in Nova Scotia on a lake, I only knew wild blueberries. Those teeny tiny pops of flavour — intensely sweet, almost jammy, the taste of summer distilled into something barely bigger than a pea. When I moved to BC I discovered these were a rarity out here. Cultivated is what you mostly find in stores and markets.

My cultivated ones ripen earlier and they’re delicious — don’t get me wrong. But they’re nowhere near the flavour explosion of the wild ones. And that’s perfectly okay. It means they’re ideal for baking, where their milder sweetness does exactly what it needs to do.

This weekend I made my first blueberry muffins of the season. One bite and I was instantly back in childhood summers. My mom made great blueberry muffins. My grandmother’s blueberry coffee cake recipe is calling me too — one I love to keep in the freezer for company.

One thing I’m committed to this summer is maxing out on everything while it’s here. Not just one thing with each fruit or vegetable — many things. The blueberries are a perfect example.

Blueberry jam is on the list. I love Christine Ferber’s jam recipes — generous with sugar but also with flavour. She has one with blueberry, licorice and pinot noir that I’m eyeing with genuine excitement. Might have to experiment.

And a blueberry pie. It’s been far too long and my taste buds are already impatient.

But the thing I’m most excited about this year is a shrub.

If you haven’t encountered shrubs before — you’re in for something lovely.

A shrub (also called a drinking vinegar) is a vinegar-based syrup made from fruit, a natural sweetener, and acid. The recipe tradition is over 300 years old — before refrigeration, vinegar and honey were used to preserve seasonal fruit and extend its life through the colder months. The result is a concentrated syrup that’s tangy, fruity, and genuinely good for your gut.

You can drink it straight over ice, mix it into cocktails or mocktails, or — my personal favourite — just a splash over ice with good soda water. Simple, refreshing, and surprisingly complex in flavour.

Last year I made Concord grape shrub from a neighbour’s grapes and it was absolutely delightful. This year: blueberry.

The recipe I’m using is from Little Home in the Making (littlehomeinthemaking.com/blueberry-shrub) — just three ingredients, beautifully simple, and a method that’s been working for centuries.

What I keep coming back to as I move through this summer of preserving and making is how satisfying it is to receive everything a plant has to offer.

One blueberry harvest. Muffins. Jam. A pie. A shrub that will sit in my fridge and carry summer into winter one soda water at a time.

Nothing wasted. Nothing rushed. Just the quiet, genuinely satisfying practice of paying attention to what’s growing and using all of it.

That feels like something worth reclaiming.

Summer is generous. Be as generous with it as it is with you. 🌿

This week’s recipe: Blueberry Shrub → littlehomeinthemaking.com/blueberry-shrub

When I first began The Frequency Diaries all I could do was see patterns emerging from areas I’d never thought about before. I still see patterns — but I’ve learned to be a little more critical of my own thoughts and ideas to make sure I don’t just see conspiracy.

When I first started I wrote a series called Progressing While Degenerating. I wrote a few posts and then moved on. Sometimes I feel like an ADHD squirrel — too many choices, directions, and rabbit holes to follow. But since yesterday was my one year anniversary I thought I’d look back at some of my earlier posts and see which ones deserved a deeper look.

This one jumped out immediately.

If you’ve been following this series, you’ve been sitting with some uncomfortable patterns.

Convenience that created dependency. Medicine that monetised illness. Food systems that prioritised shelf life over actual nourishment. These aren’t fringe observations — they’re documented, researched, and increasingly acknowledged even in mainstream conversations.

But I want to pause here and ask a harder question. One I think is worth asking if we’re being genuinely honest rather than just satisfyingly outraged.

How do we actually know the difference between deliberate harm, unintended consequence, and the predictable result of profit-driven systems with no particular malice but plenty of damage?

Because here’s what I think is true — and what the evidence actually supports.

The tobacco industry knowingly suppressed research showing their product caused cancer. That’s documented in federal court rulings. Deliberate.

The sugar industry funded Harvard research to shift blame for heart disease onto fat. That’s documented in peer reviewed journals. Deliberate.

Corporate influence on medical education, pharmaceutical marketing masquerading as science, food systems optimised for addiction rather than nourishment — these are documented patterns with real evidence behind them.

That’s enough. That’s genuinely alarming enough without needing to claim that every health problem, every systemic failure, every cultural shift was part of a coordinated plan to harm us.

Here’s where I want to be honest with myself and with you.

There’s a real difference between:

“Profit-driven systems consistently produce harmful outcomes because harm is an acceptable externality when it doesn’t affect the bottom line” — which is documented and true.

