Healing is our birth right and our communities have known how to do this in our own ways for centuries. In carving out time to remember, honor and practice these ways, we are lessening the impact of inherited trauma for generations to come. Many of our abuelxs had to practice in hiding. It is a blessing to be able to do this work out in the open and in community.
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In addition to offering workshops and healing circles in community gardens and other spaces for POC, QTPOC, QTBILPOC (queer, trans, black, indigenous, latinx, people of color) of all ages, Myrna has also been blessed to be able to act quickly to respond to the urgent needs of some of our people.
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Below are some of the experiences that have most profoundly impacted her journey:
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Community Care Herbal Response Project (CCHRP), Oakland, CA
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In collaboration with the Healing Clinic Collective and community/clinical herbalists in Oakland(Huichin), CA, Myrna co-founded this crew in the summer of 2020. Since we began in July of 2020, CCHRP has dispersed nearly 700 bottles of herbal remedies (plus a smaller number of salves and sprays) and hundreds of N95 masks to unhoused and low- or no-wage Bay Area residents through the following social justice organizations and projects, as well as two native tribes:
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Communities for a Better Environment
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Trabajadores Unidos Workers United
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Essential Food & Medicine
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Mujeres Unidas y Activas
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Asian Pacific Environmental Network
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Chinese Progressive Association
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Winnemem Wintu, 2020 & 2021 Run for Salmon
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Kumeyaay Tribe, Stop the Wall Camp
Pulse Massacre QTPOC Healing Space at Lake Eola Vigil, Orlando, FL
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In collaboration with herbalists from the Sacred Vibes Apothecary community, and local healers in Orlando, we set up a space where folks could receive reiki, massage, energy cleanses, and free medicine.
Medicine to Borikén (Puerto Rico)
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In response to Hurricane Maria and collaboration with herbalists from Sacred Vibes Apothecary and healers from her communities, Myrna hosted 3 medicine making sessions, coordinated 4 supply/medicine donation drop off sites in 3 of New York City’s boroughs and coordinated a fundraiser with A Party Called Rosie Perez at the High Line with proceeds going to DefendPR, where additional medicine was also made. She also collaborated with Boricuas flying back to the island and sent medicine (herbal tinctures, salves, bug sprays, disinfectant sprays, and spirit lifting sprays) and supplies directly in luggage to different parts of the island: Mayaguez, Anasco, Lares, Ciales, Adjuntas & Santurce. In collaboration with Casitas Wisdom, the healing arts collective she founded, Myrna also hosted a medicine-making workshop at the 9th St Community Garden so that Diasporicans could also practice self-care and make their own herbal medicine.
Community Healing in Borikén (Puerto Rico), post-Maria
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As resident healing artists at CEPA, Myrna and her partner RaheNi Gonzalez IÅ„aru, offered their wisdom and guidance in the form of two Queer Moon Circles. In these circles for QTPOC we sang, recited poetry, meditated, prayed, and we healed in community. As a two-spirit ceremonial prayer warrior and healer, RaheNi offered limpias to the community and led a sacred pipe ceremony. Myrna offered herbal consultations and assisted with limpias. They both also led workshops on how to make alcoholados, agua florida, and tinctures. They worked on CEPA's garden, watering, transplanting, leveling the land to lessen flooding, built a simple fence and planted/transplanted beauties such as damiana, tulsi, rue, swiss chard, and eggplant. Thank you CEPA for providing some of the language for this description!
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You can find more info about this journey at: https://www.gofundme.com/bb4uvj-community-healing-in-puerto-rico
