Tanya Himeji Romero 💘

Back in the Spring of my life and feeling deeply grateful. Purpose, inspiration and great devotion swelling my heart, illuminating my mind ~ empowering my able diligent hands🪄 All channels open - holding presence and space for the imminent arrival of a baby boy and thus a mother and her family that I will join in living care providing postpartum nourishment soon. This ever intimate work is truly a privilege and honor and I am feeling deeply grateful to join this sweet fam and hold them in my orbit of care 💓 Feeling heartened to support @libbyloveyoga and her collaborators Mother’s Day weekend for a very thoughtfully curated day of care for mama’s. Held at the beautiful @thebridgekingston - I’m very excited for everyone to experience the layers of care in store and their being held in the newly open to the public/practitioners 2nd floor spa space 💧 And somehow it’s time. Lesser Mysteries Beltane Celebration at Opus 40 is this Friday 🌀 I’ve always dreamt of doing something at this impressive site, so it’s truly a dream to be fulfilling it with my @greater.mysteries family ✨ So many magical minds and hearts contributing to birth this vision - it’s going to be so so special 😭🌸✨ 🌞 thinking to join us? please do - limited tickets left, get yours via link in my bio 🌝 Readying for big weeks. Head spinning and heart skipping a beat here and there for sure but how powerful and beautiful to feel so alive and so full of desire to show up ❤️‍🔥 much love 🦋

Part of what makes @greater.mysteries offerings so unique is the depth and devotion of the collaborators who shape the experience alongside us. Anyone who has encountered @woodlandpantry knows that Tanya Himeji-Romero’s creations are prayers. An artist in process, perspective, and creation, Tanya works through the mediums of plants and food. Over the last decade, her artistry has taken form as a forest farmer, plant steward, herbalist, and kitchen witch. Her work carries a deep reverence for the intelligence of the natural world, and a knowing that nourishment can be a bridge back into relationship. We’ve been honored to collaborate with Tanya since the earliest days of Greater Mysteries, from our first preview gatherings to the cave last fall. She has nourished our entire production team behind the scenes and will be doing so again for @officialopus40 , helping to ground us as we prepare to welcome you. On May 1, you’ll have several opportunities for participants to encounter her work… Nourishment by Woodland Pantry will be available throughout the evening, with thoughtfully prepared, locally sourced offerings available for purchase. Her presence is woven into the fabric of the gathering, a quiet but essential thread grounding the experience in care, beauty, and reciprocity. Come hungry 🌿

“ The most personal is the most creative” Martin Scorsese 🪞 Saying goodbye to Harley 🤍🖤 Honoring 13 years of being joined in marriage ❤️‍🔥 And the discovery of a hereditary disease, helping me understand more and more how my cellular matrix is my literal thin veil 🕸️ Through the lense of binary loss, life has been so hard. From the lense of magical gratitude, understanding how privileged I have been - that I am - to somehow not lose heart or company but to keep growing it because all I have and am held and loved by 🧬♾️🗝️ These days taking great inventory of my life since moving to the Catskills to be with my beloveds 14 years ago. It’s been such a beautiful, wild and magical albeit arduous journey that we embarked on together. Spring feels different this year without our little sweet harbinger. I miss the twinkle in his eyes and the palpable joy in this heartened feet as the earth warmed them. I miss his beauty, the medicine of his physicality… but he keeps showing us he is here and everywhere and while it is a deeply tender time, it is an awe filled one too🧚‍♂️ @onewoodland and I are coming full circle and back into intimate collaboration this year, back to our roots in the woods, literally and figuratively, where our story and family began/continues 🌿 It’s profound and humbling to track all it’s taken to get us here and all that which ignited this spark and kept it alight all these years ✨ Jamie, I’ve loved you lifetimes. I adore you and I am deeply grateful we are braving this wild life together again 🌀 Sunshine, unfurling blooms and bird call 🌿 Shaking off the cobwebs as my natal season and kin muse my life force back out of the cave 🕸️ Ever moved by this web of life and ever grateful for my inspirations and nourishments that spring me back to the saddle over and over 🐎🫀⚡️ It’s been a while friends, lots to share- lots to come ⚡️ I’m really grateful you’re here 🫂

