The Señora Era Is Alive on TikTok—And These Latinas Just Turned It Into a Book
In a TikTok that smells like abuela’s kitchen and sounds like ancestral wisdom, creator Ann Murray Dunning breaks down how our great-grandmothers used to blend their own tecitos. These were not your average grocery store chamomile bags. They were personalized herbal blends, thoughtfully crafted with what they had in their gardens or tucked into decorative tins.
“You really need just three things to get started blending your own tecito,” Murray Dunning explains in the video. “Number one, you need herbs. Like, for example, rose petals or rosemary. Number two, dried fruit like dried orange or even manzana. Number three, plant parts, like chamomile or fennel.”
More than a DIY, the ritual is about intention. “How do I want this tecito to make me feel?” she asks. It’s a question our abuelas and bisabuelas likely asked themselves, too. Flavor, scent, even color mattered. This is the kind of ancestral sensory wisdom that can’t be bottled.
Blending Tecitos Is a Practice From the Original Señora Era
As Murray Dunning describes it, the women before us would experiment with herbs like spearmint, lemon balm, rose petals, and dandelion—whatever was in season or growing nearby. They were guided not by influencer trends but by intuition, passed-down knowledge, and the emotional care of their communities.
That’s the heart of what Murray Dunning and co-author Christina Kelmon are calling the “Señora Era”—the gentle return to practices that are slow, intuitive, and deeply connected to our cultural roots. In their upcoming book Radical Señora Era: Ancestral Latin American Secrets for a Happier, Healthier Life, they reclaim abuela wisdom as a form of resistance against hustle culture and hyper-productivity.
The Señora Era Isn’t a Trend—It’s a Reclamation
This movement isn’t just about herbs and tea—it’s about remembering what it means to care for ourselves in a way that is communal, ancestral, and anti-capitalist. “Think full speed ahead on your career and make good money,” the book blurb reads, “but reject hustle mania. Embrace relaxing, mindful tasks that have no monetary value whatsoever.”
The book encourages readers to never again feel guilty for cozy weekend afternoons filled with hobbies, slow walks, or gardening. It’s an invitation to remember how our bisabuelas lived to 100 by valuing joy, community, naps, and frijoles as much as discipline and work.
Ancestral Medicine Is Finally Getting Its Flowers
This rediscovery isn’t happening in isolation. Across Latin America, academic institutions are beginning to integrate ancestral health knowledge with modern medicine. Universities like UNR, UNJu, and UNT in Argentina have created intercultural programs where Indigenous elders and modern doctors share knowledge on health and healing.
Sara Domínguez, a nurse and traditional medicine educator, explained: “We, as native peoples, think about health from a different perspective. We consider what exists around us as part of a whole.”
From temazcales to teas, these practices understand health not as pathology but as balance. The World Health Organization has recognized the value of these systems since 1977, yet only recently have they started getting their due in the biomedical world.
The Señora Era Is Rooted in Decolonial Wellness
What TikTok creators like Dunning are doing is tapping back into these oral traditions, those passed-down remedies and home rituals that never needed a marketing campaign. The “Señora Era” is a vibe, sure. But it’s also a blueprint for decolonized living.
The joy of sipping your own handmade tecito isn’t just in the flavor. It’s in the power of remembering that you already have everything you need—or that your abuelas left behind the map to find it.
Radical Señora Era is available for preorder now.
