I am Sarah, born of Mari, born of Alice Maclean born out of the west highlands of Scotland, of Gaelic language and Queen Victoria’s empire

I am born out of the British Empire, of Shanghai banks, of whaling and Newcastle beer.

Born out of Clarence Bicknell, esperanto and wild alpine flowers, out of Constable and knights and those who burnt King Alfred’s cakes.

I am born out of crofters and fishermen and the Scottish potato famine. The old ones tended the hill fires at Beacon Hill, Devon deriving the name Bicknell

I am born out of stone and wild moorlands, of moss and the fae, who travelled west through the Summer Isles on an immram of her own

I am a Brit who washed up on the shores off the Pacific Northwest amidst seaweed, ravens and cedar bough who found her feet amidst clabber board, wild mountains and cranberry bogs.

I am one who loves and changes and creates as she goes

For I am many lifetimes all rolled into one, a  traveller, a juggler, anam cara and priestess

I am one who has been adopted by these shores, who 50 years later carries my new roots in a US passport and has birthed children and grandchildren into this new land.

I am she who found her place inside and out at the feet of Native wisdom borrowed and returned.

I am the medicine of my rowan roots interwoven with wild salmon and Douglas Fir

I am earth person, vulnerable to the song of life and I follow my breath.

I am Grandmother Turtle landing in meadowland,  fresh from the ocean currents of life

I am she who crosses oceans and cultures to connect and be whole, One who dances with others in shared language of the soul

I am a dreamer, a sharer of truth, an assistant, a collaborator

I am a special education teacher, a mentor of life, a student, a poet

I am a lover, a wife, a mother, a ceremonialist, and shadow doctor of grace

I am you, I am me, and I am continuing our prayer

To love even more, to be kind even more and be here even more, whomever we be.

Sarah Maclean Bicknell is a healer, teacher, and mentor.

She has studied healing and ceremonial work in North American indigenous traditions for 30 years. She has incorporated her Celtic roots into her present North American practice and is sought out for her intuitive readings, workshops, ceremony, and her soul doctoring practice. She stands in deep gratitude to her elders and teachers that have gone before and stands firmly in her own vision, a vision that is related and crafted for these times of the 21st century. Her work is about connection, community, ceremony and respect. Also raised in the Western world, she has lived the loss of disconnection and is profoundly thankful to her indigenous elders who taught her how to re-arrive more fully into her life.

In 1991, Sarah was adopted by ceremony into the Hunka Waye tradition of the Lakota Nation. She stands in deep honor to the elders and ceremonial collaborators who have shaped her path. These include Adalberto Rivera (Maya), Wallace Black Elk (Lakota), Rod McAfee, Grandmother Red Leaf (Cherokee), Donna Carlita, Hernando Salazar (Inca, Peru), Silvia Calisaya Chuquimia (Aymara, Lake Titicaca), Youseff Bashir (Berber, North Africa), Betsy Bergstrom (NW Coastal, Norse, Scottish), Francesca Boring (Shoshone and Northern Native European), Harold Blood, Carolyn Hillier, K. Trevelyan (Northern Native European), Stephan Hausner (Germany), and many others around the world with whom she has sat, dreamt, and stood in ceremony with.

She also acknowledges the complex legacy of Buck Ghost Horse, who played a significant role in her early ceremonial life. While he was a powerful and transformative teacher, it has since come to light that he was not of Lakota ancestry as once believed. Sarah holds both the real impact of his teachings and the responsibility to walk in truth, honoring the lineages he claimed with greater care and clarity now.

Sarah’s effectiveness as a teacher and mentor is seated in her ability to move quickly with a core style of kindness, pragmatism, humor, and discipline. In workshops or in private session, she is adept at astute listening, enabling her to tease out and distill core issues in both individuals and groups. She synthesizes information quickly to determine what is really needed to shift entire belief systems and break up the gridlocks that keep people and organizations from arriving at their best work.

People have sometimes called me a "Hedgewitch"... I never took that on as an identity. It is simply a word others use when they notice how I work. I tend to stand near boundaries, the places where things shift, where someone is caught between what was and what might be. I pay attention to those edges because that is where people often find their truth, and where the world shows its deeper seams.

Much of what I do comes from listening. Not the heroic kind, not special sight or dramatic insight, but steady listening. The kind you learn after years of being called to the wounded places in yourself and in others. The wound becomes a doorway, not because you want it to, but because life presses you there until you finally look. In that looking, something useful sometimes arrives.

People say hedge witches track subtle signs. I do not know if that is true for me. I only know that I notice the small shifts in a room, the way someone’s breath changes when a story brushes up against a hidden truth, the way a field of energy steadies when someone is finally witnessed. These are skills shaped by time, not intention.

My work is mostly about presence. Offering space without taking over. Letting someone unfold at their own pace. Holding the line between what is falling apart and what is forming. It is not glamorous. It is often slow and ordinary, like tending a fire or watching weather move across a valley. If others choose the word hedgewitch to describe that, I do not argue. But in my own understanding I am simply someone who keeps company with thresholds, follows what feels honest, and tries to stay in right relationship with the seen and unseen. That is enough.