And:

“Everything harmful that has happened was deliberately engineered as part of a coordinated frequency attack on humanity” — which is a specific claim that’s much harder to support with evidence.

The first framing is uncomfortable but verifiable. It asks us to examine systems, incentives, and documented behaviour. It leads somewhere actionable.

The second framing, while emotionally satisfying, can actually make us less discerning rather than more. When everything is deliberate, everything becomes evidence — and genuine pattern recognition starts to look the same as confirmation of a framework we’ve already accepted.

The sovereign position — and I mean genuinely sovereign, not just a different kind of compliance — is to hold both things simultaneously.

Some things were deliberately designed to harm or extract. That’s documented.

Some things produced harm through negligence, short-sightedness, and the prioritisation of profit over people. Also true.

Some things are genuinely complicated — where corporate influence, cultural shifts, technological change and human behaviour all interact in ways that don’t reduce neatly to intention.

Being able to tell the difference is actually harder than adopting a framework that explains everything. But it’s more honest. And I’d argue it’s more useful — because it lets you identify where the actual evidence points rather than where the framework tells you to look.

This series started with a genuine and important observation: we’ve traded something real for something convenient, and the costs have been significant and largely unacknowledged.

That’s still true. That’s still worth examining.

But the most powerful version of that examination is one that stays anchored in what’s actually documented — because the documented reality is genuinely extraordinary. It doesn’t need embellishment.

The truth is alarming enough. We don’t have to make it bigger than it is to take it seriously.

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

179 subscribers. 1,610 followers. 192 posts.

One year ago today I started The Frequency Diaries.

When this began I wanted a place to share some of what I’d been learning and thinking about on my own awakening journey. I wasn’t sure anyone would read it. I wasn’t sure I had enough to say. And I definitely wasn’t sure I could sustain it week after week alongside everything else life had going on.

I did anyway. And something unexpected happened.

People came back.

That still genuinely humbles me. In a world of infinite content and limited attention, real people chose to spend some of their time here — with my wondering, my rabbit holes, my half-formed questions and occasional strong opinions. That’s not something I take for granted.

What surprised me most this year wasn’t the growth, though I’m grateful for every subscriber. It was the recognition.

The comments and messages from people who said — yes, I think about this too. I’ve felt this too. I wasn’t sure anyone else saw it this way.

That feeling of finding your people — of discovering that the things you thought made you strange or difficult or too much are actually the exact things that connect you to others who are wired the same way — that’s what The Frequency Diaries became for me this year. Not just a platform. A homecoming of sorts.

My wyrd found its tribe.

This year we explored a lot of ground together.

Etymology and hidden meaning in ordinary words. Pattern recognition in history and media. Plant medicine and kitchen witchery. The hard questions about consciousness and what we actually are. Entertainment that says more than it appears to. The systems that shape us without our noticing.

Some pieces landed quietly. Some surprised me with how much they resonated. All of them were genuine — my actual thinking, expressed as honestly as I could manage.

I kept some of the deeper rabbit holes for later. I’m still building the trust and the community that makes those conversations possible. But the direction is clear and I’m not afraid of it.

For the year ahead I want to go deeper.

The surfaces we’ve touched — consciousness, hidden history, the reclaiming of ancient knowledge, the frequency of everything — these deserve more than surface treatment. I want to follow the threads further. Ask the harder questions. Build the kind of community where we’re not just reading each other but actually talking to each other.

I want my writing to keep growing as I keep growing. I want to keep calling in the people who appreciate the wyrd and aren’t frightened by genuine curiosity.

And I want to keep showing up — because that, more than anything, is what this year taught me. Showing up consistently, honestly, with genuine curiosity about this extraordinary strange world we find ourselves in — that’s enough. That’s actually more than enough.

Thank you for being here. Genuinely.

Stay curious. Stay sovereign. Stay wyrd. 🌿

Here’s something genuinely interesting that most people — including most doctors — don’t know.

The symbol you probably associate with medicine and healthcare? The one with two snakes and wings? That’s not actually the symbol of healing.

It’s the symbol of commerce.

And the story of how that happened is worth knowing.

Two symbols, two very different meanings

The Rod of Asclepius is the true symbol of medicine. A single snake coiled around a rough wooden staff — no wings, no second serpent. It belongs to Asclepius, the ancient Greek god of healing and medicine. In Greek mythology, Asclepius was taught the art of healing by a wise serpent, and snakes themselves were associated with renewal and regeneration — the shedding of skin as a symbol of transformation and new life. The World Health Organization uses the Rod of Asclepius in its official emblem. Most professional medical associations worldwide do too.

