People often ask me how I became a historian, herbalist, and educator. The truth is, I don't think I became any of those things. I think I've always been them.
As a child, I was the one outside catching tadpoles in my mother's finest tupperware containers, collecting rocks and flowers, and making "potions" from mud, rainwater, leaves, and whatever else I could find. I shared kiddie pools with tiny frogs, climbed trees, talked to plants, and found comfort in the natural world long before I ever understood why. Nature felt alive to me. It felt sacred. More importantly, it made me feel like I belonged in a world where I often felt rejected.At the same time, I was deeply fascinated by the unseen.
I wanted to understand God, history, spirituality, human behavior, and the mysteries that existed just beyond what could be touched or measured. That curiosity never left me. In fact, it became the driving force behind nearly every important decision I would make in my life.
Eventually, that path led me to pursue double bachelor's degrees in History and Religious Studies. I wanted answers. I wanted to understand where our beliefs came from, why certain ideas became sacred while others became forbidden, and how human beings have searched for meaning throughout history.
What I didn't expect was that my academic journey would become a profoundly personal one.
As I immersed myself in the study of religion, history, folklore, and spirituality, I began to realize that many of the beliefs and fears I had inherited were not eternal truths, but products of history, culture, politics, and human institutions, all of which, make up what I like to refer to as dogmatic tradition. But, the more I learned, the more I found myself not losing faith, but reconstructing it.
History became a tool for healing.
What began as personal exploration eventually became something I felt called to share with others. Over the years, I've had the privilege of helping hundreds of people navigate religious deconstruction, spiritual trauma, and the complicated journey of disentangling inherited fear from authentic spirituality. Through historical context and compassionate inquiry, I've watched people rediscover curiosity, reclaim agency, and, in many cases, find their way back to a relationship with God that feels honest, expansive, and deeply personal.
But throughout all of this, there was always one constant companion: the natural world.
No matter where my academic or spiritual journey took me, I always returned to the plants.
To the gardens.
To the kitchen.
To the rituals of preparing food, making medicine, baking bread, tending herbs, and finding the sacred in ordinary acts of care.
I've come to believe that our ancestors did not separate history from healing, spirituality from nature, or the sacred from the everyday. They understood something that many of us have forgotten: that meaning is not found by escaping the world, but by participating fully in it.
Today, my life exists at the intersection of all of these passions.
I am a historian who believes that understanding the past can heal the present.
I am an herbalist who believes that plants carry both medicine and wisdom.
I am a spiritual seeker who believes that curiosity itself can be sacred.
And I am still, in many ways, the little girl collecting frogs, making potions, and searching for God in all the places I was told not to look.
This space is an extension of that lifelong journey.
Here, you'll find history, herbalism, folklore, faith, recipes, gardening, spiritual healing, and reflections on what it means to live a life that is both deeply rooted and endlessly curious.
If you've found your way here, perhaps you're searching too.
If so, welcome.
There's always room by the hearth.
- Vanessa Rose 🥀