Actively changing the shape of my heart. It’s my main work of diligent devotion these days ❤️‍🩹🤍❤️‍🔥 Life is asking me to hold more beauty and hope, more pain and concern than I ever have. At the same time. Turns out I am exactly where I am supposed to be. Exactly doing what I must to allow into form the brave rising in me ⚔️ Holding the complexity of our times is the greatest accelerator of expansion. Maturing my studiousness by reminding myself over and over that real growth comes at my own pace, in my own interpretations and in the responsible gestures and outputs I can manage that honor me first 🌟 So I counter the dark with cuts of light ⚡️Growing my heart with awe for all that manifests from the brilliance and tenacity of the spirit of good fight. All that fortifies through the reverence of gratitude ✨ Grateful no matter how dark it gets that it’s my nature to let the light in ✨ It’s your nature too ✨ So ample grace tender ones, our ability to remain soft when things get hard is proving to be a necessary pillar in anchoring the world we are gently and potently birthing✨🤍

My whole life they’ve told me to grow a thicker skin, this year I found out it’s literally thin. Laughing and crying as I connect the no longer mystery gaps of my life 🕸️ Understanding and appreciating the complexity of how I am is illuminating the intricacy of how I do ✨ Appreciating the nuance of my appetites, the nourishment I receive and in turn the nourishment I reciprocate in thanks and devotion 🙇🏻‍♀️ It’s been a profound magical dance of a year of undulating dark and light pulses - I’m looking forward to leaning on and ridng my trusty old friend into the breeze and gallop of the next ⚔️

“When I planted my pain in the field of patience, it bore fruit of happiness” Khalil Gibran 🪷 Lately I’ve been tracking and realizing the long horizon of my projects, of my visions - of my devotions 🤍🙇🏻‍♀️🤍 Zooming out is giving me a different perspective on what I have been referencing as the “limitations of my ambitions” 👁 Slowing down to truly take inventory of all that’s ensued thus far feeds my diligence and endurance with the perspective key to see all I am in fact weaving together 🕸 This year I expressed in devotional awe contribution to two dream projects- one 1.5 years and the other 3+ in the works. This year has also been about taking my sweet time to truly see, understand and feel into what it will be to honor the next chapter of one of my longest and most personally important collaborative projects yet… a decade+ in the works… Humbled by the richness and beauty of life when living in the fullness of presence ⚡️ Tracking the seasons, my friends and my teachers to feed my commitment and inspiration to always honor this sensual electric technicolor life ✨

Lately, despite the state of the world, I feel a lot of gratitude. Gratitude especially for the beautiful souls that no matter what, live and breath to brave their creations into this world to make it better. I feel such a deep and tender gratitude for these kin that nourish and fill us with their courageous heart song - it is thus life giving and ever fulfilling to be able to return and reciprocate the nourishment ❤️‍🔥 I’ve known many of these cats for a long time. I met a couple of them in the mountains on a ginseng crew now a decade ago. Thanks to one of them, I ended up in Catskill in 2018 at @theavalonlounge ‘s beloved Hilo, and met many of the rest of this configuration of artistic soul foodies I came to have the privilege to befriend, admire, respect and love 🫂 It is my joy and honor to support @campsainthelene @garys_dream and @fascinatingchimeraproject in nourishment on show day and to offer an accompanying sentimental medicinal concession stand to their kinship at their upcoming sold out @miserymother show @thelocalsaugerties this Friday 🌹 Laced with the energetics and intentions of some of my (and their!) trustiest botanical and fungal allies, come grab some very thoughtfully mused food as medicine 🌿 Come enjoy some ginseng berry, miso reishi tahini noodles , ginger chicken milky oat congee, cruciferous, root + yuba salad summer rolls or a cup of my famous house mushroom broth. I seasonally muse and tweak my batches every special occasion now 11 years running and will have her on tap for those of you that like to sip cup after cup 😉 And for you sweet tooths, I’m serving my cosmic fairy fruit salad that always surprises and delights with my special election of fermented honey, medicinal vinegar, herbs and salt. And I even asked my pal @kraykray to collaborate on a very special GF/DF brownie for me using my chaga/reishi/turkey tail infused maple syrup and mineralized stinging nettle malden salt ✨ Music starts at 7 but doors open and the show actually starts at 6 with my deep nourishment pre-show tasty set 🧚‍♂️ Excited to nourish you darlings, thanks for the pleasure 🫶

