Grief Magic: Rituals, Tarot & Gentle Conversations about Loss

In this beautifully imaginative conversation, I’m joined again by Zoë from The Runa School to explore how ritual and play can come together to help us navigate grief, transformation, and everyday life. You can listen to our first conversation on the Kind Business podcast over here. Zoë shares how her work designing ritual games grew from her studies in rites of passage and her deep interest in how we can bring the sacred and the playful into conversation. We talk about the ritual game she created for me, The Grandmother’s Quilt, and how this experience opened a space for healing, intimacy with the land, and a sense of being witnessed in grief.Together we explore:How ritual games bridge devotion, creativity, and playWhat it means to be seen and held in moments of transformationThe healing power of simple, repeated acts of presenceWhat it looks like to root into community, ancestry, and the landHow we might bring ritual and reflection into workplaces and everyday lifeZoë also shares her vision for the future of The Runa School: bringing ritual games into collective spaces and reimagining our relationship with technology, storytelling, and community care.Zoë Ackerman is a co-founder of Mycelios, a game design studio, and Runa, a school dedicated to teaching and learning animist ritual. Zoë draws on over a decade of experience in participatory design, rites of passage, and embodied storytelling. Originally from Charlottesville, Virginia, Zoë now lives in Curitiba, Brazil, on the ancestral lands of the Guarani, Kaingang, and Xetá peoples.You can find Zoë’s work and sign up for her newsletter at runa.school.You can join our weekly glimmer sessions here: https://griefmagic.com/blessings/and this is the link to my business group program Rooted: https://pinkwellstudio.com/rooted/Thank you for listening!Love,Yarrow

Enrollment for Rooted 2026 closes this Sunday, January 25th, and I would love for you to join us. In this short episode, I’m sharing what to expect inside the program and a few new updates that make it an even more beautiful experience.You’ll hear about:🌿 The six themes we’ll explore together in Rooted✨ The new series of short pep talks you can download and listen to anytime🕯️ Two new Sunday co-working sessions for peaceful focus and accountability💛 The new six-month payment plan and sliding-scale options (starting at £50/month)If you’ve been thinking about joining but haven’t said yes yet, this is your moment. Rooted begins on Saturday, February 1st, and I can’t wait to get started.👉 Learn more and enroll here: https://pinkwellstudio.com/rooted

Today I want to talk to you about something really simple but surprisingly life-changing:  the emotional support bag.I started this practice in 2021, after my friend Francis died. I was deep in grief, and at the time I was mostly homebound due to an accident and lockdown. My days blurred together and it was just hard to keep track of things. I noticed that the things that could give me comfort, like a soft blanket, a lip balm, my stimmy toy or a good smell were always scattered around the house. So I began gathering them into a small zip pouch that I could keep near me at all times. Over time this became what I call my emotional support bag. It’s small enough to fit in my backpack, but full of things that make moving through the day easier. I know this is super simple, but its also great magic. Here are the two links I mentioned: Weekly Glimmer sessions https://griefmagic.com/blessings/Rooted group program https://pinkwellstudio.com/rooted/Thanks for listening!Love,Yarrow

I'm delighted to greet the new year by sharing a beautiful conversation I had with Eileen March of My Luminous Life. Eileen brings such a rich background and really touching insights to the table. Here is some of what we talked about: Simple ways to live a more magical life Slowing down enough to notice what we actually want Embracing what we can learn from loss and good griefListening to our bodies even if we don't always get the message we want to hearEileen March is a spiritual coach, energy healer, podcast host, author, and slow-living witch devoted to helping women reclaim their power, reconnect with their bodies, and re-enchant their everyday lives. With a background in both midwifery and religious studies, Eileen bridges the sacred and the practical—weaving together science, spirit, and soul.Eileen is the founder of My Luminous Life and the creator of Unleash Your Inner Witch, a powerful program designed to help spiritually curious women remember their magic and live with more meaning, fulfillment, rest, and peace. She’s passionate about dismantling hustle culture, listening to the body’s rhythms, and creating brave, nurturing spaces where women can feel held, seen, and safe enough to transform. When she’s not coaching or holding ceremony, you’ll find her reading stories of hope and healing, tending her garden, or snuggling her sweet kitty.Connect with Eileen on IG Download Awaken to the Magic Within (free eBook) Follow Eileen on Insight Timer Send Eileen an Email eileen@myluminouslife.caYou are still welcome to join in the winter season of weekly glimmer sessions over here and here is the link to Rooted, my business group program over at Pink Well Studio. Thanks for listening,Yarrow

