Opening Doors to Plant Wisdom

Opening Doors to Plant Wisdom

Wild Enchantments, a new book and card deck melding the lyrical insights of herbalist Nathaniel Hughes with the illuminating paintings of Fiona Owen, invites readers to learn from plants as doorways to deepen our understanding of ourselves and our world

Conscious Frontiers is thrilled to be handling the publicity for Wild Enchantments: Let plants be our teachers – the stunning new book from herbalist Nathaniel Hughes and artist Fiona Owen, due for publication on Thursday 28 November, 2024. Complete with an exquisite set of plant wisdom oracle cards, the book offers a radical and immersive approach to herbalism and plant connection, and a doorway to self-awareness, healing and interrelation with all life.

Founder of the School of Intuitive Herbalism (a training school for herbalists focused on cultivating our body wisdom and relationships with plants), Nathaniel Hughes weaves 30 years’ clinical experience and profound knowledge into this work, along with a deep sensitivity and attunement to the natural world. 

Nathaniel Hughes says: “Wild Enchantments invites readers to move beyond traditional uses of herbs as remedies, exploring plants as guides that inspire a deeper, more reciprocal relationship with nature. Our aim is to encourage individuals to connect directly with plants, allowing them to uncover not only paths of healing but also ways to re-mythologise our understanding of the world.

“This is more than a book – it’s a call to pay attention to the millions of years of evolutionary wisdom held within the natural world. By engaging with plants in this way, we invite readers to explore new ways of being that are rooted in reciprocity, community, connection and care for both people and the land.”

Wild Enchantments is Nathaniel’s third collaborative publication with Fiona Owen. For her beguiling illustration of this extrasensory book and card deck, Fiona – who grows the plants she paints – has channeled her sensitivity into the creation of spellbinding paintings, intricately gilded with gold leaf and layered with alchemical symbolism and sacred geometry. “The synthesis of these gilded illuminations alongside Nathaniel’s lyrical insights vividly evokes the wild spirit and healing magic of plants,” Fiona explains.

Introducing readers to 33 plants in turn – from Angelica, Bluebell and Fly Agaric to Mistletoe, Nettle and Wild Garlic – the book explores their qualities and invitations, sharing tips and techniques for meeting each plant, and working with them ritually, and safely.  As you connect with the plants, they will stretch you, Nathaniel promises. “Wormwood will awaken your inner warrior, Clary will enliven your sensual joy, Mugwort will rekindle ancient knowing, Marigold will challenge you to find your hidden brightness and St John’s Wort, your inner vision.”

All the teachings of the book are experiential, based directly on the authors’ own experiences or those of students and clients. Having both experienced a disabling sense of sensitivity in their lives, a core way the plants have stretched Nathaniel and Fiona is by challenging each of them to embrace this sensitivity, as Nathaniel explains: “Fiona and I have both been on a journey to uncover the gifts of our sensitivity. For myself, what once led to overwhelm, exhaustion, and retreat from the world, has become the key to helping others listen more deeply to the plants and their own bodies’ wisdom.

“On this journey of befriending sensitivity, Wormwood showed me possibilities beyond the limiting, small safety zone I confined myself to, and Mallow taught me to listen to the ebbs and flows of my body. The dense wood of Hawthorn trunk gave me shelter and support in the storms, Horsetail helped reveal the hundreds of micro-violations of self that led to exhaustion, whilst Rose has been a steady presence and invitation to a live a heart-led life throughout.”

A core illuminating quality of the plants, the book explains, is their capacity to reveal our deeper truths, including hidden, shadow aspects as part of a healing journey to wholeness.  “The most hidden parts of ourself are both the most vulnerable and the most sensitive,” Nathaniel explains. “As we gradually reclaim them, we unlock depths of connection, aliveness and health previously hidden from us.”

Wild Enchantments proposes that the healing potential of plants extends to the fundamental reawakening of ancient, much needed ways of living in deeper connection with the world around us. 

“Let this book be a doorway into deepening your journey of relationship with the living world that surrounds and sustains us.  The journey is sometimes challenging, sometimes ecstatic, sometimes confusing and sometimes full of wonder, but in listening to the plants, we may grow the roots of a more profound, enduring connection with life itself.”

Nathaniel Hughes