What if your health wasn't about a to-do list?

The power of safety signaling--what's actually going on with your body & how to change your health for real

Want support in reconnecting to Nature and restoring your health? Join the Rewild + Untame Community here:

It's summer here on Arcadia farm and at the apothecary, and I have been reminded of the power of presence because Summer has a way of forcing us to gasp at her power & beauty. This has looked like morning presence with the sun, respect for wind, devotion & noticing of plants, leveraging the detoxifying power of the heat, the luminosity even in the darkness, the refreshing of a cold shower on a hot day. I feel alive, grounded, invigorated, nourished, and most of all, peaceful.

Nothing will force you to stop & be present than a peony on fire with her fertility & showiness.

Does it seem to you, perhaps, that much of the world is about to make a shift away from constantly being "on" and "plugged in" back to sanity? It may not be conscious, but more and more I am noticing others making changes.

*I noticed it with my yearly girlfriends' gathering at the lake with my besties. Many years one or two of us is working, finishing a dissertation, tending to children even at a distance. This year was different. No phones in sight. No zoom calls. Only the power of our full presence with each other, witnessing, listening, speaking truth, laughing, and soaking in the sun, the storms, the light through fog on the water, the bouncing in boats on waves.

*I noticed it a few times lately when out for a glass of wine with my husband--a lot fewer people staring down at their smartphones and a lot more looking each other in the eye.

*I noticed it on a recent trip to visit dear friends--the first time in a long time where it felt like we weren't competing for attention with the tyranny of the urgent. There was space, connection, honoring, laughter...and again, I noticed there was peace.

*I am seeing healers of various types start consciously moving off social media with an acknowledgement that it is completely lacking in healthy energy exchange or support of their work. Some of us are choosing, slowly, bravely, to get off the hamster wheel.

Perhaps our bodies are starting to tell us something we haven't consciously come to fully realize: we can't keep living this dopamine-strung-out addiction to technology. We aren't going to be able to compete with AI. Social media is full of bots and click bait and has lost much of its power to connect us to meaning.

And we are feeling empty. Stressed. Wired. Unsatisfied. Unwell. Inflamed. Addicted. Unbalanced. Without peace.

The physical toll on our bodies as a result of this ultra HD, wifi, "easier" modern life is huge. Most of our modern diseases have an underlying relationship to stress. Our bodies KNOW they are not safe in this fast paced, artificial lifestyle, even if it seems shiny and new to us on the surface, and even though it's highly addictive.

So what's going on, exactly? Well, maybe here is some information you haven't heard.

As our bodies have gotten out of sync with Nature, our daily, seasonal, and monthly rhythms, the nervous system has gotten highly dysregulated.

• Artificial lighting has disrupted our circadian rhythms, and this is a huge barrier to our well-being. Not only does this cause our nervous system to go on high alert, it causes all of the processes of the body to happen out of order, or worse, not at all. This means blood sugar issues, weight loss resistance, hormonal imbalances, infertility, digestive issues, skin problems, and major brain fog. Artificial lighting comes in all forms, but is especially devastating to our bodies from devices, so our issues with being chained to our phone go far beyond dopamine addiction.

• Lack of exposure to sunlight (through the window doesn't count), especially sunrise and morning sunlight, leaves us without the primary signal in our bodies to start the day. Think of making a recipe but the steps are all out of order or with wrong ingredients. You will end up with a pizza with frozen meat on it or a salad made of shoe leather. This is what it happening in our bodies when we are not receiving light signals into a part of our hypothalamus called the suprachiasmic nucleus. This is our primary "on" button. And most of us aren't getting that turned on until much later in the day or not at all. We are dragging. We are flat and dull. Our bodies are all kinds of confused.

• We are lacking direct contact with the earth itself. There's lots of conversation, especially in the more spiritual parts of the wellness community about grounding yourself. Often this is a term used to describe centering oneself with breathing, meditation, or other such practices. But that's not what I am talking about here. I am talking about the body as a battery. And turns out only 30% of the electrons in our body (our body's energy) come from the food we eat. The other 70%???? It comes from two places: the sun and the negative electrons we receive when we have bare skin contact to grass, soil, untreated concrete, or natural bodies of water.

• We are eating food that, yes, has chemicals and inflammatory components, and yes, is often not recognized by the body as food. But there's more to it even than that. The plants we consume contain biophotons which are light signals from the location the food is grown. Our mitochondria in our cells use this information from our food as signals to know where we are on the planet and what time of year it is--and with this, they know how to open up specific metabolic pathways and close others, balance our hormones, detox our bodies, and more. So, eating local isn't just about sustainability or supporting your local economy. It's literally about giving your cells coherent information so that your body doesn't try to do things that are out of sync it at this moment in time.

Turns out, as humans, our primary safety signals actually come from nature itself. The morning sunrise, the change in tones of light throughout the day, the grounding of the earth, the localness of our food, the structure of our water--all of these natural queues do far more in our body than most of us realize.

These are our primary safety signals. And what most of us are missing right now is safety signaling. And without safety signaling, the nervous system is in a grave state. You have probably sensed this in a multitude of ways, but perhaps you haven't had the language to express it. Now you do.

This is why, more and more, I am feeling called in my work to help people go back into the wild.

This doesn't mean you have to go live in the woods or hike the Pacific Crest Trail solo or even stop using technology.

*But it does mean learning how to provide your body, in simple, easy, and accessible (often completely free) ways the vital safety signaling it needs from the sun, water, your food, and contact with the earth.

*It means finding local & seasonal sources for our food, and our supplements and herbal medicines when we need that (spoiler alert: when we nature sync the body, we will need a lot less of these things).

*It means finding your way back to presence within moments of your day.

*And it means learning to live in harmony not just with Nature, but with technology, in a way that honors and serves the human body rather than depleting & harming it.

I am calling this way of living Untamed Biohacking--a way of being that incorporates light, water, grounding, and nervous system regulation with herbs, essential oils, healing sound, and seasonal living. Think of it as your ticket back to sanity & to true wellness.

Health doesn't come from a pill or a potion. It comes from root cause healing--and this is as root cause as it gets, folks.

In the Rewild + Untame Community this month we are going to be talking about rewilding, untamed biohacking, and what that looks like for each of us as individuals. Does reconnecting with Nature seem difficult or unattainable? Come join us, and allow me to mentor you on how this can actually be so much easier than you would think. We are also going to talk a bit about how we can take back our power & our peace when it comes to technology.

Whether you have struggled for a long time with your health or you are looking to optimize your well-being for yourself & your family--this is a conversation you need to be a part of. Our gathering is on July 23rd at 11 am mountain time--and the recording is sent out to community members who can't make it live.

Join us by hitting the button below, or if you would like individual guidance, book a Medicine Woman Session.

Many blessings & abundance to you all,

Erin