Happy New Year! I wanted to share a few small and gentle rituals for the beginning of 2026, little ways to mark this moment without rushing toward big resolutions or putting pressure on ourselves to reinvent everything overnight.I am still hibernating over here, so all I am trying to do is to prepare the soil for what will grow later in the year.I’ll walk you through a few of my favourite winter rituals: clearing and tending to your home, creating more space in your calendar, and checking in with friends who might need extra care this season. I’ll also share a reflection practice around defining your own sense of enoughness so you can move into the year with a little more peace and clarity.Finally, I’ll guide you through a simple ritual of writing a prayer for the year or the season ahead. It can be something short and personal that you keep close to remind yourself of what you most want to feel.This is also an invitation to join the winter season of our weekly glimmer sessions. These are beautiful drop ins on a Monday where you can be creative or do little rituals with other like minded people who want to begin the week (and the year) as they mean to go on: https://griefmagic.com/blessings/Thanks for listening,Yarrow

In this solo episode of Grief Magic, I share some gentle reflections on protecting your time and energy in the year ahead, so there’s room for meaningful connection with your grief, your body, and your creativity.I talk about how we can be intentional with the spaces we inhabit, both physical and digital, and create an environment that supports healing and rest. You’ll hear about:Making physical space in your home by decluttering gently and reconnecting with what you already haveReviewing spending and prioritising experiences and community over buying new thingsCurating your digital world by choosing what you engage with and using blockers or breaks to make space for stillnessSpending social time more intentionally and finding joy in making things togetherAsking what your grief actually needs from you right now, and creating rituals that allow it to move through you with tendernessThis episode is also an invitation to join the winter season of glimmer sessions, which start next week: https://griefmagic.com/blessings/ This is a beautiful space for creativity and renewal and there are sliding scale options available. We would love to have you!Thanks for listening,Yarrow

I wanted to close out the year with one more solo episode, talking about how I am celebrating and keeping things soft and simple. I am also sharing ideas for including loved ones we lost into our rituals, setting boundaries with family and making travelling more comfortable. Finally, there are some rituals for the winter solstice and a Rauhnaechste practice I am doing in here. Whatever you are up to, I hope you are ending the year with lots of rest and permission to dream. ✨ The Winter Glimmer Sessions begin in early January: weekly creative and ritual circles where we can rest, create, and tend to our inner worlds together. You can find all the details at https://glimmerportal.com/blessings/Love,Yarrow

Misha of Hafez Death Care, my guest for today's episode, has a really beautiful podcast I hope you will check out too - it's called Halva for the Heart and I was honoured to be on episode 14. In this conversation for Grief Magic, we went both deep and wide into some really meaningful topics that I hope you'll enjoy too: Dying and grieving in diasporaSmall and big rituals that help us navigate lossesListening to our bodies in the face of deathContinuing connections with people we have lost Misha (she/he/they) is an Iranian-American death doula and grief tender whose work honors the sacredness of death and the political power of mourning. Their path into this calling began at the tender age of twenty, when they were blessed with the gift of witnessing their mother’s death. Today, through Hafez Death Care, Misha offers culturally-rooted, anti-imperialist support for dying people and their loved ones before, during, and after the dying process.They also provide grief tending for personal, collective, and ancestral grief, teaching that grief is both an emotional process and an act of resistance. They facilitate community grief events, offer one-on-one death midwifery and grief support, and host Halva for the Heart, a podcast exploring death and grief through a diasporic lens. Misha’s work is grounded in the belief that by caring for our Dying and tending to our grief in community, we strengthen our movements for justice and deepen our capacity for collective care.https://hafezdeathcare.com/You are invited to join the Winter Magic retreat here: https://glimmerportal.com/tarot-for-grief-winter-solstice-retreat/Thanks for listening!Love,Yarrow

