Terra Artemisia

Throughout my life, I have always been moved by the connections that can be made with plants. From the plants dismissed as “useless weeds” (dandelion, I love you), to divinatory herbs like mugwort, to hallucinogenic and deliriant plants, there is a spectrum of experience and diversity in the plant world that would take many lifetimes to learn about. As a young pagan child, I would explore wooded areas and bodies of water and felt so naturally at ease in my environment.

When it was time to grow up and get a good job, I lost touch with this wonder. I became scared of insects and preferred to spend all of my time indoors. Even though I still favored and used healing herbs in my personal life, my connection to the great outdoors weakened. It was as if I was a completely different person, a stranger to the child I once was. I felt horrible and didn’t understand why, as if nothing could ease my discomfort. I was burning out almost yearly and felt ashamed of myself for not being able to “grow up and tough it” like my peers.

When an opportunity to move to the countryside came up in 2021, I took it and found that the inner and outer peace I had achieved was healing a part of me. Being surrounded by mountains and forests regularly was an emotional experience for me, having taken my love for nature for granted. I cried many times passing by mountain ranges and beautiful forests, as if decades of tension and what felt like surviving instead of thriving were released. I found my passion in herbalism and found myself working and studying overtime, in total contrast to my days working office jobs where I would constantly glance at the clock.

One thing that was apparent quickly, however, was that without the regular comforts of a bustling city, I had to acquire a new mindset and new skills to live rural. This was clear to me when I lost power for 3 days in the winter and I was completely unprepared and home alone. The house dropped to 5 degrees, and I struggled to come up with emergency food to make and resorted to toughing it out, which caused a massive shift in my mentality. During those days of shivering and staring at candle flames, I realized I had forgotten how to work with nature! In the city, I could likely still order takeout from another part of town when the power went out, but here, not so much. I felt a strong urge to become self-sufficient from this time on.

Terra Artemisia is a universe that reflects the process of this personal transformation, and my vision to provide people with accessible and empowering information about self-sufficiency, herbs, and natural cosmetics while growing a community of curious souls looking for a life closer to nature.

I live in a village of about 300 people in a mountain range, with a vision of an abundant herb garden coming to fruition this year. There are ups and downs to such a dramatic change of lifestyle, and I would like to present both sides, not an idealized and dreamy version of a folk herbalist’s daily life. Change gets ugly, and failure happens, and that’s alright with me. I am not an authority on self-sufficiency, instead, I wish to be seen as an ally who wants to share their imperfect rewilding journey in order to inspire others to do the same, within their means.

Cheers and Blessings,
Ophelia