The Caduceus is something else entirely. Two snakes intertwined around a winged staff. This belongs to Hermes — the messenger god, patron of travellers, diplomats, and merchants. Also, it should be noted, the god associated with eloquence, trickery, and thieves. The Caduceus is a symbol of commerce, negotiation, and trade.

One snake — healing. Two snakes with wings — commerce.

The widespread use of the caduceus in American medicine traces back to a single error in 1902, when Captain Frederick Reynolds, an assistant surgeon in the U.S. Army, recommended that the Medical Corps adopt the caduceus as its collar insignia. His correspondence with the Surgeon General’s office makes it clear he didn’t fully understand the distinction between the two symbols.

From that single administrative error, the caduceus spread through American healthcare. A survey in 1992 found 76% of US hospitals were likely to misuse the caduceus, while only 6% of doctors were aware that the Rod of Asclepius was the true symbol of healing.

One survey found that 62% of professional healthcare associations used the Rod of Asclepius as their symbol, while 76% of commercial healthcare organizations use the caduceus. The author of that study suggested that professional associations are more likely to have a historical understanding of the symbols, whereas commercial organizations are more likely to be concerned with visual impact.

That last detail is worth sitting with.

I want to be clear about what this is and what it isn't.

The historical record points to a genuine mistake rather than deliberate deception — one army officer in 1902 who didn’t know his Greek mythology, and an error that propagated from there. That’s the documented story.

But here’s the observation I find genuinely interesting regardless of intent:

The shift in American medicine over the last century — from healing as a vocation to healthcare as an industry — is real and well documented. The dominance of pharmaceutical interests in medical research, the business model of managed care, the economics of treatment versus prevention — these are mainstream critiques made by mainstream physicians and researchers.

And the symbol that ended up on the majority of American commercial healthcare organizations — hospitals, insurance companies, pharmaceutical firms — happens to be the symbol of commerce rather than healing.

Mistake or not, the symbol fits.

Whether that’s irony, coincidence, or something worth examining more carefully — that’s a question worth sitting with. The Frequency Diaries isn’t in the business of telling you what to conclude. Just what to notice.

One snake or two. It matters which one you’re trusting with your health.

Which symbol do you see more of in your health care system?

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

I find it funny how things show up in your life and then keep showing up.

Ghost pipe is one of those things for me. A few weeks ago I read about it for the first time in one of my herbalist group posts. It looked so unusual — almost otherworldly — and I filed it away as something to look out for. But I’d never seen any on my walks through the woods, or if I had, I hadn’t known what I was looking at.

Then a few days ago I was out walking and there it was. Hiding underneath another plant, tucked away in a shaded corner, but unmistakable once you knew what you were looking for. And then another patch a few feet away.

My walking companion wasn’t quite as exuberant as I was about the discovery. That’s okay. I made up for both of us.

What is ghost pipe?

Monotropa uniflora — ghost pipe, or Indian pipe as it’s also known — is one of the stranger plants you’ll find in the forest. And I mean that as a compliment.

Unlike almost every other plant, ghost pipe contains no chlorophyll. It doesn’t photosynthesize. It doesn’t need light to survive. This is why it can grow in deep shade — in the dark, mossy, mature forest floors where most plants wouldn’t stand a chance.

Instead of drawing energy from sunlight, ghost pipe is parasitic. It draws nutrients and carbohydrates from tree roots through a relationship with mycorrhizal fungi — specifically in the genera Russula and Lactarius. It’s essentially tapping into the underground fungal network that connects the trees, taking what it needs without contributing photosynthesis in return.

The result is a plant that looks like it belongs in another world entirely. Translucent white, slightly waxy, emerging from the forest floor like a small ghost. No green anywhere. Just that cool, pale, luminous white.

I stood there longer than I needed to, just looking at it.

The tincture

I brought a small amount home and got to work.

Ghost pipe tincture is straightforward to make — finely chop the fresh plant, pack into a mason jar, cover with alcohol. The challenge in BC right now is that high proof alcohol like Everclear isn’t available, so I worked with 50% alcohol instead. This means the tincture may be somewhat less potent and won’t keep as long as a higher proof extraction would — worth knowing if you’re trying this yourself.

Ghost pipe has a long history of traditional use, particularly among various Indigenous peoples of North America, primarily for pain. Anecdotally it’s described as genuinely effective in small amounts — a few drops rather than a full dropper. The evidence is traditional and experiential rather than clinically studied, so I want to be honest about that.

I’ll be opening the jar in about six weeks. I’ll report back.