I loved the chance to talk to Alexis Cunningfolk again - we did an interview back in 2019 for episode #82 (in the before times!) and now got to catch up about their new book and expansive, beautiful and inspiring magic. Here is some of what we covered:Building a collective library of plants, magic & spellsEconomic justice & supporting access to community education Slowing down and setting a place for grief at the tableBuilding sustainable and magical creative practicesAlexis J. Cunningfolk is creating plant-led spaces of healing because none of us are meant to do this work alone. Practicing as an intersectional herbalist for over fifteen years and as a witch for nearly three decades, her work has led her around the country, presenting at various magickal, herbal, and academic conferences, as well as facilitating rituals for groups ranging from a handful of folks to hundreds. Alexis focuses on evidence-based and embodied plant healing while drawing on her experiences as a lesbian, a woman of mixed ancestry, and a third culture kid to create practices that help folks re-enchant their world and call themselves back home to their bodies. In addition to working with plants, she has been reading tarot since she was twelve, teaching since she was nineteen, and sneaking off to places in-between since she could walk. Alexis offers much of her work for free or low-cost, wild seeding wisdom as an act of gratitude and a spell of collective liberation.Find her work at www.wortsandcunning.com.Join my virtual winter solstice tarot retreat over here: https://glimmerportal.com/tarot-for-grief-winter-solstice-retreat/Thank you for listening!Love,Yarrow

I am so honoured to share a beautiful conversation with Gabriela de Golia, who was also on episode #158. This time, we had a chance to go deeper and check back in on how the last few years have shaped us. Here is some of what we talked about:Discerning our unique relationship with the divineGrief and mortality as a gateway to understanding the mysteryThe politics of spiritual careRitual practice for tending, resilience and resistanceGabriela De Golia is the amalgamation of many beings, experiences, and possibilities. Weaving from a wide range of ancestral, spiritual, intellectual, political, and creative lineages, she serves as a spiritual care provider, ritualist, artist, writer, and a devotee of the mystery from which all things emerge and to which all things return. They support people in accessing the holy depths within and beyond us, to help co-create a world where all beings can be truly and deeply free.https://gabrieladegolia.com/Join us for weekly sessions here: https://glimmerportal.com/blessings/Receive a grief blessings tarot reading: https://glimmerportal.com/grief-blessings/Thank you so much for listening!

I am falling back in love with the tarot at the moment, as is custom each fall, and wanted to share some ideas and inspiration. These practices are sweet and simple to easily fit into your life and hopefully bring you some comfort and insight as we go deeper into the cozy season. Here are the spreads I mentioned:Daily CardsDrawing Closer - intentionally choosing a card and then drawing cards to explore what to release or invite in order to bring more of this energy in Past, Present, Future on specific areas of lifeA relationship spread: 1. How to stay grounded in my centre? 2. What do I have to offer? 3. What do I really want? 4. What might come up?The deck I told you about is the Nova Witch deck by Suki Ferguson and Ana Novaes and the two books I mentioned are She is Sitting in the Night by Oliver Pickle and All of our Stories by Beth Maiden. If you'd like space to practice, come join us for weekly Fall Blessing sessions: https://glimmerportal.com/blessings/or request a reading here: https://glimmerportal.com/grief-blessings/Thank you for listening!Love,Yarrow

Welcome to October! This is a beautiful interview with Charlene Lam, a creative and thoughtful voice whose work weaves together storytelling, curation, and deep personal reflection.Charlene speaks with honesty about the sudden loss of her mother and the early days of navigating grief and shock. We talk about how she approached the emotionally complex process of going through her mom’s belongings, and how her background as a creator shaped the way she honoured her mother’s memory. She offers practical, meaningful tools that can help anyone who is navigating grief to move forward with more ease and gentleness. Charlene Lam is a certified grief coach, TEDx speaker and the founder of The Grief Gallery. After her mother died suddenly in 2013, Charlene leaned into her creativity and instincts as a curator to guide herself through grief. Her Curating Grief® framework is a creative, accessible way grievers can navigate dealing with the physical stuff and the emotional stuff. Her first book, Curating Grief: A Creative Guide to Choosing What to Keep After a Loved One Dies, is out now. Website www.charlenelam.comLinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/charclam/Instagram ​​https://www.instagram.com/curating_griefYouTube https://www.youtube.com/@thegriefgalleryJoin Fall Blessings: https://glimmerportal.com/blessings/Get on the waitlist for ROOTED: https://pinkwellstudio.com/rooted/

Friends, I am so happy to share this beautiful conversation with Uma Girish with you. We talked about loss as a portal, honouring all kinds of grief, letting relationships evolve and transform and finding ourselves in a steady and loving way in the process. Uma Girish is a Grief Companion for women who feel lost as they’re grieving a loss. She serves as a loving witness and companions them on their journey so they can feel seen, heard, and supported as they heal.Her Substack publication is called “Light After Loss.”Uma is also the author of four books, the latest being “Sacred Fire: Memoir of A Marriage” which speaks to the grief in a long-term partnership when two people who love and respect each other deeply choose to walk different soul paths.You can learn more about Uma and her work at https://umagirish.comJoin us for Fall Blessings sessions here: https://glimmerportal.com/blessings/Thank you for listening!Love,Yarrow