“You are the storm and the harbor” she said to me ⚡️ And it’s cumulating reflections like this from my kin that help illuminate my life, a mirrored allowance that transmutes - that nourishes with nuance - texturizing and valorizing historical dark corners that left important parts banished, fractured and unable to come to the table until seen. As I bring above that and those, which and whom, I have been working with diligently below, I am reminded over and over the importance of everyone’s personal remembrance journey - to ignite the alchemical self so as to mine and reclaim all that can only (re)birth from bravely (re)claiming the journey key of transformation 🦋 The sonic channeling @kelliscarr and her band spelled and serenaded us with over those two nights in the Widow Jane Mine continue to reverberate through my days. @greater.mysteries touched and moved me deeply- I am still in awe ✨ It meant a lot to me, the honor to hold the home team in nourishment on our show days in the cave, to muse a botanical ode for the audience to imbibe and to accept the invitation to hold the closing event with my integration nourishment experience Eating from the Tree of Kin ♾️ Eating from the tree of kin. We are always eating from the tree of kin. And when we remember the ways that we can deeply nourish one another simply by being ourselves, simply by sharing our true selves, we remember and are reminded that this bravery serves as a permission, as an example and as an inspired guidance to our allies and kin. As we individually brave the spontaneous wild field of personal possibility, we cultivate greater relation within ourselves and thus with each other 🕸 Gratitude to all the sweethearts and helping hands that made my dinner the integral nourishment it was. And so so glad to have anchored this intentional gathering @thebridge.kingston , putting a pin on a magical space and place we can all come back to for more fodder, kinship, guidance and inspiration 🕯 Many heartlands roam freer these days, expanded by the resonance field we created together. YES✨ Kinship is the most potent and yummy fodder to sweeten the stay 💓🙇🏻‍♀️🫂

People are often surprised by my bright, perhaps especially when they understand how much time I spend in the dark. This used to confuse me too. But over the years I’ve come to understand it is for this very reason, my comfort and my regularity and courage to navigate the dark, that I am able to bring back and retrieve and transmute the brightest light 🖤 I’ve journeyed the dark more regularly than I can comfortably admit. I’ve come back from these underworlds fragile, often feeling defective - often so tender that coming back and taking new form was equally an arduous journey. It is the validation and thus nourishment of being seen and held in all my forms and especially my newly braving ones that I have come to understand this is a necessary self journey but it is not necessarily meant to be made alone 🌀 In the eyes of my beloveds, my kin - I remember and learn my value, my purpose and my direction. In the eyes of those whom truly see me, I in turn begin to see and love me and the earnest fight of my bright spirit and all the ways she braves bringing to light personal medicine to share with others 🦋 I feel so deeply grateful for the opportunity to support @kelliscarr and the @greater.mysteries kinship and this visioned transformative container and offering for the bioregion 🌀 And to be amongst so many that navigate similar terrain gives me a sense of belonging I’ve never quite felt. So many of us working diligently, working honorably to find the best ways to attune ourselves to our gifts ❤️‍🔥 It is giving me life ✨✨✨ Looking forward to seeing you this Friday and Saturday at Widow Jane and providing you with a closing botanical beverage. And feeling heartened to hold and receive you on the other side of @greater.mysteries for our closing event, my dinner gathering Eating from the Tree of Kin. Let me serenade you with fodder to stay. Let me show you how much and how many are here to support you right now, just as you are 🌹 An integrative co-nourishment experience in the sanctuary and lighthouse that is @thebridge.kingston - it’s going to be a very sweet evening together 🫶 Grateful for your courage, grateful for your YES See you soon 🖤🫂🤍

