About Me

About Herbs Love + Yoga

A Different Way of Understanding Wellness

At Herbs Love + Yoga, we believe wellness doesn't have to be complicated.

Our approach brings together plant medicine, science, traditional wisdom, movement, and ritual to help you better understand your body and make caring for yourself a practical part of everyday life.

We believe in learning from the plants around us, honoring the knowledge passed down through generations, and creating simple practices that nourish the whole person.

Our work is grounded in curiosity, discernment, connection, and respect—for the plants, for the traditions that have shaped herbalism, and for each person's unique path toward wellbeing.

Our Philosophy

Local + Accessible Medicine
We believe much of the medicine we need can be found close to home. We work with common, abundant plants and make herbalism approachable, practical, and relevant to everyday life.

Traditional Wisdom, Thoughtfully Practiced
We honor the traditions of herbal medicine and the people who have carried this knowledge forward. Teas, tinctures, honeys, vinegars, syrups, oils, and salves connect us to ways of working with plants that are simple, time-tested, and deeply relational.

Whole-Person Care
We look beyond a single symptom to the person as a whole—body, mind, emotions, relationships, environment, and daily life. We value nourishment, long-term support, and practices that help people build a sustainable relationship with their wellbeing.

Plants as Teachers
We approach plants with curiosity, humility, and respect. We pay attention to their properties, their relationships with people and place, and the ways traditional herbalists have worked with them over generations. We strive to harvest and work with plants thoughtfully and sustainably.

Discernment + Integrity
We believe herbalism is most powerful when practiced with both openness and discernment. We value honest education, evidence-informed decision-making, and knowing when another form of care is appropriate. Herbalism does not exist in opposition to conventional medicine; it can be part of a broader, collaborative approach to health.

Learning as a Way of Life
There is always more to learn—from plants, from nature, from traditional knowledge, from science, and from our own experiences. We remain students as well as teachers.

Meet Alyssa
Clinical Herbalist · M.S.Ed · RYT · Reiki Master

My path into clinical herbalism began with my own experience navigating a PCOS diagnosis.

Like many people, I was looking for ways to better understand what was happening in my body and to feel more connected to my own health. That experience led me to ask bigger questions: How does the body work? What does it need to thrive? What can plants teach us? And what wisdom have we inherited about caring for ourselves?

My path into clinical herbalism began with my own experience navigating a PCOS diagnosis.

Like many people, I was looking for ways to better understand what was happening in my body and to feel more connected to my own health. That experience led me to ask bigger questions: How does the body work? What does it need to thrive? What can plants teach us? And what wisdom have we inherited about caring for ourselves?

I began exploring herbal medicine alongside the care I was receiving from my doctor. What started as a personal search grew into a deep curiosity about plants, traditional medicine, physiology, and the relationship between the two.

Eventually, that curiosity became a path.

Today, I bring together my background as a science educator, clinical herbalist, yoga teacher, and Reiki practitioner to create an approach to wellness that honors both science and tradition. I believe we don't have to choose between the two. We can be curious about the science while remaining open to the knowledge, practices, and relationships with plants that have been passed down through generations.

Bridging Science + Tradition
Before becoming a clinical herbalist, I spent 15 years teaching high school Biology and Chemistry, including two years designing and teaching a unique herbalism elective within the NYC school system.

With my students, I mapped the medicinal plants growing in our school courtyard, cultivated plants in grow boxes, and brought them into the classroom to create teas, tinctures, salves, honeys, vinegars, and lotions.

That experience shaped the way I teach today.

I believe complex information becomes powerful when people can understand it, experience it, and use it. My goal is to make herbal medicine and body literacy approachable—not something reserved for experts, but knowledge that can become part of everyday life.

My Herbal Education
I completed a rigorous three-level apprenticeship under Karen Rose, earning certifications in Family, Community, and Clinical Herbalism.

My education has continued through years of study with experienced herbalists and teachers, including Susun Weed, Matthew Wood, David Winston, Robin Rose Bennett, Sajah Popham, Jim McDonald, and Rosalee de la Forêt, among many others.

I've had the privilege of learning through both in-person workshops and extended study, and I have also studied with Indigenous elder Tepahteh Hutze' since 2014.

I believe becoming a good herbalist means remaining a student. There is always more to learn from plants, from nature, from traditional knowledge, from science, and from the people we have the privilege of learning alongside.

Beyond Herbalism
Herbal medicine is at the heart of my work, but my understanding of wellbeing extends beyond plants.

As a Registered Yoga Teacher and Reiki Master, I also work with movement, breath, ritual, and energy practices that invite greater awareness of the body and our everyday experience.

These practices aren't separate from my herbal work. They are part of a larger picture of wellbeing—one that considers how we nourish ourselves, how we move, how we live, how we connect, and how we care for ourselves over time.

Why Herbs Love + Yoga?
I created Herbs Love + Yoga as a place to bring all of these pieces together.

A place where science and tradition can sit at the same table.

Where plants can be studied not only for their constituents and actions, but also understood within the traditions and relationships that have shaped herbal medicine for generations.

Where learning is hands-on, practical, and experiential.

Where you can become more knowledgeable about your body without being overwhelmed by information.

And where caring for yourself can become something meaningful, enjoyable, and sustainable—not another thing on your to-do list.

I believe we can learn from the wisdom that came before us while continuing to ask questions, think critically, and discover what comes next.

This is Herbs Love + Yoga: plants, rituals + wisdom for everyday life.