Shambhala Living

In this first episode of Season 2 on the Shambhala Living Podcast, I, Craig Hubbard, sit down with the incredible Heidi Merika, a passionate herbalist and author of Wildcraft and her latest release, From the Wild. Heidi shares her profound knowledge about wild plants, their medicinal benefits, and how we can reconnect with nature's wisdom.

We dive into her recent workshop at Shambhala Farm, where I learned firsthand the healing powers of the wild weeds growing all around us. Heidi reveals how to identify these plants and turn them into food and medicine, along with the energetic connections they hold.

Heidi's workshops and teachings inspire a deep connection with the Earth, urging us to tune in to nature's call. We also explore her philosophy on working with natural materials in art and the role of intuition when communicating with plants.

Join us for an inspiring conversation filled with practical tips, ancient wisdom, and an invitation to unlock your creativity through nature.

🔗 Check out Heidi's work at: https://heidimerika.com.au

🌱 Explore her books Wildcraft and From the Wild

📅 Don’t miss her upcoming Everyday Herbalism Courses workshops: https://everydayempowered.com.au/everydayherbalism/

📷 Follow Heidi on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/heidimerika?igsh=MTdyNHo0N3BkMDZlMQ==

This episode, we gonna share about the 8 billion mark that we just past this month and what does it mean and where to from here...

This episode is all about growing big harvest from tiny gardens and it's inspired by a recent video that went live on the YouTube the channel Living Big In A Tiny Home, Bryce came out to an episode with one of our tenants on the farm, Vicki, and from that it really inspired me to share with people just how smaller garden can have big harvest...

https://youtu.be/G6QD4hk6gz0

In this his episode, I want to share some questions and answers or one particular question that came in today and the answer about practicalities of building out a garden bed...

I'm sitting in the garden this afternoon, the sun is going down, there's a little wind around and birds are getting ready to bunk it down for a night and go to sleep, we've just chopped our wood ready and we've got our suit on, harvest on and I thought I'd come out here and share some of my thoughts...

This episode I've got some really excited news to share, it is about the markets it's a closing over chapter of a decade that has taking me a long time to make this decision and I've love to share that with you and why and also what has what to do with you had could that benefit you...

In this episode, we gonna be talking gardening and magic and nature...

This was an email I wrote in preparation for call with Sam Powers, a friend and Australia’s top magician and illusionist who I was seeking advice from. I am considering making my way back in some fashion to my own magic career and exploring in what capacity I could bring some ideas together.

Some background of the why and what I’m looking to achieve. As you may or may not know Ace McDermott (r.i.p) was my main inspiration to begin a career in magic. I met him when I was 17 (26years ago). It lit up a spark that I had as a boy when I deeply believed in magic and would religiously get the magic kits at the royal Easter show and watch any David copper field I could. I was convinced it was real and always dreamed of being a magician. However as a teenager my belief in magic faded and or I ‘grew up’ learning that it was not real just like I had learned about Santa and all other wonderful and magical realms. That is until I saw Ace up close and within minutes my whole world of magic came rushing back and the world lit up again with wonder and delight. This led to working at the prop shop and a satisfying decade of bringing this magic to many others. Still I longed for more, to go beyond the art of illusion and peel back the veil of perception.  Eventually my practice of martial arts, yoga and meditation led me on an inner journey. This opened the doors to the concept of Shambhala, which to me was a magical way of living. I read books about the ancient concept and even traveled to Nepal to find out more about this place or way of living. In the end it led me right back to where I started, back in the here and the now and seeing that all around us.

Magic really exists. In every sunrise and every plant, in every aspect of nature was magic. I realised it was not a place but a way of living with a sacred view upon the natural world. This concept coupled with becoming a parent and moving to QLD and wanting to provide for my family I wanted to learn more about nature, health, food, plants. This is when I met a local farmer and saw food growing in abundance and it hit me just how miraculous it was for food to grow straight out of the soil. I stared to learn just how precious and magical the soil really was and also just how precarious our situation was in regards to how we humans were treating our soil. I started to peel back the curtain of our unsustainable food system and realised that our life giving Soil was dangerously disappearing and found that not many were talking about it and even less taking action to regenerate it. I set out to buy my own farm (a 12 acre organic farm) and called it Shambhala Farm as a way to bring my love of magical living and soil/food life together. For the past 10 years I put on the regenerative farmer hat and got my hands dirty learning how to regenerate the most valuable resource that gives life for our human civilisation. I learned that our fast ways of living are harming it and are causing a chain of devastating events that if we don’t take immediate action could be catastrophic for humanity. It’s the mega industrial food system that is causing the problem, in an effort for efficiency it reduces diversity from thousands of species down to single mono crop species which devastated the soil life on mass scales and turn the living soil to lifeless dust. The good news and the solution I learned comes full circle back to community and magic. 

The good news and the solution I learned comes full circle back to community and magic . In every single seed contains the blueprints for generations of forests and diversity. In a single teaspoon of healthy garden soil lives over a billion different diverse microscopic organisms that are essential for life to thrive. Every garden becomes a magical wonderland filled with the most amazing life supporting properties that stitch together a global tapestry that gives hope for the generations to come. When consumers become mini producers by getting involved in growing some of their own food they become part of a global community that is regenerating life. The magic of food growing teaches the incredible power of regenerative living where we can continue to live in harmony with nature and bring life back to our soils. I see the gardeners of the future are the guardians of the  magic and diversity of life and plant the seeds of hope for generations to come. So now my decade of deep exploration into food growing is up I have been moving to be an educator go go from providing for my community to empowering, educating and equipping my community.

Recently I have been thinking of bringing my love of magic and entertainment into the mix to take this mission to another level. I want to educate, entertain and inspire the next generation of leaders to share how important and magical it is to plant seeds, compost, grow food and regenerate our soil life and give our children a chance to thrive. I feel that with a combination of characters being the Magician, the regenerator and the farmer there could be a new show that could inspire parents, children and anyone brave enough to roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty to make the world a better and magical place.

This is part 2 of the talk about in search for land...

In this episode, I'm driving down the highway from the Sunny Coast down to the Northern Rivers. It got me thinking about the time that I was doing a lot of traveling between Sydney and Sunshine Coast in search of land, what I was thinking about and all the lesson I had since. I also share about a lot of the questions that I get asked when someone is looking to buy a land or wanting to start a farm.

In this episode, we're gonna talk about something exciting that's been going on at the farm and home...