Join Tanya Himeji Romero of @woodlandpantry for a communal dining experience at The Bridge to integrate the @greater.mysteries journey created by @kelliscarr Greater Mysteries is an immersive music project created by composer and artist Kelli Scarr. Drawing inspiration from the myth of Inanna and the initiatory rites of the Eleusinian Mysteries, this body of work leads listeners through a journey of descent, transformation, and return. Following a week of rites leading to the Greater Mysteries performances in the Widow Jane Mine cave, we welcome you back from your journey and offer a communion meal and co-reflective and considerate space to help you integrate above that which you bring back from the below. This is an intimate gathering of intentional co-nourishment to bridge and create greater integration in our relational field. Offerings Include: Local wild leavened & artisanal gluten free breads Harvest vegetable soup Seasonal salad + other intentional, medicinal, sentimental sips and bites Mused intuitively by Woodland Pantry. Sourced, harvested, and mindfully wildcrafted from trusted local agrarians and stewards, from reciprocally tended wild and cultivated spaces Hosted in the intentional sanctuary and portal for integrative remembrance and homecoming that is The Bridge. We are honored to support in nourishment the Greater Mysteries container and vision. ABOUT THE FACILITATOR Tanya Himeji Romero is a multi-disciplinary artist and energetic alchemist whose vision for over a decade has materialized in her work and devotional practices as a forest farmer, plant steward and intuitive culinary herbalist. While she believes any medium can be used to communicate our creativity, reverence and inherent connection, she is especially devoted to the realms of nourishment inspired by that which activates and attunes the inherent potential of our bodies as instrument, vessel and channel.

It’s been a wild and beautiful journey witnessing @kelliscarr orchestrate and bring to light and life the vision of @greater.mysteries 👁🦋 And it’s been especially moving and ever heartening to see the spirit and earnest care and support rally around her to co-create this mythical sonic ritual experience culminating in the Greater Mysteries shows September 26 and 27th in the Widow Jane Mine 🖤 Drawing from the myth of a Inanna and the initiatory rites of the Eleusinian Mysteries, this body of work leads listeners through a journey of descent, transformation and return 🌀 I’m so inspired by the offerings of other collaborators - ‘preparatory rites’ before your sonic induction in the caves 💧 I myself feeling deeply privileged to hold the torch of integration as I welcome you home in embodiment through the nourishment of intentional fodder and communion via my dinner EATING FROM THE TREE OF KIN 🌿 I’m so grateful to @nicoleayame of @thebridge.kingston for hosting us. I couldn’t think of a better place to hold us 🤍 Nourishment and kin all around 🤍 Let us nourish one another, join us along the journey 🦋 Ticket link in bio for rites, shows and dinner dears ❤️‍🔥 See you there 🌀 🤍 photograph of my grandmother and I, my original womb cave 🖤

“I value your life and your exploration” my beloved said to a tender me yesterday, “even if not everyone can see or understand it” 🫂 And the truth is, it’s been hard for me to fully understand and accept my path. In many ways I am not where I started. And here only now, I understand the success of this. It’s the wisdom and perspective of time that has allowed me witness to my very own process - my movement not cycling or regressive - but one of brave ascent - one valorizing my life force to its greatest potential 🌀✨✨✨ As I attune my ever sensitive instrument to pick up and hold more, I understand what I am intimately connected to. I am grateful the concrete jungle broke and woke me. I am grateful to all my hard and despicable teachers for clarifying my convictions, my integrity - my good fight to find and protect myself and my kin ❤️‍🔥 I headed to NYC 21 years ago to “become a fashion diva” according to my 18 year old self. I am so glad and grateful the wildlings recognized, claimed and fought to bring me home to help me remember my rightful place amongst the flora and fauna and the nature devas ✨✨✨🧚🏻 A recent portrait with my darling’s darlings 🥹 Grateful for all the blossoming and nectar in my life🪷🌸🌺🌹🦋🙇🏻‍♀️