Herbal Cup: An invitation to delve deeper

Participating in competitions in saunas is not my natural inclination, but after doing a sauna ritual showcase in the autumn and being inspired by other sauna practitioners’ creativity and depth of knowledge, I've decided to throw my (sauna) hat in the ring.

My whole sauna working journey, and indeed my life, has been about finding where I sit within different traditions, identities and histories, and about finding peace in this complex and liminal space. This is also true of what kind of sauna professional I want to be, which has been heavily influenced by my politics and ancestry while of course trying to forge a path for myself in this profession.

Image of Monika sniffing meadow sweet.

Both journeys start in Latvia, my homeland and the beginning of my sauna path.

You might be thinking “This all sounds very convoluted for just deciding whether to compete in the UK Herbal Cup!” but I promise there is a point to all this.

One of the first things I learnt from my sauna teachers in Latvia was about being intentional and making sure every action has a purpose. This idea of intentionality is a tenet of Latvian culture, and intentionality and necessity are two sides of the same coin. In a harsh environment like the Latvian winter, making sure every task has purpose and saves energy is extremely important, the same way you need to save energy in a sauna.

This grounding and intentionality is something that more and more I am trying to live by. I am a third culture kid*, and as such there is a sense of go-with-the-flow and rootlessness that I have carried forward from my younger life. Born in Australia to both Latvian-Australian parents, we moved to Italy when I was very young and I grew up in Rome until I came to the UK when I was 19. I learnt to move between cultures with ease, transforming my shape to fit whatever situation I was in.

*someone who grew up outside of their parents’ culture and developed a third, more global culture. Characterised by high adaptability, independence and lack of sense of belonging.

So, why was I questioning whether I wanted to participate in the Herbal Cup?

The growing sauna industry in the UK has so many different threads to it; Aufguss competitions, community saunas, wild saunas, ritual spaces, retreats, and more, each of them offering a different way to engage with the power of deep heat. My practice exists in a more ritual space.

For me, the sauna is a sacred space uniting all the elements, the human, and the more-than-human. A space of confluence and reflection that has no need nor desire for competition. I concentrate on one or a few people and each ritual is responsive to the bather’s needs and their emotional and physical state. It is a co-created and held space focussed on the inner experience of the bather rather than a performance focussed on the sauna master. Latvian pirts practitioners are a connecting element between the more-than-human and the sauna, the energy of the ritual flowing through them and the natural elements to the bathers.

Naturally, a competition brings comparison and judgment between practitioners, which I can find difficult to reconcile with this ethos relating to the sauna. However, the invitation to share skills, refine your craft and be innovative and creative with plants in the sauna I find very stimulating.

Herbal scrubs on a wooden board created by Monika.

The Herbal Cup gives us the opportunity to explore the many different facets of one plant, as we are scored on the synergy and creativity of our use of herbs. We are also competing in two different types of heated rooms; a sauna (dry) and a steam room (wet). For example, one of my favourite aromas is fir. What fullness of essence awaits us when we combine a hydrolat, an essential oil and a smoke of fir in the sauna? Do the soft fruity notes express more in an essential oil and the pine notes in an infusion, and how do they express together? How do the same infusions behave differently in a sauna and steam room?

These kinds of questions I find extremely exciting and invite me to delve into experimentation and creativity with herbs. They also remind me that many practitioners are in this competition because they, like me, have a passion for connecting with plants and sharing that joy with others in the sauna, not just to compete and be the best in a field.

And here we come to the point of this whole story. I am not a unique story, many of us have interwoven stories of displacement and complex cultural histories, and many of us are trying to find our place in the world. The reason I am writing this is that there are many elements from a common experience as sauna practitioners in the UK. The sauna is a new field of practice in the UK, with uncharted paths, erased histories and exciting prospects. We are wading through the muddied waters of how it looks to have a career, be cultural stewards, be creative and bring some level of healing to people’s lives through sauna, among many other things.

For me to make my way through these waters requires a presence of self and lots of intentionality. I thank all my teachers for guiding me to this frame of mind.

All this being said.. see you at the UK Herbal Cup!