Like the dandelion itself—resilient, deeply rooted, and wildly healing—Dandelion Collaborative exists to spread seeds of justice and compassionate connection. We empower individuals and communities through healing justice, personal coaching, cultural reconnection, and public education. Together, we reclaim ancestral wisdom, nurture liberatory healing practices, and build equitable systems grounded in kindness, belonging, and collective care. Our mission is not simply to heal, but to transform—growing community wellness that is just, joyful, and unstoppable.
About Amy
Hi there - I’m Amy Shake Ortiz. I’m an herbalist, educator, speaker, activist, performer, and lifelong learner who’s always asking questions about how we care for ourselves and each other. I believe healing is something we do together through conversation, shared knowledge, and care that moves in many directions.
I came to herbal and holistic medicine through my own experiences with chronic health challenges. What began as survival has grown over more than a decade and a half into a practice shaped by lived experience, cultural knowledge, and ongoing learning. My work is deeply informed by who I am as a queer, neurodivergent, psychiatrically disabled Latine woman, and by a commitment to making health education more accessible, relational, and, well, human.
My approach to teaching, as healing, is grounded in experiential learning and mutual exchange. I don’t believe in arriving at expertise, only in continuing to listen, learn, and grow alongside others. I see health sovereignty as a collaborative process; a process that grows through questioning and collective exploration rather than hierarchy.
Dandelion Collaborative is my way of nurturing that vision: a living, evolving project focused on cooperative and sustainable community care. I’m especially interested in what emerges through the cracks when we build together: the informal, the mutual, the authentic.
I live, forage, and create with gratitude on Muheconneok and Haudenosaunee ancestral lands, and I welcome connection, collaboration, and co-creation that honors this land and respects its rightful stewards.
Hello!
Why Dandelion, though?
Dandelion is a mighty little plant, commonplace but miraculous. It can flourish where nothing should grow - between cracks in the sidewalk, along polluted highways, and throughout yards and prairies where it is continuously mowed over. A weed, some say. But it’s precisely that cheery resilience that I admire.
Did you know the entire plant, from the root to the flower, is edible and medicinal? It is among the first food sources for pollinators and humans alike in the spring. Even its seeds offer a magical, whimsical joy. Dandelion does nothing but grow and give and persevere. A wildflower, not a weed. A gift — sunshine rising from the earth.
Roasted Dandelion Root was my first herb. A desperate attempt to ease the symptoms of a chronic condition opened the door for me to a new world - not just natural medicine, but deep medicine. Soul medicine. Social medicine. Injustice and politics and rewritten history. Unwritten history. Ancestry. Spirituality. And, of course, connection and collaboration. Now, Dandelion is a lifestyle.