Wattle Tree Place in Vancouver attracts those seeking community, spirituality

Embers, the odor of sage and thumping rhythms drifted into the Saturday night sky. The full moon peered at a group singing in unison around a fire pit.

“Some say namaste. Some say aho mitakuye oyasin. Some say om, some say shalom, but we all call Mother Earth our home.”

People from around the area flock to Wattle Tree Place in Vancouver every other Saturday night for a drum circle and ceremony corresponding with the moon cycles.

Drumming together is a shared experience like going to church on Sunday, but it definitely is not church. Wattle Tree serves as the stomping grounds for people seeking holistic healing and connection to the earth. As a growing number of Washingtonians consider themselves nonreligious, it can be a place for those “religious nones” to tap into their spirituality and build community.

“It’s not about worship, it’s about opening a space that is safe and sacred,” said Anna Phillips, one of the owners of Wattle Tree. “I don’t know what you need, but I can offer you different tools and a space.”

Those tools may be the drum circle, meditation, tarot card reading, sound healing or just standing around a fire talking to people. The space is a converted house with a large front porch that’s sandwiched between a law office and a cannabis shop.

Phillips said she didn’t fully understand the spiritual side of the business until redevelopment forced a move from Wattle Tree’s original location on East 16th Street.

Its patrons describe it as a gathering place where spiritual people from all walks of life can find connection and healing.

“There really isn’t this type of community offering anywhere,” Danielle Chicoine Gorman said.

She led the full moon ceremony at Wattle Tree Place. She instructed everyone to grab bundles of oregano and thyme and toss them into the flames. Earlier in the evening, people jotted down what no longer serves them — negative thoughts, bad habits, toxic relationships — and burned those tiny paper scrolls as well.

“I am a glowing radiant white light,” Chicoine Gorman recited. “As I let go and surrender, the light within me glows.”

The ritual is almost like a form of prayer, Chicoine Gorman said in an interview with The Columbian, except people are looking inward rather than toward a higher power.

“Everybody is here to release and let out energy,” she said.

Often, people walk inside Wattle Tree not knowing why or what they’re looking for, but there is a menu of “magical offerings” to try.

Phillips and her sister Sophie Wegecsanyi recently drove to Tucson, Ariz., for the Gem, Mineral and Fossil Showcase and brought back crystals and stones said to have different properties and benefits. The pair also offer teas accompanied by affirmations and candles made under different astrological events. Patrons can ask to be smudged or schedule a variety of holistic healing services and workshops. People take what works for them and leave the rest.

“We don’t specify what you should be doing. We just hold the space so that you can do the work you need to do,” Phillips said. “You can be involved in this as much or as little as you want to be.”

New Age now the norm?

Roughly 6 in 10 American adults accept at least one “New Age” belief, whether it’s astrology, psychics, reincarnation or the presence of energy in physical objects (such as crystals), according to the Pew Research Center. But “belief” can be a loose term. Chicoine Gorman is a self-described astrology geek, having picked it up when she was 15.

“It’s just fun for me — definitely not a religion,” she said.

Chicoine Gorman doesn’t consider herself religious but rather on a “path to spirituality.” She was raised Catholic.

“I feel free to be my authentic self and not be put in a box,” she said. “Nobody tells me what to or how to worship.”

New Age beliefs are held by both religious and nonreligious folks alike. In fact, Pew found religiously unaffiliated Americans are about as likely as Christians to hold these beliefs. Some may identify as being religious and spiritual or spiritual but not religious.

Wattle Tree welcomes people from any walk of life or belief system, Phillips said. She and her sister developed a grounding latte inspired by a Muslim woman who walked into their shop looking for some help.

“We created something with intention for her,” Phillips said.

The fragrant drink, inspired by Persian love cake, includes rose, cardamom and almond milk. Customers liked the grounding latte so much, coffee sales declined.

“More often than not, people come in and tell me a story and are just grateful to have got it off their chest in a safe space,” Phillips said.

What Wattle Tree does, she said, is not based in fear or fixing anyone.

Colin Neale loves to dance at Wattle Tree’s drum circles. The 71-year-old doesn’t attend church but believes community is crucially important; it’s enhanced his life, he said.

“We’re all here to be one and being one makes us so much stronger,” said Neale, who calls himself “the dancing vegan.”

Drum circles are a way for people to build community and connection without talking. After a while of drumming at Wattle Tree, people begin to sync on the same rhythm.

Your brain on drums

Practices and spiritual tools such as drumming together may be considered New Age but aren’t new at all.

“Drumming specifically is probably the oldest sound technology,” Adina Eggen said. She helped bring the drum circle to Wattle Tree from its original home at Mint Tea, which has since closed.

Eggen often works with sound and music therapist Chaz Chavez to put on events and retreats focused on connection, healing and introspection.

“The ancient Egyptians were using sound and golden rods to create frequency inside of the body to create changes in their psychological and emotional being, as well as connect them deeper in their spirituality,” he said.

Eggen, who practices sound therapy and hypnosis, said music and drumming can quickly induce a healing brainwave state called theta — that’s the state people enter just before falling asleep and just after waking.

“A lot of cultures use this as a spiritual practice as well as a healing practice,” Eggen said. “A lot of people just love music, and they don’t realize that they’re actually using it to heal themselves. … Even if it’s music that’s really intense, for them that can be very healing because it’s triggering whatever they’re needing to feel in that moment.”

Theta brainwave phenomena, she said, may look the same in someone who’s religious and someone who’s not. For some, entering a meditative state means they’re connecting with their subconscious. Others may believe they’re connecting with a higher power or something outside themselves.

“A lot of the people who come to the drum circles don’t know a lot of this,” Eggen said. “They just know it’s fun, and it feels good. And it’s a good way for them to connect, you know, or just have free expression.”

More mindfulness

Over the last decade, she’s watched mindfulness and meditation grow in popularity. What used to be considered “woo-woo” is becoming more mainstream. More Washington residents meditate than attend religious services at least once weekly. Nearly a third of Washington adults are unaffiliated with any religion. They may consider themselves atheist, agnostic or nothing in particular. Yet, people feel spiritual peace and well-being just as much as they did over a decade ago, according to the Pew Research Center.

“Wattle Tree was very instrumental in creating a place for kind of a vortex of community to come together,” Eggen said. “As far as the conscious, holistic and spiritual community coming together like this — those people were always around, but they didn’t necessarily have such an ideal place to meet and coordinate.”

In the last couple of years, Eggen said, that community has come closer together.