This episode is an invitation to join me for supportive, affordable sessions every Monday this fall. We continue on from the summer blessings series, every Monday from 7-8pm UK time, with gentle space to write, make art, do rituals or dream. No pressure, come as you are and use the code FRIENDS to join for free if you can't afford the normal price of 60 GBP. Sign up here: https://glimmerportal.com/blessings/and join the branding & canva fundraiser workshop over here: https://pinkwellstudio.com/fundraiser-workshops/Love,Yarrow

What happens to the poetry, the paintings, the sketches and songs of our loved ones when they pass? In this beautiful conversation with Sarah Sawyer we talked about her friend and award-winning poet, Andrea Werblin Reid, who left us a stunning collections of poems called To See Yourself As You Vanish. It gave me so much precious food for thought about final wishes, the things we leave behind and what we can do for those we love as we say goodbye. In the last 3 years of her life, Andi 150 fierce, frank, witty poems on living with ovarian cancer and end of life. Before she died she asked a group of friends to do what we could to get it into the world. Sarah Sawyer is of those friends and is thrilled to share that this, her 3rd and strongest book yet--To See Yourself As You Vanish--is being represented by Rob McQuilken and will be published by Wesleyan Press September 9th. The book: https://www.weslpress.org/9780819502070/to-see-yourself-as-you-vanish/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andrea_werblin_reid_poetry/ Sarah Sawyer is a writer and a chaplain specializing in psychedelics and end of life. She lives in Boulder, Colorado and is proud to be helping to shepherd Andi's work to publication. Sarah's work: https://www.sarahksawyer.com/ You can join Fall Blessings over here: https://glimmerportal.com/blessings/Thank you for listening!Love,Yarrow

Last week was the first anniversary of my mum's passing, so I wanted to share an episode on what surprised me, what I needed, how I changed and what we did to mark the day. I hope this episode will offer you some space to reflect on your own grief and feel less alone in the process <3If you have a question, you can send me a voice note here: https://speakpipe.com/yarrowmMuch love,Yarrow

This is a little waffle about who I used to be when I was younger and what it was like to slowly but surely slow down to honour my health and be honest about who I actually am (not a super charged over achiever). I hope it helps you make space for your own grief around abilities, health and past versions of self. You can join my free monthly Spark sessions via Substack: https://yarrow.substack.com/This is the sign up for Summer Blessings, which starts tomorrow: https://glimmerportal.com/summer-blessings/And this is the sign up for my next fundraiser workshop on July 17th: https://pinkwellstudio.com/money-workshop/Thank you for listening!Love,Yarrow

I have two invitations for you:1. Please join me for a fundraiser workshop on money, shame & pricing: ⁠https://pinkwellstudio.com/money-workshop/⁠2. Come make weird & beautiful art with me in weekly creative sessions every Monday in July & August. Come as you are, work on your own project and enjoy gentle togetherness. GBP 40, no one turned away for lack of funds: ⁠https://glimmerportal.com/summer-blessings/⁠Hopefully see you soon!Love,Yarrow

In this episode I am sharing a few ideas to help us remember loved ones we have lost. It was my mum's birthday last week, so this is fresh on my mind and I hope that some of these ideas will feel sweet for you to try. If you'd like to send me a question, you can do so here: https://speakpipe.com/yarrowmHere is the sign up to the fundraiser workshop on money, pricing & shame: https://pinkwellstudio.com/money-workshop/and here is more info about grief companionship: https://glimmerportal.com/companionship/Thank you for listening!Love,Yarrow

Firstly, thank you so much for the warm reception, support and encouragement for this new podcast chapter and business adventure. I appreciate all the feedback and reviews so much! In today's episode I am offering five ways to connect in grief, organised in an introvert-friendly way by amount of social energy required. Here is the link to send me a voice note question: https://www.speakpipe.com/yarrowmHere is my Substack (which includes free monthly Spark sessions): https://yarrow.substack.com/and here is the link to my new Grief Glimmers course, on pre-sale until June 11th: https://glimmerportal.com/courses/The books I mentioned were The Wild Edge of Sorrow by Frances Weller and Bright Hour by Nina RiggsThank you for listening!Love,Yarrow