TO THE MODERN WORLD

 indigenous medicine | ancient traditions | botanical treasures

ANCIENT WISDOM

Our Apothecary is composed of organic, wildcrafted, and ethically grown botanicals. We aim to continuously source pristine, unadulterated and wholesome medicines for mind, body and soul wellness. Anima Mundi is devoted to making vibrant and medicinally potent remedies that honor the principles of harmony and ancient formulation that have years of anecdotal and traditional evidence. Our founder Adriana moved to Brooklyn from Costa Rica with a mission to bridge remedies from native people within Central and South America to modern day needs and imbalances. Since our evolution out of Adriana's tiny in-home office space, our apothecary has sustainably grown to contain over 200 different herbs from around the world, providing retailers, spas, hotels, boutiques, holistic doctors and physicians trustable and well-sourced remedies. We believe in sustainable growth, from the inception of the plants we use to our business practice. Our project educates and supports true fair trade practices, beyond organic farming, education, and small farmers to create remedies that benefit people from all walks of life. 

ADRIANA AYALES

Owner & Herbalist

I am the herbalist, medicine maker, educator and founder over at Anima Mundi. I'm originally from Costa Rica and started Anima Mundi several years ago in Brooklyn as a means to bridging ancient remedies to the modern world. My heart was to create a true farm to pharmacy experience through the art of medicine making with herbs. We offer a wide spectrum of remedies and plants from around the world, integrating from several traditions that I've studied over the years, such as rainforest tribal styles, Ayurveda, Chinese-Daoist Medicine, and European style alchemy. I believe that by preserving these ancient forms of indigenous botany, we keep alive a very sacred aspect to our source. Anima Mundi was founded with the intention to bridge ancient healing traditions and plant remedies as a form as grass roots healthcare for today's world.

Since I was a little girl, I devoted my studies to shamanic style healing, hands on energy work and botanical studies. I was born with intuitive sight, and at that time I was shy and somewhat scared of the potential of this energy. I remember seeing auras and spirits when I was a girly, and didn't know what to do or even how to talk about it with my family. Later I learned to cultivate it and trained with psychics and healers that helped me convert this energy into a healing art that I could apply to this world.

I focused and studied on both Central and South American tribal style herbalism, studying with plant medicine teachers in Costa Rica, the Amazon and California. I then went on to study classic Western and European herbalism. I trained as a clinical herbalist at different herbal schools, and continued on to cultivate a private practice in Berkeley CA and NYC.

I became deeply fascinated with archetypes, astrology and body types and the cosmological correlations of illness/health with planetary function. I studied astrology, cosmology and consciousness at the California Institute of Integral Studies, and immersed myself in the study of medical astrology and biodynamics.

I shortly after founded Anima Mundi Herbals in NYC with the purpose of providing a unadulterated medicinal herb line that integrated native traditions and ancient formulations. I wanted to create a business that not only provided an actual pure and powerful form of healthcare; I also cared to help preserve indigenous lands and their local economies through organic agriculture and wildcrafted goods.

Please feel free to contact me to say hello or speak about the magic of herbs and healing!

Warmly,

Adriana 

ADAPTOGENS: Herbs for Longevity and Everyday Wellness

 

Excerpt from Adriana's Book

PHYTOMEDICINE: ANCIENT MEDICINE FOR MODERN TIMES 

Wellness is a cosmology, an all-encompassing landscape that embodies the emotional, intellectual, physical, and spiritual worlds of existence. A true state of wellness is not merely dependent on the condition or mindset a person currently inhabits. Our level of wellness is finely interwoven with the intimate relationship we have with our community, our environment, and ourselves. The multifaceted universe of health and healing is cyclical, a living organism in constant metamorphosis.

Healing echoes the logic of quantum physics, suggesting that we exist in a relative, process-oriented ecosystem in which there is no “objectivity” to the world we’re experiencing. The components essential to healing disease cannot be resolved simply by measuring the illness in itself; rather, this healing ecosystem is active, with its own unique interactions and relationships. It is through this process that the healer balances the equation of physical, mental, and social well-being.

In Eastern healing traditions, human beings are perceived as microcosms of the universe, suffused with the same forces controlling the cosmos. In Daoism, for example, humans are imagined as part of the unbroken whole, called Dao—a singular relational continuum expressing itself within and without[lc1] . This thinking predates the separation of the mind from the body. It was the Western mind that created the idea that human beings are independent living systems, unbound by basic natural needs. We escaped from our dependency and attachment to the natural world, pursuing egotistic principles of invulnerability, invincibility, and immortality. The long-term survival of our species is threatened by an unrestrained lust for short-term gain, deceitful beliefs about accomplishment, and false assumptions about our civilization’s autonomy from nature. Modern-day human beings have contaminated their own nests, a clear sign of disease and future troubles, especially considering the consequences of our actions on the wider animal kingdom.

Today, many of us seek to reclaim the sense of connectedness that existed universally in ancient cultures, when human fate was wholly entwined with nature. In the ecological understanding of these cosmologies, all things were inextricably bound together. The world was seen as a symbiotic entity in which all living organisms interacted with and supported each other, from the innermost cellular level to the outermost cosmological level.

The call for plant medicine in today’s culture is a symbol of humanity returning to its source. A profound rebirth is in process, and the role of the plant kingdom is increasing in significance. An essential bridge is being rebuilt between humans and nature, allowing us to access the realm of the transcendent and the land of the luminous. Plant medicines aren’t just here to provide us nourishment, shelter, and protection from pathologies—they’re here for a much larger purpose, and that is to bring us back to the original consciousness that prevailed on earth for millenia. Herbalism is the medicine of belonging, a gateway through which we keep alive a very sacred aspect of this same consciousness.

Video

Herbalists as Seers

“Hierberas” (herbalists) let plants speak to them, through the art of communion. Medicine peoples across time have used these tools as a form of receivership, and through it, plants have disclosed their secrets. This isn’t a complex process, this is the mere act of setting aside our personal story, and participating in direct communion with the consciousness of Nature. To become an herbalist, means to become a seer. This means to be in right relationship to the being(s) of Nature, and commune in receptive awareness. @adrianaayales

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