In hindsight, there were always breadcrumbs leading me to where I am now as the creatress of The Spiral Path. At the time, however, those threads were not easy to see. Like many journeys of becoming, clarity only arrived once I had traveled far enough to look back.
I grew up in a small town in the Midwest. As I entered adulthood, an unmistakable longing arose: I wanted more. More beauty, more expression, more life.
Drawn by a desire to study fashion and immerse myself in creativity, I moved to the nearest major city. There, I encountered artists, thinkers, and people across the full spectrum of humanity. The experience was expansive and deeply enriching. It opened my heart and widened my perception of what was possible.
Fashion captivated me not simply as an aesthetic pursuit, but as a language of self-expression and liberation. I was searching for a way out of the boxes I felt society and my own conditioning had placed around me. Initially, I believed my studies would lead me deeper into art. Instead, I found myself face to face with the machinery of business. While valuable, it felt constrictive. Once again, the same inner knowing surfaced: this was not enough.
On impulse, I embarked on a ten-day road trip to the West Coast. For much of the journey, I had no cell service or internet, which created space for silence to hear my inner voice. With no external noise to distract me, I turned inward.
What I discovered was uncomfortable. The life I had constructed lacked intention. It had been shaped largely by momentum, emotion, and expectation rather than conscious choice. That silence became a threshold moment, revealing truths I could no longer ignore.
When I returned home, I dismantled everything.
I knew I had to move, to step beyond the confines of my hometown, to release relationships and patterns that no longer aligned. Growth required distance, challenge, and expansion.
After a single visit, I relocated across the country to the Pacific Northwest. At the time, I was navigating significant health challenges and sensed that this environment could offer nourishment unavailable to me in a larger, more stimulating city. I needed access to nature, cleaner food, and a gentler pace. My new home represented a profound shift, one that my sensitive body and nervous system immediately recognized.
Living far from family and largely on my own, I began to examine my place in the world more intentionally. I studied lived experiences across race, class, and culture, and reflected deeply on how my actions affected others.
Questions surfaced and demanded answers: How do I want to impact this world? How do I want to contribute to it? I confronted the stories and belief systems I had inherited and allowed them to unravel.
In that unraveling came humility, grief, and responsibility—a recognition of both how small we are and how deeply our choices ripple outward. I became acutely aware of my privilege and what it required of me.
This period coincided with an intense healing journey.
For much of my life, I had struggled to feel at home in my body. Chronic physical ailments and frustrating encounters with the healthcare system left me unheard and without real solutions. Eventually, I refused the lifelong prescriptions offered to me and chose to take my healing into my own hands.
That decision marked the beginning of a profound transformation; one that reawakened intuitive abilities I had long suppressed and reopened spiritual pathways I once believed were closed.
As my health improved, something else emerged alongside it: joy, vitality, and a sense of wonder that felt almost childlike. I knew I wanted to share this way of living with others.
During this time, Western North Carolina repeatedly appeared through conversations, coincidences, and subtle nudges. I felt called to live closer to family while remaining rooted in a place with a strong spiritual and herbal lineage. The mountains offered both, and it supported the career transition already underway.
I moved to a remote mountain home I lovingly call Fairy Mountain. The land rests atop quartz-rich soil, alive with butterflies, wild herbs, and medicinal plants. Nestled in the Appalachian Mountains, the oldest mountain range in the United States. The energy here is ancient and potent. There is also a palpable presence of the Indigenous peoples who lived on this land long before (and still do), a presence that continues to speak through the earth.
Overlooking a valley with only one nearby neighbor, the stillness is profound. There is little technological interference. No constant hum of modern life.
In this quiet, something extraordinary happened: the plants became vivid and communicative. My awareness expanded. I began to perceive the plants more clearly—who they were, how they worked, where they moved within the body.
Flowers had always been my silent companions. Even in fashion, they consistently appeared in my work as inspiration. But here, they became unmistakably present. My inner knowing awakened fully, no longer muted by distraction.
The contrast between this life and my time in the city was striking. While nature had been accessible previously, this immersion engaged my body in a deeper way. As external stimuli dissolved, my capacity to receive insight expanded.
My studies revealed the power of softness, compassion, and radical self-acceptance. I studied with teachers who worked with plants in the etheric realm, further bridging the seen and unseen.
The practice of flower essences spoke louder and louder, weaving together years of study, embodiment, and listening. Immersion in the subtle realms, paired with life on this land, allowed everything to cohere.
I realized that this was the language I had been speaking all along, one that once felt misunderstood and isolating. That frustration has softened into belonging.
I am home now, working with the plants, tending the land, and stewarding The Spiral Path.
