Erin Taylor

Honestly, very little. The primary way would be my sheer passion for writing- an intuitive knowing, if you will, that writing is just "in my blood". My great-grandfather was an author of many books and a playwright. He would write and recite poetry in front of the fireplace mantle to my family. My grandfather ran and wrote for a local newspaper. One of my uncles was also a journalist.

I have always been pulled towards health and healing. I was a registered dietitian and very involved in fitness before my 12 year career as a nurse. As a nurse, I quickly realized there was little opportunity to support people with healing modalities in Western medicine, and if there was opportunity, there was little room for freedom within that realm. I don't do well being put in a box! I didn't realize I was in major burnout at the tailend of my nursing career; I just followed my intuition and the "threads of joy" towards studying what healing modalities resonated with me.

At the end of my 12 year nursing career, I was having major lower back issues, debilitating anxiety, and an uncomfortable increased distrust in the medical system. I naively thought I was "immune" to burnout because I had had a daily meditation practice for 8 years at that point, and took very good care of my body. I started to act in ways that were very out of character for myself- like being short-tempered at work and having intrusive thoughts which were extremely worrisome. The morning I quit my nursing career, I had what felt like a panic attack and severe abdominal pain that dropped me to my knees. In hindsight, the burnout was blaringly obvious for several years before I actually retired from nursing. Retiring from nursing was very difficult for me; I felt as though I was giving up on the children and families I took care of. When my body and mind were screaming at and giving up on me, I had no choice but to listen.

Much like nursing, I realized even as an RD, there was little room (at least back then) for freedom of personal practice within the realm of nutrition. Much like nursing, everything had a protocol or agenda behind it. I felt very much boxed in, and I yearned for more freedom to offer healing modalities that resonated with me. Food is an instrumental ally in supporting and motivating our bodies to heal and be balanced.

The mushrooms "found me" at the tailend of my nursing career. I received a free book in the mail, "Santa Sold Shrooms", which to this day is my favorite book of all time. It tells the story of the REAL Santa Claus, who was actually a Scandinavian Sami shaman and gave the world's most famous mushroom, the Amanita Muscaria, to his village people to heal. Around the same time, a family member started digging a room under his house to start growing gourmet mushrooms to sell to local chefs and markets. That project fizzled out for him, but by then I had been bit by the mushroom bug and my curiosity was insatiable. I started noticing the shiitake mushrooms at the grocery store, which were selling for $18 per pound compared to other gourmet mushrooms selling for much, much less. I started to question, "Who is growing these mushrooms?!?!". Since that time, my obsession with all types of mushrooms continues to grow today. Like food, mushrooms are valuable allies that offer a wide range of healing opportunities for the body, mind and soul.

I always wanted to offer a women's healing retreat. After Denver decriminalized psilocybin in 2019, I hired an attorney, Sean McCallister, to help me see my dream to fruition. He helped me found The Church of The Divine Heart, which back then was protected under the Religious Freedoms and Restoration Act. In 2022, I had my first and only women's psilocybin healing retreat here in Colorado. I learned after the retreat that retreat work is not for me, and I needed a bigger platform to help people heal their own lives with psilocybin. 9 months later, Sean McCallister wrote the legislation that ended up decriminalizing psilocybin for all of Colorado, so the mission of the Church shifted towards a population that has always been near and dear to my heart, our US military veterans. As early as the end of 2024, Colorado therapists will be able to offer psilocybin-assisted therapy to veterans. The VA (Veterans Administration) is finally recognizing the massive benefits, backed by science, of psilocybin-assisted therapy for depression and PTSD. For the first time since the 60's, the VA is funding and looking to offer this incredible healing modality to tackle the epidemics of suicide and PTSD with our US military veterans. 44 military veterans take their own lives everyday. This statistic was recently doubled, when the US government decided it was time to include opiod overdoses in the statistic. One of many instrumental studies on the subject, conducted at Johns Hopkins University, shows a remarkable finding: Just two macrodoses of psilocybin, coupled with therapy, offers substantial relief from depression for 12 months or longer.

In 2020, I listened to "How To Change Your Mind" by Michael Pollan. I decided to start microdosing and quickly learned how powerful and transforming this medicine, combined with spiritual and integration practices, was in my own healing journey from a lifetime of traumas. In my own research, I realized how profoundly misleading, out of reach, and even dangerous most microdosing information distributed to the public is. When you are living with a history of trauma, it is often terrifying to embark on a macrodose journey to tap into these traumas. From my own experience, I learned that microdosing with regular integration practices, coupled with trauma therapy, as well as growing your own medicine, was a safe and very "doable" approach to healing from traumas. I wanted to offer a method that promoted sovereignty from "the systems" to empower people to be the guides of their own healing journeys. So I wrote my book!

I go with the flow and follow the guidance, wisdom and cycles of nature and my intuition.

As a solopreneur, especially in the psychedelic and alternative healing world, you often feel like a lone soldier (pun intended) out on an island by yourself. Coming from the "safety" of a J-O-B in the western medical world where you are surrounded by a team all the time, this was a major shock to me, but one I embraced. Through this challenge, I have learned to be even more of a resourceful problem solver than I was as a nurse, to be patient, and mostly, to trust myself and surrender to the "knowing" that the Universe will always provide what I need, when I need it.

Mind body practices are essential for health and well being. Hot yoga (Bikram style) is essentially a moving meditation. It is so easy for us to think that if we are exercising our bodies and eating clean, we are healthy. But if we are not tending to our mind, to our inner world, which is a direct mirror of our outer world, we are leaving out a key piece of the wholeness puzzle. People tell me all the time, "I can't meditate". The spirit knows balance, so if you are challenged by meditation, it is your spirit calling you towards balance, and guiding you to lean into meditation. Do you have to sit in lotus pose for an hour everyday to meditate? Absolutely not. There are many ways to access meditation that don't require you to be Buddha-like. Take a mindfulness walk, go swimming, cook, journal, just sit and observe your thoughts...there are so many ways to access meditation, where your whole life and day can become a meditation. Meditation and mind body practices are daily rituals which have become the foundation for my wellness and healing journey.

Western medicine tends to focus only on the body and the parts. I have seen this improving, where organizations are offering meditation to employees, and also offer massage to patients and at least see the benefit of ancient healing modalities like acupuncture and the chakra system. I hope this trend continues to grow to incorporate the spiritual and emotional bodies, as well as the mind body connection, and the importance of community. One of my favorite quotes, which I share on my newest piece of work I'm publishing, Health Benefits of Mushrooms: Ignite Wellness and Spiritual Growth!