Ancestral Foods

We are each a unique blend of bones, blood and earth. Through thousands of generations of migration, assimilation, and colonization we have all become parts of each other. Bits of blood from the four corners of the globe find their way into our genetic makeup, their ancestral stories hidden under generations of forgetting. Some of these ethnicities that we carry may even be in direct opposition to each other, having been mixed together through war or slavery. Their values, foods, medicines, and cultures may be different and from radically different climates.

I recently had a conversation with one of my girlfriends over a dinner of seafoods about how we can heal using our ancestral lineage knowledge. We mused on how we have noticed that what works for one person, may not work at all for the next. She noted her natural inability to process dairy, while my body seems to enjoy it. Then, I spoke with another sister who is doing her ancestral lineage digging, and finding that so much of the ancient tribal wisdom is simply gone, eradicated from the books as if it never even existed. She is struggling to learn the real foods of her people.

These questions arise in almost everyone's ancestral journey,

"But, what if we don't know our lineage? Or the knowledge of the foods of our ancestors has been lost? Or we carry multiple ethnic identities that are very different from each other?"

This is where intuition comes in.

The wisdom of our ancestors is, literally, written in the bones, blood, and earth that makeup our beautiful bodies. They speak to us through our consciousness, our desires, and our cravings.

The real work is to become clear enough to be able to listen.

"How do we become clear?" Just as with learning the foods that work best for our body, there is not just one simple answer. Meditation, therapy, plant medicines, speaking with relatives, having good relations, listening to your heart, crying, screaming, breaking down, and getting back up are all valuable parts of the process.