hey, i’m Erica
keeper of the four medicines
My ancestors are indigenous peoples of North America (Nansemond and Choctaw), African (primarily Benin, Cameroon, Congo and Southern Bantu), English, and Irish.
I am a traditional animist, a ritualist, an intuitive healer, and an ancestral medicine practitioner. I work with deep old medicines and practical magic to help folks live their best lives in harmony. My dharma is to ‘hold the space between the seen and the unseen’ to support your journey to remedy unhelpful patterns, heal wounds (both inherited and earned), and, ultimately, connect with your own deep medicines and gifts.
four medicines
mind | body | spirit | Nature
I BELIEve
The medicine is all around and within you
These slow, deep medicines are the key to living a healthy, balanced, purpose driven life, with passion. They are anchored in the power of four and the rhythm of cycles.
Four seasons, four primary directions, four primary elements.
Four medicine ways.
Every living thing is anchored in cycles. As humans, some of our cycles are ripe with inherited harms from our ancestors’ experiences, some of our cycles are heavy with lifetimes of illness or pain. The beauty is we can break old, unsupportive cycles and adopt new ones. This medicine is designed to support you as you shift from cycles of dis-ease, dis-comfort, and dis-order toward harmony, stability, and abundance.
medicine for living with passion, on purpose
What I do
Let me be clear, I don’t heal you. I enlist my ancestors and guides to help me see you, forward and backward through time. I provide the sacred container and slow medicine to support you as you relearn how to channel your own innate gifts. With gentle holding, I help remove limiting beliefs, “right” your mindset, and deepen your capacity to heal yourself.
All journey work begins with an assessment. After the assessment, if there is alignment for us work together, your personal roadmap will be designed. Your journey is unique to you and may include any combination of the four medicine ways, so you may explore practices such as yoga, reiki, ancestor connection, and/or an herbal remedy to support your journey.
For deeply intensive work, consider a four medicines journey with me.
Medicine for your Zen Business
What I do
I’ve been a soul-preneur for nearly two decades. I bring those years of experience to the table when we work together.
With my marketing background in my back pocket, I’ve built and run social impact ventures as small as a dessert cafe in an under-resourced neighborhood and as grand as a high-end yoga retreat property in the New England area. I help personal brands, yoga studio owners, and owners of boutique wellness spaces break through and thrive.
If you’re looking to reach the next level of your zen business, consider joining the four medicines journey.
If DIY is more your speed, check out the book I’ve written, The Seven Practices of Wildly Successful Wellnesspreneuers: how to live passionately, profitably, on purpose or enroll in the self-guided, online program I developed, The Art of Zen Business.
HOW I DISCOVERED my medicines
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I’ve always been an animist. As a young girl, maybe around 10 years of age, I’d leave my parents’ house and wander through backyards, over a fence, through some overgrowth, down a slope to a creek.
I’d hop, skip and jump along large stones to the center of the creek. There, in the center, was a large flat stone and the water rushed past on both sides — this was my sit spot (my place in the natural world that resourced me).
I’d sit there and catch up with Creek, Heron, Stone, etc until I could hear Trees singing again. This sometimes took hours and sometimes just minutes. But, when I could hear their voices again, I knew I was ready to return to the hustle and bustle of my every day life.
One would think there’s not much hustle and bustle for a child and, truth be told, in my childhood, there wasn’t. But, I knew even at that age, I needed to maintain my relationships with my other than human kin or I’d be lost. And you know what? Somewhere along the way, I stopped dedicating time to listening. And I got lost.
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My first year in college, I injured my back during crew practice and my coach suggested that I take the on campus yoga classes to heal and stay fit so that I could return next season. I was so inspired and transformed by this physical practice that I never went back to rowing.
It wasn't until much later that I learned the deeper lessons of Yoga and how it would transform my whole way of navigating this crazy experience we call Life. But, yes I’ve been on my mat since I was 17. #gratitude #blessed
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The year after my first child was born, I was diagnosed with Crohn's disease. I’d been struggling with it since high school, but wasn’t diagnosed until this year.
During that year while on a myriad of medications, I spent a total of one month of my life in the hospital away from my newborn daughter. When the more conventional route for Crohn's management failed to bring me relief, I decided to make some changes. I met with my gastroenterologist and arranged to wean myself off of the medications. We agreed to a one-year trial. I changed my diet and dedicated myself to my mat. At the end of my year, my colonoscopy showed no signs of inflammation, scarring, or any other indications that I had Crohn's disease. My doctors were amazed. I was not.
The universe made it very clear to me that toxic energies move forward and backward in time if left unaddressed. Ancestral tending, reiki, and meditation help me deepen my connection with bigger energies.
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In July of 2010, I was rushed to the ER unable to speak, shivering, and with a raging-I-think-my-head-is-going-to-explode headache. Once there, we learned that I had spiked a sudden fever of 103. This was the cause of my headache. The physicians spent the next 7 hours working to bring my temperature back down. Based on my initial test results, they determined that I was fine. I was sent home with instruction to return if symptoms worsened.
Two days later, I received a phone call from the ER. They casually explained that I needed to return to the hospital and that I had about 48 hours to live without treatment. I was septic. So it was back to the hospital. After several intrusive exams, it was discovered that I had two bacteria in my bloodstream; my liver and pancreas were failing, and my bile duct was inflamed. I spent a week in the hospital, was released for one week of recovery at home before going back for gall bladder removal surgery.
It wasn't until 2 weeks later during my post-op visit that I learned that what I suffered was a rare combination of ailments; cholangitis and sepsis. When it does occur, 67% of the people afflicted, die from it. My surgeon explained that I had gone in so healthy and strong that I was able to be counted among the lucky 33%.
Ultimately, I finally learned, all four pillars of wellness must be tended to and it’s my role as a keeper of the four medicine ways to help others tend to their pillars.
Some Extra Tidbits about Me
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I came into this life with proclivities toward animism, energy work, and earth based medicines, but had no exposure to the medicine people of my ancestry. My medicines chose me as I moved along my own healing journey.
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I grew up in a Christian household with a fluid sense of home and shallow ancestral roots. Beyond my grandparents, parents and siblings, I didn’t know much about where I came from, much less about my ancestors.
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I followed my inner compass to my Medicines around the globe. Two teachers ultimately guided me back to my ancestors — one a Lakota pipe carrier and the other a high priestess of the Ceann-luil.
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Whether we are in deep conversation with your ancestors, resting in the energy of reiki, flowing in yoga, or sipping on tea, my practice is built on “slow” medicines. This is not a quick fix or patch and go job.
about
Erica Nunnally
Erica is a modern folk medicine woman and the Keeper of the Four Medicine ways. She is the author of The Seven Practices: how to live passionately, profitably, and on purpose and is working on her next book, The Four Medicines: a way to lasting harmony.
In practice, Erica works with “old medicines” by weaving together her decades of experience from her initiations as an Ancestral Medicine practitioner, traditional Usui Reiki Master Teacher, intuitive folk herbalist, and Master Teacher of yoga. Erica teaches nationally and internationally, both online and in-person, to support those who are called to explore and redefine what it means to truly be well in mind, body, spirit, and nature.