Sophie Strand is a writer and author of The Flowering Wand: Rewilding the Sacred Masculine, The Madonna Secret, and her most recent book, a memoir called The Body Is a Doorway. She lives in the Hudson Valley in upstate New York where she writes about mythology, ecology, and the intersection between storytelling and the more-than-human world.

This conversation spans a lot of ground. We talk about what it means to be from a place versus being of a place, Tom Bombadil and what Lord of the Rings has to teach us about ecology, communicating with plants through dreams, the concept of pharmacon and the problems with how we use psychedelics, making good soil as both metaphor and practice, and how Sophie's experience with chronic illness has deepened her relationship with the natural world.

A brief note: This conversation includes some discussion of drug use and psychedelics in the context of plant medicine and healing.

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 - The Hudson Valley as savior
 04:42 - Being from a place vs. being of a place
 06:38 - Human beings as peripatetic wanderers
 09:07 - Sardinian throat singing and inherited traditions
 11:16 - Eucatastrophe: the happy disaster
 15:31 - Tom Bombadil and ecological wisdom
 19:26 - Communicating with plants
 20:13 - Dreams as messages from plants
 22:23 - Dreams come from a place
 27:34 - Being an instrument played by fungi
 28:51 - Naming and ownership
 35:25 - Hopi language and present tense
 37:09 - Telepathic communication as wordless
 39:24 - Psychedelics and plant medicine
 41:17 - Pharmacon: potion and poison
 43:10 - Our culture of addiction
 46:39 - Ayahuasca and ego death
 50:39 - Creating communities that honor intuition
 54:31 - Aphids, ladybugs, and observation
 56:41 - Make me good soil
 57:21 - Degenerative connective tissue disease
 59:36 - Soil as tomb and womb
 01:01:44 - Nature and healing
 01:07:18 - The blue heron as messenger
 01:09:36 - Favorite food memory: apples and cheddar

RESOURCES MENTIONED

Sophie Strand:

• Substack: Make Me Good Soil
• Books: The Flowering Wand: Rewilding the Sacred Masculine, The Madonna Secret, The Body Is a Doorway

Books & Media:

• Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
• The Telepathy Tapes podcast
• Landmarks by Robert McFarlane
• Time and Again (speculative fiction book)
• The Never-Ending Story (film)

People Mentioned:

• Tom Bombadil (Lord of the Rings character)
• C.S. Lewis
• James Hillman (mythopoetic thinker)
• Patricia Kaishian (mycologist and writer)

Places:

• Hudson Valley, New York
• Overlook Mountain
• Ashokan Reservoir
• Woodstock, New York

Concepts:

• Eucatastrophe (Tolkien)
• Pharmacon (Greek concept)
• Mycorrhizal fungi
• Healthism

CONNECT WITH SOPHIE STRAND
Website: sophiestrand.com

Substack: Make Me Good Soil
Instagram: @cosmogyny
 Books: The Flowering Wand, The Madonna Secret, The Body Is a Doorway

FOLLOW GARDENS OF EARTHLY DELIGHT

Substack: gardensofearthlydelight.substack.com
Instagram: @gardensofearthlydelightpod
Podcast: gardensofearthlydelight.com/subscribe

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