I AM Jamela Houston, CHt. I am an IMDHA board-certified hypnotherapist, holistic women's wellness and integrative healing arts practitioner, herbalist, and ordained minister with an obvious passion for holistic health. I AM the owner of Deeply Rooted Holistics and I believe that true healing starts at getting to the root.

 

My own journey started where I am sure that many of ours have, I was sick and I wanted to be healed, but traditional medical practices were only hurting me and not helping me. I began learning about natural and alternative methods and discovered that nature heals. Everything that I needed to be whole and rid my body of dis-ease had already been placed right here in front of me, but social programming had taught me otherwise. The more I learn, the more pressing the desire is to share my knowledge and my testimony with my community.

 

Discovering HPOC was certainly divine alignment; it has been like finding home. Not only is this an organization that is overflowing with a wealth of holistic knowledge, but it is also a place for me, for us! After taking the Women's Wellness Practitioner Program, I soon began their Ph.D. in Natural Medicine program, I could tell that this was far more than just an educational institute, HPOC is a movement and I am here for it!

 

I consider it both a privilege and an honor to carry the title of the HPOC Spring Texas Chapter President, this is a position I will not hold lightly. The mission is simple: we heal ourselves and we heal our communities; each one, teach two. We are at a critical time in society when it is time for us to rise up and take back our power and our health. I could not be more humbled by this challenge.

 

I recently had a brief conversation with a friend and she introduced me to the concept of "ubuntu". Ubuntu is a philosophy of some African tribes that can be summed up as "I am what I am because of who we all are." Ubuntu is the essence of being human, we cannot exist all by ourselves, we need each other; we are all interconnected. So when we heal ourselves, we heal our communities. When we heal our communities, we create a ripple effect that makes an impact on the world.

My goal in this chapter is to INbody ubuntu for ourselves and for our community.