The synchronicity thing

I keep thinking about how this works — the way something appears in your awareness and then appears in your life shortly after. It’s happened too many times to dismiss entirely.

Whether that’s simply a matter of attention — you notice what you’ve recently learned to look for — or something more interesting than that, I genuinely don’t know. But either way the mechanism is worth appreciating. Learn the name of something and suddenly the world is full of it.

The forest was always full of ghost pipe. I just hadn’t learned to see it yet.

The forest offers extraordinary things to those who know how to look. Keep learning the names. Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

Resources: Ghost pipe identification — use iNaturalist or Seek app to confirm before harvesting Traditional and folk uses — Henriette’s Herbal (henriettes-herb.com) is a good starting point Tincture making basics — Rosemary Gladstar’s Medicinal Herbs: A Beginner’s Guide

I have a deep belief that we are heading somewhere better.

I know it doesn’t always feel that way. The news is loud, the world is complicated, and some days the gap between where we are and where we could be feels enormous. But the belief persists — quietly, stubbornly — and it’s what keeps me moving toward something rather than away from everything.

Today I want to play with that belief. Not argue for it. Just imagine it.

What if we woke up one morning and it had all changed? How would we know? What would it feel like?

I think we’d notice the media first.

Instead of the familiar diet of fear and division, we’d wake up to something different. Faces reporting good things. Communities sharing what was working. Local stories about growth and connection and small genuine wins. The morning ritual of checking in with the world would leave us feeling informed rather than anxious. Oriented rather than overwhelmed.

Then we’d step outside.

We’d nod at our neighbours. Maybe stop for a conversation. The small daily exchanges that used to feel like interruptions would start to feel like the point. Community wouldn’t be something we scheduled — it would just be what happened when we moved through our days with a little less hurry and a little more attention.

Work would feel different too.

Not the grind — but something chosen. Something that used use our actual abilities and bring genuine satisfaction. The idea that we have to suffer through our days to earn the right to rest would start to seem as strange as it actually is. Meaningful contribution and reasonable reward, for more people than currently get to experience that combination.

Our bodies would feel different.

Cleaner air. Cleaner water. Food that was grown rather than engineered — that nourished rather than just filled. The connection between what we consume and how we feel would become legible again, the way it used to be before so much of that got complicated. We’d remember what it felt like to feel genuinely well.

And that wellness would reach further than the physical. The chronic low hum of stress and fear that most of us have normalised would quiet. We’d find it easier to be generous, curious, patient. Easier to see each other clearly rather than through the lens of whoever we’d been told to be afraid of that week.

Education would change too.

Less about fitting into a predetermined shape, more about discovering what each person is actually good at and building from there. Skills that made life richer and more self-sufficient. Room for the things that brought genuine joy alongside the things that were useful. Learning as something that opened rather than sorted.

I’m not describing a fantasy with no path to it.

I’m describing something that becomes incrementally more real every time one of us chooses to live a small version of it now. Grow something. Talk to a neighbour. Choose the nourishing thing. Find the good story. Reach out rather than scroll past.

The golden age — whatever that means and however it arrives — probably won’t announce itself dramatically. It will more likely be something we look back on and realise had been building quietly, in the small choices of ordinary people who decided to live differently before it was obvious that was the right thing to do.

It starts somewhere. It might as well start here.

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.

Some harvests require a little urgency.

Last week my neighbour and I set out to pick the remnants of a sour cherry tree down the street. We’d asked the homeowner — they were happy for us to take what we could. The only complication was the competition. A mother bear with triplets and a very curious teenager had been making the rounds in the neighbourhood. We knew we had to move fast before they ate everything or decided our bucket looked interesting.

We got there first. Two full pints worth of sour cherries, rescued from the bears and brought home in triumph.

The jam with a backstory

Here’s the thing about this particular jam. It’s been years in the making.

A long time ago I stayed at a bed and breakfast in the Okanagan. They served us homemade cherry almond jam at breakfast. One taste and I was done. It was one of those food memories that lodges itself permanently — the kind where you spend years trying to recreate something you only had once, chasing a flavour you can’t quite pin down.

I think I’ve finally found it.

Sour cherry almond jam. The tartness of the cherries against the warmth of the almond — it’s the combination that makes it extraordinary. I used the recipe at Dimple’s Recipes (sites.google.com/site/dimplesrecipes/sour-cherry-almond-jam) and the result made my taste buds genuinely explode with joy. That B&B memory has finally been put to rest — in the best possible way.

Waste nothing, witch

After the jam was done I looked at the pile of cherry pits sitting on my counter.

