WORKSHOPS
Please visit calendar page for dates and times.
Most of our workshops are a mixture of lecture and hands-on or experiential activities.
As appropriate to the topic, classes will include a wander into the natural world to practice techniques.
Workshops are tailored to diverse participant groups from young people to elders and across a range of experience levels learning styles and professions. Most sessions are held at our Center or in locations throughout the region. Groups & organizations can request programs on-site and some request workshops at their homes.
We also hold workshops at the Finger Lakes School of Massage where Tammi teaches Anatomy & Physiology throughout the year.
Primitive Skills, Relationships within the Natural World & Spirit
Our workshops are designed to empower women, men and young people to feel at home and inhabit their space in the wilder places. We practice the skills our ancestors used for survival to bring us deeper into connection with ourselves, each other, our surroundings and spirit.
We continue the lessons of our Elders to help people experience the world, and make
decisions, that are in right relationship with the earth and each other.
Are you longing to come home to the natural world but are unsure how and where to start? Do you want to feel more confident or safe in the woods? Do you long to feel your rightful connection to Spirit in your home in the wild? Or, do you wish for like-minded others to explore all these ideas with? If yes, this is the course for you!
We will devote two days to exploring the inner and outer realms of what it means to live in connection with the natural world.
We will practice the physical skills of shelter (tent set-up), fire-making, outdoor cooking (with an outdoor stove and maybe on the fire for fun), wild edible and plant identification. In addition, we will learn various awareness skills, as we sit and walk and sleep within the green world. This weekend is offered alone & in a series. Each successive weekend is designed to enhance your skill-base and deepen your confidence and comfort in the natural world.
Come and spend an evening devoted to deepening your relationship with this element. You will learn the potentially life-saving skill of getting a one-match fire started the first time, the safety of fire, and finally, you will sit in a sacred manner with your personal fire alone in the woods to learn what the fire itself wants to teach you. This workshop is also offered in a longer format and includes the art & skill of making a bow-drill.
The Brilliance of the Body: Adventures in Anatomy & Physiology
For over 20 years, Tammi Sweet MS, LMT has been teaching the wonders of the body. As with other workshops, these sessions are tailored to diverse knowledge levels, interests, ages, & professions.
Heart-Centered Living: Our Heart as an Organ of Perception
The time has come for us to return to our natural way of being in the world…the way we were born to live and interact with life around us. For eons, we knew this way of health-full and heart-full being. Healers and shamans have carried this knowing over time. Now, our present scientific paradigm is coming full circle to “validate” what we’ve always known.
This “heart literacy” can be used in everyday life to access and communicate with the world around us, benefiting our own health and the health of those we come into contact with. Research shows that using these techniques improves the quality of our responses and decision-making, increases our immunity, & lowers high blood pressure and our risk of heart disease. These techniques can also be used to access our inner guidance and intuition, aiding our insight and assistance with our clients, patients and students.
Finally, if you are an outdoor-lover, living in this “heart space” supports us to resume our rightful place in the natural world. We relearn ways of moving within the natural world as quietly as the chickadee or the fox, allowing us to see what those who live in their heads would never dream of. This workshop is based on the teachings of the Heartmath Institute, Stephen Buhner, Tom Brown Jr., and Paul Pearsall.
The day will be a mixture of lecture, hands-on activities and wandering in the natural world to practice heart-centering techniques.
Inflammation: A New Way of Understanding
Inflammation is one of our primary defenses in the body. It is also a major cause or contributing factor to almost all illness and disease. Many people are stuck in an inflammatory cycle and looking for ways out. This class will examine the process of inflammation at a cellular level and considering how and when this process is beneficial and when it is not. This deeper level of understanding will help individuals make informed decisions concerning when and if the process of inflammation needs to be altered. In addition, we will consider the benefits and shortcomings of pharmaceutical anti-inflammatory drugs in relation to this miraculous healing process. Finally, we will consider a variety of herbal, dietary, and lifestyle interventions including their impact at the cellular level.
The Liver: A Deeper Look at the Wonder Organ
As herbalists and health-conscious individuals, our attention is naturally drawn to the liver. Treatment protocols declare: “Treat the liver first! Cleanse the liver! Flush the liver!” Have you ever wondered why? What is so special about the liver? In this workshop, we will begin to answer some of these questions as we delve into the deep structural and cellular world of this magnificent three-pound organ. We will not cover all of its five hundred plus functions but plenty enough to leave you in awe. You will learn why herbalists will treat the liver first, why we all should be loving our livers, and will learn some of the plants known through the ages for supporting and healing our trusty friend. Many of them grow right outside your door!
A Workshop All About the Neck!!
A whole weekend workshop on the amazing, wonderful and just plain tense, NECK!
November 7 & 8, 2009
We will cover the bones of the vertebrae, skull, clavicle, scapula and sternum and the attaching structures of muscles and fascia. In addition to anatomy, we will study related pathologies, deep tissue massage techniques, and movement/stretches for this area, practice body readings and examine the body/mind connnection of this important bridge between our head and heart.
You will leave the weekend with two complete for the neck region and one session focussing on the jaw.
Prerequisites: Massage school graduate or student through connective tissue modality.
14 massage therapy CEU's
A FREE PUBLIC LECTURE ON THE FLU
Tuesday, September 29. 2009 7:30 - 9:00
Are you curious about what the flu is? How it works? How to prevent it?
Are you trying to keep calm through the media hype and reactivity?
Come join Tammi for some answers to your questions as well as a role for plant medicines.
Held at the Finger Lakes School of Massage
Just down 96 from Cayuga Medical Center and Museum of the Earth.
Apprenticeship Programs in Herbal Medicine
Lotions & Potions: Making Herbal Creams & Salves
The art of making herbal infused oils is a time-honored tradition based on a sacred relationship with the plant world. In this afternoon workshop, you will learn the arts of wild crafting, how to choose quality herbs, two methods for infusing oils, and finally, how to create salves and creams from infused oil. The workshop will be primarily hands-on activities with a small amount of lecture. Participants will make an infused oil, cream and salve to take home.
The Art of Herbal Brewing: Honey, yeast, herbs and fun!
Come and do what we've done for thousands of years, inviting yeast to dance with the herbs and feast on honey. Brewing soda, beer and mead (honey wine) is a time-honored tradition. For thousands of years people have combined yeast, herbs and sweetener to brew beverages.
We will take two weekends to cover and make these lovely, tasty and medicinal brews. Each weekend can be taken independently or together. In weekend #1, we will make soda and beer, participating in every step of the process, tasting different kinds of herbal beer and just have a good time. (We will also discuss the Hops conspiracy; why beer shouldn’t be made with hops…especially for you, men!). In weekend #2, we’ll bottle our brews from the first weekend and take each simplified step of mead-making, from start to finish. Finally, we’ll sample a few "finished off" bottles!
Up & coming…In 2009-2011
Informal Summer Adventures in Herbalism & other fun topics!
This summer, Tammi will offer weekly hands-on workshops in a variety of topics. These will be informal gentle wanderings with like-minded individuals. Possibilities include organic gardening, weed walks, preparing wild edible plants, land stewardship, outdoor cooking, building composting toilets, and awareness skills for moving silently within the natural world.
In 2010, we will be developing advanced herbal courses in Breast Care, Men’s Health, and Immune Support.
If you are interested in being notified about courses on these or other topics in herbal medicine, beginning through advanced, please let us know.