A year ago I probably would have composted them without a second thought. But over the last couple of years as I’ve been deepening into this practice — the growing, the harvesting, the making — I’ve been genuinely trying to use every part of what the garden and the neighbourhood trees offer me.

So the pits became vinegar.

Cherry pit vinegar is simpler than it sounds. The pits go into a jar, covered with vinegar, left to infuse over several weeks. What emerges is a beautiful, subtly flavoured vinegar — slightly fruity, slightly tart — that I’ll reach for all winter long. On salads, in dressings, splashed into sauces.

June’s cherries in a January kitchen. Again.

The recipe I followed is at The Spruce Eats (thespruceeats.com/cherry-vinegar-4125415) — simple and reliable.

The bigger practice

I keep coming back to this idea of waste nothing as a philosophy rather than just a kitchen habit.

Every part of the plant has a use. The flower, the fruit, the pit, the leaf. Our grandmothers and great-grandmothers knew this instinctively — not because they were particularly wise but because waste was simply not an option. Everything had value. Everything got used.

We lost that somewhere in the era of abundance and convenience. But I find myself returning to it not out of necessity but out of genuine preference. There’s a satisfaction in using the whole thing — in knowing that nothing got thrown away, that the tree gave everything it had and you received all of it.

Racing a family of bears for a bucket of sour cherries helps too. You appreciate what you’ve got a little more when you had to fight for it. 😄

The bears got some. We got some. That feels about right. 🌿

This week’s recipes: Sour Cherry Almond Jam → sites.google.com/site/dimplesrecipes/sour-cherry-almond-jam Cherry Pit Vinegar → thespruceeats.com/cherry-vinegar-4125415

The word witch has had a long and complicated life.

For most of human history, the woman who knew plants — who understood which root to reach for in fever, which herb to hang above the door, which preparation eased a difficult birth — was simply a healer. A necessary and valued member of her community. Her knowledge was practical, embodied, and passed down through generations of women who learned by doing and watching and tending.

She wasn’t called a witch. She was just the woman who knew things.

The witch hunts of the early modern period — roughly the 15th through 18th centuries in Europe and colonial America — are sometimes presented as mass hysteria or superstition. The historical record is more interesting and more uncomfortable than that.

Estimates of those killed vary and are genuinely debated by historians. But the pattern of who was targeted is documented and worth examining. Women were the majority of the accused. Specifically: women who lived outside male authority structures — widowed, unmarried, too autonomous. Women with particular kinds of knowledge. Women who healed, who midwifed, who knew the land.

Historian Silvia Federici, in her documented research on this period, argued that the witch trials coincided with a specific historical moment: the enclosure of common lands, the rise of early capitalism, and the deliberate dismantling of community structures that gave women economic and social independence. The timing matters.

The Church and emerging state institutions were consolidating power over bodies, knowledge, and community life. A woman who could heal independently — who didn’t need a physician, whose knowledge came from the forest rather than a university — represented a kind of authority that existed outside institutional control.

That, more than superstition, appears to be what made her dangerous.

The formal medical establishment that emerged in the same period actively worked to displace women healers. Midwifery was gradually professionalised out of women’s hands. Herbal knowledge was either absorbed into formal pharmacology or dismissed as folk superstition. The long lineage of women who knew plants was systematically delegitimised.

It worked. For a while.

Something interesting is happening now.

The word witch is being reclaimed — not primarily in a formal religious or pagan sense, though that exists too, but in a broader and more instinctive way. Women growing medicinal gardens. Learning to make their own tinctures and syrups and salves. Returning to plant medicine. Walking forests with new eyes, noticing things they can’t quite explain how they know.

I’d be dishonest if I said I know exactly what’s driving it. Probably several things — disillusionment with pharmaceutical medicine, interest in sustainability, a hunger for embodied knowledge in an increasingly abstract world.

But I also think something older is stirring. A recognition, not always conscious, of a lineage that was interrupted rather than ended. Knowledge that went underground and waited.

Women have always known plants. That knowing didn’t disappear. It just got quiet for a while.

I wear the word with genuine affection — Kitchen Witch, Garden Witch, Witch Doctor. Not because I’m making a formal claim about practice or belief but because it points toward something real. A relationship with the growing world. A willingness to trust embodied knowledge alongside intellectual knowledge. A connection to a long line of women who knew things that the official story said weren’t worth knowing.

The reclaiming isn’t nostalgia. It’s more like remembering.

They called her dangerous because she knew things they couldn’t control. She still does.

Stay curious. Stay sovereign.